Free Hazardous Materials by Matthew Quinn Martin Page A

wrong second . . . there you have it. All that work for nothing. The Polybius was different. At least, it was supposed to be.”
    â€œWhat were you trying to do?”
    â€œThis was before my time, Jarrod. I would have been in my early teens when the project went into its final phase of testing. I could have been one of those kids in that arcade, as a matter of fact. I grew up just on the other side of the river, in Alphabet City.”
    As they approached the center of the site, the cacophony of construction grew loud. Firefly rain fell in sheets from welders on the tall steel frame’s upper tiers. Agent Ross continued, “For remote sleeper operatives to be effective, we needed something that would have their eyes literally glued to the screen. Glued as if their lives depended on it. That’s where the games came in. The first Polybius units were deployed in Portland for the early phases of testing and intelligence gathering. For those units, the operating software was truncated, some of the more advanced functions omitted. Only a few fully functional models were produced.”
    â€œAnd I found one of them,” Jarrod said, shaking his head. “All that time pushing the game’s buttons—”
    â€œIt was pushing yours.”
    â€œWhat was the point? Turn me into some kind of assassin?”
    â€œAlmost,” Ross admitted. “But as you are aware, there were . . . glitches.”
    Jarrod’s mouth grew dry. Glitches. That’s all this was to them. That’s all he was to them, just a glitch that needed eliminating. “And who was I supposed to assassinate? A room full of kids?”
    â€œAs I said, there were glitches. The project was scrapped for a reason.”
    Jarrod scanned the construction yard’s perimeter. It was hemmed by a twelve-foot razor-wire-topped cyclone fence. Even if he could outrun the two linebackers-in-black who hung a few paces back, he wasn’t going to get far.
    Agent Ross cleared his throat. “The entire project was pulled offline and mothballed in ’83. All the Polybius units then in circulation were decommissioned and destroyed. My predecessor believed he’d retrieved all of them. The one you found seems to have gotten loose due to a clerical error or maybe a practical joke.”
    Of course it’s a joke , Jarrod thought as they walked past a bank of heavy-duty earthmovers, one of them methodically scraping a deep hole next to the building’s bare steel skeleton. He could hear the growing rotary clank of an industrial cement mixer. “What is this place?”
    â€œYou know, I’m not quite sure. Some kind of warehousing complex, I believe. Division subsidiaries got the construction contract, no bid, of course. Used to be a ballpark. You have my apologies, Jarrod, for what they’re worth. If we’d had the same intelligence back then, this would have been taken care of before you were born. Unfortunately, we were left with loose ends.” They stepped to the rim of the hole. Jarrod saw the cement mixer, still revolving, across the gulf. “And now it’s time to tie those loose ends up.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    He felt Agent Diamond’s massive hand clamp down on his shoulder as something cold and round dug into his side. “You know what he means. Any last requests?”
    At the bottom of the pit, amid a grid of steel reinforcing rods, lay the mangled remains of the Polybius console, soon to be his companion for eternity. He took a deep breath. “Got a cigarette?”
    â€œSorry. Don’t smoke,” Diamond said. “Hazardous to your health.”
    â€œThat’s funny,” Jarrod said, without smiling. “You make that up yourself?”
    â€œYeah. On the way over. After I read your file. No such thing as an ex-smoker.”
    â€œCan I ask you a question?”
    Ross shrugged, as if to say Why not?
    â€œThe demons—the