» Mon Aug 06, 2012 12:15 pm Extract from the journal of Madeleine Nixon, local print journalist.
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6th August, 2012.
The lights went off around midnight. At the sound of the first blast I woke, sweating in the cold, and stumbled out onto the balcony in time to witness a distant second explosion in the South East. Judging from the distance of the fire, which looked like tiny embers from where I stood, I guessed it was the power station. Destruction is only ugly when you get too close. It didn't take me long to reach my car.
I was stopped on the road to the power station by the police chief, Jason Gideon (hircine21), who bluntly informed me they were keeping civilians away from the power station until the cause of the accident had been determined. Lynchcaster is the kind of town where ever the pubs are closed by 11, so people flocked out of their sleep-in businesses or drove from their homes to witness the spectacle. Such an accident was unheard of. The air was a strange mixing-pot of curiosity, excitement and fear. Tricia Takanawa (TeeHee:3), the inferior TV journalist, was one of the first to arrive, angrily berating her camera man Francis Dingleberg (Suffca) for taking such a long time. Apu (ClintostheGreat) stepped outside and rubbed his eyes, as though he was expecting to awaken at any second. Even the reclusive de Groot (FloorBelow) emerged from his den.
What happened next still seems surreal to me. I glanced over at the police station to see how they were controlling the chaos, in time to witness an explosion which vaporized half of the building, raining fire and debris over the assembled crowd. Moments later a second, larger blast ripped through the local bank, shredding the building in staggering barrage of heat and sound. Waldo (Northwind) shrieked and dove for cover, while Daniel (Cecilff2) stared at the fires, stunned. As Bear (8-Bit Legend) and dike Greyson (dmel25) struggled to put out the inferno, I witnessed a figure emerge from the smoke of the building and sprint into the night. Danny Butterman (Wyatt Waste Ranger) saw the man too and lined up a shot, but couldn't bring himself to pull the trigger; instead he he dropped to his knees and fired his gun into the air, yelling "AAAAHHHHHH!"
The local barmaid Jenny (PartyPoison) pushed through the crowd, and then surprised everybody by pulling a concealed, silenced weapon from her clothes. Salvatore Chandler (Drop Dead) whistled seductively, until he found the barrel of Jenny's gun resting lightly on his forehead. "We have a situation here, and absolutely nobody is to leave this town until we get to the bottom of this. You'll all be sleeping in the Town Centre. If anybody has any problems with these arrangements, you can take it up with my gun." Nobody had any problems with those arrangements.
"That bank contained an unmarked safe deposit box, containing files and documents stretching back to the Cold War. They're both immensely valuable and incredibly dangerous, which is why they were stored in secret, in a place where nobody would ever think to look."
"Yeah, that worked out real [censored] well, didn't it? How the [censored] did they know it was there?" asked Tommy James (I Do Not Know), earning a scowl from Jenny.
We were interrupted by a police technician who rushed over to us, carrying a laptop. He explained to Chief Inspector Gideon that they'd found video from the previous night, which could prove important to the case. The video depicted three hooded figures, who Gideon termed suspects A, B and C - A appeared to be in charge. They're standing outside the police station, around the back. Suspect A walks towards the building, beckoning the other two to follow, but suspect B shakes his head, pointing to the corner of the building. Suspect A shrugs and walks over to the corner, carefully keeping a lookout. Suspect C stands well away and behind the other two, and just watches as B deposits what looks like a fertilizer bomb behind the building.
A pained breath went through all of us - it's hard to accept that people you've known your whole life could do something like this. Soon, the sadness is replaced by fear and anger.
"This can't be happening. This can't be happening." Diana (Xetirox) was breathing deeply, fists clenched tightly in front of her. Roderick Filcher (disturbing) appeared to be having a similar reaction, grasping his pocketknife. Jerry Stein (Jerhicco) walked away from the group and threw up on the curb. Nick (Frank the bunny) fiddled with his butterfly knife. Soda Pauper (Dalek) started yelling that we all had to catch whoever was responsible, and Jake Rusk (wolf bite) nodded his approval. I still remember his ominous words: "Sometimes, faith alone is not enough." We agreed to vote for somewhere in the town to search for more evidence of whatever is going on, and to vote for the most likely suspect in the bombing.
I dread to think what we'll do with the person once we catch them. The jail cells were all destroyed in the explosion.
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