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rich off the war were actually beneficial to Americans. All he could think about were the possibilities ahead of him. He planned to be an Intrasolar Combatant who controlled the drones fighting the war in outer space, but now he was thinking he could also be a vigilante or maybe even a superhero.
    Why not? He had the power to strike back at people like Hank Bloombury. He wasn’t traceable, and everything was digitized now.
    Medusa and I could even team up. Tom leaned his elbows onto the rail, thinking of his greatest foe, his sort-of ex-girlfriend, and the deadliest warrior on the Russo-Chinese side . . . the single person he knew who could’ve pulled off the same revenge on Hank Bloombury that he himself had.
    Oh, and Tom grinned at the thought of what he could do to his mom’s awful boyfriend, Dalton Prestwick, if he wanted to. Yeah, he’d find the guy in his Manhattan home and have some fun with that. Or maybe he’d do something to that Georgetown mansion of Dalton’s. There were so many possibilities, they made Tom’s head whirl in giddy circles.
    He’d even get Karl Marsters.
    No. No, wait. Maybe this was abusing his power. It probably was. So how about he only went after Karl once? After all, if he did the world-justice-vigilante stuff, he probably earned himself the right to follow up on a personal grudge just once .
    At that moment, a loud roaring mounted in his ears, and with shocking swiftness, a black shape descended from the sky, blotting out the skyboards. Tom’s entire body grew rigid, and he stood there frozen in place, as one of the Centurion-grade drones used in outer space began to hover, right in front of his balcony.
    It wasn’t a measly little police drone like the one he’d controlled. This wasn’t for surveilling individual suspects and subduing them; it wasn’t for breaking up crowds. This was built to blow things up in space. And it was close enough to touch.
    Tom gaped at it, amazed. He’d never seen one of these suckers up close, not through his human eyes. The sharp, scythelike missile turrets curved toward him in open menace, their blackness stark against the skyboard light streaming about them. After a moment of looming there, the drone’s optical camouflaging activated, shimmering its mass into invisibility, leaving only one visible aspect: the pinpoint camera eye, glaring right at him. Optically camouflaged ships were only detectable when they moved—and only if a person knew to look for the telltale wavering of the air. The camera seemed to float in space.
    Then the instant communication program in his neural processor activated, and words were net-sent right into his vision center: I know about your drone, Mordred.
    Tom was overjoyed, realizing who it was. If there was one person he’d want to share his triumph, it’d be Medusa. “You saw that?” he spoke, knowing she’d hear him. “Awesome. I’ve gotta admit it, though: yours is bigger. Where did you get this guy? I want one.”
    Are you an idiot?
    Tom blinked. That wasn’t the reply he’d expected. Or hoped for.
    Unless you are actively trying to give us away, you need to stop messing around like this!
    Tom ignored his sudden, sinking disappointment at her reaction and made a show of shrugging his shoulders. “I know you want to keep what we can do a secret. So do I, okay? But I had to do that thing yesterday. It was a matter of honor. I had to right a wrong. And honestly, Medusa, it’s kind of rich calling me a moron for using that drone when you flew in a Centurion right over Las Vegas, of all places.”
    This Centurion was optically camouflaged when I flew it down. It disappeared off the grid years ago. No one will miss it. You tampered with the navigation of an active-duty police drone. Someone will notice. That is not acceptable.
    “What, so I should do nothing, then?” Tom leaned forward, irritated. “I should wait until I’m a Combatant and use what we can do as a cheat like you do?”
    The drone drew