Chapter 4
Cross didn't bother testing the handcuffs. He was certain SHIELD restraints weren't easy to slip. It was a bit of theatre from Kherber, just like having an entire squad of Blackwatch arrest him the second the transport had touched down on the helicarrier's deck. It had taken a sharp order from him to stand the Wiseman squad down, but Fury's presence had done much to defuse the situation - as had the two SHIELD guards he had insisted accompany Cross.
Even now, in the meeting room, two of Kherber's Blackwatch faithful stood behind him, but the two SHIELD officers behind them would deter any 'accidents' he hoped. It helped that the Blackwatch attention was less on him than on the scowling virus, which was leaning against the wall behind them and returning their glares with interest. This was what Kherber was reducing Blackwatch to? Bullying thugs that acted like they'd never been trapped in a room with a walking outbreak before. He was not impressed.
Fury and Kherber were still outside, what sounded like an argument faintly audible through the doors. Brea had vanished, so he guessed she was out of it. Fury's quick assurance that everything was under control had done little to reassure him, but they hadn't been able to talk without Kherber or his stooges listening in, and talking strategy in front of the enemy just got people killed. The voices grew louder as the door hissed open.
"-internal military matter. Blackwatch will handle it in house and I am the senior officer present." Fury walked in, taking the place at the head of the table as Kherber followed, still arguing. Fury sat down, putting his feet on the table and looked at him.
"The VCJCS disagrees." Kherber waited before it became obvious that Fury wasn't going to let him take control of the meeting and moved to a seat across from Cross.
"The Joint Chiefs?" Kherber sounded disgusted. "You're taking that to Washington?" His gesture to Mercer produced no response from the virus, which was still focused on the increasingly uncomfortable Blackwatch troops.
"No, he's dialled in," Fury said, clicking the screen on. The image came to life, the General seated behind a table. Kherber stood up and saluted. The handcuffs clinked as Cross tried, and a Blackwatch minder's hand kept him in his seat.
"At ease. Captain Cross, salutes are protocol." The General sounded unimpressed.
"In handcuffs?" Fury said, and the General raised an eyebrow.
"He a flight risk?"
"No," Fury said, at the same time as Kherber's 'yes'. "We're two miles up over the Pacific with the transports off-loaded. If the man wants to fly, I'll let him."
"Then get the handcuffs off." Kherber wasn't going to argue the order. One of the Blackwatch guards, reluctantly produced a key and unshackled him. As his hands came free, Cross stood gingerly and saluted. The Vice-Chair returned it. "This everyone, Fury?"
"This is a classified meeting, all personal not directly required, leave," Fury said, rather than answering. One of Cross' Blackwatch escorts put a hand on his arm. Fury didn't even look round. "Captain Cross and Mr. Mercer, you're required." Cross settled back in his seat, uncomfortably aware that Kherber's showtrial had suddenly gone well above his paygrade. As the SHIELD and Blackwatch troops left, Mercer pushed away from the wall, and took a seat round the table from him. It didn't make the Captain feel any better. Kherber addressed the screen.
"Sir, if I may begin my report-" Fury cut him off.
"We're waiting on the Directors of MIST and the CTI." The General looked up sharply, and Fury nodded at him. "SHIELD doesn't know. I do." The General nodded, eyes narrowed.
"Cross, Kherber, those agencies are both top-flight classified. You even dream about those outside this room, your grandchildren will be in Leavenworth."
"Sir, yes sir," Cross barked at the same time as Kherber's restrained "Understood, sir". Fury pressed the intercom button twice, and the door opened. Madigan walked in, followed by Agent Brea. Agent Madigan nodded to Fury with an easy smile as they took the two remaining seats.
"Apologies for the delay, Director, Vice Chair. I had to co-ordinate an ongoing ground op with re-inforcement issues."
"Not a problem, Director Madigan," Fury acknowledged. "General Kherber, this is Interim Director Madigan, MIST and CTI, and Director Brea of MIST." Cross kept his face impassive. He didn't know what the hell those agencies did, but Fury seemed to know both of them. If Wesker had kidnapped a Director-level VIP from an alphabet agency that added enough to the picture to spell trouble.
"I'll be taking a backseat for this, as Madigan's more familiar with the situation," Director Brea added.
"Understood, and glad to have you back with us, Director Brea," the Vice-Chair replied on screen. "Now what is the situation, General Kherber?"
"The requested secondment was completed. ZEUS has been returned to the helicarrier, and Captain Cross is under detainment for working with him," Kherber said, professionally. "Given Cross' known treason, Captain Cross is facing tribunal, the Wiseman squad will be disbanded, and with Director Fury's co-operation Blacklight will be placed in containment for further research." Madigan coughed.
"As you are aware, MIST has had a priority requisition order on the Blacklight entity since the ES18 incident," he said, mildly.
"Blackwatch has no issue sharing the results of our research with MIST once the Blacklight entity is under proper containment." Kherber sounded far too reasonable for Cross' liking. The bastard had always been a political animal, not a military one, and he was in his field here.
"Except that placing the Blacklight entity into containment makes it impossible to fulfil the purpose of the requisition order," Madigan replied evenly.
"Apologies, Director, but I don't see anything the Blacklight can do in MIST containment that it can't do in Blackwatch containment."
"Strategic deployment," Madigan said, and Cross tensed in disbelief. Mercer had said, sworn, no more Penn Stations. What the hell would make him agree to that? Kherber, for once, was in agreement.
"Deploy the virus? Director, I don't think you have any understanding of what you are suggesting. In the interest of National Security, that is utterly unacceptable."
"I'd agree," Fury said. Cross turned his head slightly, looking at the virus out of the corner of his vision. Mercer hadn't moved, almost unnaturally still in his seat. What deal with the devil had Mercer made?
"Not the virus, the entity," Madigan said, his easy manner unchanged. "We want to deploy ZEUS for MIST's combat operations."
"And when ZEUS deploys the virus?" Kherber snapped. There was a low growl from Mercer and the Vice-Chair glowered on screen.
"You have any reason to believe that won't happen?"
"Two successful MIST deployments with no Blacklight outbreak or traces." It was Director Brea cutting in, and the General frowned.
"Two deployments, you claim. You got any proof or these all above my clearance?" His heavy irony didn't phase Brea, who shook her head.
"Not at all. ES18 was a successful field test. MIST operatives and ZEUS combined forces to remove a significant threat to the city. The operation was a full success with limited casualties. No trace of DX1118-C or an outbreak was found during post-op clean-up." Brea looked at Mercer, almost apologetically. "We checked." The virus just nodded. "And then there was today's secondment."
"And ZEUS will co-operate with this?"
"Worked last time." The voice gravelled from under the hood, and Kherber's face twisted in distaste.
"And you think this...creature...will be effective?" the Vice-Chair asked, directing the question to Brea.
"As an artificial lifeform, the..." Director Brea looked at Kherber and changed what she was going to say, "...what we fight can't sense him."
"It." Kherber cut in. "It's an 'it', not a he, and 'it' is not a person." Mercer was too still. If Cross had had his shock stick, he'd have been powering it ready for the pounce.
"The Joint Chiefs have seen the MIST casualty figures, General," Madigan said easily, casually leaning back and placing his feet on the table to mirror Fury. "If ZEUS can drop those, I'll take the chance."
"We have less prolific bio-weapons that could be used." The Vice-Chair suggested.
"When deployed, they were subverted and turned against our troops. ZEUS is sapient," Director Brea said. "When…they…try to subvert Blacklight, Blacklight fights back."
"And General, I believe MIST has a top-flight reputation for managing extermination-class biological weapons." Madigan slid in smoothly. Was it Cross' imagination, or was he carefully not looking at Director Brea?
"More controlled testing would be better," the Vice-Chair said.
"General, with our scheduled deployments over the next seven months, we don't have time," Madigan said. "ZEUS would be a vital element of this deployment series. With half the MIST troops tied up guarding an Umbrella base-"
"That is not MIST's remit," the Vice-Chair snapped.
"No," Madigan said, acknowledging it without complaint or embarrassment. "Captain Cross did request Blackwatch backup, but was overruled."
"Kherber, find out which ass overruled him, and get boots on the ground there now." the Vice-Chair ordered. Kherber saluted, and stepped out of the room. Cross kept his face impassive. Much as he enjoyed the look on Kherber's face, he still had to work for the man. If Madigan was trying not to get him shot, he wasn't doing a good job of it. "I'd still want more oversight."
"Understandable. On operations, MIST troops don't necessarily have the experience or equipment to control ZEUS, or the time," Madigan said easily. "A Blackwatch team or company to manage him would be useful."
"A secondment?" The General nodded thoughtfully. As Kherber returned to the table, the General leaned forward.
"General Kherber, who is your best team?"
"Blackbird team have an established record, Sir, and Lieutenant Forrester can be at HQ by 21:15 tonight." Fury leaned forward.
"Cut the crap, Kherber. The Wiseman team have the best record."
"And Captain Cross is facing treason charges for working with Blacklight."
"So you'd agree Captain Cross already has experience of working with Blacklight?" Madigan said, "and, according to your own mission logs, was the only soldier to take him down during the initial outbreak."
"Hmph." The Vice-Chair looked at Cross. "Captain, think you could take Blacklight down?"
"Sir, yes, sir." Cross deliberately turned his head and on the side away from the screen smirked. The narrow-eyed glare he got from Mercer had 'challenge accepted' written all over it.
"So why the hell didn't you?" Cross knew he had walked into that one. Still, if you're going through hell, keep going.
"I determined there were higher priority threats, Sir." Cross answered truthfully on reflex.
"You determined?" the Vice-Chair said sceptically, as Kherber looked cynical. Cross met the Vice-Chair's eyes squarely and the four-star General must have seen something in them. "Report, Captain."
"Umbrella had a base under L.A. We located Wesker on the bottom level. He sealed the base, stating that he would allow viral levels to reach critical and then in one hour, the containment would drop, releasing the concentrated viral strains into the city."
"I've seen the report. There were no more than viral traces in that base," the VCJCS said.
"No sir. After the threat was neutralised, I thought it best to sterilise it."
"You neutralised a threat on that level?" If Cross could have said yes, it would have solved so many issues. Instead he stuck with the truth.
"No sir. Wesker also stated that as he had now acquired Doctor Mercer, his target, he would extract the information on Blacklight from him and engineer his own strain. That Blacklight was an inefficient bio-weapon that burned out too quickly." He stopped, swallowed.
"And then what?"
"The zombies started coughing, sir." Watching a licker's limbs tearing off from its own bodyweight as it tried to move, infected scientists still far too human as they choked and collapsed. And Mercer simply watching, relaxed, like a man who had put a burden down for a while before he picked it up again. "Backlight went airborne. The Blacklight outbreak burned out within two minutes. We used the remaining time to sterilise any biological remains and make the base safe."
"And Wesker?"
"I put a bullet in the head, sir." The head of the viral abomination that Blacklight and all Wesker's resident strains had turned the scientist into. Cross was sure Mercer had been playing with it at the end, smirking as its form twisted and mutated at Blacklight's whims. 'Dammit, stop playing with your food and eat it' wasn't the greatest epitaph for Wesker but it was better than his squad throwing up in their gas masks. The Vice-Chair nodded thoughtfully.
"And you allowed this?"
"We couldn't have contained a T and G virus outbreak in L.A. As Wesker said, in the worst case Blacklight would have burned itself out."
"I have full control of Blacklight." Mercer hadn't moved. His voice from under the hood sounded inhuman. "No more Penn Stations."
"And you trusted him?" Cross looked the General in the face.
"In the Manhattan outbreak, I could not have got Randall's nuke off the Reagan without him, sir."
"So you have a confession. Cross allowed a Blacklight outbreak, and accessed a nuclear military asset without orders or permission," Kherber said smoothly, triumph under his tone.
"And this meeting is classified, General." The VCJCS reminded him. "Cross, what do you mean Randall's nuke?" Cross's eyes widened. He had filed a full report, as best he could remember when he woke up in the hospital. Somewhere along the line the story had been changed, or classified into non-existence. Kherber's face was set, promising consequences, but Cross had nothing to lose.
"General Randall had a nuclear bomb activated on the deck of the Reagan. He intended to detonate it to destroy the south of Manhattan and any proof of Blackwatch's involvement after the loss of his HVT. My full report was filed after I woke up on the hospital ship."
"Sir, Captain Cross is claiming a two-star General went rogue to cover his own ass." Kherber cut in. "The video footage from the Reagan was lost due to the EMP and there are absolutely no witnesses."
"Me," Mercer gravelled.
"No reliable witnesses." Kherber corrected himself, glaring at Mercer.
"But this does confirm that Cross has worked with Mercer successfully." Madigan slid into the awkward pause effortlessly. "And the Wiseman team have just completed a successful joint op with MIST. Why not make the secondment ongoing?"
"And if I don't, our mutual superior will?" the Vice-Chair said dryly.
"Well, I'll certainly ask. After all, if the military is going to shoot good soldiers for doing the exact job that MIST specifically needs them too..." Madigan shrugged, still friendly, still smiling, and Cross had never trusted him less. The Vice-Chair looked for a moment as though he was trying not to laugh. Then, his composure restored, he continued.
"So the Wisemen team are on secondment to MIST, duration at MIST's discretion. Captain Cross to act as liaision. Charges against Cross are suspended for the duration. Mission reports to my office directly, Captain."
"Sir, yes sir." Cross stood to attention saluting. The Vice-Chair acknowledged and cut the feed. Kherber looked stunned and furious. Cross was too busy wondering what the hell he'd got his men into to enjoy it. Fury sat back, lacing his fingers together.
"Now you're done poaching elite troops, Madigan, don't you have a job to do? And Kherber? Get your ass off my helicarrier."
