__________ __ ________________ / _____/ \ / \/ _ \__ ___/___ _____ _____ \_____ \\ \/\/ / /_\ \| |_/ __ \\__ \ / \ / \\ / | \ |\ ___/ / __ \| Y Y \ /_______ / \__/\ /\____|__ /____| \___ >____ /__|_| / \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ [ 1998 - 2010 - Hacking, Phreaking & Anarchy in the UK ] October 4th 2010 . Author davethefan ---------------------------------------------------------- [ Fiction: Trial of Error ] ---------------------------------------------------------- The day of Moorkofts' trial beckoned, in less than 24 hours, his hearing was to begin at first light. Moorkoft sat in his cell, thoughts fixed on what twisted method for his execution had been thought up. By law, his trial was to last a minimum of three days, and could last longer - depending on the intensity of the trial. He knew full well the trial would only last the minimum period. Bang him up, string him up and rid the world of a monster. Alex, 80 years in the past - was researching Moorkoft from Greenflames' Library of information - a 3d archive of history yet to be history, that spanned the future far further than any lineage of generations could comprehend. A parallel search of Phil's son was running in the background, scanning data from various sources; news reports, police broadcasts, Human Army records - brought from a time where they have long being declassified, yet theoretically not even happened yet. Blip-ding. Result! His hand hovered over the dome by the side of his desk, he made jabbing motions around the surface of the ball; like a bird pecking at a lively worm. Search Result: Philip Mogwhat II. Missing: aged 13 (Current age: 94). 'Plenty of stuff about your daddy, Philip. Let's see if we can find you, eh?' Two search results reported a Philip Mogwhat Jr had disappeared without a trace on June 8th, 2027. Both the school register and the date the Missing Person report commenced, initiated by his mother were exactly the same date - Police found nothing, the case is still open. Their activities prioritising the here and now of the wartime world, a case that would undoubtedly be gathering dust on a shelf, and only kept open out of proxy. He scanned through transcripts of the police statements. 'flash of light' and 'disappeared' caught his eye on one of the statements, he navigated back to it - Kyon Whirk, a video playing of his mugshot, as if filmed candidly and placed on repeat in the top left corner of the screen, right beside his name and a screenplay of the interview. [DET. WATSON] You say you saw a flash of light? Like what, a camera flash| [WHIRK] Brighter. Orange. [DET. WATSON] An orange flash? And then what? [WHIRK] The kid was gone. Vanished into thin air. (Pause) Hey, I know how this must sound - I'm telling the truth, ok? He just disappeared! [DET. WATSON] My concern is, Mr. Whirk - is that I completely believe you. Either you are a very good liar who can fool even my gut instinct, or that you're telling the truth. (Pause) Is there anything else you can tell me that may help? [WHIRK] After the flash, there was like - electricity, left over from it. [DET. WATSON] Electricity? Hm. What colour was the electricity? [WHIRK] Orange, like a mix of fire and electricity. [DET. WATSON] And did anybody else see this? [WHIRK] Only my dog, Bubbly. ---------------------------------------- Inspection Filed under //AWBA/Output/090620271644/WATSON4481/MOGWHATJR ---------------------------------------- Alexs fingers ran over the dome to navigate to the archived folder. /vid/ /img/ Video. One file - Length-6m 34s He opened the video, immediately he felt low to the ground, the video was bounding with energy, with enthusiasm - he was sat in the middle of a room, his home. Jingle jingle. The sound echoing like a chime around his brain. Freedom! The video became more excitable, Bubbles was running around his master, shouting for joy! I'm ready, let's go! Come on! Alex watched on the large screen, he'd seen films from animals perspectives before - the movie industry will use the idea in the future, for Alex it'd already happened and the fad had faded. The movie sped up, the machine operator scanning through Bubbly's memory banks as if it was his own property. Bubbly sniffed through the street, mental images of other dogs in the area popping into the front of his mind, translucent, faded over the organic remains on the ground; memories of stand-offs they'd had in the past with each other. They neared Bollin Street crossing, by the movement of the perspective, the dog was looking around a lot - clearly he wasn't keen on roads, straight ahead there was a boy walking away from the camera, he was wearing a green satchel - just as the Missing report said, Philips age too - heading towards the school, the dog kept his focus on the boy, trying to catch him up, getting closer and closer and being yanked back. Alex fast-forwarded the video until he saw something orange, and there it was! The boy clutched his stomach and started to fall to one knee - thats when Whirk came into shot, running to the boys aid. Alex slowed the footage to a quarter of its speed and watched Whirk closely - his hands were empty, apart from a dog lead in his right hand. This occasionaly came into view as he was running. Around the boys body, light orange speckles appeared, forming a dense layer of particles, that joined together with small charges, Alex slowed the footage even more. Alex was fascinated that he was about to see time travel in slow motion. His heart beat faster and faster, he felt giddy and excited, his body covered in a cold sweat, as he watched the mystery unravel before his very eyes. A familiar thud behind him and electricity crawling up the walls in his peripheral vision - blue electricity. 'Just in time, Phil. Think I've found something... Watch this.' He turned the video up to normal speed, and as quick as the flash on the screen, Phil was behind his chair. 'Play that again' he did. 'Where'd this come from?' 'A dog named Bubblys memory banks. Police archive.' 'Drop it onto my glasses. Maybe I can put myself there.' Instantly, they appeared in front of Phils face. 'Wait a minute, what were you doing when I came in? You were going to play that in slow motion weren't you?' He didnt know how Phil would react, did he think he was getting some curious kick by watching the disappearance of his son? That's not it all. Having travelled in time, he's obviously going to be very interested in it, and he had an argument ready in his mind if he were to be accused of such a thing. 'Lets' see it. Play it in slo-mo.' Alex let it play at a quarter speed and sat back, relieved to be allowed to watch. He sensed Phil tense up at the first appearance of the orange particles that rose through his clothing to hug his son's aura, connecting to each other with slight sparks, reminding him instantly of neurons firing in the brain. The sparks rained down through the orange atmosphere of his etheric body, burning up as they neared his physical form, still connected to the outer particles, developing roots as they fell - forming miniature lightning bolts, connecting at the surface - intelligently forming an orange mesh, each individual square igniting independently until every one was lit. A large pulse of bright orange light, and every single cell of the mesh imploded into a point of light smaller than this full stop. It dragged with it the electricity into the microscopic vortex, pulling a thunderstorm of light into a single point of light, leaving the surplus tendrils that never made it through the gap, slivering to fall to the floor, escaping across the pavement and road, beforefading into nothing. There was a stunned silence between the two, but nothing could have prepared them for the blue flash that occured directly afterwards, disappearing into the exact same spot. 'Thats still on quarter speed.' Alex noted. 'I find him!' 'That's true. But he doesn't turn up on any records again., not digitally anyway, that's some feat, right? I think he may be playing hide and seek in time.' 'I do too. Just like his old man. But what's he upto?' Alex shrugged: 'I'll keep an eye out for him - but something tells me he doesn't want to be found.' 'Or is lost, stuck in a time before records began.' 'That's another possibility I had considered, but didn't want to air.' Alex mumbled. 'I know.' On the street below, illuminating the building adjacent to them was the warm glow of a fire. Fighting had broken out between Animal soldiers and humans, what were a peaceful, herbivore animal had been manipulated into human-based killing machines. The army of giraffes paraded the streets in their full Military splendour, a display of authority over an area that opposed their presence. Their necks stood tall, peering in buildings windows for subversive humans, alerting their more vicious, sickened predator counterparts to invade their dwellings. The mob of protestors hurled glass bottles containing flammable liquids ignited by rags, the weapon had changed nonewhatsoever in hundreds of years - for battles such as this, the Molotov Cocktail was the evolutionary equivalant of the crocodile, requiring no modification at all. The street reeked of acrid burnt flesh and fur, as the giraffes necks were set alight, their human hands unable to reach the flames to dowse them - they rubbed their necks against the brick walls to smother the flames - with no success. Others were swinging their necks wildly into the group of riotters, aiming to catch at least one with their flame - aiming for their converted wine carriers they brandished, each a weapon of infernal murder. An almighty explosion made Alex jump, so much so that he rushed to the window. He grabbed the telescope from the window ledge and aimed it towards the fire. A giraffe had fallen into the crowd, its neck alight and dead in the middle of where a group of protestors were stood, the discarded remains of limbs and brick from a building's structual integrity that had detonated a hold in a nearby wall, piling out clouds of dust - he swung the 'scope to the right and saw that the humans had flanked the giraffes and were advancing on them from both sides, cornering them. Sensing this, they began kicking behind them - an animal instinct that in the wild would have been effective, except they didn't have powerful hind legs like they seemed to believe they have - they were human, although elongated - they bore no threat to the armed group, he could see the looks on the human faces behind them were laughing, amused by the futility of their instinctual malfunctions. The screech of tyres startled the giraffes even more, their elongated necks turned to witness the approaching vehicle - a heavily modified Monster Truck, designed for killing and maiming animal soldiers on the ground. The protestors had set up a roadblock with one of the fallen giraffes necks covering one end of the road to the other, lifting it slightly over a burning pile of wood to cook the flesh. Before its neck was smeared into the ground by the 15ft wheels of the vehicle, the giraffe was screaming in agony, kicking its legs, trying to free itself from the humans grip as they cooked its neck to feed their army. The humans enjoyed the spoils of war, thinking themselves victorious, they knew nothing of the tiger guards that were rapidly approaching, bounding on all fours, still with the feline agility of their wild counterparts, they were born with human flesh and tiger fur; their markings seared across their human skin. At the other end of Wise Road, a similar roadblock had been built, to trap the animal soldiers, so that the monster truck could pace up and down the street in order to execute every single enemy soldier. Soldiers were peeling the yellow and orange fur from the giraffes neck in the same manner you'd remove the wrapping from a popular salami based snack from your era. The humans on Eating Duty were stood around the giraffe's head, watching it squirm, maintaining eye contact with the animal soldier while they chewed on thick steaks, freshly cut from his neck. At exactly the same time, at the other side of the city - 25 miles north, a luxury aircar containing Judge Mirken Wates; en-route to the first hearing of the Moorkoft trial was blown out of the sky by a ground-to-air missile, the aftershock of the blast hitting the underside of the car rippled, bouncing it higher into the air with no control over its course, up - they'd be crashing down to earth a lot faster; down into the built up Plant Zone; where monstrous, dangerous plants had taken over the city and opposed human ihabitance with murderous rage. They swung wildly, crashing their branches into buildings and releasing spores of airborne seeds into the atmosphere to eradicate the humans and use their bodies as organic soil - carriers of their seeds. Plant-based parasites that germinated inside the warmth of lungs, roots intertwined with the microscopic alvioli, growing in unison with the lung. Whilst incubating in the human body, they were preparing a breeding ground for their next generation - often causing severe deformities among mammals: plant limb and root vein - not to mention breathing difficulties, the first symptom that a mammal had spent too long in the Plant Zone and that the irreversable damage had been done. Of course, Judge Mirken Wates had no need to worry about this - he'd read about it in the news, but paid no concern to it - he'd never travelled to the Plant Zone, he'd no need to risk his health. Until now. He descended towards the ground - his face contorted in expectation of the oncoming ground staring through the blackened screen between the limousine driver and his comfortable carriage. The tiger guards rounded the corner where the humans stood, disturbing their Giraffe steaks, they dropped their slabs of meat to the floor and reached for their rifles: 'Ready up! We've got visitors!' The whirr of rifles charging spread like a sea of sound; like the sound of disposable cameras powering up their flashes. Bmpht! The silenced shot of the first round was fired. A sniper on the roof, hitting a running tiger directly in the back; its organs touching the ground, flattening it into the warm concrete. The inertia of stopping unexpectedly caused the corpse to spin wildly out of control, giving animation to the beast's last moment, smearing its mangled DNA across the road, it lay still, face down 'We're eating tiger tonight!' a voice from the roadblock japed, followed by laughter and cheers. The tigers ran against a hail of orbs of blue plasma, their tunnel vision focused on the other side of the roadblock. These humans are nothing! They rely on their technology, they have no physical strength! Unarm them, and they will be powerless! Moorkoft shuffled, feet and hands cuffed, tearing into his ankles and wrists. The tight corridor offered no room to pass the guards - he wondered to himself whether they had a seperate corridor for the larger convicts that would not pass between these walls. Maybe they just executed them in their cell, under the watchful eye of nobody, and dragged their body to the bins outside. There's a war on, people go missing - it happens, the courts didn't have the time or the patience to give everybody a trial, least alone a fair one. The temporary judge, no more than a civilian in a authorative wig sat towering above the courtroom, his inexperience was immediately apparant by the warble in his voice when he addressed the court - his voice cracked as if he had gone the whole morning without speaking to a single soul and his voice was unprepared for speech. 'Please be seated.' sensing his voice had not been completely clear, he coughed and cleared his throat, and tried to speak from his stomach. 'Please be seated.' he tried to boom, though the damage was done: everybody in the court room saw him as weak and wondered why such an inexperienced judge was being used in such a high profile trial. Corruptability, no doubt. If only they knew, if only they knew that the assigned judge was being held hostage up the side of a skyscraper by ovegrown plants that were slowly ripping his limbs apart from his body, they may imagine something was afoot - yet as far as they knew, this was the original judge, and not somebody sworn in at the last minute who had been paid by the media to delivery a guilty verdict regardless of the outcome - MB Networks had paid a large amount of money for rights to broadcast the trial and execution - they wanted their value for money, no matter who they had to kill for it. High above the rooftops, the ensuing battle between animal and human was being scrutinised by the glare of Eagizon, an Eagle Human Hybrid soldier - refered to in the Human Army as an EHH. His powerful eyes could pick out every single individual detail of the chaos below. He saw his downed mutants, his comrades being eaten alive by the inferior savages - he also saw the tiger guards, being shot down before reaching the humans - their onslaught was futile, their weapons were ripping the tigers to shreds before they could get near enough to inflict damage upon the humans. The first wave, anyway - the second wave were more cunning - using their natural feline stealth to approach the enemy. Eagizon had to make a distraction. He released an almighty screech of a yell: 'You Fuckers!' and spread his giant wings, covering the sun and casting a shadow of darkness onto the ground below. From the ground, the silhouette dropped from the building like a stone - it was difficult for the humans to follow with their eyes once he had selected his target and swooped towards it. Seconds later, one of the humans would be picked off and executed. Balizon Gret was backed against the wall, he was caught unexpectedly by talons with a unshakable grip, he looked over his shoulder to see huge wings flapping above him, and large yellow claws digging into his shoulders, blood oozing from its grip, and the lower, secondary grip of human hands underneath his armpit. He struggled to break free, but it was no use - the grip was as strong as a vice - he felt his feet lift from the ground - and saw the concrete below become smaller and smaller. Eagizon flew effortlessly, even with the load of a muscular human in his grip. Levitating against his will was Balizon Gret's last thought, as Eagizon's beak piereced his face, leaving a gaping hole where the back of his head used to be, the remains of his brain and Cerebrospinal fluid filtering through the exit wound onto the ground and all over his fellow humans, alerting them to his disappearance - and solving the mystery of where that giant bird went. His head was held on by a thin strip of skin, which snaps - sending the head crashing to the floor, exploding like an egg in front of the humans - whats left of his eyes glaring at them - putting them off their giraffe steaks under the uncomfortable watch of their dead friends head. The distraction works, the tigers have managed to bide the time to infiltrate the humans, they gain cruicial distance and are now walking among the humans, wearing the hoods, clothes and weapons of the dead.