Priss knelt down, cracking her knuckles through her latex glove, and 
dragging a finger across the mush of gore that was nearly flattened 
down. The body looked as if it had been roasting in the hot sun for 
years, long past the point of identification. She looked up, and 
breathed in deep the stench of the room. Rot, and dryness and 
mothballs. 


"Anything special, Locke?" Sharpe asked. 


Priss glared up at the woman. She shrugged, and looked to the 
school officials, "If you'll excuse us, please." 


The group — the school principal and the faculty members who'd 
discovered the body — shuffled out of the room. The background 
noise of the school's plumbing system would drown out their 
conversation. 


"Well?" Sharpe asked softly, crouching down to Priss's level. 


"It's not dry," She mashed her finger down on the spot she'd first 
touched. It gave way, but didn't crumble, like greasy ground beef. 


"It's Florida, Agent Locke. Of course it's not dry." 


Priss sneered, and pointed up. Sharpe looked. "Smell." 
Sharpe shrugged, "Smells like death." 


"Smells like death down here. Stand up and smell. What it doesn't 
smell like is mold or mildew." 


"Because it smells like death," Sharpe put in. 


"You've never lived in a condo by the beach. If it were humid in here, 
you'd be able to smell the mold and mildew. Like... mud and piss 
and stale tobacco. It can smell like decomposition, but then 
someone would've noticed it a long time ago." 


Sharpe picked up on what Priss meant then, "So if this corpse had 
been here the whole time, it would have dried out, or else people 
would have smelled it way before just two days ago. | don't know, 
how is that enough to justify bringing the Foundation in?" 


Locke nodded to the device nearby. A stout 1ittle device, with 
wires streaming out of a teapot-like spout. The wires appeared 
cleanly severed at the end. Dust coated the near side of it, with the 
imprint of a hand shaped against it. A strip of paper was taped onto 
the side, with writing on it. 


"| still don't see why this warrants our attention." 


Priss sat back, resting her arms over her knees as she carefully 
examined the room, "Janitor said he checked this room a few weeks 
ago looking for a missing student and it was empty." 


"The janitor thought they checked this room. That's not proof 
enough. The door was wedged shut, we almost had to bust it down." 


"Regardless, what we have here is a corpse that has been here far 
longer than a year or two. We have clear evidence that this room, 
while not abandoned, has been opened up a few times in the past 
year or two. Meaning that up until two days ago, this corpse was not 
in this room." 


"Did they ever find that missing kid?" 


"Yeah, he was in the auditorium," Priss took out a notepad and 
started writing notes, "Someone told him about old fallout shelters 
beneath the school and he started looking for secret entrances 
around the school." 


"Doesn't seem unlikely that someone could hide a body in here. 
That janitor looked a little Hispanic-y... you Know how those types 
are..." 


"No," Priss finished writing, and got up to her feet, "I don't." She 
knocked on the door, waiting for the school officials to open it up. 
She noticed they still had their masks on as they came back in. 


"Could you smell it out there?" She asked. 


The principal nodded, averting his gaze from the mass of meat on 

the floor, "In the room upstairs, especially. It was the smell that got 
our attention. We thought it was rats in the ventilation system, but 

shutting off the air only made the smell worse. We tracked it down 

here." 


Locke didn't bother giving Sharpe a smug glance, the woman was 
already looking glumly resigned to the upcoming paperwork. 


"Alright. Thank you for your time. If you'll please step outside and 
meet with Dr. Horner above. Just a quick examination, just in case." 


The group nodded, and started to trudge out of the small room, 
heading up the stairs outside. Sharpe pursed her lips, resisting the 
urge to prod the body with her foot, "You think they caught 
something from the body?" 


"You know that's not what Horner does." 


"Mmm... what class do you think they'll get? | was always partial to 
Class-B's. One hell of a hangover without the hangover." 


"Do | look like | care?" She didn't look up from her notes, starting to 
take note of the clothing the body wore — or what remained of it, 
"Look at its clothes." 


Sharpe looked back down at the body, "What clothes?" 


She pointed, and Sharpe knelt down, carefully tugging at a strip of 
fabric near what had been a person's shoulder. It was blue, and 
brightly patterned. The threads were still connected to a longer strip 
going down its arm, and ending in a wide opening. 


"Looks like a robe. Not seeing any buttons." She knelt down closer, 
peering beneath its neck, "Can't see any tag, but I'm not gonna 
touch it to find out. What do you think?" 


Priss shrugged, "Could be nothing. Fabric looks like it was nice. 
Patterns might be Oriental. Principal mentioned the clothes looked 
Chinese." 


"Could be a Hawaiian shirt." 


"I'm operating under the assumption that this person was not a 
Florida native. Probably not even a US native." 


"Probably not an Earth native, even?" Sharpe stood up, "Come on, 
I'm tired of guessing. Call it in.” 


Priss looked to the body, then over to the device, "And that thing?" 


"| don't know, | can't read it. Fucking ancient Sanskrit or something. 


"It's Greek, you fool. Says 'Anabasis'." Priss tried to decipher the 
rest of the letters. She could read ancient Greek, but couldn't 
understand it. 


"She's too ugly a thing for a pretty name like that," Sharpe snorted, 
and turned towards the door, "What numbers are free? In case its 
somehow involved?" 


"You're jumping the gun here. We don't know anything about it. It 
might just be a tank of gas." 


"If it does turn up something, use '1856' for it." 
"Why?" 


Sharpe smiled, "I like that number. Plus, it's the year the Qing beat 
the Limeys out of Canton." 


Priss shook her head absently, "| don't get why you're so obsessed 
with China." 


"The Great Qing Empire is our top political enemy, Priss. It is good 
to know everything about your enemy." 


Priscilla stepped out of the room, ignoring her as she headed 
upstairs. 


Priss held her notepad up over her head, shading herself from the 
sun as she stepped out of the school and to her car parked nearby. 
Foundation vehicles and local police swarmed the area, and school 
had been cancelled for the week due to the discovery of the body. 
Out of nowhere, Rhiannon appeared, walking up to Priss before she 
could get away. 


"Hey Hey HEY Prissy-baby! You going back to school?" 
"It's work, you idiot." 


Rhiannon pouted, looking over at the police vehicles nearby, "It's 
hard to tell sometimes. Shadowy men in black-types don't like 
flaunting their shit out in public. What's going on that brings you 
here?" 


"Work," Priss repeated, "you idiot." 


That made Rhiannon smile. Her lips looked dry, and her teeth 
weren't reflecting in the sunlight, "Talk ugly to me, baby sister, you 
know how much | love it." 


Priss stepped closer, and noticed how Rhie slid back subtly, making 
it look like her usual saunters and sways. Priss winced, "You've 
been drinking. Rhiannon, it's not even 10 in the morning." 


Rhiannon pouted again, standing up straight and lifting an arm up, 
bringing it in and touching her nose with two fingers, as if taking a 
field sobriety test, "| swear, baby sister, | have not been drinking this 
day. This day. This day." She winked. 


Priss grabbed her arm, and started for her car again, "I'm driving you 


home. How'd you end up sleeping at the bar?" 


Rhiannon didn't resist, but moved jerkily, "I resent that, Prissy-baby; 
the bar closed at 5 AM, | didn't sleep at all." 


Priss thrust her into the passenger seat, and slipped into the driver's 
seat, setting her notepad aside. Rhiannon grabbed it before she 
could react. 


"Rhiannon, that's classified." 


"Fuck off," She thumbed through it, holding the pages upright 
between thumb and index finger, knowing how much Priss hated 
that. If she tried to snatch it away, the page would likely tear, 
“Chinaman’, you still use 'chinaman'?" 


"That's what the principal said, based on its clothes." 


Rhie kept thumbing through, skipping all the technical stuff, until she 
came upon a page taken up by a sketch of the device. "Anna Basis. 
Pretty name for such an ugly little girl.” 


"It's not a girl," Priss watched as Rhiannon gripped the notepad with 
one hand, letting the page fall free, then reached out to snatch it 
away. "It's an inanimate object." 


It was typical for Rhiannon to be out drinking all night, managing to 
slither back home unnoticed well past midnight. It was always up to 
Priss to get her up in time for work. That Rhiannon hadn't even 
come home the night before concerned Priss the most. As they 
came home, Rhiannon carelessly tossed her shirt aside, lazily 
dropping onto the couch half-naked. Priss noticed a new set of 
tattoos on her hips, stylized figures wielding spears caught in an 
explosion of incoherent colors and designs. 


"You were fired," Priss groaned. 
Rhiannon glared at her, "I was not fired. | quit willingly.” 


"What happened this time?" Last time Rhiannon had ‘quit' had been 
to pre-emptively avoid being fired for stealing office supplies and 


trying to blame it on the custodial staff. 


"You remember that speech President Shithole gave last year while 
on campaign?" 


“We don't support subhuman mongrels'?" 


“We don't trade with or support subhuman mongrels™ Rhiannon 
needlessly corrected. She put her fingers to her nose, pinching it 
upright like the president's nose did, Then she let go and looked 
over at Priss, "My boss was chewing out an intern. At some point, 
he called her a 'subhuman mongrel’ and fired her." 


"What'd she do?" 


Rhiannon lunged at her, leaning off the arm of the couch as if to 
strike her sister. Then she shrugged, and shook her head, 
whispering, "Nothing. Something. What difference does it make?" 
Then she spoke out loud, "The girl was crying. | saw her pass by. 
She was whiter than me, Prissy. What does that make me, Prissy?" 


Priss stared at her for a while, before responding, "You serious? 
You want me to...?" 


"What does that make me, Priscilla Locke?" 


"You know skin color doesn't matter a damn. It's all... genetic and 
ethnic stuff these days. As much white as you are, that's how much 
of acitizen you are. It's why mulattoes get half a vote, third of a vote, 
etcetera, no matter if they're darker than a full-blood." 


Rhiannon shook her head, "I'm tired, Prissy-baby. | am so, very 
tired." She flopped onto the couch, covering her face, "The racism... 
the institutionalized racism. The categorizing and subdividing of 
people into blocs and sub-blocs and ‘special interest groups’, like 
having a white poppa and a white momma is a ‘special interest’ you 
can pick up or drop when it suits you. Why are you a racist, Priscilla 
Locke?" 


Priss rolled her eyes, "I'm not a racist, Rhie. | just recognize the 
world we live in and | adapt accordingly." 


10 (Dr. Garcia) 


11 (Dr. Patel) 


12 (Dr. Patel) 


Armenian alphabet but not 
corresponding to any known 
words. 

Islet approached by boat from 
South Africa. Rock sample drilled 
from islet. Upon analysis, granite 
found to be unremarkable. Hole 
left by sample drilling is apparent 
on all subsequent visits to the 
islet, regardless of the "location" 
from which it Is visited. 

Islet approached by boat from 
Wisconsin. Personnel D-2341 left 
at islet with audio and video 
recording and broadcast 
equipment and six months' 
provisions. Thirty-one days after 
experiment commences, signal 
from islet is cut and AV broadcast 
equipment is damaged. Agent 
approaches islet by boat from 
Wisconsin to investigate; recovers 
damaged equipment and reports 
that Personnel D-2341 is missing. 
Scraps of D-2341's uniform 
remain, with residue of D-2341's 
blood and blood-like substance 
not corresponding to any known 
organism. 

Islet approached by boat from 
Wisconsin. Boat remains on-site 
for 118 days. No remarkable 
activity except that on day 91,a 
canoe-like vessel, approximately 
4 meters in length and crewed by 
three or four individuals 
(presumably human), with East 
Asian facial features and clad in 
animal skins, briefly approached 
the boat, shouted something 


"You shouldn't haaaaave to, Prissy-bitch." 
"Well | do. Why the sudden ethics lecture?" 
"You don't get it, Prissy." 


Priss snatched up Rhiannon's shirt from where she'd left it, and 
tossed it over Rhiannon's face, "No, | don't get it. You quit your job 
because your boss lost his temper at an intern. You're gonna have a 
whole lot of fun in the real world, Rhie." 


"Not his fault... he's just a man of the times, where racism is the 
norm." 


"When has it ever not been the norm?" 


Priss sneered at Rhiannon's silence, then went to the bathroom to 
wash her face and hands. When she got out, Rhiannon had re- 
dressed and was on Priss's laptop. 


"Columber still pesters you with three or four long-winded e-mails a 
week?" 


Priss's lip curled slightly and she slowly approached her sister, "Yes, 
Colonel Umber does. You should read the stories he has to tell. He's 
just like you — a cynic and a freeloading liberal. Bitches about 
institutionalized racism as much as he can without getting into 
trouble. You could learn subtlety from him, too." 


"He's another man of the times. A good man. And a coward. The 
good coward who whines about the bad men running this broken 
world, then goes to work the next morning working for those same 
men." 


"Because there's absolutely nothing wrong or flawed with you, is 
there." 


Rhiannon slowly turned to face her sister, "My flaw is | care too 
much. About people other than me and my precious white fucking 
race." 


"What are you doing to help them, then? Up until yesterday, you 


were going to work every morning for the same ‘bad men running 
this broken world." 


That finally shut her up. For a long time, it seemed. Rhiannon 
casually closed all the browsers, shut down the computer, and got 
up from her seat. She pulled her sister into a hug, "Thank you, 
Priscilla." 


"You could at least volunteer for some charitable foundation or 
something." 


Rhiannon let her go, and drifted past her, heading for the door, 
"Thank you, Priscilla" she said again in a wistful tone. 


Mongrelization | Motivation of Man » 
Anabasis Hub 


Monophobia 


| must, again, become that which | hate. 
But why? 


We haven't heard from central command for decades. They're 
probably gone. Lost to their own horrors. But because of a girl, we 
live on. She's down the hall now. She's crying out for a friend. She 
needs to know what's happening. 


| know what must be done, but what's the point? There's hardly 
anyone left alive here, and there's no one left alive outside. | want to 
let it end. | can't carry this burden any longer. 


Cowardice creeps into my mind. If | shirk my responsibility, I'll die 
and so will everyone else. | won't accept the blame for the death of 
our species. 


I'll leave it to chance. Cold impartial chance. I'll flip a coin. This time 
I'll follow through. 


Heads, | go down the hall and do my job. Tails, and | let the world 
burn. 


The toss is freeing. To have fate slip from my hands. To let the 
heavy burden fall, just for a moment. 


But is it worth it? Tossing away my humanity? Counting on a 
tarnished coin to give me a glimmer of hope? 


It's old. Older than | am. Yet it spins deftly in the air. Heads, tails, 
and heads again. It falls to the table. 


Tails. 


Tails and | let the world burn the rest of the way down.