A plain flat world

Tell me what I hear in my mind
A flurry of pealing laughter, soft
The dancing foam of watery graves
The confused rumbling of memories
Words half formed, reformed, unformed
I am become the undoer of me
Brighter than a thousand lamps
But dimmer than the iridescent sea

Eyes closed mind open
I let the thoughts flow through me
I hear the waves of that sea
Washing upon the dry parched land

There are waves here that do not flow
Stilled, sudden, eroded and driven away
I am dead within, a straw man
Seeing fear in handfuls of nothing
Yet doing nothing, this flow
This unmitigated flow of words,
Some day it will drown me
And my bones pickled in the light
Of this cruel world (cruel-mad-happy-sad world)
And the demon will laugh and make pipes
Out of my dry pickled bones
And play my song, my last song


Rhythm, there is no rhythm here
Rhyme, no sir we do not rhyme
We do not judge, we do not time
I am the shell of all I survey
A skeleton of words encumbered
In the thrall of my own nothingness
I have left my body to reside in the sky
Where I am lost not to be found again
Where my words flow into the wintry wind
Of floating emptiness and dark rain

Again I close my eyes.

Inspiration is my drug, my drug of life
A life of drowning lights and sights
Words, they are my savior
Words, they are my soul
Words, I am their slave
Words, they are my blade

Their darkness is black and deep
But they are mine to keep
Mine and only mine to keep

Ask me of lights on those lonely shores
Where I walk daily on the crystal sands
Where the mirror of my broken soul
Points at me with a thousand hands

What is it that wants to be spoken?
What is it that cannot hide?
What will stop this rising tide?
What is it that wants to be heard?

There is no reason, there is no aim
I live a gray dark dream of pain
Where slimy slithering snakes abound
Where darkness hears its own sound

There is no love left in me, neither life
Only words, and a catharsis
A catharsis of that never ending strife
And this place, this place that I call life.

Words

Words, there are so many of them
Known words, Unknown words, Hidden words
Loud words, timid words, silent words
Grave words, sad words, brave words
Short words, long words, hot words
Words that should not have been spoken
Words that should have been spoken
Words that are silently spoken
Words that are deafening yet say naught

Perhaps,
Someday,
I will know
Them all.

Encounters

Life exists in myriads of forms throughout the universe. There are creatures that are so different from each other that they would not acknowledge each other as life. There are creatures that co-exist at the same time and place and yet are blissfully unaware of each other's existence. That is because life takes on so many different forms that it is well nigh impossible to give a stable hierarchy of those life forms.

Consider the Vesan system in the Chondrial cluster. The system has ternary mother star and three gas giants making the system prone to strong magnetic disturbances. However the fifth planet in the system is inhabited by intelligent beings. Yet these beings possess no corporeal form. They are actually manifest in the constant flashes of lightning that the stormy planet (called BCEr7 - 5 in our nomenclature, the name given to the planet by the Vesans is incommunicable with out phonetic system, understandably so they "speak" in terms of electric field disturbances) While it is clear they exist even when the lightning is not flashing - the mode of their continued existence is not properly understood. In fact their discovery was almost lucky (The resident Electronic experts had an idea of hooking up the "interesting" electric field disturbances to language modeler in hope of making sense of them) However any effort to communicate with the Vesans has failed. In fact the continued efforts of the scientists stationed at the Vesan outpost has given rise to what we can draw analogies as "paranormal" activity in the Vesan society. Efforts made by linguists to modulate the electric field disturbances have made the Vesans coin a term that can be considered akin to a "ghost". Perhaps and experience similar to us if we suddenly started hearing garbled voices out of thin air.

Another fascinating race is the "Gas creatures" of Alophon system in the Bancu cluster. These creatures populate all the planets in the system yet are completely unaware of the existence across planets. It has been determined that they actually exist by means of "osmo-diffusion" an interesting physical phenomena so far observed only in the Alophon system that also gaseous volumes to exist together yet separately. In fact so many "accidents" go together to create the life system that is proper for the "gas creatures" they have been termed as the "most improbable life form of the known universe". (Close contenders are perhaps the space rocks of Graban system) Communication attempts with these creatures have been more successful with now exchange of interesting scientific and cultural information in progress (they communicate via what can roughly be thought as 'smells') However there exists no technology at present that can allow for their inter-planetary travel given the conditions that go into creating a stable environment for them.

Perhaps the strangest of life-forms of known Universe are the Time-gnomes. They are the only know intelligent race capable of traversing through time. They actually in fact live through space! Imagine, if possible, to flip the role of space and time and you have the Time-gnomes world. Contact with this species was very fortunate and first took place in the Kemer 2 Black Hole outpost - black hole event horizons being the only place where space & time beings can communicate properly. They are also our only direct experimental proof of the fact that time is in fact cyclic as proved by the periodic nature of their space. Many a fruitful theories have evolved with cooperation among our society and the Time Gnome society - most importantly the required conditions for faster-than-light travel (which forms one of the four constants that we have in common with the Time Gnome Space the other three being - gravitational constant, fine structure constant and the entropic diffusivity constant)

The universe is however vast and there are many places as yet unexplored. There are a multitude of lifeforms to discovered, studied and communicated with. We must strive to look further and expand our knowledge to embrace the universe that there is.

An Elegy to a Feeling

Often I smell that fleeting whiff
Of her fragrance, the shadow
Of a memory, of days gone by
Of wild thoughts and rampant youth
Those days of heady excitement
When I too believed in that
In the impossibility of youth

But it is a shadow.

Suddenly that day I was beckoned
By an old memory, an old friend
Perhaps a jab from my past,
And I was shoved back
To those old days, those times gone by
And I was faced with a picture
Of a ghost from my past

But it was a ghost.

I stared at that image,
I stared at that face,
I stared at those eyes,
The image stared back.
But there was no memory
Not even a small ripple
On the placid pool of my past

Not even a small ripple

It is gone now.The past is dead
Folded and disintegrated
I was sad for a moment

Only for a moment.

An Objective Confessional

I wonder how it is to live life
Riding on the shallow shadows
Of foaming waves of reason
When the ocean of logic flows by

To reason by the merest whiff
To go into a cascade of proofs
By the sound of logic's shadow
A reason that is its own reason

Objectivity:
To be unbiased in your reasoning
To be motivated by statements
Without personal leanings or bias
To be without individuality

Subjectivity:
To color every thought with you own
To look at every sight with your own
To make a conclusion with your bias
To be the individual you are

I live somewhere in the middle
An opportunist leaf on the currents
Leaping onto the one that suits me
Survival Instinct they call it.

15 minutes of an Epiphany

A moment of stillness preceding creation
Inspiration dammed, the silence before the flood
Time stopped, Life suspended
Each atom forming, deforming, reforming
The slow dance of confounding collusions
And forming that huge, Goldbergian act

For a moment, for ages, It stands still
Then it breaks... its a brave new world.

Jackrabbit Slim

Sometimes it feels so happy that I could embrace the whole world. Sometimes I feel so angry that I could tear apart the things that hold the world together. Sometimes I feel so sad, I feel like joining the army and going to the desert.

Hello, people! My name is Jackrabbit Slim. I am that raving maniac who you see begging in the subways, standing alone in the intersections and going through the garbage dumps. Yeah I am the one that smells, I am the one that stinks up the neighborhood. I am the one that you don't want your children around or perhaps better, you don't want me around anywhere you go.

Well I don't mind. I wouldn't mind going away from this place anyway. You see long time back I realised that this whole world was insane. Yeah completely totally insane. I used to live a somewhat normal life then. But everywhere I turned I saw little people aspiring to be bigger and crying because they could not. I saw how people who would not put faith in their own power put faith in abysmal trinkets and unseen powers. Its strange really, how people go on like this.

One thing for instance, the bigger the lie the more people will believe it. You catch up with some person walking down the street and tell him that there are vampires in New York, chance are s/he will shrug you off and walk on, maybe even call the cops who will charge with being a public nuisance and give you a ticket. But you setup and website, manufacture some shaky proofs and claim that 9/11 was a conspiracy and the government doesn't tell you enough, chances are one out of ten people will believe you. It has something to do with human mind I guess, the more enormous and perhaps exotic the lie the more people will believe it. That I tell you is the human mind. But hey I don't blame them.

I don't blame them because that is the way we are bought up. Don't you remember your parents telling you that telling lies was bad? Didn't your first grade teacher go on about honesty and courage and friendship and all that balderdash? Didn't your preacher warn you about the fires of hell that lie in wait for you unless you repent for all the sins that some book says? Yeah while we grow up everywhere we are conditioned like mindless robots. Do this! Don't do this! Very few people retain the tendency to ask why. Because they said so! Because my parents told me not to lie before they broke up because they were cheating on one another. Because my first grade teacher told me to be honest before she eloped with the PE teacher after they had embezzled money from the school funds. Because my preacher warned me about the sins before he was transferred after that affair with the altar boy. Yeah that is how big the lies are and that is how we believe them.

But I have my version of beliefs. They are more consistent actually then all those do's and don'ts that put together the world we live in. And I believe in them unabashedly. Thats why they threw me out I guess. But I realised that I didn't want to live in this insane world anyway. So here is my book. The Book of JackRabbit Slim if your will!

1. Life is not simple. It ain't and thats the most important thing. It doesn't work like a simple give and take. You interact with hundreds of people and each of those hundreds have their own life and own problems. If you want to go through the day unscathed think about the people you are going to talk with. Think about your actions and their effect of you or on them. Think why you might help or hurt people. In fact I could go on and on about this but this is very important and in a manner of speaking this folds around all the other things that follow.

2. Doing good won't always pay you back in good. Okay this is biggest simplification of it all. Think about it? Doing good - what does that mean? Helping people? Why? So that you get that nice arm feeling in your heart - I have heard sales clerks say that to people for selling 10 cent greeting cards. Well yeah if you are a narcissist you might wanna buy that 10 cent greeting card after you spent $750 on those shoes. But its foolish to hear people lamenting on the fact that why are bad things happening to them? Well bad things happened because 1) You were careless 2) There people after you 3)Plain bad luck. Its okay to lament if it lets some stress out but thats all there is to it. There's nothing like why to you and why not to your completely identical friends. The only thing your can do when bad things happen is salvage the situation, learn from what went wrong, avoid that again and please don't be a cry-baby.
The only reason why doing good is a good idea is because it earns you brownie points. Its simple back scratching - yours and mine. The world running on extremely convoluted give and takes. Thats also why if you can get away with "bad deed" to your advantage do it. There's no fires of hell. There's no fires of hell because its just another big lie!

3. You are on your own. There's no help, the idea of luck is top shaky to depend on. So you are basically on your own. Don't go wiggling down some altar to some religious deity just because your job pulled out.

Okay will talk to you next time, they are giving away food in that charity place. Well food calls. I will bow to any god for food.

Textures

Surfaces, unbroken, ever extending, towards the horizon. To an end that is the beginning but is not an end because, there was no beginning. To touch them is to touch the very fabric of universe itself. To feel them is to know the forces that create the very concept of existence itself. To know them is to understand the nature of reality and the way the layers fold over themselves and to know that the quest for absolute truth is a quest to understand statements that fold over themselves, to understand realities that come to existence because their causation is brought by events that proliferate in the sphere of those very realities.

There are smooth surfaces, calm and lucid, like surface of a peaceful mind. They exist only as reflections of the rough surface around them. They exist only when an observer seeks to watch upon them its own image. Are they then non-existent? Is their existence a bubble that bursts every time there is no object to reflect? Is their existence defined by the reflection that comes about because of the existence of the reflector itself?

There are rough surfaces. They are both hard and soft, much like a person worn by the world. Places where the mind has been wrought heavily by storms and hardened to those buffeting gusts of hardship and places where the soft innocence of the purity of feeling is retained. Perhaps some mountain of harshness has taken eroding to the winds of the world to protect that tiny brook of kindness that flows from the harsh, rough and sometimes regal mountain.

Put your hand of a surface today. Close your eyes. And feel every single nerve firing as the pressure sensors on your palm inject chemicals to your nerve endings and the perception centers of brain fire and the memories in your neurons are accessed and a characterization of the surface pops up in your mind. Erase that characterization, just feel the surface. Feel yourself losing to the vastness of that sensory experience where every other portion of your brain shuts down and you become the surface itself. Perhaps you are dead for that instant, your existence has merged itself with the surface and you are defined by all those impulses that keep on firing.

Perhaps our existence is also defined by others, by those around us. A circular loop of existence characterized by other existence ad infinitum.

Sorrow

What is it that words say?

I sit in this room of stilled dreams
As the sounds of the world float in
And split hissing tongue of sorrow
Wraps me in her embrace.

What is it that the words tell?

My mind warps, violently repelled
From that sharp seductive time
Like some mollycoddled wound
That I will not let heal.

What is it that wants to be heard?

A vortex of emotions that suck
Around and round and round
A hunter that wants not to kill
But to enjoy the fear in the eyes

What is it that wants to be spoken?

Silky smooth shiny sharp sounds
A split scimitar of surssurations
Slouched, slimy, slobbering sloth
Slowly sucking the soul's shadow

Sorrow.

The deafening sound of my silence
The cold wind of my warmth
The paradox of my being.

Sounds

Often, you just sit still.

You let the world flow in from everywhere. The sounds, of water flowing through copper pipes, of the periodic hum of the air-vents. Of the unknown taps that come from the ceiling, the ground below and the rooms around. A sudden scurrying of feet, or a sudden series of footfalls on the floor ringing out in the hollow corridor as the sound grows and falls. Somebody has just gone by!

A key turns, a sudden shuffling of air, it is a suggestion of motion, of action of hundreds of muscles contracting and expanding in a living organism as the initiated action ruffles the clothes that cover the body, push the air that surrounds the body and the presence is felt. For that moment the whole existence seems to collapse into that single yet diverse dance of sounds and actions that tell the brain "Attention! There is somebody behind you."

Words float down the air, from afar? from near? Who knows? Words spoken by someone meant for someone but heard by another like a spy, an eavesdropper, an intruder in the exquisite and complex social exchange of information. Perhaps the speaker knows what is said is heard by many and what has to be said is not often what should be said aloud. But what conspiracy of walls and surfaces brings that strain of pressure variations to another ear and what neurons fire that what is heard is what was said (or maybe what was meant to be heard)?

Then there is the incessant slow groan of the elevator. That eternal slave who must swallow humans and then vomit them out as it incessantly goes up and down like some modern Sisyphus albeit a Sisyphus that exist everywhere. Perhaps there is an abstract space of existence where this monster has a mind and suffers the eternal torture to always swallow but never devour, to always be near satiation but never get that desire fulfilled - an animation of the lovers on the Keatsian urn.

Sounds so many of them!

Antluppety Gluppety Dloom Gloom

Jumping and rumpling the gloomy blong
Prancing and dancing and mincing
Motion, corrosion, division, devotion
Long and long and Long and Long

Throat deep and wide and dloom
Words a bubbling, ringing, singing
Excursions, recursions, incursions, subversions
Loom and loom and loom and gloom

Fire the frailly fiery flire
Inching, screeching, beseeching and reaching
Condemnation, devastation and Damnation
Desire and desire and desire and my ire

Words acoming, words alettering, words afroiling
Squeezing, stretching, retching, writing
Abrasion, cessation, declension, ascension
Life and life and life and Life

A Poet's Curse

Similes and metaphors dance in my head
But the real words do not come out.
Perhaps that is my curse,
To never speak truth but always about.

My first poem in a long time.

The Truth about Nidarians

"I rest my case in front of the council ", Zar Chrnos said.

The five council members looked at each other and then almost in unison looked back at Zar.

Member One said "Zar, we are aware of your liberalist tendencies. But surely you cannot be serious when you suggest that we abandon Nidar ?"

"Councilperson I will swear by my findings and I will swear by my conclusions. It is uneconomical to continue the war any longer. Even after including the socio-metric factors and the appropriate mass behavior dynamics we stand to lose more than we gain if we continue this ..., this ..., this action." Zar could never call it what the council maintained " Aggressive Pacifying", they called it.

All the members stared at Zar.

Member Three said, "You have written report for us ?"

"Yes I do and I believe that it is all you will need to read to be convinced", replied Zar. Ah his masterpiece and he had not even written it.

Member Five replied, "Then we will convene after we have read the report".

By mutual agreement the council broke up as Zar bowed and went away. He knew he was going to win because the empire valued words more than people's lives and he had for them words that would prove without doubt what he was saying. His mind went back to the report and he felt a tingle go through his spine. Undoubtedly they were perhaps the strongest words he had ever read and in his heart he knew that mights of empires would wobble when they were faced by words like these. And the people, Oh the power, the people the citizenry of Nidar, what people they were! He had been there where the words had been read and he had been electrified, he had lost his own identity, he who was a council rep and class 7 investigator, had lost his own identity and been electrified by those words and he had felt something that he never felt possible. He had felt the madness of freedom. He had almost given up his identity then and joined the Nidarians. No wonder so many field operatives had been lost. They had something that the technology of the whole empire could not subdue, erase maybe blast the oblivion out of it yes but subdue, never.

It was balmy night, he could hear the sickening sounds of the suck-detonates. Empire technology at its best, these devices imploded tearing apart organic matrix while material structures like building and natural features remained intact. Also Nidarians were type IV organism with extreme psychological sensitivity and empathy. Body dissection had shown highly developed hormonal secondary hormonal system. The could practically function on their glandular energy supply for days alone. Hence they were emotionally unbalanced people and the more organic waste i.e carnage of Nidarian dead-bodies the sooner the planet would fall - simple Empire logic to make the subjugation efficient. But they had failed, of course Nidar was no match for the empire technology but the war had been on for many Terran months now but Nidar kept on refusing to settle down. It seemed the only way to keep an area under the Empire control was to wipe out every single Nidarian and even they kept on coming back. For the first time in so many Terran years, empire strategy was failing. And the economic machines of the empire had kicked in. The controllers of the empire knew too much about chaos to let this butterfly flap its wings too much. Ordinary military operatives were sent and lost. So Zar, Class 7 investigator, had been sent to Nidar, incognito disguised as a perfect Nidarian. He was to find out weak spots in the Nidarian psychology based on first-hand observation and report back to the Council.

The local Council (it was more of a ragged street gang according to Zar, typical low evolute "Might is the leader" psychology at work) had convened a meeting at night. So far with whatever out-society reconnoitering he could gather, these nightly meeting seemed to figure high up in the reason of the almost indomitable wave of Nidarians that kept fighting back. Finally he had acclimatized himself enough to attend one meeting without raised eyebrows. The smell part had been difficult, Nidarians generated individual smells that worked subliminally for identification and Zar had to master the olfactory apparatus before he could generate specific general signals that put the Nidarians at ease.

The group was raggedy and really almost pitiable. Most of the active age-group were absent or killed in the war (Zar himself was disguised as an Old male). The leader was an old female somewhat past the active age-group but with a strong control-mentality (Zar was accomplished in organism behavioral indicators). More of the local populace was shuffling in. They were all in hard times he could see that. So at least the empires' decision to attack major nutrition centers was paying off. So why weren't they giving up?

The leader female raised her hand as a silence descended on the group. What was going to happen, here, prayers asking for their local deity-of-faith to grant them powers. Maybe that was how they were resisting. Then it would be a simple matter of some mental messaging and some messiah figure and Nidar would be theirs. Faith could get complicated but nothing the empire could not handle. But Zar suspected that the answer was not that simple.

"Loorna will read her message, Nuqar Mena!", said the female leader.
"Nuqar Mena", repeated Zar with the bunch. Nuqar Mena - Never Me in the ancient Nidarian tongue. Zar had seen it plastered across battle-fields.

A small female stood up. She was thin as stick and Zar could almost feel her weakness and an artificial empathy for her. What was this? Some sort of trained exhortation. But he felt it in the chemicals in the air, the atmosphere tensed. She began:

" I am Loorna, I am seven revolutions old. I was born free", a thin little high pitched voice came out her little mouth.
"She was born free", people recited and Zar was surprised to hear himself repeat it.

"I was raised by my mother, I was raised by my father, I was raised by my brothers. My father lies dead on the soil of Nidar. My mother lies dead on the soil of Nidar, My brothers fight for the soil of Nidar. My friends of young who built huts of sand with me on the shores of Menna lies strewn in the battle-fields. I saw my domus emptied of life by the Khragar", the intense hate put in those word was more painful than whips' edge as Zar almost winced. He was disconcerted, he had never felt such intensity, not even when he had trained with Psychic races. And more disconcertingly with that whiplash of hate to the empire even he had felt something in his heart curl up, ready to follow the girl, ready to follow this raggedy bunch to death. Some intense primal feeling was rearing up that made Zar afraid.

"I have seen the Oldwyn red with the blood of my people, I have bathed in her water and heard the hearts of those who died, those who were killed and those that were not born. I have slept with bird-of-bodies over my head and I have woken to find another soldier dead without food. I have seen my army wither in front of the bombs of Khragar ", Zar winced visibly but he knew that something worse much worse was happening here. He was feeling the girls hate. He wasn't empathizing, he knew what empathy was and he could overcome it. He was becoming that thin ten year old's hate. And he could feel around him, every single eye was burning with the hate of that girl, a hate that packed thousands of years of evolution of the last charge of the instinct parent to protect its progeny.

"But till there is drop of blood in my veins, till my heart beats even a single beat, till I am alive and stand on the soil of Nidar, till I am the daughter of my parent, till I am the lover of my lover-to-be, till I am the mother of my children. I shall fight. Till we are here and and till a single drop of blood can course through our veins, till our daughter's daughter' daughter calls out from the dust of Nidar, I will fight. I am the mother of Nidar, all ye who hear me tell me", her voice had risen in tone an power and he could see that Loorna was not Loorna anymore she was what she was saying. And helplessly Zar - Class 7 investigator repeated.

"Nidar is our child, and till their is drop of blood in our veins, till there is beating heart among us, till there is one of us standing we shall protect here", Zar felt it, that rising tide of emotion and he could not believe that it was possible but he felt that incredible jump in psychic factor.

It hit him like a wall, and it drowned him and he lost himself and he found himself.

He heard billions of hearts beating, every single beat at unison. He saw the whole planet webbed to together by iridescent blinding light as every single Nidarian seemed to exist as one and as an individual within this matrix. And he suddenly heard a tornado rising, a crescendo of voices rippling with pure love, pure hate, pure resistance and pure courage, a concordant crescendo of emotion rise and dissolve him into oblivion as only the words remained.

NUQAR OMNA

Never My Child. And Zar realised it at that very moment that it had nothing to do with the girl, every person in that raggedy bunch of Nidarians was capable of what he had seen. He had seen the strongest primal instinct bred a by evolutionary nature multiplied a million times running on pure endocrines. He had heard them call the planet their child and he had seen that primal instinct aroused by those words, that primal instinct of species-self-progeny preservation rise and rip through the planet. And he knew now that the Empire could blast the whole of Nidar into pieces of rocks but it could never ever subdues these people. No, not even the mythical creator could suppress these people if the creator willed so.

Zar knew at that instant that the empire was never going to win again these people. Never against Nidar.

Finally I got about writing an SF story. This is not big-spaceship-blast-out-planet SF but the other sort :-)

Minds

When he closes his eyes, things go gray. He can see the color drain out of the surroundings as life itself seems to flow out from the world around him. Its a dead world, a world where there is no color, q world where there is no extremity, a world where moderation reigns supreme and one is bereft of extreme love or extreme hate. If fact he tries to see if he can feel and he fails. He tries again to bring those emotions, that feeling of extreme uncontrollable joy he feels sometimes. But it is like trying to catch a wisp of smoke, a gossamer thread that exist only in his mind. His hands too seem to extend out to thin air, perhaps in compensation to what his mind is incapable of doing and even they grasp into the thin air. Perhaps that gossamer thread is there, too soft even to be felt, too soft to be caught, perhaps it passes through his hand, his rough, callused and ugly hand. Perhaps.
But he feels nothing, its like a vast emptiness surrounds him, there are objects around him, yes they exist but they are colorless, they are bereft of the thing that makes them become what they are, they are merely objects that exist now. An existence perhaps as worthless as he wonders the existence of this drab dead gray world.
He stops trying to catch the thread. He stops to think, he lets the silence seep into him as his mind calms down. But this calming is strange, he knows. It is unnatural because this is not calm that brings peace, it is the calm that seeps out energy, there are no peaceful sea-shores with sunny palm trees. It is as if the grayness of the surrounding is seeping into his own mind and trying to, ... trying to bring ... bring him into this world of gray.
He lets the grayness come but he knows he will stop it soon, because he knows that he is afraid of the grayness. He fears it as some sort of death, his own personal dominion of changeless and hence dead existence. And he does not want to die, not yet.
He feels his uncertainty and fear mounting as he can almost see his mind falling like flower of dominoes with the collapse moving radially inwards. As each of his blood red dominoes turn gray and as the circle of collapse draws near he can feel his fearing rising, his nervous impulses firing crazily as some trapped animal in corner crying out ...
Suddenly he jerks his eyes open, for a moment, just for moment the grayness is there even in the real world but the color flows back instantly seeping through existence as he thrown into the world again.

He looks around, there people sitting on desks around him working away. He wonders if they noticed him. He also wonders what they see when they close their eyes.

This is my way of visualizing alternate minds. Words often fall short to describe the things I want to tell but there are time I feel that even my mind falls short to describe the things that existence in the imagination. But perhaps there are words that I don't know that would describe the things that are there in my imagination.

Peoty

Dead, dying, driven to death.

Do you see those colors, those pretty colors of red and black and yeller and, and ... ... blood. They come in mah dreams every night, those colours, every night. They are very pretty, very pretty, or atleast they seem so until, until they start forming.

They form the pistures of mah childhood all in yeller and black. In yeller and black. I see mah home back at the farm. It is night and I'm hidin' out in the farm. The corn, all the standing corn is yeller swaying slowly, slowly in the wind like Peoty's body had swayed after Pa had cut off her head with 'is sickle, slowly from left to right. I can hear the screams of my Ma and grunts of my Pa. I can't see what he is doing but I can feel it, He is beating Ma. The corn is swaying so slowly, it keeps reminding me of Peoty, swaying slowly from left to right. Peoty had been so good to me. But Pa had killed her, said he was allergic to them, people like Peoty. But I was not allergic to Peoty or people like her. I had buried her body under the cherry tree, not the head, Pa had taken the head laughing out loudly. Said he would have it framed in a plaque, his first huntin' trophee. But I miss Peoty, she used to talk with me for hours'n hours. She always knew all the answers to all the questions I ever asked. For example she knew about the man on the moon, his dawg and his bush. She also told me about the river ghost that lived down in the creek and how it would not harm you if you first threw a four leaf clover into the river and then went to the creek.

But Peoty was dead now, Pa hadn't framed 'er head in a plaque as he 'ad promised. I 'ad wondered then if Peoty might talk to me with her head framed in a plaque. But her head was nowhere to be seen. Later I had found it in the rubbish dump, rotted, its eyes gone. I guess she was not goin' to talk to me no more.

The sounds have stopped. My mother 'as fainted, I guess. Pa never hits any'un or anythin' that don't squeal or scream. He would drink some more whisky and then come out searchin' for me. I try to get lower and lower into the ground until I am lying flat on the ground. My buttocks are still sore and bloody from to last night's beatin's. I hear him scraping out of the door. The corn swaying in the wind, I hear his grunt.

"Boy, where are ya boy, ya want some whisky , boy ? "

I keep still, I can hear 'is footsteps on the ground now his boots crunching on the pebbly ground. He is singin.

"Fifteen men un a dead man's chest
Yo ho ho hooooo ..
A bottle of rummmmmm.
Drink a devil done fer the rest
Yo ho ho ho hoooooo
A bottle of rummmmmmfff... "

"Boy ,where are ya hidin' boy ? Your ***** of a mothaw ain't here no more boy. She's gone boy, gone to the magic land boy ."

My heart's beatin' wildly now. Ma is gone too, gone like Peoty. I wonder if he cut her head off, like Peoty. I could see her body, headless swaying in the wind, slowly, from left to right, left to right, like the corns.

"Ha ha ha ha, to magic land, to magic land ... ..."

I can hear his footsteps coming nearer and nearer. But I don't move. I keep very very still. He must not know that I am here, no, not until the last moment.

"Boy, where are ya boy ? Come out and we will 'ave a drink together, you and me son , like father and son, a family , ha ha ha ha ... ... a famileeeeeeee ."

He is very near. I can hear his heavy breathin' and smell o' 'is breath reeking of whisky. But I must wait, wait until the right moment, just like Peoty had told me.

"You are makin' me angry boy, I am gonna send you to the magic land boy jus like your mothaw and that that, whatsisnehm, Poetee no, Peotee, Peoteeeeee."

Just a few more steps Pa, a few more steps.

"Peoty, Peoteeeeeee what a name fer a ... "

But Pa gets no chance to complete the sentens. He is standin' jus' over me lookin' ahead with his unfocused eyes talkin' about Peoty when I raise the sickle and throw it, exactly to his neck.

There's an odd gurgling sound as blood pours out of Pa's neck falling all over the place, all over me.He sways dangerously, like Peoty had swayed left to right, left to right. Then he slowly falls on his back still making that odd gurgling sound.

"Gluphh , gloop ... ...", that odd gurgling sound.

"Peoty warn't no cat Pa", this is the last words my Pa hears.

Another semi-horror story with somewhat gothic elements. This story also has a child as a major character.

Loneliness

The Bride of Loneliness beckons me
To be embraced in her cover
To be silent and curl up
And lie down forever

It is an insiduous feeling that creeps into your life, like a canker. It is difficult to fight it and it is even more diffcult to win against it. It is like a filthy little perverted secret that you coddle and hold till it grows into a huge secret of your life and in the end you are consumed by it, like a self sustaining symbiotic parasitic relation that has gone awry. There is no cure, no internal cure for it and I hope for someone to come from outside, from away and rescue me.

There is a pleasure in stasis that is self destructive. This stasis is beyond vacillation, vacillation involves an alternating thought stream - debating options or at least avoidance of a certain thought process by indulging in others. Stasis is all pervading emptiness, an emptiness when the body becomes a shell and your mind becomes a fluid and shapeless reactive ensemble. The body ceases to be anything more than a shell, a reservoir for this mind and I float in a nothingness, numb.
The pleasure is there and the pleasure eats me, alive. My mind is slowly consumed in the vaccuum of nothingness as streams of thought break away in obedience to some cold law of nature. In the end I am left with nothing but a shadow of a forethought buried in nothingness. I am truly empty then. Perhaps that is dying.

But I cannot deny responsibility, I cannot deny that the perverse pleasure of loneliness makes me curl and think nothing for hours in my bed. Yet somewhere in my mind at the same time there a stream of thought, weak and weakening every day. This is where I cry for myself, this is where I reek of self pity and this is where I search for salvation.

My salvation takes the form of a woman. She is there smiling at a distance, enticing and forbidding at the same time. Smiling and speaking and calling out to me - 'Come to me and I shall save you, come come come ...' till the sound morphs into a sexual experience. I am lying naked with her on flat ground stretching to infinity everywhere. I want to touch her, feel her, fondle her and cuddle up with her and go thorugh the seven heavens of sexual pleasures with her. But I don't. I just look at her and she looks back and smiles at me. Her mouth moves but I hear no sound and yet I know what she is speaking. She is asking that why don't I touch her, why don't I fondle her, why don't I do anything to her? But I just lie there looking at her with nothing in my mind. She stops talking and looks away. But I know that she is smiling, she always smiles.

I am back in my drab room staring at its yellow walls and crying witihin, as always.

Again self-explanatory.

Emptiness

Let us scratch the exterior. Let us make a hole and let us burrow into it. But why, why try to look inside, what do we expect to find inside.

***

I am sitting in class and am being taught.

I sit and stare to the Professor as he moves back and forth, from the blackboard to the seats and then back again. There is a patter in this, the way he moves, he spend almost twice as much time near the seats interacting with the students and observing their faces, judging the class reaction and trying to make the best the 55 minutes allocated for drilling knowledeg into our heads.
But why am I trying to figure out a pattern in the way he moves, why am I not listening to what he teaches. I automatically have look of concentration on my face even when my mind is far away, so at least I am not a disinterested student in his eyes. There is nothing to understand in what he says, its all there in somebody's copy and I will read it from there, give the exam, pass the course and will be gone. But what will I be inside? Will I have changed, because of the new knowledege or will I transform the knowledge to reinforce my existing character. But what is my existing character.

***

I am sitting in my room and I am trying to complete a project.

I sit and stare at my laptop. There is a problem and it needs to be solved. Then I must go and search for a paper that talks about that problem. I must search the web for any code, tutorial or reference that will help me in completing my task. The deadline is in a few days and I have to submit this project if I want a good grade. So I must complete it and hence I sit and stare at my laptop.
But what do I gain from this exercise. I will have created something based on previous knowledge and reproduced somebody else's result. How can anyone judge my work without knowing the methodology I used to complete it? How is anything I do in this manner better than an accountant who adds numbers using a calculator? How am I learning from this and why should I learn? Does this activity change me or do I do this activity because of the way I am?

***

I am sitting in my room writing, what I call a 'story'. The purpose of the story was blurred when it started but with the writing it has slowly taken shape. I intend to question the nature of own existence and the mutual interaction between external stimuli and intent. But why do I have the desire for this questioning? Why is there a desire to be fulfilled? Why is asking questions important? What is it that I search for among the empty ruins of my soul?

Self explanatory.

A short Introduction to Eggology

“The Point is to get things done”, these were the immortal words of the philosopher-janitor Bubbly Montenegro. The fact the he was trying to defend his usage of radioactive waste to destroy the bugs is his Office Building has been since regarded as merely existentialist trash and hence has been the subject of many a PhD theses.

The year is 5070 C.E and dugongs are extinct. The world is united under the banner of Great Crab Hoth and there are twenty five certified holidays in the official calendar. Humanity has gone out in space and come right back declaring the inter-stellar travel is boring. Except for a few groups of unbeatable voyagers who constantly plan grandiose voyages and dream about the beautiful Pleasuring Animals of Tau Ceti, nobody seems to give a damn. Actually the existence of Pleasuring Animals (who, the story claims, can provide you with all sorts of sexual pleasure no matter how perverted or twisted) is a myth created by a certain clever grad student who wanted to fund her research.

The world exists in a constant state of turmoil with regards to certain deep ideological concerns about the great problem of the Egg of Columbus. While it has been proved without doubt (except for a few disgruntled Chefs whose leader Count Phillipe Du Fromage uttered the immortal words “The Egg is my birthright and I shall have it, boiled that is” and promptly threw an egg at the flag of Great Crab Hoth) that this is the ultimate question of the Universe, the answer is nowhere in sight. Actually the turmoil is essentially limited to the hallowed halls of the Universities and Research Laboratories of the world and the rest of the world doesn’t give a damn about the Egg unless it is on their breakfast plate. But the academia has always been known to take a global perspective of the problem. In fact the rest of the world is actually united under the Flag of the Great Crab Hoth who walks sideways and sure as hell doesn’t give a damn about Eggs.

The great problem of the Egg of Columbus dates back to, as the well known linguist Kevlar Kitanama quips, well before Yo’ Mama was born. The story goes like this, Columbus, a wise guy of his times, decided to make a point is some guy’s wedding. So he imperiously stood up in the middle of ceremonies (a series of disconnected set of actions that were an inherent part of ‘well before Yo’ Mama was born’ times) and declared that the gentleman was a fool and he could prove it. The gentleman angered as well as amused by Columbus (who was a very wise guy indeed) accepted the challenge. So Columbus took an Egg and challenged the guy who was about to get married to make it stand on the end. The guy (who it turned out was Spanish, but which has no bearing whatsoever with the story except for a group of Evolutionologists who claim that this guy was indeed the missing link between Homo Sapiens and Homosexuals and claimed finding his fossils in Spain) tried and failed after many attempts at making the Egg do so. Some academicians claim that this guy was indeed the first ever true Scientist. It is common consensus that this is the useful part of the story and anything that happened afterwards is inessential to the proposition of the problem, the Greatest Problem of the Universe had been proposed publicly for the first time.

However for the sake of completeness (which is a myth according to the Historian Daddy Longlegs) is that the wise guy Columbus took the Egg broke at the narrower end, made it stand and winked at the bride. It is at this point the things get complicated as exactly half of the academicians (Research doesn’t pay as well so every researcher is also a teacher or an academician - wise guys who teach teachers) agree that Columbus had solved the problem and all academicians should shut their traps, resign from their posts and don fluffy pink dresses and join the Bolshoi Ballet. The other half vigorously claims that Columbus was just a wise guy who was leching at the bride and didn’t know a dang about Eggology.

But such was the ignorance of the Human race that the problem went largely ignored by the barbaric scientific community which was still concerned with unimportant stuff like “Unified Field Theory”, “The Origin of the Universe” and the “The Stasis Fields of Temporally Fluctuating Hadron Systems”. It was only in the year 3498 C.E that when the philosopher Yo’ Mama spoke out that humanity was put in the right path and people lived pragmatically ever after (nobody, not even Daddy Longlegs believes that this happened but since everybody says so it must be true, Daddy Longlegs particularly disputes the date as he contends that all great events happen in round years so it is more probable that it actually happened in 3000 C.E, however everybody also agrees that Daddy Longlegs is a liar and a fool)

Yo’ Mama is widely considered as the Mother of Modern Science and was the unfortunate wife to the most barbaric Physicist of her times. The only people who dispute this fact are the ones who say that she was in fact the sister of Modern Science and her parents were the actual Father and Mother of Modern Science. One day she threw her hubby out of the window of her fourth floor house. On being brought to the court for her seemingly mindless action, she is known to have uttered the super-duperly immortal words “Time is better spent on the Egg of Columbus than on work such as his.” Some also regard this as the most foolish statement ever made as Yo’ Mama almost her life due to the barbarianism of the law courts of those days. It is said (and indeed said very loudly by the Speakers at the Council of Great Crab Hoth) that the truth of Yo’ Mama’s super-duperly immortal statement lighted a flame of in hearts of humans and there was revolution and Yo’ Mama was pardoned and she started a very profitable poultry business with the tagline “If you don’t succeed at the first, Egg it”.

Slowly the various great problems of Physics, Sociology, Math, Crab Copulation and Philosophy were reduced to the Egg of Columbus and there was much happiness and rejoicing in the world (which was mostly because of the funds diverted from the utterly unnecessary branches of inquiry went into building theme parks and Video Game arcades) There was some opposition from a few barbaric places which quickly subsided as money was cut off to those places and finally the starving Scientists Egged their original work, literally.

As mentioned before the Eggologists are mainly divided into two camps, the Columbusians (ones who deem Columbus as a wise guy who solved the problems) and the Bubblians (who deem Columbus as the wise guy who was a lecher) and since reams of papers have been wasted and heaps of journals have been published on every aspect of the Egg without any avail, all research has been reduced to an annual Egg throwing Conference between the Columbusians and the Bubblians held at different city dumps each time. The score now is 94:89 with Columbusians leading (particularly because of their drive to recruit retired baseball pitchers) and the problem will be deemed solved when either side accepts defeat or looses the lead by 25. It is also this way of research that is the major point of contention of Phillipe Du Fromage’s group who say that boiled rather than raw eggs should be used in the Conferences.

This was a short introduction to Eggology and its history.

This is my first complete absurdist piece. I still don't like some parts of it, especially the parts where some shallow attempts to "linguistic humor" have crept in however I have not come about refining it.

Freedom

Two weeks.

I am the feather on the crest of a jet stream, flying at four hundred miles per hour. The world is zipping past me like a multicolored projector gone hyper. Images flicker, disappear, distort. My mind is no longer here, nor there, nowhere …

The freedom of choice.

You walk down the street, you want to hurt someone, the boiling rage of teenage blood, they don’t understand you, they never will. All of them, tagging along each other, so co-operative.

Yes Md. Tramells, I do have a spare fly-pack …Oh you can give it back to me anytime … how is Duddles, oh that cute little boy …Did you hear about the latest cerise colored hairdryer ……… I so want to be a Kamena Girl.

Take your cerise hairdryer and stuff it into Duddles, Mother. Maybe that slobbering fat pound of living flesh will stop drooling at everything. Maybe the Kamena people will do it for you. They do half of the things for the world anyway. Kamena … the dream of every person, they supply you dreams to pack in the leftover bag for vacuum cleaner trash and then wait for more dreams. The idea of free choice, the right to choose, Kamena will give you all, Kamena will give you things that are not Kamena as well.

One-and-a-half weeks.

I am the droplet of water hanging from a huge redwood tree at the artificial rainforests of North America. Ready to float down with an acceleration of two meters per second square. My entire life is composed of exactly ten seconds of green, blue, orange, cyan, magenta slipping all around me. I am reflection all that there is, because to me all I can see is all that there is. A small distorted version of the world around me exists inside me, exactly for ten seconds. Plop.

To be free of all burdens, all expectations, all choices, all requirements. To live like the air slipping through the nooks of the world unseen, yet felt everywhere. Nature the mother, the nurturer, the sustainer … Mother, why did you send me away. I don’t want to grow up. I will look after Duddles, I will wish Md. Jenkins, I will go to meditation circles, I will serve the aged and the childish. I will conform. No mother I did not understand what you told me. To be truly free, you must break all your bonds. I don’t want to break from you mother or from Duddles. Please mother, take me back, please …

One week.

I am the piece of broken hair lying on the birthday cake of a Prima Donna. I am the cake, the cream, the sugar, the flour and the icing. I am the cake, I belong to it……… Am I? Am I not the canker in this beauty of human creation? Am I not an error, a discrepancy, an unwanted glitch in the way that things should be? A thing to be frowned upon, brushed off? But I am embedded into the cream, the icing, the sugar. I cannot be removed by without disfiguring the cake. So my portion will be discreetly cut off and thrown into a recycler. I am the unwanted part ………

Do I really know who I am? “Camellita, Camellita, Camellita, you poor dear” says the floating droplet. “Just look at you, abandoned, filled with self pity and crying with no one to comfort you.” The droplet merges into the ground, its identity lost and yet I retain the memory of the one statement … Poor dear, self pity … Is that what I am? Who Am I? Camellita Tramells, Id, no 10485467. There is no ID marker here, only miles of greenery surrounding this beautiful piece of Earth. This uncontrolled portion of Earth where the freedom of choice has found its purest mode of expression, there are no rules here, just existence, unbounded by any control. I am the canker here, the unwanted part, the part that must be discreetly cut off and removed from sight. I was removed from my home. I must be removed from here as well …

Half-a-week.

I am the white thing that forms in the corners of your mouth, a byproduct, a waste, not worth any consideration. The foam composed of excretions of the human body, the rejection from a living, successful mechanism, to be washed off and forgotten. Not worth any consideration ………

Walking through the wall of forest, free of all cares, burdens, troubles. Camellita! Camellita is not here. She is still sitting in that quite corner of the forest with her face down staring at the droplet that merged into the ground with a thousand conflicting images trapped in her mind. I am no one, I am not Pamela Tramell’s daughter, I am not Duddles’ sister, I am not Md. Jenkins’ neighboring troublesome teen. I am not ID no 10485467. I am free because I have gone away. I have died. I am born. I am the undead. I am the living. I am the feather on the crest of a jet stream spreading the news of hope, spreading the news that the powerful and the soft go together. I am the drop of water floating down to ground, I am an image of the world that exists all around, a composite beauty compressed in time and space to show the living that the universe is both big and small, that there is power in the small to encompass the big. I am the piece of broken hair in the cake, to be cut away. Yet I am the cake and the without me that cake is incomplete telling all that the discrepancy, the error is not a thing to be removed but an essentiality. But I do not speak. I cannot speak. I am to be realized.

Time.

On 2350 hours, Camellita Tramells died. She entered the troubled stage early and was sent to “grow” up before schedule. Our condolences to her brothe, Duddles.

We have new citizen among us Pristina Valkyries, born at 2351 hours. She is to become the governess of space transmissions in Tamara Province. She has also wished to remain single for the time being so she maybe addressed as Si. Valkyries.

Transformation Report:

“To be truly free, you must break all you bonds”

The growing up if a human bio-system is a very mental process. Born from the mother’s body, the human has a bio-mental link up with a family structure that may hamper the mind’s true development. So they have to be “grown”. Camellita Tramells was sent to the North American Redwood sanctuary to “grow” up. Her early entry into the troubled stage of life where illogical emotions and hyper-detailed imaginations plague one’s mind forced this unscheduled “growing”. One-and-a-half days were required for the transformation in which she passed through phases of distortion, self pity and rejection. The she died.

Pristina Valkyries was extracted from North American Redwood Sanctuary today. She is a free individual of the United Republic of Earth. She will be joining the profession of her choice (a space transmission governess) as soon as she completes her training.

End of report.

A neo-feminist story about freedom and its meaning. Most of it is in abstract because it was planned in abstract. In my opinion the meaning of abstract is in the mind of the reader. It also has elements of Science Fiction albeit social in nature, SF was my first love and the reason for even thinking about writing for the first time

Under the Bed

"Good Night, Peter. Have sweet dreams ! ", Mother said as she stood at Peter's door, silhoutted in the light coming from lounge.

"Good Night Mom", Peter replied.

Mother closed the door and Peter heard her footsteps fade away towards the master bedroom.

'Strange, how every sound got magnified in the night', Peter thought. In the day you could not hear mom open the door, which she often did, to check what Peter was doing. But at night, Peter was sure he could hear the soft swish of the owl hunting for its dinner a mile away.

"Under the bed Peter, Under the bed ... "

'I hate school', Peter thought. Peter was in the fifth grade at Crescent Bay Junior High School.

"Honey , Sweetums, Mama's boy Under the bed ... "

Peter was already sweating.

'Maria, Maria. Think of Maria.'

"Think of Maria lying under your bed, Sweetums. Think of her face burnt and mangled, her skeletal hand scratching the underside."

Peter was sweating profusely now. He held his eyes closed tightly trying to think about Maria and himself sitting on a Park Bench kissing each other. As he slowly withdrew from Maria's face, she smiled at her. And suddenly her face changed. A deep welt appeared over her left eye as her lips burst open. There were worms crawling out of the welt. Her teeth now horribly exposed, blackened. The whole world turned dark gray as she raised a skeletal hand towards him. Coming, coming for his throat ...

A soundless scream emanated from Peter's throat as his eyes opened wide. Complete darkness surronded him. His left hand, trembling wildly, groped in the darkness for the bedside lamp's switch. He found the switch and pressed it.

A soft orange glow spread in the room. The room was silent. There was no Maria with face burnt and skeletal hand stretching out. It was only his room with the smiley face wall paper all around.

'Nothing', Peter let out a sigh of relief.

"Under the bed, Sweetums ... "

That small voice again. Peter tried to ignore it. He tried to think of the Home Run he had scored the day before. Their team had won and Peter was the hero. He tried to relive the moment when he had been hoisted to the shoulders of his team mates. They had even drunk some beer that night.

"There could be blood under the bed Sweetums ! You want to drink blood, Honey. It tastes kinda salty. Good for your heart ! "

Peter shuddered. He had to do it. He had to stop this, this foolish nonsense. Kindergarten kids were supposed to be afraid of monsters under their bed. He was in Junior High for god's sake. What would his friends think if they knew this, what would Maria think ?

Peter knew exactly what to do, how to stop this. He just had to look under the bed. Then it would all stop. There would be nothing under the bed, just darkness, Then he could go back to sleep peacefully, that irritating small voice silenced forever.

"Look under the bed Peter. Under the bed ... "

But what if there was something under the bed. Something horrible and terrible.

"Under the bed Peter, under your bed ... "

'Shut up', Peter thought. There was nothing under the bed, maybe just air, nothing else. There were no monsters or witches. Nothing.

"Why don't you look under the bed Peter, Sweetums, Honey, Mama's boy. "

Peter clenched his fists digging deeply into his palms.

"Is the mama's boy afraid ? ", that small voice mocked him.

He had to do it. Peter decided that he was going to do it, now.

The small voice remained silent.

Slowly Peter sidled towards the edge of his bed. He grabbed the left bed post with his left hand as if afraid that he would fall down and started to bend towards the underside of the bed. Suddenly he scrambled backwards, towards the shelf on the otherside. His right hand groped in the semi darkness. His hand closed on the small silver cross lying on he shelf. Grabbing the cross tightly he sidled back towards the edge of his bed.

Slowly as his eyes turned towards the underside of the bed, the orange coloured carpet slid outof his sight . His fluffy white slippers and then the darkness. He continued bending until he had the full view of the underside.

Darkness, Pitch black darkness.

There was nothing below his bed only pitch black darkness. He stretched out his left hand into the darkness, half afraid that something would grab it.

Nothing grabbed it. He only felt the warm air underneath. There was nothing there, nothing at all !

Peter let out a big sigh of relief. He rose up slowly, put out the bedside lamp and lay back on the bed, smiling serenely. Now he could go back to his thoughts, about baseball, about Maria.

He and Maria were sitting on a park bench looking at each other's eyes. Slowly he moved closer to Maria's face. Oh her lips! they were so full and red . Closer and closer ...

"O Peter! Sweetums, Honey"

What now. Peter was irritated. 'And stop calling me Sweetums'.

"Just one thing, Honey. Your bed is in the centre of the room, right ? "

'And Honey too. Yes my bed is in the centre of the room, So ? '

"Whatever you say Peter, now there was light in the room when you looked under the bed, wasn't it so? "

So ????

"The other side, Peter, did you see the other side ? "

Peter's eyes widened in horror. He had not seen the other side of the bed. There had been only pitch black darkness, no faint light towards the other end, as there should have been !

The small voice cackled madly.

"Under the bed, Peter, under the bed ... "

My first try to a planned story, it is absurdist and has elements of horror and has a child as amajor character. Somethings that I have observed tend to recur in my compositions.

Death in the Desert

His mind was clouded.

He tried hard to remember what he was doing in the middle of the desert here. Some flashing memories came back, of the camp , of the Buzkashi going on in full flow and then a sudden blank. He tried hard to remember what had happened. Zemar , his elder brother had come running, shouting something, then there was a general alarm and then and then ... ... ...

Inexplicably his mind remained blank. He was also feeling thirsty and hungry but as far as he could see their was no oasis or any pool nearby. Of course there was a mirage of water visible towards south but he knew by long experience what was a mirage and what was not. No water pool would exist between two sand dunes. From far the dunes looked like islands surrounded by water. But that was only an optical illusion and he knew it. He felt the weight of his wineskin, it was fast diminishing and he had to find his way to to ... where was he going ? He had no idea . It felt like dream this whole thing him being alone in the desert. He almost believed that it was dream. He would close his eyes and would soon wake up back at the camp . There would familiar sounds of men laughing and the horses neighing. His brother would be lying besides him having a good sip of the Hookah. He would offer him one sip ...

But there were no sounds of men laughing or horses neighing or his brother having a hookah. There was only the energy sapping heat and the throat parching thirst and gnawing hunger. He tried to remember when he had last had food but could not even remember that. He slowly stood up shading his eyes against the sun (his leg was paining even more) and started walking towards the west, towards Medina. Allah was testing him and he remembered one thing that his father had taught him before he had left for the war against those whites from north , whenever in doubt turn towards Allah he would always help. Now he was turning towards Allah and he was sure that Allah would help.

***

The boy's name was Zalmai, Afghani for "young" he was the second son of his family and the third among the siblings. His father was a farmer or had been a farmer until the Russians had attacked and then he had turned to a soldier. Afghans were hardy and no matter what professions they belonged to and Zalmai's father a devout follower of Islam. As soon as the Imam had issued the order to fight to save the country he had been one of the first to leave home and among the first to die. First to die in a battle among the unequals, where the Russian tanks had run over a small group of afghan soldiers. The Russians had beheaded all of them and hung their bodies from broken trees to strike fear in the heart of the afghans. But they hardy hearts of afghans were not to be daunted so easily. Now both Zemar and Zalmai had joined the army even though Zalmai was only thirteen years old . War had rendered his childhood to a battleground.

The battle was tough with little food and lesser water. Often Zalmai cried remembering his home and his mother and sisters. He dreamt of his mother weeping as both of them walked away from their small house, never to return. But Zemar was always with him. Zemar was brave and had been the breadwinner of the family since their father had gone. Indeed his name meant "the Lion" and he was never afraid. Zalmai looked up to his brother and he had taken care of him during the journey and at the camp. Soon Zalmai had grown used to the war, it only meant that there was less food and drink and they kept moving from one place to the other. But he had yet to see any real action. They did not take him to fight yet as they told him he was not old enough and so he kept in the camp tending to the animals and looking forward when Zemar came back. Because he was secretly afraid, afraid that Zemar, just like his father would not return some day and then he would be alone ,again this time without anybody. A thirteen year old boy does not have many adult friends to look after him.

But Zalmai was not to remain sheltered from the war. Their camp had been steadily moving towards the north-eastern border closer and closer to the Russian territory.

Zalmai had also noticed that more and more men were going in groups to the skirmishes and less and less were returning. Thankfully, Zemar had returned always. But once he had returned deeply wounded and Zalmai had cried when he had crept up to the Hakim's tent and had heard that his brother had little chance to live. He had prayed to Allah with great fervor to save his brother's life and miraculously (it was nothing less than miracle , the Hakim had remarked later) Zemar had recovered. And from then on Zalmai's faith in Allah had increased manifold. He always performed the Namaaz five times in a day like most in the camp. But he also remembered Allah in every other thing he did . But nothing had prepared him or anybody else for what had happened that day.

It had begun normally enough. No skirmishes were to be that day. The loosely knit afghan army had few communication lines and their commander had received news that afghans were winning against the Russians in the border. So their commander had decided to move forward rather than wait behind. After all he wanted a share in the ultimate afghan victory. It would bring fame and may be he would become a warlord. So their leader decided to give his soldiers the much needed rest that day and follow it up with a long march right up to the borders where he would have the glory and satisfaction of driving out the Russians. There had been a lot of enthusiasm among the soldiers at the announcement of the Buzkashi. There were not very many means on entertainment in those days and Buzkashi was one. Buzkashi was an old game of the afghans. It involved bringing a beheaded calf within a white circle in the middle of the field. The players rode on horses and the one having the calf was greatly impeded by others. And only those who have great skill with horses and also ruthless with others (a skill not very uncommon among afghan soldiers) . There would be a lot of blood in the field and some broken bones too but it was a game after all. And then the Buzkashi had begun and soon it was in full flow. There was a lot of flurry of horses wherever the carcass of the calf and already a few men had fallen off their horses but the game continued nevertheless. Zalmai followed the horses excitedly as he observed the riders . He knew how to ride a horse but that was as far as his knowledge went. He wanted to become an expert horse-rider a skill much required and respected among the afghans. He tried to learn from the riders as he watched their movements closely. Zemar unfortunately was not very interested in the game and had instead gone with a party to bring water from the nearby wells. Zalmai had stayed on to watch the game. No one had emerged a winner yet .Any one who got hold of the carcass was mobbed by other horsemen and either he had been unhorsed or the carcass snatched . The one who got the carcass almost always rushed away towards the end of the field. with a trail of horsemen in his track. The game was in full flow so no one noticed Zemar who was running towards the camp signalling frantically. When they did notice him it was already too late. For just behind Zemar rose his cause of fright . A Russian helicopter was coming on to the village.

Zalmai was stupefied at the sight. He had heard his brother speak of these flying machines but this was the first time he had seen one. But what happened later made him forget completely about the helicopter. Bullets were already arcing out of the helicopter and he saw his brother fall. The bullet had hit Zemar! Uttering a strangled cry Zalmai ran towards his brother but another man grabbed him from behind and carried him away. Zalmai saw his brother's crumpled body moving away from him and kept on screaming. The man had thrown him into one of the sand pits and shouted at him to stay there in safety. Zalmai was already crying and started to climb the walls of the pits. He had to get to Zemar. But the walls were slippery and however he tried he remained at the floor . Suddenly there was an explosion nearby and debris rained down into the pit. A rock hit Zalmai in the head and Zalmai crumpled - unconscious. Unknown to him the carnage against humanity continued all around him.

What had gone wrong ? The leader had received a message regarding Afghani victories and so had relaxed the alert in the camp. But what the leader had not accounted for was the time delay. He had received the old news about some hollow and pyrrhic victories of the heavily outnumbered Afghanis against the heavily armored Russians and had gone into the false belief that Afghanis alone, had any chance holding out agianst the Russians. The Russians had attacked with new vigor and easily defeated the already stretched and loosely knit Afghani "army". And now they were busily incursing into the Afghani territory with regular helicopter patrols, that were sent out to clear the way ahead for the main army. Zalmai's camp had come in the way of such a helicopter patrol. With the surprise element with them the helicopters had efficiently wiped out the whole camp. Leaving only smoldering tents and dead bodies. Only Zalmai , by stroke of ironic luck had survived hidden in the sand pit lying unconscious.

When Zalmai regained consciousness everything was silent. Only the ghostly wind could be heard. He slowly got up, his left leg was cramped having lain in a awkward position for more than two hours. A portion of the debris had hit the wall of the sand pit had crumbled providing him a kind of a causeway to to level ground. He slowly climbed over it, the debris crumbling under his weight, Crawling over to the ground he saw the horrible scene around him.

Everything was destroyed .The tents around him were smoldering and the stench of death was in air. Zemar! where was Zemar, Zalmai ran across the destroyed camp shouting for Zemar at the top of his voice. He spied out the place where he had been standing watching the Buzkashi and ran out towards the place where he had seen Zemar fall. H came to the crumpled body of Zalmai's heart beating wildly. He bent down and sat on his knees half sobbing as he took his brothers head in his arms. There was no response. He kept of futilely shaking is brother's head crying out his name. It was after full five minutes of shaking did he realize that his brother was dead. His hands shaking he lay down his head on his brother's chest and wept , wept the tears of a child.

It was noon when he woke up. He had passed out on his dead brother's body. A moment he again felt the full shock of the grief but there was something in the air that alarmed him. The wind was blowing with the force of a mid gale. The boys senses honed by the life in the desert were at once alerted. The "Seistan" was coming. Quickly he ran towards the provisions tent and grabbed a wineskin filled with water and another bag kept ready filled with food (for the foot soldiers who went out on the patrol). The after giving a long sad look at the camp he ran west towards the caves where there would be shelter.

The "Seistan" is one of the deadliest enemies of anyone in the Afghani desert. Soldiers could be defeated, thirst and hunger could be defeated but none could face the Seistan. The deadly 120 days Wind. It blew for four months across the deserts of Afghanistan reaching speeds of 155 mph during its peak periods (in the noons). The coming of these winds were heralded with sudden decrease in temperature and a steady breeze that would soon morph into a terrific desert storm. The best way to save oneself from these winds was to go to a sturdy shelter and that meant caves. Nature and habit had made Afghanis mark routes that were close to caves at certain points so that the travelers could go to their safety in the case of a desert storm. It was to such a cave that Zalmai was heading.

Zalmai had reached the caves in nick of time. Already there was sand when he reached the mouth and where he had settled down for a long wait there was the storm in full blast. As the wind was in the opposite direction as the mouth of the cave Zalmai kept looking out with his tear stained cheeks as the full enormity of his situation struck to him. Here he was in a cave stuck in a full scale Seistan wind and there was no one in this world who knew he was here or even cared that he was here. His brother was dead and so were probably all the people of the camp and he had no idea where he was to go. Suddenly Zalmai felt afraid he closed his eyes hoping all this would pass , it was just a bad dream, a very bad and graphic dream. It would pass. When he opened his eyes he would be back in the camp with his brother. Everything would be fine. There would be familiar sounds of the cattle, the men and the camp.

But there was only the roaring of the wind that seemed to mock his wishes. He slowly opened his eyes only to see a vast thick curtain of sand blocking his view. Resignedly he settled down in between two rocks and drifted into an uneasy sleep.

Hunger woke Zalmai at the evening. Slowly, he got up and blinked his eyes. The storm had abated and it was cool now . But Zalmai knew more about Afghan nights than to be happy. Nights as in contrast to the hot days grew to be very cold, temperatures often reaching up to 10 degrees. He sat up and stared blankly at the desolate stretch of land in front of him. It was only hunger that broke his mind from the stasis. He nibbled at the loaf in the food bag and thought about what he should do. He would have to go to the camp, of course. He would try to find anybody else who was alive. If he was lucky he would get a horse and that would certainly make things easy for him. And then where would he go ? He had no idea of where he was and he also had no idea where th maps had been kept in the camp. Even if there had been maps he would not have known how to read them. He though about his father's advice. "Turn to Allah he will help" he had always said. And so he decided to turn to Allah to the west.

But fate it seemed was not on Zalmai's side. He got out of the cave and turned towards the direction of the camp and kept on walking and walking but found no sign of the camp. Strange, he thought, perhaps he had taken the wrong direction. He looked back towards the cave. No he had taken the right direction . But where was the camp ? He looked around wildly. And suddenly the truth dawned on him. The sand storm! The sand storm had buried everything. For all he would know he could be standing right over his camp buried under tons and tons of sand. He looked around wildly for any sign of his camp but only miles and miles of sand greeted his eyesight. He started digging furiously but he got only sand and sand and sand. Suddenly he realized he was being foolish. Digging would not help. Even if he got to the camp level he would hardly know where the food was kept and now no cattle was alive. He let out a frustrated wail and again silently settled own on his knees unable to believe his bad luck.

But all these experiences had hardened him . Allah was testing him. But he would go on. Sadly he loaded the wineskin and the food bag on his shoulders and head off towards the west where the rays of the setting sun shone making the desert in front of him seem like a golden carpet, a deadly golden carpet.

Zalmai lay on the sand exhausted unable even to lift his hand and shield his eyes from the sun. His food had run out two days earlier and water had run out yesterday. He was very, very weak and he needed some nourishment desperately. He had lost his footing this morning over a dune and had rolled down breaking his leg in the process. He had then crawled. But crawling over hot sand scorched his whole body making him a mass of scratches and pains. Finally he had passed out. Consciousness came in intermittent phases due to hunger and pain. But what could he do. He was practically unable to move. It was only in the evening that the lower temperatures soothed his body, and he had regained some strength. He slowly crawled to a stony outcrop and lay down besides thinking of his chances. His left leg was broken or at least badly sprained. He wondered how far he could go with this. He spied out a few dead branches nearby. Collecting them together he tied them to the side of his leg with a rope fashioned out of the hem of his shirt. Then he lay down to rest. But hunger did not let him sleep and soon it was gnawing his stomach. He slowly crawled out (his leg was too painful to stand on) and looked around There were only a few shrubs and none of them looked edible. He plucked a few leaves and nibbled them. They were bitter but still they were something. He looked around the roots and caught a desert ant . Plucking its head off he swallowed its not so small body his mouth feeling the crunchy taste. He ate some more ants and he even caught a spider but decided against eating it. Who knew where its poison sacs were. He simply quashed it and watched as the ants quickly scurried at the scent of death towards the dead body of the spider. He then lay down on the rock and drifted to painful sleep.

He dreamed about his home, his village and his friends. He dreamed he was back home with his mothers and sisters. He was playing with his friends in the village square. But suddenly out of nowhere a helicopter swooped down from the skies and all his friends , the houses ,the whole village scattered under its terrific wind. Zalmai ran and ran but the helicopter was right behind him. He heard Zemar crying "To west, run to west."

He woke with a start . It was dream after all. The sun was blazing away. He slowly got up .The leg was painful but the pain had numbed. He hobbled again turning towards west.

***

He lay on his last legs. This was it. He did not even remember where he was going or what he was doing in the middle of the desert. And now he heard the deadly noise of the Seistan brewing behind him. He did not have the energy nor the will to hide. He wanted this to end. But he would die like a man.He turned round to face the wall of sand nearing him by the second. He kept his eyes open as the wall came nearer and then suddenly that puny little body was swallowed in the vast sand storm taking his soul to Jannat, the promised heaven. His last thought was that his father and Zemar would have been proud of his bravery. He had faced the Seistan like a man.

My try to realism, I know its not too good. I wasn't satisfied either.