Chapter 19: Deep In The Headquarters
Marcus landed firmly on the floor of a small, dark room. He was now inside the MI6 Headquarters building. The room that he was now in was only small; more like a small storage room. Marcus picked out one of the small highly advanced Blacktail handguns that he had connected to his belt. Loading it with 10 bullets of ammo and starting to point it up with both hands, he took a few steps forward towards the door. He slowly grabbed hold of the door handle and slowly turned it; carefully walking out of the room and into a dark and unlit thin corridor. His digital communicator began to buzz and he picked it up from off a pocket on his belt.
"Yep" Marcus quickly spoke.
"Hey Marcus, just checking you're inside the building." Liam spoke on the other end of the line.
"Yeh, I'm in. I'm surprised that there's not more people in this building. I know I've only made it into the east beta corridor, but there are usually a lot more people in this building then there is now."
"Well, its funny you should say that, coz' Daniel found out some information regarding the presence of where everybody is in this building." Liam passed the communicator to Daniel
"Yeh Marcus, check this out. When inspecting thermal and x-ray signals of this building, it appears that most of the people in this building are based in levels underground."
"How many levels underground?"
"Ummmm, probably about 4 or 5 building levels underground."
"4 or 5?" Marcus was puzzled by this.
"Something wrong Marcus?"
"Oh no, it's nothing. It's just……well, I can remember there being a level as deep as Basement 2, but there was never a Basement 4 or even a Basement 5 level. That is odd!"
"Well anyway, me and Liam are currently sending you the 3-D digital map plus all the heat signatures of people to your digital communicator's visual reference interface. You should get them in a few minutes time."
"Cheers guys, I'll talk to you again once I find any information or data regarding where the boys are situated in this building. Marcus out!" Marcus placed his D.C. back in the pocket on his belt. He looked down both ends of the corridor and decided to go left. He jogged slowly down the dark corridor; still keeping hold of his handgun with both hands and pointing it upwards and having a small black torch attached to his belt providing a small amount of providing light.
Meanwhile, within an underground basement room filled with computers and other technological and scientific devices, the MI6 leader came walking in along with his two sub-leader officials.
"Is everything ready for the research and thorough analysis to begin?"
"Yes sir. Would you like me to press the start button?"
"Yes……but before you do, answer me this one question."
"Of course sir."
"Why the hell is there a start button on the control panel? Couldn't you scientific and medical people be a bit more…creative with these technological designs!"
"Sorry sir, it's just…well, it makes it a lot easier to run this thing since all we have to do is press one button. Pressing it will automatically run every machine, device and active droid during this process. Everything will run itself once the start button is pressed."
"I see, well now you put it that way, I guess I'll accept it as it is. Very well……you may begin the process."
"YES SIR!" The Research official quickly turned back round and slowly pressed his finger down on the dark red button that had the word 'start' written on it.
At which point, the huge towers, blocks and stretches of machines, devices and other technological devices on the other side of the glass wall started to function and buzz; giving off multiple tones of electronic colours in the devices. And it was during this point, that deep within the heart of a colony-sized collection of dark-coloured machines in the horizon that the process of this so-called research and analysis had begun. The circular platform that the four boys and their glass capsules were lying on appeared and stopped just above a moving conveyor belt. Out of one machine, four pairs of metal arms of similar length appeared and began to each grab hold of a separate capsule. Placing them on the moving conveyor belt, they disappeared back into the machine from where they came from. Another set of arms began to open up each capsule and softly took off the hats that the boys were wearing plus the oxygen masks that were covering their mouths. The conveyor belt kept moving until all four boys were positioned under a tightly constructed machine that began to create lasers that pierced through their clothes however didn't touch their bodies. With that done, the machine automatically blew a quick draft of air to clear the remains of their clothes off and out of the capsule.
Out of the other side of the machine appeared the four boys wearing nothing more than their white briefs and underpants. The conveyor belt stopped; just in front of what looked like a bottomless round hole with towers of machines based all around it. Four square-shaped holders grabbed hold of the four glass capsules and tipped them up so that the boys were in an almost standing up position. Four large screen-like devices began to buzz and move close to where the boys were. And as soon as they were nothing more than about a foot away, the screen machines began to take a slow but thorough scan of all four boys; starting from their feet all the way up to the very top tip of their hair. The scanned outlines of the boys plus data and highlighted information was recorded on a screen behind the machine. The scanning machine was dark red in colour and emitted a very bright red light that slowly crept across the boys' bodies whilst scanning. And with that part done, the four capsules along with the four boys were taken down to a deeper level for the analysis and research to resume; with the machines carefully grabbing hold of them as they moved slowly down a dark shaft buzzing with machine noise and bright colours.
Half an hour had passed and Marcus had made his way to the main ground level of the headquarters. It hadn't been easy for Marcus; considering he had already used some of his experienced acrobatic and technological skills to get past some of the buildings structural and security obstacles. While Marcus still crept slowly down endless dark corridors and through varied sized rooms; passing MI6 officials whilst not being spotted as he did so, he eventually came to a large dimly lit room full of pipes and metallic bared ground. The only door into the next corridor was directly opposite him on the far side, yet there was no way to get to it. Marcus looked round and decided to get across by means of the many pipes that filled the room. Balancing, hanging and crawling through the pipes on his way, he eventually got to the other side and jumped up onto the platform next to the door. Walking through it, he entered yet another corridor; full of medical doors that led into smaller isolation rooms. As Marcus moved down the corridor, he took some time to gaze through the door windows. He saw nothing but emptiness in the rooms.
"Heh, I wonder what all these rooms were used for." Marcus spoke to himself; at which point he stopped; coming to the end of the corridor and standing next to an elevator leading to the first underground level of the headquarters. He picked out his D.C. device.
"Guys, where does this elevator take me?"
"Looks like this goes straight to Basement Level 1 Marcus." Liam spoke; looking back at the 3-D virtual map he had of the MI6 building and the red dot of Marcus' position that was flashing on-screen.
"Basement Level 1 eh? Do y'think yer' can unlock it?"
"Impossible." Daniel quickly replied. "The lift's been locked from the basement's main computer with some kind of high-level protection code. I can't crack or hack into it at all. Looks like you'll have to take the stairs Marcus."
"Alright, anywhere I need to go or avoid?"
"Just keep following the North and East corridors once you get down to the next floor level. Look out for any officials that may be around the corners. I'm sending you some electro signal pulses from some sources I've picked up in the past few minutes, I think yer' should check those out once you get down there."
"Right, OK!"
"Oh and one more thing Marcus. You might as well find out some more info about what's going on around here. Try looking through computer databases and log bases when you find anything; they might provide some or few bits of information that may be useful."
"Alright, cheers for that. I'll notify yer' of anything I find. Marcus out!" Slowly opening the squeaking metal door into the stair shaft, Marcus carefully crept his way down the flight of stairs to the first basement floor.
Meanwhile back two floors below, pairs of mechanical arms had gabbed hold of each boy by their arms. The four were hanging like puppets above a glowing platform with four bright circles of light directly below them on the platform. In the centre of the area appeared what looked like a gun of some kind with four identical tubes each aimed at one of the boys. Powering up and beginning to light up, the machine started firing what looked like multiple little black electronic devices onto the boys' bodies which covered pretty much every part of their bodies. Each device had a huge red glowing eye and was attached to a thick wire which went all the way back into the machine's tubes.
The gun machine was attached to a much larger scan reader which was scanning, analysing and extracting genetic information from all four boys; via the small black devices and sending them to the larger machine's core. With its task now fully completed, the machine detached the small black devices and each boy was carefully lowered down onto each separate circle of light. Somehow, even after the arms of the machine let go, all four boys were still standing up; even though they were still asleep. The four circles of light which were actually smaller platforms lowered themselves and brought each boy down into a tight dark shaft full of smaller towers of machine and buzzing lights.
The platforms stopped so that further scans from each side could be taken via a thin sheet of infra-red energy, which was then followed by a couple of retina and eye scans.
But before the platforms could resume moving down, the machines had to do a few more final minor scans and modifications which included changing the boys from wearing pants to wearing boxer shorts. Why this was necessary was still unsure, but the machines did their assigned tasks quickly and fully and so the platforms lowered down to the final level of research where the four boys were each put on a table that locked them in place.
Each table was side by side one another and the room that the four boys were in now was completely blank and white. The only things that were in the room were white machines, equipment and buzzing white lights that hung off the ceiling.
"Sir, the medical teams are ready to begin performing the surgical operations." A Random official spoke.
"Excellent. Call them into the operation room where the four boys are situated now. We will begin the operation. Is everything ready and prepared for us to begin?" The General official spoke; still standing in the same room where he had been for the past thirty minutes.
"Yes sir, the research team are now as we speak transferring the four 'organs' to the operation room. Once they are done, we will be able to begin."
"Good, you may leave!...Oh one more thing, tell the medical team to not kill Kenny, because if they do, they'll be more than just bastards when they confront me!"
"Yes sir! I'll tell them that!" The official left the room at which point the General turned back round and looked up at the camera screen of the four boys in that white room.
"Everything is going according to plan. Once this operation has finished, we'll be one step closer to the extraction phase. That energy will be ours."
Back on the First Basement Level, after walking slowly through the bottom stair shaft door, Marcus carefully began to walk down the dark corridors that were lit only with small electric lights on the walls. The walls were scattered with loads of bulletin boards, pieces of paper and other small objects.
A few minutes later, Marcus found himself in a weird room full of small technological devices.
"Why does this seem all familiar?" Marcus thought to himself. "I mean, it's not as if I remember this stuff or anything, but something in my head's saying that I do know what it is."
But just as Marcus had finished talking, he started feeling pains in his chest; like a mixture of a stitch pain and a heart attack but slightly less threatening. Clinching part of his chest, Marcus poured himself a cup of water from a sink nearby in the room. As soon as he had drunk it, the pain stared to fade away and Marcus was able to stand back up again.
"Heh, I wonder what that was all about."
He slowly opened the door into the second room. This room was more scientific-looking and it had four glass isolation capsules within the central area of it.
"What the hell!" Marcus spoke as he walked up to the capsules. He had never seen anything like this before and was totally confused into what could have been in them. He noticed small traces of a thick gooey slime that had oozed its way out of the capsule and onto the room's cold floor. Marcus noticed a logbook on a small device nearby and started to read the flashing message that was on-screen.
"MI6 Log 17/05/2006; 15:36
Our Research Team has successfully managed to manipulate a genetic structure of the organ substance our reconnaissance team had found in the region of South Park that the four subject targets had been living within. It would seem that 'the Sources' had been somehow able to create this biomass over the past 9 years. With it, we have been able to re-create the substance into four completely identical new human organs that we can insert into the bodies of the four subject targets. These organs, also known as the classified name; 'Enzydriace' will give the boys the ability to extract energy from the 'Core Units' and turn into a quasi-solid mass form for us to extract when necessary. Since the original energy is infinite, the organs will have enough sources to change; thus an endless amount of energy for us to use.
The operation will begin as soon as the thorough analysis of all four boys has ended. During the past few years, our scientific and research teams have uploaded all final details of our research into the 'Core Units' into the research databases. All medical and research officials need to upload any necessary information onto the databases as soon as possible."
Marcus stood with his jaw slightly open; shocked and confused at what he had just read. "What the f--- is going on here?" He knelt down to take a closer look at the oozing slime on the floor. "Heh, kinda looks like strawberry jam………..YUK……..well it doesn't taste like strawberry jam." Spitting out what traces of the slime he had ridiculously put in his mouth left, he made his way back out into the corridor. "So……MI6 have more information about this somewhere on this floor in a room full of computers and databases. I best find that room and find out what the hell IS going on here…and fast!"
Marcus moved slightly quicker down the corridor as he was desperate to find out more information about what was going on here. And more importantly, what was all this information regarding these so-called 'Core Units' all about!