Opifex drove us to Beth’s ship. His eyes grew to the size of moons as he ogled it. In my recap, I might have skipped over the part where we’d crashed in the middle of the street. Laura and Anderson were standing by the ship’s door and rushed over to us as Opifex parked the cruiser. I had regained a bit of feeling, but walking would be a stretch. I was about to try anyway, but Opifex scooped me up again. How could I protest? I understood the need to help that he probably felt.

“What happened?” Laura ran up to us. She poked my helmet like I was a fish in a bowl. Then she sighed in relief. “Oh, good. You’re alive.”

I frowned. “Just ask next time; you know I hate that.”

“You weren’t kidding about teaming up with this guy.” Opifex looked at Anderson, who gave a confused glance in return. “Guess I’ll have to lift that lifetime ban from my shop.”

I could have pointed out that all his customers were trapped in robots anyway, but why would I even think that?

Anderson lifted an eyebrow. “You’re that…guy who owns that one place. Right?”

Of course, he didn’t know Opifex. He’d never visited the shop, even when he hadn’t been banned. These guys had occupied two very different facets of my life. Until now.

Beth poked her helmeted head out of the ship. “About time you showed up! Your friends got the Dwarf victims onboard, so follow their lead. We need to get a move on.”

Beth went back inside without even greeting Opifex. There was no way he would have recognized her with her helmet on anyway. This was going to get weird. Opifex carried me into the ship. Manning and Rebecca were hovering over two unconscious guys in the back—the White Dwarf pilots. Their eyes were shut.

“Opifex? Wander?” Manning jogged up to us with a curious expression. “What happened? Are you both all right? Is there time to hear the full story?”

“Sit. Down.” Beth tapped the ship’s monitor as she spoke. “But strap a medic bracelet onto him first. He wasn’t here when we realized that they’d work again without the tower’s interference. Once everyone’s actually seated, we’re heading to Epsilon.”

“No. We’re not,” I said as Opifex set me down in an unoccupied seat. Manning retrieved a medic bracelet and strapped it to my arm. I barely felt the warm waves flooding my body. “Your warp’s not back yet. We should go to Earth to meet the Oppressed. It’s only a planet away.”

Opifex’s face fell. “The Oppressed? Those gangsters who started the mess down in Red City? What do you want with criminals?”

“They’re not a gang. I think. The Oppressed are good people, and they can help us out. They can even help the guys who were in the White Dwarfs. They love people who hate Frost. What do you say, Beth?”

“I say that I’m done with you pretending you can give me orders.” Beth rose from her chair. I was slumped over in my chair with my little sister looming over me. “We worked together because we had a crisis to deal with. But now? You have no such excuse.”

I scowled. “If you take us to Epsilon now, we won’t go quietly. Just do as I say and drop us off at the Oppressed base.”

“Do as you say?!” Beth deactivated her helmet, showing the anger in her eyes. “I’m not some kid who doesn’t know any better! I already told you that we don’t need your stupid friends. If we want to rescue everyone, we need the AI. Why can’t you ever get over yourself and accept the better option? Or do you just say it’s a bad idea because you didn’t think of it first?”

“Beth?” Opifex’s eyes widened again. Then he shook his head and shoved himself between us. “I don’t know what’s going on, but family shouldn’t fight. Why don’t we compromise? Let’s head to Wander’s destination first. If the warp needs time to recharge, then it can do it there. What’s the harm?”

Beth eyed him as if she were seeing him for the first time. She had never been as close to him as I had been, but he was still a family friend. Seeing him now must have brought back memories: the presents he’d brought us, the family dinners he’d attended. It seemed I’d finally assembled all the remaining pieces of my family under one roof. It just sucked that Opifex had had to lose his in the process…

“Fine!” Beth reassembled her helmet and stomped back to her chair. “We’ll go to Earth. But if your friends have any ships capable of warping, we’re taking those to Epsilon. This is the final pit stop.”

I should have been grateful. Beth didn’t have to listen to us, and I knew she didn’t want to. Before, I would have said, “Maybe part of my sister is still in there.” I was still hopeful, but I was done wasting time with her. Frost was the real concern.

“Wait. Are you coming with us?” I asked Opifex.

He glanced out a window. “The town is gone, just like Ma. There’s no reason to stay. Coming with you is the best way to save everyone, no? It’s what she would have wanted me to do.”

I grinned up at him. I could tell that he had been hit hard by all of this, but something was keeping him going. Good thing too. Because I was a waste of space after what I’d gone through. It was nice to see that he wasn’t letting his baggage get to him.

Opifex sat beside me while Laura and Manning sat across the aisle. Anderson sat behind me. Rebecca strapped the two unconscious guys into seats before sitting beside Anderson. He raised an eye at her. It must have been weird now that he knew who she was. The prison warden and the prisoner sitting beside each other…

Beth announced take off, and the ship hovered into the air a second later.

I peered out the window. It was easy to see just how abandoned this place had become. The sight of discarded cruisers and empty streets burned itself into my mind. I was glad it did. I needed a permanent reminder of what I was fighting for.

We soared into the dark sky. The Sun had completely vanished. The light was gone. Stars popped up in the sky as we approached the atmosphere. It’d be a while until we got to Earth, so it was time for the rest I somewhat deserved. I shut my eyes as Laura chatted with Opifex.

I drifted off immediately. The darkness was welcoming to my tired mind. After pushing myself from place to place for so long, I could finally get some rest—

“Time to get up, bud. Your sister needs you.” A burly hand shook my shoulder. It must have belonged to Opifex.

It figured that, the one time I tried to rest, the universe would pull me back into the fray. How long had I been out, an hour? A minute?! I blinked the sleep from my eyes and examined the environment. The giant green orb known as Earth lingered in the windshield. We’d already arrived? Toxic gas was still swirling around the planet, proof of the damage that had been done in the past. Hundreds of years ago, the AI had fired a weapon known as the Planetary Devastation Cannon at Earth. It had completely wrecked half the planet and its core and engulfed the rest in unbreathable air.

It sounded bad, but the Oppressed had managed to fix some of that with the help of a prototype atmosphere tower. That was all it had taken to make an uninhabitable planet habitable again. Obviously, Frost had never been interested in restoring Earth. She considered it the territory of her ancestor, Omen Frost, and she hated that guy.

I still didn’t get why the AI had devastated Earth in the first place. Apparently, they had been made on Earth. Frost had tried to convince me otherwise, but she was a liar. I just wanted to know why they would attack their own home. Was it to cover their tracks? Hide all the evidence of their origin? I could have asked Beth, but she wouldn’t give me a straight answer. If we really were headed to Epsilon, I’d ask the genocidal freaks myself.

“What do you want?” I asked as I approached Beth. My voice was still raspy from my nap.

“Is this really the planet your friends live on?” Beth motioned to Earth. “It doesn’t seem safe.”

“You could have asked me that!” Laura rolled her eyes. “It’s safe, trust us. Just land…Wander, where should she land?”

There was literally only one place where she could land. I told her the coordinates to the base, which I had had to learn due to the off-planet missions I had gone on during our time there. Beth groaned as she flew us toward the planet. Toxic air stained the windshield, tinting the already-green world. Living here seemed like an awful existence, but our friends had shown us that it wasn’t all bad.

Now that I thought about it, this was where literally all our friends lived. I had never belonged with Frost, had I?

“Wander,” Laura said as I returned to my seat, “do you think Kaela will be happy to see us?”

“I know for a fact she’ll be thrilled to see you.” I plopped back into my chair and leaned over Opifex’s wide frame to watch Laura. “I’d bet all my nonexistent money on it.”

Laura stroked her short hair as embers flew off it. A small smile adorned her face. Laura had hated Kaela, but nowadays their relationship was much friendlier. I secretly hoped that it’d become something more, but that was for them to figure out. I was just the guy who’d been waiting his whole life to see Laura happy.

“What about you?” she asked next. “Think Nessa will be happy to see you?”

I felt like I’d just got punched in the chest. “No. Not at all.”

I should have seen that question coming. I turned back to my green window as I thought over my own words. It was extreme to say that Nessa wouldn’t be happy, but after everything that had happened? I knew she didn’t blame me for the loss of her legs, especially because I’d designed something for them before I’d left. Hopefully, she had completed it without me…

The real problem was the fact that I’d left at all. Nessa had abandonment issues. Even before I met Alhabor and learned the full story, I knew that he’d left her. Nessa had her mother, but she was too traumatized by Alhabor’s departure to care for Nessa. That was why Nessa had run away and joined the Oppressed. Since then, she’d never taken kindly to the idea of making friends. Not when there was a possibility that they’d leave too.

Technically, I hadn’t left. I’d just left for a mission and never come back. Surge had probably explained the situation to her…but there was no way she’d let me off that easily. Especially when I was bringing along the guy who’d caused her injury in the first place. She was going to kick Anderson’s butt, and she had every right to. Man, this was going to end horribly.

The ship rumbled around me. I blinked and scanned the window as its green tint faded away. A series of buildings popped up in its wake: a few big ones and dozens of tiny ones. Roads connected all of them, and they were populated by cruisers. It was a thriving town, the complete opposite of what we’d just left behind. It was the Oppressed base: our home.

Rebecca sighed out of relief. “Just as I left it. Given how awful our luck is, I expected it to be in ruins.”

“Maybe this is where our luck turns around,” I said. “We’re long overdue for that.”

Beth scoffed. “Are you kidding? This can’t actually be your base. It’s just a decoy, right?”

“That’s what I’m saying.” Anderson pressed his face to his window. “I remember tracking Genki’s dagger to this place, but I was too afraid to attack it. I thought you guys had cannons and force fields! Now I’m wondering if you even have clean water.”

The ship rumbled one last time when Beth touched down. I recognized this grassy field. It was where we’d fought Rebecca when she had still been subject to Frost’s brainwashing. Good times.

“We’ve landed,” Beth said. “Get the heck out of my ship.”

“Hold on a moment.” Manning stood up. “Weren’t we supposed to park in the hangar?”

I slapped my forehead. “That’s right. Sorry I didn’t mention that, Beth. It’s whatever, though. It’s not like they’ll ban us for parking in the wrong spot. There’s nothing to worry about.”

Beth grumbled. “I can’t wait to be free of you idiots.”

I headed to the front of the ship and walked out the door. Then I coughed as rotten air rushed into my lungs. I hadn’t missed choking on my own oxygen, but I’d get used to it. Again.

Did this place always smell this bad?

A glob of energy zoomed onto my arm, pinning me to the ship’s exterior. The glob was orange, pulsating, and warm. It would probably have been hot if it hadn’t been for my suit. I tugged on my arm in an attempt to free it. The energy budged but ultimately refused to let me go. Then the orange faded to black as the glob hardened. What had been a slimy glob was now a dark block of solid matter. It looked like mud mixed with cement.

“Figures.” I shook my head. “Stay inside, guys! To no one’s surprise, our luck still hasn’t turned around.”

I searched for the glob’s source and realized that I was surrounded by five scowling teenagers. Each held a rifle that glowed the same color as the slime before it had hardened. These hadn’t been around last time.

“Real funny, guys.” I nodded at the cement that shrouded my arm. “Nice welcome back prank. Now let me go. Is there anything that can dissolve this? Are we going to need a chisel?”

“Silence!” said one of the angry teens. “Did Frost send you? Don’t lie, or we’ll shoot your mouth next.”

“Dude, I’m wearing a helmet. Wait, maybe that’s why you don’t recognize me. That or the missing arm. Hold on.” I willed my helmet to disassemble, and swung my head around. I was trying to swish my hair like the models in those commercials, but it didn’t seem to have the intended effect. “Wander Locke at your service. You guys have heard of me, right? Did Surge not brief you?”

A few of them exchanged glances but then went back to scowling at me. I couldn’t blame them for being more naive than infants. I’d never met any of these guys. They might have known my name, but that didn’t mean they knew what I looked like. I could have been a knowledgeable First Division spy.

Who even were these guys? Last I’d checked, Surge hadn’t had an anti-Frost squad ready to immobilize anyone who breathed suspiciously. Actually, having thought about it, I knew who could help me out.

“Rebecca!” I craned my head toward the ship’s open door. “You have some explaining to do. To them and me.”

Rebecca lumbered out and took one look at the kids before laughing. “I forgot all about them. Apologies. They’ve never attacked me before.”

Inasmuch as I wanted to tell her off, the kids’ faces entranced me. Their jaws dropped like they were looking at royalty. It was obvious that they knew her. Even though I’d been gone, I felt offended that they recognized her and not me. Maybe that was my Epsilon Explorer side sneaking to the surface.

“Ms. Rebecca? Then…” The kids looked at me. I just raised an eyebrow to convey that I was done with this interaction. “Wait, he really is Wander! You really are—uh, sorry about this. It’s protocol to engage any suspicious people. Not that you’re suspicious! Well, no. You were suspicious, but—”

“It’s fine. Please just find Surge or something that can get me out of this.”

The five highly trained child soldiers stumbled off in search of their leader. I hoped they would hurry because my arm was getting tired.

Beth strolled out of the ship next followed by the rest of the team. “We saw everything from the ship. Are all the Oppressed members too young to get into an R-rated movie?”

I shrugged. “This is where all the kids who were wronged by Frost or the AI can live in peace. Mostly in peace since they’re still trained to fight and blow things up.”

“If you really need help, I might be able to heat this stuff up and make it crumble.” Laura raised a glowing hand to my trapped arm.

“No!” If my arm had been free, I would have covered my mouth at my outburst. Laura shrank away like she always did when someone raised their voice. “Sorry. I just meant that it was okay. Save your energy.”

Laura nodded despite her frown. Dang it. So maybe I wasn’t completely over my fear of fire. Why couldn’t she have gotten water powers instead? At least then our team attacks would have made more sense…and been less bright.

I have no idea how much time passed before I noticed a cruiser in the distance. I dismissed it as a passing cruiser, but it was headed right for us. The speeding vehicle was black and white. I knew only one cruiser with those colors. It slowed down a few feet away. The door creaked open, and a gray leg stomped out of it. A body draped in a black and white cloak followed. I wondered if he actually liked those colors or just wore them for cool points.

“If all of you are here, it either means that the Moon is secure or it’s been lost,” said Surge N. Antant as he marched up to us. “Considering how past events have turned out…I can guess the answer.”