by Mat Nastos
Mal didn’t have time to celebrate his kill as the largest of the ‘space ninjas’ rammed into him with enough force to grind stone to powder.
The sound of a subway’s bullhorn bleating nearby distracted the remaining pair of government killers enough to give Mal time to recover from the attack and roll to his feet. Seeing the lights of the approaching 9 train gave Mal hope that he could use it as a way to get some distance away from the skull-helmeted duo. He prayed it worked better than his last encounter with the New York City Transit Authority.
Orge rose up in front of Mal, standing squarely between the cyborg and his intended means of escape. The monster of a man flexed muscles with enough size and mass to threaten to split open the tight Lycra and Kevlar of his uniform. Underneath the grinning skull painted across the face of his helmet, Mal was pretty sure the mercenary was scowling. Behind the pair, cutting off any chance at egress in the opposite direction, the sounds of high-energy weapons spinning fast circles in the air reached the cybernetically-enhanced senses Mal had been gifted with.
The cyborg grimaced, turning his head slightly to peer back over his shoulder. Standing in a low horse-stance was the final member of the black-ops team, dressed in a similar uniform to the others but accessorized with a pair of nunchucks held twirling in each hand. The weapons gave off a particularly vicious field of glowing energy Mal didn’t like the look of—a sentiment his computer agreed with wholeheartedly. It’s analysis showed the final mercenary’s weapons to be powered by a different energy matrix than that of his companions. Some form of transuranic element unidentifiable by Mal’s scanners formed their core and they were giving off a Rad-reading that soared off the charts.
Mal felt a twitch in his groin at the thought the government was planning to sterilize him before it killed him.
Whatever powered the last ninja’s weapons was bad enough news that Mal decided he’d take a chance with the hulking brute in front of him and charged. His only hope was to get past Ogre and make it onto the downtown-bound express train somehow. All while staying out of range of a highly trained special operations agent carrying a weapon giving off enough radiation to kill him within minutes of exposure.
“Easy as pie,” thought Mal as he hurled himself directly into the leviathan’s path, fingers morphing into seven-inch long blades capable of slicing through titanium.
The first part of Mal’s hastily devised plan worked out perfectly. Far better than he had hoped. The second half of the plan, however, failed miserably.
Mal dropped in a baseball slide through Ogre’s legs, avoiding a wild roundhouse punch that would have pulverized him. As his dive carried Mal past the giant, unbreakable cybernetic talons struck, slicing through the tendons in the back of Ogre’s left leg, hamstringing him. A quick judo-throw made use of the collapsing mercenary’s velocity and sent him hurling into one of the tunnel’s steel support beams with enough force to warp it out of shape.
The speed of Mal’s attacks had not only taken out one of his foes but had also opened up his route of escape…and with that, the cyborg felt pretty good about his chances.
That was where Mal’s luck ended dramatically.
In the brief seconds during which Mal had dealt with Ogre, the fourth member of the death squad caught up to the cyborg, taking him entirely unaware and nearly killing him in the process.
Using the conductive properties of his specially designed uniform, ‘Chuck’ tied his left-handed weapon into the highly electrified third-rail of the subway line, tapping into the entire power grid of the system, supercharging the weapon in his right-hand. With a flick of his wrist, the black-ops agent snapped off a whip-strike that impacted dead center of the unsuspecting Mal’s unprotected back.
Mal screamed as pain poured into him.
The blow from the glowing nunchucks, supercharged by their wielder’s contact with the subway tunnel’s powered rail, shot through Mal’s body, nearly locking every muscle in an excruciating cramp. Somewhere, in between the pulsating bursts of pain caused by the weapon, Mal felt his control begin to give way once more. A silver haze bubbled up around the edges of his vision and the cold, calculating bloodlust of the Cestus programming started to assert its control over his mind.
With the the monstrous Ogre recovering enough from his high speed encounter with the steel support pillar to aid Chuck in pressing his attack against the mentally distracted cyborg, Mal was torn: if he lost the battle now and allowed the personality construct that had been his prison for nearly a year to take over, would he ever be able to find himself again? Or would Cestus remain in control, subjugating his will forever?
Mal screamed. “NO!”
Fear began building in the pit of Mal’s stomach. He wouldn’t risk losing himself to the programming again, not after having just freed himself from it. Using the overriding terror to push back the encroaching darkness of the Cestus programming, forcing it away from his mind and back into the mental prison he kept it locked in.
The smirking white skull decorating Ogre’s visor proved to be precisely the focus Mal needed to halt the methodical takeover of his mind by Project Hardwired’s most proficient of killers.
A ‘Ki-Ay!’ tore itself from Mal’s chest as he turned into a haymaker the giant launched at him in an effort to end things all in one blow. Snapping his hips to increase the force of his own attack, Mal’s arm warped into a savage spike and struck Ogre’s gargantuan paw with enough violence to disintegrate it into paste. The cruel weapon tore the man’s ulna from his forearm and fractured his radius in six places.
It was the giant’s turn to howl in pain, but Mal didn’t stop with his arm, launching himself fluidly off of his free arm in a handstand leap, leg extending at high speed.
Bone crunched under the force of Mal’s heel, planted firmly into the larger man’s lower jaw by a spinning roundhouse kick. Bending down, Mal dug the claws of his hand into the back of Ogre’s helmet and yanked the giant’s head up from the ground it had been resting upon. Nanites in the cyborgs bloodstream flowed through the cybernetics in his right arm, altering its shape into a killing weapon.
Mal punched the eighteen-inch blade through the rear of the man’s skull, pushing into bone and brain before emerging through the front of Ogre’s face in a torrent of blood and gore. A flick of his organic steel wrist freed a saucer-sized chunk of skull, with scalp and hair still attached, that had stubbornly adhered itself to the razor-sharp point of Mal’s knife-fist.
A snap kick to his temple nearly decapitated Mal, throwing him off-balance and sent the world spinning. A flurry of strikes and kicks, accentuated by cross-body whips from the radioactive nunchucks, kept Mal reeling and unable to do much more than protect his vital organs and pray for a misstep by his final adversary.
High energy weapons left blazing arcs as they spun past Mal, burning holes through the parts of his jacket they came into contact with. Even without the additional energy provided by New York’s Con Edison the nunchucks still had enough juice in them to melt the skin from the cyborg’s bones and his internal sensors were already giving off warnings about the levels of radiation he was being subjected to just being near them. If he didn’t do something fast, there was no guarantee even his enhanced healing would be able to handle the continued exposure.
A high-speed exchange of blows, blocks and counter-blows flew between the two combatants. Dropping back into a defensive stance, Mal was worried. Even with his superhuman speed and strength, the man he faced off against was still breaking through his guard. Chuck’s training was amazing—he was easily Mal’s superior in hand-to-hand combat. If Mal had been been a normal man, the cyborg was sure he’d already have lost the pitched battle against his nunchuck-wielding adversary.
Sensing Mal’s distraction, the black-clad assassin lunged forward, renewing his attack with increased ferociousness.
Only pure instinct saved Mal from the relentless attack. Ducking under a particularly nasty horizontal strike, he rolled towards the wheels tearing dow
n the rusted subway rails, sending off showers of sparks and squeals of stressed metal. Bracing himself on the ground, the cyborg sprung up and away from Chuck and blindly lashed out with the claw of his right cybernetic arm, slicing into the side of the MTA car. The momentum of the vehicle yanked Mal from his feet, pulling him along with the train.
With more than fifteen years of combat training at the hands of some of the hardest assed drill sergeants the United States Army had to offer, along with having been raised in one of the most fervent of football towns, Mal hated to run away from the fight. He could hear every trainer, every coach, and every instructor he had at boot camp screaming away inside his brain, demanding he go back and kick a mud-hole in the ninja’s butt. Even worse, he had to fight against the Cestus personality construct and its hardwired need to seek and destroy.
Internal though the battle was, it took its toll upon Mal, who struggled to pull himself over the edge of the subway car and onto its curved ceiling.
The move took Chuck by complete surprise and the renegade cyborg was more than one hundred feet away and climbing up the side of the subway car to safety, before his attacker realized exactly what had happened.
“Sweet Jesus…I need a drink,” sighed the sweat-drenched cyborg, panting.
Mal dropped to his belly, lying flat and resting his face down on the cold, dirty carbon-steel roof of the number 9 express train bound for lower Manhattan, completely exhausted.
*****
‘Chuck’ watched for ten long seconds as the subway train carrying his quarry faded away into the dank, lightless tunnel. Although his face was still hidden behind the smoked gray glass of his unit’s painted-skull helmet, disappointment and frustration were obvious in every step he took on the debris-filled route back to the crowded commuter platform the recent battle had begun upon.
The silent warrior dreaded having to report his failure—and the loss of his teammates—back to the higher-ups back at command and control. The men Chuck worked for weren’t the sort to tolerate a mission botched as badly as this one had been.
Engaging in combat in a public setting.
Endangering the civilian population.
Loss of Company equipment.
Loss of Company personnel.
Failure to complete mission objectives.
The black-clad agent was sure his bosses would come up with a whole list of additional transgressions to lay at his feet once it was all said and done. Nothing was worse than being the scapegoat for a failed operation.
Looking on what sliver of the bright side Chuck could see, at least he and his partners in Beta-Squad had located Designate Cestus. Located and tagged him with a microscopic tracer during their confrontation. If all went according to plan, Designate Cestus would be back under lock and key before the evening was over.
Gloved fingers touched the side of the mirrored helmet, activating a hidden communications link. The government agent spoke three words into his headset before mounting the platform and heading back into the light of the Manhattan afternoon.
“Designate Cestus located.”
CHAPTER 6
Something was wrong.
Upon arriving at the downtown Culver City offices being used to transition the former staff of Project Hardwired into whatever new positions they were being reassigned to in various top secret government organizations—the most coveted being in Congressman Fountain’s new Tiamat project located out in a facility high in the Rocky Mountains—Carl Anderson began to notice the ‘wrongness’ immediately. The front doors not accepting his key card; strange stares from the ladies in the secretarial staff; the way he found his Transformers Optimus Prime coffee cup sitting on his office’s solitary filing cabinet instead of on its usual spot on a coaster next to his keyboard. If Carl had been a more paranoid man, he’d go so far as to say all of the security cameras on his walk in had followed his movements.
Something was wrong—or about to go wrong—and Carl was positive he didn’t want to stick around the office long enough to find out exactly what it was.
Leaving the lights off and closing the door slowly to keep those who were haunting the office after hours from noticing his presence, Carl grabbed the ancient ‘Super Friends’ duffel bag he’d found at a garage sale a few years earlier for $2.50 and began to shove in as many of his personal effects as he could fit inside. Putting together important notes and documents was next, followed quickly by moving as many computer files as possible onto the virtual armada of Transformers thumb drives the technician had collected over the year.
Every moment that he was forced to remain in the lion’s den caused the dread inside of Carl to grow. He knew he didn’t have a lot of time. Behind him, a shadow pausing two seconds too long at his door would confirm how little time he really had…a shadow Carl Anderson failed to notice.
In the oppressive, rushed silence of the room, a silence punctuated only by Carl’s increasingly labored breathing, the sound of a handle rotating open and hardwood door scritching across cheap gray industrial carpet boomed like thunder in the computer engineer’s ears.
“Hey, bro. Whatcha’ doin?”
Carl exhaled deeply at the sound of the voice, visibly relaxing. For an instant, he’d been expecting a herd of security guards to rush in and beat him up for what he had been thinking, instead of one of the boys from the weapons division. The tall, bearded and bald TJ May was someone Carl could related to: another computer jockey and victim of the recent destruction of Project Hardwired.
“Just grabbing a few things to finish up my debriefing, Teej,” answered Carl. “You know how anal the higher ups are when it comes to making sure their asses are covered. Am I right?
Papers and computer disks dropped one after another into Carl’s backpack as he continued his packing. Nice as it was to have a friendly face show up, Carl knew he couldn’t afford to spend too much time at the compound, not if he wanted to get out before people started asking too many questions.
“Security Chief Doherty said I’d be able to find you here.”
So wrapped up in his hurry to pack up and make a hasty exit, Carl didn’t pick up the determined edge that his friend’s voice held. He missed the implications of TJ’s words.
“Oh, yeah…why is that?” he asked.
An unusual mechanical ‘click’ filled the room.
“Sorry about this, bro,” said TJ.
“‘Sorry about’ what, Teej?” asked Carl, turning to the sound of his friends voice. “Oh…”
Carl found himself staring down the barrel of a Glock-17, the tip of which was being held with fierce determination less than six inches away from his head by his former friend.
Friend?
No, thought Carl, more of an acquaintance than a friend, really. TJ and his recently deceased brother, Jason, were part of the elite crowd back at Project Hardwired. They were the cool guys. They got paid more than Carl. Had better offices than Carl. They got all the hottest interns.
When it came right down to it, in spite of having worked together under Doctor Ryan for more than three years, TJ May and his crew barely knew Carl existed. And that realization enraged the little man more than anything else. Getting killed by a douche bag bully like TJ May was something Carl couldn’t let happen.
“Why, man?”
May pondered the question for a few seconds, his arm locked at the elbow to try and keep the pistol steady. He was surprised at how heavy the gun felt now that he had it aimed at another human being.
“You annoyed our new boss. Hell, in the time I’ve known you, bro, you’ve annoyed everyone you worked with. Honestly, I’m surprised someone hasn’t tried to shoot you before.”
Sweat began to run in rivulets down Carl’s forehead, steaming up his thick round glasses, and draining down the back of his neck. In less than a few seconds, the man’s collar, armpits and lower back were drenched. It was the way the Anderson clan had dealt with extremely stressful situations for generations—an evolutionary adaptation to fear. Some a
nimals would fight for their lives. Some would flee. The Andersons would become covered in sweat, grow light-headed, and eventually pass out.
There weren’t a lot of heroic Andersons in the history books.
Licking his lips, Carl’s eyes darted back and forth like a hummingbird, trying to figure a way out of the situation without getting a lead injection fired into his frontal lobe.
“Why kill me, though, Teej? It has to be some sort of mistake,” Carl whimpered, firing off imploring eyes at the man holding him at gunpoint. “Fire me? Sure. Fire me. But why would the boss want me dead?”
“I didn’t ask, Carl,” snapped TJ, his arm starting to shake from the strain of being held straight out like a bar. “Word came down that whoever took you out would get a cushy managerial spot in Fountain’s new project…the benefits package is supposed to be uh-mazing!”
“‘Benefits package?!’ You’re going to shoot me in the fucking face for dental? That’s a little pathetic even for you, man!”
“Shut up, bro!” TJ’s voice was nearly shrieking. “Turn around so I don’t have to look at you!”
Carl’s eyebrows jerked up in response. He couldn’t believe what his former work associate had just said.
“You want me to turn around so you can shoot me in the back of the head?”
“Yes,” answered TJ, almost pleading behind the shaking gun in his hand.
“And what are you going to do if I don’t…shoot me?”
TJ didn’t have a good answer to the cross examination and his confidence and determination were rapidly fading. The idea of shooting an irritating turd like Carl Anderson was easy enough in the planning stages, but the act was fast becoming more trouble than it was worth to the man. Why was it that some people couldn’t just shut up and let a man shoot them?
