It's been a few days, but I have been genuinely busy.
Busy packing, that is.
It took a while, but I finally got the memo. It was sitting on my bed in the Ice Palace, wrapped in an official envelope and garlanded with all the official menace the President of the United States could embody in the "to" line.
Of course, it was being used by one of my "guests" to fan himself. "You got mail," he cooed, not realizing it meant the party was over.
What did it say? Four things: me; the Ice Palace; no longer; as soon as yesterday.
I can't say I haven't been expecting this. I knew it was in the cards as soon as Mr. USA got down here with the UN and, looking at what we'd been up to since we took it over, rolled his eyes so far back into his head it's a wonder he couldn't read his own !@#$ mind.
If anything, I'm surprised I didn't get recalled sooner. I figured we had less than a month, anyway, so being one week short isn't too terrible.
(I do owe Carl a fiver, though. He called it. Bastard.)
So it's time to clean up, then. Time to pack it up, put it away, tear it down.
Closing time, as the song goes.
Time to collect the cold weather gear and the guns. Put them in boxes. Account for every bullet fired, every piece of equipment used, abused, and lost.
Time to sweep up the bottles. Clean up the glass. Toss it somewhere to be recycled, knowing it'll be swirling in a trash vortex in the Pacific, this time next week.
Time to send the tranny hookers back to Jo'berg. Give them a last slap on the ass to say thanks. Maybe a few Hamiltons in the bra for the good ones.
Time to take our !@#$ out of the commissary. Toss our food out into the snow. Laugh quietly as the Blue Helmets learn to cook the exciting local cuisine on their own.
Time to figure out what we're going to do with the kids. I think the leftie commie pinko reporter I've collected is going to see about getting them to Neo York as part of the immersion process. I'll see he gets the way as greased as possible, but I won't tell him it was me that did it.
(SPYGOD likes doing things like that. Just don't tell anyone, son. They'll start to think I've gone soft in my old age.)
And then, finally, it'll be time to do the one thing I really !@#$ hate doing. I will personally see to the handing over of all relevant files, sensor logs, and information that The COMPANY collected before, during, and after our taking of the base.
All the evidence we've gathered, all the supernazi corpses we made, all the crazy science we trashed, and all the unofficial souvenirs we were planning on taking until the U-!@#$ing-N showed up to ruin the party. All cataloged, numbered, and handed over for posterity.
Finally-finally, I have to give Mr. USA everything we know about The Chamber, except for the one crucial thing we can't help them with. Namely, getting the damn door open again.
I know he'll demand to know what I do, but I'll tell him I know nothing. And I will say that knowing that he can't force me to tell him the truth because he's never been able to tell when I'm lying.
How do you see the falsehoods in a glass eye?
But I also know he's got a backup plan. Dr. Yesterday's already been contacted, and he and his family are doubtlessly already enroute to Neuschwabenland as we speak.
I'm sure that, given enough time, the world's greatest scientist will doubtlessly crack the case of The Chamber's door, just as he's cracked just about every other thing that America's placed on his desk.
Maybe. Or... maybe not.
You see, I know something that Mr. USA does not. Or, more accurately, I know something that Mr. USA has chosen not to remember. Something about another closing time, a long time ago, when we were bugging out of Europe and taking certain things and people with us.
Not all the people who left were the same people who arrived. Some changes were made to the manifest. Some alterations performed, both out of a sense of national security and human decency.
And some of those alterations, known only to a select few, are the sort of things that tend to engender extreme gratitude, resulting in the occasional large favor.
So yeah, I'm blackmailing a mega-genius into pretending his xeno-retro-engineering skills aren't up to this task. I don't know how long he can keep it up, or how long he'll have to. But so long as he can keep that door shut, I'll consider his debt to me paid in full.
(For now.)
One last stroll around my bachelor pad. One last piss out of the broken window onto the floor below. One last attempt to bean a Blue Helmet with pellets from my magnificent alien love god penis.
On the way out of Vietnam, the radio station said "Goodbye, and see you next war." We'll be back, somehow. We always do.
It's why I smile when Randolph Scott looks at me, as I walk past him and those kids, and asks "what now?" I could tell him, but then I'd have to kill him.
And where would be the fun in that?
Outside the blast doors, Antarctica is a sheet of bright, blinding light. SPYGOD vision changes the whiteout into distinct shapes, all buffeted by flashy motes in the wind. I chew on a tjbang stick, grin like the devil just sucked my !@#$ for a quarter, and leave.
For now.
(SPYGOD is listening to Closing Time (Semisonic) and drinking a flask of Regal Lemon Gin)
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