2017...I do have to wonder...

What do you want? For you, for your children...? What are you ...even looking for...? Do you want your name to live on, in the future (what kind of future...? Your kind of future - their kind of future...?) Come on, face it. What are you even on this planet FOR! Do you have some kind of 'existence' or God-given divine right to do...whatever that means? Oh come on! Get just a little bit real! Do NOT quote the Bible or the Koran as some vague point of reference - or a point of 'accuracy'. I mean...come on! If I went down that path, Harry Potter would be World President!!! Yes - he would!!!!

January 1st, 2017...

Well, that all got off to a great start, especially in Istanbul... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38481521 I thought 2016 was not (as some pundits are insisting) the worst year - like for EVVA! Clearly these people have little or no imagination (or brain power), and have no sense of History. Without dwelling on it, you will find a LOT of episodes in History that make 2016 seem like a walk in the park, on a sunny day. 2016? Yes, we had a lot of VFC (Very Famous Celebs) who died. I recall being shocked that DaviBowie was 69 - and had died! How dare he! Then they just kept on coming...or going...or passing...whatever. Oh yes, we had...BREXIT! Yay, BrExit - the greatest thing that May (geddit) or may not happen, depending on how much the losers want to tie up the legal system (do you not understand democracy? Really?) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-37861888 Clearly we should have another Referendum, to see which way the wind is blowing, and then a third one - best of three seems sensible, after all, apparently, all those who voted to leave are the Dumbest people. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/commentisfree/2016/may/31/brexiters-eu-leavers-remain At best, this was not a 'landslide majority' - it was about 52/48 split - the Leavers got in by the skin of their teeth! If we re-did the Referendum then I am sure that the percentages would be different, and perhaps a lot of people who are fed up with the political in-fighting just won't bother to vote, but so what? Best of three...? Anyone would think that a by-election needs to be rerun...go on, admit it; this was funny, in a sad, pathetic sort of way: http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2016/12/listen-julia-hartley-brewer-trolls-sarah-olney-second-election/ So. We have BrExit. Watch this space... And then we had the USA elections! Wow - just...wow! There isn't going to be a president Donald Trump... Sorry, can you speak up a bit? I'm not sure that I heard that: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/may/12/george-clooney-donald-trump-jodie-foster-money-monster-cannes-2016 You idiot! You, and it seems a lot of you Hollywood...actors...think that you know better than the American people - and boy, did they mess up your silly little world! Tim Allen (honesty!): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMZ0GuMWkGE Robert DeNiro (pillock): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Q-ZyW9bz5c And while we are on the subject, what is it about the current President that makes him such a 'success' story? How do people make him out to be 'the greatest President ever' and other weird titles? Based on what...? This is just mindless drivel...http://www.gq.com/story/obama-greatest-president-legacy This is just jaw-dropping ignorance: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/55-reasons-obama-will-go-down-as-one-of-our-best-presidents_us_57a1ffe5e4b0e2e15eb7f5f9 I really don't see that there is any way for this ...person...to crawl away from this. Such tactics are indefensible. Unless you are on their side...? http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2016/12/worst-president-ever-obama-gives-billions-to-the-worlds-leading-terrorist-state-iran/ What? How is this even possible? http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2016/12/worst-president-ever-obama-increases-debt-to-20-trillion/ Just pathetic: http://edition.cnn.com/2016/12/29/politics/russia-sanctions-announced-by-white-house/ The end game here is that Obama is behaving like an 8 year child, throwing a tantrum - I didn't get what I want - WAAAAAH! USA - grow up! This person, your current President - is showing his soft spots - and the major players - the ones that he wants to upset - are NOT BITING! Trump is too sharp to fall in to this nonsense, and Putin (Leader of the 'enemy', if you believe the mainstream media...I'll get to that soon) simply isn't buying in to this utter crap! http://www.naturalnews.com/048714_mainstream_media_propaganda_lies.html and this - you should watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uap0GwBYdBA ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uap0GwBYdBA SO essentially, we have been lied to for years by what we thought was reliable media, we are being lied to by the POSTUSA, and our own UK Prime Minster will most likely have agendas to keep BrExit off the table! And you seriously wonder how it is that the 'far right' is on the rise. You are soooo part of the problem! LLAP!

Modern Technology

Modern Technology The crowd had been gathering around the Lulworth Cove harbour all day. At not quite a mile wide at the mouth of the river this harbour area could take a lot of people. An annual event, running for the last fifteen years, and everyone who was in it, and everyone who was watching it, knew that it was high stakes being played out today. The world leaders in this crazy sport were here, and many dozens more who fancied their chances at being famous, even if only for fifteen minutes of air time and fame. Karen Jacobson, the current world champion, looked out from the window of her trailer. She was tired, which she knew was a bad thing. It meant that she would have to be concentrating even more than she had been in the past competitions, or she was certain to fail. She’d been practicing for the last couple of days, but felt that her heart wasn’t in it. At 30 years old, she was acknowledged to be ‘old’, but still ‘world class’, and she knew it. Not with any false illusion, but with a fine sense of pride and reality. She was still world class, and she could still give an incredible performance today, if all the luck in the world went her way. She smiled. This sort of thing doesn’t go on forever – there has to be a time where you hang up your hat and retire, hopefully with an air of gracefulness. Until then, she owned today. She owned the performances that were scheduled for the afternoon. She knew it, the crowd knew it, and most importantly, the other contestants knew it. There was a knock at the door. “Half an hour, Miss Terry.” That was her stage name, a play on the word Mystery. She answered “Thanks, Frankie.” And then, before he could move away “Frankie?” “Miss Terry?” She was sat in the AntiGrav chair, and moved, with only a little difficulty, to the door. In this cramped space it wasn’t that easy to manoeuvre around, even though the chair itself was as small as they could go. Without opening it she asked “Are you alone?” “I am.” “Frankie.” And paused. Did she want to say this? He waited and after a few seconds “Miss Terry?” “Frankie, can I trust you?” While his brain worked out what had just been asked of him, he laughed and replied “After all this time, I would like to think that I, of all people, am someone that you can trust.” “Frankie, can you spare a minute? Can you come in?” There was a small pause as Frankie worked this through his brain. She is asking me in? That’s unheard of! “Um, Miss Terry, I have a few minutes, if you want me for something.” He turned the handle, and slowly opened the door. “I’m coming in.” As the door opened, she reached out and pulled him in for the last part. She didn’t want the whole world to see her, not like this. Not with nothing on. He was gobsmacked. Not only had she dragged him in for the last few feet but here she was with nothing on, starkers, nude, naked…he let that trail off, as she was clearly not in a small-talk mood. “How long have we known each other, Frankie?” She didn’t seem to register that he was fully clothed and she was as bare as the day that she was born. “Um, how long…? About 5 years, I guess. You turned up for the show…” She cut him off. There was so much to talk about, and so very little time to do the talking! “Frankie, what are my chances today? Can you be honest with me?” “I will always try to be honest with you, Miss Terry –“ “Make that Karen, will you? Cut the crap.” “Karen? That’s your real name?” “Frankie, don’t tell me that you didn’t know.” She smiled, and he smiled back. “Well, it was rumoured… but you are a secretive type of person, so no-one actually admitted that they knew – not properly. Your chances? Your chances are what you want to make them. You told me that two – no, three years ago. And may I say that I am not aware of anyone who has been admitted to your trailer, just before the games commence. In that, at least, I do thank you, and not because you are sitting before me with no clothes on, and the only time that I have seen you before has been armoured up for the games! This day is turning stranger and stranger.” She seemed to almost not notice what he had said. “Frankie, can I have a hug?” His confusion must have been a sight, if anyone had a camera to record it, but all he could say was “A hug? Of course you can have a hug!” He moved towards her, and he put his arms around her, and she put her one arm around him. She squeezed him tight, and he squeezed back, still not believing what was happening. She held it for a moment and then burst into tears. He didn’t really know what to do so he stayed there, and they continued to hug, all the time that she was crying her eyes out on his shoulder. It went on for a couple of minutes, and he knew that he had other things to do, other places to be, other people to get sorted out. In spite of the rare honour being offered to him today, he knew he had to go. Softly he said “Karen, I need to go, I need to be somewhere else.” He pulled away from her, and she acknowledged that their time was up. “Frankie, thanks, you’ve been an angel.” She smiled at him, and leant over and gave him a kiss on his cheek. She liked him. “No problems. Good luck today. Hey, whatever happens, when this is all finished, if you want to, come and find me. Maybe we can chill somewhere for an hour – you’ll need unwinding, I’m sure.” “Thanks, I might just do that.” She changed her tone “OK, now to business. Frankie, get out!” As she was saying it she was smiling so Frankie didn’t take it too personally. “I have to get dressed and ready!” He left her to it, making sure that the door was closed behind him. He checked his mobile phone and could see a handful of messages that had come through. Who’s a busy boy then? Karen looked at herself in the mirror, wondering whether there would be stories running around the place, since Frankie had seen her, literally in the flesh. No, of all the people, Frankie could be trusted. “OK, Miss Terry, make or break time.” She moved the AG chair over to the suit, and started to get dressed. The super-thin, super-lightweight under-suit went on first, followed by the legs. She had none herself and these were the latest fully-automated cyber-controlled legs, linked in to her helmet, which would go on last. The extensive surgery that she had undergone, after the car wreck, had left her with numerous cables throughout her body. She was now able to ‘plug in’ to various adapters, rather like when people had to recharge batteries. You couldn’t just call it a ‘crash’. It was much more than that. The car was in a thousand pieces and she was impossible to put back together again. She’d been ‘lucky’, if you could use that word. She had parents who were world authorities on spare part surgery and organ replacement. She was in a forced coma for six months but then started to slowly come round. Her parents had used the six months to ask and beg every expert that they knew for advice on what could be done. It took the next two years but she ended up being a twenty five million dollar woman. Fifteen million dollars of her was pure robotics. The rest was an assortment of repair surgery and odds and ends. She put the body armour on and cautiously stood up from the chair. There was no mobility yet, since the helmet contained all of the control circuitry, but she had to make sure that the under-suit was lying comfortably, and not creased up, pinching her in any parts. The suit frame was anchored, with stays that would remain attached until the helmet released them. Rather like a Saturn V launch, she thought. All those fuel feed cables attached, right up until that time that the space ship lifted off. She was happy that the under-suit and the legs and the body armour were all fitting correctly. She moved to slip on the arms. Since she only had her right arm she only had to lean into the arm mountings to get the suit to attach to the arms. It was all automated. She thought of Robert Downey Junior and Iron Man, when the suit basically dressed itself all over him. Once the arms were attached she let the mechanism slowly drop the helmet over her head. This had happened many times before and she got a buzz every time. Show’s up, people! It’s Show Time! Once the helmet was attached, all of the circuitry came online. The lights in the helmet displays all lit up like a Christmas tree. She knew all of them inside out, but it still took another five minutes to run through all of the checks. She was nothing if not thorough. When she was happy that the whole suit was showing green lights everywhere, she stood up, and walked away from the mounting. The power cables fell away, and it was all running on internal batteries. She knew that she was good for the next six hours, whatever she managed to do. The modern technology within the suit meant that she could almost walk normally. The first few times that she had done this she couldn’t believe it – she was normal for a while! She walked to the door and opened it, visor still open. Outside was a busy corridor, with people running up and down all the time. When she stepped out, they all stopped and looked at her. As she walked down the corridor towards the outside they all started clapping. They all knew that this may be her last appearance, as the rumours had been flying around for the last couple of months that she might retire. As she went through the external doors she stopped and took in the crowd. There were thousands of them, in all directions! As soon as they saw her, in her distinctive suits colours, they all stood up and applauded too. There was a lot of yelling and whistling, which for a few seconds took her breath away. She stood there, taking it all in, and then raised both arms and clasped her hands together, high over the helmet. The huge TV screens were all over the place, showing lots of different locations – here she was on one, the targets were shown on a few more. When a few seconds had passed she could see Frankie just off to one side. “Um, Miss Terry, it’s your time to get ready.” He smiled at her, and then whispered “The very best of luck.” “Thanks, Frankie. Thanks for all of your help today.” She dropped her arms down, and checked all of the systems. This took an additional 30 seconds. They were all green. This is it – do or die she said to herself - but let's go easy on the dying. Not today. She raised her arms one last time to the crowd, and turned in all directions. She knew quite clearly that without her followers, her fans, then she was nothing. Enjoy the show, folks. I aim to see that you do. The crowd went wild, with screams from every corner. They expected an exceptional show! She dropped her arms, gave a small salute to Frankie, and then flipped all of the power circuits to max. This is it – no sense in holding anything back. She didn’t want to think about going out in a blaze of glory, but that was there, at the back of her mind. She ran forward, straight towards the cliff edge. The crowd realised what was happening, and went even crazier than they already were. She’s going to do it! She’s going for the Devils Canyon! She reached the top of the cliff and just kept on running, soaring out into the air. The crowd couldn’t believe what they were seeing! She tilted herself down, head-first, and accelerated at an alarming speed. Within seconds she was over the water, aimed straight out into the ocean. She had achieved Mach 1 and was still accelerating! The internal structures of the suit meant that it absorbed all of the stresses and pressures that would have killed any normal person. Out across the bay she screamed, accelerating faster and faster. The initial shock wave had already blown the nearest thousand people backwards. She tilted, and flew out, across the sea. She could feel the sea rise up, due to the phenomenal vacuum that she had created. The heads-up displays within the helmet told her all the information that she needed. She was flying fast and true, on direct course for the targets, twenty miles away. She knew she would be on them in less time than people expected, and that was where the others all went wrong. Many competitors had been paying too much attention to what the displays were telling them and not enough attention on where they were. Over the years hundreds had literally flown straight past the targets, and had to spend valuable time recovering their flight path. That wasn’t going to happen to her, not today. She smiled as the miles fell away and she could see the targets now close, only two miles away. Then she was there, on them. She had prepared well for this, and the way she went through the ten targets showed that she was world class – a true leader in this crazy sport. She flew past each one, pulsing as she went, and finished in a new course record. The crowd back on the ground were still going crazy, delighted by what they had seen, what they had witnessed here today. She flew high, straight up, still at the speed of sound, turning as she went. She saw the results coming in to the helmet displays and smiled. She had done it! She had made an incredibly difficult set of manoeuvres seem so simple, so easy. OK, people, now follow that! She doubted that any of the competitors would come anywhere close to those times. She was now fifteen miles up, and loving it. She slowed and stopped. The AG suit was more than capable of handling the temperature controls at this altitude and she had oxygen for another three hours. She was safe. The view was stunning, and she was revelling in the moment. She made sure that the camera was still operating and slowly turned, taking it all in. This is something to show the grandchildren, she thought. If I ever have any grandchildren… She let that thought trail off, and focussed on getting back to the land. Checking all of the displays took a few seconds and then she dived. I came out in a rush, I think I’ll take the slow road back. She was travelling at three hundred miles an hour, and felt relaxed – all the tension that she had felt before the jump had gone, replaced by an elation of success. Smiling came easy when you knew you were that good. Because of the unpredictable flight patterns that some competitors had shown, the exclusion area had grown, over the years. From the coast there was a one hundred mile radius ‘bubble’ where no flights were authorised, so she knew she had the air to herself. She came down towards the sea, in the general direction of the games launch site. Flying easily she slowed on the approach so that she was going only around fifty miles an hour when she came into the launch area. She landed at the same place that she had launched herself from, only a few minutes ago. The crowd had held their breath when they saw her coming in, and once she was down they erupted again into cheers and screams. She stood atop the cliff and turned around, arms up again, letting herself take all of this in. The crowd loved her, and she loved them. This moment was never going to happen again, and she wanted to make sure the magic of today stayed with everyone. She had decided that she would be retiring – this was her last public appearance as Miss Terry – and she could look forward to a more quiet retirement. Frankie came forward, and whispered in here ear “Well done! That was exceptional.” Ever the busy organiser he then said “Do you want to make a speech? I think the crowd are looking out for one.” She wondered. A speech? I’m not one for speeches… Then she thought Why not? They deserve it. “Sure. Patch me in to the system.” He spoke into his communicator and then gave her the thumbs up sign. She had no idea what to say, so she went with honesty. “Thank you. Thank you all! I am delighted to be here today, and I am so very happy that all of you have turned out as well.” A pause, to work out what to say. “I have no idea how I just did that performance, but I am very happy that I made it back in one piece, and with what might be a new course record?” She looked across at Frankie, who checked with someone over the communicator and came back with another thumbs up sign, followed by a whispered “You took fifteen seconds off the course record, that you set last year!” To the crowd “Oh, wow. Apparently I have just broken my own world record – by fifteen seconds! Ladies and gentlemen, I do thank you all for all of your support over the years, but please understand that this today was my last public performance.” There was a long sigh from the crowd, as what she said settled into their brains. “After today I will be retiring, and trying to take things a little easier.” The crowd then started with their version of a salute “Miss-Te-REE-Miss-Te-REE-Miss-Te-REE” and it built up slowly, until they were all screaming it aloud, loving the performer, and the amazing performance of today. She just stood there, arms up, saluting the crowd as they in turn saluted her. She repeated her turns, facing all parts of the crowd. She let this run for a few seconds, and then voiced “Thank you, thank you all. It has been a blast!” She turned, intending to return to her trailer. She went to the main complex doors but Frankie stepped in front of her. “Karen, I have just had word that someone has made it to your trailer. We don’t know who this person is, and security is on their way. Delay for 30 seconds, if you can.” Delay? How am I supposed to delay…? “Frankie, are you with someone – do you have a partner?” “Er – no – why on earth do you ask me that?” She smiled. I’ll enjoy this delay, even if he doesn’t. She smiled at him. “Come here.” She flipped the visor up and reached across to grab Frankie and pull him in close. Here’s one for the crowd, she thought. She pulled him right up to her and their lips met. “Is this good enough for a short delay?” she whispered. He choked. “Hell yeah – this is brilliant. Try it again and I may get to like it.” He was light in his tone, so they both enjoyed the moment. A beep went on Frankie’s mobile and he pulled away from Karen and looked at it. “They have him.” His faced changed to concerned. “It’s one man, in a suit, no weapons of any sort, and no ID, except the one that got him through all of our security protocols. That’s weird.” “What’s weird?” “I’m one of the three people responsible for creating all the security protocols for access to this place – nobody is supposed to get in or out of here without flagging up alerts everywhere…” “I feel a ‘but’ coming here.” “But, he did just that – he walked in, walked through all of our security… There are only three of us that have that kind of access, that I know of, and he just made it a fourth! That simply should not be happening!” He looked at Karen. “That is not possible!” “OK, Frankie, you’re stressing too much. Number one – it has happened, so there. He did all of that, so we just have to deal with it. Is he saying anything? What’s he here for?” “Hang on.” He spoke into the communicator for at least a half minute, and then said “He wants to talk to you. He won’t say why or anything else, only that he wants to talk to Karen Jacobson.” He looked at her. “Is that really your real name?” She looked at him, and sighed. “Yes, Frankie, that is really my real name. Can we get back to this mystery man.” She stopped, noticing what she had just said. Mystery Man. It’s a play on my stage name. “Frankie, where is he – now?” “He’s still in your trailer. Nobody has worked out where to take him to.” “Frankie, let’s go and meet our Mystery Man.” She didn’t wait for him but marched off, going through the doors and then down the corridor until she got to the trailer. Should I knock? Why the hell would I knock? It’s my damned trailer! She put her hand on the door handle and opened it, and walked in. She could see the mystery man, and was shocked to see him sat in her AG chair – that’s a damned cheek! What hell are you doing sitting in my chair? He smiled at her when she walked in, which made her even more annoyed. She could also see the two security guards, one male and the other female. They were both physically intimidating, which was 80% of their job. Argue with them at your cost! She flipped the visor back down and set all the power back up to maximum. She was still good for at least an hour, even though she had spent an incredible amount of energy during the show. “Frankie, you stay outside for moment, until we have this sorted out.” She made it so that the external speakers were used and said, in loud voice “You, get the hell out of my chair!” Since it took him a few seconds to realise what had just been said she reached over and grabbed him and pulled him out of the chair. She pulled him close, so that his face was only inches from her visor, and said “I do not like it when strangers come into my trailer and SIT IN MY CHAIR!” She then – gently, considering the mood that she was in – threw him to the other side of the room. “You two, the security personnel. Thank you for what you have done so far. Can you stay over there, away from us, while I try to find out what this is all about? Stay weapons hot, but on my command only.” They both raised their eyebrows and looked at each other – how does this civilian know these phrases? She thought to add “Unless I don’t make it, in which case you may fry his ass, many times!” She looked at him, across the room, quite deliberately. Do not, ever, imagine that I am joking! The security pair duly moved over to the opposite end of the room. It didn’t do to cross swords with a world champion, especially when she was so pissed off with someone, and especially since she seemed to know what she was talking about! The crumpled heap at the other end of the room managed to say “Karen, stop!” That he used her real name brought her to a stop. Very few people knew that name. “Karen, I am not here to hurt you. Not at all, in any way. Just stop getting antsy and let me speak!” He lifted his head. “Please?” She duly stopped, and looked at this man, this Mystery Man in her trailer, who had sat in her chair – the damned cheek! “You’d better be quick, before I start to lose my patience, and get angry.” She came close to him and snarled “and you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.” He made to straighten himself out, and she said “Stay down. Until I know who you are and what you are doing here I am assuming that you are hostile, and I will put you down or in hospital if I have to. You invade my damned trailer, and sit in my damned chair! You’d better watch it, mister, or these two will fry you where you sit.” He sagged back onto the floor. “Karen, relax. Nobody needs to fry anybody today.” “And how is it that you know my name? Very few people know my name.” He sighed. This was harder than I thought it would be. “Karen, a lot of people know your name. They just choose not to publicise it, that’s all.” “What the heck does that mean?” “Think about it. Think about you, your smash, the work done to repair you, the hundreds of favours that your parents called in, the thousands of people that worked on you! Think about it! A lot of people know exactly who you are.” “Oh, shit. Are you military? Is that it?” “No, I’m not, but I do work with them, and for them at times. I’m civilian, but I have read up on you and your case, and it’s now time that you and I had a private conversation.” “Private? Why priv – oh shit. You’ve come to collect?” He was impressed. She has certainly got a sharp brain to see that at this stage. “Yes, Karen. You can call it that, I suppose.” Crap, she thought. Why now? Damn. Just when she thought she could take a break, go away somewhere, and be a normal person… ha! That’s rich. Normal? She hasn’t been normal for the last few years. She turned to the security team. “Thanks guys, I’ll be taking it from here. Something for you to think about – this here never happened.” She looked at them, hoping they would say the correct thing. All she got was “OK, if you’re sure.” Good! They cautiously went across to the door, opened it, and Frankie stumbled in. The guards continued out, leaving a flustered Frankie. “In or out, Frankie, but shut the door.” Frankie thought he knew what was going on, and then realised that he was outclassed. He looked at the people in the room, and wondered which was the best thing to do – in or out? “Karen, which would you like me to do?” “Frankie, right now, I think it’s best that you go and get a coffee, as my visitor and I have a lot to talk about, and I think it’s going to be best if it’s private.” Slowly, not really knowing if he was doing the right thing, he turned and walked out, closing the door behind him. She looked at the interloper. “Ok, whoever you are. Who are you?” “Can I get up yet, or am I going to be down here for a while?” “Oh, you really annoyed me, sitting in my chair like that. Nobody but me sits in that chair – ever!” “OK, I accept that, and I apologise! I won’t do it again, OK? Now can I get up?” “Hell yes, get up, but don’t assume that I am happy that you are here, because I am not.” He slowly stood, straightened his clothes, and then said “You may need to reduce the power in your suit. If you continue to run at that level you’ve only got another 20 minutes or so. Drop it down, and recharge – keep the thing on if you must, but get recharging. You never know when you may need the power.” “Are you ever going to tell me who you are?” “Sorry. We haven’t got off well, have we?” he smiled at her, and she began to relax. Just a little. She also dropped the power levels across all of the systems in the suit, and went to get recharging again. It was a relatively simple matter to get the connections plugged in again. She lifted the visor, but stayed in the suit. “Steven. With a ‘v’, Phillips. In case you were wondering, I am a native Brit, even though my accent may well be confusing. I’ve spent too many years over in the USA, and just picked up the accent.” “OK, Steven-with-a-‘v’, explain. What do you want?” “I would have thought that was fairly obvious. I want you. I need you to come with me to the States, as we have some projects that we’d like you to work on.” She was amazed. She’d never laid eyes on this person before, yet here he was telling her what to do. “I may not be ready to go. I have a lot on for the next few weeks, you know.” He smiled at her. “Karen, no you don’t. You’ve just announced that today is your last competition – oh, well done, by the way. Terrific performance, even though you nearly pushed the suit beyond its capabilities. That’s one of the projects that we will be looking at. There are a lot of projects we need you on board for.” How did he know how much she had pushed the suit…? “Did you look at the telemetry? Can you do that? That would explain a few things…” She went off into thought. She had noticed tiny delays in reaction. Almost too small to notice, but she knew this suit very well. "You've bloody well hacked my suit? You can see the telemetry?" She felt the anger rise, and he saw it. "Karen, stop it! You are better than that." He turned slightly away, and said "You need to watch this." With no obvious machinery being in the room, an image started to appear in the middle of the room, and she could clearly see both of her parents. To say that she was shocked was putting it mildly, since they had both died two years ago! Her father spoke first. "Karen, hi, it's dad. I think I realise that you are now watching this with a mixture of emotions. Number one is that I am not here anymore, and number two is that you are being approached by an agency that you have never heard of. Don't fight it, Karen. It's bigger than you and me." He was smiling while he was saying this. "Karen, we have watched you grow up over the last few years, and we have watched your successes, with a lot of personal pride. Karen, you are today your own boss, you are the person that makes the rules, that sets the pace. The person that we would like you to be dealing with, Steven, is a good man. Don't ignore him. He will not lie to you and I don't expect you to start lying to him, not when there is so much at stake. Be good, my baby. " He smiled, one last time, at the screen, and directly at her. "Live long and prosper!" She was surprised to find that she was crying. Her mother then started to speak. "Karen, Steven will walk you through what he is here for. Don't be too surprised that he is asking for some favours. Think back to what your father and I had to call in to get you sorted out, after that awful crash, and you'll begin to appreciate how much you actually owe us - us and the rest of the scientific world. As ever baby, live long and prosper!" She was now in floods of tears, and Steven left her to work through it. She took a couple of minutes and then she was suddenly back, all business-like. "OK, Steven, what's going on here?"   "I think that you can piece most of it together, but I'll fill in any gaps that I can. It's probably easier if I walk through the last twenty or so years, and then you take it on board and then ask me questions. That's about the best structure that I can come up with." Her mind was in turmoil and all she could manage was a confused nod. "You already know that you have had a lot of work done on you. You know that more than most, so I won't dwell on the details. What you don't fully understand is the sheer number of favours that your parents had to call in for you. By rights, you should have died in that crash. Anyone else would have. The technology and personnel that were required to keep you alive simply doesn't exist in the normal world. Only because your parents pulled a lot of people together, and everyone used everything that they had at their disposal, are you still breathing." Damn, damn, damn! "Yes, you were lucky, in a funny kind of way. When you were little your parents were already world leaders in robotics, and around the time you were ten they started on other projects that were connected with bionics. I'm sure you know that word. They had ten years of dealing with spare part surgeries, robotics, circuit designing, and many more sciences. Those two people changed everything in those ten years. They moved the sciences on by a century in just a decade. They all overlapped, but the main idea was always how to improve on what was already in place. I know, from your file, that you used to watch the old TV series, especially things like The Bionic Man. And then you had your crash. Your parents were in shock for days - that's something that you were never told about, by the way. There were some project co-workers that they knew who took over, until your parents came out of their state of shock. They all knew that you were a mess, and put you into a forced coma. They then started to try to work out what could be done with you. Your parents took over, eventually, but a lot of work was already in place. You were stable, you weren't going to die, but you were in a serious mess." "It took the first three months for a viable set of plans to be put in place. For this time you were kept under sedation. You did very well, and your body repaired what you could. Because you were sedated nobody knew what your state of mind was like. If you came out of the sedation would you be a vegetable? Would you even recognise anyone, your parents, that sort of thing?" "You were monitored 24/7. You were wired up like a Christmas tree for all of that time. You did die a few times, it seems, but you were brought back by the amazing teams on hand. After six months a firm set of plans were in place, but the rest of it meant that they had to have you conscious, so they brought you out of the coma. They didn't know what to expect, but they were pleasantly surprised when you came round. You looked at your parents and smiled, and said 'Hi.'" "They had to go through a lot of psychology with you. They wanted you to be level-headed about all of this, and it was important that you understand it all. That took another few months. It was a year before they could start the repairs. They had to put you under again and basically rewire you. You are now probably the most expensive personal project that has ever been undertaken. A conservative estimate puts it at twenty five million dollars, but it's probably higher than that. All of this has allowed you to use these suits - but you knew that. What you have to understand is that you are the best candidate that my Agency has had to deal with, and it's dealt with quite a few people, over the years. Many people can't handle it. They don't go mad, or anything crazy, but their head can't cope with the changes, or the demands. In most cases we have had to scale things back, and settle people into a more usual, normal life. You on the other hand - well, whatever we put your way you just use, and then come back to us with demands to make it smaller, or faster or more powerful. You thrive on the challenges, and that is what I am here for, today. You will remember, I'm sure, the Seven Million Dollar Man episode? That has happened for almost everyone - except you." He stopped telling his story, and smiled at her. "Karen, you are a rare person. I don't know if anyone has ever told you that, but I will, now. You are rare in that you survived the crash, and rare in that you have dealt with it in such an incredibly sophisticated way. It is that, the sophisticated way that you think, why I want you to come back to the States with me. There are a lot of people who want to talk to you. You will be busy - very busy - for the next couple of years, and after that - who knows?" "You can't expect me to come back for chats. We could do that over the telephone! There's more - there has to be more." "Well, along the way, I'm sure that you will be meeting a lot of robotics and bionics people. They will want your input for the next generations of suits. The one you have is good, but it's already three versions behind what we have been working on, in the States. We are up to three years ahead of you, Karen, and we'd like you to be part of our amazing journey." Her jaw dropped - three versions behind...? Seriously? Oh, wow...she was wasting time. She looked hard at him, and wondered how her life might yet turn out. Having given it some very hard thought for a full five seconds, she said "Steven, when can we leave?" He actually looked surprised, which pleased her. "Really? Well, there's a few things that you will have to sort out over here, but we'd like you to come over as soon as you can." "Where to? Where is this all based?" "In the Silicon Valley area. It's a distributed set of buildings, over a two square mile area. You'll be staying on campus initially and then we'll see where you fancy setting up a house. There are usually a few to choose from, which we will be funding, of course." "Steven, how much do I have to sort out over here? Very little. You know that. I have no ties, no family to speak of. My friends, as such, I can talk to over the phone. Where on the east coast can I recharge? I can then go on to Silicon Valley from there." "You want to fly there? You can't be serious. You'd have to clear flight paths and such - no-one will allow you to use existing plane flight paths. You'd be too much of a headache for any Flight Traffic Control system." She shrugged. "So we don't tell them? You know the suits capabilities. You know that I can be on the east coast in three hours. I'll need an overnight base and then I can be in California three hours later. This suit can do it, I know it can." "I'll have to ask my boss." There was a slight pause and he said "My boss says OK. She seems to think that it's actually a good idea, although I'm not sure that I agree, but what do I know?" "Hang on, your boss is listening? All of this time?" He nodded. "'Fraid so. I must have forgotten to tell you that." he smiled. "Well, I have little to keep me here, and I'm sure I can get my personal effects sent over, so when can I leave? No, you don't have to answer. I can be recharged in another hour, and then I can be off. I will have a word with Frankie and then leave everything up to him. He is someone here that I trust. I will probably expect him to come over for a couple of months, once I've settled down. He and I work well, and he is an excellent organiser. I value his input - do you understand that? And does your boss understand that?" After a slight pause he said "We do, although we will have to run checks on Frankie. Security and all that stuff." "To be honest, I doubt you'll find anything strange. He's a good man, and I trust him - more than I trust you at this moment. Whatever you find on him, it better be a damned good reason, if you end up prohibiting him from coming over." "Agreed. All of that can be sorted out later. I think I will arrange a drop-off for you, on the east coast, and I'll get the co-ordinates to your suit." With that he stood up. "It's been lovely to finally meet you. I will be catching a conventional flight back, so I won't see you for a few days. Oh, and at the moment all of this is hush-hush. Much of the work that we do is pretty conventional but the stuff you will be dabbling in is all new, and we like to keep our secrets close." "Agreed."

Evolution

Phillip Crowley was sound asleep, and it took a few seconds for the fact that the house phone was ringing to seep through his fuddled brain. All that he could manage was to reach out and pick it up with a "Hello?" "Mr Crowley, this is Chief Inspector Cheeseman, based in Bournemouth. I am connected with the Agency. I need you to be awake enough to have an important and sensible conversation with you." That caught him, and he suddenly felt the adrenaline rush in and perk up his brain. Did he just mention the Agency? He was quickly awake and said "Chief Inspector, talk to me." Now it was the time for the Chief Inspector to be caught out. "Um, Mr Crowley..." "Chief Inspector, get on with it. I realise, more than most, more than you may realise, that since you are cold-calling me at this ridiculous hour then things are happening, so stop dithering. Tell me, and tell me true. Now!" Shaken, but the professional Police Officer that he was, he managed to answer "Mr Crowley, all of your family is alive and well, but we have a ... situation." His hairs stood up on the back of his neck. He hadn't heard that for a few years. "Talk." "I will say that, at this time, I do not have all of the situation information available to me, but suffice it to say that your son and your daughter-in-law are well. They are being looked after in Southampton Hospital -" "What the hell are you talking about?" "Mr Crowley, I am trying to get there! Your granddaughter is also alive and well, but we can't get into the house so that we can actually speak to her, or collect her up." A stunned silence spoke volumes to the Chief Inspector. Finally "What do you mean - 'you can't get into the house'? What the hell are you talking about?" He heard the man at the other end sigh. He sounded very tired. "I wish I could answer that in some way that makes sense. I can't, so you will have to accept that what I tell you is the most accurate information that I have available to me at this time. Whatever, I need your presence at the hospital with your son and your daughter-in-law, as soon as you can. I am currently at the house that your son and daughter in law live in. We have a car waiting outside your house now. Please do not delay." Disbelief in his voice, he managed "You have a car? Outside? Now?" He moved from the bed and pulled the curtain to one side, where he saw the large executive saloon sat outside. He returned to the phone "I will be three minutes." and he hung up. He sped through the house, collecting a few items and getting dressed. He then ran downstairs and out of the front door, walking quickly to the car. He approached it and the driver leaned out with a "Mr Crowley?" "Yes, that's me." "Please get in the back, sir. I have my instructions to take you to your destination." "Oh, good." He stopped, before he got into the car. "And where might that be?" "The Southampton Hospital, sir. Where your -" "No, no. I don't know what your orders are but they are changed. Get me to my son's house now. The hospital can wait." The driver spoke into a microphone, and Phillip hung back from getting into the car. The driver had a few words into a microphone but eventually came back with "Your son's house it is, sir. Please get in." He did so, and sat down, automatically putting the belt across him. "How long before we get there?" he asked the driver. "Around fifteen minutes, sir. Please sit back and try to relax." What? Fifteen minutes? It's over a hundred miles away. In a tense voice, which the driver couldn't fail to pick up on "Driver, some questions, and answer what you can. Do you have a name, and are you just a driver, or do you have information on this situation?" Making some last minute adjustments to his controls, the driver replied "My name is David. My last name is not really necessary, but it is Anderson. I have very little information on the current status of the incident, so I would only confuse you. It seems that there are a lot of people who are confused at the moment - I'll go one further on that. I know of nobody who is NOT confused." "Thank you." He went pensive, and then "Oh, yes. How are you proposing to get over one hundred miles away in fifteen minutes? I don't care how good a driver you are, the road system won't allow it." "Who said we were going to use the roads?" The driver was smiling now, and Phillip could sense it in the voice. Not use the roads? Then how the hell...? Now what? "Please relax sir. Everything here is under my control." and then the car lifted, straight up. Phillip immediately tensed, but said nothing, while the world literally fell away from him. The car continued to climb, straight up, for a few moments, and then levelled off, and moved forwards, gaining speed as it went. "Ah...I think I see how we are going to arrive in record time." "Sorry, sir, but I have my instructions, and part of that is to get you to the destination as soon as possible, in one piece. That does not allow me much time to explain a great deal, such as this car." He eventually relaxed and shrugged. He chuckled. "David, you and I will have to have some drinks when I get this sorted out. You'll have to tell me a lot, I reckon. I've been away too long from the projects. I think this car was only someone's idea, on a drawing board, when I left, and that was only three years ago! David, this is amazing. To have come so far, in such a short time! Wow, I have a ton of stuff to get up to speed on." "Yes, sir. Let's get to that after tonight." He looked out and could see the ground speeding by. It was dark, but random lights flashed underneath him, and he knew that this technology was something to be impressed by. "David, let me know when we are arriving. I need to catch five minutes." "As you wish, sir." Phillip went quiet, and felt himself sag into the contours of the extremely comfortable seat. He needed to think, and he was very good at taking himself away, mentally, and working through issues and problems in minutes instead of hours. He had a 'knack' of shutting out the world. He let his mind wander, as he went over the current patterns. His son and daughter-in-law were both 'safe', in hospital. What did that mean, 'safe'? His granddaughter was at the house, alone, and for some reason nobody was able to get in? Had he heard that correctly? That made no sense. She was only three, for heaven's sake! What the hell was going on here? The Agency was involved. That, to him, spoke volumes. He knew that his son was somehow connected to the Agency, as he had been for over twenty years. With the tight security that was always invoked he knew nothing about the work that his son was doing, or had been doing for the last five years. He knew better than to ask, and his son was professional enough not to volunteer. Which left him with... nothing. He didn't have a thing to go on, so he had no option but to wait until he got to the house. "We are coming in to land sir. Don't release the seat belt until I have parked." The car came in fast and low, and stopped within an incredibly short distance. Have they got an artificial gravity, too? "Thank you, David. A nice ride." He opened the door and was met by the Chief Inspector. "Mr Crowley, welcome. I'm Cheeseman. Let's walk and I'll tell you what I can on the way." "Fair enough." They both strode in a determined fashion. "Little to update you with. The house is secure, with nobody able to get in, and I am presuming nobody can get out. We picked up your relatives an hour ago, from the front of the house. It was suggested by the officers first on the scene that they looked as if they had been thrown there, but we have no idea who by. We have tried calling to the inside of the house but nobody answers." They had arrived at the house, and Phillip just stood there, looking at the scene. When the Chief Inspector had said that nobody could get in, he had not been too accurate with his description. To Phillip, newly arrived, it looked as if a huge half-football had been dropped over the whole house. A bubble, or perhaps a dome, covered it all. He saw immediately that the front door was smashed in. Just what the hell had happened here...? What the hell is this...? "Mr Crowley, if you have any ideas, then please share them. We are stumped. We had four of our officers try to get through and it just bounced them back. They are slightly damaged, through impact, but they will be fine. We simply, at this stage, don't know what to do next." Phillip just stood there, nothing in particular going through his mind. He had no idea what this was, in front of him, and no idea of how to cope with it. "Chief Inspector, I have no idea. Who have you called?" "Everyone. I have some boffins from the Military on their way, but they are miles away. We are trying to secure the area, but there doesn't look to be much in the way of hostiles. This isn't anything that I have dealt with before. There are no phone calls, no terrorism, no threats from anyone." They both stood there, looking at it. Eventually Phillip had to say something. "Well, that's a first in my books. Nothing makes sense, so how do we react to it? You said that some of your people were hospitalised by approaching? What happened?" "We didn't know any more then to what we do know now. We had a couple of people try to approach it, but when they touched that screen, or 'field', whatever you want to call it, it was as if they had a massive electric shock, and it threw them back. After that, we gave up trying to get near it." "Let's get closer. I want to see that field up close." They both walked slowly up towards the dome, and stopped some ten feet from it. It had a range of colours running through it, rather like oils mixing. He looked at the dome, then looked at the Chief Inspector. "It's got me stumped. This is Science Fiction made real." He was about to continue when a soft voice popped into his head. Grandpa, is that you? He jumped. "What? What the - Jody, is that you?" Easy, Grandpa. I'll explain. First off, don't speak. The police man next to you will wonder what's going on. Secondly, just think things. You and I need to have a talk, and I don't want anyone else to be part of it. Thirdly, do you know how mum and dad are? I've been a bit busy here. "Jody -" Then he stopped, and recalled what was just said. Jody, what is this? Explain to your old Grandpa - please? The Chef Inspector caught him starting to speak and voiced "Mr Crowley? You were saying something?" "No, it was - it was me just running some things through my head. I may have some ideas, but nothing that I can share at the moment. I need to get a bit closer." Without waiting for an agreement he just walked right up to the dome, stopping just two feet from it. "Mr Crowley, please -" "Yes, yes, Chief Inspector. I will be careful. Tell me, do you know if this causes any radio interference? Do your people have any reception issues with their radio transmission?" "Not that I know of. I will ask - and please be careful!" He turned away, to call to a sergeant close by. Jody, I'm here by the dome. Talk to me, kiddo. What's happened, and why is this dome up? I need to know if you can come through the dome. I have some things here that I need to get sorted out, and I'm not sure that I can do them by myself. Would you be able to help me, Grandpa? Jody, I am here to help out in any way that I can, you should know that, beautiful, but you have to tell me what's going on. I can't guess all of this. There was silence for a few seconds and then OK, Grandpa. I'm going to open a door in the dome and I want you to walk through it. I need to close it after you, because I don't know who else out there can be trusted. Shocked, all he could manage was Jody, you are going to have to explain that. I will, but first of all, can you make sure that there is a 24x7 guard on my parents? They need to be secure. Taken aback by what this three year old was asking, he managed to turn to the Chief Inspector. "Mr Cheeseman, I need your assurances that my son and his wife will be guarded, 24x7. What this is part of I don't as yet know, but I need maximum security around all of the personnel involved - including me, starting now." Surprised by the request, Cheeseman could only say "I'll get some people on to it." "Thanks. I need confirmation from them that they are in place, and that they know what they are doing. Mr Cheeseman, there is a lot riding on this. This whole crazy thing today is not an accident. Something happened here, and I aim to find out what. You might want to set up perimeter blocks, perhaps a half-mile away. I don't want any surprises. And tell your people to be on the lookout for vehicles that are parked and observing. Don't intercept them, just tell me." Even more surprised, all that the Chief Inspector could answer was "I'll get it sorted now." With that he was talking to other officers, getting them to take messages. OK, Jody, if we are going to do this, it better be soon. I'm available but only for a few seconds. Good. When I say, just walk into the dome. It'll let you through, but I will need to close it afterwards. Jody, my little lovely, you have a lot of explaining to do. You are only three years old, and yet you are running this show. He smiled. Good girl! OK, Grandpa, here we go. The cloudy dome in front of him seemed to clear, and then there was a space, a door. Now, Grandpa. and he stepped through, continuing to walk towards the house. Behind him there were shouts and cries from various people, but he ignored them. He assumed that the dome was now closed again. Jody, I'm in, and just outside the house. What do you want me to do next? He saw the damage to the door to the house, and knew that something violent had happened here. He stepped over the splintered frame and walked in. We need to meet and then go over a few things. Fair enough. I'm on my way. Just where are you, sweetheart? I'm in the kitchen. Come on through. On my way, baby. He knew every part of the house, so he went through the hallway and turned into the kitchen. He was very surprised to see his granddaughter in the centre of the kitchen, and he was even more surprised to see that she was about five feet off the ground! Just floating there. He could see that her eyes were closed - she looked as if she was asleep. Jody, I'm here, and I'm right next to you. Good. Can you get ready to catch me? Just put your hands under me and don't let me fall. He did as he was asked, and felt his heart skip a beat when she dropped into his arms. He gently repositioned her so that her head was on his shoulder, and she was cradled like a baby. Jody, Jody, Jody, what are we into here? he asked, very gently. She didn't move or wake, but she did reply. I'm not too sure myself. Can we go into the lounge? There are some things there that you need to see. He walked through the house to the lounge, carrying her quietly all the time. He was shocked to walk in to the room and see six black-clad masked men - he assumed that they were men - also in the room, and also floating about five feet off the ground. Softly, as he didn't have a clue what this was all about, he asked Jody, explain, baby. I don't have all of the details, but I'm sure that it's connected to dad and his work. We three were all OK at home when they burst in and got a hold of mum and dad. I was upstairs in my room, playing so I didn't understand it at first. When they started attacking mum and dad I could feel the pain that they were in and came to see what was going on. I went into the kitchen so as not to disturb things. Grandpa, I don't know how to explain it but I could 'see' everything in the lounge - please believe me. Jody, I'm not about to doubt you. Tell me what happened next. I could see that these men had bags, and they were putting their hands in and pulling out stuff, which I think is explosive. He looked around and could see four bombs in the centre. Oh crap. Jody, are these live? Yes, they are, but I have a hold on them at the moment, but I can't keep them suppressed forever. I picked up mum and dad and had to throw them out of the house, to get them out of harm's way, while I tried to work out what to do with these creeps. I put the bubble up after that. I needed time to see what was happening. Jody, we need to leave, or we need to get these people out of here. This could blow at any time. I figure about five minutes. That's time enough. Time? For what? Go and have a word with that police officer. I need a large van - armoured if they have it - backed up against the shield. Tell them to open the back doors first. When it's in position I will extend the shield and then load this lot, and their explosives into it. Then I will retract the shield and they will have to close the doors and get the van somewhere safe. There's a car park just down the road. I would advise that it is driven into the middle of it and then the driver had better run, fast, away from it. Grandpa, I really can't hold this much longer than that, I'm afraid. He turned his head and gently kissed the cheek of his granddaughter. Holy shit. Sorry, beautiful. That's what we call a rude word. You'll get the hang of it while you grow up. Jody, we'd better get things moving then! He turned and walked back to the front door. When he got there he saw the people milling around. "Mr Cheeseman, please don't argue. We are running on a small time window here. I need a large armoured van reversed against this shield, and I need it now! Open the back doors first, as we have some dangerous things to go into it. Can you get on that now? I'll tell you the next bit after you have started that off." "Damn it, Crowley - alright!" He turned and yelled at some of his staff, and they ran off. "We have one - sixty seconds." "Good. I need a way cleared down to the car park just down the road, and I need that park to be cleared - nothing in it! This armoured van is to be driven into the middle of it and then abandoned. Whoever is driving it might have seconds to get clear, because it might well blow up on us, so don't delay this anywhere along the line. Understood?" "Understood, even though I don't understand. How is your granddaughter?" "She looks to be fine, but I need to clear this up first - we can talk later." "Understood." The van roared up towards the house and turned, and two people jumped out of the back, pushing the doors fully open. It then reversed until it was inches from the shield. The driver called out "Ready Mr Cheesemen!" "Crowley, what next?" Jody, it's up to you, now. The men from the lounge floated up and moved out into the hall and out of the front door, closely followed by all of the bags and bombs that they had brought into the house. Crowley looked as the shield seemed to grow outwards and form a seal with the rear of the van, and this was followed by six men and their belongings flowing into the van. The seal came away and reformed. Grandpa, close the doors and get that van far away from here. "Close those doors! Van driver - you know what to do?" he called out. "I do, sir." "Go, get away, then. And don't delay. Park it and get far away from the van. Now! Go!" He accelerated away and everyone watched him go. It took less than two minutes for the van to turn into the park and roar into the middle. The driver was good, and he slowed and pulled on the hand brake. The van stopped and the driver was out, running away as fast as he could. He got two hundred feet away, and started to slow down, and turned. The van was isolated, except for another small number of vehicles littered around the edges. With no notice it blew, creating a small mushroom cloud, and blowing the van driver some forty feet further away from where he had been standing. Down the road they could all see the cloud. Jody, that was close. I know. Too close. I will try to not let that happen again. Jody, what happened here? What happens when you wake up? Will you remember any of this? I don't know. I've never done it before. That's an interesting thought. I'm a good defender, so long as I'm asleep. Rather like having an invisible man who is only invisible just so long as nobody is looking at him. Can you get the police to look after everything? Secure the house and such? I think we need to get to see mum and dad. "Mr Cheeseman, can you get this area secure? We need to get to my son and his wife now." "We can. I don't suppose you'd like to explain anything?" He let it drift off, knowing that there would be no explanation. "Mr Cheeseman, can we get to the car, with you, and then move to my family? I fear I may need you to open some doors when we get to the other end. Please check that full security is in place around them." "Granted." he spoke briefly into a radio and received an acknowledgement that it was all in place. "It's all good, Mr Crowley." By then they were at the car, with the driver ready. "Mr Anderson. Good to see you. Ready for another trip?" He looked at the police officer, who nodded. "It seems, Mr Crowley, that you are calling a lot of the shots. Just don't give me too many surprises, please." They all got into the car, with Phillip still holding his granddaughter, fast asleep, on his shoulder. Ready for the trip, Jody? I'm ready. If this night shows anything, it seems that I was born ready. The car lifted and moved at great speed off towards the hospital housing Crowley's son and daughter-in-law. "Can I get a status update? Are they awake yet?" "No, not yet. No further information is available."

Magic is...magic.

You have to understand that the magic in my world is not the same as the magic in your world. In your world, magic means impressions, beauty, and more, but in my world magic is real. It exists. It isn't tangible - you can't hold it in your hand - but the effects of it are...well, real. It's always been there (according to our histories), even though not everyone can use it - or control it. There are people who just have no magic at all. They try, but nothing ever happens. We have young people, from the youngest at age seven, to the oldest at age seventy four, who start to use magic, with mixed results. We have experts (who usually get elected to the Guild) and we have people who can barely rub two sticks together. There are stories, spoken about quietly, of those who showed promise and then went..well, they went nuts. They lost the plot of magic, and became a threat, to their own safety and the safety of everyone around them. Everyone. The Council has been in place now for centuries and they look after magic, and the people who use it. You might call it a Guild, I suppose, but it is a very small group of people who look after the day to day effects of real magic, and try to stop anyone going mad and wrecking the town - or worse. There is a story - admittedly, it's very old, centuries - of one of the first people to try to 'own' magic. It didn't work out too well for anyone, and it is only because of the Guild that we are all here today to talk about it. Even if we do talk about it in hushed voices.

Where shall I begin...

to tell a story...? Well, the beginning, perhaps? In the beginning, there was chaos, century after century of it (hey, in Europe - the rest of the world...well, we'll get to that later; maybe...), and then we had two World Wars, and then a little bit of peace - a piece of peace. The world did what it had done countless times before (go on, count them, I dare you!) and picked up the pieces and tried its best to move on. We sort of managed. I have to admit that I wasn't around then, so I'm taking as read that you allow me to admit that I have 'education', which has allowed me to get to grips with some of this. Politics is, at best, a dark art to most of us, and we rely on the loonies that are able to take to the world of politics and get on with it. It is not for the faint-hearted. Which is why, in recent years, a lot of people have started to take an interest in politics, both in general and in many cases in specifics. This is good news! Yes, really, it is! Think about it. All that went before was the rather boring Blue/Red divide, with none of the others standing a snowball in hells chance of getting anywhere. Tory or Labour - that was it, and they kept taking it in turns - Blue for this period, they upset a lot of people, and then Red has a go, trying to undo what the Blues did, without upsetting a whole host of people. They eventually fail, and then - yippee! - its the Blues turn. Again. (boring...:() The short-lived (and by now notorious) Coalition between the Tories and the LibDems was a straight-jacket joke. The Tories had a lot of votes, but no overall majority. They went to bed with a minority party, the LibDems, and what did we get? An unelected Government, that's what. Certainly the LibDems could not have expected such a rollercoaster of a ride, since so few people actually voted for them. Oh, yes. Voting. Why is it that so few people, until very recently, have actually bothered to turn up and vote? Seriously, why? What is it about politics and voting that makes it such a turn-off? Well, if I didn't know better (and I don't) I would take a line out of the Josh Whedon film Serenity. The ruling classes try every experiment under the sun to generate a population that will follow orders, and they succeed in one case, where the entire population just lies down and dies. I would suggest that the last few decades has been an attempt to create a population who doesn't care, can't be bothered, and certainly can't be interested in politics. That leaves it up to the Eton snobs, the ones who are bred to go into this arena. And milk it for all that it's worth. Oh, yes they do. Which means that you and I, the plebs, the unwashed scum, actually subsidise these snobs, and encourage them to milk more and more. And that brings me around to the mid-1970's, when most of the population didn't understand politics (hey, most of us still don't) and we got roped into the European Union. No, actually we were roped into the EEC, which bred the EU. From this point on, it's all downhill, but we were blindfolded and didn't think to ask, or lift the blindfold! Except that recently, something was started that nobody really understood (I wonder if the people who started it up, back then, really understood...) and that is UKIP. Oh, wow. http://www.timesofisrael.com/british-boxing-champ-warns-of-zionist-jewish-brainwashing/ You may look at this and go 'Gosh!' or you might go 'WTF?', which tends to be my reaction. Brain-washing starts at a very early age (yes it does - come on, admit it!) For the first time in many a decade the public has woken up to the in-fighting of politics. We are interested, dammit! We want to know what goes on, how you manage to pull that off... The interesting thing (well, one of many) is that since the BrExit referendum, we have some astonishing details. The people who complain the most (about the result) are the ones who voted the least! https://www.theparliamentmagazine.eu/articles/news/brexit-referendum-voting-analysis Now is that not scary? We should at least be moving to accountability - if you don't vote, then why are you bleating? You couldn't be bothered, and yet you moan? Just what are you smoking...? This, on the face of it, makes F.A. sense...http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32810887 Oh, 2016 has been a very interesting year, so far, usually for all of the wrong reasons. And we are only half way through the damned thing!

Man is going places

All the way through the written history of man – sorry, ‘Man’ - there were adventures to keep you interested. Everything from the use of the first tools to the discovery of managing fire through to the first flights of the Montgolfier brothers, people had wanted more. During the 20th century the people of planet Earth started to realise that they were running out of living space, and in the first few decades of the 21st century there was an endless number of skirmishes, resulting in the all-out war of the Middle East, which cost Israel half of its people, and wiped out seven countries in the surrounding area. It seems that Israel’s neighbours were stupid enough to think that they would go down without a fight. During 2185, with the planet seriously over crowded, and more and more battles going on all over the place, an unassuming student from South Africa discovered the missing pieces in quantum physics and ion propulsion. The result was the first ever Faster Than Light drive. He announced it to a few close friends, and then within two hours the whole planet knew about it. He was instantly wanted by every TV and radio station across the planet. Three days later he was assassinated by a right-wing Christian group in the United States of America who had decided that since Faster Than Light wasn’t written about in the Bible then it was Blasphemy to even mention it, and utter Heresy to think about making it possible! Of course, having discovered the missing parts of the maths and physics that were necessary, it was another matter entirely to build the device. That took another century, and a lot of heartaches and deaths along the way. Tests and trials had failed, one after the other, until an Israeli scientist realised what the problems were, and refined the formulas. Within a decade they had the first craft assembled in orbit, and the team of four on the craft were looking forward to a quick trip to Jupiter and back, in the same day. No-one was more surprised than they were that it went completely to plan! Millions of miles were covered in minutes. For the rest of the 23rd Century, and into the first 20 years of the 24th it meant that Man had started to conquer the Solar System. It took another two centuries to establish the Solar System Bases (SSBs), as initially all the supplies had to come from Earth. After the hydroponics had been sorted out, and most of the SSBs were semi-independent, Man began to look further out. Since the only identifiable stars that were close were still over four light-years away, this was a bit different to the activities within the Solar System. A few more adventurous types had already gone - they couldn't wait for things to be sorted out on Earth. Working spacecraft became cheap and easy to assemble – families got together and created their own ships, and went on their own exploring journeys. Thousands of families vanished from the planet over just a few years. It was the ultimate explore - even more so than those early pioneer settlers of the USA, all that time ago. None of those early explorers had yet made it back home, to tell of what they may have found, and since the communications signal still had to go at light speed, it would be some time before any messages were heard. But Man being Man, he went soon enough - huge ships, some over a kilometre in length, with 2,000 people on board. The journey to the neighbouring stars was to take a few weeks, instead of centuries, and before long a sphere of settlements had been established around the Solar System. Some of the ships were government funded, but some were private - the big Corporations had the money to create and staff some of the big ships. So too did the Religions. Not that they knew where they were going, or who they were going to find, but they went, with their Religious fervour, to convert anyone who would care to listen, each to spread their Word. For all of this time the push for this was from Earth - massively over-populated, the Governments of Earth used every excuse that they could to get people off-planet. And it worked - the subsidies were quite large, and it did allow for an easing of pressure for those left at home; the planet started to breathe again. And so it was for century after century - they went exploring, and making claims of planetary ownership along the way. In all that time, no intelligence was found - of a type that was akin to that of Earth (self-aware, building, using tools, exploring...). Not a one. There were basic creatures, on a par with the lower-end life forms of this planet, but nothing higher. And still Man persisted. After a while the only explorers that were left were the Religious ones; they had the idea that it would be in the next system, that it will have the planet we are looking for, the people to show the Word of their God to... And it never happened. For the next 4,000 years Man explored, everywhere that he could. And slowly came to the conclusion that Man is the only one. There is nothing else out there. Which is where it all started to fall apart - the Religious followers began to question, and doubt their leaders. Why have we wasted all of our lives doing this work, when we could have settled, and had a good life? So they started to fall apart, and splinter. And disintegrate. Over the next 500 years it all crumbled - having established the Earth territories of thousands of light-years in diameter, the conclusion was that they could not go on. We are alone - if we are alone in all of this space that we have now mapped, we are alone in all of the Universe. And so Man started to die out; Why should we bother...? Each of the planets slowly died out. They had literally lost the will to live. They gave up communicating with others of the group, they abandoned all plans of building any more churches or mosques or temples of all kinds. They stopped having families, and just died out. The last remnants of the Governments on Earth put things in place. They secured everything that they could and put the robotic controls in full command. Then each of them, separately, got into their own space craft and left Earth. They flew in random directions, and after the first few days lost contact with each other. Man was gone. In all of the huge expanse of the Universe he had made his presence felt, and achieved – nothing! Man as a race was extinct and over the next few centuries Nature, on every planet, took its course and removed all traces that Man had ever been there. The weather systems eroded all of the buildings, and the bacteria in the ground and the air attacked everything, reducing it all to dust. Had there been anyone left to see this, they might have remembered the line from one of the earliest Holy Books “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust”. Adam was reported to have come from the ground, and Man had now returned to its origin. Nobody was to know that two thousand years later a lone space craft – huge, with over 10,000 people on board – appeared in Earth space. They were not at all Human, but had arrived from another universe, where the technology had been similar to that of this Earth, just bigger and slightly better. But there was no-one left in this Universe to meet them.