The Agent could hear transmission from the lunar outpost, “On priblizhayetsya s temnoy storony na zagolovok pryamo dlya etoy bazy.”
‘Ah, so they know I am approaching from the dark side on a heading directly for the base,’ he thought as the systems translated Russian into English. ‘Good, so they are aware of their nemesis coming to destroy them.’
“Bystro okhranu vse oruzhiye oborony!”
‘Yes, yes, quickly arm your weapons defence systems. Your panicking will do you no good.’
He swept into across the plateau barely one hundred feet above the lunar terrain, with all weapons firing. At first, the Russian officers witnessed their systems begin to experience data disintegration. Then as the first laser pulses began their destruction, they screamed in anguish as their life support systems went offline and they lost pressurisation. A few moments later, they were drawn into the vacuum of space as their base erupted into explosions and was entirely destroyed.
‘Now. My exquisite bull shall rise again,’ the Agent thought as the automated systems took the craft to its next plotted heading towards the Sea of Serenity.
Again, the voices of panic could be heard, but this time they were American. The Agent laughed at the futility of their defence systems only momentarily affecting his laser fire, before they too experienced the same losses as the Russians. He watched as the officers were cast into the vacuum, whilst their base became a brief cloud of fire, before the airlessness of space extinguished the flames. And then he laughed as the ship took a steep banking turn on its way towards his final target.
The situation at Luna One was of a base at high alert status. Defensive systems were operating at full capacity, but the officers manning the holographic control arrays, were unaware of the virus weapon the Agent was bringing to them. They watched his approach as he covered the distance between targets at great speed, giving them barely any time to prepare their minds for the onslaught. Eric Gunter was watching the events unfold from his array deep below New York City, and after the first successful attack from the Agent, he was beginning to feel a degree of unease – something his internal nano mechanics were trying to rectify.
When the Agent did arrive, he brought his craft to a halt, hovering about three hundred yards from the base. The graphene nano ribbons inside the nano mechanics were working as fast as possible to assist Eric to anticipate and calculate the next move by the Agent. He stared at the array’s three-dimensional holographic projection of the Agent’s ship hovering just beyond the base, and the Agent was staring straight back at him as he just observed his final and largest target on his flight of fanciful destruction.
Then in a moment where a tiny filament of collective reason flashed across the Agent’s mind, he abruptly dismissed it as his mania tore into him, prompting him to unleash all the weapons power he could.
At first, Eric saw the systems at the base go haywire. He watched as defence systems could barely make any sense of the incoming craft, firing with no effect on their target. He saw the looks on the faces of those at the base turn to horror when all of their life support went offline, and Eric watched as the de-pressurised environment was torn apart and they were taken by the vacuum. Then, when in his moment of maniacal glory, he saw the Agent come in close to unleash volley upon volley of laser pulses, reducing the base to nothing. When the cloud of ashes, smoke and dust had cleared, Eric could see nothing, as the Agent had terminated all transmissions from the lunar surface, except for one. Unknown to him, the mining operations outpost at the southern lunar pole were still continuing, and so the Agent had left the Moon behind with the lonely outpost still intact.
He streaked across the sky during re-entry on a heading directly to his Seattle base. Such was his sense of jubilation that he destroyed a few more of the city’s buildings on his approach to landing. Then, when he arrived back to his minions, he immediately dismissed them as insignificant, and ordered them to leave him alone.
“Oh my tor, so exquisite you are to rise to me again, and so exquisite to end their meaningless existences. Oh my tor, those bastards could never break you. You will always be my own agent. Tomorrow my rise on Earth will resume, with you as my instrument of futility!”
The Agent’s insanity resided deep within him and he was now to try his best for expelling it upon others wherever he did – for he barely choose anything, such was the measure of its’ capacity to transcend all reason. It directed him as he was its’ instrument, and the amplifier recently reborn, was the instrument of insanity in manifestation as a weapon.
He blasted away all signs of the gates near Omaha dividing the western and eastern sectors, and almost as soon as he did, scores of afflicted people crossed the line into the east. He flew on over the great cities of the eastern United States, and destroyed anything he possibly could. People ran in fear, screaming as they went, but those in his sights could not hide. He shot them as he saw them and he blew up the buildings into which they scurried. He unleased proximity viruses in each and every pulse from his laser canons, sending localised systems into disintegration, where machines and internal nano technology implants, went haywire. Then, as the holographic array in front of him showed there was a large foodstuff manufacturing plant directly in sensor line, he smiled with his own type of glee, as he ruined the entire facility, to cause starvation amongst many in the coming times.
Eric Gunter saw all this happen as well, and more than ever, the internal nano mechanics were struggling to maintain his composure. Officers assigned to monitor Eric, hurriedly entered algorithm sequences to counteract the onslaught – but to no avail. Failure was becoming apparent within him and around him, and the authorities would look heavily upon these incidents without any sense of Eric as a person They were certain to enforce an even stricter regime for operations as a result.
When the Agent had finished his first attack using his proximity vortex amplifier upon the Earth, Eric stood motionless and almost without thought, as he stared at the holographic array before him. He was without reason, but not in the manner defying the one who had upstaged all the authorities could do in defence. Eric could not discern and appropriate developmental response to the attacks, nor could his nano mechanics offer any suggestion on what to do next. The systems inside him, and those around him used to manage operations for sustaining infrastructure to food production, had simply overloaded as they succumbed to the Agent’s doing of undoing.
With their knowledge of his latest weapon and through knowing it was only affective in close proximity to the Agent’s location whenever he fired the weapons from his spaceship, the authorities decided to take the next step. They unleashed horrors of their own as they sent all the military might they determined was necessary on a mission to destroy the Agent’s lair and any of his other installations. Within two hours, they destroyed the jet factory near Seattle, and they took upon those considered as his minions, seeking them out across the entire western sector, without regard for anyone who may have been in their way. They began a war – a war of attrition of the kind never seen previously, where they sought to wear down the Agent and his minions through destruction of all seen as vital to his presence.
The cities of Seattle, San Francisco, Portland, and Los Angeles were reduced to rubble, as were their populations. Anywhere military pilots chanced upon machines still operating and therefore under the control of the Agent, they blasted to oblivion. Great forests burned, and rivers became rivers of blood. It was not just the blood flowing from death – it was the lifeblood of almost all that lived, all that was, and all that was the integrity of existence. The Agent had antagonised them to act swiftly and without remorse, and to them, they would eventually overcome their enemy of their own swelling hate, and then re-build in the image they saw fit - the only way ahead for their vision of a machine world.
Within days of the military attacks, legions of military personnel were sent to force the remaining people who were alive, into compliance. Specialised operations teams were sent to track
down the minions of the Agent and to put them to death, whilst others were despatched to locate and similarly destroy anyone who was afflicted with viruses. Some would struggle as their last vestiges of life were being eroded, but the authorities had prepared for this, and so they unleashed a new array of weaponry to destabilise their sub-atomic mass, sending them cascading to the ground in piles of dust.
People were now ordered into every facet of life with the curfew being enforced twenty-four hours per day. No option remained for anything other than strict compliance, for to challenge any order given, would bring about the same sub-atomic death.
The masses were lured into fear in comparison to what they had encountered and dispensed by the Agent. There was simply no choice, no decision…nothing but compliance and nothing to strive for. The concept of status was entirely closed down as people were told their employment was in service to the authorities for the progress of the machine. They were offered nothing, and many others not so fortunate, began to starve when they left the foodstuff manufacturing plant to smoulder after the Agent’s attack. Then in the final move to alienate people from life, the authorities shut down most of their energy, including all the lights, and so the cities everywhere, descended into darkness.
News of these events was sent across the globe, where governments of other nations were given the ultimatum for compliance or to be cut off from any support of those at central systems deep beneath New York. In fear of reprisal and or being unable to continue operations, and additionally to defend against the Agent, most nations fell into line with the orders. Only the great powers who had vied for supremacy on the Earth since the middle of the twentieth century, objected, but they too acted to oppress their people, and to enforce their own methods of compliance. In a short two-week event, the Earth was closed down into darkness – a darkness it had never experienced before, and a darkness from which most people thought they would never emerge.
Aside from the instituting of these powers of oppression, the authorities had one other main objective in mind. They needed flux mechanics to bring in their new type of order, and so they focused with all they could, on apprehending John. To capture him and then extract his knowledge, would take them to their utmost desire realised - a desire to control the Earth, and a desire to evolve it into their efficient machine planet. Upon such a planet, there would never be an issue, there would never be a question, and there would never be a moment where they did not determine what was best for the people. There would be no law, and no argument of circumstance. There would only be the way – the way the authorities advised and enforced. They would have flux mechanics and with this technology, they would transcend the boundaries of existence as conceived by the masses and with such knowledge as their own, they would always have the upper hand.
Chapter 29
The Agent was not impressed with the destruction of his lair, and he certainly did not care any longer for those who had considered themselves his followers. Not having any location to base himself from, was his biggest concern for the immediate future, but he had the spaceship to take him wherever he wanted, and he had enough energy capacity to keep it running for years to come. Beyond that, he did not care at all, for if he were to end up without any means to an end, then he would simply relinquish himself to oblivion. Emotion was not part of his constitution, for to him, the notion of any such thing, was simply a weakness he could not sustain within his sphere of megalomania.
When he flew his craft over the now desolate city of Seattle, for a moment, he thanked the authorities for saving him the energy required to completely do away with the city. Then, as he continued southward over Portland and then onto San Francisco, he decided to reside for a time, amongst the ruins of the once great bay city. In a flash, he recalled the location of the facility where he had once been employed as Agent Eight. He saw that the vertical shaft was still in place and operational, when he inspected the site after landing. It was large enough to accommodate his spaceship and secure enough for him to install only a few monitoring systems and weapons to ensure he would not be susceptible to a ground based attack. There were no visible signs of humanity around, for the site was beyond the limits of the ruined city. This was entirely suitable to his needs as being alone was something he most often sought anyway, and it would enable him to focus on his next goal to find John.
He wanted the Torus back. He wanted to make that bastard pay, and he still wanted vengeance on his former superior officer. Deep inside the facility he began to manifest his next act based on hatred. He installed the necessary systems to warn him of anyone or anything approaching the complex. He scouted around looking for any machines he considered usable and his was almost beside himself when he discovered a large room with four six-wheeled Agent vehicles inside that were still fully functional. Then he set about going through the vast quantities of holographic equipment still in place, so he could build a scanner with a range large enough for him to detect the energies from the Torus from a great distance.
This task required him to think more than he had ever thought in any way resembling cognitive reasoning since he had operated as Agent Eight…perhaps even preceding those times. Energies within the Torus were subtle, yet recognisable to his re-built amplifier if it was configured with algorithms to boost its signal and response ratios. His main advantage came from the distinct frequencies emitted by the Torus, coupled with its crystalline resonance properties, meaning it was almost the only object on Earth of its type. The Agent still had data specific from when it was situated within the horns of his previous amplifier, which meant he could use this as a sonar wave to send out and receive a mirrored signal in return.
It was tough for him to remain composed sufficiently to devise the necessary algorithms. Lurking so prevalent within, his mania often reached out to expel its insanity in any given situation, causing him to not only have face the battle of his hatred toward John and Carmel, but to also battle with retaining his logical cognition. This manifested in a mire of synaptic convulsions where suddenly he would be taken on the ride to places he never imagined – they were new places of mania. He never made any conscious effort to express any degree of madness, for it simply took over, often causing him to drop his thoughts, drop his tool, and fall away from his holographic array bank, to writhe and expunge whatever surged within, so it could find an avenue by which to dissipate – until the next episode.
Now the latest instance of frivolity had receded, he was able to continue where he had left off, and after each time these increasingly frequent bouts of mania occurred, he took to his task ahead with more and more zeal.
The basic platform for pseudo flux mechanics was within his grasp, as it was the basis on which his amplifier operated. He knew this for certain, but he was unaware of the potential he had unearthed through the creation of so many unstable vortexes, regardless of how long they had lasted.
Atomic acceleration was a science applying physics and quantum molecular resonance shifting, to accentuate probability as a construct bound only to perception as it occurred in nominal real-time, and so within this resides the possibility of probability beyond the conceptualised dynamics of the present in construct. Basically, it could form dimensional shifts dependant only on the parameters or elements of intent sent by those who operated the amplifier. He knew this, but he overlooked the grave consequences of using a device out of alignment, and so whilst he worked, the instances of unstable vortex grew, in essence like an endless conflagration in the structure of matter, time, and those energies beyond that formed the blue prints underlying matter, spirit, and intent.
Those people afflicted by his viruses were the first inroads into the misalignment of the subtle multi–dimensional energies not evident to them in their life upon the Earth, but always there, just out of sight, only a moment away from touch, yet essential to the integrity of circumstance. As the Agent delved deeper into his work, so too did the holes in many expand as their bodies began to coagulate, and their liquids transfo
rming to congeal. Then through their convulsions into the murkiness he had created, they would send out their last fated breath of both life and of spirit as they were drawn inward to oblivion and beyond into futility. Now with so many affected, and with his raids into the eastern sector, the onslaught of this oblivion was tearing at the fabric of time, and of space both within and without, unleashing his darkest weapon yet, and soon, he would see it, and then he would embrace it.
When for this day, he decided it was enough, he took again to his spaceship – at first watching the rows of lights flickering by as the ship rode the platform upwards inside the vertical tube. Then at the moment of lift off, his mania was again confirmed, as the lights had triggered yet another episode, and so he set about erratically dispensing hatred and revulsion as he targeted anything and anyone on a maniacal flight amongst the ruined towers of San Francisco. He sent forth round after round of laser fire – both of destructive bolt, and of virus, and his intent was barely present, for intent is something conjured, but as it was through his insanity, the idea of conjuring up anything, was but a myth. It simply was, and to him, it simply is…his way, his depravity of self, and his personal affliction that he embraced without heart or soul. He cared not for himself, he cared not for any others, and he cared nothing for the planet. He was unable to care, for the concept was beyond him, but…he still wanted for need and need for want, of the Torus, and of John and Carmel, so he could express his hatred upon them in the way it needed to be expressed, such that it is for a megalomaniac who has been beset by those in sanity.
Höllenbadt: Book two of the Torus Saga Page 26
