Message-ID: <:103308Z03071995@anon.penet.fi>
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo
From: an224409@anon.penet.fi (Waldo 'D.R.' Dobbs)
X-Anonymously-To: alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo
Organization: Anonymous forwarding service
Reply-To: an224409@anon.penet.fi
Date: Mon, 3 Jul 1995 10:23:35 UTC
Subject: The Return Of The Messiah
Lines: 230
WARNING: Cross posting this to alt.religion.scientology will get you into a shitload of trouble. Don't say I didn't warn you.
THE RETURN OF THE MESSIAH
They circled down from the drop ship on gossamer wings made of foamed black plastics. Each of the three micro-lights contained three Auditors and an Auditor pilot interfaced to the micro-light's on-board systems. The fragile craft circled through the clear air in silence except for the whisper of their slipstreams. On board the Auditors either performed weapons checks or turned their unblinking stares into empty space. At each auditor's wrist, the implanted e-meter showed green, no emotional feedback response.
Things got a bit turbulent when they hit the pollution laden clouds. The auditor pilots didn't even look to the external cameras but instead followed the projected symbology of the cityscape below on the micro-light's inertial guidance systems.
They broke through the cloud layer and seconds later touched down on the helipad of Medi-care building.
One of the guards in the little mechanics control room looked up from his monitor screen of late night pornography from the Tex-Mex Free Sat in time to see dark figures racing towards the main roof access doors. He had just begun to reach for the alarm button when the red dot of laser light on his forehead blossomed into a expanding flower of blood, bone and grey matter. The other guard never even looked up, didn't even know anything was wrong until his partners blood splashed across his face. Before he could even react to this he was dead.
The nine combat Auditors filed into the lift in silence. The pilots stayed to guard their craft and keep the roof secure.
"What floor do you require?", the lift politely inquired.
"Sixty Seven." replied one of the Auditors.
The doors closed and the lift began to descend. All eyes stared impassionately at the display above the door as the numbers decreased rapidly from three hundred.
The door opened and the receptionist behind the desk looked up and smiled. She put her finger to her lips to indicate silence and then beckoned to the silent auditors. They took up positions by the lift doors as one of the combat armour clad figures approached her.
"How many?", the Auditor asked her.
"Only seven, Auditor Captain.", the girl replied, "Five researchers in the G-tec labs, one librarian and one media tech. The tech is in the locker room getting some sleep."
"Good. Well done, exceptional stats." the Auditor Captain replied. He turned his fix stare to meet her own for a few seconds, "There can be no loose ends. You understand, Auditor Birch?"
The girl nodded. "Yes, Auditor Captain. I must EOC, I understand.", and she smiled.
"In the next life." the Auditor Captain said. "The next life." she replied.
The captain motioned one man to his side and then to the rest who dispersed into the hallways.
"Take us to the Cryogenic vault." the Auditor Captain told the girl.
A few minutes later and the three stood in the cryogenic vault. Wall to wall stainless still and harsh white floor tiles reflected the cold, bright fluorescent lights. Their breath blew out as pale clouds in the cold air as they stood by one of the many metre square doors in the wall. The girl hugged herself in the cold.
"Open it." the Auditor Captain ordered the other Auditor.
The Auditor opened the door and swung it wide before pulling out the metal drawer on which normally lay a human body. In this case there was no body but at the end lay a round cylinder, connected by tubes to the cryogenic vault's control systems. It was forty centimetres in diameter and almost the same in height; it was made of some many layered transparent plastic. Clearly visible inside was the severed head of a moderately old and overweight man; his reddish hair, flecked with grey, floated around his face and half closed eyes in the liquid nitrogen.
"Good. Let's go. Combat Auditor Levitch, End of Cycle Auditor Birch." the Captain said pointing to the girl.
The Combat Auditor raised his assault weapon to his shoulder and pointed it at the young, smiling girl. The e-meter implant on his wrist cycled up to red rapidly. The captain noticed this with the same fixed, staring expression he always wore.
"Is there a problem Levitch?" the Captain asked.
"She's one of us, Sir." the Combat Auditor, replied.
The Auditor Captain drew his own weapon and shot into the girls face. Her smile exploded into blood and bone and her body crumpled to the cold, white floor. The Captain's own e-meter never changed from green. The Combat Auditor lowered his own weapon and stared at the streak of blood and brains staining the steel wall behind where the girl had stood. The Captain noted that Levitch's e-meter was green again.
"Report to the Chapel Ethics Officer when we have returned to the base." the Captain said emotionlessly. "Bring the head." he added and turned to leave the vault.
Combat Auditor Levitch stared at the body of the girl for a second and then disconnected the feed tubes to the cylinder. Hefting its heavy mass from the steel drawer he quickly followed his Captain.
The senior church officials sat in grim silence while the Chairman General paced in front of the wall of monitors. In the middle monitor a display of ten digits finally counted down to zero.
"Brain map complete." a soft disembodied voice spoke into the conference room.
"How good was the data capture?" Asked the New Church Auditor Commander General and chairman of the board of New Church Literature Inc, David Miscarig the VI. Most people just referred to him as the General, however.
"Eighty six percent data capture." replied the disembodied voice of the New Church AI.
"Run the construct." instructed the General.
On the monitors a brief burst of static was followed by the rezing up of the head of an old and over weight, red headed man. As the image cycled up to its highest resolution the man's eyes opened and he looked out into the room. A camera module suspended from the ceiling just above the monitors followed the movement of his eyes.
The general coughed nervously and addressed the monitors.
"Welcome back, Commodore." he said.
"What year is it?" asked the construct.
"2087, Sir. Exactly one hundred and one years after your death." replied the General.
"The Marcabs?" asked the construct.
"We're not sure, Sir. That's why we brought you back. We waited for you to re-incarnate after your death but you never came forward. We searched and searched but in the end we thought your theta had been captured by the Marcabs.
On the monitors the constructs face split into a grin. The grin became a chuckle, the chuckle a giggle, the giggle a laugh and eventually the laugh an hysterical fit of screaming. Abruptly the monitors went blank.
"Status, Ron?" the General asked nervously into the air.
"Analysis indicates that the subject's construct is completely insane." replied the voice of the AI.
"Shit!" replied the General, "The brain map wasn't good enough."
"Negative." replied the AI, "Analysis indicates that the subject was insane some years before his physical death."
"What!" the General exclaimed.
"Analysis indicates ...", the AI began to repeat but the General was no longer listening as the full impact of the situation hit him The soft beeping of an alarm made him look at his wrist implant e-meter. It was all the way up to red.
Around him the soft beeping of other e-meter alarms began to join his but were quickly drowned beneath the chorus of hysterical conversation among the church officials.
The Commodore was insane. The Commodore, the messiah of the New Church, always had been insane.
The Auditor Commander General opened his mouth and began to scream hysterically.