The Delta Disaster

Part five

*first person POV*

"You two can go ahead without me. I'm gonna go try to find some black tea and a microwave or a stove or something. We can meet back up at the building for all I care or the store; I just need some tea that's not coffee." I tell Jack and Parker and head off in the opposite direction. I wander aimlessly for a snack bar or small store. Shit. I really don't know the All-Star mall as well as I thought I did. I finally find a small restaurant with a fridge that luckily has a few bottles of tea in it. I take a bottle and look at the date of it. Still good. The snap of the cap sounds and I sip some room temperature black tea. I go out of the food place and walk around a bit. My legs take me to a part of the mall I haven't been to much but I start to hear voices. Welp I'm going insane.

"We won't go down without a fight!" A familiar voice states.

"What do you want out of this anyways?!" Another familiar voice says.

I try to get closer. I run up some stairs to get to some higher ground. The closer I get to the voices the more I start to realize who these people are. These are my friends. Fuck... FUCK, holy shit this makes so much more sense now. I peer over the edge of the railing and see my friends tied up against a post in the middle of the wide hall of the mall.

"She's not going to come. We've been here ever since this second quarantine started." Arson says. Scheisse kicks Arson with her foot.

"Don't be stupid she'll come. Eventually. We should start screaming again. Someone better hear. HEEEEELLLLPPP!!!" Arson, Scheisse, Tog, and Platypus start screaming for help. I look around to see if anyone is there guarding my friends. After checking I run down and my friends cheer.

"CARDINAL! How did you know we were here?" Arson asks.

"I was here on other business and I was just wandering around the mall and it led me to you guys. Let me untie you all." I start cutting the rope on Tog's hands.

"Wait." Platypus says. We all hear footsteps echo towards us. "Cardinal, you've got to run. Don't worry about us, just run."

"But-" I protest.

"Run!" Scheisse says.

I take one more look at my friends and take off running away from the footsteps. My feet don't even think and seemingly move on their own. It feels like I'm flying but on land and I don't know where I'm going. Eventually I find an electronic map and figure out I'm near the auto display. After I turn the corner I see the entrance and instead of displaying a Tesla, there's instead a cyan Vespa. "Woahhhh. That's cool." I walk closer to the Vespa and see that the keys to it are on the seat. "That's suspicious... is anyone here?" As if on cue the guy from earlier comes through the side door in the display area. "You... Dan."

"That's not my name."

"Well you never gave it to me so I'm just going to guess it. What are you doing here? Also what's with your weird edgy attitude?" I bluntly say.

"My stupid boss brought me here."

"You mean the person I saw you talking with back in the Square?"

He nods.

"So Trevor, why did you need The Tech Treaty so much? If that's what you even bid for."

"That's still not my name. And we weren't after your piece of paper."

"Then what were you after?"

He walks over to a toolbox and pulls out a screwdriver, an expensive looking bracelet with gems in it, and a dull looking letter opener but by Mont Blanc. "The bracelet was what my boss bid for, I bid for the screwdriver for my cousin who's really into sci-fi, and the letter opener is for me."