A Dream of Flowers

She sat, skirt sprawled, on the filthy floor. Filthy with the blood and bile of the dead and dying around her. Cries of pain and suffering grated, amplified a thousandfold by the confines of the room.

She did not care. Only her eyes, pinned upon the lean features of the man whose head was cradled on her lap, displayed any form of emotion. The rest of her face, her dusted countenance, her body, was set in rigid emotionlessness. Lips thin. Cheeks pale, the soft streaks of tear tracks streaming down her face, puddling in the indentation of her mouth.

The man spoke, his voice weak and cracked with thirst. "Dana. Go. Go now, while ..its not...too late."

Dana only shook her head. Her eyes spoke horror at the very thought.

Nearby, concrete slabs pinned an old man heavily down on the floor. He was screaming wildly, jerking and struggling with all his remaining strength even as his ruptured abdomen continued to tear, issuing sickening ripping sounds, as his watered-down blood soaked his clothes and the floor. Nobody helped him. Another soldier, head bloody with shrapnel wounds, was spasming wildly, face contorted, limbs twitching on the floor. His eyes were white, sclera stained red from burst capillaries. Blindly flailing.

The man offered a weak smile. "You always...were...stubborn." Gasping. "Please...for my sake. They're coming...I don't want you...to..." He trailed off.

The unspoken remainder was not absent from the gravitas.

The thin old man stopped moving, finally. His eyes, wide with fright, froze and glazed over. His body slumped, and the air was suddenly filled with the overwhelming odour of faeces. Blood, pulpy tissue and bile slid sickeningly down the side of his shirt.

Dana's frozen countenance finally broke. "Nobody helps." She broke down in a gulping sob. "Nobody helps people like us. Pete, Pete, don't be like this, you've got to hang on, you've got to...don't do this to me..." She was crying, now. Tears falling like crystals over Pete's face, his mouth.

"Oh God...please."

Pete couldn't reply; he found breathing difficult, and now, he, too, was on the verge of tears. What cruel fates were beheld to Man. What terror would be inspired from love. Quiet rumination on the verge of death, among the other beleaguered victims of a senseless bloodbath. He felt a quiet peace.

In and out, weaving through waking and sleeping, life and death. A timeless journey through fates unseen, pasts untold. Enter the Dream of Flowers, healing the pain that comes with Death. He felt a bright light, beckoning him towards peace, rest, the liquid joy of contentment.

His eyes opened, yet unseeing.

Mom?

She stood there, smiling, holding out her arms, standing at the end of a long tunnel and at its end was light, purest, most sublime, heavenly light-

He was a child again, in her arms, when some small injury sent him crying into her comforting bosom. There, there, its just a small cut, don't cry, in life you've got to look your fear in the face.

That's when you're strong.

Dana stared at Pete, horrified at his unseeing stare. "Pete? Pete!" Cupping his face in her clammy hands. "Wake up! Pete, please, don't leave me like this!" Shaking him wildly. "Pete! Wake up!" She was shrieking now, crazed with terror. "You can't die!" she wailed.

The creaking wooden door burst open. Standing there, three soldiers, wearing armbands that spoke malice. "Well, well, what do we have here?" The lead soldier's eyes swept the room, lingered tauntingly at Dana. Lips curled in a snarl, he stalked over to the stricken woman and in one savage kick sent Pete's body tumbling down on the floor.

Pete's eyes snapped open.

"Dana! I...I've...", he breathed wonderingly. Then he saw them. "Dana? No!" Beseechingly, staring up at them. "Please. Don't-"

He never said another word, for two bullets were then lodged in his head. Face frozen in a grimace of hopelessness, he slumped on the floor, dead, amidst Dana's piercing, maddened screams.

The lead soldier devoured Dana with his eyes. His gaze made her skin crawl; even as she screamed her voice hoarse, beside the corpse of her beloved, amongst the dead old man and the spasming soldier, she felt filthy and unclean at the touch of his gaze.

The lead soldier cast down his weapon. Eyes hardened into icy slits, craggy, dirt-smeared face a contortion of animal rage. His two companions exchanged uncertain sniggers, then turned their eyes to look at their leader, beads of perspiration appearing on their necks. They were shivering, stomachs knotting.

There was anticipation on their faces, but their eyes betrayed horror.

With grim, deliberate steps he rounded on her.

There was the ripping of fabric and piercing shrieks of desperation.

Outside, the sounds of war were for a moment drowned out by ripping screams. Screams coupled with wild, maddened laughter.

***

Dana lay there, bleeding, exposed. Alone. The vacant stare of Pete had witnessed all. As his body lay there, face tipped in an awkward angle at her. Life seeped away; blood pooling slowly at her legs, life returned as it was given.

And awareness shfted. In and out, waking and sleeping. Life and Death.

And she stood there, wondering, and saw Pete smiling at her from the end of a long tunnel.

And the Dream of Flowers consumed her mind, and this time, there was no return.

Verwoesting - After

No.

Smoke fell from the sky. Debris rained down in torment, rain of fire.

No.

Scorched earth. Blackened tops - of trees, buildings. People. Roads cracked by a chasm. Death resided, slavering triumphant on a thousand rotting corpses.

Darkened sky above, devastation below. A city bombarded by a thousand terrible things - weapons of terrible power, terrible cruelty - they swept and smashed the begging masses, rent them and splayed them in a thousand lacerations even as they begged, crying, screaming for mercy, for deliverance - a deliverance that never came even as they were gutted, impaled, crushed. Women ran, rent, babies in their arms, wailing, screaming, even as they were burnt and crushed under the ceaseless glint of cold, blooded metal. Men stood their ground, ineffectual weapons blazing even as they were cut down by the blasts of cannons and guns and grenades. Blood ran like water, mingling with the stink of burning oil. A story untold of a pregnant woman, swiped away with such force that her body flew and crashed on the side of a building - leaving a trail of blood - blood that glistened wetly as it ran down from between her legs. A story untold of a soldier screaming in agony and anguish as he watched his comrades blown apart by swathes of shrapnel and incendiary bullets - even as he stared at his own intestines, running wetly over his splayed torso.

Napalm spray burned people alive - screaming as their flesh peeled away, as they ran, incoherent and senseless- as the burning fire seared away their pain receptors - whereupon they collapsed on the ground, curling into a fetal position. Shrapnel seared through the chest of an oblivious civilian - and a passing soldier was blanketed by the spray of blood even as the body fell upon him. A pile of corpses - eyes glazed as they stared into space, killed by the curling mist that slathered about them.

A creche burned, assaulted by the machines of war - even as soldiers made their last valiant stand against them, protecting the children who sat huddled and terrified, sobbing and crying in fear. They watched as soldiers were rent and killed before their eyes, watched as one was cut cleanly down from neck to thigh, as a small grenade turned a nearby group of defenders into meat. Blood and bile staining the walls, soaking the boards and the floor. The place stank, as soldiers' bowels released on the moment of death, as sheer terror caused them to urinate in their pants.

Carnage ruled the city thereafter, and the streets became an abattoir. Glazed eyes, staring blankly - puddles of urine, bile and faeces littering the streets. Fires raging across the walkways, cleansing infernos. The endless wail of the sick and dying even as medics collapsed from exhaustion and terror, as they watched the slow march of defeat. As the conquerors marched in and rent them, even the sick and the injured, impaling them, impaling the bile-soaked beds, slicing the helpless medics in half, even as they screamed into the blackness of space.

The city was left, unpicked, quiet, devastated. Another kind of horror, as armies of crows, vultures, carrion-eaters, settled and gorged over the dead. Thereafter, in the days that followed till it was picked clean a stink permeated the ruined city. The stink of death.

The roiling sky continued in its ceaseless writhing.

Then it opened. The first droplet of clear, odorless, pristine rain fell from the sky's lips.

Then another.

Then, like the gates of Rome preparing for war, rain poured torrentially, God's tears, from the grey sky.

No.

Landmark

It soared, tall and imposing, the upper levels lost in the wispy clouds; akin to a spear cast into the forested earth that surrounded that monolithic base. He knew that this edifice was no mere spacescraper; its facade, at least in the upper regions, did not consist of reinforced meteoritic armour and heat-resistant superconductor plating for nothing. This Needle, as it was already called even as its halls and corridors remained bare and empty, was built to withstand the pummelings of the exosphere, the steady beat of solar radiation, the constant irritation of micrometeorites- whatever nature thought to throw in its path.

The Exoterran Connexion Superfunctional Tower, or EXCOST, stretched up even to near Lunar Orbit. Even as he stood on that platform, ships were already placing the last habitation and experimental modules at the pinnacle, wrapping up construction on the Orbital Observation Bubble a few hundred storeys below, and placing the last nanotube superstructural supports and facade platings on the rapidly coalescing tower.

He had every reason to be proud that day, as he looked up at the huge tower, reaching so serenely into the distant blankness of the cyan empyrean. EXCOST was his. His dream, his brainchild, his baby. Thirty years before his colleagues had looked upon the first blueprints and concept drawings with a warmly condescending air, some supercilious, others pitying, all scoffing and sniggering behind his back. Today they, like all the rest, scrambled for the crumbs he left them with barely a thought of their erstwhile contempt.

Fastidiously wiping his hands on a paper towel, he set it aside on the ledge for tiny cleaner bots to dispatch. The minuscule things hovered quietly around the piece of paper, tearing it swiftly apart and using microscopic mandibles to push pieces of it into their maws, where it would be recycled in a cleaner nexus into anything that merted its composition. They were efficient; the process took only a few seconds, whereupon the cloud of cleaners departed with barely a murmur.

The hue of the sky was deepening; magenta dabs of clouds were scurrying across the horizon even as the sun sank beneath the distant mountains. A gust blew and the gentle susurration of sound soothed his ears. The insignificant remnants of the discarded towel spiralled away with the wind, circling like fireflies in the night.

Before he knew it, the vistas of evening had turned a deep blue and the first stars were appearing, glimmering faintly in the night's canvas. The only sounds were the calming breeze and the distant, inconsequential hubbub of the sequestered city by the bayside a few miles away.

Suddenly, EXCOST exploded in a cascade of brilliant lights, tiny, golden liquid dots that sparkled up and down the endless length of the tower. The golden disjointed line of light was a sublimely beautiful sight to behold, like pearls of dew on a length of twig. The light traced complex patterns across the distant Needle, and the overall effect recalled the play of lights in metropolises in science fiction epics of old. On the distant face of the sea, the tides did little to obscure the bright, golden line of reflection that ran in a long streak upon its being.

This was what he had waited to see. A sight that he had beheld many times before, but never tired of; a sight that transcended human thoughts and cares and all other desires-a sight of his-yes, his- own landmark upon the sheer face of human civilization.

----
What this really is is a study of the ego of the scientist referred to as "he". Call him Dr Nick.

A Pen should never be Green

I was feeling a sense of impeding doom a few hours ago, coupled with perhaps the barest tinge of nostalgic affection for the "Good Ol' Days" of the early youth. Lounging with Lord of the Rings or Watership Down fresh in the mind, on a sunny, windy morning in some date in December.

So I picked up my old, battered, browned, tattered, splotched, and in past times oft-read copy of Jedi Search, by the ol' Kevin, and whaddaya know.

No superfluity!

(To all those mystified by these seemingly nonsensical words, please finish Horizon Storms as quickly as you may.)

No stilted dialogue!

No unnecessary add-ons!

Okay, maybe that was exaggerated. There was that characteristic Anderson ethos, but it was almost nonexistent. Submerged under the comfortable label of Star Wars.

This has led to the disturbing theory that Anderson thinks that his present writing style is good, an improvment to the slicker scribbling of his youth.

To verify this disturbing theory or postulatum further I read Darksaber and found elements of this superfluidity beginning to emerge in his writing.

I am expecting a small brick to appear on eBay. And I may even be proven right.

Saga of Seven Suns

Warning to impending readers of Horizon Storms: Here be Dragons. Avert thy eyes.



The Saga of Seven Suns continues with Horizon Storms, an Aspect (TM) Paperback.

This post does not contain a synopsis. Please feel free to write your own.

Well, Horizon Storms was a mere continuance in Kevin J Anderson's style and plot development. Roamers are marginalized. Hansa is demonized. Peter is glorified. Theron is rasterized. Jess Tamblyn is transformed into a motif of Wental power. Klikiss robots continue to lug DD around everywhere. Robb Brindle is not dead! Beneto (in a move of dubious wisdom and tact) is resurrected. As a golem. Kevin, why? Why?

As always, Anderson continues in his distinctive writing style, which is rather irritating in the way that each sentence always ends of with an unnecessary expansion, or interjected by extraneous outgrowths. Transmuted to a tape recorder, Anderson can be said to ramble. The sheer superfluidity of his prose and the resulting awkwardness in his structuring cause a sort of empty feeling in the reader.

Maybe a small part of the issue can be explained by the fact that that's exactly what Anderson does. He goes off on treks in the mountains, alone, carrying a tape recorder, and rambles storylines into it while he walks.

The phenomenon becomes doubly bad when it comes to passages describing tragedy. The rambling profuseness of his dialogue and the painful lengths that the prose goes in stating tragic events again and again, without any attempt at masking it with poetic window-dressing, coupled with the insuficient graphicity of the said tragedies, turns the tragedy so-called into an unwitting farce that has no emotional impact on the reader. Anderson would have done well with clipped, brusque statements and broken, incomplete sentences, arranged in artfully exquisite fashion to compound agony for agony, graphic detail for graphic detail, instead of the superfluous and precariously arranged prose with not a dose of poetic drapery.

Anderson also likes separating sentences with commas, bringing out their meaning, thinking that this gives a surreal atmosphere, a veritable life, to his sentences, and ending them by trailing off...

Because of this writing style, characters like Celli, Nira, and many Therocs come across as naive and innocent. And the corresponding dialogue is embarrassingly stilted (because it, too, contains elements of extraneity).

"Embarrassed by their gratitide, her newly green skin flushed dark. Nira said, "I'm glad I could do one last thing to help my family before I embark on my great adventure." Or, "His shoulders slumped. "That is who we are, though sometimes it is a difficult thing.""

Those two were extracts from Hidden Empire, where the effects of this style were most pronounced. Thankfully, its less apparent in the following novels.

Anderson's plotting, world-creation and sheer ambition overcome this prediliction. Three books already and Anderson's saga spans epic proportions and has a sense of primal scale. The aliens, modelled after the Elements, are purveyors of an ancient conflict which has destroyed worlds. For a space opera, Anderson has been successful in portraying the historical depth of the Saga of Seven Suns world. This world is carefully crafted, and conceived as a very plausible future scenario with realistic enough economic and political undercurrents. Anderson has a proclivity for making Deus Ex Machinas that work. Faeros at Theroc, for example. And he is not afraid to let his characters die, even if some of them do come back afterward. Like they do in Horizon Storms, much to my chagrin. His plot is a complex tapestry of survival, betrayal, love, and danger, set in a brilliantly realized universe that seethes with new concepts.

If only he could improve that writing style of his, that has plagued all his works, he would truly shine.

"When accosting a wall, be sure to put on our reliable safety vest. The wall does not take lightly to being accosted by unprotected people, whether brick or metal, having the troubling penchant for collecting large amounts of bloodstains and angrily scrawled graffiti."
-Adapted from Joshua

Learning to Learn?

Verisimilitude. The appearance of being real.

The June holidays lack verisimilitude. They are like a passing dream forgotten upon waking. Adaptation, otherwise, is an attributing factor to this twisting of experience in the sun-basked realm of life.

The past is always a dream, maybe. Especially when you never experienced it. Intellectually, I know that events have shaken the planet we live on; the World Wars, Vietnam, famines in Africa and elsewhere (which are blown up and exaggerated, according to some analyses); emotionally, I cannot help but view them as events in a story, a fictional tale.

The sphere, the confines, of the mundane pen me in and force me to adopt disbelief at the most primal level.

The present, as Hazel would say, is what is important. The Here and Now. And the past is a dream. The future is ours to weave. But not ours to decide on a grand level, definitively. Or not.

Learning to learn. A chicken-and-egg problem. When viewed in a certain way.

Riflessione

Just read Michael Yue's entry. I must say I find it difficult to believe that one can glean anything of introspective interest from this blogs last few entries.

I feel I'm getting more incoherent in my effort to make the blog more of interest to people. This is not an "oh-let's-see-what-I-did-today" blog. Rather its a "hmm-I-seem-to-have-a-muse-or-something-to-write" blog. Not even a blog in sooth.

I dislike tempura. Much as I dislike fish and chips. Same reason. Ironically I used to like fish and chips. A lot.

What caught my eye was the self-introspection. The question of losing your consciousness, your self, after death. It is scary. The only thing one can do is to push the awful truth away to the unconscious. I've thought about it many times. An eternal stream of oblivion, stretching out unto eternity. Like the incorporeality of the past.

Never think, feel, touch. Again. Can it be?

I wish I did believe in Heaven, sometimes. Instead of grasping at the question of life, finding no answers to questions whose answers are never tangible. But I cannot help it. I'm sort of an empiricist.

RD words of the day

Florid
Impute
Perfidious

Random Thought

I was rereading Asimov. In fact, I'm still rereading Asimov.

And I feel that Asimov wasn't a bad writer, as critics are wont to portray him as. Not exactly...bad, in the sense of the word, but, uninspiring. He was a great thinker, they say, full of fresh ideas and resonance. He wrote like a stenographer, recording is thoughts clearly and succintly as prose, hardly taking any liberties with his ascribed poetic licence. His characters are mostly flat, and are devices in the conception of a worldview, instead of the reverse.

All these things are true, but they don't necessarily condemn him to be a bad writer. The function of a novel is to entertain and to inspire reaction, positive response. If the novel is deep enough, it will inspire something more, introspection and reflection.

A good novel thus inspires positive response. I don't see Asimov's idiosyncrasies to impede his ability as a writer. He churned out good novels that inspire positive introspection and reflection. His characters draw out this quality. His canvas was not the soul, but the Universe and its laws. His setting was a galaxy of intrigue and decay.

His later novels did attempt to tie together the two; weaving a story of soul and humanity. The latter Robot books, the Foundation Preludes; all these tracked the lives of characters and observed their changes, their adaptations. Asimov began to explore the depths of the human soul, while plotting the course of Empire. This has again caused condemnation.

Being a writer must be difficult.

From the Ashes

"The Republic has ever endured. For more than twenty thousand years it has brought civilization to the galaxy, ever in league with the Jedi Order. It has withstood every trial, every tribulation; from the Great Jedi Schism, the Great Hyperspace War, the machinations of Exar Kun, to the Mandalorians; and it will withstand the resurgent Sith of the present day.
With the redemption of the Jedi Revan and the destruction of the Star Forge, the end to this destructive conflict is closer than ever. Darth Malak is dead, Saul Karath nothing more than a mote of vapourized matter floating in the ruins of the Leviathan. Revan has told me that most of the Dark Jedi have been killed, many by his own hand. The Sith are in disarray after the deaths of their leaders, the annihilation of their war machine, and the crippling or their navy at the Battle of the Star Forge. They have fragmented; wayward, disparate factions fighting among themselves for a piece of the disentegrating colossus. They pose little threat to us now.
It has been sixteen months since the destuction of the Star Forge, and the Republic Navy, under the command of Admiral Dodonna, has made great strides in recapturing lost territory. I'm told that Admiral Kardan of the Sith Second Fleet is dead. Thule and Arkania have been liberated. The Perlemian Trade Route will soon be free of Sith domination.
General, your worries about this supposed emergent Sith Lord are quite baseless. He cannot possibly pose any sort of threat against us. He will lack the ships, the men, the equipment, to be able to make any sort of headway against us. The Republic may be weak now, but it is recovering its military strength, taking the oppurtunity of this reprieve to build up our forces. Your Sith Lord will be taken care of. This Nihlius seems to have no strategy whatsoever. He hasn't made much of a move against us, infighting with the rest of his brood. They will destroy one another. It's their way, as Revan told me. Without a strong leader the Sith cannot hope to survive. And Nihlius hardly strikes me as capable.
Another matter, General. Revan's been acting disturbed, lately. He says he has dreams. One moment he's walking beside me and the next he's kneeling on the floor, gasping. He claims he's been regaining some of his memories. I want you to keep an eye on him, General. Just be very careful of what he does.
I'm not taking any chances, even though he's my friend. The man he is can be trusted. The man he was..."

Another Brief Rant

Why do Sith have British accents all the time? And why is Sion Scottish?

Such questions are the stuff of temporal meaning. The significance of the mole on the right cheek as compared to a stray hair on the underside of your chin.

Fish. Dolphins. It's the dolphins. Dolphins are not fish. It's a conspiracy. A conspiracy, I tell you. Wittgenstein, would it that we had a complete report out of your green-brown dossier!

Why do we have misconceptions about everything? Because the important stuff just isn't stressed out enough. That's it.

Dolphins are not fish, we aren't descended from apes, we are apes. And Michael Jackson Does Not Play In the NBA. And, for God's sake, Lucas, Venus is not a gas planet. Anymore than Earth is. I doubt Yao Ming's ever reported news in front of a camera crew too.

The ISS may be a white elephant. Congress may be narrow minded. And Norman Foster doesn't have a clue about non-glass and metal facades.

And we don't outlaw gum. Never did.

I tell you, the Super-class SD is 14km long. That should be a reasonable estimate.

A degree of separation is six.

[ADD-ON] Well, I didn't want to start a new post, so there.

I think I'm really going to do it. Write that KOTOR story. Just monitoring psychological patterns...

Temporal Resonance Detected

I swear, there's something fishy going on here.

I mean, to those who've felt their time percolate away from them like a squirming live eel, there is definitely something going on. One week. Left.

In the refulgent coruscation of scintillating glory that permeates across the distant gulfs of the empty cosmos, the stuff and meaning of life seems a sequestered dream. But whither do we walk the shores, gazing at the perpetuity of the starry empyrean? What for the vistas of those prodigous, herculean dances of gas and refracted light that fill the inky darkness and drives away the night? What for the swirls of dust and matter that coalesce around the newborn stars? The question, the justification, for terrestrial reality remains an ungraspable truth, an abstraction without the capacity for being understood.
And yet we walk the comforting shores and look upon the face of Heaven, and for all our brief existences, there is comprehension.

A Brief Rant

Ugh.

David Brin irritates the stuffing out of me. Writing treatises on the "anti-civilization" nature of Star Wars, ruining Asimov's work with his inconsistent capper of that terrible "Second Foundation Trilogy", and being enthusiastic about, of all things, the gradual artificial evolution of human beings into specialized biological constructs with four limbs with opposable thumbs. Like chimps, eh? I'll bet. Ben Bova and Card, too. Somehow this League of scientist-turned-authors (not Card), so full of themselves when writing their elegant hard sci-fi masterpieces, attribute the shortcomings of others with factors they are themselves prey to.

Cherie

It was evening. Anywhere else, it would have been a good evening.

In the centre of a town, shabbily clustered around a group of factories that belched forth inky smoke towards the heavens, an old man walked with a heavy rucksack thrown tiredly on his aching back. His face and clothes were stained with tarlike dirt and coal residue. He let forth a torrent of heavy coughing, and black dust mixed with saliva flew from his breath. The torrent of hacking went on, having gained a veritable life of its own, creating painful reports of noise that reverberated on and on, continuous and agonizing to the sympathetic ear. At last, out of breath, the old man desisted and the painful tension of truth, palpable in the evening smog, faded away. It seemed that the normal bustle of miserable noise, having retreated meekly to the unseen corner during the coughing fit, came back in full force, as if the old man's bout had been a dream, immediately forgotten upon waking.

Exhausted, the old man stumbled on the bare path, following unconscious instinct that had served him every evening for the past three decades. The fit of coughing had left him drained of strength. He tried to draw in a deep breath, but the filthy presence of oily smog only made him gag. He would have vomited, if there had been any food in his stomach. There was no choice but to stumble off the edge of the track towards a fallen log. He needed to rest. Get his bearings.

He sat, shivering with hunger and cold, his old eyes squinting at the intermittent few who, like him, were trudging on the track back to their homes, in time for whatever dinner their families could scrounge. The old man allowed air to whistle through his yellowing teeth, drawing long, unsatisfying breaths to reenergize his stamina, a technique learnt from thirty years of working in this town. A technique to minimize the foul stench of smoky air.

The day's wages were in his pocket. Two grimy coins, denominations unseen through the caked dirt, barely sufficient to tide by a day or two on bare flour and cabbages. The old man stared at the miserable coins, and slowly, tears welled up in his old eyes and slid softly down his wrinkled cheek.

After a minute or two, the old man rose painfully to his feet, joints creaking, muscles aching, back burning from arthiritis, hauled the rucksack up with all his strength and trudged the remaining length of his journey back to his home.

Batman Begins

And so it begins. A little discrepancy in the chronology, as compared to the progression of the real timelines of filmography. Batman Begins. I have no idea how anyone won't like this latest instalment in the Batman franchise. I mean, it's the optimal movie cocktail; with all the low-grade booze shoved roughly to one side and the cherries on top. Orange swirls, too. No, not that sort of cocktail. Really, there's these sophisticated action sequences, all that random swishing ninja sword fighting with Mr Mysterious Mentor Henri Ducard (a short-haired Neeson who vaguely resembles Viggo Mortenesen) spouting outwardly-chiding-but-secretly-proud mentor lines like "You were always unaware of your surroundings" (note that I'm paraphrasing here), the delving into dark history sequences complete with shots of an appropriately angsty Wayne delivering one-twos upon Chinese convicts, the emergence of superhero parts that are always essential for any fan-drool marathon, and the Righteous Police Commisioner(to-be), Lt. Jim Gordon, played, most inappropriately, by (gasp here for dramatic effect), Gary Oldman. Gary Oldman. What. Oldman, the classic villian? You know? Quiet British actor, bearded, can fake good accents, guy who played That Russian (Ivan Korshunov) in Air Force One, Dr Zachary Smith the Villianous GP/Terrorist Wishing to Blow the World Up in Lost in Space, (where he really spouts evil Sith/British anti-ideologue and gets the Sarcastic Treatment by Matt LeBlanc, the guy from Friends), Dracula in Dracula, and nearly got to be the voice for General Grievous in Sith. And Sirius Black (whoever that is) from Harry Potter and the [insert names of latest two movies here.] Enlighten me on the details. Anyway if you've watched Oldman in many of his roles you'll realize that guy is just scary. Look at him. In Batman Begins. Wearing the John Bolton (moustache), being the Only Honest Policeman Left in Gotham City. He emanates this aura of honesty and goodness. And competence. And his accent is American. In Air Force One its Russian. In In Lost in Space it's British. In Harry Potter and the [insert names of latest two movies here], it's uh...never mind. He is a terrifyingly good actor, because he just projects auras, from his manner, his voice, his expressions. He was absolutely unrecognizable in Batman Begins as the classic Oldman.

Anyway, Batman Begins is a good movie. Probably the best of the Batman movie franchise. (though I have yet to see Tim Burton's versions.) And I thought Batman and Robin was acceptable. George Clooney the pseudo-angsty Dark Knight seems to have little angst to justify being the Hammer of Justice. Maybe he's just too long on the job. Many have panned his "smirking Batman" and Batsuit nipples that are the legacy of Schumacher Batman movies.

Sticking to the point. Batman Begins is a fitting introduction to the series. The plot, while still a tad superhero-ish, is the most macabrely twisted and the darkest of superhero plots seen so far. Circles within circles...and the Illuminati-esque capper is most satisfying of the twists. I like how all the elements of conspiracy come together in a very neat but not contrived way. Deus ex Machina is thankfully missing. The Oriental Bit at the start, with Bale/Wayne spouting the hilarious wo bu shi huai zhe! (I am not a criminal!) in half-there intonation is priceless. While a little mystically charged the League of Shadows can be genuinely unsettling at times. Especially when Neeson/Ducard/? reveals that they were behind the burning of Rome, the Plague of the Middle ages, and other catastrophes that have "restored the balance and elminated decadence" in the world, the weight of history does hang deep. Fabricated, yes. But nevertheless. Cliched? Maybe, a little. But at least it's done with style. And style is all that matters in reviewer scribblings. Ken Watanabe (Ra's Al Gul) makes me wonder if he can actually speak English.

Acting is generally excellent all around, with Bale projecting the right amounts of emotional angst. Cillian Murphy (Dr. Jonathan Crane) scares me. His disconcertingly smug, unsettling, almost-insane stare is perfectly conjured. And when he dons the bag and becomes the Scarecrow, it wouldn't have been out of place in a horror movie. Morgan Freeman (Lucius Fox) has been described as never failing to deliver good acting chops. While he doesn't stand out, at least he still gives a believable performance. Tom Wilkinson (Carmine Falcone) is British. And he plays an Al Capone-esque, gun-toting gang boss who sounds like he was weaned in Brooklyn. Need I say more? Alfred the Butler radiates fatherly charm and concern, but I actually (shock horror) prefer the Alfred in Batman and Robin. Not to say that Michael Caine was bad. He was good, and hailed as one of the best actors in Batman Begins. Katie Holmes, (one half of TomKat) who plays Rachel Dawes, Batman's love interest ("but," you shout. "We never saw anything like that in the cartoon!") was acceptable. Not the underdog. But not outstanding. I actually am less sensitive to acting ability.

Direction. Good cinematography, good acting chops, nice closeups, very emotional. That aside, I would like to say that Batman on fire is disconcerting. He's a superhero, for crying out loud. Spoiler Alert! Anyway, Nolan is better known for the independent psyschological movie than a big-budget blockbuster, and he puts his talents for drawing out Freudian, er, themes, to good use. Batman Begins is more character driven than most summer blockbusters. The obligatory action sequences are not the centerstage. Bruce Wayne and the Internal Struggle of How He Actually Turns Into Batman is. As Bruce in his playboy persona blithely says to a group of clustered companions, "A guy who dresses up like a bat...clearly has issues." Oh yes. Humour is actually quite abundant for a supposedly dark (which it is) movie such as this.

The funniest line in the movie goes like this.

Crane: He's here.
Random Street Enforcer: Who?
Crane: The bat-man.

The way he says it is just hilarious. I am going to buy the VCD/DVD and play it over and over again. Just joking.

Anyway, Batman Begins is good, and is probably the best of the superhero movie franchise to date.

The Cycle of Rage

Night over the city.

As the last of the sun's scintillating rays were smothered by cloud and dusk the lights of the bustling downtown flared bright in answer, as if defiant to the coming of darkness. The hustle of habitation continued even as the sky darkened to a dull indigo. Night fell, and it seemed that nothing had changed. There was no lapse in the buzz, the hum, of fervent activity, the pulse of urbanity.

Downtown, where a warm wind still persisted in the cavernous valleys of glinting skyscrapers. The ataxia of activity was at its most hectic here. It helped little that there was a minor commotion in the walkways.

This commotion was a certain heavily garbed personage. Oblivious to the surrounding bedlam and the brief, incredulous stares of other pedestrians, he waded his way through the crowd. Swathed in jackets, a wide brimmed hat a few decades out of fashion, and dark glasses which hid his eyes in murky half-light, it was no wonder that this strange, comically attired character was subjected to such aporetic attention.

Little did they know that boiling within that man was a deep, monstrous, uncontrollable rage, and it was waking to the silent, brief derision. The man strode on. His comparatively large bulk and strange attire were instrumental in clearing a path for himself. That, and the growing sense of the man's impending rage, burgeoning, ever more palpable in the semiconscious tunnel-visions of surrounding pedestrians.

Finally stumbling his way out of the thick sea of humanity the man headed off to a side street. Relief puckered his unseeable brow. The red hot demon hovering at the edge of his consciousness cooled, and faded away. He flexed fingers that he hadn't known were clenched. Loosened his hold on gritted teeth. Stopped the continuous, unconscious torrent of curses he was muttering through those teeth. And walked on.

Halfway through his sojourn through the more decrepit areas of downtown he heard steps falling in with his own.

"It would help if you didn't wear those clothes, you know."
The man barely turned his head. "Shove off."
"That preposterous hat should go off first. Nobody wears those things anymore."
The red heat started to throb in the recesses of his mind. "Which part of 'shove off' don't you understand, Runt?"
"Those two words ain't in my dictionary."
With a casual swipe the man struck a blow on his companion's stomach, sweeping him off the road. Runt skidded and struck his head on the kerb. Momentarily stunned, he lay there a few moments. Finally, just as the man was about to turn a corner, he bellowed, "Wait! Where're you going anyway?"
"Where else would make me so damned irritated?"
Runt stared. "Anger management?"
Enraged, the big man turned. "Whatever in hell gave you that idea, Runt?"
"Hey, relax. I...I was just, er, joking, you know..."

The big man turned and walked off. His anger was not assuaged by the fact that he was getting so predictable nowadays. And by the money spent so far on something that never worked, especially because everyone now looked at him with apprehension. Another thing that made him angry.

Behind, Runt sighed. He often wondered at the big man. And why hid himself to disguise his identity when going for such classes.

He would probably still get angry anyway.

Dissection of Epic Fantasy

Epic. That's the word for writers today.

Ever since Fellowship of the Ring burst out (albeit unassumingly) on bookstore shelves have a century ago, the genre of epic fantasy has been revolutionized. No longer are tales of elves and goblins confined to the parables told at the bedside. Instead, modern, adult fantasy (please, don't get any ideas) has blossomed and children's tales have yielded the stage.

Today, fantasy is widespread. You could say ubiquitous, for the shelves are full of understated, pulp fantasy. Examples include, to a certain extent, game-to-book adaptations and some larger series. However, epic fantasy, or High Fantasy, is different. It chronicles the events that shake empires, that move worlds, all against the background of fantastic creatures and strange magic. Fantasy is not fantasy if there is no magic or creatures. The time period does not matter, indeed, some epics have chronologies that span millions of years. Throughout these storyarcs, the stories of its characters, preferably not flat or one-dimensional ones, fill the pages. Epic fantasy is preferably human (as in, it deals with interpersonal relationships between characters), but set against the backgrounds of fabricated histories. Epic fantasy is also characteristically long and drawn-out.

Some examples of epic fantasy: Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen series, Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, George RR Martin's A Sword of Ice and Fire series, Goodkind's Sword of Truth series, perhaps some of Donaldson's, Edding's, and Brook's works as well.

The Confines of the Mundane

The sky, the celestial ceiling, so deceivingly impenetrable, is dead. Dead, for how else can Everyman describe the blinding, pseudopungent colour of a dead fish's belly (and thus the words In the Belly of the Carp ring), slathered like melted mayonnaise on heaven? Complete with the grey mouldy growths of insubstantial clouds, wandering their aimless, itinerant way through the realities of ciel.

Still the ravaging deadness covers the habitations of Man! Not merely the sky, but the air, balmy, stifling, initiating claustrophobic bouts in the appropriately attuned. Not even the wonders of modern technology (what, indeed? You wonder. An inappropriate and cliched term, oft-used to the point of weary irritation.) can eliminate the troubles that the overcast hue of the sky bring upon my thoughts.

{insert appropriate onomatopoeia here.} It's the heat, the stifling balminess that is normally found in the Doldrums, near the Sargasso sea. Inhale the air, taste the tangy, stale flavour of it, roll it around the mouth like a connoisseur of wine, an enologist, not without aristocratic distinction, practicing with self-assured poise the cultured swirling of the golden liquids in the crystalline glass.

Combined with the mundane shrike of Unfinished Business (aka homework, if you must know) the stifling heat in a stifling sky gets to even the most stalwart of those who live within.

And I am not even in the upper echelon.

Defining the Matrix

So far this "blog" has been a hodgepodge of disparate entries, ranging from normal posts to short descriptive essays. I recently realized, much to my chagrin, that the content really has little to do with infinite dreams or some plain/savannah where one may hallucinate at his or her leisure(though these things do exist in burning deserts in Africa and elsewhere.)

Of course, the logical solution would be to do nothing, and so I won't.

Wait. Won't change anything, that is. Not not doing nothing. You get the picture.

I shall end this entry, and you shall realize that everything that has been said so far amounts to absolutely nothing. Have a nice day, and may you not live in interesting times. (Yes, I am starting to read Discworld.)

Urban Decay

The sky was not characteristically dark, tortured or roiling with the distant anger of erstwhile gods. A cool, rejuvenating wind blew from the east, a voiceless throwback to better times. Midmorning shone with soft golden light upon the streets. In the silence of the day, an invisible morass stalked the city.

Missing were the everyday noises of regular urbanity. The noise of cars, people, pets; the vital rumble of habitation; they did not exist, here, now, in this time. So silent was the deserted city that the gentle reverberation of the wind filled the ears. Tumbles of dust swept the roads, tiny molecules beating against the sides of tenements, shearing past used newspapers flying aimlessly with the air's motion. A lone car, proud in its exalted vintage, was parked beside a kerb, on a double yellow line, a blatant disregard of the message printed in bold warning on a nearby sign. A piece of white paper struggled wildly, given spirit by the gentle wind, wedged uncomfortably between the windscreen and its wiper.

The sidewalks provided little indication of habitation. Broken, cracks in the tiles exposed dry grey cement, powdered. Occasionally a gust would sweep these particles into a frenzied, tearing dance, gouging microlevel trenches on the tar roads. Half-collapsed stairs would lead to a seemingly undamaged door, antique, heavy, but not without a certain peaceful candor. But the heavy glass would not conceal the dust-covered, spiderweb-ridden realities of the interior, a veritable ghost-house of popular reckoning.

So, quietly, the city stands, aloof, unyielding against the light wind. Apartment blocks rise out of the concrete-covered ground, sometimes, with tops irrevocably altered by some force, jagged, broken, with electrical wiring and steel skeleton jutting forth, naked, exposed, in the bright sun. A train, stationary, still in the middle of the elevated track; like some image from a postcard, the entire scene projects an air of being eeriely mundane. Stained by dirt and the silent processes of decay, however; this train is hardly any qualified representative for pushing the city's image. Windows, mostly intact, do not hide the emptiness inside; where empty ice-cream cups, a handbag, clumsily disposed coke cans litter its floors, reminiscent of the bygone perpetrators of such antienvironmental villany. More distant, the missing tops of once-beautiful skyscrapers are indicators of the roving decay. But, even with pinnacles ending in chaotic, geometric barbarity, these buildings yet glimmer in the midmorning sun, yet project a semblance of their former majesty.

Hear the penetrating silence, broken only by the lonely call of the wind. See the broken tops of buildings arrayed in a vast field around you. Wonder at what agent of entropy could have brought such a thing to be. The silent removal of the life of the city brings about the edifices of its present condition. Without the mantaining energy of its inhabitants the city goes into decay. Decay caused by the destructive processes of inevitability.

Above the city, a silent peal of laughter can barely be heard, laughter that strafes through the growing wind.

The Distant Mountains

She lay there on the soft grass, as the world moved in cathartic slowness around her. Experience focused into a narrow cone of awareness, channeling a sense of peaceful solitude into her perceptions. Around this lush mound towering claws of the earth jutted out of the ground, so sheer, so tall, that their very summits were shrouded in impenetrable mist.

These were the peaks of her imagination, so distant that it would take a day on a jeep to reach the base of these colossal pinnacles, yet near as the intimate touch of the tendrils of her mind. White snow and char-coloured rock upon icy blue sky, a field of mountains piling into the faraway horizon - that was what she had come to love, a representation of the dreams that had infused her soul with yearning.

So she lies, supine, on the soft grass, with the artifices of her mind's eye arrayed around her, and she is at peace. And the mountains become sentinels to guard her, she who has spent her life studying them, loving them, as children of her mind.

---

Another experimental piece.