August Writing Challenge: The What-If Machine

The headquarters for Operation Patriot looked no different from many other government buildings: made from cement and contracted to the lowest bidder. The exterior was a depressing shade of grey, and the interior was lined with the standard carpeting and office furniture also sold to public schools and courthouses, and quite possibly constructed by prison labor, either in-state or out-of-state. From the outside looking in, nobody would ever think that this building was anything special, but for the plaque that labeled it as the workspace for Operation Patriot, named after its founder.

There were certainly no indications that the building had a basement. And in the basement was the most complex military surveillance equipment thus far known to mankind. A special grant from the Department of Homeland Security had allowed for development, purchase, and installation of the monitoring station.

A camera in every traffic light and on every street corner provided constant footage of Pilot Ridge. Their computer system, the best on the market, provided information about every resident of the town. Names, addresses, ages, social security numbers, occupations, citizenship status, bank account balances, criminal records, loan and credit information, educational history, powers if applicable... Everything was catalogued alphabetically and cross-referenced by social security number or alienage number in the case of non-citizens.

The end result was the Master List.

“We’ve made good progress,” Gerard Maybury, leader of Operation Patriot, remarked during their weekly progress meeting. A print-out of the Master List lay on the large table in their War Room, which was the unofficial name for their underground conference room. Several prominent members of the Pilot Ridge community – identified with a small picture as would be found on a driver’s license, as well as name and address – had red “X” marks through them. Every “X” meant that another person had been tended to.

“We still have a long way to go,” Victoria Jefferson, the Public Relations and Communications Officer, pointed out. She was correct; only half of the pictures attached to profiles had a red “X”. Far too many people were unaccounted for.

Gerard had faith. After all, he had assembled the best team in the entire nation. He was confident that they would complete their mission ahead of schedule, and then they could be proud of themselves. “We’ll get them,” he said. “Divide up the remainders and give everyone a list. I want to see another 20% completed by the end of the month.”

With a nod from Victoria, the meeting came to an end. The members of Operation Patriot went their separate ways, returning to their individual work stations to tend to other tasks and to await the distribution.

***************************

The individual lists were dispatched the next morning. Every single agent studied their assignments, which were organized by which areas of town they lived in or where they worked. Hammel itself was off-limits due to the complicating factors; Lenore and Moira were good at negotiation, as the liaisons, but conducting such business on school property was beyond even their skills. Those affiliated with Hammel simply had to be tracked down off-campus, outside of school hours.

There were more than enough other people to find, completely unaffiliated with the Institute. Some proved easy targets. Riley Adams and Danny Silverman were taken out in one fell swoop, in the middle of the local farmer’s market. James Campbell was found at the park with Niko. Chase Campbell was cornered at his house.

Curiously, Sean Neville, his partner and their blond friend who had the criminal record (although the charges were eventually dropped) were nowhere to be found within state-lines. Research found that they had taken a flight to Europe a couple of weeks back and were due in another couple of weeks. Gerard planned to meet them at the airport himself so he could cross them off.

Nicholas Kells had little pride in his work. He believed in the mission of Operation Patriot, but he preferred a hands-off approach. Unfortunately, those beliefs hadn’t been enough to excuse him from taking his portion of the Master List. Grumbling, he had sought out his targets, disposing of them in a quick and mechanical fashion.

All except for one.

Cobalt Weaver.

His profile was nothing remarkable. He was an orphan from New Jersey, a Hammel graduate, an attorney who had attended school in Chicago and returned to Vermont two years ago with a blonde business partner half his age, and he was both a meta and a homosexual. Also, based on his driver’s license photo, he had little self-respect; no self-respecting man had a moustache that looked like that. It never would have been allowed in the military.

It was ironic. Nick thought that those types were supposed to be ahead of the curve on fashion and style.

Unfortunately, tracking down Cobalt Weaver proved more challenging than it should have. He was one man, a man with a relatively sedentary job (since he was either supposed to be at his office, on file, or at the course house, which was well known). A man who was, perhaps, even more misanthropic than Nick himself was. He had a limited social circle – that had been learned through surveillance; he spent time with the same crowd of middle-aged man that so many of the others who played for the other team did, but he didn’t actually go out many places. He didn’t seem to go to movies or to concerts or to anywhere interesting or fun. He never even seemed to go grocery shopping, as baffling a notion as that was; it was as though he didn’t eat. He’d lived in the same apartment since returning to Pilot Ridge. There was no reason he should be this hard to find.

Nick had even tried the home of Benjamin Rhodes to find him, since they were obviously in a relationship. But each time he’d knocked, he’d found Ben alone, or Yulia, who gave Nick the creeps, since she was a walking weapon. Besides, both of them had already been checked off the list.

It was like the man could disappear into thin air. But he didn’t have invisibility, not the way Tarak did. Perhaps it was one of his shadow tricks.

Resolved to finish this task or die trying, Nick returned to some of the more classic tools available to law enforcement. Namely, the stakeout. He spent nights camped out in his car outside of Cobalt Weaver’s apartment building to no avail. Nick then put a covert GPS under the shadow manipulator’s car.

That proved to be useful. In the middle of an argument with his ex-wife about Rachel’s bedtime being extended for the summer, his smartphone had alerted him to the movement of Cobalt’s car. Nick had needed to cut the conversation short, and then he’d taken off, ignoring the posted speed limits.

Those didn’t apply to government workers. Particularly not when they had a Higher Purpose, the way he did.

The military man found him outside of the court house. Finally, he was doing something predictable and useful.

Nick was unwilling to confront Cobalt in broad daylight in the middle of a crowded court house. Instead, he parked his car a couple of blocks away and decided to wait by the shadow manipulator’s car for him to return from whatever shyster work he had in the building.

The wait wasn’t interesting, but Nick was nothing if not disciplined.

When Cobalt returned, he found the taller man leaning against his car. The shadow manipulator was confused and opened his mouth to shout at him to get away from his vehicle. Then Nick made eye contact with him, a steady gaze that made Cobalt shiver in concern. The military man pushed away from the car and took several steps towards him.

Cobalt sized him up and took the most reasonable course of action. He turned tail and ran through the parking garage, intent on putting as much distance between himself and Nick as possible. This was complicated by the fact that he had bad knees.

Nick sighed; this was what he hated about the job. Although it had been a while since he’d had a Honest to Goodness hunt. Since he was ex-military, and he didn’t have pain in his joints, he found the run far less frustrating, certainly less painful.

It also didn’t take long for him to catch up with Cobalt, even with the older man looking around for ways to blend into the shadows. Nick cornered him in an alley, with the shadow manipulator pressed up against a fence that was easily twice his size, without a trash can to stand on for stability.

There was nowhere to run.

Nick approached his target with the same confident expression in his eyes as when he first confronted him at his car. Step by step, he came closer, until he could see himself reflected in the lenses of the short man’s glasses.

“What do you want with me?” Cobalt asked.

Nick didn’t answer the question. Instead, he reached out, grabbed the meta by the scruff of his shirt collar, and pulled him close. Arms wrapped around the shorter man in the tightest bear hug of his life, lifting him off the ground with the pure strength of force.

Then, he set the baffled man back on the ground.

“Courtesy of Operation Patriot,” he said, before turning on his heels and leaving the meta alone in the alley to puzzle over what had just happened.

That was the end of his part of the List.