Something Better
Teaser #14 - Nerves of Steel
By: Jim Bates
Jen checked her monitor. The energy level was still good. She turned to Karen and asked, “Are you ready?”
“I’m more than ready,” she said. “We can’t let the City get in here to our peaceful valley and ruin our way of life. We’ve come too far to give it up.”
Jen smiled, “That’s the spirit. I told Aaron we could depend on you.”
Aaron turned from his binoculars and said to Karen, “You’re right about the City. I can tell by the drone’s markings that’s where it’s from. Looks like the Regional Food Storage Facility.”
Jen asked, “What do you suppose it’s doing?”
“Probably on a fact-finding mission.” Aaron put his binoculars up and was quiet for a moment. “You know, this can’t be good. It looks like the drone has locked onto a target.”
He turned to Karen. “You ready to take it out?”
“More than ready.” Karen nodded with a determination in her eyes that was coursing through her entire body. She was coiled like a snake.
In the next moment Karen turned to her monitor and checked her calculations and the coordinates one more time. Everything looked perfect. She glanced to friend, “You ready Jen?”
“Yep. The laser is powered up.”
“Aaron?”
“All set.”
“Okay,” Karen said. “Me, too.” She raised her hand above the keyboard, hesitated but a micro-second and then pushed a button. “Say good-bye to Mr. Drone.”
Just as Buck was about to fire the laser, something unexpected happened. The screen went blank. He quickly checked his readings. There was nothing. The drone was gone, like it had vanished into thin air. Buck’s only thought was, Oh, oh. This can’t be good.
He glanced at Rawlings who stared back at him eyes wide, waiting, Benson just knew, for Langer to explode. It didn’t take long, and when he exploded, he erupted like a volcano spewing hot, molten lava a mile into the air, which some might have found pretty, but in the case of Langer, and especially for Rawlings and Benson, it wasn’t pretty at all.
When the drone disintegrated, the cheers from the little building could probably have been heard all the way back in the village, if anyone was still around. But the village was empty with most everybody safely hidden away in their homes. In the end, that was good, because at least Karen and Jen and Aaron saw what had happened, and they had the story to tell when they gathered everyone together later that afternoon.
“Karen blasted that drone right out of the sky,” Aaron said to the villagers as they all congregated in the village green under a warm, sunny sky. His smile seemed to be a mile wide, “It was beautiful.”
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