XII. The Purgers of Progress
Haven's Finest Minds, Their Despicable Destroyer & The Secrets Uncovered by Two Newly-Minted Agents...
Six scientists in six days meant one of three things: a crackdown on civilian studies, clandestine developments for villainous outfits, or one mighty run of bad luck. The semi-official Haven Society for Public Professors deliberated these findings over and over again, but to no further understanding about the accidents. Each instance involved a study kept from the organization, begging further questions when Professor Smith seemed the only hound who understood where each unfortunate soul went wrong through his various deductions. This familiarity sent plenty of fingers pointed his way by the meeting’s end, but all were thwarted by his airtight alibis. It was rather hard to pin a crime on a hound who filmed himself conducting his own experiments.
He relayed the whole affair to a Lita he never thought he’d ever see; trapped at a desk behind a mountain of paperwork.
“Good God woman, have you gone mad!?”
Lita’s bleary eyes, red all over, looked up with a strange, twisted mix of sadness and rage. “Yes. And no. Yes in that I signed up to run this got-damn shindig. No, ‘cuz if I don’t get a real assignment real soon, I’m gonna torch this building for fun.”
“Consider the case opened,” Smith smiled, the white-furred gentleman passing a single sheet of paper to the dark gray hippie-punk. She kicked her sandaled paws up on the desk, knocking over one of her towers of Infantry-based security filings, and read the details of the case. Her eyes went wide with shock at first, and then like a miraculous eye-drop formula, the red veins vanished. The hippie-punk split her muzzle with a shit-eating grin. “You’re on, Doc!”
She leapt over the desk, through the papers, and wrapped her arms about the cloaked scientist. It was a miracle Smith wasn’t tackled to the ground, though he could only hold the 20-something for so long before she dropped.
“You really were chained to the desk, weren’t you?” the English wolf sighed.
“I’ve seen…paper trails...you people wouldn’t BELIEVE.” came the dramatic, ebony-soaked reply.
“Attack paperclips on fire off the shoulder of the filing cabinet?” he teased. “Yes, quite. Let’s get you back in your natural habitat, m’dear, before you die of starvation.”
He helped her off the floor and gave her a choice of machine, his green Jaguar or her crimson Bug.
Naturally, the Professor was thrown into the sparkling clean passenger seat of the Red Devil, hunching briefly before realizing how clean the seat was.
“Good God, you really were stuck in there, weren’t you?” he gasped.
Lita cocked an eyebrow and dug her paw into the clutch. “It takes forever to fax shit behind enemy lines” was all she said before the V8-powered Beetle whipped out of his berth, and tore down the misty blue streets of Haven, towards the most recent of the murders.
One wild ride later, the apartment came into view, and a light still shone through the scientist’s window.
“I thought it was a power surge he induced,” Smith remarked, stroking his chin.
It was only when a loud bang was heard that they realized someone else had come across the crime. The duo leapt out from the car and scrambled furiously up the fire escape, all ten flights, to find a red-furred technician missing his head. The second Lita stepped into the room, she wheeled back out as a blast of white rocketed through the air.
“On the count of three,” she grimaced, her mighty silver pistol readied. “One.”
“Two,” Smith growled, revolver in hand.
“THREE!”
Two blasts of laser fire erupted into a tremendous explosion as the wolves dove out of the flame’s way. Window glass shattered and a fire alarm screamed, the sprinklers practically flooding the room. As soon as they arrived, the duo bolted back down the rattling stairs and fled just as the few tenants who lived there filed out.
“What the fuck are you guys cooking in there?” the punk barked, pedal to the floor.
“Evidently Miss Lita,” Smith began as he straightened his cravat, “That was the last device of the late Professor H. Farnham Worthy, our sixth unfortunate soul. A specialist who let his project get the best of him. And handlers who weren’t up to the task. Some sort of automated weapon, but one not on the A.C.E.S. grid. Or if it was, no longer.”
“What’s the link besides them all being scientists and dead?”
Smith slapped a petite pair of spectacles upon his snout before thumbing through the notes. “The running theme of this litany is cutting edge research. Prof. B. Pennington from District 252 got an acid bath for his trouble of sorting out a new self-regenerative approach to battery power. Prof. S.W. Dodd from 314 was furthering some of my own findings on lab-concentrated singularities—”
“Black holes.” Lita cutoff between gear shifts. “You bastards know how to make black holes!?”
“Well only tiny ones in very secure circumstances. No rifts in time and space like that chap of yours with the Camaro.”
With a deep sigh and a defeated “carry on” from his driver, Professor Smith did so.
“Anyway, he was thrown from his balcony. Prof. T. White from the good General’s own 222 was exploring accelerated organic growth of plant life for terrace gardens. He was found having committed suicide with two gunshots to the back of the head.”
“Yeah, and we’re just crossing from 308 to 307.” Lita chimed in. “So generally one block of districts is what we’s looking through?”
“One and a bit more like.” Smith nodded. “But yes. Those inventions and innovations are the only through-line. No particular color, creed or field. Although…”
“What’s swimming in that limey mind of yours, Teach?”
“One other salient point of connection: the hounds’ research was absconded with. We retained the results and details through our collective journal we kept, but the original materials were all whisked away.”
“Meaning that bastard trying to collect on the laser wasn’t a fluke.” The dark-furred punk stroked her chin between turns of the wheel. With a snap of her fingers and a flick of a switch, she knew what to do. “Let’s trilaterate!”
Lita kicked the brakes and swerved her Beetle into an alleyway. From out the center console swung a keyboard, a corresponding set of twin computer monitors sliding out from the glovebox.
“Well I say,” Smith remarked. “The chap’s gotten quite high-tech now, hasn’t he?”
“There’s a radio show out in the desert with a car who’s got a setup like this. Fire-something-or-other it’s called. Anywho, I got a kit from the Force as a house-warming gift and I installed it in my little man. Lemme load a map up for you and I want every single one of the hits marked. We can draw direct lines between the two and see the most likely place they’d be holed up in.”
“My good woman, you are growing by the day!” The white-furred dandy flicked his fingers across the keyboard and loaded all six points of interest. They tried different combinations of the three lines, but all pointed to one locale: The Vance Building in District 291.
“The perfect median too.” Smith puzzled, thumbing his chin. “Right then, put that tungsten paw of yours to good use.”
He had hardly finished when she hit the gas and bolted back into the night. They made short work of the journey and even shorter work of going in. There was no one at the front desk, but the elevators were still in operation.
“Most of the fellows they’ve been coming for work on the upper floors.” Smith pondered before looking down the shaft. “I’d wager they’d prefer a subterranean home for their many scientific trinkets.”
They got in the rickety old wrought-iron cage, and made their slow descent. There was an air of unease, thick as London fog, as bars of light and shade flickered past the hounds. A feeling made manifest as the elevator jolted to a halt between floors. Both wolves cocked their ears up and heard the furious grind of the gears and pulley system, fighting whatever was stuck in the mechanism with great mechanical fury.
The tall white dandy looked to the short gray punk and she to he; someone knew they were in the building. Both wolves looked up through the grading, searching for some sign of life, a chance to gauge their enemy and their faculties.
All the way at the top, there was a visible arc of smoke rippling from the mechanism. The echoing electric clang of the cables rippled and grunted throughout the shaft. Ripples and grunts that gave way to a furious, deafening clanging and the sudden drop of the elevator. Smith flung his cloak about Lita and the two clung to one another, the plunge launching their stomachs into somersaults and their hearts at a million miles an hour. Down and down they fell, fell for what felt like eternity.
Such an eternity, in fact, that when Smith looked down at his watch, and saw that they had been falling for a solid five minutes, he began to question just what happened to the elevator.
“My good woman, take this flashlight and look down.”
Lita did so through parted fingers, and leapt up when she saw what was below them.
“We’re on the GROU—”
She hushed herself before her voice could carry any further. “We’re on the ground.” came her terse whisper. “But it still feels like I’m flying in Zero G.”
The white wolven scientist rose to the door. “Well in that case, let us get out.”
It took some wrenching, but at long last, the wrought-iron door slid open, and after a few tentative steps for safety’s sake, they continued their quest.
“That seems like something an old fellow in the Society would pull.” Smith pondered.
“Who that be?” Lita probed.
Smith began to speak, but shook his head. “No, it couldn’t. Devil’s dead as a door-nail, had to identify the body myself.”
Lita scoffed. “All’s fair in love and spycraft, that’s what dear ol’ Agent Steele likes to say. Faking your death is one of the oldest card tricks in the book.”
Professor Smith returned the punk’s flippant glance, but it wasn’t long before his gaze softened and he was open to the possibility.
“One of our old fellows was a Manfred Price.” the white-furred chevalier began. “Sharp speckled fellow, about my height, dressed like a Kansas City hitman. Black suit, black tie, all that pap. He was something of a joker. Practical jokes like a 4D falling elevator. The sensation of getting shot down to the Earth’s core while being not even an inch off the floor is right up his alley. Espionage wasn’t, but let’s run with your hypothesis; Price fakes his death and is now absconding with others’ inventions and research. To what or whom would he benefit from such an arrangement?”
“Well...we've been mailing postcards for a while now, haven’t we?”
“Postcards” being the operative code for stowing away secrets to newly-minted General Knox and the Ambiorixian Ascensores back east.
“Meaning some mad scientist is out in the desert rather than here.” Smith surmised. “Not sure if I buy that, but let’s see what’s down here regardless.”
Down the long dark corridor they went, treading light as feathers upon the tile floor, a door peering from the pitch-black. A rather old-fashioned door, with a pronounced wood grain and opaque glass planes. While the Professor hadn’t the privilege of a universal key like Agent Roger Steele, he was a dab hand at the bobby pin, and worked his magic to perfection.
The door quietly parted and inside was the mother lode. All the stolen gear, all the advancements, all scattered and shattered in this room.
“By God...he didn’t even use them.” Smith balled his fist and stormed over to the various bits and bobs of mutilated equipment. “It’s a damned bloody graveyard!”
His voice never rose above a terse hiss, but the fury building within Smith was palpable.
“Not all Doc,” Lita beckoned. “We got some gear here on a table.”
The Edwardian scientist spun round on his heels and saw the array. A set of beakers, vials, and test-tubes. Red liquid in the beaker, yellow in the test tubes, and translucent in the center vial.
“Don’t touch that!” he damn-near barked. Lita threw her half-gloved hands up and waited for the frenzied white wolf’s direction.
“Look very closely,” he continued in a low tone. He flicked his nose once above each liquid before taking the translucent vial and pouring it into the beaker of red. “Wait for the results. If the reaction is correct, one of these creations is a breakthrough worth killing for.”
“This isn’t your work, is it?” Lita asked.
Professor Smith shook his head. “No m’dear. This confirms Price as our culprit. He shared this hypothesis of room-temperature android toxin. Instantaneous coagulation of the cardiovascular hydraulic system. He only shared this formulation with myself, Worthy, and White.”
“Y’mean this gums up the white blood?”
All Smith had to do was point to the solidified compound within the beaker for Lita to realize just what this could mean. Even more so when the shadow of a gun-toting third wolf flashed across the wall behind themselves.
“I think he's come to collect on this little innovation.” she whispered, pulling all six-feet-plus of the middle-aged hound under the table.
The two crouched in silence as the footsteps of the silhouette echoed through the room. Footsteps marked by another sound; the sizzling hiss of hydraulics.
Marching into view was a wolf in figure, but a machine in function. Neither android nor robot; a proper cyborg if ever there was one. A crude grafting of flesh, fur and metal, marching along with an automatic pistol glued to its balled fist.
His face was that of the speckled wolf the Professor had once known.
For the first time in a long time, Lita saw real horror wash over the white wolf’s face as he clenched the grip of his revolver.
“We’ll time just as he looks.” Lita whispered, her own Wildey drawn.
Slowly, the lumbering cadaver made its way past the old lab tables, past the destroyed remains of others’ innovations, and towards the solidified glass.
“Operation: Inquisition, complete.” it remarked in its cold voice. “Last remaining toxin rendered inactive. All threats to Prime Program 01 destroyed. All advancements within A.C.E.S. parameters.”
It drew its pistol and shot the beaker. The glass shattered into a puff of powder and the two wolves leapt up and lit into the cyborg with tremendous fury. Laser-fire drilled into the eyes, the body, the limbs, eating away at it until it crumpled to the floor a red mass of metal.
A red mass with a timer.
“Self-destruct sequence, engaged.”
Lita and Smith bolted from the room, stumbling over the chairs and storming back through the hall. Without a second to lose, they leapt for the stairwell beside the elevator and leaping three steps at a time until they were back on the main floor, out the door, and screaming away in Lita’s Red Devil when the massive explosion rocked half-the-block.
Between gear shifts, Lita put her hand on the Professor’s knee.
“I’m...sorry, Doc.” she sighed. “Don’t know how else to put it.”
The white wolf nodded solemnly, and took her hand in his. “It’s alright m’dear. Just a shame that’s what it all boiled down to: ‘Prime Program 01.’ My left boot!”
“What’s that?” the hippie-punk asked innocently.
“Weren’t a regular attendee of school?” he quizzed playfully.
Lita threw her half-gloved hands up in joking defeat. “Guilty as charged.”
“First thing they teach us when studying the sciences.” the white-furred dandy continued. “Prime Program 01, all advancements flow through the A.C.E.S. We’re free to toy with our little inventions and playthings, but any real advancement must be bottlenecked and strained through the impenetrable mind of our dear electric mum.” The Professor massaged his forehead, dulling a growing headache, before another thought struck him. “There is some good to come out of this however. Take me to my apartment, first.”
Lita cocked an eyebrow, but obliged. It was a decent drive up to the northern districts, the 500s, and she chose to stay outside while he went into his loft apartment. She looked up through the window to see the tall white wolf clinging tight to his white wolven woman, dressed in nothing but her nightgown. Madly he kissed her and held her, and feverishly he leapt back into the apartment. He came back down, out the front door, and hopped back in the passenger seat.
“Just wanted to make sure she was all alright,” he said. “Now we can make some headway on one other thing.”
“What’s that?”
“A.C.E.S. and her meat puppet ended that ‘Operation: Inquisition’ cobblers a touch prematurely. I’ve got some postcards I’d like to write.”
Lita’s eyes went wide at the thought. “You remember that formula?”
“Not all but the lion’s share. Enough to give another scientist a fighting chance. That and all the ideas A.C.E.S. saw fit to snuff out. Anything that threatens her hegemony over production. We might have something to send back to the old bean back east after all. Onward, lass!”
Lita gave a wink and opened the Red Devil up wide. “Good to know there’s something good to come out of all this.”
“Better yet.” Smith remarked coldly, thumbing the trigger guard of his revolver. “I think once our Society knows the truth, you’ll have the whole civilian scientific community on-side for the Creed. This is an existential threat to the freedom of information. And you’re my meanest bulwark.”
The hippie-punk snorted. “I think you’re cute too, Doc. I think you’re cute too.”
