#075985 stalked the trenchcoated inspector throughout two more rooms. The inspector finally stopped, and #075985 made his move. "Wha...!" The inspector had yelled, seconds before being cut open. #075985 was getting nervous. He knew this ship was heavily guarded, and he knew not what to do. He rested, hours passed. Finally, he got up and moved. He was still stunned at him killing the innocent ship-worker. He knew what he did wasn't right, but it was his only reaction. He climbed into a vent. The vent was rusted, and very dusty. #075985 crawled through the vent. Reaching an ending point, he took off the cover, and slid out. #075985 coughed, dust from the vent in his mouth. He was in some sort of control room. On his left were computers and chairs, and to his right security monitors. He heard voices approaching from both entrances...

"I am getting tired of this old ship" Said one man.
"Yes, I know. I wonder where the inspector has been, he hasn't made his routine walk through?" The other replied.

#075985 realized he was trapped - again. He looked frantically throughout the room, not knowing what to do. The men were getting closer. He could hear the security door doing a retna eye scan. #075985, was trapped, and he had no way to escape . . .



[Edited on 28-11-2003 by WeBDeviL]

The two sliding doors opened, and in stepped the two men, dressed in shabby looking overalls. They took a seat at a table and relaxed.

#075985 peeked through the metal grate obscuring his figure in the vent. He could make out what the men were saying.

“So, how do you think this is gonna work?”, one of them said.

“Dunno, it seems like a really dangerous operation to me. We haven’t considered what would happen if they didn’t get there on time. Everything has to work perfectly or else we’re frocked.”

“What about the missiles?”

“I don’t think anything could possibly go wrong with them. Besides, half of them are decoys. If anyone tries to shoot them down, they’ll probably hit the fake ones. I’ve heard that they used some sort of new chemical in their production. Instead of using regular plutonium, they used something else. Not exactly sure what it is, some sort of really weird isotope or something like that”

“I’ve heard about that too. I forgot what it’s called though, Something like Un-un-um-pentium or something similar to that.”

“It seems to be really controversial. When they were cooking it up at the labs, one of the scientists mysteriously died. When they did a autopsy on him, one of the docs died as well. The government ordered a probe and had all the scientists locked up.”

#075985 crawled an inch forward, ears listening with intent.

“It was really strange. No one knew how it happened. He was perfectly suited up, and after inspection his suit seemed to be just fine. All the research and information were ‘accidentally’ lost and it was as if the entire project never existed. The newspapers never reported it, seems that they were silenced as well.”

“That new substance that they made, it has some extremely impressive properties. I’ve heard that if you expose it to extreme cold, it-

The metal grate that #075985 was leaning on suddenly swung open with a startling clang. he dropped out of the vent and landed on a stack of books and papers. The heads of the two workers span around and stared at him with their mouths open. Before they could reach for their holsters, #075985 was on him with his knife.

The men were incredibly strong, even compared to #075985’s finesse. He jammed the knife down as hard as he could down upon on of the men, but the other grabbed his wrist and twisted it, hard. Surprised, #075985 spun around, freeing his wrist from the man’s grasp and gave him a solid kick in the chest, knocking him to the floor. The other man grabbed a chair and flung it towards #075985, missing him narrowly.

Two distinct pops sounded. The two men went limp and fell to the floor. Suddenly, a long, sharp projectile whistled past #075985’s head.

He saw the woman run out the door.

#075985 gave chase to the woman, who was now fleeing from the agent. She was incredibly agile, leaping and bounding over, between, in, out, under, everywhere. #075985 finally had her trapped - he thought. She gave him a swift punched, a hard, one at that, and ran again. Stunned, #075985 froze, then ran after her. She ran to a ladder, climbed up into a guard tower, alerting a man.

"INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT!" A mechanical voice blasted. "ALL HANDS TO DECK 3, LEVEL 2!"

#075985 froze again. What was wrong with him? He had never been this nervous before, never. He turned frantically, dived off a balcony, and landed on a lower level. The alarm went off again. Soon, hundreds of men would be looking all over for him. He kept running, all the while thinking. He turned a corner, running right into two guards. He reached for his knife - it was gone. He kicked the man nearest him, who was pulling out his gun, caught the gun in mid-air, and shot the next man. They both fell. #075985 heard yelling from behind him. He ducked inside a room, and waited. They passed. He stealthily exited the room, and looked for a better place to hide. . .

#075985 rolled into another vent, there was nowhere else to hide. All around him he could here footsteps and shouting. Every few seconds the feet of soldiers flew past the ground level vent that #075985 was inside. He put his back up against the vents metal wall, feeling the vibrations of panic moving through the ship. Yet again #075985 had ruined his cover and was now trapped out in the middle of the ocean. Things began to look hopeless and #075985 felt a strange feeling in his stomach he had never felt before. It was fear.

He hid. Hours seemed to pass, though they were only minutes, but they seemed like hours. #075985 knew he had to go somewhere, so he started to crawl through this vent. Dust and dirt was everywhere. He turned a corner, and the vent curved upward. He crawled more. Crawling, more crawling. He stopped. He thought of what it would be like to fail this mission, he had never failed a mission..the fear was back. Fear was something that #075985 never had before, but now he had sensed it. Fully aware, he slid off the vent cover, and climbed down. He was in a storage house. He took two quick glances. What luck he had - he had landed in the room next to the missiles. It was completely empty. All the guards had been assorted to look for him, or so he thought. He calmly hacked a door, and entered. He heard a click. He froze. His eyes grew insanely wide.
"Freeze. Turn slowly."
#075985 did as he was ordered. He turned to see a huge, lurking man. He was at least 6'8". He was bald, the agent observed. #075985 had to think of something to do, and fast.

"Zink to HQ, I have the intruder. I repeat, I have caught the intruder."

#075985 broke the man's wrist. It was so fast, it seemed faster than light! #075985 wasn't into the clearing yet. Soon, hundreds of men, would be, again, right on top of him. He had to hide, but first, he had to take out the missiles. He planted the demolition packs, and jumped into a vent.

Ten men entered, they saw the demo packs. "Quick! Defuse them! Smith, Barnes, get to it!" One man yelled.
Two other men quickly worked at the bombs.

#075985 could do nothing. He sat and watched, as he thought he had finally accomplished his mission, fall to ruins. He was again, hidden, and trapped inside a steel ship. #075985 sat stunned, watching the men. . .

The men quickly tried to defuse the bomb, frantically working to save themselves and their precious cargo of killing devices. #075985 could feel the fear coming back, feelings he couldn't understand began floating around his head, he was feeling more human.

Since his creation 5 years ago in a secret testing laboratory under the Nevada desert, #075985 has been the most effective weapon the U.S government has ever created. With fuel for his body he can regenerate almost any injury ,his strength is that of ten men and his weapons skills perfect. #075985 is the ultimate soldier and yet he knows so little about himself. His only explanation for his conception came from one of the more sympathetic scientists at the base. "Not everything inside you is from this planet," he told him, "You are a true collaboration."

#075985 could not shake these thoughts from his mind, "Who am I?" he muttered to himself. And suddenly, PING! A magazine from #075985's weapon slammed against the hard metal floor. The men in the room spun round, "He's over there!," one of them yelled.

[Edited on 27-1-2004 by earthtone]

Shaking his head, he forced himself to abandon these wistful thoughts. There was nothing for it now but to act, to sacrifice, if the need arose... the mission, he knew, was not only his reason for life, it >was his life. 075985, he thought to himself... those numbers, and the legacy they carried, would not fall to ruin while some glint of hope yet remained.

He swallowed heavily.

He drew out his rifle, and checked the chamber; the bullet was there. It was primed, locked, and loaded, and there was no time to be wasted.

Perhaps he prayed; even he was not sure. What meaning did God have to a man with no name, a man whose very existence was thanks more to the machinations of man than the will of the Divine?

He leveled the rifle, finding the dull brown cube of the first bomb with the iron rail sights of his gun, his only true friend.

He finished his might-have-been prayer, and, as the technician's clippers closed upon the final crucial wire in the innards of the explosive, he squeezed the trigger.

By the time the resounding report of the rifle reached the ears of the bomb technician, it was too late. Too late for him, too late for #075985, and too late for the Womb.

The bullet found its mark, tearing deep into the baleful block of composition-four. Its purpose as singular as that of the man that had fired it, it sought out its destination with unremitting ferocity.

It struck the blasting cap.

>Silently, #075985's GPS transmitter went dead. Sweat beading on his forehead, shielding his eyes from the chain reaction of blazing detonations that had once been the Womb, Jonathan Price knew the task was complete. #075985 had been lost, but the day had been won; Price, and every person aboard the command vessel, knew that there could have been no other way. The Seven Five Nines did not waste their lives any more than they would waste a round of ammunition or a moment's opportunity, but there were times when it would take all three to see a mission to success.

He smiled the grim smile of a man who has sacrificed another to save thousands. He would return home now, a richer man for it, and perhaps earn himself a new medal for his flawless uniform. The mission was a success, the United States were safe, and, for Jonathan Price, all was well.




Eight thousand miles away, beneath a hundred yards of stone and steel, a new life entered the world, a life that had been wrought by science from the ore of the divine. Feeling his first breath enter his perfect body and rejoicing in the knowledge that it was his time, #075986 opened his eyes.