Lucian Roth, "Invisible", inside an apartment in 1st District, Sharias.
15/05/4837 IC
26/10/2033 AD
"That will be 50 dollars, please."
"Here you go."
"Thank you."
Flyboy pays the money to the delivery boy, closes the door and brings the pizzas to us. I am sitting on the floor, around me are glass bottles of soft drink. All of us are wearing casual clothes. To others, we just look like some young adults having a party. Of course, it isn't true, we are having a meeting.
The spy satellite at the beginning of this year has proved that passively reacting isn't enough to maintain our secrecy. The Senate has decreed that active measures must be used to better monitor and predicting threats as well as sabotaging.
All of that is easier said than done as the number of objectives increase greatly. Fortunately, the Senate, well aware of this due to a few senators being former agents themselves, provides more funds to expand our scope of operations.
So here is my team, assigned to eliminate a potential candidate so that one of our men is qualified to be among the people that meet the Vareshi's Prince. The man himself has already gotten his trainings, crash courses on everything he needs to know. Now, only the target is more qualified than him.
"Oi, Flyboy, pass me a pizza." One of my teammates shouts.
Flyboy takes one and then throws the whole stack at her face. She skillfully grabs one off with her left hand and redirects the stack with a finger of her right hand. The teammate next to her repeats and so on until a single pizza box flies at me and I just grab it.
While munching on the pizzas, which we use the mission fund for, we discuss how to do the job. Leriana Bogh, Sharpshooter, begins.
"Let's start with the second worst case scenario, killing the guy."
"You sure? You know that it would be best for you to not know in that case."
"… Yeah."
She gets that callsign since she has missed every training shot, but every single random, casual shot of her has hit the targets. The person that just speaks to her is Krobenian Keug, our Key, not because she is the key to solve problems, though sometimes she is, but because she breaks locks really well… or door hinges if that is easier.
"I vote against killing him. He is pretty famous, the gifted child of his hometown apparently." says Veraign Erin, Silvertongue, for she talks her way out of training enough times for the instructor to just write it off as social training.
"What about poisoning, does he have any conditions related to that?" I speak, going down the list of solutions.
Horigarin Koleh, Flyboy, pulls out the documents about our previous job and says: "Why don't we just bribe him, like what we did to the last guy that we were sent to kill?"
Silvertongue sighs, "That was because he had figured out that he was going to be killed, so he offered his services, mostly intel and his silence, for his life. Most importantly, he was the one who found us and made the offer, not the other way around. Plus, he hated his job while this guy very much does not."
"Alright, I found something!" Key said, showing us a paper she pulled out of the stack of documents of the target, "He suffers from narcolepsy, so no one will notice if he suddenly falls asleep."
"Lovely, we have the water-dissolvable pills here, just need him to drink it." said Sharpshooter, holding out a small glass bottle.
Silvertongue wonders aloud, "Why is the test going to be tomorrow, but we just got here at midnight yesterday?"
Our instructor, who refused to tell us anything more than her codename "Bob", barges in and answers that question, "Because finding an operative who has an interest in rocket science is very hard. Anyway, bad news, the test has been moved to an hour later, so we gotta move now."
Well, shit.
We quickly throw the pizzas into the mini fridge and get our stuff. Following Bob, we move downstairs as casually as we can and enter a car. Bob drives around in the most confusing route possible and parks at a restaurant next to the Serene Space Center.
The owner of the restaurant, who is one of our agents, leads us to the side door, disguised as leading us to some kind of VIP room. Well, we do enter the VIP room to change our clothes and gear up and then we leave through the side door.
A tall electric fence is between us and the complex and is easily scalable with thick enough gloves. Apparently, they trust this electric fence enough to not position guards here, so we get to a side door without issue. Even more convenient, a janitor unlocks the door, holding a cigarette, probably on his break.
Unfortunately for him, he will have to take a nap instead. Flyboy immediately lunges forward, grabbing his mouth and pressing him into the floor. His pupils turn focused, shrinking its width and lengthening its height. With his elliptical pupils, he can fully focus on Flyboy and raises both of his hands, aiming at Flyboy eyes and raises his right knee to strike at Flyboy genitals.
In response, Flyboy crashes onto him, causing his attacks to miss and the air to flow out of his lungs with the weight of a bulky man, plus all the equipment, ramming onto him. Key gently squats down and injects anesthesia into him.
While those two are busy with that, the rest of us walk around them. It seems that this is a break room. On the left side are a bunch of brooms and other cleaning-related stuff. On the right are a sleeping janitor on a mattress and an awake janitor drinking from a cup of beer.
He looks at us, then looks at the brand on the beer bottle, then smells the beer, then drinks the rest of the beer, both in the cup and the bottle, and then raises both of his arms. Bob walks over, grabs the man's mouth and injects him with anesthesia, twice the usual dosage on account of the alcohol.
Sharpshooter injects the sleeping man with anesthesia, while me and Silvertongue move to guard the door. After a while, the struggling man falls asleep and the surrendered man falls over. Bob stops him just before his body lands and lays him gently onto the cold, hard floor.
We hide them behind the brooms and look around for anything that can be used. Their uniforms are hanging nearby, 2 of which fit me and Flyboy. We quickly put them on and grab 2 brooms. Sharpshooter passes me the bottle. Bob waves his hand as we leave the room.
"Good luck, we will be waiting here."
Walking down the hallway, I recall the layout of the building. The waiting room for the candidates should be… Huh, right below us. That is convenient.
Walking down the stairs, I open the door and go in first while Flyboy pretends to clean the spotless ceiling. Opening the door and glancing around, I see a room filled with nervous candidates trying to relax on top of couches. Except a neatly dressed man, average and mundane enough to be ignored unconsciously, staring intently at our target. He's probably our guy.
Then he takes his glasses off to clean it, showing the face we were provided with. Yep, that's our guy. Wow, glasses can change a person's appearance that much? I should ask for one after this.
Fortunately, it seems that the only water dispenser in the room is about to be emptied. That can be a chance to put a pill inside the target's cup as he stands near it. I close the door, put 6 pills into my pants pockets and whisper to Flyboy:
"Right, we need a water bottle, the 20 liter kind."
He nods and leaves. I choose a different direction and walk. Almost immediately, I see a rack filled with the 20 liter bottles. I turn around to call for him, but he has already left my sight. Checking the clock, it is already 0800, the test begins at 0900. The target won't drink water so close to the starting time to avoid wasting test time dealing with the waste liquid, so I don't have much time left.
Therefore, I will get him later. I can do this on my own.
Easily lifting the bottle thanks to my training, I carry it to the room. The candidates move aside for me to pass through. The target lifts and puts aside the empty bottle and takes a paper cup. With a short grunt, I insert the water bottle into the dispenser and grab the empty bottle. I walk backward, my other hand on my hip like I am tired, carefully angling myself to bump into the target.
Unfortunately, that doesn't happen. The target narrowly avoids me. Then our agent stands up abruptly and bumps into the target, giving me just enough time to put a pill into his cup.
"Oh, my apologies." I quickly apologize.
"No worries, um, are you alright? You seem tired." The target replies.
"Don't worry, I will take a break soon anyway." I reply, walking away while our agent apologizes to the target.
As I leave the room, a well dressed gentleman walks toward me, Flyboy following behind him. He speaks, with a slightly annoyed tone:
"Did you change the bottle?"
I reply, confused, genuinely confused: "Uh, yes, what is the problem?"
"Well, it was a test to see how perceptive and responsible the candidates are. I know I should have checked with everyone beforehand. Anyway, aren't you supposed to be on bre"
A loud sound of a body hitting the ground interrupts the conversation. That is not right, the dosage that I used was almost at the safety limit, but it should have been 5 minutes at least, not less than 2. Then another one… I am pretty darn sure that I didn't drop any in the bottle.
We rush inside to see that both the target and our agent are lying on the ground. The gentleman runs past us and checks their pulses.
"Their pulses are still stable, get over here and help me."
We quickly come over while the other candidates discuss what has just happened. As I help the gentleman lifting the target up, I quickly knock his cup over. It is clear…
It shouldn't be. There should still be white particles or a hint of whiteness from the pill. Then I turn to look at Flyboy who has just knocked over our agent's cup. The water spilled has white particles.
I nod left, toward the gentleman, and he nods back.
We carry the target and our agent outside, following the gentleman to the clinic… I think. As we get further from the room, I memorize the path to return back to the break room. There is no way I can deal with this, I need the rest of my team.
Then the gentleman suddenly speaks: "Alright, this is far enough. You can get up now."
Our agent opens his eyes wide, pulls out his arms and legs from Flyboy's grasp and lands comfortably on the ground.
Flyboy leaps back, his legs bending slightly to dash away at any moment. Our agent calmly offers him a cigarette. Flyboy takes it and lights a lighter, moving it across the cigarette. The heat reveals the secret message, symbol of the organization.
He speaks comfortably: "Anyways, there is new intel that I overheard from the people working here. It is something about the empire mobilizing for an unknown target. Therefore, I was given orders to return back for reassignment."
Suspicious of his words, I ask: "So why hasn't Bob received any such notice about the changes, he should be high ranking enough, right?"
Our agent, seemingly surprised, turns to look at the gentleman who replies: "Oh yes, I did give him the notice. He didn't tell you guys?"
I pause, he couldn't have simply forgotten about it, maybe he has turned traitorous. Bob suddenly appears behind our agent and answers:
"No, I didn't. I just want to see how you guys would react. From what I can see, this is bad. You haven't even pulled out your guns yet, despite my sudden appearance."
Our agent responds: "Eh, they are still young. They shouldn't have been here in the first place. The government is too desperate for expansion."
"But", he continues, "the sleeping pill was a bad idea. They know this guy has narcolepsy, so they have prepared for such an event already."
The gentleman says: "Yes, we did prepare for that. In fact, everyone here is qualified. We just need to check their personality and, more importantly, meet your team."
I keep quiet, deciding that this seems to be decently above my paygrade, and Koleh seems to have the same thoughts too. Bob says:
"Now that is something I haven't heard anything about, tell me."
Our agent says: "My reassignment to somewhere more important. The gentleman here has provided us with valuable information from the Serene Intelligence Agency, which, in turn, provides us with knowledge of imperial activities."
"From what we can learn about them, the imperials are building up for war, secretly, but not secretly enough as it seems. Trucks are being produced according to military specs, reserves have been called back for retraining en masse and so on."
"Therefore", he pulls out a paper and gives it to Bob, "I have been reassigned elsewhere for more important missions." As Bob is skimping over the paper, our agent looks me up and down.
Then he throws his bag at me, which I quickly catch. "Fortunately, we apparently are blood related, enough to look nearly the same. Therefore, your team and, more specifically, you will replace me."
As I am still thinking about what I need to prepare for the new task, he continues: "The bag has necessary documents, clothes, books and intel for your new mission. Goodbye."
Right after he has said that, he briskly walks away.
Flyboy turns to the, still sleeping, target and asks: "So what do we do with this guy?"
The gentleman replies: "I have already given him an injection a while ago, it should have taken effect already and for a good while at that. Anyway, you know what to do."
With a sigh, I pull out the documents and read about how this persona has acted so far, its personalities, both in public and in private. I wonder what is going on in the empire, they haven't mobilized anything other than their standing army for a long time already.