Thriller The Sins of the Fathers

Chapter 1 ? An American Nightmare

?Proclaim this among the nations:
Prepare for war!
Rouse the warriors!
Let all the fighting men draw near and attack.? ? Joel 3:9 (NIV)

IC: Joel David Shepherd
Westbound Interstate 94, Michigan, USA

The order to mobilize could not have been timed better if Joel had scheduled it himself. In less than a few hours he had contacted all of his utilities to cancel them, he contacted his mortgage provider and bank that he would be mailing them a new durable power of attorney to handle his affairs, sealed up his house and mailed off his key to his parents in Cincinnati. This wasn?t the first rodeo he was attending, so he knew what he needed to do. He had packed his black jump-bag with some civilian clothes, his spare sets of ACUs, and personal hygiene items before he rolled out in his supped up Ford.

As he made the almost two hour journey to his unit?s assembly hall, Joel spent the majority of trip talking to his mother and father about what he would like them to do with the house. ?Mom, I have no clue how long I am going to be gone. As a matter of fact I don?t even know where I am going to going to yet. Just get everything packed up and get the house on the market.?

She tried talking him out of that decision, but it was to no avail, he had made up his mind that morning. ?Mom, even if I am only going to be gone for six months, I can?t return to that house. It holds to many memories, to many painful memories and I can?t go back there. So please just get it sold and I will figure out living arrangements when this is all done.? His mom started to cry when she asked him her next question. ?Don?t worry Mom. I am planning to come back from this mission. I?ve got my brothers to watch over me and I will be watching over them.?

Even though he had an older brother, his mother knew he was referring to his fellow MPs going into battle with him. Moments after reports came in about Boston, he had received several calls from his battle-buddies to offer their condolences. They were his family, the only one he had near him right now. ?Mom, I just got into to town and need to hang up. I will call you when I know anything.? She started crying even harder now. ?I know mom. I love you. Give hugs and kisses to everyone down south from me. Bye ma?.?

Joel pulled into the lower level parking lot where all the enlist personnel lower then Platoon Sergeant were authorized to leave their vehicles. He stepped out of his Taurus, placed his cover on, and instantly transformed into Staff Sergeant Shepherd, Bravo Squad Leader, 2nd Platoon. As he walked up the stairs built into the hillside upon which the assembly hall was located, he pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his shoulder pocket and started packing it against the heel of his left palm.

?So when did the Reverend start smoking again??

Joel looked over towards the separate building that acted as the unit?s motor pool and found the senior medic, Jeremy ?Doc? Barrett, leaning against the exterior wall smoking his own cigarette. ?Hey Doc,? he said as he walked over to his fellow Staff Sergeant and extended his hand for a shake, ?I just picked it back up and I don?t want any crap about it, you got it?? The young medic pulled him in by their clasped hands and patted him on the back.

?Don?t worry Shep, I won?t say anything.? The two soldiers separated, ?I?m sorry about your loss, brother.? Joel knew he was going to get a lot of that this morning so he just simply nodded and said thanks. He hated when people gave him condolences, it was like they ripped open a partially healed wound and poured salt into it. The same thing happened ten years earlier when his first son died in a freak accident.

I made it through that, I am going to make it through this.

---

Ten years earlier, Ft. Leonard Wood

The end was in sight, only one more major obstacle and the past 18 weeks of hell would be paid off. Private First Class Shepherd would officially be

 

Rudyard Vane-Tempest
The British Embassy, Tokyo

A blanket of silence had settled across most of the embassy, broken every so often as news from London filtered through. And yet, despite the tension, the dark rumbling of opera could be heard playing from the office of the mysterious diplomatic attaché in the east wing. The one who never seemed to conduct any official business.

That was largely because the man concerned was used to conducting a lifetime of unofficial business. Discreet, borderline illegal operations had been his forté, and continued to be so even after his "retirement" from SIS. His name was Rudyard Vane-Tempest, and when the Change had come he had greeted it with the stiff upper lip that had once been so characteristic of his people.

He had been on the phone that morning, chatting to an old acquaintance from Bailiol.

"We're the last of a dying breed, old chap," he said, reclining in his chair while the opera continued to play in the background. "These days the mobs at home are just as volatile as any hot-blooded continental. If you're looking for composure and reserve you won't find it back in London. You'd be better off coming here- the Japs have barely broken a sweat as far as I can tell. And- excuse me for a moment, it seems I have a visitor-"

He broke off. A man had just burst into his office, storming past the secretary and locking the door behind him.

"Clifton Moore?" asked Rudyard, though he recognised the man. "I find that life's foremost pleasures are the unexpected ones, but nevertheless I would prefer that you schedule an appointment-"

"Vane-Tempest," began the man. That immediately indicated he was serious. The Yanks were generally dismissive of double-barreled surnames, and tended to refer to Rudyard as 'Vane' or 'Tempest', or occasionally 'Temp', as if he were some fresh-faced intern.

"We need to talk," continued Moore. "Listen, let´s cut this short. I...?

The television, which had been humming quietly in the corner, chose that moment to switch from a weather report to breaking news of an explosion in the area. Rudyard switched off the opera with a gesture, and turned up the volume on the TV set. Thousands were dead. The US Embassy was located within the blast radius.

Moore almost collapsed, recovered briefly then fell again, crashing to the floor.

?They need...know.?

Rudyard did not respond, but simply sat back and sighed. Moore had arrived alone. He had come to a foreign embassy, to a man he barely knew. He had locked the door behind him. In all probability, he was not here on official business. This was an off-the-radar sort of matter.

"Just my specialty," mused Rudyard aloud. He picked up the phone again. The embassy always had a number of local physicians on standby in case of emergencies, and it seemed an appropriate time to summon one.

He pressed the button that put him through to his secretary.

"Linda- no, no need for an apology, I wasn't expecting him but it's quite alright. Listen to me: I would like you to call Dr Kanawa at once. Tell him that a man has collapsed at the British embassy, and we require a doctor immediately. Tell him that he will be amply reimbursed for his services. On his arrival he should come directly to my office. Thank you."

He hung up.

While he waited for the doctor to arrive, Rudyard stepped over to Moore and began searching through the man's pockets.

Tag: Fins

 

ooc: And a little special that Fin and I wrote actually for a prequel game. It did not fit, so he asked me to post them here.


The Blohm Tapes
Part I of V

Music

Doctor: Laura? Laura? Are you okay again?
Laura: *sobbing* Yes, Xavier Naidoo always got a calming effect on me, you know?
Doctor: Funny, on me too. Do you like his earlier stuff more or his latter?
Laura: The last album was his best.
Doctor: Oh, to say that you should have seen the first one live.
Laura: Are you trying to win my trust by showing me you are a human, too?
Doctor: Yes. Does it work?
Laura: *laughs* Well, yeah. Think so.
Doctor: Do you like his voice or his religious subtext?
Laura: The voice. The text. I am an atheist.
Doctor: You are? I would have guessed you believe in a higher power of some sort.
Laura: No. Not at all. You know how they say that the lack of proof is not a proof for its nonexistence?
Doctor: Sure.
Laura: Well, they ignore it might be a strong indicator though, that what you cannot be proven might be made up, actually.
Doctor: really?
Laura: Isn´t it what you assume all the time when patients tell you they saw Vampires or Aliens or they are Napoleon?
Doctor: Laura, I think you are right. Actually I do. But I wouldn´t . . .
Laura: Apply it to religion?
Doctor: Yes.
Laura: I think if the next guy comes in here, telling you he heard God voice when he kills little kids he will be enlightened to hear that.
Doctor: Does it give you satisfaction to outsmart me, Laura?
Laura: Sure.
Doctor: Why?
Laura: Because my father send you to tell me . . . nothing happened. And that is not true.
Doctor: Do you wanna tell me what happened?
Laura: No.
Doctor: Laura, your father is concerned, and he is indeed paying for your stay here. A lot of money, actually. But the things you did, they are actually a strong, very strong indicator that you might have been victim of something. So I do not work under the assumption that ?nothing happened? here. Despite what your father claims. But you know what?
Laura: What?
Doctor: I do not care. ?I am here to help you, Laura. I am here to help you and I not here to help your father.
Laura: And I shall believe you?
Doctor: You are the smart one. Find out. Our time for this week is up. Quite fitting, we both might need to think a bit about this talks, do we?
Laura: Maybe. Thank you.

 

Rufus Jameson
St. Regis, Tokyo

For freezing to death it was too warm. For Nepal´s night it was to bright. The realization he had been loved arrives before the realization arrives he has actually been saved. The pain makes a close third arrival.

Voices? Yeah, voices. Oh and that is Lilith. Lilith voice. She doesn´t wanna hear him talk like that?

He coughs. A first sign of lives, as his eyes open and close again. Damned, it is so bright. So terribly bright.

?Okay, I´ll be totally honest about this. If you don´t have a cigarette for me, please kill me now and here!? He says and is surprised how raspy his voice actually is. Good God, do I need that cigarette.

?And a gun would be nice, just in case another gang of Buddhist zombie monks with really bad karma decide to show up.? There wasn´t really any way to tell such things and stay serious while doing it, was there? There really wasn´t any way to be considered sane and talk about his last 24 hours. That thing that moved faster than the eyes, that he had dueled. The monks. The computer. The cold. He should have been dead. He had been in way over his head. Hell, he had been in so deep, he did not know where upside down really was. But he had made it.

And he had the answers. Sort of.

?On a serious note. Please tell me you retrieved that strange little computer!?

I need to smoke, need to smoke, need to smoke. He decided to quit when he survived this and filed that thought under ?probably won´t become relevant? in his head.


Tag: Sinrebirth

 

Baron Samedi
Warehouse in the D.C. West End

What always struck Toussaint Bellamy as particularly amazing, no matter how well he understood it, no matter how many times he saw it, was the capacity for humanity to revert to tribal instincts given only a slight nudge. It was as constant and ageless as the very Lwa he passed himself off as. Haitian villages or American slums, it mattered little - man joined his fellow man to better kill his other fellow man. That's deep stuff, he thought with a grin as he lit one of his cigars, I ought to be writing this down.

For today's facepaint he had chosen an inverted mirror stylization consisting of a crude skull split down the middle - white on one half of his face, normal skin on the other half, divided by a line that separated his entire head into predominantly flesh-toned (the left side, which had the white skull) and predominantly chalk-white (the right side, which had the skin skull outlined). It had been chosen to reflect the days activities - the contrasted tones hinted at the possibility of two routes which, most observers would infer, meant they were either with him or against him. The skull motif was a bit more straightforward and left little ambiguity as to what happened to those who opposed them. Bellamy actually remembered that he had once gotten into an argument with a professor about universal symbols, as Bellamy didn't really subscribed to the idea, but it was getting him results now, so who knows? The mind makes it real, as an American film had once pointed out.

He took a long drag on the cigar. The members of Los Mags were about to find out just how real it could get.

Toussaint Bellamy stood up then, and as he did so, he disappeared. In his place stood Baron Saturday, and it was the Lwa who picked up the ceremonial staff and threw open the door with an infectious cackle. Toussaint Bellamy, whoever he was, had modeled it on Geoffrey Holder. Anglos and their silly spy films - connections too strong to not play to. His voice was booming, his accent thick, his intent clear: "Bawon Kriminel, map travay pou ve de te yo, m pa bezwenn lajan! Bawon Kriminel, map travay pou ve de te yo, m pa bezwenn lajan! Bawon Kriminel, O! Lane a bout o, map paret tan yo! I am Baron, I govern all that is death! I am Samedi, none may die whose grave I do not dig! I am Cimetière, who guards the grave! I am La Croix, who sings of the inevitable end! I am Kriminel, who brings swift judgement! All who **** with me shall feast on feces in Hell!"

Bellamy, whoever he was, really hated the swearing bit, which he considered beneath an educated person such as himself, but the Ghede swore, and so too did Baron. Baron Kriminel swore most, and he was at the forefront now.

"Mambo Duchant, you would dare bring these sniveling little bitches before me? Fool bastards who would dare oppose the link to unreachable Bondye? Fool bastards so presumptuous as to think Death fears he may die? You will explain this to me." He exhaled a cloud of thick, black smoke. "And si Bondye vle I will understand."

TAG: SilentProphet

 

Thomas Schröder
Tarpenbekstr. 55, Hamburg


The noise next door was hard not to hear. He slowly moved over the long floor, his gun in both hands now like in some american cop-show. More? Did they send more? Sure they did. Why not. He slowly, carefully opened the door. The man he had seen did not look like a professional. He looked haunted, driven. thomas knew that look. He didn´t look like a friend of Laura Blohm, either. Then again Laura had strange friends, did she? He had killed and killed and it hadn´t brought her forth. Thomas was slowly running out of places to look for her and tricks to use and he was really running out of patience.

Stepping into the flat, he heard noises from the kitchen. He had taken of his shoes. His berlington socks made no sound when they touched the ground. He knew which piece of the floor would make a sound. He had trained to step over them for years. Why, he had always asked. Now it was clear. For his revelation. For his realisation of his true purpose. The man was obviously looking for something, Thomas saw his back and then him dragging plastic bags out of a drawer.

"Stop there! Whoever you are, I don´t wanna shot you." A lie. He wanted to shoot him so badly, it was almost a sexual sensation.

"ESTI? BKA? Or another of those thugs?" He asked and his voice sounded more tense than he had thought. "What did you do to Laura! Where did you take her!" He yelled, and God that sounded authentic. Almost as if he meant it. He was impressed.


Tag: Mitth, Fin

 

ooc: Posted for MoK, who has problems with the board.

---

[b]Padre Andro Davorina[/b]
[i]St. Mary Hospital, Rome[/i]

He prayed with the dying. That was what he did. They had told him nobody could do the job for more than a year. It was just too bad, to watch people die all day. But Andro knew death was a simple reality of life. Everything died sooner or later. Only God and his mercy last forever. Wasn' t it what his Bishop had told him once?

Andro had seen thousands dying. He himself had killed hundreds. No mercy and no absolution he granted any of them. So what better way there was to serve his heavenly Father than take care of the dying? Wasn?t death his greatest sin? So Andro watched people die and gave them what comfort they could receive. And when the end came, he gave them their absolution, so in the End of Days they could step before their father free of sin. It was his fourth year in this position. Many would follow.

[i]"For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But, if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins."[/i] He whispered to the elder lady, who nodded. Tears ran over her face. A deadly injury had cost to much of her strength. He organs were collapsing and only morphine kept her sane. Andro had chosen her for tonight, to sit by her side. [i]"Ak odpustíte iným ich previnenia, aj vá? nebeský Otec odpustí vám. Ale ak im vy neodpustíte, ani vy nemô?ete rátat s Bo?ím odpustením."[/i]

His favourite line. It gave him hope that someday even he would find forgiveness. There was noise outside. Some sort of trouble. He looked up and then back to the old Lady.

"What about the Sins of the Fathers?" The old woman suddenly asked, in broken English. He looked up and showed his confusion a bit too much. "The heavenly Father . . ." He broke off and considered. "I peccati sono quelli degli umani. In cielo c'è solo la purezza, la signora." He smiled and she smiled back, drifting back into morphine induced dreams.

Then the nun called Mary was suddenly there and she was obviously concerned. A woman not used to the cold touch of death, like he was.

?Father, there is matter you need to attend to,? Mary?s forehead wrinkled in worry, ?A priest has just arrived. In a stretcher, father. Sister Marina believes the man is due for his last rites.?

Ando looked at her through his glasses and nodded. "Certainly. Please bring the man somewhere quiet and I will be there in a second."

The last rites. He took his bible and his rosary and kissed the elder lady on her forehead. "Dio vi benedica e vi accolgo, Signora." He whispered and then followed the young nun. She was too pretty, too tempting for her profession, he realized. But temptation was part of being a Padre, was it?

[b]Tag: Fin, Spy[/b]

The post was approved and expanded by the GM.

 

Chapter 1: An American Nightmare

Crime Scene, West End

Malone made that look with which you could never be sure if he was bored or combining evidence. Then he took a sip from his coffee. ?They knew where to find him.? He said then. ?Look, I might not have seen a lot of action in my old days with the army, but these shots in the car look to me like 7.62×51mm shots. So they had assault rifles. Maybe Kalashnikovs or something. They couldn´t run around tooled up like that. Someone would have called it in. Or stopped them with his own little home reserve of semi-legal guns. No they came here to do this.? He turned to Garland. ?Money and everything was still there?? She nodded. She was on the phone and returned to the two officers. ?I checked, the driver will come through. He is in the metro hospital. His name is Robert Moorland. He is in OP, but it´s only his arm. So the doctors say he´ll make it. If with or without his arm they cannot say yet.?

Malone nodded. ?I´d say this was a professional hit or something. Damned. We never solve that one. These guys are probably already out of town.? He sighed and saw one of the assistance workers bring away the bag with the remains of the mobile. ?WAIT!? Malone shouted and took it from him. ?What do you say? A little swimming against the stream?? Malone asked Garret and it was his way to ask if they wanted to forget the rulebook for a second. The chubby officer opened it and looked at the sim-card. ?Looks intact. Maybe it tells us who was on the other side, when the thing got smashed by a bullet??

Not too far away they saw several police officers keep a man bag who was waving around with his badge. Whatever he was, it did not impress the patrol officers that much. He certainly did not look like a fed, with his wrecked, old clothes and the cigarette in his mouth that looked like it actually belonged there. ? Journalist.? Malone sighed and shook his head.

Tag: HS29, LordT



Camp Hades, Team Gold

The word team was an understatement. It was hard to say how many soldiers were part of team Gold, but they were certainly too many to count. They were registered, given new numbers, because their reserve numbers seem to be too much effort to keep track of. Then they got a fact sheet, each and everyone of them. All who had a number A went to the immediate transport area. Fuso and Shep were among those. There in the largest tent they had probably ever seen the quarter-master had boxes and boxes filled with weapons. They gave their sheet and each and everyone got his M4 rifle, his five mags and his Berretta M9 with another three mags. They came fresh out of the box, still smelling like the factory they were made in and the bath of fluids they had went through. Fuso looked less than enthusiastic when he got his gun.

?Damned, man. Why does this feel like I go to war?? He asked Shep and gave him a bitter smile. Looking around it wasn´t just what it looked like. The men around them were high on adrenaline, yelling, celebrating that they got their gun and their mission. ?It´s fear man. It eats away on souls. They will shoot anything, anyone just to feel a bit better.? Fuso said and was pushed away for the next to step into the line to get his equipments. They hadn´t even taken over their clothes, when they suddenly got their sheet ripped out of their hands again. A young female officer, who ignored the stupid comments by dozen soldiers looked at their number and pointed a direction. ?768, you are part of that platoon. TOD in T minus ten minutes. Sergeant Jacobs is your commanding officer. Good luck.? And then the masses pushed them on again. Everything happened according to a plan. A plan that did not allow to hesitate, think or reconsider. It was a well oiled machine. And one could feel it´s hunger. The US military had watched their country fall into chaos. Now, they were finally unleashed.

They landed on the airfield where an Osprey was already waiting.

[image=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/24/VMM-162_Osprey_on_the_tarmac_

 

Chapter 3: The Shadow of the Lord

The Esrada-Initiative

The argument below heated up again. The Cardinal nodded and leaned back, giving Nicollo a long and considering look.

"We have always moved towards a greater understanding of our world, your Eminence, and such arguments as these men put forth stultify our progress in this modern world." Nicollo added and Esrada nodded in some sort of agreement. ?Progress.? He answered then and gave the young priest a smile. The Catholic Church had not exactly made progress in the last year, although both men knew such waves were temporary. ?I agree with you, that these discussion are based on old and outdated views. Yet, maybe you are wrong about one thing.?

Esrada leaned forth and folded his hands. His tone hinted that this was their own private little conspiracy. Something between them, not meant for the holy fathers around them. ?But I disagree with your idea, that this discussion keeps us from gaining greater understanding, my son.? He made a break, looked around and then looked back to Niccollo. ?What if this is the end of the world? What if this actually is the apocalypse? Science, the modern information society, they seem to have no answer to the questions that brings up. Non at all. But I must say, I might be old-fashioned, but I never expected to find God on an iPad.? Again as sigh, this time, because he felt uncomfortable in the area he entered now. ?Maybe we were once on the right track, you know? When our faith was pure and politics, power and position meant nothing to the Christians, they knew that this day would come. And they tried to understand it. But then we turned to superstition and instrumentalized the idea of hell and apocalypse to enthrall the masses. We lost our way. We lost perspective. And now we are as surprised as everybody. We need to do the exactly opposite of what we´re doing here. What did you call it? Stultify our progress in this modern world?? Esrada nodded and gave Nicollo something. ?We need to embrace the modern age. And find an answer for it´s questions, before nobody is left to ask. Can you help me with that? Can you and your old teacher help me find an answer??

Esrada´s hand removed and the young priest held something few men in the church possessed: A chip-card to the archive of the Vatican. To any archive. No matter how forbidden, no matter how secret . . . the cardinal had just granted the young father and his absent mentor access to the vastest pool of knowledge on religious matters.
Without truly waiting for the young mans answer, the Cardinal smiled. ?Send Fra´Marcello my regards.?

Tag: Peng



St. Mary hospital

When Mary returned to the dying man, he had been brought to single room. Doctors were looking at him. Dr. Prizi was speaking to a nurse who was nearby, making notes. ?A Catholic Priest, burned badly on over 70 percent of his body, including his face. His hands indicate an age between 70 and 90. He suffers from some sort of toxic reaction, probably from breathing in too much smoke. And he repeats something I cannot understand. Probably Russian.? He nodded and looked to the nurse. What he meant was obvious. They could do nothing for him. A second nurse gave the dying man a heavy dose of morphine.

Actually the Doc had been wrong. It wasn´t Russian. Not at all. The man was whispering in good old-fashioned latin. The words repeated every two seconds: ?Umbra teneo.?
Mary understood it. The shadow knows. Whatever it meant, he repeated it like a prayer.

Outside in the corridor was another priest arriving. Andro saw him, as he was on his way to give the last rites to his dying brother. The young man looked troubled and somewhat very intense. He asked a nurse about a patient and she seemed to look it up. Strange thing, though. How old habits never leave you and resurface in the strangest moments. But the trained eye of a soldier ? that Ando still possessed ? he saw the shape of a silenced pistol right under the mans clothes. The left hand of the man never left the guns.

[

 

Margaret Elizabeth Hadley
St. Mary?s Hospital


?Certainly. Please bring the man somewhere quiet and I will be there in a second.?

?Yes, Father.? Mary rushed off, searching for the burnt man. It took several minutes because he had been moved into a room. He was the only person inside the room, which Mary believed was good. If he was to be read his last rights, he would have the peace of having his own space. Mary entered the room and glanced at the doctor. Doctor Prizi, she believed. She observed the nurse next to him. Rather ugly. She knew she was much pretty than her. Thank you Lord for the looks you have so graciously blessed me with. Mary stood awkwardly for a moment before attempting to listen to the doctor.

?A Catholic Priest, burned badly on over 70 percent of his body, including his face. His hands indicate an age between 70 and 90. He suffers from some sort of toxic reaction, probably from breathing in too much smoke. And he repeats something I cannot understand. Probably Russian.?

Mary gasped when she realized it. The priest was going to die. She stumbled over to him, as he lay on the stretcher. A single tear rolled down the smooth cheek of hers. She wanted to rest a hand on his shoulder, do anything that would perhaps comfort him in his last moments. But the nurse was applying a second shot filled with morphine to the scorched body of the man. The shell of what he once was.

As he spiraled towards his death, Mary heard the two words the doctor had spoken about.

?Umbra teneo.?

That was not Russian. It was Latin. To Mary, he spoke clearly enough to be understood. The shadow knows. Mary listened again. He muttered it again. She glanced up at Prizi.

?It?s not Russian, Doctor.? She said it rather loudly. ?It?s Latin. He said the shadow knows. Whatever that means.?

Where did Father Andro go? Wasn?t he following me?


TAG: Fin, MoK

 

Janice
Streets of Hamburg

She accelerated, whenever she did not have to hit the breaks she accelerated, pushing the German machine to the limit. She had to find someone. Tears. Were that tears running over her cheeks? Yes, probably. No matter how tough a girl, you reached a breaking point. Jonah. Jonah had handed her the key.

"Janice!" The web-connection was breaking down, the picture of her superior freezing every few seconds. "Jonah, we could not locate Markus!" It was a lie. But Jonah was angry and she did not wanted one of the most dangerous men of Europe finding Markus when he was angry. "Damned, I need him! I cracked the case. The girl is dead, but what I found here . . ." The line broke again. "Send you the data. We need to find Blohm! We need to find . . . FATHER!" The picture broke again and then he was gone. Janice stared at the screen. She knew the Vanishing didn´t make people fall apart or burn, but she had expected more. They were simply gone. through the shock she realized Jonah´s words and pushed the pain of what she witnessed aside. They were on to something. A lead. A lead after all! Probably the only lead they had in the whole, wide world. She opened the intranet and hit the refresh button. Incredible but true, the wolrd might depend on Jonah Stürmer having hit the send button or not. she hit it gain and again. Did the net hold up? Did the break ups interere with the network? Refresh one and nothing was there. Refresh two and the same. Then it appeared. Mail with attachment. Outlook began downloading.

With screetching wheels she returned to the Ring 2 and now saw the green streets of Eppendorf. Trees and then the red hourses, packed and lined up along the Tarppenbekstreet. Bierkrug. The flat was next to some kind of pub that was called the Bierkrug. Hitting the breaks Janice threw the car to the left, as a man covered in blood stumbled on the street. She resisted the urge to help him, to save him and accelerated again.

Bierkrug. how much time was left? Four minutes? Maybe five? She hit the breaks and took what was next to her. Her iPad and her gun. She hated both. iPads were ineffective tools and guns did not solve problems, they produced them.

55. First stairs and then right. Or left? Dammit!


Tag: Fin

 

Chapter 1 ? An American Nightmare

?A nation has invaded my land,
powerful and without number;
it has the teeth of a lion,
the fangs of a lioness.? ? Joel 1:6 (NIV)

IC: Joel David Shepherd
Camp Hades

Shep hated Joint Task Forces that were thrown together in the typical reactionary fashion that the military seemed to favor in the last couple of decades. A lot of people get hurt when things get rushed, details get missed, and mistakes are invariably made. As they started through the ?Turn-out? tent Shep noted the first mistake right away as his senses were bombarded with the smells of fresh factory lubricants.

When are they going to learn that no weapon system fires correctly straight out of the box?

He took the two weapons, cleared and holstered the pistol, and cleared and slung the carbine. As they rapidly moved through tent he repeatedly rode the charging handle to get the bolt moving through the receiver to try and ?warm-up? his rifle. He pocketed his mags and battle sighted the M4. Joel got the feeling that Fuso was not as comfortable with this process.

?Damned, man. Why does this feel like I go to war?? Fuso asked with a bitter smile.

?That?s because as far as our leaders are concerned that is exactly where we are headed towards,? Joel answered flatly. The bigger question is who are we going to war against: An invading country? Terrorists? Ourselves?

The other soldiers around them were high on idea of finally being able to do something to strike back at whatever it was that had ?attacked? their homeland. Fuso made an astute observation of yet another cause of potential mistakes to be made in this whole mess, ?It´s fear man. It eats away on souls. They will shoot anything, anyone just to feel a bit better.?

?It eats away on souls.? That?s an interesting thought. Perhaps we aren?t facing terrorists in a traditional sense, but the original terrorists. The Fallen Ones, the Cast Out, Lucifer?s own. But to suggest that to someone would be ludicrous, right?

But how crazy would it be considering everything else that had happened and was happening in the world. Atomic explosions in Jerusalem, people vanishing in Europe, ?Vampires? in Tokyo, and the United States nuking one of its own cities. Boston, the birthplace of the American Revolution, was gone and now everything was changed, not only for Joel but for everyone. A small tear trickled down his cheek as he thought of his wife and two small children who were now with their heavenly Father and big brother.

I guess it doesn?t matter, we?re all dead already anyways, right?

He continued on through the in-processing and eventually was directed over to his new platoon which was under the command of a Sergeant Jacobs. Fuso and Joel were in a small group and watched as one of the ?war-junkies? was trying to impress some of the younger soldiers nearby. ?Time we see some action, what do you say!? the junky exclaimed. Joel just shook his head at the overconfident bravado spewing from the man?s lips.

He just sat in silence with Fuso ensuring all of his kit was ready to go. Then his partner broke the silence, ?Shep, do you believe the Change is a terrorist attack??

The question caught him off guard and he stammered for moment, ?Uh? well? it depends on what you consider to be terrorists.? He was trying to buy himself some time and to get a better feel for the person fate had issued to him as his partner-in-crime. ?I think someone, or something, that wants to create panic and disarray out of calm and order is a terrorist. Now if you mean do I believe that it was caused by an organization or faction that we are familiar with, then my answer would be no, no I do not. What do you think?? He paused and pulled out his iPad from his ruck. He opened an app and started reading the page that was before him. Then he turned back to Fuso and asked him another question, ?What is your specialt

 

Rudyard Vane-Tempest
The British Embassy, Tokyo

"Jesus wept," muttered Rudyard as his fingers trailed across Moore's shirt. The man's ribs were broken. Badly.

A familiar and unpleasant tingle crept over Rudyard's spine. He glanced over his shoulder. No one was there, yet still he had the distinct feeling he was being watched. He checked the gash across his palm, lifting up the plaster; the blood had dried. It had been several days since he had last completed the rituals. After a moment's consideration, he decided that certain sins were necessary for the time being, even if they attracted the attention of Heaven. He would simply have to suffer the consequences until he was able to perform the Six again.

He dipped his hand into Moore's pocket. Barely had his fingernails touched the lining when the man's hands shot up to clutch his neck, tightening fast and releasing their grip only when recognition came into the man's eyes.

?They won´t know I come to the Brits, will they?" gasped the American. "They can´t. I choose you by chance. Can´t know that. They were one step ahead. Always one step ahead. God, the embassy. This thing. They killed everybody...the embassy.?

"Hush now," whispered Rudyard as calmly as he was able, though the ramblings alarmed him. A cold sweat was accumulating at the base of his neck. Again he attempted to search through the pocket, and this time he was unimpeded. There were four photographs.

"Quite the handsome triptych," he murmured, lying the first three photos on the ground, side-by-side. They were of a brooding, good-looking man who had apparently been in New York and Kathmandu. The third photo suggested he was on some sort of search. Presumably the CIA had been observing him. Or at least Moore had been.

The fourth photo was oddly unsettling. The shape of the figure suggested the feminine form, and something about "her" seemed...inhuman. It was possible that the image had been manipulated or distorted beyond recognition, which therefore made it useless. But then why had Moore been carrying it? And why had he scribbled that strange note on the back?

The phone rang. The doctor was on his way, and an encoded message had arrived from London.

"Thank you Linda," said Rudyard. "I want you to go and sign in the doctor personally, and escort him straight here. Once that message is decoded, send it directly to my laptop and then cancel all my appointments for the week. Notify the ambassador that I will be taking an immediate leave of absence. If he inquires further, inform him that I have been asked to clean up unfinished SIS business. That is all."

He hung up the phone and rounded his desk, retrieving his gun from the first drawer. Moore was whispering something on the ground.

"Speak up, old boy," said Rudyard, returning to the man's side. "You have to trust me."

Tag: Fins

 

Rufus Jameson
St. Regis Penthouse, Tokyo

Rufus slowly sat up and took the cigarette. "Knew you would try to get me naked next time we meet. Was a good idea to leave one with you, though." He smiled and looked for a lighter. His head hurt, but it was nothing compared to the pain he had felt up there. "And Leonard, I´ll try to keep my sheet up, but if not don´t worry, we guys from Tallahassee are just tall, you know? Sort of a biological anomaly." He winked and turned to Lilith, grabbed the hotels matches right next to her he lit one, then held it to his cigarette. He breathed in deeply and grinned. "God, that´s good!" The smoke filled his lungs with it´s rough and yet comfortable feel of tranquility. He looked at the cigarette. One of those cheap Nepal ones. The taste brought memories back. Of what he had gone through. "So, obviously I have to thank you for saving me. I would like to ask for two more things, though." He stood up, not caring enough about courtesy to even try to keep the blanket in place. Naked he stepped over to the computer and touched it. Looked intact. If not the hard drive would certainly be. He had protected it with his life. Of course you have, it is so much more important than you life!

All answers. Hidden within the files of a German linguistic student.

"First I need clothes and then I need some answers." He said and took his gun with one bullet left and the computer into his hand. All they had saved from his equipment. "A box of cigarettes and a bigger gun would be nice, too." He sighed. "In exchange I´ll finish what you guys wanted me to do from the start. I find out what the Change is and who is behind it. I know now where to look. I might be the only person in the world who knows where to look, now."

Looking to Lilith he smiled, then he turned to Leonard. "I think we have about the same size, do we?"

Tag: Fin, Sinre

 

IC: Markus J. F. Christianson
Tarpenbekstr. 55, Hamburg

Pulling open the drawer he sighed in that forced exhalation through the nose that his Mother used to call ?a troubled sigh, a step ahead of worry a step behind turmoil?. He was feeling it, worry gnawed at his mind even as he dragged out the baggies to put the blood samples in. Not able to read the labels he simple pulled a few baggies from each box looking for the correct size. Turmoil, he was gaining fast and felt as though he would not be able to turn away from the next step into its arms.

Then a voice spoke and he paused in putting the second piece of blood soaked toilet paper in the plastic baggy. "Stop there! Whoever you are, I don´t wanna shoot you." the voice called out. A male voice, "ESTI? BKA? Or another of those thugs?" the voice asked and it sounded very tense. Bringing Markus? hands to a pause in their labor, one of the few things keeping his mind from the paths of despair.

"What did you do to Laura! Where did you take her!" the voice yelled.

?I am without an alphabet soup. Thomas? Is. . .is that you?? the question was an oddity by a haunted hopeful voice, ?Laura was wounded in our escape, so I took her to where she could be healed, by someone better equipped I believe than a hospital.? Turning around slowly he kept his hands visible, ?Are you the one she said saved my daughter?? pleading his voice was pleading, oh, how he didn?t want to plead. There was the last though, that last message Laura had relayed in that doomed police stations stairwell. That overheard phone call where a name was distinguishable from the murk that was a foreign tongue Thomas and her telling him that her friend had his daughter.

His blood shot eyes were too dry for tears but yet they stared upon this man with a gun. Hoping. Praying. Desiring.

TAG: LordTroepfchen

 

Thomas Schröder
Tarpenbekstraße

Laura? Laura had told him? After all, he was getting closer. Indirect contact. It didn´t do the trick, but hell . . . it was progress.

"You are her father, are you?" Thomas slowly lowered the gun. Inside his head the thoughts raced. Laura had been captured by ESTI and he had got the girl. So this man saved Laura and brought her somewhere, were she was taken care of. Somewhere not a hospital. Push it too hard and he looks through you. Look at his suit, his gun, his story. ESTI. He is ESTI. "Thank the Gods, Laura is save." Thomas laughed in ecstasy. He had indeed been terrified she was already dead or out of his reach.

"So, you came here looking for your daughter?" Thomas asked and he suddenly everything in his mind. the whole story. God it made so much sense, actually . . .

"I . . . I . . ." Searching for words, for breath he even managed to show tears in his eyes.

Tag: Mitth

 

Update comes tomorrow. For now the change of the password combined with the inability to receive mail from the site seems to have caused some trouble for SilentProphet. the player send me his post via mail though and while we look for a remedy I will post it for now.

Lydia Duchant
The Warehouse

The Baron came down personally swearing and intimidating the crowd. She was not intimidated. She never was, these days. Boston burned, the world ended, who could tell what happened in the next moment?

She was asked to give an explanation, . . . no he asked her to give him a justification about why these guys were here! Well, he could have one.

"Mighty Baron, they were brought here for they dared to oppose your reign and kill one of your followers. But not only that, but they took something from us, that Dyson, your faithful follower, had aquired. Something valuable. Something important, I believe. And therefore I wanted to bring it before you so you can judge yourself, my mighty Baron. It is a girl. A girl . . ." She paused and looked up to the Baron. " . . . without a mouth."

Lydia smiled. The pills were good. The pills they had found on the guys were really, really good.

She felt so calm. So confident.

"They killed a man and stole the girl. Such a girl must . . . clearly be a sign, right?"

Tag: Ramza and Fin

 

Padre Andro Davorin
St. Mary Hospital, Roma

A gun. A man with a gun was not something he hadn´t seen before. But a priest with a gun? Was not a priest, he concluded in his mind.

Having a bad feeling about this, he still had no good feeling about this. but he had to do something. And security was not hiss concern. "Doctor? There is a man posing as a priest in the lobby, he got a gun. Please inform the security force, will you?" With a nod he hurried to the dying priest. Just before he entered the room, he stopped though. A priest with a gun. A pistol with a long barrel. A silencer, probably. A build in silencer, hwich menat it was a military weapon. Could it be . . . them?

If so why were they here? Why was this man here?

To kill: That was the answer. A man pretending to be a priest, or being a priest who tried to access a hospital with a silenced gun was here to kill someone and then vanish forever. Grow himself a beard, fly to south america. With all the change going on, will they even try to look for him? Ando sighed. They had looked for him. They had come looking for him and the Church had held it's protective hand over him. The ICFY had not found him. Neither had any of the UNO or NATO investigators. He had been a small fish. A lesser goal. Would they have promised justice, he would have come to them. But they only provided the law. Justice was God's domain.

With a shake of his head, he finally entered the room of the dying man.

Tag: Fin, Spy

 

IC: Markus J. F. Christianson
Tarpenbekstr. 55, Hamburg

The man seemed to pause, and his heart ached in that pause. The gun was lowered the space between them once more was open, and yet he ached. The man asked if he was the little girls daughter, his Alicia, his eccentric purpose beyond faith and living. Nodding slow but sure, to keep his unwavering eyes on this man.

He was being taken as he too was hungrily taking in this connection to his daughter, clothes and uncovered feet yet stood out in relief to the gun hanging at this mans side. Blood was more an accent on himself then on this fellow. He noted that now, his own clothes had blood on them, of those he killed and from Laura?s wounds. Though on black and crimson clothing it did not stand out in his relief, still it was nothing to duly note in this world of Change.

?Yes.? He replied to mans relief at the status of Laura?s safety. A hollow word on his own part, but vanishing into the mists of reality and parting ways through unseen parts of the world did not give credence to safety beyond the words of her Father and her own inhumanity. Once more asked of his daughter, once more he nodded and spoke ?Yes.? Only now the ache within was cracking with his voice and begging eyes.

The man stuttered and it took his will not to grab the man by the shoulders and shake vigorously shouting to spit it out. This wasn?t the cinema though, this was life as odd as it may be in this desolate city. ?Yes, yes.? He spoke instead, urging with a raised hand making small twitches as though to draw out those words that other held hostage. Praying that the creature styled as Father was wrong and yet his daughter might live, despite the sorrow of his hearts testimony that the thing had spoken truth, however repugnant, and nothing was about to change that truth.

TAG: LordTroepfchen

 

Thomas Schröder
Tarpenbekstraße, Hamburg

Thomas watched the man´s spirit crumble and managed to keep a face of total ignorance. As if he was dealing with the damage he had taken himself. Only after several torturing seconds, he looked up and faked realisation. "No!" He put his gun away and laughed in relief. 2No, no, she is fine. She is fine. I hope so. She was an hour ago. Listen she is with a friend of mine. Robert, Laura´s girlfriend took her with him when things went crazy and I stayed behind to wait for Laura." Thomas laughed. "She is fine! Relax! We wouldn´t have allowed anybody to harm her." He said the last words with less enthusiasm though. To avoid spoiling his performance, which he found rather impressive himself, he tried very hard not to think about the look of the girl or the feeling of his blade cutting her flesh. He stayed in his role. A role he knew all too well. A role he had played for all of his life. A role that had grown so restriciting it had turned into a prison, only to become a mask when he finally foudn freedom. Freedom!

"When ESTI showed up and outside a riot was gathering, we decided we had to take her out of here. Robert took her and my car and wanted to make his way to Kiel. We guessed if the vanishing had already happened there the city might actually be empty and very safe.It was crazy, he climbed out of the window and then when I returned to my room to monitor the situation, outside, half the people outside vanished. They just vanished, you know? Gone! I stayed behind and somehow I managed to survive, when all went to hell." Thomas pulled his gun into his belt. "Man, I really am happy to see you. She asked a lot about her mum, but about you too. She wanted to call you, but I had no number." Thomas laughed out another time and nodded. "She is safe. She is safe." He said then twice and nodded. "Thomas. By the way. Thomas Schröder."

Tag: Mitth

---

[b]Ghost [/b]
[i]Chiba City, Tokyo [/i]

Nine screens feeding from three lines and eleven computers, among them two of the finest servers money could buy, were running a cascade of programs. All of them monitored the traffic, the news and emails of a dozen people. It became a cacophony of voices speaking lies, truth and anything in between. Ghost had embraced the Change. It had made her rich and powerful. When the lawyer had handed her the keys to the kingdom she had not even begun to imagine what that would mean for her. Btu his resources and her talents united had allowed her to hack two dozen networks the same time. Pentagon he even gave her direct access to. Media. That one was important. Direct links and surveillance of news was key. Because they barely send 5% of their news stories anymore and what they did not send was often the better stuff. It was also hard to believe. What Ghost had not foreseen was betrayal. Betrayal from all sides, so to say. She had hacked the US embassy, assuming she was hunting for a mole or something as a side project. But what she had seen was much worse than espionage. The creature, or at least one of them, had slaughtered the people in it. She called that one Odo. After the guy from DS9 who could change shape. Simply because he was able to do the same, obviously. They had used her information to enter the embassy and kill the people inside. And her second betrayal, that might have been related to the first in a way, had been her looking into her contractor. The guy had showed up at her sister?s house as if she had not been the best veiled hacker in the world. Ghost had known she would not buy his façade. He had not been working for someone else. Not in the traditional sense. And then he had made the biggest mistake of all. He had given her an address. Not longer afterwards she had hacked half a dozen high security networks. And she found out she did not only piece together the Change for him, but her information were used in some kind of hunt in Nepal. A hunt in which he did not directly participate. Ghost found at least two of the . . . creatures though. Now she was watch

 

IC: Markus J. F. Christianson
Tarpenbekstr. 55, Hamburg

Safe. Secure. Fine. Reassuring words when spoken too often were known as a sign in the business. A sign that someone was about to be anything but those words. You learn them in the SIS, otherwise known as the British Intelligence Agency, rather early on unless you are dense to the world around you. The deeper you go the more likely you are to learn facts like this, he had gotten fairly deep before coming to ESTI. After all, he had been allowed access to satellites and systems to aid things that. . .never happened in places most do not know exist beyond a none blue color on a map.

It was as old as Shakespeare, ?I thinkest thou dost protest to much? as viewed in the mirror, darkly. What was not dark now, the Change came and spread, and echoed in this realm. Most vanished, but why not him, why not Thomas.

He breathed, he gasped from a withheld breath at those first words that his daughter was safe. Pushing aside the training and feeling in his guts that it wasn?t true and embraced it if but for a moment with a waning smile of relief that blossomed and faded in those thoughts. But Thomas was not done. He spoke beyond that point, and like a ship on a crest of a wave he barreled down the other side, making one wonder if it had barreled down the other side or merely had the water pass out from under it.

"She is safe. She is safe." He said then twice and nodded. "Thomas. By the way. Thomas Schröder."

Again, safe, she is safe. That and the story had holes, he was relieved and yet could not believe it. It didn?t explain the two bathrooms, it didn?t explain the body. Important details. As a programmer a simple piece of code, an incorrect decimal, one too many ones and zeros in just the right place and nothing would ever add up. This did not add up.

?Thank you Thomas Schroed-Schrood-ah, thank you Thomas.? He replied with a nod, turning he took the risk and took the bloodied toilet paper baggies and quickly stuffed them in his satchel. Without turning back, he asked, knowing he presented himself as a prime target in that moment, ?Do you know what happened to that man??

TAG: LordTroepfchen