9/25/12 - Over and Over We Die One After the Other

So it's mid-afternoon in St. Petersburg, and yours truly is putting his feet up and enjoying a very !@#$ fine bottle of vodka.

And yes, I know that sounds !@#$ing obvious, son, but you'll be happy to know that SPYGOD got himself some culture, today. I managed to actually visit the Russian Vodka Museum, which I'd been !@#$ing promising myself I'd do for some time. And, after a !@#$ fine tasting, complete with zakuski, I bought myself a nice souvenir, and have been pulling on it ever since. 

Good !@#$ing day for it, too, son. Kind of blustery outside, now. A sharp, !@#$ wind is slipping around the cracks and corners, trying to slice up your !@#$ skin and send you indoors. Overcast and dreary, windy and wet.

Spy weather, as we liked to say when all we could imagine about a place like this was that it was as cold, grey, and heavy as the government that controlled it. I used to feel that way too, especially since every time I came here I was out on spy business, and either trying to !@#$ing kill someone or avoid being !@#$ing killed. Sometimes both at once.

But you know, son? This is a big !@#$ country. And as much as it's !@#$ing easy, and maybe even desirable in times of war, to just point your !@#$ing finger at the map and say 'here lies the big !@#$ enemy,' the fact is that there's no absolute evil or absolute good in this world. Just endless !@#$ing shades of grey.

Take this city, for example. It was settled by the Swedes, back in the day. They called it Nyen, which was their name for the Neva river. And they lived and !@#$ed and smoked fish and went about their dark and dreary lives that would eventually translate into really dark and dreary crime fiction, come the 21st century.

And then Peter the Great came along and took the !@#$ing thing, back in 17whateverthe!@#$itwas, and stamped his !@#$ name on it. St. Petersburg became the capitol of Russia, and stayed that way until the !@#$ Commies took over in the !@#$ Revolution.

And those !@#$ers were all about changing names, weren't they? First they called it Petrograd, and then they named it Leningrad after Comrade Number One bit the !@#$ing dust. And that sorry state of affairs lasted until the Soviet Union bit the dust, too, and the people voted to have it named St. Petersburg again.

Different !@#$ names, same !@#$ city. Same beautiful architecture hiding under decades of socialist rot and decay. Same people trying to live and be free in the face of something nasty and degrading. Same struggle everywhere in this country, and the sad thing is that you don't always realize how !@#$ing beautiful it is until the rain and the snow stop and the Sun comes out to say hello.

I can hear it now, up there, talking to me from behind the clouds. Solar wind is a song so !@#$ loud that you can't always !@#$ing make it out, but when you just sit back and listen, like I'm doing now, you can actually start making out the melody.

...

Speaking of changing names, I'm sure you'll recall me talking about Soviet Steel, now and again.

Who's he? Just the guy I ran into when I parachuted into Havana to try and kill that !@#$er Castro, all those years back. Six foot ten, wearing this hideous, red, one-piece bathing suit that could have doubled as gear for the Russian women's swim team, and made of !@#$ing metal from head to toe. Remember him?

That's right, son. One of the best known of the People's Protectors, which was the Soviet Union's happy, communist answer to the Liberty Patrol. Except that we wanted to free people, and they wanted them !@#$ing enslaved by socialist bull!@#$.

Of course, I'm sure they thought the same !@#$ thing about us, or at least said they did. God only !@#$ing knows what they really thought about it, given what a sorry snakepit that group was.

!@#$, son, there was one night where half the people just !@#$ing disappeared. And it was all because someone thought someone else was going to narc on him, so he !@#$ing narced on him first, but the guy he narced on narced on him, and a few other people, and then they narced on a few other people on the way down...

Yeah, a real Soviet-style cluster!@#$, son. One minute there were twenty Peoples Protectors, and there had always been twenty People's Protectors. And the next thing you know there were ten People's Protectors, and there had always been ten People's Protectors. Good thing that things like that could never happen in the good old US of A, huh?

(Yes, son. I'm being !@#$ing sarcastic. But we'll talk about that fat !@#$ McCarthy another day.)

But whatever their !@#$ problems were, you couldn't deny that every time the Soviets went out to influence the world in their slimy, dirty way, there was one of those Protectors along for the ride. And they were there to make sure we didn't do the obvious !@#$ing thing with a high powered rifle or some disposable third party, or maybe just a naked and unashamed superfist to the noggin.

That's why there were a few of them in Comrade Castro's party pad, the night that I parachuted in, in case you were wondering. 

Anyway, by that point the Liberty Patrol didn't exist, anymore. Korea kind of put an end that !@#$ing ride, and instead we had the COMPANY, and, by extension, the Freedom Force. And they were out doing superheroey !@#$ instead of just acting as an arm of the American military. That was what they had the COMPANY for, after all, and if I needed them on an op, I could draft them in, but the rest of the time they were out catching muggers, putting out fires, getting kittens out of trees...

You know, superheroey !@#$.

So how about the People's Protectors? Well, they did superheroey !@#$, too, but it was all in-country and hyped all to !@#$, so you never really knew how much of it was true, false, or just inflated out of all proportion to what actually happened.

However, every once in a while, you would have some big !@#$ world-shattering disaster that was so !@#$ bad and nasty that we all had to drop our flags, rally around the middle, and fight together to save the !@#$ planet. I'm talking about things like THAT, of course, and some other really crazy, potential world-killing things that blundered into our flightpath before and after we built Deep-Ten. Conceptual and trans-cosmic alien invasions, reality breakdowns, godwars... you know, the sort of !@#$ they keep me around to deal with.

And at those times, and on those days, I very gladly clasped hands with people I'd been trying to !@#$ing kill not less than 24 hours previously, because if we didn't table that !@#$ for later and work together, there wasn't going to be a later to table it to.

Which is how I got to know Soviet Steel, all four of him.

Four Soviet Steels, you ask? Why yes, son. There were.

The first one, who did it the longest, was the same one I met in Havana, that one night. And it turns out we'd sort of met, before, when we'd all converged on Berlin, back during the War. Except that the Commies got there, first, and didn't want to let us see what they'd found. But by that point I'd !@#$ing killed Hitler, and we figured the war was pretty much !@#$ing over in Europe, at least until we learned about ABWEHR, and that the People's Protectors had !@#$ing failed to stop them from escaping...

But yeah, that's another story for another day, too.

So yeah, we'd seen each other across the line. And at the time I'd probably thought "Who's that metal mother!@#$er?" And he'd probably thought "Oh, he killed Hitler, did he?"

And little did I know at the time, or even until well after Havana, but that Soviet Steel actually !@#$ing respected me. The only reason they let me out of Havana alive at all is because he vouched for me, in his own red, realpolitik way. And the next time we met up, when there was a real !@#$ing threat in the Pacific !@#$ Ocean, he actually shook my !@#$ hand and said it was good to see me.

Can you imagine that? Mr. !@#$ing USA wouldn't even acknowledge my !@#$ing presence in the same !@#$ room, but here's this guy who threatened me with nuclear war, and that I'd been trying to off ever since, and he thought I was worth having as a frenemy.

So we fought as allies and enemies, at least as much as his handlers in SQUASH would let him, and we got to know one another. He stayed down in Cuba for decades, watching over Comrade Fidel, and I made !@#$ sure no one actually killed Comrade Fidel so World War III didn't break out. Call it a !@#$ weird working relationship, if you have to, but it worked, and over time I tried to kill him less and less, and he was more polite.

!@#$er even sent me vodka on my birthday, once. And it wasn't even !@#$ing poisoned.

Not as good as this stuff, though. Should have bought two bottles.

Where was I... oh, right. So one day, in the early 80's, something happens, and the next time I see Soviet Steel, he's not my Soviet Steel. He's a foot shorter, with a different uniform, a Ukrainian accent, and no tolerance for us Americanski capitalists and our decadent ways.

What happened? Well, you remember that period in the 80's where every !@#$ time you turned around the Soviets had a new leader because the previous one had either fallen out of favor or just !@#$ing kicked the red bucket? And you remember that SQUASH eventually got too weird, even for the Soviet !@#$ing Union to handle?

Well, Brezhnev was SQUASH, and liked Soviet Steel. And the guy who took over from him, which was Kuznetzov, wasn't exactly SQUASH, but he liked Soviet Steel, too.

But when Kuznetsov stepped down to let Andropov take the chair, it turned out that Andropov was not kindly disposed to SQUASH, and did not like Soviet Steel at all. And since the Soviet Steel technique was something they could do to people, rather than waiting to find someone with usable Talents, well, they just "retired" my Soviet Steel, and wheeled out a new one, who was supposedly three times as strong as the old one, thirty times more pompously Soviet, and hated SQUASH like a Saturday night hemorrhoid.

What happened to my Soviet Steel? Well, son, if you're going to have a man made out of Steel on your side, you !@#$ well better have a gun big enough to take him down in case he decides he doesn't want to be on your side, anymore. And they reported a successful test fire of that gun on June 17th, 1983, which was just one day after Yuri Andropov took over.

...

Yeah. Sad times. Like I said, he was my enemy, but I was actually starting to like that red, Soviet !@#$.

So we had this new Soviet Steel, looking after Comrade Fidel. And he was a tin douchebag with no sense of humor, but at least a lot of nationalist honor. On those occasions when we fought on the same side I could at least rely on him to do what he !@#$ing said he was going to do, and I got the sense that he was really !@#$ angry that you couldn't say the same about a lot of the other People's Protectors, many of whom were also second-generation, or the third or fourth person to wear the uniform after the War.

One night in 86', between near-endless waves of weird-!@#$ alien god machine things from Dimension !@#$ Your Mother In The !@#$hole, he and I got a little drunk on some vodka I'd appropriated from a smashed-up liquor store around the corner. And he opened up just a little, and told me something interesting.

"Comrade SPYGOD," he says, slurring his words a little: "In America, you know the truth, but you pretend you do not know it, because you love the lie. In Russia, we know the lie, but we pretend we do not know it, because we love the truth."

Yeah, I'm still !@#$ing puzzling over that one, son. I was going to ask for an example, but a couple seconds later we got ambushed by another wave of those weird-!@#$ alien god machine things, and that was that's night exposition quotient right down the !@#$ing toilet. So I never really got a chance to follow up on it.

And wouldn't you know? The next time I see him, in 1988, he's not him, anymore. He's half a foot taller, got a thinner face, a better costume, and sounds like he grew up in Berlin.

And he is the slimiest, most worthless, piece of !@#$ Soviet super I have ever met in my life.

Seriously, son. I mean, the first Soviet Steel was a true !@#$ believer, but had that belief tempered with enough humanity and decency to be called a worthy adversary. The second one was a true believer, too, and as for humanity... well, he had his moments. But if you jammed the soviet stick any further up his !@#$ you could have used his mouth for a !@#$ing paper towel dispenser.

This third guy had none of their humanity or decency, and he sure as !@#$ didn't believe in a !@#$ thing, either. He was all posture and poses, and was basically down in Havana to party his !@#$ing lights out at Comrade Fidel's expense. Didn't give a !@#$ about anything, and no one really cared to tell him otherwise.

What happened? Well, son, that's a big !@#$ story in and of itself, and I'm kind of on a short schedule here. Suffice it to say that the second Soviet Steel's stick in the !@#$ caused some big !@#$ problems for someone during a particularly messy situation, and that big !@#$ problem caused a messy situation of its own. And so the Soviets decided that they didn't need to be giving any true believers any !@#$ing powers from then on out.

But that was 1988. Three short years later, it's 1991. You know what !@#$ing happens then.

And when the Soviets essentially tell their Supers that they aren't getting paid at the end of the month, and they're on their own, now, the true believers stay with Castro and other friendly nations, and the people who were just in it for the cash get the !@#$ out of dodge and go try to make a buck.

The third Soviet Steel fell in with the Russian mob, doing wetwork. A couple years after that, he got the wrong !@#$ people angry with him, and the next thing you know he's been melted down into ingots and left in someone's safe.

Which brings us up to Soviet Steel number four, who was created by the new government as part of a new Russian superhero group. My old SQUASH buddy Boris Yeltsin spearheaded it, kind of as a response to the COMPANY, the Freedom Force, and all that !@#$.

It lasted for a good long while, too, but it eventually it proved to be a PR disaster in the waiting, especially when it was discovered where they'd gotten some of their Supers from. And then...

Well, again, son, that's another big !@#$ story I don't have time for. But the important part is that they actually let people !@#$ing retire from that group, rather than retiring them. And Soviet Steel number four was hired to look after the man who took over from Boris Yeltsin.

Being the former President of Russia, who is quite possibly the most evil !@#$ing person to be in charge of this region since Joe Stalin was alive and grooming his !@#$ mustache with the blood of Soviet Jews. The new new new Soviet Steel, whose highly-checkered past has such proper nouns as "Alfa Spetsnaz" and "suspected serial killer," has been keeping that lizard-eyed, worthless !@#$ alive this entire time as the head of his security team.

Which is just !@#$ing ducky, as it'd made it pretty !@#$ hard to get any good info on the guy's more secret movements. But one thing I did learn, lately, thanks to a few people who really needed big !@#$ing money in the time of the Imago, was that old lizard eyes somehow !@#$ing escaped the events of 3/15, and went right the !@#$ underground before those tin-suited mother!@#$ers could get their hands on him.

That's right, son. The way they tell it, he took one look at the !@#$ White House, that morning, did that weird !@#$ing thing where you swear his eyes are going to go all lizard-like for a second, and then turned right around, got in his car, and told the driver to get them as lost as possible. Then he shot the driver, and he and Soviet Steel took a walk, and just vanished somewhere in the streets of Moscow.

I think the Imago gave up looking for his !@#$, after a while, which is probably what he wanted. And I'm sure he's probably planning some weaselly comeback, as soon as the !@#$ers take the !@#$ off, which I'm sure he's figured is coming at some point, here, because he's !@#$ smart enough to have figured that out.

But, lucky me, I happen to have a few talents up my sleeves, even in a !@#$ty world like the Imago have left us. And one of those talents has gotten me the address for this nice safehouse he's been keeping, here in St. Petersburg.

Yeah, son. This one. And if I've gotten my timing right, he should be coming in through that door over there in a few minutes.


Oh, and Soviet Steel? Well, that's a !@#$ good question, son. But let me answer that with another question or two.

You know how I said that the Soviets had a way to kill their metal men? And that's what happened to the first Soviet Steel?

Well, after the fall of the Soviet Union, there were a lot of scientists who also got told they weren't getting paid on Friday. Some of them really wanted money. And some of the ones who really wanted money came to us folks in the COMPANY, and told us all kinds of interesting stories.

Like, for example, how to make a gun that could put a big !@#$ hole through the skull of a man made of living steel, and disrupt his energy patterns enough to actually kill that steel man stone !@#$ing dead.

So we got the !@#$ plans, and we made copies of that !@#$ gun. And I had several copies made that were just for me, and I stashed them in lockups all over the world, especially here in Russia. Because I knew there'd be a day when I would have to run into that Soviet Steel !@#$er, or someone just like him, and I'd need something that would kill him. 

And that's why I've been sitting here, in this nice chair, with a fancy gun in one hand, a nice, almost empty bottle of fine Vodka in the other, and my feet up on what's left of the head of Soviet Steel number four.

Because I've traveled here, to St. Petersburg, to have some words with the former President of Russia. And I'll be !@#$ed if I'm going to have those words left unsaid because of a sad knock-off of one of the few Soviet Supers I'd have been genuinely sorry to have had to kill.

And with that, you'll have to pardon me, son. I hear a certain pair of footsteps coming down the way, and I that means it's time to play 'surprise house guest.'

We'll catch up later, really. But right now, I got a world to save, and a really bad idea on how to do it, and this sly, nasty !@#$er may be the only salvation I have.

So it's a good thing I brought two bottles, eh?

(SPYGOD is listening to One Hundred Years (The Cure) and having a Rusky Standart Platinum)

9/24/12 - Shapeless in the Dark Again - Pt. 2

Unseen and unheard, the mysterious pair move across the world. They watch, they listen, and they consider, and then they either act or do not.

And with that decision, they are gone, and on to their next stop.

* * *

In Neo York City, right around 2:30 in the afternoon, they observe several different groups of people, almost at once.

They begin by looking in on a large band of those undocumented souls who make the technotropolis, itself, their home. These "Free," who live off the city's offered nourishment, and nestle in its warm and quiet corners, have weathered the last six months with hardly any interference from the Imago. It would seem that, as they have turned their back on the general program of the world, those who currently oversee that world have next to no use for them, and therefore no concern.

Clearly, that was a mistake on their part, for the Free's seeming disinterest is merely a front. They actually do care about the world they appear to have turned their back on, and they have proven this by willingly taking refugees into their care for the time being.

Small people with big problems, mostly: those who asked too many questions, or heard the wrong answers, or were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But there are also those who did and said things considered antithetical to the new regime. The free thinkers and loud talkers, internet outlaws and rogue pamphleteers, graffiti provocateurs and park proclaimers -- all marked for a visit from the Imago, and all mysteriously vanished just before they could get there.

It's almost as if they knew the metal men were coming.

As they watch the motley, raggedy band, moving deep into the catacombs and forgotten sub-basements of the old city -- the parts not gifted with mind and movement by the Compuconqueror -- the group stops at a large junction of strangely dry tunnels, and one of them consults her old, silver pocketwatch.

"Any minute now," the older woman says, taking a careful step back, as though she could feel something coming. A second  later, the place she was standing comes alive with electrical fire and strange crackling, and their hair stands right up on end as a massive hole opens up in the invisible fabric of the world.

Their air goes wooshing into the hole, which looks to be someplace sunny and warm. Figures walk through from the other end: men and women and children, all wide-eyed and nervous, and some of them quite scared for their lives.

At the front of the band is a youngish, stern-looking figure, dressed in black leather armor and sporting a rakish eyepatch. The back of his shaved head is a ruin of scars, wires, and ridged tubes, and he's carrying a gun that looks way too large for him to handle.

The woman with the watch sees him approach, and then walks up to kiss him -- hard and with what appears to be relief.

"How goes the front lines, embedded ?" she asks him, a breathless few seconds later.

"Not good," Randolph sighs, looking around: "This is all we could salvage from Van Nuys. Everyone else who survived was picked up for questioning."

She looks at him, taking his dark meaning, and nods, looping a hand around his waist as she turns to the crowd: "Folks? Don't worry. You're safe, now. These people with me will help you. Go with them, please."

They look to her, then to the smiling people who have come to greet them. Finally, one of their number extends a hand in trust, and the others follow suit.

"I have to get back," Randolph says, looking at the hole: "Things are about to go down. We heard from You Know Who, finally."

"Orders, huh?" she chuckles, kissing him again: "I always loved a man in uniform."

"I always !@#$ing hated taking orders."

"You give them very well."

"Yeah..." he sighs, looking at the gun: "Funny old !@#$ world, huh?"

"Do you think there will be more after this?"

"Wayfinder can't see that far in advance. But I figure there's going to be a lot of evacuations before this is all over. Especially to here."

"We'll be waiting," she says, giving him a last kiss goodbye: "Tell Jess I said hi, and tell the kids I'm making them the best hummus ever when this is over."

"I will," he says, and then, with one last squeeze, he walks away and back into the hole. He turns around to look at her just before it closes, and then, with the whooshing of air, she's all alone.

"You're watching," she says to the chamber: "Aren't you?"

"Yes," the older-sounding member of the pair says, choosing to make himself visible as well.

"I don't know whether to thank you or punch you," she says, not turning to look at him: "This has been heaven. But now..."

"You knew what was coming," the one with the echoey voice says, not choosing to make himself visible: "We gave you a choice. You chose this."

"Don't I know it," she says, not wanting them to see her cry: "But was this really my choice? Or was this something else?"

"Six of one, half a dozen of the other," the older one sighs: "I wish I could tell you more, but..."

"But there are no words for this sort of thing," she sighs: "Yeah, you told me that, too."

"Is there anything... I know, that's not much, but-"

"You tell him I loved him, when this is done," she insists, turning around to look the man in the face: "You tell him to never forget that I loved him. And you do every !@#$ing thing you can to make sure he's happy, after this."

"I will," the one with the echoey voice says: "You may rely on that."

"Thank you," she says, closing her eyes. By the time she's opened them, they're both gone.

And the woman walks away, wishing only that the last time she and Randolph were together could have lasted forever. 

 * * *

That done, the pair check in on two more people, neither of whom are all that easy to find.

* * *

The first one is hidden in a secret compartment within the B.U.I.L.D.I.N.G., hiding out from the Imago and False Faces that are stationed there, trying to make sense of its many strange and dangerous secrets. Unfortunately for them, he's been watching them almost non-stop since they entered, and takes a great deal of pride in letting them get only so far, and then yanking the prize right out of their hands. 

Hunched over a hastily-built conglomeration of viewscreens and consoles, down in a small vault that doesn't show up anywhere in the schematics, Benjamin Franklin -- Founding Father, inventor, genius, politician, diplomat, spymaster, and apparently-immortal sex god -- chuckles and eats popcorn by the handful. 

He's currently watching a gaggle of False Faces try and disconnect a rather strange-looking weapon from one of the downstairs armories. He's already planned a few nasty consequences for them when they do get it out, but he's not so concerned about that, right now. 

What he's really interested in is the code he's been working on, in the last few days, after he got word that SPYGOD had gotten back in contact, and that things were soon to be on the move. When that movement happens, his part of the plan will involve a larger, longer, and much stronger version of the virus he unleashed on the American people last June.

It wasn't perfect, and didn't achieve all that he'd hoped, but a lot of people did a number of interesting things in that precious twenty seconds of free thought he'd given them. Who knows what they might do with a whole !@#$ hour?

Of course, the humorless metal bastards adapted and overcame his attempts at patriotic sabotage, so he's not completely sure his hack will go as well as he hopes. But if the plan's what he thinks it is, it's more than likely they'll have many other problems on their mind when he flips the switch. 

And after that, their problems will really begin.

There's a shudder and a thump that's felt all over The B.U.I.L.D.I.N.G, and the screen in the armory he was watching goes blank. Ben laughs through a mouthful of popcorn, wishing he had someone cute and well-proportioned to share this moment of triumph with, and then gets back to work on the code.

Partway through a troubling line, the silver-handed member of the pair waves in Mr. Franklin's direction, and suddenly he realizes that he's been coming at the problem from the wrong way around. Cursing his own stupidity, he immediately starts making feverish changes to the code, seeing that he could do so much more than he'd hoped...

* * *

The second person isn't easy to find either, but only because the older man and his young apprentice/rival/lover are hiding in plain sight, today. 

They're in Queens, again, parked on a dingy, wreck-choked back alley, just a little down the way from a small, Korean restaurant that's been out of business for a few months, now. No one's paying much attention to their van, as it's just another junky-looking vehicle, and for all they know he bought her for an hour and this is where he'd like to get his !@#$ sucked.

"So after we do these !@#$ers, who's next?" Whisper asks, checking her gun just one more time: "The Russians? The Chinese?"

"I was thinking of looking back at the Mafia," The Black Card says, his voice as rough as flint as he checks his watch: "They're probably organized, again."

"After what we !@#$ing did to them?"

"Especially after," he says, looking at her with a little smile: "This is what they do. You cut them to bits, you walk away, and then the bits reform again. It's one big, bloody cycle."

"Like starfish, huh?"

"What?"

"Starfish. You chop them up and toss 'em in a bag, and everyone's pieces will go right on each other."

"Really?" he just looks at her, like she said hat the rain was actually a host of angels taking a !@#$ shower.

"Yeah, really. You mean you lived right by the side of the Ocean for all these years and you've never known that?"

"Don't really have time for strolling the boardwalk," he says, looking at his watch again.

"No, I guess not," she says, reaching over and taking his hand in hers. He sighs, and lets her do it.

"I love you," he says, for the first time that they've known each other.

"I love you too," she lies, not knowing if he knows what this is really all about or not.

But then the explosion happens, and the restaurant's front and sides are all over the road. And then she's out of the van, guns ready to execute anyone who runs out the back. And then he's right beside her, wearing his black, Ace of Spades mask and grinning like a hungry tiger. 

The pair of observers watch from up high as the two of them gun down a number of panicked, badly-burned Korean mobsters that come running out the back. Somewhere in there, they see to it that the old man doesn't have the time to even suspect that the woman who's sharing his crusade, his trust, and his bed could have yet another ulterior motive. 

And then they're off, again, leaving the two killers to do what they do best. 

* * *

They also drop down to Washington DC, to look in on two other people who have no real business being in the same bed, much less the same space.

Indeed, their close (some would say "intimate") proximity to one another is causing severe problems in the local area. The spiritual distortions they give off have caused their apartment building to start crumbling apart like an early snowman caught in the rain. Its exterior walls are rotting from the inside, its hallways are so damp they're turning to paste, and its wiring going malevolently bad. 

Only some dark miracle is keeping it from collapsing around itself, and maybe that's being done for those few mortals who yet remain. Most of the other tenants moved out shortly after the couple moved in, all fleeing some unseen dread. And those who have stayed are slowly going insane, beset by disturbingly beautiful visions of a glorious world beyond this, or else catching truly horrible glimpses of the damnation that's awaiting them.

Sometimes both kinds at once.

Six months ago, these two beings entered into a bargain. They did so at the prompting of SPYGOD, himself, who said that they might need to change the rules of a certain long game, if they were to head off a massive problem down the road. His proposal was long on orders and short on explanations, but, after their mutual dealings with the man, they were both willing to extend a little trust.

So a deed was done, and a change made, however subtly. Now they are simply waiting for the expected change to come, and with it the moment they've been waiting for. And it would seem that neither of them handles waiting too well.

Aarondiel pretends to sleep in their bed, wrapped around a pillow, presenting himself to the open door. He knows that his roommate will eventually come in, away from his self-imposed punishment, and want to do something to take him mind off of how badly they've !@#$ed things up. And then, after doing the deed, he'll feel terrible again, and want to leave the room and take his mind off what they've done.

The cycle has been well-established by now. Neither of them expects anything else to happen, here. And it will be like this until their plan comes to fruition, and they can finally leave this sour-smelling room. 

The one with the old voice wishes there was something he could say. He wants so much to be able to tell one or both of them what they should do, now. He wishes he could be a comfort, now that they need it most, and give them a warning well ahead of the looming danger they face.

He wishes he could do these things, but he knows he cannot. And with that sadness, he and his companion leave.

* * *

They make several more stops, after that -- of them fairly brief.

Most of them are young men and women who have but one thing in common, and that is that they had cause to be visited by SPYGOD in the past, and were sent in new life directions as a result of it. Some of them are good, and some are not so good, but all of the ones the pair look in on have been keeping to their part of the bargain.

So far as their family, friends, and neighbors know, none of them is extraordinary in any way, shape, or form. And if even their closest companions have no idea of the miracles stewing beneath their ordinary facades, then the Imago have even less of an idea. 

Which is exactly what concerns the pair as they take each person into account, and wave a hand to ensure they stay quiet, hidden, and alive -- at least for now.

They also visit the members of the Freedom Force, who are all wondering what to make of SPYGOD's last, quite perfunctory communication. Some think they know what he means, and some are as baffled as ever, but they are all ready to move when he gives the word.

And ready to die, if the cause be right and just.

They take the time to visit a young man with big ideas, great techniques, and a terrible secret. They watch him send secret messages back and forth with a mentally unbalanced robot who's locked herself into a very bad position for a truly horrible reason.

They don't know whether to laugh or cry at what they see, there, but they're both content that what's happening is what needs to happen, now. With heavy hearts, they leave the two schemers to their plots and plans, and go on to something much nicer, and yet sadder than either of them could express.

* * *

Across a dimensional barrier, they walk, and end up in a strange, cyclopean treehouse, currently under attack by winged dinosaurs. In the confusion of sad battle -- for none of those poor creatures will live through this day -- they walk, observing numerous persons as they do.

They see two people who are not in love, but need each other so very brightly. His new-found strength keeps her from breaking, and her affections give him a purpose beyond riding the wave of all this slaughter, horror, and upheaval.

It will end, soon, this affair, but the pair of watchers need do nothing about that. One morning, soon, she will awaken to a memory that she has avoided facing, and realize there is nothing about it that can harm her now. When she tells the others, it will change everything, and the affair will come to its natural conclusion.

They also see a man in love who cannot express it. Perhaps it is best if he does not do so, at this time, but rather lets it burn his soul and inspire his actions. One of them almost makes that love vanish altogether, just in case it gets in the way of something else, but the other advises caution. Uncertain, they leave this chip to fall where it may. 

They see other heroes, here, brought from many lands and lives to work together on one great purpose. Some of them are doomed, some are not. Some of them will live with honor, some will die in fear.

The best of them is not easy to spot, given his predilection for remaining quiet and hidden. They would like to appear and tell him of what he must do, and how important it is that he do it. But he already knows, this Green Man, and maybe it's best to not spook him any more than he's already been.

(Conversely, the worst amongst the group is very easy to spot, given that one's condition. But as much as they'd like to stop that person, now, before the terrible thing that will happen her can even begin, they know that this, too, is part of the plan.)

They end their visit with a young and broken boy in a hospital bed, who's praying to God for his family -- especially the father he's just now regained. Every day in here is a struggle to stay alive, as terrible infections wrack his body, and push his already-ruined systems even closer to the point of collapse, and yet he still thinks only of others, and what his absence will mean to them.

On his shoulders, so much depend. The older man places his hand on the boy's brow and prays over him, unseen and unheard, as his companion takes a few extra precautions, here and there around the room.

That done, the older man dries his eyes, and they leave. And when the young boy awakens, he may yet remember that he was touched by angels.

Or not.

* * *

"Do you wish to see her, again?" the silvery one asks the older one as they make their very last stop, out in a desert. It's just before Noon, here, and the wind is picking up a little.

"No," the older man says, shaking his head and adjusting his robes and mask: "If I did, I don't think I'd do this."

"You wouldn't?"

"No. I'd... I'd find some excuse. I'd try to get more time, again. More than I've already taken. And..."

"You deserve it," the silvery one says, putting a hand on the old man's shoulder: "You deserve so much. There are no words for what you have done, and what you are about to do."

"There is," the old man says, smiling under his mask and putting a hand on the other one's shoulder: "'Repentance.'"

"I think I am the one with something to repent for," the silvery one says: "But maybe we both needed each other, my friend."

"Maybe we did."

"I love you, old man," the silver one says, embracing him: "Thank you for what you've done."

"Thank you," the older man says: "I love you, too. God bless you, boy. Be strong. And when the time comes... you give them !@#$ for me, you hear? And then you go and make this world amazing, again."

"I will," the other one says, stepping back and away, his form starting to dissipate: "I am already there, now. I am many places at once. And in them all, you are guiding me. Thank you."

And with that, he's gone.

The older man sighs, wipes his eyes one last time, and then adjusts his robes and mask. He stands there for a time, wondering if the other person is going to come back, again, maybe for one last hug, or one last strange message, or fantastic errand.

(Maybe to find a way to give him one more day with her. One more hour. Or even a minute, precious and quick...)

But no. There is nothing. That is over, now.

And this? This has truly just begun.

"Just after I left,"  the masked leader of the resistance says, checking his watch as he goes into the Toon city, and gets ready to make war.

(SPYGOD is listening to The Hanging Garden (The Cure, Demo Version) and having something reverent and wide.)

9/24/12 - Shapeless in the Dark Again - pt. 1

It's the dreams that get to him, these days. They always do.

In his dreams, Wen Boxiong is back on 3/15, and the Imago have just upended the would-be upheaval of the Chinese government. The pro-democracy forces have been quite literally broken, their battered and bloody pieces strewn over the floor like a scene from a particularly filthy slaughterhouse. He can hear screams echoing throughout the building as the revolution's remnants are seen to, and the sounds and the smells are so vivid and nauseating that even when he closes his eyes he can still see what's causing them.

There is no escape from this one terrible moment he is trapped within.

If this was merely a memory, the Imago would be hailed as liberators, and then tell their General Secretary (the one who's dead, now) to stand by for an important announcement. And Wen Boxiong would remain kneeling, praying that no one noticed that he had soiled himself while begging for his life. He'd remain there well past the announcement, miming shock, until he could excuse himself to a nearby toilet to be sick in, and then, weeping, clean himself up.

If this was merely a memory and not a nightmare, that is what would happen. That is what happened, all those months ago. And everything that's happened since then is further testament to either the power of cowardice, or the fact that something out there is looking out for him -- near-worthless coward that he is.

But in his nightmares, the Imago do not stand there like serene, metal statues, perversely beaming with endless smiles and kindly looks after having torn men apart like paper dolls. Instead they all turn towards him as he kneels, festering in his own filth, and point their bloody fingers at him.

"Traitor," one of them says.

"Collaborator," says another.

"Saboteur," confirms yet another.

They repeat their accusations, stepping just a little closer with each new round. He whimpers and protests his innocence, begging for his life to them just as he did to the now-dead revolutionaries. He falls to the ground and abases himself, losing control over his bowels yet one more time as they finally reach him.

And then they all raise up their fists like hammers, and bring them down on his head.

That's usually when he wakes up, eyes wide open and heart racing. Sometimes he dreams they're halfway through pulping him, first. Sometimes they're more creative than that.

He used to always scream when the dreams reached that point, and wake up to the sound of his own voice in his ears. These days he just sits up with a start, gasping and thankful that it was just another dream. His head is still intact. His pants are not full of !@#$.

And no one -- not even the American President  in exile -- knows all his dirty secrets.

But as he slowly takes control of his breathing, once again, and debates whether to try and go back to bed, pour himself a drink, or try and do both, he remains unaware that a pair of figures are watching him from the shadows. They remain both still and mute, watching and listening as he makes up his mind, and as he goes to turn on the light one of them nods.

The lamp goes on, but they're gone just before its light can reach them. 

* * *

It's 10:30 at night, and the biggest, best hospital in Addis Ababa has been closed to visitors for quite some time. Nurses perform their rounds, doctors check up on their patients, and surgeons go from case to case, looking forward to the chance to do what this time of the day normally demands.

Somewhere in all that motion, an unseen crime takes place. A strange noise is heard by no one, and then there are two people in a private room, meant for only one occupant.

He's young and good looking, the man lying in the hospital bed. He's also in a vegetative state, blank eyes staring at the ceiling. The only sounds in the room are his gentle, shallow breathing and the endless beep beep beep of his heart monitor.

It's a good set-up, this room, and the least that NGUVU could do for one of its stricken agents. But there's very little hope of this man ever getting any better. Some strange kind of sudden brain damage, his doctors figure -- nothing they've seen before, and nothing they'd wish on someone.

The two figures regard the young man as he stares at the ceiling. There's spy cameras all over the room, but they don't seem too concerned, any more than they're worried about the two fellows who are lounging outside in the hallway, their guns just a quick gesture away.

"It's time," one of them says, his voice old and scratchy, but quite forceful.

"So it is," the other replies, his voice strange and echoing, as though it were coming from a long ways down a tunnel.

The other waves his silvery hand, and something strange happens to the man in the bed. He blinks his eyes, screws them shut, and shakes his head, as if he were coming out of a bad dream.

"You're not dreaming," the one with the old voice tells the man, who starts at the sound, but is unable to raise himself from bed.

"Where... who..." Khalil asks, his voice weak and raspy: "Why can't I see?"

"Your sight will return in a few days. You've suffered brain damage."

"I... brain damage?"

"Yes. That thing your attacker used scrambles your brains into paste. If you hadn't put up your shield, it would have killed you outright. As it is, you were pretty much gone from the neck up for the last nine days, but darn lucky to be alive."

"I see..." the man says, trying to put his hands to his face but failing.

"Don't push it, young man. It's going to take a while to get back to normal."

"Who are you?" Khalil asks: "I remember... I was..."

"You were visited," the old-sounding man says: "And you might think you know who it was, but you don't. Not really, anyway."

"I do not understand."

"It is well that you do not," the one with the echoing voice chimes in: "But when your friends find you, tomorrow, you must not tell them who did this to you. It is not yet time for them to learn the true face of the one who attacked you."

"No," Khalil insists: "We promised... no more... no more secrets."

"Did you, now?" the old-sounding one says: "Well, we can't have that, can we?"

The other visitor waves a silver hand, again, and the expression on Khalil's face changes. He blinks his useless eyes and tries to get up.

"Do you remember who attacked you, son?" the older-sounding man asks.

"No..." Khalil says: "I thought I did, but... no, it's gone. I do not know who... who are you?"

But the two mysterious figures are gone, leaving Khalil to yell at an otherwise-empty room until the NGUVU agents out in the hallway come in to see what the matter is.

* * *

Human time is a hard thing to reckon at the black, crushing bottom of the Atlantic, where the Kingdom rises above the Wet Below. The Sun's rays do not shine down there, after all, and any landmade contrivances for keeping track of its passing tend to be flattened into hard, little balls of matter before they get even halfway down to its spiky, rock towers and glittering walls.

But it is enough to know that it is the later part of what they would think of as a day. And that is quite significant, tonight, as the activity within that city is much, much greater than it would normally be for this point in time.

The citadel has come alive, tonight. Swarms of living lights encircle its tall, craggy spires and shed light on its dark hollows. Near-mindless, globular things are goaded into floating about the city in an endless parade of alien pomp and circumstance. Its denizens' finest jewelry crawls about their carapaces, and all eyes are bright and filled with wonder.

For today is the day that the Emperor dies, and yet lives.

Today, Emperor Thurl, who has ruled the Kingdom for untold ages, will sink so that his spawn may rise.

At this very moment, in the room of the seven jaws, dignitaries and emissaries from every corner of the Dark are watching as Thurl is being consumed by his strongest, toughest spawn. The Emperor has been prepared with the utmost skill by the royal food preparers, so that he is most edible and delicious, yet still alive and conscious.

It is a complex and meaty ritual, this deathlifedreamsleep. His spawn and he must remain in conversation as long as possible as the former devours the brains of the latter. They must share their souls, their hopes, and their dreams as they become one in the flesh. Only then can the royal jewels truly accept their new Emperor, and only after that happens will the Kingdom truly kneel before him.

This ritual has happened many times, but this is truly a special occasion. It is not only the first new deathlifedreamsleep since the ending of the Overobligation, but also the first to be witnessed by an overlander. Yellow and Blue, Imago adviser to the Kingdom, floats above the sacred feast and watches, apparently quite fascinated by its savage intimacy.

(Or maybe she's smiling for a different reason?)

Outside the palace, at the outskirts of the city, the other Imago -- Orange and Green -- walks amongst the people, as has become his habit. He has found that watching a condemned and mewling leader spend his last days in power is not to his liking. And, as his companion seems better suited to make certain the Emperor does not renege on their agreement.

Of course, that's academic, now. The Emperor is soon to be dead, replaced by his child. That child will be advised by Blue and Yellow, and thereby kept from discovering the shocking truth that his father had uncovered, about the their City. And so will the mighty Kingdom be kept blind and docile to their plans, and what will come on The Day.

And after that, well...

He smiles a little at that thought, wondering if the soon-to-be-late Emperor's boasts of being able to survive another "overapocalypse" will amount to anything, this time.

As Orange and Green wanders, observing, he is in turn observed. Up above his head, hiding in the wandering shadows between schools of lightfish, two figures float. The one with the older voice is nestled inside the silvery body of the other, as though they were Russian dolls of a sort, and in this fashion they are both protected from the harsh environment, here.

The Imago comes to the very edge of the city, now, and turns to look around, taking in the few stragglers to the party, or those few who are choosing to leave it. As he does, he listens to a family as they devour their dinner in a cramped hole that may be their home, a restaurant, or just some corner they've ducked into.

It's two adults and a child, possibly no larger or older than the one who's about to be the new Emperor. He's not sure if what they're eating could be something that has a name, or is just food -- even after a few months he's not sure how they differentiate between the two.

"If the Emperor is dying, why are we happy?" the child asks.

"Because the Emperor never truly dies, my freshshell," one of the parents explains: "He dies in the mouth of the spawn but he lives in the heart of the spawn. This is how we continue, here in the Dark."

"But I thought when we died we went into Mother Dark?"

"Only if we choose to," the other parent said, letting her mate eat in peace: "Those like us have no power and no station, and must obey our masters, but ours is the right of joyrest. And those who have power are both master and slave to their station, and they must suffer the deathlifedreamsleep for all our sakes."

"Deathlifedreamsleep..." the child says, letting the word roll out of its mouth.

And Orange and Green hears this word, and remembers something that Thurl spoke of, the first time they met. He remembers something about "formlife," and how the Emperor had taken three forms since the Overobligation.

He had thought that Thurl had been referring to some kind of molting process, or some strange metamorphosis, unique to their species. But remembering the strange words he heard the massing guests and dignitaries whisper amongst themselves when he deigned to visit the citadel -- reverent mentions of sacred cycles, the gifting, and the oldnew --  he begins to understand that he has misunderstood.

He realizes he has made a mistake, and that they have been fooled.

Oh, there will be punishment for this deceit! This Kingdom is now forfeit. The Imago will rain down fire from Deep Ten to purge it from the seabed. They will send down reinforcements to rend and tear to pieces what manages to live through that. And they will ensure that this "oldnew" Thurl lives long enough to see the full consequences of his sorry, sad attempt to trick them...

But that is the last thought that Orange and Green has, at least along those lines.

The next thought he has is why everything around him is shimmering, and then blazing hot.

And then he never thinks anything, ever again.

The two figures in one watch as the small piece of Earth from a few billion years ago -- molten and hungry -- consumes everything and everyone that stood atop it. Those few beings closest to the Imago are instantly slurped down and immolated, and while Orange and Green's armor can withstand the stress for a time, its fleshy bits are less protected.

Its work done, the superhot maw begins to cool off. Those nearby either scuttle away from the intense heat, or kneel and pray towards it, hoping to supplicate its hunger with their love. The family in the cuttlehole leave their meal to observe, praying as they go.

For they believe it to be the Red, come to take its due for this day. Such incursions are not unknown, even right here within the Kingdom. And while some may say that such a thing, in such a place, at such a time, augurs ill for the start of Emperor Thurl's new formlife, some will say that this is as it should be.

And with the disappearance of the two figures in one -- sad, but satisfied that what has needed to happen, here, has been done -- no one will be any the wiser.

Especially not Blue and Yellow.

(SPYGOD is listening to The Hanging Garden (the Cure) and drinking something under heavy pressure)

9/23/12 - How Bad It Gets, You Can't Imagine - Pt. 4 - Amporn

The old man coughs, and reaches for a bottle of water.

"Amporn survived, of course," SPYGOD surmises: "How many of the bastards did she take down?"

"Not a one," Dr. Krwi says: "In fact, they beat her quite badly. The only reason she got away from them is because one them somehow smacked her back into full consciousness, allowing her to marshal her powers and go intangible, once more. This way, she slipped through them, and into a part of the temple, itself."

"A strategic withdrawal. Good for her."

"And there she spent the next few days, hiding out from them and their patrols. She could either be invisible or intangible, but not both, which made resting quite a difficult thing. But she soon struck upon the idea of curling up inside a long box that was not occupied, anymore. So she searched for one, and in that searching she discovered more than she'd bargained for."

"Like what?" he asks, leaning forward and putting the bottle to one side, supremely interested.

"She did not get a full and thorough look at the temple, but she did learn that she was correct," Krwi says, also leaning forward, but not caring to look SPYGOD in the eyes: "The children were being drained of their life, a little at a time. Some of them were in the boxes, and being drained, and some were not in the boxes, and being used as slaves. Why some were in the boxes and others not, she did not discover, though the slaves were as old and drained as the ones in the boxes."

"So maybe they were drained for so long, and then given a chance to regain their strength?"

"Maybe. But she found a lot of empty boxes that were once full. And there were the ones who died and fell through the floor..."

"Wait," SPYGOD says, holding up a hand: "You said the girl in the box was seeing herself? Ten minutes of her talking about her life while she was going around the birthday cake?"

"Yes, but-"

"But nothing," he says, pounding that hand on the bar: "Those Imago !@#$s can absorb memories, right? I always thought it was just for interrogation purposes, or impersonation, but what if they actually need memories? What if they !@#$ing feed on them?"

The vampire hunter blinks: "Then perhaps they were showing those poor children videos of themselves in order to get them to remember?"

"Squeezing the last bits out of the !@#$ing toothpaste tube," SPYGOD says, wincing and helping himself to another bottle, closeby: "!@#$ers have officially succeeded in making me !@#$ing sick, today, Doc. And you know that's quite the !@#$ achievement."

"Yes," Dr. Krwi says, looking at his conversation partner: "I can well imagine."

There is silence between them, for a time. 

"So what happened then?" SPYGOD finally asks: "She got out, somehow. How did she do it?"

"Not by choice," the old man says, continuing her story.

* * *

On the third day, Amporn has had enough. 

She is weak, now -- weaker than she has ever been. Her organs are withered and shrunken, and her tail is starting to rot at the edges. Her lungwings have become brittle, and are barely capable of keeping her aloft. She spends most of her time crawling along the floors, hoping that the Imago do not find her, or that if they do, they kill her before she can register it.

So weak. So hungry. She has never known a hunger like this since when she was first cursed, all those centuries ago. The roaring, churning hole in her that yearns to be filled is normally a minor thing, and easily tended. But after three days and nights of being denied sustenance, the noise is so loud and dissonant that she can barely stand it.

She must feed. She must have energy, if she is to face these creatures again. She must have something if she is to escape this place, and fulfill her part of the bargain. 

Maybe this SPYGOD will be angry with her, and maybe he will understand. But either way she must feed, and that is all there is to it. 

So she crawls up to a long box in a room filled with them. She sticks her entire body into the thing, and regards the poor, blank-faced boy who lies in there, smelling like dust and rotten, sick flatulence. The shroud of wires and lights that surrounds him glows weakly in time with his breathing, and he's so weak that even a lick of her tongue might kill him.

She does not care, anymore. She must feed. He would die, anyway. What's one more body amongst the hundreds this terrible place has already created?

Her tongue flicks out of her mouth and into his neck. She begins to drain him, feeling the rush of fear along with the blood and the life as it all goes into her, in time with the weak beating of his heart.

But then, something happens. Something wrong.

* * *

"It fed on her,"  SPYGOD says, having a slug from the bottle.

"Exactly," the old man says, deigning to take it from SPYGOD when it's offered, in turn: "Apparently, even when they weren't on that !@#$able machine in the central temple, the things wrapped around the children were draining them. Not as much as there, perhaps, but enough."

SPYGOD sighs and shrugs: "I !@#$ing told her. It wasn't just because I didn't want to give someone like her the keys to the !@#$ candy store, either. I figured there was some kind of drainage going on, and if she ran in and acted like it was !@#$ buffet she'd regret it. I just didn't expect it on that kind of scale."

"How did you guess?"

"What they do? All that !@#$ teleporting and flying and eye-beaming? That takes a lot of energy, Doc. And whenever I see them, I can see lines of energy going to them from somewhere."

"Your eye," Dr. Krwi says, tapping his own temple: "Very useful, provided you can understand what it tells you."

"So now we know," SPYGOD says, taking the bottle back: "The kids have all been yoked up for their !@#$ life energy. I guess when they talk to their parents once a week it's a !@#$ing simulation, just like half the news on the !@#$ing internet, right now. They get drained directly at night, the power goes into those flying balls, and the balls..."

"She did not see where they went," the old man says as SPYGOD downs half the bottle: "She was too busy hiding. But when she did poke her head out, the next night, to see if the Imago had vanished, there were fewer balls than before."

"So at some point they were collected. But where the !@#$ did they go?"

"An excellent question," Dr. Krwi says, taking what's left of the bottle back: "All we know for sure is where Amporn went."

* * *

Oh God, oh Gods, the pain. The pain. Losing herself to the machine this child is hooked into. Her life and memories and the very marrow of her being sucked out through her tongue back into this child. Flesh on a grater, long ragged strips being pulled over and over and over and over and

(this is what it felt like this is what it felt like this is what it felt like all those years ago when she was bitten the loss the horrible terrible black sucking of all that she was all that she could have been going away going down the gullet of the thing that feasted on her the rotting churning of maggots in her soul the draining the sucking the slurping the nasty wet gooshy noises the creaking of dry tissues the cracking of bones and rents in the skin the massive holes in memory the broken pieces of a life gone under the tongue of endless ancient hunger that awful moment when what she was was all gone and then nothing remained but the gnawing absence that grotesque feeling of being on the edge of oblivion the black backwards orgasm the moment of No and then)

Amporn screams and shrieks. She pulls herself out of the body and crashes out of the box, exploding pieces of it everywhere. The boy dies and falls to the ground, his skin breaking open as it hits the ground, bleeding dust where it falls. Alarms go off everywhere and decrepit slaves stumble after her as she crawls along the floor, then flaps, and then takes to the air again by some dark miracle.

She's out of the temple in seconds, heading for the wall. She doesn't care if she runs up against the field, again. If she dies here and now it would be a mercy, and most likely justice -- the only kind she'll ever get.

But somehow she makes it through that wall. The field is not there. She sails through it effortlessly.

It isn't until she flies out into sunlight that she realizes the depth of her mistake.

* * *

"And then she rested, regained her strength on lesser victims, and returned to her body, but at a terrible cost," Dr. Krwi says, getting up and stretching his back muscles: "She could no longer persuade herself to feed."

"Why not?"

"Something with being sucked upon, I suppose," the old man answers: "When she had been bitten all those years ago, she knew what it meant to have a yawning black hole inside of her, and then sought to fill it in the same way that the creature that turned her had filled its own needs. But as soon as she drank of its blood, and the curse was transferred, she forgot that moment of horror. After that, there was only the need to feed, and the joys it brought her, and the dark delights she could manufacture while searching for her next meal."

"You sound almost sympathetic, doc," SPYGOD says, finishing the bottle: "I don't remember you being that kind the last few times we've waded into them."

"Then you know nothing about me," he says, putting his things away: "The truth is that I do retain some pity for these creatures that I fight. I see the victim behind the monster, still, as I know that is all that they are. As a victim, they are worth my pity. But as a monster, they must be slain. The pity forces me to make that second death as quick and as clean as possible, and to not be cruel or vindictive... if possible."

"And it isn't always," SPYGOD admits: "But yeah, you got me there. You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din."

"That, at least, was never in doubt," Krwi says, leaving some money behind for the bar: "When I visited Amporn, she wanted me to say two things to you. One was to thank you for her freedom. The other was to apologize for her mistake."

SPYGOD has nothing to say to that, and just nods. When he looks back at the old man, the fury in the vampire hunter's eyes is so fierce that he looks away, wondering what else he could do or say, now.

"Thank you for finishing her," he eventually finds the courage to say: "I know I asked a lot of you."

"It was all in a day's work," the old man says, getting ready to leave: "And I am glad that her sacrifice is not in vain."

"Not at all. This has actually been very helpful."

"Then there's only one thing left to do," Krwi says, pointing to the edge of town: "At the main road leading into Chaing Mai is a battered, red volkswagen. It's up against a tree, maybe two kilometers outside of town. Twenty paces south, in some bushes, you will find a woman's body. I'm sure you'll know it when you see it, as it's been drained to the point of becoming shoe leather."

"The victim from Bangkok?" SPYGOD asks.

"Yes. You will bury her, my ally. You will make this right by her, as I have made it right by Amporn."

"I don't know if funeral arrangement's really anything I have !@#$ing time for, right now," SPYGOD starts to say, but then the old man gives him that terrible look, again, and he falls silent. 

"If you do not do this for me, our agreement is over," the vampire hunter says: "Find some basic decency, somewhere within yourself. If not for the sake of her soul and yours, then for your !@#$ mission, and my part in it."

SPYGOD looks at him, and nods. The old man nods back, and then turns to go without saying another word.

Once he's completely gone, SPYGOD shrugs, sighs, and gets out another bottle from behind the bar. Then he drinks it down in less than a minute, and throws the empty bottle against a nearby post, watching it shatter into numerous pieces. He watches them all fall and tumble, and watches as they sit there, glittering in the sun. 

He watches for quite some time, and then he lies down on top of the bar, looking up at the sky. And he thinks really !@#$ hard at a lonely, dying communications satellite, far up there.

And while he knows that what he's saying to it is going to write him a first class ticket to the deepest pit in Hell, he says it, anyway.

(SPYGOD is listening to Coelacanth & This Big Hush (Shriekback) and having something you don't want)

9/23/12 - How Bad It Gets, You Can't Imagine - Pt. 3 - Amporn

"To her credit, she didn't just dive into the temple," Dr. Krwi continues, handing over the whiskey bottle, as he's had more than enough by now: "Amporn stayed above, and watched as the balls of energy accumulated, again, and then went up into the top of the temple after that strange noise was heard. It took them an hour, and in that time she counted the number of white boxes those poor slaves pushed up the temple."

"Let me guess," SPYGOD says, tossing aside his glass and drinking straight from the bottle: "Same number of energy balls as boxes?"

"Exactly the same," the old man says, trying to find something to sit down upon: "So now she realizes that this is nothing to do with building, or any of the other thoughts she had, flying around the place. Now she realizes that something else is going on here."

"Good for her."

"She wanted to be thorough, for you," Krwi says, giving him that nasty look, again: "She felt she owed you a boon, and wanted it to be fully repaid."

"Again, good for her."

"And now she is dead because of it."

SPYGOD shrugs, and knocks back some of the whiskey: "She did what I told her not to do. !@#$ happens."

"I can't believe you could-"

"You were going to finish telling me the story," SPYGOD says, giving the old man a look back: "Please do."

So he sits down on the upended crate the bartender was using, and he does.

* * *

Satisfied that she is not incorrect in her assumptions, Amporn hurls herself into -- and through -- the temple under the ziggurat, allowing herself to go intangible for however long it takes.

Once through the thick bricks, all made from the same strange, white substance that everything else here is, she finds herself within a great machine. It is filled with cyclopean gears, great belts, and strange pulleys, all positioned to efficiently move the white boxes from place to place. And their constant motion is eerily silent, as though she had lost her hearing in the journey there.

The boxes are taken down from the surface to the center of the temple by a helical screw, much like a wide conveyor belt, and righted up on their narrow end. They are then deposited onto a large, rotating central plinth, like cubist candles on a birthday cake. There, they slowly rotate about for one whole turn of the wheel, only to be dropped away just before a replacement is brought forth.

And just before that happens, a ball of light escapes from the top of the box, and makes its way up into the darkened corners of the machine, most likely to find a hole to escape from. 

It takes ten minutes for a box to go around the entire circle, she sees. She also sees that there is a large hole in the center of the circle, and a strange, bright glow coming from within it. She flaps to the center of the circle and looks down.

Whats he sees makes her recoil with dread.

* * *

"A giant ball, glowing almost as bright as the sun," Dr. Krwi reveals with a slight flourish: "And while she could not be certain in the brief time she looked at it, she thought she saw something moving within it. Something moving in a perfect spiral, within it, like a fish within an egg-"

"DEROS," SPYGOD says, pounding the bottle down: "And that would just !@#$ing fit, wouldn't it?"

"What is this thing you speak of?"

"Long story short? Big, fast metal serpent from beneath the hollow Earth."

"You're joking."

"I wish I was !@#$ing joking. Large, powerful, and !@#$ing dangerous as !@#$. We thought they were Japanese weapons, back during the War, but it turns out they weren't theirs. Just some weird thing that liked to attack our ships and planes but not theirs. We started running into them again when we tangled with GORGON, back in February, before everything went to !@#$, , so it fits that the Imago are using them."

"She said she thought it was being used to power the machine. Possibly the entire temple, as well."

"She'd probably be right. Those things give off a !@#$ of a lot of power. !@#$, we've seen them them use them as generators, before. But..."

Dr. Krwi raises his eyebrows: "'But?' You have a theory?"

"Keep on with the story, please," SPYGOD says, having some more whiskey: "I think some pieces are coming together."

* * *

Ignoring for the moment the fear she feels at whatever's in the center of the rotating platform -- and the increasing likelihood of running into the Imago, here at the heart of their temple -- the Krasue decides to investigate one of the upright boxes. 

She flaps over to the one that was just deposited onto the platform and pokes her head in, ever so slowly. The inside of the box is lit up with layers of alien, hissing machinery, so she goes just that much slower, just in case it's boobytrapped or something.

Inside the box is a wizened, old woman -- shrunken and sere. Her eyes are filled with cataracts, her teeth have fallen out of her mouth, and she's drooling all over herself. Her brain doesn't seem to be working so well, anymore; dementia, perhaps, or maybe she's so run down that she doesn't care to dignify her surroundings with any kind of response. 

Around her are white wires, wrapped all over her like vines over a ruined statue, deep in the jungle. Along those wires are small lights that slowly rise and lower in intensity, seemingly in time with her breathing. Thin, clear tubes snake in and out of her clothing, going to small, white boxes placed around the front of the box, with liquids of varying color and consistency sluicing to and away from her.

In front of the old woman's face is a screen. On that screen is a smiling little girl, dressed in a peasant girl's dress, and talking of her life in the town of Chiang Mai. She talks about school and friends and her favorite toys, and how sad she was when her cat was run over by a tuk-tuk, and that she wants to be a doctor when she grows up just like her mommy and...

And and and. She keeps talking like she has diarrhea of the brain, or someone is having her speak non-stop about herself for as long as she can.

As the girl prattles on, Amporn sees that the old woman is crying. She also sees that the lights on the wires are glowing a little brighter with each cycle.

She also realizes that the old woman must be related to the little girl, as their bone structure is eerily identical. Also her hairstyle, and the dress they're both wearing.

Amporn hears the little girl laugh, and she tips her hair back to reveal a small, puckered scar across her forehead. And then she looks to the old woman, and sees the same exact scar there, reflected under the lights.

* * *

SPYGOD spits up the mouthful of whiskey: "No !@#$ing way," he says, wiping his mouth.

"That is what she saw. And when she went from box to box, she realized that it was the same thing, over and over again. The children were in those boxes, watching themselves on the screens, and they had all become incredibly old and frail.

"Some were more mentally gone than others, of course. Some were actively sobbing, or begging the Gods for help. Others were like the first girl, missing behind the eyes..."

"And the lights came out of the boxes," SPYGOD says, after a moment's reflection: "So whatever they were doing with them, it was taking the life energy out of them."

"Yes," Dr. Krwi says, handing him a rag to clean up with: "And that light became a ball of energy that went up to the temple's surface, and joined the others."

"Holy !@#$," SPYGOD says, having another swig from the bottle, and then another right on its heels.

"It gets better, my friend," the old man says: "Because that was when she decided it was time to leave..."

* * *

She flies up and up as fast as she can, slipping through the gears and wheels and belts, the white glowing bricks, the schools of light. She gets past them all as quickly as her lungwings will carry her, now understanding how ordinary people must feel when they see her. 

She had no idea - no !@#$ idea. She didn't know they could make machines that stole lives like this. She didn't believe that you could turn a child into a whispering ghost, wrapped in papery flesh, without sinking your fangs into their necks. She didn't know it then and she doesn't want to know it now, either. 

She just wants to get out of here. Now. 

The wall of the box looms ahead of her. She increases her speed and prepares to fly through it, eager to be gone and away.

And then she's splatting up against something -- something unseen and painful -- and she's screaming and falling, her wings fighting to right herself as she fights off the numbness and strain and hopes no one heard that.

Of course, they did.

* * *

"Twenty Imago," Dr. Krwi says: "All of them literally came from nowhere, surrounding her as she fell. They did their usual greeting, and she was as well-spoken and polite as ever-"

"Which essentially means she told them to go !@#$ a blender," SPYGOD says, having another swig: "Something tells me they didn't !@#$ing appreciate that."

"Not exactly, no. She collected herself before she struck the ground, and tried to phase through it. But she encountered the same painful field there, too. Only this time she couldn't fall down, as she was already there."

"So she splattered"

"Badly. And then they were upon her..."

"And I bet that didn't end !@#$ing well."

"No," Dr. Krwi says: "Not at all."

(SPYGOD is listening to Evaporation (Shriekback) and having some more Wild Turkey )

9/23/12 - How Bad It Gets, You Can't Imagine - Pt. 2 - Amporn

"Amporn did exactly as you told her," Dr. Krwi begins, grimacing at the whiskey's bite as he downs his shot: "She came to Chiang Mai, hid her body, and infiltrated the white box outside of town."

"How did she get from Bangkok to the north without being caught?" SPYGOD asks, wondering when the vampire hunter is going to pour him that double, or if he's just going to withhold the bottle.

"She did not specify that. However, coming here, I heard tell of a mysteriously abandoned vehicle from the city, previously belonging to a young dancing girl who cannot now be located."

"That sounds about right-"

"A young. Pregnant. Dancing girl." The old man interrupts, his eyes filled with contempt.

"Yeah," SPYGOD sighs, looking askance and drumming his fingers: "She warned me. I guess it was too much to hope she'd slip into a !@#$ing smuggler's trunk and take her chances."

"Oh no. Of course not. She becomes free for the first time in years, so of course she is going to behave herself."

"So she kidnapped some pregnant hooker, stole her !@#$ car, and drove up to a former tourist mecca at night, sleeping and feeding during the day. She gets there, and... what?"

"It was as you told her," Krwi says, having another slug and trying to ignore his ally's complete lack of sympathy: "Her ability to become intangible allowed her to slip past the energy field that surrounds the place, and would kill a normal man. It also allowed her to enter unseen, at night, when the very interesting things are going on."

"Well, that's !@#$ing spiffy," SPYGOD says, pointing at his unfilled glass: "So she fulfilled her mission?"

"She did, yes," the old man says, pointedly pouring only a few measly fingers of the high mark stuff: "Admirably, I should say, considering you left quite a few details out when you explained it to her."

"Such as?"

Dr. Krwi scowls, puts down the bottle, and takes a deep breath to steady himself.

"You neglected to tell her what she was most likely to find."

* * *

Unseen and untouchable, the Krasue flaps over the structure within the white, plastic walls of the box, her gut-tail curling behind her. 

Below, rising from the blasted floor of the jungle, is a strange, temple-like affair, made of the same, white material as the walls she just came through. The structures are eerily reminiscent of ancient ruins all over the world -- temples and pyramids, theaters and tombs -- and make her somewhat nostalgic for times gone by, long long ago. 

The temple isn't what's got her immediate attention, though; She's more intrigued by the small, pulsing lights floating around the tallest spires of the structures, and the large, looming ziggurat that dominates the complex. 

Perhaps the size of a football, the lights cycle between colors, and move in large groups like schools of fish. They cast weird, throbbing shadows on the walls as they slowly cycle around one another in overlapping arcs -- sometimes overtaking, sometimes veering away.

She hovers above the color fields for some time, making certain they are not some kind of guardian or barrier. She also casts her bloated, starting eyes about to look for any trace of the Imago, who should be here, somewhere, but do not appear to be.

And then, satisfied that no one has seen her, and they will not attack her, she plunges into the smallest part of the symmetrical complex, hoping that it's also the most deserted.

* * *

"Of course, there was no one there, where she landed," the old man continues, finishing the bottle and opening another: "There should be no one here, either, come to think of it. How is it there is a bar in a town that the Imago have emptied out?"

"Smugglers," SPYGOD explains: "It's just like any other !@#$ing occupation, doc. There's a black market running, and someone's getting !@#$ing rich."

"I thought the Imago gave their slaves everything they wanted?"

"I guess those metal-plated !@#$holes aren't big on letting their workers get drunk or !@#$ed up. Who'd have thought?"

The old man shrugs, pouring SPYGOD another double: "Who indeed.

"So she lands, and enters this strange, white temple. Its walls are lit from within with a strange light that casts no shadows, and she hears strange noises echoing from ahead. So she slowly and carefully flaps her way forward, careful not to let her tail drag upon the floor, nor her wings touch the ceiling or walls..."

* * *

 The light flickers between pale green and pale pink, and makes her feel nauseous, somehow. She ignores the sensation and keeps going, intent on completing her mission.

"Mission." She sneers at the thought. She owes this SPYGOD a debt, and will repay it if only to be free of any obligations, now that she is once again free. But more of an errand, surely. 

That and a test of temptation.

'Go inside, find the children, and tell me how they are and what they're doing,' he said: 'And whatever you do, do not eat any of them. Not even a !@#$ing lick. I'll know if you do.'

She chuckles at that. Would he really? That strange eye he wore -- the one that made her cower in fear for a few seconds, before she realized what it actually was -- did it really allow him to watch her from afar, or is the notion that he sees all merely self-serving lies?

Either way, she would keep her promise. She will find these children that are living and working here, see what they are doing, and be gone in the same night before anyone can find her. Surely it could be no simpler a task?

* * *

"Of course, it didn't go according to plan," SPYGOD says, regarding the whiskey in his glass.

"Of course not. And that is why she is dead."

"That and I bet she got stupid."

"Oh?"

"I bet she did what I told her not to do," he says, looking at Dr. Krwi: "Didn't she?"

The old man bites her tongue, and then continues her tale.

* * *

The first doubt she has is waiting around the first corner, when she sees a slow-moving procession of robed and hooded priests, pushing long, white boxes along the floor.

It's a large group of them, maybe thirty or so, all heading in the direction of the main part of the complex. They wear filthy, black robes that stretch from their heads to their feet, and are all bent over, as though they had become too infirm to stand up. The only visible flesh she can see are their hands, which are bent and gnarled, and seem barely capable of pushing those boxes along.

She flaps past, and indeed through them, taking in their particulars as she goes. At first she thinks they may be some alien life form, but they're all too human -- just quite old. Indeed, she thinks they're maybe a few bad knocks away from falling into piles of dust and bone. 

Are the Imago employing the elderly here, then? She has no idea what has been done with people too weak to work in the tent cities; perhaps they wind up here, alongside the children, working towards their strange goals together. 

She could move on, she supposes, but she decides to stay with the group, and see where they go. If anything, their presence should mask hers -- especially given how much noise they make as they push the boxes along the floor.

* * *

"She follows them down that hallway, and into a large chamber, tall and wide. In that room are more groups of these hooded, robed priests, all pushing more long, white boxes along the floor. Some are pushing them in the direction of that her group are going, some are pushing them back the way they came. 

"She flies along after them, invisible and untouchable, as they go down one hallway, and then another. One of the priests falls to his knees, collapses, and dies of what is probably a heart attack. His last words are something akin to 'thank the Buddha,' she thinks.

"One of the stronger ones in the group takes the dead priest's box, puts it atop his own, and continues pushing it. The others do not slow down for him, so he must speed up to meet them. 

"No one sees to the body. She flies on, and then she thinks she hears a strange noise behind her. When she turns and looks back, the body is gone, and the floor seems to be rippling, somehow."

"!@#$," SPYGOD says, indicating he'd like another double, please: "And all this time she hasn't seen a single !@#$ing kid?"

"Not that she knows," the old man says, sighing: "But-"

"How about the mother!@#$ing Imago? None of them yet, either?"

"Not as yet, no," Krwi replies, clearly unhappy to have been interrupted: "But as the group continues on, she realizes that she can feel they are near, somehow. It is as though they are everywhere, and yet nowhere..."

* * *

The hallway leads to another large chamber, with many hallways going in and out of it. The procession halts for a time, and they sit down on the boxes, too winded to speak. Some of them seem to be praying, others meditating. One cries, weakly and alone.

After a time she grows bored of watching them sit, and goes ahead a little, following another procession as it goes down the hallway she thinks the others might have been heading towards. As they go further in, she becomes aware of the air being slightly charged, and a weird, crackling noise echoing down the hallway. 

Intrigued, she barrels forward, thinking that perhaps she will find the children there. Maybe they are toiling at some strange, highly-dangerous factory, and the priests are bringing them tools and materials in their boxes? Or maybe they are all learning, as promised, and the old beings are simply bringing white pieces of material to build their school around them?

Either way, she hopes she can find the answer soon. She would be done with this strange, eerie place with its sickening lights and strange noises, and sense of being watched. She would be back in her own body, and preparing to meet the strange human.

She would be far, far from here.

* * *

"She is now," the doctor sighs, downing another drink.

"You sure?" SPYGOD asks: "These !@#$ things have a way of coming back-"

"I think I know how to kill a !@#$ing vampire, you idiot," he says, pounding the bar with his hand and staring a hole through SPYGOD's forehead: "I blessed her in the name of her peoples. I made her tell me of everything she had ever done, and then forgave her for each and every dead person. Each and every woman, baby, child, and man. The people she had fed upon because she was hungry, and the people she had played with because she was bored, or they had offended her. I listened to every death she had caused and said I forgave her-"

"And then you shot her," SPYGOD says, tapping his own forehead: "Right in the !@#$ing head?"

"Yes. In the head. With bullets made from the special amulets they give to pregnant women up here to fend off the likes of her. And she cried with joy as she died-"

"And then you burned her."

"Every last scrap. And I did not set out for here until I was certain that her ashes were ashes."

SPYGOD nods, takes the bottle from the old man, and pours himself a drink: "I just wanted to be sure, old man. You know me."

"All too well," Dr. Krwi says, continuing to give him a dire look.

* * *

 

Up ahead, the hallway widens out and grows taller, so that she can get a better view. She is entering the largest chamber that she saw from above the complex, and here, under the central ziggurat, lies an interior temple -- its contours exactly matching the roof, and its surface crawling with the same kind of light swarms that she saw outside. 

The temple has a gentle slope, leading from the room's floor to its apex. The priests are pushing the white boxes up to it, and then laying them on the top. As she watches, a box is absorbed by the floor atop the temple, and then another box is placed in the same location. Over and over again this happens, like some strange production line.

She flies over the temple and looks at the other side. There, the priests walk down another, mirroring slope to reach the bottom of the chamber. On that side of the temple, long boxes are endlessly and slowly ejected from holes along the sides of the slope. The priests take one apiece, and start pushing them to other hallways on the other side of the temple.

Amporn watches this for a while, fascinated. She also notices that the boxes seem as heavy going in as they do coming out. 

A weird noise sounds, and all the priests stop what they are doing and fall to the ground, as though they were afraid. A moment later, the lights that crawl around the edges of the temple leave them, and fly up to the roof, seeking its very apex. 

There, they seemingly exit -- doubtless to join the others, outside. And once they're gone, and the priests pick themselves up off the floor and get back to pushing or collecting long boxes, more lights begin to come out of holes in the temple's walls. 

* * *

"So it's a factory of some kind," SPYGOD says, shooting down his booze and setting himself up for another: "Either that or they're having one guy pound in the peg on one side of the !@#$ing wall while the other person bangs it out, over and over."

"Nothing so amusing," Dr. Krwi says, having another swig, and grimacing at the bite: "Surely you can see where this is going? I have been trying very hard to avoid making this obvious, but-"

"It's going straight to !@#$, Doc," the man says, grabbing the bottle from the old man and pouring himself a drink: "I just want to know how !@#$ing deep the hole is, right now."

"Things are that good?"

SPYGOD scowls, and then relaxes his face a little: "Well, I managed to make contact with my people out East, in California. It's a touchy reception, lousy sending kind of deal, but at least we got to talk and compare a few notes. I don't feel like I'm feeling the !@#$ Elephant, anymore."

"And what kind of progress are they making?"

"Enough."

"Enough for what?"

"Enough to be ready to move when we know which way we're !@#$ing going," SPYGOD answers, pouring himself some more and handing the bottle back to the old man: "That's as good as I can say, right now. Don't !@#$ing get yourself killed anytime soon, though. We're gonna need you."

"Always good to feel wanted and appreciated."

"I'd appreciate it if you finished your !@#$ story," SPYGOD says, smiling.

"Then I will," he says, and begins to do just that

(SPYGOD is listening to Feelers (Shriekback) and having some Wild Turkey Kentucky Spirit)