ANTS III—THE WAR OF THE WORLDS

In twenty-four hours they did twenty-four hours of work, as even on earth is perhaps the case with the ants.

 —Herbert G. Wells

TIME TRAVEL, DRUGS, AND PALMER ELDRITCH

  Alternative realities are always a tough log. An ad infinitum of ifs, variable after variable, unique to each fray of an activity—down to the minutest division of time, as such is the untimability of events. Their susceptibility to utilization as the answer ton a time travel paradox leaves them as an area of exploitation and manipulation. If, for example, a grandfather paradox is solved using alternative reality, the invaded alternative universe is set amok at the expense of the tentative universe. This is a rob Peter to pay Paul scenario, where in fiction, these universes have interminable laws with actual consequences—somewhere between the doppelgänger, twin team bail-out.

  In The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, realities are sold by the skin. For the benefit of an experience on the average city's hithertos, pushers have been pushing Terra's  common setting for pleasure to Mars colonists via Can-D. A drug whose effectiveness is realized with a few requirements—Layouts: miniature (mins) representations of earth's life, and where available, partners in partaking. Mins being life-sized objects that underwent mining. These little objects are sold by a monoploy, Perky Pat Layouts—also the commercial name for the products.

  One Barney Mayerson is a precog. the types with precognitive ability. A Pre-Fash talent and skill. Foresight that can realize what items will be fashionable in a time to come—ceramics, pot (cannabis) or neckties (The Werner simulated-handwrought living tie)—, advise their employers on such—P.P. Layouts in this case—, buy, min, sell to colonialists for escape. Though he disliked Can-D for its bad taste and experience, which wouldn't make much sense to a normal Terran, his perceptions are disfigured once he partakes in Chew-Z, a competitor drug. The reaction one gets to Can-D depends—varies with—their imaginative-type creative powers. Around the building blocks of P.P. Layouts. Time spent in the illisionary Terra under a Can-D influence, termed an essence, is longer than the more outward manifestations of places and objects involved to simulate Participants sharing essence along gender affiliation.

  Like a lot of topnotch precogs, Barney sees the future so well the past is a hazy recollection. It is after foreseeing his bosses' killing of Palmer in the homeopapes, among the alternate futures, that Barney and Leo encounter Chew-Z. The drug from Proxima that the multi-industrialist Palmer has brought to take over the P.P. Layouts market. Funnily enough, Palmer also foresees his downfall from the varrious futures he crafts under the influence of Chew-Z, and the motive for selling the drug becomes to counter Leo from offing him. The drug's user being a chooser.

  Chew-Z's translations are of longer duration and intensity. A far superior drug, because a chooser—even from a lifetime of translation—returns shortly, even instantly in terms of timeflow in the world. In one of Leo's encounters, he translates centuries into a future of old Terra. On the moon of planet Sigma 14-B, meeting two highly evolved creatures resembling Terrans who are guards to the monument of Palmer's downfall—Leo's underworking. They assume he has come back to haunt the place for historical importance—acknowledging him. But if he's from the past, he can't have possibly came back, or it could be a second coming for him after his own time—inhabiting two timelines at once, and other religious overtones.

. . . psychedelic warps ensue.

  Chew-Z produces time-overtones.Occupying a locus years after death. However, as a chooser, one can determine universes, create them, unlike Can-D's that are P.P. Layouts and Terra mins restricted. A magnification of Can-D's imaginative-type creative powers. The worst aspect of Chew-Z is the solipsistic quality. And terrible things like turning humans into walking corpses, once you wish them unfathomables beyond their Terra life-years. Leo falls into an addiction where he tries to correct the past through the illusionary drug. in the end, fatalism prevails, which contorts the thin line and a muddied timeline between running into future self and being a future self.

  Since a phantasm, the dead Palmer Eldritch, can go anywhere it isn't bounded by time or space, and all Chew-Z experiences are  a haste to give him one last shot at, right, at redemption. It is more a case of the past and the future converging from different timelines to obtain a present. In an interplanetary system of planets; Terra, Mars, Venus, and moons; Luna, Io, and Ganymede. One devoid of Palmer. An ADD's dream plot  beyond shortened words.

THE MOMENT OF ECLIPSE: THAT UNCOMFORTABLE PAUSE BETWEEN LIFE AND ART . . .

  What happens when science fiction and poetry and art supersede their commingle? A lot. A denigrable botch.  The avant garde. Or Brian W. Aldiss. A master of wayward crafts.

  On this collection are short stories that appeared in magazines and anthologies such as The Year 2000, London Magazine, Galaxy and Nova I. Arrangement is done in such a way that, where possible, there is (even the slightest) links between one story and the next.

  Mixing British English and American English is always disregarded or frowned upon, but an instant of its manifestation in the collection might be more in a way of inter-cultural appreciation/expression. on The Day We Embarked for Cythera . . . , Brian displays his wordsmithing abilities. Here, he comes up with the paradox of imprecision—where word sequence utterly contradicts meaning. The speaker's time-sense gets to be so awry that they negate what they did (or rightly put, said) in one breath. The setting seems to have been derived from Titian's The Concert due to Portinari wearing a red jacket, or the lack of music in Monet's Le Dejeuner sur l'herbe (The Picnic), who influenced a controversial and visionary artist as Aldiss  himself, Edouard Manet. Grotesquely enough, Brian incorporates from both, just like Manet! After this tale, one can only adore Brian.

  Some words used were not available in the current dictionary version. Confluence might have been the ADD answer to The Devil's Dictionary from quipster Ambrose Bierce. The stories are engaging enough to make one forget why 85% of science fiction has been removed from their science fiction; and it is always a delight when his philosophizing starts with characters, who have been set as great conversationalists.

 .  .  .

  Always an amusing, experimental take on his writing and language use other than the ever witty and informative quips, celebrating everything Aldiss; film, art, poetry, and general perversion. Either from describing a generous of flesh madonna painting—or beautiful women with corrupt natures.

ANTS II—THE CITY OF FORCE

"Would we notice a particular ant on the ground if it tried to communicate with us?" 

"Let's go back to the example of the make-believe ant. It's chances would be pretty slim if it tried to communicate with just any human."

 —Daniel F. Galouye

DOPPELGANGERS XII

  Art and its influences, besides styles.

 —Robert Colescott
 —Pablo Picasso

 
 

THE SIGMATICLE TOUR GREEN (WELCOME TO THE FUTURE)

  Aboard the Rock 'n' Roll train. Compartments and striations, styles bleed through the hallways. Brooding. Delights, defiance, delineation. Two plus two and many others. Fueled by alco--COAL.

  Forging beyond the wagon to the space age. Every aligned star is calling. Ensnaring—Welcome To The Future / CUTE TOUR FLEW THEME / TROUT CUE FLEW THEME / OUT WHERE COMET FLUTE. Covered with pop-art ensemble. Like a cognizance of the dreary vocalizations of Remember Me / MERE MEMBER—slowly rising from the previous song Far Beyond / BEND OF RAY—and the tripped hoars from Star Gazer / ART GRAZES.

  I love Rock 'n' Roll, but like everyone, I get the blues. The drums took a backseat to a very watered-down Rock 'n' Roll sequence. Not far from programmed. Monophonic. Ignore for the fuzz, Down the Wire / DREW THEIR OWN / WORD HE TWINE perpetrated. These are the effects of incorporating influences to the extent of disregarding essentials. Some tracks could have been done away with, however an instrumentalist's play for fun that he decides to share.

  These gritty—a few—tracks could have been shooting for the stars. As the assemblage with Johnny B Goode. For Psychedelia diehards.

1984 (ATROPHIE)

  With a disappointed recollection of never completing 1984, a similarly named post-apocalyptic rap duo with sci-fi themes can only dig on that. This is a Gorgon of sci-fi that needs a book armoured slayer! Titled Atrophie, less couldn't be agreed upon on the teetering mass wasting of everything society.

  Currently with the label Rap and Revenge, their second release opens with Le Pavé De L'enfer whose beats and delivery an appetite for what's to unfold in the ensuing fourteen tracks. The chorus' final stanza is massively melodic, spiking a craving for Sonata Arctica's Fullmoon; a track they actually sampled. The album cover paints the music's visual the same way an off-radar society disregarding (post-apocalyptic) Thrash Metal band would want it conveyed. If that could be any bleaker than a space captain trying to calm the nerves of a shipless crew on re-entry. Even with a sneaky rebel. Does (future) Earth have a captain, or it's all illustrated by man? Can't decide which. Hardcore dancing or going away.

  The beatsmith's piano preferences and polkas dot Coppélia laying the foundation for a loop of a coalescing cold touch to the other artist—with scratches peppering every track. If this is taking Hip Hop back to its roots, then that is cemented by J-Merk's collabo—a professation of  studying under the game's great MCs. Heck, the auto-drenched female chords on Le Pavé De L'enfer and Archétypes are one of the classical things about Rap that haven't been overdone or misused. But then again, it is hard to do badly, once gotten right.

  Catchy THX 1138 shines with some string touches—a contrarian explanation to the indifferent, surgical white coldness and monochromatic realizations of the film. Samples are in French, I suppose, adding dimension by virtue of opening and closing the track.

If Archétypes are the Jungian revelations which I won't pretend to have explored beyond casual interest, then this might have more to fucking bite into, excusing the French. And as it is said, this is not music for someone and their girlfriend to listen to. It requires full regards. Enter post-society.

SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL WIZARD BY DIANE DUANE

  Beyond the various fact-induced tales, fantasy is the fulcrum of all fiction. A sensibility linking creatures to creators by virtue of narration—the be all and end all relation between the two; albeit sometimes the traditional meaning is superseded by genre-lisation from the same. Better yet, a world venerated enough to generate pensy regards—Muggles alike. The world of magic, witches, and wizards.

I

My name is Khairelikoblepharehglukumeilichephreidosd'enagouni

  Equal to latent talents, magic presents itself at the right moment. Calling finally meeting intent. For Nita, a flexure from bullies foresees her foray into this striking world. Confessions fall into place about the love of, among other things, space and astronomy—which form the basis of her earliest manoeuvres into the realm of magic. Summoning and befriending a white hole that in quite mega-nova fashion, radiates and releases residue as required. Maraudings lead to a fellow outsider schoolmate, Kit, new to the craft. And as Harry's acquaintances, they can't help being friends after certain encounters.Curiosity and sheer aspirations for mastery—or a destiny pre-written by magical lore—leads Nita and Kit to Tom (keeper of a clearinghouse, similarly named from the H.P. one), and Carl. They are older wizards and guides of fledgling new entrants.

II

Wizardry—not one particular spell

  By way of proclamation and unhesitating rendezvous at the heart of earlier pop-culture, the yet two-wizard tale trickles to the sea. SYLW values dolphins like any self-respecting book, regardless of the sea's powerful force and myriad lifeforms. Timeheart has become the dreamland. With the adoration of Jaws—whose Amity beach billboard had the first googly eyes— and the outing of Tom as a wizard whose irl occupation is writing scripts and experiences in the Business, Diane Duane might have blatantly alluded to herself. The Invisibility Cloak finding a place in The Curse of the Ring settles any doubt. This, however, births the tough question of adaptation, or if she would be involved should Hollywood depredate the setting. The former? This is Timeheart, after all.

III

It's Alive! Send it something! Send some 1's!

  The younger the wizard, the powerful their abilities. Geek in, geekin' out. For a Trekkie, Nita's kid sister, Dairine, is the family's motion setter; explaining her early accustomization to wizardry and other subversions. Delving into hyperspace by loading worlds and navigating datastreams beyond BEMs and silicon. Reaching for the further shore; Voyager of course. Dairine's interstellar intervals interact creatures and lifeforms that relay posterious wars; where the best upload may win, governed by wit-showdowns.

  If playing by the rules guarantees an arrested-age and a lifetime of consultancy. . . . Wizardry got no match. It is a hard sport