Variant: The Inception

diX

Seated at the head of a large conference table is Salazar with his ever so pompous loo. There's a large silver chalice with a red liquid placed on the table in front of him. The room is modern looking, but equally looking quite drab. Other than the air-conditioner, a large monitor on the wall facing Salazar, and an unfamiliar device hanging from the ceiling directly above the middle of the rectangular conference table, nothing adorns the room, making it look like the room was hurriedly assembled. Salazar looks at his wristwatch, the time is 11:07. Although it is unclear whether it is morning or night. At that moment, a shabby looking man with white scanty long hair bursts into the room looking all sweaty and haggard. He bows lightly to Salazar who pays him no mind. He is followed by a timid looking boy, with a completely shaven head. He is dressed better than the older man. He is an apprentice to the old man. He is holding on to his master's bag.

"Get on the table and pass me the power cable. It is at the back of the holographer ," says the old man to the boy, pointing at the unfamiliar device hanging from the ceiling. He places the bag on the table and attempts to climb on it. He pulls a chair away from the table and gets on it. He is about stepping on the table when the old man notices that he still had has his shoes on. " You get down here boy, and you take off your shoes," yells the old man. The boy hurriedly gets down and takes off his shoes. He climbs back on and does as he was originally asked to do. He passes the cable to his master. On his way down he clumsily knocks down the old man's bag, spilling it's contents on the ground. Among the contents is a glass vile containing blood. Luckily it didn't break as it landed on an open notebook. The professor smacks the boy on the back of the head. The boy regains himself and puts the contents back in the bag. The old man bows slightly towards Salazar, apologizing for the mishaps. Salazar barely lifts his hand off the table, in an effort to wave his bow away. The old man simply smiles at his king and immediately scowls at the boy before reaching and angrily snatching his bag from the apologetic boy. He reaches inside the bag and takes out a makeshift walkie that seems to have undergone a lot of modifications and repairs. He speaks into it, "I am connected over here, power it up on your ends, I'll do the rest." A bunch of voices acknowledge on the other side of the walkie. The old man walks to the large monitor, powers it up and a world map appears with a dot on each continent. He uses a remote to turn on the holographer. It starts with tiny specks of light on different chairs on the conference table. It gradually grows into a very clear 2-D image of all five heads of the continents. "can all five you see his Eminence seated there. They respond in the affirmative.

"Doctor, your invention has paid off quite well, our engineers were able to replicate your design. I just wish I could have seen the mastermind behind this marvelous idea," says Asia.

The doctor responds, "the packets it would be sending would be too heavy even with our own network capabilities if I had made it so you could see the entire room instead of a specific point. Besides if a conference call had such a module to begin with, it wont be possible to see everyone's surrounding simultaneously."

"I understand," says Asia, "thank you for your contributions Dr." He simply bows, aware that they couldn't see him, but for formalities, nonetheless.

Salazar speaks for the first time, "is there an explanation to why the humans are still obstructing my plans?"

"Sir we seem to have underestimated the human resistance," says the representative of Africa.

"It came as a shock, we keep on loosing soldiers here too," says South America.

"I'm guessing it is the same issue all around," says Asia.

"They seemed all too organised for it to just have been a coincidence all around the globe. I reckon there is an organisation large enough to rival us for them to be able to pull off a resistance on such a large scale" says Australia.