Neighbourhood Watch Ch. 02

"There you go," He said. "Screamager-lite, diet Screamager, Screamager Zero, whatever you want to call it." Ash studied it for a second.

"You're sure this is harmless now?"

"Well, relatively." Mark replied. "It's as safe as it's ever going to get."

"Perfect." She said, and then looked at Mark as Steph began to make her way out of the garage. "Well done."

"Aw, don't mention it." He replied as he began to remove himself from the hazmat suit. "It's all for a greater good, right?" Ash nodded and then turned to follow Steph.

"You know, I would never have pegged you as a They Might Be Giants fan." She said as she left.

"Hey, you know me," Mark's reply was coy. "I'm full of surprises."

****

Hamilton stared at the two vials in his hands. He passed it before his eyes several times, allowing the light suspended from the ceiling to pour through the liquid, giving it a strange amber colour.

"So, these are the concentrated sample?" He asked. Ash nodded on behalf of the five individuals gathered in the small study.

"Yes, just as you asked." She looked over at Mark.

"Fantastic," Hamilton's voice was filled with awe. "Truly inspiring. So, to weaponize it...?"

"You just need to add water," Mark said. "Just like concentrated orange squash."

"Wonderful," Hamilton said, his gaze never breaking from the vial of liquid in his fingers. "What happens if I used it neat?"

"Well, it would work about seventy times faster," Mark answered. "Lethality would be achieved in under sixty seconds. Why?" Hamilton ignored him as a door at the back of the study opened and a non-descript individual entered dressed in a suit. Hamilton handed him the sample.

"Please take this down to the vault Mr Jones," Hamilton instructed the man. He duly nodded and carefully carried the vial out of the room. "So, I read about the incursion at the laboratory -- and it appears that you kept casualties to a minimum."

"Any more than were necessary would have brought more...intense scrutiny." Steph answered. "Besides, the authorities will have already dispatched agents to begin their investigation..."

"Precisely!" Hamilton exclaimed, suddenly standing up from his chair and pulling a green cover off a cupboard. Underneath it was a television monitor and a remote control that their host picked up. He aimed it at the screen and pressed a button. "You'd never believe what I found snooping around the grounds this morning!" The screen flickered into life and there were several sharp intakes of breath.

The image was stark. Shackled to a chair was a figure dressed in black. The room was illuminated by harsh electrical strip lighting -- but several of the occupants of the study recognised the figure tied to that chair.

Agent Rapid.

"So, you can imagine my surprise when my security team located Agent Rapid lurking around the property." Hamilton said. "However, this gives me a perfect chance to test out my new toy, after all, competent staff are so hard to find these days and I'd hate to waste one of them to check the validity of your gift."

Everyone saw the assistant called Jones enter the room, this time dressed in protective clothing, not unlike the same sort of outfit that Mark had been wearing less than twelve hours ago. He was carrying a small piston driven chemical dropper in his one hand and a small sheet of glass in the other.

The six people in the study held their collective breath as they watched Jones place a droplet of the primary Screamager chemical on the glass slide. Less than thirty seconds later they began to see the effects of it on the captive secret agent. He strained at the restraints on his wrists and ankles, thrashing his head around as his eyes became bloodshot. Rapid's movements became more pronounced as the gag around his mouth became stained with a sticky red-brown substance. He was arching his back now, almost throwing himself out of the chair as his body tried to resist the effects of the virus -- but it was a losing cause. Another minute and his physical protestations began to weaken, and a minute later he was still.

Jones placed a device against Rapid's neck, looked at it, then gave a thumbs up signal to the camera before covering the body in a fluid from a container in the corner of the room. The image shut off before anyone could see what happened after this.

"Perfect!" Hamilton said. "And to think that I doubted you all -- I was so sure you were going to swap out the virus for some sort of poor substitute."

****

No one spoke as they left the house. Once outside though, Ash grabbed Mark's arm and pushed viciously, forcing him up against the wall. In the blink of an eye she had a blade at his throat.

"I said you had to destroy it," her intensity almost led to her spitting in his face. "I trusted you..." He could feel the blade moving slightly.

"I said it was as harmless as it was going to get," he said through gritted teeth. "Now, before you do something really stupid," Mark said. "Look down." Then Ash felt it -- a short-barrelled pistol buried in her stomach. "Even if you slit my throat, the neurons in my brain will fire with enough time to tell my finger to pull the trigger." She paused for a second with everyone else looking on.

"Something else for you to consider," he added. "Have you ever bought a used car?" Mark asked Ash. She nodded, not seeing where he was going. Part of her just wanted to tear open his jugular, but part of her hadn't seen Mark as that kind of betrayer. "Then you understand the concept of a test drive?" Ash nodded again. He could feel the pressure of the blade against his throat easing slightly. "I knew Hamilton would try something like that -- so I altered the structure of Screamager -- the minute he weaponizes it, the virus dies. The hydrogen in the water neutralises the second stage completely. It's useless to him except in its pure form -- and then the first stage is only lethal for about twelve seconds in the open air if you inhale the fumes. He's only got enough to spread on a couple of digestive biscuits right now."

"You changed its chemical structure?" Ian asked. Mark tried to nod -- which he was able to do as Ash removed the blade. It suddenly disappeared and she stepped back and allowed him to move away from the wall.

"Yeah -- I figured it was the only way we could get Hamilton to trust us." Mark said, brushing the twigs from his clothes. "If I had told any of you there was still a risk he might have picked up on something when we were all together." He paused, then looked at each of the others in turn. "I'm sorry -- we couldn't risk him knowing what we had done."

"Kudos to you," Abbie said. "But you know what you've done, don't you? You killed Agent Rapid -- something several of us have tried to do before and failed abysmally every time. Talk about popping your cherry."

"Talk about getting your hands dirty," Steph mused. "Okay well, I need a drink. Anyone care to join me?" Ash looked at Mark.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I thought..."

"It's okay," He said. "You didn't think I was going to risk pissing you off as well did you? I've got enough potential enemies in this village already without adding to the list."

Ash smiled tentatively. "That's good thinking. I think under the circumstances that I'm buying. And while we're drinking a toast to our celebrated biochemist here I'll tell you a story about secret passages."