The Weapon - Lex - part 20
By Diana the Valkyrie
Geoff's story
Update: 04/11/2003 to valkyrie05



Geoff:

I was down in the server farm, putting fresh weed killer on the file systems.
It's terrible the way you have to keep updating the weed killer, but if you
don't, the servers get so choked with worms and weeds and stuff, they can't do
their job properly. And my mobile buzzed; when I looked, it was Ms Cattermole.
Oh god. Her.

That woman makes my knees tremble, makes my bowels watery. She's one of the
high-up people at Roberts and Williams, Attorneys-at-law, and I'm just a peon.
Just another dumb farmer, tending the server farm. For some reason, she hates
me. I can't understand why, I'm such a low form of life, she shouldn't even be
aware that I exist. Like pond scum. Although, in my dreams ... ah, that's a
different matter.

So naturally, I dropped everything, threw the weedkiller at Sally Hambington,
told her to finish the job, and ran. When Ms Cattermole says "jump", you don't
ask how high, you just jump. She'll tell you if you got it wrong. Somehow, I
always do.

"You're in a meeting in half an hour," she said. "Ulp," I replied. "Make sure
you have your mobile," she continued. As if anyone these days goes anywhere
without their mobile. "Courthouse, room seventeen." And she tuned me out, went
back to her papers. I waited a bit to see if there was anything else, like
maybe "That's all, get your ass out of here", but there wasn't. Me, pond scum.

I collected a spare mobile battery, if I ran out of battery I'd look such a
fool, and scooted over to the courthouse. If I had an electric scooter, I
thought, I wouldn't have to leave so early, but I can't really justify one for
how much I'd use it.

Outside the courthouse, there was a big demo going. It was the Humanity First
crowd again, I guessed that there might be something special going on. Maybe I
should read the newsfeeds more, but who has time for that when you've got a
farm to tend? They were shouting "Aliens Out" as usual. I mean, so what?
What's the beef? The Guardian of Humanity is the greatest thing that's ever
happened to us. We should have ten like that. No, a thousand.

So I just picked up my scooter, folded it up, put my head down and got into
the building. I found room 17, and sat down in the public area, at the back.
Then some other people started to arrive. There was some old lady in a black
gown, she was the judge. Then I saw Ms Cattermole, then some grey haired guy
in a grey suit, and then ... and then ...

Oh, my god.

So that's what they were demonstrating about!

I pointed my mobile at her, and started snapping off shots. Sure, there's a
zillion pictures of the Guardian of Humanity on the net, but these would be
mine! But I soon stopped, there wasn't really much point.

You see, you can take a picture, but it doesn't really convey the feeling. In
a still picture, you see a static pose, but that's not what I saw. What I saw
was, was. Hey, I'm a techie, not a poet. But I'll try.

She was power and glory, she was potency and pulchritude, she was trust and
love. I suppose quite a lot of that was coming from what I knew, not what I
saw. But you see a beautiful female, long hair trailing down her back, and
she's flying, actually flying, a few feet off the ground, with two huge white
wings slowly flapping to and fro as she propels herself forward. And your mind
supplies the fact that she's 150 years old, and expects to live for several
billion more. That she can summon the power of a thousand stars. And that
no-one has every really gotten a good grasp of what she's capable of.

After a few seconds, I remembered to breathe again.

I don't know what they were talking about up there, I was focussed on the
Guardian of Humanity to the exclusion of everything. It isn't every day you
see her in the flesh - no, wrong word. In whatever it is she's made of.

It ended much too soon, and she flew out of the room, leaving me sitting in a
daze. The others all left, and I came back to Planet Earth with a jolt. I ran
out of the building, unfolded my scooter and scooted back to the office. I was
kind of hoping I'd see her again there, but I was out of luck.