For ten minutes my brother and I sat with our legs spread out with me leaning on his left shoulder for support while his arm went across my back and rubbed his hand against my arm. My sobs and wails of pain and anguish continued for another ten uninterrupted minutes while Thomas whispered in my ear,” It's gonna be okay, buddy.” With a soft voice.

Moans of sadness escaped my throat as tears coursed down my cheeks. It had made my voice croaky and breathless whenever I tried to speak. I am glad that Thomas was here with me as he tried to dissuade me from talking. Good, I was done talking, I was done walking, I was done fighting dragons and trying to save my country while I kept getting my head concussed.

If only this happened to someone who truly deserved it. Why me, what on Munhiero did I do to deserve this? Was it a thankless course of action that no one will acknowledge me for if I did succeed or will this be a fruitless endeavour?

On the bright side I suppose it was highly likely these creatures killed a few people I despise back home. At least outliving them will be a victory.

Thomas shifted his posture as he retracted his hand from my shoulder, exhaling deeply and then stood up.

“I’ll leave you alone for a bit.” That was all he said.

After that, I had lost all sense of time as I continued to weep and sniffle to myself while facing the canyon before us. The sky had darkened in the interim and the air grew colder. There was a stiff breeze that gently brushed my face as I looked up to see stars perking out more prominently than before and the three moons shone like street lights in the twilight sky.

Behind me I could hear a hushed argument going on between Thomas and Clarke, I couldn’t make out what they were saying as it seemed like they had deliberately moved further away and lowered their voice so as not to upset me any further. I did not enjoy feeling this way, I did not enjoy feeling sad or weak or helpless.

And just when I thought I had regained some sense of control over myself and brought myself back from my sadness I would devolve into a struggling mess with my breathing before my body convulsed with a hiccupping motion before slipping straight back into crying again. My body leaned to one side and I was back on the ground once again in a fetal position as saliva drooled from my mouth.

“Whyyyy… why, why, why, why?” My voice croaked as I pounded my fist with each word. My mouth was left wide open, only barely moving my lips to formulate the right sounds I wanted to produce. I didn’t care who was watching or who was listening as I began ranting to myself. “What did I do to deserve this… I just want to go back home. Go back to mum, my bed, my job. I just want to go back. Please, lords above I beg you, please tell me what am I doing, what is my purpose!?”

To anybody else, it would have sounded like I was mumbling incoherently with barely any muscle movements made to enunciate the words I had said. I sniffed, then spat out the mucous that got sucked back in and resumed my self-pitying.

A set of footsteps approached from behind. I hoped it was Thomas as I wanted to hug him for support but the sound of the gravel crunching underfoot was not as loud or as intense as it did when he walked. The footsteps stopped, and then a hand was placed on my shoulder as it convulsed with each sob. Their hand felt cold and small, I turned to look and saw Ghilya hunched over me with a sympathetic face.

I turned away and leaned further in to my right arm which supported my head off the ground. I didn’t want to see her. Hell, she was part of the problem. I still hadn’t forgotten that she held me at knifepoint!

If she was offended that I turned away from her then she didn’t show it. But instead, she leaned closer in and spoke with a soft, tender voice that came out almost motherly. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

“No.”

“Are you certain?”

“Yes, I am certain.”

There was a brief pause. She didn’t say or do anything for a moment then whispered in my ear once more. “You just had a near-death experience, Michael. There is no shame in admitting you are scared.”

There wasn’t anything in what she said or how she said it that set me off. If my emotional state was a flammable substance then it was as if someone had tossed a match into the pool of sadness that I was currently submerged in and caused it to spontaneously combust. The sudden rise of anger, stubbornness and pent-up frustration that rose up gave me enough strength to roll over to the other side and face her directly. Everything bubbling underneath the surface rose up violently to create an outburst I didn’t know I had within or how to control. My face scrunched up irritably as I became judgemental.

“Four!” I said louder than I had meant. “I have had one, two, three, four near-death experiences in the last two weeks!” I had my hand up and extended each finger as I counted to visibly show her just how many. Behind her, Clarke was crouched low as he inspected his bag and turned to look at me as soon as my voice grew louder. Thomas on the other hand was further away but even he glanced over his shoulder to see what was going on.

“Two of which nearly had me eaten by a dragon!” I continued. It had felt good in an odd sense as though the floodgates were truly open for the first time. Anger welled up behind my eyes causing them to get misty. “I’ve been held hostage with a knife to my throat twice, the last of which was done by you!”

Ghilya’s head jerked back slightly but not so obvious that it looked like I just insulted her. There was a slight tick in her facial muscles as though she was trying to suppress the urge for her eyes to widen and her brows to rise.

“But,“ I continued, this time my voice came out in a more reasonable tone. “I shouldn’t hold it against you, after all, you did save my life the last time I nearly got killed by a dragon. But that doesn’t make it any less terrifying having a sharp blade pressed against your neck!”

My body shook with an intensity I hadn’t experienced in a while. It felt like I was ready to just take off and run and keep on running until the sun rose once more.

“You might be enjoying your parkour and your fancy blades running and jumping from tree to tree but I can’t do any of that shit! I’m not physically fit, I am just some loser from Sanctuary Hills who was trying to make it day by day. I’m not some hero destined to bring greatness and peace and all that shit!”

I breathed in, my lungs unknowingly depleted of air as I ranted. Sadness returned to me once again and left me to choke on my words.

“I-I just… I’m just some guy who wanted to do the right thing because it seemed like nobody else had any better ideas. I… I don’t even know if this will work with the Dragon Lord, for all I know I’ll just make it worse.”

Tears resumed their flow from my eyes and down my cheeks again. I turned to face away from her. Gravel crunched behind me and I felt her hand on my back.

“In my village, we have this saying.” Ghilya began. “‘The black heart seeks glory, the white heart seeks integrity. No one is the hero until they do the right thing.’ Nobody is destined to be this prophesised hero from some ancient fable, Michael. In life, we are all given choices, free will and a sense of right and wrong and it is our chance to prove our lives mean something by making the right ones. You see yourself as a loser, a nobody, a vagabond. Destined to live your life devoid of purpose or meaning as you drift through life searching for that very reason you were born for.”

I craned my head toward her with a flat expression. “You’re not making me feel better.”

“But do you know what I see? I see someone who is worthy of my respect and my friendship. You alone decided to take matters into your own hands and save your people by going to the Dragon Lord. You didn’t care about the dangers or the risks involved, you didn’t do this for glory or fame or admiration. You did this because it was the right thing to do regardless of the cost to yourself. And that, Michael, is what makes you a hero.”

She patted me on the back twice, then stood up and walked away without saying another word, leaving me to think about what she said.

A few minutes went by and another set of footprints approached me from behind. I spun around to see Thomas coming toward me, he had a sympathetic look in his eye.

“You feeling better now?” He asked.

I nodded.

“Alright then, when you’re ready we’ll go.”

As he went to rejoin the others I took the time to clear my nose and spit out any excess phlegm built up within. Then, wiped my face and stood up off the ground, dusted my pants, and went back to collect my stuff.

Everyone looked at me with a gentle, understanding smile as I approached them but said nothing. Which I was grateful for. The last thing I needed right now was the usual bouquet of shallow statements and offerings of support like ‘I’m there if you need me.’ or ‘If you want somebody to talk to…’. It wasn’t that I doubted their intentions were insincere but such platitudes were not what I need right now. All I want is silence.

Thomas looked down at his submachine gun, pulled the magazine out and inspected it before slotting it back in. “Are you all good to resume hiking?” He said without taking his eye off the magazine.

“Yeah,” I nodded, my throat made my voice sound gravelly. “I’m good.”

Then without another word exchanged all four of us resumed our journey along the mountainous pass. Ghilya led us while I stayed behind and watched the rear. I needed the silence; I needed the distance and alone time. Had we been back at home I would have stayed in my room and only come out for the necessities or to use the bathroom. But now here we are hiking along the flattened top of a mountain wedge that leads to the next biggest mountain around here.

Seeing the mountain up close somehow made it seem less impressive yet capable of retaining its natural majesty. Its broad, wide base rose up very steeply until it was almost vertical. At around its middle, it then split itself into two separate peaks with a widening wedge between them with the peak we were walking towards being broader and flatter than its perkier counterpart.

Ghilya assured us that there was nothing else out here, no other thing lived upon these craggy peaks aside from the Nuckelavee which we had dispatched. But I still felt the need to check our rear now and then for good measure and peace of mind. And every time I looked back and saw the vacant trail and heard nothing but the howling, biting wind it had brought me a sense of comfort knowing we were all alone up here.

For most of the journey up, my gaze had been focused downward, mostly scanning the floor for any trip hazards to signs that there was something else out here, not that I found any, but it didn’t mean my field of view was not keeping a partial eye on what was ahead of me such as when a pair of feet slowed their pace and entered my field of vision and kept on slowing down until they were next to me. It was Clarke this time.

Oh great. My eyes rolled.

He looked over toward me as I kept my face as uninterested as possible and kept my gaze dead center. Refuting all attempts to turn my head and face him.

I am sure Clarke has good intentions, in fact, I am even more certain he has political motivations and is using this to encourage me to vote for him, but all I wanted was some time to think to myself uninterrupted.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

He asked me if I was all right as I had expected him to, and I responded with the affirmation that I was.

Clarke snorted to clear a blockage in his sinus’. “I know we have only known each other a little over a week but as someone who understands what you are going through you can always come to me for advice or a shoulder to cry on.”

There was a pregnant pause as he waited for my response to which I had nothing to say. He cleared his throat and resumed.

“Your brother, tells me the two of you never really got to know your dad before he… uh,”

“Died?” I interjected.

“Yeah…” He sounded so uncertain as if it were up to interpretation. “Look, as a father myself I know a thing or two. And it is impressive just how far the two of you have come without a proper male role model in your lives. Somebody you can look up to and give proper fatherly advice, what it means to be a man. That sort of thing.”

Without facing him I could not suppress the urge to raise an eyebrow in confusion. I had no way of knowing where Clarke was going with this and I was cautious to even engage with him in case it was something I didn’t like.

There were many ways I could respond to this; I could ask where he was going with this, I could ask why he sounded like he was proposing to fill in the role of my father, or perhaps I could say thank you and let him know if I want to take up his offer without actually meaning it. Or more likely forgetting it.

In the end I chose to not say anything and Clarke took that as an invitation to continue speaking.

“I can’t pretend I know what its like growing up without your father and I know I can’t replace him but if there’s anything you want to ask me or talk with another man about things I can be there for you.”

Even with my gaze angled down I still felt the need to face away from Clarke. There was something about what he said that triggered a sadness within me, one that I didn’t want to deal with right now. Clarke took my gesture as a sign, I jumped in place when he placed a firm hand on my shoulder for comfort then let it slide off as he picked up the pace and left me be.

The peak came closer to us than before, the view from where we were seemed quite beautiful, expansive even but I needed to focus on the task at hand and not worry about sight-seeing.

“We’re almost there!” Ghilya shouted back at us.

Her voice echoed and could be heard bouncing from sources that seemed to come from nowhere. The incline started to flatten out once more, I could see the tip from where I stood. All of us panting, breathing hot and heavy as our lungs ached yet with the goal in sight it pushed us further past our limits than any of us humans thought we could.

Finally, it flattened out. The surface was not craggy or snow-capped like the rest but it was noticeably chillier up here than it was before. Night time had settled, had it not been for the light of two full moons and one crescent moon this wonderful evening we would have been left totally in the dark and we would have had to set up camp to avoid any hazards.

But since it was just bright enough for us to see and with our goal so close we had to push further and run the risk of running into hazards. We couldn’t let this stop us, not now.

Ghilya broke into a sprint and jumped on top of a large rock next to an upright pillar sticking out of the ground. She threw her hands up as though this was an achievement for herself and put on a wide grin as if to say “we finally made it!”

The three of us hunched forward to catch our breath. I looked up to see Ghilya still standing on that rock glaring down at us with a satisfied grin. She had her hands placed firmly on her hips like a drill instructor watching her recruits struggling under the intense physical training regime and deriving pleasure from the resultant suffering.

“What a magnificent sight!” She exclaimed so freely.

Her voice carried loudly on the brisk wind as though she was conveying a message via the wind carrying her verbal proclamation to some far away receiver down in the forest below. Her eyes scanned the vista as though she was keeping an eye out for any threats to her or to us, I turned around to see this view she mentioned.

I had to admit that the sight of the forest sprawled out as far as the eye could see was a wonderful sight. Perhaps it would be a more magnificent sight were it not for that I could only see the river clearly reflecting the moons light. The pale silver glow gave the barest of illumination to the forest. If I zoomed in at the maximum distance of my optical lens’ I could make out a faint orange glow just over the horizon, which had to have been the main city back home.

Whether it was a remnant of an out-of-control fire or a new one that had devastated entire city blocks was all speculation at this point. I frowned as that had triggered a new line of thought that suggested that if it were a new devastating fire then it was perhaps mine and Thomas’s fault for what we did to Xareith and that this was his reprisal against my innocent countrymen for burning off half his face.

I guess now he has a temper to match his half-burned face, or full-burned face. I never did get a good look at how much damage we did to him. Hopefully, it damaged his intellectual capacity in some form.

The stars flickered as their ancient light fluctuated in the sky. One particularly bright one pulsed with a strange glow.

Thomas sat down on the rock next to Ghilya and he let out a short chuckle of bewilderment. “I gotta admit, the view is not half bad for an evening stroll.”

“It kinda makes you wonder if we’re being too reckless with this world we live in,” Clarke injected thoughtfully.

As much as I wanted to admire the view, I was equally interested in seeing what the path ahead of us was like. To my satisfaction, I was impressed with the wide-open expanse before us. The light reflected off the vast sands of the Soulfire desert almost to the horizon and was as wide as the Great Mountain Range was. It almost seemed like an ecological dichotomy between the lush and lively rainforest to the dry, barren desert. Smaller mountains pockmarked the area but what truly caught my eye and stood out on its own even in the cover of night was the turbulent and active volcano on the horizon.

Even in the dark I could make out its foul and noxious cloud of heated gasses spewing and raining down on the lands below. The home of the legendary Dragon Lord stood like a tower forged by nature’s most destructive tools and glowed orange so all would know at all times of the day the vengeful wrath of nature itself and the being inhabiting it.

It made one feel a sense of majesty and impunity standing before it. The orange glow of the lava reflected off its own cloud granting it a hellish appearance as though it was plucked straight from the fieriest pits of Hell itself.

“Would you look at all those stars, I’ve forgotten what some of the constellations were called.” Clarke said.

Ghilya jumped off her rock, the gravel crunched and she spoke. “Well that one over there we call the ‘Archer’s Bow’, see how those stars there are curved? That one over there we call it ‘The Hand’ because those bright ones there are the fingertips. But my favourite one is ‘Maccabeus The Merchant’ because those over there look like a wagon full of produce and stuff.”

I made my way over to the stone pillar next to Ghilya and noticed its sharp corners and realised this pillar was carved here. Words that I did not recognize were carved into the flat surfaces of the obelisk. This was probably some kind of marker or something.

On a good day, the smog clouds that permeated our cities would part just enough to allow us to partially see the night sky but not all of it. In most instances, the only thing we could see with clarity were the three moons; Lua, Charybdis, and Qamar glowing through the cloud layer. So for me, seeing the stars on the other side of the mountains was a strangely fascinating sight, seeing all these new lights in an entirely foreign configuration made it seem like I was checking out the night sky of an alien planet.

Celestial bodies both familiar and foreign presented in a whole new way to create a brand-new night sky that made the land feel all that more stranger.

“What about that one there, what do you call that?” Thomas asked.

Ghilya made a humming noise as though she had to think on that. Then a second later she replied. “If you turn your head to the side you can just make out the ‘Two Lovers’…”

After angling my head upwards towards the moons, I took a moment to let myself bathe in their gentle light. Charybdis had a gentle lavender and light grey-brown surface colour while Qamar's surface was a stained yellow. Yet despite the colours these two still glowed a bright silver on the ground.

Thomas shuffled in his place, the gravel slowly grinding under his feet into fine dust was evidence of this. “That star there… what is that one called? I don’t think I’ve seen it before.”

There was another brief pause. “I… I don’t know. I have never seen that one before. What is that?” She stammered.

“Its pretty bright, “Clarke added. “Is it moving?”

That statement got my attention.

Confusion and curiosity compelled me to look at what they were referring to. Nothing obvious stood out to me as I traced the direction of everyone’s glances to where in the sky they were referring to. Stars twinkled and glittered like the rest of the sky, the soft orange glow remained, but when I focused on the stars along the horizon it was then that I could see what they were referring to.

It moved upward on a steep angle toward the sky. Slowly at first but its velocity picked up as it raised its altitude.

Thomas stroked his chin curiously. Head cocked at an angle as though it would help give him some new insight to what it was. “Is that a shooting star?”

“No,” I replied. “That’s moving way too slow for a shooting star.”

“Shuttle launch then?”

Clarke shook his head. “No way, we don’t have any launch pads anywhere near the Barrier, nearest one is in Holleston, Ganis.”

“Then… if its not a shuttle and its not a shooting star, then what is it?” I asked.

The light in the sky kept rising in altitude, it wasn’t until it was seemingly inches above the horizon that I noticed it was glowing brighter, its light flickering wildly. My implants zoomed in to their maximum magnification, trying to get a glimpse of whatever the strange light was but it was still too far away to make out.

“Could it be space debris falling out of orbit?” I asked Clarke.

He shrugged. “Maybe?” He didn’t sound certain. Then again how could he be? None of us worked in the orbital monitoring stations. For all we knew this stuff was happening all the time.

But there was something about it that didn’t sit right with me. Even as a guess it didn’t seem right to suspect it.

The light streaked across the sky, its pace continued to accelerate, then its altitude began to descend.

“What is that?” Ghilya sounded entranced.

The light drew close to a cloud, the orange light reflected brightly off its vapour creating a bright orange blur in the sky. The light went from a bright ball to a cone-shaped plume of fire, after it had passed through it, I could see the darkened streak of smoke that it left trailing behind it.

It picked up the pace, almost going at the pace of a shooting star. The rainforest below slowly glowed under the fiery orange light as it drew closer to the ground.

A sharp gasp escaped Clarke’s mouth, his whole body tensed and he took a step back as though he was going to run straight toward the Soulfire desert.

“OH SHIT!” He exclaimed.

We looked to him to see the senior senator run down the trail towards the other side of the mountain. Then back at the light, then back to Clarke as we tried to figure out what the politician had just learned that we hadn’t. We didn’t wait long to learn what that is as he broke into a sprint and shouted back at us.

“GET TO COVER! NOW!”

My nerves acted up as I had no idea what was going on. I took one last look at the light as I saw its drawn-out flame screaming towards the ground. A second later, all three of us ran after Clarke. A faint growling sound broke through the otherwise silent atmosphere. The light, whatever it was, started casting its light on the mountain top, making it more visible than it had been under the light of the moons. The surface started going down and I could see Clarke was not running at his full pace as he was carefully watching where he stood while moving as fast as he could. The trail took a sharp left turn down a path that looked as though it went straight through the rock which provided cover behind a flat wall where Clarke had his back firmly pressed against it on the far end.

“HURRY!” He shouted as he waved us over.

The look on his face was that of pure abject horror as even in the low light conditions it could easily be seen the lack of colour in his face. Ghilya and Thomas were ahead of me and behind cover of the cliff face.

Suddenly my eyes ached as a flash of light illuminated the whole of the mountain and even the foot of the desert below with the intensity matched only by the sun itself, even my shadow was non-existent as I ran from the source. I dared to turn and face what just happened and I was almost left paralysed in shock at what I saw. It was as though I was staring directly at the fiery, violent surface of the sun itself; a ball made entirely of flame and fury had swollen to gigantic proportions, swallowing up everything in its path. Clouds were blown apart like they were trying desperately to get away from the explosion themselves. The rainforest shimmered in a way that caught my eye, I looked down to see some invisible force disturbing the treeline and rapidly expanding outward.

“MICHAEL, GET TO COVER!” Everyone shouted.

My skin felt like it was bitten into by a thousand insects, the radiant heat sizzling everything around me, the ground rumbled angrily as though it was furious about something. A brief microsecond thought made me think it was going to open up and swallow me whole as I ran to cover.

I ran with all my might and nearly crashed into Ghilya who braced herself. I was on the verge of apologising to her when the air around us suddenly erupted into a roar bellowing from the most furious thing on the planet, its anger beating us down into submission by its will. The sound and change in air pressure made my ears ring, I could feel something trickle down my neck providing a negligible amount of relief as it absorbed the heat from my burning skin. Wind gusts that were difficult to even guess their speeds rushed past our hidden cove, roaring with that lingering fury, the superheated air around us, not even giving us the reprieve to sweat.

Almost as quickly as it started the shockwave had passed over us. My ears continued to ring and throb and pulse with each elevated pulse of my heart while my knees wobbled fearfully. Was it over? Are we dead? What was that?

Eventually I was able to open my eyes and look around. The Soulfire desert was viewable from where we were and I could see most of it under the vengeful orange light, the shadow of the mountain was cast down onto the sands of the desert like the only shelter from the burning light.

Everyone else had crouched down whilst covering their ears, dried rivulets of blood stained the side of their necks. All that could be heard behind the mountain was a gentle rumbling like thunder from an oncoming storm rolling toward us. The edge of our cover and many of the rocks found freely on the mountainside glowed a warm red that faded into black, heat waves wafted over the sides creating a rippling image of the damage done.

Ghilya had kept her hands over her pointed ears, her face was clenched and her teeth was grinding down on itself. Clarke and Thomas rose to full heights, my brother looked worried and concerned. Understandable given what just happened. He looked past me to see the heated rocks slowly cooling off and was about to say something before catching himself as he struggled to even find the words to utter.

Clarke looked worried as well but it was clear to deduce that he was worried for an entirely different reason. His lip quivered as he stood there breathless.

“I duh… I don’t believe it.” Clarke uttered breathlessly.

He continued to repeat that sentence a few more times, he stared in my general direction but not focusing on anything. There was a particular look in his eyes that seemed to suggest he was shocked beyond any hope of recovery.

Ghilya finally got up from her ball, looked behind me to see the trail, and started to walk toward it. I attempted to stop her from going further but she mindlessly pushed me aside to continue hobbling out of cover. She seemed to snap back to reality when her hand pressed against the rock wall for support and immediately pulled it back letting out a pained yelp.

I took her hand instinctively, inspecting it for any damage. Thankfully there was nothing beyond some reddening of the skin. She pulled her hand back from me as she tried to look out from the cover to get a glimpse of the forest.

While we waited for it to cool down enough, thinking it would be hot enough to be felt through the ground. Clarke continued his stunned rambling as Thomas tried to shake him out of it, then slapped him for it, then let the man by himself before joining Ghilya and myself. He set one foot outside the cover and onto the blackened gravel and let his foot remain there.

“It’s warm but it should be good.” He stated after a minute.

We followed him back to the peak of the mountain, all the rocks shifted from their original position and were stained black making them all look like lumps of coal. We stopped at the top and what we saw was beyond belief, the destruction was absolute and the shock was immense.

Where there had once been a wonderful and lush biome of rainforest in the calm of night now was the smouldering cinders of what had once been trees. Were it not for the vengeful hellfire that lit the sky I would not have been able to see the remnants of the river we followed evaporating and boiling. The epicentre was obscured by a thick trunk of smoke billowing up into the sky, red bolts of lightning thundered across the cloud and upward into the sky as though it were charging up to something.

Ghilya fell to her knees, her hands flew to her mouth as tears streamed down her face.

“Oh gods no…” her voice wavered.

Her mouth agape, her hands clutched her chest as her form listed to the side and fell to the ground.

“Plehehease, noooo!” She cried out.

The rainforest… her home… her country was just wiped off the face of the planet in one fell swoop. I looked in every direction for any sign that the rainforest survived and was horrified to see nothing as far as the eye could see. The fiery shockwave obliterated everything organic in its path and left nothing but scorched earth in its stead.

Our elven guide wailed her sorrow at the destruction sowed by our kind.

“Was that a nuke!?” Thomas asked.

I pulled up all the features and monitors on my cybergear for a dosimeter feature. Thank gods there was one, I selected it and was relieved that there was nothing setting off the internal sensors that could be detected.

“I’m not picking up anything on the dosimeter, “ I reported. “If that is a nuke then it doesn’t have a lot of radiation.”

“It’s not a nuke.” A voice from behind called out.

Thomas and I looked to see Clarke finally with his sense as he strolled up to the peak and looked over the vast fiery inferno before us.

“It’s a Pyrosonic bomb. A highly pressurised thermobaric device capable of destruction without the nasty fallout.” Clarke explained.

We stood there in shock. Looking at Clarke, then at the cloud of flame. Ghilya’s grief howling damnation at the loss of her home.

“B-but, the Security Council, the Amerians would never launch one without their approval, they can’t!”

“What does that mean, Clarke?”

“It means that the rest of the world knows what happened back home… and if the Amerians launched one, then they were given the clearance to do so. They are gonna fight back. And we are running out of time.”