CrudeOil City had towering buildings and compact streets. The buildings were built differently depending on where you were staying. The Scrubs district, on the south side of town, was a good mix of older buildings that lasted the test of time or were put back together in a patchwork of different materials. The buildings in the middle of town, Mid Town, were also a good mix of new buildings using sand-colored cement, glass. Then there was the North Side where the buildings were substituted with trailers to the northwest and Proxima Centurion portable stations to the northeast. The craziest thing to B was that there was plenty of water to go around. There were water spouts that gave you a quarter gallon for every twenty-five cents you put in. The city was set atop of a natural spring where fresh clean mineral water came out and only sometimes natural gas or oil would mix with the water coming up to the surface.

B, Lola, and Mothman set up their base in The Scrubs district. Mothman used his money and influence to buy a hotel room in the possibly sketchiest street B thought Mothman could find. The hotel itself had all the modern comforts of a one-bedroom apartment, but the neighbors were moaning like ghosts every night and banging on the walls. B decided that they were the quietest room in the hotel at night, and possibly the most active hotel room in the day.

After a day of much-needed rest, Mothman left early one morning and came back with a messaging machine.

“Ok hacker man,” Mothman said, plopping the message machine on the desk, “set us up a secure connection.”

“You know it’s not that simple right? I need a place and person to connect to,” B replied with an eyebrow raised.

Mothman passed him a paper with some information on it that looked strangely familiar.

“Wait… this is almost the same address as Jormungrans’s messaging machine,” B stated when he observed the paper.

“Pretty much, it’s the same location but a different machine he’s using,” Mothman replied nodding. “Oh, and it’s a different kind of messaging machine it’s-”

“It’s a Centurion. I can tell by the last few numbers,” B said as he moved to the messaging machine and got to work.

“That’s not a problem is it?” Lola asked as she sat up in bed.

“Not really,” B replied as his fingers flew over the keys and screen of the machine logging in and downloading some security and anti-tracking software, “It’s actually a little easier. I’ve been working with Centurion tech since I was a baby. It wasn’t until about two years ago that I started using Jormungrand’s M3’s...” B’s sentence began to get softer as he spoke.

B began to become very focused and zone into his usual workflow of hooking up secure connections. It wasn’t a complicated process to him, but it was tedious to get everything right the first time before he pressed the button to connect. Especially if he’s going back into Jormungrand’s place.

“Hey B?” Mothman asked, snapping B back into the hotel room, “How long is this going to take?”

“Uh… I’m actually almost done, I need to triple-check my work though,” B replied not looking up from the screen.

“Wow. Is that fast?” Lola asked.

“I think so? I’ve never done this before,” replied Mothman. “Are you sure you did it right?”

“That’s why I’m triple checking it,” B replied in an annoyed tone. “What should I name the username for messaging your friends?”

“Just M and M’s, they’ll know it’s me,” Mothman said.

“M and M’s? Like candy?” Lola asked, surprised with a little laugh. “I always took you as a Snickers guy.”

Mothman smirked and rolled his eyes at Lola.

“All...right. I sent them a message. Now we just wait,” B said leaning back in his chair.

“It shouldn’t take too long in the morning they are usually-” Mothman was cut off by a rhythmic beeping coming from the messaging machine.

“Uhhh… What does that mean?” Lola asked, extremely nervous.

“Relax,” Mothman replied as he reached for the messaging machine’s screen, “It’s just a video call.”

Mothman pressed the accept button on the screen and the screen filled with the video of a wiry, red-headed man with pale skin and freckles on this weary face. He seemed to be in his early thirties.

“‘Ello? Candyman are you there?” asked the red head man. He squinted into the camera. Mothman squatted into the view of the messenger’s camera and pushed B’s chair to the side a bit.

“Oh! There you are,” the cheery voiced man said as smiled into the camera, “Who’s your friend?”

“Friend? Is it her?” There was another voice on the other end that was huskier and the sound of rustling. The redhead was soon joined by another, slightly buffer version of him with slightly shorter hair wearing a red shirt like Mothman.

“Nah, it’s just… no... this guy’s new,” the new redhead said in his ruff voice.

“This is B. He’s our new uh… client. B, This is the McHarvy’s, Mark and Blake,” Mothman said pointing to the one in the red shirt as Mark and the cheery one that answered the call as Blake. “And it was going to be a surprise, but,” Mothman waved over Lola with a smile.

“Guys?” Lola said to the machine as she approached. She took a spot behind B and looked at the screen with a smile and tears in her eyes. “You’ve grown up so much.”

“Dr. Nova,” Blake said with a sigh and a sad smile. Tears were coming to both the McHarvy’s eyes.

“It’s true,” Mark said, looking away for a moment to catch some tears before they fell.

“Dr. Nova I’m so sorry!” Blake blurted out in a bit of a blubbering way, “I was told that my prototype didn’t work and you had died! And I’m sorry that I experimented on myself- even though you said not to under any circumstances. But this was important! Mark and I were planning on just skipping a few years to meet up with the aliens when they landed but then-”

“Blake! Calm down. It’s fine,” Lola said between laughs, “You’re fine. Your machine worked very well by the way. The only weird side effect was my hair turning this weird iridescent blue, but that’s it. Everything else was to be expected, like the weariness, and weight loss.”

“Blue? I thought that was just the screen messing up. Hm…” Blake held his chin and looked like he was lost in thought.

“It’s great to see you again,” Mark said finally.

“Uh… I hate to break this up, but what about my mom?” B said shyly.

“Right,” Mothman said, nodding to B then to the screen. “Mark, Blake, we need to do another rescue mission.”

The McHarvy’s looked at each other nervously.

“You mean, we have to do another rescue mission,” Mark replied pointing to himself and his brother, “You’re a shoot-on-sight target now, M and M.”

“That makes sense,” Mothman said, discouraged.

“What about me?” B asked, desperate.

“I don't see why they would want to shoot you,” Blake said. “But tell us who you want us to get out first. Let me guess, one of Jormungrand’s new ‘employees?’”

“Her name is Diana Prosmith,” B explained, “She’s my mom, she has long blond hair, and blue eyes. Jormungrand shot her and my dad, I think- I know she’s still alive.”

“He was planning on ‘steak-ing’ them,” Mothman explained.

B looked serious at the screen at everyone’s reactions. Lola looked down and away with a sad frown on her face. Mothman looked at the screen with a concerned look on his face. Blake smirked while Mark looked stone-faced.

“Diana will be out as soon as you guys can pick her up,” Blake said.

“She’s alive?” Lola asked in amazement.

“They arrived at the compound…. about a week ago?” Blake asked his brother.

“Yeah, sounds right,” Mark confirmed, still stoned-faced.

“She survived the shot to her leg but she won’t be able to put any pressure on her leg for another three days if we’re lucky,” Blake said.

“We’ll need a car,” Mothman said, “and a place to take her to.”

“I was planning to get her back to the Proxima Centurion’s Colony to be with the rest of my family,” B said.

“Unless Jormungrand doesn’t mind us taking one of his cars, we could just drive her straight there,” Mark joked.

B’s face lightened up.

“What if we did?” B asked.

“What? What do you mean?” Lola asked.

“What if we tricked Jormungrand’s men into taking her to CrudeOil City and we can get her on an airbus to the Colony?” B asked.

“Ok. How?” Mothman asked.

“Well, sometimes get orders from Jormun-Jerk in our M3’s,” Mark said, helping B out.

“I can fake an order coming from his M3,” B said, not skipping a beat, “Down to the address and everything... if you guys need it.” B was excited that this plan was coming together.

“We’ll need it to get by some of those brainwashed people,” Blake noted.

“Alright, we have a plan. Fake some documents saying that Mrs. Prosmith needs to be moved to that station in CrudeOil City. M and M can show you what one of the orders looks like. We’ll take care of the rest. Once you send us the documents, we’ll be there in two hours. Meet us at the cross-section on the North Side.” Blake said cheerfully.

There was a noise on their end of the line, right off-screen. Mark got up quickly while Blake put a finger to his lips to hush the messaging machine. B was going to ask if something was wrong, but as he was inhaling to ask, Mothman gripped B’s shoulder hard enough for him to get the message to not talk. While looking off-screen Blake gave a quick, serious nod, then gave the screen a smile and a wave before ending the video call.