The name was kind of a misnomer. When he’d first heard command center he’d pictured something like NASA mission control. This was more like an office overlooking the laboratory floor, populated by a handful of nerds armed with computers and some big screens on the walls. It wasn’t impressive because of how it looked, but rather, what he could screw with from here. The nerds looked at him fearfully as he entered and then furtively went back to their work. They reminded him of a bunch of ground squirrels.

“I don’t know who you intend to use for this mission then, sir, because we’ll need time to get other assets together. You don’t intend to send only our regular forces, do you?”

It had been Foster who had asked that question. It was a reasonable question, since the former CIA man had just been put in charge of a hit against the biggest badass in the federal government, but Stricken figured the hesitancy was because Foster was still a little squeamish from his encounter with Franks in Vegas. No STFU man wanted to go up against a monster without monsters of his own.

“Of course not, Foster. I’m a firm believer in letting our subcontracted employees do the bleeding on our behalf.” He spotted exactly who he was hoping to find in the command center and walked directly toward her. “Hello, Dr. Bhaskara.”

She turned and nodded politely to the albino. “Mr. Stricken.”

Stricken liked the Project’s head scientist. She was an attractive Indian woman in her mid forties, with a British accent that reminded him of Mary Poppins, but she was every bit as driven as he was, and as far as he could tell, she’d never been weighed down with any of those pesky medical ethics some of these brilliant science types seemed to get hung up on. “Any new developments with our babies?”

Dr. Bhaskara sniffed. She didn’t like when he referred to the Project Nemesis prototypes as babies. “Of the thirteen we have decanted so far, the prototypes are still testing at peak efficiency. Their ability to learn is remarkable. There has yet to be a single testing failure, cognitive or physical, thus far.”

“What’re the new scores looking like?”

“Far better than expected. They are remarkable. Let me put it this way, Mr. Stricken. Take ten minutes to demonstrate the skills necessary and another ten minutes to explain the rules of the sport to them, and then they would easily win the Olympic gold medal for that event and their human opponents wouldn’t even have a chance.”

“I’m not rigging the Tour de France, Doctor, hilarious as that would be. I’m talking combat capabilities.”