Excerpt: Mirrors and Glass

(Mirrors) Hunting Caffeine
Kitari stared at the lines of code on the screen, occasionally hitting the page down key on the keyboard, rereading it all to make sure he had made no mistakes. He switched out of the HTML screen and into the WYSIWYG screen, and examined his work again. It looked innocent enough, which was what he wanted. The rest of the code would kick in when the website was visited – as long as it was visited by the right computers with the right IP address, with the right programs. Then the hidden code would kick in and do its stuff, allowing him to track the rogue knights he hunted for Interworld Law and Relations.
He leant back in the chair, taking his hands off of the keyboard, satisfied with what he’d done. Kitari stretched, heard joints pop and crack. He’d spent too long in his chair, too much time doing desk work rather than legwork.
Some knight he was, but this was necessary these days. He let his hands fall, slid his hand over the hilt of the short sword by his side. His weapons didn’t leave him. He kept them by him at all times.
Kitari reached for the oversized mug of coffee on his desk and wrapped his hand around it. He took a large gulp of double strength, almost cold coffee and swallowed it, making a face at the taste of half cold coffee. He looked away from the computer screen for a moment, let his eyes adjust to the dark room, illuminated only by the bright glow coming from the computer monitor. Kitari sorted through the tangle of cords dumped in a wire trash can hanging from a hook in the wall until he found the plug in mug warmer. He plugged it into one of his computer’s USB ports and placed his coffee mug on it to warm up the already twice reheated coffee.
Kitari felt around on the desk for single serve packets of instant coffee, his questing hands finding only piles of junk and empty packets. He knocked over an empty can of Mother perched on a pile of trashed CD-R and DVD-R discs. It rolled to the floor with a tinny clatter and joined the pile of other empty energy drink cans, lost to the mess that littered the floor of his basement workroom.
With the intention of adding some fresh coffee to his mug, he pushed his chair away from the desk and let it roll across the floor as he stood and stretched his legs and back, taking a deep breath of the chilly air. It smelled of old floral perfume, dead food and stale coffee, not particularly appealing, but something so familiar that he barely noticed it anymore.
He walked across the room, instinctively stepping over piles of paper and computer manuals to make a perfect beeline for the box full of packets of instant coffee and teaspoon sized packets of sugar. His sword bounced lightly by his side, and he held it still, intent upon coffee.
Kitari reached up and grabbed the box off of a shelf. He grabbed a handful of coffee packets and dropped them in a semi clean throwaway foam mug. Sugar followed, and as an afterthought, he bent down and opened the mini bar fridge that lurked under the worktable. Yellow light spilled out onto the floor, revealing a greasy pizza box with hard cheese sticking a hard piece of forgotten pizza to the bottom. He kicked it under the table. It hit the wall with a soft thump, probably throwing the slice of pizza out of the box to stick to the floor again.
He examined the meagre contents of the fridge, eyeing off the container of old Chinese takeaway. He set his mug full of powdered sustenance on the table, and pulled out the plastic box. Kitari cracked it open and took a sniff of it. It smelt bad and he snapped the lid back on and tossed it on top of the pile of rubbish that overflowed from the box he was using as a trash can. Several items thudded to the floor. Maybe it was time he tore himself away from work long enough to clean up the mess. It was getting past the point of disgusting.

© 2009 ReiKnight/Tshinta Grace