Mathias was the first to open his eyes, awakened suddenly by the sunlight already high in the sky, in the middle of a very sparse blue sky. The song of the birds in the nearest trees was already heard. Mathias is lying on the sand, his military shirt as a blanket and smelling Elizabeth's soft, warm hand in his palm. The young lady was lying at his side, his blue jacket covering her body to keep her a little warm. So, they spended night outside. She opened her eyes, towards Mathias, with a smile on the corner of her lip. He too was glad to see her like that, and said hello to her by a little kiss on the corner of her lip.

(Elizabeth): "That night was like a dream. I almost wish I would never wakened from it."

(Mathias): "I have the same feeling." He said in rising and putting on his shirt, while Elizabeth rubbed her eyes and put her jacket in the stillness, admiring the nature which awaked around them and the water of the river, shining like crystal under the sunshine. In her mind, Elizabeth remembers this pleasant moment last night ..... She and Mathias, lying on the fine sand .... Him, leaning over her and hugging her cautiously ... Their lips meeting, then after, Mathias kissing her in the neck, making her feel a very pleasant pleasure .... But now the time was no longer for love but for war, and the duo, now a couple, had an important task to accomplish. Despite her determination, Elizabeth feels a little nervous, and Mathias noticed.

(Mathias): "Are you afraid?"

(Elizabeth): "Well ...... A little, yes."

(Mathias): "Good. It means that you are a reasoned person. Only an idiot would go into battle without being afraid. We often forget that it is the desire to overcome fear that often allows us to 'moving forward."

She kept this sentence in a corner of her head. On their return to the camp, the people of the Vox Populi were already awakened for the most part. Women are seated in front of steaming pots, surely preparing breakfast for their children, with the meager food they can have. Groups of armed soldiers are already leaving for patrols in several directions. The couple soon encountered Cornelius at the entrance of his tent, already awake long ago. When he saw the couple holding by the hand without hiding it, Cornelius smiled, not mockingly, but amused.

(Cornelius): "Well ..... I guess you had a good night, did not you?"

Mathias and Elizabeth laughed a little. After a sip of strong coffee, Cornelius Slate comes forward to talk to them about the mission.

(Cornelius): "So tell me, how do you expect to enter the Fink industries without getting you noticed?"

(Elizabeth): "I could open one of my vortex which will lead us directly inside the premises."

(Mathias): "Are you sure you have the strength to do it?"

She looks at the palm of her hands, confident.

(Elizabeth): "I begin to understand this power a little better. When I saw Songbird flying on us, I thought very strongly of a place very distant from him, and my powers obeyed me. If I focus on a specific location, I think I can do it."

Mathias has no better plan, and he trusts her. Cornelius Slate leaves them carte blanche, as long as they manage to meet the gunsmith Chen Lin. After a rather meager breakfast, but to regain some strength, Cornelius assembled his lieutenants in council, in front of his tent, to talk about the plan of the future battle to come. Among the lieutenants is one who had threatened to hang Elizabeth, and who always looks at the couple with suspicion, and vice versa. The Handyman met yesterday is also there, sitting on a large rock as a seat and silent, with his gruff look, watching and listening. The men listen, in a circle, some smoke a cigarette, and Cornelius advances to speak.

(Cornelius): "Comrades, I have gathered you this morning because as you know, the time to resume our freedom is coming. Zachary Comstock will have no mercy for us, so we have to do the same. They're maybe more numerous and better armed than we are, but they do not have the strength of mind that we have. Our two newcomers, Mathias and Elizabeth here, have decided to help us in our cause. I give them the floor."

Mathias decides to let Elizabeth speak, because she wants to. A little intimidated by all these strangers who look at her, Elizabeth nevertheless advances with confidence in the middle of the council. But already, the suspicious rebel judges her.

(Rebel): "Why should we listen to the daughter of our worst enemy?"

(Elizabeth): "I know that many of you continue to see me as the daughter of the prophet, and I do not blame you. but locked in my tower, I was ignorant of all the atrocities that my father committed. How can I prove that I am not like my father? I can't now, and if you do not trust me, kill me immediately, I will not stop you."

She spoke with force and determination. The men, especially Mathias, were very surprised. The Handyman continues to observe with attention. Elizabeth remains, as ready to undergo a shot, but no one dares to take his gun and shoot, showing on their faces a certain doubt. The noisy breathing of the Handyman is heard as he gets up heavily from his rock, and all eyes are resting on him. Mathias swallowed, and hoped the robot would remain calm. Elizabeth, without fear, looks at the Handyman in the eyes. The giant cyborg remains silent for a few seconds, as if judging the young woman. 

(Handyman): "Lady Comstock."

These were the only words he pronounced with his inhuman voice but with a certain respect for the young woman, respect which she returns with a little nod. And on this the cyborg moves away with a heavy step. Cornelius spoke again.

(Cornelius): "It seems that our Handyman accepts you. He's hardly sociable, but there's something in you that convinced him."

(Mathias): "Well, I prefer to have him in my camp than against us."

After the council meeting, the couple set out to the north, and once out of sight of the camp, in the midst of a vast expanse of grass encircled by the infinite void and The sea of ​​clouds, Elizabeth stretches her hands forward, eyes closed, concentrating all her mental strength. Mathias stands ready, confident. The bluish energy emerges from the palms of Elizabeth, fluid and brilliant, floating in the air and begins to tear the landscape in front of them, like paper, to open the vortex, which barely opened, widens at the speed of light, to engulf them, as well as all the landscape around them. In a matter of seconds, Mathias and Elizabeth find themselves in the middle of a small storeroom, where are arranged brooms, dish towels, buckets and cleaning products. Elizabeth, a little breathless by this effort, quickly regained her spirits.

(Mathias): "Are you okay?" He whispered, in case someone was close to the storeroom.

(Elizabeth): "I ..... Yes, I'm fine."

Mathias advances first, opens the door slightly and glances through the embrasure. In a huge open air space, surrounded by several workshops, all of them carrying the Fink banner, dozens of workers work as usual. But suddenly the door opened before them, and a man with a filthy face appeared, carrying an apron on him, and seeing the couple in front of him, opened wide astonished and angry eyes.

(Worker): "Hey, do you think this is the place and the moment? In a storeroom?!

(Mathias): "Uh, we ....."

(Worker): "Never mind, you go back to work immediately before I call the guards, and you, madam, with the respect I owe you, you have nothing to do here."

A chance for them that he does not know them. After he left with his broom and bucket of water, the couple breathed again. Fortunately, this worker did not give the alarm. Elizabeth and Mathias come out of the storeroom and begin to walk, in the most natural way possible, among the workers. At the top of the main tower Fink, a grand building, a giant clock turning really slowly, and a massive gold statue representing Fink.

(Elizabeth): "I knew Fink had a high opinion of ​​himself, but there....."

(Mathias): "We must find the shop of this mr. Chen Lin."

In the midst of the dust of work and the rising heat of the sun, Mathias feels bad for those people who work for this rich racist Jeremiah Fink. To their miserable clothes and their faces dug with fatigue and anger, it was not hard to guess that Fink was paying them miserably and considers them like cattle. A shop with a red brick roof, at the corner of one of the alley, attracts their attention. "Chen Lin - Weapons of all kinds. The best weapons on the market." Say the sign hanging over the door.

(Mathias): "Here we are."

But hardly have they pushed open the door to enter that their faces froze in surprise and fear. In front of them, stands Jeremiah Fink, smiling behind his mustache and sadistic eye, and with him a procession of Comstock soldiers, one of them holding in hostage, a little Chinese man, a little round, frightened. Surely Chen Lin. Mathias and Elizabeth do not dare move, the guns of the guards threatening them. Fink lets out one of his amused and hypocritical laughs.

(Fink): "Aaaah .... My dear friends ...... We were waiting for you."

(Elizabeth): "Fink? But ..... But how .....?"

(Fink): "Come on, dear Elizabeth. I am Jeremiah Fink, and no secret escapes me in my own business. I was already wary of Chen Lin, and after spying on him, I discovered that my suspicions were justified. It did not take him long to confess everything to me."

The little Chinese man turns to Mathias and Elizabeth, and even without knowing them, look at them with a sorry air.

(Chen Lin): "I'm sorry. May you forgive me." He cried by telling this to the couple. Jeremiah shook his head nonchalantly, understandingly towards his gunsmith.

(Fink): "Lin, I understand you. Everyone can make mistakes ...... But at Fink Industries..... Mistakes are never without consequences."

And on the businessman's finger snapping, a soldier shuts down, mercilessly, Chen Lin, with a bullet in his head, under the horrified gazes of Mathias and Elizabeth, who could not do anything. Chen Lin collapses to the ground, dead, while Mathias, clenched fists, looks at Fink.

(Mathias): "You fucking bastard!"

(Fink): "I'll teach you good manners. Guards, take care of him as you want, and bring Elizabeth to her father."

On a stroke of anger, Mathias' hand catches fire with his tonic, and throws it in front of him, creating a firewall preventing Fink and the soldiers from passing. The couple took the opportunity to escape as quickly as possible, under the watchful eyes of the workers, who do not understand anything that happens. An oversized shadow suddenly appears under the running couple, making raise Mathias' eyes towards the sky.

(Mathias): "Elizabeth! Move!" He exclaimed, throwing himself on the young woman to push her to the side. Two seconds after they roll to the side, a Handyman arrives heavily on the ground, cracking the ground and striking his metal fists against each other.

(Handyman): "False shepherd, I'll crush you into my hands!"

Mathias reacts immediately by taking his gun and starts firing several times on the robot man. The bullets fail to pierce the thick armor of the cyborg, who tries to crush his target with his fists, but Mathias avoids all the blows, sometimes narrowly. Elizabeth rolled to one side, and tries to find a way to help her partner.

(Elizabeth): "Mathias, target the heart! The heart!"

Indeed, like all Handymans, this one has in the center of his chest, a small container closed of a glasses, in which bathes a human heart in a strange yellow liquid. Mathias takes count of this precious detail, but too late, is grasped to the leg by the Handyman, who in his distorted voice sneers cruelly, and throws Mathias against a pile of wooden boxes. Mathias' pistol fell to the ground, leaving him defenseless against his enemy. Mathias gets up, with great pain in his back, and from the corner of his eye, sees Elizabeth discreetly heading toward the gun while the Handyman is focused on him. The metal fist left violently, but Mathias again avoided by rolling between the legs of the Handyman, to join Elizabeth.

(Elizabeth): "Mathias! Catch!"

She throws the gun to Mathias, who retrieves it and just aiming, shoots a single bullet, which comes to reach the right Handyman in the heart. The bullet passes through the glass which shatters and pierces the heart of the cyborg, immobilizing it, and a few moments later, heavily falls backwards, turned off. But the couple do not have time to thank themselves for the team work, because Fink and his security teams arrive not far.

The couple runs through several alleys, avoiding the workers on their way, and a few minutes later arrives on a wider and open space. An aerial dock, where some goods are waiting to be washed away. The couple reflected on a way to escape, but to their horror, Songbird's giant and monstrous mass rose from below, straight in front of them, pushing its most powerful shriek. With his giant hand, the bird seizes Mathias and with great violence, throws him against a wall. Mathias rolled on the floor, out of breath and suffering terribly, the sight disturbed, while Songbird lands by shaking the quay under his paws and advances with a heavy step towards the young man, in striking the crates on its passage to remove them from its path. Mathias is too stunned to move, and the shadow of the mechanical monster covers him. The claws ready to kill, Songbird is about to send his fist to his target, but Elizabeth arrives in front of Mathias, like a human shield, and with tears eyes, she begs the bird.

(Elizabeth): "SONGBIRD! STOP! I BEG YOU! PLEASE, STOP!"

Songbird, seeing Elizabeth, did not send his fist, and his eyes became new greens, meaning that he became calm again. Elizabeth continues to cry and seeing Mathias in this state knows they have no chance to escape alive, so she makes a painful decision to save him from Songbird. Again she speaks to the bird, her voice full of sadness.

(Elizabeth): "I know I should not have fled, but I beg you, Songbird. No more harm to Mathias ........ You won ..... Leave him alive, and take me home ..... Please."

Elizabeth approaches Songbird, and gently caresses the beak of the creature. The giant bird responded with little no aggressive mechanical cries, and delicately took Elizabeth in his giant hand, and while ignoring Mathias, began to fly away. Mathias looks up at Elizabeth, and the eyes of the couple cross, Elizabeth's one showing a deep sense of sadness and remorse, tears on her cheeks, and that of Mathias, showing the distress of seeing her carried away by this monster but too weak to can save her.

(Mathias): "ELIZABETH! NOOOOOOO!"

He tries to gather his strength on his trembling knees and elbows, his face distraught and suffering, while in the distance the giant bird moves away in the sky, taking with him the young woman. Mathias remains on his knees, on the edge of the precipice, dejected, tears falling from his cheeks in the void, and very quickly, at the sight of an aerial rail just below the dock, a feeling of anger gradually invades Mathias.

(Mathias): "I will not let you take her away!" He yelled at Songbird with all his strength, then without hesitation threw himself into the void, his Sky-Hook in his hand. The hook of the weapon suddenly clings to the rail, almost dislodging Mathias' shoulder, but it does not matter, begins to slip at full speed in the air, in pursuit of the flying creature, to the rescue of his lady.

TO BE CONTINUED