Summer is almost upon us once again! Hide your wallets! Hide your tickets! Nobody is safe!

  Elen: I’m in the middle of a frozen hellscape, what the hell are you talking about!

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  “I can’t believe you couldn’t get all the cookies,” Anis was teasing me, but that still didn’t change the pout on my face. I saved more than half, which was better than nothing. But I still didn’t like it. One would think with the ability to augment my reaction time, catching a bunch of falling cookies launched from a plate would be a pretty simple task, right?

  Wrong!

  I was still figuring out everything, but it seem like stuff directly attached to my body, or held by my hands, was effected by my ability. So yes, I could get under a falling cookie, but gravity was going to be going slow until it got to the plate. And I couldn’t just, shotgun it from one cookie to another. Keeping it on for too long wasn’t good for me, but using it in extremely short bursts had its own issues.

  “You saved so many!” Alice, bless her heart, was going to treat it as a good thing. Which, I did save more than I thought I’d be able to.

  “Thank you, Alice,” I grinned back, gently putting down the plate towards the center of one of the nearby tables. Hopefully, that would be enough to keep any further spills to a minimum. That didn’t solve the question of where the milk went, but with the suspiciously moist spot on my back and the look Ludmilla’s face told me that it wasn’t much of a mystery.

  That, and the abashed look on Alice’s face said clearly that this was far from a one-time thing.

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  “Bye Rabbity! Bye Anis! Bye Rapi! Bye Neon! Bye Cinderella!” Yeah, the nickname was going to stick, I’m afraid. At least from Alice. I don’t know why Johnson and I were the only two to get any, but I guess we left that much of an impression.

  “Bye Alice! Bye Ludmilla!” I shouted back, waving back at them, with similar declarations coming from the rest of our squad.

  A bit surprised that Neon didn’t get one, though. The two got along swimmingly. A bit too swimmingly. I hoped that they didn’t pick up any of the others’ eccentricities. I don’t think I could handle being called Cinderella of all things on a daily basis. I’d make an exception for Alice, because she was nice and was the one who came up with it. No other exceptions!

  “So, Cinderella, huh?” Okay, one other exception.

  “It fits a bit better than Rabbity,” I huffed, a slight blush on my face. I know about Alice in Wonderland. Okay, I knew about the Disney version of the story. Probably not the best way to know about the work, but my parents very much made sure I grew up in a Disney household.

  “Really? I think it suits me just fine!” Johnson smiled at me, a bright, cheery grin that made me blush even harder. It took every ounce of willpower I had not to blurt out my thoughts on what exactly that meant. Did this man not realize what type of words were coming out of his mouth? There were only so many ways someone could take that!

  Before the silence could get awkward, Anis, who looked like she had just rolled her eyes, spoke up.

  “Would the two of you stop flirting already?” Her voice was a tad bit annoyed as she moved past us, my face blushing even more. Was I flirting? Had I been flirting this whole time?

  “I, I,” stammered, looking at Commander Johnson as he scratched his check, a faint dusting of red coloring them. Oh God, I had been flirting with him! On accident! It was on accident!

  Please, someone get me a hole I can hide in!

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  “Is something wrong?” Neon asked as we continued to make our way through the snow. The weather had been considerably cooperative. The Kansan in me didn’t trust it. The weather was staying much too stable for far too long.

  That was not the problem, though. I really wish it was the problem, because it would be a problem that was out of my hands and urgo, not one I’d have to worry about anymore. That, wasn’t entire a lie, I would still worry about it regardless. But it wouldn’t be a problem I didn’t have any degree of control over. Not that I had much control over what was bothering me, either.

  But I had somewhat more control.

  Yeah, time to just rip the bandage off. Something was screwy.

  “I’m pretty sure Chatterbox hasn’t moved at all. I’ve been trying to keep tabs on his movement, but I don’t think he’s moved an inch,” I said, getting three more sets of eyes on me in short order.

  “Isn’t that a good thing? If he hasn’t moved, then he hasn’t moved, right?” Anis’s gave me a confused look. One would think that, but.

  “But we have. Even if Chatterbox’s position hasn’t changed, our position in relation to where he is should have,” Rapi said, nodding once.

  “Meaning Chatterbox is mirroring our movements precisely to give the illusion that he’s not moving,” Johnson’s fingers were scratching his chin.

  “Or he’s found a way to prevent me from detecting his presence beyond being in my range,” while Johnson’s suggestion was doubtlessly spooky in its own right, I’d always been quietly concerned about my own hypothesis. Chatterbox was strong and smart. If there was a Rapture that would be able to figure out how to block out my abilities or turn them to his advantage, it would be him.

  “Ludmilla mentioned that there has been problems with radio’s in this region as of late,” Rapi continued. I don’t know if my ability to detect Chatterbox would be countered so easily. But at the same time? Chatterbox would have put more effort in it than me.

  “So you mean we'll have no idea where it actually is and have no chance of backup?” Anis complained with a huff.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “I mean, if Chatterbox is using jamming, then there is a good chance he can't pinpoint me, either. At least, if my understanding of how jamming a radio works is correct and my ability to detect him works on radio based principles,” I shrugged. No, I wasn't freaking out internally, I wasn't freaking out internally at all!

  “A good chance?” Good, I wasn't the only one freaking out about that prospect either. And it wasn't as if I ever really confirmed that he could also detect me back. Christ on a stick, we really were on a hell ride without a padel, weren't we?

  “At least Chatterbox wouldn't have been able to get his hands on the data, right?”

  As one, all of our heads turned towards Neon.

  “What did I say?” She looked at each of us confused as I clamped down on the urge to just swear. Swear at every God to have ever existed, alongside several of them that didn't, and just damn every single one of them to their mythological equivalent to hell.

  If he knew about the data existing, even suspected it existing, he could have had the place attacked. Drive off Unlimited, so he could do whatever he wanted with the data. Such as using it for himself.

  Or plant a false trail.

  “Ludmilla would have noticed if something had messed with the data,” Rapi frowned, but she seemed to be considering the worst case scenario.

  “I mean, would she?” I started, tapping my chin. “Not even accounting for human memory being infallible for a second here, but Ludmilla can't use the computer herself. That means Alice or another member of Unlimited is putting in the data. The Raptures had the place for some time. It's plenty of time to just tweak the information slightly. To make it look correct at a glance, but shift some dates around, slide the latitude and longitude around, maybe even play with the patrol paths shape.”

  God, this was a nightmare. This is why I hated smart opponents.

  “I mean, how would he know that we were going after that information in the first place?” I clamped my mouth shut, hard. I had no idea how much Johnson and the others were in the know when it came to Anderson's ideas. If Chatterbox knew of our intentions before we left the Arc? The odds a mole jumped up from likely to certain.

  Why not say it out loud? Because everyone was already spooked, and out of all the things I could say, that would make things so, so much worse than they already were.

  “And even if he did, then why leave the date for us to find? Why not just delete it? Anis continued, even as I kept my lips tight.

  “As a trap,” Commander Johnson said aloud, giving voice to my fears. My certainty.

  The only reason was to lure us into a trap.

  Returning empty handed wouldn't be great, but Anderson would understand. But it would leave Ludmilla and Alice deep in hot shit and in what was very hostile territory. If Chatterbox could worm into its systems and hijack the place then, it would be easier now. Unlimited was far more vulnerable now than they had been before.

  My fingers gripped my rifle. I didn't like that one bit. We may not have the firepower to take out Chatterbox, but leaving him in the area was unacceptable, either.

  “So if it's a trap, what do we do?”

  That was a good question. We'd all faced Chatterbox before. It was a trap. Why it was a trap, how he would use it, and what was the trap were all questions to be asked. But it simply was a trap.

  There were a few options. Spring it and try to find a way around it. That wasn't ideal. It required knowing more about what the trap was, beyond it just being a trap.

  The second was that we tried to find Snow White anyway. Which was much easier said than done. Finding someone like her in the snow was going to be like playing Where’s Waldo on hard mode.

  And I wasn't good at Where’s Waldo.

  Not to mention the scale. A centimeter or two on a map scaled to outright kilometers or miles, depending on what the scale was. So the map, even if it was only shifted slightly, might as well be close to unless.

  What was it going to take for Chatterbox to permanently fuck off? Launching him into the sun?

  “I think I have an idea,” Commander Johnson said at last, as we all looked toward him.

  I really hoped it was a good plan.

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  It wasn't the greatest plan I had ever been privy too. But it was better than anything we had, and the risk should be low. Scouting the meeting point at an extreme distance, and seeing if we could figure out how Chatterbox had messed with the map from there.

  If Chatterbox were smart, Snow White should be further along on her patrol route. Something he granted, didn't have much control over, outside of throwing Raptures in her path.

  As for what that meant right now? I'd gone slightly ahead, more than a ridge over, looking down the scope of my rifle into the sloped valley. I almost couldn't make it out at the distance. But what I saw? Trap.

  A stationary figure, cloaked in white, no movement, not even a twitch, beyond the gentle breeze. Simple, yet possibly effective if one wasn't paying attention.

  I gave a quick signal to the rest of Counters, confirming our suspicions. But as I pushed myself up, something felt unsteady. The snow, once steady enough to support my weight, suddenly became unsteady.

  Every instinct flared, no, screamed to life in my head as the movement sent a signal right into my brain.

  “He's!” I didn't get any further, supercharging my reflexes as something closed around my foot. Snapping my rifle down, I unloaded into the snow. But even at point blank range, the damage didn't last as Chatterbox’s body emerged from the snow beneath me in slow motion.

  Even as I felt the heat begin to build up in my spine, glared at me for what felt like minutes, but was barely seconds at most. Firing off another clip into his ugly mug was the most I could do, before my regular perception of time resumed. Then Chatterbox threw me aside like a rag doll, over the ledge as I continued to take shots at him until gravity pulled me out of sight.

  That was when my wars let me hear it. The rumbling. I managed to turn my head a few seconds before impact, seeing a wave of snow stretching out beneath me. I hit with a crash, being swiftly buried and carried away by the tide of snow, noticing in the back of my head that Chatterbox was already moving away.

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  “Pull!”

  “Be careful! We don't know how damaged she is!”

  Voices were the first thing that greeted my pounding head. That, and several other alarms that I had slapped a mute button on. I let out a groan, pushing myself up slightly, but barely able to do more than that because of the weight on my chest.

  “She's conscious, at least.”

  What happened? The last thing I remembered was.

  Chatterbox.

  “I'm going to kill that fucking piece of shit right now!” I shouted, even though I knew there was no way I could follow up on such a threat. I was being rescued, that much was clear. Neon, Anis, and Rapi. But there was someone missing from that list.

  Whatever Chatterbox had been doing to lock out my ability to detect him was no longer working, and he was on the move. Did he have to stay still to get that hat trick to work? Did he think I died? Or did he just not care anymore?

  “I think she's a bit more than conscious.”

  After that comment, I felt a grip on my legs, and I was gently but swiftly pulled out of a mound of snow with a groan.

  “Thank you,” I said, looking between Neon, Anis, and Rapi with a slight smile on my face. But I noticed someone was missing.

  “Where’s Commander Johnson?”

  There was a look on all their faces. Even Rapi's. A look of sadness.

  “Captured.”

  The words made my blood run cold. What use did a Rapture have for a human? Nothing good. There was nothing good that could have come from that. My fingers clenched. My teeth ground against one another.

  I had no clue what Chatterbox did to stop me from detecting him. All I knew is that it wasn't working now. I could track him. Could we run him down? Maybe, maybe not.

  With a scowl, I stood up, ignoring the damage the avalanche no doubt caused, grabbing the rifle, surprisingly intact after the fall that was sticking out of the mound of snow like a tombstone.

  “Well, you pulled me out for a reason, right?” I was already moving, heading towards the signal. Was it a suicide mission? Probably. But I was past caring about that. I was going to end that fucker even if it killed me!

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  “How can you even detect him now?’ Anis asked as we ran through the snow. Chatterbox’s trail weaved through the snow. His size made his passing clear, but with wide bounds, he made following him tricky if you didn't follow the trail.

  Me? I didn't need to follow a trail. I knew exactly where he was now, not where he had been. That was all I needed to hunt him down.

  “I don't know why I couldn't in the first place! Maybe he needs to stay still. Maybe he needs to focus on it. We can beat the answer out of him once we have Johnson back!” I continued to pump my arms and legs, operating beyond the human limit.

  “Elen is right. Right now, rescuing the Commander is our top priority,” Rapi said, but I could feel the judgement in her gaze.

  I get it. I fucked up. Commander Johnson got captured at the end of the day because of my negligence. I should have brought up that Chatterbox hadn't been moving sooner. That way, we would have had time to come up with a better plan. So yeah, I was going to own up for that mistake when it came time to.

  But at the moment, we had far more important matters on our plate, like dealing with the results of my screw up.

  “The good news is he seems to be going slower than normal,” I was going to interpret that as good news. It could be any number of things. But I needed to look on the good side right now. “We should be able to close the distance if we keep up our pace.”

  Now that was the real question. Despite me dope slapping the mute button, it was doing nothing to actually fix anything. Shocking. Something was going to give out, and give out sooner rather than later. Arguably, taking care of the damage would help the commander more in theory.

  But we were already getting close.

  I don't know why Chatterbox had stopped. But him doing so was going to make me grin.

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  “What is?”

  We'd finally arrived, cresting over the hill, even as my body cursed at me in protest. I was expecting it to go into full revolt soon. The scene before us was not what I had been expecting.

  Chatterbox crawling along the ground like a worm brought a smile to my face, made even better by the fact Johnson looked like he was okay. Even Snow White was there, standing almost as still as the bait Chatterbox had used.

  But my eyes weren't on any of that. Not for long. The clouds parted, sun streaming down. Some would attribute such a thing to a divine miracle.

  But what descended from the sky was no angel. It was a monster. A massive Rapture that almost looked like an Armored Core, floating down on steel wings. Chills ran up and down my body as it got closer and closer, gripping my weapon as hard as I could.

  It was Rapi’s voice that filled the silence, confirming what reverberated in the back of my mind.

  “Heretic!”