MJ-12: Inception

17

Can someone explain exactly what it means to ‘permanently deny’ us if we’re captured?” Ellis demanded as they reviewed operation planning for what seemed the millionth time. “Maybe I’m not the brightest bulb, but it sure sounds like you’re authorized to put us down.”

Danny smiled at this, leaning back in his chair. “Well, yes, Ellis, that’s exactly what I’m authorized to do. In fact, each of you are authorized to do that to each other, should one of you be compromised or captured and there isn’t a reasonable expectation of escape.”

Cal really couldn’t help but shake his head. Now, he didn’t want to hurt anybody, especially the folks he’d spent weeks getting to know, working with, sweating with, living through strange times with. That even included Ellis, the idiot cracker who still didn’t quite understand how deep the mud was here. But while Cal swore to the Almighty he’d never harm Ellis again… there wasn’t enough spiritual fortitude in the entire world for him to resist enjoying the man’s discomfort.

He made a mental note to reread that passage from Ephesians again. At the rate he was going, he’d have to write it down and keep it in his pocket just in case.

“Commander Wallace, sir, I admit I got a problem with that,” Cal said, wresting his attention away from Ellis. “These are good people here. They’re my fellow Americans, my fellow Variants. Some of us have gotten close as kin. And even those of us that ain’t, well… I don’t want to kill anybody. Period.”

Danny’s smile faded and he nodded gravely at Cal. “And if we all do our jobs, it won’t come to that. You’ve all been reviewing the ops plan daily for the past few weeks now, and you know what we expect you to do if things take a turn. This is last-resort stuff, and it’s an expectation that will accompany every assignment you folks carry out. You don’t want to kill someone, and I truly respect that, Mr. Hooks — I’ve been in the military all my life, and I’ve never killed anyone. I don’t want to start, either. So, let’s be sure that we’re so well trained and well prepared that we exhaust every single avenue before that happens.”

Cal nodded, deep in thought. He thought about protesting yet again but remained silent. He knew, just as sure as he knew his own name or his child’s face, that he would not take a life — not even with a gun to his head. At least, he hoped not. He knew men came back from the war different from the men they’d left as, even as they went to church and prayed for salvation and the strength to follow His Word.

Cal knew from day one this was going to be hard, but was only now considering just how hard it was going to get.

If nothing else, at least they got to leave Area 51. They were at Fort Dix, in New Jersey, in a for-real room — no government plywood held together with wire. That was something, wasn’t it?

“Now, let’s bring in Mrs. Stevens and we’ll get you equipped,” Danny said. “Mrs. Stevens?”

A moment later, a motherly white woman entered the conference room — Cal put her age in the early thirties or so, with blond, coiffed hair and a very prim, proper, floral-print dress. Pearls and low heels. But she cradled a clipboard with a thick sheaf of paper in one hand and carried a large duffel in the other.

“Good morning, everyone,” she said in a soothing voice that sounded like one of the women on the radio selling soap or makeup. “I’m Mrs. Stevens, and I’ll be your quartermaster for…” At this, she looked on her clipboard. “Operation OUTREACH.”

Cal traded a look with Frank, seated next to him; the Army veteran looked outright amused. Ellis’s scowl got just a little deeper, while Miss Maggie — well, it was tough to get much out of Miss Maggie these days beyond a sort of bemused calm. Calm, sure, but with some edge behind it, too. Of all the Variants Cal worked with, he worried over her the most these days.

Mrs. Stevens dropped the duffel on the table in front of her as she referred again to her checklist. “So, I see you’ve been training with Mr. Mulholland — what a nice man he is! Mr. Stevens and I saw him in New York on our honeymoon. Just lovely. Anyhoo, you should all be trained up on how to deploy these fun little items.”

“Wait a second,” Frank interjected. “You’re here for what, exactly?”

Mrs. Stevens opened her mouth to reply, but Danny beat her to it. “Mrs. Stevens is part of our engineering team, Frank. She invented this stuff.”

Frank looked positively shocked. “No shit?”

“Language, Mr. Lodge!” Mrs. Stevens said, looking genuinely aghast.

Cal couldn’t help but smile a bit as Frank stared at the woman with visible confusion, while Maggie reached over to punch him in the arm. Women gotta stand up for women, Cal figured. Now, Cal was all for women having a little more responsibility here and there — his mother worked hard her whole life to bring Cal and his brothers and sisters up right. But putting a woman in charge of the equipment for a spy mission? Especially one where he might be expected to kill somebody? He wanted to be OK with that, but that wasn’t sitting right. And yet Commander Wallace seemed fine with it, so he figured he’d better get used to it. He supposed that if the government was going to trust a Negro man on a spy mission, trusting a woman was pretty much the same thing. And there was Maggie, after all.

The quartermaster, meanwhile, was rustling through her duffel bag and setting items out on the table. “So, first we have these packs of cigarettes, one for each of you. Lucky Strikes, which is what Mr. Stevens smokes. I admit I sneak one from time to time,” Mrs. Stevens said with a smile as she tossed four packs on the table and held up a fifth. “Now, you’ll see that there’s a black dot on the edge of the filters on six of these in each pack.” She held up the pack; Cal had to lean in to see the specks, which looked like tiny little flecks of tobacco. “These aren’t manufacturing defects. It indicates which cigarettes in the pack are loaded. Inside each of them is a small dart, with a knockout agent on the tip. All you have to do is light, point at the person you need to take a nap, and let our R&D handle the rest.”

Mrs. Stevens produced a cigarette from her pack, lit it, and took a big draw — it looked to Cal like the lady liked a good cigarette more than occasionally. She held it idly in her hand, but Cal saw the tip was pointed at the surface of the table. A moment later, there was a small sound, like a quick exhale of breath, and the dart embedded itself into the table. It was no larger than the tip of an old fountain pen.

“Effective range up to fifteen feet, but in a pinch, you could probably get thirty feet out with a favorable breeze and a bit of luck,” she said, folding up her pack and slipping it into the pocket of her dress. “Total incapacitation for around ten minutes.”

Maggie raised her hand and looked to Danny. “Commander, we don’t need that if I can just—”

Danny cleared his throat and cut her off, looking pointedly at Mrs. Stevens. “Security, Maggie. Not everyone here is cleared for everything. And you might not always be around, so these are a good backup.”

Maggie nodded and looked back to Mrs. Stevens, who smiled sweetly at Maggie. “Well, then. If I may?” She looked to Danny, who gave her a small wave. “Good. Now then, you’re also getting this lighter. If you just use it normally, you’ll probably never run out of fuel. It contains a highly concentrated, highly flammable liquid, and the lighter itself has three uses. One, of course, is you can just light your cigarette. But when you depress the valve for more than two seconds, you’ll see just how handy this little gadget can be. At that point, one quarter of the fuel supply is expended, creating a flame six feet long in front of you for five seconds. Remember to point it away from yourself. Safety first!”

Mrs. Stevens then turned away from her audience, put the lighter out in front of her, and produced a burst of fire that looked like it came from a flamethrower in the old war movies.

“I won’t demonstrate the third option, as it’s significantly more dangerous. But should you find yourself in dire straits, all you have to do is pop open the lid of the lighter and throw it as far as you can. The resulting grenade explosion will set fire to everything in, oh, let’s say a twenty-foot radius. Again, it’s powerful, so don’t say I didn’t warn you!”

Her demonstration concluded, Mrs. Stevens then handed over a lighter for each of them, along with a pack of her knockout Lucky Strikes. Cal picked his up and eyed it warily; he was never much of a smoker to begin with. But he could see how he might need one or two after all this was said and done. And besides, he could probably heal himself of any ill effects after. He would just need to remember not to pick one of the marked ones.

Mrs. Stevens, meanwhile, was still rummaging through her duffel bag. “One more thing for you here. For the men, a nice new billfold, and for the lady, a nice new compact, complete with mirror and powder.”

The three leather wallets looked a little bulky but otherwise normal. The powder compact was smaller but had a hard case. Cal picked his wallet up off the table and weighed it in his hands. “It’s a little stiff, ma’am.”

Mrs. Stevens shook her head at the complaint. “With some use over time, it’ll be a little more flexible. And I’d encourage you to keep it in your front pocket rather than the back. I don’t think you’ll be wanting to sit on your handie-talkie.”

“A radio?” Frank asked, eyes wide. “This thing’s a radio?”

“Yes, dear, it’s a radio. Just open it up and hold the left side to your ear and let the right side fall to your chin. Short range, less than a mile, but I imagine it’ll be handy,” Mrs. Stevens said.

“So, what happens if someone tries to call while this thing’s in my pocket?” Ellis drawled. “My pants gonna start talkin’?”

Mrs. Stevens’s laugh was like something you’d hear at a cocktail party. “Oh, Mr. Longstreet! Give us a little more credit than that! The audio doesn’t turn on until you flip open the wallet. If someone’s trying to reach you over the channel — and it’s a dedicated channel, by the way — your wallet will vibrate a little bit. Just a buzz. You’ll feel it, and when you’re in the clear, you can answer.” Mrs. Stevens turned to Maggie. “Yours vibrates just a little bit more, so you’ll feel it when you have it in your clutch.”

Maggie frowned. “I don’t really use makeup. And I don’t have a clutch.”

Mrs. Stevens looked positively shocked at this, but Danny intervened. “Your cover identities will include all the clothing and accessories you need. And we can get someone to help you with your makeup once you’re there.” He turned back to Mrs. Stevens. “One more thing, I believe?”

“Oh, yes. I have them right here,” Mrs. Stevens said. She pulled a small case from the duffel bag and opened it, revealing four small automatic pistols. “These are Spanish make, Regina pocket pistols, 32 caliber. They weigh just twenty-one ounces, not even six inches long. We chose them because carrying around an American-made weapon, wherever it is you’re going, might not be the brightest idea. These have been around a while. Six rounds in the magazine and another in the chamber. If you remember Mr. Mulholland’s tricks, you should be able to get this into wherever you need to go, no problem.”

She then pulled four small metal tubes from the case. “Now, I know the OSS folks liked the High Standard HDM pistols during the war. Those had an integrated suppressor and a bigger magazine. Impressive, but really big — not suitable at all for parties!” Mrs. Stevens giggled. “These suppressors screw on, which will take a few seconds, but you’ll be far less likely to be spotted carrying a gun this way.”

Danny cleared his throat again. “Again, I really want to stress that if we end up having to shoot, I’d consider that a pretty big failure all around.”

Cal looked down at his gun, frowning. “I couldn’t agree more, Commander.”

“And that’s that,” Mrs. Stevens said, tossing her clipboard into the duffel. “Now, you folks be careful, all right? And please bring as much as you can back in good condition, will you? They may seem more like slightly dangerous toys, but your newly acquired equipment represents a significant percentage of my department’s operating budget!”

With that, she strode back out the door, leaving the Variants in an amused silence for several long moments — until Maggie spoke.

“She’s got to be one of us.”

“Excuse me?” Danny asked.

Maggie tilted her head toward the door. “Mrs. Stevens — she’s a Variant. No other explanation why you’d have that woman handling weapons and gear like that. She was proud of this stuff. I think she helped make it, and I think from the look of her, it’s kind of new to her.”

Danny smiled at Maggie, revealing nothing. “Mrs. Stevens has been a great addition to our technical services department. She’s a genius with chemistry and engineering.”

Frank narrowed his eyes a bit. “Why don’t you put her on the big science project down at Area 51?”

At this, Danny grew serious. “She’s not cleared for that, Frank, and neither are you.”

“But if she’s a genius, why not?” Ellis asked.

Danny sat down with the others and took a deep breath. “What you saw there — and I know Frank told you what he saw in Berlin — is one of the great scientific discoveries of the twentieth century. It’s also still one of the most mysterious and dangerous. If Mrs. Stevens is a Variant — and I’m not saying officially whether she is or isn’t — she could never be the one to figure out how it works. Not with folks like Jim Forrestal looking over her shoulder. Understand?”

The others look confused, but Cal caught his meaning fast. “If the Variants are the ones who figure it out, then the government’s afraid it won’t be able to control it — or us,” he said. “It’s got to be the normal folk. Otherwise, people gonna get real nervous.”

“Exactly,” Danny said.

Frank smiled a bit. “You basically confirmed just now that there are other Variants on the payroll, you know.”

Danny fixed him with a hard look. “You’re hearing what you want to hear, Frank. And you didn’t hear it from me. Now… let’s go over that ops plan one more time and see where these new toys will fit into some of the contingencies.”

With a chorus of groans, the team opened up their file folders. Again.