From:	"Michael R. Goldberg" <mrgoldbe@**.NETCOM.COM>
Subject:	dueling machines
Date:	Sun, 16 Nov 1997 22:00:16 -0600

****** Private: Nightmare
>>>>>[ I have some news to report. While I am still stymied on where
the trid clip of Death's actions a couple of weeks ago, I have found
this gem in >>encrypted<<. There are decker footprints all over the
place and looks like Eriksen is aware of the incident as well. It
appears that the church keeps remote camera drones to make sure its
worshippers don't rip off the mother church. As usual, I constantly
amazed at the quality of friends that the Wanderer keeps.

Here's the clip, sir.

+++++ include: transmission

You see a poorly lit church. It is in relatively clean state, although
the furniture looks like it use a long vacation in a refurbishing shop.
In front of the alter there is a large man, praying. His dirty green
duster is not buttoned shut, and you can see the cross-pommel of a
sword, which means only one thing: The Wanderer. The camera slowly
pans by from an unseen drone. He is wearing black jeans, and a black
t-shirt. He has shades that cover up his green bug eyes and he is a
wearing a hat backwards to keep his bangs out his face. He has a
five-week old beard that is pretty thick and curly.

The side doors to an alcove off from the main sanctuary of the church,
open. A young woman, clad in biker leather's walks in. A priest who
happened to be walking down the stairs (from his office, most likely)
greets her in German, "Good afternoon, child."

The Wanderer has just made a cross gesture in front of his face. As he
starts the long way down to finish the cross, his pointer finger snags
his sunglasses and drags them way down his nose. He looks like he is
chewing gum, although still focusing on the floor. (At least his head
is facing the floor, but it is hard to tell where he is looking with
"bug" eyes.)

The woman responds (in German), "Father, I was looking for a cousin and
a friend of his. This is the picture of my cousin." After a half
second, the Wanderer grimaces and makes another cross gesture -- this
time pushing his sunglasses back on with the back of his hand. He
continues looking at the floor. "This is a picture of his friend.
Have you seen either of those?"

"Not recently, child, but if we look to God, no doubt, the Almighty
will lead you to them. Perhaps you would be willing to offer a
donation to the needy?"

"Ah -- sure." She hands the priest some hard cash, which the priest
amazingly makes disappear quickly.

+++++ interrupt transmission
I love the reality's of day to day life. Where does War find these
type of people?
+++++ continue transmission

As she starts to walk away the priest says, "Child, I recommend you
pray before leaving." The Wanderer grins tightly. The woman raises
an eyebrow and walks into the main sanctuary. She stops in the doorway
in amazement as the Wanderer looks up at her.

In smooth German, the Wanderer says, "Can I help you, madam?"

She responds calmly, "Why, yes you can, in matter of fact." As she
reaches for something in her jacket, the Wanderer leaps up and rushes
her. He is moving way too fast, and is almost in point-blank range by
the time she has the gun drawn. He dodges behind a column as the shot
goes way wide and then heads to the main sanctuary doors at the far end
of the church.

The woman drops into a crouch and fires at him, the shots echoing
hollowly. The Wanderer continues running and smoothly weaves in and
out of the shadows of the columns lining the side of the chapel,
preventing her from getting a good shot. Realizing the situation, she
bolts out the side door.

The doors fly open as the Wanderer continues running to his left. In
the distance, you hear the roar of a heavy motorcycle starting up. The
Wanderer easily hops a synth-wood fence and keeps on running through
people's backyards. He slams into one person and sends the person
flying. The person gets up in a daze. The woman roars her bike around
the front corner of the lot the Wanderer just ran through.

The Wanderer grins, and while not breaking his running pace, stuffs his
hat into one of the duster's pockets. He then folds his sunglasses and
mutters, "What's the matter, chica? You don't want to chase me through
people's yards?" He smoothly jumps another fence, which lands him in
the street again, just as the woman rounds the corner. The modified
bike's weapons open fire. The Wanderer does an amazingly dance of
avoidance and amazingly almost escapes the whole barrage unscathed.
(His jacket isn't nearly so lucky though.) He continues to make a good
pace down the street and turns into an alleyway as he reaches into an
inner pocket and pulls out a remote. In the distance you see a bike,
with a kid (no older than probably 12 or 13) admiring the bike. The
kid's eyes get wide as he sees the Wanderer running full steam at him.
If possible they get bigger as the other bike comes roaring around the
corner.

The Wanderer snarls something unintelligible as the bike roars to life
(from the remote probably). He kicks the kid into the alley-wall as he
leaps on the bike. Weapon fire streams by as the bike immediately goes
into motion. The Wanderer barely keeps control of the bike as he takes
off since he pays more attention to watching the other motorcycle than
to the alleyway. The woman smoothly jumps the stunned kid and keeps
barreling down the alleyway.

The Wanderer takes a sharp corner and nearly gets rammed by on-coming
traffic as he drives heedlessly into traffic. "Fragging idiots." In
the distance, you can hear sirens blaring. The woman follows into
traffic smoothly and keeps pace for a short distance. However, the
Wanderer's bike is a racing bike and slowly he widens the gap between
him and the chaser. He reaches in the bike bag and pulls out a beaten
up helmet. Quickly he puts it on, ignoring the fact it almost causes
him to get into a car accident with a parked car. He then purposely
brings the cycle up on the sidewalk, causing people to dive for cover,
as the bullets continue to chase after him.

"At least she hasn't used missiles on me yet. Probably fragging needs
hard proof and a missile wouldn't leave any." The bullets stop firing
as he takes a corner wide (putting him back on the street) and the
other rider looses line of sight of him. He quickly reaches into his
bag and pulls out a grenade. Pulling the pin, he tosses it smoothly
over the shoulder.

The woman roars around the corner and all of sudden, the bike surges to
life as she rapidly starts to gain ground on the Wanderer. Then she
sees the grenade and stops firing as she barely keeps the bike upright
from the resulting white phosphorous explosion. Wisely, she drives to
the side of the burning zone and keeps after him. The Wanderer
meanwhile, continues his straight run toward the edge of town.

As he is passing the last intersection in this little town, a police
car roars into the intersection clipping his back tire. The Wanderer's
reaction to the pain of his right leg sliding on the ground is hidden
by the helmet. He pulls hard on the front handlebars as he forces the
bike to turn around completely 360 degrees and then pushes himself up,
and keeps going.

She roars around the back of the car and keeps gaining on the Wanderer,
streaming a dense blue smoke for a hundred yards that hides her from
the police car. Meanwhile, the Wanderer presses a button on the bike
and tosses a small device into his bag. He then carefully closes the
bag while trying to keep focused on going straight, as the bullets
begin to fly at him again. He grins and tosses the bag. It explodes
into a huge fireball as it hits the ground, which forces the woman to
drive into the brush on the right side, and she gets attacked by sticks
in the face for her efforts. The Wanderer skids on his left leg and
races off-road through the lightly wooded area It takes the
woman precious seconds to get back on his trail as the Wanderer
continues to run hard, heedless of the abuse he is taking from branches
from the trees.

Suddenly, the Wanderer drives right off a small drop (probably only 20
meters or so). He jumps off his bike and disappears into thin air.
The bike, riderless crashes to the ground below and skids to a stop.

The woman barely reigns in her bike. Looking for any sign of life, she
uses the vehicle weapons to fire at the breaking branches. You hear a
grunt, as a bigger branch breaks under the momentum. Suddenly, it is
completely silent as the Wanderer must have hit the ground.

Then the woman sees it -- another grenade incoming fast! This one is
completely on target for her. She just barely gets her and her bike
out the path as a white phosphorous cloud blooms right where she was.

In the distance, a blood-curdling scream is unleashes its fury at the
sky and world at large.

++++++ end transmission

She tried following his "blood" trail, but the trail dried up after
about one minute of following it. She was left in the middle of a
lightly wooded area with no real trail. I suspect Pestilence and
Famine were the reason she couldn't follow the trail, but I couldn't
prove it because the drone never spotted them.

Fireworks anyone? My analysis is simple: Death's next target was the
>>encrypted<<.. They will probably delay now, or possibly change
targets rather than risk further exposure. In addition, I bet War will
want revenge.

As we expected, War is even harder to kill than the Wanderer was. The
hunter, I believe is a woman called, Harley.

+++++ include: Harley.report ]<<<<<
-- Ratspeak <04:00:00/17-NOV-58>

***** Private: Ratspeak
>>>>>[ War is even harder to kill for at a couple reasons. Death and
Pestilence have quickened enough spells on him to make him even more
deadly. Further more, it looks Death has taught him finesse as well.
Doomsday and Whirlwind will never take him now. How unfortunate.
Still, this could be to our advantage assuming they can get Eriksen to
respect them. Do not contact Eriksen yet, because I wish to see how
they will handle his team's imminent arrival.

I expect they will continue only light observation on their true
target. I will expect they will do one of to things. One, plan an
ambush, or two, prepare to leave the area for another target. Still,
it is a known fact that between the four of them, common sense is not a
strong trait. Perhaps it would be wiser to expect the unexpected.
]<<<<<
-- Nightmare <04:01:57/17-NOV-58>