Inside, it was a time capsule. Dusty seats, the smell of an old car — and Spark, glimmering behind the dashboard.

"…Are we really allowed in?"

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "Volt opened the door for you, didn't he?"

The two climbed in carefully. The seats exhaled — poof — ten years' worth of dust.

Then the radio crackled on, all by itself. A ten-year-old commercial poured out.

"— A world with no power worries! The unlimited charging plan!"

"I said don't turn it on!"

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "That wasn't me. I think Volt is… excited."

For a moment, none of the three spoke. Ten years ago, that world had really existed.

Spark's light suddenly stood on end.

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "The drone. The revisit. …Two days early."

This time it didn't wander the sky. It was coming straight down — toward the logged heat signature. Toward the garage.

"The tarp won't work. This time it knows the coordinates."

"Then what do we do?"

"We move."

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "The drive motor needs 15% to wake. We have 20%. After start-up we'd be running on 5%. …I can't do that."

"So we pour it all in. The whole storage bank, fast-charge. If we're getting caught anyway — let's get caught running."

The age of 'slowly' was over.

Click. Click. And then —

the drive motor howled, for the first time in ten years.

Low, deep, and alive — that hum was one the three of them would remember for a long time.

The headlights flared to full beam and the whole dashboard lit up. The garage turned bright as noon.

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "Seatbelts."

The doors closed on their own. Volt stood at the starting line.

Volt burst through the garage door and shot into the alley. A missed red scan-beam slashed the wall.

The drone gave chase. The alley was narrow, Volt was wide, and the steering wheel — no one was holding it.

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "I'll handle the steering. Who knows the streets?"

"Me! Every alley in this neighborhood is my map!"

"Right turn, now! …It's not a dead end, there's a gap at the fence!"

"Left alley — watch the clothesline!"

Volt slid exactly under the clothesline. A single shirt caught on the wiper.

Every time Volt swung its body, Dot got slammed into the seat.

"A license! None of us three has a license!"

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "I have a ten-year no-accident record."

Being scared would have been the normal thing. And yet the corners of Bit's mouth — kept curling up.

The instant the drone's scan-beam grazed the rear window — Bit shouted.

"Noona! Hold on tight!"

Volt slid into the darkness beneath the ruined overpass. The red dot passed by, overhead.

Inside the abandoned tunnel. The motor wound down; only darkness and silence remained.

Battery 8%. Rock bottom again. But nobody regretted a thing.

"…You just called me noona, didn't you?"

"That was an emergency. Doesn't count."

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "Logged it."

Laughter burst out — inside a car that had just run for the first time in ten years.

A single shirt still hung from the wiper. The spoils of their first sortie.

The tower. On the screen, the afterimage of a fleeing white car replayed, over and over.

"Found it."

The red eyes, slowly, grew wider.

Day four of summer break.

And this was — Volt's first outing in ten years.