by James Somers
Routine bio-scans, conducted by the unit’s med tech, had revealed several unexpected facts about the man. First, he was physiologically not the man he appeared to be. Scans revealed a physiologic age below thirty years, while simple observation would easily place him as an Israeli man in his mid-fifties.
They had also discovered that this man was enveloped within a highly advanced holographic field, utilizing neural wave pulses. Most likely he was a secret government agent. The only question was, which government?
Expecting the man to be unconscious for several more hours, the IDF secured him to a stretcher, his wrists and ankles bound, and prepared to remove him to their headquarters. He wasn’t an official prisoner, yet, at least not until they found out who they were truly dealing with, and what world power had jurisdiction over him.
Israeli Defense Forces rushed out onto the roof of the Lynwood Towers building. Jason, Hatter and Rogue still wore perceptor disguises, but they appeared as police officers, not soldiers of the IDF. This was unexpected.
Jason and the others instinctively clicked their ammunition to tranquilizers. The soldiers approached them with their weapons raised and puzzled looks on their faces.
The leader shouted orders. “Weapons down! What are you men doing up here?”
Jason didn’t drop the weapon, but answered innocently. “Hey, hey…we’re Jerusalem Police Department. We were trying to apprehend a suspect up here. The guy just jumped off of the building, with a parachute of all things.”
“All civilian officers were ordered out of the building ten minutes ago, why didn’t you—?”
Jason dodged past the soldier’s gun barrel and shot him with a tranquilizer. The soldier’s weapon fired reflexively above Jason’s shoulder as the man went down. Hatter and Rogue had reacted to their commander a fraction of a second later, taking down the other two soldiers before they could respond. The tranquilizer agent in the capsules was that good—able to act almost instantly as a mild paralytic and synthetic narcotic.
Everything had been instinct beyond Jason’s initial move. Hatter spoke up. “Boss, why did we just take out IDF?”
“We couldn’t relinquish our weapons and get away. In a moment that sergeant would have been uncompromising. The building must be crawling with IDF by now.”
Rogue looked worried. “What about Wraith? He’s still down on the tenth floor, unconscious.”
Jason holstered his weapon, tapping on his perceptor control pad located on his left forearm. He knelt down, placing his gloved hands on the unconscious sergeant’s body. Jason’s appearance, as one of the Jerusalem Police Department, wavered then morphed into that of the IDF sergeant. He took the man’s weapon and stood. “All right, men, assume the other two. We’ll head down to the tenth floor and see what has happened to Wraith. We can only hope he’s not been moved.”
Hatter and Rogue tapped the commands into their own perceptor control pads, soon appearing to be the same group of IDF soldiers who had been ordered to investigate the roof. Taking the light armor piercing rifles of the IDF, the three agents headed back down the stairs toward the tenth floor where they hoped to find their fellow agent.
He led the men down until they reached the tenth floor stairwell access door. Jason paused and looked at his men. They had to be convincing as IDF soldiers to be able to get out of the building.
When the door opened, he immediately saw that Wraith had been removed. A medic packed up his case of electronic equipment. Other soldiers were present in the office, but Nightstalker and his agents were barely regarded by them. Jason decided to push his luck a bit with the medic. “Has the victim been transported, already?”
“Yeah, I think we’ll have a brief layover at the closest police precinct until our Special Forces interrogator can interview him when he wakes up. Did you guys find anything on the roof?”
“Not a thing.” Nightstalker motioned for Hatter and Rogue to follow him as he passed by the medic.
Other soldiers from the IDF milled about on the floor, but no one paid them much attention. They made their way to the opposite stairwell taking them down to the lobby and out of the building. Now they just had to figure out where Wraith was being kept. A quick uplink with Babylon and they would have GPS tracking on Wraith through the aural receiver implanted in his ear canal. Babylon always knew where to find its agents.
The med-tech ran a scanner back and forth across Wraith’s unconscious body. He appeared to be a middle aged Israeli man, but they knew it was a facade. Within the perceptor envelope lay a secret they wanted to discover. Wraith’s wrists and ankles remained bound with leather gauntlets as he lay on a locked stretcher in a fifteen by fifteen foot room. He was secluded inside police precinct number seven in the new section of the city of Jerusalem.
Dr. Emil Kelvin watched his med-tech working with the scanner. “Does it show anyway of getting it off of him?”
“No, sir. The suit seems to be code locked, and there’s no way I can break it with this equipment.”
“What about the Neural Wave Pulse generator? Can we disable it to see who we’re dealing with?”
“Even if I can, it will still take time.”
Dr. Kelvin tousled his disheveled gray hair. “Then you had better get to work on it, right away. My superiors are not patient men.” Emil had always enjoyed the lavish salaries available in the private sector, but it came with a price. He squinted from a lack of sleep, as he watched Carl toying with the high tech device keeping this man’s identity hidden from them.
Consciousness called out to Wraith. He lay nestled in his own personal void and did not wish to be disturbed. Wraith felt hands on the perceptor control module located on his left wrist. Someone unseen fumbled to work the control pad, pushing buttons randomly.
Wraith felt the person hovering over him, but he was still in the black of this catatonic state. Very slowly, feeling returned. He remained motionless, waiting for his vision and strength to return to him before trying to make his move and escape.
“Doctor, I’ve got it!” Carl stepped away, as the perceptor envelope fell. The man’s appearance morphed from that of a middle-aged Israeli man to his true form—a strong, young man in a high-tech combat uniform.
Dr. Kelvin had seen this before—from his past he had hoped to leave behind. This man had to be an agent of Babylon. Others would certainly be tracking him, putting him and his IDF compatriots in danger by the agent’s very presence. Very few people had come across a Babylon agent exposed and lived to tell it. People had a tendency to come up missing shortly after the encounter. If he alerted the IDF to this man’s identity then calls would be made. Anyone looking for him might find him sooner.
A thought occurred to him. He could reactivate the man’s disguise system. The IDF wouldn’t know—no one else would see him. “Carl, we have to reactivate that device.”
“But we were supposed to deactivate it, so we can see who he is.”
The Doctor grabbed the man by the arm, punctuating his next words. “Carl, we are in danger having him here. I’ve seen this uniform before. Others will be coming!”
“What are you talking about? Who is he?”
Dr. Kelvin wrung his hands in a panic. “I can’t explain it right now, just reactivate it.”
Carl did as he was told, though he didn’t understand why. The med-tech leaned over the unconscious agent, fumbling with the controls, trying to redo what he had undone.
Wraith fought the tranquilizer drug, trying to worm his way out of the cocoon of sleep that held him captive. He heard words filtering in to him. One of the two men he heard seemed agitated.
Wraith felt impulses of sensation from his extremities again. One of the men in the room, speaking from the void around him, touched his arm and the control pad—time for the sleeper to awaken.
An imperceptible movement of Wraith’s finger touched a control on the base of his palm which ejected a black nylon blade from the side of the control pad into the inside of the leather strap binding his left wrist. A quick
jerk of his arm sent the blade through the strap. His left hand was free.
With a quick slash back over his torso, Wraith caught the med-tech across the carotid and through his trachea. Carl gasped, gargled through his own blood and slumped to the floor, leaving a crimson streak across the stretcher.
The doctor had been leaning over Carl’s shoulder, trying to urge him to get the disguise back in place. Wraith slashed through the other wrist restraint and caught the doctor’s clothing as he tried to pull away.
Wraith pulled him back and pinned him with his right hand while he cut through the ankle straps. He sat upright on the stretcher and slid off of the end of the rolling bed, keeping the doctor pinned with his right arm. He poised the knife above Kelvin’s throat.
Wraith spoke in a gravelly tone. “You know who I am?”
Dr. Kelvin shook his head, no.
“I heard you speaking. So, you know what I am?”
The shaking turned to reluctant nodding.
“How?” Wraith moved the hovering blade just enough to remind the man that he expected a legitimate answer.
Emil Kelvin swallowed hard, watching the black tip of Wraith’s blade dancing off the end of his nose—a charmed viper, but ready to strike.
He whispered, barely able to get his voice. “I used to work for Babylon, as a scientist.”
Wraith’s curiosity grew now. “Really, what division?”
“Physiologic Enhancement” Dr. Kelvin smiled weakly and perspired heavily. Trickles of sweat ran down his forehead. Wraith smiled. He had all the control in this situation, just the way he liked it.
Kelvin pressed his luck. “Your enhanced agility and reflexes, I helped to develop these things for the agents. I see my work has served you well. You’re very fast.”
Wraith ignored the compliment. “Where am I?”
“Jerusalem Police Precinct…number seven, I believe. I could help you to get out of here.”
“Where are my other weapons?”
“I don’t know where they’ve put them. The military had confiscated them by the time they brought me to examine you.”
Wraith snatched the visitor security pass card, clipped to Dr. Kelvin’s dark blue, button down shirt and placed it on his own collar. “I suppose there are military guards waiting outside?”
Dr. Kelvin hesitated then affirmed it with a nod. Wraith smiled. “I thought so.” He tapped his perceptor control pad, adjusted its parameters and then grabbed the doctor’s arm. Wraith transformed into Emil Kelvin before the doctor’s terrified eyes. Wraith stood a little taller, but otherwise he looked just like him. Wraith pulled a ceramic disc from a hidden pocket on his uniform, now obscured by the holographic disguise, and turned a small knob on its surface.
“Doc, you just hold this timer and stay in this room until the time is up. That should give me enough time to get out of here. Then you’re free to go, all right?”
“You’re letting me go?”
“That’s the least I can do for a former employee of Babylon, right?”
Dr. Kelvin smiled. “Yes, of course, thank you.”
“Good.” Wraith turned to the door and swiped the security pass on the reader. The door opened into a thin hallway with another security door twenty feet away at the other end. Wraith walked through the doorway then turned back to the doctor. His index finger was set in front of his pursed lips in a shushing motion. With a wink and a smile, the door closed after him and locked.
Wraith made his way down the short hallway, using the security card to pass through the other door. On the other side stood a foyer with armed military personnel waiting. They gripped their weapons tighter as the image of Dr. Kelvin came through the door. They relaxed again when they recognized him. One of the soldiers asked him a question, but Wraith simply tossed his hands in the air in a frustrated gesture and kept moving through the auto door, on the other side of the room.
The soldier became annoyed as the door closed again. “Scientists.” The soldiers laughed together.
Dr. Kelvin breathed a sigh of relief. The mysterious agent had let him live. He laughed a little to himself, thinking of the encounter now that it was over. If he had realized I was on a hit list for Babylon from years ago, I would have been dead meat. Now, he just had to wait here in this room until the timer device finished counting.
A terrifying thought suddenly hit him. He looked at the device. He remembered the agent’s wink and smile. A bomb! It only had thirty seconds left.
Dr. Kelvin tried to fiddle with the timer, but it wouldn’t stop. Kelvin set the device on the bed and went for the intercom. He had to call the soldiers from the anteroom. “Help me! Get me out of here!”
A voice replied over the intercom. “Doctor? Is that you? We’re on our way!”
Dr. Kelvin pounded on the door then he remembered that Carl also had a pass card. He got down in the floor with the blood soaked body of his assistant. Carl had bled out quickly from the horrid gash across his throat and had fallen into the floor face down.
Emil pulled sluggishly at the body, but he was barely able to budge the two hundred pounds of dead weight. He desperately thrust his hand underneath the body, using Carl’s drained life as a ghastly lubricant to speed his passage. Emil grabbed the badge. He heard heavy footsteps hammering down the hallway beyond the door.
The soldiers had arrived, but would they get to him fast enough? Mere seconds had passed, but every tick of the timer seemed like years. Dr. Kelvin pulled his hand free of the body, with the security card in tow. He wiped the congealed mess across his shirt to clear the card for the reader then swiped it frantically. The door clicked then opened. The startled soldiers pointed their guns through the doorway.
“Dr. Kelvin, are you all right?” The first soldier grabbed the frantic doctor by the arms, examining him for wounds. The others scanned the room for the attacker. The timer, sitting on the stretcher above his med-tech’s body, dinged!
Wraith had managed to make it as far as the main holding room of the police precinct before the minute on the timer was up. The entire building shook violently from an explosion at its core. Windows shattered. People were thrown in the concussive wave that ran amok in the building, trying to find the fastest way of escape. Wraith had hit the floor instinctively to avoid injury, covering his ears a second before the blast.
When he got back to his feet, the few people who were conscious screamed in shock and pain. Wraith dusted broken glass pellets away from his uniform, which was still hidden by the perceptor disguise of Dr. Kelvin. The good doctor had thought him a fool.
Wraith never forgot a face—probably part of the physiologic enhancement he had received with Babylon. Dr. Emil Kelvin had defected from the Babylon network years ago, but he was still on the backlist of people to find and terminate. Another job well done.
Glass crunched beneath his boots as Wraith casually walked through the chaos inside the precinct processing room, heading for the door to the street. Smoke billowed out of the building through shattered windows and the main doors. No one bothered to stop him. They never realized that a Babylon agent had been among them. Neither the doctor, nor his assistant, would be talking.
When Wraith reached the street, three special signatures appeared through his CLD’s. His control pad vibrated as it reacquired the signals for the other team members by proximity. The men, all in disguise as IDF soldiers, carried standard issue Israeli military assault rifles.
They recognized Wraith by team signature in the same way and made their way to him. A multitude gathered around the police precinct building to see what had happened.
“I see you’ve managed to free yourself,” Jason said.
“No thanks to you pukes.”
“Tell me you didn’t take out civilians in there.”
Wraith grinned. “Not too many, boss. What about Solomon Gauge?”
“After he took you out, we cornered him on the roof.”
“And?”
Hatter gave him a disgusted look. “
And he still got away. I’m telling you guys, Gauge had to be trained, somewhere.”
Wraith looked at Jason and smiled. “At least one of us got a kill today.”
Jason boiled inside. He would have liked nothing more at that moment than to strangle the life out of Wraith, for Sarah’s sake. He controlled his temper. “Yes, at least one of us did.” Jason tried to turn his thoughts away from Sarah’s death for the time being. They needed to get out of Jerusalem. “It’s time to split up, men. With the plane down, we’ll all have to find alternate transportation out of here. IDF will be crawling all over the city looking for us. Split up and get out of Jerusalem any way you can. We’ll go over the mission briefing with our new team handler in a couple of days.”
The men nodded then broke away from each other as casually as possible. The Police precinct was the focus of public attention now, along with the bus bombing. It wouldn’t be too difficult to leave the area unnoticed.
PROMOTION
As usual, Jason had planned ahead. Alfred had been waiting for him in Jerusalem with a room in the finest, five star hotel in the city, The Parada. It wasn’t exactly the first, or even the last place, the military would look for secret agents.
Alfred had Jason’s private plane waiting at the airport in Tel Aviv. When a leisurely stay of three days was up, they left the city in a rented limousine—driven in style to the airport. Jason laughed to himself when he thought about it.
The other men had probably had a much tougher time of it, and though he felt a little guilt over Hatter and Rogue having a more difficult escape, he knew that four men together would have been more suspicious.
The team assembled again in a virtual room for the mission debriefing. Illumination, originating from nowhere in particular, shined on each of them as they sat in chairs. They remained veiled from one another by static screens, which distorted their images. The handler’s image had been distorted as well, but Jason knew this was a different handler than the last.