The front cabin of the Raptor was quiet, lit only by a scant few rays from the morning sun. Arte and Angel were sleeping quietly in the comfortable seats, leaned halfway back. The door to the rear slid open with a gentle hiss, which was enough to stir Arte from his slumber. He looked around, then slowly hoisted himself up and stretched.
After shaking some life into his body, he peered into the rear compartment, a glint of concern in his eyes. “Mae?” he said. After a few seconds with no response, he tapped Angel on the arm. She woke quickly and stood behind him. He motioned for her to follow, then walked into the other room.
They were greeted by a floating drone, which approached Arte and dropped something into his hand before zipping out the side door. Arte looked at the object.
“My phone?” he said. He studied it a few seconds, seeing it was indeed his old phone. It was slightly more chipped and scuffed than a few weeks ago, but otherwise intact. There was an extra cable plugged into a port on the bottom.
“What’s going on?” Angel said. “Where’s Mae?”
A message flashed on Arte’s phone. “Need Favor. Land. Follow.”
“Cybel?” Arte said. “What’s happening?” Angel watched over his shoulder. After a few seconds with no reply, Arte continued, “It’s rude to boss people around, you know. We deserve some kind of explanation. Where did Mae go?”
The screen changed to a video feed, a wide angle view of Mae from above. The Solver was wearing power armor, fighting a swarm of drones. She made quick work of the eight legged walkers, but a seemingly endless number of them poured in from every angle, showering her with a continuous stream of bullets. The attacks glanced off her with little effect, but she was already reduced to crushing the machines beneath her feet to save ammo.
“Is she all alone?” Angel said. “What is she doing?”
“Helping.”
“Who? You?”
“Correct.”
“What are you trying to accomplish?” Arte asked.
“Explanation Long. Time Short. Trust. Yes?”
“Fine, but you better explain everything when this is done.”
“Will Understand.”
“Alright,” Arte said. “Lead the way, I guess.”
The rear mounted seats dropped, which the pair took as an invitation to sit down and strap in. The moment they did, the Raptor plummeted, pressing them into the wall with tremendous force. They had a split second of weightlessness, before being slammed with another wave of acceleration. Then, suddenly as it started, it stopped.
Before they could so much as breath, the door slid open, and every terminal and screen in the cabin flashed, “Dismount.” Arte and Angel scrambled out of their harnesses, then onto the ground outside. The Raptor peeled away and shot into the sky. A sharp cracked echoed down a few seconds later.
The pair were deposited onto a vacant lot, situated in front of an imposing looking concrete building. Arte pulled out his phone and looked at the screen. “Now what?”
It flashed, “Wait.”
“Wait for—“
A drone swooped into view in front of him. It was roughly the size of a large dog, held aloft by four turbines at the end of each of its stubby legs. There was a small package clamped to its underbelly, which it deposited at his feet before floating off a short distance. Arte opened the box and found a pair of tiny earpieces. He handed one to Angel and equipped his own.
“Good.” Cybel’s voice was as curt and oddly demure as ever. “Follow.” The drone hovered away, leading them towards the nearby structure. When they reach the front door, it poked a spindly arm into an adjacent pad, triggering a mechanical click a second later. “Open.”
Arte pushed through, holding the door for Angel and the drone before following after. It guided them along, passing through a few doors with Arte’s assistance until they reached a stairwell adjacent to a staff room.
The drone motioned to the room. “Angel. Unneeded. Wait. Safe.”
“What!” Angel said. “No! I’m coming with.”
“Accepted. Find Use. Dangerous.”
“I don’t care. I’m going to do my part, no mater what.”
The drone tapped the panel by the stairwell door, unlocking it. Arte pulled it open without being asked, and joined them inside moments later. Cybel led them to the lowest floor and into a cavernous basement loaded with an endless array of dusty shelves overflowing with ancient paper.
“Are we looking for a document?” Angel said.
“Secret Path.”
“Wow, really?”
The drone continued, navigating between the rows and aisles until reaching a nondescript section of open wall on the far side of the storeroom.
“Uh, Cybel,” Angel said. “This… seems to be a dead end.”
“Cover.” The drone pointed its nose at a line of filing cabinets a few feet away.
“I think she wants us to wait behind those cabinets,” Arte said. He led Angel to a nook behind the metal furniture. The moment they were tucked safely behind them, the drone mounted vertically against the wall, then exploded. The dust settled to reveal a narrow passage, wholly bereft of light save a faint glimmer in the distance.
The pair approached cautiously, peering skeptically into its depths.
“Hurry.”
“Right, right,” Angel said. “Let’s run into the spooky tunnel you just exploded out of a wall.”
Arte laughed, then motioned for her to follow as he trotted into the darkness. It didn’t take long until the light behind them faded to a paltry flicker no brighter than the glow ahead. They continued through the lightless hallway for a half hour, eventually coming upon a wide tunnel illuminated by a string of dim yellow bulbs hanging on the wall. Their own passage joined two others in forming this larger corridor.
“Finally!” Angel said. “I almost tripped three times back there.”
“Silence Preferable.”
“Ah, sorry,” she whispered.
“Do we follow the lights?” Arte said.
“Correct.”
The pair crept forward, moving at a more cautious pace in spite of the better lighting. After fifteen minutes they arrived at another intersection. Cybel directed them along the left path, which eventually deposited them in a cavernous hall. Two massive tunnels stood in line along one wall, an old subway track long abandoned.
Arte poked his head out and looked around, before ushering Angel to join him in the open. “Alright, where do we go next?” Arte said.
“An excellent question,” said a voice to their right. “Might I suggest back into the hole you crawled out of?”
Arte and Angel turned to discover Seig glaring at them, a handgun waving perilously between the two. He had been waiting in an adjacent room—an old office—and emerged when the pair entered the chamber.
“Problem. Hold. Incoming.”
Arte looked from Seig to the gun, then back to Seig and frowned. “What are you doing here?”
“My job, obviously,” Seig answered.
“So you kept working for Martel after you let me pass at the resort?”
Seig scowled. “That… was a mistake. And not one you should hope I’ll make again.”
“Perhaps.” Arte shrugged. “Was Gale mistaken when he helped rescue Mae?”
“Simons,” Seig seethed, “is an idealistic fool. His notion of honor is as outdated as it is irrelevant.”
“And I suppose your notion of unity and security are much more up to date? How is ‘standing strong against the Chinese’ working out now that you’ve joined them?”
“Don’t think you can talk your way out of this!”
“I don’t, just trying to understand why you’d shoot me.”
Seig scoffed, “Like you don’t care if you die.”
“I didn’t say that, but all the concern in the world won’t deflect a single bullet. If you’re going to kill me, I’d at least like to understand the reason.”
Seig glowered at him. The gun no longer waved between the pair, and instead remained fixed on Arte.
After a few seconds of silence, Arte said, “Well, are you going to stand there glaring at me, or are you going to answer? Is this how you hoped things would go?”
“The Chinese role in the new order,” Seig said, “is still… being negotiated.”
“Is that why they’re a founding member?” Arte said.
“Martel has them where he needs them.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet,” Arte said. “Right by his side. You really think he cares about anything more than power? What way of life are you even defending standing with him? This?” Arte motioned to their surroundings. “Frankly, the rate thing are going, it won’t be long until he doesn’t just have you living like machines, but will replace you with them entirely.”
“You don’t know that,” Seig said.
“Neither do you. The question is, are you so sure you’re on the right path you’d kill an innocent man to stay on it?”
“Don’t try to walk away.” Seig held out his gun, moving a finger to the trigger.
“I didn’t intend to,” Arte said. “But I also happen to know something you don’t.”
“What’s that?” Seig glanced warily to each side.
“This conversation has a time limit.”
Seig snarled and dived to the side, rolling into a crouch facing away, pistol at the ready to confront… nothing. He hissed and turned back to Arte to stop him from… standing perfectly still.
“That would have been excellent timing,” Arte said. “Don’t you think?”
“Is this a joke to you?”
Arte canted his head. “No?”
“Why Alert?” Cybel said in his ear.
“I just don’t want you to die pointlessly, is all.”
Seig stared at the Class B, unsure how to respond. Strength slowly drained from his arm, gradually lowering the tip of his weapon to the floor.
Arte hummed. “Were you friends with Gale?” he said. Seig shifted away, looking at the floor. “Well, if so, I think you owe him an apology, wherever he ended up.” He started to walk away, motioning for Angel to follow.
“He’s… being held below the Senator’s estate,” Seig muttered.
“Then you have something more important to do right now.” Arte continued around Seig, giving him a wide berth as he headed to a set of stairs on the other side. A drone emerged from one of the subway tunnels and whisked across the room to a position above Arte’s shoulder.
“Too Nice.”
“Maybe,” Arte said. “What do we do next?”
“Follow.” Cybel led them out of the station, through another storeroom packed with dusty shelves, and along to a spacious foyer. A glass wall on one side showed a large white building tucked behind a small forest.
“Is that the White House?” Angel said.
“Correct. Wait.”
“Wow….” She shook her head. “I can’t believe there’s a secret path leading up to it.”
“Angel. Door.”
“Wait? Me?” she said in alarm.
“Yes. Found Use.”
“O-okay.” Angel crept to the door, doing her best to remain hidden behind a stone column. When she arrived, she said, “Open it?”
“Correct.”
She crouched, then leaned over, grabbing the handle with an outstretched arm and pulling it towards her. She winced at a distant popping sound, but held strong right up to the point something swooped through the opening and landed skidding across the floor. She yelped and tumbled onto her back.
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After rolling to her butt, she was confronted by a strange drone clamped to a metal box about the size of a carryon luggage. The drone detached itself with a click, then slid off the case, leaving a trail of smoke from its thrusters as it fell to the floor. It broke apart, and several components melted into slag.
Meanwhile, the crate unfolded into a vaguely humanoid shape, standing with its front half popped open. A matching helmet sat by its toes.
The drone from the tunnel motioned to the suit. “Angel. Pilot.”
“Y-you want… me to do it?” Angel said.
“Cover Arte.”
“Is that… really alright?”
“Help. Yes?”
“Right, okay.” Angel clambered to her feet and approached the power armor. She studied it a few seconds, then looked at Arte. She blushed, and said, “T-turn around!”
“Ah, o-okay,” Arte said, doing as requested.
She threw off her shirt, shoes, and pants, before taking a deep breath and backing into the suit. It snapped shut around her, then sealed tight with a cascade of clicks and hisses. She plucked the helmet off the ground, then tucked her hair in and slid it over her face. It wiggled into position and locked onto the suit.
“Y-you can look,” Angel said. Arte faced her again, still blushing.
“Open Door. Wait.”
Angel let the drone outside, then motioned for Arte join her beside the entrance while Cybel went ahead. A few minutes later the display in her suit guided her forward. She set out with Arte in tow, rushing down the stairs and across a grassy field to a large tree which they huddled behind.
That process repeated a couple times, moving them from cover to cover as they approached the open field on the opposite side of the small park. They arrived at shallow recess behind a stump, a few feet from the wide clearing around the White House.
Angel grabbed a large handgun from a clasp on her hip, then turned to Arte and said, “Alright. I… I’ll go out there and shoot a few sentries, then draw them to the other side. It won’t make much of an opening, so when Cybel says go, you’ll need to run with all your might.”
Arte looked at her and grit his teeth. “Okay,” he said with a nod. “And good luck.”
“Thanks, you too.” Angel made like she was about to jump out, but stopped and suddenly pulled Arte in by the shoulder. She tapped the brow of her helmet on his forehead, then said, “Just in case, I’m glad I met you.”
Arte stuttered a few words, but she leapt away and into the field before he could manage a coherent sentence. A split second later she was battered with a hail of bullets, though the suit functioned as intended and deflected every shot. She responded with her own fire, blowing apart machine after machine.
Arte listened to the action, his eyes growing more alarmed by the second. “Should I have gotten one of those fancy suits?”
“Only Two. Mae One. Angel Other.”
“Ah, I guess you only have so much stuff.”
“Not Purpose.”
Arte hummed, then waited in silence. After about a minute of Angel’s battle, which diminished in volume over time, Cybel signaled for him to go. He sprinted from cover into the open, aiming towards the nearest point on the approaching structure. In between breaths he yelled, “Where am I going?”
“Drone.”
Arte looked up in time to see a machine swoop from above and into the wall a dozen feet in front of him. It exploded, knocking a hole clean through and pelting him with a hail of earth and stone. He ran through the dust and dived through the breach onto the carpeted floor inside, then rolled to his feet.
Cybel urged him on, guiding him down the wide corridors until he arrived at a solid metal door neighbored by a glowing screen. It dutifully informed him that the White House was under lockdown, and that he should obey the orders of security personnel.
“Connect Terminal.” When Arte looked about dumbfounded, Cybel added, “With Phone.”
“Ah, right!” He pulled the cellphone from his pocket, complete with the mysterious cable Cybel delivered with it. After poking around a few seconds, he found a socket on the pad’s bottom edge and plugged into it.
The screen flickered, then went dark. A moment later it returned, apparently unconcerned with the chaos outside. It reminded him to have a safe day as the metal doors slid open, revealing an elevator cab.
“Take Phone. Enter.”
Arte disconnected his phone from the terminal and pocketed it, then stepped into the lift. The doors slid shut, and the car began a downward journey at a rapid clip. It stopped without warning and the lights went dark.
“Exit. Ceiling Panel.”
Arte looked up, eyes drawn to a faint outline of a square in the corner. He climbed onto the handrail, steadying himself by grabbing the edge of the protruding wall panels, then pushed on the metal sheet. It wobbled, but a locked clasp prevented it from going up. He studied it a moment, hummed, then shrugged and climbed further until he was dangling upside down from his arms. He kicked the door open, then clambered into the shaft.
“Close Hatch. Ladder.”
A string of metal rungs was tucked into an indented channel wedged behind the elevator. Arte climbed on, and a moment later the car whirred to life and continued down. It traveled a few dozen feet before stopping again, where it was promptly shot to pieces and exploded.
“Descend. Quickly.”
Arte gave the ravaged cab a wide eyed stare, but nevertheless complied, climbing down the ladder several rungs at a time. As he approached harsh clangs rang out, like someone was stomping around the elevator with iron boots.
“Underneath. Quiet.”
Without hesitating, Arte squeezed between the car and the ladder, wiggling into the narrow space. The unknown entity inside continued banging around, and shortly after Arte got himself fully concealed behind the cab it clawed through the ceiling into the shaft. Arte slipped into a narrow crawlspace beneath the elevator moments later. There was barely enough room to maneuver between a set of springs fixed to the floor.
“Right Corner. Vent.”
Arte followed Cybel’s direction, finding a metal grate over a small duct. It clicked when he approached, and popped free with little effort. Arte squished himself inside, awkwardly pulling the cover back into place with the help of his left foot. He crawled forward, inching along until coming to a four way junction, where he was sent to the right.
He continued his slow journey, making a few more turns, until finally arriving at an upward bend. There was almost enough room to stand, leaving him hunched over behind another grate. This one separated him from a sparse room, which was furnished in such a way to suggest an office, or perhaps a bedroom in a pinch.
“Wait.”
Arte frowned, but complied, moving only to find a more comfortable position. He remained there several minutes, until the chamber door slid open. He ducked as best he could, although the tight space only allowed him to wedge uncomfortably into the bend on such short notice.
Something entered the room, carried forward by a multitude of spindly clicks. It tapped around the scattered furniture until it landed in front of the vent. It wasn’t visible from where Arte was, but it could be heard latching onto the grate with metal claws. It pulled with an electric hum that wound up then stopped abruptly. The cover remained firmly locked in place.
A few seconds later, after a few whirrs and ticks, it began to cut through the metal slats with a small electric saw. Arte watched in horror as it cleared line after line, detaching one side of each horizontal strip a few seconds at a time. It finished clearing the right side, then started immediately on the left.
A claw gripped the bottom slat as it was sawed free, then pulled it away and casually dumped it out of the way. The pincer moved up one level, and the saw began its work. Before it could finish a terrible crash rumbled through the complex, shaking the floor even at such a great distance.
The noise was followed by several cracks, then a cacophony of explosive noise. The machine by the vent ceased its work and scurried out of the room towards the chaos. Arte released a ragged breath, sagging into the walls of the duct.
“Leave.”
Arte huffed and glared briefly towards his earpiece, but nonetheless shook out his limbs and wiggled into a standing position. He pushed on the cover, which clicked and popped open with little effort, then dragged himself onto the floor. After a few seconds to steady his breath, he hoisted himself to his feet.
He crept through the room, exiting by a sliding door on the opposite side. Outside he found himself at the end of a long hallway, lined on either side by regularly spaced doors. The lights flickered with every bang and clash in the distance, sending shimmering ripples though the fine dust in the air.
“Forward.”
Arte nodded, then moved along the passage towards the sound of battle. He arrived at a T-intersection, where Cybel directed him to the left, then later followed a right angle turn into a short hallway, which led to a large open chamber. Shards of metal were scattered along the floor, and the righthand wall had several gashes torn into it. A pile of rubble spilled into the corridor from the great hall.
“Cover. Rocks. Stay Right.”
Arte pressed into the side wall and crawled forward on his elbows until he reached the stone mound. He rolled into a low crouch and canted his head to listen. The battle had died down, for the most part, and was replaced with two people yelling back and forth. Arte risked enough of a peek to see the pair were both wearing power armor, each hunkered behind a titanic slab of concrete.
“You don’t have to do this Martel!” Angel yelled, her voice amplified and distorted by the suit, but recognizable.
“Someone does!” Martel replied. “Humanity is nothing more than a simpering mass of panicked apes! They need a wise hand to shield them from ruin!” He leaned around his barrier and unleashed a barrage towards Angel. Each shot bit away huge chunks from her cover.
Angel didn’t answer for a couple seconds, and when she did it was only to fire a wild salvo across the room, ripping fresh holes in the ceiling and sending crumbling blocks of stone crashing to the floor.
“Look at you!” Martel said. “A few minutes of pressure and you’re already falling apart.”
“Around Martel.” Cybel said. Arte cast a panicked glance at his earpiece, but relaxed when he checked in front of him. The collapsed rubble formed a safe path along the edge of the room. He started creeping down it, careful to keep his body well out of view.
“You’re not handling it much better!” Angel said. She took a potshot at Martel, sending him ducking further into cover. “You scurried into a pit the moment you faced the slightest hint of resistance.”
“I am ascending to my rightful place! If not for the failings of incompetent flesh, rats like you could never betray the system that sustains them.” Martel unloaded into Angel’s barrier, then took a fresh magazine from a four legged drone and slammed it into place. “I had to activate the Aquinas Protocol prematurely in order to protect the world from your foolish meddling.”
Arte made it halfway through the room.
“You’re delusional!” Angel yelled. “And your Panicked. Desperate. Hypocritical. Pretentious. Idiocy”—she punctuated every word with a bullet—“has killed who knows how many people? And for what?” She fired again, drilling even deeper into Martel’s cover. “So you can cling to this moronic illusion of grandeur a few extra days?”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Martel answered. “This is the beginning of my reign. You can’t push through my defenses, and in a few minutes reinforcements will swarm in from the factories. Your friend on the surface will fall, and an unstoppable tide of death will wash through here, ending this final, pathetic act of rebellion.”
Arte reached the end of the path, a few short feet away from a large steel door centered on the rear wall.
“Prepare Sprint. Aim Door.” Arte coiled himself into a kneeling spring. “Go.” He pushed off, leaping through the air. The metal panels slid open inches before he crashed into them, then snapped shut a split second later. A terrified cry echoed through the chamber behind him, followed by a chaotic exchange of fire.
Arte paid it no mind, instead racing forward the moment his feet touched the ground. A narrow hall lay before him, leading into a large room flush with glowing screens and whirring computers. The passages on either side of him each contained a huge, tank like machine. They spun their turret with lighting speed and fired, clipping the hem of Arte’s coat as he cleared their line of sight.
The drones rotated on their tracks and whirred to the junction where their target disappeared. Meanwhile, Arte kept up the pace, barging into the control room a second later.
“Center Terminal. Connect Phone. Lower Left. Contains Key.”
Arte rushed to the console standing on an elevated platform in the middle of the room. He whipped out his phone, lunging forward when it almost slipped from his grasp, then scanned the panel for a split second. His eyes landed on a thin black wedge sitting in a socket. He ripped it out and slammed the plug on his phone into its place. He doubled checked both ends of the cable, then jumped over the railing to the lower level.
One of the drones cleared the hallway while he was midair, and fired quick enough to strike his leg before he got out of sight. Arte gasped in pain, pressing the wound as he grit his teeth.
“Problem. Need Code. Find Key.”
“Fucking hell,” Arte hissed. The tank robots rolled into the control room, splitting at the door so they could attack him from either direction. He checked the floor around him, coming up empty, then glanced up. His eyes flashed with relief when they landed on the data stick from the center console. It was resting halfway off the upper floor, where it tumbled after slipping from his hands. He swiped it, fingers barely dodging a pair of shots from the incoming drones.
“Panel Behind. Try.”
Arte twisted around, careful to keep his body close to the wall, and pried open a thin rectangular cover over a compartment crammed with wires. He scanned the various bundles until finding a trio of cables joined by connectors identical to the socket on the central terminal. After a moment of frantically darting his gaze between each option, he ripped one out at random and shoved the Command Key into the receiving end.
The tracks of the bulky drones poked from around the corners, and he threw himself against the wall and shut his eyes. The machines crawled forward, their weapons twisting eagerly in their mounts, edging ever closer to on target as the robots rolled into position. They cleared the wall a few seconds later, fixing their aim on Arte’s neck. They beeped once in warning, then stopped.
The guns lowered, and the drones rotated their bodies into the opposite direction. The tanks began a slow trek out the room, while Arte sank into a trembling heap on the floor. Bright red warnings began to flash throughout the room as he drifted into unconsciousness.
When Arte came to he was being carried in a pair of metal arms. The wound on his leg was wrapped in white gauze. His face was pale, slick with a sheen of sweat, but he had the energy to look up into the face of his rescuer. It was covered by a thick layer of opaque glass.
“Angel?” he said.
“Y-yeah,” she replied. Her voice was soft in spite of the mechanical distortion. “This was pretty crazy, huh?”
“What happened? Is it over?”
“I don’t know exactly, but I, uh, think we won.”
“And Martel?”
Angel laughed. “He got ambushed by a pair of robo-tanks. They pinned him to the wall, and after that it was easy enough to stroll over and take him out.”
“He’s dead?”
“What? No, of course not,” Angel said. “I meant take him out of the power armor.” They walked into the great hall.
“Where is he now?”
“Ah, well, I… wasn’t sure what to do with him,” Angel said. “So I, um… taped him to the floor.” She motioned to the side where, sure enough, the Senator was pinned to the ground with countless layers of silver strips. He glared at them, silent on account of how his mouth was also sealed shut.
“Will he be alright?”
Angel shrugged. “I’m sure someone will come down here soon enough,” she said. “Though I doubt there’s anyone who will be happy to see him. Still that sounds like a whole lot of not my problem.” She reached the elevator that lead to the upstairs and jumped through the shattered door into the shaft. She landed on a pile of mangled steel, then hopped up and was carried aloft by the thrusters in her suit.
They reached the top a minute later, where she floated through another busted door and landed on the floor. It was a short walk to the front lawn, a wide grassy field currently occupied by the smoldering wrecks of countless drones.
“What happened to all these robots?” Arte said.
“No idea,” Angel answered. “I’m just glad they didn’t make it downstairs.”
“The machines turned on themselves,” said a voice above them. They were wearing the same kind of armor as Angel, and landed a few seconds later.
“Mae? Is that you?” Arte said.
“It sure is,” she replied. “I was in deep shit back there, when all the sudden the fuckers started shooting each other to pieces. You kids have any idea what happened.”
Arte started, “I think—“
He was interrupted when Cybel cut in on the radio, “Arte. Saved World.”
“Wow! Really?” Mae said. “How’d you mange that.”
Arte looked around in confusion, then said, “I, um, snuck past Martel into the control room, then I, uh….”
“Corrupted Targeting. Very Lucky.”
“Ah, yeah,” he said. “I guess I… accidentally pushed the right buttons.”
Mae laughed and said, “Oh man, God must really have been looking out for us, huh?”
“Well, I couldn’t have done it without Cybel,” Arte said.
“Only Advised.”
“Still, I owe you a ton of thanks,” Arte said.
“Nowhere near as much as we owe you,” Mae said. “Who knows where things will go from here, but I’m positive it will be in a much better direction with Martel out of the picture.”
“What about the rest of the world?” Angel said. “I mean, there’s still the Chinese, and all those other countries, right?”
“That’s the funny thing,” Mae said. “According to Solver HQ, every country who signed on to Martel’s little ‘Peace Keeper’ plot—which was most of them—went and self destructed their robot armies at the same time. Apparently they hooked all their computers together, presumably with the Americans at the center.”
“So this is all over?” Angel said.
“Mostly. There’s a couple countries who didn’t sign on, but after this fiasco, and the global pressure, I expect even Vlad Junior will give up without a fight.”
“Then we can go home?”
Mae smiled. “Sure can, though I think it would be best if you waited in a Blue Zone until things settle.”
“Wait,” Angel said. “You mean both of us?”
“You bet, kid. We dragged you into this mess, the least we can do is make sure things work out for you.”
“O-oh.” Angel blushed. “Th-thanks.”
“Any time,” Mae said. “Now let’s get onboard the Raptor, out of these stuffy suits, and the hell out of here.” She waved to the sky, summoning the aircraft from the clouds and onto the ground in front of them. The side doors slid open, inviting them inside one final time before whisking them over the horizon.