He awoke floating in a haze of euphoria and numbness, but even that wasn't enough anymore. It was like standing in a glass elevator and looking beneath you to see infinite floors below you – each one promising agonizing pain, mind-numbing torture, the futility of hope, and other proverbial fires of hell. Then watching the glass crack in your fragile cage. This was the last time he intended to be forced back here. Which was all well and good because from the look of it this was the last time that he could count on waking up to the fragile cage of his body still existing. As usual his plans were accomplished just in time. Well, except that once.
That morning he had looked out over Novendrica and once again reflected on the new deep-rooted connection that he now had with the land. Closing his eyes he let his vision travel to various parts of Threshold – then outwards to the various farms outlying the city. She was right – it did itch, he thought as his attention was temporarily drawn to the bunyip tree in the woods before refocusing his attention. He had managed better than he had hoped in tying himself to his new home. Oh his success may not have been entirely due to luck. After all it was common sense to tie himself peripherally to the other sleepers. Innocuously earn their trust, and then of course use it to carefully accomplish his own ends. He didn't have that much time left though. He had left the overlook he was musing on and carefully sat down at his desk – then picked up his pen. He had one last play to make – while he still could wake up.
Years ago when he had first stumbled across the Parallel Project on Earth, all he had been looking for was an escape. An escape from both the intense pain his condition had caused and the bitter regret from past actions. Anything seemed better than being trapped in the rapidly disentegrating prison that was his 'earthly flesh'. So he had escaped into another world. But try as he might old habits die hard, and he couldn't help but to meddle. After all Firma wasn't just a new frontier, it was its own world – and more than one pen must author history or no one would be able to bear to read it.
So he had established . It was an excellent cover after all, the vast majority of what was posted there never even touched on Firma. He had also recruited some of the best and brightest, well ok, three of the best and brightest. He had been careful to avoid recruiting from his first profession initially. Spending as much time on Firma rather than outside of it as he did it is small wonder that recruiting quickly took off without him. Still on the whole the impact had been positive and had given a dynamic to the world's growth that he had been looking for. Nevertheless the recruits had quickly gotten dumber and more self-absorbed. Yes, he definitely needed to tie up loose ends while he still had the time.
He checked his coms, and sure enough Adelaide was heading for Omega Pointe. He gathered together the pages that he wrote. Quickly double checking the message that he had carefully encrypted into his story. Yes the correct coding was all there: specification of the two targets, authorization of funds, the algorithms necessary to raise flags with his former agency contacts to ensure that message would be delivered – redundantly – to multiple agents. Yes his affairs were in order. He had taken every precaution with this imaginable. If the site was hacked and the post taken down – it still would not stop this. Should they travel to the past and prevent this from being posted on – the mirror sites, backup servers, would still get the message – and they still would not stop this. "Author W" aka "TJ" and "Aubern Leanan" may be ridiculously powerful godlike personages here; but on Earth they were the self-obsessed, shallow, typical fools that made up most of the population there – they would never even see this coming.
He had including the all the information that they would need to locate the targets. Who they could use inside the Parallel Project to get the necessary access to "Aubern" and make it look like the most reduntant thorough and obvious accident ever. The point being that they would not be able to stop it. He hoped that the message would be clear enough to all concerned. If the rights of both worlds could not be respected or ensured then they would be fought for by whatever means necessary. A sword, or in this case an online post, could always cut both ways.
He awoke floating in a haze of euphoria and numbness, nevertheless the pain hit him immediately and it took him a moment to gather together his concentration enough to begin giving the computer he was hooked into commands. Sure enough there was the file he had carefully composed by hand. He started scanning and, yes, there was she was. He connected with her computer – coffee shops were not known for its internet security – and used her recently acquired laptop to post the message. There it was done. Next he inserted the other necessary commands: his affairs were ironclad and in order, the funds were paid and the kill-switch set. Now all three people on Earth were as good as dead.
Adelaide smiled to herself. Mr. Black had been right – she had just needed some time to herself. Arrayed before her in the coffee shop was a milieu of various pastries and hot beverages. Most notably the many empty cups that used to contain hot mocha lattes. Her eyes gleamed with the frenetic energy of rampant escapism as she played the recently released Diablo III computer game. The computer screen reflected off her eyes as she pictured the various demons she slaughtered with the Aubern's face. Yes this was quite cathartic.
She had bought top end of course. Thus never noticing the temporary hack or other processes used on her laptop while she enjoyed her game. Sadmin15 had posted his message successfully with her none the wiser.
Back on Novendrica Mr. Black awoke from his nap, stretched, and smiled to himself. Content in a job well-done. Gathering himself together he returned to the work stacked on his desk. Threshold wouldn't recruit new citizens, build its colleges, hospitals, and build its own infrastructure by itself after all.
On Earth a nondescript man and woman were standing by a bedside. In the bed a their long-time companion was hooked up not only to an excessive amount of medical equipment, but also to what appeared to be several servers and other advanced computers that could be operated by tracking his eye movements alone. They and many others had received the message posted on and other sites with this man's final requests.
They watched as the equipment began turning itself off. They waited the five minutes it took for everything to shut itself off. Two minutes later the body before them expired. Then the woman left the room while the man stayed and started planting the explosives.
Later that day the woman watched the building exploding on the news. It was a planned demolition of course that had been safely and thoroughly. She finished attaching herself to the machine, and went to sleep.
Mr. Black finished the interview and looked up. A woman across the cafe caught his eye, then made a hand sign. Smiling he returned with a complex series of gestures. The woman got up, and walked out. It wasn't until she had walked a block away that she allowed the grin to break out over her face. It had worked! Finally there was the ultimate retirement. A verifiable afterlife should your body on Earth wear out. She returned to her hotel and posted the 'Do Not Disturb' sign on the door. Then went to sleep to deliver the message.
His requests would have been honored before – but now the agencies would be zealous in executing their duties. You should never underestimate the extremes people are willing to go to in order to protect their retirement.