The Resistance

Chapter-3

The control room of this operation was actually the surveillance room of the BMX central. It was located in a corner of the underground parking lot. It is a small cabin usually occupied by low-tech monitors and an underpaid watchman who watched  football matches in a mini-TV while feasting on a pizza or taco. But not on that day.

That day, the watchman had been kicked aside and the room was filled with a dozen or so team specialists and commanders and high-tech equipment to track all soldiers floor wise.

Five high-tech laptops have been connected into in system to pick up the signal received from trackers placed secretly in the soldiers' suits and display their location. The people who knew about the trackers were the five team commanders who were each responsible for a particular floor. The other people who knew about were a couple of clever soldiers who helped in the plan and team specialists who observed the camera footage carefully for any signs of odd behaviour. And of course, the leader was present there, monitoring the work.

The tracker was a small circular red device which could be easily sneaked into the suit. The tracker emitted a particular frequency which was received by the laptop and displayed as a red dot on the screen's landscape of the floor. It was impossible for a soldier to find the tracker because it was placed in between the insulation fabric of their helmets.

Every suit's helmet had a built in speaker. Only the floor commanders, the ones in the building and the team commanders, the ones in the control room had access to a microphone. The commander's messages could only be transmitted to the soldiers of his floor, other floor commanders and the control room. The soldiers were not given a microphone because it could lead to great confusion if a crisis emerged as everyone would shout out their responses. And also one couldn't steal the microphone from the commander because it only responded to a particular voice pattern. In other words, it had a voice recognition system.

All these security measures were taken to suppress any rebellion immediately without any risk. Yet, somehow, something broke out in the third floor.

***

Sobriek'O Neil was a man of aggressive attitude. He was very violent and dangerous which made him an infamous soldier for illegal operations like this. However, this was an operation with no action at all except 'babysitting' the people whom they took as hostages. He was feeling very bored walking up and down the aisle in the third floor. But he was the commander of floor-3 so he had to take his work seriously.

Suddenly something happened. He saw a soldier holding a business man wearing an Armani suit by his collar. The man had a look of absolute terror on his face. The soldier punched him in the gut and pulled something out of the man's briefcase. A metallic pod. Interesting, he thought, finally some action.

He couldn't help but smile at the look of terror on the man's face. Like the other soldiers, he approached the scene. The rogue soldier's code name A-37 was scrawled on his breast pocket. He kept striking the man with blows demanding an explanation.

Sobriek demanded "What's going on? What are you doing?"

A-37 replied "Sir! I found this-" he said, pointing to the metallic pod in his fist, "-in his briefcase. You recognize this sir?"

"Of course I do. It's a polymer enforced trigger-detonative grenade. Latest tech. This is only given to floor commanders and field spies." Field spies were appointed and highly trusted men of the leader who directly reported to him. Only the leader knew who the spies were but it is easy to recognize them as they have some special tech on them.

"Yes sir! And what is it doing in his briefcase?! His hands were in it. Maybe, he was trying to detonate it."

The business man stammered "No! Believe me, I wasn't holding it. I...I didn't even know about it!"

A-37 shouted "Sir! I think I know what's going on. Some rebellion, in which either a commander or a field spy was included. This man must be a part of that. He must have been given the task of detonating the bomb for something. He arrived here before us and the bomb couldn't be sneaked through the security so I think it was given to him on the inside. As far as I can see he didn't leave the aisle during the attack. So I think it was given to him when he was inside."

The commander replied "Slow down soldier. You might be right but you are jumping to conclusions. It could have also been planted by someone to cause a distraction. If that's the case I'm afraid it's working." He glanced around uneasily.

"Sir! You may be right. So, we should have a look at the recorded footage. They may have missed something big. Tell them to zoom in on the bag. At least we will know if it was planted by someone or not."

"You are a pretty sharp soldier. I will give you that. But you are ordering me which bothers me a lot so shut your hole and let me do my work." saying so he started barking into his microphone.

The other soldiers circled around the business man. They were questioning him. But no one had noticed A-37 taking a step backwards.

***

The control room had not taken this situation lightly. The leader was giving them orders and considering scenarios, exactly like A-37. He had to review the footage from five minutes ago and zoom in on the bag. There were only two cameras which had a clear view on the bag, the ones in the aisle. But he couldn't rewind both cameras on the bag as it would temporarily block their current footage on the aisle in the third floor. Then again the angle was very important so they would need both cameras to solve this case faster.

Finally the leader decided to rewind only one camera. He continued surveying the aisle using the other camera.

Nothing seemed happened for quite a while, which was actually five minutes but they were staring so intently that time seemed to slow down. They saw someone entering the aisle. A leg blocked their view on the briefcase for a second. But he didn't have time to find out whose as that very moment, hell broke loose.

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