Devil Destiny

by Michael G. Crawford

"Looks like this is it" he whispered. His friend Jim looked in the direction his friends eyes pointed, and saw the slight movement as an usher seated someone in their general area. As the newcomer turned to sit down, Jim could see the man's face shrouded in the darkness. The minute red glow of the implant could just be seen at this distance, and Jim shuddered at the sight of it.

"Isn't that the Secratary of State?" asked Jim's wife.

"Yep, old big dollars himself. But I guess those days are gone, aren't they?" he replied with obvious bitterness. He couldn't help it if he was just a wee bit bitter about the subjugation of his countries leaders by the Morn. The politicians red glowing eyes was really only a by-product of the bio- silicon lifeform which had been implanted in the man's system. The red glow was really more akin to a small L.E.D. which had been placed in the man's eye just above the iris. Although grown very much like a deposition of silicon on an L.E.D. wafer, this artifact was in fact alive, acting more as a receiver/transmitter, rather than a light emitting diode.

It was a sign of the times. Every important person on the planet now had the telltale sign of the Morn's interference, their incessant desire to control the destiny of man. Of course, the more rebellious youth of the world had been killing off those subjugated in this manner, but at twenty rebels to one controlled leader, their cause was doomed to failure.

Jim and others in his cell of quiet rebels, had long ago decided that the only method to disposing of the Morn was the disabling of the implants. This project then was the largest, most secret and incredibly hurried project in man's lifetime. For the Morn, in their hurry to control the leaders of the world, and as they assumed thereby control Earth, they had made the mistake of not controlling the scientists of Earth.

Perhaps it was a flaw in their understanding of Earth's power structure, or perhaps an ignorance of the proven ability of the science community to provide the tools which provided the power to the politicians. If they had only studied DaVinci or the more modern Oppenheimer, they would have known that a scientist anxious to provide his political leaders with power, could determine the entire course of human existence. In fact, if the Morn had even looked at recent history, and seen the decline in economic power demonstrated by the United States' unwillingness to fund growth in the "power sciences". The entire economics of providing power had been relegated to government regulated industries, who in their attempts to stay afloat under such harsh limits on their competiveness, had not spent one dollar on research for cheaper, cleaner, safer, and more efficient power. Subsequently, the world's future had become totally dependendent upon the scientists ability to build better power sources while fighting an ever decreasing budget.

The result, of course, had been some rather dramatic accidents in the course of investigation into new power sources. Short cuts had led to lack of proper precaution. Just as in the Manhattan Project, many scientists found themselves only guessing at the control problems for the new energy sources. Eventually, someone misread the danger, and in haste to prove the existence of Quark Disentegration Energy (QDE) or "cuties", one such scientest had blown the side out of Lawrence Livermore Labs and punched a whole in the nearby hills.

Eventually, a subtle fraction of a second later, the beam of blue light had made a straight hole through buildings in Palo Alto, the Santa Cruz Coastal Mountains, and had flashed on out into space, a slight curvature due to gravity causing the beam to bend toward the Morn's galaxy some 650,000 lights years distant. As luck would have it, the Quark Speed beam had impacted an asteroid in the outer belt of the Morn's furthest mining colony, igniting the gaseous core into an explosion resembling a giant flare sent up by downed airmen. The Morn of course had come investigating after checking their monitoring devices, following the trajectory of the beam as it had bent around a number of gravity wells on its journey.

Despite their earlier failures, no one in Jim's project group had been discovered or even suspected of an attempt to stop the whole business.

For in their planning they had strived to find a method where they could attempt to destroy the implants, without seeming to be trying. For instance, they couldn't just walk up and point some electronic or biological weapon and expect to not be detained. No the solution they had hit upon was the simplist yet most pervasive means available to Earthmen today. The television camera.

Using tickery unimaginable, they had altered various reporting cameras to test their devices, keying on obvious political figures. If they could disable the implants with their technique, then everywhere a politician was, there would also be an anti implant device.

If the test failed, no one would be comprimised. If teh test succeeded, then it was up to the scientists to zap the other politicians in their vicinity, before the Morn would regain a critical mass of leaders.

For this reason, Jim unconsciously fingered the small cigarette case in his jacket pocket. Inside the case, a small oscillator was ready to power a high power beam which was intended to flash in the eyes of the unsuspecting subjugate. If all went well, the implant would either die altogether, or in a less desirable, but certainly useful result, cease transmitting or receiving.

All that he and his compatriots needed to begin the assault was the word of the cameraman.

Looking up on the stage, he watched as the two cameras panned the audience, waiting for the planet-wide teleconference with the Morn leaders to begin. As the right hand camera came to rest on the Secretary of State, Jim involuntarily tensed. Here was the test coming up. The cameraman would zoom in on the small red square on the man's pupil. Then with crossed fingers he would press the button to fire the beam, hoping to see the red glow die.

"It worked" whispered his friend's voice, and looking back off stage, Jim saw the cameraman standing to the side of his camera.

Looking back to the politician, Jim saw the man shake his head as if in a daze. Suddenly Jim knew that they had been successful. With his signal, the television pictures on the monitors went blank and the "technical difficulty" message appeared. With a roar, people all over the audience began standing and aiming compacts, cigarette cases, cigarette lighters, purses, wallets, and various other hand held objects. Every politician in the building received a dose of the latest test device, its frequency being controlled worldwide by the generators tuned to the successful test frequency.

As politicians shrunk back from their fear of physical attack, quickly recovered as they realized that the voices in their heads had disappeared.

Jim stood and calmly walked over to the Secretary of State and placed his cigarette case in the man's hand, folding the Secretary's fingers around its smooth black surface.

"This will prevent you from ever being controlled again, Sir. Let's get you together with your peers and begin to re-take our world again." He only hoped that they could manage to maintain the new lack of control long enough.

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Last Updated: November 7, 1996