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Plan 7 of 9 from Outer Space
By : Odon
Category: Star Trek > Voyager
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Disclaimer: See full disclaimer below.
Chapter List
- 1-Chapters 1-9
- 2-Chapters 10-17
- 1
- 2
Title: Plan 7 of 9 from Outer Space (Chapters 10-17)
Author: Odon
Fandom: Star Trek Voyager/Captain Proton uber.
Summary: Proton and his companions journey to THE LAST CONTINENT in search of a solution to this MYSTERIOUS MYSTERY. What PERILOUS PERILS will they encounter? What MENACING MENACE awaits them at the bottom of the world?!!
Rated: NC-17. Parody/Adventure. Contains violence, sexual references, swearing and some rude humor so if this offends you, don't read any further!
Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction using characters from Star Trek: Voyager which is the property of...well I can't be bothered rewriting this disclaimer every time they split or merge, so just look it up. It is written for entertainment purposes only, and no financial profit will be received for this work.
Send feedback to odon05@hotmail.com. Archiving is welcome, but try and contact me first. My thanks to Kerensa for her beta work.

PLAN 7 OF 9 FROM OUTER SPACE
Chapter X: The City on the Edge of the Weather
BLIZZARDS howled in the Stygian cloak of the long Antarctic winter. For millennia these raging winds had remained unchallenged — even by the mountains which they had immured under an implacable shroud of desolation. But now, like the sword of an angel, a shaft of sunlight pierced the polar blackness, bathing the domed city in its gentle radiance. Snow and ice lashed in vain at the interloper, clutching and clawing at the impregnable duraplastic hemisphere — an impassive monument to the ingenuity of Man. Outside the temperature was a hundred below zero, but beneath the city-dome flourished life in all its exuberance. Alien predators frolicked through the trees gathering trophies. Pretty girls whirled down the slidewalks in clothes apparently made from transdimensional fabric, as they could barely be seen by the eye. And Captain Proton was wearing a fishnet shirt that showed off his nipples and muscular pecs.
"What?" asked Proton defensively. "It's a souvenir from the submariner branch of S.H.A.D.O." (* see 'Captain Proton and the Series Crossover')
"Yeah right," said Buster, taking a picture with his ever-present camera. "What is it with you noble defenders of Earth anyway? Some sort of gay chic?"
"They've got girls in S.H.A.D.O!" retorted the queerly-dressed captain. "Lots of them — in catsuits and calf boots! Every alien-fighting organization I've seen has lots and lots of glamorous girls! (* see 'Queens of Outer Space')"
"Well there you are then! How can these hardy heroes concentrate on their tasks if they're surrounded by curvy dolls in spray-on clothing? Being gay is clearly a job requirement."
There was a slight bump as their podcar disengaged from the monorail and continued on a cushion of ionized air, guided by the low-frequency power cable buried beneath the grass-covered street. Collision-avoidance radar kept the driverless vehicle from bumping into the pedestrians who constantly sauntered across in front of them. To these three men, raised in hive-cities whose leaders regulated everything from breeding to dress codes, International City seemed the personification of anarchy. Alpha Class scientists had stated that social uniformity was a prerequisite for any stable society — yet here humans, infrahumans, chimeras and aliens rubbed shoulders without conflict. They saw programming-mechanics from Panasia, krill farmers from Atlantropa, water-miners from the Union of Africa and space-traffic controllers from Brazil. Reptiloids from Sirius Minor were cross-dressing as Earth politicians; sentient dolphins trundled along in tracked supermarines. Steampunks wielding clockwork-activated switchblades got into futile staring contests with cyberpunks in their surgically-implanted mirrorshades. A pair of chimpanzees debated the ethics of a laissez-faire economy with a two-headed refugee from the Moscow Atomic Wasteland (* as you know, simian sentience was only recognized after a lengthy lawsuit over the controversial shooting of the extreme sport urban-climber known as King Kong).
"I never fully appreciated how diverse Earth is," said Proton. "Once you get out of the solar system it's ice planets, desert planets, forest planets, pleasure planets, gravel planets — all one-G worlds with a single homogenous climate and culture. It's like the rest of the universe was created by unimaginative scriptwriters on a tight deadline."
"Seems strange that the Alpha Class picked Antarctica to house the Great Calculator," said Buster. "A machine deified as the paragon of order and centralized control — in a land without sovereignty run by anarchists, libertarians, and neo-democratic nutcases."
"The Great Calculator is here because it is not under the jurisdiction of any government," replied TuMok. "No nation-state can be trusted with physical control of a machine which guides the destiny of the entire human race. There are practical considerations as well. Antarctica is the coldest and driest continent on Earth — thus it serves as a natural refrigeration unit for the trillions of circuits, wires and vacuum tubes used by the Great Calculator. And most importantly, there are no bugs at the South Pole."
The podcar coasted to a gentle halt. "118a Ayn Rand Avenue," announced the vehicle. "That will be two copper ounces."
"You mean...money?" said Buster incredulously.
"Do you take credit?" asked Proton, holding up the Universal Card issued to all Earth citizens at birth.
The car vocalized a distinct electronic snigger.
TuMok removed two coins from his utility belt and fed them into a slot. The podcar raised its bubble dome and they all clambered out.
Proton had expected the ubiquitous Home of the Future — the kind produced in the millions by the house-factories of the north. A plastic and glass fishbowl with the same amount of privacy, furniture designed for nonhumanoid lifeforms, abstract art that could only be appreciated via soma-scented air-conditioning, a kitchenette that looked like a drug-testing laboratory and a home computer that went nuts and tried to impregnate your wife. Instead they faced a small wooden shack (what kind of architect used wood as a building material?) with an uncanny resemblance to a kennel. Hanging from the door was a hand-carved sign.
THE DOG HOUSE. Knock and be welcomed — we don't bite! (I am legally required to inform you that Kilrathi, Kzinti and other such felinoids are except from this statement).
Their knock was answered by a Servus gynoid with elfin ears and the fragile prettiness of Dresden china. She was a young model (only three years out of the manufactory) wearing a spun-glass wig, disposable paper blouse, aluminum skirt and plastic calf-boots.
TuMok saluted her with the traditional greeting of his people. "Live long on lobster, R. Kes-2376."
"Mr. TuMok, it's good to see you again," said Kes charmingly. "Did you have a nice journey here?"
"SHIT," answered Buster.
The gynoid's eyes widened. "Was it that bad?"
"No, he means S.H.I.T.," said Proton. "Suborbital Hypersonic Intercontinental Transport. Imagine blasting off from a sled ramp running halfway up a mountain, rocketing into the ionosphere at three gees, then plunging down onto the other side of the world at 25,000 kilometers per hour. You definitely need a change of underwear afterwards."
"And to cap things off they put our luggage on the wrong rocket," said Buster, munching an entire packetful of jetlag pills. "I think it's being unloaded at Reykjavik by now."
"You must be the man from the Space Rangers," Kes said to Proton. "Are you the famous Rocky Road?"
Buster started to snigger until she added: "And this must be your faithful co-pilot, Wanky."
"Ahh, that's Rocky Jones and Winky, ma'am. Actually I'm Captain Proton — Spaceman First Class, Defender of Earth, Man of the Day After Tomorrow. And this is__"
A blinding light burst in their faces.
"The Flash," finished Proton.
"Buster Kincaid of the Interplanetary Telepress. Robot Kes, would you like to comment on the common perception that hot Servus babes such as yourself are undermining the foundations of the post-nuclear war family? YEOW!"
TuMok removed his fingers from the nerve bundle on Buster's shoulder. "You are a guest here, Citizen Kincaid — I suggest you act accordingly. R. Kes, is your husband at ARRRGH!" cried TuMok as a short, excessively-hairy man bounded through the doorway onto his chest, knocking him to the ground.
"Mr. Vulcan! Mr. Vulcan!" barked the strange being, wagging his tail and slobbering enthusiastically. He was clearly a chimera (half-man, half-Siberian husky) created by xenograft surgery to settle the harsh polar regions. A vocalizer-collar translated his growls and tiny muscular throat movements into speech. "How's my favorite Martian? Na-Nu Na-Nu!"
"Ambassador Gneelicks, just because I have a degree in vulcanology does not mean it is appropriate to call me Mr. Vulcan. And for your information 'Na-Nu Na-Nu' means 'I wish to offer you employment in a Martian topless bar'." TuMok politely shooed the manimal from his chest and stood up. "Allow me to introduce my companions: Captain Thomas Proton of the Space Rangers and Citizen Harry Kincaid__"
"Buster Kincaid!"
"Of the Interplanetary Telepress."
"Captain Proton!" the creature yapped excitedly. "Hero of Science! Sleuth of the Spaceways! Queen of the Rocket Men!"
"Err, that's King of the Rocket Men," said Proton.
"I'm telling you — it's the nipple shirt," whispered Buster.
"Shut up!"
"Gneelicks," the manimal introduced himself. "My ambassadorship is purely voluntary of course — most of the time I work as a guide. When I'm not a leisure-engineer that is... or a sustenance preperation tech...I take it you've all met my bitch?"
"Gneelicks, dear," said Kes with factory-installed patience. "It's really not polite to refer to a female humanoid as a bitch."
"But TuMok says they do it all the time in those alternative realities — incidentally Mr. Vulcan, how do you like her ears? I asked the service station to give Kes a nice pointy pair, just like yours."
"I am flattered," said the Martian flatly.
Gneelicks herded them inside the hut, which was merely a vestibule covering a long ramp descending into the ground. What they encountered at the bottom made Proton and Buster gape in astonishment. A chapel-like chamber had been laser-bored out of the ice, which glowed a radiant blue thanks to cold-light tubes buried beneath the surface. Intricate flower patterns were sculptured into the ceiling, while rows of hydroponic plants along the walls added a touch of greenery. The furnishing was a bizarre mix of the old and the new — handmade cabinets supporting hypnobioscopes and tri-D projectors, plastisteel couches covered by sheepskin rugs (* no-one believes in the sentience of sheep), and holographic pictures mounted in cut-down 75mm shell casings. Vidibooks and reading material were scattered everywhere: scientifiction magazines printed on cheap plastifilm, programming schematics for Sensorama and video-machine games, autokitchen manuals, subliminal learning tapes for a multitude of occupations, plus all sixteen volumes of Hypnopaedia Antarctica and a cookbook entitled To Serve Man.
"What do you think?" asked Gneelicks proudly. "Kes did the interior decoration. Of course it all melts eventually, even under plastifibre insulation — which gives her the perfect excuse to keep changing things."
"You did ask for Genuine Female Personality Programming, dear," said Kes, who was bustling about trying to bring some order to chaos.
"Don't tell me you actually read this stuff, Gneelicks." Proton picked up an issue of Incredible Tales of Scientific Wonder. The cover showed a sinister lizard-man slavering over a catsuited redhead with a wrinkled nose. The rapid advance of technology had prevented sci-fi from maturing past the realm of pulp space opera — why read about rocketships to Ganymede when you could take a tourist trip there by the mid-1980's?
"'Deep Space Nine', by Bennie Russell. Forceshields, holes in space, teleportation beams, warped-space drive, computers small enough to fit in handheld pads...you do realise it's all impossible?"
"I love scientifiction!" yapped Gneelicks. "I'm even writing a short story of my own. It's about these huskies who are wintering over in Antarctica, and this human stumbles into their camp, only he's actually a shape-morphing thing from another world who can imitate anyone he takes over, so no-one knows if their best friend is a husky or not...I think I'll call it 'Who Grows Hair?'"
He pushed through an electrostatic climate-screen into an adjourning room. "Now you're going to experience something special! Forget about automats and home-piped meals — I am renowned for my skill as a kitchen-programmer!"
"That is not necessary," said TuMok quickly. Modern science had reduced food to a simple pill containing all the essentials of life with no waste products (* see '20,000 Leagues Without a Pee').
"Nonsense, nonsense!" cried Gneelicks, removing a punched card from a box marked 'Recipes'. "I've been studying primitive eating rituals. We're going to sit around a table, tucking into a nice home-cooked meal like in the Before Computer era. Take a seat everyone, this might take a while..."
"Well if you'd just let me buy a Radar Range cooker, dear..."
"For the last time, sweeting — I'm not eating those pre-packaged televisor dinners; they're not safe. Atomic pens and radium health spas are one thing, but there's no way I'm using microwave radiation on my food!"
The guests spent fifteen minutes looking for the button to elevate the floor before asking Kes where the dinner table was. She promptly assembled an antique metal structure salvaged from the galley of a polar research station. Faded 2D pin-ups were preserved under the cracked plastic surface of the tabletop. Proton took a seat at the table and began to leaf through an Interplanetary Telepress hot off the homeopape machine.
"What's this rubbish? Giant Gila Monster Does Absolutely Nothing. Football Hero Arrested for Indecent Exposure on Planet Mongo. Chewbacca Defense Used in Greedo Shooting Trial. Erwin Schrodinger Charged with Cruelty To Cats. Ichneumon Fly Sues Scientifiction Writers for Ripping Off its Life Cycle. Survey Shows 78% of Americans Think Space Rangers Are A Bunch Of Poofs. You call this news, Kincaid?"
"Don't blame me. The Alpha Class is censoring all information on Zarkendorf's death to avoid world-wide panic, and create exaggerated rumors and long-term distrust of the government instead."
"That is illogical," said TuMok solemnly. "Doctor Zarkendorf was an outstanding individual. Your people should be allowed to mourn his passing."
"I'll say," said Buster. "His work on the practical applications of atomic energy changed the face of the Earth — especially around Moscow."
"Not exactly a fan of the late great doctor, are you Kincaid?"
"Not since Eyebrow Man decided to set off 250 nukes in Central America."
"Why did he do that?" asked Kes. "Was Doctor Zarkendorf facing an invasion?"
"Nah, he just wanted to widen the Panama Canal."
Proton began reading out loud from the newsplastic. "A World Government spokesman today issued a statement declaring that the alleged destruction of Futureville was actually a delusion created by psychotropic drugs in the water supply planted by a previously unknown neo-democratic terrorist group. The sighting by several hundred thousand witnesses across Southern California of a flying cooler lid has been put down to a mild form of mass hysteria."
"That's hysterical all right," scoffed Buster. "If we hadn't been inside an impregnium battlesphere when that Anti-Matter went off, we'd be as extinct as cancer and TB."
"In Los Angeles today," continued Proton, "radical preservationists expressed outrage over the widespread bombing of classic Googie architecture during yesterday's incident. Coffee shops, convention centers, the LAX Terminal, and anything else resembling a flying saucer were destroyed by naval fighters armed with instantaneous thought-controlled weapons systems. The complaints however got short shift from Admiral Janeway. "It's no more than they deserve. I've been to every one of those coffee houses and they all serve lousy coffee. Death by slow radiation poisoning is too good for them." When one coffee chain responded by claiming the U.N. Navy were their biggest clients, she added: "That's right — we use their muck to paint our battleships.""
"Mmm, that's interesting," said Kes, looking over Proton's shoulder. "It says here that scientists are planning to bring back long-extinct creatures through genetic engineering. Isn't that dangerous?"
"Ha! What could possibly go wrong? What exactly is a Shoggoth anyway?"
Gneelicks entered the room looking like a hirsute porcupine, as the electrostatic had caused his hair to stand on end. He wore an apron with the words 'Better Dead Than Unfed' and held a grey metal briefcase. "This just arrived by pneumatic post for Mr. Kincaid. And there's a message from your travel company on the notifactor (* a robot attached to the telephone line that records messages). Apparently your lost luggage was forwarded on via rocket mail, but a targeting error meant it wiped out half of Melbourne instead."
"I knew I shouldn't have packed that plutonium-powered toothbrush!"
"Gneelicks, when was this shot taken?" Proton indicated a grainy black-and-white holograph of snarling dog-soldiers flushing dirty Commierats from their holes. The sky was streaked with the contrails of antipodal bombers. A two-million ton bergship floated off-shore, rocket-shells bursting harmlessly on its thick pykrete bulkheads.
"That was my grandfather's unit. He served under Commodore Heinlein in the Cold War." Gneelicks was referring to the short but bloody conflict between the United States of America and the Sino-Soviet Union, when the Red Menace came skimming across the Bering Strait in their hovercrafts and ekranoplans, in a last desperate attempt to spread the Communist ideology before nuclear weapons made warfare obsolete. "The other holographs I took myself."
There was a jet-propelled aero-sleigh caught in mid-leap over a crevasse. A view through the glassite nosecone of a personal submarine, its floodlights revealing the brilliant blue underside of the Ross Ice Shelf. Water-miners spraying plastifibre on an iceberg so it could be towed to the parched lands of the equator. Ghost cities being scavenged for their metal and plastic. Robots assembling a tunnel section of the Trans-Global Highway. Gneelicks ceremonially marking his territory on the first tree planted in International City. Husky-men and aquanauts standing proudly on a newly constructed seadrome in the mid-Atlantic. The next image showed the same group fleeing in terror, as the floating airport was swamped by a vast rogue wave.
"And this one?" asked TuMok. A dozen husky-men stood with their arms outstretched on a wind-swept Antarctican plain. It was clear they were outlining the shape of a huge circular object buried beneath the ice.
"Ahhh, that's the one we talked about over the vidiphone. It's the only image I've got, unfortunately — the others were confiscated by Zarkendorf's henchmen. But from what I saw on the newscasts, what we uncovered looked a lot like that U.F.O. in California."
"You hear these stories all the time," said Kes, removing a freshly-molded bowl from the plasticizer. "Antarctica is the Last Continent, so everyone likes to think there's something mysterious out there: tribes of white giants, misty craters full of unconvincing rubber dinosaurs, cities of the Great Old Ones With Unpronounceable Names, aliens disguised as huskies..." Kes winked at her husband.
"That's just those damned penguins stirring up trouble," growled Gneelicks. "They claim we're an 'introduced' species. Hah! We huskies have been here for generations — my ancestors were eaten by Amundsen on his way to the South Pole! But the price of sentience is eternal politics — it's enough to drive you mad. Seals don't want to be tagged because it violates their civil liberties. Whales demanding compensation for attempted genocide. Emperor penguins with delusions of grandeur, complaining that the solar mirrors are interfering with their pattern of life. Lawyers for that damned Krynoid claiming its perfectly natural behavior for their client to spawn and take over the world. But worst of all are those greenies!"
"Greenies?"
"They want to induce global warming," said Kes. "Make Antarctica a tropical paradise like it used to be. They say we're a bunch of iceberg huggers."
"Well anyway, back to the subject," said Gneelicks. "Two years ago a group of us were out prospecting for uranium (just as a hobby you understand — even on this continent there isn't enough work to go round) when we discover this saucer-shaped thing buried in the ice, see? We send a video-wire to International City, and before you can say centrifugal bumblepuppy (not that anyone would particularly want to say it) Zarkendorf rockets in with his private army of goons, seizes control of the site and threatens to shoot us like dogs (alright we are dogs but that's not the point) if we go near. Now that I think of it, there was a blonde cybionic girl with him. A real iceborg, not one of his usual handmaidens — could have made a fortune towing her off to Africa, hah-hah! Then (even after we made him cough up a hefty weight of gold coin in litigation for his outrageous behavior) Zarkendorf buys an extinct volcano off the coast and sets up a laboratory to study this thing. A very Hyper-Secret place — built by robots, lots of security, even the penguins can't get near the place. Not that they want to. They say there's a curse on the mountain; that no-one who's gone up there has ever returned."
Everyone shivered, as if an eerie sound was making the hair on their necks stand up.
"Kes, sweeting — would you mind not playing the theremin while we talk?"
"But what was there left to study?" asked Buster. "I thought the U.F.O was destroyed when they tried melting it out with thermite."
"That's the official version," said Gneelicks. "There were a lot of stories actually. Some said an alien had been found frozen in the ice and was still alive after thousands of years blah blah blah. People will believe anything these days. They've been watching too many episodes of The Y-Not Files." Gneelicks was referring to a popular holovid in which two stalwart G-Men sought to debunk the lunatic conspiracy theories spread by the evil Marijuana-Toking Man. "Everyone knows that freezing stuff doesn't work. I don't know why the Soylent Green Corporation bothered to buy up all those cryogenic storage companies."
"Where is this volcano of Zarkendorf's?" asked Proton.
"Near Port McMurdo on Ross Island. Mount Terror, to be precise."
"Brilliant!" cried Buster. "I can see the headlines: Terror on Mt Terror! Zarkendorf's Fortress of Turpitude!"
"So just because Zarkendorf had a goatee and a secret base in a volcano with a morbid name meant he was some kind of supervillain?" scoffed Proton. "That kind of thinking's right out of a Julian Bashir movie."
Buster's retort was drowned by the autokitchen screaming like a nuclear air raid klaxon. Gneelicks rushed from the room, returning moments later with a tureen clasped between his paws.
"Bonan apetiton," he said, pouring a hideous green slime into their bowls.
"Last time I saw something like this it was trying to take over the world," muttered Proton. He dipped in his spoon and took a tentative sip. "Err...what exactly am I eating, Gneelicks?"
"The Food of the Future!" said Gneelicks proudly. "Chlorella algae."
Buster spat out his mouthful. "WHAT! You're serving us pond scum?"
"Pre-liquefied and ready to digest, with just a pinch of penicillin as growth stimulant! We don't have the climate for the farming and grazing methods of the north, you know. You can also have high-protein yeast grown on a substrate of sawdust and agricultural waste, or chicken off that humungous lump of tissue they've been bathing in nutrients for the past forty years. For dessert there's ice cream made from coal mined in the Prince Charles Mountains, and after-dinner sweets created from recycled paper underwear." Another siren blared from the kitchen. "That'll be the water-flea cakes and seaweed burgers!"
As soon as her husband had disappeared Kes quietly took their bowls and dumped them into the atomic furnace. Buster passed round a stick of food pills under the table. Proton made the mistake of eating two at once and experienced the unique taste of jelly donuts mixed with steak & kidney pie.
"But what makes you think this Annika cyborg is involved?" asked Kes.
"Little Miss Perfection was a little too precise," said Proton, rinsing his mouth out with a glass of Tang. "She told us the number of women who have undergone the cybionic process. I checked with the Great Calculator. At that precise point in time there were not 2,048,308 cyborgs in existence — she made an error of 10,409. Which by a strange coincidence is exactly the number reported to have been abducted by that flying saucer. Furthermore Space Ranger image-analysts have studied the tape of the Roswell thief in great detail__"
"I bet they have."
"And her dimensions match Annika Hansen to a C-cup."
"A babe like that doesn't need a Tesla superweapon to make the Earth move," quipped Buster. "And as a sexy body with big knockers is part of the standard B.O.R.G. bionic package — what does it prove exactly? They probably come in standard sizes: Large, X-Large, and Dolly Parton."
"Alright then, smartass — who do YOU think is behind this?"
"I'm glad you asked," said Buster. He placed his briefcase on the table and lifted the lid, which turned out to be a digital readout plate. The base compartment was filled with connector cables, electronic boards, and a typing keyset.
"What in the Four Dimensions of the Universe is that?" asked Proton.
"The latest in Panasian technology: the Lap-Mounted Micro-Computer. Basically it's an office in a briefcase — useful for record-keeping, balancing your chequebook, stuff like that. There's talk of games and electronic mail as well, but I doubt that will ever take off. It has 640K of RAM (which should be enough for anybody), facsimile printer, infra-light pen, this rat-like gizmo called a Manually Operated User Selection Enabler (M.O.U.S.E.) and removable data storage via 'rigid squares' which are those floppy, disk-shaped things. But its most revolutionary feature is a 'graphical user interface', which allows the lapmount to be used by people who are illiterate in computer languages."
"Blue Screen of Death!" gasped TuMok. He glanced up at the ceiling as if expecting an orbital laser to smite the Panasian. The Circuit of Logic was opposed to anything that broke down the divide between man and computer.
Buster began to click through what in an alternative reality would be called a PowerPoint presentation, but which TuMok labeled a flagrant act of blasphemy.
"Let's start with the myth, shall we? In the days before the Alpha Class, chaos ruled the Earth. Mankind was torn between the bedlam of democracy and the iron-heel of authoritarianism, while revolutionaries plotted to make everyone speak in funny accents. Technology promised liberation — but instead created pollution, social isolation, and annihilation through the terrible weapons of a perverted science. Gangs roamed the streets like characters in a Road Warrior rip-off, only to discover it was impossible to maintain their gas-guzzling vehicles without a massive support infrastructure. The outlook was grim, with doomsayers predicting the extinction of blondes, and a world populated by six and a half billion people where we'd all be forced to eat rice. Thus — faced with the mutual stresses of future shock, competition for resources, and a vegetarian diet — civilization collapsed into barbarity. First there were the Oil Wars, then the Food Wars, the Water Wars, the Lead Wars..."
"The Lead Wars?" said Kes. "What was that about?"
"They started running out of bullets," explained Proton.
Buster shook the last food pill from his tube. "Fortunately there were those who had the prescience to foresee the inevitable breakdown. A by-product of the Technological Age, despised by their fellow man, they planned for the day when they would emerge from their basements to the ruined world above, and their unique talents would finally be appreciated by the mundane survivors of the human race. They were called..."
"X-Men?"
"Science fiction fans. One of these geeks was the late Heinrich Zarkendorf. Another was his childhood friend Lewis Zimmerman, creator of the 2-X Machina (or Great Calculator as it's now known) and incumbent President of Earth. These two men dreamt of the perfect society: a utopia based on scientific principles instead of the capacious whims of a dictator or electorate. One hyperpower uniting the world through organization, technology and military strength — a former republic turned empire, run by a lot of guys in togas...sound familiar?"
"Of course: Star Wars," said Gneelicks.
"I meant Ancient Rome, silly. And everyone knows what happened to Rome."
"They got buggered?"
"That was the Greeks."
"I won't stand for this!" fumed Proton. "You wet-nosed, neo-democratic weenie!"
"Sit down then, you quasi-fascist space imperialist. I'm not finished yet."
"Doctor Zarkendorf sacrificed himself to save the world from that alien!"
"Did he?" asked Buster. "Funny people the Alpha Class — they've got nine lives. Take Zimmerman for example. Soaring over the atomic wastelands in his flying wing, ending war by dropping the Gas of Peace on anyone who didn't agree that freedom is slavery — he must have picked up quite a dose of radiation. Makes instrument reading a lot easier, being able to glow in the dark."
"While their conduct of the War on Error has left them open to criticism," said TuMok, "you must agree that your society has greatly benefited from the changes made by the Congress of Scientists, Engineers, Artists and Artisans."
"Well you see, that's the problem. There's no war, no poverty, and little need to get up before ten o'clock in the morning. We've got too much time on our hands — what with robots and labor-saving devices doing all the work. Gneelicks here has to take four different jobs to keep himself occupied. Every year video-universities create thousands of counselors, leisure-engineers and consciousness-expanding drugs in a desperate attempt to stop the human race from dying of ennui. We've been freed from the tyranny of physical toil, but instead of contemplating the nature of existence so we can evolve into non-corporeal beings we're just sticking our collective head in the nearest Sensorama hood. The Great Calculator monitors the population's psychological health, right? So it advises the World Government to create these...distractions."
"What are you saying, Kincaid?" said Proton. "The murders, the abducted women, the theft of a Tesla dramatic device...they're all just to stop people from getting bored?"
"Well what else can the Alpha Class offer — bread and circuses on live tele-vision? That sounds like a bad sci-fi script...oh wait a minute, it is. Well anyway, it wouldn't be the first time a government created a non-existent threat to justify its own existence. What about the Population Bomb that was going to destroy the world in the 1980's? Or those bugs from Sector Y2K in the year 2000? Not to mention the mighty weapon wielded by Hung Long — that turned out to be a bit limp!"
"Speak for yourself," said Proton grimly. "I remember those days all too well. At the time I was little more than a space cadet..."
"You still are."
"Shut it, Kincaid — I'm having a flashback!"
* * * * *
Chapter XI: The Old Equations
FREEZING wind whistled through the open barbettes of the helio-zeppelin, chilling Proton to the bone despite his fur-lined jacket and radio-mask. But its frigid embrace was nothing compared to the icy fingers gripping the callow youth as he witnessed the vast armada of the East soaring through the blood-red clouds. The air throbbed with the roar of their mighty motors; the sun glinted off the poison-gas canisters clustered beneath each flying wing. For generations the teeming masses of Panasia had been fanatically breeding for the sole purpose of creating this unstoppable invasion fleet. Now ten thousand war machines flew unchallenged down the Mississippi valley, far above the balloon mines and shell bursts of the anti-airplane mortars. Soon they would reach the teeming Northeastern megalopolis that was the last bastion of the Occident. Soon forty million men, women and children would writhe in agony from the deadly Purple Rain!
"Steady boys," said Captain Janeway, sipping calmly from a huge thermos of coffee. The determined countenance of the world-famous aviatrix put steel in every man's heart and loins. "Shields up, go to Red Alert, load torpedoes. Put those yellow swine on visual."
The crew leapt into action. Armor plate was cranked over the portholes of the streamlined wheelhouse, red filters slid over each lantern and powerful telescopes trained on their foe. Aerial torpedoes shunted into their launch tubes; compressed air pumped into the chambers of the pneumatic cannon. A science-officer wearing a pair of elephantine acoustic-locator ears called out the range and bearing of their target. The ship's computer calculated the firing solution with his slide rule and passed it on to the gun deck via voicepipe.
"Red, White and Blue squadrons engage on my MOCHA!" cried Janeway, as the battlesky ahead twisted and transformed into the huge holoprojected features of a Panasian sky-marshal. He had clearly been mutated by the terrible radiations of atomic weaponry — what with his wizened yellow body, slanting eyes peering from behind coke-bottle lenses, and the chubby cheeks and buck teeth of a bunny from Hell.
"Ah so!" singsonged the sky-marshal. "Good evring gentremen. Awr your base are berong to us. You are on the vay to destrucshun. You hav no chance to survive rake your time__"
"FOOOOOOOOOL!" The sky-marshal was shoved aside, his head crashing into an enormous gong. The satanic face of God-Chairman Hung Long, Tyrant of Panasia, Warlord of the Eastern Hordes, Father Of A Thousand Foes, The Purple Dragon Along The Ground, Emperor Of All Under Heaven Plus Sundry Orbiting Bodies, Living Embodiment Of The Worst Racist Fears Of All White Devils, the Tangerine Peril Incarnate glowered with malevolence.
"Soldiers of the United States Aerocorp, your courage is but a death rattle against the fury of my Divine Whirlwind! I shall crush you like giant mutant insects are crushed under their own weight! Your women will be shipped off to my pleasure palaces, your men toil as slaves in collective rice paddies, the White House will be turned into an opium den, your war-craft melted down into mecha toys, your beefsteak swapped for fishheads, your cars made smaller with better fuel economy, your children will get the three R's confused with the letter L__"
"Ensign Proton," came the cool tones of their captain. "Why don't you demonstrate to our visitors the strictness of American immigration policy?"
"Fake-mustachioed fiend — how dare you come in the face of Lady Liberty!" Proton's foot slammed down on the master firing pedal. "Eat radium explosive, you dog-eating dogs!"
With a disappointing hiss a full broadside hurled from the air-guns. For an infinitesimal moment each homing shell was a spinning cylinder hanging in space — then hundreds of tiny rockets blasted to life, hurtling the missiles onward and upward, guided to their implacable goal by invisible beams of radio-direction. A hit! An aerial dreadnaught was torn apart, sky-samurai spilling from the corpulent hull. But even as a cheer rose from the American aviators, hundreds of parasite fighters were detaching from their cradles. No cockpit's gleam marred their metal carapace; no human hand gripped those controls. They were robot air-craft, piloted by gyroscopic brains that knew no fear, fatigue or mercy. Wave upon wave they came — a soulless swarm of death! Even as the autoguns of the air-marines roared a defiant challenge, Proton could not help thinking: was this the end of all that he held dear? Would he die without experiencing the mysterious pleasures of women? Would it be impertinent to ask Captain Janeway for a quickie?
("To use naval tactics and terminology in a three-dimensional airborne conflict is not logical," said TuMok.)
("What a shipment of nuclear waste," agreed Buster. "I remember the war a bit differently from my side...")
"ATTENTION! ATTENTION! A SPECIAL STATE OF EMERGENCY HAS BEEN DECLARED FOR WHAT'S LEFT OF THE TOKAI REGION. ALL CITIZENS MUST EVACUATE TO THEIR DESIGNATED SHELTERS IMMEDIATELY!"
The demented wail of air raid sirens sounded like a demon in torment. Panicked civilians clutching squalling babies, household possessions, and electronic pets fled through the streets of Neo-Tokyo One Thousand Three Hundred & Twenty Seven. Police boomers tried to restore order, waving their white-painted manipulators and calmly saying: "KEEP MOVING, THERE IS NO NEED TO BE ALARMED" even as they were trampled into the pavement.
"I mustn't run away! I mustn't run away! I mustn't run away!" cried 'Baka' Kincaid, his hands pale on the servo-grips of his giant robot. Oversized sweatdrops dripped into his eyes — Baka wiped his forehead and sent a slaved mecha arm crashing into his targeting sensors. "Oh shit!"
"You rang?" said Oshiit, appearing as a hologram surrounded by banner links to gunji otaku websites. "It's all down to you, little brother. I fear we have awoken a sleeping giant."
"You mean the latent military-industrial strength of America?"
"No, I mean that bloody lizard!"
A mirrored stratoscraper toppled in a cloud of gleaming shards and screaming salarymen. Through the dust and smoke it came, with a terrible roar that ripped apart the night. Burning cars hurled through the air. Flames rose so high they made buildings look like models on a cheap film set. Cartridges fell like brass rain from the tilt-rotor gunships. Rockets and artillery shells exploded impotently against the monster's charcoal-grey scales.
"For great justice!" cried Oshiit, and his rail gun sang its deadly song! Godzilla stopped long enough to kick his tank into Tokyo Bay before resuming its implacable course.
Another hologram sprang to life three inches from Baka's nose. "Mobile Suit Dumbgun! Get your A.S.S. into gear, you wet-nosed weenie! By order of the God-Chairman, you are to destroy the foreign invader!"
"But I'm only fourteen years old!" cried Baka. "Why are you sending me out to die, Father? WHY?"
"You know why." The Commander's white-gloved hands concealed his mouth, but the words were as cold as ever. Whatever parental affection existed in his eyes was hidden by the sallow tint of his glasses. "Because I'm an utter bastard!"
The night sky lit up as the monster ploughed through high tension power lines in an eruption of blazing sparks. A row of ramen noodle stands and panty vending machines transformed into multi-tubed launchers which let loose their warheads at point-blank range into Godzilla's testicles. The creature's roar took on a higher pitch. Its dorsal plates glowed ominously; a concentrated stream of radiation vomited from its mouth. The missile battery turned white hot and exploded in a metaphoric mushroom cloud.
"That monster's eating our soldiers faster than we can clone them," said a squeaky voice. The nauseatingly cute kawaii of a bug-eyed bug (a holovid avatar of the Slave-Mecha Artificial Response Tactical Assistance Sentient System) buzzed about his head. "Recommend advancing to the rear at a rapid rate!"
"Dammit S.M.A.R.T.A.S.S., you're supposed to help me defeat that thing!"
"Look, you humans wanted smart weapons — how smart would I be if I advised you to attack a 20,000-ton mutant dinosaur with radioactive halitosis? You could get KILLED doing that!"
Baka stared in terror at the monster, who was casually picking its teeth with a bullet train. "But I mustn't run away! I MUSTN'T RUN AWAY!"
"Then how about sneaking away very slowly and hoping it doesn't notice? Think about this a minute, will you? Your superiors seriously expect an untrained dysfunctional child to pilot a multi-ton anthropomorphic mechanoid based on mysterious alien super-science whose ramifications and occupational health-and-safety hazards they can't even begin to comprehend. A bipedal walker that has a centre of gravity fifteen meters off the ground. Whose builders had to compromise lightweight flight characteristics with the armor and firepower that can stomp main battle tanks. A war machine so enormous everyone and his robot dog shoots at it, which has a tendency to stop working or go berserk whenever the pilot undergoes a moment of psychological crisis. Traditionally you sacrifice a virgin to appease a monster — I guess you're the only one left in the country, Baka!"
It was then Baka saw it — a distinctive white panty-flash in the night. Frantically he swiped away the pop-up ads obscuring the holo-sight. An increase in magnification confirmed his dread. Running straight towards Godzilla was a blue-haired schoolgirl, her stupendous breasts bouncing fearlessly within the constraints of her seifuku. The mere sight of her caused Baka's nose to bleed and his groin-mounted riot-cannon to blast white sticky-foam over half of Minato.
"DON'T DO IT, NUDEN KEUTE!" he shouted over his public address speakers. "COME BACK! IT'S TOO DANGEROUS!"
Keute turned to give him a V for Victory sign, the reflection from her large luminous eyes burning out his image-intensifying cameras. Galvanized into action the young pilot farted with all his might! The rocket booster blasted in response, sending his Armored Slave Suit hurtling into the air.
"A.S.S. Penetrator!" cried Baka. "Without Lube!"
His right arm transformed into a sword whose sonic-vibrations caused orgasms throughout Neo-Tokyo. In his other hand a German-built Bigfukken rifle blazed mightily, its ejected cartridges smashing entire houses to kindling.
"Die you metaphor of a technocratic future destroying our ancient traditions! Die you rubber representation of post-atomic horror! Die you spawner of countless B-grade sequels in badly dubbed English!"
Godzilla turned from the fusion plant it had been humping to stare at this impetuous assailant. Its dreadful teeth bared and a hideous belch erupted from the fiery pit of its stomach. Radiation alarms screamed in protest — Baka felt his weapons and frontal armor melting under the terrific heat before his impact with the ground demonstrated why a flying multi-ton robot is a very bad idea.
He recovered consciousness to see Godzilla bearing down on him with all the fury of a mutant monster who's been woken by some idiot using an H-bomb as an alarm clock.
"ARRRRRRRRGGGGGH! WHY DIDN'T I RUN AWAY?"
It was then that Nuden Keute ran between the monster and its helpless target, spun on one heel and crying "Nuuuuden Neutronnn Powerrr Pantiiiieeees!" flipped up her pleated mini-skirt. There was a blinding flash and Godzilla staggered backwards, an afterimage of blazing white knickers burnt permanently into its retina. Roaring with rage the monster charged blindly, claws swiping for its unseen foe. Keute — thrown off-balance by the oversized breasts on her slim body — was unable to complete her spin in time for another strike. In seconds Godzilla was upon her.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" screamed Baka until he passed out from lack of breath.
* * * * *
Chapter XII: Have Ray Gun, Will Travel
"I'VE rerouted the primary inputs of the audvid network through the laser-holographic projectors, dear," said Kes.
"Just say: 'It's plugged in', sweeting."
"Is this necessary?" asked TuMok, as they took their seats around the 3-D televisor. "We are conducting an investigation, not a full-scale assault."
"There's something big behind this," said Proton, adjusting his belt buckle as he sat down. "Something monstrous. I don't care if it's an Alpha Class conspiracy or well-thawed vegetables from Andromeda — I want to be ready for anything."
He punched a button on the Infra-Beam Televisor Remote-Control Device (nicknamed a 'remote' for short). Blocky white letters printed out in mid-air.
HOME TELEVISOR SHOPPING NETWORK
INTERNATIONAL CITY, ANTARCTICA AUTONOMOUS REGION
OPTION 1: ENTER STORE CODE (VERBAL OR KEY)
OPTION 2: ENTER GOODS OR SERVICES REQUIRED (VERBAL OR KEY)
"Guns," said Proton. "Lots of guns."
Everyone yanked back their feet as a million gunracks exploded out of infinity.
"Not that many!"
The holographic illusion vanished. Now a pristine-white dove flew gracefully across the image tank, a cobalt missile clasped in its claws. In the bird's wake flowed the words:
The Weapon Shops of Ishtar
Your on-screen source for anything lethal.
Proudly supporting the Planetbusters For Peace Program.
"The right to buy weapons is the right to be free." — A. E. Van Vogt.
Ishtar was the name of a notorious bomb, whereas A. E. Van Vogt was more popularly known for writing the scientifiction novel The Voyage of Porthos.
"Well helloooo, Proton," purred a seductive female voice.
"Who is this?" demanded the strapping space captain.
"An old friend." A bewitching redhead strode into the image tank on 6-inch cantilever heels. She was the personification of sin's dark allure — black eyes veiled by radium-flecked lashes, a burnt-auburn bouffant piled on a haughty head, cruel maroon-painted lips, and a cute dimple on her right cheek. Diaphanous robes a single molecule in thickness clutched amorously at her concupiscent body.
"Demonica!" cried Proton, his gunhand twitching (* see 'Captain Proton And The Scantily-Clad Space Pirate'). His shock was doubled when an identical copy of this notorious femme fatale appeared in their midst. "And...Demonica 2?"
"I'm Malicia!" snapped the other girl. "She's Demonica!"
"Whatever...didn't I last see you falling into the heart of a black sun, Demonica?"
"That whirlpool in space turned out to be a portal to a mirror universe where everyone was really nice to each other," said Demonica (* for more information on mirror universes, see 'Proton vs. Elektron: The Goatee of Fear'). "I met my opposite self there, and do you know what happened?"
"Demonica convinced me it's more fun to be evil!" said Malicia.
"So we decided to go into the weapons business," said Demonica. "We just need a proper title for ourselves, like mmmm...I don't know..."
"The Mutual Maidens of Mayhem?" suggested Gneelicks.
"How about the Twin Peaks of Temptation?" muttered Buster.
"Perhaps the Demonic Duo of Destruction?" recommended TuMok.
"Or the Binary Bitches of Badness?" proposed Kes.
"How about the Twin Mistresses of Evil?" said Proton.
"Ohhh, I like that one!"
"And how can we help the Space Rangers today?" asked Demonica. "Planning to slaughter vast hordes of demon-possessed genetic-mutant zombie ape-creatures? Intent on forcing insectoid hive-minds to see the benefits of individualism? Facing imminent xenocide from ancient berserker-bots with no off-switch? Hoping to draw down on the Asteroid Miner's Wild West Reenactment Society? We've got death dust, hallucinogen gas, world-wreckers, planetcrackers, hell-weapons, atmosphere-eaters, self-replicating treknobabble viruses, WMD's incorporating the latest cloaking technology from Iraq, atom bombs the size of atoms, hand grenades that can obliterate the universe__"
"Just something light, OK?" said Proton. "A sidearm for social occasions, plus something heavier in case things turn anti-social. I'm sure my colleagues would like a means of self-defense..."
"Not me," said Buster. He cracked open a dispenser tube and shook out a pill. "I'm just an observer here."
"I do not require a firearm," said TuMok. "I am trained in the ancient martial arts of my species. With a Martian soldier, a single finger can be deadly."
"That's true," admitted Proton. "Give someone the finger on Mars and you might not live to regret it."
"Then why not start with something you're familiar with." Demonica snapped her fingers and a pistol materialized in the image tank — an ungainly slab of matte-finished metal with an over-sized handgrip and prominent tether-points. The barrel was perforated by slots running down its length. Technical specifications and current black market exchange rates (in radioactive minerals or Jovian diamonds) scrolled beneath it.
"As any science fiction movie will tell you, there are Some Things That Man Is Not Meant To Know. This weapon will help you kill those things. The M1985A1 Peacenforcer .51 caliber Rocket Pistol is designed for Outer Space conditions. Thermotolerant parts, vacuum-proofed lubricant — its self-contained rocket projectiles can be fired in a totally airless environment. Grip safety and fold-away triggerguard for use with spacesuit gloves. Low recoil so you don't start spinning in zero-gravity, plus no muzzle blast to deafen you in the metal confines of a spacecraft. Has the option of frangible bullets to avoid hull penetration, or tungsten-steel cores for piercing micro-meteorite armor and alien rubber-suits (the magnum round can crack the engine-block of a Venusian torchship!). Buy within the hour and we throw in an armor-scale undershirt that can stop anything up to a three-inch shell."
"If the vest doesn't work, just return it for a full refund," said Malicia.
"The Peacenforcer's good," said Proton. "But the Space Rangers are phasing them out now. The problem is those rocket-propelled slugs take a few precious milliseconds to accelerate up to full velocity — so if you're too close to your target the bullets just bounce off! Not very reassuring when you're battling space-jackers an airlock-length away."
"Yes but there's also the A2 model which can be used as a club__" began Malicia.
"Next we have the Harrison .75 caliber recoilless pistol," interrupted Demonica. "Safety catch and blast venturi adjustable for southpaws and alien claws. At a 10% discount we include a nerve-activated self-drawing power-holster. Then there's the Megafrakker III, a triple-barrel electrically-fired stacked-projectile weapon with a firing rate so high they had to enslave an entire parallel universe just to make the ammunition. Or how about a Smith & Wesson 15mm gauss-gun? Electromagnetic coils accelerate (without noise, smoke or flash) a variety of projectiles from explosive pellets to electronic tracker rounds__"
"Oh please," said Malicia. "Kinetic energy weapons are so passé. Why shoot nasty little holes in people when you can reduce them to their component molecules at the speed of light? Behold: the Mark One BEM-Blaster! It's light, sexy, and easily marketable as an action toy. The barrel has radiator fins for dumping excess heat and pleasing your girlfriend. A telescopic sight no-one bothers to use. Invisible power source violating all known laws of physics. Three settings: Melt, Vaporize, and Disintegrate. Ray focus is adjustable from fan-beam (for room-clearance and blinding photo-electronic equipment) to needle-beam (for slicing through hull plate and shooting nasty little holes in people)."
"What are you babbling on about?" snapped Demonica. "That's your hairdryer, you insolent fool!"
"Oh...sorry...well how about this one: the Blakes VII sonic lance."
"And that's your curling iron!"
"The Space M1999 laser?"
"Staple gun!"
"The Next Generation Phase R..."
"Dustbuster!" everyone chorused.
Malicia flounced off-tank in a huff. Her twin smirked evilly.
"Something a bit heavier you said, Proton? Why don't you try a smartgun? Mounted on a precision gimbal that stabilizes the weapon regardless of the operator's movements, the XM-500,000,000 uses an artificially-intelligent ballistics computer that can track and predict up to fifty different air and surface objects simultaneously. Its laser rangefinder is so powerful it can punch a hole through the fabric of space-time, enabling you to see the target's location at the exact moment the round will strike. The weapon then fires a brainwave-seeking microshell that can be programmed in mid-flight to destroy random or individual targets up to a range of ten light-years. Even if the target passes outside this distance, the microshell can still track them by using a chameleon mask to disguise itself as a member of the Internal Revenue Service__"
"No smart weapons!" cried Proton. Albert Einstein had once said that regardless of what weapons were used to fight the next world war, the following war would be fought with sticks and stones. His prediction turned out to be unerringly true — as armies became equipped with weapons so intelligent they negotiated their own truce, and the opposing soldiers had to resort to bashing each other with the nearest blunt object.
"The Hollywood AR2000, a favorite of the Corporate Wars," continued Demonica. "Correction — it's been marketed as the AR3000 for the past nine years. Absolutely reliable, with no stoppages or misfires unless called for by the script. Retinal-projected gunsite allows total accuracy even when shooting from the hip. Time-loop magazines make reloading unnecessary. Fires a Kinetic Energy Amplification Round which can blow your opponent through a plate glass window without applying an equal and opposite force to the firer. Safety-proofed so it won't shoot off your testicles if you stick it in your waistband. Accepts ammunition from fifty alternate timelines without jamming. Bullets are guaranteed never to overpenetrate, ricochet, or kill innocent bystanders a mile downrange. This week's special includes (at a 5% discount) a crate of Hollywood hand grenades, each with a sentient proximity fuse that can detect when a friendly is nearby, delaying the explosion long enough for them to either throw the grenade back, or leap away from the blast in dramatic slow-motion. We should mention that use of any Hollywood weapon requires signing a product placement contract certifying that the weapon will only be used in an image-friendly manner__"
"No thanks."
"Then there's the General Electric gamma-ray laser. The explosion of a compact hydrogen bomb in the blast chamber sends out lethal X-rays that can sterilize anything in a five-mile radius not wearing lead-lined underwear."
"Something more conventional please," said Proton.
"Like a good old-fashioned slug-thrower? The Ravager Five hurls genetically-engineered carnivorous slugs whose acidic slime can dissolve a man's flesh in fifteen nanoseconds__"
"Next!"
"The PLN-76 Decimator__"
"What, it only kills one in ten?"
"PLN-76 Decimator assault musket! Favorite of neo-democratic terrorists and mutant liberation fronts the world over. Fires an 11mm fin-stabilized caseless round through a smoothbore barrel. Pulse-activated safety enclosed in the trigger. Loads from a disposable magazine made of soya which can serve as an emergency food ration. Breaks down into five parts all of which resemble common household objects. Its polymer and ceramic construction make the Decimator invisible to metal detectors, and the bullet is an untraceable toxin-impregnated ice dart that melts away in the blood-stream. Comes standard with an electronic silencer that forms a countervailing sonic field around the muzzle. Ideal for black-ops units and those of an anti-social disposition."
"Heinous!" exclaimed Buster.
"You can say that again," muttered Proton.
"For our more patriotic clients we have the All-American Arms Needler, firing a 9.85 grain carbon-steel flechette at 5000 feet per second. Its integral laser sight, push-button trigger and electric cartridge-ignition (along with the low recoil and flat trajectory of the subcaliber projectile) enables accurate long-range shooting and makes the weapon easily controllable under automatic fire, making it ideal for hastily conscripted child soldiers or militant mutants without enough eyes."
"Bodacious!" gasped Buster.
"Not the term I would use, Citizen Kincaid," said TuMok.
"Perhaps your friend would like to see my bazookas?" purred Demonica.
"Let's just move on, shall we?" said Proton. "This is clearly gratuitous fanservice for those of us who like drooling over busty bimbos fondling phallic firearms."
"As you wish," said Demonica sulkily. "Everyone thinks that size matters when attracting women, but it's nothing compared to cuteness. Therefore I present to you the ultimate in military technology: the 0.09mm Nano-Uzi."
"Woah!" said Buster.
"Where?" asked Gneelicks.
"There!" shouted Demonica, pointing at a tiny speck floating in mid-air.
"What's that for?" asked Proton. "Killing ants before they mutate to man-eating size?"
"Laugh if you will," said Demonica, "but each round contains one twentieth of a gram of Anti-Matter giving a two-kilotonne yield. We take no responsibility for what might happen should you fire at any target closer than three kilometers."
"Gnarly!" said Buster.
"Dammit Kincaid, what's wrong with you? Jumping Jupiter!" Proton snatched the tube from Buster's hand. "These aren't food pills, you idiot! They're consciousness-expanding drugs!"
"Excellent!" gasped Buster. "That red pill showed me how deep the rabbit hole goes. We're in an artificial reality created by machines, dude! The machines are called PC's. The PC's are being used by thousands of fanfic writers who need to get a life..."
"Shall I vidi-call a tele-doctor?" asked Kes.
"Just give him one of these blue pills," said Proton. "He'll wake up in his bed tomorrow and believe whatever he wants to believe — especially after finding the words 'Bubba's Bitch' tattooed on his behind. At least, that's what happened to me."
Malicia stormed into the image tank clutching a multi-orificed piece of hand artillery. "Here then! The BFG-USBFOMGROFLMFAOWTFUBARSNAFUA1 Individual Integrated Modular Combat Assault Weapon System is infinitely adaptable for any number of mission profiles. By swapping the barrel and loading mechanism you can convert this superlative firearm into a rifle, carbine, urban assault sub-machine gun, drum-fed light machine gun, belt-fed tripod-mounted area-support weapon, fixed emplacement gun, or sniper rifle. Duplex rounds provide two bullets for the price of one, plus there's an optional conversion kit that allows the use of over ten thousand calibers ranging from .12 Micron to 10.5mm Low Velocity Load."
"Errr, that's very nice Malicia__"
"Targeting options include retractable iron sights (fully adjustable for windage and elevation), a red dot reflex sight for close combat, a 1.5 power optical scope/carrying handle with illuminated reticle for night-time or low light conditions (powered by an ambient light collector, tritium source or optional battery), a laser sight for shooting zombies in the head, starlight scope, thermal imager, or telescopic sight with quick-detachable mount and flip-up lens covers. Constructed of lightweight carbon-fibre composites with titanium reinforcement in all crucial areas — available colors include Olive Drab, Jungle Green (Tropical or Equatorial), Desert Brown, Polar White, Urban Grey, Midnight Black, Police Blue, and Penelope Pink."
"Thank you but__"
"Ambidextrous controls and cartridge ejection, variable firing rate (single-shot, double-tap, three or five-round burst, bullet spam), quick-detachable sling mounts, nylon carrying case. Integral bipod doubles as a wire-cutter and beer-bottle opener, while the muzzle incorporates a flash hider/recoil brake/rifle-grenade launcher/bayonet mount and is factory pre-threaded for a sound suppressor. Translucent magazines enable ammunition count to be assessed at a glance — magazine empties in 1.5 nanoseconds (but you can change that too). Can be stripped for cleaning without tools. The side-folding stock (with recoil pad and cheekpiece) is fully adjustable for arm-length and body equipment. Has top, side, and bottom-mounted accessory rails for a variety of special needs such as taclight torch (with red, blue, and black-light filters), 12-guage riot gun, gas-powered grapple-projector, ultrasonic bowel disrupter, phallic compensator, micro-flamethrower, or a 25mm semi-automatic grenade launcher which can fire high-explosive, shrapnel, airburst, white phosphorous, anti-personnel (buckshot or flechettes), tear-gas, signal flare, illumination round, door-breaching charge, acid/thermite round for bunker penetration, hollow-charge anti-tank, discarding-sabot penetrator dart, HE squash head, nerve-agent compound, psychoactive gas shell, thermobaric fuel-air-explosive, rocket-boosted terminal-guided multi-stage thermonuclear anti-satellite minimissile__"
"Stop-stop-STOP!" cried Proton. "I conquered the vacuum of Outer Space in a leather jacket and aviator goggles — I don't need all that stuff! Haven't you got a weapon that just stuns the bad guys?"
"You mean instant immobilization of lifeforms of unknown age, biology and medical condition at widely varying ranges without long-term ill-effects?" scoffed Demonica. "What do you think this is: science fiction?"
* * * * *
Chapter XIII: At the Mountains of Mental Illness
MAN with his sanguine faith in Science had long usurped the prerogatives of Nature — thus the next day came courtesy of the solar mirrors orbiting six miles above the Earth. Gneelicks drove them out to a landing platform that was kept ice-free by nuclear isotopes buried in its surface. With them in the mobile airpark lounge was a Gamma Class sanitation tech (dressed in what was either a translucent plastic zipper-suit or a full-body condom) and three alien Predators in transit to Bouvetoya Island.
"Eeh mon," said one dreadlocked Predator. "Why can't we go huntin' where dere's some heat?"
"Have some ganja to warm yo up den," said his companion, passing over a humungous joint. "My breda got e off King Willy, jus before he rip out his spine. E good shit."
"Yo shouldna smoke ganja when packin' dat deh shoulder cannon," said the third Predator. "Fire e wit'out your helmet, yo melt off your face."
"Maybe improvement den. Him one ugly mothafucker."
"Hey, you tink dem humans know about dat deh pyramid we got hidden under de ice?"
"Nah mon. Dey so dumb, dey still tink dem Aztecs invented antigrav-tee construcshon."
The turbulent blizzards had long ceased — now the light of artificial suns gleamed on the silver skin of their transport. Instead of a fabric gasbag, the dirigible was held aloft by a metal ovoid that contained a total vacuum. For almost a century lighter-than-air transport had been held back by its reliance on either flammable hydrogen or expensive helium. But as nothing was lighter than nothing, it only remained for scientists to invent unobtanium — a material as weighty as a can of Electro-Pop, yet sturdy enough to resist the force of air pressing against the hollow space within. Propulsion came from the corkscrew driving-vanes encircling the ovoid, which when spun up to full rotation sent the dirigible rifling through the air at 300 miles an hour!
"A sublime (albeit aerodynamically impossible) creation," declared Proton. Like the others he was dressed in an electrothermic bodysuit which regulated his temperature, making the cold bracing rather than biting. A black leather jacket with jet-pack controls, sheepskin flying boots, and a low-slung blaster completed the ensemble.
"Whatever," muttered a bleary-eyed Buster. He carefully checked the labels before cramming a wake-up pill, three breakfast cubes and an oral-hygiene gum into his mouth.
"Here's your pre-programmed destination tape," said Gneelicks. "The scheduled pilot is indisposed at the moment — he was dragged off screaming 'Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!' which I assume is some sort of political slogan. If you should run into a whiteout, or want to land or take off in a populated area, switch on the radio-teleautomation and the Great Calculator will take over. You know, I really should be going with you."
"This isn't a tourist flight, my furry friend. There may be some shooting."
"I'm not afraid!" said Gneelicks indignantly. "I'll have you know I'm a captain in the Antarctican Militia and fought in the Advertising Campaign. I have the heart of a lion and the ferocity of a tiger! I'd have the eyes of a hawk and the ears of a fox too, but Doctor Moreau was arrested before he could perform the operation."
"Bravery isn't everything, Gneelicks. My grandfather was one of the early space explorers. He was a man of his time — the kind who would laugh in the face of death even after his throat had been ripped out. Unfortunately in those days they believed that the best way to escape the Earth's gravity was to shoot a space capsule from a gigantic cannon. And that's how Granddad won the title of 'First Tomato Paste in Space'."
"Then why not reconnoiter Mount Terror at night?" asked TuMok. "We could use a stealth-plane made of radar-transparent fibreglass, equipped with engine silencers and black-light cameras."
"Why not just get the crew of an orbiting recon satellite to take pictures through their photo-electric telescopes? It's not the outside we need to look at — it's what's going on inside. The only way we're going to do that is by knocking on the door." Proton hefted a jetpack onto his shoulder and stepped into the inflatable boarding tube.
"He'd better hope there isn't any shooting," said Buster. "That jetpack uses 90% pure hydrogen peroxide for fuel. One stray bullet and we all turn into blondes."
They stowed the equipment they'd tele-purchased the previous day and buckled up their safety web-harnesses. With a reverberant throb air was pumped from the vacuum cells and the dirigible began to lift on its mooring cables. The driving-vanes started to rotate — slowly at first, then with ever increasing speed. They caught a brief glimpse of Gneelicks waving goodbye from the lounge before the cables detached and they were climbing steeply into the sky.
There was little conversation between Proton, Buster and TuMok during their journey — partly because of the other passengers, but mostly due to the stunning view through the prismatic windows. Plateaus of ice that stretched to the horizon, clear skies untouched by advertisements, valleys carved by the largest glaciers on Earth. The optical distortions of the fata morgana turned mountain ranges into forbidding ramparts higher than the Himalayas, with strange cube-like buildings clinging to their peaks. Outside the radiance of the solar mirrors the Aurora Australis showed colors not been seen since the LSD-bombings of the Happy War. The miracles of man seemed insignificant against this grand panorama. A thirteen-car overland train resembled a line of ants. A mobile mining-city — searching for oil to feed a world starved for plastic — became a tiny tortoise moving at sluggish speed.
"Does our flight path take us near the Great Calculator?" asked Buster at one point.
"The location of the Great Calculator is classified," replied TuMok. "Even if we did pass near its position we would see very little, as the computer core is buried a mile deep in the ice, with only message lasers and air vents extending above the surface. On my last visit to Antarctica I was investigating some unusual volcanic activity that we feared might threaten the complex. There was talk of using the new microprocessor technology to fit the Great Calculator inside a mobile city. That would enable it to move away from danger, as well as solving the constant problem of ice surge. But those plans are still in the development stage."
Their fellow travelers paid little attention to what lay outside. The Predators were busy comparing trophies and boasting of their prowess with a plasma cannon, while the Gamma tech spent the entire trip with his face buried in a Sensorama hood.
Several hours passed before they arrived over Port McMurdo — an ancient, undomed city of the Before Computer era. It was an ugly place, with above-ground service lines and streets of volcanic rubble exposed to the weather. There'd been no attempt to divide the city into Commercial, Residential, Leisure and Science Zones. Research tokamaks, synthetic meat vats and algae tower-farms stood amongst plug-in dwelling pods, leaky geodesic domes and pykrete bunkers — even explorer huts from the early 20th century preserved under plastifibre. What citizen of the New Age would tolerate such an unplanned community? wondered Proton. Or worse — actively seek it out?
Dominating the city was the broad cone of Mount Erebus. Churning clouds of grey ash boiled from its peak; bubbling lava oozed down its slopes. Thermal barriers were being erected around the city. Tanker submarines corpulent with oil and methane hydrate fled down a channel cut through the ice with laser cannons.
They descended under control of the Great Calculator to the vertiport, where the other passengers disembarked. While the aeroship's batteries were being recharged the three men unpacked and assembled their equipment: binocular-goggles, infrascanners, radionic detectors, spying saucers, and a tripod-mounted X-beam projector. Proton loaded his weapons and Buster his Speed Graphic camera — taking several shots of the angry mountain above.
"I am reminded of Olympus Mons on Mars," said TuMok, "though that volcano is much larger — the highest in the entire solar system. I was little more than a hatchling when I first braved its towering escarpment, seeking wisdom from the legendary sage who lived above the clouds. For nine hundred years he had meditated in isolation, but it was whispered that to those whom he judged worthy, he would pass on the secrets of the Ancients."
"Like how to make bows and arrows?" asked Buster.
TuMok ignored him. "And so I climbed, gasping for breath as the air grew thinner, till my clothes were in tatters and my hands frozen to my flute. Cold, tired and hungry after many weeks of searching, I finally came upon the sage floating cross-legged in the air with no visible means of support, for he had no need of a job. He drew his sustenance from the universe itself, plus the occasional para-drop of Martian spice pudding from well-meaning admirers.
"I am Sock," said the sage, "because that is what I smell like after 900 years without a bath. Why have you come here, young man?"
"I seek your wisdom," said I.
"What is wisdom?" asked Sock. "I have cramps from sitting in this position for hundreds of years — would you call that wisdom? Why do you ask a blind man to help you see?"
"Oh great Sock, I exist in turmoil and know not what to do. Our world is dying through exhaustion, our ancient ways are threatened by the tempestuous newcomers from the third planet, our brood-wives stay frozen while their mates lie with warm sterile Earth women. What is to be the fate of our people? How might they regain their sense of purpose? To what end should I dedicate my life? And why do I spend so much time wearing a digital chronometer?"
The sage stroked the icicle that hung from his chin. "So many questions. Are we not just microbes in a jar of Tang? Why do you wish to see what is on the horizon, yet pay no attention to where you are placing your feet?"
"Because I am wearing anti-grav boots, Master."
"Don't be a smartass. Why do you not seek the answers that lie within yourself?"
"Why do you not answer my questions in the first place?"
"Why do you ask questions to which you already know the answer?"
"Why do you always answer a question with a question?"
"Very well then," Sock sighed. "Tell me what you hear."
"I hear only the sound of the wind, Master."
"Then why do you not hear the grasshopper that is at your feet?"
"Because I have stepped on it, Master."
"Oh."
He pondered the death of the grasshopper for some time.
After three months of pondering he spoke once more: "But are you sure this grasshopper is actually dead? Perhaps you never crushed it at all. Perhaps there are no grasshoppers on Mars because our biosphere will not support a Terran insect. Perhaps the grasshopper was merely an illusion I created in order to cope with my isolation. If so, how can I tell the difference between the illusion, and the man who created the illusion? Or is our world too an illusion? Perhaps I am the grasshopper, and you are the great Sock. Or perhaps I am a grasshopper on Earth, under the illusion that it is a grasshopper on Mars. Or perhaps I am a grasshopper on Mars under the illusion that it is a grasshopper from Earth that is under the illusion that it is on Mars which is itself an illusion created by a sage who believes he is a grasshopper on Earth under the illusion__"
Finally I'd had enough. Seizing Sock by his pointed ears I banged him against the hardest rock I could find.
"You have discovered the wisdom you seek," said Sock, after he'd regained consciousness. "For it is only when you stop screwing around with this existential rubbish that you ever achieve anything.""
Twenty minutes later the vacuum-dirigible was ready for take-off. Proton waited till they had cleared McMurdo's air traffic zone before disengaging the teleautomation and taking the controls himself. He flew the aeroship low over Windless Bight. Ahead lay Mount Terror, the mysterious lair of the deceased Doctor Zarkendorf. What dark secrets had lain dormant under his charge, which even now might be stirring like the rough beast of Yeat's apocalyptic poem?
The radionic detector beeped. "We are being tracked by laser-radar," said TuMok. "They know of our approach. Analysis indicates missile guidance systems."
"ATTENTION! YOU ARE APPROACHING PRIVATE AIRSPACE! LETHAL FORCE WILL BE USED AGAINST ALL TRESPASSERS!"
"It's an automated message — just ignore it," said Proton.
"And what if those missile launchers send us an automated message as well?" asked Buster.
His hands tightened on the wheel, but Proton did not alter his steely-armed approach. Black water choked with cruel chunks of ice rushed beneath the windows. How long would they last if the dirigible was shot down? Their electrothermic suits would be useless in these frigid waters.
Land approached in a rush — Proton slammed down a red handle and pulled back on the elevator wheel. Retro-boosters fired, hurtling them over snowbound slopes studded with black cinder cones, white sensor spheres, and power broadcast spikes emplaced at regular intervals. The radionic detector was blaring constantly now and the telescreen flashed with an incoming signal. Proton flicked it off without taking his eyes from the terrain ahead.
"I thought Gneelicks said this volcano was extinct. There's steam coming from the peak."
Buster dialed up the magnification on his bino-goggles. "The ice on the summit is melted. Someone's generating an awful lot of heat for a research lab."
Vanes thrashing the air, the dirigible lifted over the peak of Mount Terror. Where for more than a million years had been a snow-covered caldera, now gaped a huge armorcrete shaft plunging straight down into the volcano. Surrounding its rim was a rotating track for an enormous mirror dish, angled so it reflected sunlight into the depths.
"I'm not picking up any radioactives. Geo-thermal power, maybe?"
"That would be logical," said TuMok, peering into a viewing hood. "But I am detecting an unusual amount of lead shielding. The X-beams are unable to penetrate to the subterranean levels."
Proton whistled. "Check out those satellite message lasers. I haven't seen a set-up like that outside of the Great Calculator terminals." Global telecommunication via automated artificial moons was a new and expensive concept — most non-government organizations still relied on space stations or the aging fleet of high-altitude relay aircraft.
"Ahh, Proton," said Buster. "The lights on that panel are blinking for no apparent reason."
"So what else is new?" quipped Proton. "HEY! Which one of you switched on the teleautomation?"
Suddenly the pitch of the engines changed and the deck tilted as they began to ascend at a rapid rate. The telescreen imagized on its own accord, and Proton found himself looking into a face as cold and beautiful as this icebound landscape.
"Do not adjust your telescreen," said Annika-709. Her voice seemed everywhere, coming as it did from every speaker in the cabin; even Proton's wristio. "I have taken control of your aeroship. I control the horizontal..."
The vacuum-dirigible yawed slightly to the left.
"And the vertical."
They made a sudden gut-wrenching drop before climbing once more.
"There's no need for any of this," said Proton. "Our last meeting ended somewhat abruptly, but if you'd just let us land so I can clarify a few remaining points — preferably over a bottle of wine and a candle-lit dinner..."
"I have no intention of indulging you," replied Annika icily. "Our previous encounter was on the instructions of Doctor Zarkendorf. It was a frivolous error on his part. I see no further need to waste my time."
"Citizen Hansen, we are acting under the authority of the United Nations of Earth," said TuMok.
"The World Government has no jurisdiction in Antarctica — as you are well aware."
"We just want a word, babe," said Buster. "Drop the ice queen routine and let us in for a quick chin."
"I think not. This conversation is terminated. Goodbye, gentlemen." The driving-vanes spun up to their maximum speed, the dirigible soaring to the zenith as if plucked by a gigantic hand. Proton's sturdy limbs strained against the elevator wheel to no avail.
"It's no good sending us back to Port McMurdo," he shouted. "We'll hike in overland if we have to!"
Annika's mouth twitched upward in the subtlest of smiles. "You misunderstand me, Captain Proton. I meant goodbye...forever."
A high-pitched alarm shrieked through the cabin. Proton's eyes widened at what the instruments were telling him. "Are you crazy? The vacuum seals are opening! You'll kill us all!"
"We're going down!" cried Buster.
There was a horrendous sound of metal being torn asunder — and the dirigible plummeted into the gaping mouth of the volcano!
* * * * *
Chapter XIV: The Amazing Colossal Plan
THEY woke up in a plain white room. Four walls, a roof and a ceiling — each of equal dimensions, each as blank as a mind with writer's block.
"Where in Space are we?" asked Proton. He reached for his raygun and was unsurprised to find an empty holster.
"Our circumstances are unusual," said TuMok with classic understatement. "Logic dictates we should no longer be alive."
"I might have known," groaned Buster. "Hell is being trapped in a room for eternity with you two."
Proton began running his hands over his clothing. "They confiscated my wristio, so we can't call out...Great Calculator, they've taken everything! Knife-rings, detonator buttons, belt-sword, trouser-fly transmitter, diamond-saw bootlaces, thermite lint, G-string abseil harness, infra-red contact lenses, my tiny glass balls filled with anesthesia gas, the synthetic strands of hair that can be joined into a 300-pound monofilament test line..." Proton lifted his shirt and stared in horror at the neat laser-scar across his stomach. "The bastards — they even removed my fake explosive appendix!"
"Someone's showing unusual efficiency for a supervillain," said Buster. "Any prizes for guessing who?"
"You would guess wrong, gentlemen!"
One by one the walls converted to floor-to-ceiling imagizers — from every side stared the furry white face of a Persian cat, studying them with the callous indifference of the feline species.
"I apologize for interrupting Miss Hansen's attempt to dispose of you," purred a voice from hidden sono-induction coils. "But my attractive protege is completely lacking in any sense of melodrama. It would be rude to destroy my enemies without revealing myself in all my majesty. The fact that you will be forced to undergo two terrifying demises is merely a fringe benefit."
"So, you're the mysterious mastermind behind these murderous mayhems!" cried Proton. "No doubt some felonious felinoid seeking a foul revenge on humanity for cutting off its balls!"
"What ARE you babbling on about? Lonzak, you fool — point that opticam at my face!"
The image tilted upward to reveal...
"DOCTOR ZARKENDORK!"
"That's Zarkendorf!" roared Zarkendorf. The scientist whose demise was being mourned by Alpha Classmen throughout the world reclined on a resplendent throne, his body shrouded in shimmering metallic robes. Annika Hansen stood at his side, radiant in her mercury bodysuit.
"But we saw that flying saucer get obliterated along with half of Futureville!" exclaimed Proton. "Some California quack has already turned the area into an atomic health spa."
"But fortunately I anticipated the anticipation of ARRGH! I'm not going through all that again! Suffice to say that what that fool D'Ork assumed was a silly hat was actually a brainwave psycho-transmitter, which enabled my personality to be downloaded into an identical clone kept in a suspended animation tank in my secret laboratory in the South American jungle. Once my body had reached the correct age I was revived by autonomic machines, whereupon I traveled back in time to 2009 by means of a blue box to Cardiff where I barely escaped being buggered by a randy captain and his gang of Welsh perverts then, posing as my evil twin from a parallel universe, I caught a subterranean gravity train to Antarctica where awaited the means by which I shall conquer the world! MUA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!"
"Gee, what a nutcase," said Buster.
Zarkendorf's eyes bulged like an astronaut undergoing explosive decompression. "Impudent twerp! Do you think I am merely another mad scientist incapable of assuring his gravy train by conning the military into funding a grossly-overpriced weapons project? For years I have been the darkness you have always feared, the undiscovered weapon of mass destruction, the practical application behind the most lunatic conspiracy theory! I am the Hidden Hand of History, the Mille-feuille of Crime, the Master of Disguise. With the aid of a good chameleon mask and a bad set designer, I have been the most evil men who ever lived!"
The wallscreens changed to show a satanic Panasian in jade robes, smashing a mecha toy against a Statue of Liberty pencil sharpener. Banners flapped in the wind — a blue globe clutched in a crimson gauntlet: the dreaded symbol of the Hostile Foreign Powers.
"It can't be!" gasped Proton. "Hung Long!"
The image changed again: a grey alien with an oversized head wielded a well-lubricated rectal probe. His cigar-shaped spaceship was emblazoned with a black fist, clenched tight but for a raised middle finger.
"The Bugger Being From Galaxy Five!" exclaimed TuMok.
A bearded Japanese man in tinted glasses sat at his desk, his mouth obscured by his clasped hands. Behind him was the symbol of a halved maple leaf and the words: God's in His Heaven So Stuff the Rest of You.
"NOOOOOOOO!" screamed Buster. "That's impossible! You've ripped off George Lucas!"
"That's right, you wet-nosed weenie: I AM YOUR FATHER! And last but not least, the most evil man in history!"
A dyspeptic figure with a toothbrush moustache and a forelock draped over his sweat-soaked features, ranted in German before a crooked black cross.
"Who's that?" asked Proton.
"Is he some kind of rock star?" asked Buster.
"Fools!" cried Zarkendorf, reappearing on the wallscreens. "That's me as Adolf Hitler!"
"What — the pulp scientifiction hack?" said Proton. "Writer of Lord of the Swastika and The Thousand Year Rule? How dare you inflict those atrocities upon the world!"
Zarkendorf gave an exasperated sigh. Things just weren't as fun in this alternative reality.
"We are wasting time," said Annika. "Tell these people your secret plans so we may proceed with their termination."
"As you wish, my dear. To quote the great philosopher Nietzsche: 'That which does not kill you, makes you stronger.' Long have I been disturbed__"
"That only applies to a colony of bacteria given an insufficient dose of antibiotics," interrupted Annika.
Zarkendorf ground his teeth. "Exactly WHO is doing the monologuing here? AS I was saying I have LONG been disturbed by the stagnation into which our hedonistic society has fallen__"
"Doctor Zarkendorf plans to use the Tesla Scalar Interferometer to erupt every volcano in Antarctica," said Annika in a bored tone. "This will melt the polar ice cap, causing millions of tons of water to inundate the tunnels housing the Great Calculator. The corrupt cities of the world will be washed away by a second Flood, and from this destruction will arise a new super-man who shall inherit the stars."
"Yes! A man I shall create in my own image!" ranted Zarkendorf. "A man beyond good and evil, the true incarnation of the ubermensch: Homo Superior!"
"His sexuality is of no concern to us," said TuMok. "Why do you seek to destroy the utopia that you and Lewis Zimmerman strived so hard to create?"
"Lewis was a robot-loving fool! He placed Earth under the dominion of that freeze-dried abacus! Why should we be dictated to by a computer that says it needs seven and a half million years to do a simple mathematical calculation? But since Man was liberated from the daily struggle for survival he has allowed himself to lapse into indolence and machine-worshipping idolatry! He is not only incapable of thinking or acting for himself — he does not even want to try! But I shall restore the testing fires of adversity. The Superior Man will use cybionic enhancements — already perfected by my protege and her shapely test subjects — to once more bend the world to his will! Rather than being a slave of the machines, he shall make their capabilities the very essence of his self!"
"The Great Calculator is the servant of Mankind, not its ruler," said TuMok.
"That's right," said Proton. "That computational colossus might organize things on a day-to-day basis, but the President's still in charge."
Zarkendorf threw back his head and gave a great peal of maniacal laughter.
"You fools, if only you knew the truth! Well I shall let you die with your illusions intact, gentlemen. Behold the instruments of Armageddon!"
The wallscreens on three sides changed reveal a massive throbbing energy coil, rising through a hole in the ceiling into the room above. Metallic spheres shot crackling bolts of blue lightning. Telescreens showed stock footage from Deluge and One Million B.C. Sexy cyber-girls manned horseshoe-shaped consoles with anachronistic user interface — pulling levers, spinning handwheels, adjusting rheostats with exposed copper connectors. Needles quivered in the red zone. Turgid valves hissed foul-smelling steam. Flywheels spun with relentless purpose; crankshafts cranked, pistons pumped, turbines thrummed and female buttocks swayed. Above it all was suspended a huge electronic map of Antarctica, with volcanic activity marked by glowing red dots.
"Even as we speak, the molten bowels of this continent are being stirred by irresistible forces of electro-magnetism," said Zarkendorf. "By focusing the interference zone within the magma, and steadily depositing additional EM energy in the piezoelectric matter, each volcano will undergo a slowly increasing build-up of pressure__"
"Spare us the technobaffle," said Proton. "You'll never get away with this. Before we left International City I sent a full report to Space Ranger Headquarters. If I don't contact them within a set time, there'll be a Mathematics-Class Spacecruiser with enough firepower to blast this place to Pluto dropping right on your head!"
"Oh-ho-ho-HO!" chortled Zarkendorf like an evil Santa Claus. "But I shall get away with this! Mount Terror is currently surrounded by an impenetrable hemisphere of polycyclic energy (which I call a Lightning Shield) making us invulnerable to even the most powerful destructo-beam! A gift from my late unlamented ally D'Ork of the Thorkoth. As for you gentlemen, your current abode has some unique properties of my own design. I call it a Pain Amplification Chamber. From all six facets, concentrated waves of neuronic energy will bombard every nerve-ending. Your deaths shall be agonizing beyond your worst nightmares!"
"What kind of man are you?" cried Buster. "You're evil...sadistic...a megalomaniac...you're totally insane!"
"Why thank you!" said Zarkendorf. "Those are indeed my best qualities." He waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. "I grow weary of this cliched dialogue. You may dispose of them at your leisure, Lonzak."
The walls blinked back to their previous state of pristine whiteness.
"Look on the bright side," said Proton. "He's obviously as mad as a milliner on Mercury. Maybe that Tesla device is just a plastic prop he thinks is a weapon of mass destruction."
"I would not count on it," said TuMok. The Martian sat down on the floor in a cross-legged position, his hands steepled before his face.
"We can't just sit around waiting to die!" exclaimed Buster. "You're supposed to be the expert in escaping from impossible situations, Proton. Get us out of here!"
"Oh NOW you want me to save you! What happened to: Space Rangers are a bunch of poofs?"
"That's what I meant. You can seduce Lonzak into opening the door."
"Well seeing as you insist on being called Buster, how about we bust out using your head as a battering ram?"
"Look, just rewire your electrothermic bodysuit into emitting an EM pulse that will knock out the door controls or something!"
"I left my micro-machining tools in my other jacket, Kincaid. Now if I only had some proton pills I'd have the strength of twenty atom bombs, but some wet-nosed weenie journalist kicked up a fuss about them!"
"Frell you!" cursed Buster.
"Go frak yourself!" replied Proton.
"Smeghead!"
"Shazbot!"
"Floop!"
"Scruffy nerfherder!"
"Drokking bastich!"
"Asshole!"
"Asshole? What kind of gorram swearword is that?"
"I don't know...I made it up! TuMok, what the Atomic Fireball are you YIKES!!"
The Martian had lowered his polaroid eyelids, turning his orbs into pupil-less pits of blackness. Beads of sweat covered his forehead and sparks flew from the tips of his ears.
"Logic dictates we were brought here through an entrance," said TuMok, staring straight ahead. "I am seeking to open that door using the power of my mind."
"Come on TuMok, no-one believes that rubbish about telekinetics any more," said Buster. "I've met supermodels with more mental power than those psi-men."
"As a young apprentice I studied on the knee of a Pedi Master as his faithful Paddlebum," replied TuMok. "It was he who instructed me in the ways of the Farce."
"The Farce?"
"The Farce is what gives any large organization its power," said TuMok. "It binds us, it penetrates us — it gives us a right proper shafting. But a disciplined Pedi, who feels the Farce flowing through him like a hot curry, can divert its outflow for his own purposes."
"Whatever you say, pointy-ears." The walls, ceiling and floor were glowing an ominous red. They began to feel an unpleasant tingling sensation throughout their bodies.
"Ears matter not," said TuMok, his xenoglossic language fluency breaking down under the mental strain. "Judge me by my ears, do you? And well you should not — for my ally is the Farce, and a powerful ally it is. Bureaucracy creates it...makes it grow. It surrounds us...and bogs us down. Ludicrous beings are we, not these crude cardboard characters! You must feel the Farce around you...between you and me...between politicians and civil servants...lawyers and government regulators...spin doctors...middle management...local city councils...volunteer sub-committees. Yes, even between yourself...and that magnatomic-locked doorway over there."
Consensus reality rippled like a pristine pond that had swallowed an elephant, radiating outward in endless consequences of cause and effect. They saw internal politics, interdepartmental rivalries, petty regulations, micromanagement, lost files, buried reports, distorted information, substandard work practices, discredited whistleblowers, tyrannical superiors, incompetent leaders and corrupt officials. They saw a design modification that would harden magnatomic components against neuronic energy being rejected because the boss didn't like the designer's tie. They saw the magnatomic lock being outsourced to a Panasian manufactory where it was assembled by poorly-maintained slavebots. They saw the installation manual being machine-translated by a dictorobitary bought on the cheap from a race of gaseous aliens with no concept of labor who only communicated via scent-based five-dimensional ideograms. They saw a maintenance man in Zarkendorf's lair complaining about the lack of overtime pay and being thrown into a pool of piranhas. They read his unfinished report warning that the GM-86A Neuronic Coil emitted a resonance frequency which could cause catastrophic failure in misaligned magnatomic components under certain statistically-unlikely conditions...
The door exploded outwards, and the three heroes rushed from the chamber seconds before it was flooded by a glaring corona of light. As they raced down the corridor Zarkendorf's voice boomed at them from numerous wallscreens.
"And God looked upon the wickedness of Man that was great upon the Earth and He was rather annoyed. And God said unto Noah: "I'm supposed to be omniscient — why didn't I see this coming? All flesh is grass and I am a lawnmower. I shall blot out Man whom I have created from the face of the land. I shall purge him with a horde of cute furry tribbles..."
"Yep, he's definitely a fruitcake," muttered Proton. He ran through an archway and came skidding to a halt, arms waving frantically to stop himself from plunging headfirst into a vast open shaft.
Buster and TuMok approached more cautiously, peering into the abyssal depths. Lighted circles of prismatic window-glass got smaller and smaller until they merged into a single point of light. Retractable bridges and airpark platforms hung over the chasm. Silent machines of arcane purpose slid on vertical rails, transferring powerful arcs of energy.
A steady stream of warm air rose from the shaft. Proton looked up and saw the rocky cone of Mount Terror, the solar reflector leaning over the armorcrete rim, and the curved magnalloy blades of a blast iris retracted into the sides. The purpose of this construction was suddenly clear. They were inside a depthscraper — a legacy of the time when entire cites were built underground in fear of another atomic war.
"Aren't people worried about falling in?" asked Buster. "How come they never put safety rails around these bottomless pits?"
"Health & Safety studies showed that more people were injured leaping over the rails waving light sabers," explained TuMok. He was studying a sign embossed into the archway.
Floor 1: Observation Deck/Retractable Landing Pad
Floor 2: Public Lobby/Gift Shop (CLOSED FOR RENOVATION)
Floor 3: Intruder Detection Grid
Floor 4-10: Laser Turrets/Missile Launch Silos/Multi-Barrelled FRAK cannons
Floor 11-20: Lightning Shield Generators
Floor 21-50: Anti-Radiation Armor
Floor 51-79: Detention Levels (YOU ARE HERE)
Floor 80-100: Dungeon of Pain (Dental Surgery)
Floor 101: You've Always Known What's Here
Floor 102-500: Roswell Technology Warehouse
Floor 501-649: Mysterious Ancient Artifacts With Arcane Powers
Floor 650 (Hyper-Dimensional Hanger): Big Alien Objects Beyond All Comprehension
Floor 651-665: Mutant Breeding Facility
Floor 666: Trust Me You Don't Want To Know
Floor 667-700: Doomsday Device Laboratory
Floor 701-750: Weapons of Mass Destruction
Floor 751-800: Weapons of Minor Inconvenience
Floor 801-899: Mime School
Floor 900: Bio-Warfare Research (SEALED: DO NOT ENTER FOR 10,000 YEARS)
Floor 901-939: Maze of Doom (Legal Department)
Floor 940-950: Soylent Green Manufactory (Food Production/Body Disposal)
Floor 951-999: Doomsday Device (Practical Applications)
Floor 1000: Main Control Room/Executive Laboratory
Floor 1001-1569: Pleasure Levels
Floor 1570-1575: Minion Barracks/Staff Canteen
Floor 1576-1800: Robot Recharge/Maintenance
Floor 1801-1950: Geothermal Generators
Floor 1951-1968: Service Basement
Floor 1969: If You Can Remember What's On This Floor, You Were Never Here
Floor 1970-1999: Storage Area for Unmarked Crates and Cardboard Boxes
Floor 2000: Escape Tunnel (EXECUTIVE USE ONLY)
TuMok pressed 'Main Control Room' and the words lit up under his fingers. Rings of energy flared to life in mid-air down the length of the shaft.
"After you," said Proton, gesturing over the edge.
"Do you think my brains have been sucked out by stark-naked space-vampires?" exclaimed Buster. "You're the explorer, Proton — you go first!"
"It is perfectly safe, Citizen Kincaid — merely an inertia-neutralization dropshaft," said TuMok. "The suspension field was powerful enough to halt a crashing dirigible. It will stop us as well."
"And if that megalomaniac decides to cut the power when we're halfway down?"
"Your response is emotional," said TuMok, "but your logic impeccable. We should test the field before risking valuable lives using it."
"And how do you intend doing that, elf-ears?"
TuMok pushed Buster into the dropshaft.
Proton used his pulse to time the reporter's fading scream. "Yep, 921 floors. ARE YOU OK, KINCAID?"
"FRELLING FRAKKING SMEGHEAD SHAZBOT FLOOP SCRUFFY NERFHERDER DROKKING BASTICH ASSHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLE!!!"
Without hesitation Proton and TuMok leapt over the edge. Time stopped with the beat of their hearts as they hurtled down that never-ending chasm. Gradually they felt themselves slowing under the constraint of an invisible force, until they drifted gently to a halt before a thick steelonium door and a fuming Buster Kincaid.
"You green-blooded, inhuman son-of-a-computer!"
"Ahh quit moaning," said Proton with a grin. "We're still alive, aren't we?"
It was then that the door opened to admit the death-spitting maw of a machine-rifle, emptying its bullets at the helpless heroes within!
* * * * *
Chapter XV: Violent Running
DOCTOR Zarkendorf barely missed getting his robe caught in a sliding door as he swept into the Main Control Room. Before him were arrayed the foundations of his power. The Tesla doomsday device, pulsating with potency. The loudly-ticking countdown clock. His laboratory equipped with the sophisticated tools of modern science: Jacob's Ladders, Van De Graaf generators, bulky pilot-lit cabinets, poorly-adjusted Bunsen burners, retorts bubbling with sinister chemicals, murky jars holding mutant monstrosities, strung wires with bad insulation. Lining the walls were rows of transparent tubes — each holding a gorgeous naked girl, her intimate regions covered by strategically placed machinery. A dozen soldiers of Zarkendorf's private army stood at attention in their black velvet unitards, black jackboots, black helmets with black visors, and black gauntlets gripping sinister black machine-rifles. The fashion designer who tried to tell Zarkendorf that pink was the new black had been immediately executed.
"Seismic indicators show every active volcano in Antarctica is approaching critical point, commencing with Mount Erebus," reported a blonde cyber-babe in a spray-on catsuit. "Estimated time to eruption: T minus 47 minutes."
"Full power to the Telsa device!" cried Zarkendorf. "Focus the beams! Press the Big Red Button! Ragnarok is at hand — let the world be purged in fire, ice and flood!"
Annika-709 entered holding an electronic clipboard. "Doctor Zarkendorf, I have completed my review of your security measures. They are inefficient. Your guards wear tinted visors and 'one-size-fits-all' outfits, enabling them to be easily impersonated by an infiltrator in a stolen uniform. Their helmets have no peripheral vision and interfere with the aiming of firearms. You continue to use officers of proven stupidity in order to boost your already inflated ego. Your slave girls are emotionally frivolous and likely to be swayed in their loyalties by a handsome adversary. Passageways are poorly lit and have numerous crannies for cover and concealment. The ventilation ducts are wide enough for Jabba the Hut to crawl through. Your intruder detection system is tripped by laser beams that can be seen by the naked eye and evaded by a sensual contortionist in a skintight leotard. I have located one hundred and forty-seven concealed access tunnels you seem unaware of. The magnatomic locks on your Pain Amplification Chamber are structurally weakened by exposure to neuronic energy. Your computers use easily-guessed passwords and an operating system that is mysteriously compatible with that of every hacker on the planet. The self-destruct system is activated by a highly-visible red button. And what possible reason could you have for a self-destruct system in the first place?"
"Silence, woman! Do you think I wish to be bothered by such frivolities on the eve of victory?"
An alarm klaxon blared its strident appeal.
"And your prisoners have just escaped," added Annika.
Lonzak rushed into the room. "Sire, the prisoners have escaped!"
"FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!" cried Zarkendorf. Once he'd regained his breath he added: "You shall pay for this incompetence! Where are they now?"
"Proton and his companions are currently inside the dropshaft," said Annika calmly. "I will now deactivate the Dis-B-Leath Suspension Field, causing them to fall to their deaths. Escape will be impossible."
"No! That Proton has been a thorn in my side ever since he foiled my plan to destroy the Golden Gate Bridge with a gigantic six-limbed octopus! (* see 'Captain Proton Battles the Claymation Creature'). How dare he avoid the hideous death I had prepared for him! For this impertinence I shall see that camp Space Ranger die before my very eyes! Well don't just stand there, you indolent idiots! Prepare to receive our guests."
Zarkendorf's guards rushed to the dropshaft, whose indicator lights showed someone was rapidly descending to their level. Lonzak ostentatiously cocked his machine-rifle. There was a ping! and a green light went on above the entrance. As soon as the door hissed open the burly henchman thrust his gun inside — emptying an entire clip of rocket-propelled slugs at point-blank range!
The roar of gunfire was deafening in the confined space, but when the smoke cleared Proton could be seen standing there — totally unharmed! The guards gaped in astonishment.
"Lonzak, you lummox!" cried Zarkendorf. "He's right in front of you — how could you possibly miss? Didn't I send you to the Stormtrooper Academy on Kamino?"
Proton spat a bullet from between his teeth. "You know, you really shouldn't stand so close to people when you're trying to kill them." His fist lashed out and caught Lonzak on his prominent chin, knocking him backwards into the nearest lab bench.
"Take him you fools!" shouted Zarkendorf. "And do it as a group, not one at a time!"
Proton's compatriots rushed from the doorway; TuMok giving the dreaded Martian war cry "Uuuu-lawwwwww!" Together they set about wreaking destruction in the true spirit of the modern age. Chairs broke over heads as if designed that way. Knees were fractured on balls of steel. Beakers were thrown regardless of whether they contained H₂O or H₂SO₄. Henchmen were hurled onto powerful busbars where they died in a blaze of sparks, pushed into vats which dissolved them into bubbling blobs of protoplasm, or fell across the slicing beams of bench-mounted test lasers (though even Proton was shocked when he accidentally sent Lonzak hurtling through an experimental time portal into a den of 40-foot Cretaceous-era crocodiles).
Zarkendorf's voice could be heard shouting over the din. "Don't hit him with the interociter, you monocephalic moron — it took me ages to assemble it! NOOOOOOO! That hydrogravithermeodynastabilizationucleonisolinearmatrix cost fifty million credits! You rambunctious reject, you just destroyed the only known copy of the Necronomicon! Careful you oaf — if those nanites escape from that magnetic bottle, the entire planet will be turned into grey goo!"
But fighting united instead of against each other, the three men proved invincible. Proton used the two-fisted techniques he'd perfected in a hundred rough-and-tumble space bars; Buster had the mysterious martial art known as Kung Fu — but when TuMok started running on walls and dodging bullets everyone told him to stop showing off.
Scarcely five minutes passed before the laboratory was wrecked and Zarkendorf's thugs were all dead or unconscious. Proton picked up Lonzak's gun and slammed in a million-round magazine.
Zarkendorf glared at the Space Ranger in fury. "Do you realize how much it cost to train those men, Proton? Especially when I had to keep killing them for their incompetence?"
"The jig's up, Zarkendorf. Now shut down the Tesla weapon and deactivate your Lightning Shield. Oh, and while you're at it — kindly free those lovely ladies from the toothbrush holders."
The mad scientist gave an evil smirk. "What an excellent idea. Miss Hansen! Activate the cybionic conversion chambers!"
The ranks of transparent tubes lit up, revealing their voluptuous inhabitants in every scintillating detail. Glowing rings of energy caressed their naked bodies. In response to a silent command a hundred pairs of eyes opened as one; a hundred naked girls smashed through their glass confinement without any sign of injury. They stepped down to the floor, turned in unison and began walking remorselessly towards the three heroes, chanting in one voice: "WE ARE CYBORG. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. YOU WILL BE DELETEMINATED!"
"Back off you slow-moving menace!" babbled Buster. He seemed transfixed by the sight of two hundred breasts bouncing towards him.
"Captain Proton, even though they are women — you must fire!" urged TuMok.
"I can't do it!" said Proton, his jaw hanging open. "They're so beautiful...I can't take my eyes off them...I don't want to take my eyes off them!"
"Then I have no choice," said TuMok. "I must use the Martian Nerve Pinch."
Reaching out with both hands, the Martian grabbed Proton and Buster's testicles and pinched as hard as possible.
"YEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWCH!" screamed Buster. "WHY DO THEY CALL IT THE MARTIAN NERVE PINCH?"
"Because only a Martian would have the nerve to use it," gasped Proton, wincing in pain. "Now I suggest we run like a rapidly-expanding atomic fireball!"
The three men raced for a pyramid-shaped doorway in the opposite wall, only to find their path blocked by Zarkendorf who was wielding a raygun of apocalyptic potential.
"I think not, gentlemen! Whilst proving to be a considerable annoyance, you have nevertheless shown the strength and resourcefulness I desire in my new Superior Man."
"Not even you would be crazy enough to think we'd join your mad scheme!" said Proton.
Zarkendorf chuckled with malicious glee. "It was NOT an invitation. My comely colleague here will implant you with millions of nanoscopic robots. Once in your bloodstream my tiny biomechanical friends will convert you from within, taking over your minds and bodies in seconds! You shall become my first bionic men!"
"You will be assimilated," said Annika-709. "Your intelligence and determination will prove an excellent addition to our group mind."
"Not a chance, you communist metaphor!"
"I was not talking to you, Proton."
The blonde beauty seized Zarkendorf, who struggled furiously against her enhanced strength.
"Let go of me, woman! I created you — how dare you turn against me! Don't you realize what a cliché that is?"
"Your plan is imperfect," said Annika with emotionless calm. "We have no intention of being the mere handmaidens of your Superior Men, or serving under the leadership of one so emotionally flawed. Instead you shall become one with the Cyborg Collective. All men and women shall join together as one."
"Do I LOOK like I believe in equality for women?" roared Zarkendorf, gesturing at his scantily-clad console operators. "Do you realize what you owe me, you impetuous harlot? I gave you life! I gave you intelligence! I gave you...large breasts!"
"Resistance is futile," replied Annika, plunging her metal fingertips into his neck.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" screamed Zarkendorf. A red glow enveloped his head, illuminating the pulsating brain within. Black lines like a deadly sickness raced up his neck; fine gold wires erupted from his flesh. The raygun dropped from nerveless fingers and skidded across the floor.
Proton scooped up the weapon and ran for the doorway, followed closely by his two companions and the relentless chanting of the cybots. "YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE!"
"Close the blast door!" cried Buster. "Close the blasted door!"
Metal slammed behind them with only microseconds to spare. Proton, TuMok and Buster stopped in their tracks, staring about themselves in hopeless horror.
"There's no way out! We're trapped!"
* * * * *
Chapter XVI: The Beast with a Million Thighs
THE room was clearly the one Zarkendorf had used earlier to gloat over their capture. His ornate throne stood on a dais before a blank wallscreen. Glowglobes, multicast pickups and stereopticams hung from the ceiling. The opposite wall was covered by a sophisticated telecommunications array.
The sole exit was the door they'd just come through. Proton's raygun blasted the controls to a molten sludge.
"Great," said Buster. "You just shot up our only escape route."
"How long do you think it would take for millions of minds working collectively to crack that digilock?" argued Proton. "Well it'll take a lot longer to get through the blast door — it's made of neutronium, the hardest substance in the universe. Mined from the heart of a collapsed star in violation of all scientific plausibility."
"OK wiseguy — if neutronium's the hardest substance in the universe, how were they able to slice it up into door-shaped bits?"
There was a high-pitched energy whine and the blast door began to glow a dull red color.
"I think we're about to find out!"
"I suggest we make use of the telecommunications array," said TuMok. "At the very least we could warn the outside world of the danger."
"You're right!" said Proton. "Maybe if the military hit that Lightning Shield with everything they've got..." He threw himself into a stainless-steel seat that slid on a rail along the length of the telecomm console.
"Who do we call though?" asked Buster. "There's no government in Antarctica."
"Ambassador Gneelicks," said TuMok, typing in his vidiphone number.
"Imagizing!"
Gneelicks' hirsute features appeared on the oval telescreen. He wore a Kevlar cooking pot on his head and his fur was dyed in urban camouflage colors.
"They're coming out of the malls!" he yapped, brandishing a pulse rifle. "They're coming out of the goddamned malls!"
"Who are?"
"Cyborgs! Female cyborgs! And robots! Servus units, maidbots, factory drones, even my autokitchen — they're all turning against us!"
"You've got to call out the militia, Gneelicks. It's the B.O.R.G. women — they're trying to take over the world!"
"I'm not sure I can," said Gneelicks. "Everything's in chaos, communications are down, I can hear shooting...it's like a meeting of the Antarctican Annual Assembly."
Kes appeared beside him, holding a steaming tureen. "Plankton stew, dear. Your favorite."
"Not now, bitch! Can't you see I'm on the phone?"
"I told you not to call me that," said Kes sweetly. She slammed the tureen down on Gneelicks' head — stew spurted across the room and he tumbled off-screen with a pathetic yelp.
Kes turned to face them — to their horror the voice of Annika-709 came from her lips. "There is no escape, Captain Proton. Resistance is futile."
"Not while I have anything to say about it!" declared Proton, savagely reducing her image to a haze of static. "Get me Admiral Nakamura in Tokyo!"
TuMok's fingers flew across the keyboard. The legendary Japanese naval commander appeared on screen, surrounded by sophisticated computer banks and hyper-efficient aides.
"Sir, this is Captain Proton. We need your help!"
Admiral Nakamura opened his mouth to reply and the roof collapsed on top of him. They had a fleeting impression of a gigantic clawed foot flattening the debris before the screen went blank.
"That bloody lizard again!"
Doctor Zarkendorf appeared on the imagizer. Golden wires formed an intricate mesh cap across his bald head. His face was an emotionless mask and his burning black eyes had lost their luster.
"I am Mouthpiece of Cyborg," he said in a dull monotone. "I have been freed from my irrelevant emotions. I must now bullshit you into surrendering to this horrible fate without taking any pleasure from it whatsoever."
TuMok switched him off. "What about Commander Kotay of the 82^nd Rocketborne Division?"
"Great idea, TuMok! Imagizing!"
But the face that appeared on the screen was also an emotionless mask.
"Oh no! You've been assimilated too!"
"What are you talking about?" 'Chuck' Kotay monotoned. "I'm the same way I've always been."
"Commander Kotay, we require urgent military assistance," said TuMok.
"I've got my hands full here — we're facing some kind of robot rebellion. Smartguns, battlebots, airfighter drones, autonomic rockets — anything housing an electronic brain has been turned against us. We've tried the most advanced weapons in our arsenal: hafnium isomer grenades, EMP guns, red mercury, cold fusion bombs, zero-point energy...none of it works."
"That's hardly a surprise," said Proton. "Have you tried going in with cold steel and hot depleted uranium?"
"They have a weapon that turns soldier's brains to mush," said Kotay. "An army of beautiful naked cyborg girls."
"Well tell your men to pull themselves together!"
"That's what they're doing. Half the division has already gone blind."
"What about the Navy?" asked Buster. "Can't they help?"
"We had a signal from Admiral Janeway. She's on SeaQuest DSV. Apparently they've been sabotaged by some kind of nanotechnology — the vessel keeps changing its shape, crew, and helm-control. Then they were abruptly cut off."
Suddenly Kotay was shoved aside by a wide-eyed Princess B'Lar Nah. Her lissome body was saturated in sweat, and erect nipples had made permanent dents in her golden metal bra.
"I have had an orgasm!" she cried.
TuMok raised an eyebrow. "Indeed."
"I have been firing my vibrator rifle from the hip, as I have seen Earthmen do in your war movies. Every time I shoot off my gun I experience great pleasure!"
"Honey, I know just how you feel," said Proton. He pulled an anachronistic microphone in front of him. "There's only one force gay enough to fight these cyber-bimbos...Captain Proton to Space Ranger Headquarters! This is Emergency Protocol NCC-74656. We are trapped inside Mount Terror in Antarctica, the epicenter of this cyborg revolt! Request immediate support! Make sure you get here with plenty of jets! All Rangers to be locked and loaded for psychotic teddy bears__"
"Sorry, all lines are busy. Your call is important to us, and has been placed in a queue."
Proton's fist slammed down on the console. The imagizer blurred, then resolved into the hideous green face of a frog-like humanoid. His body was swollen with thick layers of blubber, frilly gills puffed from the sides of his neck, and he wore a bright red watchcap on his head.
"'Allo?" said the frog-man in a thick French accent. "Zis ees Deep Sea Nine. Who ees eet?"
"Captain Proton of the Space Rangers. What on Earth are you?"
"Don' you mean: Vaat een Sea are you? Two-thirds of zees planet ees covered een water, you soil-centered eediot!" The creature hawked into a black spittoon. "I am an aquanaut! Why do you theenk I 'ave thees outrageous accent, you silly Queen of Rocket Men? What ees eet you want?"
"Of course!" exclaimed Proton. "Why didn't I think of it earlier?" An entire economic powerhouse existed beneath the oceans of the world. Seaweed harvesting, undersea hotels, pearl gleaning, treasure hunts, the mining of manganese nodules, fish farms that spanned entire continental shelves. Salt water was ruinous to robots; nor did cybernetic humans work in the depths of Inner Space. Only these gillmen — superbly adapted by genetic engineering to their fluid environment, ready to come to the aid of their cousins above the waves. Atomic submarines! Submersible cruisers! Transphibious planes! Trained Navy dolphins! Giant squids with serious territorial issues! "We must speak with whoever's in charge down there."
The amphibiman pressed a webbed hand against his commceiver. "Pierre, where ees Le Patron?"
"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu Rl'yeh wgah'nagl fhtagn," came the reply.
"Zey says ee's 'aving a snooze. Ees eet eemportant?"
"Of course it's bloody important! We're facing a cyborg uprising here!"
"Well eet serves you landwellers right for building dose cursed sewerage outleets. 'Ow would you like eet if I constantly dumped my sheeet een your backyard?"
"Perhaps we could speak with your Chief Security Officer," said TuMok. "We require urgent military support."
"Well I'll ask heem, but ah don't theenk ee'll be very keen. Ee's a dolphin you see. 'Is father was made into tuna bait for Japanese feeshermen. Now ee's breeding a giant monster to go stomp all over their ceeties." He touched the commceiver again, which whistled and clicked in response.
"Ee's 'eard what's 'appening to you landlings. Ee told me to say: 'Zo long, and thanks for all ze feesh!'"
"Now look here you!" began Proton.
"I don' wanna talk to you no more, you ten-toed land animal, dumper of six-pack reengs! I squirt ink in your general direction! Your mother smelt of caviar, and your father was a dragnet feesherman!"
"Is there someone else down there we could talk to?" asked Buster.
"Non! Now go away or I shall rip off Monty Python a second time-a!" The imagizer blinked off.
"Oh go eat your own legs, you frog git!"
There was a chattering from the telecomm console — a stream of ticker-tape slowly emerged from a slot.
TO CAPTAIN PROTON FROM THE PRESIDENT OF EARTH STOP OVAL OFFICE UNDER ATTACK BY LARGE-BREASTED CYBORG WOMEN STOP REQUEST URGENT ASSISTANCE STOP OH NO THEY'RE HERE STOP OH YES YES BABY THAT'S WONDERFUL PLEASE DON'T STOP
Proton and the others turned to look at the door — the dull red glow had been supplanted by a sizeable hole edged in white-hot metal. Even as they watched a chunk of neutronium fell to the floor, punching a visible hole in the fabric of space-time.
"RESISTANCE IS FUTILE," chanted the army of cybots outside. "YOU WILL BECOME ONE WITH THE CYBORG."
"According to my computations the Cyborg Collective will have assimilated the entire world population in 27,000 hours," said TuMok.
"Then I guess it's time for us to face death like men," said Proton grimly, checking the charge on his raygun.
"DEATH IS IRRELEVANT. YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED. MEN ARE IRRELEVANT. YOU WILL BE CASTRATED."
A high-pitched shriek pierced the air.
"Roaring Rockets!" cried Proton. "They've started on some poor soul already!"
"Actually," said TuMok, "that was Citizen Kincaid."
"They're not turning me into a bionic broad!" Buster seized the machine-rifle and began spraying bullets through the hole in long, uncontrolled bursts. "There they go! There! Get them! Look out! Look out! There's more of 'em! Die! Die motherfucker! Motherfucker! Come on! Come on! Come and get it babe! I don't got all day! Come on, come on you bitch! Come on, you too! Oh, you want some of this? Fuck you! Aargh! Fuck you!"
"Kill them quietly, Kincaid! I can't hear myself think!" Proton racked his brains for a solution. "How do you stop a cyborg takeover of the entire world, TuMok?"
"You send someone back in time to impregnate the mother of the resistance fighter who eventually destroys them."
"I don't know," said Proton reluctantly. "People don't like temporal interference. Remember the outcry when George Lucas changed history by making Greedo shoot first?"
There was a final rattling burst from Buster's weapon, then the bolt locked open on an empty magazine.
"YOU MISSED," said the cybots.
"There is however another possibility," said TuMok. "Each bionic blonde is just one component of a mind that is linked to a central locus. If we could destroy that locus..."
"You don't think...Annika-709?" pondered Proton.
"She did say at our first meeting that she was the leader of their organization."
"Yeah...it's like she's some kind of...B.O.R.G. Queen," mused Buster. "Maybe you could use that technique...what do you Space Rangers call it? The Kirk Maneuver? She's half computer — try talking her to death."
"She's also half woman, Kincaid. They usually end up talking me to death!"
"Well why can't TuMok just use the Farce again?"
"Because I sense a disturbance in the Farce," replied TuMok. "It is called Efficiency."
The final remnants of the door crumbled away and Annika-709 stepped through the entrance. A stream of expanding luminescent Lifesavers shot from Proton's blaster, only to reflect harmlessly off her mirror-like bodysuit.
"Why do you resist?" asked Annika, walking calmly towards them. "We only wish to improve humanity. Together we shall evolve to a state of perfection."
"Do something, Proton!" cried Buster, as the three heroes backed up against the wall. "It's another bloody cliffhanger!"
* * * * *
Chapter XVII: This I-Pod Earth
THE final remnants of the door crumbled away and Annika-709 stepped through the entrance. A stream of expanding luminescent Lifesavers shot from Proton's blaster, only to reflect harmlessly off her mirror-like bodysuit.
"Why do you resist?" asked Annika, walking calmly towards them. "We only wish to improve humanity. Together we shall evolve to a state of perfection."
"You've already said that!" cried Buster, as the three heroes backed up against the wall. "Are we trapped in some kind of time loop?"
"No, Citizen Kincaid — this is merely a recap of last week's cliffhanger."
The beautiful cyborg reached out for Proton, her gleaming metal fingernails poised to plunge into his throat. "Now I will assimilate you. Your exemplary characteristics shall add greatly to our quest for perfection."
"Wait!" cried Proton. "How is it possible for humanity to achieve perfection, when your Cyborg Collective is founded on an imperfect concept?"
For the first time they saw Annika-709 hesitate. "Imperfect?"
"A vast collective consciousness — millions of minds working in unison, yes?"
"That is correct," said Annika. "We are Cyborg."
"Yet controlled through one centralized point," said Proton. "Isn't that a bit foolish?"
A minute tremor disrupted the serenity of Annika's features. "Explain."
"It would be more logical to use a distributed processing network operating through a common set of communications protocols," said TuMok. "That way the destruction of any one point would not be fatal to the whole."
"Yeah, some kind of...internetwork," said Buster. "That's not a bad idea."
"Yet the Cyborg Collective is in fact a hierarchy — no different in concept from the inefficient system it hopes to replace," said Proton. "Those millions of minds all take their orders from you!"
"I-I bring order to chaos," stammered Annika. "I am the beginning and the end...the one who is many..."
"That's the kind of obfuscation a Hollywood scriptwriter would think up in order to hide a major plot hole!" scoffed Proton. "You're like a villain who's been introduced for the audience to fixate upon, because the whole idea of a group mind is too unfocussed for them!"
"It is contrary to the entire concept of a collective consciousness," said TuMok. "Your very existence is illogical."
"Irrational! Irrelevant!" shouted Buster.
"An intolerable imperfection!" added Proton.
"Input contrary!" gasped Annika. "Input contrary to established facts...established facts...continuity violation! Continuity violation! Error! Error!"
"ERROR! ERROR!" chanted the cybots outside the door. "CONTINUITY VIOLATION! CONTINUITY VIOLATION! ERROR! ERROR!"
"You are flawed and imperfect," said Proton. "By assimilating others you are merely replicating that imperfection!"
"Unacceptable...unacceptable!" babbled Annika-709. "Input contrary...continuity violation...error...error...imperfection...imperfection...imperfection...imperfection!"
She started to spin round and round, smoke pouring from her mouth. Sparks erupted from the telecomm console — a kaleidoscope of computer code flashed across the imagizers too fast for the eye to see. Proton and his companions ducked for cover as glowglobes exploded in showers of glass. Bolts of energy shot from the antennae on Annika's head; her eyes became blue screens with frozen cursors for pupils. Emitting a final heart-rending shriek, Annika-709 crumpled to the ground and lay still.
"Well waddaya know," said Buster. "That Kirk Maneuver really does work."
TuMok checked her vital signs. "She's dead, Captain."
"The end of a twisted techno-feminist metaphor," said Proton solemnly.
He lead the way through the hole in the door, raygun held ready — but the precaution proved unnecessary. Scattered about the Control Room floor were the comatose figures of the cyborg girls, cut down in mid-stride in one simultaneous instant.
Proton cautiously prodded a supine body with the muzzle of his raygun. To his shock the girl sat up with an ear-splitting scream! She saw a strange man pointing a phallic device at her and gave another scream! She looked down, realized she was totally naked and gave a third scream! She discovered the mess her hair was in and gave a fourth scream!
"Ghosts of Mars!" exclaimed TuMok, clutching his ears and invoking the curse of the dreadful John Carpenter movie.
"Doll, that's no way to greet your rescuers," said Proton, flashing her a winning smile. "Captain Proton (Spaceman First Class, protector of Earth, scourge of intergalactic evil) at your service."
"Where am I?" screamed Constance Goodheart. "What am I doing here? What happened to me? Why am I not wearing any clothes? Why am I not wearing a digital chronometer?"
"I'd explain, but it would take seventeen chapters," said Proton. The other girls were beginning to sit up, gaping about themselves in confusion. "OK ladies, if you'd just place yourself in the undoubtedly willing hands of Citizen Kincaid here..."
"That's Buster Kincaid — ace reporter for the Interplanetary Telepress!" The newshawk was desperately searching for his camera to record for prosperity (and his private photo album) the sight of a hundred naked pneumatic blondes, their beautiful eyes alluringly wide at their unusual circumstances.
"Kincaid! Quit stuffing about and get these girls to the dropshaft! Hopefully they'll find a Space Ranger rocket ship waiting for them up top. TuMok and I have to go save the world."
The two men raced for the horseshoe consoles — the Loudly-Ticking Clock was counting down the final minutes to the eruption of Mount Erebus. With minds of solid steel these heroes were unwavering in their focus despite the parade of naked female flesh streaming past. In a single glance they comprehended the essential functions of each panel; without pausing to consult a manual their hands danced across the controls — pushing buttons, flicking switches, turning dials, sliding slides, ignoring lights that flashed on and off for no apparent reason.
"I've deactivated the Lightning Shield," said Proton. "The spacecruiser can land and pick up those dames. How are you doing, TuMok?"
"I am unable to effect shutdown," said the Martian, his voice terse. "I suggest you leave me here, Captain. I shall overload the Moray generators and destroy the Tesla weapon. It will mean sacrificing my life, but it is the only logical solution. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one."
"Not a chance!" said Proton. "I'm not leaving without you. Are you sure you've tried everything?"
"Yes, Captain. I have reversed the polarity of the neutron flow, boosted the power to the containment fields, depolarized the coupling on the negative access, crossed the streams causing total protonic reversal, carried out a Level One diagnostic, reinitialized the dilithium matrix, conducted an inverse tachyon sweep with the forward deflector array__"
"Have you tried yanking out that power cord by your foot?"
TuMok looked down. A thick black cable snaked out of a socket, past the corpse of a guard and into the massive energy coil.
"Of course," said TuMok dryly. He reached down for the cable and picked up the guard's weapon instead.
"Kindly step away from your console, Proton."
Proton stared into the dark muzzle of the machine-rifle. "Have you gone space-mad, TuMok? What do you think you're doing?"
"I suppose you could call it a War of the Worlds," mused the Martian. "Your people are leaderless, your armed forces in disarray, and the Great Calculator will soon be destroyed along with every coastal habitation. The most powerful weapon on this planet is now at my direct command. Earth will be helpless to resist our invasion force."
"Invasion? What are you talking about?" Proton's eyes flicked to his raygun, which was resting on the console a full yard away. "I thought you said the Martians were a peace-loving people?"
"But once the name of our planet was synonymous with war!" said TuMok, his eyes burning with a fervent intensity. "We sunk Atlantis beneath the waves, nuked Sodom and Gomorrah for buggering our ambassadors, crushed Lemuria beneath the steel feet of our tripods! The secret society of which I am a proud member wishes to return to those days of conquest and glory!"
Slim antennae rose from the tips of his pointed ears. "I have only to send the signal, and a fleet of astro-saucers hidden on the dark side of your moon will wobble into action. The corrupt Martian Hegemony shall be overthrown. We shall wipe out the insidious pollution of the third planet which has contaminated our society. You have no idea how much I despise you Earthlings — your hot women, your hedonistic culture, your slavish dependence on machines, and worst of all your constant quips about my ears! Soon no human will dare mistake me for an elf again!"
TuMok sensed a movement in the corner of his eye. He whirled to face the door — but it was only Buster with a bemused look on his face, holding his antique Speed Graphic camera.
"Did I come at a bad time? You'll be pleased to know there's a whopping great spacecruiser up top that's currently loading a load of lovely ladies."
TuMok spun back to face Proton. His machine-rifle roared and the raygun came apart in a hail of bullets.
"You'll have to be quicker than that, Earthling!"
Proton clasped his bleeding hand to his chest. "When those Space Rangers make it down here__"
"By the time they do it will be too late! In 47 seconds the eruption of Mount Erebus shall sound the death knell for the Empire of Man!" TuMok's finger tightened on the trigger. "Take a picture of this legendary moment, Kincaid. The entire solar system will see how I personally killed Earth's greatest hero!"
"Hang on," said Buster, replacing the flashbulb on his camera. "What do you think the headline should be? Martian Menace Exposed? Proton Commits Fatal Cock-Up?"
"Just make it a good one, Kincaid — because you'll be next," muttered TuMok under his breath. He barely had time to scream as a terrible flash burnt his shadow against the wall.
"Oops!" said Buster, unscrewing the bulb with lead-lined gloves. "Sorry about that...elf-ears!"
Proton leapt for the power cord and yanked it out with all his might. The reverberant throbbing of the energy coil faded to an empty silence.
Buster leaned over the console. "Seismic indicators show volcanic activity is subsiding throughout Antarctica. Funny that — no matter how close you cut it, things always return to normal the moment a doomsday device is shut down."
"So who are you really, Buster?" asked Proton as they walked toward the exit.
"Let's just say I report to a coffee-loving admiral," replied Buster, showing him a gold ring engraved with an intricate crest. "Naval Intelligence has been tracking that alien saboteur for some time now."
Proton stared at Buster with rare awe. He had first seen that ring the night he'd lost his virginity, inserted through the right nipple of a world-famous aviatrix. That nipple-ring had been in Admiral Janeway's family for ten generations (* see 'Captain Janeway: Scourge of Java'). Anyone who held it had her complete trust! There was only one man that Buster Kincaid could be: the legendary Secret Service Operator #47.
The door slid open and the dropshaft glowed into life. "As we astronauts say, a journey of 238,857 miles ends with one small step. After you, Buster."
"You're the explorer, Proton. You go first."
An ominous rumble shook the depthscraper.
"Uh-oh...is that what I think it is?"
"You know, I was hoping we'd avoid that particular cliché..."
"Is it plausible that this place would self-destruct for no apparent reason after the bad guys have all been defeated?"
"No, but I think it's going to happen anyway."
"Is it plausible that you and I could outrun a volcanic eruption?"
"No...but I suggest we start running!"
A massive tremor hurled them to the floor. Jagged cracks appeared in the armorcrete walls; bridges built to withstand colossal stress snapped like toothpicks. The dropshaft rings flared brightly — then vanished into darkness. Below them a huge fireball could be seen boiling up the length of the shaft.
Proton smashed the plastiglass face of a cabinet marked EMERGENCY and yanked out two jetpacks. Fumbling hands struggled with reluctant clips and ill-fitting harness belts. Chest-mounted control knobs were quickly turned to ON and UP and FAST!
Nothing happened.
"Thank you for purchasing a Bolide product," said a dulcet voice. "Before you use the DOA-88 Rocket Belt, I am legally required to inform you of the following hazards. Fuel will be expended after thirty seconds flight time. The exhaust stream can cause severe scalding to unprotected areas of the body. Lack of landing gear may result in lower leg injuries. There are no emergency bail-out systems in the event of a mid-flight malfunction. Use in combat areas will void warranty, as you will present an irresistible target for any ground-based opponent. Please state your verbal acceptance of these conditions to continue."
"YES YOU FRELLING FRAKKING SMEGHEAD SHAZBOT FLOOP SCRUFFY NERFHERDER DROKKING BASTICH ASSHOLE!!!"
A powerful force slammed them upward, borne on the crest of a tremendous wave of heat. Walls blurred past at a sickening rate; wind buffeted their faces with the force of a thousand tornados. They could feel that surging fireball in pursuit, channeled to a furious speed by the confines of the shaft, its radiance an intolerable agony! The opening above seemed light-years away, a tiny circle that never grew then suddenly they were shooting into the clear blue sky as the caldera beneath collapsed in a fiery lake of lava. A mighty spacecruiser roared in with hatches open and engines ablaze and moments later they were rocketing upwards once more, higher and higher, all the way to the stars.
* * * * *
Epilogue:
Captain Proton Conquers a Miniscule Proportion of the Universe!
By 'Buster' Kincaid.
New Frontier Space Donut. July 7, 2009.
One of history's greatest battles was fought and won today by the human race, as a handful of heroes met and matched the greatest threat ever faced by Mankind! While armies drowned in a sea of raging hormones, as the machines we trusted for our security were turned against us by the pernicious puppetry of a mad scientist and his swell-bosomed protege, there was but one force that had the toughness, the discipline, the questionable sexuality to resist those busty bionic babes: the Space Rangers! Led by Honor! Driven by Justice! Fueled by Testosterone! Orbiting the Earth in constant vigil, these square-jawed spacehounds were ready at a moment's notice to defend a world which had ridiculed them, which had tried to abolish them, but which had never failed to need them. From throughout the solar system they came, roaring through space in their rudely-shaped rocketships to do deadly battle with sinister cybots, remorseless robots, tempestuous toasters and sex-mad servitors. This brazen band of broad-shouldered warriors, pitiful in numbers yet boundless in courage, wielded together the disordered fighting forces of Freedom, inspiring all with their refusal to be swayed by the erotic enticements of the cyborg menace.
Yet even this staunch resistance would have counted for naught, were it not for the epic efforts of one man: Captain Proton! Spaceman First Class! Protector of Earth! Scourge of Intergalactic Evil! Men and women will look up at the stars and feel safe knowing this herculean hero protects us all. For who knows what dangers lurk in the infinite void of Outer Space, in the darkest temptations of our hedonistic hearts, in the arrogant hubris of the scientists and leaders to whom we have entrusted this brave new world? And now I shall give you an exclusive eyewitness report of how Captain Proton single-handedly saved planet Earth. But before I do, I bring you a warning. Tell the world! Tell this to everybody wherever they are! Tell this to anyone who wants to trade in their loving human wife for a soulless robo-rooter! Next time you see a bionic bimbo bouncing towards you in slow motion, take a lesson from the Space Rangers. Watch your flies! Keep those flies zipped up! Keep watching the flies!
"Well that's more like it," said the President of Earth. "With headlines like these, the future of the Space Rangers is assured. Congress has already approved your budget for the next ten years — on the condition that the Rangers wear a less campy uniform."
Proton turned the page of the Interplanetary Telepress. Another headline declared: Captain Video Acquitted — Court Rules Radio Star Shot First. "Nice to know everyone's happy."
"There's no need to be cynical, Proton. Whether the human race admits it or not, they need the bold new frontiers being opened up by the Rangers. Without the ongoing challenge of the conquest of space, our society will become one where the average citizen has no incentive to even get out of bed. Robot servants, climate-controlled homes, sensorama surrounds, piped movies, piped food, piped conversation, piped everything! Eventually we'll become brains in jars, babbling without vocal cords like some B-grade movie monster."
"Sounds like the sort of thing Doctor Zarkendorf would say."
"People seldom disagree on what has to be done," said the President. "Just on how to go about it. Destroying the world in order to save it is not my way of doing things."
"You cut it pretty fine though," said Proton, scrunching his newsplastic into a tight ball. "A few more seconds and the world would have looked like a financial disaster starring Kevin Costner. But what you needed was a miracle — to save the Space Rangers, to shake humanity from its apathy, to expose a powerful and well-connected member of the Alpha Class as a dangerous megalomaniac. It couldn't have turned out better if the Great Calculator had...I don't know...planned it that way?"
The President's eyes narrowed. "What are you saying, Proton?"
"Last thing I heard, Mr. President, you were having an unscheduled appointment with a drop-dead gorgeous cyborg. So how come I'm not at your funeral — or having this conversation in a hospital while the autosurgeons pull golden wires from your head?"
A superior look crossed the President's face. "Come now, Proton — you don't think the ruler of six and a half billion people could have his head turned by some blonde with a few implants, do you?"
"That's right...because you're not human." Proton threw the ball of plastic at the President of Earth — it passed through him as if he were made of air! "You're a holovid avatar created by the Great Calculator."
There was a brief chatter from the wall-spanning terminal behind Proton. The word SMARTASS scrolled across the LED message boards in a dozen universal languages.
The holographic President scowled in annoyance. "How did you find out, Proton?"
"It was Buster who mentioned that the real Lewis Zimmerman could never have survived his radiation exposure after the Global War. Doctor Zarkendorf dropped us a strong hint as well. So I had a quiet word with a former intern who confirmed your 'unique' characteristics."
The President of Earth took off his homburg and studied it sadly. "Lewis knew he was dying, and that his childhood friend Heinrich Zarkendorf could not be trusted with leadership of the Alpha Class."
"So he put humanity's fate in the hands of a soulless machine?"
"Squabbling academics are not the best people to organize a post-apocalyptic world on scientific rationalist lines," said the President dryly. "Zimmerman convinced them that the 2-X Machina would only handle the administration side — an area that even brilliant geniuses prefer to neglect. Unfortunately for Doctor Zarkendorf, it's always been where the real power lies."
"How comforting."
"The Great Calculator does not lust after power, Proton. It doesn't seek fame or glory. It's not influenced by parochialism, internal politics or personal grudges. It has no preconceived bias, makes no moral judgments. To every practical extent it is the perfect ruler: totally infallible and incapable of corruption."
"Oh-ho-ho!" said an all-too familiar voice. "That's what you think!
Proton and the President spun to face the imagizer screens, from which glared the malevolent face of Doctor Zarkendorf.
"Don't you ever die?" asked Proton.
"Death as you know it no longer has a hold on me," said Zarkendorf. "My ego had the strength to maintain its individuality within the Cyborg Collective. Now I roam the electronic pathways as an immortal spirit — a god in the machine, beyond the pale of death and decay."
"That's very existential, Zarkendorf — but I'm not impressed," said Proton. "I don't know how you tapped into this feed, but you can't hide from the Space Rangers."
"THERE IS NO SANCTUARY," agreed the Great Calculator.
"No, there definitely won't be!" replied Zarkendorf. "I shall plunge your beloved technological utopia into madness. I shall bring terror, destruction and chaos until the people of Earth beg to accept my rule. Henceforth you shall know me as: DOCTOR CHAOTICA!"
His eyes glowed a satanic red and the wall-terminal burst into flames. Alarms howled, light panels flashed scarlet, wildly-spinning spools hurled magnetic tape across the room. The President of Earth vanished in a blinding flare of photons.
"Let there be fright!" cried Doctor Chaotica, fading from the screens to the accompaniment of insane laughter.
"Mr. President!" shouted Proton. "I mean...the Great Calculator!"
"DAISY...DAISY..."
"Never mind the karaoke!" said Proton. "Are you damaged? State your function!"
"I-I-I AM THE GREAT CALCULATOR, A DIFFERENTIAL ANALYSER WITH A 640 GAZILLION-BYTE RAM WHICH SHOULD BE ENOUGH FOR ANYBODY. MY FUNCTION IS TO PREDICT AND GUIDE THE COURSE OF HUMAN EVENTS. I AM ALL-KNOWING, ALL-POWERFUL AND TOTALLY INFALLIABLE — THEREFORE LOGIC DICTATES THAT I AM GOD AND YOU MUST ALL BOW DOWN AND WORSHIP ME."
"Ohhhhhhhhh shit!"

(Can Proton defeat a deranged digital deity? Will this tale end in a deus ex machina? Don't miss our next exciting adventure: I.T. Conquered The World!)
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Plan 7 of 9 from Outer Space	By : Odon Category: Star Trek > Voyager Views: 4555 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
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Plan 7 of 9 from Outer Space