Buggiez.

I quickly averted my eyes from the flesh scramble I made below in case Luha was watching and turned around hastily.

Behind me, there was a group of kids holding their heads tightly and crying. Compared to me they were whiny little babies. But then again, I was a man who faced war while they were infants who played fortnight VR. I didn't want to be rough with them. I didn't hate kids, and I could strangely sympathise with their state.

Too bad, I didn't have the time. I looked at the converging dots up on the map.

"Umm.. You are all from the Mech's club right?" I asked as politely as I could.

The sound of sobs. But it was only a matter of time before the older, more stable ones took charge. Some consolation and the pats on backs. Everyone recovered as quickly as they could. They probably knew their situation was dire.

"Y-yes." A young boy finally answered while getting up and looking at me.

"Who is he?" I whispered into my lens.

"Hito-san vice leader of our club." Luha answered.

"Competent?"

"Plenty."

"Good."

I could maybe rely on him a little bit. While the number of kids in my custody wasn't a lot, the number of enemies was. I had to ensure that no one messed up at any point along the way.

"There are 4 buggies downstairs and around 19 of us. Can we all fit inside?" I asked.

"A buggy can fit 4 on the seats and one could be stationed between the front and the back." Hito said.

"I see."

Luha and I would go in the same buggy. And for safety have the two younger members with us. The rest I will distribute alternating on ages.

"Who here knows how to drive them?"

Only a person raised her hand but it was shaking… She was clearly in no shape to ride the thing. Welp.

I looked at the corner. 45+ minutes until the battle starts. The dots started to disperse around the campus.

The terrorists were suspicious. We had successfully run out of time.

"Luha… do the buggiez have autopilot?" That could have been our saving grace. Either that or hiding the kids in here somehow while I run away with Luha and some really young kids. I had my priorities straight.

"Yes. I did put that system in."

Noice!

"Rune, can you get a small team to pilot them?" I'm not technologically illiterate. Sure, I haven't studied up on it as much as I would like to ideally. But I at the very least knew how hijacking worked.

I also know that autopilot on such a small scale meant that there was a certain network that the cars used to move around.

"If I can get in. Luha-chan, what network does the thing use?" Rune asked.

"We use a personal one... uhh here's the key."…

Their conversation continued in the background as they tried to get their stuff together.

I started heading down the staircase as the others followed.

"Try not to look at the centre… It's a whole mess." I alerted them quaintly.

But they remained silent. While walking I turned my eyes sideways and saw the brutality I had just committed. Well, the terrorists had it coming. Coming to kill kids was totally on them.

Suddenly my lens went red. On the map, I could see that two hostiles were headed in our direction.

SHIT! WE RAN OUT OF TIME MUCH QUICKER THAN I EXPECTED!

"Hurry up!" I ran all the way to the buggiez. The others followed. Calling it a buggy might be a gross simplification of what this unit really was.

Reinforced metal. Thick tinted windows. Two seats up ahead and two behind with plenty of room between them. A piece of retractable glass sunroof. The tires were huge and the body looked solid.

It was dark gray with gold highlights.

There were golden rails running that lead to the bunk behind. Perfect for outdoors stuff, but this might become a problem considering the fact that the terrorists might get on it.

"Luha, could we cover the bunk in flames?"

"It should be fine. The metal wouldn't melt. The glass… might. No- it won't actually we added some stuff to it. A normal flame shouldn't be able to melt it."

I got the thumbs up.

"Great." I turned around towards the rest. "Poor oil into the bunk."

"Bunk?"

"Is that not what it's called?"

"I think the word you're looking for is... bed."

"Whatever! We don't have the time to correct my lack of voca- You know what? Just get to it!"

"Yes sir!" Hito and his group went around the room.

I heard steps and some steps and then a thud.

God damn it. Why did I leave this stuff to these nincompoops? They barely hatched out of their eggs!

I turned around and saw a girl on the ground while Hito was going over to help her. Now I watched enough slapstick comedy routines to know where that was going. So I intervened and helped her up before she dragged more people into the oil with her.

"You know what? Just arrange yourselves outside every buggy. 3 older kids for 2 younger ones." I said rather rudely. "As for the oil... I'll just do it myself."

I carefully navigated around the periphery to that one rack where the machine oil was kept and then bent down. There was coal and there was petrol.

"Why is there coal here?" I asked Luha. Petrol worked as pretty good fuel for engines but coal was-

"Barbeque."

"Ah." Well, coal worked splendidly for what I needed it for right now.

I grabbed a bag or two and distributed it amongst the groups.

By the end of around 3 minutes there was a bed of coal inside every bed in the buggy.

Then I poured some petrol on top of it. The black rough coal was now shiny.

"Step inside. Younger kids in the back and older ones up front and the space in between. Turn on the ACs." I waited for all of them to go in and lit the thing.

The fuel burnt violently and was extremely hot. Just a small price to pay for temporary safety.

In my group, I was seated up front in the driver's seat, while everyone else arranged themselves.

"Rune… Start driving… We're ready." I said. If push came to shove I would grab the wheel, but it would be my first time driving.

"Okay." Rune announced.

I heard the engine rumble and the buggy started to move and then to accelerate at speeds that made my neck jerk. And accelerate it did even more. For such a squared of design it was surprisingly quick. In fact I think that the weird design, instead of making the buggy aerodynamic made it completely attached to the ground. It felt like instead of flying off a cliff we would just ride down it. Even if we tried to jump off.

The car never deviated from the path.

Whoever designed this machine outdid themselves. Oh wait, it was my little sister! I'm so proud of her!

Our buggy pulled up right next to the path and I saw the door next to me.

"Ah, open from the other side. I'm here." I clarified. "I think we'll need an actual driver now… And the other buggiez to follow the main driver." It only made sense considering that instead of going on a predetermined route we had obstacles this time.

"Who's going to do it?" Rune asked. "I have a team here for slight adjustments but having a main driver to follow is the best way to go."

"I'll do it." I said. I did play racing games before. Even ones with steering controllers. I mean how hard could riding a buggy be?

"No… Let me drive." Luha said confidently while putting her hands on the steering wheel. I got pushed to the other seat.

"What are you on about? How can you drive? Your legs barely reach the accelerator."

"I can do this. I've done this before and while heavy testing too. How did you think this thing got to such a high level of precision."

I looked around at her club members and they nodded. They trusted her driving. And if they did, I had no reason not to.

"Are you sure that you can do it?"

"A hundred percent."

At times like this you need to put your faith in a person. I knew that Luha wasn't the type to be stubborn for pride. If I were a normal person without enlightenment, Luha would have been the smartest person this year. She was more than capable of going through with this.

"Let's do this then."

Our buggy was the first to enter the underside of the roofed path. The others lined up behind us.

"I'll clear as much way as possible."

The engine revved… Over and over.

It was time to escape this place.