Too Much Turkey

Ack! Long time no blog. Pushing through to the end of the working year drained me to the point where I was running on fumes with just enough energy to make it through each day without complete mental and emotional collapse, so writing witty blog posts was completely beyond me.  But I’ve rested up for a couple of days, eaten some turkey and banished all thought of work to the land of wind and ghosts, so should be right for a while now.

Anyway, as my previous post suggested I have fallen deeply into the Stand Still Stay Silent fan community. Well, deeply for me, which means I lurk on the fan forum and occasionally pop up to make inane comments. A couple of these inane comments (and too much turkey) have led me to perpetrate an awful crime against the noble art of fan fiction, which I have decided to present here so the world may judge it and decide on an appropriate punishment.

(It goes without saying that it will not make much sense unless you’re familiar with the comic. Frankly it may not make much sense even if you are familiar with the comic, but at least you’ll know who the characters are. Also in SSSS the new year is in Autumn, which is why August comes after October.)

So here we go. I have no title for it, but then it probably doesn’t deserve one…

——————————————————————————————————-
——————————————————————————————————-
SAIMAA – OCTOBER, YEAR 78

The door flew open, letting in a gust of cold wind and a swirl of snow. Lalli, who had been practicing some simple spells by the hearth, leapt up as his grandmother staggered in, grabbing at the doorpost for support.

“Grandma..?” he started uncertainly.

“Lalli! Oh Gods Lalli! Where are your cousins?” Grandma staggered across the cabin towards him but collapsed onto the table halfway. Lalli ran to her and helped her to her feet. “Where are your cousins child? Quickly!”

He hesitated “I.. I don’t know Grandma. Onni said he was going hunting…”

“You have to find him. And Tuuri! It’s not safe!”

Lalli helped Grandma into a chair. She sagged forwards, burying her face in her hands as he ran across the room and pushed the door closed, jumping up to pull the latch firmly shut. He ran back to the chair and knelt by her side.

“What’s wrong Grandma? What happened?”

“I… I thought maybe I could teach them!” she moaned “There were books I read, as a child…”

“Teach who? What did you try to do?”

“…they seem so much like us in so many ways. I didn’t think the illness had changed them as much as the others…”

Lalli was frightened now. No matter the problem, no matter what went wrong, Grandma always knew what to do. Seeing her so confused, so frightened shook his world to its core. He threw his arms around her legs and buried his face in her lap.

“Grandma, what should we do?”

He felt her take a deep, shuddering breath and shift upright. When Lalli looked up, the calm, strong Grandma he’d always known had returned. She pulled him to his feet and looked him in the eyes with a sad smile.

“It was a mistake. I should never have tried it. It was a terrible mistake and now we have to make it right.”

She took Lalli’s hands in hers.

“I need you to go and find your cousins. We’re going to have to leave this place. But before we do, there’s something I need to teach you…”

——————————————————————————————————-
NORTH SAIMAA – AUGUST, YEAR 78

There was a space under the jetty just big enough to hide in and stay dry.

It was Lalli’s favourite place. He’d found it not long after they’d arrived at the village, three months back, and he retreated there regularly – particularly when Onni wanted him to do chores.

Today he was using it as a hideout after stealing a fresh bread roll from the village bakery. He knew that Grandma wouldn’t approve, but…

He paused, his thoughts halted by a pang of sorrow. Grandma wouldn’t have approved. It was Onni who was in charge now. Grandma’s plan to lure away and then outrun the… the thing, had worked, but at a dreadful cost.

But things were slowly getting better. Almost a year of running from village to village had ended. They’d found a home. Onni was working hard to earn them a place here, Tuuri was learning weird foreign languages at the school and Lalli – Lalli was training as a scout, stealing rolls and hiding under a jetty where he could eavesdrop on his fellow villagers with little chance of discovery.

Two of those villagers, both fishermen, were walking up the boards from their newly landed boat. Lalli tuned in to their conversation as he chewed.

“Did you hear that racket last night?”
“What racket?”
“Out in the woods past the south wall, you seriously didn’t hear it?”
“You know I’m a deep sleeper”
“You’d have to be. Weirdest damn noise I’ve ever heard, and it went on forever.”

Lalli stopped eating as a wave of foreboding swept over him.

“Probably just some troll”
“Not like any troll I’ve ever heard”
“Well, what’d it sound like?”
“Well first of all there was this deep humming sound, like standing next to a hive of giant bees…”
“There you go, it was just a hive of giant bees!”
“Shut up! Then over the hum there was this horrible, high pitched wail, like someone was strangling a pine marten.”
“Well, maybe that’s what giant bees do for fun!”
“Are you taking this at all seriously?”
“Nope!”
“You’re an idiot.”

The two walked away, continuing their banter as Lalli cowered under the jetty.

It had found them again.

——————————————————————————————————-
KEURUU – YEAR 84

Lalli had been sitting, staring at the blank report ever since he’d made it back through the east gate just before dawn. What could he write? Onni had been clear when they’d first arrived at the base – if the authorities found out just what had followed their family halfway across Finland they’d be out of Keuruu faster than a Grade A feline pouncing on a rat-beast. He could probably make something up, but what would prompt an appropriate level of caution without giving away exactly what…

“Lalli!” his thoughts were interrupted by Tuuri, scurrying across the compound and waving vigorously despite juggling two steaming wooden bowls.

“Welcome back!” she exclaimed, plonking onto the bench opposite and setting down the porridge. “I bought you some breakfast since I thought you wouldn’t have…” she saw the look on his face and paused. “It’s not…” she began.

“Yes” he replied.

Tuuri paled and pushed the bowls aside.

“But we’ve come so far!” she whimpered “You’re sure it wasn’t…”

“Yes” he interrupted.

She buried her face in her hands for a full minute as Lalli sat in silence.

“We have to tell Onni” she finally whispered “But if we do he’ll only want to move us again, and there’s nowhere else to go!” She took a deep breath and looked up at her cousin. “The spell. The one that Grandma taught you, will it keep it away?”

Lalli thought for a few seconds. “Yes”.

“And the walls here are strong. If you can force it to keep its distance, Onni might never hear it. He’ll think it lost our trail after all. Could that work?”

“Yes”

“Good!” She jumped to her feet. “I’ll go remind him how terrible the outside is and how he should never leave the base! He already mostly thinks that, so it won’t be very hard.” She turned to go, then turned back “And don’t tell anyone about this! Ever! Understand?”

“Yes”

Filled with determination, Tuuri strode rapidly away in the direction of their quarters.

The sun rose slightly higher. Lalli was just finishing his bowl of porridge when he spotted the Scout Sergeant striding across the compound.

“All night scout summaries are due now! Don’t make me ask again, people!”

Lalli scribbled down the first thing that entered his head and ran off to submit the report, pausing only to grab the second porridge bowl as he did so.

——————————————————————————————————-
THE DREAM REALM – YEAR 90

“No” said Onni “I’m ordering you to not step outside your perimeters again until I say you can. It’s not safe.”

“I – ” began Lalli

“Don’t argue…” Onni paused, closed his eyes and turned away. “It’s looking for us again”

——————————————————————————————————-
COPENHAGEN – YEAR 90

This was it. No more running. It was going to end tonight in the ruins of this weird, scary, foreign city.

He’d known it was coming, ever since Onni had warned him. It might seem impossible that the creature could follow he and Tuuri across the entire world, but it had tracked them for over ten years and across most of Finland, so whatever strange force linked them was clearly not hindered by distance.

It had been lurking at the edges of his dreamscape for at least a week, getting stronger each time he spotted it from the corner of his eye. So tonight, under the cover of scouting a route for the morning, Lalli was on the hunt.

It would be near the water of course. Fresh water. And to intrude on his dreams so strongly it couldn’t be far away. He’d examined the map that the crazy Norwegian lady was always waving around and decided the most likely place for the beast to be lurking was the weird, star shaped lake in the north of the ruins.

He’d carefully made his way to the southern point of the star and had sat quietly in wait for several hours. But it was getting late, and there was no sign of the beast. If this was going to be over tonight, he had to take a chance.

With a whispered prayer to the Gods, he picked up a rounded stone and stepped out into the open.

With one swift motion he hurled the stone. It skipped across the water, bouncing several times before sinking into the depths with an echoing plunk.

Nothing happened.

Silence.

Lalli’s shoulders fell.

But then, a stream of bubbles rose from the depths of the lake. The stream elongated, heading across the water towards the shore where Lalli stood. He stepped back, drawing his blade.

As the bubbles drew close the dark bulk of the creature rose up from the murk. It had grown since Lalli had seen it last outside the walls of Keuruu. Its black skin glistened in the moonlight and it wheezed as it hauled itself onto the land.

The drone began. The deep thrumming buzz that had driven so many to madness since the day twelve years ago when Grandma had made her terrible mistake. Then the high pitched, piercing, demon-wail. Lalli resisted the seductive urge to block his ears and flee and instead summoned his internal strength. Raising his hands he intoned the last spell Grandma ever taught him,

Musiikki on kamala,
Sinun pitäisi,
Tuntea huonoa!
Mennä kotiin norppa,
Olet humalassa!

The beast paused, its infernal cacophony dying away as it pulled its head back and upwards – almost as if it was offended by the words of power. Taking his chance, Lalli lept forwards, stabbing his knife upwards into the creature’s bloated air-sack.

The beast let out a high pitched squeal and fell back towards the water, trying to shake Lalli off. But he kept hold with an iron grip born of twelve long years of fear and rage. The creature’s flippers beat at him, but he refused to let go, tearing at the cursed thing that had started all the madness. As the first glimmer of light crept into the pre-dawn sky he tore it loose, and the beast let out a wail of defeat, falling back into the black water with a great splash and rapidly swimming away.

Lalli collapsed onto the snowy ground, gripping his prize. It was over. The long nightmare was over. He pulled himself to his feet and began the walk back to the tank.

Never again. Never again would the Hotakainen family – or anyone else – have to fear the sound of a beastified seal playing Pomppufiilis on Grandma’s old bagpipes.

——————————————————————————————————-
——————————————————————————————————-

I am most dreadfully sorry!

Stand Still, Stay Silent

Stumbled over a new webcomic this week. Well, not strictly speaking new, it’s been going since 2013, but it’s new to me, which is what matters in my small, self-centered world.

Titled Stand Still, Stay Silent it’s set 90 years after a plague wiped out most of the world’s population and transformed almost all mammals into hideous abominations. Civilisation survives in Iceland and a few pockets of Scandinavia and Finland – the rest of the planet is left alone as “The Silent World”. The survivors have turned back to their ancient traditions and belief systems while still maintaining as much technology as possible, so it’s a world of tanks, trains and assault rifles paired with runes and spells – except for those crazy Swedes and Danes who don’t believe in magic. And cats. Cats are important.

Here’s a map

The story is that of the first expedition out into the Silent World. The first badly funded and under-trained mission, whose real job isn’t actually to explore, it’s to make money or (more likely) die trying.

The plot is interesting, the setting is fascinating and the art is top notch. So go check it out! The prologue (set in the current day when the plague emerges) starts here, and the main plot here. You could probably skip the prologue if you really want to but there’s good background info in there, so don’t.

So check it out, and enjoy!

The Marble Paradise

As I have often commented on this blog, I am insane. Not “come at you with a tomahawk” insane, but certainly “do very strange and ill advised things” insane. Like attempting to rewrite Hamlet into rhyming couplets, or inventing the cheese shot. Well, I’ve started on another insane project – this time I’m aiming to learn more about the world created by Dmitry Glucovsky in his post-nuclear Metro 2033 series and teach myself German at the same time by re-translating the German translation of Sergey Kuznetsov’s мраморный раи into English.

Now I’m not going to do anything as crass as take a German course. That’s for sane people. No, I’m teaching myself the language by squinting at Google translate, beating myself around the head with Barron’s German-English Pocket Dictionary and occasionally sending begging emails to my friend Matt.

It’s slow progress, but it does actually seem to be working. I’m starting to recognise words and I’m sometimes able to figure out the general gist of a sentence. It’s going to be a long time before I’m singing along at Oktoberfest, but at least it’s giving me something to do and will probably have some kind of long term neurological benefit. Or something.

In any case, I thought I’d post my translation of the book’s introduction. So strap yourself in for a slightly-awkwardly-phrased journey through the harsh streets of post-nuclear Russia in Sergey Kuznetsov’s The Marble Paradise…

THE MARBLE PARADISE

by Sergey Kuznetsov
Translated from the Russian by Anja Freckman
Translated from the German by Denys the Purple Wyrm

The author dedicates this book to the shining memory of his father

Prologue

A long time ago, many years ago, there was a city here.

It was an ordinary, not particularly large provincial town. The inhabitants were simple people, some educated, some less so. They led orderly, peaceful lives, had times both good and bad, watched their children do the chores, and had a drink from time to time. They managed their lives and their city as best as they could. Some found work in the town, others commuted many hours to Moscow and back and cursed the travel time and crowded railway carriages.

Their city drowned in greenery and its squares, parks and well tended gardens were a welcoming sight. It was especially beautiful in the Indian summer when it was wreathed in every conceivable shade of yellow and red. In late autumn and in winter it was gray and monotonous, yet it still radiated its own particular warmth and coziness. On the long winter evenings the lights burnt in the homes, on the streets the lamps shone one by one in long garlands, and from the air the town looked like a giant, fully lit Christmas tree.

Now…

Now there was no longer a city. All that remained were meaningless, jumbled boxes of abandoned homes with smashed windows, torn-off doors, and power lines hanging limply between crooked, semi-collapsed power poles. Steel rods poked from the torn walls of ruined buildings like exposed bone. Across all was smeared lichen and the green-brown stain of moss. Through the cracked asphalt grass and bushes poked, and the playgrounds were overgrown with high weeds. The summer dressed rusted cars and buses in a cloak of dusty reddish green. That that could rot, decay or dissolve had – over the years – rotted, decayed and dissolved.

On this day the houses were covered by a thin layer of fresh snow, which had fallen overnight for the first time this year. It was a strange snow, light blue-gray. But not even the snow could conceal the aberrance of this world. In the dead city terrifying new residents had emerged. People had not lived here for a long time. Except…

Through the dead town staggered a man, swaying like a drunk. His dark blue radiation suit was badly torn – three deep, bloody furrows ran across the back from shoulder to waist, as if three sharpened blades had sliced in one stroke through the rubberized cloth, the fur jacket and sweater beneath and into the man’s flesh. His chest and left shoulder showed other injuries and his right arm was soaked purple with blood – although it was perhaps not his own. Only the sturdy plastic helmet on his head and the expensive foreign respirator mask strapped across his face seemed intact.

The man was breathing heavily and awkwardly dragged himself in a strange zigzag path – any observer would have thought he was wandering aimlessly. But he had one goal – to escape as soon as possible from this terrible place and reach the Military Academy. Because – he had heard – the basement levels of that facility housed a few other survivors. That would be his salvation, his only salvation. If he managed to reach it…

The man tried to concentrate, to remember: Who had attacked him? Who had he fought?

Something gigantic and grim-faced had attacked in a flash with tremendous force. The creature had pounced on him from behind, slashed him with those claws right through the suit, his clothes and – damn how his back was burning! He was losing blood and there was no way he could reach the wounds to patch them up. What if the beast had venomous claws? The second creature had knocked the gun out of his hands and would probably have demolished him with its next blow if he hadn’t had his army knife.

He’d driven the blade – a serrated-back Spetsnaz knife slightly smaller than a machete – forcefully into the monster’s gut and twisted. Both beasts seemed to lose interest and they… fled?

What happened next?

He couldn’t remember. His thoughts were confused. How had he entered the city? When? And what for?

The man couldn’t answer these questions. He remembered the battle, but tried in vain to recall the appearance of the creatures. Helpless, he gritted his teeth. Had the beasts thought he was dead? Why hadn’t they devoured him? After they’d left he must have lain unconscious for a while. He’d only come back to himself when he was already wandering through the city.

He collapsed repeatedly from exhaustion, lying on the ground, trying to get up again, but every time he staggered painfully to his feet he found that he’d lost more strength than the brief rest had granted him.

Twilight settled over the city. He looked around in alarm.

He slid his right hand in its torn glove under the protective suit to the handle of the knife, which hung in a short sheath on the belt of his jacket. He heard – or did he imagine? – sounds that made the blood in his veins falter: howls, yelps, growls, and sometimes a smack and a short angry roar, as if unknown predators were fighting for prey.

He glanced around startled, but couldn’t see anything living.

The wind came up and it started to snow again. With each step, his strength waned, but he knew that he could no longer spare the time to rest, not even for a few seconds – he had to hurry. An hour ago he could ignore the pain in his back, but now the wounds were burning like crazy. It almost felt like insects were crawling in them. He grunted and shrugged. The temperature had dropped considerably with nightfall and the cold was creeping into him through the slits in the suit.

The ruined buildings swam before his eyes, and his vision doubled as his sight dimmed. He laboriously set one foot after another, his legs were like wood and barely obeyed him. Suddenly he clearly heard a voice. Mechanically he turned towards the speaker only to find there was not a soul there.

But the twilight hissed around him, shouted, howled, and the sounds were getting closer…

He had almost left the city behind him.

It was dark.

His hand clasped the grip of the army knife.

His foot caught on a piece of broken asphalt. He tripped, and fell hard onto his back. The noises all around fell silent for a moment, and in that silence he heard, rather than felt, a sickening crunch from his left arm. When the pain arrived a few seconds later it was dull and grey.

His energy was spent. He tried rolling over onto his front like a beetle but a few attempts exhausted his last pitiful power reserves. They also knocked his knife loose and out of reach, which raised a small spark of anger in him – he would have liked to take at least one of the creatures with him into death.

As everything around him slowly sank into a fog, he realised just how carefully a large grey animal was slinking out of the nearby bushes, snuffling up his scent with its half-rat half-wolf snout, teeth bared and growling.

Then he lost consciousness.

Want to know what happens next? Learn German! 🙂

Incredible!

From that bastion of accurate and up to the minute reporting, news.com.au…

A MYSTERIOUS crack in the earth the size of five football fields has opened up in Wyoming’s Bighorn Mountains.

No one can explain the gigantic tear in the rock, which measures an extraordinary 685 metres long by 48 metres wide.

“The gash”, as locals are calling it, was discovered by hunting organisation SNS Outfitter & Guides, which posted a photo on Facebook in late October. An engineer from the town of Riverton went out to investigate, reporting that there appeared to have been an incredible 14 to 18 million metres of movement.

Incredible indeed!

Hark! A Well Employed and Housed Gentleman:

Title: “SWEDISH”

Panel 1: A Victorian gentleman in a cape and top hat is walking up the steps of a well-to-do house in foggy olde London Town.

Panel 2: Now inside, the gentleman speaks – somewhat furtively – to a well dressed young man while several elaborately dressed ladies lounge about provocatively.

      Gentleman: I believe you offer… Swedish
      Young Man: That is a service we can provide sir. If the price is right…

Panel 3: The gentleman – with a look of unseemly eagerness – pulls out his billfold.

      Gentleman: Money is no object!

Panel 4: The young man accepts a wad of cash and calls over one of the well dressed ladies.

      Young Man: Maria, please see this gentleman to a room. He requires… Swedish
      Maria: Of course. This way please, sir.

Panel 5: The Gentleman is in bed, with the blankets pulled up under his chin, a nightcap on his head and a look of childish delight on his face. Maria – fully clothed – is sitting on a chair reading from a child’s picture book.

       Maria: En gång i tiden fanns det tre små grisar…

THE END

(Apologies to Kate Beaton)

Just be glad I don’t drink…

Burger King, Burger King,
Does whatever a Burger King does,
Spins a web, any size,
Catches thieves at Burger King,
Look out, he’s a Burger King,

Is he strong, Burger King?
He’s got radioactive blood,
Can he swing, from a web?
Take a look at Burger King,
Look out, he’s a Burger King,

In the chill of night,
At the scene of a crime,
Like a beam of light,
He arrives at Burger King,

Burger King, Burger King,
Friendly radio Burger King,
Wealth and fame, listen Bud,
Burger King is his reward,
To him, life is a just like flies up,
Overhead just in time Bud,
You’ll find the Burger King!

Do You Believe in Life After Frud?

Channel 10 News should really take a look at their closed captioning.

While I’ll happily support “Family Frud” taking over from the banal and pointless Family Feud any day, I’m not so sure about tomorrow’s predicted “60% chance of a Cher or two”.

I mean, one would be bad enough…