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--donation bonus (day #31, post 5/5)--
Hector searched for his motorcycle as he ran, expecting to find a smoldering pile of scrap, but there it was, untouched and right where he’d left it.

“Hey, put me down,” said Roman as they reached the bike. Hector did so, and Roman proved capable of standing again.

“Get on, and I’ll--” The sentence died in Hector’s throat as he turned.

Harper was right there in front of him.

Hector leaned backward, eyes widening. The look on Harper’s face was especially unsettling, because it was one that he’d seen before. It was just like Stoker’s. Half-asleep, seemingly unaware or even conscious. The only difference was that Stoker had been twitchy, whereas Harper still moved rather smoothly as he poked his head closer, perhaps curiously.

‘Don’t attack him, Hector!’ said Garovel. ‘Just let him look at you.’

‘O-okay,’ said Hector, trying not to sound terrified. After everything he’d faced in the past, he’d nearly forgotten what it was like to feel genuine fear. Without a doubt, this was a much more effective reminder than necessary.

Harper’s head turned, and then in a blink, he was gone again, leaving an equivalently tall streak of light behind as he went after Nola next.

Her reaper went down first, and Nola hardly had enough time to look confused before a luminous pillar burned through her skull.

Seeing how quickly the man could dispatch people, Hector didn’t understand why Harper had just let him and Roman go. But he decided that now wasn’t the time to question it. He mounted his bike with Roman behind him. He found the dirt road, as well as the Queen in her black sedan, already ahead of him.

She soon stopped, however, as they arrived at a group of armored vehicles. It was the soldiers that Abolish had kidnapped.

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The border guards had proved rather stubborn, trying to stop them from crossing into Atreya. Vladimir had briefly considered merely waiting for Desmond and his comrades to cross into Rendon first, but that would have required far too much patience. And besides, he hadn’t gotten to kill anyone in ages, and those guards had really annoying faces. It was definitely the correct decision, he felt.