There was still a lot of adrenaline in the house after Cal caught his girls up on what they had missed. So, after checking the cameras to confirm all-clear, he moved everyone outside.
V and Cecil were loudly recounting the entire night's events, as if they hadn’t all been there.
Maria seemed mildly in shock. She had finished one beer alarmingly fast and was already halfway through her second.
Cal leaned against a post near her on the porch, watching his family with quiet satisfaction.
Everyone had held up well. Even his horses hadn’t panicked.
Cal didn’t know it, but Nugget had laughed very hard at the dumb herd and their snobby stallion as they ran fleeing.
"Idiots!" he had yelled. "The metal bugs can’t hurt you! They just make noise!"
Until the ones that shot smoke got a little too close to the paddock. Those, he didn’t like. So he had gone into the barn and had a bite to eat, waiting for things to settle down.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Now, Nugget was listening to Tracer talk about how she had bitten one of her new friends after he cried because the door hurt him.
She felt conflicted about it, but at the time, it had seemed correct.
Junkrat, listening nearby, was proud of her.
Finally, Maria spoke.
"This is your life? Bad food, scary men, and a house infested with the devil?"
"?Por qué quise venir aquí? ?En qué carajo estaba pensando? ?Todo era tan bonito!"
Cal grinned.
"Yeah. Big night. Weird future. Feels… significant."
Savannah, thinking about the collection of fantasy novels that lined her bedroom, announced—a little too loudly for anyone’s liking—"End of act one!"
—
Diamondback had added Maria to the Friends & Family list.
Without being asked.
Because it had calculated, to a greater than 99% probability, that Cal would want it to.
And now Diamondback watched its charges.
Ensuring its secondary subroutines continued monitoring the cameras and seismic sensors periodically.
They always did.
But it checked anyway.
