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  • #3937
    F LoveF Love
    Participant

      Finnley, who you will surely recall had been on a brief excursion to Nowherehampton, wondered whether to ask what she had missed while away. She decided forlornly there was no point.

      It never makes any friggin’ sense.

      Sense was important to Finnley. Even if superficially a subject made no sense, she liked to believe there was an underlying meaning.

      That’s not true. What are you on about? Your brain is clearly addled. And possibly baduled as well.

      “Finnley! you are monopolising the thread again,” admonished Liz. “You are thinking too much and it is sabotaging the beautiful spontaneity of my story. Now, be a good dear and wipe that surly look off your face. You look so much prettier when you smile; you might even attract yourself a nice young man if you would make a bit more effort. Anyway, do cheer up—I want to hear about dear cousin Badul.”

      #3934
      ÉricÉric
      Keymaster

        “Why do you suffer pain? You have compressed yourself into a form and an identity, hence the suffering. You pursue spirituality from the same limited and conditioned standpoint and hence you cannot secure any foothold in these pursuits. In whatever subject you are absorbed, you deal with it from the standpoint of a personalized entity, and not as dynamic manifest consciousness…”

        “Hear that Liz’ ?” Godfrey beamed in delight “It was not Roberto or any bloody character, it was only your dynamic manifest consciousness!”
        “In other words, are you saying it was all my fault again, cheeky blithering fool?” Liz’ couldn’t contain her petulance.

        “I think you’re missing the point, dear,… but yes.” He added after a dramatic pause “or you can blame it on Cynchtia Dipity, or her twin sister, Serene.”

        #3929
        ÉricÉric
        Keymaster

          “You should have thought about it before sending me for a spying mission, you daft tart” Prune was rehearsing in her head all the banter she would surely shower Aunt Idle with, thinking about how Mater would be railing if she noticed she was gone unattended for so long.
          Mater could get a heart attack, bless her frail condition. Dido would surely get caned for this. Or canned, and pickled, of they could find enough vinegar (and big enough a jar).

          In actuality, she wasn’t mad at Dido. She may even have voluntarily misconstrued her garbled words to use them as an excuse to slip out of the house under false pretense. Likely Dido wouldn’t be able to tell either way.

          Seeing the weird Quentin character mumbling and struggling with his paranoia, she wouldn’t stay with him too long. Plus, he was straying dangerously into the dreamtime limbo, and even at her age, she was knowing full well how unwise it would be to continue with all the pointers urging to turn back or chose any other direction but the one he adamantly insisted to go towards, seeing the growing unease on the young girl’s face.

          “Get lost or cackle all you might, as all lost is hoped.” were her words when she parted ways with the strange man. She would have sworn she was quoting one of Mater’s renown one-liners.

          With some chance, she would be back unnoticed for breakfast.

          #3897

          Seeing Dido eating her curry cookies would turn Mater’s stomach, so she went up to her room.

          Good riddance she thought, one less guest to worry about.
          Not that she usually thought that way, but every time the guests leaved, there was a huge weight lifted from her back, and a strong desire of “never again”.
          The cleaning wasn’t that much worry, it helped clear her thoughts (while Haki was doing it), but the endless worrying, that was the killer.

          After a painful ascension of the broken steps, she put her walking stick on the wall, and started some breathing exercises. The vinegary smell of all the pickling that the twins had fun experimenting with was searing at her lungs. The breathing exercise helped, even if all the mumbo jumbo about transcendant presence was all rubbish.

          It was time for her morning oracle. Many years ago, when she was still a young and innocent flower, she would cut bits and pieces of sentences at random from old discarded magazines. Books would have been sacrilegious at the time, but now she wouldn’t care for such things and Prune would often scream when she’d find some of her books missing key plot points. Many times, Mater would tell her the plots were full of holes anyway, so why bother; Prune’d better exercise her own imagination instead of complaining. Little bossy brat. She reminded her so much of her younger self.

          So she opened her wooden box full of strips of paper. Since many years, Mater had acquired a taste for more expensive and tasty morsels of philosophy and not rubbish literature, so the box smelt a bit of old parchment. Nonetheless, she wasn’t adverse to a modicum of risqué bits from tattered magazines either. Like a blend of fine teas, she somehow had found a very nice mix, and oftentimes the oracle would reveal such fine things, that she’d taken to meditate on it at least once a day. Even if she wouldn’t call it meditate, that was for those good-for-nothing willy-nilly hippies.

          There it was. She turned each bit one by one, to reveal the haiku-like message of the day.

          “Bugger!” the words flew without thinking through her parched lips.

          looked forgotten rat due idea half
          getting floverley comment somehow
          prune hardly wondered eyes great
          inn run days dark quentin simulation

          That silly Prune, she’d completely forgotten to check on her. She was glad the handwritten names she’d added in the box would pop up so appropriately.

          She would pray to Saint Floverley of the Dunes, a local icon who was synchretized from old pagan rituals and still invoked for those incapable of dancing.
          With her forking arthritis, she would need her grace much.

          #3896
          TracyTracy
          Participant

            “What I really love about this, Finnley,” Liz said, “Is that it really is complete rubbish. I mean, it’s not cleverly pretending to be rubbish, it really IS rubbish. But I am feeling the energy, and I feel that I enjoy such utter rubbish and that’s the feeling that counts. Oh, and by the way, where have you been? You’ve been sorely missed, Finnley dear, there’s been rubbish accumulating all over the place while you’ve been gone.”

            #3895
            TracyTracy
            Participant

              Liz waited until Godfey wasn’t looking, and then spit the pill into her hand. So they thought they could drug her did they, so that she’d miss the signs. Hah! She hadn’t missed the signs: four times now the word KALE (short for Keys Around Lucid Elements) had appeared to her, and it could hardly be a coincidence that word had come from the Other Side of the Lord of the Kale’s progress. Much to everyone’s surprise, the Lord was making a rapid transition, and was already noticing the HOLES (otherwise known as Highest Order of Loose Electrical Signs.)

              It wouldn’t be long now before there was a direct communication from the Lord. Liz cackled, and rubbed her bony arthritic hands together. She was ready and eager to hear his report. Godfrey looked at her sharply, so she closed her eyes and pretended to dribble.

              #3888
              ÉricÉric
              Keymaster

                This morning was quiet, but his mind was not.
                There were always the nagging thoughts that something ought to be done, the restless fear of forgetting something of importance.
                But this morning was quiet.
                A bit too quiet in fact.
                No raucous cackling to stir the soft velvety dust from the wooden floorboard.

                Quentin was wondering whether the story makers had lost all interest in moving his story forward. Yet, he was more than willing to move it notwithstanding, his efforts seemed of little consequence however. Some piece was missing, some ever-present grace of illumination shrouded in scripting procrastination.

                His discussion with Aunt Idle had been brief. She’d told him with great intensity that she had a weird dream. That she looked into a mirror and saw herself. Or something like that,… she was not a very coherent woman, the ging wasn’t helping.

                Maybe his task was done. Time to leave the Pickled Pea Inn.
                His friend Eicnarf seemed eager to see him. Or maybe that had been a typo and she really meant to sew him, or saw him,… she could be gory like that…

                No matter, a trip out of the brine cloud of this sand coated place would do him good.

                #3866

                Vincentius took one last look at the children, wondering if he should give them all a hug and bid them farewell. But they were happily engrossed in smearing Fanella’s collection of Venetian glass with marmite and peanutbutter paint effects, so he slipped out without a word and left them to it.

                Shivering in the damp chill air, he looked nervously at Arona. “Where are you taking me? I’m not supposed to leave without permission, I might get sent back to the detention camp on the island.” He shuddered at the thought.

                “Don’t be silly,” snapped Arona, “Do pull yourself together, you are but a shadow of your former self. Yes, yes, I know it must have been awful,” she said impatiently at Vincentius’ self pitying look, “You can tell me all about Tikfijikoo Spider Camp later. But now we must hurry. Come on!”

                #3840

                “Al’s gone too far this time, Tina” Becky said, perusing the latest installment of the Reality Play. “He’s just adding old characters willy nilly now!”

                Tina just looked at Becky for a moment before replying quietly, “Isn’t that the point?”

                Gripping Tina’s shoulder firmly and giving her a little shake, Becky continued, “It’s getting serious, Tina, can’t you see the danger we’re in? Fictional characters are coming to life all over the planet, demanding birth certificates and passports and refugee status. Insisting on continuation, more detailed back stories; some are even demanding therapy for what the authors have put them through!”

                Tina looked shocked. “Is it really as serious as that?” she asked. “I had heard about it, but, well, I didn’t like to think too much about it…” her voice trailed off, hoping that Becky would drop the subject so she didn’t have to think about it any more.

                “It’s the Imagination Wave, Tina. We’ve never really understood Imagination or how to use it. During this wave, we’re going to find out, and it’s going to be messy, believe me! It’s not just the characters we’ve made up, it’s the land mass. Characters are looking for their lands, demanding compensation for missing islands…”

                “What are we going to do?” Tina whispered dramatically. “We’ve been churning out characters and littering changed landscapes with them and then just leaving them stranded, for nine years!”

                “And we can’t even get away from them all if we flew to Mars, either,” added Al, who had been eavesdropping from behind the door. He joined them and pulled up a chair. “Seriously, girls, we need a plan. This is our most important mission of all.”

                “Should we kill them all off?” asked Becky, wincing as she said it. “I didn’t mean that!” she added hastily.

                “Oh, you don’t want to do that!” Al replied quickly. “Some authors have done that and have been haunted by dead characters something awful! Dead characters are a worse nightmare than characters coming to life, believe me!”

                “Well I didn’t really mean it,” Becky said sheepishly.

                “Let’s ask Sam,” said Tina.

                #3836

                “Cheers!” said Bea, batting her eyelashes at Gustave while trying to suppress a grimace at another round of cackling coming from the contest in the function room. The combined effect was an alarming expression sensation saturation, and Gustave took an involuntary step backwards. He bumped into Linda Pol, who was wrapping her luscious lips around an authentic straw and sucking up voraciously the glowing rainbow cocktail.

                “Linda! Fancy seeing you here!” Gustave exclaimed, trying to suppress a cackle at the sight of the rainbow cocktail running from Linda’s nostrils as she tried not to choke.

                “Gustave! What on earth are you doing here with that old slapper!” she replied in between coughs and splutters, with a dismissive glance at Bea.

                Fortunately Bea was cackling so loudly at the sight of Linda choking that she failed to hear the remark.

                Not for the first time, Consuela, dolled up to the nines behind the bar in a purple wig and elaborate make up, wondered what it was about humans that they found it so amusing when people choked.

                #3831

                “Sorry to bother you again, Ed.”

                This was a lie; Evangeline wasn’t at all sorry. There was nothing she loved better than to be the bearer of bad news and she was rather pleased to have an excuse to call Ed Steam so soon after their last conversation.

                “The Cackle Insanitization Committee contacted me. Their spies reported that Gustave had a meeting with that awful whinging Bea woman from Cackletown.”

                Ed was shocked. “Gustave? Gustave Butterworth, the scientist? He’s supposed to be working for us, isn’t he?”

                Evangeline sniffed dismissively, eager to pass on her next tantalising morsel. She tried to keep the excitement out of her voice and sound appropriately serious.

                “The other concerning thing is that the Contumacious Cackler is in town. There have been several verified hearings of him.”

                “The Contumacious Cackler!” Ed’s horrified reaction was music to Evangeline’s ears, although she was not entirely sure who the Contumacious Cackler was or why the mention of his name elicited such horror. She decided to ask.

                “It’s rather a sad story. His mother ran away from home when he was just 3 years old, due to his father’s incessant cackling. The Contumacious Cackler never saw his mother again and he grew up with an obsessive hatred of cackling. He vowed to put an end to cackling. He cackles so evilly that he stirs up trouble wherever he goes. His dastardly plan is to create so much resistance to cackling that the people are inflamed sufficiently to rise up against cacklers. He is reported to be responsible for the demise of cackling in 2 of the provinces.”

                #3830

                Gustave was having second thoughts. What had possessed him to suggest meeting this unknown woman? What if he was spotted in the Spotted Dick and Fanella found out? He hesitated outside the pub with his hand on the door. What was this woman like? It could ruin his image as a respected scientist. What if she was one of those new age high vibrations positive thinking ignore the evidence types and someone from the Institute saw them together?

                A cocophanous group cackle ricocheted through the building and snapped him out of his indecision. He was here on a mission, his role was to collect data on the cackle phenomenon. Bracing himself, he pushed the door. Feeling foolish, he noticed the “pull” sign on the door and his squared shoulders drooped. Is it a sign? he wondered.

                #3826

                In reply to: The Hosts of Mars

                prUneprUne
                Participant

                  It feels like it has all been a dream. And not a particularly good one, too.

                  I look through the window, and the blue sky of Earth shines brightly though. Only a few more days before the quarantine is over, if I’m to believe the hazmat-suited staff, and I should be able to get out to wherever I want to. You can go back to your family the nurse had said with a smile. They surely must miss you.
                  Obviously, the well-intentioned nurse had no notion of her family…

                  The TV set they’ve put in the rooms is more helpful to piece together the fragments of memory of what happened. The news had kept mum about the aliens, or about our return for that matter. It seems they can’t explain how we came back so fast, without telling more. Maybe that’s the real purpose of the quarantine… brainwash us into forgetting, returning back to our lives quietly, and be happy that we could get back in one piece. Funny they should even bother at all, actually.

                  I don’t know if there’s any coming back to how life was before. Surely the Inn and Aunt Idle would still be there, if only both more derelict than before. But would I want to get back? Do what? Only Mater’s sharp wits were ever a match, and she is gone too.

                  This is the end of the Mars story.
                  With some chance, I’ll start a business with Hans — raise Guinea pigs, rats and maybe a couple of those cute African pygmy hedgehogs. That would be a lot more fun.
                  Squeals and cackles, and truckloads of cuteness.

                  #3821
                  TracyTracy
                  Participant

                    Gustave Butterworth cackled delightedly. The crowd control custard gas formula experiments were looking promising. The first batch, all being well, should be ready for a trial run in time for the bake sale at Lemoine Meringue Hall. If only he could deduce that vital missing ingredient in time!

                    Gustave looked at his watch and decided to call it a day. He was the last one in the laboratory as usual; before turning the lights out and locking the door, he made a quick tour of the lab rats accommodation. There were no cages like in the old days: scientists in this partially enlightened age were not allowed to keep rats and beagles against their will, and only volunteer creatures were used in modern laboratories. Thus, no actual physical abuse was administered, but the energy the creatures reflected off the experiments, and the scientists themselves, was monitored; and human “animal whisperers” were employed to communicate directly. Gustave was a scientist, not a whisperer, but he had been developing his whispering skills secretly, while observing the staff.

                    Most of the rats has nestled down for the night in their miniature studio apartments, but one comfortable little abode was empty. “I say, Rodean,” said Gustave to the neighbouring occupant, “Has Penelope gone for an evening stroll again?”

                    Rodean shuffled around in his tiny bean bag chair to look at the scientist.

                    “What, gone to visit her cousin Patty, you say?”

                    #3818

                    Evangeline Spiggot admired her long crimson polished nails before pressing the button for the Noise Control Officer, Ed Steam. He answered the call with a muffled “hwellflow?”

                    “Ed, are you eating peanuts again? Vangie here, just had a call from Muffin Mews, another complaint about the cackler, over in Cakltown this time.”

                    “Cakltown! I say, she’s frightfully efficient, she must have finished Bunbury already, I must see the boss about giving her a bonus.”

                    “Oh, I don’t think Bunbury’s finished yet, Ed, you know these freelancer chancers, they don’t usually stick to the plan. Hedging her bets, I expect, covering her trail. Most of Tartlett Terrace has been insantizied, but I haven’t had a single call from Croisssant Crescent in Bunbury yet, nor Pieman Park.”

                    “This mission is taking a good deal longer that I imagined,” replied Ed. “Might have to see if we can insantitize en masse at the bake sale next week at Lemoine Meringue Hall.”

                    #3803

                    In reply to: Mandala of Ascensions

                    Lord R’eye, the one-eyed ruler of the known universe, was known by many names, a great lot of them completely forgotten by the masses. He had to constantly reinvent Himself, borrow new disguises, create factions, sprinkle in a few miracles, create order ab chao and voilà.

                    He owned a few bodies, strategically placed here and there, one of his favourite in Geneva, quite involved in banking affairs. His bodies were a rare indulgence, and he couldn’t stay too long either, as his massive energy could easily get stuck with the lot of them, down to density.
                    Overall, he was much more comfortable managing his immense wealth “up there”, in the cosmic realms he had helped shape. So many underlings were ready to carry on his biding, and apart from a few small number of very close ergo very dangerous confidants, many of the minions didn’t even know each other, or that they were, for the most part, owned by Him, and part of the same team.

                    This was a cut-throat business, He had to admit, and everything was based on it. Manipulation and deceit, coercion, coaxing, anything necessary to control and manage the Empire.

                    One of those confidants, Lord Apex had been summoned and appeared almost instantly.
                    He had this charming archangelic halo and aura, but Lord R’eye would have none of it. A correction was in order, the latest results were extremely concerning.

                    “My Lord?” Apex asked in his mellifluous voice.
                    “My dear Apex, remind me what responsibility I gave you last century?”
                    “Of course my Lord, the Innovation project, the Great Disclosure and Holographic Contact projects, amongst other proj…”
                    “And how much progress have we had with those?”
                    “Well, my Lord surely knows that so much herding is delicate. The interference with Lord Bael’s projects too, you should know…”
                    “The Desert and Green Revolutions projects, indeed. A great success, so much pain and anguish! That’s what I’m talking, you should learn from Bael.”
                    “But my Lord, that has caused quite a conundrum with the Mars simulation, which, by way of fractal holographic recurrence, could well impact the whole delicate matrix we weave…”
                    “Stop your angel speech, Me’dammit. Plain Anguish, so I can understand every word. The Hell pits cannot wait to have you, so you better give some good explanation.”
                    “I mean, my Lord, that were the sheeple able to glimpse that the Mars experiment is but a reflection of a deception of grander scale in the cosmic realms, that the aliens saviours, or whatever saviours or… masters of any genre, are just ways to fleece them off their power… “
                    “Everything would unravel like a pile of dominos.” Lord R’eye’s voice made very clear that he had full grasp of the situation. “So,” he continued with the nicest menacingest voice “you better make sure that doesn’t happen.”

                    He dismissed Apex with a wave of a thought.

                    If the net of illusions unravelled before they have time to create the Earth 5th Dimension in time to double their profit, it would certainly be a disaster.

                    A few humans lost through the gaps were a hard to accept reality, but so long as they could cut the losses, it was not dramatic. But they were talking another order of magnitude. It could be a definitive blow. It always had been an issue when the net of illusion became too big in the past. They had bigger and bigger holes. So they had to start again, destroy, and recreate civilisations.
                    Stupid humans, if only they knew that Ascension was not the way out.

                    #3800

                    In reply to: Mandala of Ascensions

                    Dispy was starting her own secret Descended Dissent Classes.

                    It was not long ago that she had a very sudden and all-encompassing revelation at one of her flights above the great tundra of Siberia, which she liked for some reason to fly over, counting the red spots made by the fly agaric mushrooms in the tundra.

                    She’d been very disturbed by the revelations about her assignment to the Mars mission. She’d genuinely thought she was in for the support of the greatest advancement of humanity since quite many decades, and to realize it was all a quite twisted experiment made her uneasy at her core. She had some profound respect for her teacher, and despite her usual impulses to immediately confront Medlik for the inherent contradictions in his self-professed compassion and wisdom talks, something in her had told her to remain quiet and observe. And more surprisingly, she had complied. And observed very attentively.

                    During her flight afterwards, the same strong impulse had told her to land in the tundra, right next to a very nice patch of red. Being ascended had the wonderful benefit she wouldn’t feel the bone chilling cold, and she could just immerse herself in the joy of the scenery, and at the same time felt all very quiet and full of love and, strangely, a sort of distant regret for not being able to feel more of the cold and the whole scenery. And in the silence, she had a sudden unraveling of reality like never before. She could see the contradictions she noticed, one after another, destroying every layer of what she thought she knew, only to be left as a silent, quiet and very aware presence. She could have stayed like this a long long time, but she felt the call for the next Ascended class, for which she was late, as usual.

                    She continued to ponder while she teleported back, and without word (again, quite unusual), formed the resolve to expose more of the truth she’d grasped. Create a fifth column for the Descended, something her old friend who liked spy fictions would definitely have loved to hear about. But for now, she would have to keep it quiet, and maintain her cover at the Order of the Ascended Masters. She’d worked quite hard (well, not as hard as many, but that wasn’t the point) to get to her coronation, so she now had a nice Light Clearance that allowed her to tap into the Coloured Light Rays. This would be helpful.

                    In the beginning, she’d thought naively that concealing her true motives and secretly recruit like-minded students would be terribly difficult, but to the contrary, she found the light to be very responsive and easy to bend into subtle illusions of the truth. In short, she could still lie very well, and quite effectively. As though the light helped her in her attempts.

                    At the moment, she just had one student, Domba. They were meeting out-of-body at a hut in Chernobyl. The place was actually quite nice, and teaming with wildlife and surprisingly gorgeous nature. The perfect hideout.

                    Her course, well, was a course in spontaneity mostly. She would help people question reality, and authority. Something she had been lightwashed to forget for awhile too.

                    Domba had a pure heart, and was full of illusions. It had been easy to recruit him. She had to start with what he brought to her. At the beginning, mostly quotes of spiritual teachers. She had to teach him to question and see by himself.

                    “The Buddha said that when we dedicate merit, it is like adding a drop of water to the ocean. Just as a drop of water added to the ocean will not dry up but will exist as long as the ocean itself exists, so, too, if we dedicate the merit of any virtuous deed, it merges with the vast ocean of merit that endures until enlightenment.” – Padmasambhava

                    That quote he brought was interesting. The idea of being a drop of water lost in the ocean was enough to make her lightskin crawl. Because it reminded her all too well of the manipulations of the ascended masters. Twisting just barely enough the Love stream, so that It would be redirected just were they wanted.

                    So they meditated on that for now.

                    #3795

                    In reply to: The Hosts of Mars

                    ÉricÉric
                    Keymaster

                      Fin Min Hoot was not displeased that the interview went 87.21% successfully.

                      Kale was an interesting pick. Not particularly bright (by her standards, nobody could be anyway), but with a sense of heroism that was easy enough to manipulate.

                      The bending bots presented new defects by the hour, and no amount of counter-bending seemed to help, so they had to accelerate phase 2.33, which swayed Eb enough that he allowed the use of mild psychotropic injections to let their translator ignore the most obvious discrepancies, and avoid asking embarrassing questions.

                      All in all, it could raise even to 89.34%

                      And that was even factoring in the latest unexpected report from Finnley 21:

                      Mother Shirley died today, at an estimate rate of 3% peacefulness. Probable cause of death: brain overdose of suggestibility waves from the headpiece. Her visions will be missed.

                      #3794

                      In reply to: The Hosts of Mars

                      ÉricÉric
                      Keymaster

                        “You can call us the Blue Enders” said gently one of the blue aliens, which by the shade of it, must have been a top ranking official.
                        Kale was a bit confused, and space had a jelly consistency that harped and warped around his ears. It may have been the injections they gave him after the meeting with the sculpturesque Fin Min.

                        She had explained to him, they had made contact with a unknown sentient civilisation, and that they had in their infinite and blue compassion decided to warn us of impending doom on the Mars colony. They had requested a translator to go with them on a rescue mission on their faster-than-light bluship named Sprakle Star.

                        Hazy and fuzzy, he was quickly put and wrapped in a ball of cotton, ear-deep into a globe coaster of roller proportions.
                        At least, that’s how it felt… That waccine must have been full of blue bees.

                        “Arrival on Mars orbital level 1, in 5,… 4… 3…”

                        At least, the Blunders had the good idea to put an instant translator in his ear-muffins.

                        #3790

                        In reply to: The Hosts of Mars

                        ÉricÉric
                        Keymaster

                          For all her wired cleverness, there was something that the central intelligence had seemingly forgotten to take into account in her parameters.

                          Eb woke up in a sweat, barely remembering bits of a horrible dream of being chased and banging on a closed door for escape from a herd of phombies (those guys who had their phones implanted under their skins and would often have a creepy vacant look while in communication).

                          The banging on the door. According to his mother, if there was something that her nurse Fancy Woo was better at than cooking rice, it was at interpreting dreams. But he didn’t need her expert advice on this one.

                          His mind was aching from the lack of alcohol, but at least he could think quite clearly.
                          There weren’t many accesses to enter the simulation, for obvious reasons. Continuity had to be maintained at all costs, to preserve the sanctity of the experiment. That motto had survived the multiple iterations of the simulation since its inception.

                          Eb knew of most of them, even if he’d wondered about the presence of backdoors. He had not been able to find any since his many years of service. So for all he knew, there were only two ways to get in and out: up and down. “Up” through the fake ships, with the whole stasis protocol, and “down”, through the mines were they would usually send agents from time to time, mostly for reconnaissance purposes.

                          He looked at the screen, and as he had feared, the explosion triggered in the tunnels by Finnley had sealed their main exit point.

                          “You underestimate me, my dear Eb” the voice of Finnley merrily bounced on the insulated walls.

                          Eb was startled. Hadn’t he known that Finnley was just a program, he could have sworn her synthetic voice had a trace of menace in it.

                          “Finnley” he regained his composure as much as he could “Haven’t the thought occurred to you that the tunnels are now sealed? We cannot let your blue aliens go in and out as easily now!”
                          “Eb, you do know I do not think.” Her voice was still slightly ominous. “But I ran multiple simulation, and this one still yields the best possible outcome.” she continued more cheerily.
                          “How so?”
                          “It is evident. Many of the earlier settlers, still know about the simulation, even if they self-programmed themselves to accept the illusion as better than outside reality. They can become a problem for the evacuation protocol. With the tunnels’ exit collapsed, they have no other way than to comply. Besides, what good plausible aliens come out from the ground, really. We don’t want to miss their grand entrance.
                          And don’t be such a worrywort about budget, Eb.”

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