Surprise Kidnapping [1]

Gio did his best to worm himself into the nearest seat. 

"Hey, you good up there?" He yelled, getting Ricky's attention. 

He couldn't see his friend clearly, but soon enough, Ricky stuck his arm out and flexed. Gio could almost hear the grin on his face.

"I'm good. If it weren't for you, I don't think I'd even be alive, but somehow I only have some scrapes and cuts."

Ricky didn't seem concerned at all with the massive catastrophic event that happened behind them, but looking back at it, it was more likely that he hadn't seen it at all. 

The Hammer was made to be a silent killer. It sent out a small shockwave as it landed, but the sand and dust it kicked up made it look like an ordinary sandstorm. Those happened all the time in the Wasteland. 

"Did you see what happened back there?"

"Huh? You bragging about your aim right now? I saw it, don't worry."

"No, why the hell would I be–"

Gio almost wanted to facepalm, but it was better this way. What Ricky didn't know wouldn't hurt him. As he held down the words that wanted to come up so desperately, he decided to change the subject.

"You know the way to the hospital, don't you?"

It wasn't even a question where their immediate next destination was. 

"Hospital? Do we have those?"

"Yeah, idiot. Have you never seen the Old Lady and her people?"

"I mean, sure, but can they do anything about…"

Ricky didn't finish his sentence. Gio couldn't see him, but he could see Gio. The Old Lady knew medicine and she spread it to people across the land. All of them were skilled enough to help with anything ordinary that happened, but this…?

This level of injury couldn't be treated by the ones who'd do it for free.

They had to either find an actual hospital somewhere or they needed to approach a black market healer, which never ended without someone getting scammed.

Plus, though Ricky wasn't aware, something like black market healing was the worst possible thing for Gio specifically.

Nevertheless, Gio was right. They had to find a hospital or someone who could heal him. He looked like he was on the edge of death to the point where Ricky could hardly understand how he was operating so normally. 

He wasn't.

"Khhh…!"

Gio was in the back holding his groans. The adrenaline wore off, and all of the pain he had been ignoring popped up in his face and forced him to look it in the eyes. There was a searing pain across his body. His head, his hands, and his chest were pulsating strangely, making it hard to focus. 

He was doing his best to use past experience to keep himself sane, but his current body wasn't used to this kind of stress. 

"Huu…"

He took a deep breath and looked at the passing scenery outside the window. 

'The first step is done. From here, I'm free.'

He was finally out in the world without anything holding him back. The moment he was healed, he could start working towards his original goals in the 6th Stratum.

'Right. It's all just a few weeks away…'

"...what the hell is that?"

Gio's optimistic thoughts didn't last very long. All of a sudden, he saw several shadows swoop down from the clouds. 

Blue afterburners gave away their identities, and as they descended further, the branding on the sides of their machine bodies made their affiliation clear as well. 

'Hmm…'

Gio's eyes narrowed.

'Four omnicopters and two starjets escorting a zephyr. That kind of fleet can't be carrying an ordinary squadron.'

The fleet moved in silence. The technology used to propel those aircrafts was specifically created to avoid any sort of detection. 

In fact, in humanity's arsenal, the zephyr was the best stealth plane for most use cases. Considering its price, it couldn't be beat.

However, even if every military tried to have more than a few zephyrs on hand, they weren't given out to any stealth squadron in the world.

They were given to hand-picked squadrons who proved themselves worthy of such vehicles.

The reason why such a squadron was in the Wasteland didn't need to be questioned after the Hammer was just dropped, but…

'Why are they here?'

More than that–

"Hey Gio, you see them following the truck, don't you?" 

Ricky's hesitant voice spoke the thoughts in his mind. Neither of them were left guessing about it for very long. 

Before Gio could even answer the question, the fleet steadied itself above the truck. The zephyr opened a set of doors on its underside and activated some sort of system.

VOOOOOM!

The winds kicked up as a hazy blue light shone from a platform on the zephyr's underside. All of a sudden, the truck slammed down into the ground, practically crushed to a stop.

As Gio and Ricky watched, the vehicle they sat inside was pulled into the sky like it was made of feathers.

"Hey! Hey! Hey!" Ricky shouted, banging against the window in a panic.

"What is this?! We're innocent people, you know! You can't do this to us!"

Gio sighed and rubbed his forehead. Evidently, this kind of situation wasn't entirely strange. Usually, scenes like this could be seen when criminals were being hunted down. 

Only, the two of them hadn't committed any crimes?

'They wouldn't use these measures if it was just a matter of stealing a vehicle.'

If that was the case, they wouldn't have destroyed the vehicle, right?

As the two boys reacted very differently, the truck was safely brought into the zephyr's bay. The doors below closed and created a floor, and only then were they dropped again.

Ricky breathed a sigh of relief when he felt solid ground again, but he very quickly realized the situation they were in.

"Uh…"

His face instantly paled. His hands shot into the air.

"I'm unarmed! The kid in the back has two broken arms so even though he's armed, he can't shoot!"

It was a terrible introduction to give to the ten soldiers surrounding the vehicle with weapons drawn, but it was the one Gio had to deal with. 

The doors of the truck were flung open and guns were pointed inside. 

"Remove yourselves from the vehicle with your hands up. If I see you reaching for anything, I will shoot."

Ricky was dragged out as those words were spoken. He yelled and tried to demand softer treatment, but that only made them treat him worse. 

The trunk was opened to reveal Gio, who was almost given the same instructions until the soldiers noticed his state. 

He was given much more leniency and was aided out of the truck while being stripped of his armaments. Being empty-handed left a sour feeling in his mouth, but he couldn't do anything about it.

'At the very least, they're ordinary soldiers. It would be much more difficult if they were Evolved.'

Because if something went wrong, Gio was still confident against unevolved people. 

Once they were out of the car, Ricky was led and Gio was carried deeper into the zephyr. 

'A 3005 model…it feels so outdated.' 

The zephyrs that would be invented in the future would leave the models of this era looking like rye bread next to a full-course meal from a prestigious restaurant. 

Still, even in this era, they had all the basics down. Gio thought they'd be going to the interrogation wing, but that wasn't the case at all.

Instead, he and Ricky were brought to a sterile white room lined with six hospital beds and two strange-looking chairs.

'Haha…'

It was a bit odd, but in the end, Gio could only laugh.

They'd been brought to the medical room on a zephyr.

A single room that contained much better technology than any hospital that existed in the entirety of the Wasteland.