“You have to get out of here. Tom, Amy, grab your stuff from lockers and meet back here. Quickly. Go. Now!!”

Tom and I raced back to the locker. I kinda panicked, just grabbed the gi and towel I had taken, but that in a bag I found in the locker where I got the gi and raced back to James. Tom was arriving there too, still in his gi and all his other clothes in a bag. James was already at the exit waving at us and Elise came running.

“Go, go. Follow me,” James shouted.

Tom and me looked at each other with questioning looks and somehow decided to follow James. We ran towards a rather large tree, or rather the wooden cabin at its roots. The cabin door opened as we approached. When Elise was in, she closed the door, James worked a virtual panel and suddenly the whole cabin was falling down. Or at least the interior was. It was in fact an elevator.

The elevator descended for something like half a minute before the door opened and we entered the lobby. I quickly checked my navigation sensors and they said I’m now at 150 feet below ground. The door opened into a lobby. Yes, a lobby. Beautiful wood paneling, leather benches, carved tables and an actual desk. Nice soft lighting gave it a homey feeling. Behind the desk was the Nigerian flag and a corporate logo of some tree and Latin slogan. I didn’t bother running it through the translator.

Behind the desk, a man faded in. “James, Elise, dear guests, good day to you. Your vehicle is waiting in bay 17A. The man gestured with an arm towards a corridor on the left side and faded out.

“Was that a hologram?” Tom asks.

“It’s more an augmented reality projection, not a real hologram, but the result is the same. We don’t have time for this. Come on.”

With that, we sprinted through the corridor. I glimpsed laboratories, people in lab coats around strange tech, plants and animals and even a cafeteria and rec room until we reached a part of the corridors with labeled doors. 17A was already opened and gave out to a small waiting room with one wall in glass. Behind that glass wall was a small subway car. The door closed behind us, and a part of the glass wall opened, allowing us to go in the subway car. As soon as we were in the car, it closed its door and started to race away. James and Elise relaxed somewhat and turned to us. “It looks like you guys are going home sooner than planned,” Elise said.

~o~O~o~

“We’re going home?” I asked hopefully.

“Yes. We have to do this now otherwise the risk of being detected will become too big,” James told us.

“Why?” Tom asked. “What happened? You got this message. It was some red alert announcement, something to do with launching boats, right?”

“How do you know that?” James demanded to know.

“I have been training hacking today, you know. That message had strong encryption but I’m figuring it out. I can read some parts.”

“I’ll let the alert management know. They think they encryption is safe,” James commented. “But yes, the United States is about to deploy two submarines with advanced detection equipment. It’s on the edge of being sensitive enough to detect our transports, so it’s important to transport you before they launch.”

“You spy on the military?” I asked.

“Of course. We have our sources. It’s one of our prime interests.”

“With those rats?”

“Err. Yes. And other ways of course.”

“You have to forgive him,” Elise said smiling. “He doesn’t like other people figuring out his little spying business.”

“This is a serious intelligence operation and important to our people,” James said.

“I know honey,” Elise said while patting is arm. “But now we have to get our guests home. Tom, Amy, we’re now driving back to the coast where a submarine is waiting for you. It will take you back to your country. We’re going as fast as we can, burning some serious kilowatthours. In the meantime, we have to tell you something. You probably guessed there is a bit more to everything that happened.”

“Yeah. Why had you guys having us running around planting seeds?” Tom demanded to know.

“Let me start at the beginning,” Elise explained. “Our original plan has always been to eventually give to you what we have here. With our technology, we can dramatically decrease and reverse carbon dioxide emissions and other pollutants while increasing the standard of living for millions of people. We don’t need factories and trucks for our houses, clothes and food. Neither do we need electronics, like a TV, computer or phone. It would destroy most industrial, commercial and financial industries in the process without most people to give up anything.”

“Destroy? Are you so mad at us?” Tom asked.

“A bit. People are not exactly loving you at the moment. But by removing most of the industrial complex, the military loses a lot of power and money while politics goes in disarray. The end result means no attack on us and attempts to raid our resources or tech. The projections are really solid.”

“So killing us with kindness,” I remarked.

“That is the general idea,” James stated. “A complex solution to a complex problem. Our first plan was to have people plant seeds and we can use those to start growing advanced plants that give people some upgrades who eat the fruit. That’s what you were doing with those letters. But your little kidnappers have given us a new opportunity.”

“They were saying they read everything on the internet. Your work I assume?” Tom reasoned.

“Of course. The few local operatives can easily do that.”

“But,” Elise began. “If you are willing to work with us and do a more controlled spread, like setting up companies and selling the tech as a new product on the market, even on the black market, things will go a lot more smoothly for everybody. If Amy designs new bio products and treatments while Tom designs a machine to support the biotech and sell to the black market, you will have enough market and money to go legit. Your products will sell very good and make you rich. Being rich, you gain political influence, bend some regulations and spread from there.”

“And in the meantime get every oil tycoon after us,” Tom remarked.

“If you continue combat training on you own I know you will be better than all assassins out there,” James sad. “I didn’t design all that training programs just for fun.”

“Yes, you did. You were giddy with excitement when you finished a training chapter.”

“Did not. So what do you think? Want to go home and become a billionaire?”

“I’ll do it,” I said. “Save the world, become rich, make the boys real hunks and the girls very pretty.”

“Me to. Somebody has to watch Amy here,” Tom said giving me a wonderful smile.

“Thank you,” Elise said smiling. “We’re going to help what we can but that’s limited from here. We’re working on that but it’s going to take some time.”

“Okay Tom, what do you think. Amy Enterprises!”

From there on we were speculating wildly on what we would sell, name of the companies while Elise tried to prevent us from being too silly. She didn’t really succeed. But it did make the travel go by quickly.

The subway car parked in its dock automatically and opened the door. We followed James as he briskly walked through the corridors. Here too, there were labs, cafeterias, meeting rooms and roaming people in lab coats.

“James, why does it look like the Google headquarters here below ground?” Tom asked.

“Hanging around in trees gets boring after some time and isn’t a good defensive strategy. We needed a hobby and an edge.”

“But digging all this must take so much time,” I asked.

“Not really. Some smart boys and girls build a robot that builds other robots out of scrap metal. Other people remotely control the robots to make the underground installations and power plants. It’s pretty easy when you have some people with a talent for controlling a few hundred robots. I helped out some too. It feels like you inhabit the robot body.”

“You mentioned an edge,” Tom asked.

“Some people got carried away and now we have some nukes and intercontinental missiles ready in case we need to announce ourselves sooner than anticipated. We need some mutual assured destruction to be taken seriously of course, that’s just how the world works. Just in case, you understand. Politics can be weird. Ah, we’re at the harbor.”

A man was waiting for us at the end of the corridor. He shook out hands and then gave us a package.

“Hello. I’m honored to meet you. These are suits for your travel. Please put these on over your street clothes. The toilets are right over there. Put your personal belongings in the provided bag. Please don’t take too long.”

We quickly got into the provided suits. It was made out of some strange material. Then James led us through some really large corridors and through a large door. There were a number of people zipping at high speed through the corridors on what appeared to be electrical skates weaving between some velociraptors walking. Neat. I guess that improved equilibrium and reflexes prevented them from assaulting the floor with their face or other people.

We entered a huge cave with a few small and larger submarines moored at the quays. They have been busy. There were even a drydock where robots were crawling over a half build submarine. But James took us to the side and stopped at a small quay.

“Oh look, a whale!” I exclaimed. “How did that get in here? Can I pet it?”

“That’s your transport,” James stated in his usual drone.

“That’s a whale,” I repeated.

“It’s a not a whale,” Elise explained. “It’s not even an animal. It’s a submarine made out of mostly biological parts. It helps when you try to stay low key.”

“I have to get in there?”

“Yes, you do,” James told us. “It has enough fuel to cross the ocean and self destruct after dropping you of. The suits you’re wearing will keep you dry and keep you out of contact with the biological parts. But first we have to give you a few things. These are the instructions on how to handle your whale.” With that he handled us an info card.

“And this, ” Else said while manifesting two shiny golden coin, one for each of us, “is all the software, designs, genetics, training and information you can ever need for the near future and your mission. You’ll have to interface to transfer this.”

“Thank you. We’ll do whatever needs to be done.”

I grabbed Elise’s wrist to interface and took the coin. Then I felt like somebody tried to ram the entire internet through my frontal cortex. I whimpered a bit.

“You really got it all, didn't you,” I complained, rubbing my temples.

“Yup,” said a smugly smiling Elise. Then she repeated the process with Tom.

James gave us helmets from the bag the guy I the corridor had given him. It looked like jet fighter helmets

“Time to go, I guess,” said Tom. “I’ll miss you guys.” He shook hands with Tom and Elise.

“Me too. I’ll miss you too. Thank you for everything you’ve done for us.” I hugged Tom and Elise and start strapping on the helmet.

We managed to give the command for the ‘whale’ to open its mouth and we used the instructions James had given us to climb in, got us settled and connect the umbilical. It was a messy process and we ended up wedged in between the artificial meat of the whale. We closed the mouth of the ‘whale’ and turned on the autopilot.

“There we go,” I said. “I hope everything works out.”

“It will. Now we just activate the stasis routines and wake up when we’re home.”

“Okay.” I sought out Tom's hand and gave it a squeeze. “Sleep tight.”

~o~O~o~

This annoying beeping was making me up. I tried to stretch but the blanket was really heavy. And the blanket was covering my face. When I eventually reached with my hands to my head, I felt the helmet. Then I remembered I was traveling inside a whale submarine slab of fake meat.

“Tom, you awake?”

“Ugggh.”

“I think we’re almost home.”

“Home?”

“Yes. Lemme checked. We’re something like a quarter mile front of the coast, at the surface. We have to swim the last part.”

“Then let’s go. How do we get out of here?”

“I found the eject function. You can’t miss that handle, it’s the bright flashing yellow thing. Are you ready? Oxygen and pressure okay? You have your luggage?”

“I’m ready. Blow this thing and let’s go home.”

I hit the button and the whale came apart around us in a cloud of bubbles and foam. Then we were floating on the waves and could see some lights in the distance, while dissolving parts of whale floated around us. That’s one way to do an ecological friendly self destruct. We started swimming towards the beach and after some time crawled into the sand.

“The instructions say to ditch the helmet and suit,” Tom said. ”Just throw it in the ocean and they’ll self destruct soon.”

“Could you turn around?”

“Oh. Okay.”

I quickly got out of the suit and helmet so I could straighten out my skirt, shirt and hair. It was still a disaster after being stuck for several days asleep on the ocean. I need a shower at least to fix this somewhat. It can’t be helped now.

“Tom, your turn.”

Tom didn’t bother to turn around and just stripped out of the suit. He even went as far to flex his muscles and grin. I could appreciate that.

“I’m ready. Do you have any idea where we are now?”

“South of Miami. 26 miles that way to my home, 38 miles that way to your place.”

“Let's drop you off at home first.”

With that we started walking to get off the beach and made our way carefully through the flooded streets until we reached the city proper. Then a driverless taxi zoomed by us and suddenly did an emergency stop. I gave Tom a questioning look.

“Your work, I assume?”

“Yeah… I tried to go some quick attack on the thing as it went by, just for practice. I never knew it was so easy. The damn thing might as well not have security.”

“And now it's calling home with our pictures.”

“I shut down the cameras before it saw us. All other communication is disabled. All logs are deleted and a scrubbing is almost done.”

The door from the car opened.

“Ladies first.”

After the obligated annoyed look, I got into the car followed by Tom. My seatbelt was barely clicked shut and the car took of with squealing tires. These things were not supposed to drive like that. Tom was sitting there with a very broad grin, so I can make an educated guess.

“Having fun?”

“Oh yeah. This is awesome. I can access all sensors and controls. It's like the car is an extension of me and with a bit of physics software...”

The car drifted through a tight corner at rally speed.

“...it allows me to go a bit harder than the normal pace.”

“Aaah, slow down!”

He did slow down eventually. Perhaps he figured out it was better to stay low key or it was the death grip on his arm and my nails digging into his flesh slowly drawing blood that was the reason, but the last miles were very smooth, better than any normal driver, robot of human. Tom jumped out very happy with himself, walked to the other side of the car while the door opened automatically and helped me out of the car. As we walked into the entrance of the apartment I felt a network connection like there was in the jungle. It came from the two rats peeked out from under the mailboxes.

“Andy, you’re back!” one rat said. ” Good. Your mother is getting worried. We’ve been sending her updates for a cover story that you’ve been in surgery after an accident.”

“Sorry?” I squeeked.

“Oh I’m sorry. Mario is the name. And this is Alex. We’ve been assigned to your case.”

“Hi,” said the other rat while waving at us.

“Errr hi,” said Tom. “You made up a fake story?”

“Yep. Just the usual things: intercept a few phone calls, updates by mail in the mailbox here.”

“Oookay, errrr, keep up the good work lads,” Tom said as we continue

“Thank you. Can we talk later? I really want to see my family.”

“Certainly”, the rats said. ”We didn’t mean to hold you.”

We went upstairs after that and I was now standing in front of the door to my home, too afraid to ring the bell.

“But what if mom doesn’t recognize me?”

“She’ll recognize you. You still look like family. And she’ll recognize me. I haven’t changed that much.”

“Then you do it.”

“Okay.”

And at that moment, Tom pressed the doorbell.

“What did you do?!”

“I pressed the bell. You told me to do it.”

“I did not! I meant to...”

“”Dani?” my mother asked from the now open door. “Daenerys? What are you doing out here so late?”

“What are you talking about?” Dani said from the kitchen. ”I’m in the kitchen, not outside.”

Mom turned around. And back again. And once again her head flopped back and for. Then Dani saw me.

“You!” Dani exclaimed. “That’s my body. I designed that.”

“I remember you throwing away the letter that could have given you that body. Now it’s mine. You really should stop throwing stuff on the ground, sister dear. Still letting towels and panties laying on the floor in the bathroom?”

“No, of course not! Maybe. But that didn’t allow you to steal m-”

“Andy! Dani! Stop fighting,” my dad yelled as he came in the hallway.

“But she starte-”
“But she starte-”

“Both of you! Stop fighting.”

“Andy?” my mother asked.

“Yes. Although I do prefer Amy.”

“Why do you look like your sister? They said you had surgery, but this?”

“That is a long story,” I said as I carefully moved forward to hug my mom. “But it’s all Dani’s fault.”

“Andy!” my father warned.

“You shouldn’t blame your sister for everything,” said mom. “You always do that.”

“Sorry mom,” I said while slowly hugging my mom. “I missed you so!” That’s when the tears came.

“It’s alright, dear. Let’s get inside. Come. You too Tom.”

I walked into the apartment that I haven’t seen for so long. Then I saw my sister eyeing Tom appreciatively. That wasn’t allowed to happen. I caught Dani’s eye, discretely pointed at Tom, narrowed my eyes at her and quietly hissed “He’s mine.” I had to nip that in the bud.

Finally we all settled in the living room for a really weird family gathering.

~o~O~o~

Epilogue

I was looking out of window of my office. It afforded me a nice view of the city. That city has changed so much.

When we got back, we started a little family company. The first factory made small model carbon convertors. It sucked the carbon out of the air and converted it into sugar. It actually produced something very similar to honey using electricity and water. The FDA required a stabilizing agent and conservation agent. It gave the honey a blue color. Of course everybody now called it manna what only added to the popularity.

We also made machines that used the “manna” to grow plants. We only sold seeds for decorative plants at first of course for legal reasons. That didn’t stop the black market from selling modifications that were surprisingly easy to use and plants that produced food. We deny any involvement and there is not a shred of evidence for this. Anyway, all trails are passed now to even sell medicinal plants.

It did make it a lot easier for a lot of people to have very cheap healthy food and medicine. It costs energy to run the food machines but we also sell semi-organic self growing solar panels of course. The recently introduced eggplants were also a big hit. It grows a large egg, and in that egg grows a garment.

And there were the mods that could eat plastics as fuel source or recycle septic waste. It could make each house or apartment into a small self sustaining biosphere. There was serious interest from the independent folks and from NASA.

Our company was now in the top 500, although many copied us. We upgraded the whole family pretty soon. Dad turned out to be a gifted micro mechanic, speeding up the design process quickly. Mom was really good with numbers and administration. It all helped our little business grew tremendously. The end result was a green city, a concrete jungle reclaiming some aspects of a real jungle, bustling with plants and animals.

Pretty soon we’ll start slowly to distribute the first “sensu beans” for public testing. That was a long fight to get it approved, but there is progress.

Dani, now my twin sister, turned out to be a fauna-devisor. True to her namesake, she had several small dragons flying around the office. They didn’t breed and tended to spontaneously combust when Dani didn’t take care of them and keep tweaking their metabolism. She insisted on them breathing fire, but that turned out to be really tricky. Luckily she had rapid regrowing of hair and burned skin down pat and was making serious progress on making herself fireproof. She needed it a lot.

I need to go now. Tom is standing at the door in the classic pose every husband has when his wife is late. We’re invited to the arrival of the Nigerian delegation today, now that diplomatic relations have started. I can’t wait to see James and Elise again.

Author’s note: Well folks, this is where it ends. It was the intention of giving you a glimpse of a possible future and some of the weird and/or useful things we might see happening soonish. I hope I succeeded in this in combination with providing a bit of entertainment.