Five?

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They don’t do things by halves your Excellency…wait…looks like the French are involved now, I’ve got another three traces coming from western Europe – I told you it was a bad idea to run that website…

It was a good idea at the time – besides which, this is no time for arguments General – how long until the first missile impacts?

About ten minutes my Lord.

Alright then, let’s look at our options – can we activate the orbital defences?

The what?

The orbital lasers we launched to shoot down enemy missiles.

Erm…

We do have orbital lasers to shoot down enemy missiles, don’t we?

Well, not as such my Lord, you will remember we held a meeting about this a year ago, and I went to great pains to inform you that the project wasn’t feasible. That kind of technology isn’t available, no matter what President Reagan thought in the 1980’s.

OK, then what about the satellite railguns?

Still on the drawing board my Lord.

The atomic X-Ray emitters?

Errr…there’s no such thing my Lord.

I’m disappointed, so that’s a big "no" to the Star Wars weapons then?

I’m afraid so. We can’t even rely on the Ewoks. Erm, nine minutes left my Lord.

OK, what about our own submarine fleet? Can’t we counter-attack?

Well, technically we could, if you were prepared for total nuclear armageddon, but they won’t be checking in for another two hours, and this entire facility will be a bubbling mess of goo by then.

Which leaves?

Well, running away would seem to be a good idea right now.

Excellent, that sounds like a plan then. We shall run away. (To the Scientists) Gentlemen, thank you for your assistance, as incompetent as it was, if I ever need to construct another communications console that can be field-stripped by a cat, I’ll know where to come. Assuming you survive that is. It goes without saying, your double-bonuses are cancelled.

Eight minutes my Lord, we must hurry…

Follow me General!

(Doctor Sinister and General Menace head towards the rock wall and enter a metal door, followed at a languid pace by the two cats. Once inside, the door closes. It is an elevator)

Up or down my Lord?

Ooh, down I should think, this thing goes down three hundred levels. I’ve an escape pod in the submarine pens that will do very nicely.

Very well my Lord. (The elevator lurches as General Menace hits the down button and it plumetts down the shaft. The General then checks a display on his remote control pad) Oh dear.

What’s up now?

Our eight minutes just got slashed to three, an update from the computer shows the nearest missile to be much closer than we first thought.

Ah. That’s a bit of a problem then.

How so?

It’ll take five minutes for this elevator to reach the bottom. Let’s hope the rock around us will withstand the accummulated detonation of a dozen nuclear warheads.

Hmmm…with respect my Lord, I think that’s asking a bit much. Two minutes now.

Oh well General, it was nice knowing you.

And you too my Lord. On the plus side, if we survive this, we have at least learnt a valuable lesson.

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