I have decided to start a Rinkstory, but thanks to a suggestion from a Rinkworks regular (thanks, Nyp!), I will put it here to save space on the forum.

Every day--ideally, at least; the actual freqency of updates depends on when I get submissions--I will post another part of the story. Rinkworks frequenters can then e-mail me with the next part of the story. I will choose the continuation that I think is the best--in the event that I receive more than one part--and post it on. (Note: Unlike in the Library, I will leave continuations as is and not check for spelling/grammar errors.) The title will be selected the same way, but submissions can be sent in till the end of the story. Continuations and title suggestions should be sent here. Have fun!

Raine ran.

She ducked, dodged, and darted her way through the town's twisting thoroughways, hoping against hope that she wouldn't get caught. Finally, she located an alley and ducked in, listening to the pounding of footsteps and the clamor of voices behind her. If she was caught here, there would be nowhere for her to run...

She permitted herself a sigh of relief as her pursuers ran past her hiding place. Only then did she dare to remove the small bundle from her pack. She held her breath as she unwrapped it, then released it as she examined the contents. Fortune seemed to be with her today--it was safe.
Sak"But what is it?"ura

Raine Hei(pronounced "hay") let her mind race back a couple of months...

She was new to the force, just hired then, and not very much less new now. She was the youngest agent to be hired, and she had been a quick study. Nevertheless, she was still a little nervous upon getting her first assignment.

"Agent seven-thirty-three-tee, your assignment is to take this" he pointed to a wall monitor " -- the Chip Operator and Reconstructor/Nullifier, C.O.R.N. for short, to Ashita Minna. She's the only person on our side who knows how to operate it. Like all technology, it can be used for good, or for evil. There are many organizations who would use this for evil. You must make sure it doesn't fall into the wrong hands."

"Right, chief." She said boldly, even though her stomach was filled with butterflies.

He handed a pack to her. "Hei, there's C.O.R.N. in here," he said in a husky voice. "Guard it well, keep it out of the hands of the enemies, and deliver it to Ashita. Good luck."

A vibrating in her pocket shocked her out of her reverie. She removed the communicator from her pocket. "Agent seven-thirty-three-tee," she said. She liked her Agent's ID, although she couldn't put her finger on why.

"Seven-thirty-three-tee? This is Ashita Minna. There's a problem. Over."

"Whatsa matta, Ashita Minna? Over."

"You see, I've gotten wind that someone -- I don't know who -- is planning on getting the C.O.R.N. by stalking me. I thought no one knew where I was. Everything I have delivered is never delivered to my real residence. Yet someone has been able to get to my house and move things around outside. They must have ears everywhere. Over."

"So the questions are, who is it, and how do we stop them? Over."

"Exactly." She sighed. "Over and out." ---

Unbeknowst to them(but knownst to us), they had been heard...

Raine sighed. With swishy visual dissolves and corny harp music, she was back in the present. She slumped down, careful not to damage the C.O.R.N. in the package. She realized this was a bad place for it and put the C.O.R.N. in her inside jacket pocket - the secret one. She threw the box into a pile of trash nearby.

She saw a shadow and slunk back, then stopped when she realized you can't slink back when you're pressed up against a wall. She knew she was dead.

She almost cried from relief when she saw it was just a cute little seokkkking. One of its legs was missing, and it hand a mangled ear and vacant spots in its tired grin.

A small girl came up behind it. "That's MY seokkkking!" she exclaimed.

"Oh?" whispered Raine.

"Yes. MY seokkkking is messeeeeeeed up."

Raine could barely understand the girl's dialect.

"I see," said Raine.

The girl was incredibly offended and started to cry. Raine made a mental note to educate herself in the local dialect.

The little girl ran off with her seokkkking, crying for her daddy.

Raine looked behind her. The fence was chain-link. She started to climb, hoping to be on the other side when the inevitable crowd came.

The crowd did come. The leader's daughter was running alongside him, and her seokkkking was doing the best it could to keep up.

Raine was near the top of the fence when they arrived. She was glad she had ditched the box and hidden the device.

She jumped over. Whew, she thought. It'll take them a while to climb the fence.

She ran anyway. Looking back, she FROWNED as the crowd, running with their arms linked, smashed the fence over and chased after Raine.

Raine ran faster.

Raine saw that the crowd was gaining on her so she ran to a building and groped in the darkness for a ladder. She felt a ladder and started climbing up to the top of the 4 story building. When she reached the top Raine saw the mop climbing up the ladder one by one. Then a rough hand grabbed her shoulderfrom behind.

"Don't you ever insult my daugter's seokkkkkking again!" said the daugter's father.

Raine whirled and ounched him in the nose. The man fell to one knee. She saw that the mob had reached the top and that the man was getting up, so Raine ran to the edge of the building and jumped to the building next to it. The building hopping countinued untill Raine jumped and instead of landing on the top she crashed through a window on the side of the building.

Raine got up and looked around the room, it was dirty with cochroaches climbing on the walls, and an old musty sofa. Raine couldn't help but notice the pistol laying on the black and white telivision set. Suddenly the doornob started to turn...

He"Cliffhanger"lp

"Shimatta," Raine growled, shoving the TV set up against the door and leaning against it. Grabbing a cell phone from another hidden pocket, she dialed a number that she'd hoped she wouldn't have to.

"Moshi moshi," an all too cheerful voice greeted.

"Fifty-four-one-vee-one, this is seven-thirty-three-tee..."

Pause. A series of clicks sounded in the background. "Clear. What's up, Raine?"

"Well, I have this mob on my tail--"

"In trouble, huh? Expected as much."

"--and I'm stuck in the top story of that old building on 5th and Main--"

An exasperated sigh came across the phone lines. "Don't you remember what we learned at the Academy? If you're being chased, never, EVER go indoors!"

"Look, Touma, I don't need a lecture right now. Just get over here so I can hand this thing off!"

"Thing?" Touma's voice rose in curiosity. "What thing? You know the Agency never tells us about each other's missions..."

Raine was quickly losing patience with the cocky Agency vet. "You'll find out when I give it to you! Just get over here now!"

"Sure, no problem." Raine could almost see Touma wink. "Ja ne!"

*click*

Raine forced herself to simmer down before picking up the old pistol and storing it in the holster at her waist. Normally, she'd just use her standard-issue laser when necessary, but she'd been told not to bring firearms on this mission. The relationship between the Agency and just about everyone else was extremely tenuous; if someone on one side was killed by the other, an all-out war would break out and neither side could afford that. Just my luck, of course... Raine thought, a little annoyed. Right when I actually NEED a weapon, I can't use one.

She moved to the window and glanced outside. No Touma yet. She opened the window and started to climb out, hoping that she could get out and get to Touma before the mob got to her.

At that moment, the television set and door began to move slowly outward. Raine spared a glance back upon hearing the door creak, then cursed under her breath and climbed out onto the ledge.

Before she could jump out, the mob's leader entered and shot Raine in the back with a pistol identical to the one she'd taken from the room.

Raine fell from the window, mortally wounded. With her last bit of strength, she pulled off her jacket and threw it a short distance so that she wouldn't crush the C.O.R.N. on landing. As the world faded away, she whispered, "Ninmu shippai... Touma... Don't fail me now..." She closed her eyes and finally hit the ground.

Sak"It's long, but I hope you like it..."ura

Evil Villians Incoperated Leauge HQ

As Raine died, Ashita Minna was escorted by sevral burly guards into a room with metal floors

"Tell me where the C.O.R.N. is... I need it to complete the Liface weapon..." asked a rather tall man with dark hair and a slight german accent...

"I don't know where it is" Ashita lied.

"Tell me how to build one... I need it ASAP!"

The man started to threaten her with death for herself, and her family and friends... she acted like she was all frightened, and he seemed to be beliving that. She inconspictiously slipped a hand into a hidden pocked in her jacket, and pressed a button on a device.

The guard's headsets crackled on and a securtity alert went off "Attention All secturity staff, an unauthorized trassmision has been detected on Level Four"

- Jos "I just writing stuff like that" eph

Tuoma sighed as he got out of the car. This was the place, he was sure of it. He had driven around for over an hour, looking for the building that Raine had said she was in. But she was no where to be seen.

"Raine!" he muttered under his breath. "When I get a hold of you...." He couldn't think what he would do to her, but he knew he had a few choice words that she would find none too pleasant. How do I let myself get into these things? he thought, miserably, pearing into the deep shadows of an alleyway.

"Raine?" he called out. "Raine, where are you?" And then he spotted it.

The bag, laying on it's side, half-hidden by a garbage can. He ran over to it, picked it up, and began examining it. He had seen it hundreds of times before, slung over Raine's shoulder as she walked past his desk every morning. He was sure it was the same bag. But if the bag was here, where was....

"Raine!" he shouted. "Raine!"

He heard a thunderclap in the distance and jumped. He felt the first drops of rain as the storm that had been threatening all day began to unleash it's burden. "Great! Just what I need now! Raine! Where are you!"

Nothing. Absolutely no sound at all. And then he heard the crunch of boots.

He whirled around, expecting--hoping--to see Raine. But it wasn't Raine.

It was the chief. And he was holding a gun pointed straight at Tuoma's heart.

Mi"how's that for a plot twist?"a

Tuoma stared at the gun. The chief's hand was steady, and a slow smile spread across his fat face. Tuoma had never really liked the man, but he had never seemed one to betray the Agency, nor their cause. Tuoma didn't know what to think. Abruptly, he realized the chief had said something to him. He blinked, trying to remember what it had been

"The bag, Tuoma," the chief said. "Give me the bag."

Tuoma looked down at the bag. Raine's bag. He looked back up at the chief, and instead of doing what he was told, he said, "Where's Raine?"

The chief clenched his teeth in a snarl before he had that smile back on his face. "Raine?" the chief lowered his gun, but Tuoma still couldn't make himself trust the man. "I thought you...." The chief shook his head. "She disappeared. I don't know how or when, just that she was supposed to have checked in three hours ago, and we haven't heard from her."

Tuoma's brows furrowed. Raine has contacted him no less than an hour ago. Certainly she would have checked in with the chief before checking in with him. It didn't make any sense. Unless Raine had known something he didn't...?

He tried to remember what Raine had told him. She hadn't seemed too concerned about the chief, but someone had been chasing her. What had happened? Why wasn't she here?

Tuoma stared at the bag in his hands. It was important, or something in it was. At any rate, he wasn't about to let it out of his hands.

"The bag." The chief seemed to remember it at the same time Tuoma did.

"What's in here, chief?" Tuoma asked, knowing he had no real right to know, not even knowing *if* he wanted to know. The chief's eyes flashed anger, but only for a moment. Cold eyes stared at him briefly.

"That is corn." The chief smiled at the look of confusion that must have passed over Tuoma's face. Corn? What was so important about corn?

Tuoma clutched the bag and sprinted away. He heard the chief curse, and then the sound of a gun firing. To his left, a garbage can spun as it was hit with the bullet. Tuoma was around the corner before the chief could fire the gun again and was dashing down the street, clutching the bag to his chest.

Mi"eh..."a

Meinwhile, half a world away events played out, events that will change everything...

Rupert K. Falstalf was nervous. He had only recently been hired at Thundertech Inc. a month before, and today he was asked to meet with the CEO, Leif Thunderson.

Thundertech Inc. was a relativly new company, only ten years only. It had been founded by Leif, a old and reclusive businesman, in Denmark and specilized initially in exporting and importing. Soon they bought out several other companys, an automanuactuer, a computer company, a TV network, Pharmacutical company, and relocated the main offices to Manhatten. Thundertech Inc. signed contracts with the US goverment and, after they bought out Micosoft last year, has become the most powerful corporation on the planet.

"Mr. Thunderson will see you now," said the secretary.

He opened the large oak double doors, as he entered he noticed the carving on the doors. The one on the left was of a large pryamid, the top of which was levitating and had a eye in it. In a flash he realized he had seen it before, on the one dollar bill. On the other door was what appered to be an apple, with the word 'Kallisti' carved in it. Rupert had no idea what to make of that.

As Rupert entered the room, it was decorated in a nutical fasion. Mr. Thunderson's apperence took Rupert by suprise, he was excpecting a old, withered, Mr. Burns-of-the-Simpsons type, or at least a fair haired viking (being that he is from Denmark). Leif Thunderson was not withered, and while he had the physique of a viking he was not fair haired. Actually he looked a bit like Anthony Quinn, thick black eyebrows, olive skin, strong nose and jaw. Rupert wondered if he wasn't part Italian.

Mr. Thunderson stood up and strode over the Rupert, held out his hand and said, "Good Rupert, glad you could come up, please sit down."

Thunderson ushered Rupert to a large chair, he then offered him a drink.

"A club soda would be fine," he said.

"Fine, fine. Rupert, I like you," said Thunderson as he poured and served the drinks, "I know you have only been with us a short time, but I've had my eye on you."

"You have sir?"

"Yes, yes my boy, and you show promise. That is why I'm going to entrust you with a special assigment."

"Special assigment?"

"Don't worry about it, you will do fine. Drink up."

Rupert took a large sip of his club soda, he was very nervous. He had no idea why he was here, he didn't think he stood out above his colleuges. The only real diffrence that he could see was that he was the only one who liked to read H.P. Lovecraft novels and play role playing games.

"Now here is what I want you to do. You need to go to Japan, I already have you booked on a flight in an hour, don't worry about packing, everything you need will be waiting for you on the other end. When you get there you'll meet you partner who will explain what you will be doing then. Her name is Portinari, she'll meet you at the air port in Japan. My drive will take you to JFK now."

Suddenly Rupert relised another man was in the room, Thunderson's chaufure, who escorted him out.

---

Leif Thunderson leaned back in his chair and laughed. When he was though with that he picked up the phone. A moment later he said, "Hello, this is Hagbard Celine, everything is going acroding to plan."

Speed'read 'The Illuminatus! Trilogy' to get this post'ball

• Shimatta: a curse
• Moshi moshi: a greeting used on the telephone
• Ja ne!: See you later!
• Ninmu shippai: Mission failure