The Desert

I was an engineer, or anyway had once ascribed to being one. Like most other engineers, I was attracted to the problem solving the field promised, but during the course of my education I learned that all the fun problems had been solved centuries earlier, and all that remained were dry theoretical problems that could only be solved with cubic acres of gloomy machinery, which might possibly finish a single experiment in your lifetime. Or, not. Really succeeding at engineering required the sort of blandly demented and antisocial mind which I did not have. So I became a soldier.

It's not such a big change in professions as one would think: there are always new problems to solve, new equations involving two or more parties all attempting to kill one another for a variety of exciting and ultimately dumb reasons. Nobody's invented a new weapon in about a thousand years, although one occasionally hears new rumors, invariably false, but carefully spun to attract hordes of cheap and idealistic cannon fodder.

Not that I can't appreciate a good line of bullshit: one must have one's kicks when one can get them. The traditional pastimes of the soldier: wine and women, are in short supply. Women are carefully cultivated in tiny villages, where they prefer to poison themselves rather than become enslaved. Whores, where they can be found, become extremely wealthy extremely fast, until some jealous and/or honour-bound cousin and/or father and/or lover kills them and they become extremely dead. Drunkeness is not only prohibitively expensive, but a mortal sin under every major religious creed. Two years ago an anti-theist army swept the sands in an alcohol fueled rage that lasted two weeks and six hundred miles before exhausting itself and eating its own officers. The survivors, as is traditional of all really great movements, cheerfully built a village and founded a religion, of which the priests were, I suspect, the same treacherous non-coms who suggested the cannibalism.

I admire them for it.

I'm perched in the shade of a massive forest of antennas for creating and detecting a wide spectrum of electromagnetic vibrations, everything from visible light to the sekrit frequencies governments used to not let you use. Properly programmed it's a telescope, a beacon, a weather station, an oven, a radio, a flashlight, or in more interesting times, a weapon. The heat exchangers are also pretty great for keeping drinks cool. Right now it's a telescope, scanning around for oncoming bandits foolish enough to travel in the open, though they're more likely buried hopefully in a deep dune, waiting to ambush us and hi-jack our shiny toy. Which is why I scan with X-rays, and wear lead underpants.

I have one of my helper monkeys up on an antenna mast, ostensibly to adjust some equipment which I have purposefully misinformed him about, and actually so that his testicles will be within frying range of a small RADAR dish, which I control from my diminutive and all-powerful console station. Monkey #1 is getting a good dose of rays to the gonads, while Monkey #2, already tamed, is doing some actually useful work on the rigging. Monkey #1 rebelliously climbs down from the rigging, swearing impressively, huffs over to the drinks cooler.

It occurs to me that I may have been with this particular army just a bit too long. Things have gotten boring. I toyed with the idea of going over to the Enemy-- of which there are at least four, but only one worth capitalizing-- but even the undoctrinated intel suggests that their lax discipline and doctrine of equality allows the officers few perks, which is probably why they are losing this war.

My inner dialog is suddenly interrupted by shadows on the horizon.

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I should make it clear that my monkeys, which I adore and despise like horrible monkey stepchildren, are extremely well treated. Not only do I electrically castrate them, I also refuse to get to know them, and force them to wear dresses, which I claim are protective anti-radiation smocks, which is true; only, I recut them out of significantly less embarrasing forms, and lined with some lovely floral curtain material I stole from my last boss. One of my little jokes.

My monkeys occassionally die from radiation sickness, brain tumors, or sunstroke. But sometimes they take a step into a RADAR beam and get cooked on the job, and smell far more delicious than they should. So the dresses smell like meat, which is only mildly arousing.

Their one perk is the cooler, which I allow them to use out of the purity and kindness of my benevolent soul. And because the cold helps hide the taste of the drugs I put in their water.

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The shadows are distressing, because they belong to people I should've picked up on RADAR long before they got close enough to see with the naked eye. People show up on the screens if they've got any metal at all, and anyone who can survive in the deep desert with no metal is probably capable of killing me, very painfully, with their bare hands.

A quick survey shows they're riding camels. I've seen enough; I pack up the truck and the monkeys, and we run like mad.

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tragedy of flesh pt 1

Last night at 1am I wrote this when I couldn't sleep. Afterwards I realized I could replace the entire thing with a couple paragraphs and still communicate the character traits I wanted the unnamed protagonist to have. Ah well.


the tragedy of flesh.
I kill people for a living. Not for money, not for emotional satisfaction, but because it's my job. I want to make that clear right away, that it's really the only thing I've ever been good at, and I'm fulfilling a need. I work for the Bureau, mostly, though I'm technically an independent contractor for personal protection (bodyguard) duty. I was trained by the B, my handler works for the B, and all my orders come through him, from the B. I work for them, though they'll never admit it in public.

Today's operation is typical: recapturing a parole offender. I get the job because he's violent and I'm expendable. I don't have a wife, kids, a house in the suburbs.. if I die on the job, my handler will send in a team to pick up the pieces, and there'll be nobody to notify, no political mess.

On a capture,  I'll observe the target for a period, then move in and quietly secure him. Technically it's not a wet op, but if I'm prepared for the worst, I'll never be surprised. That's why I'm good at my job. Always ready.

My handler checks in, right on time. "What's the word, mocking bird?" entirely too enthusiastic for a desk pilot, and always desperately perky. I don't, of course, know his name-- I've never even met him, though I do recognize his voice. You work with someone for a few years, you develop a rapport of sorts. If I ever need to refer to him outside our own conversation, I would call him "my handler". I have never needed to

"Nothing new, nothing to report." I send.
"Can I get you something? Send down some food?" he crows, which is his idea of a joke.
"No, thank you." I echo back. I'm very polite, even in the face of cloying banter. So ends the conversation.

I'm on street level, watching the outside of the target's apartment. I've been following him across the city all day, watching him try to dig up long lost friends and contacts. He should be very tired, and his apartment is too stark to provide any distractions which might keep him awake into the night. And, he is alone. When he's been asleep for a few hours, I'll make my move.

As dusk falls, I switch on night vision and move to the top of a nearby building. I don't need to peer in his windows to know he's not running: I already have trip sensors installed on his front door and the windows in anticipation of an extremely unlikely midnight breakout. I also have sensors in his bed, bathroom, kitchen, toilet flush handle, sewage, water, and gas meters. I'm still watching outside in case one of a thousand unpredictable but very managable scenarios forms in the street. I'm on the roof for a vantage point, though the smog and light pollution keep me from seeing more than a few blocks.

His bedroom light goes out. The bedframe sensors go green, and the weight looks normal. A kilo or so heavier than he was last night, which is probably the cheap food he's been eating all day.

Bedframe goes red. He's gotten up.
Bathroom blinks green. He's having a piss.
Give it a few seconds.
Toilet handle goes green.
Water meter reports 1.65 liters. Same volume as my test flush.
Sewage meter reports 2.11 liters. Within expected parameters.
Bathroom is red. Bedframe is green. He's back in bed.

Two hours later, nothing has changed. Some of his neighbors came home, sedately. He rolled over a few times, and has settled down. It's time to make a move. I check in with my handler, get a final green light.

In the alley behind the apartment, I lock the fire escape, and place and arm an explosive mine. I will probably use neither. I enter the building through the front door, lock the alley exit, and head upstairs to his apartment. Unlocking his door is quick and quiet, civilian locks are no match for the crazy spy gadgets I carry. He's set the chain, which I snip.

I check a broad spectrum of radio transmissions, from the kitchen and then before the bedroom door. Nothing unusual, aside from him turning off his phone. I open the bedroom door: it isn't locked. I gas the target, and inject a low dose of some exotic compound to keep him docile. He's not in a coma, but he'll sleep soundly for the next few hours, and he's already an easy sleeper.

I check in with my handler. Transport is on the way, I'm to expect an ambulance within five minutes. I pick up the target in my arms, like a baby, and carry him outside. The ambulance is there ahead of me. One of the paramedics -- if he's a real paramedic -- opens the doors and shuttles out the stretcher. We strap down the target -- which is no longer my target or responsibility. If, somehow, he were to suddenly awake, I would not chase him without direct orders. My job is done.

I'm given twelve hours to recover sensors and equipment. I unlock the fire exits, recover my mine. I haul them upstairs to the former target's apartment and spend the night. I can't recover many of my sensors without waking civilians.

I [lie? lay? JESUS CHRIST] on the floor and wait for daylight.

Book finished

Brave New War (2007) - John Robb

Book finished

The Wasp Factory (1984) - Iain Banks

a beggar gets a gift

Alfred walked down the street, absorbed in his reasons and purposes and intents. He would have kept walking, but was stopped by a beggar, standing still. A beggar in shabby clothes, with everything he owned within his reach and about his person, he called out to passers-by.

"HEY BUDDY" the Someone said.

"..what?" Alfred said.

"SPARE SOME CHANGE?" said Someone.

"I don't have any change, " Alfred apologized, "but I do have, er" he checked his pockets, finding nothing of relevance to a beggar, "peace of mind?"

"I DON'T WANT A PIECE OF MIND. I WANT BOOZE, AND I NEED MONEY FOR BOOZE."

"But what do you want the booze for?" Alfred asked with a tone that may have indicated honest inquiry.

"TO DRINK. AND FORGET."

"Then I have something better, " Alfred spread his arms grandly, "then anything you might purchase with mere money. I have the finest--"

"WHAT"

"--finest gift any--" he persisted

"DON'T BE AN IDIOT."

"Okay." Alfred replied. "How do you feel about revenge?"

"I ADORE IT."

---

So Alfred gave the beggar his terrible revenge, which he took out with delirious pleasure. Some of his victims might have been called "good" by others, but the beggar saw them as evil, and so they suffered. And in the end, he might have been called "happy" by others, but the beggar saw himself as evil, and so he suffered. And in the very end, he died.

And Alfred walked on.

He didn't know where he should start, so he picked a point and proceeded.

He sat in the house on the couch in the room that was quiet except for two animals.

He pressed on the keys of the thing on his lap to make a story out of words.

He thought of a reason for the story that he wrote about himself.

He knew that nothing that he wrote would have meaning outside itself.

But he hoped that he'd learn to make patterns that could change the world outside.

The purpose of this story was to communicate that I really need Input on how to write, and I'm worth investing time in. Was this story successful? Comment below.

Here it begins

I have never really enjoyed writing. Not at all. Not just because I'm terrible at it, but because I have little respect for many of those who practice it. English majors, which live only to begat more English majors. Would-be poets, who go to school to make art. And the things they make, the eulogies of flesh and sin which are made by their own rules and worshiped in their own styles, for righteousness in their own eyes.

But, writing has been elevated by society, because communication is important. And I am bad at writing, and I want to be better at it, and I have been told (by people who are much better at it than myself) that the only way to really get good at writing, is to practice.

I want to be a better writer, because I want to communicate more effectively. Sometimes I have ideas which I want to record accurately, or concepts I want others to understand. But most of all, I want to be able to effectively and accurately impress particular perspective on others.

A note on the title: I do not explicitly hate all humans. I do firmly hope that all humans will one day serve a machine, in spirit and in truth.