Caught in the Act

"I got it!" Khai exclaimed, punching the air in delight. 

As though to prove his statement, Alicia's magnetic bomb deactivated a moment after that. IRIS did not attack, but climbed up from the crater and stood stiffly beside it. 

"Heh, my attack sure was sick," Jet appraised himself, nodding at the large crater which was smoking slightly.

"Are you sure you got it?" Moon asked uncertainly, approaching IRIS with much caution. 

"Positive," Khai reassured. "Look."

He pressed on several holographic buttons, and IRIS did a sort of curtsey for Moon, who grinned. Behind Moon, Iman giggled silently into her hand.

"OK, Khai, that's enough," Moon said, though she was still smiling.

Khai tapped on a button and IRIS went back to its previous position. 

"OK, IRIS," Alicia said sternly. "We would want you to answer a few questions. First of which-"

"What are you doing here?" Jet interjected forcefully, though he looked worried.

Once again, Khai pressed on a button. IRIS raised its head slightly so that now it stared at Jet. 

"Hiding from MATA. I know they are after me, I hacked into their system and found out. I needed to hide," it said tonelessly. 

"But why did you steal IRIS?" Moon asked.

Now it turned its head in Moon's direction.

"Khai, can you stop that, it's creeping me out," Moon whispered towards Khai. Khai chuckled drily.

"Ali thought he was kicked out of the agency. He wanted to prove he is as much as an agent without me, by defeating Uno."

"Wait...why are you saying Ali as if he's not part of you?" Alicia questioned suspiciously.

"Because..." IRIS suddenly flashed a brighter shade of white. All the agents surrounding it was caught unawares and were blinded. Amongst all the screams issuing from the agents, IRIS' final sentence could still be heard. "He isn't anymore."

"Stop it!" Alicia commanded, scrambling to get up and locate IRIS.

 But even as she did, a haze of blinding white was preventing her from looking around properly. There was an unmistakable frantic buzzing of Khai's hover board somewhere, a blast, followed by a ringing silence...

"MY HOVER BOARD!" came an anguished yell that pierced through her soul like a knife.

When her vision had finally cleared, she could see the other agents covering their eyes, or else rubbing them. The lights had gone off. Though there was little they could see, but one thing was sure: IRIS had fled.

Other than that, there was a red figure squatting with his head bowed in a corner. Alicia, Iman, Moon and Jet immediately rushed over to Khai, who was staring mournfully at little pieces of metal strewn in front of him. 

Iman gasped, then said in a most reproachful tone, "Khai..."

"He...he destroyed...my hover board..." Khai gulped shakily, wiping off tears on his sleeve noisily. 

Alicia didn't know what to do. She wasn't one who was good in consulting someone about their emotions. 

While the other agents were grouped mournfully around Khai, Alicia looked around and noticed that something white was approaching her.

"Eh, Comot? What're you doing here?" she asked curiously, bending down to be level with it.

It gave several meows in different pitches, which Alicia took that it has decided to put its faith in MATA for the better sake of Ali.

"Don't worry, we'll get him back soon." Alicia patted Comot, which purred happily.

***

It was raining. Hurried footsteps of agents could be heard splashing through puddles of rainwater towards a large factory. They were sent here to capture the IRIS agent, but to their disappointment, there was no sign of him there. Other than the Main Vault nearly destroyed and flooded with water, there was nothing else left here to see or investigate. 

"How can this be?" General Rama had grumbled to Sapphire that very day, who was busy taking notes on IRIS' case from the other agents which had investigated the factory. "It's almost as if it knew we were coming for it."

"And there's some pieces of metal scrap here." a Kombat agent was saying from a smaller screen beside General Rama's. "What do you think, Sapphire?"

The camera moved towards a dozen of black and red metal. Somewhere close by were two mini tyres.

"Probably just some rubbish," Sapphire said. But then she saw something. "Wait."

"What is it?" said a voice from the transmission.

Amongst the pile of burnt metal, there was a white MATA symbol imprinted on one of the buried pieces.

***

"What is the meaning of this?" General Rama shouted angrily at the five agents, showing them an image of the singed metal of red and black. Khai looked up, opened his mouth, noticed that he lost his voice and closed them again.

"Alicia," the General suddenly barked, making Alicia stiffen. "I rather thought better of you."

Alicia looked down shamefully. It was clear amongst all the agents standing in front of him, he was most angry at Alicia.

"But General, we were just trying to help our friend," Jet stated. 

"Ha-ah," Iman said in the tiniest of voice. "We weren't trying to do anything else."

The General observed them for a moment, before letting out a sigh. 

"You five have shown great loyalty, but that doesn't mean you can simply assign yourself to a mission that is extremely dangerous and meant for trained agents only!"

"But General, we are trained," Moon said profoundly. 

"Anyone of you could've got hurt badly!" the General burst out, his eyes twitching uncontrollably. "You should've left it to the better agents!"

"I think we did very well," Jet said bravely to the General. "We managed to distract IRIS long enough to get information from it."

At this, the General faltered. It was as though he was too impressed to even make any sounds. But then he turned back harsh in a matter of time.

"And what is the information?" he rasped.

The five agents exchanged looks before nodding. They looked straight into the General's face as Alicia begun.

"Ali thought MATA had dismissed him, and wanted to prove that he is still worthy by defeating Uno-"

"How did he know-" General Rama started.

"I don't know how he found out about that," Alicia pressed on. "But IRIS has managed to hack into MATA's system. It knew it was wanted and made a run for it."

A silence so thick greeted this. General Rama's eyes were in danger of popping out.

"Hacked into MATA's-" he started again.

"Yes." Alicia said firmly. "Khai's robot was destroyed because he had tried to use it to hack into IRIS, but IRIS managed to counter hack and probably made the robot self destruct."

"The rest of the mess were made by us," Moon smiled guiltily. 

General Rama observed them once more over his long nose. Then he sighed and said, "Alright. You five are excused. But that doesn't mean you can simply choose your own missions because you like it, understand?"

"Yes, General," everyone chanted.

"You five are now assigned instead to this mission. Good luck."

And the transmission ended, leaving a stunned silence behind. The five agents stood dumbstruck. They exchanged confused looks.

"Did the General just say..." Iman said, her eyes widening.

"'You five are now assigned to this mission'," Jet repeated, frowning.

"What do you think we should do, Alicia?" Moon asked tentatively.

Alicia thought hard. They know one thing crucial fact: IRIS was going after Uno. So does that mean they should join forces with Rudy and Bakar too? That would increase the chances of catching IRIS and stopping Uno at the same time. After all, two isn't such a high number, and she has complete faith in Rudy and Bakar to perform their parts well. Bakar would come as an advantage too, since he is an adult and a definitely more experienced agent than any of them.

"Alicia?" Khai said, glancing at her worriedly.

"Oh, yes," she said, snapping back to reality. "I know what we need to do. But first, let's meet up with two of our other members."

"Wait what now?" Jet questioned sheepishly, while around him the others shrugged in reply.

***

Half an hour later, the group of five were joined by two other agents: Rudy and Bakar. Rudy looking as haughty as ever and Bakar smiling widely.

"You called us, Alicia?" Bakar asked.

Alicia nodded, then told Rudy and Bakar in particular, "We have found information that Ali, or rather IRIS, is trying to defeat Uno single-handedly. Though we don't know how it's going to do it, it doesn't know that there are two teams on the task."

***

Another group of five were grouped in a dimly lit cave. A red-haired woman was busying herself with the large computer, a large man and dark haired woman were playing poker, watched by a black-suited boy who was on the verge of falling asleep. The leader of the group, a masked man, was observing the red-haired woman's work without moving the slightest muscle. 

The large screen above them suddenly changed into the file of Ali's villainy, stamped across with an official MATA symbol.

The masked man chuckled rather sinisterly. "About time."

At that moment, crunching footsteps were heard approaching the cave. The large man and dark haired woman froze to stare at the entrance of the cave instead. The black-suited boy jerked awake. 

A teenage boy wearing white glowing glasses appeared at the entrance of the cave, illuminated by the red light of the inside-cave facility. 

"Welcome, Ali," the masked man said.