by Cole Anders
Another thought squatted heavily on Simon's mind as well. What was going to happen when they caught up with those Oculus operatives? He was in no condition to fight, except maybe firing from a seated position at a stationary target. And if anything were to happen, Simon would be next to useless.
“Based on the way recruitment works, it must be difficult to replace agents if something happens to them, if they can replace them at all. And with Nerva having taken over so much of the decision-making process, they must not even need much support staff anymore, just field agents who can step in front of vans driven by madmen.” thought Simon.
Simon ultimately decided against trying to take a shower as he wasn’t able to stay standing for long enough, and the idea of trying to ease down into the tub part was even less tempting. So instead, Simon cranked the hot water all the way on and used a damp hand cloth as best he could in the steaming shower room. The hot humid air felt good, and Simon lingered for more than an hour there with his eyes closed, processing the story Luke was unfolding for him. After a while Simon heard Luke return to the room and moments later knock on the bathroom door.
“Found an all-night pizza place if you can believe it, seems pretty good too, you alright in there?” Said Luke.
“Ya I’m ok, just taking a sauna. I’ll be right out, I’m starved.” Said Simon.
Simon began the long slow procedure of standing up and putting on fresh clothes. He was honestly surprised he was even able to do it himself, but after some effort Simon managed to get dressed and exit the bathroom, a great cloud of hot steam following him into the cool motel room.
Luke was standing there waiting to get in himself, he could help but laugh. “Ha-ha, looks like you’re walking out of a smoke shack Simon.”
“Felt good, I’m never been in this much pain before.” Winced Simon, making his way to his bed. The pizza was already open and partly eaten.
“Eat what you want, I’ll be quick.” Said Luke, shutting the door behind him.
Simon slowly lowered himself into his bed and started in on pizza Luke had gotten, pepperoni and mushroom. It’s wasn’t half bad, maybe a little too greasy from using cheap pepperonis. Luke reappeared from the bathroom just a few minutes later dressed in fresh clothes and grabbed the last slice of the now cold pizza.
“I guess it's true for just about anyone in a line of work like ours. Thirty seconds of absolute madness, followed by days and weeks of waiting. Just as well, the longer you can recover the better, I'd really like to have a doctor look you over, but hospitals ask too many questions.” Said Luke, talking through his chewing mouth.
“Why don't you just send me back and have them send you another agent? I'm just gonna slow you down like this.” Asked Simon.
“You might be surprised what you’re capable of in a pinch. And anyway, we don’t really have any intention of getting in another fire fight with these guys, strictly re-con and surveillance. Plus, on top of that, we don’t have anyone else to send out. I’m sure you’ve noticed, Firewall if fairly lean on personal.” Explained Luke.
“Exactly how many people does Firewall have working for it anyway?” Asked Simon.
“Ten men and women all together, I haven’t seen several of them in months because of field assignments, Nerva likes to keep agents in the field as much as possible, she says it’s so we don’t get too institutionalized, whatever that means.” Said Luke.
“Well firewall is such an isolated environment, maybe she thinks we could get too comfortable with it and let something slip on the outside about what goes on.” Said Simon.
“Makes sense really, and it’s not like she’s constantly rushing us around over working us like we are short staffed, we have plenty of folks to cover missions and provide backup if someone else gets into trouble most of the time. That’s the real beauty of the Flapjack, when someone’s in trouble we can send the cavalry in right on top of them when they need it. Things got way more outta hand today than anyone could have predicted. The whole point was to have your first mission go smoothly and without issue, but it was something that couldn’t wait for redundant backup either. So, we just took a chance and it turned out this way. In fact, I was going to be going on my own before Nerva gave you final approval.” Said Luke.
“Ten seems like a pretty small number for us to operate effectively, how are we able to function with so few people, I really can't believe that's all the people we have.” Asked Simon.
“Ever since Nerva took control of Firewall it's been like this. Finding compatible agents is a very long tedious process, and there are still no guarantees a person will be able to resist the Gorgon effect. I think she's right too, the fewer people we have, the smaller our profile is. Especially since Oculus seems to of become a wider spread terrorist organization then it has been in the past. Everything points to them building up to something big. Nerva is constantly detecting activity all over the world now. But we can't fight an organization like Oculus out in the open. The risk is far too great, not only to innocent civilians, but the wider risks of exposing the world to the kinds of technology we have curated would be devastating. Surgical strikes against them keep the ball in our court for now, so all we have to do now is wait for them to make a mistake and reveal where they are based at, then it'll be all over.” Said Luke.
“It's easy to react to immediate threats as such a small organization, but we are vulnerable to losses, this being the perfect example.” Said Simon, slowly rolling over to his left side trying to find a position that would relieve the pressure on his ribs.
“Nerva can basically do everything except field agent work. I'll finish that story I started in the car unless you are ready to try for some sleep.” Said Luke.
“I definitely want to hear what happens, I can't believe something so terrible happened at headquarters.” Said Simon.
Luke shifted his weight and sat up so that his back was against the headboard of his bed. Snorting his nose and letting out a short cough to clear his throat, he began.
“So, with Jeffrey three stories below me with a broken leg, and an unknown number of those grotesque machine things still lurching through the base, I called David and Calvin up on the radio. They weren’t having any luck getting more access to the mainframe or facility controls, but they could tell at least one more of the things was still around because it was stomping around outside of the maintenance chamber they were in. They agreed the first thing I should concern myself with was getting down to Jeffery before any other surprises turned up. There is a ladder tube hidden in a closet in the back of the kitchen, and since I didn't have access to enough rope to climb down, much less anything I could reliably tie it off to up on the ground floor, I worked my way back to the mess hall so I could get into the kitchen. It didn't look like any fighting had taken place there, and at the time the kitchen and dining area where configured much differently since it was all designed for human cooks to run it back then. I crept through the dark empty mess hall, every step agonizingly slow in an effort to make it silent. Again, looking back, I'm not sure why I bothered with the stealth as we'd had several firefights already, so I certainly wasn't going to sneak up on anything. But sneak I did, right into the kitchen and back along the wall to the rear pantry. I pressed the release button located along the top lip of the door and slide into the ladder tube and make my way down to the main level. Luckily, the passage from the bottom of the ladder opened out close to where Jeffery had fallen, so I would be able to get to him right away, but other than the desk he was already behind, there was no cover to speak of in the central chamber. Any dash to one of the side corridors would be suicide if we can under fire from virtually any direction out past the lift deck. But my first priority was to get to Jeffery. After making it to the bottom of the ladder I crept up to the chamber leading out onto the lift room and slowly, carefully slide it open. I could see Jeffery and immediately knew all the sneaking around wasn't going to cut in anymore. His face had gone from bright red to ashen pale and a pool of
blood was forming around where he slumped. He was still conscious as he reacted to me opening the ladder hatch, but it was clear he was no longer aware of his surrounding as he'd raised his gun in my direction, probably the only reason he didn't fire on me was that the strength in his arm gave out before he could finish pointing his pistol. The two seconds it took me to across over and join him behind that desk was the longest run I'd ever done, I didn't see anything, but there was little light beyond the blood red emergency lighting on the lift deck anyway. It was even hotter down here and I'm sure it would be lethal if I stayed in it for too long, and it certainly was deathly to Jeffery in the condition he was in. When I reached him he tried to grab my arm but his grip failed to hold his arm to mine, I'm not sure he even realized it was me at that moment. I took another risk and popped my head up over the examination table and searched through the drawers of the turnover desk. Dumb luck that the fake lift room was also a mockup of a medical examination room, the desk had bandages and compression pads, what I hoped was going to be enough to keep Jeffery from bleeding to death in the next thirty minutes. I used a pair of bandage scissors to cut away most of Jeffery's left pant leg. The break couldn't have hardly been worse, the knee and part of his shin had been pushed up through the top of his thigh, blood oozed out of the wound like bubbling oil. His right shin was cocked at a ninety-degree angle also clearly completely broken, but there was no blood around the bend so I decided to focus on what I could help immediately. I had so much adrenaline pumping in my veins my hands shuck like a paint mixer, but I managed to get the comp-press and bandages around his exposed shin bones and the puncture. Jeffery waned in and out just at the edge of consciousness, and I knew he'd be lucky to live through this even if a trauma team took over for me right then. So, I fished three quick injection morphine pens out of the desk, gave him one and left the other two in his hand. I promised I'd be back with David and Calvin as soon as possible and that we'd get him fixed up. Jeffery lulled his head in my direction and half opened his eyes. I'm sure he at least heard something, so that had to be enough for now.” Said Luke.
Luke had transitioned into laying on the other bed and was staring into the ceiling by this point.
“Didn't you say Jeffery was still with us? I haven't meet him yet.” Asked Simon.
“Ya, he unbelievably survived that fall. He's been on mission in Germany of the last six months, I checked in with him while we were stopped in that meadow earlier today in fact. You'll like him, pulled my ass outta the fire more times than I've pulled his out.” Said Luke grinning.
“So, go on then.” Said Simon.
Luke nodded and continued.
“I left Jeffery there crumpled on the floor, mostly convinced he'd be dead before I could get back to him. I resolved myself to get to Calvin and David and try and save them somehow. The heat was making me light headed already by that point, and it was difficult to even touch any of the metal fixtures as I make my way down the side corridor to the core room. Fortunately, the auxiliary lights were still working otherwise it would have been pitch black down there, but I managed to find my way to the entrance to the core room without much trouble. Standing there before that hatch in that intolerable heat, bathed in the dim red emergency lights. My stomach sank into my feet. I’ll never forget that feeling. It came from that deep primordial place inside all of us, that place that’s still afraid of the dark and sees the eyes of lurking predators everywhere. I could smell Jeffery's blood fermenting in the heat on my shirt. I reached up to touch the hatch control panel, my hand trembled so bad I could hardly control where I pushed my fingers and I completely missed the panel on my first attempt. I took a moment and tried to steady myself but I couldn’t get the shaking to stop completely. If there was something waiting for me on the other side of this door, I thought. I was sure I'd drop my pistol if I tried to raise it in reaction. So, I did something that saved my life. I took a breath and raised my pistol, shaking like leaf, and pointed it at the closed hatch. I could feel my heart pounding its way up my throat and out my ears until it was all I could hear. I tried to take a deep breath to steady myself and realized I was already on the verge of hyperventilating I was breathing so hard. I reached out again, flailing my hand at the control panel, this time managing to hit the release button. The hatch door hissed open with a quick snap and spread out down the middle seam. Instantly, putrid air rushed out of the opening door seal and slapped me in the face. The door stopped, the power shorted out just as the door opened wide enough for me to squeeze my head in. The emergency lights weren’t on in the core room, later I'd see that they had been destroyed. I stared for a frozen eternity into that hot, stinking, black crevice. Then I heard it. It the stinking silence, I heard two faint metal clicks and a sliding noise, I pointed my pistol towards the sound and fired into the darkness. I clamped my eyes shut instinctively from the muzzle flash. My ears rang and ached from the echoing tenor, but I heard no movement, and saw nothing in the blackness once the flash after image started to fade. But I was half delirious with fear and had just as good a chance of running away or falling to the ground in catatonic shock as shooting at that singular moment. But I shot again, one round turned into two, two turned into several. I dry fired my pistol several more times just to make sure I'd expelled all the rounds and then reached for my last spare mag. I dropped it on the hard metal plating the second I pulled it from my pocket. A moment after it landed on the ground in a clatter, I heard a loud crashing just on the other side of the half open door in front me. I was already half bent over trying to pick on my dropped mag. When that happened, I was much to off balance, so I turned the stooping move I intended to use to bend down and pick up my dropped magazine into a full-fledged dive. I leapt flat onto the ground and scrambled like a dying fish as I struggled to get turned around. I sprawled on the shearing metal floor and raised my pistol, though had something come through the door above me I wouldn't have been able to fire a single bullet because I ended up laying on top of the magazine I was trying to get. So, I sat there and waited, no more sounds, no movement. Slowly, I picked myself back up, my hands blistered from the scourging metal floor and crept back over to the half-opened door hatch. I took a step and felt my dropped and nearly forgotten magazine under my foot, only this time I bent down once again and this time managed to retrieve it without falling over. That same rotting stink oozed out of that black room and burned the flesh inside my nose and throat. Still, no more sounds other than my own panting and heartbeat. I was soaked to the bone from sweat so any noise my shifting clothes made was a distinctive stretching sound. That, and my hand was shaking so bad my pistol was making a rattling sound. Then, just as I reached to try and pull the door open I saw a small pool of liquid making its way into the hallway through the gap in the door. In the low red light, it looked like a black viscous oil, the same rancid fluid that came out of the things up on the ground floor, I flinched my hand away from the opening and raised my pistol again. I still could hear nothing but my own pounding heart.” Luke let out a deep sigh and did a couple of rapid sit-ups on his bed.
“How can you remember so much detail man? Especially when you were obviously pumped full of adrenaline at the time.” Asked Simon.
“Clarity training. I have a near perfect recall. Which for me is great. I spend almost all my idle time mentally dissecting every combat encounter I have, working every single angle and possibility. It's funny, as far as I can tell, keeping from getting killed isn't about making the right decisions, I've discovered it's about not making mistakes faster than your opponent. I should have been by rights killed several times, but luck and patience have fallen in my favor so far. Just like what I'm telling you about, that creature on the other side of the door should have killed me dead, it was waiting for me right on the other side of the door. Had I not already had my pistol raised and fired blindly into that gap, it would have cut me down an instant later I have no doubt.” Explained Luke, finally settling back down into the bed.
“So, then wh
at happened?” Ask Simon.
“So anyway, all together I had only been standing at this partially opened hatch for less than a minute. You've experienced it yourself already, time has a way of drawing out like a razor blade when adrenaline thunders through your brain. I collected myself for another moment and reached up and yanked the hatch open in a single swift move. As I did, one of those cybernetic things fell out into the hallway almost landing on me, but it leaned the one direction as it fell and I leaned the other. It must have been standing literally face to plate with the door, I could have reached through and touched it when I first got the hatch open. Now half in and half out of the room, it was laying sideways motionless with that disgusting black sludge pooling around it. To my regret, I produced my flashlight and revealed its monstrous form in crisp nauseating detail. It was little more than a skinned bloody skull sitting on top of some servos. Its eye sockets had been scooped out and replaced with crude video camera lens. It had no lower jaw, and in its place, was a hap-hazard gambol system that went from the roof on the mouth to a few pistons that had been shoved down into its chest cavity. The lungs and heart were still present exposed through the front of the cracked open ribcage, but none of the intestines or secondary organs were still there. The entire abdomen had been mostly opened so that the only thing connecting the chest to the pelvis was the spinal cord with a metal bar bolted to it, and a crazy tangle of wires and cabling that disappeared into the mush of the pelvic area. Although it still had pants on, the legs were twisted into strange, illogical shapes. There were no feet, the left leg just ended at the bottom of the calf bone with a metal ball grafted onto the bottom, and the right was a metal plate welded to a rod that ran up into the pants. The arms were a different story however. It's left was a completely mechanical construct of perfectly machined pistons and flexible metal weave tubes. The hand ended in a wholly inhuman hand. Ten thin multifaceted little fingers spread out evenly in an array around a central gambol wrist. There was no sign of blood or viscera inter weaved with the limb, and it looked completely mismatched with the rest of the creature. Its right arm was the same as the rest of its body, a flayed mockery of a natural human arm with cabling and wires threaded through muscle and bone. Where a hand should have been, there was just a tangle of finger bones and muscle stapled around a rusty machine pistol, it looked like a Tec 9. There were no sparks or lights anywhere on it, and I could see that I'd shot it right between the eyes at least twice. Looking back, I really had no reason to assume it was dead, but it never moved again so that at least worked out in my favor. I eased through the hatch stepping over the things body and began making my way around the edge of the room. The entrance to the maintenance chamber was on the opposite side, and crawling over debris with nothing but a flashlight make it very slow going. However, finally there, I could see back into the room and out into the hallway in silhouette. A long piece of re-bar had been wedged through the handle and bent, and there was no way I’d be able to remove it quietly or quickly. I called Calvin on my two-way, who was now just a few feet away.”
