Ashes, Ashes, We All Fall Down

Chapter 7: Worth

July 8th, 2478

Guinevere went to hug her fathers and Alexandria flipped to the next slide. "Plan" was in big, bold, white letters against an orange background.

"There are five steps to toppling a regime. Number one, understand. Number two, infiltrate. Number three, number two. I'll explain it all in a second," she added in response to the confusion on Nicholas and Christopher's faces. "Number four, leader part one. Number five, leader part two."

She nodded at Guinevere, who scurried back to the laptop to turn the slide. The slide turned. The steps were all listed there. Guinevere flipped the slide again. A large one and a list of bullet points were plotted beneath it.

"Number one, understand. To destroy a regime, you first must understand a few things. The first thing you have to understand is, do you have a valid reason for destroying this regime? In this case, yes we do. They are taking away our personal freedoms. So then, we move on to part two of step one. Understanding the setup of the regime. What are the entry level jobs, how do you move up in the order, where the real power is controlled from. I'll explain more about that when we get to step three. Gwen, will you turn the slide please?"

Guinevere flipped the slide so it showed number two.

"Number two. Infiltrate. This one's a pretty simple step. All you have to do is infiltrate the regime--get a job in it somewhere. And that brings us to number three." She raised an eyebrow at Guinevere who changed the slide again. "Which is labeled number two. What your goal here is to try to become the second in command to the one who holds the power. Sometimes, someone is just a puppet, a political figure that was picked because they have a better face or a better grasp at presenting, things like that. Anyway, try and get to the level of confidant to the person who really holds the power. If that's not possible, get to be the number two of the person who is the one who appears to be in charge. Luckily for us, that's not a problem because the one who is in charge is The Author and they also happen to be the political figurehead."

She nodded at Guinevere to turn the slide once more. A purple slide with the black number four on it was shown.

"Leader part one. Okay, so this is just figuring out what you need to do with the leader. Usually assassination is what happens here. Let's try and use that as a last resort and attempt negotiation or a more peaceful way of getting means of an end. And then number five. Leader part two. This is when you have a new leader. Maybe a president, or like in Harry Potter a new Minister of Magic in Kingsley Shacklebolt after Fudge and Scrimgeour are removed."

The final slide asked the always daunting question, "any questions?"

Christopher had his eyes close, and was mouthing something to himself, hands flicking empty air back and forth as if making a list of pros and cons with tangible building blocks. Nicholas was leaning back against the couch, deep in thought.

"That doesn't explain what you're going to do, Alexandria," Christopher said, eyes opening. "That's just a general plan for how one would overthrow a regime in general."

"I'm so glad you asked about that, Christopher." Alexandria pressed another button and a new list came up.. "Here's what we're going to do. First, I will find myself an entry level job. Second, we will follow the steps for a few years until we get to step five."

"That'll take a while," Christopher noted dryly.

"We don't have many other choices," Guinevere shot back with just as much sarcasm.

Nicholas spoke up, a slight tone of resignation in his voice. "You give me a week, I'll get you an audience with The Author."

Christopher turned to him. "You're not going to-"