“Is this the place?” asked Arron.
“It’s what the directions say,” said Kix as they stared at a greasy and crumbling building with the holographic sign [GW Bar] floating above the front doors.
“Let’s hope these disguises work,” said Arron, who was wearing a flimsy mask and baggy hoodie to cover his face.
When Arron and Kix crossed the street and were only a few steps away from the door…
“Stop right there,” said a rough-looking man holding up a metal hand in front of Arron’s face. The man had two oversized model B bionic arms that made him look exactly like a muscular ape standing on two feet.
“This is Greasy Weasel’s territory. Only members are allowed to enter,” said a second equally ape-man who stepped up to block Kix who also wore a similar disguise as Arron. Their masks would do little to stop the Office of Reason or the police from figuring out who they were with all the technology they could use to scan their NerViz. But this was not a place that had such government-controlled tech.
The two apes pulled part of their black trench coats to the side to reveal guns resting on their hips.
It was a clear message to Arron and Kix. If they wanted to fight, the two apes were ready.
“AS told us to come here and meet him,” said Kix ignoring the two Ape’s hostile glares and the hands that were resting on the pistol grips.
The first ape frowned at hearing this. While the second ape hurriedly said in a hushed voice. “Shhhh! Don’t say his name out loud in front of everyone! Are you trying to get us in trouble with the other yakuza families and gangs?”
The two apes began scanning the surrounding area for any eavesdroppers but when they saw no one paying attention they let out a sigh of relief.
They then pulled out a pair of cheap scanners and ran them over Arron and Kix to check for the most basic weapons and found none on them.
“Hurry up and get inside. Don’t start causing trouble inside or the guards will take care of you,” said Ape 1 before stepping aside and waving the two inside the building.
Arron had several questions buzzing in his head but could ask Kix for clarification now that there were four apes surrounding them as they were escorted toward an elevated platform near the rear of the building’s first-floor bar.
The large room which was painted green, was nearly empty due to it being so early in the morning. The only people that were here, were silent save for a few guards whispering with each other.
The four apes stopped at the base of the steps that led up to the platform. They did not say anything and only stared at Kix and Arron. They understood the meaning and climbed up the short set of stairs to the top of the platform which had several plush couches and a large floating para-steel table at the center.
A man, dressed head to toe in black leather with not even a sliver of skin showing, was sitting on one of the couches sipping on a straw that was stuck in a bubbling green drink. Inside the glass, there were two floating scoops of what looked like vanilla ice cream.
Arron looked around searching for the other two Office of Reason field agents but saw no one else. This was odd since they always came in threes.
“You’re late,” said the man in a robotic voice that was not his own.
“We were held up at the entrance,” said Kix.
The man ignored Kix’s excuse and pressed a button on the armrest of the couch. An opaque privacy shield shot up and encased the entire platform in a dome blocking all sight and sound from those outside the dome.
Arron was impressed with the setup that this place had. It was not the normal cheap civilian privacy shields but the type used by mega-corps, Mother and Father party members, and the Office of Reason. It was extremely expensive and not just anyone could get their hands on such systems even if they had the money.
“So you’re Arron?” asked the man who was now staring at Arron assessing him. “I am A.S. I am the agent in charge of this undercover mission. You will be getting your orders on what to do directly from me. You are to treat these orders as if they are directly from Mother and Father. You must complete the tasks given to you without hesitation. If you do not, a few points being docked from your SCS will be the least of your worries. Do you understand?”
There was no room for Arron to disagree, so he just shrugged and said, “Yes.”
“Good, do you have any questions or concerns?”
“I’m not sure if you know this, but both Kix and I have been in the news several times. How am I supposed to be an undercover agent if anyone can search for me and find out I work at M1?”
“Already taken care of. Everything about you since you entered the Mega-city has been wiped. You do not exist here. In theory, with your prototype NerViz, we can hide your personal data with a temporary spoof identity. A new update has already been sent to your NerViz. Don’t worry you don’t need to do anything as it will silently and atomically update itself. This way we can keep any unauthorized people from snooping and allows us to keep your involvement with the Office of Reason safe. With this update, you are now [Ark Fune], a country bumpkin who was just recently smuggled into Sector one. Even if you are exposed, it helps that your face has had a few minor changes from your recent minor mishap.”
Arron did not think barely surviving a near point-blank explosion in which he lost an arm, was just a ‘minor mishap’.
“To be sure that your new identity is flawless, a specialist will be arriving to help alter your appearance further. They will make sure that you look at the part you will be playing tomorrow,” said A.S.
“What? So soon?” asked Arron.
“It can’t be helped. We had to rush this operation plan as our target has changed their schedule. We need to strike while the para-steel is still hot. If you miss this chance then we will have to wait at least another month. If you did miss it, don’t think I would allow you to do anything during that time. I’m sure the Office of Reason could find several chores for you to do.”
“We can only hope that this prototype is more successful than the failed robo-dog that was your partner.”
This was Arron’s first time hearing that the Office of Reason was not satisfied with the D.O.G.E. prototypes.
“You two need to stay here until you’re fully fixed up. If you have no other questions then I will take my leave as I have stuff to do,” said A.S. as he stood up with his drink still in hand.
“Wait, which yakuza family am I supposed to be infiltrating? And where are they based?” asked Arron.
A.S quickly scrolled through some menus on his wrist-datapad and then flicked a file toward Arron before leaving the enclosed platform.
“My head is spinning. Everything is happening too quickly,” said Arron as he flopped onto one of the couches.
“So who is the target?” asked Kix sitting down on a couch opposite the slouching Arron.
Arron opened the new blinking file, “Umm… the Ryu Family?”
Upon hearing the name Kix’s face was not as calm as before.
“What is the Office of Reason thinking?” asked Kix.
“Is this a really notorious Yakuza Family?” asked Arron.
“I know they said it was one of the main yakuza families, but I thought they meant someone in the upper mid-tier… Instead, they have decided to go straight to the top and challenge the number one family.”
“So will this be harder than normal?”
“Of course! They are not the simple poor thugs like these Greasy Weasels. The Ryu family is really the ruler of the yakuza families in sector one. If anyone messes up big time or tries to start a major fight with another yakuza family, they will first have to deal with the Ryu family.”
“Speaking of the Greasy Weasels, what are we doing here in one of their bases?”
Kix gave a loud huff and said, “Although the Yakuza families on level one are viewed as lawless brutes, they have an honor code where they will help another group out if the enemy is being targeted by Mother and Father. In the past, a few of these families betrayed the cause and teamed up with Mother and Father forming discrete gangs of lawless hoodlums that did not fit in with the Yakuza system. Of course, they were wiped out alongside the agents and families they worked for. Now these dishonorable gangs and their yakuza family backers who are in the pockets of the Office of Reason, do not openly state their position. This allows them to stay alive and also gather information, grow in power, and take control of major businesses including several mega-corps. This is one of the ways Mother and Father can claim plausible deniability when accused of acquiring and controlling all the mega-corps openly.”
“And the Greasy weasels are one of these Rogue families?” asked Arron.
“It was only a rumor that a few people muttered about, but no real evidence was ever found.”
“Until now. So what are you going to do about it? Keep the info or spread it?” asked Arron.
“I’m not stupid! The Office of Reason will immediately look at the two of us if suddenly their important pawn is uprooted after staying hidden for so long.”
Their discussion was cut short when a female, also covered from head to toe in black leather, stepped onto the platform followed by four hover suitcases.
“Which one of you is my project?” asked the robotic female voice.
Kix pointed to Arron.
She pulled the hover cases over to the table at the spot closest to Arron and started unloading the first two cases. There were many tools and chemical vials now neatly lined up on top of the table.
The woman turned to a third suitcase which had a black metallic ball and began to tap and pressed a few invisible menu options. The ball floated up out of the suitcase and flew over to Arron where it started scanning him with a flat yellow holographic light gathering detailed information about his body’s build type.
When it finished the needed scans, it flew back and chirped a few electronic messages to the leather female. She silently read the flowing data before turning to the vials on the table. Her hand grabbed a few vials before concocting a mixture of the chemicals into a metal box.
She worked fast without a word spoken and quickly finished creating the needed mixture. She turned to another thin sheet of special thin metal that was laying on the table and began to impute the gathered measurements allowing the special metal to slowly change from a flat, into the shape of a metallic face.
This metallic face was gently placed inside the metal box that held the chemical mixture. With this task finished, she turned to Arron and picked up an odd tool that looked like a pair of scissors, but on one side there was a large razor blade while on the other there was a metal comb.
Snip! Snip! Snip!
She opened and closed the odd scissors a few times before grabbing a palm-sized square metal container. With a click of a button on the side, a flame popped out of the end. Arron’s eyes squinted at this as was now more sensitive and aware of fire after his most recent experience.
Now with the cutting tool in one hand and a small flame in the other hand, she walked over to a nervous Arron whose eyes were locked onto the flame. The leather female did pay his nervousness any attention and started to alter his hairstyle by roughly combing his hair until it was as she wanted it.
With skilled hands, she used the razor and flame to cut and burn away any stubble that was on his face, while also altering his newly cut hair into a different style. When she was satisfied with the results she placed the tools back onto the table and dunked a white rag into a bottle of strong chemical disinfectant before rubbing it all over Arron’s face.
Arron was sweating all over from the experience that felt like torture as he tried to keep calm. His recently regenerated skin was now a shade of red and stung as if thousands of insects were crawling all over his face as the chemical disinfectant also ate away at the stubble’s hidden roots.
The chemical smell was strong enough to make his eyes water and his nose sting as well.
With the chemical, cleaning finished she reached into the metal box that was now letting off a cold mist and pulled out the newly created mask. She did one last inspection before typing in a few commands on an invisible menu.
When she was finished with the setup she turned and placed the mask on Arron’s red face.
The mask immediately activated a suction force as it began to finish conforming to his face and locked itself onto his head by sending several skin bands to latch onto and adhere to his face, neck, and ears securing it to his face.
With a few more commands the mask began to tighten and the skin color began to slowly meld with his own making it unable to be discerned from his real skin as it thinned out to be even more unnoticeable.
The leather female ran her hand over the mask and the new skin bands before nodding her head as she inspected her work. Just to be sure she added fake earning clamps on each ear to make sure the mask stayed on.
With this done, she opened the last hover case and took out a large round device that took up the entire space, and tossed it onto the ground.
She turned to Arron and silently motioned for him to step onto it. Arron was unsure what it was but decided that it was probably nothing dangerous, so he did as she wanted.
As soon as he did, several holographic outfits appeared on his body allowing the leather female to sort through the several thousands of outfits to decide on which ones to use for Arron’s new look.
She continued to swipe through the outfits mixing and matching certain parts before pressing enter on a few of the options.
Minutes later several delivery drones flew to the platform and dropped off the outfits that she had picked out.
“This is the best I can do with the limited funds I was given as well as your body type. The mask is made from the latest stealth alloy and synthetic skin produced by the researchers of the Office of Reason. I doubt anyone will be able to notice a difference or see through it even if they somehow gain access to an old military-grade scanner,” said the female robotic voice.
“With if they have a current military-grade scanner?” asked Kix.
“Then you have the worst luck because they have all been programmed to recognize such material. Just in case separatists somehow receive the material. We can not allow them to use it to hide their identity and skirt the laws set down by Mother and Father!”
