Operation Gajin Begins

"This is the Gaijin," Destro spoke to the Cobra command. "A highly powered communications satellite owned by both Extensive Enterprises and a powerful Japanese Corporation which we are partners with. As you can see I've taken the liberty of installing a few extras into it. Such as some cameras so we can watch the live broadcast as well as a few million nano-mites."

A large screen showed the satellite. "The Gaijin was hailed as one of the world's premier conduits for wireless technology," Destro continued. "Cell phones, wireless web messaging and even television signals. Today it becomes something more. A Trojan horse carrying the radio waves needed to control the nano-mites. As of now the Gaijin is under the full control of Cobra. My control."

"Yippie," Mindbender grumbled.

Lillian walked into the room. "They've captured Bludd."

"No matter. He was expendable," Destro waved his hand. "He's served his uses." He pressed a communications button. "Zanya. Operation Decoy has gone smoothly. Report."

"We've infiltrated the Senate building," Zanya told him. Her hair had changed to a light brown and she was wearing a more conservative outfit. "We've got all the files we need. Proceeding next to the Pentagon."

"Excellent," Destro nodded. "Everything is falling into place."

"I still would have liked to see those Joes' faces when they realized what they put their foot in," Zanya folded her arms.

"I need you and Zartan where you are," Destro informed her. "As well as Mystique and Sabertooth. Besides, Zandar and Road Pig did quite well without you."

"Guess there's a first time for everything," Zanya snorted. "Zanya out."

Lillian embraced him, ignoring the disgust of the other Cobras. "Everything is going smoothly darling," She grinned. "By tomorrow the entire United States will be under our control. We've crippled GI Joe and the X-Men in one fell swoop."

"Not to mention gaining several new test subjects," Destro grinned as he switched on the monitor that showed the captive mutants and Joes in their cells. "This will prove quite interesting."

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"Still no word huh?" Arcade asked Hawk as they made their way to the Joes' computer lab.

"Not yet," Hawk sighed. "The same can be said for the Joes in sickbay. But the good news is we finally have an idea what happened to them. And we need your help."

"Me?" Arcade blinked. "But I'm not a medical expert."

"But you are a computer expert," Hawk said. "That's why I need you for a very special assignment."

"Wow…" Arcade looked in the huge computer lab. "This is every hacker's dream!"

"Arcade these are our new Joe computer experts Firewall and Daemon," Hawk indicated two college age kids. Daemon was a tall blond youth wearing a black T-shirt, headphones and jeans. Firewall was a girl that had short black hair in ponytails, an anime T-shirt under a black leather jacket and red leather pants. "Firewall, Daemon, this is Arcade."

"Kind of young ain't he?" Firewall asked. "What the Feds recruiting kids now?"

"He works with the Misfits, Firewall," Daemon told her. "Even though he's not a mutant."

"You know about me?" Arcade was surprised.

"Let's just say we have a lot in common," Daemon grinned. "Long story short we're both hackers who the government wants to hire us instead of locking us up."

"Compared to this or prison we chose this," Firewall grinned. "You must be good if you're here on this nanite thing."

"Nanites?" Arcade blinked. "You mean as in tiny robots?"

"Yeah that's what's infected our guys," Mainframe entered the room with Dial Tone. "Somehow Cobra's found a way to control them and infect people with them. Our job is to find out how they do it and stop them."

"It's not just people," Firewall told them. "We did a little sweep of computers worldwide and found something interesting. It seems somehow they're building up in computers all over. Look at this." She pressed a button and showed a grid.

"How'd you do that?" Dial Tone asked.

"A little something we cooked up in our spare time," Firewall said.

"Thanks to Logan's little 'talk' with Major Bludd we now know what Cobra is planning," Hawk told them.

"World conquest with nanomites, am I right?" Arcade asked.

"Bingo. The main thing is if Cobra can control these nanomites they can be used to destroy anything," Daemon told them. "Weapons, computers, a person's central nervous system you name it…"

"If Cobra does that…" Mainframe shook his head. "We will be in it deep."

"Well then we'd better stop 'em," Firewall said. "Let's get to work."

The three of them went to work and made considerable progress within an hour. Even though Arcade was much younger than the two other hackers, they got along quite well. "So what's it like working with mutants?" Firewall asked while they worked.

"It's pretty cool actually," Arcade told them. "I mean they're kids like me so we have a bit in common."

"Aren't you like…afraid of them?" Firewall asked.

"At first yeah," Arcade shrugged. "But the way I see it is that we all have special gifts. Mutant powers or otherwise we all have something that sets us apart. We're just learning how to make those gifts work with each other. Yeah sure they've got powers like creating earthquakes and stuff, but none of 'em know how to hack into the MTV computers and the ones at the Playboy mansion. It all evens out."

"Never thought of it like that," Firewall shrugged. "I mean I don't know anything about mutants. Never even seen one, well except on TV."

"You kind of have to get to know them before you make any judgements," Arcade told her. "But they're a lot of fun."

"Any progress?" Mainframe asked as he and Dialtone walked in.

"Nothing much yet," Firewall said.

"Hey guys I've just found something," Daemon told them. "I've just hacked this encryption code. Do you know these things can upgrade themselves on a molecular level? Unreal."

"How is Cobra controlling all the nanites?" Firewall asked.

"Simple they've somehow infiltrated several satellites to broadcast signals all over the planet," Mainframe told her. "But we can't figure out which ones yet."

"Well can't we just do it by process of elimination? How many could there possibly be?" Dial Tone asked.

"Uh, this many," Arcade pushed a button and a screen showing every satellite orbiting the earth was shown. There were literally thousands of them on screen.

"This is not good," Dial Tone muttered.