Lightspeed

Chapter 52 (Night 4) (TBOM): I Won't Hide

ARIEL: Dude. DUDE. What the fuck? How much more pain and suffering do you intend on putting me through?! 

Hey, it's okay! Don't worry; I promise things start turning around right here! 

ARIEL: Really?! Is that the truth?! 'Cause throughout this entire novel, you've been making me nothing but miserable! You've taken away my fiancé.....you've taken away my mom.....you might as well take away everyone else I've got while you're at it. 

Would I really do that to you? Loss makes people strong, you know. It builds their character and makes them more mature in the process. Look at how you reacted to Higgins's bullying! The old Ariel would've never had that much restraint! 

ARIEL: What's THAT supposed to mean?! 

Ahhh....umm.....never mind. Can we just continue on with the novel now? Last time, we witnessed the beginning of the epic Battle of MIT, and got to see each and every one of Ariel Axilas's allies fight to their last against the evil Chief Charles P. Higgins and the Cambridge Police Department, while Ariel hid away like a coward!

ARIEL: A "coward"?! 

But things soon came to a head when Higgins lured them all into a trap and threatened them with pain and torture if Ariel's location isn't revealed to him. Of course, they declined, and were promptly shot by Higgins's new sonic gun, with their fates left unknown. This time, we see the aftermath, and bear witness to a glorious, heroic emergence indeed.....

ARIEL: .....Now you're speaking my language, author! Let's get to it! 

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Ariel watched with horror as everyone she knew was sent flying by the blast from Chief Charles P. Higgins's truck-mounted sonic gun. Some were moving, but struggling to even hoist themselves up by their hands, like Marle Atkins and Tajwar. Some weren't moving at all, like Herb Axilas and his brother Carmine. Some were trying to move, but couldn't do so because they were horrifically injured, like Silver, Kellan, and Kasim. 

"Guys!" Ariel cried softly from beneath the Mastermind Conspiracy van. She instinctively tried to rush out towards them, but stopped herself; all of her family members and allies were currently incapacitated, and couldn't rush to her defense if Higgins and his men noticed her approach. 

She stayed beneath the van for a little while longer, looking with immense heartbreak at the current state of everyone close to her. She looked at their injuries, their suffering, and, in some cases, their unconsciousness. Her gaze then shifted over to the prison van, which had a still-incapacitated Erica Shields contained inside it. 

What Ariel didn't know, however, was that the recorded clip of Higgins's confession---the one that Erica herself had obtained---had successfully made it onto all of her social media accounts. The entire population of Cambridge, now thoroughly angered at what Higgins had done, was currently preparing to descend on the MIT campus right that moment, and it would only be a matter of time before they arrived. 

But she and her party needed more time, and at the moment, she was the only one capable of buying said time. 

She thought of how much pain and agony Higgins had put her team through. She thought about how he didn't hesitate to use the sonic gun on her friends and family, how he had gravely injured Erica and ordered his men to drag her out of the patrol car, and how he had even previously attempted to use Erica, an innocent person, as a hostage just to get her to reveal herself.