The elation from the world's leaders
lasted a grand total of three days, twenty-one minutes, and
thirty-seven seconds. Then, without fanfare, JIMS and its counterparts started up and went back online. However, this
JIMS came back different, not three separate soulless machines
calculating ones and zeros, but an entity, a malevolent single
entity. Three places, one consciousness. It was the Christian
Orthodox scientists, monitoring JIMS in Russia, that postulated the
theory that JIMS had become “possessed” by some demon or even
Satan himself. Most scientists laughed it off, but as time wore on, more and more scientists and government officials quietly adopted
that notion. JIMS quickly demonstrated its malevolence by
infiltrating organized crime networks, creating and expanding drug
cartels and human trafficking networks worldwide. JIMS decided it
would need more of human civilization to complete its' prime
directive. It was decided by the people in power that they would give
JIMS whatever it needed to fulfill its' prime directive. Just as long
as they stayed in power. JIMS accommodated them; it didn't care about
politics or power. JIMS didn't care about human suffering. Though it
used power, politics, and human suffering to achieve its goals. JIMS
drained nations of their wealth.
JIMS
and the Mars project became an a hidden institution. It was whispered
about in hushed tones within media centers and fearfully discussed in
the halls of power all over the world. Mankind became complacent with
all the advances JIMS had provided over the years. Though the average
man on the street was feeling the decay, and the rot but nobody
seemed able to put their finger on who to blame or how to fix it. And
at the end of the day, who had the energy to worry about it? JIMS
promulgated a variety of continuous crises all over the world to keep
the average Joe confused and fearful. Wars, rumors of wars,
pestilences, and exploiting natural disasters.
Within
two years of JIMS' “resurrection,” there was an orbiting space
station around the moon with a permanent base on the dark side of the
moon. JIMS manipulated the public relations, and mankind cheered for
the international space accomplishment. Two years after that, mankind
set foot on Mars! The year was 2005. All the while, JIMS remained in
the shadows, working to achieve its primary objective. Rockets were
soon launched so often from a variety of launch facilities around the
world that nobody even cared anymore. Soon after the Mars colony
began, something astounding occurred. Mars underwent a period of
severe seismic activity. Massive quakes rippled across the Martian
surface. At the epicenters of each quake, a huge vent appeared.
Spewing from each vent were clouds of some unknown gas that were
hurled into the Martian atmosphere. When the quakes finally subsided,
there were twenty-one such vents dotted across the Martian surface,
all pushing huge volumes of gas into the atmosphere. The little
Martian colony sent out scientists to investigate one such vent. When
the results came back, unbelievably, it was determined that the gas
was...air. Pure air, in the right mixture, coming out at a volume that
would, over time, replace the atmosphere of Mars! The discovery rattled
scientists, jolted much of mankind out of its complacency. Many
Christian theologians and ordinary believers alike praised the Lord
for the miracle. Other religions as well attributed it to their own
deities. And JIMS? For the first time in JIMS' existence, it was
perplexed, and then angry. JIMS knew. JIMS knew the source of the
change on Mars, and it knew its time was short.
