Chapter 9 – The abandoned research

Chloe was glad to see me home earlier than usual.
- “What happened?” She asked.
- “Nothing really. We failed to catch him again, but Rob tracked what he’s stolen, so they’re working on the stolen file. It should be a big day tomorrow.” I explained.
- “Oh, well you definitely be careful. I don’t want to lose you.”
- “You won’t lose me. I can promise you that.”
Here Chloe hugged me and I hugged her back. She really loved me and I knew it, so I didn’t want to hurt her one bit. Even though work is important, the loved ones will always be on the first place.
Chloe and I relaxed and spent some quality time together for the rest of the day. My mind still kept on going back to the mission, but I tried my best not to think of it.
I had to wear the mind deactivator again when I went to sleep. I definitely needed to save the thinking for the next day.
The next morning I woke up feeling quite refreshed. It was still a bit too early for work, so I stayed in bed with Chloe for a while.
When the time for work came I took my time getting ready and was looking forward to going there. Chloe kissed me goodbye and I left to work. I could see a worried look on her face, but I reassured her that everything will be all right.
When I reached my station I went straight to Dave’s office. He said that there will be a meeting very soon and told me where it will be. They must’ve worked something out I thought to myself. Dave handed me a little slip saying ‘alpha’ and told me not to worry about it yet but to keep it with myself. Jack and Rick greeted me and I told them what happened when they left yesterday. The meeting began very soon and a few agents collected in a small room where Dave and Rob were going to explain the situation.
- “You all must’ve heard about the robber.” David began, “Well he turned out to be after something very unusual. Rob will tell you briefly about the situation and then I will give you orders on what to do.”
We all listened in.
- “Rob you take it from here.” David said.
- “OK sir.” Rob said.
He then cleared his throat, took a deep breath and began explaining:
- “What we found last night was that the stolen file contained an abandoned research. This research was abandoned pretty much within the first year of humanity’s arrival on Venus. A few bright scientists were working on how to make Venus a better place for us and they were manufacturing some sort of medicines. They kept on experimenting the medicines on humans to see how they would work. The research must’ve been about something to make humans more durable and more effective at something. Unfortunately we do not have the complete research. We believe a lot of it was lost 14 years ago when the research came to a dead end. The original research was taking place in Dome #13. That dome used to be a huge lab facility back in 2107. Even though most of it is now populated there are still some lower levels that are not functional. However we believe the antagonists started a secret lab down there. The machines used for the experiments cannot be moved from place to place, so if they want to continue the experiments then Dome #13 is the only place that can happen.”
Rob finished here. Every agent had a puzzled look on their face. I was glad that they enlightened us on this. At this moment I had so many thoughts in my head that I almost got a headache. Here David began to speak:
- “I’ve assembled you all here because this mission is going to be difficult and I want you all to work as a team on this. Now, I gave you all slips. On it there’s a team that you will be in. OK, so Delta team I want to go with Rob and do more research through the database files. Find any files matching this one. We must find the rest of that research. Team Charlie will go to the upper levels of Dome #13 and try to evacuate the people from there. We don’t know what kind of things are in these secret labs, so we better stay on the safe side and get the civilians out of the way. Team Bravo will go with Team Alpha and will be awaiting orders. Team Alpha will infiltrate the lower levels and will try to find the labs. Once the way is clear team Bravo would move in. If we are to meet retaliation team Bravo would shoot to kill. So you all know your orders, now let’s move out.”
I went to see Jack and Rick. They too were part of alpha team.
- “Is anyone else coming with us?” Rick wondered.
- “I would think so.” I said, “Surely boss is not going to send three of us there alone.”
Here one agent walked up to us.
- “Team alpha?” he asked.
- “Yeah.” I replied.
- “Good. I think it’s gonna be just 4 of us.”
- “Jeffrey? You’re coming with us?” Jack got surprised.
Jeffrey was one of the best agents, in fact he was second best VENUS member in existence, even better than me. He was mostly taking a role of a sniper in his missions as he was very accurate at shooting and could easily take out a moving target that he saw on a horizon.
- “So, boss really wants this mission to succeed if he is sending the best agents.” I said.
- “Well of course.” Jeffrey agreed, “Alpha team will have the hardest job here. The whole mission is dependent on us. If we fail - all of them fail. We are the key link holding this whole chain together.”
Afterwards we got our gear and headed for our Spiflyer. Many spiflyers will be heading to Dome #13 today as teams Bravo and Charlie will have to get there too. We all were looking forward to the mission but at the same time were very nervous.