Episode 33, “Project Terminated”

 

[image error]He’s dead, thought Agent Bridger. He’s dead. Let him be dead.

The chopper floated above the cul de sac, gliding in methodical cross-hatches from North to South and back again. The pilot, half his face hidden behind a smoked visor, had not said a word. He simply did as he was ordered.

Those orders had included the release of the poison gas canisters filled with a synthetic neurotoxin. This toxin had been specially formulated by VanClef. It was based on Peyton’s body chemistry.  While never tested, several of VanClef’s subordinates had, in the Project’s files, expressed their hope that the poison’s could kill even Ian Peyton. The man’s implanted organs generated counteragents to injected and externally introduced toxins. A synthetic toxin was deemed the only option to overcome his natural defenses.

Equipping the chopper with the Project’s full inventory of the gas had been Bridger’s idea.  He believed in being thorough. He had not asked permission to do so; he had not cleared the act with VanClef. In his opinion, VanClef spent too much time behind a desk or an operating table, preoccupied with his ghoulish experiments, to understand the exigencies a field operative faced.

The problems at the school were evidence of this fact. VanClef had long ago relinquished his grip on the place. How many computer and mechanical problems had to occur before someone realized it must be the test subjects doing it? Vanclef had not wanted to see it, but this much was obvious to Bridger from his first moments attached to the Project. He had tried several times to convince VanClef to terminate the subjects, but the man would hear none of it.

Small wonder it was, then, when the alarm sounded within the converted warehouse, that VanClef was caught flatfooted.  He was in the middle of another drill with his trio of pet monsters when the passive systems at the school signaled a breach.  Given the considerable security in place, a breach could mean only one thing: Peyton himself had come calling. This had always been a possibility, and one for which they were supposed to be prepared.  A breach immediately mobilized a detachment of the Hongkongtown Civil Defense Force, whose commanding officer had orders to defer to Intelligence for the duration of operations around the school site. VanClef had only to take a chopper from the warehouse to the cul de sac and oversee the affair.

The black mist still clung to everything.  That was a function of the toxin’s design. It stuck tenaciously to what it touched, which helped introduce it more throughly in the target. The pilot was careful to keep the helicopter well above the effective range of the poison.  The rotors of the chopper helped disperse the mist as they passed over, allowing Bridger to check the brief window that this opened. As the chopper moved on, the mist rolled back in to fill the gap.

He has to be here, thought Bridger.

No one could survive an onslaught like that.  He had watched the soldiers’ guns chip away at Peyton’s body, had watched Peyton stagger and slow. But it was one thing to watch VanClef’s monsters from a floor above and through a mirrored barrier. It was easy to look at surveillance recordings of Peyton fighting police. It was nothing to review the medical examiners’ reports of the victims Peyton had torn to pieces.  It was quite another to see Peyton from scant meters away, ripping the heads off armed men and wading through gunfire as if he did not feel it.

Bridger could admit to himself that Peyton terrified him. That was why he had released the poison.

They had to find his body. It had to be here somewhere.

The pilot jerked as if surprised.  He put two fingers to his helmet and then looked to Bridger.  “I have a transmission from Intelligence, Agent Bridger,” he said.

Bridger nodded.  He pressed the shunt button above his own seat.  The radio switched on.

“Agent Bridger. We’ve received an automated report that you are on site to address a breach at the Hongkongtown laboratory. Report. Have you apprehended the intruder?”

“I’m afraid it’s much worse than that, sir,” said Bridger.  “Agent VanClef has lost postive control of the facility. The test subjects have escaped or are terminated. Our heat sensors show nothing alive inside the lab.”

“And Patient 4?” The reply from the radio was distorted electronically. This was not an error. Bridger had never seen his superiors in Government Intelligence, nor did he possess any information that would help identify these men and women. Concealment of successive layers of the Intelligence heirarchy was a way of live for the agency.

“I’m surveying the area now,” said Bridger.  He looked to the pilot. The pilot shook his head.  “Ian Peyton… has been killed. To make certain, we used a Termination Agent specifically formulated for him.  We have not yet identified any survivors.”

There was a pause. “Say again, Agent Bridger.”

“I repeat,” said Bridger, “Patient 4 neutralized using a wide-area neurotoxin specifically developed for this subject.  We have yet to identify any survivors among the Hongkongtown military unit.”

There was another pause, longer this time.  Finally, the voice said, “Understood,”

Bridger waited until his nerve gave out.  “Uh, orders, sir?”

“Agent Bridger, we are activating containment protocol. Repeat, containment protocol. Project Violet is terminated.”

“Acknowledged,” said Bridger.  “Sir,” he added. “What about Agent VanClef, sir?”

“We repeat,” said the voice. “Project Violet is terminated. Proceed accordingly. Out.”

Bridger and the pilot exchanged glances once more.

Below the chopper, the black mist continued to roil.  “We’re running out of grid,” said the pilot.  “I don’t think he’s down there.”

“That’s impossible,” said Bridger.

“Is it?” said VanClef, appearing on the small screen in the chopper’s control panel. He was seated behind his desk in his office at the warehouse.

“Agent VanClef,” said Bridger.  “I didn’t expect you–”

“You didn’t expect me to have bugged the chopper?” VanClef asked.  “You didn’t expect me to have heard every word of your exchange with Intelligence?”

Bridger paled.  “Sir,” he began. “I–”

“No,” said VanClef, holding up his hand.  “Don’t insult my intelligence with whatever you’re going to say next.  You’re a deep disappointment, Agent Bridger.”

“Sir, I’m only following protocol.”

“I’m not talking about that,” said VanClef.  “I’m talking about your failure to kill Peyton.  Had you simply let the military do its job, they could have brought him down through sheer firepower.  But you panicked.  You released an unauthorized neural agent in a civilian sector, killing the very men who were supposed to be neutralizing Peyton for you.”

“But sir,” said Bridger.  “You didn’t see him.  In my place you’d have done the same thing.”

“Agent Bridger,” said VanClef, “don’t ever project your insecurities onto a man. Never assume he shares your weaknesses.”

“The poison was designed to kill Peyton.”

“And never tested,” said VanClef.  “Has it occure to you that Ian Peyton can hold his breath for at least six minutes? Are you familiar enough with his charts to tell me his lung capacity, which is ten times that of what you or I would consider ‘normal?’” You didn’t just create a smoke screen to hide Peyton’s movements. You also eliminated his enemies en masse so he could slip away under your nose.”

“He’s here,” said Bridger.  “I’d bet my life on it.”

“You already did,” said VanClef.  “And you lost.  We were just speaking of what you didn’t expect, Vincent. I have one more for you. You didn’t expect me to have my own chopper wired with enough explosives to turn it to ash.”

“Sir–”

On the screen, VanClef pressed a switch on the panel of his desk.

Bridger never heard the explosion that killed him.