CHAPTER TWO
Ethan's POV
My name is Ethan Gould. I'm on my final assignment before I officially graduate from the Academy. My Father is one of the Institution's scientists, and he offered me as the first of ERA's first Genetic Experiment that survived. My younger brother, unfortunately, the only family I had left did not make it through the brutality of the Experiment. May his soul rest in peace.
For the past fifteen years of my life, I have been under tough scrutiny left with only a final task before I'm officially one of the Agencies finest products. Others may look at me as some sort of freak show of a Guinea Pig, losing all forms of humanity and only designed to be programmed by a Neurovascular Invasive Electronic System or N. I. E. S. for short.
But they're wrong. I am every bit of human that I am. Save for the Intellectual, Mental and Physical enhancements.
Today's objective is to retrieve the N. I. E. S. software from our traitorous counterpart, the Amalgamated Research Constitution also known as the 'ARC'.
One of our agents have already extracted the Target from the enemy's database and is currently under transport in the midst of a heavily armed defense strategically covering every angle to secure our lone agent.
I'm currently garbed in civilian's clothes with shades, trying to pull off a tourist image as I angled my undercover gun of a camera to every blind spot that I knew was applicable to me. I glanced at my wristwatch.
At exactly 1400 hours, the exchange should have been made. A second too late is already a second too dangerous. I began heading towards where I should have been expecting my fellow agent to be coming from.
"This is Alpha Niner Zero One, requesting for a code one-two-five-o'three, over," I articulated into my mouthpiece, a tiny clip-on trying to pass off for the highest button of my floral printed Hawaiian polo. It was a code that meant a possible sabotage on Plan A and needed to confirm with the permission to engage in Plan B regarding the exchange.
I calmly walked down the alleys of tall buildings as I repeated the phrase carefully. I press my index against my earpiece, checking if it was in place. Static emanated before my Team Leader granted me my permission, informing me that Agent Craw was still within the institution and on hold for a reason they could not confirm with. "Good luck Agent," he said.
Our team leader, Col. Marduk, was an old man with a toughened facade that brandished a thick, graying mustache matching his equally graying cropped hair. He always stood firm and tall with hands always clasped behind him. Though stern, you can always feel his confidence overflowing throughout his very presence. Any means of doubt was always something we all knew he could not afford.
It was a warning.
I broke out into a sprint, weaving through the shortcuts I studied over my briefing. I darted towards the building in the heart of Aerodale City, the University of Immaculate Fidelity, giving myself a maximum of ten minutes to locate our agent and save the day before the Head Quarters decide to quarantine the school for a wipe out--a term used to basically eradicate any evidence that we were once here, a procedure that lasted for a maximum of three hours and a minimum of five minutes.
This task was also very significant to me, because the N. I. E. S. software is directly hot-wired into my system, making me a potential threat to the human race if it ever fell into the wrong hands. As much as I hated to be cliché, there was no other way to explain it exactly the way it intended to sound like.
My camera gun was fatal in its way where its flash can hyperstimulate the victim's cranial activity, causing them to drop and convulse uncontrollably until they suffocate from laryngeal spasms. I wove through heavily gunned men, remaining immune to ERA's gadgets. In a matter of minutes I managed to slip in the University's building unnoticed as long as the enemy security remains oblivious to my invasive presence.
I pressed flat against a wall before entering a corridor, switching weapons to my favorite CN89, a more enhanced version of the Chief Special 45 with the capacity to spit out ten sluggers instead of your usual seven. It almost has a 50% less hand recoil making it easier to handle and a built in silencer to up my game. I know my baby so well because I created her, the Charlie Niner '89. Long story short, smithing guns is also an assignment back in the academy. It was one of the things I excelled in if I should say so myself.
I received feedback from the head quarters, informing me of the exact coordinates of Agent Craw. Instantly, I understood he was on the second floor probably taking cover in a closet. He must have been badly injured. I asked if there was any response and my Intel, Agent Green, confirmed that no contact has been made or any attempts to reach out to the HQ.
Agent Craw was a good friend of mine if you looked at it that way. He was a candidate to becoming a Sergeant. He was my senior. I remember the very first day I met him. I was barely ten; he had piercing blue eyes that gave horrible nightmares at first. He hated me because I was his final assignment. He had high expectations for raiding an illegal laboratory that tried to plagiarize our Father's break through.
Except that wasn't what happened. He ended up staying with me in our house. It was about bedtime before we all realized that the plan backfired. It was a trap, leaving Agent Craw and me the survivors of that dark day. I was the very first experiment, so they needed me. Whatever it was that they chemically engineered coursed through my veins ever since my Father volunteered my brother and I, so even if they destroyed all information regarding the Chemical, I was all they needed to rebuild the Agency.
I am the Agency's Legacy.
Long story short, we started from scratch, and I underwent through a series of tests to reconstruct their chemical invention and voila. Here we are. It's not like Agent Craw and I developed a sense of family over the last fifteen years as I was growing up.
God, who am I kidding? I got to put my head back in the game. Nothing was going to happen to him. I just needed to find him.
Footsteps began approaching my corner, I wasted no time as I pulled the trigger hastily gathering the fresh corpse out of view and dumping him next to a locker--I'm in a University, try to keep up, ok?--before advancing further in. I stealthily wove through the corridor, evading sentinels or taking them down as quietly as possible when they came in groups of three.
"Agent Alpha Niner Zero One, you have about five minutes to get the hell out of there, do you copy, I repeat over,"
I took a quick glance at my watch, noting the amount of time needed to get Agent Craw out of here otherwise I would also be trapped in the Massive Wipe-Out. I advanced further in, taking down as much agents as quickly as I could before they had time to request for back up.
The moment lifeless enemies littered the hall I began banging through the doors, taking a quick glance with my pistol, aimed and ready. I made sure to do the same for every room as I slowly made my way to the closet where Agent Craw was taking refuge.
I knew I was genetically enhanced somehow, I knew I was stronger, smarter and excelled in all other aspects. But to prove myself, I needed to restrict myself from those upgrades. I wanted to be acknowledged with my own capacity. That's what I needed--
My lower back spiked in pain before I fell to the ground. I instantly balanced myself, using the momentum to swing my feet about, knocking my attacker to the ground. I rolled away from him before regaining my stance, my gun pointed firmly to the enemy.
He gazed back at me sternly in the eye with piercing chocolate eyes that instantly kept me frozen in place. A vague sense of familiarity danced around the edge of my memory before I watched him slowly get up.
I should shoot him right now.
"Door behind you," He said. "Another to your left down the hall, three doors down before the last,"
I kept silent. This must be a trap. If he was referring to Agent Craw, he was right about the latter mentioned. But the first, was somewhat questionable. Maybe it was a choice that he gave me. Maybe the coordinates given to me were a trap. I'm so confused.
"Agent Gould, get the hell out of there now, you bar
ely have three minutes before the Wipe-Out!" Col. Marduk screamed through my earpiece.
Shit! Do I even have enough time to escape the premises before I'm trapped in here?
"You better hurry," He said before running off, I let him go.
I had no time to kill him off.
I turned around, kicked the door wide open and there I found Craw sprawled supine in a classroom's floor. No sign of blood on him or broken bones. I did a quick check on his pulse... Still beating but slow.
"Agent Craw, get up!" I shook him vigorously and he barely stirred from a stupor.
He slurred a few comprehensible words. I couldn't afford to wait for him to fully recover. I grabbed an Epi-pen from my breast pocket, tilted his head to the side and aimed for his carotid to get a quick jolt to his brain. I hope that won't do any side effects on him in the long run.
"Agent Craw," I tried again, my voice strained.
"Wha...?" This time he pushed himself up from the ground, startled as he wildly took in his surroundings like a Java Man kidnapped from the past and thrown into Aerodale down town.
"Where's the 'Package'?" I asked, obviously notifying that he's empty handed with just a rifle strapped to his body.
"I swapped it with a student, hoping it would get far from here," said Craw, his onyx eyes never wavering contact with mine.
"Let's move," I turned to the door and headed straight to where the coordinates led me. He complied without question. I was so relieved to have him back in one piece. "This is Agent Alpha Niner Zero One, I have Agent Craw, now zeroing in on the package, requesting for a Bravo Delta B, over"
I walk past three doors.
"Do you read me, over?" I tried to keep calm, never looking back at Craw. I didn't even want to think about the inevitable. I just kept my head low and in the game. I reached the door where the enemy had told me and positioned myself for a defensive stand; I grabbed my camera gun and weakened the intensity of the flash to a minimum for the purposes of confusion only.
I gave a signal to Craw to break the door and I flashed my camera gun the moment the door collapsed. He moved in and stepped out, retrieving a female nursing student thrashing vehemently against his firm grip. My eyes instantly fell on the brown leathery handbag she had pressed against her chest. I saw Craw looking at me and I immediately understood. I nodded and he retrieved a silver pen-like object and jabbed her on the junction of her neck and shoulder, just to inject a sedative. She calmed down until her knees buckled.
All was made possible in under six seconds.
"Carry her," I muttered. She didn't deserve to be part of the wipe out she was just a civilian. Without a word or an argument, Agent Craw slung her over his shoulder then I led the way.
"This is Alpha Niner Zero One, I've got--"
A sharp ringing pierced through my ears, wedging a migraine through my brain. I glanced behind me and barely took in the clarity of Craw's face, but from the way his burly silhouette collapsed to the ground, he too was in as much pain as I was. I doubled over watching my surrounding blur then blacken.
Only one thing ran through my mind before I lost consciousness: Operation Quarantine was completed; now we're trapped in the Wipe Out.