THE PERKINS' RESIDENCE

Doubled over and through exhausted breaths, Brian was just able to expel two almost-coherent words. "Th-thanks… mister."

"No problem," Jack said as he wrestled with the drone, trapped and entangled within his jacket. Even incapacitated it was still proving to be a formidable foe; its rotor blades still managing to spin around – no doubt tearing his new jacket to pieces, he knew. Fortunately, his own fingers were spared any damage as he grasped the drone's central body, and it was not long before he had disentangled them and had managed to draw it out.

Keeping a wary distance as the drone attempted to pull away from Jack's grasp, Brian said, "There should be a switch on the side."

But the drone's sudden bid for freedom was short-lived and, pulling the drone back, Jack found the switch; putting an end to the madness.

"Thanks," Brian said again.

Through an exhausted breath of his own, Jack nodded, words failing him as to what had just happened. In his line of work he had seen his fair share of drones before. But to put a dangerous thing like this within reach of a child was just a recipe for disaster – and quite possibly a deadly one had he not been here to help – and if he had his way, things like this would surely be banned.

"Sorry about that," Brian said, sucking on his finger where the rotor blades had cut him. "I don't know what happened."

Jack shrugged it off. "No harm, no foul," he said as he let his ruined jacket fall to the ground. "Probably just a faulty wire or something."

Downcast, Brian slumped slightly. "Tell that to my –"

"What the hell was all that about?" Zoe called out, casually walking over to them. "A killer drone?"

"Apparently," Jack said as she kept a cautious distance from him – or at the very least, the drone in his hands.

Zoe then turned on Brian. "There's a reason things like these have ages on the box you know!"

Jack cleared his throat. "Zoe, play nice."

"What?" Zoe snapped, staring up at her father. "That thing could have killed us!"

"Oh, stop being so melodramatic," Jack said, rolling his eyes with a shake of his head. "It's a toy, not a Terminator."

"That's how it starts."

Not wishing to waste his breath any further, Jack turned back to Brian. "Sorry about her, but that's just about the range of her people skills."

Against the intense glower that Zoe threw Jack's way, Brian hid his smile well. "That's alright," he said apologetically in a bid to ease the tension, "but I honestly don't know what happened."

"Don't worry about it," Jack said with a light shrug. He then looked to the drone in his hand. "Hell, this thing has nothing on what we've been through tonight, I can tell you."

Brian's brow furrowed. "What do you mean?"

Jack told him.

"Oh, that's probably Lowjack."

"Lowjack?" Zoe said. "What the hell kind of name is that?"

Brian shrugged. "That's just what people call him."

"Well, he was a long way from home, that's for sure," Jack said. "What is he, a stray or something?"

"Pretty much," Brian said, "but some of us think that he may have been involved in an experiment up at GD. It's the only reason why Taggart would –"

"An experiment? On a dog?" Zoe broke in, aghast at such a notion.

Even Jack couldn't disagree with her on that one, but he now had questions of his own. "GD?"

Brian nodded. "Global Dynamics," he said, looking up as the bleeding began to subside a little on his finger. "It's where my dad works."

"What, torturing animals all day?" Zoe said sharply. "Oh, you must be so very proud of –"

Jack cleared his throat quickly before Zoe could finish with the rest of her retort.

"I don't know what they do up there," Brian said defensively. "Even my dad can't tell me. Everything's classified."

"Classified?"

Brian nodded again. "Speak a word and you'll be redacted like that," he said with a sudden click of his fingers.

"Redacted?" Zoe said.

"Yeah," Brian said. "Billy Jessops mum got redacted last week, and it wasn't a pretty sight. People from GD came and started clearing their house out, and then Sheriff Cobb had to come up to the school to get Billy, and that was the last we ever saw of him."

"They arrested a kid?" Zoe exclaimed.

"What? Oh, no, no, no," Brian said. "He's just going back to live with his dad. It's his mum's who's in trouble. GD doesn't take treason lightly."

Jack was taken aback by that. "Treason?"

Brian was about to answer when the colour suddenly drained from his face.

"Brian!"

Jack and Zoe turned back at the shout, looking on as a woman ran down the road toward them.

Brian cleared his throat nervously.

"Mum?" Jack correctly guessed.

"Yep."

Susan's suspicious gaze passed between Zoe and Jack and the Drone in his hands before finally resting on Brian as she approached them. She looked anything but pleased. "What is going on here?"

Jack was reluctant to hand the drone back to Brian, but he could not deny it to him – and especially in front of his mother. "Now, you be careful with that."

"Oh, you don't need to worry about that, Marshal," Susan replied after Jack had just about managed to smooth things over. "I'm sure he's learned a valuable lesson." Her gaze lingered on her son as she spoke.

Brian gulped, looking down at the drone.

"Well, don't take it too hard on him. Accidents happen to the best of us," Jack said, smiling down at him. "Even if they're not our fault."

Zoe snorted. "You can say that again."

"But anyway, we best be heading off," Jack said. "The car's not going to tow itself out of that ditch, and the sooner I get this one back the better."

GLOBAL DYNAMICS

WARREN KING'S OFFICE

With a calm and composed impression, Warren King, Head of Global Dynamics, drove himself to stay positive as his meeting with his IOA counterpart continued on.

"And just how much longer are we to wait before a demonstration of the next generation of railguns are to take place?" Jean LaPierre asked, looking up from the folder in his hands.

"Doctor's Felger and Angstrom are overseeing preparations for the demonstration as we speak," Warren replied, "and I have been assured that we should be ready sometime later today."

Jean scribbled something down at that. "And are we certain that these…" He paused, looking back to his notes for the meeting. "… thermal issues have been addressed?"

"Doctor Angstrom has been able to rectify the thermal expansion issues that our earlier tests have suffered from, and our initial projections are indicating that we should achieve our target impact velocity of mach eight."

Warren watched as Jean continued writing more notes down. This was all becoming a bit too tedious now. At first it had been the wealth of knowledge at his fingertips that had pushed for him to accept his position – as well as a generous paycheque – but now he did not know how much more of it he could take, and the past nine months seemed like an eternity.

Jean looked up, seemingly happy judging by the slight nod of his head as he wrote. "And now to your own work, Doctor King," he began.

Warren sat up slightly straighter. Finally, he thought.

"When last we spoke, you were in the process of devising a means for adapting one of our existing sensor arrays for –"

"Yes, were," Warren broke in, placing a good deal of emphasis on the last word. "Unfortunately, my other duties have hampered my research efforts, but –" Just then, the telephone on his desk rang.

INCOMING CALL: DOUGLAS FARGO

Warren declined the call. When will that boy learn?

Jean did not press the issue as Warren declined the call. Unless it was another member of the IOA or a high ranking member of the military like General O'Neill, they could wait.

"As I was saying, my research efforts have been hampered by other duties. As you are well aware, levels three, five, six and nine are all being expanded in order to accommodate more laboratories, and with –"

The telephone rang a second time.

INCOMING CALL: DOUGLAS FARGO

Warren quickly declined the call. He could feel the cracks beginning to form in his composure now, and he was fairly certain that Jean could read them too. But if Jean did not care for them, he spoke the truth. Global Dynamics had only been in operation for nine months now, and with half of the facility still under construction and more new employees passing through its doors with each passing day, there was only so much he could get done in a day.

But before he could speak, the telephone rang a third time – and with a caller I.D. that meant only one thing to his mind. Something bad was about to happen.

INCOMING CALL: HOMEWORLD COMMAND – COLONEL PAUL DAVIS