Lazerlot woke to the sound of Relena’s scream. He saw Noko slide across the floor to Drake’s side, her voice frantic as she confirmed, "He’s alive!"

  ?Lazerlot crawled over, his optical sensors rapidly scanning Drake’s vitals. The readings were grim: heart rate dangerously high, blood pressure spiking, and glucose levels bottoming out. Without a word, Lazerlot gathered Drake into his massive arms to carry him to the back room. As he laid Drake onto the bed, he ran a deep-tissue scan to check for internal injuries; luckily, everything appeared intact.

  ?Before leaving his side, Lazerlot reached into a sterilized medical compartment in the headboard. He pulled out a banana IV bag—a potent yellow cocktail of multivitamins and saline—and expertly tapped the line into Drake’s vein to stabilize his crashing system.

  Stepping back into the main cabin, Lazerlot watched as the two women began numbly putting their shopping bags away. He walked to the spot where Drake had collapsed, picked up the heavy ballistic shield, and locked it back into the gear cage. Once the weapon was secured, the couch slid down from the ceiling, returning the room to its original, unassuming state. The air in the kitchen was thick with unease. Lazerlot poured himself a cup of coffee and leaned heavily against the bulkhead, staring into the dark liquid while feeling the weight of both women's glares.

  "Okay, what happened?" Noko was the first to speak, her voice sharp.

  Lazerlot looked up at her, his optics dimmed. "I don’t know. I was still offline when this took place."

  "But how did you not hear him training?" Relena demanded, her frustration boiling over.

  "Because I was trying to process what happened yesterday during our session," Lazerlot admitted quietly.

  Relena opened her mouth to snap at him, but Noko held up a hand to quiet her. She turned toward the ceiling. "Wait. Bus, are you ready to go? Can you think of anything else we might need?"

  The tablet still sitting on the table began to blink rapidly. Noko walked over and saw the word NO pulsing on the screen, followed by a single word: TRENCH.

  Below the text, a set of coordinates appeared—11°22.4′N 142°35.5′E—along with a single, staggering number: 10,935. Noko stared at the coordinates. For some reason, they looked hauntingly familiar, but she couldn't quite place where she had seen them before. Noko walked over to the counter and was about to ask for a world map when a holographic projection shimmered down from the ceiling. "Coolest bus ever," Noko whispered under her breath, giving the counter an appreciative pat.

  ?A small, blinking point pulsed at the exact coordinates from the tablet. As Noko zoomed in, her eyes widened as the reality of the location set in.

  ?"Fuck me," Noko breathed.

  ?"Sideways," Relena added, her voice trailing off as she stared at the depth reading.

  ?"Over a monkey barrel," Lazerlot finished, his low, metallic tone matching their disbelief.

  ?The three of them stood in a unified silence, the shared sentence hanging in the air as they stared at the blinking dot in the center of the deepest trench on Earth.?"We aren't diving anywhere yet," Noko said, her voice steadying as she looked at the GPS. "The Trench is half a world away, and Drake looks like he’s been through a rock crusher. We need a shoreline. We need to ground ourselves before we go under."

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  ?Relena nodded, her fingers still trembling slightly from the adrenaline of the mall fight. She stepped up to the main console and engaged the system. The Bus hummed—a deep, resonant vibration that felt like a heartbeat beneath the floorboards.

  ?"Setting coordinates for the Gulf Coast," Relena whispered. "Engaging Autopilot. Take us down Highway 183, Gizmo. Straight to the coast."

  ?As the Bus settled into a steady cruise down the dark stretch of US-183, the interior lights faded into a warm, amber Night Mode. Noko and Relena retreated to the back room, leaving Lazerlot alone in the kitchen.

  ?"Is the hull ready, Gizmo?" Lazerlot asked the empty air.

  ?A soft, melodic chime echoed as a panel shifted, showing the chassis thickening into a pressure hull.

  ?"Hey, Tin Man," Spike’s gravelly voice crackled from the counter. "You gonna stare at that map all night or are you waitin' for it to grow legs and walk us there?"

  ?Lazerlot didn't even look up. "I am monitoring our trajectory, Spike. Something you might find easier if you weren't occupying a hatchback with 1970s upholstery."

  ?"Oh, low blow! For your information, the shag carpet is a vibe," Spike barked, his icon's claws waving frantically. "Besides, I’m the one keepin' the Gremlin-Tesla docked and sealed. If I let go, your precious little sub-bus loses its getaway car. So maybe show a little respect for the 'little brother' keepin' us aerodynamic."

  ?"I shall show you respect when you stop refering to a trillion-dollar piece of inter-dimensional technology as a 'sub-bus,'" Lazerlot buzzed.

  ?"Whatever, rust-bucket. Just tell the big guy the truth when he wakes up," Spike growled, his tone softening just a fraction. "Tell 'em once we hit those coordinates, Texas is in the rearview for good. No coming back."

  ?Lazerlot stared out the front glass. "I know. But the Dragon needs his fire back."

  ?In the back room, the banana bag was finally empty. Drake was still deep in a restorative sleep, but his color had returned. Noko and Relena sat on either side of the bed, their eyes fixed on the shimmering bands on their fingers.

  ?"When did he even do this?" Relena whispered, her thumb tracing the hammered metal of her ring. "He was with us all day yesterday. He was training until he collapsed. When did he find the time to breathe, let alone make these?"

  ?"And why wait until we were asleep to give them to us?" Noko asked softly, looking at the glowing opal. She held her hand up to the dim light. It wasn't just jewelry; the metal felt warm, pulsing with a faint, steady energy that felt like Drake’s heartbeat.

  ?"I don't know," Relena murmured, leaning closer to Drake. "But they’re perfect. It’s like... I can feel him in the grain of the metal. His love, his soul... it’s all right here. He didn't want to say it. He wanted us to wear it."

  ?Noko nodded, her eyes misting over as she squeezed Drake’s hand. "He was giving us a reason to come back from wherever the Bus is taking us." Relena and Noko started to walk back into the kitchen, but they froze just outside the doorway when they heard Spike and Lazerlot speaking.

  ?"They have to know, no matter what," Spike’s gravelly voice growled, the digital distortion in his tone sounding like grinding gears.

  ?"Yes, I know. But not yet. We need to reach the coast first," Lazerlot replied, his metallic voice heavy with a weight that wasn't just physical. "Drake needs this. He needs this."

  ?"Does Drake really need this, or do you?" Spike barked back. "Is this about him, or is it because it was your fault?"

  ?The silence that followed was deafening. "What are you talking about?" Lazerlot asked, his optics flickering a dangerous red.

  ?"You were the last vote, L.T.!" Spike growled, his digital icon flickering frantically on the screen. "You were the tie-breaker, and you said yes. Don't you remember?"

  ?In a rare flash of mechanical rage, Lazerlot slammed his massive fist toward the counter. But the Bus was faster; the kitchen surface slid out of the way just in time, leaving Lazerlot’s hand to punch through empty air as the floorboards groaned under the shift in weight. Outside in the hallway, Noko and Relena didn't flinch. They shared a long, silent look—not of terror, but of cold calculation. The shock of the secret had already passed, replaced by a sharp, unspoken plan. They didn't just have a destination now; they had a mystery to solve. And if Lazerlot wasn't going to tell them the truth, they would find a way to take it.