Seb held the clipboard firmly in his left hand and crisply addressed the group.

‘OK team, great to see you all again’ he beamed. ‘Let’s all gather round, pull our chairs into a circle… that’s it! Ooh, careful Niqui, you nearly bumped poor Owen there! We wouldn’t want ‘Health & Safety’ coming in and ruining the party now would we?’

Everyone squirmed uncomfortably in their sweaty plastic seats. Jo’s shoulders slumped. Neil leant back and crossed his arms, squeaking his chair against the laminate. Luke trudged in with a plate of economy rich teas and a pot of PG.

‘Thanks Luke, nothing like tea and biscuits, eh? Now, I can see we’ve got a lot of talented people here today, so who’d like to ‘kick us off’, as it were, ha-ha-ha?’

Richard coughed. Jamie fidgeted. Matt wondered whether they might ‘continue this discussion in the pub’. Then, coyly raising a hand, Alison said ‘I… I’ve got a website. I could show you that?’

‘Well Alison’ said Seb brightly ‘that would be just fab! And as we’re all showing such enthusiasm today let’s reward that. I want show some stuff I’ve been working recently, such as the BBC’s Big and Small, games for Cartoon Network & Blue Peter, iwillpayyourparkingticket and… God, just loads of great stuff! And of course if anyone wants to get all “impromptu” and present something unannounced on the night, they’d be super-super welcome to, as always. It’s all about ‘maximising your potential’, eh?’ Charis visibly bristled.

‘Right, so, Project Nights IV will be on Tuesday September 1st, 7pm at the Werks with Alison, myself – and anyone else who wants to join in the crazy fun – presenting. Sign up on Upcoming, as per. Troops… DISMISSED!’ snapped Seb, and saluted like Arnold Rimmer.

Matt snuck out and made a beeline for the bar…

Niqui Merret brushed the creepers aside and pushed further into the dense code.

She was the point man for Bugfixers XXIV Flash Corps and had been leading the line since God knows when. She knew well that in the jungle of other people’s ActionScript the canopy is so thick that the light only filters through in pale shafts. She took a step forward, the muddy nook sloshed against her thighs. Forgotten slicks of AS2 napalm drifted across the surface, burning fresh sores into old wounds. Malarial clouds of timeline Cong Moui swarmed and bit.

Flash bugs – Charlies, Vietcong, whatever you wanted to call them – she could smell them coming. She showed a flat palm to the slack man behind and the whole line came silently to a halt. She’d been through so many old FLA’s and undocumented hacky AS Classes, that everyone knew they could trust her implicitly. She knew Charlie like he was family and nothing was going FUBAR on her watch.

“Charlie code” she whispered “bites you motherfucking rookies in the ass. But not me, I prioritize, and know enemy code bases inside out. You better listen to me unless you plan on flying home in a body bag. DO NOT hunt Charlie in circles and make sure you document your goddam area for the marines following you up, you understand me newbie? Stick with me and I’ll show you how it’s done.”

A band of Vietcong burst out on the starboard side. “Strike those down” screamed Merret, and turned her Tommy on the Bugs. “Anyone who makes it out alive meet me back at the Werks in Hove, Tuesday 25th August 7pm for debriefing.”

“Now fight you bastards!”

Brendan Dawes woke with a start.

He was troubled, a man with a past. He’d been working with ‘Flash’ for years now, he’d been at it so long he wasn’t even sure what version he started with anymore. The past was hazy, as if the city rain had washed it clean from the streets. Once the whole neighborhood was crawling with Flash, so much so that you never even noticed it. ‘Ubiquitous’, that’s what it was. The word came back to him like a bad hangover. His moles at Adobe used to use it all the time, like the sons of bitches were on commission or something.

But the game was changing, see. There were new faces on the street, smart kids, straight outta Cali. The whole goddam district had become overrun with ‘iPhones’ and Flash was shrinking back into the shadows. How could Dawes compete with these nerdy lowlifes? He reached for his loaded AS3. It felt cool and heavy in his hand, reassuring, but the iPhones were freebasing on C, real strong shit. How was he gonna keep pace?

‘Processing.js’ he thought, ‘maybe that’s the answer’. The ‘Times had done a piece on it, apparently it was ‘an open programming language to run animation and interactions without using Flash or Java‘. Dawes had tried it a few times and, he had to admit, it was pretty powerful. But was it a credible alternative to ‘ubiquitous’ interactive experiences?

He booted up his mainframe. ‘Maybe I’ve read too much Bill Burroughs, but I reckon Tuesday 18th August, 7pm, at the Werks in Hove oughta do it, try this baby out‘.

He put the AS3 back down on the desk and went back to bed. An iPhone glimmered briefly in the window, then vanished.