Revenge and Reversed Flight

The acrid tang of burnt metal still hung in the air, a bitter perfume to the lingering scent of Mark’s distress. Anna watched him, a crumpled heap of frustrated energy, his four-hour tantrum finally sputtering to a halt like a faulty engine. He’d wailed, he’d stomped, he’d thrown imaginary rocks at the sky, all because his precious pogodozer had blown up in his face, a fittingly explosive end to his brief, selfish reign over the colossal machine. Serina, bless her patient heart, had sat beside him, offering quiet words of comfort that Mark, in his self-imposed misery, had largely ignored.

Just as a fragile peace seemed to settle over the scorched earth, a familiar, grating rumble disturbed the quiet. A sleek, obsidian van, the kind that screamed ‘danger’ in bold, black letters, screeched to a halt a few yards away. The door hissed open, and out stepped General Stokes, a smug, self-satisfied smirk plastered across his face. Beside him, looking understandably bewildered and a little shaky, was Serina.

Anna’s breath hitched. Stokes, the architect of so much of their recent chaos, the man who’d gifted them the very pogodozer that had just exploded, was here. And he had Serina.