The elevator doors whisked open, and Evann stepped out, removing his helmet. The tips of his blonde hair were flecked with beads of sweat and his face pale from the drying perspiration. As he rocked his lower jaw from side to side, he pinched his nose and blew to alleviate the pressure in his ears. It was always like this. As incredible as the power suit was, any extended amount of time in it meant a long, hot shower and a couple of cigarettes upon return.
“Still have my report to make,” Evann muttered, desperate for the taste of tobacco as he marched through the hall of the executive floor, cracking his neck from side to side. The helmet remained tucked under his arm, chip held securely in place within the gear. He sniffed, then approached the large double doors at the end of the hall, knocking twice.
“Enter,” a voice with a thick baritone came from within.
Evann pushed the door open and shut it behind him. Men and women sat in a half-circle of desks adorned with electronic pads and microphones. The room was without windows to maintain privacy, and the walls were made of a thick steel that could only be punctured by the most powerful of weaponry. The executives were clad in formal wear, bearing piercing eyes and rigid facial structures. They bore into him with their stares, the man at the very back setting his elbows on the desk and crossing his hands. There wasn’t a single person around these tables who was incapable of dismantling departments with a single phrase.
Offering a crisp salute, Evann put his free hand behind his back and stood at attention. He chose to stare at the Centurion banner against the wall behind them. It was customary that people in Evann’s position avoid looking into the eyes of one’s superior unless expressly told to do so. A Centurion custom, as he understood it.
“What news do you bring, Andvari?” the man with the crossed hands asked. Each SPECTRE was expected to take on a codename upon their initiation. Evann had chosen the term, Andvari.
“The chip was successfully retrieved,” Evann said.
“Was the information compromised?”
“There is no history on file that the chip has been accessed.”
The man drew a long, sharp breath, slowly nodding. “Set the chip on the table.”
Evann stepped forward and extracted the chip from his helmet. He observed the chip momentarily before setting it down in front of the man. The president slid the chip closer and picked it up, rotating it in his hand and humming. “You have done well, Andvari. Your contribution is to be commended.”
These meetings were always a conniving dance of shifting power. Despite his excellent performance and his prestigious position as a SPECTRE, he was still small fry when compared to the suits of Centurion. No amount of combat ability or wit could overthrow the word of Centurion’s executives and its other corporate partners.
“Thank you, sir,” Evann said, his attention still firmly glued to the banner. In these meetings, it was important he only spoke when spoken to, and that he avoided offering information that wasn’t asked for.
“I shall see to it that you receive a bonus for your work,” the man continued, pulling his electronic pad closer. Evann glanced down without moving his head, impressed with the speed of the man’s fingers. Rumor had it that he had extensive work done on his hands to improve his speed and dexterity while reducing the strain and fatigue. Evann had his doubts, as the man’s hands displayed no scars or inhuman movements. Then again, cybernetic implants were improving every year. “Return to your quarters and await further instructions. You are dismissed.”
Evann nodded and exited back through the double doors. He allowed his body to relax and shook his head. I need a smoke.
Wiping the sheen of sweat from his forehead, Evann returned to the elevator and took it down to the commons floor. When he stepped out, he took to the hall on his left, evading the security desk and pushing open the door to his quarters. Centurion policy was exceedingly strict about where Evann was allowed to go when wearing his suit. His quarters were a fine place to remove the suit, though it needed to be placed in a special container that ensured the suit was operating at full capacity.
After sliding his card through the reader and leaning forward for a retina scan, a chime followed, and the door slid open. “Welcome back, Evann,” an electronic female voice said.
Evann walked into the room and the door hissed shut behind him. The cigarette was calling his name, but there was still protocol to be followed before he could lounge around. He retrieved his pistol from the holster and switched on the safety to his gun before striding over to the rack of weapons on the wall. He set the gun in a slot that was level to the wall, and a green light came on above it. The light flickered to yellow moments later, indicating that the generator was being charged.
While weapons and armor were expected to be placed inside the secured room of the accompanying SPECTRE when not in use, Evann felt naked without his weapon, and so he preferred to keep his weapon where he could see it. Centurion rule dictated that any SPECTRE was allowed their weapon so long as they were present to observe it. He would be in direct violation of Centurion protocol the moment he left the room.
Drawing a deep breath, he stepped over to his side where another sliding door was. Beyond this one was the secured room where a cache of weapons and armor suitable to Centurion SPECTREs lay. Any attempt to break in would set off a silent alarm and initiate a secondary set of emergency locks that few had the knowledge to. He slipped his card through the reader and a loud click emanated from within. The door whisked open to reveal a small room with several black crates of weapons and suits with the Centurion logo.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Throwing open the crate to his right, he took off the body suit and carefully placed it inside the grooves next to the helmet. Once he shut the crate, a light came on where the handle was, turning green, then flickering to yellow just as his pistol had. With that out of the way, he exited the room and locked it through use of his card.
Striding over to the door to the back porch, he pushed it open and took a seat on one of the luxurious seats Centurion provided to their employees. State of the art stuff, it cushioned the person’s muscles and adjusted specifically for that person’s body type and weight. He sat down, flicked the switch on the side, and let the machine do its work while the rain pattered against the veranda.
He retrieved the pack of cigarettes and lighter from the glass table and tapped the packaging until a cigarette fell out. He lit the end, puffed on it, then set the lighter and pack back on the table, blowing a huff of smoke upward and leaning into the chair.
The AirVac machine hummed above him, drawing in poisonous fumes and unbreathable air and expelling it back into clean oxygen. It was a miracle of technology and ingenuity, taking what should’ve been an unlivable environment and turning it into something that resembled the world before the Great War. Or, at least, a shell of something resembling the world as it was.
AirVac was what kept the world in check, complacent, obedient. It brought about law and order and allowed those at the top to ensure cooperation among the populace. Centurion—alongside its allies, Shinsei and Praetorian—worked to help maintain and balance life in Bastion. If not for their work, there was a good chance Evann would’ve never been born at all, and the entirety of the human race would now be extinct.
All because of some A.I.
Evann flicked the ash off his cigarette as he mulled over the significance of A.I. from the world as it was. Nowadays, such a concept was expressly illegal and punishable by death. Rumors would float around from time to time that the big three corporations were inventing new methods for how the technology could better assist humanity so as to prevent a repeat of the prior disaster, but such rumors were ill-founded at best. Even if such a method could be found, Conrad—the late founder of Praetorian, and a hero to Bastion—stood at the center of Bastion, immortalized in bronze as an everlasting reminder not to repeat the past.
Taking another puff on his cigarette, the lure vanished. It was always like this. Regardless of the stress he felt, the desire to take more than needed off of the blunt was never appealing to him. A few long drags and he’d be done, oftentimes discarding the remaining half in the tray. He put his cigarette in the ashtray and pressed the full weight of his thumb against it to extinguish the ashes, then flipped the switch off on the chair, then stepped back into his room when he was sure he wouldn’t take any of the smoke in with him.
The sofa called to him, but the allure of the shower was stronger. His muscles desperately craved some relaxation and a decent show. Not that there was ever much to watch. Society was still working its way back up to creating entertainment. More people found their fun in building things, playing games, or going out for drinks. Television was a poor imitation of what it used to be, under exceptional scrutiny from the corporations. A strict set of rules had to be followed to end up on television, and even if it managed to get that far, chances were the show would be canceled within a year’s time. Oftentimes, long before that.
He slid his finger along the wall where the restroom’s entrance was, and a green light turned on behind the transparent finish. With a hiss, the wall folded itself into a compartment to reveal a sleek room of black marble and glass.
Evann undressed and threw his clothes onto the sink to his left. His room was as luxurious as it got, but it was still a studio at best. The restroom—if you could even call it that—was slick and precise, hidden behind a wall like everything else. That was the theme behind Centurion’s make. If you couldn’t find it, then you knew they were proud of it.
The showerhead turned on at his approach, and he stepped over the ledge and into the compartment. A glass sliding door emerged from a slot in the wall, encasing him inside. Hot water drenched his sculpted body, finding its way into the gaps of his hair and skin. The tension left his body in waves, and a satisfied sigh escaped his lips.
“Evann. You have a bonus awaiting you from Centurion Corp.,” the female voice assigned to his room said.
“Ignore,” Evann said, washing his hair.
“The message is available at your convenience.”
Centurion had been kind with their bonuses up until now. Perhaps it was an incentive program of sorts or a way to encourage consistent behavior. From what his commander had told him, he displayed exceptional performance during missions, so as long as he was being paid it was all the same to him.
“Cancel shower,” Evann said.
The showerhead responded and the water stopped. With a sigh, he exited and began his usual hygiene routine. As much as he wanted to go back to his home, Centurion had been clear about his need to remain on standby until further notice. Whatever Centurion had cooked up for him was bad. Real bad. It was the third mission in as many days, and each of them was a reconnaissance task. The suits had been tight-lipped for the most part, but from what little he’d heard, someone within was leaking classified information out to the public.
“Razor.” Moments after his request, a compartment opened up next to the mirror, revealing a razor that cost more than most people made in a month. He retrieved it and set to work on shaving the stubble.
Considering Centurion’s inconsistency regarding his dismissal upon capture, he figured each of the chips he’d retrieved up until now were important in different ways. Whether that was weapons, conspiracies, or otherwise, he couldn’t say for sure. Though, whoever was distributing this information knew how to cover their tracks.
Centurion was home to some of the best hackers and programmers in all of Bastion. He was no slouch himself, even if his SPECTRE duties often found him in the line of combat more often than not. As far as he understood it, Shinsei and Praetorian weren’t suffering from the same issues. Allegedly.
When Evann was done, he shut off the systems through a number of voice commands and slipped into his boxer shorts and a loose-fitting T-shirt. The half-circle sofa was calling his name, and he made no effort to refuse the call. After he retrieved his gun from the charging station on the wall, he jumped over the back and landed on the soft material, clicking on the television for any semblance of entertainment. He stopped when he landed a history channel detailing the events of the Great War, then set his gun on the marble coffee table, making doubly sure that the safety was turned off.
He nestled into a comfortable position, and sleep took him shortly after.
