C: Public Security Section 9, Once Again – STAND ALONE COMPLEX.The dismantling of Section 9, spun by the media as a JSDF preemptive strike against a radical security unit planning a coup, provides the Prime Minister with the public support his party needs to win the Lower House elections. Immediately after the election, in keeping with his promise, the Prime Minister discloses the information regarding The Laughing Man case, fingering Yakushima as the ringleader. Three months pass, during which Togusa tries to come to terms with all that has happened with Section 9. In his attempts to find information on the rest of the team, he learns that the Major was killed and the remaining members of Section 9 are serving time in a state prison for high treason. The news upsets Togusa, and he resolves to assassinate the man responsible for Section 9's dissolution. Togusa intends to catch Yakushima as he arrives at the ruling party’s headquarters, but before Togusa can follow through with his plan, he is stopped by Batou, who brings Togusa to Section 9’s temporary headquarters. Here, Togusa is informed that Kusanagi is alive and Section 9's disbandment and destruction was merely a ploy. Elsewhere, Kusanagi and Aramaki meet with Aoi, the young man Togusa encountered at the MHLW facility, who turns out to be the true identity of the Laughing Man. Aramaki offers Aoi a job at Section 9 for his outstanding hacking skills, but Aoi politely refuses, claiming he is not a team player and wishing to remain at his current job with the public library to sort through and read its collection of books. Public Security Section 9 once more becomes an active security unit of the Japanese government, and its members settle back into the routines they had at the beginning of the series.