Lines Converging And Parting

It wouldn’t take an expert to guess Hugo failed the training program. Not only did he disobey orders and put human lives at risk, he also destroyed an expensive military aircraft. And, for the first time in years, the military needs every piece of equipment it can get.

But now, after having just arrived home, Hugo suspects something’s afoot. The minute he stepped in the door of his apartment, he received a call from Casey. It was a brief, ten-second call, leaving Hugo with an abundance of questions and very few answers.

So he stands, in front of the tech corporation building, unsure of what’s awaiting him inside.

Hugo’s escorted to the meeting room at the top of the building – the exact same one Simon had interrogated him, Noah, and Eugene in months earlier. He waits outside the translucent door, leaning against the wall and tapping his foot in anxiousness.

If he’s about to be reprimanded for his behavior in the training program, he doesn’t need to be here. Couldn’t they just send him the bill for the expenses? As a successful public figure, Lily’s more than capable of paying it off.

Out of the corner of his eye, the door turns to transparent, normal glass.

“Hugo, come in!” Casey opens it and beckons for Hugo to enter. “I’m sure you’ll appreciate what we’ve done to the place.”

Hugo hesitantly pushes his back off the wall, walking inside as Casey holds the door open.

The inside of the room hasn’t changed much. The major difference now is the number of potted plants and small trees along the wall. The corridors of the building have been transformed in a similar manner.

Several military commanders stand around a desk, pointing at large tablets resting on top. Hugo halts when he sees them – being in the presence of such powerful people is intimidating enough. Let alone being in their presence after having destroyed one of their expensive aircraft.

Casey walks around Hugo, giving his shoulder a couple of friendly taps. He joins the other commanders, instantly getting their attention when he speaks. “I’d like to introduce you to one of our recruits, Hugo. He’s the one I was telling you about.”

They look at him, their serious stares a force of their own, pushing Hugo towards the door. They chat quietly amongst one another. Hearing fragments of their conversations, Hugo senses their apprehension towards him.

“Failed.”

“Reckless.”

“Unpleasant.”

It becomes clear they know exactly what went on during Hugo’s training program.

Hugo clenches his jaw, retreating into himself even further. Immediately, he doesn’t like them as much as they don’t like him. He glares at Casey, refusing to acknowledge the other commanders. “Are you gonna tell me why I’m here?”

“We’ve got something we might need your help with,” Casey replies.

The audacity for Casey to ask for Hugo’s help, when he won’t even spare a minute to talk about Eugene.

“I failed, didn’t I?” Hugo asks. It’s a statement more than a question. “So – with your permission – I think I’m gonna leave now.”

“Hugo, we need your help,” Casey says.

Hugo tilts his head to the side, amused. “So I passed? I’m part of the military now?”

“Well, technically not, but–”

Hugo gives him a condescending smile and an equally condescending wave. He turns and walks to the translucent door.

“I’ve got something you might want to see.”

The words stop Hugo in his tracks.

The council members are in hiding, and even he doesn’t know where Lily is right now. Could it be something to do with her? The thought sends a shiver down his spine.

As he halts, still facing the door, he hears the voice of another commander. “Are you sure we can trust him for this?”

Casey doesn’t have time to respond, however, because Hugo turns back around and walks right up to the table.

“What is it?” Hugo demands.

Casey spins around a silver pad, resting on the table. A holographic screen, projected by the base of the laptop, comes into Hugo’s view.

A video plays – footage taken by a military surveillance drone. The drone rounds an abandoned concrete building, revealing two male figures side-by-side. It approaches rapidly, firing bullets. One of the figures jumps in front of the other, protecting the other with his own body. They dash for cover, and the video ends.

While the quality of the video was rather shabby – having been transmitted wirelessly – Hugo’s certain of two things.

First, no complete human would be able to survive being hit by bullets like that.

And second, the bleached blonde hair of the other figure looked a little bit too much like the hair of Hugo’s best friend.

Hugo tightens his fist, clenching it increasingly the more he thinks. The boy – wearing the clothes of the attacking cyborg – couldn’t have betrayed New Kansai. Or Hugo. He just couldn’t…

Could he?

* * *

As soon as they get back to the warehouse, Aiden leaves to treat his wound alone. The robots already march about, seemingly preparing the hovercraft for takeoff.

The splints on Noah’s fingers have become loose. Without anything to do except watch, he removes the tape from his fingers. He tries to do it slowly at first, but the pain isn’t worth it. So he rips it off, careful to unwind the tape naturally rather than yanking it off to the side.

Once they’re off, Noah examines his fingers. The swelling has gone back down, but it hurts to curl them up. From where they were broken, the joints still jut off at unnatural angles. It doesn’t look like they’ll ever go back to looking normal. Not for a long time, anyway.

Aiden arrives back from the workers’ quarters, a white bandage wrapped around his torso. He catches Noah looking at it, so he tugs his black coat back down, covering the bandage from sight.

Simon, pacing around near the hovercraft, sees Aiden enter. “Are we ready to go?”

Noah wonders if this is all Simon’s done while he’s been in bathroom confinement – anxiously pace around. He’s still not used to seeing Simon in an environment where he has no control of anything whatsoever.

Aiden ignores him, swinging himself into the cockpit of the hovercraft. He grunts from the pain in his torso.

Simon impulsively storms over to him. “Well?”

Aiden shakes his head wearily, as if he’s had enough of Simon’s demands. “Chill out, man. Your son almost got us both killed.”

Simon scoffs, but can’t think of anything to reply with. So he shoots Noah a deadly look, making Noah instinctively cower.

“Then what’s taking so long?” Simon demands.

Aiden sighs, looking dejectedly at the systems display in front of him. Then, he delivers the line he might’ve been keeping to himself the whole time:

“We’re out of fuel.”

Simon gawks at him.

“We were never meant to be stuck here, so I only filled up with enough gasoline to start the engine once, fly in, and fly back out.”

Simon digests the information much quicker this time, but struggles to form a complete sentence. “Then… then what are you going to do about it?” he snaps.

Aiden doesn’t rise to Simon’s pointed question. “I might be able to make the modifications. Can get the engine started and have enough to get us the hell out of here.” He jumps out of the cockpit, grunting uncomfortably as he lands. “So sit tight and shut up.”

Simon growls in frustration. He turns and makes a beeline for Noah. “Get up.”

Noah, sinking into the wall as Simon approached, slides back up the wall.

“You know what they’ll do to us if they find us, don’t you?” Simon threatens.

Noah nods in quick, little movements. His father’s right – there’s no way he can somehow turn this into a believable hostage situation. The military won’t believe a word he says.

“Look at me when I speak to you.”

Noah raises his chin, staring his father square in the eyes.

“You haven’t dealt with the military commanders like I have,” Simon continues. “They’re ruthless. They’ll kill us on the spot. So don’t try anything dumb.”

Noah nods again, Simon’s presence overbearing. Then, he’s left cowering there, starkly aware of the truth in Simon’s words.

* * *

Not more than an hour after Hugo’s meeting, a hovercraft flies over the old world, following an advance team of ornithopters. Inside the cargo hold, Hugo’s strapped in his seat, next to Casey and another commander from the meeting.

The hovercraft lands. Hugo unstraps himself, but the cargo hold doesn’t open.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Casey says after noticing Hugo’s glance to the exit. “If we need you to liaise, we’ll bring him here to us.”

“Then shouldn’t we be on the front lines?” Hugo asks.

But Casey’s already walking away to a portable desk, putting a hololens in his ear. The other commander follows his lead, already giving orders into a hololens of his own. Only Hugo is left without one, as if expected to twiddle his thumbs throughout the mission.

From outside the hovercraft, the sounds of explosions and gunfire begin. Hugo’s oblivious to their location in the old world, not to mention what’s happening outside.

A lineup of exoskeleton suits hanging on the wall catches his eye. He gets an idea and looks around the cargo hold, but he can’t find any corners to hide around.

A minute into the mission, Casey and the commander talk into their hololens with raised voices. Things don’t seem to be going quite to plan. Casey suddenly looks up at the cargo hold, and it begins to open.

Through the gap, Hugo sees a couple of wounded ornithopter pilots, supporting each other while walking directly for the hovercraft.

As they get close, Hugo takes the opportunity. No longer concerned by the commanders across the cargo hold, he rushes to the exoskeleton suits. He straps one on as fast as he can, only glancing upwards when he hears Casey shout at him:

“Hey! What do you think you’re doing!”

The other commander tells Casey, “I’ll handle it here. Get him.”

Casey runs over, but Hugo’s already tightening the last strap. He activates the stealth mode on the exoskeleton suit, and the whole world turns the light blue color of a hololens projection. Casey leaps towards the place where Hugo was just standing, but Hugo’s already gone.

As Hugo dashes past, the rush of air by their side causes the ornithopter pilots to jump. Then, he’s out of the hovercraft and in the old world.

Above the peaks of the buildings, Hugo sees a stream of laser bullets not too far ahead. He takes off in this direction, turning a few corners and entering a complete war zone.

At first, he only sees the shimmer of exoskeleton suits, taking cover behind sturdy, ballistic shields. Then, he sees the same sleek, humanoid robots from the induction ceremony. They protect the warehouse, firing their laser guns at the military troops.

Hidden from the human eye, the shimmer of ornithopters in the air shoot down at the robots with laser weapons of their own.

There’s a loud shout beneath the sound of gunfire. Then, a brilliant white flash forces Hugo to immediately shut his eyes. He opens them a second later, but it’s hopeless – his vision’s already gone. He staggers to the wall of a building, reaching out to it for balance while his vision recovers slightly.

When he’s able to barely see, he enters the building. He finds the stairs and takes it to the top floor. A window exits to the rooftop. Blinking a few more times in an effort to restore his vision a little more, he runs the length of the roof. He throws his body forward, concentrating his recovering eyesight on the next roof over.

Hugo leaps to the next building – the building directly next to the warehouse. He turns his focus to the warehouse and his eyes open wide in recognition.

It’s the building where he thought he saw Noah. The thought fills him with a mixture of fury and determination, and he pushes his foot off the ground, recklessly leaping over to the roof.

Several robots stand guard, tracking the invisible ornithopters with their laser guns and preventing them from landing. Hugo, staying low to the ground, dashes past them for the door to the warehouse.

A beam of energy scores a direct hit on a robot to his right, and the remainder of the robot crumples to the ground. Another beam hits the ground in front of Hugo, causing him to reel back. A small crater’s left in the concrete where it hit.

He reaches the door and enters without being seen. The robots might be high-tech, but they’re not superhuman. Unlike the cyborgs Hugo’s seen before.

Careful not to let the door slam, Hugo quickly takes in the interior of the warehouse. High shelves store boxes of god-knows-what. Through the gaps, he sees the movement of black robots, as well as the stationary, black hovercraft – the same hovercraft that took Noah away.

Hugo creeps down the stairs to the floor, holding the rail the whole way down. As soon as he reaches the bottom, he faces the floor in front of him.

Sitting against a wall, a blonde-haired boy holds his head, scrunching his hair in stress. His hair’s regrown black at the roots, but still fades to blonde a quarter way down.

The boy doesn’t notice him, but Hugo stumbles down a stair, the metal echoing after being struck by his sneaker. The boy immediately looks up, eyes wide in panic at what could be anybody in front of him.

That’s right – Hugo’s still invisible.

Not wanting Noah to cause a commotion, Hugo deactivates stealth mode on his suit. They look at each other for a moment. Unsure of what they should do. Unsure of what they should say.

Then, Noah looks to the side of the staircase, jumps up, and grabs Hugo’s wrist. He pulls Hugo around the side of the steps before turning back, shielding Hugo from view.

Two humanoid robots round the corner, glancing quickly at Noah. They march up the stairs, their metal boots clanging quickly up each step.

Noah takes Hugo’s wrist again and – walking briskly – leads him through a door and into a corridor of rooms. They enter one and Noah shuts the door.

Hugo takes this as a sign it’s okay to speak. “We’ve got to go–”

But Noah embraces Hugo tightly, cutting him off.

For a moment, Hugo’s too surprised to react. Then, he returns the hug, letting months of fear flood away from his body. At last, Hugo’s found his best friend, and he won’t leave here without him.

Noah pulls away, trailing his hands down Hugo’s arms, and eventually holding the ends of his fingers. Hugo notices Noah’s twisted fingers, and Noah immediately pulls away, hiding his hands behind his back.

“Are you okay?” Hugo asks.

“Yeah,” Noah replies.

“What happened? And your clothes…” Hugo tugs lightly on Noah’s black jacket.

“It’s fine,” Noah says abruptly, then falters. “It’s… It’s all a bit confusing.”

“We’ve gotta go. The military are here and they’ll take us home.”

“Wait…” Noah’s hesitant. “You’re part of the military now?”

“Well, kind of…” Hugo’s surprised when a look of fear flashes on Noah’s face. “What’s wrong? I’ve come to get you out of here.”

“Then why are you alone?”

“I–”

“Are you acting on the military’s orders, or your own?” Noah demands.

“Noah, what’s the–”

“I don’t…” Noah retreats with cautious steps. “I don’t think this is a good idea…”

“Noah, please–”

But Noah hears something Hugo can’t – a voice in Noah’s black earpiece. The earpiece of the attacking forces.

Outside the door, the dim noise of an engine begins. It’s the sound of a petrol engine, like those used a long time before New Kansai became a society of its own.

“I’ve gotta go…” Noah opens the door, keeping himself facing Hugo. As if retreating cautiously from an enemy. And then he’s gone, running back down the corridor.

“Hey!” Hugo follows him.

Up ahead, Noah throws the warehouse door closed. It slams shut in Hugo’s face, delaying him for a couple of seconds.

Hugo opens the door to the start of gunfire – the military has breached the warehouse. But he doesn’t let this distract him from his target.

Noah disappears behind a row of shelves. Hugo follows him, corner after corner, determined to catch up to him. Noah steals glances at Hugo through the shelves, his face filled with fear.

But Hugo doesn’t notice this emotion. The only thing he notices is that his best friend – who he’s risking his life for – is rejecting the opportunity to come home.

Hugo turns into a row of shelves. At the same time, military shields turn into the row from the other end. Hugo activates stealth mode immediately. They’ll still be able to see his suit registered on their hololens, but he doesn’t want to risk being shot at through reflex alone.

He follows Noah around one last shelf and into an open floor. In the middle of the floor, a small, crude hovercraft prepares to take off.

Noah enters the carrier, and the hold begins closing swiftly. Simon, surrounded by robots, looks out into the warehouse in anxiousness.

Hugo sprints at full speed. The carrier’s almost shut tight, but he might be able to make it.

But, just before he’s at the hovercraft, there’s a deafening explosion from above. The roof crumbles, concrete and metal raining down into the warehouse.

Hugo throws himself backwards to avoid being hit. Crawling into a shelf behind him, he watches the carrier seal itself completely, shutting off Noah and Simon from view.

Then, the black hovercraft lifts off the ground, zooming off into the sky at full speed. The roar of the engine’s almost as loud as the explosion. The remaining ornithopters see it emerge. They turn their lasers on the hovercraft, but it’s too fast for them to track.

His ears still ringing, Hugo sits dumbfounded in the shelf. Debris from the roof falls around him. The shimmers of exoskeleton suits enter the space, even more prominent in the ring of light shining down from above. Their enemies, however, are long gone.

Hugo can’t help thinking one thing: maybe Noah has betrayed him after all. And – if there’s one thing Hugo knows about himself – it’s that he doesn’t let go of grudges easily.