I am a beast! I wrote half of this in one sitting! This is important, 'cuz, with this story, it's normally written over a period of several weeks. That's why it takes so long for me to update. Enjoy!
Yes, he had already been inside the building and seen its massiveness. So, part of is awe was an act. However, the other part wasn't. The other time he had been there, it was darker, and he didn't have much time to soak it in. This time was different. Lights showed the rest of the room and helped heighten the look of the ceiling. Plus, he just kinda went through a stone wall. Doesn't that deny the laws of physics?
Gulping, Stephen looked back at the wall he just came from. There was no way he just went through a cliff wall.
"Heh heh, yeah, it took me a while too." The young spy looked over at the speaker, who was a smaller man with red hair that stuck out of a small cap. From the appearance of his clothes, Stephen guessed him to be a mechanic. Glancing around, he also guessed a Metal Maniac.
Looking at the bemused expression, the red head introduced himself, "I'm Monkey, the Metal Maniac mechanic."
"M'nM m," Stephen muttered to himself.
"What?"
"Nothing, I'm Stephen." He held out his hand, which Monkey accepted.
Stephen noticed that Monkey was the only one to come forward, until he saw the older man in the metal suit walk over.
"I'm Dr. Peter Tezla," The man said.
"Stephen Dawes. Why am I here?" he asked, careful to keep the slight accent in his voice.
Though he couldn't see his eyes, Stephen was pretty sure they were radiating surprise. The scientists' voice held a hint of the emotion. "To race."
Feigning ignorance, Stephen looked as though he was clueless. "Oh? Where? The road?"
Instead of answering, Tezla motioned for the young spy to follow him.
Stephen complied and noticed that the other people followed as well.-some apparently knowing where they were going. However, making an educated guess, Stephen derived from his quick and agile mind that they were headed to the conference room. When he surmised that his hypothesis was correct and could now be called a theory/fact, he successfully struggled to keep the smug look of knowledge off of his face.
He also guessed that the drivers didn't need to be there. They were just curious.
They entered the large room, and Stephen surveyed it with a look of mild curiosity. Dr. Tezla motioned for him to sit, and he complied. A few of the other drivers entered and stood in the back as the lights dimmed and his eyes were drawn to three massive screens. Within seconds, Stephen was being shown footage of elaborately designed tracks flying by. He could only guess that this was footage taken from the cars.
"This," Tezla said. "is where you will race."
Stephen raised his eyebrows, silently asking for further explanation.
"These are Racing Realms, created by the Accelerons. We gain access through a hologram of the Wheel of Power," Tezla pressed a button on the table and a mini hologram of the large ring Stephen had seen upon first entering the building popped up. "When this opens, you must be going 300 miles per hour to enter. In these realms, you will be tested for skill, racing against the racing Drones, all in hopes for winning an Accelecharger."
The clips from the realms played during the whole speech-however short it was. Once he finished talking, Tezla stopped the footage, ending on a portal with the realm emblem on it.
Following the end of this, a silence enveloped the room. But only for a short while.
Stephen looked up. He smirked. And he chuckled. "And you…expect me to believe all this?"
The scientist stared at him levelly from behind his purple glasses. "Every word."
Stephen's smile grew a little bit more. "Of course. I mean, it's completely logical in every sense. Honestly?" He stood, but before he could take a step an alarm sounded.
Instinctively, he turned in time to see the giant ring rotate to become three separate rings-creating the Wheel. In a very short period of time, a massive blue sphere was whirling in the middle of it. It once more amazed him to see it, but Stephen ramped up the look of disbelief on his face. After a minute, he looked around, but found himself standing alone.
At almost the exact same moment, he heard Tezla's voice over the intercom: "The following drivers will enter the realm. Nolo Pisaro, Karma Eiss, Kurt Wylde. Tork Maddox, Deezel Riggs, and Mark Wylde."
Wylde. Stephen's eyes narrowed as he watched cars one by one shoot into the ball. Brothers. He nodded. They were on separate teams, and hated each other. He mentally went through their backgrounds. Mark Wylde-Markie to his brother, and Wylde to his teammates-had spent two years in prison for a 'business deal' the brothers had done. From the file Jerry sent him, that's all he had learned. It hadn't given any more detail-saying it was classified.
He turned away from the window and started as he came face to face with GIG.
"If you would like to watch the race," the floating computer said, "follow me."
Stephen complied and soon found himself in another large room. The difference, this one had computers in it, and an island in the middle that had a smaller holographic wheel slowly rotating above it. Above the window, a large timer showed, counting down. He remembered this room. Then, he couldn't see all of the monitors. However, that was no longer a problem. Dr. Tezla was close by, also observing the race.
Yet, he still didn't know what the drivers were talking about.
This realm was interesting. It was all underwater.
"This is the Water Realm," Tezla said from behind him.
Stephen turned and accepted the proffered headset. It was an interesting race. Simply thrilling. They were floating slowly to the bottom of some ocean-like place.
"Taro, can you see anything?" Lani was asking.
Stephen didn't wait to hear the answer. He turned to Tezla and asked, "So, they enter that blue sphere-" he pointed to the portal "-and wind up in a different world?"
The scientist's lips formed a small smirk. "Yes."
The spy turned back to the monitors. He wasn't overly fond of the tone in Tezla's voice. Too…victorious? No, smug. It irked him terribly. Could the man please get over himself?
It wasn't too long before the drivers found the track. Soon, they were all racing through underwater tunnels, while mammoth fish swam around the track. By this time, Monkey had made his way up the computer room, and was trying to flirt with Lani.
"I should've brought my board." Vert commented.
Stephen looked questioningly at Lani, feigning ignorance.
She smiled and quickly replied. "He surfs."
He nodded and continued to watch the race.
Presently, the drivers came to a section of the track that was made of water. It was a tunnel with walls of water, but the center was dry. In order to go through, they had to accelerate across-and never slow. Within seconds, all of the drivers had made it through. All except one.
"You need to speed up Porkchop," Lani said, looking worriedly at Porkchop's monitor. "Porkchop?"
Stephen also turned his attention to that screen, wondering why the man wasn't accelerating. His mind reeled through all of the information he had taken in on these drivers. Despite his best efforts, some of it managed to get jumbled up and he mixed in drivers. But he finally realized what was happening.
The story flashed through his mind, and he couldn't keep himself from whispering, "He's afraid of water."
Lani glanced at him, while Monkey was shouting out orders into the microphone, GIG calmly correcting him on some error.
There was a sudden flash of light and a dark form was thrown from the portal.
Stephen looked in at Porkchop lying in the bed in the infirmary. Yes, you had known this job was dangerous. But, he somehow found this incident unnerving. He walked down the hall to his room, thinking about the possibilities of injury. Or death. Neither one of those sounded inviting. True, with his job, it was quite possible to get a serious injury. But, when the possibility of that happening was magnified, it made him stop and think about what would happen to his brothers and sister if and when it happened.
He had heard of agents making it through their entire careers without getting a single injury while on the job. But, that wasn't always going to happen. Someone once told him that a CIA agent making it through his career without an injury was like a kid going through life without candy. It just wasn't right.
He had laughed when that was first said, but, now it was infinitely more serious. Or at least seemed so. He picked up his phone and dialed Aaron's number.
It took a few rings, but the older man finally answered. "Hello?"
"Hey, Aaron, it's me," Stephen said, sitting down heavily.
He knew Aaron had to sort out which 'me' it could be, since it took a few seconds for the man to reply; and even then it was a question. "Stephen?"
"Yeah."
"What's wrong?" There was the sound of material rubbing against each other, and the creak of a bed or chair.
"Uh…" Stephen scratched the back of his neck, not sure how to put it.
"Having doubts?" Aaron suggested.
Psycho. "Um, yeah. Kind of." Stephen replied awkwardly. Normally, he was confidant and firm. But, this wasn't exactly a normal thing for him to feel, these doubts.
There was a deep sigh on the other end. "What about?"
"Uh," he pinched his nose. He started to say something, and then sighed. "This is gonna sound stupid."
"Kid, to me, you always sound kinda stupid."
"Thanks, that was really encouraging," Stephen smiled slightly.
"Here, I'll guess again. Injuries?"
Okay, now this guy really has me creeped out. "Yeah. I'm…worried."
"About your family." It wasn't a question.
Despite himself, Stephen nodded. "Yeah. I don't want them to find out, or to worry if I get hurt." He took a deep breath. "And I don't want them to have to got back to England."
Aaron knew what that meant. If Stephen was injured seriously, the truth would probably come out. If that happened, the government would have to take extensive measures that the information didn't go anywhere. If he was killed…the truth would definitely come out, and his siblings would have to go back to England, until Josh was old enough to claim his inheritance, and take over guardianship.
"Yup. That's definitely something to worry about. But listen, you'll be well protected. Not much could happen."
Stephen let out a short bark. "Yes, but you didn't see what I just saw! A man was just thrown a hundred feet at a hundred plus miles an hour! His leg is broken. These realms are much more dangerous than you thought."
"I know. But, Stephen. You can't just go about your job freaking about every little possibility. If we all did that, where would we be? No where!"
Stephen sobered a bit after this speech.
"Look, I've gotta go. But, call me if anything comes up. Alright?"
"Okay," Stephen answered curtly.
"Bye."
"Bye." He flipped his phone shut, and sat there thinking for a while.
Aaron was right. He couldn't just freak out over all the little details. But, Stephen always had Aaron with him, leading him through the whole thing. Details large and small were thought over and dealt with. This was a different experience when it all depended on you. There was no one to share the burden. No one could do much over the phone. This assignment was considered pretty small. But, as it was his first solo, it seemed too big.
Stephen carefully attached the small device into the hardware of the main computer. It would store a certain amount of information before it could hold no more. At this time, the information-whether it be data files, audio files, or video files-would be sent to a command site. These particular files had all the information having to do with the races.
Standing up slowly, Stephen recounted everywhere he had placed similar bugs. In the computer controlling security footage. Tezla's computer-the image of the unconscious doctor being controlled by GIG was still floating through his mind-this computer. And the infirmary computer. That was all he could think of.
He had also placed listening bugs in the team's 'living rooms.' Not much-if anything at all-could escape CIA intelligence.
Looking down into the garage, Stephen assured himself that no one was down there. And why should there have been? It was three in the morning. He himself had been in bed until his alarm woke him at 2:15.
Now, he headed back down. He paused slightly to look at the car that Tezla had provided for him. It was a sleek machine, looking more like a TEKU car than Metal Maniac, though one would definitely know upon seeing it that it was not TEKU. It was a single color-a lovely chrome-and styled rather similar to a Lamborghini.
"Are you done?"
Stephen turned to see GIG floating silently next to him. "I take it Dr. Tezla's back in bed?"
"Yes."
Stephen nodded. "I'm done. Once I reach my room, you can turn the security system back on."
GIG nodded, and a few minutes later, Stephen was just about to get in bed when he heard the hum of the security system return. Well, he thought, my job just got a lot easier with all those bugs. Let's see if Tezla ever notices them.
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