PonyBoy33:These assholes freaked out my mom. Let’s tear this place apart. They gotta be around here somewhere.
“Roger,” I said, “tell Lulu it’s time!”
A moment later, Lulu roared so loud, I could hear her.
“You assholes think we’re really on this stage? We’re in the barn, fuckers. Come and get us!”
My heart hurt at the thought of the barn, the hive, that attic, finally getting destroyed. It didn’t seem fair that we’d have to sacrifice it for this.
I suspected the barn was already heavily damaged, if not destroyed by this point. The thousands of pounds of printed explosives we had placed under the floorboards and the hundreds of explosives I’d personally filled into the crawl space, however, seemed to still be intact. We were just waiting for them to get a little closer.
FelixtheRat:The wall is down! The wall is down! Everybody charge!
Docking soon. Please wait.
ThePinnaclecame into view as we turned toward it. The silver behemoth was surrounded by ships similar to my own coming and going. I quickly tried to examine the exterior of the thing, looking for the Moderators, but I couldn’t see them.
“All four Moderators appear to have detached from thePinnacle,” Roger said. “That is unfortunate. I suspect they’re likely on missions to cut off our connection, which means they are currently destroying all the communications satellites, possibly in an attempt to stem the tide of domestic phone attacks. They do not know I am already based Earthside. They likely don’t think it is possible. As of this moment, both connections—the one on theForlornand the one onAdios—are still working normally. I will let you know if I detect any attacks on the generation ships.”
Now entering the repair bay.
A countdown appeared.
“Roger, it’s saying the repair will begin in two minutes.”
“Okay,” Roger said. “The honeybee units you are carrying in your backpack have their orders in case I go offline, but I will begin the mission soon.”
PonyBoy33:It’s a trap! Run! Run!
“Wrong barn, motherfuckers!” Lulu roared.
“The explosives have detonated,” Roger said.
I quickly hit the pass-through on my visor. Lulu remained at the front of the stage, head lowered. She’d removed Mr.Gonzales’s giant hat, and she held it in one hand. I could see the tears on her cheeks. A moment later, we all heard the explosion. Even this far away from the farm, the walls shook. On the other side of the bar, the Belly-Rubbed Pug sign that mirrored the one on the outside fell off the wall, which caused Cindy the pig to snort in dismay. Betty Sue and the rest of the chickens scattered. Yasmine, the holographic pole dancer, flickered.
“Christ,” Sam muttered, “I hope the others were far enough away.”
“May I remind you all that you’re still live on stream,” Roger said in our ears. “It appears we have successfully killed most of the invaders, but unlike the previous evenings, they are allowing those with insurance and those not completely destroyed to return to the battle to hunt for the survivors. Also, the stream on Real-Friends was shut down. It appears the Tuneage account will also soon be shut down based on the warning message we just received. The Pig Plus Some Chickens account is still streaming with forty-five million viewers, and I have multiple backup accounts available while we still have a connection.”
“What about Rosita’s documentary?” I asked as I reset the pass-through. The repair bay came into view. I was being lowered feetfirst into the bay.
“The account on LoftBase is still showing the stream, and it is being watched by seventy-five million viewers. The download-now button has been clicked approximately twenty-five million times, and the documentary is already being re-streamed on multiple platforms. Both LoftBase accounts—Rosita’s Zapatero Films and my APig Plus Some Chickens—have cleared a significant number of donations in the past hour as well. Unfortunately, as both are new accounts, we won’t be able to withdraw those funds for ninety days.”
I put down my drumstick, and I held out my left hand. A moment passed, and I felt Rosita’s shaking hand in my own. I squeezed it, and then I went back to work.
Chapter 48
Repairing now.
I no longer had control of the mech, but I could still see. They wouldn’t let you control these things while you were in thePinnacle, lest some idiot should go on a rampage and damage everything.
“Interesting,” Roger said. “The repair bay is in the very back of the ship. I am uploading the map of the location. I will update as necessary.”
Several arms reached out and removed the damaged leg from my mech. A splint appeared around the area as the printing gel was injected. The rapid repair process would take only a minute. We had to time this next part precisely.
Please wait.
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