The three of them slowly broke the hug off. But Arnold wasn't done yet. After Nicole mentioned the transdimensional portal, he suddenly remembered something. Something he had forgotten a long time back. He excused himself from the ladies and walked into the washroom, then he immediately called Talos who was taking care of the base in Arnold's absence. 

The communicator rang once before Talos picked it up. 

"Yes, master?" He asked.

"Talos do you still have the file which I told you to take while we were stuck inside the dimensional portal?" Arnold asked.

He didn't specify what he was asking for as it would rule the surprise for Nicole. After all, he told Talos to save it because she liked the sky and shiny things. 

"Are you referring to the photographs, master? I've kept them safe on the local server." Talos confirmed once again but kept his voice low because Arnold was kind of whispering to him as well. 

"Yup. That's what I'm talking about." Arnold replied while he made a man bun out of his overgrown hairs, 'I need to cut em short soon...'

"I've sent you the images, master. You should receive them at any moment now. Would there be anything else?"

"No. Nothing else for now. It's all good." Arnold smiled as the pictures flashed upon his communicator. 

As Arnold looked at the photos, forgotten memories came rushing back to him. He remembered how he had burned the entire forest down and after the sun went down he had expected the jungle to get covered in pitch-black darkness, but instead, two luminous blue full moons took over the sky and lit up the surface. The beauty of that place was astonishing. 

'If this doesn't please her, I don't know what will.' Arnold thought as he stepped out of the washroom at headed back to the ladies.

He sneaked up behind them and projected the images in front of them. The sneaking didn't work though. Nicole could feel him sneaking up, thanks to Donna, who thought Arnold was going to attack them. While Nina was as perceptive as ever. Still, the out worldly images managed to surprise them. 

"It looks so beautiful..." They mumbled while Arnold smiled at them. 

It was true. The scene was majestic. It's not every day one got to see not one but two different moons in a starry sky. 

"Where did you-" Nicole mumbled. 

"I was stuck inside a dimensional portal remember?" Arnold winked at her, "Since modern devices don't function inside transdimensional portals, I told Talos to take a photograph of the sky because I knew how much you liked it."

He then explained to her that he wanted to send her the image as soon as he got out of the portal but things happened and he ended up forgetting about it till now.

"Even now I only remembered about it because of you, as you're the one who kind of reminded me about it."

Silence shrouded the room as the three of them were stargazing at dawn. 

"So, do you like it?" Arnold asked her. 

"I wanna live there." She smiled back, as her eyes reflected the image of the moons. 

****

A couple of hours later...

Arnold and Nina were on their way to the syndicate headquarters. The heads wanted them to attend the meeting as Arnold and Nina were the only ones who were sent to explore the swamps. And now that the forces have been gathered and the expedition was about to begin, they needed intel which the two of them had. 

"By the way," Nina asked while driving the car, "What was this paladin thing Nicole and you were talking about, huh?"

Arnold was hoping that Nina would've forgotten about it since she didn't ask any questions about it while Nicole was over her apartment. But he was wrong. She had heard it all and now she wanted to know more. But Arnold couldn't possibly tell her about it. Not because he didn't trust her but because knowing about paladins might put her in danger. 

He was afraid that if the fact got leaked that she knew not one but two paladins, her life would be in danger as the other paladins might attack her to obtain some information about them.

Although Nina was fairly strong, he doubted she'd be able to defeat a paladin on her own. Nor could he keep her near him all the time. The best he could do was to appoint a few of his summons to be her bodyguard. But then again, doing so would also arouse suspicion. 

In the end, Arnold decided. The little Nina knew about the paladins, Gods and whatnot, the safer she would be. 

"Earth to mister creationist, hello!?" Nina snapped her fingers, "Where are you lost, mister? Although I'm beautiful, I doubt you'd get lost in it now after being inside me."

"You're a barbaric woman, you know that?" Arnold replied. 

"Says the one who keeps beheading his enemies the first chance he gets." She sniggered, "So you wanna tell about the magical word? About the paladins I mean."

"It's nothing important. Just a nickname we used to call each other."

[ That's the best you could come up with? You disappointed me human. And here I was thinking after investing so many points to increase your intelligence, you'd have gained at least a bit... Well never mind that. I think you're immune to intelligence itself. ]

'Oh shut it, like you could've done any better.' Arnold snapped back at the system while half-heartedly wishing for the system to never come online. 

"Oh really?" She gave him a look that pierced through his body. 

"Y-Yeah."

"Look, if you don't want to tell me then don't. But at least try to come up with better lies next time."

[I think this is the part where I say, 'I told you so.' ]

'Shut up please, system-sama!'

Arnold shook his head and replied, "Look, Nina. I don't want to hide anything from you. But I can't tell you about it. Not now, but I promise, I'll tell you about everything soon. Till then, just do me a favour and forget about it. Could you do that for me?"

Nina looked at him. It was the first time Arnold was refusing to tell her about something she directly asked about. But she also knew that Arnold wouldn't lie to her about anything, until and unless it was to protect her. Thus she relented and dropped the topic. After all, he wasn't the only one who knew about these 'paladins', whatever they were. Nicole too knew about it and Nina knew, of she asked her nicely enough, Nicole would tell her all she could. 

****

At the Syndicate headquarters... 

The 12 heads of the syndicate were patiently waiting for Arnold and Nina to arrive. 

"So Nathan, why didn't you told us about your plans to send a couple of soldiers to gather information about the swamps?" Andrex asked for the third time. 

"We had to be discreet for the success of the mission." Nathan gave him the same answer once again. 

"You do know that by unilaterally deciding to do something which could potentially compromise the safety of the nation, you have broken innumerable laws right?" Andrex pressed on while the other heads silently observed the two argue. 

"I did what I did for the welfare of the nation. And since we already knew that there were spies within this very same hall, working against us, I only did what I thought was the best thing to do." Nathan calmly replied hinting at the incident with the white family. 

Andrex slammed his hands on the table and stood up, glaring at Nathan with fury, "You're trying to say there's a traitor between us?"

"I'm only pointing out the possibility," Nathan replied, staring at the nuisance of one of the 12 leaders. 

At this point one of the other members, Madame Roosevelt intervened between them. 

"Sir Nathan, with all due respect. Those are some serious allegations you're throwing around at every one of us."

Nathan averted his gaze from the ape-like man known as Andrex, and focus on the beautiful lady Roosevelt. She wasn't much tall just 5'4", but her beauty could outshine even much younger ladies. She didn't look like it but she was approximately of the same age as Nathaniel. So she was pretty aged, yet she looked as if she was in her mid-thirties. 

"I'm not throwing any allegations, Madame Roosevelt. I'm simply pointing at the obvious." Nathan crossed his arms in front of his chest, "Because the recent attack on LA and my family was staged by one of the people present inside the room." 

All of the head who had been previously silent were now filled with rage. How dare Nathan say something like that without proof? 

"Are you trying to say one of us wants the death of this nation?" Andrex yelled over everyone else. 

"Who said the wolves were here to destroy our country?" Nathan smiled as everyone immediately went silent. 

It was true. The wolves never wanted to attack and destroy the entire nation. They were there only to end the Black Family. This much was clear after rigorous interrogation of the captives. They never wanted to unleash something like Tiamut on the nation. They only wanted to destroy the Blacks, and when they weren't able to do it, they released that monstrosity over Los Angeles to get back at them. 

"They said someone within this country helped them stage the attack and to the best of my knowledge, only the ones inside this room are capable of doing something like that. The only question is who?" 

Andrex was about to say something, but just then the doors were flung open and Arnold walked into the room along with Nina. Upon seeing them, everyone got silent once again. All of them were well aware of Arnold's anger and didn't want to accidentally piss him off. 

They were the leaders of this country, the roots binding the broken country together, but in front of Arnold, they were nothing more than a tried up tree, waiting to fall over.