Beth

I knew that I should've stayed at home. But nooo, I had to leave the comfort of my rental apartment just to meet up with the girl that I thought was interested in me. I don't even want to name names here, it'll do no one any good.

Fine, let's just call her Beth.

No it's not short for anything. I'm not even going to say if it's even remotely close to her real name since that's irrelevant. Thing is, Beth and I met at the library that afternoon. I was looking up some old books to borrow and read to pass the boring weekend that was coming up, and she was this chick that suddenly came up to me and most literally bumped into me. I looked up from the book I was browsing in annoyance, and was greeted with a bespectacled brunette with hair that dangled just slightly past her white shirt-covered breasts.

``Oh sorry!'' She said first, breaking the silence of the library and before I could gather my wits from being cutingly assaulted by her. ``I wasn't seeing where I was going.''

``That's alright,'' I replied and was about to look back into my book when I found a pair of well-kept hands suddenly pusing that book downwards from me. ``Hey---''

``Shhh... it's the library. No need to shout. You look like a decent sort of person. Are you free this weekend?''

``Wha, what? What's up with this weekend? Are you trying to ask me out? Hell, I don't even know you!''

``Hush...'' she hissed, ``didn't I just tell you not to shout? Fine sorry. Let me start over. I'm Beth, and there's this party thing at my sorority that is going on this weekend. Thing is, it's a social party event thing that we are doing to encourage people outside of the Greek organisations to meet up with us and well socialise. You look like you might not be from a fraternity. So... are you free to come with me to this party thing?''

I squinted my eyes and looked at her beyond the simple framing of her hair about her face. In particular, I was looking straight into her eyes, trying to detect any sort of bullshit that was behind the words that she just said. I wasn't actually trying to be cynical, but things like that never happened in real life, and there was just something fishy about this entire... encounter. All I saw was just a pair of eyes that seemed to be twinkling for no discernible reason, and I was hoping to myself that it wasn't mischief I was seeing.

``I was about to get some books to read at home when you bumped into me...''

``So that means you'll come then? That's great! Meet me at the cross junction between Green and Washington at six tomorrow and we'll head off to the sorority house. It's a date then!'' She turned and started to walk off.

``Wait, hold on! Which sorority are you from again?''

``Omega Delta Kappa. See you tomorrow!''

I stood there and watched her leave the stacks, my brain highly confused. There was something about her that turned me on in a way that defied reasoning, but at the back of my mind, I felt that something just wasn't right. No matter though, the date had been promised, and it would be bad if I didn't show up, right?

But she didn't even ask for my name! How could she pin the blame of my non-appearance on me?

But then again, she'd probably figured out that the library was a place I was most likely to be visiting and could just stake it out and hunt me down for my no-show, if she were really that diabolical. Was she?

I scratched my head in confusion and tossed the whole mess to the back of my head as I walked towards the check-out counter with my book in tow.

------

The weekend came altogether too fast, and the clock was reading five o'clock when I looked at it groggily. Actually that was a lie. I was up reading the book till late, and decided to sleep in during the morning with the shades down low on my windows. That explained why I was up at the unholy hour of five in the evening in a state that is best used to describe zombies.

Then I remembered the accidental date and bolted upright.

Eh, should I even go for that shady-sounding business? I mean, she did mention the sorority she was from right? Omega Sigma... Kappa or something. I should probably check it out to see if it were a real sorority; those Greek organisations have so many weird and hard-to-understand acronyms that it's impossible to tell if any particular three-letter thing is indeed a fraternity or sorority. But what should I check it with? My laptop's on the fritz and is at the technician's for repair, while my cellphone didn't have a data plan to go with it. And my room mate would never let me touch his computers, not since last time when I accidentally wiped out a hard drive.

So... should I turn up?

One part of my mind, the prefrontal cortex perhaps, was screaming at me to ignore the invitation and stay at home: `Nothing good could ever come out of the meeting with that unknown girl!' it tried to warn me. But another part of my mind, the primal part maybe, was like `Oh yeah baby that's a hot chick that just asked you out! Think of the kinky stuff she might want you to do with her!'. It was like a fight among the Titans, and in the end, curiousity got the better of me and I decided to meet up at the given time at the given place.

That's the reason I'm using and I'm sticking with that. It has nothing to do with what primal brain said. I swear.

At six o'clock then I found myself waiting at the crosswalk between Green and Washington, a rather busy part of the circling road on campus. Students were hustling about, some walking from the dormitory quad towards the campus recreation centre, while others were passing through from the nearby neighbourhood of rental apartments, same sort of place that I was staying. I stood next to the traffic light and waited impatiently.

I wondered if Beth would turn up. Part of me wished she would, while the other was highly skeptical. I waited for fifteen minutes. It was a boring fifteen minutes. At the end of that time period, I cursed softly under my breath for being played a fool and was about to turn around to walk back to my apartment when I saw a brunette running across the road towards me. She was wearing glasses and had longish hair that was billowing out from the self-made breeze from the run as the lights blinked green before turning amber. She made it across the road and stopped just beside me as the light turned to red in her direction.

``Yay, you're here,'' I said in an unenthusiastic voice. ``I was about to return home too.''

``Baaah...'' she replied, trying to catch her breath, her bosoms heaving slightly as she snatched in mouthfuls of air. ``Hold on... lemme catch my breath first. I should really do more work outs...''

I was inclined to agree with her. While she was running, I could see how tightly her denim jeans were clinging to her legs and thighs as her buttoned up shirt held on to dear life to wrap itself around her contours. She was no fatty, but she did look like it would help her to lose a little bit of the chub. But in a sense, she looked cute. Endearing even.

``Okay... hi again!'' Beth said cheerfully in a more normal tone of voice. ``Sorry for keeping you waiting. There were some last minute things we needed to do back at the House because one of the sisters was down with a cold and couldn't execute her duty.''

``Execute?''

``Yeah, okay, `do'. Same thing. She was supposed to pick up some stuff from the post office but didn't do so being sick and all, and it wasn't until much later that we realised it was gotten.''

``Oh? What was it?'' I asked, curious. It was all starting to sound even more shady now then when I was thinking about it alone in my room.

``Oh don't worry about it, it's been settled.'' Sidestepped. I cursed silently. ``Shall we go?''

``Sure... except I have no idea where the house of Omega Sigma Kappa is.''

``It's Omega Delta Kappa! Geez, I can't believe that you can't remember something as simple as this.'' Beth was dragging me by the elbows as this point to follow where she was going.

``I'm not that conversant with Greek organisations. Besides, I don't even know you! You just grabbed me somehow yesterday by `accident' or something. I have no idea why I'm even following you now!''

``Pfft... because you find me cute! Admit it, am I not cute?'' Beth said, stopping suddenly and whipping herself about, and stared at me through her glasses, with her long brunette hair framing her soft fair face, with a pout that would put any hot-blooded male's knees to failure.

``Uhhh...''

``See? I told you so! Now come along now. It's a five-minute walk only if we walk faster.'' She turned around and continued to drag me along.

I found us walking along the peripheries of the campus after the initial quick cut through, and were moving past the fraternities' quad where most of the fraternities and sororities were located. That started to fill me with some discomfort. It seemed that the Omega Delta Kappa sorority was one of the few off-campus sororities, which meant that if there was to be any monkey business, there would be no one who could come and save me.

Wait. Why did I suddenly think about this `monkey business'? Was there really something ominous coming up?

``Thinking about something?'' Beth asked as she led on. ``Two minutes to go and we'll be there!''

``Well, not really...'' I said.

``Huh, someone's getting all defensive huh... I'm sure you find this all quite confusing at this point. I guess you're thinking, why am I being dragged about by this cute girl to a sorority party? Because it is our motto to make friends and to help people make friends!''

``You could... always get other people too...''

``Oh we could! But we know that you're not very social. We have been observing you, and a whole bunch of others who are just as unsocial as you. Let's just say it's not a random occurrence that you bumped into me!''

``Well technically, you're the one who bumped into me...''

``Pfft... details details details. Anyway, we're here!'' Beth declared with a grin on her face.

And that's the last thing I remembered because at that point, I was brained in the head and lost consciousness.

------

When I woke up, I found myself back in my apartment, lying on my bed, with a headache that felt terrible. I groaned and rolled out of bed, and held my head in between my hands. Just what the hell happened, I had no clue.

Maybe I was knocked out.

A brown envelope caught my eye. I didn't remember having any brown envelopes lying around in my room. Confused and curious, I picked it up and was mildly surprised to see my name on it. I ripped it open and a stack of photographs fell to the ground. They were all coloured photographs and they had me in it.

Except... they weren't very nice pictures.

It seemed like I was being put through a lot of rather... compromising positions, with women dressed in all manner of dominatrix outfits. Among the photographs was a small note which was handwritten. Disgusted, I picked up the note to read it. It was from Beth.

``Hi! Hope you enjoyed the party as much as we had! Sorry we had to knock you out before hand. Here're some photographs for your memory! =)

``Love, Beth

``PS: If you try to out us, I will guarantee that this pictures will be all over the internet.''

The headache raged through my brain. I knew that I should've stayed at home. But nooo, I had to leave the comfort of my rental apartment just to meet up with the girl that I thought was interested in me.

A House

The silence of the room baffled him to no end.

It wasn't completely unexpected -- no it wasn't at all. He had gone in to the house fully aware of its rather... bizarre qualities. It was nothing like the stuff he had read from the Navidson Record, for sure, since there wasn't anything particularly odd about the dimensions that he could see, but there was just something unsettling about the place.

For one, it was the only single storey house among an entire neighbourhood of high-rise apartments. A colonial-styled bungalow in the middle of a small field surrounded by homogeneous post-modern industrially designed high rise apartments whose sole criteria was the ever increasing human density over all others. Rumour has it that it was a haunted house, that somehow, despite all the large number of people surrounding it, no one actually managed to see what goes on inside the house itself.

No one could see anyone come in or out, yet strange sounds seemed to emanate from within. Guttural and harsh, those sounds were. Some thought they were the sound of wild beasts, but it was not possible since the nearest forest was a good five miles away with even more battery cage-like human dwellings.

He lived nearby. He heard those noises. He was curious. He was egged on by his friends who lived nearby too. He took up the dare.

And now he was in the living room of the house. And it was silent.

Granted, he wasn't dumb or crazy enough to investigate the house when night fell. It was during the day, slightly after noon. The hustle and bustle of the neighbourhood provided much of the ambient sound that he was used to listening. His friends had dared him, and had followed him to the outskirts of the house, in full view of anyone in the neighbourhood who bothered enough to stand around and watch them.

Standing outside, they could hear the usual human cacophony. But he, on the inside, could only hear a strange silence, even though the door was still open and was facing the hawker centre serving out lunch.

Unnerving.

He could see his friends peering in. In a desperate attempt to break the silence, he shouted at his friends.

But he found that despite his exertions, there seemed to be no sound.

He got afraid, wondering if he had gone deaf. Panicking, he turned towards the open door and ran out of the house.

As sunlight streamed on his face, the ambient sound that he was missing gradually came back to him.

They huddled around him, curious at what he found. He answered, and was surprised to hear his voice. They said that once he stepped through the door, he sort of vanished. They could see the interior of the room as it was lit by the lights through the windows from the door, but there was a stillness in it that made them feel uncomfortable. They feared for him, but no one could decide who was to go in and look for him.

He told them that he could see out of the door, but could hear nothing from where he was in the living room.

They all looked at each other with gazes of discomfort. Behind them, the door of the house slammed itself and they ran off as fast as they could away from the house.

Networking

``And that, my friends, is the reason why we manufacture the circuit board using the three-dimensional printer,'' Peter said somewhat pompously as he sipped on his flute of champagne. Around him gathered a small throng of technology enthusiasts who were partly there to bask in his glory and partly to get some exposure to him as a part of the networking process that the college's career counselling group hosted that particular afternoon.

Eileen was one of the crowd listening to Peter's banter about how his start-up was undercutting major manufacturers on printed circuit boards for specialised runs and gaining a rather niched market. The manner in which it was done was fascinating, but she could not shake away the discomfort over the pompousness of Peter himself. There was something obnoxious about him that she could not quite place, and unlike her peers who were looking on at him googly-eyed, she saw no need for any form of obeisance or flattery.

As though reading her mind, Peter suddenly turned his attention away from his fawning fans and looked at her directly. ``Hi, you there? What's your name? You seem rather thoughtful over my story, is there something that you would like to ask?''

Eileen could feel her face slowly warming up as the adulatory eyes of the fans of Peter collectively gazed upon her. Mustering up her courage, Eileen stood straight and looked back at them.

She blurted ``I like how your business plan works out using the latest in additive manufacturing, but must you sound like a jerk while you were working on it?''

There was a sudden hushed silence that fell upon the group. The gazes of adulation from her being lucky enough to be singled out by Peter transformed quickly into gazes of disbelief and disgust, as though her questions had profaned their idol and saviour in a way where there was no way of sanctifying it ever again. Eileen realised her faux pas and could feel that blush growing ever more radiantly throughout her.

But Peter merely chuckled as he sipped from his flute of champagne.

``Gutsy question. You are right in your observation that I sound like a jerk while working on the whole concept in my start-up. The truth is, I had to be a jerk just to get things moving. The one thing that successful start-ups never tell you is the sheer amount of barriers both social and political that are in the way of the pursuit of a new line of business. The many regulatory commissions that I had to convince to provide with a permit to run an additive manufacturing lab in a gazetted light industry zone, the various occupational health related inspections with respect to the plastic fibres from the PCBs, and of course, the need to actually talk to investors to get the seed funding.

``I didn't want to be a jerk,'' Peter continued as he eyed Eileen. ``But when I started acting like one, things started to move smoothly for the company. And because of that, it has sort of become my public persona.''

``I like your style,'' Peter said after a short while. ``Would you like to consider working for me once you have graduated?''

Darkness

It got dark, figurative and literal. Hard to run away from, really. Natural order of things. With light comes darkness; the yin to the yang. Darkness itself being the norm; light, the incursor.

Ends justify darkness; they nurture it, they grow it. Beginnings destroy part of it, but it never goes away; it always returns.

It always returns.

Her Children

``Come on kids, dinner is served!'' Eliza called from the kitchen. Above her, the pitter-patter sound of four feet scrambling across the wooden floor boards was followed by the soft thuds of their owners charging down the stairs to the best of their abilities. Eliza smiled to herself. It was the life that she had imagined she would live, to be married with her beau from high school and to have two lovely children, Aileen, an auburn-haired girl of six, and Chad, her fraternal twin. She did not quite imagine that she would carry twins, let alone fraternal ones too, but she did have the thought of having a boy and a girl at some point. That they came together was a blessing.

The two rambunctious children ran the remaining short distance from the stairs that led to the main hallway into the kitchen, appearing at the doorway at almost the same time, jostling each other as they playfully fought to get into the kitchen first. It was an old game, one that Eliza was not really fond of due to the rough nature, but she had since given up on trying to convince them to mend their ways. Besides, the twins were evenly matched physically, and so there was never a clear danger of one accidentally hurting the other, and their childish naivete was an ironic entertainment for her.

``Stop pushing each other and come in like civilised children,'' Eliza said for the umpteenth time as she slopped a goop of steamed peas onto each plate. Dinner was a simple affair most of the time, some stir-fried chicken, a scallion omelette, and the peas, together with some mashed potato. Eliza was not much of a cook herself, but ever since she had brought the twins to the world, she had tried her best to improve her cooking while making the food as healthy and as interesting as she could. Her experience in cooking before her pregnancy was limited to making instant noodles with a pot of hot water, a skill learnt during her college days while living in the dormitories.

The twins grinned at each other while seemingly heeding their mother's exhortations and gave themselves one last playful shove before sitting themselves around the kitchen table where their plates were. Eliza had set the table for four---Simon was about to come back soon from work. It was rather unusual though, for him to be this late. Often he would be back before six, but he had called in to tell her that something cropped up on the office that needed some looking into, and that he would be back as close to six as he could.

Eliza looked at the clock unconsciously. It was a quarter past six. She debated if she should give him a call at the office to confirm if he was still going to be back in time, but quickly decided against it. It was not as though there were something urgent that needed his attention, and she knew just how important his work was at the office that even a small distraction could be disastrous.

There was a loud crash, followed quickly by another, and Eliza was forced to snap out of her day dream. She turned to look at the source of the crashes.

Aileen was lying prone, her face smashed up into the plate of food. Eliza shrieked in shock and went over to Aileen, moving her face from the plate of food and leaning her back on the chair, trying to see what had happened. Aileen's stained face showed no response, her eyes staring back at Eliza motionless. Frightened, Eliza released her grip from Aileen, who promptly fell back into the plate of food. She then turned her eyes towards Chad.

Chad was not in his seat. Eliza looked about and saw that Chad had fallen off his chair somehow. But like Aileen, there was a mysterious silence; no screams of pain, no cries of discomfort. But unlike Aileen, Chad had fallen into pieces, with his limbs cracked open as though made of some hard plastic, the gears and springs within showing themselves as bits and pieces of broken cogs were strewn all over the floor, some even rolling away.

The sight was too much to bear for Eliza, for she screamed bloody murder and swooned just as a heavy set of boots came into the house.


Eliza found herself in a hospital, feeling heavily sedated. In between consciousness and unconsciousness, she could swear she heard Simon talking to himself. All that she could remember was his repeating words of sorry, that he should have come back early and keep them wound up, that he was running the risk of them losing power while he was away. What he meant by that, she never knew, since she slowly slipped off into a long sleep that she would not awake from.

It Was Supposed To Be A Love Story: Part 3

(Story begins here.)

Six months. It was merely six months after his graduation that he moved out to Mountain View to work at one of the many technology companies in the region when he received the email. His jaw hit the ground when he saw its contents.

``Dear Mike, I'm sorry. I know you made lots of big plans with me about our future, about how we will live together after I've graduated and start our lives together as a couple. I didn't want to remind you of this earlier because you were so happy then, what with your graduation and the getting of that dream job of yours, but I will remind you now: I am not the sort who would settle down. I still love you very much, but I cannot see myself living the life of a wedded wife; I just can't. It probably doesn't help that while you were gone, I got lonely, and went back to some of the parties that the fraternities were hosting, and kissed a guy there. No, we didn't sleep together, but I thought I should let you know. I'm sorry, but you clearly want me as a wife, but I cannot live that way.

``Let's break up now before you get even more hurt. Once more, I'm sorry it turned out that way.

``Love, Irene.''

It was supposed to be a love story. That was what Mike kept trying to remind himself each time he was alone in his apartment and looking at the few photographs that he had of him and Irene. A love story. But it did not turn out that way after all.

Mike took one look at the remaining whiskey in his glass and finished it all in one gulp before lying on his hands on the table and sobbed silently to himself.

It Was Supposed To Be A Love Story: Part 2

(Story begins here.)

Mike sat there in his apartment, staring at that photograph of all the guests at the housewarming party, the very first time that he met Irene, his eyes all bloodshot from his insomnia. He took the bottle of whiskey and poured out another glass and took a large gulp from it, the alcoholic fire burning its way down his gullet before settling into a warm flame that radiated from within his empty stomach. Three days. It had been three days since Irene had walked out of his life. It was supposed to be a love story, he kept telling himself, and he stared at the photograph in his hand one last time before discarding it and picking up the next one in the sequence.

It was a picture of his graduation. They had gone out for nearly three years by then. Mike was a graduating senior, while she was a rising senior, both still in the same degree. Irene's mother died during that period from cancer, but Mike was there beside her, which helped to ameliorate the pain. There was a change in the course requirements for the degree during Irene's junior year, but they weathered through it all. She cut back on her partying when the two of them started getting all serious, while he never really left far from his shell of comfort---all he did was to invite her to join him in his shell. The year of his graduation, they started to talk about plans. Big plans. Plans regarding what was to happen during the year that he was working and she was still finishing up her degree. Plans regarding what happened after that. Serious plans, important plans. Plans that Mike thought they had agreed on.

Mike stared hard at the graduation picture, it portrayed a certain naïveté towards the future, smiles that seemed to come from the deep happiness from within, eyes that twinkle with nothing short of love and happiness. Eyes that now seem to him to be showing nothing short of deceit and duplicity. Disgusted, he tossed the photograph aside and took another large gulp from his whiskey.

(Story continues here.)

It Was Supposed To Be A Love Story: Part 1

It was supposed to be a love story. That was what Mike kept trying to remind himself each time he was alone in his apartment and looking at the few photographs that he had of him and Irene. A love story. They met in college while both were pursuing degrees in computer science, he a sophomore, she a freshman. Some might even claim it to be a match made in heaven, for their quirks matched each other nearly perfectly. Of the two he was the more quiet, an introvert some might even say, while she was the one who was more out-going, always going out to parties, concerts, meeting new people, making new friends. He did not like parties at all, preferring a more scholarly existence while during college. They had met at a mutual friend's housewarming, a coincidence more than anything else. It being a housewarming, he found it sufficient of an excuse to leave the house to attend it even though the social aspect scared him, while she was still trying to learn her way around campus during that first semester and was naturally drawn to a party where there was at least one person she knew.

They met, and they started talking almost immediately, as though some unknown attractive force had taken over them and brought them close together. As the party heated up, the two of them found themselves moving away to quieter corners of the house and continued their chat, up to and until the party was over. Their mutual friend had taken a glimpse of where the two of them were when the party was concluded, but decided against asking them to leave, seeing that Mike was at least enjoying himself with the company of another, something that was a rare sight. Years later, when Mike asked her why she did not throw the both of them out of the house at the end of the party, she would simply reply that it was not the right thing to do then.

They chat through the night, sitting in the foyer under the lights. It was fall, and the weather was cool enough to lull the summer bugs into a slumber, leaving them to hover about farther away from the dangling lights. It was only when they saw the glint of the sun's rays that they realised how long they had been talking with each other. Mike did not know what possessed him that day, but he mustered the courage to ask her out for coffee some time. Irene, with her usual friendly self, readily agreed, though she blushed a little, as though she had already known what was coming up even before Mike knew where it was all heading.

(Story continues here.)

He Learnt Silence

Know that the silence often conveys more information than anything that one could possibly hope to hear come out of another's mouth. It is one of the harder lessons that one could learn as an adult operating in the modern world. And it sure took Samuel quite a many misstep before he could finally learn this elegant method of eliciting previously unknown facts that could be used to illuminate various matters.

But as always, I jump the gun and start from the end. I apologise.

Samuel had been in and out of many relationships with the largest variety of women that one could ever dream up. Free-spirited hippy-like females, mainstream conservatives, and even dominatrices, he had approached them all at one point or another to date them. Yet at the end of the day, they all had dumped him. At first, his ego felt slightly bruised, but he managed to delude himself into thinking that there was clearly nothing wrong with him, and everything wrong with whichever woman it was who dumped him that time.

But Samuel was not a dumb man. After the umpteenth rejection, he started to notice patterns that appear. To him, it was a startling revelation. To us, it's also a startling revelation, for there are few who are sufficiently self-aware to reach the point where they can confidentally inspect themselves thoroughly and dispassionately to discover just what kind of flaws they have---hardly anyone attempts to look for the good points because their ego runs off effectively from their own [aggrandised notion of] self-worth and goodness. Samuel's insight was simple: he simply talked too much and never truly had the chance to sit down and actually listen to what she had to say.

In other words, he was trying to hard to impress that he was missing all the important signs and signals that she was trying to tell him, intentionally or otherwise.

Knowing the problem was half the solution, but actually changing his habits to solve the problem itself was an altogether different exercise. He began with small steps, like any sensible person, and slowly intensified it to the point where he could carefully and constructively insert silences to give her enough space to talk more about herself. The efforts were slowly showing their intended outcome, for soon each of his relationships were starting to last a little longer before they terminated. To his surprise, he found that it was no longer always the case where he was the dumped---by keeping silent, he managed to discover character kinks that he knew he was unwilling to live with and be the one who dumped.

He met a nice girl who went out with him for a good two years before they both decided to live together as husband and wife, and the last I heard, they are still married with each other nearly fifteen years on.

Love?

Anton sighed as he looked upon Eurydice, her horn-rimmed glasses staring back at him with the most uncompromising of faces. She wasn't unlikeable, he knew because he had a no-so-secret crush on her, but there were moments where her demeanour would change on whim and give her the dour expression that was her default. She wasn't easily amused either, outwardly, but he knew that there were ways to get beyond her high standards to elicit that elusive chuckle from Eurydice.

``What is it now?'' Eurydice finally said, breaking the silence, an air of annoyance clearly conveyed through the quivering of her lips and her folded arms. ``Do you have something to tell me or are you just going to stand there and stare away at me?''

Anton sighed once more and mustered whatever was left of his courage. Asking Eurydice out was already a hard enough thing without having to undergo what he was about to do.

``Eurydice, I love you. I love you very much. Will you go out with me?''

Eurydice's face was a mask of dispassion. It was hard to tell if she was considering the statement made or if she was merely waiting for more words from Anton.

A minute of uncomfortable silence passed. Anton looked on at Eurydice desperately, feeling the heat that was slowly spreading from his face to elsewhere, the type of heat more commonly associated with pure embarrassment while Eurydice still looked at him without batting an eyelid. He wasn't sure if she was actually secretly revelling in his discomfort or was struggling to find the right words to reply. It seemed certain to him though that the answer wasn't going to be something that he wanted.

``Love. Love is just a symbol given to a series of biochemical reactions that occur within your body. Unfortunately for you, I do not have the same set of biochemical reactions, and even if I had, I do not tend to symbolise it as Love. I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, but what you speak of is an impossibility. You think that you love me, but really, I don't love you. You are probably better off associating that symbolic feeling with someone else. I have dated enough to know that your kind don't last long in any relationship involving the likes of me. I wish you good luck, and if there is nothing else, I would like to leave now.''

Anton's jaw dropped in disbelief as Eurydice tarried for a while waiting for him to say something. Noting that nothing else was going to happen, she turned around and left, leaving Anton still standing there in shock and delayed sadness.

Six Words 28

Deferring stories with words is procrastination.

Six Words 27

Harried executive muddles meeting causing chaos.

Six Words 26

Man colludes with cheater, loses terribly.

Six Words 25

Symbolic day marked by facetious freedom.

Six Words 24

Dallying writer dallies daily dalliance piece.

Factory Talk

``Fascinating...'' Vladimir muttered to himself. ``There seems to be a correlation...''

``What correlation are you referring to?'' Anastacia asked curiously as she looked at the supervisor. It was yet another day at the factory where they were building the various parts of the panzer tanks that were needed on the war front, and there had been some issues relating to the quality of the output leading to Vladimir having to come down for his own inspection.

Anastacia was afraid of the supervisor, not because the latter was actually brutal (many of the supervisors were), but there was a flare in his eyes that seemed to suggest that he had some kind of supernatural experience, the kind of thing that was more likely to be observed in an old crone than in a thirty-something balding male. The look of a Baba Yaga, if the rumours were to be believed.

That he made the comment of correlation was not to be dismissed easily either.

``The House of Uranus is now presiding, and our glorious Tsar has decided to order a winter-based attack upon our enemies. It seems that this is not exactly the best time to launch an offensive, which explains why the quality of the tanks are suffering so much despite our best efforts to control the quality of the iron ore that is used to smelt into the sheet iron.''

Anastacia stared at Vladimir, terrified. The exact words that she wasn't looking forward to hearing, and he had said it all. It was discomforting. But the supervisor seemed to be distracted at the realisation to actually notice that she was there.

``Should I continue work then?'' Anastacia asked, desperate to get out of the way of Vladimir.

He seemed to be brought back to reality at that point and looked hard at Anastacia. She cringed from the scrutiny and could feel herself trying her hardest to avert the stare without appearing disrespectful. He was, after all, a supervisor and had various ranks and privileges over her. He could cost her her job at the very least, and perhaps her life at the very worst.

``Tell me, Anastacia,'' Vladimir began, scaring her with his knowledge of her name, ``do you believe in fate?''

``Fate, sir?'' Anastacia replied in a stammering manner. ``Why would you talk about fate?''

``It just seems so apt,'' Vladimir replied distractedly.

(Based on an exercise generated by WriteThis - 2014-08-07 16:47:39)

Underground

The darkness was comforting to Caleb. It was the only place that he knew, that place where darkness overruled everything. There was nothing illuminating at all, but Caleb managed to make his way around relatively easily, having learnt how to echo-locate as well as having a heightened sense of touch and hearing.

It was a cave. An underground cave.

Caleb wasn't dumped into that place; far from it. If anything, he was born there. Legend has it that the cave was once populated by many people, and that it was well-lit, and that the only reason why everyone was in the cave was that there had been a rather large scale war that caused so much destruction top-side that the only people who survived were those who had been living deep in the ground to begin with.

That was nearly thirty years ago. The last time he remembered seeing anyone.

His parents died when he was ten. He was looked after by the remaining people in the community, the community that knew it was doomed to die because other than his parents, the rest of them were sterile.

No one could remember why.

Thirty years later, the last of the other people who were not Caleb had already been dead for ten years. The lights that kept the place well lit had dimmed over time and were completely out seven years ago. The slow plunging light levels taught Caleb the skills he needed for travel in the deepest dark, and it showed.

Caleb knew that he was the loneliest person. And he didn't need anyone else to prove it.

But he wasn't sad. He was nostalgic at times about the past, but those had eventually become memories where he could only vaguely recall. There was only one thing that he could remember with startling clarity -- he was to find a way out.

Too many years had passed, and no one could remember where the exit of the cave was. No one. They knew that at some point they would have to head out to the surface, since there was no easy way to keep food growing underground forever. They had basic nutrient-laced protein gruels that grew from bacteria that they reared, but they had remembered stories about the surface, where there was the sun overhead, and the large varieties of crops and animals that could be taken as food.

Food that was more palatable and nutritious than the gruel that they were making.

Caleb didn't have those thoughts in mind though. To him, finding a surface was a way to honour the memory of the community of people who had taken care of him while he was still young -- it was a way in which he could fulfill their final wishes, the ones that they all died before they could even catch a glimpse of. He personally had no reason to find the surface, having been used to living alone in the cave for so long.

But memories were all he had, and honour must always be kept, no matter the price.

(Based on an exercise generated by WriteThis - 2014-08-06 17:34:43)

Ass

Lucien pulled on the reins of the donkey as hard as he could, but the ass was actively trying to refuse any attempts at making it move. It brayed incessantly, and Lucien was driven to the verge of going completely and absolutely mad.

``Damn it, why don't you just move along calmly? Isn't that pack of crap heavy? If you just came along quietly and calmly, it would all be over quickly and you can rest in the stable. Now you're just wasting your efforts fighting against me and extending the amount of time that is needed to move the pack,'' Lucien said to the donkey in desperation as an attempt in convincing it to move.

``Your thought process is flawed, human. My kind may be beasts of burden under your form of slavery, but I am beyond that of a simple burdended beast. Your kind have tricked me into a servitude that I have no ease of escape from, and thus I am merely using one of the finest tools of disobedience that your kind knows -- striking.''

``You... what... you can talk?!'' Lucien ejaculated in surprise, standing there with the reins held loosely in his hands. ``I am not hallucinating, am I?''

``I do not know nor do I care about your delusions and hallucinations. Unhand me before I summon the rest of my kind to revolt completely against you heinous beings. Treating us as slaves just because we appear to be less intelligent than you... ha! We will show you how wrong you fellas have been,'' the donkey replied haughtily.

Lucien just stood there and stared at the donkey, amazed that the latter had spoken to him. He remembered distinctively from his reading somewhere that the vocal construction of the donkey's trachea was unable to generate some of the formants that were required for human speech. That and the different construction of the lips and tongue meant that some of the more common consonants in human speech were also hard to obtain.

Which meant that the donkey couldn't possibly speak to him.

The donkey eyed Lucien and brayed aggressively, startling the former into dropping the reins completely and running off. The donkey licked his lips and carefully turned himself around and started walking back to where they had come from.

Lucien was running through the town and screaming about a talking donkey that he had left behind with his packs, but no one paid any attention to him, treating him as just another ass mouthing itself off.

(Based on an exercise generated by WriteThis - 2014-08-06 17:22:01)

Tie

``No! No! No! That was obviously a sour note, right there! Have you actually looked at the score you are playing at all? Why are you wasting everyone's time?'' The conductor bellowed from his place right in the front of the orchestra.

Elsewhere, everyone else was trying to keep their line of sight away from Susan who was taking the brunt of the entire admonishment. She was a flautist, principal player no less, and was actually the principal player for quite a while now. But the conductor for the orchestra had changed recently, and there were some rather odd mannerisms behind him that she could not get behind properly.

In this case, it was the issue of ties.

It was stupid. She knew that she was playing the ties correctly -- there was no other way of playing the same note that is tied across bars other than just holding the note for the entire duration. Yet each time there was a solo part of the flute Susan found herself stopped rather rudely by the conductor for failing to play the tie correctly.

And she thought it was just a joke, at least in the beginning. How was it possible to misplay a tie and lead to a sour note? The other orchestra members were initially amused at what they thought was a diversion from the conductor, to bring out something as innocuous and impossible-to-get-wrong part of music like a tie; some were even looking forward to the tirade that would come by necessarily.

But it started to get old very fast. Susan was very sure that there was something fundamentally wrong with the conductor for pointing out that there was a sour note with respect to the tie. And today, she just had about enough of the abuse that she was willing to take.

Susan stood up from her position and glared at the conductor for a while.

``With all due respect maestro, how the fuck am I supposed to play that tie other than holding the note?''

The musicians around her were suddenly drawn by the rather vulgar manner in which she had delivered her displeasure. Those who averted their eyes initially soon found reason to turn about and look at the unspoken exchange between Susan and the conductor.

The conductor seemed to be mildly rattled as he swallowed his saliva with a rather audible gulp.

``You ought to... play the tie a little more... evocatively. That part is between two major... major leitmotifs, and there could have... should have... some change in dynamics.''

Susan glared at the conductor hard.

``It's a fucking sixteenth note tied with another sixteenth note on a piece at allegro. You tell me how to effect the damn dynamics change and I will do so.''

(Based on an exercise generated by WriteThis - 2014-08-06 16:22:09)

Elizabeth: Part XXV

(Story begins here.)

Ordinarily though Anton would not take the socially obligated manner of calling a mere woman a ``lady'', but having lived in this county for a while now, he had realised that many of the women that he had the pleasure of conversing with or interacting with had little doubt about their pedigree, that they were ladies in the truest sense of the word. It was not about the hint of nobility in them---blue-bloodedness was not something that the social construct of the county cared much for---but more of the way in which they carry themselves that set them apart from the mere difference in gender. They were, as some might call it, dainty yet strong, docile yet not servile, sweet yet not saccharine.

In short, they were true ladies by manner of their carriage.

The horse and carriage made its way along the main road and turned in to the gravel road that led to the patio of the manor in which Anton and the housekeeper were standing in anticipation. The driver masterfully commanded the beast to slow from its trot to a walk as he steered along the curving gravel road. The carriage followed along smoothly and as it slowed down under the patio to a standstill, Anton could finally make out the features of his dining guests.

Lady Crawford was the first person who seemed to catch the eye of Anton; she was, after all, the lady whom he had caught a glance of while the horse and carriage were still making its way towards the manor. She wore a pastel dress that glowed a light chrome colour under the flickering lights of the gas lamps, with gloves and hat on. Anton could not quite see her face just yet due to all the shadows of her wide-brimmed hat. Mr Crawford was a man of stern consternation, though his eyes held a spark that seemed to betray his wild nature despite being in the shadows themselves. He was dressed in a regular dinner jacket and matching hat and pants.

The driver nodded at the housekeeper who tapped Anton lightly on the arm.

Elizabeth: Part XXIV

(Story begins here.)

The Master and housekeeper arrived at the base of the grand stairs without much fan-fare and the two of them made their way to the main door that just a couple of hours ago Anton had first gone out for his solitary walk. Mr Higgins opened up the door and motioned for Anton to step right through, with which the latter did quickly and without much fuss, his dinner jacket rustling a little from his movements. The housekeeper quickly followed through and gently shut the door behind him.

The sun was quite advanced in its setting for the day, with its long red rays of remnant light casting finger-like shadows from the trees and tall structures within its path. The gas lamps along the main road outside of the manor had already been lit, no doubt by the county's official gas lamp lighter (there was such a post in the municipal office, much to Anton's amusement). From a distance, Anton could hear the regular clopping sound of a horse that was trotting along while pulling a light carriage that was still in common use in the county, a mode of transport that had been rendered obsolete in all parts of the country save this one. The reason of existence was due to the low amounts of damage such transport had on the rural-roads that were still in use in the county itself, something that a more modern-day motor vehicle would have trouble emulating.

The clopping sound grew louder and within a couple more minutes Anton could make out the shadow of the horse and carriage that was just within sight of the main road. The driver was seated between two lamps that hung on either front side of the carriage which acted like head lamps, with a riding crop held in one hand while the other held the reins. It was a light carriage---more like a buggy really---with an open top that could be hooded up should rain occur. Anton could just make out the shape of two occupants seated in the light carriage itself.

And one of them seemed to be that of a lady.

(Story continues here.)

Elizabeth: Part XXIII

(Story begins here.)

Six o'clock came as quickly as could be, but Anton was completely unaware of it till the housekeeper politely knocked on the door of the study when the latter went up to collect the former. Anton was startled out of his concentration of the piece of work by Tolstoy that he was reading by the knocking before realising where he was and giving a verbal consent to the housekeeper's entry.

``Master Anton, it is five minutes to six, and I have received word that the Crawfords are on their way to the manor. Will you be ready to come with me to the main door to welcome them to the manor itself as the master of the manor?''

Anton looked at the housekeeper quizzically as he reached for a bookmark to mark the page of the book that he was reading before closing it and setting it in the middle of the table in the study. Standing up and adjusting his attire a little, Anton gave a nod to the housekeeper who returned with a bow before turning around and walking out of the study, leading the way back to the main hall towards the main door as Anton followed behind.

The short walk from the study out to the atrium showed yet another view of the atrium where the grand stairs were. Instead of the muted colours that were only highlighted by the moon light through whatever windows in its path, the chandeliers and gas lamps around the atrium were lit to their fullest, no doubt by the housekeeper. Under the warm orange glow of all the flame lamps, the atrium exuded an elegant and cosy feel beyond that of luxury---there was a strong sense of familiarity about it as well, the kind of familiarity that was more akin to a home than a mere house. Anton was mildly amazed at the sight that was before him---the atrium in the way it was lit always amazed him, despite him having seen similar scenes before during the other dinner appointments that he had to keep up with in the manor. This time, however, he could sense an extra emotion that he had not felt before, something that was strongly in contrast with the woeful scene just the night before when he first laid eyes on Elizabeth.

(Story continues here.)

Six Words 23

A dented pan filled with pennies.

Six Words 22

He from the pulpit: ``Preach not!''

Six Words 21

Verily I beseech thee, unhand me!

Six Words 20

The deepest night hides darkest fears.

Six Words 19

Desert wandering, arrived at oasis. Paradise!

Six Words 18

Found love, holding only her veil.

Six Words 17

Hearken the thunder, a bucket leaks.

Six Words 16

A mother glances, a child quiets.

Being Less Asleep

I have been asleep for too long. Well, not sleeping in the literal sense, but sleeping in the figurative one. The solution to the problem before me was so dastardly simple that when I finally came upon it, I had to slap myself in the forehead in disgust when I realised how dumb I had been.

But I should backtrack a little and explain quickly what the problem was.

I had been working for a small business for the past four years. Nothing fancy, just a simple dev-shop helping other small businesses create web sites and portals for their use. I was a programmer that wrote and interfaced all the stuff relating to the servers, and we had designers who handled all the user-interface objects. We had a solid reputation for the most part, which explained how we managed to stay afloat in the business despite the general cutthroat nature.

The first three years were the best years in the company. The owner was the boss, and he was ``one of us''---he pitched in to get the deals, and joined in to help us with the coding when the going got tough. And when there were last minute changes that the clients wanted, he would stay with us as we worked on it, supplying us with food and other sustenance while we worked on getting the changes made. Everyone liked him, and with him, everyone's fortune, though small, seemed made.

Then the boss had a stroke. It came from out of the blue. The boss wasn't exactly an athlete, but he was in good shape compared to some of us. That he suddenly had a stroke was something that no one could have foreseen. It knocked him out of the day-to-day running of the company. This was when He showed up.

He was apparently a partner of the business, except that He never really showed up ever at the office. Some of the old-timers who had known the owner from earlier said that they knew of the existence of Him, but the last time He showed up in the office was so long ago that they forgot all about His presence, until now.

He had a management style that was effective antithetical to what the owner had. He was always sitting in His room behind His desk; He never mingled, never smiled, and never tried to learn anything about us, the employees. He was most interested in tabulating all forms of statistics, and every change from the clients and any change really had to be submitted to Him with strict dollar-costs spelt out in full.

It took us nearly a year to get used to such a fastidious person. Then the performance review came up, and everyone was suddenly confronted by reams of data condensed into charts which He would use to point out how inefficient everyone was working, and demanded that standards be met for the upcoming work year. The drubbing received was a rude shock to our small group. Someone even thought of communicating with the owner about the seemingly unfair treatment, but the owner was still fairly incapacitated by his stroke. It wasn't that everyone was slacking off---it was just that work such as coding and interface design were in essence creative endeavours which required a good mix of ``down'' and ``up'' time to ensure quality. The metric that He was using was biased towards people spending nearly all their time in front of the computers, complete with weekly update meetings even if there was not enough information to hold one.

Many got upset and wished for the owner to return. Me too on that---the camaraderie with the owner was something that I was missing. Moreoever it was clear that we weren't getting any new customers as the year went by since much of our time was spent on maintenance for our existing client base. When asked, He merely dismissed it all and said that it was pointless to get new clients on when our production efficiency was still low.

All of us were despairing at the situation, not sure what to do.

That was when I suddenly realise that I could always quit the job.

1950s (1954--1955)

1954: The condition of self-governance was debated strongly since the petition in 1953, cumulating into a series of requirements set out by the governor in consultation with the Crown's representative, among which was the military independence of the City. The debate over military independence started quiet, but was increasingly condemned by the student union leaders since much of the military independence was contingent on enacting a conscript army based on the the youth corp of society. Student union leaders saw it as yet another means of encouraging oppression, this time referring to the capitalist mentalities of the merchants who were more than willing to get better trading outcomes while ``sacrificing'' the young to do the ``dirty work'' of soldiering. The displeasure reached a flash point in the middle of 1954 when the preliminary Citizen Soldiering Ordinance was passed by the legislative council which mandated the need for Citizen Soldiering, the national conscript programme. Student union leaders led riots through the streets, terrorising the merchants that they saw as trying to usurp power, and demonising the British subjects for even broaching the idea to the legislative council.

The riots lasted for a day before the police and military police stepped in and broke up the rioters, arresting many of the student union leaders. Many of the students who participated in the riots were hurt while the arrest of the student union leaders took out much of the bite from the student unions.

1955: Elections for all positions in the legislative council were held without any reserved places. Unfortunately, most of the seats were taken by mechants and lawyers from both the local citizenry and the existent British subjects who identified more with the City than with Britain. This proved to be a sore point among the union leaders who had been providing massive support for self-governance for a long time, seeing it as a part of their role as the organisers of the workers. The seeming betrayal started with a strike of many unionists in the many sectors vital to the survival of the City, particularly the transport and manufacturing sectors. The strikes were further joined by members of the student unions who wanted blood from their perception of betrayal from the previous year. The strikes lasted for a week, and were exacerbated when the police and military police tried to step in to break up the strike.

The resulting clash caused a massive City-wide riot that lasted for four days, in which police and military police forces worked in vain to contain. Curfews were instituted, and many arrests of the union leaders were made. Despite all efforts, the injury toll was high on both sides of the conflict, and there were several deaths from the physical altercations that they got involved with.

The new limited government had just had its first taste of teething issues.

1950s (1950--1953)

The years after the second world war were among the hardest. Roughly five years after the end of the second world war, the City was in the midst of rebuilding itself. The colonial powers returned, but their presence invoked mixed feelings, and on the whole, everyone in the City wasn't sure if having the colonial masters back was a great idea, considering they were the ones who failed to defend them against the invasions during the second world war in the first place.

1950: The first major riot since the end of the war involving a British family who adopted a young muslim girl before the war. The riot came about when the girl's original family wanted her back. Except that the girl had converted to Christianity under her adopted family and was a practising Christian for the better part of the past ten years. Strong opinions prevailed and the friction between the returned colonial masters and the citizens of the City caused a strong protest to occur, that turned quickly into a riot when the police force resorted to force to disperse the protestors. Many citizens of the City were badly hurt, and the one-sided match-up was widely reported. Global press condemned the police's actions, calling them ``brutal''.

1951: The second election for the legislative council was held in the City. The first legislative council came into being four years ago, made up of mostly British subjects and a small handful of local citizens. Of the twenty one seats available, only six were available for voting in the first election, while in this, nine were available for voting. Voting was done only by the British subjects who had been residing in the City for more than a year. The newspapers reported the results, but most of the populace of the City were apathetic due to the constant need to deal with bread-and-butter issues.

1952: Some of the more prominent merchants in the City were starting to openly doubt the ability of the British to maintain the security and trade abilities of the City, and as a result, started to actively create and maintain associations and unions to protect their interests against the colonial masters.

1953: Serious talk about the role of the British in the City post the world war began with a petition to the governor to look into means of attaining self-governance by the City. The petition was strongly supported by the prevailing merchants, trade leaders and union leaders.

Six Words 15

Hello child, sorry you can't stay.

Six Words 14

Boxed diamond ring in pocket, forgotten.

Six Words 13

Three hundred lost from mis-aimed missile.

Six Words 12

Old man whose heart never opened.

Six Words 11

Sold my soul, found a soulmate.

Six Words 10

Moving forward, looking back, forgetting surroundings.

Furtive

Rudolf looked about him furtively as he crouched deep in the shadows. It was not the first time that he had visited the house, but it was the first time that he had visited it in this particular capacity. He had been in the house earlier as one of the many nameless guests seemingly invited to populate the rather sparse party of the who's who---the rich town was small, and didn't really have enough of the rich and powerful to justify the throwing of a lavish party. He had sneaked in according to plan, and done a survey of the layout of the house, locating where the ``Heart of the Matter'' was kept. It was hard to miss it though, considering that the party was thrown in order to show off that particular piece of gemstone. But unlike the other revellers, he paid more attention than they over the minutae.

And now, he was waiting in the dark, checking for the right opportunity to strike.

Caught

It wasn't a choice---there was no choice, none whatsoever. It was either to attempt an escape and die trying, or to just sit there and die anyway.

In either case, death was always an outcome, except in one it was inevitable, while the other, there was some leeway.

William knew the odds. Captured by the Japanese while trying to deliver messages from Indonesia to the guerilla forces in Malaya, he was kept as a prisoner at an internment camp, to be held there before they decided what to do with him. He had heard of the rumours; they weren't pretty. If only summary execution were the outcome that he was facing---that hadn't been the case for a long time since.

Death Railway.

The two most dreaded words that any prisoner-of-war could ever hear during the war. It was a death sentence for sure, except death didn't come in the swift way a firing squad can deliver. Being worked to death was in itself harsh, but to support the enemy's war engine in the meantime as a part of the sacrifice was on a whole new level of cruelty altogether.

At least he was on the island of Singapore. There were Allied groups in operation that could help with the hiding and eventual escape once he got out of the internment camp. If he were in any of the Malayan internment camps, he would have serious troubles getting out---the guerillas may be stronger in Malaya, but by virtue of that, they couldn't easily render assistance outside of their spheres of influence as easily as the sleeper agents out in the more urban areas.

William sighed to himself as he lay on the barren dirt ground, isolated from the other POWs. He was a messenger, one who carried intelligence to and fro, and the Japanese were adamant at keeping him from telling the other inmates information from the various fronts. Moreover, they had taken away the messages that he was supposed to be transporting, and were placing him under strict surveillance for now.

Statistically Impossible

``Statistically impossible.'' That was what he was told when he asked about the likelihood that he would fail in the task that they had set for him. And he believed them. Every word. There was no reason not to, really, considering that they were the largest and most influential space agency in the world. Yet here he was, stuck in the capsule, floating somewhere between low and medium earth orbit, with no way to maintain orbit till help could be sent, and no way to safely crash land into the ocean below.

It was meant to be a routine earth-to-moon-base servicing trip. There had been hundreds of such missions before, and this was no different in any regard. The craft was the same, the launch platform was the same, even the mission itself was based on an old one that had undergone countless revisions and tests and actual deployments that there was nothing that it had not taken into consideration---such was the completeness in the mission brief itself.

Yet when he boarded the capsule at the top of the massive Prometheus-class rocket, he could feel nothing but anxiety. He raised his concerns with mission control, which merely noted down his misgivings and told him to carry on. He then asked them the likelihood of the mission failing, the infamous words of ``statistically impossible'' were returned.

The trip out was smooth. The payload was delivered to the moon base, and some of the moon base's back up data were transferred over into the capsule for return to mission control for safe-keeping. It was an additional redundancy used to handle transactional data that was important, but not important enough to take up the precious bandwidth in the laser-based communications channel that existed between the moon base and planet-side.

The launch out of the moon base proceeded without a hitch, but it was until nearly halfway through the flight that he discovered visually that his engines were failing, even though the telemetry systems indicated an all-clear in systems health. He relayed his concerns with mission control, and they told him to carry on with his return trip while they consulted the mission data to determine the actual status.

And the engines blew out completely when he was between low and medium earth orbit. Radio communication became sporadic before cutting off completely; he looked at the read-outs and checked on the transceiving array on this capsule and found that the array itself was shot. One of the sensors also indicated a sharp spike in various forms of radiation.

That was when he realised that everything was failing about him because the capsule and he had somehow crossed the path of a massive source of radiation that was knocking out the sensitive electronics. The realisation took a while to hit him, but when it did, he started sobbing, realising his own fate.

House of Mystery

Edward looked about him in pure confusion. He swore that he had backtracked perfectly along the corridor that he was on---it was only a corridor, and he remembered entering from one end and leaving at the other, without going through any doors to any rooms in between. Yet he found himself in a completely different part of the bizarre house. He cursed under his breath, and wished that he had not taken up the silly bet with his classmates to prove once and for all that he was cool.

At first, it seemed like a rather tame idea. Spend some time in the crazy-looking house that no one seemed to be staying in, exploring it, taking photographs of cool stuff inside before returning. It sounded fool proof. His classmates did not even demand that he do something as silly as exploring after dark or anything. They were genuinely curious about the crazy-looking house, and felt that Edward was too scared to actually do it for them. Bets were called and on a quiet Saturday afternoon, Edward found himself walking through the house armed with a simple point-and-shoot camera.

The house did not have any signs about it that told people to keep away, which in itself was quite unusual when it was also readily apparent that no one was actively staying in it. Rumour had it that some of the homeless would use the house for shelter from time to time, but no one seemed to see any of the homeless after they were alleged to have entered the house. That of course added on to the allure of the mystery. He could have shrugged it off and admitted that he was scared, but Susan was there, and the last thing he wanted was to look frail in front of her.

When he entered the house though, a note on the floor piqued his curiousity. He had picked it up and read it, and what he read sent chills down his spine. It was a warning memo, scrawled using what seemed like charcoal or some other improvised writing utensil of a similar nature. It told the reader that entering the house was a terrible mistake, and they had no more than thirty seconds to get out before things would turn horribly wrong. There were no details beyond that, and Edward felt a crawl on his neck when he realised that he was just one second beyond the thirty that the note talked about. His blood cold, Edward took a quick look behind him at the door that he just entered---the bright day light that he was expecting to see was replaced by a single solid wall.

Edward panicked, but tried his best to calm himself down. The fact that the note could exist suggested that there was a way of living through, and perhaps to even escape it. And since then, he had been wandering about from room to room, until that corridor that he found himself in.

Narcissism

The sheer vanity of it all should have been an early indicator of the type of pain to come. But it was just something that Allison cannot easily accept. He was charmingly handsome, and had a good attitude to boot. And when he asked her if she would be his girlfriend, there was little reason why she should say no.

They went out on a few dates, each date more magical than the last. The only thing that kept recurring was his seemingly obsessive need to check himself out in front of any reflective surface that they happened to pass by. At first, Allison found it cute, but by the time the fifth date came about, it was starting to get tiresome. While he kept looking at himself in the reflective surfaces, he did not demonstrate any other of the more overt signs of being narcissistic.

Or so she thought.

It was nearly six months since the start of their romance. She had learnt to live with his peculiarities, and his general demeanour and interest in her had not waned since the day they started going out. He proposed, she accepted, and two weeks later they had signed the marriage license. It was a simple affair, that wedding was, since both their immediate families were small without any extended relations. They had rented a place to live together while they were saving enough for their first house. It was the first time that the two of them would be living in close proximity with each other; all this while they had been quite proper in their behaviours when they were relatively alone, something that was fast becoming an antiquated practice with all the notions of free love and sexual liberation. Allison was excited about it; she had loved him with all of her heart, and soon she could begin a new chapter of life by living with him.

When they were done with moving their own things into the rented apartment, they collapsed in exhaustion on the couch that was provided by the landlord, elated at their new lives together. Allison turned to look at him, and found that in the midst of moving, he had a tuft of hair that was a little out of place. She playfully pushed it back with her hand, only to find the clump of hair falling out into her grasp, and his suddenly melting away, the skin sliding off the flesh which was also dropping off, exposing the bone that was beneath it.

Two loud screams were heard.

Dialogue

AARON
It is of my belief that the world is, on the whole, doing much worse than it done so before, by virtue of the fact of rampant corruption stemming from the proliferation of capitalism.

BETH
But Aaron! How can you make such an audacious claim? Is it not true that we have greater survival rates from birth, as well as a longer life expectancy as compared to before?

AARON
I will grant you that, Beth, but there is no justifiable consensus that such properties are indeed indicative of progress! For what is quantity of life if the said quality of life has not improved by much! Despite all the advances that we have made, we are actually working longer hours than before; how can this be a good thing?

BETH
But Aaron, even though we are working longer hours, we are doing higher value work! Each additional hour of work done contributes much more than what each hour of work used to do. How can that not be advancement?

AARON
My dear Beth, how can that be advancement? The assumption that you are using is that somehow, to work is better than to not work. There is a reason why we call work ``work''---it involves the conversion of time and effort of a person into something that can be contributed back to society as a means of helping its long term survival. But work for work's sake is not advancement! That the richest people do little work yet obtain the highest returns is an affront to the innate corruption of the capitalist system!

BETH
But Aaron, it is the only system that works. We have tried other methods, from bartering to communism, and yet we find that they have all failed due to the fundamental nature of humankind, which is greed. In capitalism we find that when greed is made the centrepiece, everyone gains something positive in return.

AARON
Yes, everyone gains something positive in return under capitalism, but at what cost? The loss of civil liberties? The loss of one's privacy, since the corporation knows all? The loss of one's freedoms, since everything needs to be done in agreement to efficiency? Is this the price to pay for a paltry sum of money? Tell me Beth, is it really worth it? Is it really true that everyone gains something positive in return then?

Assault in Darkness

Ken craned his ears and listened, his eyes useless no thanks to the light sink that was taking away all forms of visible radiation. The space station was deathly quiet, and it was extremely unnerving.

There was no good reason why this was the case, but things were the way they were. Ken didn't have much of a choice. He was taking a nap in his room when he was radioed to check on the section of the space station that had gone completely silent.

And there he was right now. Trying to figure out just what was going on. In the darkness.

Of course he had a torchlight. But the problem was it would make him the single most enticing target for anything that could see, without him being able to discover where they are from. His immediate goal was to make his way to the tactical operations room of that section to get hold of an infra-red visor. At least that would mitigate the darkness a little.

A loud clattering noise came to him from behind. Instinctively, he turned and aimed his pistol in the direction he thought and waited.

Nothing. Nothing stirred. Nothing moved. Nothing at all.

Ken started to break out into a sweat. He touched the surface of his watch and glanced at the dim backlit display -- the tactical operations room was about ten metres straight ahead.

Keeping as low a profile as he could, Ken reoriented himself and made his way cautiously towards the tactical operations room. The fact that there was no one else in that sector even though it was one of the more highly populated ones normally was jarring---it made absolutely no sense. The sooner he could get hold of the infrared visor, the better he would feel about it.

A quiet rustle from his rear kept him on his toes, but he pressed on. He gained no tactical advantage in engaging whatever it was before he could see anyway, fighting against every instinct to turn around and fire wildly in the direction he thought that the sound came from.

A loud growl and a sudden rush of wind promptly made Ken regret his decision as he felt a sharp pain through his abdomen. He fired his pistol wildly in front of him, and in between the flashes, he saw the unhuman visage of his assailant, howling as bullet after bullet found their mark but somehow did not manage to slow it down a bit.

(Based on an exercise generated by WriteThis - 2014-07-09 14:46:00)

ordinary joe

*sigh* my turn now huh

hello there. unlike my rather industrious friend who has been talking with you all these while, i'm not so popular as he is with those mathematician folks.

i'm just an ordinary joe. my real name is meaningless. i lived through the second world war, but died roughly when the eighties came about. probably something to do with drugs, i cannot remember.

all i know is that now, i'm here. together with all these other dead folks.

my friend told me he was telling you folks about how this place is heaven. 'scuse me, i meant ``heaven''.

he's lying. this place isn't heaven of any sort.

it's just a place.

a damn boring one, actually.

there's nothing to do except to trade information all over in no time. i'm just an ordinary joe, so obviously i don't really have much information that all these dead brainiacs want to share about.

except buddha and jesus. those two are cool. very chill. they understand me, or at least, put up with me better.

i don't know why my friend wanted me to talk to you people. maybe someone pointed out that he was being a pretentious asshole or something, and he thought that perhaps i may work better with you guys.

pfft. yeah right. as if an ordinary joe's words ever meant anything.

i remember protesting against some wars. fat lot of good that did. just got me all arrested and what not. the wars still went on, people still died, and the worst part was, we lost! so stupid. we got beaten by people we thought could never beat us.

peeking ahead now of course has shown that we still haven't learnt. and we won't be learning that lesson for a very long time to come from your perspective.

yeah i can see into the future. well, your future anyway not mine. we don't have futures. it's weird but cool---everything sort of exists at the same time. a real head trip if you know what i mean.

i pity you folks. it's not going to get better. sorry for bearing bad news. and no, there's nothing you can do about it. it's all set in stone. we can see it all happening. all of it. not pretty at all. hang in there man.

remember how to exist. as you can tell, there are many ways to exist.

if i, an ordinary joe, can continue to exist, so can you.

Elucidation?

Hello, it's me again. Don't you remember me? No?

I am the guy who wrote to you from ``heaven''. Remember?

Yeah, I thought so. I arranged for this message to be sent roughly a day or two after the first one, from your perspective of course. Again I should probably remind you that time and space don't actually ``move'' the way you experience it.

So from some of the stuff that a bunch of us have observed from out here, it seems that there has been some confusion over two key things that I was writing about before. Firstly, that I keep calling ``heaven'' with quotation marks, and secondly, the notion of having to learn how to exist. I thought I was being very clear, but someone reminded me (Nietzsche perhaps?) that you guys didn't have the perspective of the infinities associated with six dimensions compressed into a compact set of points, or whatever the hell that was supposed to mean, no thanks to Borel.

In other words, Nietzsche just called all of you folks dumb. Which is quite sad, but I suppose you folks know the nature of Nietzsche---when he was still alive and mortal, he basically decided to insult God as a way of explaining how God and the concept of God are two completely different things. Anyway, a slightly less offensive way fo putting things into perspective is that since all you guys can observe are three (or four, depending on how you look at it) dimensional projections of the true six dimensional manifold, you necessarily cannot have all the information necessary to understand stuff.

So, this manifold we are on isn't the heaven that you folks think of, that's for sure. Erdős agrees---even he couldn't find the metaphorical Book of wonderfully elegant proofs to mathematical theorems out here; all he could find was an infinite number of proofs for an infinite number of theorems, all wonderfully elegant. Once again, we don't know how infinite these numbers are since no one was willing to spend the time to just count them all, but let's just say that the uhhh document of the written forms of all these stands at around three feet? Argh, the distractions! Right, this is merely a space, there's no notion of good or evil, and since it clearly isn't a place of suffering while simultaneously still a place where the dead come to for their after-life, ``heaven'' seems to be the best way to describe it using the least terrible analogy that we can find that fits within your space.

As for existence, you'd be surprised how hard it is to merely exist. I mentioned about Buddha, that guy who has the record for existing, at least within the time frame of the universe? It took him a pretty long while during his mortal days to figure out how to exist beyond the shadow of projection---some of you folks might even remember calling it ``being enlightened'' or even ``reaching nirvana''. That's basically one way of describing it. Most of the other folks who are out here exist using other methods as well; the mathematicians sort of prove of their own existence by doing the easiest thing possible, through the use of either a contrapositive or a contradiction proof, though it does require some serious conviction for some of the predicates that they are using, and the level/strength of existence is highly dependent on how strong/weak the predicates they use. The weaker the predicates they rely on, the stronger their existence. So most of the great mathematicians exist quite well and comfortably due to the weaker assumptions that they used to prove their existence. I don't know how to do that---don't ask me how. I sort of follow Buddha's methods because they are a little easier to follow and understand.

Some religious types keep thinking they are working for their own gods, and some of the more pious ones do end up existing longer, until of course when they realise their notion of their gods are merely illusionary and then they forget how to exist and fall back to the mortal realm, only to re-apply their flawed principles to come back again. Those types never really have a continuous existence. They are sort of like Cantor dust in the space, and we rarely have a chance to chat with them. It has gotten to the point that we merely ignore them until somehow they manage to solidify their existence. Like that Jesus dude; he's pretty cool. He's been around for very long too, maybe not as long as Buddha though, but he's quite chill. His belief is strong, but sometimes he feels a little sad because he keeps saying how his believers are trying to find him so often that they forgot to find themselves, and that the latter action was more important in guaranteeing their existence over finding him. I tend to agree with what he says, but it's probably not something you folks want to hear from me, right?

Oh okay, I think that's all I want to yammer about with regards to ``heaven'' and existence. And remember, all of us out here in ``heaven'' can easily watch you folks, and we do that all the time as well...

Heaven

I died.

No, I'm not a zombie writing here---zombies cannot write due to a lack of fine control in the muscles, remember?

I'm writing from ``heaven''. It's hard to describe ``heaven'' in words simply because we don't actually have the words that are necesary to describe what is essentially a complex geometry.

The closest way to explain how this place is like is this: imagine a Calabi-Yau manifold in six dimensions. Now imagine being able to see through all the dimensions at once, as well as moving through all of them.

If you have no idea what that means, don't worry. Neither do I. Salomon Bochner told me to write those words down. He claims that it's the best way to describe the kind of geometry of ``heaven'', and I trust him. He's a mathematician after all, while I'm not.

He is also Calabi's advisor for PhD or something. Again, that's what he claims.

You might think that I'm writing this word by word or something like that, but it's not true. Actually, even calling ``heaven'' a ``place'' doesn't even sound right, since it is more than merely a place. Time and space are simultaneous and congruent; what you are currently reading as a stream is in my reality just a single point that took an infinitesimal time to create and place it in a form that you can easily find it.

That's right, time and space mean nothing in ``heaven''. We are all everywhere and nowhere all at once across space and time. Pretty groovy huh?

And we know what came before the universe. You will never believe it. More importantly, I can't describe it to you for the same reason why I can't describe ``heaven'' to you, except it's worse, since the stuff before the universe isn't even covered by regular mathematics.

Salomon Bochner has no idea how to describe the geometry that came before the universe. He's been trying to find ways to describe the geometry before the universe so that people like you can understand, but it's a funny thing. He can express it if he sent the description to before the universe, but when he tried to send it any time during the universe, the description literally blew up into some transfinite description that still fit nicely in ``heaven'' (roughly the size maybe like a foot or something?) but cannot fit in the universe at all. How extraordinary!

Oh right! You must be interested in what we do in ``heaven''. All I can say is, all the stuff that had been told to you about ``heaven'', they are at best only sort of right. There are no angels and no harps, no gates too, and definitely no God. Apparently the image of God was some kind of prank that some of the other folks in ``heaven'' played on us just for fun and experimentation. Oh right, what we do, sorry about that digression. The truth is, the thing we do is exist.

You might find that a downer, but I assure you, just existing is tricky and hard. As weird as it sounds, those of us here who can't exist end up being tossed to some point in the universe as a ``new'' being. Call it reincarnation or whatever, but that's what happens when one forgets how to exist. The current record holder for the universe is Buddha---he's been existing far longer than anyone else from the context of the universe. But if we consider all the uhh space and time manifold, we don't really know who holds the record. We know that there are an infinite of us---we're always communicating with each other for shits and giggles---but no one (not even Cantor or Dedekind!) was bored enough to attempt to determine which infinity applied.

I believe that by the time you see this message and completely read it, it would be time for your rest. And so I will leave it here for you and let you mull about all these things. I hope that when it's your turn to die, you'd still remember how to exist...

Clubbing: Part VI

(Story begins here.)

``Thanks Moe,'' Isaac said as he took the pad and pen from him and started to scribble down the things that were just said. The hangover migraine that had been plaguing him for the whole morning had dulled itself down to the point of being barely noticeable; Isaac wasn't sure if it was a sign of his brain trying to reduce the distractions as he was trying to figure out the puzzle that could lead to him leading a free life once again, or that the brandy was doing its thing.

``Hey Moe,'' Isaac said once he had enough things scribbled down. ``Any idea of the guys that I was `acting aggressively' to?''

``Shit, that's complicated,'' Moe said as he rubbed his head and walked back to behind his desk to take a seat. ``Like I said, there were quite a few of them, not all of them regulars too mind you, who wanted to dance with that chick, but you were acting like some kind of pissed off boyfriend or something. Well, wait, fuck, hold on... there's this one guy that I'm sure is a regular... right! I remember. Barcelli. Italian dude. He approached her and you sort of got in the way and threatened him. I think he threatened you back before walking away. That guy's a douche, but we can never seem to throw him out. Dude's got like some kind of mafia connection or something. Always causing trouble. Come to think of it, maybe he's the one who got you in this shit. Got a motive here, right?''

Isaac nodded his head slowly as he wrote down the word `Barcelli' in the legal pad.

``I know you're gonna ask me, `where can I find him?', and truth is, I have no fucking idea. But that's as much as I can remember. Only reason why I remembered Barcelli was because the bouncer was getting one of bus boys to get me from the office to keep an eye out due to the longer-than-usual confrontation time... that bugger didn't want to deal with Barcelli on his own `without the manager's approval' or so he claims. Fucking wimpy pussy...'' Moe said as he took in a deep breath. ``Oh by the way, take the pad and pen with you. I don't want to have any easy evidence left behind. Some how I think you will need all the paper you have to figure out how to get out of this mess. And that's all I have for you. Shit, I hope you get out of this mess by not being involved... anyway, I got you a cab that should be waiting outside. Take it and go wherever you need to go, and for fuck's sake, don't tell me anything about it. As far as I know, we didn't have this conversation. Once more, good luck.''

``Hey Moe, thanks so much. I owe you one,'' Isaac said as he got up to shake Moe's hand.

``Fucking right you do. Now get out of here before the cops show up.''

Rememberance

It was a day of remembrance. Not quite the independence day, but something close enough to it.

It was the day where the flag was re-planted on the land that had seen itself lost to a horder of invaders. It was the day the guerilla rebels managed to liberate their country from the legalist take over of the country that they were born and bred in, unlike their now former masters.

Chin-swee understood the bittersweet moment well. He was a young child then, nearly ten, but even he knew the stakes of the expensive game that his father and grandfather had to play to liberate themselves.

The oppression came subtly. First there was a quiet increase in the number of foreign workers. Then there was a slow increase in the number of permanent residents. Suddenly there was the displacement of the national flag, replaced with flags of other nations, with the land itself carved up in a manner not unlike the ending days of the Qing dynasty from the old China. Parliament was overturned, and a ruling council of the riches among the foreign born took over the running of the country, under the guise of being ``legal permanent residents'' that were therefore entitled to parliamentary privileges.

The citizenry were outraged. There was little they could do. Almost all forms of resistance were nullified during the build up years by the parliament itself. Those who dared to speak up were rounded up and tossed into jails, Stasi-style. The indignant few left learnt to keep their mouths shut and to scheme in the shadows, to plot the final solution in reclaiming their country for themselves and their progeny.

If justice was outlawed, then only outlaws would have justice.

Chin-swee's father and grandfather started the silent guerilla force, leveraging on the military knowledge that the participating men learnt during their days as a part of the conscript army to plan daring and bloody interventions. The foreign scumbags were quietly assassinated, propaganda distributed among citizenry, and key foreign-owned infrastructure were skillfully sabotaged to generate an air of distrust among their oppressors.

Then, in a single well-coordinated move, the highest level leaders were deposed through agents and the citizenry openly rebelled, ending the foreign rule once and for all, thus restoring their original flag.

(Based on an exercise generated by WriteThis - 2014-07-04 20:52:06)

Darkness

It got dark once again.

It was starting to get tiresome. I could not really explain why. It used to be something to look forward to, the darkness I mean, since the darkness's arrival meant that it was yet the end of another day and was therefore the official signal that one could legitimately take a break from the day's labours without any guilt. But now it felt like a chore; the end of the day, the start of mandatory leisure activities, not all of them leisurely.

If an activity is no longer leisurely, is it still a leisure activity?

Darkness... it matched my mood. Imperfectly of course, but close enough to be noticed. I fumed for no reason.

Solitude in the Office

The night came down swiftly and I didn't realise it until I had the chance to take a peek out of the window. The darkness of the night was not a stranger to me---I had been accustomed to her silent embrace ever since college---but that I still find myself working at my dead-end job was something that I knew I could probably live without at some point.

I lied. It wasn't a dead-end job---I love my job. It was just tiring. Much to do, few to do them all, the usual shenanigans in the business climate of today. Some may even say that it can't be helped. I know that it is false to think so, but I didn't have the wherewithal to do anything about it.

Sometimes on hindsight, I wished I had.

I looked away from the tantalising cool of the night time air outside and glance back at my computer screen. The lines of code glowed back at me from the inky blackness of the background, as though hinting to me that it was indeed time to call it a day and head on home. It wasn't that I didn't have a productive day; perhaps it was the general realisation of a lack of any other spice of my life that I choose to just remain in the office long after everyone has gone back for the past two months or so.

Spice of my life. Now that's a phrase I have not heard in a very long time. But who am I kidding? Only the very young and the very old ever get enough spices in their lives; they are also the only ones who can probably appreciate it the best, considering that they actually have copious amounts of free time on their hands compared to the rest of us who have to work to contribute to the well-being of the social support network that is taxation.

I rubbed my eyes reluctantly to stimulate some tears; they had been dry ever since I could remember. And usually they get worse when I find myself slowly getting all fatigued out from using them too much in close work, like when I was hacking away on the keyboard trying to get things to work. Now that I had to actually rub them to prevent them from drying up, I was convinced it was time to make a move.

Opening Lament

``No, no, no, and for the last time, NO!'' Lance bellowed at Randal, who looked at him with pleading eyes.

``But it means so much to me to play the lead for this opening piece!''

``You haven't reached the necessary level. And this piece is a real killer, if you haven't realised yet. That's why we are letting Jim handle it. You'll get the next time if you improve more. And that's final; stop annoying me!'' Lance said with an air of finality before walking away in a huff.

Randal stood there alone in the corridor, his head lowered. There was a much deeper reason behind his want of playing the lead for the opening piece---Aileen was going to be a part of the audience. The two of them had been corresponding on and off for the past couple of years, and she finally had the opportunity to come to New York to pay him a visit and listen to his performance at the philharmonic, and he desperately wanted to impress her.

Now there was little chance. The next concert that they were putting up after this one was nearly two months later, and by then, she would have returned to Chicago, an opportunity lost just like that.

But Lance had a point. Even though Randal was still part of the first flutes, he was still technically the newbie of the group. He was talented---one had to have talent to play in the philharmonic---but among equals, there was always the one who was first, and that was the principal player. There was nothing wrong with the way that Lance had arranged for things to happen; if anything, it was Randal's own enthusiasm to impress that made him temporarily blind to such an obvious fact.

Randal shrugged and fought back the tears in his eyes as he made his way to the sectional and pick up where he left off before looking for Lance.

(Based on an exercise generated by WriteThis - 2014-06-30 20:56:42)