423 - Jailbreak!

Fiction Menagerie Phase 3
1

The world’s smallest covert ops agency is hitting its stride.

Costigan and Parker have offered some kind of quasi-legal access to satellites, but Charade is adamant. “Knowing which birds we use will tell people where we are,” she explains. “For now I believe it’s better that we rely on our ad hoc solution.”

The team in Antarctica and their MIA partners both know the score. Half the world’s intelligence agencies are on the hunt for Alycia Chin, to get at the lifetime of knowledge about Achilles Chin and his tech that’s in her head. The other half simply want revenge. And MIA is in the crosshairs for sheltering her, although day by day the online evidence of that collusion disappears from the world’s servers thanks to Alex’s diligent efforts.

The team has tackled two other jobs since their run against the Golden Dragon near Shanghai. One was thwarting a theft of high-tech gadgets, which exposed an international spy ring. The other was preventing an assassination attempt against a well-known diplomat working to broker peace in a regional conflict.

Now the work is finally feeling routine. Get a data dump from MIA. Make a plan of action. Launch aboard John’s stealth jet. Carry out the mission. Defeat the bad guys and look good doing it. Do some vitally necessary shopping. Go home.

Life in Antarctica isn’t easy, but it too is feeling more comfortable. Some ground rules have quickly emerged. Everyone cooks, everyone does dishes, everyone runs laundry. Group meals use rice, beans, and other staples, slow cookers and woks, and plenty of creative seasoning to offset the lack of fresh imports. There’s a big whiteboard where people keep track of tasks and supplies.

Life without regular Internet access is a rough adjustment for a bunch of Gen Z geniuses, but board games and other analog group activities are helping take the edge off. Two activities in particular keep people coming back. The first is Alycia Or Jason vs. Everybody, a paintball-style hunt through the tunnels of the Stone Builders’ city. Either Alycia or Jason take on the other four. So far it’s been total destruction for team Jalycia (and Alycia takes special pride in shooting anyone who refers to it as such), but the scores are starting to even out a bit. The second activity is a regular tabletop role-playing game Nono runs, where she rehashes some of her old spy plots off Tumblr, with the rest of the group as spy characters. It’s an exercise with high competitive value and low risk, which makes it a great training device. And for Nono, learning the flaws in her plots is a good way to improve her own skills as a planner.

That’s why everyone feels pretty good when the new mission comes in. Parker’s prerecorded video plays, as people look at the data on tablets and other devices.

“Tyran Enterprises has steadily been taking control of AEGIS assets. Part of this is the incarceration of supervillains. Tyran is moving a few such individuals, including one especially dangerous subject, from an AEGIS West Coast facility to a Halcyon-adjacent complex. We have strong evidence that at least two runs will be made against the convoy. First, we believe that Tyran will try to free their prisoner covertly, through intermediaries or deniable assets. Second, there are indications that independent supervillains are planning to disrupt the convoy themselves.”

Jason starts. “Let’s get the obvious out of the way first. Why would Tyran want to free supervillains they’ve been entrusted with keeping in lock down? I think I know why, but just in case anyone’s still in doubt.”

Alycia has this one. “The Stellar Six took a tremendous PR hit from their revelation as remote-operated puppets, cloned from the city’s heroes. The villain team the Seven Wonders are now effectively masters of Tyran’s New Tomorrow. They demonstrated on camera that they can shut off the Stellar Six with a snap of their fingers - literally. Tyran is therefore recruiting villains to battle the Seven Wonders on their behalf, while they either retool or replace the Stellar Six.”

This revelation happened in “420 - Revenge of the Seven Wonders” – Ed.

“Isn’t it in our best interest to weaken the Seven Wonders too?” asks Alex. “I get that it’s like asking Gigan to fight Godzilla, Tokyo’s gonna get stomped, sure, but isn’t there some way to swing this?”

John scowls. “A villain’s a villain,” he retorts. “Nothing good can come outta freeing more.”

Emma punches him in the back of the head - to no effect - and speaks up, in a more serious tone of voice. “I can tell you who else is making a run at this convoy. Chief prisoner Numero Uno is Father Freak. Big mutated dude out of Detroit. Super duper tough, like tanks a rocket to the face tough, and very bad attitude. Also drinking buddies with another well known villain, who’d be the logical leader of any jailbreak attempt. Mr. Big. My old mentor.”

She looks around with a worried look on her face. “Gang, I dunno if I’m gonna be able to go on this mission with you.”

And before anyone else can respond, she walks out of the ops center.

Alycia and Nono find Emma hanging out in the hangar, staring out across the Antarctic landscape beyond. It’s Emma’s favorite solo hangout, since only she and John can comfortably endure the cold without help, and John typically has no reason to interact with Emma. That leaves the two visitors struggling with the temperature in thick coats and mitts, while the pyrokinetic is comfortable in casual wear.

Alycia coughs, thanks to the bitter cold in her throat that fights to keep her from being heard. “You can tell me to leave if you wish, but…”

“Leave,” calls Emma loudly and distinctly.

Alycia and Nono look at each other. They turn to go, and begin walking, until - “Wait.”

Emma lets out a long sigh that turns to condensation a few inches beyond her protective heat shield. “Maybe you can help me through this. You with your particular background I mean.”

She turns to her partner. “Nono, no offense but keep your mouth shut for this, okay? You’re gonna be too supportive for what I need right now.”

Nono makes a lip-zipping motion, and Emma smiles wanly.

She turns back to Alycia. “Say that you got a powerful dad. He’s got a lot of pull with you. You struggle to go up against him because of that. But he’s doing a thing you’ve been asked to shut down. You worry you’re gonna earn his displeasure, disapproval, dis beating, whatevs.”

Alycia’s head tilts slightly. She thinks she knows what this is about. She suspects it’s as important to Emma to say it as it is for her to hear it, and so she listens.

Emma goes on. “Mr. Big isn’t my dad. He’s like… uh, you know those t-shirts like, I’m not the stepdad, I’m the dad that stepped up? That’s what he was for me. I couldn’t stand to live like I’d lived. I felt like everything had been a lie. And Mr. Big… he was okay with the haha, hot mess I’d become. And he said, you know, we’ll get you therapy, we’ll give you something to do, but he cared, he accepted me.”

She looks up at Alycia with tired, pinched eyes. “So I got two problems here. I don’t wanna go up against this guy who gave a shit about me. And I’m scared because he and his cronies are genuinely experienced badasses and I do not like our odds.”

Alycia opens her mouth. And Emma immediately cocks a fist. “Do not patronize me or sympathize or anything-ize me, bitch. I’m warning you.”

Alycia just smiles. “I hadn’t planned to. Your prohibition to Nono is understandable and I am complying with it as well. Instead I want to make two points. The first is that your intelligence about Mr. Big and his allies would be invaluable. Anything you can contribute to our plans would be welcome. That may be nothing at all. If so, I understand.”

Emma pauses, eyes narrowed, then lowers the fist and nods cautiously.

“The second is to say that while I do completely understand your situation as you’ve framed it - the outsized influence parents can wield - I will only give my advice if you ask for it. However, I would like to pass on advice I’ve heard elsewhere. I think you will be receptive.”

Emma looks cautiously between Alycia and Nono. “Yeah, okay, go on?”

“You are a supervillain. Your mentor has given you advice for supervillains, which you’ve often repeated. In this matter, as in all others, you should do whatever the fuck you want. It seems that your difficulty is determining what that is right now.”

Emma’s mouth hangs open, perhaps out of shock that Alycia has actually been listening to her past tirades.

Alycia jerks her head to the side, indicating to Nono that it’s time to leave, and begins walking away. Nono waves and smiles goodbye, and follows. Emma turns back, looking out of the hangar and across the white desert of Antarctica.

1 Like
2

Nevada.

Emma has agreed to partial participation in the operation. She’ll pilot the stealth jet and handle any necessary pickups and drop-offs. Alex is aboard as operator, performing surveillance and monitoring comm chatter.

Emma also oversaw the various robberies and thefts needed to keep the operation going. Thefts like “motorcycles” and “gasoline”. The team is how riding those motorcycles, which are burning that gasoline. They’re cruising in formation, north along I-15, toward Vegas itself, as the jet flies high above them.

Alycia Chin is in the lead. It’s not her Vyortovian hoverbike, nor the CHIMERA units created by John Black. And why? She reiterates the rules over the radio in her helmet.

“We can’t be outed as ultra-tech black ops people. No overt powers, no superhuman moves. If you wipe out on the road, SNOWMAN, at least pretend to limp.”

“Brigand and I will take lead in any engagement. Agent R, SNOWMAN, you’ll be our backup.”

“Our primary goal is to detect threats to the convoy and neutralize them. Since we can’t reliably anticipate threats, our operational posture is aggressive and proactive. Keep your eyes open and remember that threats can come at us from any direction. We’re far more dangerous than we look. That goes for any hostiles as well.”

She gets a chorus of acknowledgements over the radio, and revs the bike a little. The team, looking all black and badass in their riding leathers and helmets aboard their muscular motorcycles, follow her lead.

The Nellis Air Force Base is located in the northeast corner of Las Vegas. Nellis has played host to experiments since the 50’s in things like atomic weapons and superhuman power testing. The military blasted hell out of the desert of Yucca Flat over the next few decades. When AEGIS was shopping around for a secure facility to place prisoners in stasis, the Air Force repurposed some of its buried bunkers. And while scientists studied the biology and physics of the villains’ powers to find ways to permanently neutralize them, those villains slumbered.

Now those bunkers are being cleared out as part of Tyran’s takeover of the supervillain prison system. The stasis pods - cylindrical ultra-tech machines, filthy with the grime of time and connected to sensors and power banks via sturdy insulated cable - are loaded by crane into oversized armored pods mounted on trailers. Those trailers are then hitched to reinforced big-rig trucks.

Just before sunrise, those trucks’ engines roar to life. The rigs pull out. The couplings on the trailers jerk, but they hold. Pickup trucks flashing amber lights and bearing “OVERSIZED LOAD” signs pull out ahead, leading the way.

“Convoy underway,” reports Alex over the radio. “They’ll be on I-15 in 90 seconds.”

Alycia acknowledges. “Agent R, with me northbound on I-15. Brigand, SNOWMAN, get ahead of them on I-11.”

The team has just passed the Strip to their right, ending with the Golden Nugget Hotel & Casino at the north end. Now they split up at the junction of freeways at the heart of Vegas.

Alex is narrating the potential dangers the team will deal with - mostly the lawful security apparatus of the United States.

“LVMPD responding to some calls. Nothing outta the ordinary… Some local superheroes doin’ their biz. Did ya know some heroes here wear actual fucking neon in their costumes? It’s in the spirit of the city–”

“Focus,” Alycia says sharply.

If Alex was chastened, they don’t sound like it. But the narration returns to topic. “Couple folks overflying your position, Charade. Local heroes who either took an interest or were invited to play along at our party.”

Alycia only needs to glance up to see the bright flashes of Las Vegas’ aerial heroes in the predawn hour. “Roger.”

Northbound, they streak past the caravan of trucks and escort vehicles. There’s no police escort, but Alycia is pretty sure there will be soldiers in the tractor-trailers, and maybe more than that. And how long will those Vegas heroes fly along?

“Convoy visual confirmation,” she reports. “We’ll take East Lake Mead Boulevard out of town and come back around Henderson.”

So far everything feels like it’s under control. But the place for an attack isn’t here in Vegas - it’ll be out in the desert.

Jason and John ride southeast. Their job is to scout out possible locations for ambushes. Canyons, tunnels, even roadside billboards. Anywhere with low visibility, where a few vehicles could hang out, needs to be found and checked. Alex’s online maps of the region were a start, and the jet will help, but sometimes you don’t know until you get up close. Not being obvious from a distance is part of what makes potential ambush sites good.

Their second task is to just keep an eye out for the vehicles on the road. Is it all commuter cars and cargo trucks and stuff? Will they keep seeing the same few vehicles over and over?

By the time they’ve “frisked” the route for dangers, it’s dawn. The two pull up in a parking lot near the Railroad Pass Hotel at the southeast tip of Vegas’s dominion. Jason grabs a snack, while John refuels the bikes.

Off of the radios, the two men can afford a little chitchat without being chided for it.

“You ever do anything like this?” John asks.

“High-speed vehicle action across the American southwest?” Jason grins. “Not this specifically, no. Boat chases through the Congo. Instrument flying during bad weather conditions in the Himalayas, with nothing but a stopwatch and a map. So generally yes.”

John snorts. “Must be nice to retire. Now that you’re in your middle age and your busiest times are behind you, you can slow down and really take it easy.”

Jason bursts into laughter at that. “Yeah. Hey, I could retire here to Vegas and be an old pensioner. Order drinks with fancy umbrellas. Make friends with mobsters in Witness Protection.”

Alycia’s voice over the radio makes them sit up and take notice. “Brigand. We’re coming down 147, close to the junction to 564. We triggered a speed trap.”

Jason’s helmet is back on, so he can talk back. “Need us to run interference?”

“Maybe. I’ll let you know.”

Nono is speeding past cars on the road. She and Alycia are fleeing from the police. Somehow this feels very normal.

Her particular suit was tailored to let her slap on a flow patch just by hitting her forearm. She’s done so. Now the dangers of navigating complex traffic situations at 135 mph have become nothing more than an interesting puzzle to be solved.

Every so often, she gets a glimpse of herself reflected in the windows of cars she passes. She sees nothing but a person in black motorcycle leathers and a feature-concealing armored helmet. Were she a girl in one of those cars, she might be intimidated by this scary looking stranger on their high-speed bike, violating traffic safety laws. Now, she’s the person they’d be afraid of.

What a novel feeling, she tells herself.

The motorcycles have an advantage that the cop cruisers don’t - they can go on sidewalks or on narrow shoulders. Nono thought the strategy should be to find a traffic knot that’ll block the cops but not them, and communicated that to Alycia. Alycia agreed. Now they just need to find it.

The motorcycles hang low through a tight turn onto a side road. Nono can feel the friction as her armored kneecap brushes almost too close to the pavement. But she pulls the bike out of the turn without incident, shifting her weight and extending an arm or leg as needed.

Behind them, two cop cruisers try their best to make the turn. One looks like he tried a handbrake turn but only saw it done on television. The other sends up a plume of white smoke as his brakes fail.

“We’re going to reverse course and drive past them,” Alycia tells Nono over the radio. “But we have to stay in character. They must assume we’re local miscreants, not some kind of street gang or ops team. So as we pass, make a rude gesture. The middle finger, for example.”

Gotcha," Nono almost giggles. The flow patch makes her feel drunk, or high.

Alycia pulls her bike to a hard stop. The back of the bike rises into the air, and she forces the whole thing around in a graceful 180. The back tire lands, she hits the throttle, and off she goes.

Nono can’t manage the same feat, but she manages an acceptable substitute by putting a foot down on the pavement, and pivoting her vehicle around that. And on the way she manages a two-fisted finger combo, using her body weight to steer the motorcycle for the few key moments it takes.

As the pair of them howl down 564, Alex reports the police chatter. “Couple joyriders heading south. No units in position to intercept.”

Nono throws back her head and laughs.

It’s morning.

The convoy is rolling along US Route 93, a long stretch of road going south-southeast from Vegas. They’ll turn onto I-40 at a place called Kingman, then stay there through Flagstaff and Albuquerque.

The two pairs of motorcyclists can’t be seen by the convoy too much, or they’ll get suspicious. A couple of bikers passing them might not mean anything, once. But four bikers, passing multiple times, would raise suspicion. The bikes run on ordinary gasoline. And of course, almost everyone on the team has basic biological needs. Opportunities for individuals to trade positions, attend to themselves or their bikes, and so forth are thus very limited. Emma and Alex will be responsible for maintaining timetables and locations for such logistical concerns.

Alycia relents on the radio chit-chat, if only to keep people from tensing up too much due to the demanding conditions of the mission. Their comm channels out here are secure enough.

Nono, coming off her flow patch use, is the first to take advantage of the opportunity. “How long have you guys been riding motorcycles? You all seem like pros.”

John is the first to answer. “I got to ride dirt bikes when I was like 13. Never owned one, but the neighbors had a spare. Got about six months of practice.”

Jason speaks next. “Rusty kept me trained on every kind of vehicle I was likely to encounter, which was a lot. He also taught me the concepts behind different kinds of vehicle operation, such as aerodynamics and buoyancy, just enough to grasp what a new cockpit control might mean.”

“Same,” says Alycia laconically. After a moment: “Well. I didn’t train with Rusty Byrne specifically. But - you get the idea. For me, the key was to extend one’s proprioception - your sense of where your body is located - outward, to encompass the vehicle. As long as you knew where the tires pointed, or which way the ailerons were canted, or what-have-you, the rest of the vehicle would follow.”

“That doesn’t sound very specialized. So all those cool J-Turns and U-Turns and X-Turns and stuff… I guess it’s all the cool hypergenius brain stuff, huh?” Nono sounds a little disappointed.

Alycia considers this. “To an extent. Some of it is simply confidence to attempt difficult maneuvers, trusting one’s instincts and reflexes, supported by the regular training of those reflexes. Training such as you’ve been engaging in.”

Jason chimes in. “Rusty put it this way. The biggest enemy in battle isn’t the enemy’s surprise move, it’s you wasting time being surprised.”

Emma, from the jet, has something to say too. “I’ve done my share of heists. Did plenty of planning for them. Most of that planning is just knowing what pieces are on the board and where. The minute someone else’s pieces start moving is the minute your own planning stops working.”

“This kinda got off motorcycles,” Nono observes wryly. “But that’s not a bad thing, I guess. Hmm. Hey, who wants to play road trip trivia?”

Alycia and Nono ride parallel to each other.

The sun, rising in the east, is right in front of them. Fortunately their helmets’ visors handle most of it, leaving one bright spot where their eyes can’t go.

Their hair is tied off and bunched up, with the helmets and their suits keeping it restrained. Still, they can feel the wind whipping by and tugging at everything that’s capable of moving, hair included.

I-40 is a long stretch of road that runs through the desert. There are mountains in the distance, scrub in the foreground, and the occasional weather-beaten building - motels, gas stations, and eateries - breaking the monotony of the landscape.

“Heads up, gang,” reports John tensely. “Likely threat. Northbound on U.S. Route 89.”

Alycia’s response is immediate. “Acknowledged. Specify nature of the threat.”

“'Bout a dozen motorcyclists in three groups. Brigand and I just passed 'em. They’re Rossum-type robots in biker leathers, basically evil robot usses.”

“I need confirmation on that last assessment,” Alycia orders. The team is armed with conventional firearms, loaded with live ammunition, rather than their usual high-tech multi-function guns. Nobody wants to open fire unless they know for sure who or what they’re shooting at.

“I know my shit,” John growls.

Jason is a little more forthcoming. “They’re moving in near-perfect sync with each other, no hesitation, nobody’s following the leader’s cues. Like watching synchronized swimming or something.”

“Get confirmation,” repeats Alycia. “Live fire is not authorized until then.”

“Convoy’s three minutes behind Brigand and SNOWMAN,” Alex reports from the plane, looking at their map. “Only way to get that is to engage now, proactively. We okay picking that fight?”

Alycia has to think about it. It would be two against twelve… and Jason would be one of the two.

Then again, who better to tackle robots than another robot, and a man equipped with nano-robots?

“Brigand, SNOWMAN, engage target on 89. Agent R and I will trail the convoy and peel off to assist as necessary.”

Jason’s voice is high and happy. “Roger that. Here we go…!”

1 Like
3

The highways jammed with broken heroes
On a last chance power drive
Everybody’s out on the run tonight
But there’s no place left to hide

Arizona.

John Black is morally certain that the riders he and Jason spotted are robots. It was just a flash - a glimpse - but somehow, deep in the pit of his stomach, he knew.

Jason’s more analytical view confirms his opinion. But really, if Jason had said nothing, he’d still be convinced.

The pair had driven south to frisk the road, and passed the dozen or so bikers. They were heading northbound, precisely timed to intercept the convoy. Now they need to catch up.

He roars the engine of his motorcycle and makes a wide arc, bumping across the median with no concerns for personal comfort or safety. Behind him, Jason follows suit, though he’s a little more cautious about the crossing.

The pair drive their vehicles hard, leaning forward so their weight compensates for the torque that might yank the bikes onto their back wheel. John gestures to his partner - a thumb to the chest, a couple of fingers pointed definitely north to indicate the robo-riders, then a closed fist to indicate violence. Jason nods, accepting the plan. John will attack, Jason will observe. That’ll give Alycia the confirmation she needs.

John streaks toward the rear of the robo-riders’ ranks. He hops up, crouched with his left foot on the seat of the bike, right foot ready. And as he passes one, he aims a savage kick at the helmeted head.

The rider crashes into the others. They recover, but the rider hits the pavement. John circles around, braking harshly, and grabs for the helmet.

Underneath it is a clearly metallic robot’s head. It is, after all, what he guessed.

The first thing Jason notes, even before the robotic reveal, is how inhuman the riders are. One of their fellows just got viciously attacked. The response of real bikers would be to protect a member of their pack, or express concern for their fellow. None of that is here.

John’s a robot too. But I could never, ever imagine him reacting that way, thinks Jason, in a stray moment. “Charade, Brigand. Targets are robotic.”

“Live fire approved,” comes Alycia’s voice. “I predict they’ll try to split up. Priority 1, stop them from reaching the convoy.”

There’s three packs of robo-riders. Sure enough, the first two packs roar ahead, leaving the remaining pack. They turn around, trying to encircle John, while the downed robot rises from the pavement.

Jason roars past him. “You got this dude!” he yells out.

“Fuck you I know that!” John yells back.

The standing order is still not to do anything that would expose the team as what they are. John’s not sure how he’s going to pull that off here. He decides to start by riding away, spinning his motorbike around, and coming back to run over the robot on foot, as it tries to regain its own bike.

The others roar in to try and intercept him. Good, that’s what he wants, because they move oh so god damn predictably, and he has known how Rossum robots move for a long long time. In and out he swerves, dodging each robo-rider. He revs his engine hard, and leans back, letting the torque do its thing this time. The front wheel rises off the pavement, just about head height, and – bam, the Rossum robot collapses to the pavement. John brakes, bringing the front wheel down on its face.

The other robots are armed with human sidearms, just like he is. They go for these now.

John reaches - and hesitates.

As Leo, he never, ever wanted to use a gun. He took up boxing and other martial arts. He was fine with fighting. The non-lethal chemical weapons the team normally uses were fine too. But a gun doesn’t give the other guy a chance. It’s fundamentally not fair. And that always rubbed Leo the wrong way.

I’m long since done failing to be him. I’m going to be me, John tells his hesitation.

He draws the pistol at his side.

The robots are already firing. The bullets are all aimed predictably, at the center of mass. John knows it’s coming because he knows how they work. He dodges left, then drops out of the dodge by deliberately tripping himself so their tracking is thrown off. As they try to re-acquire, he shoots from the ground, going for the helmets. He misses the first few shots, and their counter-fire hits his biker leathers and his invulnerable carbon shell beneath. He cries out in pretend pain, but keeps firing. Someone might be recording this.

The bullets break through the helmet visors. This by itself won’t be enough to destroy the robots. But it’s enough to interfere with their sensors.

The grounded robot trapped under his bike is doing its best to push the vehicle off itself. While it does, John lunges for the left most of the standing robots. He throws the pistol into the air, needing both arms for the moment.

He grabs the robot’s arm and swings it around himself. The giant metal bludgeon smashes the other two to the ground, and he lets go. The pistol comes down, and he tracks its fall and snatches it out of the air.

The trapped robot has freed itself and doing its best to stand despite structural damage from the collision with his motorcycle. John levels the pistol at its head and empties the clip.

He’s got more, but now that he’s actually gone and shot something, like with a gun, it’s kind of… unsatisfactory?

The other robots are up, and after him. Their faces and optics are a mess, but they have other sensors.

He throws the gun away, and lowers himself into a fighting stance.

Jason is after the other robots. They’re accelerating, and he’s accelerating, and it’s largely a matter of whose bike is more expensive at this point.

That’s fine - he’s a good shot with a pistol. Plenty of men, and a few women, have found that out. And in spite of his faked death, new lease on life, and bon vivant attitude, their ghosts still whisper to him.

These are robots, he tells himself.

So is Summer, says the darker corners of his mind, the part of him still bent on his own destruction, and he fights to push that voice away and concentrate on the task at hand.

He leans forward, bracing his shooting arm against the handlebars of the bike, and aims for the tires.

Bang - bang - bang - bang.

Two rear tires deflate. Two motorcycles wobble.

Emma was able to get the team a variety of handguns commonly found in the United States, but she couldn’t be picky while shopping the black market on a tight schedule. Jason managed to get his hands on the one SIG Sauer P365 she got, which means he’s got seven bullets left, plus a couple of spare clips.

Reloading while riding on a motorcycle is left as an exercise for the reader, he tells himself.

He rides through the pair of stricken robo-riders, and takes aim at the next two.

Unfortunately, they are armed too. Fortunately, they’re not the crack shots he is.

As bullets whiz by, Jason realizes a flaw in his tactics. The nanobots have come online, detecting danger. But he cannot be identified as himself. So now he’s got to keep them suppressed, while still steering, dodging incoming fire, and aiming his own weapon.

No problem, right?

The two riders of the middle pack have also drawn their weapons. Good, good - that means they’re slowing down, which means they’ll be easier to hit.

Jason, holding the gun in his right hand, streaks between the two riders and shoots out the tires of the right-side bike as he does. He spins his bike around in a quick in-place turn, and gets the tires of the other bike.

As he does, the robo-riders draw a bead on him and fire.

His arm automatically rises to shield his face. The bikers’ outfits they all wear are made of the same carbon tech as their usual garb, but human reflexes are hard to fight, and Jason’s also doing his best to keep his nanobots from doing their jobs and giving him away in the process.

The impact knocks him back off the bike. Without a rider to stabilize it, the bike crashes to the pavement. The wind is knocked out of him, and Jason spends his next drawn breath cursing.

He’s going to need to do a lot of shooting. On the ground, he ejects the mag from the P365, slaps in a new one, and instinctively checks that a round has been chambered, all within a tiny fraction of time.

As the robots circle his fallen bike to finish him off, he shoots. Visors first - go for the eyes, robots or not. Elbows next - a flaw of humanoid robots is that the joints are as weak as in a human being, because joints have to be, and the arms hold the guns. Knees next.

He empties the P365, ejects the mag, slaps in the half-empty magazine he started with, and resumes firing.

One robot remains. The others are in pieces on the burning hot pavement.

John has let his temper get the better of him. What are the handlers of these robots going to make of this, he wonders.

He comforts himself by ramming it with a clothesline - a wide swing of the arm, elbow crooked, straight to the face - and grabbing hold of the robot by the neck. He squeezes the robot’s head between forearm and bicep, braces with the neck grab, and rips the machine’s head off.

He’s also wasting time, he realizes. There were probably more efficient ways to do this.

He tells himself that it’s okay, because these robots might have hijacked a passing car or something.

Shit. That means he’s gotta get this scrap off the road, doesn’t it.

He runs, quick as he can, from robot bit to robot bit. He throws each piece off the pavement. He’s a third of the way through when his conflicting impulses stop him.

These guys aren’t just gonna hijack a convoy and go to Sonic for burgers. There’s gotta be someone somewhere who would take charge of the villain stasis pods - and someone who doesn’t want their robots found and implicated. Someone probably on the way here, right now, with reinforcements.

Someone who can clean up their own damn robots.

John pulls his bike up, leaps aboard, revs the engine, and takes off.

Jason has made it out unscathed. Unfortunately, his bike did not. A pair of the robots picked it up and tried to smash him with it. He dodged, but the chassis took enough damage to make it unsuitable for use.

The robots’ own bikes are right here - except he shot out their tires.

“Brigand. On your six,” he hears John call over the radio.

“Need a ride, SNOWMAN,” he calls back.

“Roger that.”

The android pulls up on his still-functioning motorbike, Jason hops aboard, and the pair take off north. There’s still time.

The final four robots are a quarter of a mile away from the junction with the convoy. They can’t go too fast, or they’ll overshoot their target. Jason and John have no such limitations, and John pushes his bike as hard as he can.

Jason, hands free, grabs John’s gun. He checks it, briefly - “didn’t think you’d use this,” he remarks over the other man’s shoulder - and grabs his own piece. As the two draw near the robo-riders, Jason opens fire. One back tire - two - three - miss - miss - four.

“Charade, Brigand,” he calls again.

“Go ahead Brigand.”

“Robots down but not fully out. Convoy okay. We have some playmates to clean up.”

John adds his own question via radio. “Comrade X. Advise on nearby vehicles. These guys would hijack the convoy, right? Then drive it where?”

Alex is ready. “Offroad, most likely. They won’t care about the trucks long term and you can land a cargo VTOL anywhere out here, load it up, and take off. I haven’t been listening to ATC but I’ll start, just in case Tyran has a suitable bird in the area.”

Alycia concurs. “Not precisely what I’d do but well within the realm of reason. Brigand, SNOWMAN, advise on possibility of exposure.”

SNOWMAN has to think about that, and doesn’t really want to. “Uh, probably 1 in 3 chance,” he says with reluctance.

He can just hear Alycia scowling over the radio. “Too high. But very well. We have a very narrow window to pass the convoy in several miles. We’ll take vanguard, you two pick up the rear.”

It’s Jason’s turn to be embarrassed. “Uh, Brigand is down one bike. Got a replacement?”

Emma snorts over the radio. “I got two. You get one tonight. Ride shotgun for awhile, you two can have a male bonding moment.”

The robots are dealt with. Jason’s a better motorcyclist thanks to his upbringing, but John doesn’t fatigue. Both men agree John should ride, and Jason will hang out on the back seat.

Now all they have to do is pour on the speed and catch up with the convoy.

The window Alycia mentioned is in a town called Williams. She and Nono abruptly take the off-ramp and roar at 120 mph past the Shell station, past the Best Western, past the cemetery, and down the main thoroughfare of this small mountain town. Out again, over the railroad tracks, and back onto the Interstate they go.

They went far too fast for the police to respond to them. Probably someone will call it in. Hopefully nobody attached to the convoy will make the connection. Hopefully.

Well behind them, John and Jason are catching up.

The next several hours are uneventful. To pass the time, the team talks about what they just experienced.

Alycia sums it up. “This transfer is still technically Air Force business. Tyran has to be seen taking charge of the villains and storing them in well-monitored facilities. Tyran wanted to get the villains to whatever program they have that runs the Stellar Six, off official radar. So they deployed anonymous robots, something that couldn’t be traced so easily to them.”

“SNOWMAN, to address your concerns: the robots could be traced to Tyran, except there’s nobody to do the tracing. The Air Force doesn’t know the attempted strike even happened. Tyran will collect their scrap from the desert and nobody will be the wiser.”

Nono raises a question. “I’m still not clear on this. Wouldn’t it be better for the Air Force to know Tyran is dirty? Shouldn’t we be telling them everything?”

Alycia sighs, and Jason steps in to keep her from getting too frustrated. “It’s like this. Charade’s real name is back on the lips of the intelligence community. If we’re exposed to anyone, they’ll say, ‘oh look, a super-terrorist made a move against Tyran’. Tyran looks good, our bosses at MIA take more heat, and nobody wins.”

“But that’s not true!” protests Nono.

Nobody can see Jason’s smile under his helmet. Nobody can comment on how empty it is. “That doesn’t matter. In this world, everybody lies to everybody.”

Alex adds their own commentary. “MIA could report to the Air Force. But they’re still smarting from their link with Charade being outed. Simply put, we have a big credibility problem. A win on this mission puts an ace in Costigan’s hand to play down the road, but we have to stay dark for now.”

Nono wraps up with her own conclusion. “So… we have to do the right thing, only nobody gets to take credit for it.”

Emma laughs. It’s the first time anyone’s heard that sound in awhile. “Welcome to the life, sweetheart.”

The convoy’s plan is to stop at Kirtland Air Force Base inside Albuquerque, roughly 660 miles from Las Vegas. They’ll refuel, rest for the night, and get going again in the morning. And hours later, the convoy pulls in.

The team has the same objective - refuel and rest. They can’t afford to waste time at a hotel and don’t have a nice Air Force base to hang out in. So Emma lands in the desert, three motorcycles are wheeled aboard, and the jet takes off again.

The jet’s interior has already been rigged with hammocks, a minifridge, privacy partitions, and other supplies. People refresh themselves, change clothes, and throw themselves down into a hammock to sleep.

It’s been a long day. And they haven’t even gotten to the supervillains yet.

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