ARC10

Chapter 31

The sight of two-thousand people in one room, all of whom I'm supposed to keep alive, speeds up my heart rate. None of my training prepared me for this.

They clump together, waiting for doom to strike. I ball my fists.

Hand me a big gun to trail a hovering Invader ship. No problem.

Put me in front of a room of people and watch me splatter.

Umpire and Grant flank me. In their dark ATACs, they appear like enormous tornadoes on my tail. I am a strike of lightning ushering them into the field.

I ascend the slim ladder to the platform. I wish Simon were here to bolster me. I even wish my biological parents were here. I wonder if my father would have been proud—I wonder if my mother would have believed it was in me all along. This is my time to be a leader. It's my moment to show the people of the URE that I care about their safety—we're here to guide them in what could be a heinous cluster of years.

Umpire's gruff "Fuck 'em where they sleep, Boss" crackles out in my earpiece. I look down. Grant gives me two thumbs up.

Each bar is cold in my hand. Anxiety builds. Fingers soak with sweat as I climb higher to reach the platform where I'll tell—

"Good evening, citizens of the URE."

The sonorous voice echoing throughout the hall causes my grasp to waver. My foot falls through the gap in the bars. I cling to the ladder to save myself from crashing to the ground.

Peering past my dangling boots, I catch Grant's worry and Umpire's twisted face, attempting to contain his laughter. His hands remain firmly on his rifle while he observes me from his peripherals. He's a dead man.

So is whoever the fuck is on my platform making my speech.

My jaw hangs open when I catch the bob of salt-and-pepper hair from the one person whom I never guessed would expose herself to the masses. Hayomo is a shadow. What is she doing in the limelight?

"I come before you as your servant and as your leader. You may not know me, but I know you. I have thought about you in my waking moments through each of my hardest trials. I've lived, breathed, and bled this operation for ten long years. The time has finally come to tell you that this is our moment. This is our time." She approaches the railing. She's as composed as every other time I've been in her presence—her arms behind her back, hand to wrist.

From the ladder, I study the reaction of the civs as she speaks.

"I see many faces marked with fear, with sadness, with loss, with regret, with confusion." Her gaze sweeps over the crowd. "But I observe something else." She approaches the railing and clutches it with both hands. "You are living testaments to humanity's hunger for survival. You have obeyed your government. Security was your prize."

Some civs shift their attention to my VIPERs at the two main entrances.

Leaning heavily on the rail, Hayomo whispers to the crowd. "But now, our age of safety has ended."

Stunned, the civs murmur questions.

"On NOHA, we will reunite with the other ARCs and rebuild." Her voice crescendos until she knocks us backward. "We will reconstruct bigger, stronger. This time, no one will take our planet from us again."

The crowd applauds.

My back contorts as I gaze out into the crowd to nod. I hope they recognize my overt faith in the woman on the platform. A united front. If anything, that's what's necessary now.

She points toward the masses. "Citizens of the URE, are you ready to brave the new frontier?"

A few shouts shatter her words.