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)

9/23/12 - How Bad It Gets, You Can't Imagine - Pt. 1 - Amporn

9/10/12
Bangkok, Thailand 

By the time Amporn gets back to her body, she's already resigned herself to her fate. She failed to kill her targets, and it's doubtful that the backup team had any better luck than she did.

The mission was a failure, and therefore her life is forfeit.

She knows that the agents will burn her body, and stand there and watch to be certain that not even the smallest scrap of her escapes the flame. And then they'll sweep her ashes into the crate, and dump it in the ocean, somewhere -- just to be sure they're rid of her.

(Whether they'll burn the box too, or keep it as some grisly memento, is something she'd rather not think about.)

So she's more dumbfounded than relieved when she re-appears in the room, and finds that one of the Agents is dead -- shot right through the forehead -- and the other badly wounded, groaning on the floor, and missing his firearm.

For a moment she isn't sure what to do. Should she take her body and her box and run? If so, where to? Everything North is an armed camp, now. How long could she survive?

Or should she sit here, in her crate, and wait for ISOC to send more Agents to replace these fools? Say she stayed out of loyalty, and maybe they'll overlook her failure? Would that even matter?

She looks to the table, thinking that maybe the box will have the answers. But when she does, it's not there. She hisses in anger and frustration. 

"'You're welcome' might be nice," someone says, stepping out of the shadows. He's a big and burly farang, dressed in the wrong black leather for this weather, and wearing an eyepatch.

And he has her box in his hands.

She's about to attack him, but something about the look from the eye she can't see makes her float backwards, instead -- instinctively terrified.

"Amporn, right?" he says, gesturing to her with the box: "Sorry if my colleagues were a little rough on you. We needed to make that look good."

"What are you talking about?" she spits, her voice a deep horn, her teeth extending sideways out of her mouth.

"We had no plans to kill you," SPYGOD explains, putting her box down on the table: "In fact, we are setting you free. It'll be dark, soon. You can get the !@#$ out of town."

"And why would you do that?" she asks, looking at him with what can only be called dire and utter suspicion: "Is this a peace offering? Do you think I will let you live?"

"I think you'd break your !@#$ing teeth on my fine, gay !@#$, honey," he chuckles: "It's been a while since I went at it with one of you, but it didn't end too well for her."

"Then what is this? What do you think you can command of me?"

"This isn't about commanding anything. I'm just tired of having these ISOC !@#$ers having a Penanggalan on their payroll."

"I'm a krasue, you fool" she hisses: "You're thinking of the ones from further South."

"There's a difference?"

"Oh, that's right. All Asians look the same to you farang."

He chuckles: "Good point. I apologize. But if you think I'm gonna take a lesson in racial awareness from someone who looks at me like a steak on legs, you're !@#$ing crazy."

She looks at him, her black in red eyes flaring, and then she actually smiles: "I see your point. So am I to expect that you will simply let me take my things and go, and that you will not try to stop me?"

"That's pretty much it, yeah," he says, lighting up a very noxious cigarette.

"You know I'll feed."

"I know."

"And you know who I will feed upon."

"Yep," he says, inhaling and exhaling, blowing strange rings of smoke into the air: "Pregnant women. Little kids. Puppies and kittens. See if I !@#$ing care."

"How are you so cold?" she asks, touching down onto the table and taking hold of the box with a fleshy loop of her muscular intestine tail: "Are you broken in your mind?"

"Not really," he says: "But they say one person's monster's just another person's predator. Antelopes got lions, bugs got bats, and we get... well, you."

"How very... cosmopolitan of you."

"Well, that and there's worse monsters out there, in case you hadn't noticed," he says, turning to leave the room: "Speaking of which, I have places to go and things to do. Don't mind me?"

"Wait," she says before he can put a hand on the door: "You cannot simply leave like this."

"I can't?" he looks back: "You sure you want to be !@#$ing telling me what I can and can't do?"

"We monsters have rules, same as you," she says, flapping forward and stopping right in front of him, looking him literally eye to eye: "You have saved my life, farang. I owe you a favor."

"A favor," he says, getting a weird gleam in the eye she can't see: "Are you sure you want to do that?"

"I am certain," she says: "A life for a life, that is the law."

"And don't we just !@#$ing love the law?" he smirks: "Alright, then. I'll accept. Come to think of it, your particular skill set might come in pretty useful for a job I need doing."

She laughs: "More killing? I am always happy to do that-"

"Not this time," he says, holding up a hand: "In fact, I want you to not kill someone. Several someones, in fact. Can I get you to promise me that?"

"What all does this favor entail?" she asks, clearly intrigued.

So he tells her, in crisp and exacting detail, exactly what he wants her to do. Somewhere in that telling -- maybe halfway through -- she becomes convinced that he knew the rules already, and has engineered this entire scenario just to get his hands on her 'skill set.'  But the rules are the rules, and without them she is less than nothing, so she bites back any comments she might have about his true motives, and agrees to his terms and his timetable.

After that, he leaves the room, and she takes the opportunity to feed on the ISOC Agent he left alive for her. It's not the slow, sick, and torturous fate she'd had planned for this one, but the fear in his eyes makes the meal sweet and full, if lacking in twisted invention. And when she pours herself back into her waiting body, she does so with a full belly and a content mind.

As soon as it's dark she leaves the room and enters the street beyond -- another lovely, young Thai out for a nighttime stroll in the humid, neon-lit Patpong night. She drinks deep of her freedom, mind roiling with the delicious, wet possibilities it holds, and cradles the box like it was her child.

A late rain shower slakes the city's thirst. When it abruptly vanishes, so has she.

* * *

9/20/12

Chiang Mai, Thailand

The jungle is hot and wet, and filled with layers of noise. Predators and prey, mostly, along with the wind and other, stranger noises. 

Especially the ones that come from the large, white box outside of the town.

The box is about the size of an olympic stadium, and made from thick, white sheets of plastic. It hums and thrums, and occasionally crackles. At night it's lit up from within, and the lights seem to be moving around, and casting strange, otherworldly shadows against the walls.

Nothing grows next to the box. The trees and grass have withered and died. Animals don't dare come too close, and on the occasion that one blunders into the dead zone by accident, it falls down dead and twitching within three steps -- their brains gushing out of their eyes, nose, and ears.

Even the insects will leave those festering corpses alone.

The box is where the children went, last June. Their parents were moved to a high-tech tent city, just north of the town, but all but their youngest kids were sent to the box, where they were promised educational facilities far beyond anything they could have dreamed of, and opportunities unknown to the world. 

The box was shut around them, and there they have stayed. Every week they hold a teleconference with their parents, and tell them what they've learned, but no visitations have been held, and no leaves of absence permitted. Except for the Imago, no one comes in, and no one goes out.

Until today.

The shrieking, whip-thin thing that was once a brilliant monster flies out of the side of the box, wide-eyed and panicking. Her red eyes are starting from her skull, and she's screaming so hard her long, barbed tongue seems in danger of popping out of her mouth. 

The moment she hits the sunlight, she catches on fire. She doesn't seem to care about this. Her lungwings smolder and blacken, her intestine tail goes up like someone soaked it in gasoline, and her other parts singe and smoke in the unforgiving rays of the Sun. All it does is make her fly even faster, aiming for the line of trees outside of the dead zone, and the cool, dark areas therein. 

She finally gets there, after what seems an eternity of burning, and crashes to the dense, wet ground. A shivering mess that's as much goosh as crumble, she inhales deeply of the air, and tries to force herself to heal. But with so little energy left to her, the effort proves too much, and she blacks out, instead. 

When she comes to, late that night, she discovers that scavengers have been feeding from her, thinking her just another body, ripe for the consuming. She gladly turns the tables on them, taking enough sustenance from their small and furry forms to heal the worst of her wounds.

And then, on crusty wings barely made airworthy, she takes to the skies: a wounded nightmare, seeking the warm, meaty safety of her hidden body.

* * *

9/23/12

Pong Pha, Thailand

At a small, frankly scruffy, open-air bar in the center of the village, a strange man dressed like a tourist -- but clearly anything but -- stands and sips an off-brand, local beer, feeling rather nonplussed.

The place promised Singha. The cracked and dirty mirror behind the bar says Singha. The non-functioning neon sign that's on the place's only outside wall says Singha. Even the cheap paper coasters says Singha. But it turns out it's the one beer they don't have, and the smiling, nervous barkeep's insistence that the watery, local brew is even better is not going to get him a good tip.

SPYGOD sighs, wondering if he should trade up for one of the imported Whiskeys the man's been encouraging him to try for the last half hour, but then he hears his contact coming down the road.

"You got anything Polish?" he asks the man in eerily perfect Thai. The man starts, and admits he doesn't know the first thing about European beers, but by the time he's made a complete fool of himself, SPYGOD can hear that Dr. Krwi is getting his flask out, which is good news for everyone, frankly.

"Buy you a drink?" he asks, anyway, turning around and smiling.

He takes the old man's fist in his face without so much as ducking. He closes his eyes, opens them up again, and sees that the vampire hunter is red and shaking with anger.

"That !@#$ing good, huh?" he asks, trying to regain his smile.

The bartender gasps and starts making useless threats, but SPYGOD tosses him some baht and tells him to take the whole !@#$ing day off. He does, and with a lot of dispatch.

"You are despicable," the old man says, taking a swig from his flask and pointedly not offering the man any: "Devoid of conscience. Uncaring and amoral. I... if I were not your ally-"

"How about my friend?" SPYGOD asks, crooking his nose back into joint and wincing at the pain: "Or have we crossed that line, too?"

"Oh, we crossed that some time ago," Dr. Krwi says, having another swig, and then going behind the bar to steal a bottle of whiskey: "There are times when I feel pity for those I slay, (REDACTED). They are often as much a victim of what's happened to them as their prey is. But you? You chose to become this. You choose to do these things."

"Cry me a !@#$ing river, Doc," SPYGOD says, knocking back the beer and thumping the bottle onto the table: "And pour me a double while you're at it. It sounds like I'm going to need it."

"You have no idea," the old man says, and begins to tell the story he just heard from a dying vampire. 

(SPYGOD is listening to Nemesis (Shriekback) and having a beer so !@#$ty we're not going to name it here)

9/12/12 - Commit the Sin, Commit Yourself

" ... was the scene from Pontianak, yesterday, at 4 PM local time. Residents were stunned by a loud explosion, followed by a sound that witnesses described as screaming metal.

"They came out of their homes and businesses in time to see a seemingly-small portion of the Space Elevator wrapped in flames, and then ran for cover as it began to crumble and break at that point, and slowly fall down.

"The tower fell in keeping with the Earth's Eastward rotation, so that its staggering, 100 mile length came crashing down to the West.

"The tower was made from a special, transparent, heat resistant metal, so it did not burn up in the atmosphere as it fell, nor did it crumble under its own weight as it came down.

"As one giant, super-steel tube, it fell to the Earth, striking down on the fields, hills, and rivers of that part of Indonesia.

"And the roar it created as it fell, and as it hit, could be seen for hundreds of miles around, and heard for even wider distances -- at least as far away as Hong Kong, by some accounts.

"Fortunately, loss of life was minimal, as there was nothing in that area except for the Imago's mostly-automated receiving station, which takes, sorts, and transports the many things that a unified humanity makes in order to safeguard Earth against the threat we all face.

"Responsibility for the attack was claimed by the New Pattani United Liberation Organization, a group of Islamic radicals primarily operating in Southern Thailand, who were thought to have been mostly wiped out by a government crackdown in 2006.

"So far, the Imago have only broadcast a single message in response to this terrifying incident: DO NOT BE AFRAID OR ALARMED. EVERYTHING IS UNDER CONTROL.

"Already, witnesses claim they have seen 'legions' of Imago floating about the ruins of the space elevator, seemingly preparing to fix the massive damage done to it, and raise it up above the clouds once more...."

* * *

Applause and cheering erupts at B.A.S.E.C.A.M.P. 4. as they watch the pirated -- and non-brainwashing -- video for the first time. There's dancing and hugging, laughing and tears of joy.  

(Winifred surprises Myron with a big hug and a kiss, and after a second or two he doesn't seem to surprised or worried about it.)

"How did this happen?" Mark asks the people back "up top," in Toonland, once the cheering dies down a bit: "Does anyone have any idea?"

"We don't, no," Fred replies through the communicator: "We checked in with Freedom Force, but they're at a loss, too."

"Well, I can tell you it wasn't New Pattani," the Green Man snorts, shaking his head as the announcer repeats the story: "Not without a lot of help, anyway. I worked a bit with Thai Intelligence before the coup. Those fools couldn't blow up a schoolbus, much less a thing like that."

"And you'd know all about blowing up schoolbuses, wouldn't you?" Mark replies, to which the pale fellow says nothing -- wheeling on his heel and leaving the room in a huff. On the way out he almost bumps into Myron, who's left the room in quite a hurry, his face red as a beet.

"He does have a point, my dear," the Fist says, leaning in to speak quietly: "I did work with Egyptian intelligence, and their data on that group was quite extensive. They were a fourth-rate outfit at best. So either something has changed, or someone helped them, or..."

"Or someone used them?" Mark completes the sentence, finally able to decipher her mostly-hidden facial expressions through voice alone, given that she covers.

"It would be his style," she offers: "I think I heard him say 'I use the enemy' on more than one occasion. And it is not bad strategy, to kill two targets with one bullet."

"Fred? Did you catch that?" Mark asks: "Do you think it's SPYGOD, come back at last?"

"Could very well be," Fred says: "I don't know if he's back yet or not, but we've seen how his plans work."

"Well... what does he say?" Mark asks, not willing to say too much about the mysterious figure in their lives.

"He's not saying anything, actually. He smiled and took off. So either he knew, or this wasn't very surprising."

"And that's not very surprising at all, is it," Mark sighs: "Any news of what's happening now?"

"No, they just keep repeating this. I guess the Imago couldn't just sweep this one under the rug, so we're getting it looped."

"It's !@#$ darn to hide when a 100 mile space elevator falls down and goes boom," Myron adds, running back into the room with a big bottle of champagne: "I was saving this for something, but..."

He looks around the room, realizes how many people there are Muslim, and smiles sheepishly. The Lion just laughs and waves him to come in. "We will be happy with some juice, my friend. On this day, all drinks are in celebration."

Everyone laughs, the drinks get passed, toasts are made and thanks are given. Strategy is discussed and amended. New plans are made, new timetables proposed. Hope doubles in size.

And, by the end of the evening, no one has any better idea who may have actually done this, though they all hope it's who they think it is.

Some remark, later, that Myron and Winifred are quite inseparable throughout the celebration, and leave earlier than the others.

A few also remark that Green Man stayed quite clear of everyone for some time thereafter, though, given his sour disposition -- and the bad news he got, the day he arrived here -- that's not so surprising.

And a few remember that the otherwise-convivial Man Of Steel was not anywhere to be seen throughout the entire thing -- almost as if he'd been in hiding for some weird reason.

* * *

O peoples of the Earth, hear us.

We send this to all the people of the world,

in all ways you speak to each other,

so there will be no confusion, no misunderstanding.

No mistake.

O peoples of the Earth, we bring sad news,

For as you have seen with your eyes, we have been attacked.

Our space elevator has been cut down by dangerous persons,

interrupting our shared efforts to protect the Earth.

Protect you.

We regret having to show these things to you. 

We know that these things must shock you, and scare you

and make you wonder if we, the Imago, can protect you at all.

We realize this must erode your confidence in us.

We are sorry.

But you can rest ensured, O peoples of the Earth,

for we Imago are not so easily harmed or destroyed.

These terrorists may have brought down a single tower,

but they cannot touch us in our entirety.

They cannot.

Do these misguided and sad people know what they do?

Do they believe this is the right thing, to condemn Earth to death?

Do they feel we are evil, or that they know more than we do?

Or are they in league with the threat, ever-oncoming?

We don't know. 

But you can be assured that we will find out their reasons.

We will hunt them down and bring their leaders to justice.

They will see the error of their ways, and work to fix that mistake.

No one group will be allowed to harm the whole.

Not by us.

And you can rest assured that the tower will soar, again.

Even now, as we speak, we Imago work to put it back up.

It will rise as high as before, and be twice as strong.

This moment of darkness will soon be eclipsed by bright light.

You will see.

So do not fear, O Peoples of the Earth.

You still need fear no evil or darkness, for we are here.

The trials of the present will bring the joys of the future,

And all you truly need is love.

Let us soar. 

* * *

The Asian Imam screams as his brains boil inside his skull. The metal thumbs in his eyesockets record all the details, big and small, of his life, until there's simply nothing left to remove. And then -- his mind an empty, ashen slate -- he's dropped to the white, plastic floor of the small, tent Mosque, twitching as his nervous system collapses upon itself. 

The Imago that killed him -- Light Green and Purple -- stands upright and regards his gauntlets, slick and red with dark blood and other bodily fluids. He also regards the many bodies on the white, plastic floor he's floating above, all with their eyes pushed in, their sockets smoking, and their brains turned to smoldering powder. 

He floats out of the room, over the corpses he created. Already, the floor is lapping up the liquid and solid waste products their deaths have generated; given time, they'll break the bodies down, too, though he suspects the workers here will see to their burial long before then. 

Provided the Imago leave any alive, today.

Outside, in the main thoroughfare of the tent city that houses the population of Thepha, in southern Thailand, he can see that his fellow Imago are not being very gentle. Black and Dark Green has just finished interrogating a dormitory for young, single men, and his hands are even bloodier than Light Green and Purple.

"No one knew anything of consequence," Black and Dark Green reports: "The names of the men who died in the plane are unknown to them. Many of them were sympathetic towards, or knew members of, that organization, but none of them knew anything about this attack, nor anything that could help us in the search."

"None of these men knew anything useful, either," Light Green and Purple says, gesturing to the mosque: "The Imam was morally opposed to sectarian violence, and told his people not to get involved in it."

"Apparently, his reading of their Holy Book is at extreme variance with the interpretation that this organization seems to follow."

"Not surprising, given Human history. Would we achieve better results by threatening the children?"

"No," Black and Dark Green says: "They would merely consider them to be martyrs as well. And when we failed to carry through on the threat, they would see too much."

"True, on both counts," Light Green and Purple says: "Proof of how truly wretched humanity is." 

"It is nothing we do not know by now," Black and Dark Green says "I look forward to The Day."

"The Day," Light Green and Purple repeats, sharing in the reverence: "We should erradicate the rest of these people. They will not serve us, now."

"I will see to that," Black and Dark Green says, rising up to do just that.

"And I will sync with the Leader. Perhaps others in other work camps are having better luck."

 * * *

They weren't.

In every tent city, and every non-resettled population center in Southern Thailand, the Imago were asking questions, and no one could give them any answers. All their victims could "say" for certain was that while they may have had their own feelings or sympathies towards that group, or any other such group, they did not know anyone involved in the attack. Which was sad, seeing as how, in the end, the Imago had to exterminate every work camp they interrogated, and they interrogated many work camps. 

Five million people dead, just like that.

* * *

Their quest for the truth took them to Bangkok, and the headquarters of the Internal Security Operations Command. Their contacts there were a little more forthcoming, especially after the first thing that Blue and Vermillion did was to crush the skull of their leader while he was trying to introduce his new assistant, and then demand that assistant give an exact accounting for the whereabouts, activities, and technical expertise of the New Pattani United Liberation Organization.

But in the end, all they could say is what was already known. The group was a splinter group of another splinter group, and had proven themselves to have much more bark than bite. After their leader had been shot and killed in 2006, and many of his lieutenants captured, tried, and executed for their crimes against the state after then, the remainder went underground. And they did nothing more dangerous than pray, plan, and trip over their own ammunition and shoelaces.

"So you mean to say they have been out there, all this time, and you have done nothing to them?" Blue and Vermillion asked the assistant to the assistant to the assistant, who was the only person still alive in the room by that point.

"Sir, you must understand," the man said, trying not to show his fear: "Such a group is useful from an intelligence standpoint. They can be used to watch overall movements within a larger terrorist network. By observing them, and gently working to counteract their major goals, we can keep tabs on other, more dangerous groups. We can even infiltrate them, if necessary, and set up crossfires and accidents."

"So you mean to say that you had them under surveillance this entire time?"

"Yes," the man says: "But so far as we knew, they were planning nothing of this caliber. I think they were going to assassinate an Imam who tried to get his flock away from violence, but that was it. And it was so badly-constructed a plan I do not think we were even going to intervene."

"Then you have been fooled," Blue and Vermillion said: "And your foolishness will cost you."

On his way out of the office-turned-abattoir, the Imago turned to the assistant to the assistant to the assistant to the assistant, who hadn't been in the room because he'd been in the bathroom, and then wisely decided to wait outside. The little man stumbles before the metal being who whirls on him, about to plead for his life, but halts in mid-prayer as the stern face smiles upon him.

"I have good news for you, O friend," Blue and Vermillion says: "You are now the acting head of Internal Security Operations Command. We shall inform your leaders of this change. And your first duty is to make the finding of the New Pattani United Liberation Organization your primary objective.

"You will see to this?"

"Yes, yes," the small man stammers, trying not to !@#$ himself: "At once, sir. You can count on me."

"Good, O man," the Imago says, patting him on the head with a hand still sticky with blood and filth: "They could not. I feel you will."

And then he's teleported away, leaving the small man to collapse to his knees, suddenly very grateful for his touchy digestive system.

* * *

Later that night, in a dim sum restaurant in Hong Kong, there's something of an odd disturbance. 

People would tell the police that a white man entered and had a few courses. He spoke decent Chinese, with an American accident (New York, someone thought) but people could not quite place him, visually. It was as though no one who saw him could accurately describe any feature of his that could make him stand out from their general idea of what a white man looked like.

He'd been there an hour, and had several course, and more than a few beers. It was odd that he didn't return the flirting of the young ladies who served his table, much less the friendly conversation from the old ladies who trundled the food carts across the floor. He was not drunk or sullen, but seemed preoccupied, as though he was waiting for news.

He received a message on his pad, and when he looked at what it said, he went rigid, and then began to shake. He got up and walked to the men's room, and locked the door behind him. And for the next ten minutes, every person in the entire building was scared utterly !@#$less by the rapid-fire barrage of curses and screaming that erupted from there.

("You dirty !@#$holes," "How could you?" "Five million people!" and "I didn't know!" seemed to be the four key phrases, but "I am going to !@#$ you to death! All of you!" stuck in one waitress' head.)

The police arrived after it had been quiet for a few minutes. They kicked down the door, but the man was already gone; he'd apparently shimmed out a window that he shouldn't have been able to fit through. On the sink was how much he owed for dinner, plus a sizable tip, and another pile of money that was clearly meant for damages.

(The mirror over the sink was smashed, doubtlessly punched in. There was no blood.)

What could the police do? They told the owners of the establishment to be grateful he'd paid his bill, and said they'd get back with them. Past that, all they could do was put out an APB for a white man with no description, and chalk it up to another strange night in Kowloon. 

And when the surveillance camera logs were checked, and they found out that the video could not focus on the man's face and eyes -- so that their computers could not identify him at all -- they kicked it upstairs, like they were supposed to, and went back to rousting easier crimes.

When you have to police eight million people, sometimes living with desertion is all you can do. 

(SPYGOD is listening to Other Voices (The Cure) and having a Sinkiang Black Beer)

9/11/12 - Running Towards Nothing, Again and Again

So, son, I bet you've been wondering what the !@#$ your old pal SPYGOD has up to, lately?

"Been a bit !@#$ quiet, lately, there, sir. Do you have a rescue plan up and running, yet? The planet isn't going to !@#$ing save itself, now is it?"

And no, son, it isn't. But these things take time and finesse. Especially when you've got the kind of odds stacked against us that we do.

I mean, !@#$. They have Deep Ten, don't they? That's total coverage of the airspace of the entire !@#$ing world, right there. We so much as pop up our heads and they'll !@#$ing vape them from orbit, just to be sure.

And then there's those Falsefaces, and the Imago, themselves. And whatever the !@#$ they turned my beautiful Flier into. And that city that rose out of the waves.

Oh, yes, son -- I know about that, now. I know all about that !@#$, now. And while I may not know exactly what it means, I know enough to know that it's nothing good, and that we're going to have to be just a little more careful about certain things.

And I do not like it -- Not one !@#$ bit.

I do not like sitting on my hands with my thumbs up my !@#$. I do not like this waiting and watching instead of kicking and fighting. I do not like the fact that people around the world are being !@#$ed and enslaved and killed.

And I do not like not being in control at a time like this. 

So I've been making plans. Quiet and careful plans. Mostly with friends, sometimes with enemies, and sometimes with people who have no !@#$ idea who I am, or what I'm doing, or what I need them to do it for.

Like today, for example.

Today, I'm sitting in a sun chair on the deserted beach of the Samui Beach Resort, in sunny Koh Samui, off the coast of Thailand. I got here yesterday, after some quiet but necessary business in Bangkok, and I've been sneaking around ever since.

I'm drinking cold, local beer that I liberated from what's left of the resort's kitchen, since the island was evacuated and put to work by the Imago. No one's left here but crabs, birds, and the occasional escapee or thief, but I've got plenty of time before the metal men come looking.

I'm looking Southwest, towards Indonesia, as I drink my beer. On a clear day like today, you can almost see a certain orbital elevator the Imago put together, quite some time ago.

Yeah, son. Almost. It's tall enough to put something in near earth orbit, with a little help, but it's not too wide, or thick.

Or well armored, for that matter.

I'm checking my watch, every so often. It's a nice watch -- heavy, thick, and precise to the last nanosecond. It's also loaded with lots of neat spy tricks, but right now they don't matter as much as just knowing what !@#$ing time it is.

Especially given what's about to happen.

Now, I can hear you asking, son: "Gee, SPYGOD, what is about to happen? What the heck have you been up to since you taught the President how to kill people three times his size with three pennies, a shoe, and a wad of chewing gum?"

And that's a !@#$ good question. But let me answer it by asking you a question, for once. And it's a really simple one, so no cheating, okay?

Son, do you know what today is?

Yes, smart!@#$, it's September 11th. But do you know why that's important?

No? Oh for !@#$'s sake, kid. I know we talked about this last year. It's the day that America was almost attacked by a bunch of cave-dwelling religious zealots. You know, the four-plane hijacking that would have cost us the Pentagon, the Capitol, and the Twin Towers if we hadn't gotten !@#$ lucky?

Oh! Now you remember. Yeah, I did talk about that quite a bit, now didn't I? Something about getting lucky versus getting it right, and what you can only learn from failure. It's an old speech, but a good one.

Well, I'm sure you might remember that, for years afterward, we were always on high alert around that time of year. I may have gone into Afghanistan and turned those idiots' leader into a stain on the cave wall (and his head into a hallway decoration) but they still had lots of friends, and their friends had friends, and so on. And there was a good chance that, if they actually got the faculty together, they might !@#$ing try to attack us again on that day.

Did they? Well, they tried. And we caught them. And they paid for their !@#$ing stupidity.

But not completely.

Yes, we could have wiped them out. We had strategic talents who could hunt them to the ends of the Earth and beyond. We had weapons that could obliterate them from outer !@#$ing space, or from the ground up. We had the tools, the talent, and the intelligence.

We had mad skills, as they say.

But yet, in spite of what they did, and what they kept trying to do, we always let some of them live.

Why? Well, it goes back to the Outland mentality, I guess. That group might not have been the same kind of dangerous as HONEYCOMB or GORGON, but we were worried they might have some kind of doomsday plan, or an alliance we didn't know about. And if we wiped them all out, then maybe some big !@#$ domino would fall down, and we'd be butt!@#$ed before we even felt it going in the backdoor.

And we also wanted to follow them and see where they led. Maybe they'd show us their true masters, or lead us to other criminals and terrorists. Maybe we'd learn about new and emerging groups, or find out that they were splintering. Maybe they'd lead us to something we thought we'd lost, or never even knew we had.

All kinds of possibilities, there, son -- even if it meant being partially !@#$ing responsible every time they hijacked, kidnapped, tortured, oppressed, corrupted, or killed someone in the name of God. 

But then, we also wanted them around because they were superstitious, crafty, and easy to use.

Oh, does that bother you, son? Well, welcome to !@#$. This happens all the !@#$ time.

!@#$, son -- I told you before. You remember the talk about Harold, and how most of our spies actually operated? Well, sometimes Harold wears a cape and steals diamonds. Sometimes he spins genes for HONEYCOMB or goose-steps for ABWEHR. Sometimes he worked for SQUASH, or the People's Protectors.

And sometimes, Harold carries a rocket launcher on his shoulders and a holy book in his pocket.

Like today.

I've been busy since I got back from that weird-!@#$ future I drank and ghost-screwed my way into, son. Part of it's been intelligence-gathering, and part of it's been making alliances and rebuilding organizations, but part of it's been getting certain loose assets and liabilities back under my thumb.

Hence Thailand, where, down in the South of the country, there are large numbers of militant religious zealots. And while they're mostly all about stomping on people who don't share their unique and cozy point of view, they are also loosely allied with the ultimate successor of the organization that tried to mess with America on September 11th of 2001.

Now, I'm sure you remember my saying that we dealt with that organization with extreme prejudice. We also dealt with its son, and its grandson, and its great grandson, and we did so with such ruthlessness and exacting standards that what's left of it's great great grandson is a shattered wreck of a terrorist outfit. It's got big plans but lousy follow-though, leaders who are corrupt as sin and competent as a braying jackass, and no real handle on what to do or how to do it.

I mean, !@#$, son. On 3/15 the CIA decided to !@#$ing use part of this group as their revolutionary patsies? They failed. The Imago showed up and found that the Thai Junta was still very much in charge, and their proxy army was in pieces on the floor.

(But lucky for everyone, the surviving Junta members were oh-so-willing to cooperate with the Imago because they had similar goals in mind. Hence some of the fun I just had, up North, in Bangkok. But enough on that today...)

So yeah, they're superstitious, easy to lead, not technically savvy, reliant on others for direction, and their communications network is so insecure a ten year old kid could prank-call his way into it. 

Which brings us here, to sunny Koh Samui, which is quite the tourist destination. So much so, in fact, that this island has its own, tiny airport -- an airport that the Imago didn't get around to blasting on 3/15 because everyone forgets its there, except for the tourists and travel agents.

Nice little airport. Bamboo huts with wi-fi. Covered golf carts to take you to and from the plane, and deliver your luggage right to the waiting area. Banana republic immigration shacks. And a runway that takes you right past the big Buddha at the North end of the island.

Not that the Southern Thai friends of the great-great-grandson took off that way, son. They went South, and then Southwest, in a cargo plane that was packed full of very sophisticated explosives, and tricked out with certain anti-radar, anti-visibility, and noise-baffling devices that will all but ensure that the Imago will not see, hear, or sense it coming.

At least, until it's right at its target.

September 11th, 2012. Four in the afternoon in South Sumatera, 150 or so miles Southeast of Pontianak. I don't know if they've got anything scheduled to go up, today, or not, but I think after this they'll be having a few problems with that next shipment.

And as soon as I see the explosion, I'm going to send out a statement of intent and responsibility on behalf of their organization, and "mine."

Yes, son. I used air quotes. Those !@#$ing idiots, whose communications network this grown up kid prank-called his way into, thought I was here to help them. They thought I was a fellow zealot, out to strike a blow for our great and terrible God against the evil Satan-worshiping tyrant idolators, Imago. Because we're all massively !@#$ing angry that those tin-suited !@#$s have ruined their chances of taking Thailand, Malaysia, the Pacific Rim, and maybe the whole world for their version of our religion.

And they're so !@#$ angry that they can't even bring themselves to ask questions when someone they can barely see or describe offers them a !@#$ing flying bomb that won't be seen until it gets there.

Oh? You think this is immoral, son? You think it's a bad thing for me to use a bunch of dumb !@#$s who want to die in a fire for their God?

Well, what do you think I should !@#$ing do with them, then? Shoot them? Put them in jail? Hand them over to the Imago?

No?

I didn't think so. As far as I'm concerned, they're weapons. I'm just the one who gets to aim them and pull their trigger, this time. And that's all this is.

3:58 in the afternoon. Two minutes from now, there will be a Boom. After that Boom, there will be a crash as however many !@#$ing miles of orbital elevator comes crashing back down to the Earth. After that crashing, there will be !@#$ to pay in South Thailand, as the Imago will be crash down here, scour the area, and root out every last bastion of these !@#$ers to find and cripple the ones responsible for blowing up their !@#$ing space elevator.

And while they're doing that... I will be somewhere else, doing something else, and not being seen by them. Because they will be looking here, right where I won't be.

It's an old trick, son. You make them run to get you, but you're not anywhere near there. Close by, maybe, but not here.

And boy do I have some some plans going in that regard...

Well, will you look at the time? 3:59, Son. Time for another beer before it all gets started. You pop, I'll pour...?

Oh? You sure you don't want one? Things are about to go !@#$ing crazy, son. Might be a while before we get to sit on a sunny, deserted beach, have a cold one, and watch fireworks from a long way away.

No? Well, suit yourself. I'll have one for you.

You're welcome.

(SPYGOD is listening to A Forest (The Cure) and having a Singha)