“S, scan the building for traps.”

Traps detected. Showing locations now.

A few traps showed in my vision, highlighted red. It was one thing to know where the traps were, but it was another to clear them. Luckily, most of them were based around motion sensors or laser wires. 

Pressure plates were simple, as long as they didn’t cover too much space. Some traps, in some scenarios, could also be directly controlled by the “enemies”. In reality, though, it was just the robot assigned to the kill house that was controlling these traps.

These were the most dangerous, as some of these traps could be used from great distances, or were very hard to detect, as they didn’t need to “extend” themselves to know when to be used.

For example, one could find lasers with smoke. Pressure plates could be scanned. But all a poison dart needed was about a millimeter-wide hole in the wall, and a tiny antenna.

Much harder to detect. 

Anyways, none of the traps S highlighted for me were pointed at, or on, the stairs leading to the house. I ascended them and cracked the door open.

Kevin had told me to watch my feet, but his “advice” hadn’t really been helpful, as it was quickly obvious why he’d said so.The door opened to an open foyer, with rooms on either side. But the entire first floor, and from what I could see, all of the second floor had been trapped with pressure plates, each of which was tied to a mine. 

If it was just a situation where I needed to clear the hostiles inside, this would have been an extremely easy kill house. I could have just tossed a grenade in, and let the chain of explosions handle everything.

But given that there was an object I needed to retrieve… if I set off all the mines, the object would most likely be blown to bits or even vaporized.

To start, I threw in my drone and hunkered down outside.

The drone was capable of scanning for traps, and it was also quite capable at safely scanning for hostiles.

Unlike the drones of this world, the drones of the old world were technologically speaking far superior. They weren’t fan-based, but instead used a form of electromagnetic propulsion to move around instead. 

I flew the drone into the house, and used it to safely activate a few of the motion-activated traps. With a small electric discharge gun, I was also able to disable a few others.

The pressure plates, though, I didn’t have an answer for. All the mines were hidden under the building’s flooring, and I wasn’t confident enough to try my hand at removing the flooring without tripping the plates. As for an EMP grenade… it was possible for these mines to be rigged to blow if the connection was terminated, somehow. I wouldn’t put it past C Systems, at least.

Even the combat suit wouldn’t be able to be able to protect me if anything went awry.

At the very least, that the floor on both levels was completely covered in pressure plates meant that there likely wouldn’t be any enemies to deal. Meaning, it was a static kill house. I wouldn’t need to worry about changing variables.

“S, scan the walls for traps as we move. How big is your range, again?”

For the level of detail necessary to reliably detect all traps, I am able to scan around you with a five foot radius.

“That’ll be enough.”

I leaned in through the door and slapped my hand, palm open, against the wall just inside the door. Then, I tested my weight.

It held.

I then slapped my other hand onto the wall, and dragged my feet in and stomped against the wall, until I was attached to the wall on the inside of the building, perched like a frog above the floor.

The combat suit was made so that the wearer would be able to climb up the sides of skyscrapers, nevermind the wall of a two-story building like this one. Still, it’d taken me several hours of practice to just get used to the sensation of hanging off a wall. It was almost like rock climbing, except for the lack of a safety rope.

Was it like free climbing then? Perhaps, but I wouldn’t be able to say for sure. After all, I’d never gone free climbing before.

Either way, it wasn’t a great feeling, being stuck to the wall just a foot or two above some mines. I slowly lifted my right hand, crossed it over my left, and then slowly did the same with my feet.

In this manner, I slowly climbed my way along the wall toward the stairs. Climbing the wall to reach the second floor was even easier.

“This seems almost too simple, S. Are you sure you’re not detecting anything?”

Scans are negative.

I paused, then lifted one hand off the wall and tapped the side of my head.

Inside the combat suit’s helmet, my sight zoomed forward - I now effectively had superhuman vision.

Really though, I was just looking at zoomed-in video feed from a camera mounted between my eyes. Using the magnification, I was trying to spot manually-activated traps, anything that could have escaped S’s attention.

Nothing.

“S, how far am I from the objective?”

Linearly, you are approximately twenty feet from the objective.

“Got it, thanks.”

I slowly made my way forward, until it came time to make my way around the doorframe of the master bedroom. My hand stuck to the wall just fine, but when I tried to attach my leg…

The drywall suddenly collapsed, and both my left hand and leg were suddenly falling towards the ground. Until now, I’d taken care to maintain three points of contact with the wall at all times, but suddenly all of my weight was supported by my right hand and foot.

I could see the drywall beginning to crack. With no better alternative, I let go and held on to the door frame for dear life. 

No fucking wonder the task had seemed too easy. As I looked at the drywall that had crumbled beneath my feet, I could see that it was extremely thin. Clearly, the point of the exercise had been to lull the climber into a false sense of security. Then, they’d remove the ground, literally from the climber’s feet.

If I’d been just a bit more careless, I would’ve died then and there.

Still hanging to the doorframe, I looked around. There was a large, queen-sized bed in the middle of the room, as well as a bedside stand on either side. There was a door on my left that I presumed led to the bathroom, and there was another just past it that was likely for the closet. On my right, I could see a dresser just around the corner. I’d have to be pretty acrobatic to reach it, but it was possible. 

“S, scan the dresser for traps.”

The dresser is alarmed. The alarm is connected to the mines beneath the floor, on a five second timer.

I looked around, but didn’t see any other options. 

“S, highlight the objective item for me.”

A red outline of an item appeared on top of the bedroom stand.

“Alright, not too bad.” I muttered under my breath.

With how strong I was, I could clutch to the doorframe with just my knees, so I activated the drone again and checked the bed for traps.

Negative.

“Well, here goes nothing.”

Preparing myself, I threw myself around the corner, landed on the dresser, then shot a grappling hook out from my left arm and used it to drag myself to the bed. I rolled over and grabbed the objective with my right arm, then used my remaining momentum to roll to my feet, and leaped towards the window.

*Bzzzzt*

Something shocked me as I crashed through the window, and I fell to the floor outside, convulsing. After a mere second, though, the building behind me exploded, knocking me another twenty yards away.

I landed at C9-S2’s feet, and it scanned the item in my hand.

“Congratulations, Agent. You’ve completed your task.”

“...” 

A while later, I woke up in the infirmary.

I detached myself and got up from the bed, then winced.

They’d fixed me up, mostly, but the aching and pain was still there.

I’d need to submerge myself into a serum bath later for that.

But first, food!