Endgame
XxxxxxX
"A piece of my soul dies every time some jackass in a comic book says some variant of 'we have laws to control guns, so why not laws to control people with superpowers? It's the same thing!' Hey, Senator Strawman! Why don't you call up any expert in Constitutional Law in the country and ask if there's actually any legal precedent on the books for laws that regulate human beings in an identical manner that other laws regulate guns?"
"You know what they'll tell you? That the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution entirely forbids you from doing something like that, you asshole!"
"Treating human beings under the law as if they were property is called slavery, and we already had a Civil War for the specific purpose of making that shit 200% super-double-plus-ungood illegal!"
"I won't even go into how you would formulate any law aimed only at "super-people" without somehow violating the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. 'Separate but Equal' is a legal concept that the United States has specifically rejected by way of Constitutional law."
– Worldmaker, explaining his motivation in writing this story.
XxxxxxX
"Jesus Christ! Give me that god-damned thing." Alex swiped the pistol out of Deadpool's hand, looked around for a moment, then pitched the weapon into the melee surrounding her. The pistol flew straight and true, bouncing off the back of the Iron Patriot's helmet with a loud CLANG! And leaving a dent in the armor's nickel-titanium skin. The armored hero immediately nosedived into the ground and buried himself shoulder deep in the dirt. Alex watched just long enough to confirm that the James Rhodes wannabe was out for the count.
She turned back to Deadpool. The Merc with the Mouth was holding up the hand that had just a moment before been grasping the pistol and waggling his fingers. "All five of them still attached! Good job! You're getting better at that maneuver."
Deadpool dropped his arm and glanced down at the unconscious Squirrel Girl. "You were a little harsh on her, don't you think?"
Alex looked askance at her now-unconscious attacker and shrugged. "What do you want? She attacked me with no hope at all ever winning. Seriously, the unbeatable squirrel girl? She was a joke character that someone took seriously enough to make mainstream."
"Sure, but so was I, remember? I started out as a parody of the DC character Deathstroke, remember?" Deadpool pointed down at the unconscious super-heroine. "She's got just as much right to be a hero as… wait… no, that analogy doesn't quite work, I guess. What I mean is…"
"I'm not a fan of yours either, Wade." Alex muttered in frustration, interrupting. "What are you doing here, Wade? Why are you bothering me?"
Deadpool straightened his shoulders. "Well, that's a bit complicated. I mean, it's not that complicated, it's just not something I can explain in simple, two- or three-word sentences. You see…"
"Could you just get on with it?" Alex gestured to the battle around her. It was clear that the good guys were winning, if only because the bad guys had a lack of experience, and that Alex herself had taken out three of the bad guys' heavy hitters.
Deadpool paused. "As I was saying, it's a tad complicated. I'm here for three reasons, really. The first is simple: The Department of Justice hired me to help bring you all in if you can believe it. I've decided I'm going to crawfish them – I'll keep they money, sure, but I think that there's a movie on somewhere I could go see instead of fighting people. Maybe I'll go see "300" again. Nothing like oiled-up gladiators, right? And I've only seen it eight times; it keeps getting funnier every time I watch it."
Alex crossed her arms over her chest. Unfortunately, she did so in such a way that they effectively lifted her already impressive bosom, so they became even more pronounced.
"Uh… yeah, that happened." Deadpool said, staring right at Alex's tits. "You do that on purpose, don't you?"
She opened her mouth to respond, but he beat her to it.
"Anyway, the second reason I'm here is because Alexi offered the writer double-or nothing against him putting me into a scene where I blatantly stare at your tits and make comments about them. So, the writer just made a hundred bucks because Alexi never learns." Deadpool grinned behind his mask. "But it's the third reason you want to pay attention to. He visibly tore his gaze away from Alex's expansive chest and nodded.
"The third reason I'm here is to serve as a sort of deus-ex-machina reminder for you and the rest of the Avengers that you've forgotten something." Deadpool shrugged. "Not your fault, because the truth is, the writer forgot about it first, which is why this particular hanging plot thread exists. But it is important, and sort of changes the direction the story is going in. Or should that be 'changes the direction in which the story is going?' I can never remember. Anyway, you should listen to this next part."
Alex grimaced. "Okay, what?" She could not keep the skepticism out of her voice. "What are you going to say that I should listen to so badly?"
"Tell me. Do you remember that Air Force Base? The one in Jersey that had been shut down and sold to a development company to turn into a new housing development and a shopping mall? The one that…"
"… the one that Hydra took over." Alex's eyes widened and her mouth fell open. "Oh shit. No, I forgot all about it."
"Yeah, I know. So did everyone else because the writer himself forgot about it. There was supposed to be this big fight back in Chapter 30, right after you found it, but he lost that plot thread and wrote you guys into an entirely different direction." Deadpool shook his head. "It's sad, but not totally his fault, really. Brain damage plays funny games with your memories."
Alex ignored the non-sequitur and concentrated on the important information. "You're telling me that Hydra…?"
"Hydra is taking advantage of all this chaos…" Deadpool waved an arm toward the battle, just in time to see Spider-Man bounce the joker calling himself Hawkeye into the air using a trampoline made of spider webs. "… to launch their big assault. If they succeed it won't be pretty."
Wade Wilson reached up and took off his mask. His face was atrocious to look at, but somehow it reminded Alex of the guy from that frat house movie, "Van Wilder." Deadpool stared her right in the eyes, all joking, hilarity, and silliness gone from his features.
The mercenary leaned in and pointed directly at her face. "This is a job for Superwoman." It was understated. Calm. Said with no histrionics. A statement not a declaration. But it caused a shiver to go up and down Alex's spine. And then, just as quickly as "Serious Deadpool" arrived, he was gone. The disfigured man grinned at her – making his face that much worse – gave a jaunty wave, turned, and walked away. He was humming the Superman Theme by the immortal John Williams as he did.
Alex was flat-footed for a moment, but then rose into the air. "Tony, Cap… I have it on good authority that Hydra is about to launch a major attack on the US. They are using this fight as cover for it. Can you guys handle this? I need to take care of it."
"Hydra is doing what now?" Cap asked through the radio. His confusion was echoed a moment later by Iron Man.
"You guys remember that closed-down Air Force base in Jersey? Apparently, some serious shit is going down! I'm about the only person in position to take care of it." Alex sped through the sky above New York City on a parabolic arc destined to drop her on New Jersey soil.
"Holy shit… no, I completely forgot about it." Iron Man said.
"Yeah, me too. But apparently while the cat's away, the mice will play." Alex said, speaking quickly. "I'll be back as soon as I can."
Captain America added one last comment: "Keep us updated."
XxxxxxX
Major General Gregory McGrath (US Air Force, ret.) smiled as he watched the first of two helicarriers rise past the open roof of its construction bay. It had taken close to five years, and billions of dollars spent, but Hydra now had three of the flying weapons platforms, making them easily the equal of SHIELD.
It had been his uncaring nature when it came to civilian casualties that had eventually ended his Air Force career. Of course, McGrath was far too connected politically to simply discharge dishonorably. Instead, he had been "retired" and offered no choice in the matter. It still pissed him off that he'd been undercut by colleagues he'd known for 30 years. Pissed him off enough to march right into Hydra's arms.
And now here he was, in command of Hydra's own air force. It was beautiful.
The plan was simple: The Hydra weapons platforms would move about the country, eliminating the foes of the organization using the highly accurate computer targeting of each carrier, plus the highly destructive weapons systems. They would start with the superheroes. Sure, there would be some who could survive a burst from a phalanx canon, but that was what the cruise missiles were for.
The slaughter would commence in less than an hour. It was going to be glorious.
"Radar warning." The soldier at one of the consoles said, suddenly. The general turned toward him, but the man immediately followed it up with, "Wait… no contact. Must have been a false contact." General McGrath nodded to himself. Such things happened all the time.
"Continue operations. Notify me when we're at cruising altitude." The General turned back to his own console. He sighed. SHIELD had decades worth of building these things and operating them. Hydra had all of SHIELD's data, but no amount of computer simulations and tests could predict the bugs that popped up when you put new technology into action.
There was perhaps fifteen seconds of silence before an alarm rang out. "SECURITY ALERT. THERE IS AN INTRUDER IN THE MAIN COMPUTER CORE." The voice sounded young, probably belonging to one of the young technicians who worked in the core itself. They had all been through basic combat training, but technicians weren't soldiers.
He picked up the phone and tapped three buttons. "This is General McGrath. Tell me about the intruder?" The voice on the other line was succinct. Tall blonde woman, blue costume that showed off an enormous expanse of chest, red cape. McGrath had sat through all the security briefings. He knew who it was, and he knew the threat this woman posed. "Roger. Tell your men to not engage, it won't do any… what?" He sighed again. "I see. Well, the loss of one security team is acceptable. Pull your people back. I'll be there in a moment."
McGrath moved to a panel along side his command console. He removed a key from around his neck and inserted it into the panel, then tapped a code known only to him. He then turned the key.
On the topside of the helicarrier, a set of panels opened and a large missile, laying in a cradle, arose. After a few seconds, the missile fired.
"Let's see how she deals with this." McGrath pointed at the two guards on the bridge. "You and you. You're with me."
XxxxxxX
The kid who managed to get the alarm off lay unconscious in a heap. The other two people in the computer core just stood there like statues, obviously unsure of what to do. Alex strode to the obvious access terminal and started tapping away at the keys.
The side of her that was Xander Harris knew fuck-all about computers. His experience was occasionally playing games on them, and that was it. But Kara Zor-L had both the benefit of being a genius level intellect, being experienced in Terran computer technology, and a breadth of knowledge in Kryptonian computation. As such, it was mere moments before she was in Hydra's onboard database.
"No, no." Alex said without looking. One of the Hydra techs had been creeping toward the door. "Stay right where you are. I can punt you to the moon before you can react, so its in your best interest to act like statues."
She skimmed through Hydra's files, learning about their ultimate plan, as quickly as she could. That meant as quickly as the computer could bring up the information. Much faster than a human could normally read, of course. Within moments she had the entire scheme. The mass slaughter of threats to Hydra, the infiltration of the Avengers. And of course, just what the Chameleon had been up to for the last two years.
It all went onto a thumb drive. All of it. Proof positive of the whole conspiracy.
A quartet of guards rushed into the room and sprayed her with bullets. Naturally, she was unaffected, but the terminal at which she was sitting was torn up completely. That was okay, though, she already had what she wanted.
Alex stood, and in one fluid motion grabbed the seat she had been in, tore if from its floor mounting, and tossed it at the gunmen hard enough to knock them over. She strode past them into the corridor only to stop, suddenly.
In both directions was a wall of guns. Eight men to a side, two rows of four, with the front row kneeling in front of the back row. The idiots had set themselves up so that there was no way they could fire without hitting each other.
To the left, behind the gunmen, was a man in a Hydra uniform with gold stars on his shoulder. Presumably, the leader, this person nodded to her almost amicably and spoke. "Welcome to the Hydra helicarrier Broadsword, Superwoman. If I had known you were coming, I would have thrown a formal reception. As it is, though, we are quite busy so I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to leave."
"Right. Sure. Would that be before or after I break your arms and legs and smash this aircraft into wreckage?" Alex was not in a mood to play. She had seen what they were planning, and it had earned every Hydra soldier on this base an ass-whipping.
"You may want to rethink that plan, young lady. You see, before I came down to talk to you, I launched a nuclear-tipped missile. Its on a parabolic trajectory that should have it crashing into…"
"Don't tell me you sent a nuke towards New York City." Alex could feel her pulse pounding in her temples. This she did not need.
"No, of course not. That would be too easy. Boston, on the other hand, takes you nicely out of the picture long enough for us to be on our way. By the time the missile hits, you'll be too busy helping survivors to stop us." The officer nodded and smiled. "Might want to get on that, by the way."
Alex seethed, but did not stick around. She burst upward, through six decks and into the sun, then took off to the north east. She had a missile to catch.
XxxxxxX
"Well, that was easy." General McGrath said to himself. He turned to one of the soldiers nearby. "Get damage control crews to see about the holes she poked in our decks. Report to me when the repairs are finished."
With that, he walked back to the staircase leading upward toward the bridge. By the time he had reached the control room, he was humming. It was not actually a song, just a tune he was making up as he went along.
"All right people," he said, resuming his position. "Time to…"
"Radar contact. We've got something… looks like a missile, but it's moving too… BRACE FOR IMPACT!" The man on the radar console was almost screaming the last words when the ceiling of the bridge tore open. Superwoman landed on the deck in the center of the bridge. In her hands was the missile, or at least most of it. The top eight feet were present, but the rest of it was missing.
McGrath blinked. The top eight feet. Of the missile. The top eight feet.
The part with the active, armed nuclear weapon, in other words. His mouth went very dry.
"I found your missile." Superwoman said, grinning up at the general. "Wasn't awfully hard. You should have targeted New York; I would not have had time to catch it. As it is…" she waved the weapon of mass destruction around like it was a conductor's baton. "… well, you can see it. I broke it a little. It still has the good part, though."
She stepped to the navigation console and laid the missile had across it. Superwoman smiled at the pilot sitting at the console. "Might not want to fuck with this. Its likely to be touchy."
The hero turned to McGrath, who was wildly waving away the guards who had run into the room, guns drawn. "Oh hey, General Patton. Now that I have brought back your toy, I wanted to tell you my plan. First, I am going to destroy these two helicarriers. Then I'm going to the White House and unmask your agent in front of what's likely going to be three dozen secret service agents." She grinned at McGrath, but it wasn't a pleasant expression. "Of course, you're not really going to be around for that part. Fucking Nazis…"
McGrath finally started to say something in return, but the superhero had already flown out of the hole she tore in the ceiling. Instead, he stared at the disabled, but presumably still active, nuclear weapon just sitting there in his control room.
The shouting from the bridge crew woke him from the daze he was in, and he noticed the rapidly growing shadow. Looking up, the general could only see the flight deck of the other helicarrier, upside down, approaching quickly.
McGrath was beginning to regret his decision to join Hydra.
XxxxxxX
"Cap, Iron Man, this is superwoman. I'm going to be incommunicado for a bit." Alex gripped the second helicarrier by its keel and sank her fingers into the metal. Putting her all into it, she flew in a great arc. It took a moment to build up momentum, but eventually the flying aircraft carrier began to tip, and then careen, until it was hanging from her hands upside down.
"Do you need assistance?" Captain America asked her.
"Negative. Hydra has a pair of SHIELD-style helicarriers. I'm taking them out." Alex dropped the helicarrier she was holding onto the flight deck of the other, with a resounding crash. Immediately both began to fall from the sky. She could hear screams and yells from both crews. Certainly, suddenly being inverted caused injuries on the second ship, and the fact that the first was now in an uncontrolled drop would frighten the hell out of the crew of the first ship. But Alex didn't care.
"We'll alert SHIELD so they can start recovery on the wreckage when you're done." Iron Man sounded out of breath. "We've got this fight just about wrapped up, in any case, so we can assist when you need us."
"There's not going to be any wreckage. Remember what I said to you about SHIELD's helicarrier?"
Alex could almost hear Tony Stark's grin. "You're going to kick us into space. That would be a sight to see. Good luck."
Alex flew under the stacked helicarriers and caught the thing's weight easily. Taking a deep breath and balancing the load in her arms, she willed herself upward. Faster and faster, she climbed into the air. The approximately 730,000 metric tons of metal and plastic and other materials creaked above her as she rose, but nothing tilted too far, and nothing broke off. Alex kept expecting to see life pods or something like it flying away from the helicarriers, but it didn't happen. There were a couple of parachute jumps, but only a couple. She wondered if one of them had been the guy in charge.
She reached space in twenty minutes, already traveling faster than escape velocity. At thirty-five minutes, she gave the helicarriers a powerful shove, and watched as they continued their journey into space. She was cognizant of how many people had died, or were in the process of dying, on both aircraft. But they were Nazis, so fuck them blue. She didn't care.
She watched for another three minutes. If nothing disturbed their passage, they'd likely crash into the moon in the next week or so.
Good riddance to bad rubbish.
Alex turned toward Earth and dove.
XxxxxxX
The moment she was deep enough in the atmosphere, Alex began speaking. "Guys, we're really in the shit. Hydra's been playing a long game. Plans on plans on plans. Do you need me to come help wrap things up there? Because we have to move on this pronto!"
Captain America answered. He sounded winded. "We've got things covered here if you need to be elsewhere. Give us the details on Hydra's plan."
Alex guided herself on the North American coast. She wasn't precisely sure where Washington DC was other than it was between Maryland and Virginia. Unfortunately, there were no geographic map labels in real life, so she'd have to guess.
"You want everything? Or should I give you the Reader's Digest version?"
"Probably best if we know everything, Cap." Iron Man added.
"Check. Go ahead. What was their plan?" Cap responded.
"It was a multi-tiered plan whose goal was the infiltration of the United States government, and the undermining of the various superheroes that culminated in every single one of us declared a clear and present danger to the country. They were going to declare us all terrorists. Even the ones cooperating with the Registration were eventually going to be declared outlaw. The helicarriers were going to be the final solution to the superhero problem. Heavily armed death wagons striking from the sky without warning."
"Okay, so you took care of those. How were they working the terrorist angle?" Iron Man asked.
Alex slowed down as she passed over a city. She didn't recognize any of the landmarks, but she knew that this wasn't anywhere in Florida – she'd made it a point to learn all of the major landmarks in Florida cities. It took her ten minutes to realize she was in South Carolinian airspace. She put the sun on her right and continued flying.
"Hydra manipulated the CEO of a company called "Damage Control" to arrange Nitro's power boost; the CEO figured Nitro would blow up and cause a bunch of collateral damage and his company would sweep in and fix everything for a hefty profit. This caused the national outrage, and calls for the SHRA were, of course, bolstered by lobbying by undercover Hydra agents."
"Holy shit." She couldn't tell, but that sounded like the Invisible Woman. "Tony…"
"Yeah, I know. I was an idiot." Iron Man's voice was shaky as he realized how easily he had been baited into Hydra's trap. "So, what else?"
"You're really not going to like this next part. Remember how I mentioned infiltration of the government? Turns out Dick Cheney is on Hydra's payroll. He arranged it so that the Chameleon could replace George W. Bush shortly after Bush won the election. The Chameleon has been in the White House since the inauguration."
"What happened to the real Bush?" Captain America asked.
"I'm betting he's in a shallow grave somewhere in the Texas wilderness," Iron Man responded.
"Good bet. There wasn't any information on what happened to Bush in the Hydra database, but seeing as Hydra is Hydra, it's a sure thing he's not alive anymore." Alex paused over another city. Baltimore. She was almost to Washington.
"Guys, that puts us in a really bad position," Captain America began. "If you unmask the Chameleon, even if you do it on live television, all that means is that Dick Cheney becomes president. There's no provision in the law for removing a sitting president or vice-president without an impeachment."
"I'm sure Speaker Pelosi would be fine with beginning impeachment proceedings, but would Cheney get convicted?" Alex dove down into Washington D.C., landing silently on top of the Washington Monument. There, across the monument's grounds, and the Ellipse, and the President's Park, was the White House. "What do we do?"
"Not much we can do." Captain America said. The man sounded exhausted, not just physically but emotionally.
"Do you think the American people would put up with a Nazi as president?" Alex asked.
"I'd like to think not, but given how politically polarized things are these days?" Again, Captain America sounded beaten. "I don't think anyone ever anticipated this kind of situation."
Alex gritted her teeth and closed her eyes. She couldn't believe she was thinking about doing what she was thinking about doing. "There's another way. There's a way out of this. Its just… not a very pretty solution."
"Hey! No! You cannot mean what I think you mean!" Iron Man was almost yelling into the comms.
"What is she thinking about doing?" Spider-man asked. He was echoed by several others.
"I want her to say it." Iron Man said, coldly. "I want to hear her say it."
"I can remove Cheney from the equation and do it in such a way that no one would ever know it wasn't natural causes." Alex said. "I mean, the guys in his late 60s and he's got to be a good 80 pounds overweight. People will buy that he had a heart attack. It would even be painless."
There was silence over the radio.
And more silence.
Finally, "I can't believe we're even contemplating this." Surprisingly, it was Iron Man and not Captain America who objected.
"Its not my first choice of action, but we can't leave a Hydra agent in the White House. We just can't." Alex was begging someone, anyone, to come up with a better plan.
"No… there's no way… that's too far. Even for… just no…" Iron Man spoke finally. "Do you have evidence that Cheney is Hydra?"
"I've got a thumb drive with Hydra's files on it." Alex fingered the compartment on her belt that held the small device.
"Okay. Okay, good. We're going to unmask the Chameleon and make our accusations public against the Vice President. We'll send copies to the media." Tony Stark was sounding as emotionally exhausted as Captain America had been. "And we'll just have to trust that Pelosi can take Cheney down."
Alex swallowed, heavily. "What if she can't?"
"Then we cross that bridge when we come to it." In the end, Captain America had the final word.
Alex nodded her head, knowing that no one could see her do it. She looked again at the White House, this time pegging her vision up telescopically. She could see movement in pretty much all the windows, and on the breezeway as the guards moved about.
"All right. I'm going in," she said.
XxxxxxX
Alex landed on the White House lawn, took a quick look around, and strode toward the building. The guards, both Marines and Secret Service, noticed her immediately, and gunfire followed. She let it continue for as long as it had to; until the guards got the idea that gunfire just wasn't going to cut it.
She stopped in front of the main entrance. A collection of guards were standing between her and the doors. One or two had extendable batons in their hands.
"Good morning. I'm here to see the president. Right now, he's being led to…" she peered through the building's superstructure. "A room in the first sublevel that has what looks like solid steel walls. I should warn you that you're not going to stop me. I should also warn you that the man you are protecting isn't the president, but an imposter. I'll give you a couple of seconds to process that."
She counted to three mentally. During this sort-of-three-second period, the men rushed her. It didn't matter. On the three count she blurred forward, weaving through the men so that she never injured any of them. The doors to the White House were, surprisingly, mostly glass, but it was the heavily reinforced bulletproof kind. The door was secure with a maglock, but that took less than a second for her to pull loose. And then she was inside the White House itself.
The place looked magnificent, and Alex wished she had the time to take it all in. Instead, she moved quickly around a sea of living statues, only taking her eyes off the Chameleon long enough to navigate.
Alex arrived at the safe room after it had been sealed, not that it mattered. She sank her fingertips into the metal of the door and pulled, peeling it back like the skin of an orange. She timed her entrance of the room in such a way that, when the guards finally noticed her, she was standing right next to the fake president.
"Good morning, folks." From the sound of the snapping fingerbones, the punch the nearest Secret Service agent landed against the side of Alex's face was serious. "If one of you could get that man to medical attention, that would be great." The Chameleon was trying to get away from her, but once she had a hand on his shoulder, and was exerting pressure, the Hydra agent stopped moving.
He didn't stop shouting, however. "Get her!" The Chameleon screamed. "Stop her! She's here to kill me!"
Four guns rose in her direction. The lead agent yelled, "Put up your hands and back away from the president!"
"He's not the president." Alex reached up with her other hand and grasped "George W. Bush" by the top of his head. Using just enough pressure, she began to lift the mask away. There was a gunshot, and a whining "veerp" sound as the bullet bounced off her chest and into the ceiling. "Also, I'm bulletproof. But anyway, let me introduce you to Dmitri Smerdyakov. Former agent of the KGB, current agent of Hydra. Master of Disguise. As I said, he's not the president."
Under the George W. Bush mask, Smerdyakov wore his trademark featureless under-mask. Alex reached under the mask's jawline and pulled it away as well, revealing an unassuming generic face that could have been unnoticed in a crowd. But it was definitely not George W. Bush.
The agents lowered their guns and stood silent, in shock.
Finally, the senior agent spoke up. "So where is President Bush?"
XxxxxxX
Author's Notes
1. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is the property of Warner Brothers in conjunction with Mutant Enemy productions. The Marvel Universe is the property of the Walt Disney Company. Power Girl is the property of DC Comics, which itself is a subsidiary of Warner Brothers.
2. I am constantly making edits to this story, correcting some grammatical, spelling, and punctuation errors, including adding missing words, correcting whatever misspellings I find that escaped the editing process, and so on. I also occasionally tinker with the language I used. In any case, its slow going and gradual because I don't have any sort of beta reader helping me with it and because of my physical situation. So, if anyone spots any errors, please feel free to let me know. I need all the help I can get.
3. This story has its own page on TV Tropes. Due to my long-standing argument with the people who run that site, I am not allowed to update it myself. If someone wants to go over there are tinker with it, please do.
4. Just to issue the usual warnings, there is explicit language in this story, but no explicit sex. The lead character is a gay woman, so if the idea of two women getting together offends you, sorry, but there are other stories out there you might enjoy more than this one.
5. This is the last chapter of the story, barring the epilogue. For all that the storyline is simple, and that it is shorter than most of the other chapters, it took me a while to pin down. And yes, I consciously left the ending ambiguous. As I said, there is an epilogue coming in Chapter 33.