Henna

Ryohei Hase

She dances a pagan ritual seduction
Through halls that echo a ghost tattoo
Blue aura hosts the introduction
To a world unnamed; an alien view

He drinks her down like perfumed smoke
Savouring the head reaction
He pays the price and wears the yoke
Tastes her name in warm transaction

She takes his offering, thin and fleeting
Files it with the wilting roses
Sets him up for an executive meeting
On an oversized bed of poses

And gazing into the void created
He wonders if he’s gone too far
To ever have this love back-dated
or breach the cores of distant stars

Ghost Story

[Extracted from the files of Mark Time P.I.]

The honed edge – all molecules radiating in the same direction.
“Mark Time is not a sword; he is a razor. “
Well… that’s what they say in the tabloids anyway. Far be it for me to contradict the wisdom of the crowds, I am content to bask in the light of good publicity and enjoy the financial boost that it has given me.
“I’m trying to get in contact with my mother” her face was a pale triangle of light in the shadows of my office. She handed me a photograph of a dead woman. She didn’t look dead in the photograph but it was a face that had been plastered across the news over the last few weeks. Those same tabloids were whipping themselves up in to a brown froth over the sex-death of Ophelia Moncreif-Brown, wife of our much maligned Minister for Trade and Industry.
“You’ve got a reputation for getting the job done” she said to my questioning face.
“Not always to the gratitude of my clients”
“I just what to know what happened”
“Are you prepared for the possibility that what really happened is what is being reported in the papers?”
“I’m trying not to think about how embarrassing that would be.”
“I’m not a psychic, and neither am I a spiritualist” I tapped the photograph edge on the desk, it made a pleasing sound. “There will be no séance“

Fingertrap

His eyes followed the letters across the page, his mind decoding their shapes and groupings into an approximation of the messengers intended meaning; communication is an inexact science.
Nevertheless, the hand that puts the letters upon the page holds the power to influence.

His eyes followed the letters across the page and images formed in his mind, as if he understood everything in the visual sense, stretching it across the cogs and wheels of meaning as if afraid of what he would come to understand by observing these working parts.

His eyes followed the letters but they slowed, realising he had not taken in the last sentence; distracted; went back to re-read it and realised that the source of his distraction was that the page he’d previously perceived as containing orderly rows of words, contained more.

His eyes, drawn closer to the page, made out vertical rows of tiny symbols in a shade of grey halfway between the black letters and the white page. And then another layer, smaller and a lighter shade of grey. And then another layer, closer this time , larger and darker. Layer after layer.

His eye, followed closely by his head and eventually his whole body, snake-like, was drawn into the black magnetic void formed by the open book. And when he was entirely consumed the book fell to the floor, laughing.

Tales for the attention-span deficit reader

6.1 Sans Crypt

Sergey Pozhidaevvia

“When we first met,” said No.3, “we had a conversation that had something to do with an experiment. Could you run that by me again as I was a little disorientated at the time?”
“Which bit?” said Cajones, “The bit that says this is all an experiment conducted by a madman who has lost all contact with the original reason for the experiment”
“And what was the original reason for the experiment?
“How the fuck would I know” said Cajones.
“So what’s next then?” said Atom, “What’s the next test?”
“I don’t know”
“Whatchu mean you don’t know… you’re the babysitter aren’t you?”
“To tell you the truth this is the furthurest I’ve ever taken you,” Cajones’ stare seemed to focus somewhere in the distance that stretched out behind them. No.3 turned and glanced back at the town in the valley.
“So what are you doing right now,” he said, “now that we know that at least one of the three of us is off script?”^[8]
“I’m content to sit awhile; to allow nothing to happen,” said Cajones, “something you lot might do well to learn; always needing to do something, as if the constant stimulation will ever be enough to calm your consciousness; the constant dread of your inevitable demise.”
“So how does that work then?” said No.3 “I am led to believe that animals fear death while being unaware of its inevitability”
Atom sat on a moonlit stump and picked at the grass.
“In fact,” Cajones continued, “it is exactly that constant stimulus that desensitises you to the world. Perhaps that is the intention, your constant technological drive fuelled by the need to render yourselves numb, to obliterate the world from your catalogue of needs.”
“You’re a ray of light, you know that?” said No.3, “I can assure you, Cat Stevens, that him and I,” he glanced over at Atom, “are very aware of the world; only thing that concerns me is whose fucking world have we been plonked into the middle of?”
“And what are the alternatives?” said Atom.
“Alternatives,” Cajones shut his eyes, “are infinite in number but vary in duration. Alternatives depend on decision; an act which leads us into a whole new territory.”

^[8]Editors conjecture: At this point it appears that just about everything is off script: we’ve ended up with two Atoms (for the price of one) ; Cajones may or may not have jumped ship and the Mad Scientist is being as obtuse as he always is. Perhaps our heroes might take strength from a line in a popular song by the psychedelicious Of Montreal; which concludes “At least I authored my own disaster”.

Synaptic Radiation (Burn Baby Burn)

A Separate Reality ~Alex Andeyev

Here at locustheart where they take your shadow and shave its edges just enough
to take you by surprise.
Like when you pass between two streetlamps and the second shadow rushes to pass from behind you
to in front of you.
Here the cold and crawling skin that radiates from the base of your skull and intensifies
with its own awareness.
Like the fear of being alone in an empty cave where unseen lives seem to leer
from the umbra of your fire.
Here is where you begin and here is where you end.

Air Guitar

Those grains of sand that reshape my face
Under the direction of these trade winds
Do so without intention or regret
For the weather is not a malevolent tool
At the hand of some divine purpose
But a blind force tied to those mechanical laws
To which each atom is bound


Japan, New Zealand, Pompeii

You Have Been Warned

Middle Management Man

Sometimes time presses heavy on the moment
Like all the weight of the body as it concentrates itself into the tip of a stiletto heel
These are the times when it is good to walk barefoot

Sometimes the light can erase a whole layer of skin
Like a chemical breeze gyrating through a forest of locusts
These are the times when it is advisable to wear shoes

Sometime the tide will bring in the fresh salt of mourning
Like a wrenching arm in garage changing wheel
These are the times it is best to lie still

Sometimes the day will be filled with war
Like green algae on a pond full of eels
These are the times to make waves

∞.5b The Moon is for Dreamers

A triangle of lumpen life in a green meadow dusted with pale flowers and surrounded on three sides by the listening woods.
The moon has feelings too and she tugs at your heart like a nagging doubt.
But the affairs of these pseudo-men hold not yet enough water for her tug to inspire a reaction.
So it is you and your yellow eyes who must continue to bathe in the stress of her regard.

∞.5a Mad Scientist's Notebook

It’s difficult for a self-conscious man to pin himself down in the company of others: he may be solidly aware of his merits as a voice worth hearing, but he would also be aware of his shortcomings:
• His love of the sound of himself being clever
• His underlying dislike of his fellow man
• His regret for the inability to find kindreds
• His ability to alienate
And yet, when it all came down to the wire, we were left with only this particular strand of usable DNA. I cannot help but feel that we are heading nowhere with these experiments; we with our inadequate science and our inability to understand that we too are part of the experiment.

We Live, as We Dream, Alone

the bus ~ Paul Kirchner

No Orchestra for Miss Blandish

[Extracted from the files of Mark Time P.I.]

Robert McGinnis

Complicated. Things always get more complicated as the job develops.
It starts as a simple case: What is Miss Blandish’s prospective husband doing during those nights on ‘special assignment’ at the Dartminster Hotel?
The more you know the more you need to find out.
It is possible that Miss Blandish’s fiancé is a special agent on assignment at the Dartminster Hotel.
Is it possible that Miss Blandish is as stupid as she is beautiful.
Mind you, she did choose to hire me.

“Mark Time ~ All your questions answered”

Or so proclaims the traffolite label on my door.

The title is a perversion of James Hadley Chase's 'No Orchids for Miss Blandish".
The content is just a perversion.

5.4 Free Radicals

The Little Tramp

The street accepted the incongruous twosome as it accepts everything.
“I don’t care” said the street
“Which way?” said Atom
“How would I know,” said No.3, “I’ve been trapped in the presence of two madmen for three years”
“Three years and two months,” said Atom, “And I think we should leave town”
No.3 contemplated sarcasm but settled for “Good Idea.”

Passed the post office…

At the gate they found Cajones arranged in a winter sphinx-cat-square, all tucked in with eyes half closed.
“Congratulations”
“Thank you,” said Atom “but for what?”
“For passing yourselves off as mediocre entertainment; for proving, if proof be needed, that your lot are about as sentient as foggy day.”
“Glad you liked it golden balls” said No.3.
“I think I remember you…” said Cajones vaguely, “…vaguely”
“Three years ago” said No.3.
“Three years and two months,” said Atom, “and I don’t remember doing anything entertaining.”
“Did I forget to mention that it was mediocre?” said Cajones, blinking a silent greeting to Atom. “At least you haven’t lost your dignity.”

Spider

Jack Crossing

Come to my head
In the fury of the rain
In the patterns here defined
As the wood reveals its grain

Come to my thoughts
In the bustle of the train
Nobody here reports
To their automated husks of pain

Come to my arms
Embrace that knows its bounds
Give more that the words reveal
Take more than these echoed sounds

Come to my heart
In the kingdom of my chest
Beats a hollow thud were it but
For the things that we invest

Come to my hands
That which cannot be bought
That whose price is far beyond
The lies that we are taught

Come to the moment
Come to the day
Come to the party
Well…come to the fray

Visions of Helvica

Alexander McQueen

With an accompanying flutter of apprehension, a pale shadow crossed the walls of his night; an ever-present spectre on the surface of his tenuous existence.
Helvica had left him in the underpass where the water reflected on the underside of the concrete structure formed a net to catch his fleeing and wordless thought-dreams.
“Don’t fucking move monkey-boy,” she’d said, “I’ll be back with food.”
He hated it when she called him names.
He loved her for looking after him.
He lay back and materialised her face in the light-net – a mahogany mask, cheeks resplendent with name-scars at the hand of her father’s ritual razor; hair a suede halo – he was overcome by her beauty; black fur bristled at his nape.
His thought-dreams were interrupted by an avalanche of loose dirt announcing Helvica’s return to the underpass.
“Bad news Tarzan, the locals have picked up our scent; we need to move, like now.”

Tales for the attention-span deficit reader

5.3 Sleeping Policeman

Incontinent

The policeman was asleep. He cradled his baton neatly between his legs and drooled into his whistle, which had unconsciously fallen from his mouth. If his thumbs had not been safely tucked away in his trouser pockets, one of them may have found its way into his mouth – such is the innocence of a policeman’s dreams.
Now you can think all you like about escape, but the physical act of escaping is generally regarded to be rather more fraught when attempted in the nude. People will tend to notice two naked men running down the street past the post office.
Atom, already predisposed to the wearing of clothes, decided that the policeman’s raincoat, which hung behind the door along with his winter scarf, would serve to cover him well enough for the purpose of escape. No.3, who we should, by rights call Atom 1.1^[7] but that would lead to untold confusion - had to make do with a loincloth fashioned from aforementioned winter scarf.
The PO-Box lay on the desk adjacent to the spiky soles of the policeman’s shiny black boots. Atom felt a twinge of nostalgia for the once shiny shoes that he had once owned. He slipped the PO-Box into one of the coat’s voluminous pockets. No.3 (who had never owned anything) appeared to take Atom’s actions as license and began to unlace the policeman’s boots.
“You’re gonna get us into trouble” said Atom in the smallest voice.
The policeman snorted and knuckled his nose wetly, returning the silver whistle guiltily to the corner of his mouth.
“We’re already in trouble,” said No.3 carefully removing the policeman’s boots and donning them himself.
Atom eyed the baton, worrying the painful lump on his head with his fingertips, but could not bring himself to liberate it from the policeman’s superior grasp. He looked at No.3, a bony bearded apparition in woolen loincloth and large black boots; “You’ll blend in nicely”
“Speak for yourself,” said No.3, “You look like a malnourished flasher.”

^[7]Editor’s note: For any of reader who may be feeling a bit confused themselves by this statement, No.3 is none other than The Atom whose birth was described in Instalment 1.1. For those of you who had already figured that out, my apologies for bursting your sense of superiority.

Jargonaught