by Craig Boldy
“I’ve read your file or rather files. Plural.” He adjusted his seat on the hard table slightly, clearly uncomfortable at the odd height, “You have an exemplary service record. I’ve never seen anyone with as good a takedown record as you. A rising star as a few of your senior officers stated. It was a real blow to the service, having this accident.”
“I think it was a bit more of a blow to me than to the government. They don’t have to spend their days stuck in this chair.”
“Sorry, I was a little insensitive there,” I shot him a look to say ‘Ya think!’ He held his hands up apologetically, “Like I said, I have an offer for you. I can’t go into specifics. As I said it’s highly classified, but to use a cliché, it might just save your life, and it may even mean you can go back out into the field.”
“How long do I have to decide?” I asked, already sure of the answer. He smiled, stood up and put his sunglasses back on his face.
“You know how these things work. The offer expires as soon as I walk out the door. I’ll give you a few moments to mull it over.”
I watched him stride out of my field of view and then just stared at my reflection in the blank screen of the TV for a good few minutes, going over the possibilities in my mind. Half of me wanted to tell him to stick his offer, after all the heartache I'd had trying to get back into the agency, why now all of a sudden did they want me? On the other hand, it was surprising what tech the government and the military had at its disposal; most was years ahead of what was available to even the most cutting-edge hospitals for the general public.
“I just want to know one thing,” I took the controller of my wheelchair in my mouth and turned to face Wilson as he stood looking at the medals and commendations on my bookshelf. He turned to me at the same time and removed his sunglasses once more. “Is it going to be more interesting than sitting here waiting to die?”
He smiled at me for a second before walking back over to me “I’ll take that as a yes then, shall I? I hope you don’t think this is inappropriate.” He cupped his left hand under my right wrist and grasped my hand in his. He shook my hand gently, possibly because he was afraid of hurting me, not that I had any feeling. It almost brought a tear to my eye.
“We will get you transferred to our facility in the morning. Make a list of anything you want out of the house before you leave tomorrow; I’m afraid anything else will be lost in the fire.”
“You’re going to burn down my house?!”
“Standard procedure to have a cover story in place: you know that. And technically it’s the Agency's house." He smiled as he stood up and made for the door, "One more thing before I forget; I’m afraid you didn’t survive the fire.”
I smiled once more as he left my field of view and started making a list in my head. It took me two hours to realise the only thing I would take with me would be the old photo album I had of my family. My parents had died when I was young, and the state had fostered me.
I was in and out of foster homes for years before I landed in one which changed my life forever. Where the man was a police sergeant and the woman was a criminal justice lawyer. I quickly stopped being a tearaway system kid and began working hard and getting good grades. My foster mum had wanted me to follow her into criminal law, but I had preferred the idea of putting together the pieces of evidence, building a case and the inevitable hunt for the criminal rather than deciding how long to lock them up for.
I signed up for the police academy almost immediately from college and excelled at it. I loved every minute of it, and because I was so passionate and put everything I had into it, I rose the ranks quickly. Just before I graduated, there was a training day for the top candidates to test their skills. I hadn’t known it at the time, but the agency had organised it to scout for new agents. I came top of the class again and was earmarked to join, the youngest they had ever had. I loved it. Every day was something new and exciting. The memories were bittersweet as everything I had worked so hard for was all gone now.
I didn’t sleep that night. I was excited, more excited than I had been for a long time. I watched the sun come up from the corner of my eye, willing it faster and faster.
∆∆∆
Chapter Two
The next morning I was awake as soon as the sun had risen; my carers getting me out of bed and into my wheelchair with the same diligence as the always showed. From the moment everything was connected, and I was able to move about as I pleased, I took up station in front of the large picture window at the front of the house and proceeded to sit and watch the road for any sign of them coming back.
Luckily, I didn’t have to wait long, the van pulled up in front of the house a little after 8am. It was one of those modified people carriers, in the standard government issue black, which had the lift system in the back to make it easier to get the wheelchair in and out.
Almost in unison, all four of the car doors opened, and a dark-suited agent stepped out of each. Wilson stepped out of the front passenger door and proceeded to issue orders to the other agents, none of whom I recognised. They took a few moments using the lift to bring out another wheelchair from the back of the van, its occupant in civilian clothes and dark glasses.
Once they were ready, began to walk up towards the house as one unit. Wilson was in front, leading the pack, shortly followed by the agent pushing the man in the wheelchair and finally the other two agents side by side, both of them scanning their eyes left and right, more like they were on protection duty and were assessing for threats.
One of the carers let them in the house as he was on his way out, shift ended. Wilson greeted me as he walked in. The other agents said nothing, the two at the back walking straight into the back of the house. I could hear them going room-by-room sweeping each and closing windows and doors as the wheelchair, and its occupant was wheeled into position in front of the TV.
“Who’s the replacement?” I asked Wilson as we waited for the others to complete their tasks.
“Unclaimed cadaver, from the city morgue. A John Doe who won’t be claimed. Do you have anything you want to take?”
I was slightly taken aback, I knew there would be a cover story, but this would mean the entries in the public records would show me as being deceased. I was starting to wonder just how classified this program was. I told him about the box which the carer had placed in the centre of the sofa, and he directed the agent who had wheeled the decoy body into the house to pick it up and take it out to the car.
The two agents performing a sweep of the house reappeared, gave an all-clear nod to Wilson and walked outside. “You ready?” he asked. I blurted a quick yes as he began to wheel me out of the house.
The two agents waiting on the doorstep escorted us to the van, one of them stepping in front to use the controls of the lift system, the other opening the door for Wilson. As my wheels were locked into the holding clips in the van, I watched the house. The final agent had hung back in the house and was only just now stepping out. He gently closed the door behind him and proceeded to walk down the path towards us. Just after the halfway point, he pulled some sort of remote from his inside jacket pocket. I heard a faint beep as he pressed the button and by the time he closed the door of the van and we had set off, I could just make out the thin dark tendrils of smoke coming out of the chimney.
We had only been driving for a few minutes when I heard the muffled boom of my spare oxygen tanks exploding, and it wasn’t long before the wail of a fire engine could be heard speeding towards us. I watched as it passed in a blur of red and blue, its lights flashing and its siren changing pitch as it passed.
The rest of the journey was pleasant enough. I sat and watched the scenery pass, all the time considering the possibilities of where we were headed. It took a couple of hours to reach our destination, and my mind had been whirring throughout. I barely noticed as we passed from my local suburbia into rural countryside and then further out into the heart of nowhere.
Finally, we seemed to reach some s
ort of compound. Red desert turned into a large concrete wall with only the one opening as far as I could see. We pulled up to the entrance, and an armed guard stepped out of a little booth set into the wall. Wilson flashed his credentials to the guard, and the barrier lifted for us to continue through.
This side of the wall was almost a different planet, perfectly manicured lawns and hedges surrounded a glass-fronted building, which seemed to dominate the landscape. I watched the slight breeze stir the leaves of the various trees dotted strategically to allow shade until we pulled to a halt outside what appeared to be the main entrance.
It took a few moments to get me and my wheelchair out of the back of the van, during that time I noticed the sign displayed above the door denoting the building as 'MediTech Incorporated, A Division Of FutureTech Industries'.
The security measures were stringent, there were two sets of doors which required each of the agents to swipe their ID's to get past the first, and then again for the second, almost like an airlock. Wilson came through last, answering a call as he stepped through the second door. He motioned the agents to take me further into the building as he mouthed a quick apology to me before turning to continue his conversation.
They wheeled me down a few long and brightly lit corridors before finally opening one of the side doors into some sort of guest quarters, entered, left me facing the door roughly about central in the room, and asked me if I needed anything before stepping out and closing the door behind them.
I took a few moments to investigate the room, noticing the small sofa and side table with a selection of drinks. There was a landscape painting hung on each wall which served to be the only decoration in the room other than a large monochrome clock above the door. Its loud tick was the only thing I could hear until the light knock at the door.
I shouted come in just as the handle dipped and the door opened enough to admit Wilson’s head. He looked at me then opened the door fully and stepped into the room, two nurses following him in. He stood with his back leaning against the door, typing away into his phone, while they checked my ventilator and repositioned me in my chair. He knocked on the door once they had finished and an agent opened it from the outside. The nurses smiled at me and exited the room, leaving me alone with Wilson.
“I know so far the facilities leave a little to be desired, but this is not where you will be staying. I need to ask you a few questions, just to make sure your mind is still as sharp as it was before you left the Agency.”
“Let me save you the breath. We took a left followed by two rights in the corridor. The receptionist had blonde hair, a dark blue blouse and a black pencil shirt and her nametag said “Shelley”. The signs on the various doors we came past were Utilities, Storage Room 3, Meeting Room 1 and an unmarked door with a scratch on the handle. There are twenty-seven light fittings between here and the reception,” I finished by giving the licence plate of the vehicle we travelled in and then the plate numbers and descriptions of the three parked in front of the building. "Need I go on?"
He held his hands up and shook his head in disbelief. “I hadn’t even thought you'd seen the receptionist. Fair enough, no more questions.”
He spoke quickly into his cuff microphone, and the door opened once more. A man and a woman both in white coats entered, one carrying a clipboard and another carrying an inch thick file.
“This is Dr Filch and Mr Sutton, specialists in nanotechnology and neurosurgery respectively,” He gestured to them in turn, and they nodded in greeting, “They are going to explain a little further about what is going on.”
I looked them up and down. Sutton had a mildly expensive grey suit under his coat with a white shirt and a horribly clashing red tie. He was roughly in his late forties, grey hair was advancing along his temples and winning against his mousey brown hair. He had deep bags under his eyes made worse by his pale skin. I didn’t give him a second glance. My eyes were concentrated on Filch. She was almost petite; thin but athletically so, wearing a charcoal pencil skirt and a white blouse to great effect. Her dark black hair was up in a high ponytail, almost scraped back from her face. She wore thin rimmed designer glasses over her slightly pointed nose and stared through them at me as if she were studying an animal in a cage.
"So," I said, "Let me guess; a doctor but not medical and a medic but not a doctor?"
"I have a doctorate in engineering and biochemical science," Filch said, cocking her head to one side.
"And I am a doctor," Sutton cut with a snap, his English accent giving it a slight whine "but in England, we call surgeons Mister rather than Doctor."
Wilson smiled as he watched us talk, and stepped in to begin his promised explanation.
In the end, it took them three hours to explain the whole process to me. I expected them to patronise me a little, especially after the back and forth we began with, but they were quite lovely, although they did use a few large words I had to admit even I didn’t understand.
I sat patiently, what else could I do, and waited for them to finish. They talked excitedly throughout. Once they had finished, I had a decent handle on what they wanted to do. The basics of the process would be to implant a series of communicating nodes along my brainstem and connect them into any parts of my spinal cord still functioning. This would allow them to tap into the signals my brain was attempting to send to my body and transmit these into their network. They would then theoretically be able to transfer the signals from my brain to control other things all from the comfort of their lab.
“What’s the downside?” I said, “I can imagine it must be a pretty big one or you would have people lining up to do this. It smacks of high-level spy gear to me.”
“That’s the thing,” Sutton’s face took on a grim look, and his eyes said this information had been imparted before and without success, “The implanting of the tech is permanent; there is no way to remove it without killing whoever undergoes the operation.”
“I figured as much, but what else? That can’t be the only thing.”
“Well,” Filch cut in, glancing at Wilson for a second, “We don’t have a huge sample group to work from. You see, to be able to implant most of the nodes we need to access the brainstem where it goes down into the body.”
“We basically have to cut the spinal cord and paralyse the subject.” All of us shot a look at Sutton over the use of ‘Subject’, and he apologised immediately.
I thought it over for a second. “So basically you need someone who is either already paralysed or someone willing to have their spinal cord severed in the name of science?”
“Not to mention their clearance level,” Wilson supplied, “We can’t just have the average Joe from the street in here. Most of what’s in this building simply doesn’t exist on public record.”
“That’s why your injury is perfect for this technology. The accident you had severed your spinal cord at more or less the perfect place for us to be able to implant you with the nodes.” Sutton looked pleased with himself over the comment.
“So how big exactly is your talent pool for this little experiment?” I asked, suddenly curious.
“Our sample of prospective individuals is, well, basically you.” Wilson stood up, walked behind my chair, and began to push me towards the door. Sutton gave it a knock, and another dark-suited agent swiftly opened it.
“We need your consent to the procedure, I know you have already told me you are happy with this, but unfortunately we need something on record.”
That amounted to Filch holding a video camera in front of me while he asked questions, which I had to answer to the camera, finally ending with a statement that I was of sound mind and I was giving my consent freely and without coercion.
I was surprised at the speed at which they wanted to proceed. No sooner had I accepted and provided the video consent than Sutton was on the phone to his team, organising for them to make the operating theatre ready. They were performing the operation that night, but in the meantime, they had provided me with
an upgraded wheelchair. I had seen them when I was choosing mine not long after my accident. This one was the type generally reserved those with complete paralysis; the kind with a large screen attached to the chairs arm and a camera capturing your eye movements to control the inbuilt computer.
The same nurses came back and helped me into it before checking over the ventilator once more. It took me a little while to get used to the interface, blinking at the right times to select anything I wanted, but once I had the hang of it, I spent my time reading up on all of the files. Wilson had been kind enough to preload onto the system quite a wealth of information about the project and the operation. I was halfway through a particularly exciting report when I heard the usual swift knock at the door.
Wilson, Sutton and Filch all entered the room, leaving the door open behind them. Sutton asked me if I was ready to go and I told him I was just about as prepared as I ever would be. We exited the room, and they walked with me for a short distance along the corridor, Filch and Sutton cut off to get ready for the operation part way, leaving Wilson to direct me to a small room next to the operating theatre.
Once inside, I could just see over the half glass partition between this room and the next. There was no way into the theatre from here; I decided it must have been some sort of viewing gallery. There was an airlock on the opposite wall where a person was standing, waiting to get in. I could see the jets of air blowing at the protective suit he was wearing. It covered his whole body and head. A respirator mask obscured most of his face, but I instantly recognised him as Sutton.
The whole operating theatre must have been what they call a 'clean room', where no foreign bodies would be able to get into the delicate technology they were working with. I watched as Filch entered the same way and then a further three people I didn’t recognise, each going through the airlock one by one.