(W) Shirow Masamune, Junichi Fujisaku (A) Yuki Yoshimoto Hackers attempt to assassinate a politician during a speech preaching the advantages of cybernetic prosthetics. Fortunately, Togusa is there to whisk her to safety, and the investigation leads Batou to a suspicious factory in the artificial islands in southern Japan. Meanwhile, Chief Aramaki hears of a disturbing discovery at the other end of the country: dozens of artificial bodies, illegally dumped near a village where an anti-cyberization sect conducts their training and 'rites.' Among the empty shells is one formerly inhabited by the woman who embodied Section 9 until she left it behind and disappeared: Major Motoko Kusanagi.

(W) Shirow Masamune, Junichi Fujisaku (A) Yuki Yoshimoto Hackers attempt to assassinate a politician during a speech preaching the advantages of cybernetic prosthetics. Fortunately, Togusa is there to whisk her to safety, and the investigation leads Batou to a suspicious factory in the artificial islands in southern Japan. Meanwhile, Chief Aramaki hears of a disturbing discovery at the other end of the country: dozens of artificial bodies, illegally dumped near a village where an anti-cyberization sect conducts their training and 'rites.' Among the empty shells is one formerly inhabited by the woman who embodied Section 9 until she left it behind and disappeared: Major Motoko Kusanagi.

(W) Shirow Masamune, Junichi Fujisaku (A) Yuki Yoshimoto Togusa and Tsunagi are racing after a fleeing suspect when a van suddenly slams into the suspect's car, killing the van driver instantly. As Togusa hooks into the man's cyberbrain, he sees residual images of a group of children and a masked figure who says, 'I am a warrior.' Later, an autopsy yields a shocking revelation: the driver was killed not by the collision, but by a neurotoxin derived from the venom of the African black mamba. Section 9 needs answers, and Togusa and Tsunagi get sent off halfway across the world to the Sahel Special Economic Zone. What mysteries await them in the 'oasis of the Sahara?'

(W) Shirow Masamune, Junichi Fujisaku (A) Yuki Yoshimoto Togusa and Tsunagi set out for Africa to investigate a poisoning death at the Japanese consulate in the Sahel Special Economic Zone. Using their 'honeymoon' as a cover, the two trace the black mamba snake venom used in the assassination to an oasis outside the zone that's part of Gili tribal lands. While they're gone, a coup rocks the Madisi Republic that governs Sahel, and General Mosey seizes control, sparking conflict with the 'liberation forces' of the Gili. What does snake venom have to do with a civil war rising from the baked desert sands? That question is the key to Togusa breaking the case…