Late Friday Night
Colin glided hopefully unseen into the unlit back alley, his hybrid bike running silently on electric. Looking at the burnt out and gutted cars on the nearby streets he immediately wheeled it behind a couple of large, overflowing bins and covered it with a mucky old tarpaulin he found nearby. He knew that any vehicle left on the streets around here would either quickly vanish or be stripped for parts, forcing him to have to hide it while he investigated the nearby party supply factory. He locked it and considered whether he should switch on the bike’s alarm, but in this rundown district did he really want to alert others if someone found it?
He’d finished his latest session with London Watch and once again he’d found himself sidelined into listening to the action rather than actively participating. School wasn’t expecting him back until tomorrow night as he’d become rather expert at forging the letters of authorisation required to allow him to stay out overnight. Instead, he’d departed the Watch’s clock tower base on his bike at 10.30pm and rushed to a meeting with Malone. He’d hoped that his old friend would have uncovered some more information for him into whoever was unifying the kiddie and Fagan gangs in London. Instead, he’d told him he needed to make urgent contact about a possibly related matter with a Rabbi Shallach Ben Holmz, who worked out of the East End of London, in the Shambles district of the city to be precise.
At first, he was for putting off the meeting until a more civilised hour, but Malone smirked and told him that the Rabbi was known to be an insomniac and as he ran a network of homeless and street people, was used to meeting people at weird hours.
Changing into his Cadet costume, Colin had agreed and that was why half an hour later he’d found himself standing in a pleasant kitchen listening to the good (he assumed he was good, perhaps he shouldn’t?) Rabbi Holmz.
The Rabbi was tall, over 6ft, lean and thin, which somehow made him seem even taller. He had messy black hair, which was starting to turn grey at the temples under his hat which he removed to reveal a black kippah skullcap, with bushy eyebrows above steady dark eyes, sharp and piercing with a far-away, introspective look. He had a long face, thin lips and a ‘hawk-like’ nose above a wiry, bushy beard. He paced as he spoke and it was clear that he was an obsessive personality. Malone liked him, informing Colin beforehand that the Rabbi worked compulsively at everything he did.
Refusing the Rabbi’s offers of hospitality, Cadet explained that he was here because he’d been told that unregistered migrant teens had been going missing from the Shambles. The Rabbi clarified what he knew. While it appeared unconnected to the gang unification, the facts were that a small number of young illegal migrants, all males and all of a similar age, between 12 and 14, had started to go missing from the streets. All were orphans and living alone; all were fit and healthy but not especially strong or skilled at fighting and as far as anyone knew, they were all unpowered. They had vanished separately and always unwitnessed. If he hadn’t been keeping an eye on them because he had been worried about their vulnerability it was likely no-one would have known they had even existed, never mind gone missing. All of these facts appeared to be significant contributing factors in their disappearances.
Cadet had initially assumed that Mystery had to have revived her fight clubs but as the Rabbi expounded the facts, he could find no evidence that the clubs had restarted or that these kids had been taken by her. There were too few people going missing and they all seemed to lack the essential characteristics that Mystery would have looked for in fighters.
No, something else was going on and the Rabbi suspected it was connected directly or indirectly to a previously deserted building near the docks. One of his flock had thought he had seen one of the missing boys there a few weeks after he’d initially disappeared but the figure had immediately vanished inside the old factory without a word, though the person who’d seen him thought that there had been something unnatural about the way he’d moved. He’d tried to follow but the building was well and truly locked up. Since then two more children had vanished off the streets nearby.
Cadet agreed he would investigate which resulted in his current nocturnal presence outside the factory. The double gates into the yard were covered in adverts for indoor party fireworks, giant foil poppers and party balloon supplies. He climbed over and looked around. A small, human shadow stood by the factory doors apparently guarding the entrance. What he couldn’t understand was why every time he moved it was accompanied by a quiet, whirling sound.
The building was two storeys high with a flat roof. There were bars over the ground floor windows though the majority of the filthy panes of glass had been smashed at some point in the past. The windows on the floor above were similarly smashed but thankfully unbarred. To his surprise, there was no fire exit from the upper floor, which had to be against fire regulations. On the roof, another small, silent figure bulky-looking, probably due to the thick coat he sheltered under, could be seen pacing. By their size, they could be a couple of the missing kids.
Ask he approached he heard a high-pitched scream from inside the building, coming from the opposite side of the ground floor revealing that someone was in deep trouble inside.
Cadet’s first instinct was to grapnel-up and work his way down from the rooftop, but in this case he suppressed it, reasoning that by doing so he risked being seen by the guards. Instead, he slipped on his rebreather and stealthily ran across to the front wall of the building (crossing the yard in front of it as far away from both guards as he can manage). Once within throwing-range of the small figure at the front door he threw a sleep-gas pellet directly between their legs. As the cartridge shattered, the guard turned towards Cadet. For the first time he could clearly see his opponent; he was young about 12 or 13 at most but the majority of his body had been replaced with cybernetics including integrated nose filters and his right eye, which had been replaced by a camera, its red light flashing. The unholy amalgam of child and machine raised his arm and unleashed a massive discharge of electricity at him.
Cadet was slightly faster. He rolled out of the way of the blast, his right hand grabbing for his staff as he extended it and braced himself in readiness for the cyborg rushing at him at inhuman speed.
Then from above he heard the whistling sound of air rushing passed a falling object and he risked looking up. From above the figure from the roof was hurling towards him with absolutely no sense of self-preservation. He tried to dodge the fast falling object that was another cybernetic youth only to be hit by a second burst of electricity from the first guard and then a second later another blast hit, this time from above as the falling guard unleashed his attack straight down at him before slamming into the ground. Cadet collapsed in intense pain and passed out.
He regained consciousness slowly and painfully and squinted. How long had he been out? He had been imprisoned in a damn cage next to several other thankfully empty cages identical to his prison.
To the rear of him, he could make out stacked crates of fireworks and party poppers, in front of him stood a Eurasian woman apparently in her late twenties dressed in a red and black trimmed bodysuit. Her cruel almond eyes belayed her superficial beauty as did the cruel smile that she had begun to unveil on her face.
“Ah good, I was afraid I would have to start the conversion process while you were unconscious. Not a fan of that, I prefer you to be awake so I can monitor your higher neural functions while I install the control chip and upgrades.”
As she spoke, the two guards stepped into view dragging a skinny, waif-like youth between them. Both had been cybernetically-enhanced to such an extent that less than a quarter of their bodies was still organic. Their left arms have been surgically removed and replaced with weaponised replacements seemingly way too large and heavy for their organic bodies, manageable only because their spines had been enhanced with an exoskeleton frame attached to replacement mechanical legs again too long and muscular for their current bodies. The youth being dragged between them was currently still whole but had a weird slim box fitted to the back of his shaved skull.
The woman smirked as the two cyborgs opened the cell next to Cadet and tossed the unconscious boy in and locked the door. Cadet tried to grab at the arm of one of them but found himself being slammed into the bars as the cyborg yanked itself free.
The woman ignored the interaction and continued talking, “Ah, meet my last recruit as you can see he is now fully compliant, ready for his cyber-conversion. The control chip you can see overrides his conscious will. Once fitted, they are mine to command, absolutely.”
Cadet realised he had best try and find out what was going on while he was a captive audience, so to speak, “So why kids? Why not use willing adults?”
“The process can be rather fatal for adults, pre-adolescents however have a higher survival rate. They ah, generally grow into their cybernetic enhancements, adapt better. The Control chip consists of an immensely complex sandwich of organic and inorganic layers, which we implant between the two lobes of the brain. It renders them compliant. After that, it’s just a matter of removing the unnecessary organics and making them into living weapons.
Adults find it hard to adjust to the process. There is a 65% death rate in those who undergo the procedure and the survivors risk a 75% incidence of iatrogenic schizophrenia and overwhelming paranoia that the chip induces in the survivors. As a result, the procedure never caught on with the military or legal medical establishments but I discovered that pubescent teens are more likely to survive the procedures, less likely to suffer cyberpsychosis as their bodies adjust quicker to the physical alterations. I have a 50% better survival rate with using youths and only 25% become psychotic or kill themselves within a couple of years of conversion. The Foundry can financially benefit from those survival rates.”
“Foundry?” Cadet had heard of The Foundry, after all his father had purchased weapons from them at one time but personally he had never dealt in bioweapons thankfully.
The Foundry was a secret criminal organisation dedicated to hi-tech research and development (or theft). Their technology was available for sale to anyone willing to meet their prices, which were exorbitant but supposedly worth it if you wanted ultimate lethality. Unlike other international criminal organisations they had no political or social agenda, and were only interested in profit.
“Mistress Myung Tesla, Toy Maker?” One of the undersized cyborgs asked, “Do you require me to power up the Conversion Cradle for the latest capture?” She turned, “yes Delta Four, I look forward to seeing if this one survives the process. He would make an excellent assassin if he survives. Be aware child, I like my subjects to be fully conscious during the process it aids integration as it ensures accurate biofeedback responses. That and I enjoy the screams…”
She turned and walked towards a large metallic chamber at the far end of the building, which was slowly starting up, leaving Cadet and the unconscious kid in the cell next to his alone. It had to be some sort of automated surgery he assumed. Damn, he needed to escape and quickly unless he fancied becoming a zombified slave to that woman… What had the cyborg called her, Toy Maker? Sick bitch more like.
The cyborgs had searched him but had just left his own ‘toys’ heaped by one of the crates opposite. Next to them were several large cylinders of compressed gas, helium he assumed for inflating party balloons. He reached into his hair and found the wire he kept hidden there. When he realised no one was watching he pulled it free and used it to pick the lock. It took longer than he would have liked but eventually he succeeded and he gently, quietly, opened the cage and peered out. Behind him, he heard a groan as his ‘neighbour’ began to wake up.
Free of his cage, Cadet was finally able to get a clear view of the inside of the warehouse. It was an open skeletal structure, about fifty metres wide and over two hundred deep, strongly lit with metallic catwalks fixed to the walls just below the second storey windows with another free hanging catwalk running all the way down the middle of the structure attached to the roof joints. Looping power cables ran along the ceiling as did roof-mounted hoists used at one time for loading containers and crates onto open backed trucks. Crates of party materials were piled several high on racks throughout the warehouse. Two metre-high gas cylinders were stacked on either side of the wide corridors.
At the far end of the warehouse, about 50 metres away from Cadet, was a recently erected large, sterile-looking plastic chamber on what looked to be some sort of raised platform. He looked closely. There were a lot of cables and power connectors slotted into one side of the plastic device that he assumed was their ‘cradle’; some sort of Autodoc unit apparently designed for surgery in general and amputation in particular…
The two cyborgs and their ‘Mistress’, the Toy Maker were still in full view by the entrance to the Conversion Cradle though thankfully they had their backs to him.
There was hardly enough time for thinking, he had to act immediately. He dashed across and snatched up all of his gear as quickly and as quietly as possible and sped stealthily towards the nearest cut-through, running between the aisles and quickly got out of sight. He then checked and stowed his gear back in his costume before beginning to climb up the storage racks as quietly and as fast as he could. He knew that his grapnel would have been quicker, but in the absolute silence of the warehouse, he reckoned it would have been too noisy. The biggest risk would be the final leap from the racks up to the catwalk where he could be fully exposed to their view if he were unlucky, but it was a chance he would have to take.
He reached the top and peered over at the three figures in the distance. They were still occupied getting the Cradle readied for Cadets’ proposed cyber-conversion. He climbed on top of the crates and sprang up, grabbed the walkway above, somersaulting over the rails and landed softly before sprawling out flat, hidden from sight he hoped.
Before he moved on, he paused just long enough to toss a sleep-gas capsule into the cage below that held their latest victim slowly resuming consciousness. He reckoned that was all he can do to ease the kid’s suffering for the moment. The boy would need expert surgery and treatment and likely psychiatric help if Cadet managed to get him out of this nightmare. As unconsciousness once again claimed the boy, Cadet moved rapidly and cautiously forward at a crawl towards the powered up structure and the three figures moving around below. It took much longer than he had anticipated.
He looked around as he crawled forward, taking in the stacked crates of fireworks, the multiple rolls of reflective foil waiting to be cut into steamers and the cylinders of gas lined up below. He desperately tried to recall the physics classes when they studied Faraday cages, regretting now that he never really taken the trouble to understand and memorise their basics as he quietly gathered a large roll of foil as he crawled along. Eventually he got to a point where he can look down on the trio immediately below.
He hoped that when the time came, Myung would send the cyber-kids back to fetch him from the cage. True to form a few minutes later, the two undersized cyborgs turned and headed towards his now empty cage. As soon as they had moved far enough away, he dropped a couple of sleep-gas capsules to land between Myung’s feet.
The capsules shattered and the gas billowed out, combining with the air molecules. She began to shout out to her minions only to fall backwards as Cadets’ bolos spiralled down and pinned her arms to her sides, knocking her off balance. She collapsed to the ground and promptly fell unconscious under the influence of the gas. He could now turn his attention to the real problem, the two cyber-kids rushing back towards him. They represented the real challenge to his continued survival – as he knew only too well from painful past experience. They were too fast and strong for him to take down in hand-to-hand combat, especially two against one; and equipped with that deadly ranged weapon of theirs, which he couldn’t possibly match with his current armaments, his odds of survival was definitely a lot lower than he would have liked.
He considered what to do next. Filling balloons would take too long and what would be the benefit anyway? Myung might have some sort of over-ride controller on her, though the cyborgs seem to have some considerable degree of autonomy when not responding to her verbal commands. He’d considered releasing helium into the air to alter Myung’s voice and thus prevent them from recognising her commands or at least hopefully confusing the cyborgs, but that was before he’d decided to render her unconscious.
There was no shortage of explosives readily to hand, but he couldn’t help thinking of the cyber-kids as afflicted children rather than a pair of mind-controlled deathbots. He didn’t want to blow them up or damage them severely if he can avoid it. It seemed he had to attempt to stand them down, or disable them instead somehow.
As soon as their mistress had let out her incomprehensible shout, they had immediately turned and ran back towards her, autonomous indeed. Studying the cyborg’s progress, he tried to assess how much time he has before they become aware that something had happened to their mistress.
He immediately rappelled down to the inert Myung using his grapnel and rapidly started to search her, intending to confiscate any weapons or technology that she might have. Unfortunately, all he could find was her password-protected tablet before he was forced to winch himself back up to the central gangway as the two cyborgs began unleashing shot after shot of high voltage electricity in his direction. He began to wrap himself in an improvised foil-tent, not sure how effective it might actually be against their blasts, but hoped against hope that even if it was only as a “magic feather” (à la Dumbo), it might stand him in good stead. He raised it using his Bo staff hoping it would help to keep his makeshift cage from becoming charged, which could be dangerous if he were to touch it. To his surprise, their attacks hit the makeshift foil tent and dissipated, protecting him against the electric shocks.
He prepared himself for an assault by the ‘terrible twins’, ready to instantly drop the makeshift cape and swing, somersault, leap, run, dive and vault around the higher stories of the room, relying on fast movement and quick reflexes, intervening objects (and the magic foil cape) to defend him from any further electric bolts.
To his surprise, all he heard was a strange sizzling sound that seemed to envelop the entire warehouse then… nothing. He risked peeking out of his makeshift Faraday tent and realised that the Chamber structure and the unconscious Toy Maker had simply vanished. On the ground, previously hidden by the Cradle was the off-white platform that sparkled with energy that arced across its surface apparently out of control. The two pint-sized cyborgs stood in front of it either guarding it or waiting as the platform smouldered. Were they commanded to wait until all the evidence of their presence here was destroyed in flames or an explosion and if so, did that include their own destruction?
Cadet remembered his father had once explained that The Foundry had facilities all over the world for storing and shipping their technology and protected them by using teleportal platforms to allow Foundry personnel and equipment to be transported around undetected. He bet that the Cyborgs had been programmed to protect their Mistress and her conversion equipment by activating the teleportal but then what?
Cadet swung out, grabbed at the power cables hanging from the roof and yanked them free, allowing them to cascade down on the two standing guard in front of the platform. The cables whipped around their feet before connecting and causing the two cyborgs to go into convulsions. Fearing the worst, he lowered himself down, kicked the live cables away and checked their necks for a pulse. To his surprise, they were still alive. He looked at the energised platform and realised that the teleportal was likely about to explode.
He ran back, grabbed a fire extinguisher and used the base to smash the lock on the neighbouring cage to his. He grabbed the unconscious kid, pulled him free and threw him over his shoulder. Then he sprinted to the nearest fire exit and carried him outside before dropping him in the middle of the yard. He then turned and ran back in.
He ran towards the platform and tried to drag the cyborg’s downed bodies away from the booby-trapped platform but they were too damn heavy for him on his own. Then he had an idea – he fired his grapple down the aisle allowing it to wrap around one of the stacks as he wrapped the spooler round their legs and over his shoulder before hitting rewind. His own strength coupled with the rewind mechanism dragged him and his ‘passengers’ away even as the platform exploded. That set off the fireworks and within seconds Cadet felt as though he was running through the middle of an explosion. He did his best to wrap himself in the foil cape but refused to let go of the two cyber-kids.
Seconds later, he found himself by the grapple hook as he pulled it loose and fired it again at the far end of the warehouse next to one of the exit doors and once more hit rewind. The warehouse was rapidly turning into an inferno as more and more crates of fireworks exploded and the gas cylinders began to crack open under the intense heat. Thankfully that actually worked in his favour as the inert helium leaked out into the warehouse and helped smother the flames.
It gave him time to drag the unconscious and seeming depowered cyborgs outside into the relative safety of the yard one by one. He considered trying to secure them somehow but if they reactivated his cable ties wouldn’t be able to restrain them so in the end he just gave up and placed first a call to the Fire Service to inform them of the blaze which now threatened to burn the building to the ground. His next call was to Malone, sketching-out the situation and getting him to alert the appropriate authorities to clear-up and treat the three victims lying unconscious in the middle of the yard.
He then headed for the rooftop of a nearby building and watched. Minutes later, the Fire Service arrived followed by the Police who immediately called in the Met’s MeRCy Squad, The Malfunctioning Robotic and Cybernetic team to examine and help the three unconscious youths.
He knew he would have to inform them about what had occurred, anonymously of course, but that could wait until tomorrow. Meanwhile, he headed down, uncovered his bike before discreetly departing. For once, he just headed back towards the school as he desperately needed some sleep, hopefully one without nightmares about being converted. He tucked the confiscated tablet into his jacket intending to get Firewall to examine it later and shuddered as he sped off into the night.
Growing up Meta, UK-Style! 