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185 lines
6 KiB
Text
185 lines
6 KiB
Text
.LP
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.ce
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.ps 16
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.CW
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PIECES OF FILTH
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.R
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.ps 8
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.CW
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tags: 1886, haus_mold, jerrymander_mold
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.R
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Haus was down. Jerrymander sank backwards into the wagon and hugged
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his satchel. The Mold family backups.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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More shots rang out from the top of the canyon. A gurgle came out
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of Haus. He would be useless for at least another hour.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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The Secret Service detail had vanished into the brush.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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These fools worshiped a blank sheet of paper.
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.I
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Any
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.R
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blank sheet of
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paper. Considered them sacred. That's why they didn't like it when you
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filled them with words.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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And Jerrymander Mold had gotten an awful lot of ink. According to
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the
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.I
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Blanks
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.R
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(as they were known), excess quantities of pulp were
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spoiled disseminating the tales of his exploits. Naturally, such
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tended to happen when you were the President of the United States, but the
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.I
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Blanks
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.R
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refused to abide the extraordinary circumstances. The
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simple inevitability of the press' fascination with power was
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considered, by their stubborn, peculiar order, to be no excuse. They
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declared Jerrymander responsible for the destruction of the 25 lb.,
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white bond industry. The market had proven incapable of fulfilling
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wartime demand. Therefore, President Mold, as the dominant public
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figure of the war, was obviously to blame for the industry's collapse.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Haus had uncovered only minimal data on their rituals, but it had
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been enough to put the fear of the Green into Jerrymander. By his
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reckoning, they indulged in blatantly inhumane practices. And now they
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had tracked him into the canyon.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Echoes of movement had been detected nearby. Or so Jerrymander
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calculated the delay. He hesitated to peek over the side of the wagon.
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He could see nothing but the sky and the western rim of the canyon,
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straight ahead of him.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Ten minutes elapsed with no further shots fired. Jerrymander
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assumed the
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.I
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Blanks
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.R
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had moved on, but he declined to relax his grip on
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the satchel.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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By any means necessary, the backups must be preserved.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Two hours elapsed. Jerrymander pulled out a blank sheet of paper
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and investigated it in the failing sunlight. It looked normal enough
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to him. He felt no particular spiritual stirring. Of course, the
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nature of his mechanical body guaranteed that this would be the case.
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He found himself absent the necessary hardware to affect faith, even
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if his ghost had been willing. The virgin rectangle of white paper
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looked very much to him like a virgin rectangle of white paper. It lay
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spread out on his hand, motionless and lacking in semantic content. He
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turned it over and examined it at different angles, but could only
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derive this same, dispassionate reading.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Haus started awake with a gasp. He spit blood on the floor of the
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wagon, all the while cursing the name of the Green.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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"These people are truly trying my patience," he remarked, bitterly.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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"I know what you mean. First they elect me, and then they want to
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kill me just because I find it insensible to worship reams of
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tractor\-feed printer paper."
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.PP
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.ps 10
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"It's amazing they've tolerated you for so long."
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Jerrymander threw up his hands. "They're a guerrilla force. The
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Federal government is fat and slow. Furthermore, the recalcitrant
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aesthetic appeals to the mainstream. These are not the ingredients of
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an Administration victory."
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.PP
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.ps 10
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The horses were tired. Haus decided that the wagon could afford to
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stay put until morning, even in its disadvantaged position. He'd
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finally gotten the shields up and running. At first light he'd try to
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track down the awol SS men, while Jerrymander made a beeline for the
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Continuity of Government bunker thirty miles to the north. The
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President would be safe there, provided he didn't run into any more
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.I
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Blanks
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.R
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along the way.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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They divided the backups between themselves according to family
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protocol. Haus carefully punched out duplicates of everything they
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had. He took the originals and gave his new copies to the President.
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If either of them were captured or killed, at least one full copy
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would survive. If both of them were captured or killed, the
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preservation of the archive would be irrelevant anyway. They were the
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only remaining Molds left alive, and it took a living Mold to resume a
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saved state.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Haus realized then that the Molds were the precise antithesis of
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everything the
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.I
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Blanks
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.R
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stood for.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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All the more reason to survive.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Jerrymander dreamed of white squares in space. He conceived them
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almost as overlapping pixels, multiplying until they blotted out the
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stars and planets. In his dream, he observed the total heat death of
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the universe, presented as a linear narrative spanning the spectrum
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from red shift to blue shift. Near the end, the white squares took on
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a pale, greenish hue.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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He fancied he could make out some meaningful pattern in the mesh of
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interlocking pixels. The whole enterprise brought to mind Penrose
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tiles. He felt that there must be some significance to the display
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that he couldn't quite grasp. Even in his dream he was frustrated that
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the solution seemed to languish just out of reach.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Jerrymander awoke with a crick in his neck. He ran some diagnostics
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and adjusted the latches of his spine, but this action only minimally
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reduced his discomfort. He realized then that he felt cold and reached
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for his jacket. He could definitely do with better weather. The skin
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on his knuckles was starting to crack.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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Haus had set off without waking him. It was just as well that they
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split up early in the day. Jerrymander checked his rifles and made
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sure his internal GPS was functioning as expected. Presently, he
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yanked on the reigns. The horses roused groggily to cruise velocity.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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As the wagon drug forward, each horse evacuated its bowels, one
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after the other, in an alternating pattern of green and brown.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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The dust of the trail caught in Jerrymander's teeth. His grimace
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felt permanent, fixed in place.
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.PP
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.ps 10
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He was embarrassed to admit that the smell of the horses bothered
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him.
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