Trey had no memories of living in a place other than this, but even so, he was smart enough to marvel at its perfection. Light shone gently from behind every surface, the same white translucent panels used for the floors, walls and ceiling. He could detect the low levels of UV light emanating from them to keep the residents happier and healthier. He would sometimes get brief flashes of memories, of watching movies as a child – science fiction had been his favorite, he remembered that much – and this place felt like the spaceships imagined by cinema. This was here on Earth, however. An Earth that, despite all their resources, the island’s founders had been unwilling to abandon.
Everything here had a purpose, even if that purpose was leisure. No space could go wasted: it was a large island, but not infinite, and even though they had mastered building both upwards and underground, efficient use of space was still paramount. There were other islands they could build on should the need arise; close enough to be practical, but far enough away to discourage the notion. This was the seed from which the Earth would be reborn, but first, men and women like him needed to ensure the cleansing fire continued to burn in the outside world.
He moved closer to his destination passing through checkpoints and genetic scan locks, the areas growing sparser as he did, until he finally arrived at his briefing room. Every one of his kind had their own briefing, though he didn’t know why. There was nothing inside his that would make it unique and unusable by others. It felt very much like his living quarters in the building, abandoned but immaculate, daunting in its uncluttered perfection. He held his hand to the panel next to his briefing room’s door where one of the chips in his hand emitted his unique digital signature and the door opened.
“Welcome in, Infiltrator. Please have a seat.” His handler smiled at him from her end of the lone metal table that occupied the middle of the room. Her chestnut brown hair was pulled back in a tight bun, which did nothing to soften the sharp angles of her face. A pair of librarian’s glasses would have seemed right at home on her nose if the Consortium’s genetic health program hadn’t wiped out poor vision years ago. She dressed in the dark grey uniform of the covert team.
He pulled out the chair at his end of the table and sat obediently. “How are you today, ma’am?”
“Please, I told you to call me Rachel,” she chided.
Had she? He couldn’t remember his last briefing or the last mission for that matter, but her words rang true. She had indeed told him to call her… the name slipped away, deleted by the program that ensured his superior’s anonymity should he somehow, against all odds, fail in his mission. Denizens of the island were typically unmodified in any way beyond the genetic health program unless they suffered an injury, but that was because they wouldn’t leave the island until the glorious day the Earth was ready for them, so their secrets were safe. At least Trey wasn’t one of the island’s pilots or captains: their programs were much more complex, hiding access to memory of the island until they had left the outside world and were already on their way back to a place they couldn’t remember when they set out. To leave a place and not know your destination must have been maddening for them.
“I apologize, ma’am. I have trouble remembering names.” A sense of déjà vu struck him, and he had the keen sense that he had had this exact exchange with her many times.
“No need for apologies, Infiltrator. Before we start, how is the new arm treating you?” Trey used the electronic portion of his brain to query the device logs from both arms. His left was the same model he’d had since they’d fully replaced his biological limbs, but his right was new, with a version number one higher than the left. He raised the arm in front of him and put it through several simple movements. His handler continued, “You should see only slightly improved function, but greatly decreased power draw. Please log its performance to report back at the conclusion of your mission.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Trey returned his right arm to his side. It wasn’t alarming that he didn’t remember it being replaced, it only meant they’d done it in the time between missions. He was rarely allowed to keep those memories, generally only if he’d never left his compound to see the rest of the island, and replacing an arm would have required a trip to a different area. He did, however, retain the memories of his missions, so he knew that he’d returned from his last one a week and a half ago. New Zealand had managed to bring one of their hydro power plants back online, so Trey had been dispatched to handle it. Soon after he arrived, a previously undetected structural fault caused the dam to fail and flood the area down-river. Plans to bring two others back online were scrapped until a full review (that would likely never be completed) could be conducted.
His handler tapped the stack of papers in front of her on the desk to level them out. “Shall we begin?” He nodded his agreement and his handler began her presentation. “This video was taken in Seattle eleven days ago. The man in it is named Mason Rayne.” His handler was looking down at her dossier and the various details inside, but the wall behind her displayed footage of a man being struck by a car at high speed at an urban intersection. Trey took note of the buildings, approximate time of day given how the light cast shadows on them, the clothes the bystanders wore, every detail ingrained in his artificial memory the way his handler’s name could never be. He had already begun replaying vital sections of it at slower speed and zoomed in on details from his own internal recording even as the main display continued with the rest of the video. “Would you like to know why it took us eleven days to identify this footage as noteworthy?”
The question confused him. “Is the answer relevant to my assignment?” he asked after a pause.
She smiled. “No, I suppose not, Infiltrator,” she answered and looked back at the dossier. On the wall behind her, the man struggled to his feet and Trey made note of the rate at which his body was healing. Easily thousands of time faster than normal, and recovering from a fatal injury no less. Replaying from the beginning, the man displayed reflexes far superior to any regular human, attempting to mitigate the impact with his left arm.
“Infiltrator,” she muttered to herself, “we really must come up with a better name for you than that.”
Trey hesitated. He used his internals to scan the room. Though it was equipped with plenty of sensors to watch or record this conversation, none were engaged. The Consortium’s faith in him was absolute (and well-placed as far as results were concerned). The power and digital storage those recordings would take could be better spent elsewhere. Though he couldn’t remember her name, and the memory of her face would fade the moment he left the room, he felt a fondness for her and wanted her to know his name.
“You can call me Trey, ma’am,” he answered.
His handler looked up shocked, mouth agape, but after an initial pause, her expression softened. “You didn’t just come up with that, did you?” she asked.
“No, ma’am,” he answered, still cautious, but outwardly.
“Trey, is it short for Infil-trey-tor?” she smiled at her observation and the almost infantile process by which he’d selected his moniker.
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered.
“Let’s keep that between us,” she winked at him. “Some of my superiors might not like that you have a name.” It was interesting the ease with which he had shared his secret and her amiable reaction was even more interesting. Did some part of his memory still function as it related to her? He had felt he could trust her, and he could hardly be described as a gambler. The same program that deleted her name also made it impossible for him to remember this island’s location whenever he deduced it from evidence like climate, variability of sunlight hours, general shape, or surroundings. His trust in his handler would suggest that some bit slipped past it, however. It’s control over his memory was not total.
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered. She didn’t need to elaborate as to why this must remain a secret. The Consortium had replaced so many of his biological parts that very little of him was still org
anic. If they found out that he had given himself a name, he would probably lose the last of his original biological brain as they sought to keep him predictable and loyal. What they didn’t understand was that he believed in this work; still having some free thought didn’t affect that.
“Well Trey, let’s get back on schedule, shall we?” she said, bringing his thoughts back to the present. “Your name for this mission at least will be William Fullerton. You will appear as a civilian contractor to the government with the highest possible clearance. The identity has been inserted into all relevant databases. Your assignment is to retrieve Mason Rayne under the “no harm” and “indirect harm” protocols. Your best lead will be the Seattle Medical Examiner’s Office. We have record of evidence being logged in there that will most likely provide you a starting point in your search. Acknowledge.”
“Acknowledged,” he replied.
“You may now ask questions,” she prompted.
“Are any exceptions to protocol authorized?” he asked.
“No. Acknowledge,” she commanded.
“Acknowledged. Are all means within allowed protocols authorized?” he asked.
“Yes. Acknowledge,” she confirmed.
“Acknowledged. What is my allowed timeline?” he asked.
“Three weeks,” she replied, giving him the longest assignment length that was ever authorized. “Acknowledge.” Even the Infiltrator line, the most advanced of the Consortium’s projects needed to have their blood filtered every so often. There was little left in Trey that ran on blood, but what did would begin to notice the lack of organs to clean it after several months. Had Trey given it any thought, he would’ve realized that miniaturizing the machines used to clean his blood and placing them inside his body would have been a simple enough task for the Consortium’s scientists, but the need for Infiltrators to come back every so often was a failsafe. Of course, Trey didn’t think about such things. They were irrelevant to his assignments.
“Acknowledged. I have no other questions.”
His handler smiled and shook her head. “Always efficient. Never any curiosity. You make us all very proud, Trey. You leave from Helipad 3.”
“Thank you, ma’am.” He stood and pushed in his chair before exiting the room. Rachel watched as he went. Originally chosen for his completely average features, his occupation had hardened him. Even as the Consortium replaced him piece by piece, the assignments they gave him had carved an imposing figure from their mundane clay. Though he stood barely over six feet tall, he had a powerful build. His muscles had been replaced by more efficient artificial models long ago, but the extra space his barrel chest provided gave the Consortium’s Engineers plenty of space to insert their latest creations, and so over time he had gone from average and forgettable, ideal traits in an Infiltrator, to something no woman (and most men) wouldn’t forget seeing, especially in the outside world where available nutrition rarely allowed people to look like that anymore. His efficiency and flawless record were most likely the only reasons he hadn’t been overhauled, a fate that had befallen many of the Infiltrators she handled. He paused ever so briefly in the doorway, barely a flinch, but it seemed he had something to say to her. The moment passed, however, and he left as he always did; the completion of the assignment almost a foregone conclusion.
Rachel almost felt sorry for this ‘Mason Rayne’. At least if he knew Infiltrator 1, or ‘Trey’, as it had taken to calling itself, was coming for him, he could take the time to get his affairs in order, but instead, he would vanish from his old life like everyone else the Infiltrators were dispatched for. Based on the protocols her superiors had authorized, she would have guessed Mr. Rayne was merely a curiosity for them, but Infiltrator 1 did not get sent for curiosities. It wasn’t Rachel’s place to know why the Consortium wanted him, but she could take a few guesses, and Mason wouldn’t enjoy any of them, especially since they had sent their best to retrieve him.
Thank you for reading!
The story will continue in Book 2!
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The Fall: Sanguine Series: Book One Page 25
