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An Eye for an Eye
"Jeong, get to your post! We haven't got all day!"
The order from Dr. No had not gone over Hunter's head. He made his way to a nearby control panel, looking around his shoulder every other moment to find an opportunity. His moment came when both the technicians, as well as the good doctor, had their backs turned.
While consulting a clipboard, Dr. No heard light footsteps behind him, quickly followed by two soft pops and successive thuds.
He turned around to find a modified Walther P99 aimed at his head.
The silenced pistol led to its hand, to the hand's arm, to the arm's body, an unmoving statue in its own murderous intentions. Behind the visor, he could make out two eyes: one blue, and one golden.
Yes...he had heard about that.
"So," he said without a hint of surprise. "Jonathan Hunter. What a treat."
The man standing before him pulled off the facial shield, revealing his features. The face was slightly tanner, more hard-cut and brutal than the last encounter.
"It's GoldenEye," he said. "I must say, I'm thrilled you could make the date."
The voice was solid, straight-edged, flat. This man was definitely on a mission. Dr. No smiled and dropped his clipboard.
"GoldenEye, is it? Refreshing to see that you've switched not only alliances, but names, as well. That inorganic machine in your eye socket must be worth quite a fortune. I'm afraid, with the distance, I must have missed it in Hong Kong."
"Too many things were missed that evening, weren't they? Including you."
"A terrible pity, no doubt. It was my understanding that gentlemen were to take greater care with their ammunition."
"Let's call it a professional discourtesy. I'm just here to make up for it."
Dr. No turned up a politely unamused corner of his mouth.
"How kind. However, the faux pas could have been avoided had you played your cards closer to your chest."
"Forgive me for carting about a mistaken impression of trust."
"Yet the question remains of how you could assume allegiance, after you had so determinedly turned against your own government; your government which had granted you imbursement, had allowed you benefit of the doubt for years in spite of your demeanor, had-"
"-had cut me loose without the slightest shade of sympathy."
"That was your doing directly and mine indirectly. Britain's intelligence service is hardly to blame."
Hunter squinted.
"Why do you want me to forgive MI6?"
"You needn't."
"Then who am I supposed to turn the other cheek for? You?"
"Don't look down on me, Jonathan. I don't seek your abdication. You merely need to reevaluate this mindset of yours that you cannot live with treachery, and that its occurrence, even on the most reasonable grounds, should be sufficient to tip you over the edge."
Hunter's jaw clenched.
"What is it you suggest should 'tip me over the edge?'"
"For the well adjusted criminal, it's threat of death; loss of power; a change in character. Yet you go about as though a rejection of confidence is the worst sin known to man and a fate worse than hell. You decry all betrayal, and then take part in it."
Hunter felt some sort of invisible wave hit him, and readjusted his stance.
"Britain played me," he uttered through gritted teeth. "They looked at me, hated me like the mutt they thought I was, and tossed me out. I had no choice."
Without changing expression, Dr. No somehow conveyed a disbelieving condescension.
"But of course you didn't. You could have applied for any civil servant job, or even for a spot at the pub down the corner; but you, of course, needed the challenge; needed the payback. Jonathan Hunter couldn't possibly dream of sitting still while he had been given the boot by Her Majesty. Heaven forbid you should have sought that greatest revenge of personal success; naturally, illegality and bloodlust were most appropriate benchmarks for your next course of action."
Hunter opened his mouth to speak, and instead had to take a breath. What was this man doing to him?
"My character has no place in a law-based society," he managed. "I have no cooperation, patience, or empathy for the world they'd have me live in."
"Haven't you, Mr. Hunter? Or have you allowed yourself to lose these things?"
What had he said earlier? Something about...
"A change in character; that is what I mentioned earlier, and what you were just attempting to recall."
What the hell? How had he done that? Some sort of near-psychic perception if the Universe would have it, or otherwise some advanced ability to analyze one's mind.
"So what is it about?" he asked.
"It's about who you are, and what you do. Tell me who you are; whether you are good or bad."
"I'd expect you to tell me that it's subjective."
"In a certain sense. The qualifiers for either trait don't count for nearly as much as a change from one to the other. Tread too far down a certain path, and you will forever leave the one you knew."
"Thank you, Doctor; your talk today has inspired me in the deepest sense to be myself and I never shall forget it. I'll send you a check in the post."
"An unsurprising display of arrogance. Deny your character all you want, Mr. Hunter, but reality will overshadow it in due time."
"The opportunities I've had have been out of my hands."
"Regardless, Mr. Hunter, you broke the ranks of your country. You were kicked from the cliff, but you severed the rope. You decided instead to join the underworld of London crime, and soon enough left it to enter the vicious vortex of international crime. Perhaps it's not those who play us, Mr. Hunter, who make it vicious. Perhaps it's ourselves. When the rule is, 'Always look out for Number One,' what can one be expected to do? Men kill men, and there's no one to blame but each other. That's what you're told, and you continue moving along in life, killing and killing again, until finally you realize you're the evil one. You've been the devil all along, playing your own advocate while others try to hunt you down. It hits you and hits you, until eventually it strikes with enough power to kill you.
And you're grateful."
No. No. That was it, damn it. No word, no letter, no sound that poured from this man's mouth carried with it the vaguest iota of truth. His fate was in his own hands, and any notion to the contrary was a lie. He had mixed the spirit evenly: one half life, one half retribution.
And what happened when retribution ran dry?
It never would. Its sweet nectar was endless, and would always prove as much.
Perhaps the cocktail had been disturbed...
No.
Perhaps the bubbles had stirred and made the drink rise higher and fuller and it was bound to fall out of the glass-
No.
But if-
"Take off your visor."
The order had left Hunter's lips almost before he had processed it. He did not know why he had said it, but he discovered soon enough.
Dr. No, hesitantly but with some innate calmness, unclasped the snaps at the suit's neck and pulled the head protector from the rest of the affair.
"Surely you know," he said with defensive threat, "that whatever effects I feel, you feel just as well. I shall be irradiated, and you are no different."
"I'm plenty different," Hunter retorted. "Iodine tablets are a beautiful thing. Now kick it over the edge."
Dr. No did so. The near-weightless plastic drifted down into the green water before appearing to disintegrate.
Keeping his pistol raised, Hunter detached the silencer.
A shiver ran over him, starting in his head and traveling down his spine and into his feet. A sensation of unbelievable reward overcame him, that he could not believe it was real. He swallowed down the disbelief, blinked his twice, and positioned himself into his perfect, final stance.
"Three years ago..." he said anxiously and with much nearly satisfied spite, "...in this very room, you shot me in the right eye. I nearly bled out; nearly died. You've wreaked havoc on my body, on my soul, and on my life. As the phrase suits you, I've come to return the favor."
Dr. No stared back, not a muscle or nerve twitching in his face.
"A matter," he asked, "of poetic justice?"
Hunter shook his head gently.
"No; a matter of revenge. An eye..."
He cocked the gun.
"...for an eye."
The shot was deafening. The bullet traveled from the chamber to the barrel, across the short distance of space, and into Dr. No's eye, shattering the eyeball and tearing the optic nerve into pulp. It penetrated his skull and continued, delving into the liquid membrane and finally embedding itself within the brain.
The gloved, artificial hand reached up as a reflex, though no impulse could save him from the round fired into his eye socket. In a moment's time, he fell backward, mouth agape, and landed headfirst on the metal.
Hunter looked down, examining the scene.
There, at his feet, with a hand over his right eye, lay the corpse of Dr. Julius No.
More tomorrow.
Chapter Forty-Nine:
Reaction Time
The nerves began to freeze into place as rigor mortis set in. The right hand would lay permanently on its matching eye, while the left would sit face-up next to its owner. One eye was closed now; the other...well, the other was a different situation.
As Hunter stood over the body, he kept his pistol drawn. He felt some strange sensation that the corpse would come back to life, but...it never did. The arms, the legs, the head; none were moving, and would stay in place forever, like some eternal chrysalis.
He could not believe it. He finally had to convince himself of it.
Dr. No was dead. The man that he had long hated with the worst of poison, driven his focus toward, conspired privately against for years, whom he had sought to no end, by whatever means necessary...this man was dead now, and by his own hand.
He had the briefest feeling that a life goal had suddenly disappeared. Sensory nerves temporarily ceased, then once again made themselves evident as Hunter reminded himself that there remained a task at hand. Giving the body one more look, he stepped back down the walkway and approached the central reactor unit.
Of a light orange color, the central reactor unit served as the main control console for the room's operations. It had two graphic gauges and four silver turn wheels, each for their own specific purpose. Below these lay an impressive array of buttons and switches, most of them metal. Acting on prior instruction, Hunter flicked two switches on the machine's bottom portion and spun the first wheel all the way to the right. He repeated the process, this time using the wheel next over, and twice again manipulated the controls with the remaining two wheels.
He waited a moment, observing his handiwork. At first, nothing seemed to happen, but after a few seconds, the green shade of the room began to intensify. It enveloped the stone and steel, growing darker and of a more focused hue. A high-pitched vibrating noise commenced to sound from within the central pool while the water itself rippled. Waves shortly followed, glowing clearer as a bright, yellow light emanated from the center, growing closer all the time.
There was no space to muck about. It was time to leave.
Hunter approached the thick, circular door in the wall. He rotated its spinning lock once, opened the door, and, taking one last look at the still-unmoving body of Dr. No, stepped through. He shut the door behind him as the water began to crest and bubble.
He had just sabotaged the cooling rods, an action which would trigger a total nuclear meltdown of the facility.
Just then, a deafening alarm bell rang out that gave his heart a jump. Evidently, his activities had not gone unnoticed by the base alert system. He picked up his pace, soon encountering concerned scientists and receptionists, fretting terribly amongst themselves. What on Earth had just happened? and just what the hell did they do now?
Let them find their own ways out.
Hunter made his way through the throngs easily enough, all the others either too focused on escaping or not concerned enough to notice the features that marked him as Island Enemy Number One. This being the case, he was perhaps the only cool-nerved individual in the facility.
He continued on, making his way back out of the main complex and retracing his steps through the many warehouses and work areas. He had heard a few explosions by this point, usually followed by screams. Uncontainable damage had clearly already been done, he noted, breathing through the acrid smoke that filled his nostrils.
After a while, he reached the loading docks. A great number of workers (mostly Chinese and Jamaicans) ran this way and that, some of them jumping into the sea to escape the inevitable destruction. He jogged to the end of the plank walkway and produced his submarine's remote device. He pressed the end button, but nothing stirred below the surface. He tried again, and again, to no success and no avail.
Surely the device could not have malfunctioned? The signal could not have been compromised in any way, could it have? Perhaps the sub had somehow bumped into a mine, but the odds of that were low. Whatever the case, he had to find a new option. He spun on his heel. There must be-
Hunter stopped in his tracks. There before him stood a familiar man, defying all reason and expectation.
Standing there, in the bright, Jamaican sunlight of Crab Key, was Oddjob. Wherever he might have been previously, he had just come across Hunter. There was slight surprise in his eyes, concealed by his always present determination. He was inevitably decked out in his standard manservant uniform, though the ornate, black clothing did not seem to break a sweat upon his Oriental features.
How had he gotten there? Why in the devil had he come? Thinking, he recalled an instance nearly two weeks ago, in Nevada. What had Goldfinger said?
Be careful, Jonathan. I think he's gotten a bit jealous of you. Perhaps he is under the impression that you are my new golden boy....
Could that have been it...?
No. There was simply no likelihood of that happening. Even if Oddjob had wanted to leave Goldfinger's side, there was no way he would have managed it, let alone make his way past the inner security circle.
Whatever was to be Hunter's next thought had a stopper put in it as Oddjob launched himself at him. The two-hundred-plus-pound Korean knocked him to the ground effortlessly, and commenced landing punch after punch on his face and upper torso. Hunter, still winded from the brutal first strike, gasped for breath as the ham-like fists pounded into him.
He tried desperately to score a hit, arms and legs flailing under the behemoth. He drove a knee upward into the tailbone. Oddjob flashed an undaunted smile, hammered into Hunter's ribs, and proceeded the pummeling. Hunter winced painfully and, after a brief moment, regained his breath. He threw a hard punch at the hipbone, but again to no avail. Hell, there must be some option! Ignoring the numbing sensation in the skin where the blows had registered - and which would undoubtedly turn to violet and black -, he considered. If offense made no difference, perhaps defense would prove viable.
He had to move quickly. He jerked his right knee up into the crotch, bringing an angry but controlled expression to Oddjob's face. Hunter slammed a fist across the steely jaw and arced his knee into his attacker's left flank. Oddjob made a pause, caught in the slightest daze. Hunter took a deep breath and pushed his hands against the concrete thighs, then slid roughly out from beneath the Oriental tank.
He tumbled away and skidded to a stop just inches from the walkway's edge. He stood and turned, and immediately his eyes locked wide open.
Oddjob had come to his feet, and was now reaching for the bowler hat on his head. He pulled it from the short black hair and held it in his hand almost affectionately. He squatted slightly, holding the woven weapon in his hand and looking for any opening.
Hunter tiptoed in a lions' circle opposite his opponent. Matched perfectly in sync, the men locked eyes and watched every move...until both stopped. A deathly silent second passed, then Oddjob stepped, leaned back, and lunged forward, throwing the bowler with all his might. Hunter dived out of the way. A deafening whistle sounded in his ear, and his neck felt briefly blistered with white heat. He tumbled and watched as the queer instrument of death plopped unceremoniously into the sea.
Oddjob glared at Hunter with a newfound fury. He charged at his adversary with a roar of rage. Hunter stepped cleanly to the side. The manservant went just clear of his left arm, the elbow of which Hunter drove into his back at the base of the spine.
Toro, you bastard.
Oddjob froze up in spasm before feeling a fist crash into the back of his neck. He fell forward, helpless as he discovered the follow through knee to the stomach and punch across the face. In spite of the stun, Oddjob attempted a frantic judo chop. Hunter blocked the hand and blew back, striking the side of his hand into Oddjob's neck once, twice, three times as he began to sag downward. Once he had sunk to the plank, Hunter chopped once, and...twice more.
He watched as the vibrancy slowly drained from the almond-shaped eyes. Laid down on the wood, he inhaled once violently, and expelled the breath until he finished.
Hunter rose and looked at...admired the body. There; he was done with. The tongue lolled grotesquely from the slackened mouth, making the only assurance Hunter needed.\ The corpse reminded him of a monument, lying there in its well-dressed state as a tribute to the impressive fortress of a man who had used to be.
Hunter wiped the back of his hand against his bloody mouth. He glanced at the ruby smear above his fingers and, while it already congealed under the baking sun, struggled to make a connection. He took a breath, and froze.
Oddjob could not have come voluntarily; not outside of SPECTRE's accord. Holy hell. Holy hell. Somebody in the ranks wanted him dead. There must have been a direct request for Oddjob by someone who held him at close hand.
A heavy shot of ice poured through Hunter's veins.
It left no other option.
Goldfinger.
More tomorrow.
Over and Out
Hunter felt the cold rush throughout his body. Goldfinger had betrayed him. The man he had worked for, been friends with, had entrusted himself to...had turned against him. The blood kept pumping, harder and faster, through his system.
MI6 had betrayed him. Macnair had betrayed him. Chang had betrayed him. And now...this. Damn it all, where was the trust? Did it lay completely out of reach, with no place in this world he had come to inhabit?
The hell with it. Play it close to the chest, then, just as the good doctor had ordered.
When had Goldfinger turned the knife on him? Had he played the prescient puppet mater, only using Hunter for as long as necessary, or had he made the call recently, for whatever reason, to wipe him out? More importantly...which of them had truly broken ranks?
Hunter gritted his teeth until they hurt. Whatever the case, he certainly would not allow the island's reactor to finish the job.
The sub was gone, likely sabotaged by Oddjob or some SPECTRE frogman. An explosion sounded nearby, and Hunter racked his brain for some information that could help. If he recalled...yes; yes, that was it!
He clung tightly to his sole contingency, and prayed it would prove viable.
***
Five minutes later, Hunter sat in a Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey on Dr. No's airstrip. The spot was damnably obscure, but he had found it. As he fastened his seat straps, he looked out the window. Smoke poured thick and gray from the complex. He started the engine, and figured he would have no more than ninety seconds until the whole base went up.
He flicked a pair of switches and heard the twin blades start to beat. Faster and faster they whipped, spinning wildly until finally they became blurs. Hunter felt a slight bump as the aircraft took off, but quickly readjusted. The great dual-prop kept climbing, ascending further and further until finally he could see the whole island, now looking like a fantastic, mechanical beast about to burst. The Osprey moved farther out to the ocean as the waters below shimmered up at it in blissful unawareness.
A sharp crack reached the cockpit. He looked back at the island, now a giant, ruined cigar. What remained of the reactor belched choking, black smoke all around, complementing the red and orange fires that popped up and grew everywhere. The fast-diminishing key seemed to take a quiet breath inward, an act of solemn preparation for the final step.
A great, angry ball of white spoke its word. With historical spite it swallowed up a massive radius and then let its colors show, of hellish orange and onyx cut from the Reaper's cloak, with no bias in its massive smothering of Hades. The mushroom cloud soon followed, and marked the occasion in its pluming shaft that hid everything, that had been and which now lacked even a pretense-claim to existence. The fire at its heart beat a bloody tangerine dye into the air, tinting the whole world in Lucifer's domain.
The former blue-green calm below crashed and threw up a grand fit. Massive, isolated explosions of white-colored-orange froth blasted forth, certainly a result of mine detonation.
The sole, peculiarly surviving bird kept up its flight. In its belly, Hunter let his head fall back into soft leather. That was it. Crab Key was gone. Dr. No was dead. To be certain, as life played its cruel hand, there remained ever more with which to cope; but was not this enough?
Hunter kept his eyes firmly averted from the sight behind him and took several deep breaths. Though the harrowing grip of fallibility sat in his stomach, logical thought still felt within reach. He meditated briefly on a course of action, then activated the radio system and began to manipulate the dials. He readjusted the transponder settings until finally reaching the correct frequency. A string of static, a buzz, and then silence; more static...and further silence. Perhaps he would have to find another way; and yet...
He borrowed a shallow breath and parted his lips.
"Pussy?" he asked.
More silence; then vague murmurs - blessed, blessed noise! - and:
"Jonathan?"
Hunter smiled in relief. So she had picked up his signal!
"Yes," he said exhaustedly, "yes, it's me."
"Jonathan!"
The voice was thrilled.
"Jonathan, oh, Jonathan...you're alive!"
"Yes...I can imagine how you might be surprised."
"I only overheard about Goldfinger's plan shortly after you left, but by then it was too late to warn you. I thought I...I thought...oh..."
"Pussy, don't worry about that. It's alright now. I'm alright now."
"I...well, what happened?"
"I got on the island just fine, and I..."
He had to force himself to say it out loud; to realize that it was no fantasy.
"...I killed him. I did it. Then I overloaded the reactor and tried to make my way back to the sub, but it wouldn't come. Oddjob showed up, but he's dead now. Pussy, he's dead now. Crab Key's been destroyed. I managed to get away; I'm in Dr. No's Osprey."
"John...oh, my...oh, John...."
Hunter frowned.
"What is it, Pussy?" he asked. "What?"
"Goldfinger, he..." (she paused) "...he said you were dead."
That newly familiar sense of stinging treachery hit him again.
"Yeah, I bet he did. Was I supposed to be the end of the bastard's plan?"
"John...maybe you had better hear this. Scaramanga managed to pick it up when he and Oddjob were talking in his office."
He heard a click on the other end, and then the press of a button. He heard a new voice, which he identified as Goldfinger's.
"...and I know you cannot keep your feelings at bay much longer, Oddjob. But the good news is, you will not have to. Since he has joined us, and has done all that he has...Jonathan Hunter has become too powerful of a force in our organization. I understand your situation, my loyal friend, but it goes far beyond that. Given his skill and character, he has revealed himself to be a vermin. The poison cannot stay in our system any longer, Oddjob, lest we allow him to kill us himself. We are secure no longer; he is a weapon more dangerous than the OMEN. He must be eliminated."
So; that was the story. He's served us well, but dump the beast before he blows up in our faces. The mute Oddjob would tell no tales, but his boss had done all he needed. After a simmering few moments, Hunter returned to the radio.
"Pussy," he said, "I heard it. Where are you?"
"I'm in Japan, John."
"Japan? What in God's name are you doing in Japan?"
"Goldfinger had me fly him there. But I've retreated on his orders about fifty miles away by now."
"So where is he?"
"He's at the SPECTRE base of Japanese operations."
"And where exactly is that?"
"In Kyushu...in a volcano."
Hunter could only shut his eyes and shake his head in disbelief. There was no end to the fantasticality of this organization, was there?
"Alright. What's the boss man up to?"
"From what I've gathered, he's either taking it over or already has, and he's got his troops with him. If you ask him, that's his domain now, and you'll be damned if you try to stop him. Of course, I know you better than that. Whatever purpose it was serving before, it sure isn't serving it now. He's even had the guards there incarcerated as a security measure."
"Damn; the man's insane. does he actually expect to get away with this?"
"This is Goldfinger we're talking about, John. What doesn't he expect to get away with?"
Hunter sighed.
"True enough. Look, I'll fly your way; there have got to be places to refuel until then. What say you we set up a meeting point?"
"Sounds like a plan. I'm at a safe house a little while away from there; I'll try to transfer it to your GPS."
"Good; I'll let you know when I get it. I'll come in with an update when I can."
"Alright. I'll see you here, John."
"I'll see you there, Pussy."
"Oh, and...good luck."
Hunter smiled.
"Thanks. Out."
As he powered down the radio, the Osprey banked west over the horizon.
More tomorrow.
Strategic Discretion
SPECTRE safe house
Kyushu, Japan
1:50 P.M., JST
The meeting place was a quaint affair. Situated on a lush, green hillside, its plain, wood-and-metal structure did not betray its true purpose. If one observed the scene, they would find a barely concealed helicopter tucked away on a nearby helipad.
Pussy and Hunter walked up to the door, the former knocking once.
The two had reunited in Tokyo. With preoccupation in his own endeavors, Goldfinger had little opportunity or interest in what were not outside affairs. They had made for the safe house immediately upon their reunion.
A few moments later, the unimpressive, pine door swung open to reveal the tall figure of Francisco Scaramanga. He looked at them with the vaguest fear in his eyes.
"Jonathan," he said, "Pussy. Do come in."
They did so, shutting the door behind him. Scaramanga led them into a small, cozy sitting room.
"You must forgive me, Jonathan," he explained, "if I seem a little surprised. I figure I oughtn't be, but...I had received word otherwise."
"So I understand."
"He had an inane confidence in that manservant of his," Pussy added.
"If you don't mind my asking," said Scaramanga, "what did happen on the island?"
"Well, I made it onto Crab Key just fine. Long story short, I found Dr. No, er, disposed of him-"
He subtly itched his right eye with his finger, which Scaramanga seemed to acknowledge.
"-and overloaded the reactor. Needless to say, I got out of there as fast as I could. I got back to the sub, found it was compromised, and there was Oddjob. He had his fun; gave me a few nasty cuts and bruises, actually."
"What happened?"
"I put him on the chopping block. I managed to nick our friend's bird from the airstrip and got away just in time to avoid meeting my maker. I got on the radio with Pussy, she passed along the coordinates, and here I am. Now, give me the story on the Goldfinger situation."
Scaramanga nodded without any remnant of surprise.
"Right. I'm still taken aback myself. I never would've thought it possible, but...he's taken over Number One's Japanese base."
Hunter narrowed his eyebrows.
"I heard the same from Pussy. How exactly did he manage it?"
"It can't all be explained," Scaramanga shrugged. "But it was in a surprise attack. It only took an hour of fighting before his men rounded up Number One's and threw them in the base prison cells. Number One got away, of course, so Goldfinger can't touch him, but we're very nearly thrown."
Hell. Some kind of corporate takeover....
"It's utter chaos," said Pussy. "If all hell didn't break loose when Dr. No tried to steal the OMEN, it certainly has now."
"Great," muttered Hunter with a hand over his mouth, "bloody great. So, what's Goldfinger's objective?"
"Power," Scaramanga answered. "Only power. The man has a superiority complex the size of this country, and look where it's gotten him."
Hunter stared down at his hands unmovingly.
"So what do we do?"
"They say a man's lust for power can only lead to his own destruction, but I'm afraid we're going to need something a little faster than that."
"Any ideas?"
"Brute force. You find a way to free the prisoners, and I can assure you you will have their allegiance. Infiltrating the detention center will be the difficult part, but they will fight against Goldfinger and his men. Even if you don't find him first, the assault may force him into retreat, and hopefully into a clear shot."
The plan appeared sound. All the same, something felt tentative; too much left to chance for such a critical objective.
"And if not?" Hunter replied. "This isn't just about the base. This is about Goldfinger. Sure, with some effort, we can retake the center, but if he gets away, we may never see the bastard again for the rest of our lives."
With a cautious lilt, Scaramanga intoned:
"Granted, there may remain particular security concerns if he escapes, but with virtually all loyalty and power as established by SPECTRE stripped away, perhaps there would come great benefit from him simply disappearing...."
The words sunk with a sharp edge of preemptive defeat into Hunter. Simply give him up? Hunter, with vestiges of hope in his face that clung to only one outcome, looked up at Scaramanga.
"No."
Scaramanga peered at him as a father would his son, debating approval for a schoolyard scuffle.
"We need some contingency plan. I'm not about to let that man get away."
Scaramanga said nothing for a moment, then slowly nodded.
"I understand. To that end, I must admit I have one such avenue in mind...should it prove necessary. All I require is an hour of your time, if you'll be so kind as to follow me downstairs. You may wish to remove your shoes."
With great curiosity, Pussy followed both men down the stairs. She simply prayed that all would go well.
A belated congratulations to William and Kate (and indeed the entire Royal Family) on their new baby!
More tomorrow. :)
Chapter Fifty-Two:
Going Through the Front Door
Half-mile from Mount Shinmoe-dake
Kyushu, Japan
3:47 P.M., JST
Less than two hours later, Jonathan Hunter had traded the flowered serenity of the safe house's hillside for the cloudy skies of a more mountainous region. Rolling domes of grass no longer observed him, but rather mountains of stone that stared up at him from their observation posts.
Hunter leaned away from the window and back into his seat. He held in his hands his SPEC-9 pistol, distracting himself temporarily with the ornate octopus engraving along its side. He wore a black combat uniform, agreeably the best option as suggested by Scaramanga. A Kevlar vest wrapped around it, laced here and there with spare magazines and silver flash grenades.
Pussy's voice came through the headset.
"We're just coming up on the volcano. You should be able to see it in a few moments."
Surely enough, Hunter could soon make out the funneled peak of Mount Shinmoe-dake. It was a monstrous sight, dominating the comparatively miniscule formations that surrounded it.
"It's been dormant for years," said Pussy, "but that serves their purposes just well."
True enough, thought Hunter. No one would go pointing their guns at a sleeping volcano. An office or an airstrip, sure; but the unlikelihood, combined with the over-the-top fantasy of the location, made it an ingenious vantage point.
From the cockpit, Pussy changed the channel on her headset.
"Mother Hawk to Base One. Come in, Base One."
Static, and then a bored male voice.
"Base One reads you, Mother Hawk. Base One would also like to know just what the hell you're doing here. I've got your chopper on the camera. What gives?"
"Forgive me, Base One. I know Midas One told me to stay put, but Midas Two showed up early and demanded I bring him here."
"Do you always do what the butler tells you, sweetie?"
"When I want to keep my job, I do."
"Fair enough; that cinderblock's not one to argue with. Alright, I'll let Midas One know the situation. Thanks for the inform. I'll get on base control to activate the entrance. Base One out."
"Copy, Base One. Thanks. Mother Hawk out."
More static, and the line cut.
"Well," said Pussy, "that wasn't as hard as I thought. Looks like we'll be going in the front door after all."
Hunter smiled.
"Excellent."
He spun the pistol in his hand so that the butt was facing down, then fed a magazine into it. Suddenly, he noticed something out of his peripherals. He looked out the window, and gazed in awe as what might have been a pool of water at the top of the volcano's funnel split open. What had just been a calm face of dark, greenish water divided straight down the center, its twin halves pulling away from each other and retreating into the brown rock. Hunter shook his head as the gap opened completely. He figured the surface must have been made of steel or some other such metal.
"John," called Pussy, "get your gun ready."
Hunter fitted a silencer onto his sidearm and pulled the rail back, letting it slide back into place. He would have one chance, and he would need to do it right. The helicopter hovered over the entrance a moment before beginning its descent. Hunter had to crouch directly beneath the left window as they went, clenching his jaw in tension as the slight darkness overtook the daylight.
Finally, the bird landed. A guard stood on either side, weapons in hand. Pussy, situated on the right side of the cabin, began to power down the rotors as one of them approached her. She opened the door kindly enough and spoke over the steady beating of the blades.
"Hawk One landing," she proclaimed loudly. "Good to see you boys. Have you missed me?"
The guard sighed exasperatedly.
"Just as much as I could without getting in trouble. Now, what's the deal, Pussy?"
Pussy frowned innocently.
"I thought Base One would've told you that."
"Very cute, Galore. I know why you're here; I'm asking why the hell there isn't the cargo in the back you said there'd be."
Pussy shrugged.
"He must've dropped off for a shot."
The guard barely had time to notice as the Derringer blasted its copper round into his head. He jerked back as the blood sprayed, crashing to the ground as the life poured out of him.
Pussy stepped out of the helicopter nonchalantly. She bent down to check his pulse before replacing the revolver in her thigh holster. She made her way to the other side of the aircraft, looking on in casual satisfaction while Hunter stood over a matching body. He turned.
"Clean enough for you?"
She shrugged and held up her pistol.
"More fun to be loud."
The two came close and shared one long, passionate kiss. They gazed into each other's eyes for a spell, then parted. Pussy gave him a cautiously confident look.
"Good luck."
Hunter smiled.
"Thanks."
He reached for her hand, giving it a light squeeze as he walked the other way. Pussy returned to the helicopter with only half her mind on aviation. She flicked a few buttons, switches, and was off. The bird moved up, up further, and finally disappeared into the sky as the metal door shut closed.
Hunter looked back down and focused on the objective at hand.
He was in the belly of the beast now. It was up to him whether he would slay it or be consumed by it.
More tomorrow.
Through the Cracks
From his standpoint, Hunter could see that the lair was an immense operation. It was as large inside as one might expect it to be from a glance at its top, but had been endlessly modified. Beside the metal floor, a monorail system had been installed around the bottom. Tracks in the main area led into various rooms at several points around the perimeter. Silver steps led up to walkways and observation platforms. Perhaps most remarkably, at the front of the room stood an enormous, square video screen placed within the wall. It remained blank at the moment (if one could call it that: Its front featured a digital image of an octopus against a black background).
Hunter made his way down to the main floor, taking the first door he saw. His preliminary target was the detention center.
Goldfinger is holding the captives in the east quadrant, Scaramanga had said. Free them, and you will have their allegiance.
He entered a short corridor with walls and floor of stone. He moved forward and peered around the corner, finding a longer hallway with two guards standing in its middle. One was talking, and the other nodding his head. Both held automatic weapons. Hunter waited for one to turn and, he sent a silenced shot into his compatriot’s head. The first man twisted to look, stunned, before receiving a slug between the eyes.
Hunter stepped over their bodies and continued down the corridor, doing his best to avoid the sweep of the security cameras. He kept moving, dashing from wall to crate, crate to side room, until finally he reached a sign on a wall that read in block letters: DETENTION CENTER. A white arrow lay beneath it, pointing to the left.
Hunter followed the sign and rounded a corner to find a door. He crept toward it and glanced through an inset pane of glass, finding inside two men standing in front of a bank of monitors. On these he perceived scores of prisoners, all sat restlessly in their cells. One of the men put his hand on his friend’s shoulder and appeared to say something to him, to which his friend nodded. He turned and walked toward the door, punching in a key code. Hunter moved beside the lintel as the door swung open. After the door closed, the cap-bearing guard carried on obliviously down the hallway.
Hunter approached in all silence from behind and drove an elbow into the man’s lower back. He crumpled to the floor in spasmodic agony and, on his hands and knees, felt a boot kick him backward so that he lay face up. A man in black now stood over him, pointing a silenced pistol at his face.
“Password?”
The guard trembled, opening and closing his mouth several times before managing words.
“Five…three…seven…two…one.”
“Thank you.”
A boot flew into his face and all was black.
Hunter punched in the code, stepped inside, and let the door shut behind him. The remaining guard exhaled a laugh.
“What’s wrong, Hardy? I thought you were going for a smoke.”
“Didn’t feel like lighting up,” Hunter replied. “You, on the other hand…”
The guard turned at the unfamiliar voice. Two rounds leapt objectively at his chest, and he fell.
Hunter looked at the numerous television monitors before him. At an estimate, there were at least one-hundred inmates. He looked at the array of cell controls. There must be some way….
Out of nowhere, a steel-cut, American voice came over the radio on the counter in front of him.
“Well done staying out of the cameras. Whoever the hell you are, just stay right there. Rest assured, we’ll be sending down men to that block to pick you up.”
Damn! Hunter looked all around, and sunk in self-blame when he noticed it: a tiny camera mounted on the ceiling. How could he have missed that? And after all his effort! The radio crackled.
“Alright, Block Two, shut down the override cell controls. We’ve got a fly in the ointment, and I don’t want him getting in. Lock him out and we’ll take care of the rest, over.”
A thought occurred to Hunter, and he smiled. He depressed the button on the side of the radio.
“I commend your effort, comrade; but I’m afraid you’re still on my channel, and I’m still not finished.”
He wordlessly unplugged the device and gazed at the so-labeled "Master Panel" of buttons below him. With sufficient focus...
In the detention center’s other control room, a security officer hit the red button that would deactivate the cell controls. He frowned when nothing happened. He tried again, this time watching in horror as green lights turned on above every last prison cell. The collective buzzing of over a hundred electric locks sounded, dying in an instant as the every last steel bar in the room retracted into their respective walls.
The guard could believe neither his eyes nor eyes. Somebody had…somebody must have…but how?
He and his fellow guard swiftly pulled the door open and made their way into what was now a free man’s room.
In his own control room, Hunter could only grin. The eye had certainly done its job, even for its mere second errand on record. The first part was done. He left the room and entered the detention center proper to look over the railing.
In a few moments’ time, all hell would break loose.
More tomorrow.
Prison Break
The inmates stepped out of their cells, apprehensively at first. It could have been no happenstance, no mistake…but their doors had opened. As this basic truth set in, they walked forward almost as one, bound together by the bent rage of the confined. They looked this way and that around the block, searching for any sight of liberator or oppressor. They found their quandary in two scared-looking guards behind the far railing; but what course of action to take?
The answer came when both men received two silenced bullets in the chest each.
The prisoners stared, startled, in wonder at who had pulled the trigger. Shortly, they found a single man in black, standing at the top-floor railing on the opposite end, holding a black-and-silver pistol.
“Alright,” he called out to the yet-silent crowds, “I’m sure you all know what’s happened, and I’d bet you’re all damn mad about it.”
A shout of wrathful agreement went up around the block.
“From what I've heard, Auric Goldfinger’s made a right bloody mess of this place. He’s walked in, taken occupancy, and left your arses in the dust to rot; but I’m the man on your side. I’m looking to kill Goldfinger and to undo what he’s done. He betrayed me, just as he’s betrayed you and your organization. I don't know how we'll do this, but we'll find a way. He’ll be dead, his army will be gone, and any last trace of power will be ripped forcibly from his hands. What do you say?”
A huge shout erupted from the prisoners, with many yells of encouragements and triumph calls. They clapped, threw their fists up, even jumped into the air.
“We’re heading out of here,” he hollered. “Goldfinger’s got his own men all around, so it won’t take long for you to find them and take them down. We’ve got the hell of a lot of people here, but even if you don’t match them in number, you damn well exceed them in spirit. Now everybody, head out these doors! You all take whatever paths and corridors you want, but try to keep it even. We don’t want anybody making his way alone.”
He received various nods, eyebrow raises, and other general acknowledgments. With one more, uproarious shout, they ran out of the block, leaving not one person behind them. They resembled a family of ants, the lines of definition blurring all around as they pushed onto their common objective. They kept moving, filing out in as disorderly a fashion as possible until only Hunter remained.
He smiled and nodded with much satisfaction. Good. That was one job down.
He turned to leave, and watched the door in front of him burst open. Two heavily armed men appeared, hulking about in all the muscle they carried. One made to raise his weapon, but had it knocked out of his hands and its butt rammed into his head.
As he fell to the floor, his companion saw his submachine gun knocked, flying, upward and out of his grasp. A swift flurry of hands and feet hammered into him, and he was down to the floor.
Mere seconds later, both men looked up with fear, rage, and intent. While they both reached for their weapons, Hunter raised his own and shot both men square in the face.
He let the pistol hang there in the air for a moment, time standing still as it sometimes did when men died defenselessly. The Walther breathed a sigh of relief, gray and acrid in its obscurity. Hunter lowered the SPEC-9 and rubbed his eyes.
It had been cold, yes, but…perhaps - perhaps he thrived on it.
He had heard of murderers taking people’s lives for their own pleasure. This had been in self-defense, but still….
One question mark hung in the air. Would he start to function on it? Would other’s death blood become his lifeblood? Sure, he had felt the aftershocks of living this life on many occasions, but could he not simply discontinue that and recover when needed? Dr. No's words to the contrary filled his mind in spite of his best efforts.
The hell with what Dr. No had said. The hell with doubt and concern and what-ifs. When an adversary gave his piece, one tossed that piece into the fire and moved away from its lying glow. Anyway, sentimentality would get him nowhere. He rechecked his weapon and left the way he had entered.
Now was the time to work.
More tomorrow...really tomorrow.
Chapter Fifty-Five:
Kickback
Hunter raced through the hallways of the lair, taking turn after turn as he watched his newfound compatriots seize their freedom. In any given corner, one would find an angry-eyed prisoner taking on an armed guard, and virtually always winning. Risk of gunfire provided no deterrent, and for every UMP raised came thundering footsteps to meet the threat head-on.
Hunter rounded one corner, and at once stepped back as a stray fist almost knocked into him. A submachine gun clattered to the floor while its owner, a medium-sized Japanese, fell over his attacker’s shoulder and onto the ground. He pounded hard onto the stone before receiving a boot to the face.
“Vicious,” remarked Hunter. “I approve.”
The man flashed a grin.
“Thanks; and for saving our sorry arses.”
“My pleasure, mate. How are the odds looking?”
“Not bad,” he shrugged. “Of course, there’s strength in numbers, and we’re back in full force, so give us an hour and the rest of these buggers should be bound and gagged.”
“Glad to hear it. I'm Hunter, by the way.”
“Fortier.”
They shook.
“Well,” said Hunter, “now we’ve met, we may as well team up. As a matter of fact, I’ll be needing your help with something.”
“Sure,” Fortier nodded. “How’s that?”
“From what I’ve heard, Goldfinger’s in the base, but where would he have gone?”
“He, er…damn….”
His eyes lit up as a thought seemed to occur to him.
“You know, he should be in Room One.”
“Let me guess: not the first door when you walk in?”
“I’m afraid not. It’s called that because it’s where Number One operates, or ought to be operating. It’s in the north quadrant of the building, but news of an intruder would almost certainly have reached him by now.”
“No doubt; but here’s to hoping he doesn’t know that intruder is me. Think you can take me there?"
"It'd be my honor. I take it I won't be getting a shot at Goldfinger?"
"Well, you sure as hell won't be getting a letter of recommendation from him; but no, I'm afraid that's down to me."
"As you wish. Aiding and betting is good enough for me."
"Perfect. I’d take that UMP if I were you.”
“On it.”
Fortier picked up the gun and weighed it in his hands. Confirming it had a full clip, he retrieved two more from the guard’s vest and wedged them inside his belt.
“Let’s go.”
They made their way swiftly down the hallway. Against a constant background of stone and metal, their feet beat softly against the floor. They hardly clung to the element of surprise, sure, but a modicum of stealth seemed the best policy.
After a while, Hunter started to pant. The path could not be too much longer at this point, surely, but...?
He looked around him, seeing at least two or three men on his side sending their opponents into death spirals. Good; they would need to-
“Hunter!”
The warning voice of Fortier as a fist flew into sight. Without thinking, he caught it in his left hand. In an apparent blur Hunter dropped his sidearm and shot his right fist into the nose and groin. The attacker twisted immediately to the floor, eyes clenched shut. Hunter kneeled to retrieve his pistol. He sensed movement, and hammered its butt into the man's neck. A grunt, and then no more.
Hunter observed the man. He seemed the thick type, in multiple senses. Built short and beefy, and with little hair upon his crown, he lay stationary with rubbery lips clasped in defeat.
“Damn,” murmured Fortier. “Where’d you learn that?”
Hunter shrugged.
“Learned in the SAS; perfected in MI6; kept up to standard in our very own SPECTRE.”
“Impressive. Though I might say it isn’t exactly ‘our very own’ SPECTRE anymore.”
"One last dent to hammer out, and it will be. No doubt your men can take care of the rest. Let's move."
They carried on yet further toward their objective, not stopping to take breaks. The hallways evolved from granite to metal, from metal to brownstone, and seemed to carry more of an air of officiality the farther they went. Eventually, Fortier’s footsteps slowed to a crawl as he put a finger to his lips. He brought up his index and middle fingers to indicate the number two. Hunter nodded and attached a silencer to his weapon. They stepped up to a nearby corner, where Fortier raised a halting hand.
Hunter tightened his grip on the SPEC-9 and took a deep, quiet breath. He braced himself and, in one movement, stood, pivoted on his left foot, planted his right on the ground, and put two silenced shots in the guards standing sentry before they had a chance to notice.
Fortier walked up behind the stock-still figure, gun still raised contingently. He put his hand on the left shoulder. The shooter relaxed, his head turned down, and his eyes closed.
At the end of the hallway lay a silver door, marked ominously above it with a large, yellow number 1.
“Well,” Fortier uttered softly, “this is it. Are you ready?”
Hunter took a breath.
“This man has abused my trust, betrayed me without a thought, and put blood on my hands that will never wash off. I’m damned if I’ll ever be more ready.”
Fortier nodded.
"Good. Just make sure the bastard doesn’t kill you. The way you are, it seems you may just be damned anyway.”
Hunter let out a whispered laugh. The rope felt as real as ever; one might as well revel in the gallows humor.
“Thanks.”
“Well, hell; thank you for getting me…us out of here. I’m in your debt, mate.”
Once more, the men shook.
“Good luck.”
With that, Fortier was gone.
Hunter could only stare at the door in front of him. Metal, security-locked…behind it sat the man most dangerous to him in all the world. The viper that had bitten him and let the poison spread unceasingly into the whole of his life. If there was one man he wanted dead…
Goldfinger could not live.
Apprehensively, determinedly, Hunter took a step forward.
It's all about to come to a head.
More tomorrow.
Throne of Bayonets
The broad tunnel moved right along through his field of vision like a static kaleidoscope. It moved into and out of his peripherals as his feet carried him ever closer to his goal. He almost failed to notice when he was standing directly in front of the door.
Subconsciously, he had stopped. Some part of his brain still functioned, but on a disconnect.
Concentrate, you damn fool. Get that door open.
Hunter looked down at the electronic keypad beside the door. Mechanically, almost unthinkingly, he focused on the white buttons and half-squinted his right eye. He had practiced the technique so often now, it almost immediately began to work. A low hum rose from the metal box, practically below the range of hearing.
Then the great metal door split down the middle, either half pulling away from the other as the gap widened. And as the divide grew, with each passing millimeter, Hunter felt even more naked, even more unprepared.
His legs shook. He had to force himself to stand as his heart pounded, and then slammed inside his chest, telling him to walk back, to run away, to go home and forget the whole thing had ever happened.
But Hunter could never forget; not after what he had done; not after what had been done to him.
In a way, it had been a child’s reaction: the flight instinct. He would have to force the man in him to take over, to stand his ground and put up a damn hard fight. He would have to stand up for himself, and for…well, was it for anybody else? He was not sure. Those who stood against Goldfinger, perhaps, but…not now. This was for him and no one else.
He barely noticed when the metal doors had slid all the way open.
He strained with every muscle in his neck to look up at the room that now lay before him. It was an elaborate setup, a granite-walled office-type affair with sparse pieces of irregular-looking furniture. Truth be told, there was little in place on the metal floor for decoration: a simple, high-backed chair sat behind a wooden desk, with a small bookcase behind it that seemed more for show than for reading. In retrospect, the simple, yet vaguely showy room stank of authority.
And sitting behind that desk was Auric Goldfinger.
Hunter felt a million little claws scratching at his insides that ordered him to flee.
But he could not. In spite of his internal battle, he made himself look at the devil behind the desk. He had to admit, nothing much about him seemed different. There was the same golden hair, the same slight roundness, but something new seemed to flicker in his eyes. Hunter had seen and analyzed the eyes of many men before, and these seemed to be…certainly not a lust for power? No; in truth, he had noticed that lust before. Rather, this was the aftermath of that lustful flicker dimming: the flash of triumph.
Goldfinger was the winner, and he knew it.
The larger man finally broke the silence, with all the shaming spite of a victorious businessman.
“So, Jonathan Hunter. To what do I owe the extreme, and particularly unexpected, displeasure?”
Hunter managed only to shrug.
“Come now,” said Goldfinger playfully, “surely you have your reasons? Surely there is some objective you had in mind by not being dead?”
Gradually, Hunter nodded.
“Yes…” he finally said, “…yes, there is; but you know me, Goldfinger. I’m a survivor. And somehow, no matter what you, or Dr. No, or anybody has thrown at me…I’ve gotten past it.”
“Precisely why I hired you,” Goldfinger smiled.
Hunter held his face in a semi-grimace, furrowing his eyebrows.
“Just as well, I figured that was why you tried to have me killed. You had never dreamed of underestimating me before you met me, but the truth is, you came to realize it would have been impossible to overestimate me. Yes, Goldfinger, you hired me for my skill, but…you never truly knew just what you were in for.”
Goldfinger smiled in all good humor, pointing at him and rising from his seat.
“That you are right about, Mr. Hunter!”
He barked that coarse, two-part laugh of his.
“And it was a pity to hear about Oddjob. He was and shall remain irreplaceable. However, that was your doing, and not mine, so it shall not sit on my conscience. I suspect, too, that you have no interest in being my bodyguard, is that correct?”
Again he laughed, grating harshly on Hunter. He made steps toward the front of the room, but stopped dead in his tracks as the younger man raised his weapon, shaking his head.
“Don’t even think about it, Goldfinger. You shouldn’t dare to step closer after what you’ve done to me. I may just have to pay it back.”
“What I have done to you, Mr. Hunter?”
Goldfinger allowed confusion to creep over his face - anguish of the suing creditor!
“What I have done to you is to save you from becoming a street rat under the English police’s paw. What I have done is to help you help yourself; to give you an opportunity to prove a point, and to strike out against those whom you most despise; to kill the man who made your heart and mind like…this. What of Dr. No? What of him?”
Hunter gritted his teeth.
"My book's closed on him. All he is now is irradiated ash scattered in the sea, and that's that. I had an enemy, and I killed him. He had done me wrong, but I got rid of him. You may have helped me do that, but you were only using me as a tool to play to your own end.”
“And were you not doing the same to me? Jonathan, that is what this new world you’ve found, but of which I've long been a part, is all about. We help each other to hurt anyone else.”
"Fine enough; but you turned the knife in my direction, and now I've pulled one on you."
"Be careful how you hold the blade, Jonathan. I fear you've forgotten how to point it at the correct target. Perhaps Nevada will serve as a helpful reminder."
A hot chill ran through Hunter's body. The clammy moisture grew between his hand and its gun, and he had to swallow down the venom until it burned.
"Nevada...was not on me. I followed the instructions that left no innocent dead; I went by the orders that did just enough to-"
"Please, Jonathan, please! Do you plan to rob from twenty - ha! - fifty banks and blame ME for shooting one clerk?"
"One person can't compare to-"
"Of course not. You merely sought to stay black-and-white in a gray-washed world. You never wanted your hands dirty. You just wanted them bloody. If I might remind you, it was only by means of what happened on that dam that you were able to attain your vengeance. 'An eye for an eye,' I believe Mr. Scaramanga told you?"
Hunter cursed the man before him with every foul word he could think of. Goldfinger dropped one rough laugh.
“Don’t tell me that that was just your battle cry! I saw the look in your eye when you came into my office; the look of that same eye as you spilt yet more blood on your hands; and yes, it was that eye only. That other eye was a gift by me, but, more importantly, it is artificial. No pain or emotion can be seen through it. You cannot express yourself through it, even if you may express yourself with it. The blood of the innocent and the guilty; as long as you’ve got that eye, they’re damned all the same. Would you truly rather have let that man, Dr. No, go on and live after what he had done to you, if it meant being able to save an infinitesimal percentage of the world population on a dam in Nevada?”
Hunter’s grip on the gun tightened. Everything felt tense, everything squeezed damn near to breaking while the blood pounded through his brain.
“YES!” he shouted. “Yes, I would have damn well let him go if it meant less blood on my hands! I would let him go, give up vision in my right eye, and relinquish any possible hope of a real life, as I call it, if it meant less death! Because I don’t give a shit if that’s ‘how it is’ in your world. We may both exist in this one business, Auric, but God and Lucifer shared the same room and look how that turned out. If the criminal underworld for you is death, killing, and yet more slaughter, than you go on; but perhaps I’m from a different region of that world. That’s not me.”
He had to stop and pant from the mass of words that had spilled from his mouth. Goldfinger's eyes, showing something like boredom, drilled into him.
"You express your sentiments in a most interesting fashion, Jonathan. The only pity is that your poetry will be wasted."
"I suppose nobody can hear my screams?"
"Ah!" He pointed. "You will soon be spot on!"
"We all die. Even if it were painful, the only difference would be a small fraction of my life spent in discomfort, extreme though it might be."
"Your quality of living comes at a small value, it would seem. However, perhaps the worst death has nothing to do with discomfort and pain. Perhaps the worst death is one where you feel nothing at all."
Goldfinger walked nonchalantly over to an object beside his desk, draped in an off-white cloth. How long had it been there? He must have somehow failed to notice it when he came in, unremarkable as it seemed. The large man casually removed the cloth to reveal a cylindrical, tank-type device that glowed blue. Hunter took in a sharp breath and held deathly still.
The OMEN. He could only gape and stare at the mechanism that he had not seen in ages. But surely it was just as unstable as it had been before? Surely no great difference could have been made since then…?
Suddenly, a chuckle from Goldfinger.
“I know what you are thinking, Jonathan. Yes, it has been a while since you have seen this machine, but alas, here it is; and it’s been modified since then, too. The targeting system - about which I expressed great grief following our first meeting - has been greatly improved. I can now aim it straight at you! All it takes is a little push of this button….”
He touched his finger delicately to a red button on top of the device. For a moment, Hunter's heart stood still. He recovered just enough to speak.
“You’re crazy!” he exclaimed. “Surely you must realize you’ll go up in vapor, just the same as me?”
“Ah!” replied Goldfinger excitedly. “But that’s where you are wrong, Jonathan! You see, when I said that the targeting system had been improved, I did not mean simply that it could be directed in any general area. Rather, its energy can now be focused precisely on one specific spot! It can even penetrate light objects.”
Hunter furrowed his eyebrows.
“Such as?”
“Such as this.”
Goldfinger stepped forward yet again, bringing Hunter to tighten his grip on his pistol. After a moment, Goldfinger came to a halt and raised a closed fist. He knocked it forward and back twice, and a small banging noise sounded.
A moment passed in confusion, and Hunter caught on. There was a wall of glass between them!
“Amazed you failed to notice, aren’t you?” Goldfinger chuckled. “To be fair on your part, that was the idea behind its design. And just so, it’s been constructed to be bulletproof, as well.”
The peculiarity of it all never seemed to end.
“So, you wouldn’t mind if I were to put a few rounds in this thing?”
Goldfinger shrugged.
“Not if you were willing to pay for it.”
“Well; let’s test that out, shall we?”
Hunter stretched his gun arm out, at which Goldfinger made a slight flinch. He aimed to his adversary’s left and fired a shot, bringing yet another flinch and a small spider-web pattern in the glass.
“Switzerland.”
He repeated the action to the right, achieving the same effect.
“Nevada.”
The man behind the glass stared back at him with vague confusion and shades of uncertainty.
“Both places I should have killed you, but didn’t. This time…”
He repositioned the gun to point at Goldfinger’s head.
“…I won’t hesitate.”
He put one more slug in the glass, loud and sharp in the small distance between men. His “target” jumped back instinctively. Still the fracture stayed in place, directly in front of his skull. Goldfinger shook his head with something like ruffled disappointment. Adversary or not, I thought I knew you, old boy, but I'm afraid you've gone quite mad!
"Most impressive, Mr. Hunter. You have broken my window. Whatever doubts you may have had, you must realize now that it is undeniably bulletproof, and one hundred percent impenetrable. Just like this glass, I cannot be broken, compromised, or destroyed, no matter what you may try. Have you now descended to this? Are you attempting to frighten me to death?"
Hunter tilted his head.
"You can call it that if you wish."
Goldfinger laughed once more, this time with a thick overtone of condescension.
"Now you have come to the end of the road! Your greatest strength now serves now purpose but to set your failure in stone. This perseverance of yours has driven you to walk straight through hell, and now bids you to stumble directly into your grave, without ever understanding your defeat; without ever comprehending that my power cannot be taken. You crawl to me like an insect, and now seek to topple me from my throne? YOU CANNOT! Yet you cling to your hope; of what? To make me experience death and defeat, in their worst forms?"
For the first time, Hunter held a sustained gaze into Goldfinger's eyes. He pursed his lips, raised his brows in consideration.
"For as much as I can; but then again, perhaps the worst death is one where you feel nothing at all."
Goldfinger furrowed his eye brows suspiciously.
"Your defeat, however...well, I'll make you feel that for as long as I can."
Hunter's eyes slipped behind Goldfinger, who followed his gaze to the iridescent machine beside his desk. An electric drone pierced the atmosphere first quietly, then more loudly as it built. Goldfinger's eyes opened wide in horror while his mouth parted, desperate to make words.
"The OMEN! I...you...!"
Hunter stood tall opposite Goldfinger, all pretensions, fears, reserves completely disposed of. All this had fallen away, and only he remained for this man to witness.
"Your weapon..."
He nodded.
"...your downfall."
Goldfinger stammered heavily. He constantly turned from Hunter to the OMEN and back, arms out frantically to take some reverse action.
"I-but...it-it's hack-proof! Even with your eye, its safeguard cannot be penetrated-"
"-except with a virus to override its defenses; like the one Mr. Scaramanga so kindly uploaded to my eye's network. You know, perhaps you should have chosen less proficient friends."
Hunter smirked while the hum of the device grew ever louder.
"Technology's a wonderful thing, isn't it?"
Goldfinger came close to the glass, all manner of despondence apparent in his face. He spoke in a soft, tortured tone.
"Mr. Hunter...Jonathan..."
Hunter exhaled objectively through his nostrils and looked back at him without expression.
"It's GoldenEye now. You'd do well to remember that in the last few moments of your life."
Goldfinger stared back at him with magnificent terror. His eyes seemed like golf balls, set in below a crown that rapidly accumulated thick beads of sweat. They ran down his face and neck while he stood paralyzed, mouth agape, without a single movement in the face of his personal apocalypse.
The OMEN was at a roar now, a deafening warning klaxon that signaled caution for its inescapable dread. From the ceiling, a thin, metal sheet began to descend the entirety of the glass. Goldfinger, with eyes like dinner plates, came directly up to the giant pane. On the other side, the thick hands pressed desperately, pleadingly against the broken crystal.
The ex-Jonathan Hunter, formerly of the British Secret Service, now GoldenEye, simply looked on as the single trio of words escaped from his lips:
“Go to hell.”
The metal fell to the floor. Invisible to anybody who might have stood on that side of the barrier, a radiant, white-blue glow lit up the other half of the room. The electric drone at once reached its high, eardrum-piercing zenith, before being replaced by an even louder explosion that would have driven anyone deaf.
Not that the effect would have mattered; for by the time one experienced it, less than one half of a second would remain to experience any one of their sensory perceptions. And that was exactly what happened. Literally before the brain could have time to process it, there came an explosion of pure energy that drowned out anything and everything that one could stand witness to save, moments later, for the extracorporeal sensation of having one’s soul depart their body.
To anyone else, perhaps circling the majestic dome of the dormant volcano, there would have appeared a fantastic, almost indescribable shaft of pure, golden light that seized forth from the mountain like a medieval knight drawing his lance.
Several hundred meters from the peak, a woman flying a helicopter encountered exactly this sight.
“Oh, my God…oh, my God…”
More tomorrow.
Chapter Fifty-Seven:
Final Reflections
It had taken thirty seconds for the light to dissipate; two-and-a-half minutes for Pussy to approach and make her landing; twelve minutes for the man she knew as Jonathan Hunter to return to the helipad and watch her come to tears. This had been followed by a deep, long, passionate kiss with no reserves and no holding back. Pussy simply embraced the man before her, attempting somehow to capture his essence.
“Oh…John….”
Eventually, all the former prisoners had shown up, proclaiming total victory. They held weapons high above their heads, yelling battle cries and joyful shouts. Holding the girl in one arm, Hunter had looked at all of them - at their bright, fresh, victorious faces - and help up his sidearm in triumph. He had shouted his praise, congratulations, and thanks, leaving all operations of the base to them and bidding his farewell.
Had Hunter done that?
No…GoldenEye had.
One more victory cheer erupted as the aircraft ascended, rising up through the mouth of the great mountain. As the man in the helicopter looked out the window, his eyes traded lair for volcano, volcano for cloud, and eventually looked out into the clear, blue sapphire of the Japanese skies.
He sat quietly in the back, half-mulling things over. All that had happened to him over the past few months…being given the boot by the Secret Service…meeting Darius; Caroline…that fateful night in the East End…Switzerland, Hong Kong…
All the blood shed by old and new enemies; some of his own….
As memories of the Hoover Dam hit him, he found himself once more burying his face in his hands. The heart-rending tumult of agony and destruction stayed damnably with him; the recollection of throwing the deadly device into that hole just to secure another man’s enterprise….
Could he forgive himself? convince himself, deeply within his soul, that the hand in tragedy had not been his own? The answer remained a gray blur in his head, but the memories were - not quite fading - having their edges filed down. They did not retain those skin-pricking, jagged ridges to them as they had had before. There remained still dull studs, but that was a separate matter....
Much to his surprise, a message felt impressed upon him, spoken softly and without a trace of insistence: that he would never achieve absolution, much less peace, unless he let go of the memories; unless he freed himself from their arresting grasp, at least as best he could.
And then Crab Key…what had happened in Japan, even that very day…it was all over.
Still, a question itched persistently at the back of his mind. In spite of the losses, what had he gained?
He momentarily considered. Well, he counted three things with him in the steel bird. He could perceive his world with two eyes; his right, regardless of color, had come as a spoil of war beyond what he could have asked for. What else? The gun….
Oh, yes, he smirked, mustn’t forget that….
And the girl. The girl, the girl, the girl….
If he had gained one thing without the slightest shred of regret behind it, it had been her. For all they had been through, for all they had yet to experience…no other bounty could dream to compare.
He turned as he heard an electronic beeping noise and the slight shift of the cabin door being opened. There stood Pussy, wearing her black cat suit. One corner of her mouth turned up, submitting happily enough to reality.
“I just wanted to say ‘hi.'”
In spite of the day's events, the face bore a remarkably gorgeous smile. The teeth showed as the red lips parted…GoldenEye melted in admiration.
“Well, that’s fine,” he managed, with a slight, warm grin of his own. “I just hope you don’t end up needing to say that other word any time soon. One syllable, begins with a 'B' and rhymes just with ‘hi’….”
Pussy walked over to him, hands on her hips. She leaned into him and settled her hands on his neck and shoulder.
“I’ve no intention of that,” she whispered.
She leaned in and kissed him yet another time that day, knowing for sure now that it would not be the last. Eyes closed, she managed between heavy breaths, “I love autopilot….”
Eventually, the two slid to the floor, keeping their eyes shut and their lips locked. The shoes went, then the shirt, then all the rest until a naked man and woman lay on the floor, embracing each other in a passion that overshadowed everything else in their world.
The man who now called himself GoldenEye kissed his way down the woman’s neck, realizing at this point that he did not care about Goldfinger; did not care about Dr. No or SPECTRE or MI6 or any of the rest of them. What mattered to him now was that he was a different man. Jonathan Hunter had been left behind, an anonymous docket in the data bowels of the British Secret Service and a vague memory in the recollections of some men in England and Switzerland.
He was GoldenEye now, and would take the full content of that identity with him for the rest of his life.
As the helicopter floated forward toward the sun, the man and woman inside allowed all thought to escape them, and let themselves be willingly swept away by their passion that would carry them into heaven.
More tomorrow.
The Watchful Eye
The complex was small in size. Admittedly, no one had predicted that such a place would prove necessary, but designers had nonetheless taken care to ensure its sufficiency. Built on a miniscule island outside of Tokyo, no parties had granted it any concern, or even much notice. Several other such islands were occupied by fishermen, contributing to the element of subtlety.
Inside, one would find only three rooms: the “reception,” the living quarters (which constituted a sleeping space, lavatory, and kitchen), and the central operating room. The latter was a dark, dimly lit area, aglow solely from the electronic hue of monitors and computer lights. This room, like the rest of the place, proved relatively small, providing comfortable space for only a few people without causing discomfort.
In this room now abided Francisco Scaramanga and Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the head of the criminal organization known as SPECTRE.
They observed a single monitor that took up much of the room on one wall. The screen showed a live security feed from the Japanese base of operations which the latter had recently been forced to vacate. While the taller of the men stood, his boss instead took a seat in a black, leather chair. A bald man of average height and weight, he examined the video display through a disfigured right eye. A white, thickly furred Persian cat sat in his lap, purring pleasurably as its owner stroked it.
“Well, well,” he remarked nonchalantly, “this has been interesting, hasn’t it?”
His ally nodded in agreement.
“It certainly has been, Number One. Of course, you planned the entire scheme brilliantly.”
“Yes,” replied Blofeld, seeming somewhat distracted. He certainly enjoyed the praise, no matter how frequently he received it. “I should think Auric had no idea what he was in for when I recommended him this GoldenEye fellow.”
“You’ll forgive me, sir, if the title still feels somewhat foreign to me. However, your strategic planning certainly was inspired.”
“I had always known,” Blofeld mused, “somehow, that Julius would choose to break ranks with us. I still cannot tell you how for sure exactly, but it has happened. And I knew Goldfinger would want to take him down just as much as, perhaps even more than, I would. The moment I read the file on this Jonathan Hunter, of the tale of his encounter with the good doctor, I knew the stars had aligned.”
He paused for a moment, reflecting on the utter genius of his somewhat algebraic strategy.
“Yes, Francisco…such an opportunity comes once in a lifetime; for some, never at all; but at long last, it has happened. We placed the fly in the ointment, and he almost immediately stung out two of our problems. However, that insect may not be quite as easily disposable as we thought. We have gotten rid of Auric and Julius, but I fear, in doing so, a variable has been added to the equation; a threat to the organization.”
Scaramanga pondered these words. He had to admit, they held an undeniable grain of truth. As amicable as had proved the brief friendship between him and…the “variable,” he did pose a threat not only to those he might encounter, but also to anyone and everyone in the organization. Furthermore, a free agent who had walked into and out of their closely guarded orb of operations, dangerous man as he was, could do more to incite uprising and disloyalty than an entire world of propaganda. The potential of this man, whether he realized it or not...was frightening.
“So,” said Scaramanga, his rich voice resonating in the brief space, “what of this GoldenEye?”
At once, the feline resting in its employers arms leapt to the ground with a contemptuous growl at the name. The head of SPECTRE considered the question before giving his answer.
“I will keep an eye of my own on that one….”
THE END OF
GOLDENEYE: ROGUE AGENT
JONATHAN HUNTER WILL RETURN IN
GOLDENEYE: DECEPTION
That being said, I think people were probably turned off (and fairly enough, I suppose) by the thread title: a fanfic of a terrible video game that scarcely even features Bond, so why bother? I do wish people would consider the content in spite of the impression, so I may end up pulling a bit of a nasty trick this next time to combat that.
So...a reflection; if nobody reads it, well, I'm going to say it anyway. It feels great to finally be finished with this. Even though it's not a personal story, so I don't feel as much of a thematic attachment, revising it ended up being a wonderful writing exercise at points, both in creating and editing, and especially in a summer where I was largely too lazy to work on many other projects. Furthermore, in going back over this whole story (especially the epilogue), a theme and personal challenge/conflict for Hunter's character emerged that's now shaped the future of the story. I hope that overcomes his static nature from the original game (which is hardly ever in mind while writing at his point, by the way), and I hope it allows people to become engaged and overlook the mediocre origin of the coming story.
Now, a few fun facts/thoughts:
-The story feels massive because it took a preexisting story with a grand plot and hugely well known characters, all thrown together in an over-the-top conflict, and then tacked on a tense, multi-character-driven origin/transition tale in front of it. In short, well established (and/or many) characters in conflict + OTT plot events + decent length = a big story. Probably contributes that it took over a year getting there, but... At any rate, will be a bit briefer and less out-there going forward.
-Originally, Hunter blew up the dam himself, and knew the implications when he did it. In revisions, I determined that this was too big of a moral conflict to address realistically, so I took the edge off by having him only partly implicated. Probably still isn't realistic the way it is, but oh, well.
-The OCTOPUS wasn't included because it likely would have felt boring and repetitive. It would've meant more action for a story already dangerously close to bloated with it, and for a small objective (getting coordinates for Crab Key, or whatever it was) that could easily have been addressed in dialogue. That said, it may...or may not...make an appearance further down the road.
-At times, the globetrotting felt ridiculous; Switzerland to Hong Kong to Nevada to Jamaica to Japan, and scarcely spending any time there at all. Probably inspired by Skyfall around its release, I considered changing the casino and dam to be set in China - and, for a few reasons (destroying the Hoover Dam amongst them), maybe I should have - but it is what it is, perhaps for the best.
-There are so freaking many shootouts, fistfights, and the like. They're not my favorite thing to write and, past the point I'm at right now, may well be reduced in the future. The character stuff, while sometimes difficult, feels infinitely richer and more rewarding.
-In ways, it surprises me that the East End portion turned out alright the way that it did, partly because it's one big loose end sitting in the middle of the story, but more on that later....
-Sometimes, it felt like there were so many characters, properly addressing/developing them all seemed difficult (Onatopp); so, fewer characters going forward, but with greater focus on them.
-The editing got more careful and hand-wrought the further it went, leading to (I think) a noticeable quality gap between start and finish; but again, oh, well; it is what it is.
-If I recall, Hunter's confrontations with both Dr. No and Goldfinger were toned down in the emotional department (e.g., in the former, he started freaking out from a moral crisis, and in the latter, he almost began crying). It just felt uncomfortable, so it kinda got replaced with a "professional anger."
-I'm looking forward to getting away from volcano lairs, national monuments getting destroyed, and reactors melting down like it's just another day in the life. Besides, hopefully people will have greater interest without them.
-All in all, I'm happy with how this turned out.
Now, either somebody's read this self-interested, long-winded, whole thing or nobody has, but either way, that's that. MASSIVE thanks and my GREATEST gratitude once more to everybody who's read any part of this, and especially to those who have commented and given me support, and those who have so graciously kept reading through delay after delay; you all are wonderful. I want to get a bit more writing for it done first, but GoldenEye: Deception will make its appearance in due course for anybody who's interested - just have to kick my own butt to get it done!
Once again, thank you!
I didn't know the existence of this work of yours until I recently joined this forum. Being both a fan of GERA myself I took all the time to read it all, and I guess you'd love to hear thoughts about it. I apologize in advance though, since I'm also rewriting the game's plot in a very different way than yours I may be a bit biased despite my efforts not to be. Well in any case, let's do this by answering the points of your latest post.
- It's funny that you apologize for this story being massive, because on the contrary despite its length I thought the succession of events was pretty quick, especially from Auric Enterprises onwards. I guess you wanted to keep up with the pace of the game without extending as much as its levels, and it is true that if you did then your story might have needed to be twice as long. Still, the main issue I have with this is the characters immediately trusting each other. I actually even thought that if McLaren gave so many privileges to Hunter so quickly it was to lull him and stab him in the back later on.
- Hunter blowing up the dam... well to be perfectly honest with you I would have done it (and included moral repercussions). But I understand that this is strongly linked to my own portrayal of the character; in your story, it is consistent with Goldfinger's later line 'You never wanted your hands dirty. You just wanted them bloody' and overall with the way you developped Hunter - as in it's only at the end that he accepts to put his morality aside and truly become GoldenEye.
- I was sad to hear that you removed the Octopus from the plot (since I love the level up to the servers), but since everyone in your verse knows the existence and location of Crab key it wouldn't have been useful indeed. Wise choice of yours, hence.
- The globe trotting in the game indeed is ridiculous, which is another reason why I think that your story would have gained from an (even) slower pace.
- About the various fights, I'm surprised to hear you didn't like that much writing them. Actually I think that's one of the best things in your story; honestly, the fight with Onatopp on the dam and her eventual death made quite a big impression on me.
-About the East End portion, I guess I wasn't wrong to suspect you didn't intend it to be so long in the first place. And it is very good. A shame that it feels somehow disconnected from the rest of the story, because I would have loved to hear more about McLaren, Caroline and the survivors of the attack.
- As I write in the same universe and added even more characters to the game's story, I wasn't really deterred by the number of characters in your story. Only time it was a bit more difficult for me to keep up was during the East End's meetings, but not that it mattered that much.
- The quality gap is a phenomenon I know all too well. I guess it is a good thing that you didn't take more than a year to complete your story, otherwise you might have ended in the same hell than I'm currently in - in other words, considering to rewrite an extensive part of it to remove plot holes and get the writing style up to date. In your case, all still seems consistent so that's plus points for me. Also, now that that I come to think of it, I'm happy of how Hunter quickly ceased to be the jerk he was in the MI6 chapters.
- It is a very good thing you got rid of the emotional department in the confrontations with No and Goldfinger. I still think that Hunter speaks a bit too much before offing them, but then again he had them cornered and I did enjoy Dr No's barbs.
- And lastly, a big 'yes, me too' to your penultimate point.
My dearest wish as of now would be to see the sequel you teased, and that it's written more in the style of East End chapters. Also, I hope you'll see this post... as for its length, well, due justice I guess ;)
Now, thank you very much for writing in that verse. I have to say, it's good not to feel alone.