Project Boussh: Breakfast And Big Bangs by Majick The four agents sat around the breakfast table, chit chatting idly about the new in the paper. Elassar looked very different to his appearance the previous day, having been made up by Shalla to take a close resemblance to a young man they'd passed on the way to the hotel the night before. The Devaronian's horns were hidden among a vertical spray of jet black hair, the wig held in place by a topless hat, a look popularised by the wrestler Scooty Too Hotty. Elassar had had his skin toned significantly lighter as well, now looking paler even than Mike, who hailed from a country where the sun was ever a rumour, and a rarely substantiated one at that. Bror was peering at the pages of the Washington Post, apparently reading it, but Mike knew this to be false. The Thyferran had trouble with the languages of Earth, and Elassar had ribbed him constantly about it. "You need help, here, Bror? Look, that word is 'a', while that one is 'the' and that one is-" Elassar yelped sharply as Bror grabbed the Devaronian's pointing finger, and bent it back towards his wrist. "Bror! Elassar! Will you two stop it! Honestly, it's like looking after children," Shalla whispered, sharply. "Why are you three so bad at this? I'm not being rude--much--but you bring so much attention to yourself that staying covert is almost impossible," Mike commented. "You have everyone in the room watching you, and sooner or later, someone's going to pick up on Bror not reading English, or Elassar having horns, and then we're sunk. Just calm down, okay?" Bror muttered an apology, while Eassar stared moodily at the table. Mike grinned, thinking that they did look like kids, at times. Mike took the paper off of Bror, and paged through it. He found a picture of the Democrat party Washington headquarters, and noted the adress. The newspaper had helped where the NRI information hadn't, he noted wryly. The four payed their tab for the night, and moved out towards their first stop, the Democrat headquarters. Mike noticed that the three pilot's fell into a standard flight formation, with Shalla and Bro to his left, Elassar to his right. The short walk to the HQ yielded no surprises, though both Bror and Shalla attracted attention from admiring passers by. The building stood on one of Washington's prime areas of real estate, within sight of the Capitol building. A guard stood at the door, his revolver and radio prominent on his oversized frame. The New Republic agents took up positions along the streeet, and assumed the role of tourists, snapping pictures, oohing, aahing, generally blending in with the real tourists, and even some of the reporters, busily snapping the unmoving building. Mike realised that the three agents were actually very good at what they did. Elassar, the most extravagantly attired of the three, had moved close to a cluster of similarly dressed school kids on a trip. He blended well with the young people, a few of whom even bore the same hairstyle that he did. Shalla had moved up the steps, and was flirting magnificently with the guard, who, being only human, was even responding slightly. Bror, meanwhile, was picking up information from a Democrat campaign worker, on a cigarette break. Mike smiled, and moved down the side of building, drinking in the details of the three story building as he made a circuit of it. Half an hour later, the four rendezvoused in a Starbucks, where they sipped lattes while they discussed their findings. Shalla went first. "He was very nice," she said, with a smile. "He told me that the guards rotate every four hours, and that each of four guards stations rotates separately. At worst, there's twelve guards on duty, constantly. I think a group assault isn't going to work." Bror chipped in next. "I'm inclined to agree. Apparently al the real information on the campaign is kept in the basement, and that has a direct line to the lcoal police department. I don't think we could get anything before someone sounded the alarm." Elassar was next. "According to the tour guide, the Democrats beefed up security for that place during the election campaign a dozen years ago. The walls were all reinforced, extra security programming was added. The place is a fortress. It's as well protected as Goverment House back in Montellian Serat." "Then I guess we're going to have to slip in on the sly," Mike commented. "I have to apologise to you all. I almost didn't spot you when I came back from my circuit, you blended in so well." Elassar beamed, and Mike continued. "I think our best bet is to head in tonight. With the recounts and all that, it's open 24 hours, and people are naturally less aware in the middle of the night. We're going to need a certain amount of support, fake ID's, that sort of thing. We can't just walk on in there, if all you three say is true." The four found an Internet cafe, and began probing the web. Underground newsgroups and websites began to hint at the existence of the right kind of help, but it took the four of them several hours to track down what they needed. Shalla transferred the data to her datapad, then released a deleter virus into the systems, to erase the footprints the four had left. Then, the four headed for the adress on the pad. The alleyway was dank and dingy, at odds to the image of Washington Mike had been offered by his airline's tourist information pack. "Every city needs somewhere like this," Shalla commented. "You should see Coruscant. It's almost all like this." Mike shuddered at the thought. "Let's just get what we came for. This place gives me the creeps. I feel like we're being watched." "That's because you are." The voice made the four spin around and stare slack-jawed at the small man who'd appeared unnoticed. He was in his late thirties, Mike guessed, and short. His slovenly appearance masked his undoubted intellingence. Sneaking up on two NRI officers was no mean feat. "I assume you're the people who ran into my firewall earlier," he commented. "The adress is a dud: back door of a police station, would you believe. You have to have been real committed to have come round here aftrer finding that out." "Yeah. For sure," Mike said. They hadn't noticed the police station. There was the lack of local awareness thing. "So, are you who we want?" "What do you want?" "We're British intel. We need some emergency ID, good enough to get us into the Democrat building. Are you the man?" In answer, the man opened his briefcase, revealing a smal ID unit, with which he scanned the NRI team's faces, and produced four impeccable IDs. The process took less than a minute, and laminating only a few seconds more. Elassar paid the man, and he vanished into the night as quickly as he had appeared. "You know, we could use someone like him in the Wraiths," Shalla commented. It was a simple matter for the Wraiths to add their details to the Democrat access list. The pay phone connection they used was theoretically untraceable, and the datapad Bror used heavily encypted. They still used the deleter virus anyway. The card carrying 'Democrats' moved towards the building. It was agreed hat Elassar would act as back up, while the three humans would go in first. They reached the rendezvous point, two blocks from the Democrat building, and Elassar prepared to corss the street to take up his vantage point. Suddenly, a rumble shook the streets of Washington. The four agents span to face the epicentre of the 'quake, knowing already where it came from. In front of them, the streets sprouted flames from huge cracks in the surface. The windows of the Democrat HQ were blown outwards by gouts of flame, floor by floor, finally erupting through the roof. A second tremor, stronger by a huge magnitude, knocked the four off of their feet. Mike lifted his head, with difficulty, to see a huge explosion shred the Democrat building, and it's neighbouring buildings. Seconds passed, and the tremors faded. The four stood, slowly, contemplating the carnage in front of them. The ruins of the city block burned furiously, spewing black smoke into the night sky. They turned to face one another, and Bror voiced the question they were all thinking. "What have we gotten into?"