Chapter 610

"This operation needs to stay quiet. Don’t turn it into a spectacle."

Having established the tone for the mission, Evenson gave Moira one final instruction.

"As for the mind controller, no matter how the police question you, your answer consists of exactly three phrases."

He held up three fingers.

"Don’t know. Never saw them. Don’t speculate."

"Understood."

Moira immediately grasped his meaning.

If the existence of a genuine mind controller was confirmed, the Black Badge Division was to eliminate the threat quietly, then deny afterward that such a person had ever existed.

"But Black Badge still has to report its activities to the U.S. government."

Evenson gave a cold smile.

"Exactly. Afterward, you can provide senior officials with a detailed report on the dangers posed by people with this kind of ability. At the same time, leak the information to the public through indirect channels. People need to know that mind controllers really exist."

Moira paused for a moment before nodding.

"Understood."

It sounded contradictory on the surface, but it wasn’t.

Black Badge needed to keep its own involvement hidden while allowing the information itself to spread.

The distinction mattered.

Humanity had always been remarkably intolerant of anything it considered different.

People could turn on one another over skin color. Parents could recoil from children born with severe deformities, sometimes even abandoning them. Now that supernatural abilities were becoming part of everyday reality, there was little reason to think people would automatically accept those who possessed them.

After the Battle of New York, the public had become considerably more accustomed to the existence of superhumans.

They could accept a veteran hero whose physical abilities surpassed those of ordinary men.

They could even accept a god descending from the sky with lightning in his hands.

But a person capable of taking control of someone else’s mind?

That was different.

Mind control didn’t merely threaten someone’s body. It threatened the existence of the self.

A body without free will was little more than a puppet.

And throughout human history, the soul and the mind had often been treated as nearly synonymous. Religious traditions had spent thousands of years teaching that the soul was sacred and inviolable.

Anyone who claimed the ability to reach inside another person’s soul would be viewed as something beyond monstrous.

If the existence of a genuine mind controller became public knowledge, panic would be inevitable.

Given the choice, most people would probably demand that such a person be eliminated before they could ever become a threat.

Nobody wanted to wake up one morning and discover that their body belonged to someone else.

You might tolerate your neighbor using a ridiculously powerful computer to play video games.

You’d feel differently if they installed malware and turned your machine into a remote-controlled zombie.

And once people panicked, their ability to distinguish truth from nonsense would collapse almost instantly.

Fear of mind controllers would spread into fear of everyone with unusual abilities.

Fear would become distrust.

Distrust would become resistance.

Resistance would become legislation.

And, eventually, confrontation.

From Evenson’s perspective, that chain reaction was extremely useful.

Once tensions became severe enough, governments would be forced to act.

There would be laws and policies, of course.

But laws were meaningless without the power to enforce them.

That was where the Black Badge Division and Umbrella would suddenly become very important.

Nor was this problem limited to one nation or one ethnic group. Fear of the unknown was universal.

Wherever that fear spread, Umbrella could follow.

The Eredar Twins exchanged an amused glance.

"Looks like we’d better tell Genos to speed things up," Oletheis said with a quiet laugh. Naturally, they could see exactly where Evenson was going with this.

"Wouldn’t want demand to exceed our supply."

"Not yet."

Evenson nodded.

"Fear needs time to ferment. It’ll take a while before it spreads far enough to create the environment we want."

He looked toward Moira.

"You’re leading the operation personally?"

"Yes."

Moira nodded.

"Normally, I wouldn’t bother getting involved personally. It’s not really my style. But this target is unusual enough that I want to see it for myself."

"Since you’ve decided to go personally..."

Evenson looked her over.

"Does that mean your self-modification is finished?"

Moira didn’t answer.

Instead, she quietly rolled up her sleeve.

She wasn’t preparing for a fight.

Evenson looked at her arm.

There it was.

The Centipede device they’d discovered some time ago.

Only now, it had been installed directly into her body.

"You’ve already finished reverse-engineering it?"

"The underlying principle is extremely simple."

Moira smiled with restrained pride.

"It’s essentially an intravenous blood-filtration system. The mechanics weren’t difficult to understand."

"The original model used Chitauri metal, but the company had a considerable supply in storage. Genos also examined the material and gave us several excellent suggestions concerning the smelting process and alloy proportions."

She tapped the device lightly.

"This version is actually better than the original."

"And the serum inside it..."

Moira gave a dismissive little snort.

"I’ve spent more than a decade researching this field. Even a mediocre formula developed by me would still be considerably better than whatever those amateurs were mixing together."

"I’ll give you that."

Evenson curled his lip.

"That stuff they were using was basically a chemical junk drawer. They threw anything they could find into the mixture."

He remembered the last person he’d seen carrying a Centipede system.

"That poor bastard was practically a walking bomb. More unstable than an Extremis subject."

Evenson leaned back in his chair and looked at Moira with growing interest.

"But you..."

He studied her for several seconds.

"You’re sitting right in front of me, and I don’t sense any indication that you’re about to explode."

"Naturally."

Moira’s confidence was unmistakable.

"The technology used to prevent Extremis from overheating was originally developed by me. Now we also have the company’s proprietary stabilizer."

She smiled.

"If I still couldn’t control the reaction after all that, I’d deserve to die in the explosion."

"One thing, though."

Evenson tilted his head.

"That thing seems rather long."

He followed the device up Moira’s arm.

He remembered Michael’s original Centipede implant. It had only extended along the forearm.

This one clearly reached past her elbow.

Yet he still couldn’t see where it ended.

Evenson tilted his head farther.

Then farther.

He leaned to one side, trying to see beneath her sleeve.

And discovered that Moira had remarkably pale skin.

Huh.

A hand suddenly smacked the side of his head.

"Ow!"

Oletheis had casually knocked him upright again.

She hadn’t even needed to check what he was looking at. She knew exactly where his thoughts had wandered.

Salorass clicked her tongue.

"Stop staring. The device isn’t limited to her arms anymore."

Evenson blinked.

"What?"

"All four limbs have been modified."

Salorass gestured toward Moira.

"And her entire spinal column."

Evenson’s eyes widened.

"All of it?"

No wonder people said a scientist without restraints was more dangerous than a madman.

Most people would hesitate before implanting a device a few inches long into their bodies.

Moira had decided that if one worked, then several meters’ worth ought to work even better.

"So you’re pretty damn tough now, aren’t you?"

"Based purely on the numbers?"

Moira gave him a confident smile.

"I’m already far beyond Captain America."

There was a trace of caution in the statement.

Purely in terms of measurable physical parameters, with all the usual heroic nonsense stripped away, she was confident her current capabilities surpassed Steve Rogers by a considerable margin.

But that didn’t necessarily mean she’d win an actual fight.

Who knew?

Maybe Captain America would suddenly be possessed by the spirits of every U.S. president in history and evolve into some kind of Presidential Super-Soldier.

Reality in this world had a habit of getting creative.

"And once the energy inside my body reached a certain threshold, I awakened several additional abilities."

Moira raised one hand.

Energy gathered in her palm.

A bright orange sphere roughly the size of a washbasin condensed above it, its surface rippling with contained power.

"I’m still working out the best ways to use this energy."

"Excellent."

Evenson sounded genuinely impressed.

"Looks like you’re the strongest person in Black Badge now."

The old saying about scientists who could also fight had apparently survived for a reason.

McKenna nodded from the side.

"Absolutely, boss. I can guarantee that picking a fight with her would be a terrible decision."

Moira gave McKenna a small smile.

"Perhaps."

Then she added pleasantly,

"It would certainly be the most beautiful mistake you’ve ever made."

"Good."

Evenson nodded.

"If you can gain some real combat experience on this mission, your growth might exceed our expectations."

His expression became more serious.

"Still, be careful. This target is unusual."

Oletheis also stepped in with a warning.

"You were trained by us, after all."

Salorass’s eyes gleamed dangerously.

"So..."

Her voice went cold.

"If something embarrassing happens, don’t bother coming back."

Moira and McKenna both fell silent.

The meaning was obvious.

After spending so much time under the tutelage of two high-ranking Eredar Warlocks, being defeated by some random human mind controller would be humiliating beyond words.

Coming back alive might not save them from the Twins’ wrath.

Moira and McKenna bowed together.

"Understood."

They turned toward the door.

Just as Moira reached it, she stopped.

She turned back.

"Three ladies, there’s another person I’d like to recommend to the company."

Evenson exchanged a glance with the Twins.

"Someone talented?"

"Yes."

Moira nodded.

"She’s a former classmate of mine. More precisely, she was one year below me."

Her expression brightened slightly.

"She’s exceptionally skilled in artificial biological tissue engineering."

Evenson rubbed his chin.

That was almost suspiciously well suited to Umbrella.

"Who is she?"

Moira answered without hesitation.

"Helen Cho. She’s Korean."

"Cho?"

Evenson’s mouth twitched.

He instinctively rearranged the name in his head.

Helen Cho.

He’d heard that name somewhere before.

Then, after a moment, his expression turned into a faint sneer.

"South Korea, huh?"

He looked at Moira.

"Don’t Koreans always go on about sinh-to-bul-i? Would someone like that really come work for an American company?"

He shrugged.

"Shouldn’t she stay home and contribute to their glorious little space empire?"

"That whole ’body and land are one’ thing?"

Moira gave a derisive laugh.

"It’s just something people say."

Her smile was cold.

"If they can’t even maintain control over their own territory while foreign troops are stationed there, what’s the point of talking about national purity and loyalty?"

She shook her head.

"That’s just comedy."

...