第14話

あらすじ

日本語の要約がないため、Englishで表示しています。

出典に基づく · バージョン: v1 · オリジナル

A wave of robberies targeting Astral Gate toll systems creates a large bounty for an unidentified mastermind. Spike, Jet, and Faye initially chase separate suspects, only to discover that each captured criminal received a chess piece containing a microchip. Ed uses the device to enter an online match against the person directing the scheme, the legendary programmer Chessmaster Hex. Jet's investigation reveals that Hex helped design the gate network decades earlier and warned his employer about a serious billing flaw. The company dismissed him and concealed the defect, so he programmed a long-delayed revenge operation to exploit it. The crew traces him to a community living among orbital debris, but another bounty hunter follows and nearly kills the old man. By the time they meet Hex, age has damaged his memory so badly that he no longer understands the crime unfolding in his name. The elaborate attack was set in motion fifty years earlier and continued automatically. Rather than turn a confused man over for punishment, the Bebop crew leaves him in peace. Ed remains connected long enough to finish their slow virtual chess game, valuing the unusual opponent more than the vanished reward.