by KrazyFace, HSM team writer

Entry: Day 42

Our operatives were right there! We had him, or at least we thought we did. Never underestimate your opponent – rule No.1 – and I ignored it. Because of our brashness we’ve lost Sandboxx yet again, and now I have to go hunting for him all over again. The Primer suggested I start where his friends are and there’s only one place that can possibly be – the aszero website. After I paid a quick visit there, it seems even the AS-0’s need Axioms help judging by the conversation thread I found. Thankfully, the AS-0’s were not around when Sandboxx went to them for help, but I was watching, and the description he left for me to follow lead me right to where he’d been moved. I’ve informed our overseas agents of the new location.

I’m not sure on what exactly went wrong last time; maybe they spotted our agents, or maybe they have tabs on us like we do them. Whatever the reasons, we must be more careful this time. This time we’ll have to be much more tactful about it if we’re to succeed. We need our best stealth agents in on this one, we have to get this right or we risk loosing him all over again and if that happens, there’s no telling what they might do to him. What do they want with him, I wonder? He did briefly mention that he knew now why they had captured him, but didn’t say why.

Since I’m at the forefront of the Continuum, I’ve given our other agents the information required to find Sandboxx again, so I might focus my attention on continuing to evacuate the Continuum personally. So far, we’ve managed to remove 60% of Continuum personnel, and I won’t rest until we hit 100%.

Entry: Day 43

We got him! This time, they didn’t even see it coming!

The agents had the place surrounded; we waited for EFD and Stickman to leave before we made our move. Everything went perfectly without even the slightest hitch. As soon as he was free, Blaise asked to go back to the AS-0’s and we obliged. While on our way there, Blaise/Sandboxx informed us that EFD was going to have him reconfigure the Continuum; every access point in and out of the Continuum would be locked down, all except one. EFD would then take control of that singular portal and use it for paid access to the organized crime lords we’ve already heard rumors of, granting access to the highest bidder. She may not have the smarts to make these things happen by her own hands, but she’s extremely good at manipulating others to get what she wants. It’s become apparent to Axiom and the AS-0’s that we’re not the common enemies we first thought. I’m not saying we’re all best buddies right now, but a personal video message from Tiberius himself thanked us for our efforts in saving and returning his friend.

There are however some unseen problems that have arisen. It seems the programme that runs the A.I of the Continuum has become threatened by the bomb situation itself. Tiberius has told us that it was just a fail-safe he made in case things got out of his control. It seems that this fail-safe is actually causing us more problems than helping us. Not only has it taken control of the Bully Drones from Tiberius, but it has claimed control of the AS-0’s Simulacra also. So now the bombs have gone A.W.O.L from our holding cells and the Bully Drones are hunting anything that moves.

If we’re going to wrestle back control of the area and save it in the process we’re going to have to come up with something special, and soon.

Entry: Day 44

This is not looking good.

The Continuum has descended into darkness due to a shut-down of its own power supplies so it might fight the virus that seeks to destroy it – us and our bombs. We have evacuated 100% of the personnel within and only we agents of Axiom and the members of AS-0 remain here now. The countdown on the three bombs however continues at its typical pace despite the lack of power. HAZCON warnings have been upgraded to a threat two.

It seems we have very few directions to turn right now, and should the Continuum fail to protect itself from this threat, there are Agents asking to remain here, without extraction, so that they might witness the end of this world – just to see what may come. I have to admit that I’m curious myself. What will it be like? Might there be a visual blast like nothing we or anyone else could ever have witnessed since the impact of the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs on our physical Earth? Or will it just simply fade out of this virtual existence? I know this much – I will not stop to save this place, even if it means the destruction of my own avatar.

All of this bright new land that the creative minds of the Zeros have made will be gone. All because of one silly little girl’s greed. It’s amazing when you think about it, how an entire world can be destroyed by such a simple base-desire of one individual. Eat, flaming, death. The maker of complication and hardship, the bringer of quandaries and dilemmas, what have you done to this place we all might have called a garden of Eden?

At least she lived up to her name.

Entry: Day 45

I’ve been informed that by initiating the jamming devices we might extend the last days of the Continuum by another three. It seems the Continuum had all of the bombs locked up somewhere while it worked out a way to eject them from itself, and Sandboxx’s Simulacrum had become problematic, so much so, it had been caught in a perpetual loop. This loop saw the Simulacrum being ported to various points within the Continuum randomly and I had to catch it so I might help pull it out. Thankfully, the real Sandboxx was on-hand to help us track it down to the old trash site. It didn’t take long to wrangle it back into a position that the Continuum might eventually safely eject it.

So, we’re one down now and two to go with three days left. Things are finally starting to look positive. With the help of the other Zeros I have a new-found hope in my heart that we might just save this place that EFD has put into a position of such vulnerability.

I’ve been told that flaminatorix is next, well, her Simulacrum anyway. We shall see what tomorrow brings, I can only hope it’s as simple as today’s events.

Entry: Day 46

It appears that the Continuum still sees us as a hindrance rather than a helping hand. Flaminatorix’s Simulacrum isn’t stuck like Sandboxx’s was, but had been intentionally cloaked somehow by the Continuum. By using a backdoor via the xoff cola site, I was able to hack out the frequency code that the Continuum had been using to keep the Simulacrum masked from me. After that, all I had to do was input the correct data into one of the signal jammers we have set up in the Continuum, then trace the signal back to the flaminatorix Simulacrum before the Continuum discovers us and locked us out for good. Simple, one might say.

What I didn’t count on was having flaminatorix barking little insults at me the whole time though. I know now that it’s just her way really, another part of her insecurities, which I can’t really blame her for, and after a while I kind of got used to it if I’m honest. I wouldn’t say she’d ever reach the dizzy heights of “endearing,” yet I found her little snide remarks almost cute – in a way. I didn’t tell her any of this, of course, as I’m sure I’d only suffer more of her mouth’s talents and we certainly didn’t have any time for bickering, so I let her yammer away. The end result was what was important regardless, and we tracked her with hardly a hitch.

Another one bites the dust then! Two days left, and one Simulacrum to help the Continuum eject it while it fights us. I daresay I might even have time left at the end of this to have a little celebratory gathering at Snowcrash with some of the other agents! But alas, there I go again with my overconfidence and boldness. I shall try to remain humble given what looms in tomorrow’s presence.

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