Pandemonium: Chapter Three

'I' & Eyes

By: Mark Anthony Pritchard (aka Rorshach)


I'm writing in what must be the early hours of the morning, though time here is confused, for there are no timepieces, digital or otherwise, and I have yet to see the light of day. Two days have passed, and those two days are the only memories that I possess.

In this windswept ruined house, where I sit, surrounded by sleeping forms, I, nameless as the rest, search for answers, but answers refuse to come.

The only thing that I know for sure, is that I think, therefore I am. My mind exists, and because it does, so do I.

I don’t know who I am, but today when I gazed into a cracked mirror in this ruined house, I could at least see the exterior face that holds this relentlessly questioning mind.

That face was neither young, nor elderly, but the exact age was impossible to tell. Am I in my thirties, forties, or perhaps even early fifties?

I do not know.

I have a mop of thick, black unruly hair, and my deep blue/grey weary eyes peer out of a pale, gaunt bearded face. My beard is dense and sprinkled with dashes of distinguished grey, strands of wisdom in a still youthful face. My nose bends slightly to the right, like it has been broken, and inexpertly reformed, and my jaw-line is strong, the jaw-line of a fighter, a man who can take a punch.

I like my face. It is a strong determined face, the face of a fighter, confirmed by the thick bull-neck that is attached to the body of an athlete, a man of action, not words. My arms are heavily muscled, scarred, but not tattooed, and my shoulders are broad and strong. I do not know who I was in my previous life, but I know that I was a physical man, a man with a body that speaks of strength and determination.

With my mind on my physical form, I think back to yesterday, when fear evaporated, something clicked, and my body exploded into action, with a speed that surprised me, and I begin to speculate on my previous life.

I look at my clothing for further clues, and see that I am wearing loose khaki trousers (dark blue) a red T-shirt (sporty?) a blue sweater (no-logo) and a black zip up jacket that has a high neck to protect me from the cold. I check my pockets, but there’s nothing, no wallet, photographs or any other clues as to my life before.

The clothes are practical, informal and loose, and do not hinder my physical movements at all. Was this a deliberate choice that I made before? My missing shoes could have perhaps given me another clue, but at the moment I have to make do with some old white tennis shoes that I was lucky to find in this derelict old building. My feet still hurt, but they are tough and callused, and the damage was merely superficial. My body is tough, and used to physical discomfort. Is that another clue to my identity in a previous life?

I clench my fists, feel my biceps contract, and continue to speculate about that life, and what I did on a daily basis. I think about the status that I did or did not enjoy, my work, my family, my hobbies, my personality itself, and then spin-back and marvel at the contradictions in my mind.

How is it possible for me to theorise and speculate about work, family, and hobbies, when I should have no idea about what any of these concepts mean? How can I write? Was I writer? How do I know of family? How do I know of a career? It doesn't make sense that I can speculate on anything at all, but confusion and contradiction is the norm here, and in that delirium is there somehow a deeper meaning?

I do not know, but in the not knowing, is there a key? Something has to make sense. There has to be answers here, there simply has to be answers.

In searching for those answers I have attempted to engage in various conversations with the people here, but they do not last for very long. They appear lost in their own minds, and talk in single sentences, with closed statements of safety and suspicion. The impression is of isolated individuals living in their own personal vortex, tormented by secret problems, thinking only of themselves, running, hiding, but deliberately shutting themselves off from their fellow travellers.

I suspect that the confusion and isolation that dominates can only exist because in this world of isolation and silence, nothing is being recorded and so therefore nothing can be known. If nobody talks, and nobody writes, what is there to ever know? There is humanity here. I am certain of that, as I benefited from it myself on the first day that I awoke here. I was warned, and helped, and if one person here cared, surely there are others that feel the same way?

The question, of course, is why don’t they? Why do people seem so shut off from each other? Why do I sit here (this morning?) having endured a day of limited human interaction, even though I am surrounded by people who suffer just as greatly as myself?

My working theory, at the moment, is that the people here are stuck in an endless cycle of run, hide, repeat, and lessons are not learnt, as nothing is communicated, and nothing is written down. The people care only about themselves because they think only of themselves. Empathy is lacking, as the people do not see themselves as people at all.

Everybody is I, rather than we. Does that make sense? It sounds like a strange thing to write down, but there is truth there, even though the truth seems very odd indeed.

I will record my experiences in this journal, and in doing so hope to break the cycle of I, rather than we. These words are not for me, but for those that come after, those yet to experience the same feelings of confusion that I have felt, and continue to feel today.

‘I’ must become ‘We.’

This journal then is for tomorrow, and the intent is to break the isolated cycle of today.

Reclining upon the same damp mattress where I composed the previous chapter of this journal, tiredness begins to assail me, but before I surrender to it’s pull, I feel duty bound to record my first experience of sleep in this strange realm of isolated confusion.

Why write about sleep? Because in sleep there are dreams, and the dream that I want to record was too strange to ignore. On the first night, when I woke with such a fright, my only concern was for bodily protection. Did I dream? I do not know, but if I did, it was lost in the terror of the night. On the second night, however, I dreamt, and that dream is still fresh in my mind.

Here are the fragments that remain.

I see light blue eyes of liquid purity, flowing auburn hair, and a countenance that beams with the optimism of spring. The beautiful girl smiles at me, kindly, not because I have said or done anything to deserve this blissful reward, but simply because I am there.

A jolt of happiness shoots through me, and I don’t know what to say, but I feel perfectly okay, and I understand that silence is not isolation here, as there is a bond beyond verbal communication, a bond that ties everyone together, in the shared warmth of human contact.

Shivering in the cold of my nightmarish waking world, the warmth of the dream makes me wince in comparison, and all I want is to return to that infinitely better place.

Thinking hard on the details, trembling in the darkness of this derelict house, I start to recall a feeling of weightlessness. I am walking in the dream, but when my feet touch the ground it’s like there is no ground at all.

Perhaps it is the pain still emanating from my bruised and bleeding feet, but the memory of painlessly walking on weightless ground makes me long even more to fall back into the realm of dreams.

Why do I have to be here, in this dark place of loneliness and fear, where it is cold and scary and dangerous, where people are huddled together, but there is no connection, and no warmth? This is not where I want to be. Why am I here? Why do I have to be here?

Oh, to dream again, and walk on weightless ground, that’s where I long to be. I want warmth. I miss the warmth.

Longing overcomes me, and I feel, for a moment, reconnecting to that realm, as sleep again tempts me away.

Warm, so warm, walking, with no destination, for the destination is already here. Independent, but not apart, feeling overwhelmed with bliss, unconditionally belonging to a fraternity of humanity, no more I, just we, and a connectivity that can only be described, as love.

The dream pops, and I awake again, reclined, sore feet, with pencil in hand, staring at the words on this thick notepad, sentences scrawled out, confusion overwhelming me again, and my eyes begin to well with tears.

I miss the dream. I want to live there, in the dream, forever. This reality is too cold, too harsh, too painful, too lonely, and far too horribly real.

I’m weeping as I write these words down.

I want the dream. I want the dream. I want the dream.

A cruel wind howls through the cracks in the broken panes of glass, whipping through the room, obliterating the dream entirely, and reminding me of this harsh isolating reality that I cannot escape from.

It’s ominously quiet here, everyone sleeps, and I count their sleeping forms, jealously wishing that sleep will once again take me away.

Thirty souls I count, sleeping amongst towels blankets, rugs, bags and coats. Some snore, occasionally a cough breaks out amidst the silence, but overall the impression is of blissful escape, like each and every sleeping form is attempting to connect with the warmth of the dream that I myself had experienced.

Is this the case? I do not know, though I hope that it is, for these people, quiet as they are, isolated from each other as they are, share one common experience, and that experience is to exist in a world that none of them want to be a part of.

I don’t want to be here, and they don’t want to be here either. In sharing that one fact, I guess we have something in common after all?

As my feeling of empathy grows, and I start to identify more and more with the isolated people around me, a flicker of movement warns me of a danger lurking outside.

There is something stirring in the window.

Eyes.

I can see eyes, yellow eyes of cold predatory hunger.

Do they know that I have seen them?

I watch, silently, as they multiply, two, three, four sets of eyes now.

Danger!

No more time.

I have to do something.

Now!

Pandemonium: Chapter Two

Chapter Two: Endless, Nameless


by: Mark Anthony Pritchard (aka Rorshach)


I write these words by the light of a single candle, struggling for the answers that will not come. In this world of confusion, the only thing that is concrete and clear is the black animalistic terror that clouds the night sky outside, a threat too awful and real, to be denied.

It is late evening on my first day, after I awoke here, and I have no memory of my previous life, at all, if such a life did indeed exist. Am I insane, or does my mind instinctively protect itself from a truth that I will not be able to take?

After witnessing the events described in Part 1 of this journal, I followed the barked orders of the fearless young girl, and lagged behind her rapid step as she led me away from the alley, and the filth encrusted safety of my place of concealment.

The girl was not alone, and did not slow her pace for me, as she sprinted away, joining a group of refugees who were rapidly accelerating from the recently vacated tall and foreboding building where I had so-recently awoken in confused terror. I struggled to keep up, barefoot as I was, as the crowd passed me by, and watched in panic as they began to board a large articulated vehicle that was parked at the side of the road.

I wasn't going to make it. I was too slow. My body was locking up again, and the vehicle was going to speed away, and leave me here, in the slime encrusted streets, defenceless against the strange beasts that patrolled the night.

I was wrong, as panic accelerated my step, my frozen limbs kicked into gear, and I flew past the crowd, into the waiting vehicle, as it’s engine roared into life, and it sped away into the cold night’s streets, leaving dozens of desperate faces behind, to fend for themselves.

I had made it. I was safe, for a while.

Struggling to keep my balance in the uncomfortable, cramped quarters of the steel-floored vehicle, as it sped through the dark silent night, I looked from person to person, and what did I see?

Reflected in terrified faces, eyes avoiding contact with the people around them, focussed on the metal floor, wide open in horrified recognition that the nightmare was real, I saw fear, and the awful truth about myself, and the situation that I had found myself in.

There I was amidst the horror, confusion, vulnerability and fear of a shipwrecked people, battered remains of torn humanity, slowly drowning, in a deep pool of shark-infested brutal, horrific inevitable demise.

There was no comradeship there, no bond of familiar or tribal loyalty, just helpless individuals in a horror show of predator and prey, treading water, with the mute understanding that the jaws of death could drag them down, at any moment, into the depths of the black abyss, forever.

But I survived, and now, by candle light, I record events, surrounded by my fellow survivors, in another building, dark, cold and foreboding as before, and my memory returns to the brief interactions that I have had, in this quiet world of terror and confusion.

Seated on the hard floor of the canvas covered vehicle, shivering with cold, my feet bloodied and sore, I began to study the blank faces alongside me, searching for the blonde hair of the young girl who had bade me to follow. At first I did not see her. The people blending into each-other, crouched in shivering balls of cold fear, their bodies covered in dirty brown clothes and blankets, attempting to retain their rapidly diminishing body heat as the chill night air throttled through the vehicle as a whip to the rear of a broken beast of burden.

How to detect a ray of hope in a sea of brown misery? The thought splintered through my mind as I failed to detect her, then suddenly, there she was, in the middle of a row of filthy and unkempt people, a mixture of old and young, men and woman, of different ethnic types, most speaking in tongues that I did not understand. Her hair was covered in a grey hooded top, protection against the ruthlessly cold night’s air, but one stray blonde lock dangled down, a smile of colour in a sea of brown and grey.

Apologising for my rudeness, not that any complaints were forthcoming, I haphazardly forced myself through the packed carriage, eventually muscling into a space alongside the girl herself.

‘Thank you for warning me out there,’ I said, as way of introduction, and her fierce eyes starred directly into my own, in a look far closer to irritation than friendship or concern.

Waiting for an answer, that did not come, her aggressive glare returned to the floor, and she tucked her blonde hair back into the hood that was now wrapped tightly around her head, and obscuring most of her face.

I pressed again for a small titbit of information.

‘What is your name?’ I asked, the answer to which came in the form of look of extreme astonishment, and a tremendous bout of laughter, a reaction that confused me, for what was so amusing about asking for a name?

A response to my look of confusion came immediately, but not from the girl herself, instead from a haggard looking old man alongside her, having heard my question, he could not help but to interject his own words of mockery.

‘Don’t ask stupid questions,’ he said, a look of incredulity writ large upon his heavily lined face, ‘a man your age should know better than that.’

Leaning back, his head rebounding against the soft canvas cover, he began to chuckle softy to himself, and as I struggled for something to say, a sharp dig in my ribs diverted my attention, again, to the young girl beside me.

‘You’ll get used to things around here,’ sighed the girl herself, finally speaking, and there was a resignation in her voice, sad to hear from somebody so young, ‘if you survive, of course,’ she continued, ‘and nobody survives for very long.’

‘I don’t understand,’ I stupidly replied, feeling instant embarrassment at my verbal ineptitude as the confusion in my mind intensified to a fever pitch of incomprehensible panic.

‘Of course you don’t understand, none of us do,’ she replied, her voice lowering now as a sense of deep melancholic resignation set in.

‘Don’t get your knickers in a twist about it mister,’ she continued, looking up at me again, revealing sorrowful brown eyes of long-suffering truth, though there was a return of the previous defiance in her tone that I was happy to hear.

‘They chase, we run,’ she said, ‘what else is there that you need to know?’

Hearing these harsh words of hopelessness caused some kind of metaphysical breakdown in my soul, and I sat back in horror, understanding at once that what she had said was true, horribly, horribly true.

Hours passed by in silence, and the vehicle thundered through the streets, to eventually stop, and deposit me here, in a decrepit old city house, where I sit, surrounded by my fellow survivors.

I record these experiences now, with a thick stub of a pencil, and on a voluminous notepad that I found stashed away in this new hiding place, and I still do not know the name of the young girl who bade me to follow her here.

I asked her again, later on, as we settled into this house, and she replied with a question that finally gave me the answer that I required, even if the answer itself was as terrible as not knowing at all.

‘Tell me your name first, and I will tell you mine,’ she said, a knowing look of strange sadness writ large upon her small child’s face, as she established her claim on a tattered sofa, where she will sleep for the night.

Struggling to recollect a name that did not come, realisation dawned, and harsh reality numbed me into a somnambulist epiphany that was there all-along.

I did not know my own name.

There are no names, not here, and thus ended our conversation, terminated on the terrifying fact that here I am, a nameless mass of flesh, hiding in the night, from black lumbering beasts, moving from building to building, hopelessly lost and confused.

Now, as I recline on a wet mattress, in this broken windowed, wind swept, decaying old building, struggling to find a soft space free from damp, I finish this journal entry, and hope for sleep to take me away to a better world.

Will the beasts find me here? Will I be awoken again and told to run? I do not know, but I do know this. Somebody has to do something, as words alone will not change a thing, and if solutions to do not present themselves to me, I shall find them, for myself.

Yes, I am nameless, confused and afraid, but in this dying candle’s flame I am reminded of something old, eternal, and thus new.

There is the faint light of warmth here, and it speaks of life and hope, and when I awake tomorrow, I know exactly what to do. I will not surrender, and I will not live like the shipwrecked survivors around me.

To run, and hide, waiting for the inevitably of death, that is not life, and though I do not even know my own name, I know these facts for sure.

I will not surrender, and I will not run. Tomorrow morning, whoever I am, wherever I am, the resistance against the monsters outside, will officially begin.



Chapter Three: Out next week. 

Miss Morality in ‘The Tunnels of Intolerance’- Part Two

Written by: Mark. A. Pritchard
Released on: The Rorshach Rant- 6th March 2015



As she rushed, heroically, into the cold, dark, patriarchy filled streets, the strong, empowered, beautiful and independent Miss Morality courageously blocked out the despairing wail of a crying child and moved forward, towards her duty, her destiny, her raison d’être.

No longer would the white male privilege of her society continue to victimise those she loved, no longer would she remain powerless, victimised, unable to defend herself from the tidal wave of sexism, of racism, of homophobia, of intolerance that was destroying the very planet herself. NO, she would bravely stand up, and do something about this intolerable situation. A member of the homosexual community had been raped by the system one too many times, and today was the day when she righted that wrong, and changed the world forever.

Rufus ran into the street, mobile phone in hand, frantically waving at the departing Miss Morality as she took the Number 176 Bus.

‘Miss Morality, Miss Morality…wait. I have to go to work in ten minutes and my sister is missing. Who is going to look after the baby, she’s crying. Miss Morality…..Miss Morality.’

Focus, focus was needed here, no distractions, just focus, and that’s what Miss Morality had in spades. The world was blocked out, her mission was set, the outside world faded into the background as she concentrated on her goal, the goal of liberation, the goal of emancipation, the goal of freedom.

‘Daddy, what’s the matter with that lady?’ Asked a young girl who sat one row behind our snorting, mumbling and ranting super-heroine as the number 176 Bus jerkily made it’s way through the mid-afternoon traffic.

‘Don’t look at her Sally. She’s not very well,’ her father softly and quietly replied as he shifted in his seat now shielding his daughter from an increasingly loud and agitated Miss Morality as she cleared the back of the Bus from all passengers but herself.

Meanwhile, deep beneath the city centre, in the cold, grimy, filthy, rat infested den known as the ‘Man cave of Intolerance, the devilish group known as ‘The Politically Incorrect Scoundrels’ chuckled in delight at the scene they had expertly managed to orchestrate.

‘Ha, ha, ha, ha ha, my fellow scoundrels, the plan is working to perfection,’ spoke up the leader of the group, the face of evil himself, a man known only as ‘The Dissenter.’

‘Not only has Miss Morality left a crying baby behind her, she has also caused quite a scene on public transport. Her true colours are being revealed, and the public will inevitably start to lose sympathy for her rightful cause. Now, let’s sit back, relax, and watch our Patriarch-cam monitors as she walks directly into our trap, Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.’

And as the evil, cackling laugh reverberated around the lair of the villainous scoundrels a kind hearted, trusting selfless Miss Morality walked straight into their trap.

Can of mace in hand, and with her keen senses alert to the faintest threat of danger, Miss Morality stealthily made her way up the front path towards Ruthus’s flat.

‘Oh hi Liz, nice costume you are wearing. How’s little baby Sojourner today? Does she still have her funny tummy?’ said a smiling, cheerful, middle-aged lady as Miss Morality crept stealthily down the pathway.

‘Yeah, she’s fine. Bit busy now, chat later,’ mumbled a fiercely determined and steadfast in her assignment Miss Morality. This was no time for chatting; this was a life or death situation she was dealing with here.

‘Oh, okay then. Talk later love,’ came the reply from the ever cheerful, middle aged victim of masculine, rape culture oppression.

Miss Morality had been working on her for six months now, but it just didn’t seem to be working. Patriarchy was strong, but social justice was stronger, and Miss Morality felt sure that it would just be a matter of time before this poor, deluded old lady was wakened up to the realities of our times.

However, that smiling middle class lady was not what she appeared to be. She was no innocent; she was in fact the distraction agent of the Scoundrels. It was her job to distract Miss Morality, to break her focus, to leave our brave heroine open to attack, and that is exactly what she had done. Miss Morality attempted to refocus her attention on the mission of the day, but she was off guard, and taken unawares.

What happened next was almost beyond words, beyond powers of description, of comprehension, of believability in fact. The front door of the block of flats flew open, and a smiling young man bowed respectfully before a startled Miss Morality, loudly announcing,

‘Hey lads, the stripper’s here. Barry get Dave, get Dave quick, he’s going to love this. Right love, we’re ready, that bald bloke coming down the stairs now is the husband to be, so do your worse and show him some final freedom before his big day.’

Everything in her body screamed no, struggled to rebel, to fight the situation, to fight for woman-kind, to fight against this disgusting display of brute male sexist aggression, but Miss Morality felt powerless to resist. She struggled and struggled, but the distraction agent had done her work and our brave social justice warrior felt her willpower evaporating. What happened next was terrible.  She grabbed a bottle of vodka, took a hearty gulp, and then began to slowly strip, and dance for the group of demonically cheering men.

Just half an hour later and the world was turned completely upside down. Miss Morality was dancing drunkenly upon a table, and a panicked, scared and quietly sobbing homosexual brother searched desperately for his missing sister, and somebody, anybody to help him pacify a crying baby girl. He called his sister, called his friends, called his family, but there was no reply. Something very strange was happening here, and he didn’t know what to do.

The wild, triumphant scenes of celebration coming from the bowels of the earth threatened to shake the city itself as the gang of rogues known as the Politically Incorrect Scoundrels saw their perfectly set trap coming into fruition.

‘Settle down lads, settle down,’ said the devilishly hateful Dissenter, the leader of the group of intolerant, sexist, racist and homophobic scoundrels.

‘Our plan is going just as I envisioned. Miss Morality has been drawn into our tractor beam of Patriarchy. She is powerless to resist, and her time as a thorn in our manly sides is over. It’s now time to put stage two of our plan into operation.’ 

There was no humour in his voice, not now, just cold, harsh malice as he detailed the endgame of his devious, woman hating plans.

‘Our friends in the Police and Social services are waiting, we have netted our prey. It’s time we put this wet fish out of her misery. The days of social justice for all are over. Miss Morality is finished. Make the call, and end her for good.’


END OF PART TWO

Miss Morality will return next week (Friday 13th March) in ‘The Tunnels of Intolerance’- Part 3. How can our brave heroine extricate herself from what seems like certain doom?   All will be revealed next week. DON’T MISS IT.

* If any artist would be willing to illustrate this story, then please let me know.

Original fiction: Ms Morality in ‘The Tunnels of Intolerance’- Part One.

Written by: Mark. A. Pritchard
Released on: The Rorshach Rant- 27th February 2015


A thundering on the door was the signal of a new beginning, the start of a day that would change everything for young Ms Eva Truth (real name Elizabeth Ponsolby Holdings). Armed only with her mobile phone she bravely walked down the stairs to investigate just what the jolly hell was going on. By the time she had made the twenty-yard walk the Police were already on the scene. Her speed dialling bravery had saved the day once again.

She opened the door with caution, can of mace in hand, to find three Police cars, numerous Police officers and her handcuffed and embarrassed looking brother Rufus.

‘Oh hi Rufus, what’s up?’ said an empowered and confident Ms Truth.

‘Hi Liz, any chance you can explain to these gentlemen that I’m not the serial rapist you described on the telephone?’ replied a clearly annoyed and exasperated Rufus.

After a quick explanation, some on the spot counselling from a concerned WPC the brave feminist warrior Ms Truth finally allowed her brother to come into her house for a cup of tea, biscuits and a quick chat.

‘Now Rufus, before we begin I have to make things very clear here.’ Started a still shaking (but bravely) Ms Truth as she put the kettle on and made for the chocolate bourbons.

‘You have to understand that you can’t just knock on my door at 10am in the morning and expect me not to be concerned. You have to…..’

‘Wait a second,’ interrupted Rufus. I come around here every Wednesday morning to baby-sit for baby Sojourner and it hasn’t been a problem so far.’

‘Yes, but today is Thursday Rufus, today is Thursday.’

There was a stunned silence in the room, as Rufus came to the awful realisation that an entire day had gone misssing.

‘Oh my word,’ he cried. ‘Whatever could have happened? I feel a bit queazy. I thought it was Wednesday, but it’s actually Thursday??? Oh my mother earth goddess, I think I’m going to faint.’

‘You stay right here bruv, don’t do a thing, don’t even move a muscle,’ replied Ms Truth, now taking charge in a confident female manner. ‘This is a mystery for a super heroine to investigate, and I know just the woman for the job. You stay here. I need to make a call. ’

‘But what about baby Sojourner?’ replied Rufus. ‘Where is she? Is she at her Dad’s, is she….’

But before he could finish the sentence his fiercely determined sister was off, out of the room. There was no time to waste. Patriarchy was a menace that had to be snuffed out immediately, and every second spent talking about babies, children or families was a precious second wasted.

An hour later, and after the upstairs sounds of a shower, hairdryer and Pussy Riot CD, the living-room door flew open, and there she was, the heroine of the masses, the saviour of the offended, the amazingly empowered MS MORALITY.

What a sight it was to behold. Trouser suited, Pink Doctor Martin boots a cute orange balaclava and a little briefcase to show that this was a businesswoman, and not somebody that you should be messing with.

‘Greetings comrade. I hear you have been threatened/slightly offended by a mysterious event that was out of your control, and as a young homosexual gender neutral comrade of the politically correct nation of togetherness I am here to right all wrongs that were done to you.’

Her voice was booming, empowered and impressive, but not in an aggressive way. Young Rufus sat back in awe, quietly clapping his hands like a Dolphin at a theme park.

‘Ohhhh Ms Morality, I can’t believe that you have taken time-out from your duties at the politically correct nation of togetherness to help somebody like me.’

‘Of course comrade, that’s what we are here for. Whenever one of our comrades has suffered we are here to help. So what is the problem? Your sister told me that it was urgent, that you had lost something because of the evil system of white heterosexual patriarchy. Please tell me, calmly, in your own time, what have the evil b******s done to you? ’

After five minutes of explanation our quick-witted heroic detective/investigator/super-heroine determined that a conspiracy was afoot. It couldn’t be the fault of Rufus that he had managed to lose an entire day. He was after all just a single young gay man living all alone in the cold, harsh city. No, something else had to be happening, something bigger that needed to be investigated.

‘This is a most intriguing and complex mystery comrade Rufus. Your sister did the right thing to call me rather than letting you doing anything for your poor, innocent victim self.’ boomed the confident, and attractive (but not in a sexual way) feminist heroine.

‘I detect the intolerant and probably secretly gay workings of master criminal Doctor Homophobial behind what has happened to you. If anybody would have the motivation to cause the unpleasant scene with the Police that so victimised you this morning then it would have to be him.’

‘Oh, how do you know about the Police?’ replied Rufus. ‘I forgot to mention them. I just said that I’d lost a day and thought it was a bit strange.’

‘Ha ha ha, my young friend,’ replied the resplendent superheroine. ‘We are always listening, we are always watching, but just for your own protection of course.’

‘But now, I must be gone. It appears that Doctor Homophobial is up to his old tricks again, and it’s up to the nation of togetherness to stop him. That is our duty. That is our curse. Oh, and you don’t mind if I have a quick look around your flat for clues do you?’

‘Of course not Ms Morality, do you need a key?’ replied a now visibly shaking with excitement Rufus.

‘Ah no, that won’t be necessary. Just thought I’d ask. I’d hate to intrude on your privacy without asking.’

‘But didn’t you just say that you were listening and watching me for my own protection? And where’s my sister gone?’

‘No time for that comrade,’ interrupted a heavily in thought Ms Morality. ‘No time to waste, I must get to the bottom of this intriguing mystery.’

And with a quick nibble on a custard cream, the brave, heroic, towering, empowering superheroine was off into the dangerous mid afternoon traffic to investigate this now deepening mystery.

Meanwhile….deep in the bowels of their mancave of intolerance the evil gang of villains known as the ‘Politically Incorrect Scoundrels’ planned their next move. The leader of the Scoundrels, a particularly evil, devilish and devious character known only as ‘The Dissenter’ spoke up:

‘Stage one of the operation has now been completed my politically incorrect brethren of rogues. The trap has been sprung, and Ms Morality is walking straight into it. Now we move on to stage two of the plan. Operation Disempower is going exactly as planned, and it’s time we turned up the heat on little Ms Morality. Ha ha ha ha.’

The evil, intolerant laugh of the menace to society known as ‘The Dissenter’ echoed menacingly in the mancave of the rogues, and all the while Ms Morality was walking straight into their trap, a trap that could spell the end of her intolerance busting days, forever.


END OF PART ONE


Miss Morality will return next week (Friday 6th March) in ‘The Tunnels of Intolerance’- Part 2. What do the brethren of rogues have planned for her? What exactly is ‘Operation Disempower?’  All will be revealed next week. DON’T MISS IT.


* If any artist would be willing to illustrate this story, then please let me know.

I didn’t want to write tonight- Anarchy, compromises and a nice cup of tea

I don’t want to spend my Friday evening writing. I don’t want to have to think too much, too hard, editing and sculpting my words down until they resemble something that could be passed off as a readable tract of writing. No, I would rather not say anything at all tonight. I would rather not rail against the deliberate ignorance that has invested 95% of the comic books that I read today. I don’t really want to upset the writers anyway, and they have kids to feed and they have bills and car payments and stuff, and I understand why they are running on the corporate treadmill. Yeah it’s a bit cowardly, but that’s the compromise of life, isn’t it?

If you want a wife, kids, a car, a house (and things to put in it) then you need to compromise, right? You need to put your morality aside and look after yourself first, right? Because that’s what most of us do. I look around me and I don’t see heroes. I don’t see villains. I see compromises. That’s what makes the world, those compromises fuel the evil that we pretend does not exist. Well, we pretend, but I’m here shouting about it on my blog, annoying those poor compromised writers, and I didn’t even want to write tonight, so I need to shut up. I want to make myself a cup of tea, put on some music, read a book that comes from the mind of somebody, anybody who refuses to compromise, because that’s what I want to do tonight.

Behind my left shoulder, on my clean as a politician’s soul (it’s actually a lot cleaner than that) floor, and amongst the silly, childish comic books there is a big old proper book. It’s a book about the potential that we all deliberately stifle in order to fit in, a book with a dirty word on the front cover. That book has a great title: NO GODS NO MASTERS- An Anthology of Anarchism by Daniel Guerin. Did you spot the dirty word? That word, of course, is anarchism. That filthy, never to be mentioned in polite society word signifies the freedom that we are not allowed to claim as our own, as long as we continue to bow down and worship a centralised state control system of human slavery. Yes, anarchy is such a dirty word. So dirty that it’s not allowed on television, well unless there is a university-approved expert there to soften it’s blow and remove any real meaning that it’s trying to convey. No freedom here, this screen is a no freedom zone.

Oh television, how you made me into something that I hated, moulded me into something that no longer even resembled a human being. We had a long relationship, too long, but I had to break away from you. You talked and talked and talked, but nothing was ever said.  We are strangers now. I look at you with pity, with the sad recognition that what we had was a lie, that I had to move on, that I had to grow the Hell up. Ha, I’m waffling now, so self-indulgent, and I didn’t even want to raise my head above the parapet tonight, but here it is, so take a shot. I’m a manic street preacher yapping like a little doggie into the big black bottomless GCHQ Internet void. A revolutionary, that’s me. No black mask or red flag needed, I drink tea and read a book, and I need to shut up now, stop writing (which I didn’t want to do tonight), put the kettle on and get back to my original plan for the evening. Goodnight, have a great weekend, don’t follow orders, be nice, and speak the truth.

Nothing happened: A short story for the modern age

Writer: Mark. A. Pritchard

Released: 11th February 2015

Publisher: The Rorshach Rant



Nothing happened, and so he waited, waited, waited.

Still nothing, so he acted.

On the day that would be his last he woke early, excited with the knowledge that finally, finally, finally, something was actually going to happen.

How exciting, an event, a scene, a moment when the apathy, the boredom, the routine, the tedium would be broken.

Forever.

Shower, shave, and the rest, his breakfast was light.

He put his shoes on, walked to the bus.

The driver glanced indifferently with cold dead amphibian eyes.

Still, he smiled.

Something was happening to him today; at last. The smile came naturally, like the dawn of a new day on a blood soaked battlefield.

It’s such a joy to smile, unprompted, to hide it with shy self-conscious embarrassment. But to let it out, let it beam to the universe, that is joy, that is freedom.

The young man was liberated, so close to his end, and free at last.

He fiddled with his coat, adjusted his backpack, time was almost running out.

Passengers finally noticed him; they shifted uncomfortably in their seats.

What was this young man doing?

What was he up to?

He stood up.

No, no, no, he can’t be, he can’t be.

Surely somebody will do something?

Stop him?

They sat, watched, nobody acted but the young man.

Then

It happened.

An explosion.

Not in our town?

Surely not in our town?

A defining moment that would change the town forever.

Nothing could ever be the same again.

The young man stepped off the bus.

Carrying with him the battered remains of his iphone.

Destroyed, never to be used again.

He dropped it in a bin.

It was easier than he had thought.

His mind now free, he had acted, and done what had to be done.

He walked to the library.

Smiling.

Picked up a book.

And started to read.


Artwork in story is 'New World Order' by the brilliant theKinhe on deviant art. Check him out here:
http://www.deviantart.com/art/New-World-Order-175230007

Book review: War God- Return of the Plumed Serpent- Unrelentingly brutal

Author: Graham Hancock
Publisher: Coronet
Release Date: 9th October 2014

Website:
http://www.grahamhancock.com/wargod/vol2-synopsis.php

Graham Hancock on the Joe Rogan Experience (Highly recommended)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygWxXphYRos

***Spoilers in review***

‘War God II- Return of the Plumed Serpent’ is a difficult book to read, but not because it isn’t very well written, and not because it isn’t very cleverly structured. It is in fact extremely well written, expertly structured, tightly edited and extensively researched. It also has helpful summaries of previous events that nudge the reader’s memory, making it easier for him/her to understand what is happening in the relevant context.

The book is very good, but I didn’t enjoy reading it, and when I came to the final page I felt a wave of relief come over me. It was a relief that I would no longer have to read about disgusting, self-serving, avaricious sociopathic leaders instructing their order following subservients to carry out acts of inhumanity that they were very obviously revelling in.

Graham Hancock

This is not the fault of the author, as what he is doing in this book is using fiction to tell the real-life story of the Spanish conquest of the modern day Mexico. The problem is that we know how the story ends, and it’s difficult to see anybody in a positive light, not just the Spaniards, but the sacrifice crazed Mexica as well.

Author Graham Hancock understands that this is going to be a huge problem, and he does his best to surmount it, but I feel that the task is impossible. There are no heroes in this story, just sides.

A young girl named Tozi is introduced (in the first book) as a potential sacrificial victim to the wicked Mexica. She ends up as a servant of the wicked Spanish, as does her best friend Malinal, an attractive translator who sleeps with the psychopathic Cortez, helping him to deceive, manipulate, butcher and conquer the native people. A brave warrior name Shikotenka ends up utterly defeated and emasculated by the Spanish war machine. He doesn’t sleep with Cortez, but he might as well do. He finishes the book as little more than another concubine/vassal to the psychopathic Spanish leader. A good hearted and innocent young boy named Pepillo is taught how to kill, as is his pet dog Melchior. Innocence corrupted, incorporated and made into a tool to be used by the blood and gold thirsty Spaniards.

All of the characters that I could relate to, all of the individuals that I could empathise with in the first book have now joined the Spanish war machine of death and conquest.

Hernan Cortez himself is disgusting. He orders massacres, the burning of villages and the killing of civilians for tactical reasons. The individual human lives are not important to him. He is complex and cunning, but that does not interest me. He is simply disgusting, as is his rival Moctezuma. The former delights in getting his hands bloody on a one to one basis, whilst the latter is a coward, but both men revolt me. I don’t like reading about them, I just don’t.

UK book cover

The novel contains detailed accounts of massacres where the heavily armoured Spanish use their superior technology to slaughter the local tribes whilst having a whale of a time doing so. I could take no enjoyment from what I was reading here. This is a narrative for fans of splatter movies and serial killer books. They’ll love the descriptions of hand to hand butchery, the piled up human bodies, the torture, the stench of rotting flesh, the pulled out fingernails, the disemboweled wailing victims, the skin torn off screaming bodies.

To me it was unrelentingly brutal. It is historical fact, but there is no redeeming message here. Its just humanity at it’s worse. Order following, greed, deception, butchery, war and death. The gods look on, revelling in the bloodshed, but I don’t.

War God II- Return of the Plumed Serpent is a harrowing book to read. The young heroines and brave warriors of the first book are now just vassals of the Spanish Conquistadors. The streets are lined with rotting corpses and rivers of blood as Cortez the butcher enjoys the prettiest girl in town whilst dreaming of wealth and power.

History is harsh, it can leave you feeling hopelessly depressed that this is what our modern civilisation and cultures have been built upon. Graham Hancock has woven a brutal account of some terrible times here, but it just left me feeling cold. As Hancock himself puts it in the amendments of his book:

‘It is a historical fact that within fifty years of the Spanish conquest, the indigenous population of Mexico had been reduced through war, famine and introduced diseases from thirty million to just one million.’ 

There was no happy ending in Mexico. The gods of war enjoyed themselves, and the humans suffered. This brutal book tells the awful truth.

Rating: 9/10

Review: Trees #1- Toxic Alien Trees = Normalcy Bias

Writer: Warren Ellis
Artist: Jason Howard
Publisher: Image Comics
Released: 28th May 2014

You are born into weirdness, but the weirdness is all you have ever known, so it ceases to become weird at all. Support the troops and slave away for the corporate elite’s. Eat your poisons and vote for your oppressors. Never question who is in charge and pay your tributes or end up in cage. It’s normal to put a rope around your neck, cuffs around your collars and support the status quo control system of oppression. You live to work, and when you are too old to work you no longer have any purpose in life. Overwhelmed by shame you age rapidly, deteriorate into a shell of what you once were in your working prime. You have no wisdom, just regret that you are past your working prime and beginning to break down. The young do not value your opinion, and you have nothing to say to them anyway. They look at you in horror, a reminder of what they will soon become. Used up, discarded, as experience is useless, and wisdom non-existence in this corporate land of the forever young, forever enslaved. Generations repeat, repeat, repeat and the slavery of humanity continue forever. This is normalcy bias, where the insane becomes normal. Everything around you is insane, and sometimes it takes a comic book about toxic alien trees to remind you of that fact.

ALL THIS IS NORMAL

 This statement concludes the first issue of ‘Trees’ by Warren Ellis and Jason Howard. The book boasts quality art, quality art and quality writing. It begins with some scene setting detail, some history about the madness that is now viewed as normalcy. It could be talking about private banks with roots in everything that modern society is built upon, toxic roots that are poisoning us all. That is our world, this one is using the clever allegory of trees. You see what Warren Ellis is doing here? Trees are perfect.

‘And now we all act like this is normal.’  

Is private banking, loaning imaginary money to our governments, at interest, normal? No, it’s about as normal as a toxic tree suddenly sprouting in the middle of our cities, but that’s what the banking industry is, isn’t it? A giant toxic tree with roots in our cities.

There are three main characters in the book. An ambitious politician who sees his job as defining normalcy through control of the biggest gang of thugs in the city, that gang of thugs of course being the Police. The second character is a scientist, a story-telling vehicle who will no doubt be used to explain what is going with the trees. The third character is more interesting, an artist who is going into the heart of darkness, and the toxic centre that is the city. Is he going to work for a bank? Perhaps he is writer Warren Ellis himself going to work for Marvel comics?

What do you reckon?

Issue #1 concludes with a single page reminder that normalcy bias makes the insane appear normal. That’s how it works, and if that’s what this book is going to explore then it’s something I’m very interested in following. Warren Ellis might have had his wings clipped on Moon Knight, where issue #3 saw him falling back into the tired and dated tropes and clichés that makes up 90% of the Marvel corporations output, but he appears to be doing something more relevant in this book. It’s a promising start, check it out, and don’t hold up any hopes that Moon Knight #4 will be any good. That book is just paying the pills in the Ellis household; this book is actually trying to say something. Rating 9/10


Notes: I use the term ‘Normalcy bias,’ to describe a phenomenon of putting your head in the sand whilst the world turns to s**t around you, or seeing the insanity as just being a normal part of life, when this is certainly not the case. Think about the people living in Nazi Germany with a concentration camp down the road from them for a recent historical example.  ‘Normalcy bias causes people to act as if life is going on as normal while the world is falling apart around them.’ Check out this blog link for more info- http://geroldblog.com/2013/04/26/beware-your-dangerous-normalcy-bias/

SERIAL KILLERS ARE EVERYWHERE! - The Baffling Case of Pete the Pot Head

After another hard evening of attempting to catch devious serial killer Pete the Pot Head (so-called because he leaves a potted plant on the head of his victims), hard-boiled detective Jack Jackson is drowning his sorrows in his favourite watering hole, ‘The Quiet Exposition.’ But before he can down his fifteenth shot of whiskey coloured water he is interrupted with the devastatingly predictable news that Pete the Pot Head had struck again. This time it is personal, for the victim is none other than Jack’s ex Girlfriend, or something. This had really upped the ante. Pete was already playing mind games with the suspiciously handsome detective, but he had potted the wrong person this time, and it was time for Jack Jackson to play dirty to get results.

Leaving just enough time for a flashback of some scene in a play park or something, Jack quickly downs his whiskey coloured water, leaving just enough time to stare mournfully in shadow before putting on his 1980’s flowing Mac coat, tossing some dimes at a fat bartender left over from old Bogart movies, and strolling nonchalantly out of the door, cigarette dangling cooly from his lips, even though smoking indoors has been illegal for well over a decade now.

Arriving at the murder scene in his beat down car, Jack stoops low under the yellow tape to see for himself the results of Pete the Pot Head's latest, dastardly crime. Oh, it’s raining, and it’s dark, and the crime scene is in an alley, or something like that.

“So what’s the score,” asks Jack, lighting another cigarette and sprinkling it over the crime scene as he does so.

“You might not want to see this Jack,” replies Inspector Moustachio, “It’s Sally, and she has a pot in every orifice of her body, it’s not a pretty sight, the sick bastard.”

After a close-up of the poor be-potted victim, Jack screams to the heavens, clenched fists raised to the sky, “That’s it Pete, you think you can play me for a fool? I’m going to get you Pete. I’m going to get you if it’s the last thing that I….”

But before Jack can finish his sentence a bored looking cop who normally spends his time giving people tickets for not wearing their seatbelts and for having expired tax disks stops him in his tracks with breaking news about the case.

“Errr Jack. We caught Pete. He’s at the station right now. His name is Malcolm McSpannerheadz and he’s confessed to it all. We checked the CCTV tapes, used the licence plate recognition software on the roads, and then checked his cell-phone. DNA testing should confirm it was him, but he confessed immediately when we told him we were sending his clothes to the lab, although he did look a bit surprised that we caught him so easily.”

A shocked looking Jack knows that the criminal mastermind cannot be caught so easily. This must be a ruse, right?

But no, it wasn’t a ruse. Malcolm Mcspannerheadz, a television obsessed website designer in his early thirties was duly tried and convicted two months later, after DNA evidence, phone evidence and CCTV evidence connected him to every murder. Plus a quick check of his computer showed he had an unhealthy interest in pot plants.

Jack Jackson knew that this was only the beginning of the story though. The day after Pete was caught another serial killer was on the loose. This time he went by the name of, ‘Sid the Stroker.’ This devious madman would brutally slay his victims in their homes before stroking their pet cats with his bloody fingers, thus traumatising them for life. Jack knew that this would be a difficult case to crack, and so he went to the bar to drink more Whiskey coloured water, whilst another bored traffic cop checked through the CCTV footage, again.