“[Target located at my location. (Haargh)]”
I received that message from Zero on my EX-MU-DE, which was connecting me to all the Skulls Paladins that were under my command. Upon receiving that message, I quickly inspected Zero’s body camera from my control computer. And there he was… our target, Alan Leigh, being watched from a couple dozen meters away by Zero. My screen reflected a monster drinking a cup of coffee at a table outside a store.
“Delete him,” I said, with contained anger.
“[Negative. (Ragh)]”
“Skull Paladin Zero, you must eliminate the target.” I reminded him the mission parameters.
“[There are too many civilians in the vicinity. (Haargh) My presence will be revealed to all. Requesting reinforcements, Centurion Sullivan. (Gaaargh)]” Despite receiving my orders, Zero refused to act. It made sense. We couldn’t reveal the existence of the Skulls Paladins to the world just yet.
“What's wrong, Sullivan?” Seeing my unusually, motionless state, Blake spoke to me as he stood up from his seat, which was located a few feet away from me, and approached my desk.
It was the first time in so long that I had processed this kind of fear in my mind. A misty black smoke quickly hid my eyes as it took the form of a dark blindfold, having just enough transparency to hide my eyes, but not take away my vision.
While I was doing the usual intelligence operations in the Control Room, a brief message opened the scars of a hellish past that would never be erased.
“He found him… The bastard was discovered by Zero, but his death has not yet been confirmed.” My voice trembled as I uttered those words.
One of my men had found the man I had been searching for, for decades until today.
“What…? What do you mean his death hasn’t been confirmed yet?” Blake replied hesitantly. His confusion was understandable. After all, the mission was to find and execute the target.
“The report I received only mentions his location, but does not confirm his elimination. Zero cannot execute him; he is surrounded by civilians who can identify him. Causing a commotion of that level will be dangerous for us in the future.”
It seems that Zero is not going to act until I pull the trigger myself.
“… In that case, let’s track his movements until we find a chance to kill him without leaving any evidence,” Blake said after thinking for some seconds. His idea was logical. If the chances of failure were too high, we would just have to wait as long as necessary until we find the scenario that could completely nullify them.
However, our circumstances forced us to act even if the danger variables overwhelmed us.
“No. We have wasted too much time looking for even a trace of his presence. You don't know him, but that bastard could very well be bringing us closer to our graves with every second he breathes. Gather our men, we're leaving now.”
Without saying anything else, I stood up and left the Control Room to head to the military personnel transport vehicle. Once inside the vehicle, my mind calmed down enough for my black smoke blindfold to dissipate.
“What is our destination?” As we moved forward in the vehicle, Blake requested a report on our next movements.
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“We are heading to where Zero is located; apparently it’s a shopping mall. We will deploy the rest of the Skulls Paladins on the location, in a search and destroy operation of the target, but we’ll adopt a special reconnaissance strategy. You will secure the extraction point and I will take care of the intelligence by monitoring the mall's surveillance cameras.”
To hide our presence, we parked the vehicle at a gas station near the mall, rather than in the mall's parking lot. The Skulls Paladins in my squad hid their tactical uniforms with casual clothing, camouflaged their skull faces with fake faces, and mingled with the people entering the mall to begin the ground search operation.
After a few minutes, Blake and I got out of the vehicle. Blake headed to a nearby fast food store, located in the same gas station, to secure our vehicle, and I headed to the mall to take control of the surveillance cameras through a hidden cyber-attack.
“Skulls Paladins, report,” I said, seeking to know the progress of the mission.
“[Still nothing. (Hargh)]”
“[No results. (Gargh)]”
“[Nothing. (Argh)]”
“[No trace of the target. (Hargh!)]”
At my request, the response from each Skull Paladin under my command came with a whisper of pain accompanying each word they spoke. It had been almost 15 minutes since the start of our operation and the reports I requested every 5 minutes only repeated. During all this time, we had found no trace of the target or Zero.
“…!?” My concentration, which had been completely absorbed by the search tasks I had been doing until now, was suddenly annihilated by an abnormal signal I received on my EX-MU-DE.
“What does this mean…?” Stunned by a sudden state of shock, my throat spat out a vacuous cacophony, dead words that futilely tried to make sense of the unreal thought that generated them. “The Extinction Protocol was activated?”
The Extinction Protocol had been activated to test Zero… and was accepted by him.
My brain became a mess of disgusting mass as my agitated thoughts moved it from one side to the other in an uncontrolled manner.
The Extinction Protocol is activated by the Centurion, which is me, to test the loyalty or functioning of a Skull Paladin. The Skull Paladin requests a reason for the Extinction Protocol to be rejected or accepted. Once it receives it, his Internal System evaluates that reason and verifies the actions of the Skull Paladin. If his actions validate the received reason, his Internal System accepts and starts the Extinction Protocol. Otherwise, it rejects it.
But I have not sent the order to activate the Extinction Protocol. This is something so impossible, that it shouldn't happen even by mistake.
“…!”
My psychic chaos was abruptly interrupted when I received a new signal on my EX-MU-DE. It was then when I realized that I had been stunned for over 2 minutes by the activation of the Extinction Protocol. And now, an hour had passed since I received the last message from Zero, along with his location. That meant that the new locations of the Skulls Paladins had been updated. But again, an anomaly had occurred.
A smile of denial appeared on my face.
No… this is absurd. The Extinction Protocol was activated and accepted more than 2 minutes ago, so Zero was eliminated at least 1 minute ago. Receiving his location at this moment makes no sense.
“… Squad, gather at the extraction point and prepare your weapons.”
Once I got Zero's new location, I had my men gather at the gas station after taking a couple of minutes to plan my next moves.
“[What's going on?]” As I headed to our extraction point, Blake requested a situation report.
“It’s been an hour already, so the Skulls Paladins’ location has been updated. Zero was looking to get us away from the Control Room or send us somewhere else. We’re now heading to a nearby hospital. It’s Zero’s new location. It’ll take us 5 minutes to get there. We’re going to completely raze that hospital. When we meet, I’ll let you know the details.”
It seems that destiny has become a miscellaneous codex of impossible events and uncontrollable processes.
I just resigned myself to accepting the new reality.
None of this makes sense.
That brief thought, which had been repeating itself for the past few minutes in my mind, came to the fore once again as my teeth were nearly shattered by the tension in my jaw, which was caused by frustration. I tried to convince myself that the reality I was living was just an illusion. It was impossible for the Extinction Protocol to be activated without my order, but even more impossible was that, despite accepting it, Zero seemed to still be alive. But, despite all that, I considered a possible answer.