EVO Universe 1: The First (35 page)

The old dog still had the sight; he also knew that if Dunbar had a laser on him, he had one too. Out of nowhere, he booted Dunbar in the ass sending him flying face forward before diving himself. He was not fast enough as a bullet or dart hit him from behind, luckily in the back of the vest.

“Dude! What the?” Eric howled.

Mark ignored Eric’s temper tantrum over kicking him in the ass, quickly grabbing and dragging him around the largest thickest oak tree he could find before putting a portion of his body out with his M4 Carbine to shoot at whatever was taking a shot at them.

The objective was to try to rattle them into making a sound, so they did not have time to set up another shot and take them out. His shooting was apparently pretty close to the proximity of the snipers, because he could now here slight movement of something unnatural; he continued to fire near the sound.

Off a ways a pack of five Shock Troopers, in heavy camouflage body armor stood by as bullets fired from Mark’s M4 either whizzed by them hitting the trees or luckily hitting two of them in their chest plates of near impenetrable armor which was probably what Mark heard.

The Lead Shock Trooper instructing his unit, “Intruders have made our position, switch to live rounds…move in…move in.”

Heavy gunfire erupted back at them ripping into the trees, Armitage fired back but he knew he could not hold their position long.

He quickly grabbed Dunbar by his vest looking him in the face, “Remember what I told you?!”

A now terrified Dunbar shook his head in obedience.

“Then go! I’ll cover you! Go! Go! Go!” Mark screamed.

Eric fought past his fear and ran back in the direction he came moving from tree to tree to avoid the barrage of bullets flying around, while Mark returned fire and began to move himself. He let it fly hoping to draw all the attention to him and away from Eric, and also hoping someone else would hear the commotion and call for help as well.

He moved while returning fire, a bit winded sliding behind another big oak now ripped to shreds by automatic gunfire. The old man was use to chasing people down, not running and ducking for cover. Quickly he changed out the clip to his M4 locking and loading as he sucked up as much air in his lungs to get a second wind.

“Come on you sons of bitches,” he gasped, “Let me see your faces…so I can blow it off…”

He went to aim and shoot when a humming bird whizzed right up to him, the last thing he expected in the middle of a gunfight, until he realized in disbelief that it was mechanical. Its eyes, blinked red as it let out a high-pitched noise that got louder before he could react.

“Oh shit!” he yelled.

Instinct told him to run for it, which he did, but he did not get enough distance between him and the flying robotic assassin as it detonated with enough concussive force to throw him several feet slamming into one of the great oaks of the forest. His head rang and everything went blurry, the veteran in him quickly grabbed body parts checking himself. Limbs still attached. Everything was still here. His vision came back enough to see that they were already on him from different angles.

Armor and weapons he had never seen before, one of them had what appeared to be a hi-tech version of a mini-gun; they definitely looked like storm troopers but more terrifying and ruthless. Armitage slowly raised his hands fearing the worst.

“Target has been captured…prepare to terminate…” the Lead Shock Trooper ordered.

“My name is Special Agent Mark Armitage of the FBI!” yelled Mark at the top of his lungs, “You are under arrest for charges of murder and kidnapping of a minor! Agents now know where I am, and they will be coming for me and for you! Believe it…you sons of bitches!”

A last ditch effort for a condemned man, but it was enough to have the Lead Shock Trooper turn and talk to whoever was giving him commands from behind the scene, with one swift motion the Trooper pulled out his side arm and fired a shot into Armitage’s neck without hesitation, only it did not feel like a bullet. The world started to go black. He imagined this was probably what Dunbar’s world was like.

Mark would here the trooper utter one final sentence before going into the darkness, “Secure the perimeter; bring the transport so we can take him back to the base…”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Light slowly came back into Armitage’s world along with the taste of cotton mouth; he braced himself for probably being butt naked with something stuck in him in the intersection of the town of Klamath Falls for all to see, but that wasn’t the case. They removed his body armor along with all of his gear and weapons. He was in chained shackle restraints. Under arrest was his second thought, prepped for agents coming to take him back DC to face disciplinary action for going rogue.

The room he was in was more of a large sterile conference room with a large silver table that stretched from one end to the other with one of those comlinks that he hated using in the middle, extremely uncomfortable chairs you see out of the Jetsons, and a huge flat screen like monitor.

Two guards wearing lighter black armor versions of the ones that captured him stood at attention on opposite corners of the conference room confirming his suspicions that he had made it alive inside of the base in somewhat one piece.

He adjusted himself in his seat bending forward to shake the cobwebs off; his movements did not make the guards jump at all, which meant they were highly trained to expect the unexpected, not the obvious. In his current state, he was not going to fight his way out of that conference room, even if he got lucky, they would gun him down the second he exited the room with no clue as to where he was.

His best hope was to sit tight, gather as much information as he possibly could, and pray that Dunbar made it out in time to contact Dustin who would be here with some agents on the ground looking for him.

“Any chance a guy can get some water around here?” asked Mark out of nowhere.

Still no reaction, but he really did need water, the cottonmouth was getting to him, and he did not have anything other than the breakfast that morning. Just then, the door in front of him slid open and his prayers went up in smoke.

Eric Dunbar a little bit worse for wear also in chained shackle restraints walked through with another guard bringing up the rear.

“Sorry man…I ran as fast as I could,” said a disheartened Dunbar, “Everything just went black again…”

“It’s okay kid,” he smiled, “It’s okay…”

The guard gave Dunbar a sharp tap on his shoulder with the butt of his rifle to keep moving forward escorting him to one of the chairs where Eric took a seat. The guard then positioned himself by one of the vacant corners of the conference room.

A minute went by before Mark turned to address Eric, “They give you water when you woke up?”

Dunbar gave him a weird look, “Uh…no…”

“Me neither,” Mark shook his head, “What a stingy joint…”

A minute later, the door slid open one more time. The devil himself would walk through with his entourage of Agent Slater and Ms. Barrett bringing up the rear holding her tablet, still walking in her trademark pink flip-flops. Armitage stood up ready for anything, Dunbar did the same trying to mimic him in looking tough; Rosen however ignored Mark all together and made a beeline straight for Eric.

Director Rosen walked up grinning with his arms open, “Eric! Eric! You made it Eric! You made it!”

Mark and Dunbar looked at each other with utter confusion as an approaching Director Rosen gave him a warm hug rubbing his back. It was like some twisted scene out of Wily Wonka and the Chocolate factory…the Gene Wilder version.

“Great to see you Eric…finally great to see you in person,” the Director let out a sigh of relief as if they were old college buddies.

Eric gave the Director a weird smile pretending to know him, “Yeah…okay…who the hell are you?”

Rosen with a smiling hurt look, tried to jog his memory, “Come on Eric! Veterans Memorial Park…the police chief’s patrol car…candy store…City Hall.”

“City Hall?” Mark turned to a now livid Eric.

“Son of a bitch had me drunk on a bench in my boxers wrapped around a goddamn blowup doll…” Dunbar bared his teeth.

“That’s not too bad,” shrugged Mark

“It was a male doll,” seethed Eric.

“Candy store is my favorite,” the Director beamed wagging his finger while walking away; “Francine the store owner didn’t know whether to laugh or be mortified with you sleeping in the jelly bean pit in just a diaper and bib.”

Rosen sighed clasping his hand smiling like a father with pride, “Eric you’re like my Wile E Coyote, time and time again venturing up here looking for us, no matter what embarrassing, humiliating, or hysterically funny situation we left you in after we bag and tag you. Well…here you are, you’ve made it…you’re not crazy Eric or some drunken reprobate. This is a covert government facility with the sole purpose of creating advanced weaponry ensuring that the United States of America remains a Super Power in the world for like forever.”

After finally giving Eric his golden ticket the Director gave a saddened sigh, “Unfortunately…as wonderful as it is to see you Eric, you now know far too much.”

Eric nervously smirked, “So what? This is where you blow my brains out?”

“Come now Eric…I told you…I like you…” Rosen scoffed at him making a ridiculous assertion, “But we are going to do something to your brain…Ms. Barrett…”

As the guards moved into position around Armitage, Ms. Barrett looked at her tablet typing something in, instantly Dunbar’s face went blank as he dropped to the floor a drooling catatonic mess. Armitage lost it attempting to rush the Director but because of his own restraints, the guards in the room quickly overpowered him

“You son of a bitch! What did you do to him?!” Mark roared.

“Nanites Special Agent…nanites…” the Director explained.

“How do you think we were able to stay fives steps ahead of him? After his third attempted try to breach our perimeter here, we decided it was best to keep close tabs on him. You were right…we did know you were coming. We were considering notifying the local authorities to deal with you especially with the “firepower”, you came with,” Rosen chuckled, “But seeing how resourceful you’ve proven to be…we couldn’t risk probably bringing more problems to our doorstep, so we decided to let you come and deal with you in house.”

The Director walked over kneeling down next to Eric rubbing his head, “These are in their early stages, the programming for something so small to do complex things is very difficult, but these were given the specific functions that allow us to both hear and see everything around him, as well as track him. In this case, they performed a high precision lobotomy leaving him in his current yet somewhat functional vegetable state. One day they’ll be able to permanently correct erectile dysfunction in men.”

“You fucking monster!” Mark shrilled fighting to get free.

Director Rosen got up and moved closer to Armitage with an irritated bewildered look, “I’m a monster? You blaming me for this Special Agent?”

He pointed at him baring his teeth, “This is your entire fault. You brought a civilian to a highly classified government facility jeopardizing national security when given
strict orders
not to pursue this case any further. You did this to Eric. I could have you shot for treason.”

“You tell me, where’s the national security in murdering a family; and kidnapping a little girl you sick piece of shit?!” Mark snapped back.

“An unfortunate necessary evil that had to be done to ensure the creation of the ultimate defense for this country Special Agent,” the Director said somberly before motioning to Ms. Barrett, “Please take Mr. Dunbar out of here…make sure he’s found in a hiking accident. Make sure there’s an anonymous payment for his medical bill…make it look like a bunch of his conspiracy theorist followers pulled together on his behalf…looks good…pay off any debts he may have too…it’s the least we can do for him…”

“Yes sir…” She motioned to two of the guards who shouldered their rifles; they walked over grabbing Dunbar off the floor and dragged him out as Ms. Barrett followed them.

“Also bring in Ms. Dennison,” he added to his request, “Might as well have her present since I hate repeating myself.”

He turned to Armitage, “You want the James Bond treatment…you got it…”

A minute later after Ms. Barrett leaves with Dunbar, the doors flew open again as Sophia walked in. Her arms and hands still donning the huge shell like restraints, while she still wore her battle worn clothes from yesterday flanked by four heavily armed Shock Troopers; bringing up the rear were the remaining members of the D.E.A.D partially out of their gear. She appeared to be quite calm and relaxed despite her current predicament.

“You alright?”A concerned Mark asked.

“Doing good….pretty…pretty…pretty good,” she nodded with her best Larry David impersonation, “You come here to rescue me?”

“Yeah…” he nodded.

“Good job…” she nodded with a sarcastic smile.

“If you two are done with the plot filling banter,” Rosen interrupted, “Allow me to quickly explain why you,” he pointed to Sophia, “Are here, and you,” he turned pointing to Armitage, “Should not be here. Project Evolution or the Olympus Project as it was known back then was started the same time the Manhattan Project was created in 1942.”