Unexpected {Ejen Ali Fanfic}

Mission: Numeros

The next few hours of the following day had passed so fast, Ali was surprised to find himself with his friends already entering a helicopter in the round copter park which would bring them to Numeros' hideout. 

He was half-way up the stairs when someone called him.

"Ali."

Ali turned around to see that Agent Zain was standing at the foot of the steps, waiting for him. Ali hastened to rush down, nearly tripping as he did so, but luckily caught himself on time. 

"Agent Zain," Ali said, putting his hands by his back. 

"I nearly forgotten," Zain said, reaching out a hand to him, but with his palm facing upwards so he couldn't see what he was holding. "This is for you."

Curious, Ali reached out his hand too. Zain had dropped something thin and light onto his palm, but it couldn't be-

Ali could have sworn he might have exploded with happiness if it weren't for Agent Zain standing in front of him. Perhaps some of it showed on his face, because Agent Zain smiled and had said proudly, "IRIS 2.0."

Ali looked excitedly into the Neuro Chief Pillars face, trying with all his might not to shake with emotion. "Thanks so much, Agent Zain!" 

"You're welcome," he beamed. "Now get into the copter. We'll be taking off soon."

As Ali skipped up the steps in thirds, holding the new gadget as tightly as possible in his hand without shaking and launched himself into a seat next to Iman, he rather thought...today might not be that bad after all.

"What's that you go there?" Jet asked, looking curiously at IRIS 2.0 which was still clenched in his grip. Rudy and Iman had even looked around at Ali. Ali tried with all his best to make his next words as humblest as possible.

"It's IRIS 2.0. Agent Zain had just gave it to me just now," he said with an attempt at calmness, at the same time trying his best to repress a sudden urge to jump. 

"Congrats, Ali," Iman said, smiling.

"Yeah right. 2.0. It looks the darn same," Rudy said haughtily, who was secretly stealing glances of the blue and black metal object in his hands. 

"Well, even if it does look the same," Ali started heatedly. "I'm pretty sure the inside things will be different. It's 2.0."

At that moment, the helicopter shook and they could hear the loud noise issuing from the engine over the swishing of the large blades. But they paid no attention whatsoever to these loud sounds. All of them only had eyes for Ali. 

Without further ado, Ali had pressed on the very middle of blue part of the thin metal object. White circles and lines appeared it, and next second, a blue ray of light had scanned his face and two red beams of light his eyes. After that, two thin rays of white light made the outline of the glasses and with a short flash that made him close his eyes, a new pair of IRIS had appeared on his face.

Ali opened his eyes slowly. 'Synchronizing' spelled an orange word across his vision. After a few moments, the words disappeared and IRIS 2.0 was finally active.

"It looks nice on you," Jet remarked, nodding.

"Still looks the same, in my opinion," Rudy puffed, crossing his arms and not looking at Ali.

"At least you're armed better now," Iman said analytically, who was still beaming.

For the rest of the journey, Ali, Iman and Jet discussed about the possibilities of the upgraded version of the new IRIS. They had suggested that they might have removed the file in which Uno has implanted into the previous IRIS so that the overpowering Override Mode was no more. Iman and Jet agreed that if they did this, it was the right thing to do. Especially Iman, who of course could not forget the moment when she was knocked out straight by the original IRIS three years ago. Though she had shown improvement by not being knocked out in all her previous encounters with IRIS. 

It was nearly half an hour when they arrived at the forest. The Chief Pillar's and Ali's helicopter were to find a clearing to land in while the third helicopter circled the area, though invisibly, in case something happened they could attack from above.

Meanwhile, the other two helicopters were forced to land a few distance away from each other, since each clearing wasn't that large to fit two helicopters at once. The two teams gathered behind a rather large wild-looking clump of bushes a few metres away from the entrance of their target. 

"Is everyone ready?" Agent Zain asked in an undertone.

"Ready," they all chanted back in a whisper. 

"Remember the plan," Agent Ganz said. "No one should do anything else unless if-"

"Ganz, enough," Dayang said exasperatedly. 

"Coast is clear, let's move," Rizwan reported, retracting himself from the top of the bushes from which he had been overlooking from.

The first team to enter was the Chief Pillar and Rizwan. Ali's team were to wait for the signal that it was safe to enter. They had waited for about five minutes when one of Dayang's red round bots flew out of the entrance. 

"OK, it's our turn, let's go," Rudy commanded.

Ali, Rudy, Iman and Jet hurriedly rushed into the shelter of the pointed cave's entrance, which resembled something more like a mouth of a fanged monster. Red glowing light lit their path so they didn't have to use anything to help with their vision. Dayang's bot led them down a slimy, steep stairs carved out of the floor of the very cave itself. Jet flew down instead with his jet pack to avoid slipping. 

When they had reached the bottom of the stairs, they found a stone passageway ahead of them, from which the red light seem to be coming from. Dayang's bot went in first. Ali looked uncertainly at the others, who nodded their reassurance back and walked with more stealth than ever through the passageway. Because who knows? All members of Uno's team might as well be waiting for them at the end of the hallway.

But when they emerged on a large metal platform, it was to find that the Chief Pillars and Rizwan not fighting at all. Dayang was busy with a keypad that was connected to two red large screens. The other three looked around when Ali and his team entered.

"Ah, you're here," Zain said, smiling.

"Er...where are bad guys?" Ali asked, startled by their absence. Not one of them was even in sight. "This is their hideout, right?"

"They might have already evacuated this place," Rudy suggested, though he looked very certain with his opinion.

"Zain, Ganz, Rizwan," Dayang called, not tearing her eyes away from the two large red screens. "Come look at this."

The two Chief Pillars and Rizwan walked over to where she stood. But then-

BZZT.

Four sheets of glass had appeared on each side of them. Before any of them could react, they were already trapped inside what seemed to be a glass box. 

"It's a trap!" Ganz bellowed, his voice a little muffled. He threw his entire muscled body on the glass box, but nothing so much of a scratch appeared. Zain took out his pair of guns and shot the glass too, but unfortunately, nothing happened.

"Right you are, MATA agents," said a digitalised, playful, almost mocking voice.

Out from the shadows of a dark hallway, walked out Viktor, Seis and Siete.