The interrogator was as small and white and unremarkable as the room. “I want you to know that this will be your only opportunity to explain your actions. Your future depends on you being completely forthcoming during this investigation.”

“You expect a confession?”

“I want the truth, Agent Franks.”

“Are you my judge?”

“Your fate is out of my hands. Everything you say here will go straight to the top. He makes the call. Do you understand?”

Franks nodded.

“Start at the beginning. Tell me everything.”

The California Incident

18 Months Ago

20 miles off the California coast

The final ritual had begun.

Another massive wave lifted the fishing boat. Lightning flashed across the sky as it came crashing back down. A mighty blast of water came over the side and knocked a few of the cultists from their feet, but the rest continued chanting and circling around the runes painted on the deck.

Cold water ran through the seams of the crate to soak him, moistening the dried blood on his suit enough to make it pliable again. His crate was about the size of a coffin. If it was swept overboard he’d have to break out, swim to the surface, and try to find the boat as it was being tossed about on thirty-foot waves, and considering that he’d already been shot and repeatedly stabbed tonight, that would be inconvenient.

The rain was coming down in hard sheets. Only suicidal idiots would take a boat out into a storm like this, but after the Monster Control Bureau had interrupted their plot on the mainland, the remaining cultists had been desperate enough to try to perform their big finale right on top of their target audience. Cultists were a particularly annoying type of vermin.

Some of the deck was visible through the air holes punched in the side of the crate. The ship was running dark and the storm clouds were blocking the moon, but none of that mattered to his augmented vision. Once a month the Bureau scientists stuck a needle into his eye and injected a syringe full of burning chemicals, which helped him see better in the dark. Originally developed by DARPA, the vision enhancement serum had driven the original human test subjects so mad with pain that they’d clawed their own eyes out. He found the process mildly uncomfortable. The injections meant he had to replace his eyes every few years, as they inevitably caused ocular cancer, but that was a small price to pay for increased tactical awareness.