Mother Earth had seen and “heard” what had gone on in Tail’s attempt to snag Varmint, but Tail had only ended up losing his guns. Mother Earth was very worried that this was the end of Tail.
But Varmint kept his nose pointed in the air and Mother earth saw him say, “Because of you inviting me to join you with our noses pointing up, I am going to give you a thirty second head start before I hunt you.”
Tail said nothing and ran toward a house that had a woods out back. Mother Earth timed Tail and he took 20 seconds to have the building between him and any shots from Varmint. Varmint remained still until he counted out the full thirty seconds.
Now Mother Earth had a choice. She could follow Tail or Varmint with the scope. She had planned out that she would follow Varmint. Varmint was slower than Tail; it’s just that he had that amazing endurance and would easily catch Tail at the end of the day.
She told the spy satellite to change to infrared as Varmint came up to the woods. This enabled her to track him. She knew her tracking would be okay as long as he didn’t go into a building. Confident of her abilities she began thinking ahead.
She got a Russian translating app off of the Pentagon computers. She then went into the Kremlin’s computer system. It took less than a second to get in.
She had actually used that brag to Tail. She had said she could get into any computer system in less than a second. But really, it was less a brag and more an assertion of ability.
The translating slowed her down a bit but eventually she found the link up to all the submarines at Russia’s disposal. She had hoped for one in Hudson’s Bay but was happy to find one even closer – in James Bay off Moosonee. She gave the order and it rose to the surface.
There were various missiles it could launch but she was happier to find a long range drone on board. She took over it’s electronics and then launched it. At the pace it was going she estimated that it would get to Varmint in two hours.
So she bided her time following Varmint. Who in turn was following Tail. On the other side of the woods, Varmint broke into a house that Tail must have broken into earlier. This worried Mother Earth for a few moments as she could not see Varmint. But he came out a different door sneezing. Mother Earth decided Tail had put pepper on his scent trail and Varmint didn’t realize it until too late.
In the two hours, Varmint passed at least 5 cars. Since Tail hadn’t hotwired any of these she realized that’s a skill that he probably didn’t have. If he ever got out of this alive, that lack of skills would need to be addressed.
Finally the two hours were up and Mother Earth could also see Varmint through the drone’s camera. She came in low with it and began shooting.
Varmint started doing the “dance of death” as every bullet made his body twitch a bit. He could still move because of his bullet proof outfit. He ran immediately to a house as he figured out that the bullets were coming from the sky. The drone circled and circled and Mother Earth guessed that Varmint wasn’t coming out for any reason. At first Mother Earth hoped that Varmint would come close to a window so she could snuff him out with the whole drone crashing into him. Wherever in the house Varmint was, he wasn’t near a window.
There was, however, a propane tank in a barbecue right beside the house. Mother Earth tried shooting at it until she was out of bullets. She was desperate now and launched the full drone into the barbecue and wall.
From high up she could see the explosion. The house burnt up in minutes. There was no sign of Varmint leaving. She watched until the volunteer fire department showed up. They sprayed water on it from a tanker truck but really it was too late for the house.
That night Mother Earth still hadn’t heard from Tail. But still she couldn’t say he was safe, anyway.
The next day the fire department had found the body of an adult male burnt to death. Mother Earth breathed a sigh of relief. Still, where was Tail? He was still on the run. Perhaps he had run out on the whole idea of being a hero. Mother Earth needed a superhero to be a superhero herself. Maybe she would have to look elsewhere.
THE END (for now!)
