Helga swept the group around a huge skyscraper, and suddenly the building to which Agent Weber had sent them with the Lance came into view. Or the remains of that building, anyway. What they saw was the aftermath of the destruction they were responsible for. Most of the structure had collapsed, and thick black smoke poured from its ruins. Crowds had gathered to witness the devastation, and police, firemen, and medical teams surrounded the perimeter.

It was all an exact re-creation of what had actually happened. Michael watched himself and his friends being dragged toward the police vehicles. His own face looked even more stunned and confused than he remembered feeling.

Michael’s breath caught when he saw Gabby, Jackson Porter’s ex-girlfriend. Ex-girlfriend? Current girlfriend? Neither sounded right. But he focused on her now, knowing what was about to happen, dreading having to see it again. The cop approached her, lifted a nightstick, swung. It hit her in the head, knocking her unconscious, and she went limp. Michael cried out in shock despite expecting the violence.

“What just happened?” Sarah shouted. She hadn’t seen the attack originally, and they’d never had a chance to discuss it.

“Why would they have done that to her?” Michael asked in a tight voice. He still didn’t understand, and he felt terrible that he’d almost forgotten about her in the last couple of days.

“Whoa,” Bryson murmured. “It’s like that cop singled her out.”

“Why?” Michael whispered, not sure to whom exactly he directed the question.

The scene below suddenly shrank away and in front of them appeared a holographic image of a woman, dressed smartly, with perfectly styled hair—an anchorperson for the NewsBops.

“Breaking news this morning,” the woman said in a lyrical British accent. “Representatives from VirtNet Security have finally gone public with their official findings from the terrorist incident one week ago. It happened at their secret mainframe facility hidden within a historical building in the city of Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States. Three teenagers, wanted for prior crimes, have been charged with the incident, having used a highly sophisticated device that set off chain reactions through the entire security system of the VNS. Charles Rooney, outside VNS headquarters, has more of the story.”

Her image dissolved into a million digital blocks and was swept away as if caught by a sudden gust of wind. A man replaced her, gray hair, mustached, his tie loosened and his face red and sweaty.