GLOBAL WARNING

Chapter 8

The final stop. The final test before the escape. The one that mattered the most.

The SLAT.

Strategy and leadership acquired test. Everyone was lined up. No one wanted to fail. Each person was sectioned off into groups, given rounds of which they would feature in a test to get the trophy. This required each soldier to lead a team of AI armies to kill and require an object hidden within the base. This object changed each time. Whatever happened to the trio it didn't matter. They knew that this test didn't define what they were going to do in the future, what they were going to achieve.

The first round began and all the hall went silent. There were four rounds and in each round, there were over fifty teams. It making both an extremely stressful and hard task. However, the largeness of the site proved no match in the task as it was rare anyone had found the object within ten minutes before.

All the leaders were running, no planning ahead just running like a bunch of chickens just before slaughter. Every single one just picking up a gun or a knife or a dagger or a bow and just shooting. No thought behind the action but only one motive.

To kill.

They didn't care mainly about the object, they focused on releasing their animalistic blood lust urges they have hidden for too long. It was terrifying. Tanya sat wide eyes at all the occurrences whilst Hope hid her face with the shaking hands barely gripping onto sanity. Deshi sat there as a tear rolled down his face. A small whisper of "I could have been one of them." fell from his lips as the feeling of his heartbreaking into millions of different pieces.

They weren't animals but were once human beings with thoughts and feelings of their own. Humans that could have been married or had children. Children who have to teach themselves the meaning of life and have no one to guide them, children who will now lie in the rain with only a small rag wrapped around the skinny, starving body they hold. Children who have no idea that their mother or father has turned into just a body waiting to tear something apart.

It wasn't much longer until the object, being a world-renowned silver bullet first used by frost in the name of creating the base. The first-ever bullet to be shot, commemorating the years to come of brainwashing, brutality, and beasts to be made. The winner was a black man who had a rather large nose and scary eyes which contrasted the bounce in his Afro hairstyle. He looked aged, who has seen too much in life but once used that to create a better environment for someone. Someone that Tanya couldn't quite grasp yet. Someone too far out of reach. It all didn't matter now as that man had been drained away and pumped with rage and torture.

The next three rounds were the same. Each member of the trio taking part in one of the three rounds. Hope brought back a gun, one that Frost held deeply to his heart. It was made in the time of world war two and even used in battle. We will never know which country held that power but it had now transferred over to Jasper.

Deshi then won the penultimate round, bringing back a badge of honor. One given to Frost from the previous president who had hoped for a better planet. That present was forgotten but his ambitions weren't. It was unfortunate that when the world was just starting to heal, a small bully with a baseball bat made of ignorance came and beat the shit out of it.

Finally, Tanya won her round. The biggest object featured in the task was the reward. A car that had all the technology from the late twenty-first century. Frost was a lover of cars, especially expensive ones that just so happened weren't too great for the environment. All of the hall had been surprised when it was Tanya bursting through the doors, barging the car right into the middle of it. No lies being told, Tanya did enjoy the superiority for a second as Frost had a frown of anger and disappointment painted on his face.

The final round was here. Four champions stood facing the audience. The bell rang for them to start. The other man dashed off, running like the wind into the unknown. The trio stayed back and planned their strategy.

As Frost questioned his guards on what the three were doing, they had planned each to take a building than when they had found the item to notify the others so they could meet up and safely travel back. Running out of the room grabbing the dust layered walkies, the search began. High and low, wide and far. Each nook and cranny didn't go upturned. Each AI of Tanya's were looking out for possible signs. The advantage of the challenge being whatever the leader thought would transport to the ai's so instead of just one pair of eyes there were multiple.

Just as Tanya was turning over the fruit bowl she found in the kitchen the walkie talkie started to screech. Coming through the frequency was the pitchy voice of Hope saying she had found the object. In a rush, each person in both Deshi and Tanya's army ran to the location designated on the talkie. The only thing is they had to be silent, the other player couldn't catch them or all of them would die.

When meeting up they had reached just outside the hall. The object turned out to be the last living plant. The vial held something the world hadn't witnessed in a long time.

Nature and the purity of oxygen. New life.

No one dared take off the lid as the need to protect over bared the curiosity. Satisfied with the finding, each held a hand onto the vial and walked into the hall. All eyes on them. Growls and gasps shrieked in the hall. The herd looking like each one could have ripped the flesh of each three members with ease, kept growling until Frost hushed them. The fact all three had turned up with the object after teaming up paired alongside that they had done the task in nine minutes and forty-nine seconds infuriated the very minds of each blood boiled soldier.

"I guess you all win." the disgraced clap started from Frost's own hands and soon resonated through the entire hall, pets been put to peace. That was until the unnamed man who had failed in the mission came in to find he was not victorious. Fists clenching, his charge took towards the three. As the attack came from the left, Deshi grabbed hold of the two girls' arms backing them away slowly.

The pace of the attacker quickened ready to pounce until a furious clap of a gun ricocheted through the air. A bullet hole was now formed in the man's head courtesy of Frost himself. That was the moment they had recognized their power. The moment that empowered them to decide the escape was definitely happening. The moment to realize that Frost needed them but wouldn't get to keep them.

Now to only wait for the beep test.