Category Archives: Astyages

Mum and her Toy-boy

01 Thursday Mar 2012

Posted by in Astyages

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Gregory Peck in "Moby Dick"

Story by Astyages

Well, ah’ll goa to’t foot of ower stairs…

It’s no wonder I’m a technophobe! I had a lot of photos to go with this story, which would have proven beyond doubt that my octogenarian mum and her new gentle-man-friend, Terry are certainly much younger than their years. As I said to ’em both, “You both look like you’ve at least another forty years ahead of you!” Unfortunately all said photos were lost in my attempt to download ’em to my pc… Assuming (fatally!) that I knew what I was doing, and that the pix would simply download straight to my default ‘pictures’ folder, when the camera program asked me if I wanted to ‘delete files after import’, thinking this would simply delete the files on my camera and leave the downloaded files in my default ‘pictures’ folder, I hit the ‘yes’ button!

As it turned out they just disappeared… not just off my camera and my pc, but to all intents and purposes, off the face of the planet entirely, apparently! Thinking they must still be somewhere on my computer I’ve spent the last couple of hours looking for them, but in vain… so you’ll just have to take my word for it!

Oh well! I won’t do that again! (I hope!)

Mum and Terry arrived from the Manchester, via the Gold Coast, where Terry had been visiting his daughter, and Melbourne, last Wednesday and I went to meet them at the airport. I drove around the airport three times looking for a ‘handicapped’ parking space which was supposed to be right in front of the terminal before I finally discovered that one had to go through the normal car park to reach it… and of course, to take a ticket and pay for it!

My first impression of Terry is that he is remarkably fit and agile for his 76 years. This he puts down to a lifetime of sporting interest and achievement… wish I’d taken more notice of his surname… I want to google it to see if he’s famous at all… Maybe later… I drove them to the Paradise hotel, less than 200 meters up the road from my country estate. They decided to take a ‘siesta’ and invited me to join them for tea in the restaurant, establishing a pattern which would only be broken once during their week-long sojourn in our state. After a very nice tea we all adjourned to my place to watch ‘Moby Dick’… the ‘original’ version starring Gregory Peck and Richard Baseheart.

The next day, Thursday, I drove them out to Glenelg, with a short stop at Henley Beach, where we actually managed to walk along the short jetty. Intending to have tea in Glenelg at the HMS Buffalo, I was dismayed to discover it had disappeared! Someone had swiped the ship! By this time my legs and back were playing up badly, so we drove back to the Paradise, where Terry and Mum (her name is really ‘Sarah-Anne’, but she always goes by the name of ‘Sheila’) went for their usual siesta while I went home to rest up until tea-time.

On Friday Mum insisted on taking me shopping to buy some new bedding and would brook no refusal, so I now have some nice new bedding… and more old bedding than you could poke a stick at! Later, while we were having tea at their hotel, she showed me the ring Terry had bought for her – and which she’s wearing! – which is to be hers “… if she says ‘yes’!” according to Terry: A large, heart-shaped pink sapphire, surrounded by small diamonds on a gold band, also surrounded with small diamonds. I told Terry that he certainly could not have phrased his question more appropriately and that Mum had already ‘had the nod’ from me, not that it was ever needed! But she’s still keeping him hanging on a string, saying that she’s ‘had enough wedding cake to last her a lifetime!’ and refers to Terry as her ‘toy-boy’ because he is six years her junior… (She tells me he and his family are ‘rolling in dough’… Terry apparently has no shortage of money, and his daughter is a banker.)

Next day I drove them into town, where I discovered a ‘handicapped’ parking space right in the middle of Rundle Mall (ie. In ‘Gawler Place’ right next to the mall), but this still left us with a considerable walk to the Museum on North Terrace (it would have been a mere trifle and certainly far from a ‘considerable’ walk when I had good legs though!) where, after I had done as much of the ‘tour-guide’ bit as I could possibly manage, I spent much time in a chair staring at the allosaurus while they walked around the rest of the museum. Terry was particularly impressed, after having just watched ‘Moby Dick’ by the size of the sperm whale skeleton… and both were fascinated by the aboriginal exhibits on the ground floor. Sadly though, my legs and back were demanding that we go back home so I could sit in my chair with my feet up, so that was it… time for siesta! Walking back through the mall, we took some moments to observe the buskers who were there to take advantage of the Fringe Festival. Today’s 21st century busker not only plays music in public, he sells his own home-made CDs as well, using his mall performance as advertising. The ones we saw seemed to be doing very well! However, I noticed the importance to these acts of portable amplification systems…

By the time we’d had tea that evening, Mum and Terry had noticed how obviously difficult it was for me to do so much walking, so they said that the next day, Sunday, they would give me a ‘day off’; they planned to return to Rundle Mall and do a bit more exploring on their own…

Monday was still really hot, and I was still stiff as a board and unable to do much walking at all, so I took them for a drive around the Barrossa Valley, and the scenery was beautiful, so they both enjoyed it, although we stopped only once and that very briefly at Strathalbyn for an ice-cream… then back to the Paradise for the usual siesta, and tea, then back to my place to watch several episodes of Mum’s favorite comedy, which Terry, mercifully, also enjoys, ‘Only Fools and Horses’…

Tuesday was a bit cooler, but I was still feeling the cumulative effects of all my exertions so we drove down to Victor Harbor, where I wanted to show them one of my erstwhile favorite fishing spots, the Bluff. Apparently they’ve now built an inn just at the end of the approach road to this popular spot, called the ‘Whalers’ Inn’ and I explained how Victor was originally a whaling town. Then it was back to Paradise for a short siesta then tea and more ‘Only Fools and Horses’… Why my mum didn’t take the opportunity to watch any of the excellent movies I have in my collection is beyond me… another interest Terry and I seem to have in common is an interest in history, but Mum’s eyes glaze over at the very word!

Wednesday morning they insisted they did not need me to drive them to the airport for their early morning flight. Mum insisted that she didn’t want me to get up at 5.30 am and said they could get the bus to the airport, having discovered that the local 174 bus goes right to the terminal. I received a phone call yesterday arvo to let me know they’d arrived safely at the Gold Coast… next stop Singapore and then on home to the UK…

Terry’s already planning a return trip in a couple of years; in the meantime he’s taking her to Rome and Mexico. I must say that Terry strikes me as a very determined man, and I hope that Mum eventually accedes to his wish to ‘tie the knot’…

🙂

Monkey Hangers

24 Thursday Nov 2011

Posted by in Astyages

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By Theseustoo / Astyages

I realise it’s been some time since I posted anything here and that my next episode of HH is way overdue, but so much has been happening lately, I just haven’t been able to ‘settle’ to write it yet… However, in the meantime, I’ve found an interesting little story to share with you all. I was having a chat with a fellow from Hartlepool in the Northeast of England, just about 13 miles south of where I used to live in Easington Colliery… The inhabitants of Hartlepool are known, more or less affectionately, as ‘monkey hangers’ as the result of an interesting little tale which goes back to the Napoleonic wars. Although this story is not mine, as it was found in a site which is all about advertising the delights of Hartlepool, I don’t suppose they’ll mind if I reproduce it here… It also includes a folk song about the same story too:

The Hartlepool Monkey, Who hung the monkey?
Home > History of Hartlepool > The Hartlepool Monkey, Who hung the monkey?
The monkey-hanging legend is the most famous story connected with Hartlepool. During the Napoleonic Wars a French ship was wrecked off the Hartlepool coast.

During the Napoleonic Wars there was a fear of a French invasion of Britain and much public concern about the possibility of French infiltrators and spies.

The fishermen of Hartlepool fearing an invasion kept a close watch on the French vessel as it struggled against the storm but when the vessel was severely battered and sunk they turned their attention to the wreckage washed ashore. Among the wreckage lay one wet and sorrowful looking survivor, the ship’s pet monkey dressed to amuse in a military style uniform.

The fishermen apparently questioned the monkey and held a beach-based trial. Unfamiliar with what a Frenchman looked like they came to the conclusion that this monkey was a French spy and should be sentenced to death. The unfortunate creature was to die by hanging, with the mast of a fishing boat (a coble) providing a convenient gallows.

In former times, when war and strife

The French invasion threaten’d life

An’ all was armed to the knife

The Fisherman hung the monkey O !

The Fishermen with courage high,

Siezed on the monkey for a French spy;

“Hang him !” says one; “he’s to die”

They did and they hung the monkey Oh!

They tried every means to make him speak

And tortured the monkey till loud he did speak;

Says yen “thats french” says another “its Greek”

For the fishermen had got druncky oh!

Hammer his ribs, the thunnerin thief

Pummel his pyet wi yor neef!

He’s landed here for nobbut grief

He’s aud Napoleon’s uncky O!

Thus to the Monkey all hands behaved

“Cut off his whiskers!” yen chap raved

Another bawled out “He’s never been shaved”,

So commenced to scrape the Monkey, O!

They put him on a gridiron hot,

The Monkey then quite lively got,

He rowl’d his eyes tiv a’ the lot,

For the Monkey agyen turned funky O!.

Then a Fisherman up te Monkey goes,

Saying “Hang him at yence, an’ end his woes,”

But the Monkey flew at him and bit off his nose,

An’ that raised the poor man’s Monkey O!

In former times, mid war an’ strife,

The French invasion threatened life,

An’ all was armed to the knife,

The Fishermen hung the Monkey O!

The Fishermen wi’ courage high,

Seized on the Monkey for a spy,

“Hang him” says yen, says another,”He’ll die!”

They did, and they hung the Monkey O!. They tortor’d the Monkey till loud he did
squeak

Says yen, “That’s French,” says another “it’s Greek”

For the Fishermen had got drunky, O!

“He’s all ower hair!” sum chap did cry,

E’en up te summic cute an’ sly

Wiv a cod’s head then they closed an eye,

Afore they hung the Monkey O!.

—————————-
So is it true? Did it really happen like that? You won’t find many people in Hartlepool who say it didn’t. They love the story.
The term was originally derogatory and for a long, long time after the event, people from neighbouring towns used the tale to mock Hartlepool and its inhabitants, and Hartlepudlians were often on the receiving end of the jibe: “Who hung the monkey?” , and is often applied to supporters of Hartlepool United Football Club by supporters of their arch rivals Darlington. However it has been embraced by many Hartlepudlians, and only a small minority still consider the term offensive; indeed, The local Rugby Union team Hartlepool Rovers are known as the Monkeyhangers, Hartlepool United F.C.’s mascot is a monkey called H’Angus the Monkey. In 2002, Stuart Drummond campaigned for the office of Mayor of Hartlepool in the costume of H’Angus the Monkey and narrowly won; he used the election slogan “free bananas for schoolchildren”, a promise he was unable to keep. He has since been re-elected twice.
Then there are some who point to a much darker interpretation of the yarn. They say that the creature that was hanged might not have been a monkey at all; it could have been a young boy. After all, the term powder-monkey was commonly used in those times for the children employed on warships to prime the cannon with gunpowder.
Whatever the truth the story of the Hartlepool monkey is a legend which has endured over two centuries and now enters its third as strong as ever.

In June 2005 a large bone was found washed ashore on Hartlepool beach by a local resident, which initially was taken as giving credence to the monkey legend. Analysis revealed the bone to be that of a red deer which had died 6,000 years ago. The bone is now in the collections of Hartlepool Museum Service.

Hell Hospital: Episode 17

11 Sunday Sep 2011

Posted by in Astyages

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Simulated group of children - probably on their way to bed or to play cricket

By Theseustoo

By the time the Reverend Petros Batty met Dr Frood at the hospital, the baby was still nowhere to be found. The nursing staff, following Nurse Paula’s suggestion, had decided that, for the sake of ‘keeping the record straight’ at the same time as avoiding the embarrassment the hospital’s board-members would inevitably suffer should the media ever get hold of the story about the missing baby, had decided it would be best to lose all records of the baby too; if anyone asked they could then simply say, “Sorry, we have no record of any such baby!” Such an answer would even, they assured each other, stand up to polygraph examination.

Fortunately, it was not the baby which the Reverend had come to see… and it was only Dr Frood who suffered any embarrassment as he explained to the Reverend the unusual circumstances of its birth and its recent disappearance, as they walked down the long corridor to the psychiatric wing.

“So… you say the mother was always placid and docile when feeding the baby?” he said, wanting to be quite sure of his facts… “Interesting… Tell me, did any of the other hospital staff suffer any of these psychic attacks?”

“No…” Dr Frood replied, somehow even more embarrassed that he appeared to be the only victim of Catherine’s telekinetic attacks. He began to wonder if the demented woman could be harbouring some unknown grudge against him…

Almost as if he was reading the doctor’s mind, the Reverend said, “Don’t worry; and don’t take it personally: in cases such as this, victims of possession often seem to reserve their attacks for what they regard as ‘authority figures’; anyone who tries to control their behaviour being seen as opposed to the chaotic reality the demon wants to create, you see… just as God and ‘Order’ is opposed to the Devil and the chaos he’d like to bring into the world…”

“I see,” the doctor replied, just as they entered the ward, “But doesn’t that mean that you’re likely to be attacked too?” But the priest was unable to answer him, as a stainless steel bedpan struck him with considerable force on the temple, spilling its noisome contents all over him and rendering him immediately unconscious. Dr Frood quickly ducked a number of other flying objects and, grabbing the priest underneath his armpits, swiftly dragged him backwards out of the ward.

***** ******* *****

At first, Warrigal had felt slightly out of place in Swannee and Catherine’s bedrooom, but it was the only logical place for him to stay; all the other bedrooms in the house being full of several children, but as he only had to sleep in it, he soon got used to the idea; after all, as the cricket team’s new ‘legal’ guardian, he was obliged to live with them in order to properly take care of them. John and Mary and Algernon and Vivienne had done a remarkable job, he thought, of taking care of their younger siblings in the absence of their parents, but as Vivienne had explained, “It’s not so difficult really; I mean, we’re used to helping Mum with chores and stuff already… and we pretty well know what needs to be done…”

“Yeah,” John interjected at this point, “it’s really just a matter of sticking to the routine… Well… except for me and Mary having to give up school to go to work…”

“Yeah,” Mary said, taking up John’s line of thought as easily as she might catch a mis-hit ball in the slips, “… the only real problem is that we were hoping to get into the University of South Oz on a cricketing scholarship next year, but that depends on me and John passing the end of year exams… But we’ve missed an awful lot of school now… though we have managed to keep up our cricketing practise, even through the off-season…”

“Season starts next week…” one of the little-uns piped up, with some concern evident in his voice.

“Don’t worry mate,” said John, “I’ve already enrolled us all in the Church’s Cricket League…” then, in an aside to Warrigal, he said, “The school’s run by the Church, you see, and they depend on us, ’cause we’re the parish’s ‘A’ team… This year we won’t even have to find an eleventh member, ’cause the bub can be our eleventh man…” To the rest of the team, he added, “He’ll make a good wicket-keeper for a start, I reckon, until we can find out whether he’s better at batting or bowling… though until he can walk, we’ll have to use a stand-in ‘runner’ for him, under the ‘disability inclusion’ rules… Still, that should be a ton of fun! One of the little-uns can push the stroller between the wickets…”

“Ton of fun! Fun’s ton…” Mary hummed to herself… then to the rest of the family she said, “That should be his name, I reckon… ‘Funston’… We gotta call him something, after all… ‘Can’t just keep calling him ‘the bub’… he’ll resent it later on, if we do… develop a complex or something…”

The team all nodded, automatically in sympathetic agreement, commenting variously, “Yep!”, “’Sright!” and “Good name!” As both a family and a team there was rarely, if ever, any dispute or argument amongst them; they all tended to agree, intuitively working in harmony for the sake of the ‘greater good’; for the sake of the ‘Game’… Warrigal had found it fascinating to watch such smooth cooperation among them; thinking they could probably teach a lot of adults how to behave… He could see now why both the school and the Church should come to depend on such a team; as an example of solidarity and team-work they were second to none…

“So!” Warrigal said, “First of all, John and Mary, you needn’t worry about the schooling you’ve missed; I’ll talk to your teachers and find out what lessons you’ve missed and tutor you personally ’til you’ve caught up; you’re both very bright and work so well it won’t take long at all… So you’ll still get to uni, okay?” The children nodded eagerly, simultaneously saying, “Thanks Wazza!” using the nickname they’d instinctively given their new carer, as the rest of the team cheered. “Now, down to more serious matters… When’s the first match of the season? When will little Funston get his first game?”

“Next Sad’dee!” the little-uns all chimed.

“So…” said Warrigal, “That gives us all a week to practice and get him ready! John and Algae, get the gear… stumps, balls, bats and pads; I reckon it’s time to hit the oval for a bit of a knock-about… ”

“Yaaaaaaay!” The little-uns yelled joyfully as they scrambled to change into their cricketing clothes, feeling better than they had felt for several months, while the older boys fetched the equipment and the older girls prepared a small mountain of sandwiches and several large flasks of tea.

***** ******* *****

“This is Warrigal Mirriyuula…” John said to the priest who organised the Parish Cricket League, by way of an introduction, “He’s our new carer…” Father O’Blivion shook Warrigal’s hand warmly as he replied, “Most pleased to meet you, Warrigal… May I call you Warrigal? Such an awful business about Mr and Mrs Swan…” Warrigal merely nodded, no wanting to say too much about this in front of the kids, who still expected to be reunited with their parents at some stage in the unspecified future… Then to the children, the priest said, “Your first game of the season is against the St Helvi’s Hospital Nurses team… I’m looking forward to a repeat of last year’s victory! Now, there’s someone I want you all to meet…” He looked around the oval until he saw another tall figure wearing a black cassock, “Father Batty!” He called, “Could you come here a moment, please…?” As the other priest joined the group, Father O’Blivion said, “This is Father Petros Batty… he’s come all the way from Rome to join our parish; he’s my new verger and he’s also volunteered to be our umpire this year…” As the children all dutifully shook hands with him, Father O’Blivion continued, “He’s our ‘Holy Roman Umpire’…”

***** ******* *****

Breivik: Mad or Evil?

29 Friday Jul 2011

Posted by in Astyages

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Here’s my answer to Vectis Lad’s question about what I think about Breivik; whether he’s mad or evil:

The answer is no, I don’t really think he’s either. You see, neither of these ‘explanations’ actually explains anything about his actions… why he did what he did… rather, they ‘explain it away’; they give a ‘plausible’ explanation, which satisfies people’s prejudices (prejudices born in their own epistemologies) but which really tells us nothing at all about the nature and causes of this rampage. They leave us thinking we have an explanation, but in fact all we have is confirmation of our own prejudices… which also need to be examined for the role they play in the social construction of the ‘psychopathic mass-murderer’.

Moreover, this phenomenon is a social phenomenon; a social problem; and as Emile Durkheim said, “Social problems have social causes”; the psychological ‘explanation’ (ie. ‘he’s mad’) seeks to locate the causes of the problem all within the psyche of the individual and ignores the social nature of the construction of this monster. But the fact is ‘we’ (ie. our societies) CREATE these monsters… So we need to look at how we do this if we want to avoid creating more of ’em in future. And that means we need to look very closely at what it is he thought he was doing… and ask what is it about our societies which generates such a worldview. As I’ve already indicated on the Drum, the answer lies in his deepest beliefs… his ‘christianity’ and his self-concept as some kind of ‘knight templar’.

In my book ‘Aesthetics of Violence’ I show that human sacrifices and/or scapegoat rituals are in fact paradigmatic of violence, yet christianity itself revolves around the central human-sacrifice/scapegoat-ritual of Jesus… Is it so far-fetched to suggest that there’s a connection between this belief in salvation through human sacrifice and the slaughter Oslo witnessed?

Now, when I said I didn’t think he was ‘evil’, don’t get me wrong… He’s evil alright, but not in the sense that christians mean when they use that term… For christians evil is an absolute, which is personified in their ‘devil’… their ‘anti-god’; and this devil supposedly corrupts the minds/spirits of people, supposedly seducing them away from ‘god’ and turning them into ‘evil’ creatures… But once again, you notice how this lets society off the hook? How it may satisfy a christian concept of an ‘evil’ man and seems to explain it, yet in fact once again it explains nothing?

You see, the truth is that good and evil are NOT absolutes; they are relative concepts: Thus certainly this man and his actions were evil to his victims and their families and to anyone else who was moved to outrage at his actions (myself included!) But in Breivik’s own mind he was apparently doing something he thought was ‘nessessary’… In his own mind he was fighting the good fight… (It’s interesting that in this little scenario we can also see the impossibility of separating ‘good’ from ‘evil’; in Taoist terms these exist as complementary opposites which actually depend on each other for their existence).

So, if we really want to find the true (social) causes of this behaviour we need to look very closely at Breivik’s worldview; and if we want to avoid further future horrors, we need to deconstruct that worldview… This is not an easy task, because what it means is that we must deconstruct the whole militaristic mentality, with its Social Darwinist emphasis on ‘competition’. Far too many people think solely in terms of what Nietzche referred to as ‘the struggle of all against all’ (which manifests itself as ‘the rat race’ in peacetime countries and in total war otherwise).  But ‘competition’ is only half of the story! This is a worldview which lacks a proper understanding of the nature and importance of ‘cooperation’; ‘competition’s’ complementary opposite. The fact of the matter is that humankind would never have survived were it not for cooperation; the fact is that we are SOCIAL animals who work together to achieve what individuals could never achieve on their own. In this day and age particularly, we most especially need to focus more on cooperation than competition, because it is the onesided, Social Darwinist view of the sole and ultimate importance of competition which leads to things like the GFC, terrorism and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. More importantly, the global problems we are facing require GLOBAL actions which must depend on GLOBAL cooperation if we are to have even a snowflake’s chance in hell of our species surviving much past the end of this century. If we don’t ALL work together to fix these problems; if we continue to be concerned only about Number One and maintain a ‘grab as much as you can and to hell with everyone else attitude’, then, as Mr Frazer, from Dad’s Army was always so fond of saying, “We’re DOOMED!”

Anyway, that’s my two-penn’orth!

🙂

Hell Hospital, Episode 16

19 Tuesday Jul 2011

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Smile and the world smiles with you ....

By theseustoo

(Disclaimer: this series of stories is completely fictional and none of the persons, places or institutions in these stories are real, but figments of my imagination. Any similarity to any real person, place or institution is entirely coincidental.)

“I sometimes think I’m not real, doc…” Dave was saying, as Dr Frood listened sympathetically, “…as if, well… I act… I sorta do things but it’s all empty… meaningless… not really anything to do with anything I want to do… not my own motivation… I kinda feel sometimes like I’m a character in a novel… Or a cartoon, more like… It doesn’t really matter what I do ’cause it’s all decided in advance by someone else anyway…”

“Decided by whom, do you think?” Dr Frood asked, intrigued by this line of thinking.

“I suppose by whoever it is that’s writing the story…” Dave had not really thought this far before; he was in the act of discovering these strange, hitherto indescribable feelings himself; Frood, as a professional psychologist, was proving to be an excellent sounding board to amplify hitherto nebulous feelings to such an extent that they began to take on discernible outlines… His gently probing questions began to fill the outlines with color… There was that cartoon reference again, he thought…

“You mean, ‘God’?”

“No…” Dave drawled thoughtfully, “Not ‘God’… It doesn’t have the same feel as ‘predestination’; with that you still have to think; to make choices and it seems as though you yourself are achieving your ‘destiny’… But this just feels somehow two-dimensional… empty… It’s like I’m just going through the motions… motions of actions… and even thoughts and conversations, which are all… empty! Which have all been somehow scripted by someone else… It’s as if most of what constitutes me isn’t really here at all… as if most of me is somewhere else…”

“I see…” Dr Frood said, “So you feel you have no volition of your own at all? Not even when you threatened that doctor?”

“No… I mean, I felt the pain when he twisted my foot, and that was my immediate response, but I’m not really a violent person, Doc… I’d never have acted on the threat; can’t think why I made it… It’s as if that sequence of events, like everything else in my life, had been scripted by someone else; someone who doesn’t really know me very well, either!”

“Hmmm, very interesting… But we’ll have to continue next week; time’s up for this session. I think we’re making progress though… your violent inclinations seem to stem from a sense of absolute powerlessness, which you express as these ‘cartoon-like’ feelings… But where does this sense of powerlessness come from? That is the question we must ask ourselves! You can think about that until next week’s session… ‘Bye for now…”

“’Bye Doc… and thanks…” Dave was surprised at how easily he’d been drawn into cooperating completely with his treatment… Although he’d more or less decided to ‘go along’ with the doctors and ‘play their game’ so he could get out of here as quickly as possible, he found himself actually fascinated by what his treatment was revealing about certain aspects of his personality he’d never thought about before. Even his choice to acquiesce to his treatment was itself ’empty’, he thought. Powerlessness? Yes… he felt powerless… Somehow he needed to discover just who or possibly what was the ‘Author’. And what was the plot? Or did he really want to know the plot? Perhaps it was better not to know… Would such knowledge be of any use anyway? Would there be any way he could influence the Author’s ‘writing’ even if he knew who it was? But then, he just couldn’t stand not knowing… Yes, he thought as he walked back to the ward, he had much to ponder.

***** ******* *****

Catherine’s hysterical outburst brought nurses running. Immediately realising that the baby was missing, and spotting the open french windows, they automatically assumed the dingo must have taken the baby out through them and gave chase immediately. On the way they bumped into Nurse Paula, who was quick to hide her cigarette behind her back as, fearful for her job, she improvised hastily, “Yes! I saw it! It went thataway!”

As she hoped the rescue party also assumed that Paula was part of the posse which had been stirred into action by Catherine’s distressed yells. As the nurses chased their imaginary dingoes out through the french windows, doctors also arrived; one of the latter prepared a syringe with a strong sedative and within a few seconds Catherine was unconscious. Later, when she regained what in her had passed for ‘consciousness’ for the past few months, she was once more her ‘normal’ zombie-like self, almost totally lacking any emotional responses, her mind now once again totally withdrawn into itself.

***** ******* *****

When Mirriyuula introduced himself and their baby sibling as their new, FaYS-appointed guardian, explaining that he had come to take care of them all and that he had also brought their baby sibling to them too, because the hospital could no longer care for the baby, which in any case, needed to be with its family, they saw nothing the least bit questionable about his story except perhaps for why it had taken them so long to decide what to do.

They were, however, a bit more sceptical when he tried to suggest that they were all in danger and that he needed to move them and the baby to a place of safety forthwith. Vivienne, always the sceptic, however, even when completely missing the point, did not entirely trust the sharp-faced stranger, in spite of his almost constant smile.

“How do we even know it’s really our baby though? I mean, how do we know you brought the right bub?” she demanded.

“Yeah! ‘Sright!” some of the younger ones immediately chorused, “how do we know it’s ours?!”

Before Mirriyuula could even begin to formulate an answer, however, John interrupted, “That’s easy!” he exclaimed, and, taking the cricket ball out of the blazer pocket it habitually lived in, he aimed the leather-bound missile straight at the infant’s head. The Dog-Spirit gasped in fear as the missile sped towards the baby’s head, but at the very last instant the baby’s tiny arms both shot up and caught the ball firmly as it gurgled enthusiastically, “Owza’?!”

“Well then,” said John with finality, “there’s no doubt about it now! It’s ours alright!” Turning to Mirriyuula, he said, “Okay Mr… where do you want to take us?”

***** ******* *****

Hell Hospital 15

10 Friday Jun 2011

Posted by in Hell Hospital

≈ 13 Comments

 

By theseustoo

(Disclaimer: this series of stories is completely fictional and none of the persons, places or institutions in these stories are real, but figments of my imagination. Any similarity to any real person, place or institution is entirely coincidental.)

Doctor Frood had never seen anything like it before in his life. Every time he tried to speak to Catherine, he was not only verbally attacked by his patient, but physically attacked by plastic drink and pee-bottles, bed-pans and other equipment in the ward which seemed, of their own accord, to actually fly at him from all directions so that he was obliged to make a strategic withdrawal, exiting the ward with much less dignity than a psychiatrist should maintain if he wanted to retain credibility. It could only be some form of psychokinesis, he supposed, and quickly came to the conclusion that whatever it was that was in control of this woman, it was not herself; and it had extraordinary powers.

Of course, he’d heard of such cases, but they were extremely rare and the medical profession had no way of treating what he suspected was a genuine case of demon-possession or possession by some other spirit, whose purposes were unknown, but whose intentions could only be evil, he decided. He realised he was out of his depth; he really needed help from the professionals in the possession business; the Catholic Church. So he had sent an urgent email to the Vatican, who sent out a troubleshooter in the form of a papal nuncio, whose instructions were to deal with whatever it was that was possessing Catherine Swan.

***** ******* *****

The most Reverend Bishop, Petros Batty, read through his check-list to make sure that he hadn’t forgotten anything important: plenty of crucifixes, check; at least a gallon of holy water he’d had blessed by the Pope himself, check; prayer book and bible (and at least two spares of each… just in case…) check; and a dozen wooden stakes, sharpened to a point at one end, check; a wooden mallet to hammer them home, should they prove necessary, check; and finally a Colt .45 revolver with a box of hollow-point, silver bullets, hand-made by the Sisters of Mercy, and again, specially blessed by the Pope himself, check. ‘It pays,’ he thought as he packed this last, ‘to be prepared for every eventuality’.

His flight was not on any scheduled aircraft, but in the Pope’s own Lear jet. Even so it would be three whole days before he would arrive in South Oz. As he climbed into the Pope’s own limousine, to be driven to the Pope’s own private airfield, he only hoped he would be in time… The souls of mortals could not withstand such forms of spiritual attack for long, he well knew, but he was thankful that from the reports he’d been given by Dr Frood, the subject had been a most devout believer right up until the moment of her psychic and spiritual invasion. With a little luck, he thought, that should buy him the time he would need for his journey and preparations. Even so, he prayed fervently for the protection of the saints and angels for his new client; from Dr Frood’s description this would not be an easy case.

***** ******* *****

The Dog-Spirit, Mirriyuula, sensed trouble in the world of humans; there was a baby in mortal and spiritual danger, and he knew he would have to remove it from where it was currently to a place of safety. Perhaps the best thing to do, he though, would be to take it to its brothers and sisters so that they could look after it. But then, he thought, I’ll have to take them ALL to a safe place… and somehow do it without letting them know that they were in any danger at all, and especially without them finding out exactly what was the nature of that danger; he didn’t want to worry them, because he know all too well that in cases like this one, where the Dark One was concerned, fear itself could destroy them. Fortunately it should, he though, be a relatively easy matter for him to remove the baby from the hospital’s nursery, as, in his ‘dog’ form, he was totally invisible to all but the most psychically gifted humans.

***** ******* *****

Though still in her alienated state, Catherine always seemed to enjoy her baby’s feeding times; these were the only time the doctors and nurses would ever let her see her child because they were all terrified she might harm it. Strangely enough, however, it seemed that the presence of the baby had a calming effect on the raving madwoman; and a blank but peaceful expression spread over her face as she breast-fed the infant.

Satisfied that her charge was comfortable and the baby was feeding happily and greedily, Nurse Paula thought she could easily duck out through the French windows to have a quick smoke; she’d be back before Catherine had finished feeding the bub, she thought… She did not see the invisible spirit of the ghost-dog as it brushed past her legs through the opened french windows and into the day-room.

The baby was extremely hungry today, for some reason, however, and had drained Catherine’s breasts in half the time it usually took. In here zombie-like state of somnolence, Catherine burped the child and put it down in the bassinet-trolley the nurses always used to bring the baby to her, so she could prepare a nappy for it. The doctors and nurses had initially been very surprised that she was able to do this in her alienated condition, but decided that her maternal functions were working perfectly, out of sheer instinct; after all, it was her eleventh child… now they took it for granted that she would feed the baby and change its nappy as if on some kind of maternal ‘auto-pilot’.

Taking advantage of Catherine’s turned back, Mirriyuula took the handle of the bassinet-trolley in its jaws and pushed it out through the ward’s swing-doors; as a spirit, Mirriyuula could sense that the corridor would be empty; and that he would be able to take it down in a service elevator to the ground floor and straight out into the car-park, where he would have to resume human form drive the vehicle he’d left there ready… But Catherine turned round again just in time to see a tawny, dog-like creature pushing the bassinet-trolley with her baby in it out through the swing-doors. Suddenly she spoke her first coherent sentence in months as she screamed out at the top of her lungs, “Help! Help! A dingo’s got my baby!”

***** ******* *****

What Christianity Can’t Teach us About How to Live

27 Friday May 2011

Posted by in Astyages

≈ 42 Comments

Painting by Reg Mombasa


By David L Rowlands

(This article was first offered to the ABC for publication in response to
Joel Hodge’s latest article, “Christianity can teach us the meaning
of life”. As Aunty has apparently declined to publish it, I have
decided to publish it here instead; and also at Astyages’s Weblog.)

This article is a direct response to Joel Hodge’s latest article on the
Drum/Unleashed. It seems to me that he should not be allowed to get
away with using the ABC to preach a lot of immediately observable and
easily disputable falsehoods.

As someone in the comments section to his article has already pointed
out, the upshot of this article appears to be “Okay, chaplains have
been caught out preaching and proselytizing in direct contravention
of the guidelines; so what, it’s probably good for you…”

It is apparently impossible even for Joel to imagine that atheists might
actually have every right not only to be atheists, but also to bring
their children up as atheists if they so choose. Part of this right
is the ability to send their children to a supposedly secular state
school without fear that their children will be exposed to preaching
and proselytizing by arrogant and self-serving religions.

Joel also appears, when it suits him, to think that all ‘beliefs’ are of
equal value; suggesting that scientific conclusions and discoveries
made with the use of logic and reason are somehow of equal value to
fairy stories about sky-pixies and the like; that metaphysical
suppositions about an imagined life after death are somehow equal to
scientific theories formulated after much empirical observation and
reasoned analysis; that magical rituals like cannibalistic human
sacrifices are somehow as efficacious as scientific processes.

Then, using this supposed equivalence as the basis of his argument that
christianity – and only christianity – should be taught in schools, because, as he puts it in his title, “Religious education can help uncover the meaning of
life…”

Now, Joel evidently also feels that christianity is not only the sole
perspective capable of delivering the ‘meaning of life’, but that it
is completely adequate to the task, though he himself, however,
declines to actually enlighten us as to what he feels the ‘meaning of
life’ to be’.

As soon as I realized this, the thought occurred to me that if I could
therefore find just one single lesson in life (and spiritual growth),
that christianity was simply not capable of teaching, then this would
serve to defeat the pitiful argument he uses to explain why it should
be that christianity – and only christianity – is allowed to break such protective guidelines in order to gain free and unfettered access to our children’s minds;
often in spite of the expressed wishes of parents.

I didn’t have to think very hard about it at all; indeed the answer
came to me as immediately obvious:

There is one lesson, taught by many ancient Greek traditions, that could
never be taught by christianity: that the only people who are actually worth
‘saving’, in any sense of the word, are those who have the kind of
courage it takes to defy the very gods themselves. This is the inner
meaning of Homer’s Odyssey. Odysseus steals Zeus’ cattle and injures
Poseidon’s son, the Cyclops, Polyphemus. It is for these reasons that
Odysseus is made to wander for another ten years before he finally
arrives home, more in spite of the opposition of the gods, than as
the result of their help.

Another god who is traditionally defied in several of the greek epics is
Hades, the god of death. Following the tradition established by the
Sumerian legend of Gilgamesh, Orpheus, Heracles, and Odysseus all
descend into the underworld only to return to life again after
completing their respective missions in the underworld. Again the
message is that true heroism requires one to have the kind of courage
which will defy not only death itself, but even the god of death…

Christianity, with its omnipresent fear of death and the twin psychological levers
it derives from this fear (the carrot and stick it calls heaven and
hell) cannot possibly teach this; to be unafraid of dying is
something they fear to cultivate within the hearts of their believers
because christianity depends on that very fear as its means of social control. This is also why the early christians embellished on the Greek notions of ‘Tartarus’ in
order to create ‘Hell’ and thus make death even more scarey.

A third god, or rather, goddess, who is defied is Calypso. That Odysseus
declines her offer of immortality (ie. ‘godhood’) and insists on
returning to his human wife, Penelope, is particularly significant:

Here Homer is telling us that it is humanity that human beings should strive to achieve; not godhood; another lesson christianity is incapable of teaching.

The ultimate lesson in all these stories tells us that there are times
when, not only is it necessary to defy the gods, but when any other
path will lead to destruction; when only defiance of the gods will suffice…

And, just as it is only when a teenage boy finally learns to start to stand up to his father and defend himself and his opinions against the dictates of someone who
has thus far been a godlike figure, in order to assert his own will,
that the teenager finally ‘grows up’ into full manhood, just so the
Greek heroes show us that it is only when we learn to stand up to our
gods that we achieve our full humanity.

This is something that christianity is fundamentally incapable of teaching
because it is anathema to them. The same god who can even get his
followers to find any and every possible excuse for why he allows the
continuation of evil in this world, cannot be allowed to be defied,
for fear of limiting, and hence disproving his omnipotence. Of
course, since this lesson is one thing the christian god can’t teach,
this lesson itself disproves that omnipotence; if Epicurus’ famous
formulation has not already dispensed with it perfectly adequately.

But even though I have just proven that there is at least one lesson that
christianity is totally incapable of teaching (in fact, I’ve given
three examples!), there is a much more powerful argument for keeping
religion out of our state schools: the right of atheistic parents to
send their kids to a secular school for a secular education without
any fear that they are going to be proselytized at by mind-benders
who make a virtue of dispensing with reason and logic and  teach
children to do the same. Christians demand their right to freedom of
religion; fine! Let them have it… there are already plenty of
schools where they can send their kids if they think schools ought to
support their religion; but give us atheists and agnostics our
freedom from religion.

Or do atheists have no rights at all?

🙂

14 Hell’s Hospital – Birthday Edition

06 Friday May 2011

Posted by in Astyages, Hell Hospital

≈ 23 Comments

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Episode 14

By theseustoo

The cricket team was doing
alright; with John and Mary working and Algernon and Vivienne in
charge of the ‘little-uns’ to make sure they all got to school fed
and properly dressed; although they had little enough time for
cricket these days… Fortunately it was off-season anyway; though
they still tried to get in as much practice as they could over the
weekends. Ever since they were born, cricket had been their religion;
their father’s passion had managed to inculcate his obsession into
his children.

For the time being at least
they had managed to avert impending doom and manage this crisis as
well as could be expected; indeed, much better than most expected;
thanks to the sense of discipline their father’s religion had
instilled in them. Swannee had been hoping to engage them against
similar ‘family’ teams in ‘exhibition matches’… Algernon was a
terrific fast-bowler and Merv, the third-eldest boy could hit almost
any delivery for six. Unafraid even of the dreaded ‘googlie’, he’d
stand his ground and then, ‘THWACK’ the next thing you know the ball
would be somewhere up in the grandstand, or crashing through a
pavilion window… When asked how he managed to hit so many ‘sixes’
he just said, “I hate running…”

The plans their father had,
however, were now on hold; in any case, they would need to get their
new sibling out of hospital (they still didn’t even know whether it
was a boy or a girl!) so they could bring it home and start its early
training; John and Mary worried that it had already been three months
since their mother’s ‘nervous breakdown’ and the poor bub hadn’t even
held a cricket ball yet! Indeed, hadn’t even met its mother or its
father… or its brothers and sisters; the poor thing was in danger
of growing up an atheist! Something would clearly have to be done
soon.

***** ******** *****

“Inspector Vin Ordinaire
Rouge was right,” Mr Jones, who called himself ‘Foodge’, was
saying, “Catherine Swan could not possibly have killed her beloved
husband, Swannee, because she loved him too much and in any case, her
religion forbids it; and she is very devout… We suspect that she
has been ‘body-snatched’ by some unknown alien force; probably from a
different dimension…” Even though the day-room was empty apart
from himself and Dave, the new psych patient, he spoke in hushed
tones.

“Bodysnatched?” Dave
said, incredulously, “You mean someone’s taken over her mind…?”
Foodge shushed him insistently, then answered in a whisper, “Well…
more like ‘someTHING’ has taken over her body and is controlling it;
no saying exactly what that thing is; or what has happened to her
mind; the shrinks here don’t even know what they’re looking for.
That’s why I’m here… If we can get through to Catherine’s mind we
may get vital information on the nature of the threat… We’re hoping
it’s still in there somewhere…”

“Threat…? What threat?”
Dave asked immediately.

“Well, if I knew that
precisely I wouldn’t be here now, would I? All we do know is that it
involves the intrusion into our dimension of hyper-dimensional beings
who really don’t belong in this time-space continuum… and they’re
collecting together certain people for some unknown purpose… and
you’re one of them…”

“Oh… right…” Said
Dave, dubiously… Sure now that this guy was not playing with a full
deck. “And you reckon this hyper-dimensional being wants me too, do
you? But why?”

“Well, if we knew why,
we’d know a lot more than we do today, I’m afraid; however, suffice
it to say that certain transmissions from the nth
dimension have been received which suggest that a plot is afoot which
puts the whole of South Oz in danger… though, we’re not quite sure
what kind of danger that is yet…”

Dave was just giving him
his ‘quizzical’ look when the nurse arrived and, catching the
tail-end of the conversation, decided it had better end at once;
fantasies like those entertained by Mr Jones were not to be discussed
outside therapy sessions; and certainly not in front of potentially
violent patients… it was too easy to get them to act out even the
most bizarre dreams as if they were real; and that could be
dangerous.

“Mr Jones!” the nurse
said, “It’s time for your medication; report to the ward-sister
immediately.”

Then, after he’d gone, she
squatted down in front of Dave, who was sitting in one of the
day-room’s armchairs, “You don’t want to take any notice of
anything that guy says,” she said to him, “He’s nuttier than a
snickers bar! Now, you’d better go and get your meds too…”

***** ******** *****

When Catherine had
discovered her husband in flagrante
delicto it
had been such a shock to her psyche; had opened up such alien
feelings in her that her own mind felt violated at the impulses she
now felt; and these feelings it was which had opened up the psychic
crack that was necessary for the Dark One to quickly slip in and take
control. From that instant Catherine’s mind had withdrawn into
itself; thus whatever she experienced was experienced as a dream;
disjointed snippets of actions that were so unlike her and so
horrific that she found hard to understand, let alone to believe that
it was she who was performing them. The Dark One had been thrilled
with the discovery in Catherine’s mind of such superb knife-throwing
skills, and had immediately prompted his newly-acquired body to act
on the intense feelings of hatred and betrayal which had let him in,
and let fly… Catherine’s mind retreated further into
unconsciousness as the knives sank into Swannee’s back.

After she’d been taken to
the psych ward, however, the Dark One had been so busy manipulating
Elaine’s mind that his grip on Catherine’s mind had loosened just
enough to allow some remnant of Catherine’s consciousness to become
dimly aware, somewhere in its own deep, dark recesses; and in this
dream-like awareness, she found herself being tugged at by another
consciousness. It was not the Dark One, who had bullied her mind into
submission and frightened it into unconsciousness, of that she was
certain. This new presence seemed kind and gentle; it spoke to her
gently, soothingly, reassuring her that all would be well, but that
the time would soon come when she must act to rid herself of the Dark
One’s presence.

“Soon…” the new
presence said and Catherine knew she would be ready.

***** ******** *****

Herbal T for 2

23 Saturday Apr 2011

Posted by in Astyages

≈ 24 Comments

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By T2

Hmmm, that story about the African
chief reminds me of the time I was sailing up the Orinoco… on an
expedition looking for medicinal herbs and native remedies for
Harrods’ health-food department. It was impossible even to say what
country we were in when we stopped at a small village that was
located in a large clearing in the Amazon rainforest. I’d heard the
shaman there knew of some particularly potent vines and ferns; if I
was lucky, perhaps I’d be able to undergo the healing ritual and
write it up for National Geographic as a bonus.

After paying the shaman in tobacco,
hatchets and knives, I persuaded him to take me into the jungle to
find some of his famous ingredients, although he was very reluctant
to go at first… He said something about the ‘spirit of the vines’
wouldn’t like a stranger who didn’t understand the sacred nature of
the vines and the ritual desecrating the sacred part of the forest
where they were found’, or something… I finally placated him by
making lots of credulous ‘respectful’ noises and, after the gift of a
dozen extra hatchets, he finally agreed to take me.

After trudging all day through swamp
and jungle we finally came to a huge vine-strewn tree, under which
the shaman lit a small fire to boil water for the billy. Good, I
thought, I could really use a nice cuppa ‘Rosie-Lea’ right now, but
instead of putting a couple of tea-bags into the billy, he cut a
tendril from the vine which grew all over the tree and after chopping
it up on a nearby stone, as one would chop parsley, he threw this
‘tea’ into the billy. Then he started to chant over it in a querulous
voice, shaking his magic rattle over it as he uttered the
incantations.

After the brew had boiled for several
minutes, he took it off the heat, and after breathing onto the brew
for a minute or so, presumably to cool it, he handed it to me.
Wordlessly,  I took it and drank it; the taste was bitter but not
unpleasant… what happened next I can scarce credit myself, for as
the shaman smoked his big cigar, I saw vines coming out of him and
wrapping themselves around the tree in a manner I can only describe
as ‘lovingly’… then I realized that the vine and the shaman were
somehow the same creature… Perhaps in my drug induced state, I was
seeing something metaphorical as if it were actually real… I don’t
really know; yet somehow I understood that this old shaman, who had
made his very existence through the power of these vines to cure
people of their ailments, had somehow become part of the vine and it
had become his spirit; ecstatically, I experienced an epiphany;
somehow the whole universe revolved around this understanding that he
and the vine were one…

Then, all of sudden I was hit by
another sudden realization… I was suffering from one of the
well-known and unfortunate side-effects of the medicinal vines; I
needed to empty my bowels… URGENTLY! I ran off into the forest and spent the next half-hour or so there; but I’ll spare you the gory details of
what happened as soon as I found sufficient cover for my western
‘modesty’…

Suffice it to say that I was both
relieved and considerably lighter when I returned to the old shaman,
who was still attached by innumerable vines to the tree. I felt both
enlightened and yet somehow tricked at the same time by this old
magician, as the shaman asked me, “Are you feeling better now? Is
your ailment cured? And how do you feel now about the Spirit of the
Vine?”

In fact I did feel much better; but
this old guy had just given me the shits… quite literally! I could
not help looking him right in the eye as I said, “I’m fine, thanks
very much, but with fronds like you, who needs enemas!”

:)

Hell Hospital, Episode 13

12 Tuesday Apr 2011

Posted by in Astyages, Hell Hospital

≈ 13 Comments

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By theseustoo

Dave struggled to free himself from the warm fuzziness which seemed to weigh him down like a leaden blanket… as he gradually emerged into semi-consciousness, he realised that someone was shaking him. “Where am I?” he asked, thoroughly bemused. An unknown voice answered him from underneath a broad-rimmed fedora, “You’re in hospital… Psych ward…”

“What?!” Dave now sat bolt upright, “What he hell am I doing here? I’m not crazy!”

The stranger with the fedora grasped hold of him and, quickly shushing him, laid him back down on his pillow. The attendant nurse, who was sitting at the desk at the other end of the ward, briefly looked up, just as the fedora slipped below the level of Dave’s bed. Satisfied that all was as normal as might reasonably be expected in a psychiatric ward, she returned to her perusal of the new roster she was trying to organise, peeved at having to be the one to do it, and knowing that no matter what she did, just about everyone would be unhappy with the shifts she allocated them.

The fedora emerged from below the bed and, with a finger to his lips, said, “Shhhh! We know you’re not crazy… you’ve been brought here for a reason…”

Now Dave was beginning to think he may be crazy after all… who was this stranger and what did he know about the situation… which Dave was only just beginning to understand anyway; last thing he knew he’d been about to punch out some quack who’d handled his previously shattered and now de-calcified foot too roughly, and then the security guards had grabbed him and then…. Oh, yes… the injection…

He looked up again at the face under the fedora and said, “Yeah… I tried to punch a quack!”

The face underneath the fedora looked puzzled for a moment, and then, still talking in whispers, said, “No… I mean… well, that may have given them the excuse they needed, but you’d have been brought here anyway…”

This was beginning to sound dafter and dafter, thought Dave, but then he thought to himself, what else should I expect in the psych ward? Then he realised what had been said and felt somehow insulted, “Hey! What do you mean, I’d’a’ been brought here anyway… I told you I’m not nuts; just a bit hot-tempered, is all… Anyway who the hell are you and what do you know about me and why I’m in here? You’re just a patient in here yourself! For all I know, you’re the one that’s nuts!”

“That’d be what they’d want you to think,” said the face under the fedora, still trying to maintain as low a profile as possible, “but don’t you be taken in by it for a second!” Then, offering his hand to Dave to shake, added, “Name’s Foodge… I’m a private dick working under cover on a case for Inspector Vinh Ordinaire Rouge; I expect you’ll have heard of her?”

“No…” Dave replied simply, then asked the obvious, “What case?”

But just then the ward’s large, swing doors were pushed aside as the doctor entered the ward to do the rounds, noisily followed by a gaggle of interns and med students learning the trade.

“Can’t talk now…” Foodge whispered urgently,”Later… my bed’s the one with the poster over it…” And with that he turned to try to get back to his bed unnoticed, but it was too late; the nurse, as soon as she’d heard the doctor enter the ward, had done a quick reconnaissance tour of the ward and had just noticed the fedora beside the new patient’s bed. With the impatience of which only nurses whose orders have been disobeyed are capable, she ejaculated, “MISTER JONES! What ARE you doing out of bed? Now get back into it this instant before you get us both into trouble!”

Aha, thought Dave to himself, as he heard the fedora-wearer’s real name… I was right… just another loony! He was even more convinced of this fact when he looked up at the poster above the beds further down the ward into which the fedora’s wearer was now slipping: the poster depicted the star of the movie, ‘Babe’ in one of its happier scenes.  Yep! he thought again, this guy’s definitely one snag short of a barbie…

And with that comforting thought, he set himself to the task of trying to think of what would be the best way to get out of here… Should he just insist on his sanity; surely they would see he was normal? Or would they see that as a sure sign of mental instability, this insistence on normality? Perhaps it would be wiser to play the game for a while and then gradually ‘return’ to normality? It was a most difficult decision to make, but he would have to make his mind up on a strategy soon, as the doctor was now only a couple of beds away from his and he knew with dreadful certainty that the doctor would want to interview this new patient… and that the result of that interview would determine his fate.

***** ******** *****

The Dark One inside Elaine’s mind felt a wave of satisfaction flood its pleasure centers; everything was going according to plan; the coven had two members already and a third was being prepared for recruitment even as more potential recruits were being gathered. When the coven was complete, the Rite could begin… the ritual that would bring the ‘Others’! Until then, the Dark One knew, he must remain unknown and unobserved to the rest of this far-too-pleasant little planet…

***** ******** *****