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" safe " - behind his desk - locked in a windowless burrow - protected from
earthquake - nuclear blast and CBW agents - and shielded from every means
of eavesdropping known to maN - plus a few that mortal men cannot . in an
unnamed annex to government facility - the purpose and scope of which -
most civilians - could not dream of from the bland façade of the building
above it .
Alphonse - sat , his hand shaking - for the first time in years - as he
arranged the hard copy - " doc" had just sent - so it , along With the
reports of 8 other agents - he had received in the last day - formed a "
big picture" - that only some one who had already seen too much could even
begin to comprehend .
It was at times like this that Alphonse - wished he w2as not that someone .
Treading softly to - the small wall safe - sitting incongruously - across
from the Huge - 5 ton freestanding safe - which sat brooding in the corner -
despite the attempt - to hide it - behind a monster ugly yucca plant .
He did not twitch - as he - disarmed the 3 interlocks - that would blow
himself and the safes contents into if one step of the complex procedure was
botched .
Strangely - Aphonse did tense as he - removed the . The last CD - the 13th
in line - "it would be " he mused . as he slammed the safe door shut - the .
interlocks resetting with a series of notes hat reminded him all was secure
.
There was no logic - to this - only that fate had decreed exactly 12 changes
of the secure server encryption algorithms - before this fateful day .
Unlike the rest - it was black - she shook his head has he reflected the wry
humour - of ..... dam what was his name , dead now as most of them were who
had Sacrificed their minds bodies and more .... For what - it was coming to
pass any way . had they really made a difference .
One way of another - we were going to find out . Did the thinning of ranks -
that the nearly 70 years of war had achieved . mean anything ?
Were the archives , the eldritch tomes - all the mission logs -
communications intercepts - reams of text , man was not meant to know -
prove to be of any worth ?
Would the trinkets - charms and artefacts- collected at such cost in bodies
and souls make any difference . what so ever ?
Will any of the rituals - painfully mastered on a none Euclidean learning
curve - be of any hope of salvation - from what is to come
I guess - its time to find out .
As the audio feed from " general Fairfield" - and his team buzzed in his
ear - courtesy - the earpiece he wore . he smilled - as all teams
reported - 100% success - "doc" - had been killed - but every one knew - he
was dead any way .
At least something was going right . Or seemed to be - it may not even
matter . That was the problem with the Endtimes - the was no prior
experience - no precedent to guide the game - luck and skill will have to be
thrown to chance - as only one thing is certain - we cannot afford to
loose - problem is every one else has the same idea .
Was this even the endtimes ? - Well other people certainly thought so - -
and if in doubt - one has to go with the flow .
His heart skipped a beat - as the black disk - yielded its information , the
plain grey server - hummed softly as it digested the data .
It was Time to call in the cavalry .
Scant seconds later - the status - light flashed for a moment - as the
programs were erased - and written over . finally done - the black CD was
ejected - its job done - allophones snapped it back in the jewel case - and
smacked it hard with the base of the obsidian statue of a deity. - not
worshiped on earth . that sat in the corner of his desk. savouring the
irony - as the image of the unearthly god peered out from above his fist .
was its image - helping to sow the seeds of its destruction ?
And the by time - the disc had stopped smoking - on 1 million computers -
around the globe - owned by a disparate group of men and women . the - same
bland message - offering free nude pictures of britteny spears - flashed on
the screen . as they opened their "in-box" .
999,819 of the recipients kill filed it with out a second glance - cursing
the Spam bot they assumed created it .
181 of the people reading it - demonstrated how sad and gullible they were -
by clicking the link - to start the tortuous slog through - banner ads - pop
ups and teaser pages - as they vainly sought to reach the " free " picture -
which was fake anyway .
the remaining 4 were griped by a fear they had tried to keep at bay - the
realisation - that they had lived longer than they wished too - and the
would have to face the menace again after all .
and so - without even saying goodbye to any of those - they had held dear in
their past life . stepped out to meet their destiny .
they paused briefly - to collect various objects - they had collected from
varying points in space and time - before heading off to ..... save the
world? ... wait ...hadn't they done that already ? ...... Too late to think
about that now - show time .
a casual observer - unversed in the nature of the war which had consumed
their lives - would have been amazed that none of them thought to include an
weapons in these " essentials" despite the fact that between them they had
over 70 fire arms salted away " just in case" and had at one time or
another killed countless foes - human an inhuman - in the defence of
humanity .
and with every second - every step - every breath - they moved closer ... To
the end ? ....... Or was it the beginning? ...... hell ! - that's the
problem with a war in 4 dimensions - its tooooooooo fucking easy to loose
track .
*******************************************
END.
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