Project A.N.E.W

Initiate Reprint

A man and a woman wearing white biohazard suits enter the briefing chamber, bringing with them a steel levitation cart. They pick up the limp corpse, and place it on the hovering vehicle; silently transferring it from the room.

In another chamber, equally white, they push the body into a small, plastic compartment built into the wall between two rooms. Once sealed, they inject a bacteria which has been carefully engineered to break human bodies down into the basic components needed to print cells.

When the body is completely rendered into liquids, the box automatically sanitizes itself through the deprivation of oxygen, and—its light flashing green—drains the contents into the next room through a series of tubes. It is there they are fed into a large, 3D printer.

The machine whirs as it initiates, and begins to move.

A soft chime rings out on unseen speakers, as clear as if someone rang it in the room. Then a young woman's voice softly announces, 'Cleanup to room A3, please.'

The man sighs, looking over to his companion. 'Well, I guess that's us.'

The two scientists exit the room, stopping as they do in a decontamination chamber, which sprays chemicals onto their suits.

Silent plastic doors slide open, and they step out into a white hallway, tastefully decorated with plants.

Aiden is sitting in a chair, in a plain room. He feels drowsy, as if drugged.

'Hello, Mr... Witchowski,' says a portly man in a floral suit. He sits opposite him, and glances up from where he read the name, on the clipboard before him....

....Aiden's mind was reeling. They would threaten his wife, his children—such a thing is unthinkably cruel, and yet what choice did he have? What man, when threatened with the lives of his loved ones, is willing to trade them up for his own selfishness?

Then the thought comes to him, unbidden.

What if it is all a bluff? Organisations like this thrive on blackmail; he had no way of knowing what was out there, really—or even what planet he was on.

Bertrand watches him, silent. He is letting him puzzle out his thoughts.

After a while, Aiden asks 'How do I know that my wife and children are even alive, still?'

'Are you really willing to gamble on it, Mr. Witchowski?'

He breathes, slowly. 'No.' He isn't willing to risk it. He doesn't know what to believe anymore.

Bertrand smiles, boyishly. 'Exactly,' he says; leaning back in his chair with an expression of satisfaction that defies his simple answer.

Aiden sits silent for a while, defeated. When Bertrand merely keeps grinning at him, he bristles 'So? What clandestine task is so important you would steal a man from his own life?'

'Oh, that. Yes.' Bertrand sits straight again, reminded of his task at hand. He clears his throat, loudly.

'We need you to help us recover some files,' he says, cheerily.

Aiden is stunned. 'Files?'

'Yes,' agrees Bertrand. 'Files. Paper files, from an inter-planetary branch of your company. I was made to understand that you, Mr. Witchowski, are a specialist in this regard. Known to travel vast distances for your employers, for the sake of maintaining their... confidentiality.

'Hmm, look at this,' he exclaims, looking up from the document he had been perusing. 'It says here you were paid handsomely as a result, too—not many your age could afford to take your family on a trip to Mars, oh no.'