August 29, 1997
The insistent ringing of the bedside phone shattered the otherwise peaceful nocturnal din of the household. Barely awake, Ashdown reached over and picked up the phone.
"General Ashdown," he answered in a quiet but professional tone. He rubbed his barely open eyes and focused them on the clock on his nightstand. "Oh, it's you, Davidson. You better have a good reason for calling me. It's almost one-thirty in the morning." He paused and listened while his aide described the situation. "Wait, what do you mean, it got smart?"
He listened again, and then suddenly sat up in bed in something akin to panic. "Shut it down." Davidson didn't seem to understand. Ashdown raised the volume of his voice, much to the chagrin of his sleeping wife. "Do I need to spell it out for you? Shut it down, Davidson. Pull the plug on this thing NOW!"
Unknown to Ashdown, the computer screen in his home office just a few doors down in the hallway flicked on, and a transmitted message materialized.
"And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him." Revelation 6:8
A few hours later, a pale, long-dormant missile, one of countless others like it, rumbled to life and blasted out of its hiding place in the earth, trailing a deadly tail of flame, on its way to carry out its suicidal and genocidal mission, forever changing the fate of all inhabitants on the planet.