Part of this transformation has been noted in the previous two articles on this newsletter of mine. Part of it has been transpiring offline, or away from social media at least. I’ve got new projects on the horizon—some for fun and some paid—and I’ve got my old stable of favorites to tend to. I also have some complete revitalizations I’m undertaking on others. This newsletter will no longer be called “Universe of the Astounding” and will no longer be this half-baked dumping ground of articles and stories. In fact, it will be a complete pivot away from it all. I won’t be deleting any previous items, but they’re going to be cordoned off in their own archival section.

Part of this reason is something I’ve been ranting about for months now, be it at walls or any friend willing to lend an ear, and it boils down to the following:

Just replace “Earth” with “discourse.” Not just any old act of written or spoken communication or debate, as per dictionary definition, but “THE DISCOURSE.” Specifically discourse that pertains to the ever-magical concept of “The Culture War.”

What started some 10-plus current years ago because of the (then) latest improprieties in the comical world of gaming journalism, fanned by a litany of divisive Hollywood pap and the birth of a subsequent cottage industry bitching about it, amplified ten-fold by trapping everyone and their mothers inside their home with their electronic hell-mouth of choice for the better part of two years. The monoculture dissolves through the shattering of shared values and the perpetual atomization of internet, and we find ourselves in our current cultural moment. Over half the United States has thrown out the old administration in favor of a return to their prior break from the norm, and popular culture is a shattered landscape. Or rather, there is still a monoculture, but the radicalization of the political American has drawn them far away from that common denominator, however low it is deemed.

And all you fucking people can do is bitch about the same goddamn things you’ve been talking about for that very decade. Still on it about Disney Star Wars, still crying about shit you had to read in high school, still debating people about Starship Troopers with all the good faith of a Sonderzüge driver bound for Dachau. I’m not expecting the world to have changed on a dime because we just threw out the last half-decade’s status quo, and I certainly have no illusions about the rate of progress in fine art and popular entertainment. Because here’s the bitter truth.

No one cares.

Not in any meaningful way. Most people just want the diversion. Most are happy to idle for 90 minutes on a TikTok or Facebook reels, clock their dopamine, and call it entertainment. For the marginally more sophisticated animal among the normie population (of which there are objectively more of them then there are of you), you still have hundreds of thousands who will just play their AAA games, who will go to the latest big-name blockbuster (even as the numbers dwindle), and who will listen to whatever’s topping the charts because more people still listen to radio than any other audio format, even the much-cherished and attacked podcasting business.

They do not care what the neckbeard screaming about the M-She-U thinks. They do not care that “modern music is autotuned garbage,” an opinion based on the fact that “Believe” by Cher and the party pop craze of the ‘08 Recession exist. You are not winning hearts and minds crying about CIA funny-money in mid-century postmodern art, you are not a 4D chess wizard for bitching about The Great Gatsby.

For they simply do not care.

There is no one left to enter the gateway.

That leaves us with a self-congratulatory cottage industry of people complaining about problems they already know, with solutions they’ve already proposed, arguing in bad faith with people who attack them in bad faith.

I have been feeling sick to my stomach because this is what I have surrounded myself with for the better part of a year. I am not interested in naming names because that is pointless. If everyone in my immediate vicinity is doing it, and I’m the lone freak of nature that would actually like to find something more in life, then I suppose I’ll saunter off and sort myself out. And I’ve been doing just that, starting with a surreal ritual to take me right back to my roots: a movie marathon.

I have come to the terrible conclusion that good things have been made over the past 25 years and some of them are actually quite well-known too. This past Sunday was the day I decided to pop a couple of my cinephile cherries that had gone untouched.

My first David Fincher film about the ever-(in)famous Facebook, a beautifully performed film that reeks of the 2000s. Check.

Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive, a foundation piece of both synthwave culture and the Ryan Gosling Industrial Complex. Double check.

On the list went, including one of the finest films I’ve ever seen in my life: Deep Cover. Laurence Fishburne and Jeff Goldblum in a Bill Duke joint that’ll blow the back of your head off. Neon noir brilliance to the Nth degree.

I even managed to watch The Matrix and Dark City back-to-back, and came to another terrifying conclusion: both are awesome. None of this contrarian horseshit about latter besting the former. Both are damn good blockbusters with their own phenomenal sense of style, action, and atmosphere. I capped it off with my fifth (or was it sixth?) viewing of Blade Runner, where the sublime subtleties of the film sock you in the jaw, tied together the whole affair. A cleansing ritual that started high noon on Sunday, and right to high noon on Monday.

You know what gives me joy?

It’s not watching people throwing their inadequate tastes at one another on Xitter, scoring their paltry little wins for their side in the rat maze of modern social media.

It’s watching artists at the absolute apex of their powers. It’s watching that incredible film, listening to that incredible song, reading that incredible story. If I can bring that revelatory experience to an audience, whether as creator or curator, I will die the happiest man to have ever lived on this godforsaken third rock from the Sun.

You know how I’m NOT going to get there?

By persisting in this delusional, petty, low-rent rat-race to the bottom of the algorithmic barrel. I’m not going to get there by hot takes, news updates, or playing the trend game. I’m not going to get there by being a smarmy cunt screaming about films I don’t care about or bitching about music I don’t listen to.

When I say “The Culture War is Unwinnable,” this is what I mean. I mean that if we are simply here to whine and cry about shit we all already know to people who already get it, while “ze enemy” (in GIGANTIC air-quotes) has nowhere left to go culturally or creatively, then how does one WIN? Wars are meant to be WON. They are not meant to peter out into abstract stalemates like the one we are presently in. The fact of the matter is that technology has outpaced even politics as being an arch-culprit in the destruction of monoculture.

We have access to everything. Normies can watch/read/listen to WHATEVER they damn-well please. They aren’t going to come for your book or your comic or your film or your album because it is now competing not just with how much people want to protest “the left,” but how much effort they want to put into something NEW. They do not want to put a sliver of effort into that in a culture that has blessed them with the amount of convenience born from streaming. What they need are curators. They need those who can actually point them in the way of good, nourishing art.

The problem: the way “the right” has set their table, they couldn’t curate a fucking carpet color, let alone play tastemaker. Moreover, by focusing so hard on the political nonsense, they are simply alienating themselves from a public that are SICK TO DEATH of hyper-politicization. When people say they hate how everything is political, THAT MEANS YOU ASSHOLE! It ain’t just “the left,” Sweet Cheeks, it’s the whole fucking game. My answer to that is the same as it was by the end of cult favorite from ‘83, WarGames: “The only way to win is to not play.”

The Culture War is unwinnable because the problem is beyond politics. It is the fact that we have access to everything and have left curation in the hands of people whose only interests are keeping you slavishly glued to the system at all costs. These tools can be used to curate and enrich people’s engagement with the arts and entertainment, but the right is so fucking narrow-minded, they keep missing the forest for the trees, and forsake growth in the name of “ourguying” themselves out of civilization. And frankly, if the decision came down to “be an artist in a political space” or “be an artist beyond a political space,” I’m going BEYOND. Bed and Bath included. Because this is an evolutionary dead end for the arts. Nothing is getting done, no one thinks more than five feet ahead of themselves.

You got to reach people where they are, and while yes, many are still in their soma-induced pleasure-stupor surrounding mainstream entertainment, no one cares if it’s “woke” anymore. Are more people tuning out? Yes. The superhero craze is on its last legs, and whether the latest iteration of Superman soars or self-destructs, it’ll be what brings the house down. But that then begs the question of “where are they going?” And frankly—with no disrespect to the medium—anime and manga are not good answers.

It’s an industry riddled with workforce problems, a house of cards that can get brought down by one good act of meaningful reform, and a packed, decades-long back-catalogue that’ll snuff out interest in ANY Western media, indie or mainstream. Furthermore, Japan is not the West. There is osmosis for sure, but there are objectively different sensibilities at play, and in an age where people are getting more and more protectionist about American interests, outsourcing your entertainment is a dumb move. I say this as a man who does enjoy the fruits of that industry’s labor, but I like it to have some actual home-field competition.

How do we get there? How about, instead of trying to sell people on politicized art in an age where people are sick to fucking death of politics, we sell them on cool shit and remind them WHY it’s cool? We work backwards towards the unique meanings of art and entertainment instead of flailing your limbs wildly, pissing your pants about bananas on walls and hate-jizzing into them about the latest idpol identity swap in [INSERT MEDIA HERE]. How about, in an age where no one knows what the fuck they want to watch or listen to—or frankly HOW to watch and listen when most use media to silence their inner dialogue—we point people in the direction of the good kush as I often call it? The great fun stuff worth their time and attention

If it sounds like this impossible given the current climate in conservative media, that’s because it is. And that’s why I’m taking my things and going home. That’s why this newsletter is getting a five-alarm makeover and is becoming part of a much larger rebrand and relaunch.

I’m done justifying my tastes. I’m done pretending like arguing on the internet means anything anymore. I hate this. I hate the entire godforsaken system, and if it was a tangible entity, I would firebomb it into the ground. I would hack a drone, and strike it down like a terror cell in the Middle East. I would raze the machinery, and tear the building down brick-by-brick with a sledgehammer and my bare hands. I always keep saying that I’m glad I never became a pundit, but this is the moment where I officially cut that shit off. I have nothing left to say on the whole “RW art” discourse. Nothing. There are good things being made out in the world, and I frankly don’t give a shit if they’re made by card-carrying communist or a maniac 3rd positioner. If Curtis Yarvin broke into my house, dropped a Great American Novel on my lap with his name on it, I would sing the praises of that book as a book if it spoke to me.

I like jazz, love it in fact. I like certain Rothkos and Pollocks. I like Charles Ives. I am down to read Joyce or Fitzgerald. The ending of “The Dead” from Dubliners is objectively one of the finest pieces of writing in the English language. What I don’t like is listening to a bunch of (ironically enough) sound and digital fury crapping on these things because we’re supposed to because some conspiracy from before I was born made these forms of art and artist null and void.

That’s bullshit and you can fuck yourself kindly for thinking so. None of this is up for debate, because that’s not why I’m writing this. There is no getting me back on-side, there’s no “telling it how it is.” These are my opinions, and I’m done justifying them to the world. What matters is that I like them, and I like them just as much as I enjoy reading The Shadow pulps or my Marvel Conan comics or watching the Godzilla films. I will sing the praises of Stravinsky’s Rites of Spring just as I would any of the great Beethoven symphonies. I will share my love of Miles Davis and his electric era in the same breath as I would the works of the impressionists like Ravel, Satie, and Debussy.

Because the insecurity is gone. I am a dangerous animal to be having in any creative space right now because I am young, hungry, passionate, and without shame. That doesn’t mean I’ll write a million theme and variations on 4’33” to “PWN DA RIGHT,” nor does it mean I’m going to make my SUPERBASEDMAN comic series where we all scream about The Gays™ for 20 pages a shot. It means something much more deadly:

I will make what I like, and I will share it with whomever enjoys it. Whatever I enjoy, I will share gladly with those willing to try. I’m keeping everything from this iteration of the newsletter available as my lone act of “filtering.” If you can stomach the remains of this 20-something’s bloviating, fantastic! If not, sorry to see you go, but go with God regardless.

There is no future in this iteration of the Culture War. The one who wins this is the one who manages to crack the code on curating. The one who understands that the key is in finding the commonalities, promote them, and pivot. The key is in finding and celebrating what resonates, ideology be damned, and pointing people in its direction. I plan to play that role of curator because I’m better than every sorry soul I’ve seen try. You’re all scrubs. You’re about to be outdone by a 23-year-old running on the piss and vinegar of a college experience dashed by COVID and a burning desire to break out of this pathetic infrastructure built to enrich some talking heads and foster fistfights on the bow of the Titanic.

The next time I post on here will be different. This entire newsletter is about to change. Buckle up.

Following on from last time, I want to explore that act of moving on some more as I’ve come to a small revelation. Running on pure gut-level instinct here, so any-and-all discourse is welcome.

The epiphany is thus: I think the 2020s are the true-birth of the 21st century.

The 2000s were immediately occupied with a brief reveling in the new millennium before the last terrors of the 20th century reared their head. Tech-wear, globulous architecture and chromium-plated pop music videos, once heralding a techno-utopia, dashed in a bubble’s burst and the calamitous destruction of two towers on a fateful Manhattan morn. Not even two full years into the dawn of a new age did the shadow of the old smother the hopes and optimism of the new.

The 2010s were an attempt to hold together the remains of the 20th century after that setback. Continuing to reel from the War on Terror, continuing to persist in the old ways of the neoliberal-neoconservative kickball game. Even when disruption came in 2016, there was still the gnashing of teeth and wailing of the old guard. Sick, elderly politicians holding onto power with their dying breaths, moldering before rolling television cameras.

We were swamped in nostalgia for the last remains of the 20th century. Waist-deep in an 80s love-in, powered by synthwave, slasher films and icons of modern pop culture. A 90s love-in was on the horizon (not accounting for the sheer lack of progress past the decade) and the mid-century was mined for the comic cinema craze brought on by the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the resurrection of franchises nearly or well-over a half-century old. Star Wars, Star Trek, Ghostbusters, Halloween, the lot. Legacy sequels and side-tangents, all revived and/or reimagined for new generations.

Then, at the top of our third decade in this new millennium, everything stopped.

The world stopped for nearly (or over, region-dependent) two years straight. We were locked up with the latest iterations of the technology and social media apparatuses, force-fed the agonies of the world through pocket-sized obsidian slabs and crisp 16:9 screens. We were treated to miseries unparalleled, caught in everything from bodycam footage to slanted media coverage, witnessing a social devolution in real-time, helpless to do anything but watch the inmates rule the asylum. Fraught elections, evermore fraught fallouts, and what felt like a decade unto itself. When we were let out of the cage at last, dopamine-addled and maladjusted, we were forced to contend with a completely different world than that which we left behind December 31st, 2019. The graft, the lies, the distrust and divisions fostered in the name of empathy and redressed grievances; it had been seen, and it could no longer be unseen.

Even when it all seemed hopeless, even when it all seemed like we would be forced to endure further divisions, when it seemed like civil wars were set to consume the whole of the world: something changed. Obviously, this is where the 2024 United States election comes in, but beyond that is the truth of incumbent governments the world over—those ever-faithful custodians of the status quo—being shown the door. Some shifts left, others right. More fascinating in the afterglow of the American election, two months hence, is the lack of action from opposition. I’m not talking about congressmen or the magical dissolution of the old media structures. I mean a grassroots depression among the most rabid of the far-left, and the most milquetoast of moderates alike. Instead of riots or a reverse January 6th…nothing. A stillness among the left-wing body politic, even with the roaring din of media reporting.

This article by James Pogue for Vanity Fair (don’t mind the paywall, there’s an audio version attached) finally put some of this into perspective for me, and helped me realize why I’ve been on this tear, reevaluating the doldrums of things like modern pop music, or why I write about what I write about as a creative.

They really did not see this coming.

No one was ready for the 21st century to finally begin. No one was ready for a complete, genuine paradigm shift to be thrust forward in the manner it had. Listening to the article Infighting. Panic. Blame. A Special Report From Inside the Democratic Party’s Epic Hangover carries with it an air of almost apocalyptic doom. Like anyone upon watching The Day After in 1983, unprepared for the watershed depiction of nuclear devastation on primetime, ad-free network television. You see the little people with their myopic view of the world. A myopia not wholly malicious, but ignorant; they have but only their frame of reference. Nothing more, nothing less.

The moment I heard the opening relaying of a “Hotties for Harris” campaign party with the mental image of one David Hogg—a man but one year my senior—as guest, proclaiming the Dems as the true party of the youth, only to get blown the hell out by youth turnout for Trump in the short-term future, I knew Pogue’s article was going to hit like mortars on the beaches of Normandy.

Hell, even I wasn’t even ready for the 21st century to begin. Look at what I watch, read, and write. My veil of old, archaic, borderline antique art and entertainment went from nostalgia for times long since past—faerie-tales of mythic golden ages—to a simple rejection of the times in which I was living through the sheer dearth of meaning they afforded me. True nostalgia, something intimate and personal regarding your own lived experiences, never even factored into this equation; it was pure escape. Escapism from a miserable reality, miserable people, and a culture set adrift aesthetically and politically. A lack of vision I had tarred and feathered all media past the year of my birth with.

Social media pummels you with information overload, mainstream movies have become half-hearted and abysmally-produced IP placeholders. Music might never be in a healthier place artistically, but we are so fractured, there is seldom more than five songs binding us on any given playlist that isn’t from a time when we still had a monoculture. It is no wonder that I continue to look backwards for inspiration, because I felt the hole in my malnourished soul, and sought sustenance.

And then I realized I actually liked some of what this century had to offer. There are movies and songs from the past 25 years that genuinely spoke to me, visionaries whose great works took shape within my lifetime. Following this and the election came the sudden realization how silly so many of our hyper-fixations have become. Focusing our ire on things we have no control over when there are plenty of actionable items on the menu. How meaningless all the propaganda, the corrupted visages of classic franchises, the brainless scrolling that social media inspires. Intelligence-insulting thumbnails, tripe and trash galore when there are so many more wonderful, inspiring, and beautiful things to be done.

It was in this that I finally realized: I am living here. I am living now. I was not born in time to be a part of Roger Corman’s Informal Film School for Cinema Legends. I was not born in time to see space-travel as commonplace as taking the bus or subway. I was born in time to be me, in the here-and-now. That all the great joys of life are coming down the pike, so long as I make sure to be ready for them. So long as I show up, accept the world I’m in, and make of it what I wish.

It would’ve been nice to not have taken the entire upending of my college experience, my mental wellbeing, and society at large, but hey, as the old saying goes: to make an omelet, you got to break a few eggs. And in the words of W.A.S.P. frontman Blackie Lawless: “and if that’s the case, we’re going in and raping the whole damn henhouse.”

It was a torrent of pain and anguish, teeth-pulling powered by a V8 block. At the end of it all, however, the slate is being cleared. Room is being made for the future, and we can actually build something properly new. Not new in the vain hope of innovation, but new applications of known truths. Restoring what worked, and ensure it works for all as best it can. There’s no Pollyanna promises in this endeavor; there is only moving forward into the brighter future and ensuring it glows like the sun. I’d like to think I was born just in time for that. And I have a good feeling that I am. And so are you.

First off…allow me to instigate your existential crisis with the knowledge that we are now halfway through a decade whose first two years felt like an epoch unto themselves. I’ve been slowly closing the door on the confusion and frustrations experienced during that fraught time, and one method of achieving this was slowly coming out of my curmudgeonly shell about contemporary music.

For those not in the know, not only do I write music for short films, audio shows, and my own amusement, but I happen to love listening to music too! I’ve got scores of records, cassettes, and CDs as well as loads of playlists for work and play. The problem, you see, is that most of what I enjoy was written well before I was born. I am THAT kind of 20-something. The kid who had the nostalgia boner for times he was never privileged enough to endure. The kid who does his best writing to crusty-old library music and gets inspired by rare 80s metal records and 60s jazz albums. That kind of genetic freak y’know.

It was during college that I did start entertaining the idea of enjoying things from the time I happened to be born in, and not for nothing, I grew up enjoying the music of contemporaries from the synthwave genre and adjacent movements. It also helped that, contrary to all previous knowledge, MTV DOES still play music videos. Only on their college-focused cable channel MTVU, of which I was able to watch in my dorm. However, once I left college and joined the slog of the real world where you got work to do and precious little time to piss away scrolling for tunes (though you’ll do it regardless), I retreated to my cozy alcove of crate-digging and largely stayed there.

Until recently.

This reevaluation was a two-for-one special, instigated by not only my experience watching the Super Bowl this year—having not seen a game (or a Halftime show as cool as The Weeknd’s) since 2021—but in particular the two moments of pop stardom intersecting with the big game. I didn’t give it much thought at first, but this exceptional article by got in my head and stayed with me, as well as some fascinating reactions I saw on social media in the heat of the blitz.

The first, naturally, is the Halftime show, this time helmed by Cali’s own rap savant, Kendrick Lamar. Now real talk: I dig rap. In fact, I’ve clocked Ready to Die by The Notorious B.I.G. as one of my favorite albums of all-time. Top 3, easy. I’m not here to jeer and sneer about the genre, the culture, any of it. If it works, it works, and Lamar has proven himself to be a truly singular talent, world-renowned.

And then I kept seeing posts about people mentioning how many relatives, parents and other elders had never even heard of the man.

We’re not going to talk about the stark symbolism, the entertaining interludes by Samuel L. Jackson as “Uncle Sam,” or even the honestly amazing braggadocio on display in the lead up to a wild performance of “Not Like Us,” the final hammer-blow in an epic saga of hip-hop beef between him and a substantially disgraced Canadian titan by the name of Drake.

I want you to process the fact that a 22-time Grammy winner, one of the most beloved figures in a massively popular genre, being completely unknown to a large swath of the American public. This isn’t a diss, this isn’t meant to belittle the man’s talent or body of work. This is a moment of reflection. Reflection on how a man known to millions, who has sold millions, can still be unknown by millions before February 9th, 2025. And the fact of matter is, I know the answer, and it’s one the things that helped propel him to his elite status in the rap game: the internet.

In an age where music reviewers largely dwell on YouTube and Pitchfork, where fandoms rabidly consume the latest releases the second they drop, where there has never been more access to more music in the entire history of Man, it is often hard to realize just how atomized we’ve become. The mainstream is only the mainstream by virtue of its infrastructure alone. It’s the mainstream because of several decades-old companies—some kissing a century of existence—growing to a size bordering on too big to fail. Lamar himself, while co-owning his company PGLang, works with labels like Interscope and Aftermath, both of which fly the parent flag of Universal Music Group. Lamar has had serious studio backing since his lauded 2012 release Good Kid, M.A.A.D City. He’s gone from indie mixtapes to industry legend status, album after album, Billboard smash after Billboard smash. And yet, look up “not knowing Kendrick Lamar” on a site like X, and amid the remains of the feud, you’ll find posts like this who genuinely admit to not being familiar with his work.

This phenomenon is not unusual, and not exclusive to music. In his excellent video “Our Culture is Eating Itself,” Solar Sands makes several mentions in his conclusion about major financial successes of the past few years enjoying a nonexistent place in popular culture. Everything from Dreamworks sequel Kung Fu Panda 4 to legacy prequels like Wonka, films that objectively made hundreds of millions, leaving a nonexistent impact on popular culture. It is perfectly possible for a work of modern entertainment or art to be seen and heard by millions, but to fade from view as soon as it arrives.

Because it’s never been easier to ignore the mainstream.

In the age of streaming and stan culture, an age where information and media move at a rate unprecedented, through a wide array of mediums, it has never been easier to simply opt out of what’s popular, and even more-so to just miss out entirely. When I started getting back into contemporary music, I found myself jamming to Foster the People’s “Pumped Up Kicks” a great deal.

For the bassline, I swear.

It was during this revisiting of a now decade-old breakout hit that I discovered that the band had dropped a brand-new album, and it included a song that captured the bittersweet feeling of time passing by, mistakes made, and the chance to step into the future with weight off your shoulders. The perfect tune for my mood.

“Chasing Low Vibrations” is the kind of song I wish I had in college, but also the kind of song that tells me it’s okay to let go of that feeling and move on. A killer downtempo jam with slick grooves, cassette-faded synths and a catchy-as-all-hell chorus. It really feels like the gallant return of an early 10s indie darling.

Let’s see how it sold:

Well shit.

That kinda sucks. But at the same time, did that matter to me when I first discovered the record and the songs on it? Hell no! I’ve probably accounted for at least a hundred of those nearly 3,000,000 plays on Spotify of the single alone—a whopping 34 cents! Jokes aside, my summer jam was a track that did not chart on an album that lasted one week on the Billboard 200. And I’m not any less enriched because of those paltry figures. Hell, when I crawled out from under a rock and discovered one of the great pop success stories of the year, Sabrina Carpenter, her ascent to star status didn’t really factor into my love of the music. I chucked on a track like “Please Please Please” or “Espresso,” dug the nu-disco affectations and her vocals, and carried on.

A more pointed (and admittedly more hostile) version of this apathy to mainstream success comes in the form of that other moment from the Super Bowl.

Taylor Swift.

Taylor “Highest Grossing Concert Tour Ever” Swift.

Taylor “Bet On The Wrong Horse, This Time” Swift.

The eminent pop goddess of our modern era, who hasn’t courted a fraction of the controversy accrued by past monoculture idols like Michael Jackson, getting booed to hell-and-back at the Super Bowl. The woman more well-known than the Halftime headliner thanks to her start and eternal rotation in country music before breaking out into pop. The woman now booed at the very same game where a recently-reelected President Donald J. Trump received an explosive ovation during the National Anthem. The candidate she and essentially every other major pop artist, from Beyoncé to Cardi B to scores more, did not back in the 2024 Election.

That was how she was greeted in New Orleans when they got her on the jumbotron.

Musicians beloved by critics with massive fanbases are not fully a part of popular culture. Great music by former hitmakers can exist happily away from the Everestian heights of the sales charts. The artists who are supposed to be the modern equivalents of the Elvises, Jacksons, Beatles and more, are being shouted down by the layman.

Pop music may never be in a healthier space artistically. Artists are free to do whatever they wish. They can say anything, make anything, and provided they’ve got a built-in fanbase or a knack for the wirework of music promotion, they’ll be all set for life so long as they keep cranking out the tunes or create a strong enough body of work to rest their laurels on. Taylor Swift is talented. Kendrick Lamar is downright electrifying at his best. But so are the Foster the Peoples of the world, forgotten after their wonderous one-hit. So are artists like a George Clanton or a JW Francis, indie artists with their own aesthetics and ideas miles away from mainstream radio and chart success.

Popular music, however, has never been more dead. Because the monoculture that once anointed kings and queens of the radio—some of whom like Swift are late beneficiaries—has faded away. Divisive election after divisive election, headline after headline, all piped into the phones, computers and televisions of a nation increasingly divided over all manner of identitarian lines.

Back in the day, everyone leapt to buy Thriller. It had something for everyone, from hard rockers to post-disco dancers. Today, The Tortured Poets Department is beloved by fans, reasonably well-regarded by critics, has broken damn-near every record in book. Yet for all the success, it means nothing to the common wheel as they gather for one of the few traditions that still binds America as a country (just barely at that if you believe the political commentariat). I don’t know when the day will come when it feels like we’re all connected by that one great track or that one jaw-dropping performance, but I do hope it comes after some healing of the divides we’ve been enduring for a decade-plus. It’s nice to actually be a part of something, y’know?

If you want to dig some of what I’ve been listening to, I got a playlist up on Spotify. Covers about a 33-year span tunes (the 90s are there to ease the pain). The fuel for this slow exercise of affirming that, yes, I am in fact living in the 21st century. If you’re new here, welcome.

It’s gonna be a wild ride.

ADDENDUM. February 21st.

I just completely forgot that last year saw one of the rare, grassroots promotional campaigns of pop music, and its implosion from under the weight of political co-opting. I remember when one of my filmmaking friends shared tracks from hyperpop star Charli XCX and her new album Brat. I was digging what I was hearing, and kept a couple of songs in my playlists.

What I didn’t realize was that “Brat Summer” was going to become a thing, and that said “Brat Summer” in all its green Arial glory was going to burn up as fast as it arrived in the modern equivalent of “Pokémon Go to the Polls.”

I don’t think I’ll do this better than Hadji here, so dig this video:

I’m writing this less as an act of therapy and more a script for a podcast I might record some day. I’ve got a lot of things on my mind that don’t fit neatly with my current career path of interdisciplinary world domination, and I think it’ll be good to get these out before I overhaul this newsletter into a more productive space.

Today concerns something I only talk about when asked about: college. I’ll spare the poor school the ignominy because everything frustrating about the college experience boils down to one word: pandemic.

I loved what the program was offering, the locale, and best of all, the price. In fact, to shed some happy news before we dive in, I was 100% debt-free by the ordeal’s end thanks to a real blessing of a financial aid package. I do not owe the school a red cent.

This will be important later.

I graduated a high school valedictorian (of a class size of 30, steady on) in June 2019 and dove into my first semester that August. I went through all the teething troubles of being away from home, and I wasn’t exactly in the best space mentally at the time. The cruelty of public school teendom really came into focus during the last few years of high school, and I was still pulling myself back together. Add to that the sudden change in my life, and you wind up with fertile ground for an existential crisis. I got over that, finished the semester (not without some egregious first projects), and had an otherwise enjoyable winter break. It was a good, healing process that made me feel right as rain and ready to take advantage of the school.

You see, I was going for film, and I knew exactly what I was doing. I wasn’t expecting to be whisked away to Hollywood by the bachelor’s end; I was here to build a portfolio. I was here to share my vast knowledge of film history and wield it in the making the work I finally wanted to make. I wanted to experiment, to push my high-contrast, noir interests. I was here to make friends and collaborators.

What I wasn’t here for was a virus of ill-gotten origin to spread its tendrils across the globe and upend all of functioning society for a solid two years.

My 2020 Spring semester was spent back home. My 2020 Fall was spent in my dorm, or donning those ever-famous masks. 2021 was a hand-crafted depression factory, from an underwhelming stint as production assistant over the summer to the breakdown-inducing discovery of overexposed film in the fall. Worst of all offenses, however, was a class meant for portfolio building that spring getting hijacked for some bizarre side-quest that took up a third of the semester and yielded no results. What was supposed to be a “make one short a week” class became a nightmare of sociopolitical posturing which, in the end, amounted to weeks wasted.

It wasn’t until my Cinematography Final at the bitter end of 2021 that I felt like I was coming into my own. It also helped that, during that tedious P.A. gig over the summer, I spent the idle hours cooking up a certain science fiction project familiar to you regulars here. 2022 marked the final uptick where I was making more of what I wanted again, being drafted to help others make more of what they wanted, and at long last, a senior thesis. The coup de grâce. And I mean that.

It was a hard-won victory muddied by some poor speakers, the simple fact it was ultimately a rough cut, and the fact that I was going to check in with my cast and some of my crew for the rest of the screening…only to find out they were off to see Wakanda Forever. I was later told, months after graduation in December, that the film was still regarded as something of a triumph for the department.

What I glanced over in this brief summation of the work were long nights in tears, depressed over a clarity of vision I couldn’t achieve until nearly the end of my time at school, but also the sheer alienation of living under the strictures of the pandemic. You can’t make those meaningful connections, it’s hard to deepen the surface-level friendships even beyond the usual difficulties there, and you always feel at odds with everything. Professors don’t understand you because you’re a box on the screen, your peers don’t understand you because you’re about a decade older than them on the inside, and you’re also visibly poorer than most others in terms of gear.

That or I was a wiser spender.

You feel like wasted space, you don’t feel like anyone will care about your work when it’s finished. Hell, I was once told a short of mine had “white supremacy” and “school shooter” vibes because of my use of heavy metal imagery in an EXPLICITLY GENRE context. It was a piece of sci-fi poetry, pulling on themes from my work on 365 Infantry, and that was the response I got. You feel like you can’t plead your case over a Zoom call, you feel like an atlas no one wants to read in a field they could most benefit.

You feel fucking lonely, man. There was no focused introvert, because I’m not really an introvert. There is nothing lonelier in the world than an extrovert unable to make connections, and that was what college became. That was me for two years straight. I had to sneak into the dorms of the few friends I had made like a fucking drug dealer, and even then, they were fleeting visits spent venting and vegging. Even the gains made in 2022 were soured by the mental health sewer I was in, and the feeling of never being enough for myself.

With all of this, you’d never guess that I graduated Summa Cum Laude, would you?

I have the robe to prove it, but I’ve never taken a photo of myself in it. All my family has are screenshots from the livestream, and some taken from those who could be in attendance. Never bought the formal photographs, never even slid the diploma into the leather case until nearly a year later, even after it arrived in the mail a few months after the ceremony.

I’ve made good work in college. I’d even go so far as to say I have a portfolio. I made a thesis film that apparently has some serious staying power. And yet, I felt like college was a three-year whirlwind of nothing. I try to look back with the class half-full, but someone always drinks it on me. It’s the reason why, if I ever go to grad school, I am probably going to act more like a business executive in negotiations than a student looking for further education. I don’t ever want what happened to me in those three years to ever happen again. I wouldn’t wish that shit on my worst enemy. If I’m paying, and sacrificing my current status as debt-free, to go to your school, I want everything you fucking promise or else. It’s on me to make of the most of things, but it’s on the school to afford me the chances I am paying it to.

That’s why I get real bitter about college, and why I only talk about it when asked. I titled this piece “Jilted Lover Syndrome” because that’s how I feel about college. I got the luckiest hand anyone could ask for. A free ride in a program that afforded students a tabula rosa to learn and explore. Lovely staff, solid equipment. I knew what I wanted, I knew that the diploma was little more than a formality. What was important was the work I made, and I wanted to make the most of it. All of that got snapped away for two years straight. I made the most of what I could, but I was promised the chance for more, and if I had that luxury, I would’ve grabbed it by the throat. Instead, here I sit your local zoomer on the web, typing on a computer in a rural house in the dead of a New England winter. Grey skies, leafless branches, and a bitch of a shoveling job if I want to walk anywhere without slipping.

Recently—thanks to some of my SoCal inspired projects and Y2K curiosities—I’ve grown fascinated by surfers and skateboarding. Not just all that pap about the human body in motion, but about the sensations. Water on skin, catching air, grinding on a rail. Most of all, I’m fascinated by the communities arrayed around. The friends who go the skatepark or hit the beach. I’m fascinated by skate videos and surf films. It’s the same kind of fascination I have with hot rodding culture.

I wish I could’ve filmed some skaters back at school. There was a solid space for them on campus, I saw them everyday between classes and on the weekends. I wish I could’ve shot some of the street-racing shenanigans one of my dorm-room neighbors was up to. I wish I could’ve gotten out of my head and have actually been a part of a community instead of constantly alienated by circumstance.

I may have gotten over what transpired, but I don’t necessarily forgive what happened to me, because I got fucked. An entire generation got fucked. And when they ask us what was taken, why so many young men swung rightward, some will say housing, some will say mobility or love. Some will talk about the identarian villainizing. I will be here to say, “I didn’t get what I fucking paid for.” Or as I often like to joke, “I basically went to college for free and I got just what I paid for.”

The blessing of my mental well-being is that I know now those opportunities will come. They may come in the spring if I head over to a local park and just ask “mind if I grab some shots?” It’ll come in the following years when I’m able to leave this state and travel more. Everything I want to do in my life will be done, because no matter what the doom-saying creep says, relishing in the despair of the early 2020s, life goes on. People are still on the move. All hope is not lost. Things will get better, things will get more affordable. I will own a kickass classic car one day. I will be living in a nice place where I can catch up the local crew. Hell, I might even take lessons—I’m only 23, even if I don’t write like it.

All the same, while I’ve managed to fill the three-year hole in my soul with some of my most rewarding creations yet (and many more to come), I still feel it at the edges, waiting for the piece to cure. That day will come. Just not today, although penning this has helped. Till next time.

While I’m still plotting that video exploring the right’s failings in arts and entertainment and prospective points of success, I’m finding myself increasingly disinterested in the topic, and that came to a head recently. The news is out that an infamous conceptual piece sold again for millions. Last night, having been to above my head with talk of it, I penned another of my venomous screeds, admonishing those who keep giving this work “power” instead of doing quite frankly anything else. And when I awoke, I found myself in the unusual position of a bit more disagreement than such outbursts normally court. I vented with peers, who also gave me some more push-pull as well. I deleted it so I could focus on work instead of wasting anymore hours on X than I already had.

And then a certain feeling came wrenching through my gut.

It wasn’t the piercing of an echo chamber, nor the indignity of being “wrong,” because to be blunt, I’m not. Unless you’re kicking down the door with a Bren Ten screaming “FREEZE” on your alleged money launderers, or you’re publicly and consistently countersignaling this nonsense with actual art you value, it is a waste of time. If you are doing these things: great, bitch all you like. If not, you are part of the problem.

Moreover, this banana living rent-free in the zeitgeist’s head for half-a-decade did contribute to its increased value. In the same way hate-watching delivers dollars and relevance into the hands of companies that spit in your face, the fact “Comedian” has remained something of a icon for the Dadaist insanity of modern fine art has unfortunately blessed it with a substantial reputation. A right-time, right-place expression of bizarre banality that pissed off enough people and ensured itself a small place in art history. If you want to feel better about yourself, say you helped “prank” a millionaire into buying a banana on a wall. But by that virtue, aren’t you now the “comedian” Cattelan titled the piece after?

The sensation, in truth, had nothing to do with the blowback, or the banana. It was the feeling of becoming something I loathe and detest: the angry pundit.

Earlier that night, after fits and starts in my writing, I sat down for an animated short film. 1962’s The Hole, directed by husband-wife duo John & Faith Hubley, the former a legend of style icons United Productions of America (UPA). It was an improvised conversation between construction workers, animated in the Hubleys’ unique mid-century modern styles, and performed by jazz artist Dizzy Gillespie and long-time Hollywood heavy George Matthews. It was a slow burner at first, one that grew into an exchange equal parts funny and furious, with kitchen-table Cold War conversations soon dominating the proceedings. And all throughout it, I was enjoying myself, and was floored by its finale. As a chaser, I dug up an old abstract Jordan Belson short, 1959’s High Voltage. All the Cold War talk made it feel like staring at three minutes-worth of nuclear fallout, and I felt the palette had finally been cleansed. I was thinking straight again, I felt like I was gonna.

And then I saw that “Comedian” had sold for $6M and the rightoid social media ecosystem was banging the same useless drum they had for five-plus years.

And then I made that post.

And then I saw the reaction.

And then I realized: I had just wasted whatever energy cultivated the night before on screaming at strangers screaming about a banana on a wall into the black hole that is internet discourse and social media.

And Christ, do I regret it. Not because I fear reprisal or conversation, but because of the futility of it all. I am at my best when learning or creating. It’s how I make my money, it’s how I keep sane, and it’s how I cut my teeth and improve my talents. That one post triggered a flood of realizations, about the abject insanity of social media, of the absolute vacuum of productivity made by scrolling through feeds of shit you don’t need, things you can’t buy, and opinions you’re better off without.

How many hours have I wasted on that godforsaken site, trying to convince people who are either not there, already on side, or too thick to think? How many mad ramblings have I vomited into the ether, never to see the light of day again after their 48 hours of circulation, if they circulate at all? Sure I’ve made friends there, but those friendships can be reached via email and phone and Discord. There was once a time when it was easy to grow your platform, but now you’ve got a million angles of attack to pierce this ineffable black box we call “the algorithm.” Not to mention that the very platform upon which I’m writing this is still effectively suppressed over on the only platform I have a substantial following on, which has reduced cross-pollination.

Then another thought: how many people, who could make the world a better place, who could get up and really make something terrific, are permanently trapped in this cycle of outrage and low-effort dopamine? How many are just thumb-flicking their way through life, venting outrages without a hope in hell of effecting any change?

Even if not a single soul currently using social media was that inebriated by its nature, the thought of at least hundreds of thousands of people like that scared me shitless. Even if it was impossible for the common man to become terminally online, the potential to become that angry, gamer-chair bound man, forever shrieking at a computer screen or a phone, is almost cosmic in its horror.

That revelation wasn’t the only part of the gut-wrench, though. The other part was a good old-fashioned case of “we’re not so different, you and I.”

Am I fully justified in wanting to focus my attention on actual positive change instead of wallowing in a conversation I’ve seen spinning its wheels for years? You bet your ass I am. But at the same time, there are people who, given the sudden shift in the political winds, may genuinely only just now be hip to a lot of weird cultural shit. And part of my problem was assuming that everyone is already on the same page. The pundit’s excuse is that they’re getting paid to bang the gong, but the truth of the matter is that not everyone’s a pundit.

That said, I do still think that we’re stuck in a system that hinges more on the engagement gained through negativity than through positive impact, and that’s the last part of this: I played the game that I hate, and I won the only prizes there were. Like the protracted reeing over bananas on walls led to its inflated value, to what end does being an angry schmuck online actually break people out of their continuum?

The honest answer is that it doesn’t. It’s just more blood for the blood gods, more white noise to pollute the information superhighway. It’s too easy to let the venom get to you and to give it free rein on a platform where no one can come to your door and personally split your skull over an opinion.

Insert overused R.E. Howard quote here.

It’s too easy to be an asshole online, and the fact of the matter is, it only pays to be one if you go in wholesale, and make it your main M.O. And as vicious as I can get at times, it truthfully isn’t my M.O. I’m not here to be the next “Comicsgate King,” nor an internet bloodsports gladiator, nor the next TurkeyTom video in your feed. I happen to enjoy the arts and entertainment. I wouldn’t be making movies, music or other forms of fiction if I didn’t. I wouldn’t have cultivated such a wide base of knowledge if I didn’t. And I think, in conjunction on my recent election treatise, this is the final nail in the coffin for me really getting up in arms about these things politically and sociologically.

The video’s still coming, but the tone and style of everything has changed, because I realized that all the old ways are not working anymore. We’re not in the old world anymore, we’re not living thru “The End of History.” It isn’t the 200X, it isn’t 201X, and it sure as hell ain’t 2020-2023 anymore. I’m not interested in what I already know, I’m not interested in playing ideological favorites, and I’m not interested in being an angry idiot online. I’m interested in the future. I’m interested in building and believing in it rather than sign its death warrant on a daily basis by not working towards it. I’d rather be productive and fulfilled, even if it means I miss out on “discourse” and hot topics, than be screaming into the void, because in the end, it’s not worth energy expended.

To quote Mark Twain (however apocryphal the attribution itself may be): “Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.” Although by that definition, maybe this was all just a case of heartburn. I’ll pop some TUMS and get back to work.

I’M BAAACK! Though not in the way I anticipated. The TL;DR is that I just bashed out a very passionate piece on my 365 INFANTRY Twitter/X account that is secretly the basis of a much longer video essay. Working on a piece concerning this unending cycle of right-wing do-nothingery in the domain of art/entertainment/culture-building. This isn’t edited, this isn’t the full script, but I think the emotions of it are right for now. Let me know your thoughts in the comments of this one, really looking forward to having a conversation about it.

Essay time with JC, putting the blue check to use. While I keep an explicitly apolitical project, I do tend to float around right-leaning circles as they happen to cater to the brand of old-school pulp and SFF that I dig. But every time this godforsaken conversation happens, it's the exact same & the results are the exact same. Allow me to pitch my two cents on why.

The right is abysmal at the art & entertainment game because the right is incapable of building an actual coalition. Objectively, there is no dearth of talent. Plenty of incredible writers, musicians, game devs & filmmakers are in this space. And while the coffers aren't infinite, there are plenty of investors floating in the ether.

Where the trouble begins is when the two try to meet. Most independents (especially those who didn't have a decade-plus to establish their brand in parts elsewhere), are trying to revive older styles, classic ideals, and more that are spiritually inline with the right's general wants & needs, but at odds with the modern entertainment landmark. Conversely, the new media establishment's knack for being trendy & focusing on ROI means they'll keep up with the zeitgeist, but will end up being little more than the left's opposite number. Disney makes a shitty version of [blank], millions must scream. DEI is a hot-button issue, here comes Daily Wire with a hot-button response. There's a reason why damn-near everyone short of party-liners hated THE NEW NORM. Why does anyone want a right-wing animated version of ALL IN THE FAMILY that's all about how everything is shit and nothing is good anymore? "Relatable" ≠ Good.

One side (indies) can't make cultural change off of work foreign to the masses, and the other side (new media) makes its money off work with zero aspirations and a shelf-life to match. All that matters if that it makes its money back, and inevitably rewards more of its kind, instead of what's needed. Neither is able to hear out the others' case. To be blunt, the indies grinding it out without any true patronage sound like whiners looking for handouts, and the new establishment types look tone-deaf and out-of-touch with the artists and underserved audiences they'll inevitably have to court.

My final straw, however, is this election cycle. I'm a zoomer. I'm being constantly told my generation doesn't have a future, Gen Alpha beneath me is DOA, and I keep seeing pundits all over the right talking about this moment in time as the "end of history." If I'm to be a part of the "conservative counterculture," what's the fucking point of being part of a counterculture that won't live to see another day? What's the point of "building your own platform" if the same kinds of people behind shit like AM I RACIST are the ones blackpilling you out of a country?

On the right's own terms, AM I RACIST is a pyrrhic victory. It legitimizes the Daily Wire and their aims for a media empire in the twilight of Western civilization. All the other artists, writers, musicians, filmmakers, game devs who wish to celebrate heroism, adventure, the indominable human spirit left to twist in irradiated wind because boomers & Gen X cons can't stand the idea of matching the left in anything other than rhetoric. They don't dare outspend them, they don't dare cultivate a genuine sense of aesthetics or depth.

This is why I can't consider anything I ever do "right wing art/entertainment." Not even because I don't fit the ideological boxes of the political spectrum, not even because I genuinely welcome all who enjoy my work, regardless of ideology, but because the Right in the West is broken. It is dysfunctional beyond repair. There are a million variants of "dissident right-winger" that will fight amongst themselves, and only break to deal with this tired-ass conversation of mainstream conservatives asking "where's muh good stories/where's muh western art," and then spitting in the face of tens of thousands trying to make something of worth that may line-up with what they espouse, but will "never make it."

My best years as a creator and a man aren't going to be spent trapped in a defeatist ideology that would sooner die fighting itself then tend to any of its external threats. You can blame all the external factors in the world for why you can't back an SFF revival on the right, or why you can't patron a sculptor, but the simple fact remains you're all trapped in a never-ending cycle of chicken v. egg that'll end in a deep fryer and an iron skillet. Not only am I bypassing all this idiocy by giving up on the idea of "conservative/RW art & entertainment," but I am going to overcome all of this out of spite. Because if nothing else, I'll laugh my ass off at the idea of a furry sci-fi magazine outdoing the entire RW media machine. Besides, if you're born to lose, might as well live to win. It's what Lemmy would do.

Another layup, this time with some history. In 2022, I first discovered the Storyhack anthology series Sidearm & Sorcery, and was intrigued by the premise of nonmagical characters contending with fantasy scenarios, and for two years…I was cockblocked by life itself from submitting. Be it thanks to college or private matters IRL, and through no fault of Bryce or any of the talented authors involved, my inability to find the time for the idea pissed me off. Like “threatened to sour me on the whole thing” pissed me off.

Until now.

Consider this my sidearm-and-sorcery pitch-reel, a small-scale taste of the kind of tales I enjoy telling in the framework: high-octane, peplum-flavored western fantasy. I’m treating you all as beta-readers, so if something isn’t clicking, comment below, and I’ll see what I can do to fix it. The final edit may be collected in my forthcoming anthology, or it may not. Either way, I hope the stars align for a tale in this vein (or perhaps with these characters) may get the chance to go up for consideration. For now, enjoy, and if you haven’t already, check out their latest volume.

Barbarians seem to have the best taste in cars. A taste for speed, for slaughter, and for sheer electric thrill. That was the rule of thumb Mara Li held to as she ran the dealership twenty miles out from the village of Aula, and five from the nearby encampment of Balzoth Rock, a landing space that cycled through travelling hordes like clockwork. She made sure to keep the lot filled with all manner of muscle cars, souped-up trucks, all built for warring, that would keep the lads coming back. It was lonely work, with only a few “metalheads” in each camp that pass through the area, but it paid well, and kept the Citadel’s taxmen off her back.

One morning, just as she had pulled in and parked her comparatively mousy pickup, she spotted the first and last customer of the day, ambling down the road.

He cut the classic profile, from his muscular, six-foot build to his minimal ensemble of knee-high gladiator sandals, leather cuffs, the bottom-half of a tunic, and a large belt holding it up. The thick head of neck-length blonde hair, plus the short scruffy beard, made him stand out from the many long-maned brunettes she had entertained as customers. The sword on his hip remained standard issue, however.

“Looking for Mal!?” she hollered playfully, stepping out in her Canadian tux and beige cowboy boots.

“I believe you call them automobiles, no!?” To the country girl’s surprise, the voice was round, full, and remarkably articulate.

“Yeah!” Mara smiled, “Just not used to the lingo catching on.”

By the time the bronzed man had sauntered onto the lot, he gave a perplexed stare, before realizing the confusion. “Ah, I see. We aren’t all oafs, I hope.”

“Not at all,” Mara replied, shaking her head. “Just not used to—”

“Not used to the plain-speaking among us.” he growled playfully. “Name’s Jaal B’ak. ‘Spose I ought to beat my chest, toss you in the first one that takes my fancy, and bring you to the harem, eh?”

The short, auburn-haired girl burst into laughter, and the broad smile splitting the warrior’s face told her she would in the company of a most special man. “Name’s Mara Li. Guess I don’t have to sell you on how much enemy blood it can tank.”

“Such details wouldn’t hurt.” he teased. “Show me the lot.”

They walked amid the excellent Mustangs and mighty vans, and Mara took to asking all the question she usually did, sizing up needs and wants. Warriors like Jaal were what she jokingly called a “Samson,” for his strength was such that the bending of metal came easy. One kick of the gas too many, one wrong tug at the gearshift, and that car would be bent out of shape. Fortunately, she had every single machine reinforced to hell and back now (after a few years of trial & error), so the worst a man like Jaal could do was stress the floorboards, not puncture them.

The walk around lead both client and saleswoman to a silver-and-black Chevelle, dated back several centuries. He rested a broad tan palm upon the machine’s hood, patted it gently, and surveyed the rest, from its broad tires to its sleek build.

“Magnificent.” he beamed. “How many can she fit?”

“Five ideally, six in a pinch.” replied Mara. “What’s the plan? Lead on field, outer side of the lance?”

“Wife and four kids.” he said solemnly. “Clan’s moving again and we just lost our horse of 30 years. Had a good run, but time takes all as they say. There were none to spare, and I can’t have my woman going it on foot any longer. So here I am.”

“You’re a good man.” the young gal nodded. “She’s a bit overpowered for domestic needs, but’ll do good in battle, and the kids’ll love ‘er. And I won’t speak for your woman, but a strong man like yourself in a strong car paints a helluva picture.”

Jaal chuckled lightly at the remark, the “barbarian’s blush” as Mara so called. “Shall we test her?” he asked innocently.

“How long a one?” she asked in kind.

The towering man gave a solitary blink before realizing the insinuation. “You really have had men run off with these, haven’t you?”

“I’m not saying you would, I just—”

Before she could finish, slapped into Mara Li’s palms was an ingot of solid gold. No satchel of coins, no haggling, just a single brick plucked from the man’s belt. “Consider her bought, and consider the test drive a courtesy.”

First there was silence, and then the rustic saleswoman’s wry charm. “Still room in the harem?”

It was an expert breaking of tension as she handed Jaal the keys, and both customer and saleswoman climbed into car, laughing hysterically.

The barbarian fixed the seat to give him plenty of legroom, swung down the brake and clutch, and twisted the key. The Chevelle roared to a lion’s life, the engine settling into a warm purr as he pulled the machine out of its space.

“Why sell rides so far from the towns?” Jaal asked, easing the car onto the road.

Mara Li shook her head in dejection. “You guys are better for these ol’ goats. There always clans at Balzoth Rock, and always a few of you metalheads among them. Not a lot, but that’s the price I pay for principles, I suppose. You should see the devils they drive the Citadel’s way, the vomitous sacks-a-shit. Thin sliver headlights, no bumpers, pussy-willow engines. They all look the fucking same no matter who slaps a logo on the hood and they got a 0-60 a snail could beat.”

Jaal chuckled at her disgust. “Thing still takes gas?” he quizzed again.

“Ya. We’ve hybridized them for desert travel too, so even if you run out, the solar backup lasts for millennia.”

Jaal nodded. “Let’s see what this one’s made of.” He brought his flat sandaled foot down on the throttle, the silver-and-black beast sent screaming into action. Mara Li, flung back in her seat, looked over to see her favorite seal of approval; the warm smile of a barbarian’s face, that primal love of all things swift written all over. Jaal let out a deep, hearty laugh in his throat as he felt the engine rumble through his veins.

“Gold well spent?” she asked, peeling herself off the bucket seat.

“Every last ounce,” he growled with pleasure. The floorboard grunted as he shoved the pedal down harder, his mighty hands clung tight to the wheel, but neither bent out of shape from under the weight of the warrior’s ecstasy. Her favorite part really was that devilish smile they always got. She saw that radiant fire of battle in their eyes whenever they ran a machine like this.

Unfortunately, it all came to an end in the middle of nowhere. The Chevelle’s tires shrieked, the car lurched to a sudden stop, but Jaal’s foot was still flat on the gas.

The Chevelle’s wheels spun frantically, smoke spewing from rubber, but it couldn’t budge even if it wanted to. When Jaal swung the brakes down, and looked into the rearview, there was nothing. Same for Mara riding passenger side, just the long, half-paved highway, passing through land that couldn’t decide on if it was desert or forest.

“Back her down, and try to take off.” the denim-clad gal suggested. “See if it’s something we can rip thru, whatever the hell it is.”

“This isn’t a thieves trap, is it?” he asked, reversing the car.

Mara shook her head. “Not this far out, and not while I’m palling with you. Besides, closest I ever got to witchcraft was card tricks.”

When the Chevelle was in place, Jaal ripped her into gear, and hit the gas again. The tires squealed, the muscle car bolted forward…and was stuck again.

The burly warrior slammed the brakes in frustration, and Mara looked for looking something, anything to explain their ensnarement. All she could find was that clear blue sky and the menagerie of desert sand and impossible trees. Her eyes then fell to the warrior’s sword.

“You fellas still keep your blades hexed?” she asked in full Southern drawl.

Jaal nodded.

“Grab it, put her in park, and come with me.”

Both barbarian and cowgirl stepped out and crouched down by the silver Chevelle’s trunk. “Just a good clean slice thru the air down here.”

With a swing of his blade, the invisible trap was revealed; a bloody, rotting arm. Its severing was marked by a hoarse scream, and a pool of blood pouring from the limb and onto the road. He uncurled the dead fingers from the axle with the tip of his blade as the duo exchanged perplexed glances.

“Shit,” she sighed, mopping the flecks of red from her face. “I thought that was just gonna be some crazy cosmic lasso. Who the hell slipped that there?”

Jaal shook his head. “Failed necromancy perhaps. What in all the worlds they’d want out here is beyond me.”

When both stood up and looked to the road ahead, both found their answer.

Ahead in the sands of a roadside plateau, came withered skeletons, moldering flesh, and the rotting husks of war, all dead men walking. They faded into being like a filmic dissolve, and aimlessly wandered into each other and away. Whatever they had severed, it was some lock between life and death itself, and when Jaal and Mara looked to each other, a flash of worry came over their faces.

“Well.” the young woman resolved. “Can’t bury ‘em standing here.” She dove back into the passenger seat, and Jaal behind the wheel. He was to quick to hand her the sword, but Mara refused, the denim-clad gal producing a matte black automatic pistol.

“I wouldn’t want to taint it.” she teased. “Besides, you’re driving 4000-pound piece of American muscle that does 120 on the dial, but 200 if you treat her nice. One stomp’ll get ya 10 skulls every second. You’re the man with a mobile battle-axe here, I’ll just cover the headshots.”

Jaal had never heard a woman talk like this before, even among the female warriors of the hordes, though he was getting used to it. “No wonder you are so well liked among us,” he smirked. He flung the blade in the back seat and kicked the throttle. The Chevelle launched into action, bolting towards the growing mass of undead.

Mobile battleaxe echoed thru Jaal’s mind as the car raced closer and closer to the mob. He had never gone into battle behind the wheel. He had known enough to drive someone’s ride, be it at the end of a fight or to keep a hoard moving, but so long as his horse could stand, he’d be there upon her, swinging his blade and cleaving everyone who ran against him. The thought of being one with the blade in this manner was the kind of excitement that finally made it all click, and by the time it did, the sedan’s silver bumper was kissing the rotten legs of the zombified soldiers.

He nailed a handbrake turn and smeared ten of the undead devils beneath his wheels, and without a second thought, gunned the Chevelle and cut a line straight through the shambling, bloody carcasses and time-stained bones. Mara was landing her shots, but knew exactly what was coming up as the bodies were cleaved by the speeding hot rod. Up the window went, and the cowgirl kicked her boots up on the dash, blowing the smoke from her barrel.

The engine screamed as the putrid cocktail of rot and blood sloshed against the windshield, one Mara was quick to turn the wipers on for. “They’re good in rain too.” she winked, as the first slap revealed a cliff ahead.

Jaal slammed the brakes, and the Chevelle skidded, her momentum carrying her front wheels and half the car’s length off the cliff. Just as the car’s nose dipped, a twenty foot drop to their deaths staring them down, the warrior murmured a feverish incantation under his breath. The final, snarling word set the nose of the car rising and the mountainous man gunning her backwards.

“There’s my Sol.” he soothed, patting the wheel and whipping into another handbrake turn. “Let’s go find the bastard who laid this wretched trap.”

“Whatchu say there?” Mara asked, catching her breath.

Jaal looked puzzled at first until he realized what “it” was between the 160th and 170th zombie sent flying through the air. “Praying. Praying to my dear steed of long ago. This machine can never be Sol, but I have a good feeling she’ll have earned her name before the day’s end.”

Mara nodded, checking her pistol’s magazine. “I’d love to nail this bastard too, but where the hell do you keep generals of the dead around here?”

“Their animating force can’t be too far,” answered Jaal. “Must be up on a ridge overlooking the mass. Let’s climb one and get a good look at where they might be heading.”

They carved a trail of black blood through the sickly hoards, pulverizing even more of the undead beneath the Chevelle’s mighty wheels. They made their way up a winding, sandy road to a nearby cliff, a road the sedan handled well after all the abuse.

When they ground to halt and got out, the pungent odor made even their strong stomachs wretch. “We can clean her back at the dealership.” she coughed, turning away before the stench broke her. When they turned their eye towards the undead, the impromptu duo were met with more questions.

It was a clear, humidity-free day, so you could see the spires of the Citadel itself, far off to the south. Mara could spot her ant-sized dealership to the east, Balzoth Rock was behind them to the north, and to the west were even more rock formations lording above the plateau, forming a canyon pass to parts elsewhere.

For the shambling, shuffling crush, there was no direction, no guiding force. The undead stood milling about where half their brainless brethren had been massacred, with the trail of blood signing a cross on the space. Some who materialized closest to the ledge fell as soon as they appeared, affording them mere minutes of undead life. It was the purposelessness of it all that repulsed Jaal the most. “By all the gods,” he murmured gravely. “Who would leave a pocket to the underworld like this?”

Mara racked her brain for an answer, but never before had she been this deep in preternatural insanity. It was like grasping for a pool ladder in the middle of the ocean.

“So a dead man’s hand grabs the Chevelle,” she pondered. “We cut the hand and it unlocks a pack of zombies that don’t know what to do with themselves. They ain’t looking for brains yet, they ain’t being wielded for anything…oh Jesus, did we just?”

Jaal snapped towards the woman as she slapped herself upside the head.

“Fucking burial ground!” Mara bellowed. “We just opened up a fuggin’ Injun-burial ground!”

The towering barbarian gave her a baffled glower before she explained the whole conundrum. “Read about this once on an off-day, but we’re standing, right here, at a cross-section of faiths. We’s in a part of the country that used to have folks from way, way back, dealing in all sorts of spirits. Animal, nature, you name it. You folks worship gods of the north, the state worships the God of Abraham. This is hallowed ground that they can’t escape, but also land they are destined to remain on. A Norse blade unleashed ‘em, but we nailed them down by drawing that cross.”

She pointed to the sanguinary icon they had drawn with the Chevelle’s tires.

“Alright, so we’ve spoiled some ancient rites,” Jaal surmised. “How do we restore them? And furthermore, what was so special about this car at that moment that the dead should want to return?”

“Rites is easy!” Mara smiled, holding her nose and grabbing the rotting hand stuck in the Chevelle’s grill. She slammed it down into the sand, the hand beginning to spasm as its knuckles cracked. She spoke her own strange set of words, and slowly, both the hand before them and the dead below them faded away, even the putrid remains that dressed the car. All that remained was the black cross embedded in the sand.

“I thought you didn’t deal in magic,” observed the perplexed warrior.

“I don’t,” she replied, “I just pulled the words from memory. No sense arguing with your eyes, that’s belief enough. If the rite says one hand stands guard over the dead, then one oughta stand guard.”

They gave it a few moments, hoping she hadn’t sneezed on the last word and spoiled the whole shebang, but after a good minute of silence, the sheer simplicity of the solution sent Jaal bellowing with laughter. “The strangest wench in all the land! Speaks fleetly, moves between gods, but says she can’t cast a spell.”

“Play all sides, and come out the middle fresh as a daisy.” she chuckled. “We can still hose her down at the shop if you like.”

“I think her wheels have been washed,” Jaal sighed, leaning up against his metal steed. “You still haven’t answered the second question: why her?”

Mara looked off into the distance, then back to the Chevelle, then back to where she planted the now invisible hand. “If I knew that, I wouldn’t be selling cars.”

The gentleman warrior nodded in deference. “Guess I’ll be saying another prayer for this beast, then.” he smiled, climbing back behind the wheel. Mara followed suit into the passenger seat, and the metallic mare roared back towards the dealership.

“Hope I didn’t take up too much of your business,” Jaal sighed, a touch wistful as Mara stepped out.

“The days tend to be slow anyway,” she smiled. “Besides, I’d ride into battle for ya any day. Maybe the next one will be a bit juicier. Felt sorry to have to waste all those old warriors after their rest.”

Jaal nodded solemnly. “Here’s to our bodies standing upright for a while longer.” He clutched the woman’s upper arm, and her his in a proper Romanesque handshake. “I’ll be keeping that offer of aid in mind when next we meet.”

“One last question for you, Mister.” the cowgirl cheekily pressed. “What you naming her? The Chevelle.”

“Mal-Fer,” he smiled. “In our old tongue, ‘metal guardian.’”

With that, the Chevelle and her newfound master vanished into the dust of the highway. The rest of the day was spent buried in mythological quarterlies and the rare glance up awaiting the customers yet-to-be, but in following weeks and months, a hell of a lot more business cropped up in the area. Word got around that an auburn-haired enigma a few clicks south of Balzoth Rock was the Metal Queen of the Desert itself, served to arm the common warrior, and had a knack for spiritual observation. While she had to clear up the latter misconception, the former held most true.

In those newfound halcyon days, machines flew off the tarmac, ingots grew in volume, and the second a raider arrived to torch the office or abscond with a machine, it was the blade of valued customer who cut the man down on-site. Worth more than the sight of old iron horses riding off with engines afire, or the dragon’s stash of gold accrued, was the warm friendship of every blood-drinking, war-crying, mad-as-a-hatter warrior who made the job a little less lonely. The new sign she hung up atop the building said it all: “Mara-Li’s Mobile Battleaxes”

Here on Astounding, you’re going start seeing what I’ll call “layups.” I got a lotta stories in me and a lot of plans. Some of them, like “The Venator’s Apprentice,” are going into short story collections. Others are trial-runs, like this. Taking ideas and aesthetic and playing them out in our sandbox here. This one is for a forthcoming tale, “Watch the Prey Run,” and is demoing a little taste of my idea of rustic life down under. Part of this is the Mad Max influence from 365 Infantry, and the other the more pointed influence of the 1986 thriller Fair Game, which is the more direct backbone of “Watch the Prey Run.”

But who knows, maybe these’ll start popping up in collections too!

For Lance and Keria Andrews, the damn thing was the best horse they never had. Farm life for the brown-skinned, dark-haired couple, deep in their neck of nowhere, was about everything one could expect in the Outback. Keeping their beasts fed and watered, keeping the land fertile, fending off the idle predators, both man and animal alike, contending with the elements. All the same worries, joys, tight community of good neighbors, and the farmhands who made their pilgrimage up the hill to work. And give or take a few thousand dollars, it ultimately paid well for a small operation.

Their slice of heaven was atop a long rolling hill, peppered with foliage among the red dirt, with a lone, five-mile stretch of half-paved road their only way out to the main highway, and to the towns nearby. While the trucks of the farmhands aided in moving meat, milk, and produce, the Andrews’ daily-drivers were quite the odd couple. Lance’s was only a few years old, a slender ‘72 Chrysler Valiant that ran well and did the trick every time.

Then came the Bug. Or rather, then came the Andrews.

Keria would be the ultimate adopter of the rusted-to-hell-and-back Volkswagen Beetle, allegedly dated 1957. It had come with the farm, but there was no special mention of it made when the couple had finalized the deal. And much like the sellers, the Andrews didn’t concern themselves with it at first.

One day between chores, Keria walked past the car. Though its crusting metal and flaking paint looked as ancient as the hills themselves, closer inspection revealed that its key was still in the ignition. Soon, curiosity got the better of her, and with a few kicks to the throttle, the farmgirl managed to get the machine turned over. While it coughed and spluttered like mad, and there was only enough gas to prove itself, the Andrews farm now had itself a proper beater.

Everyone looked at the bubble-shaped thing like it had 80 eyes and walked on legs. Keria herself found the old Bug peculiar, but like any of its kind, the smiling bumper and its dinner-plate headlights soon worked their charms. He was a loud, friendly sort of chap, and the rush of running him flat-out endeared the machine to his newfound gal. It was on a particularly sweltering day of stump removal when the Bug finally made himself a staple of the team.

Two of the workers, Davies and Hodgson, were shoveling a monster of a stump by hand when Keria pulled up. “Ain’t you boys got any utes left?” she asked. “Sun burns ya any badder, you’ll have to join a tribe.”

“Lance and the lads are at market.” the 20-something Davies sighed, mopping his brow. “And Brett still has to get the tractor sorted.”

“Well, don’t work yourselves into hospital.” she sighed. “Let’s see if the Bug can do it.”

Hodgson scoffed. “Heat’s getting you too, Kerry?”

The brown farmgirl grinned. “Worse could happen is he finally croaks,” she chuckled, patting the Bug’s wheel. With odds like those, and everyone beat to hell and back, the workers figured it’d be a good laugh to watch the half-pint machine burn itself silly.

The chain was rigged up to the rear bumper, and his driver patted the throttle with her worn-out work boot. When everyone stood clear and the Bug’s hammer dropped, the damn stump leapt out of its grave! They repeated the experiment to make sure the boys hadn’t loosened the proverbial pickle jar lid, but sure enough, the Bug managed another without its engine bottoming out. And another. And another, until the whole job was done.

For weeks thereafter, whenever a certain kind of problem arose, in rode Keria with her Bug. “Worse he could do is die” was the in-joke of the land, and upon its mere utterance, the ratty little Volkswagen would have the problem solved on-site. Everything from stump pulling to jump-starts to towing tractors to the odd bout of chasing wild boars off the land. The latter task was always performed by the long-haired, brawny Lance, who couldn’t get enough of their pantomime pairing. His stocky build in that small a car, chasing down these feral beasts. It sounded utterly mad, and yet, here he was doing just that. The mufflerless roar of Bug as its all-terrain tires pounded the red dirt made for quite the deterrent, and a cracking sight for the ranch-hands following its lead.

For the Andrews clan, the Bug proved himself to have that same farm-bred stubbornness anyone working the plot needed. The loving couple just starting out, the workers who drove an army of pickups over the hill, and here, a twenty-year old, bubble-shaped ripper, thriving on gas, oil, and spite.

To the workers’ ever-lasting titters, the Bug was christened “Captain Scarlet,” in honor of his indestructible nature (and its alleged red paint), saluted by a “rat-tat. tat. ta-ta-ta-tat,” drummed out on anything within reach. Lance, ever the stoic, simply called him Bug, though in the heat of a hog chase, he graduated to “Ripper” when his boot hit the throttle.

Keria, on the other hand, sought something more.

He had come with the land, and while not a beast of nature, there did seem to be an animating quality about him on the farm. The animals seemed to greet him as he passed, and even with the busted muffler, there was a warmth to the way his engine purred when on property. He belonged here, and deserved a proper name.

There were about a dozen Aboriginal tribes in her family tree, and a half-dozen more via Lance, and when looking for that special name, she whittled it down to three: Omeo, Tjanda, or Miro. While he was truly as steady as the mountains, and she chuckled when Lance realized “Miro” would mean two men in her life named “spear,” the couple ultimately settled on her diminutive form for Tjandamurra.

“I swear, if there’s any Banuba in either of us,” Lance ribbed, tousling his wife’s long black hair, “I’ll start wearing bloody war-paint on them hunts.”

It was upon one fateful night that name of a warrior would soon prove most apt.

The Andrews had been trying for a kid for ages now, and tonight was another night to give it a shot. Lance, for all his ruggedness, was a lamb about loving his dear wife, for he knew how much it meant to her. Even with the excitement, and an hour or two’s rest, the Missus found herself stirring.

“Gonna hoon in the Valiant for a bit,” she groggily smiled, kissing her lover’s forehead. His answer was an equally tired, “have fun, don’ ‘urt ya’self, I’ll clean the Manchester in the morning.” The two broke out laughing like hyenas while Keria looked for her clothes. She got as far as a slightly oversized T-shirt and her leather-and-suede sandals before moving onto the key hooks. Sure enough, she wound up with the keys to her own Bug instead of the Chrysler.

“Fate knows how to pick you.” the farmgirl chuckled. With that, she walked out the one-story home without a care in the world, and without her pants on. She took her seat, (found it a rather soft touch) and dug the key in.

The engine’s roar shocked her awake, the poor girl yelping before breaking into another fit of manic laughter. When she pulled herself together, she playfully hushed Tjanda and put him in gear, pulling away as quietly as she could.

They took the dirt trail that ran the perimeter of the farm. A good, easy ride, with all the clear night air whipping through the rolled-down window. Even with her ride's wake-up call, it felt like driving in a lucid dream. The touch of the suede on her tan lead foot, the rumble of the engine all around her, the sweet smell of the aired-out cab, even with the hint of dust still lingering. “Never knew you’d even hang on this long,” she teased, gently pressing the gas down. “To think you’d…the hell’s that?”

She slammed the brakes, and squinted. Down the bottom of a hill, a large truck was pulling up the fence. They’d be nearest to the cow barn, though it was a few clicks off. Furthermore, none of the Andrews’ lads would ever roll up in the middle of the night like this, not without so much as a call or a mention during the day.

“Damn poachers again.” Keria growled through her teeth. A whole new woman took over at the very thought. She didn’t care what she did to them, why they were here, or even that she was half-naked amid it all. Everything was second to protecting her land.

Without a second to lose, she ripped the Bug into gear and rammed the throttle down, sandal straps digging in as the rust-bucket beater tore away down the hill towards the trio unloading from the truck. She made no grand declarations or screams or noises of any sort; she let her Tjanda do all the talking as the Bug sent the men scurrying. She shifted to keep her momentum up and a handbrake turn caught one of the crooks on the Beetle’s hood and sent him flying off. He wasn’t killed, but the hit-and-run made it clear that whatever their plans were, they were not to take place. They all scrambled over the fence as quick as they could, but even with Tjanda’s headlights, she couldn’t get the number of the ute’s plates. And damn she want that number.

She sent the Bug blasting thru one of their breakaway gates (as this was not the first time they had chased men off the premises), and the scrappy machine roared away down the road, screaming like mad, and surely waking the whole neighborhood.

“C’mon” she growled, burying the pedal in the footwell. “Just a little closer.”

Try as the jacked-up pickup might, the Bug managed to get its lights on the plate long enough for his driver to commit it to memory. When Keria had her number, she swung the Bug around and headed back up the hill. It wasn’t worth getting killed for, and she knew thugs like these were never above killing the people that got in their way.

The commotion had awakened Lance, himself only in shorts and flip-flops, and halfway to the Valiant when his crazy little woman and her crazy little car screamed to a halt. “Chrissakes, the hell that all about!?” he asked feverishly.

“UXP 175, South Australia, Black ‘70 Ford F150, trespassing on Andrews Hills. And tell ‘em if I ever catch ‘em on our land, they’ll have to bring body bags!”

Lance bolted for the phone inside and made the call then and there. Sure enough, the plate was wanted for crimes elsewhere. “They oughta be toast here shortly,” the farmer sighed. “Whatever they were after. Good news though, if you’re this clucky about our beef, you’ll be a peach keeping an ankle-biter safe.”

They held each other tight for a good long while, the adrenaline’s shiver soothed by her man’s touch, and the evening’s breeze gently wicking away the sweat. Once calmed, Lance and Keria hopped back into the Bug, and bolted for the breakaway gate to rebuild it. Once they had, Lance looked to the rest of the dirt trail from behind the Bug’s wheel. “Still wanna hit it?” he asked, revving the car up. His woman put her head on his bare chest and sighed.

“If my little warrior’s up to it.” she smiled.

The roundtrip made for as good an unwinding as they could hope for. By the morning, they’d have to make a formal report. In nine months time, they’d see the birth of a newborn, and then another the year after. And all along the growth of the Andrews and their farm, the Beetle Tjanda stood watch over all, a service rewarded with refurbishment after refurbishment, bringing new life to that same old stubborn car, who through all the odds and elements, stood guard over the farm.

And among the many other names the little rusty steed had accrued over the years, it was on that manic night when Lance finally found a pet name of his own for the car.

“The Watch Bug.”

Trunk stories are an odd beast. They have a sell-by date when it comes to hitting a magazine, but when the idea’s a winner, you know it’s worth bringing into the world. That is how I’ve felt about The Venator’s Apprentice since I first penned it three years ago.

It’s a tale of gothic action, of burnouts with renewed purpose, and of that most ancient fight between good and evil. Here, the war is waged by a righteous champion of Christ who dresses the part of a cowboy, but with an English air that dates him to the days of colonial America. It’s Solomon Kane for the 70s, backed by a killer car and a gal at the wheel.

And it is the first of many more stories yet to come…

She was at the bottom of her Black Label when the car swerved down the wild woodland road. Velveteen digits gripped the wheel with vice-force as the black ‘64 Polara pounded the ground beneath her, the thin sliver of moon lighting the winding path. Trees towered on either side, billowing in the whistling wind, the gusts gathering and swirling about Morgana Elster and her unwavering metallic steed.

“C’mon,” she slurred. “Let’s open up good and wide for your ol’ pally.”

Open up it did. With a kick of her thin-strapped sandals, the throttle hit the footwell, speedometer racing, battered tires throttling the half-paved road.

60. 70. 80.

She’d finished the bottle at 85, chucking it over her shoulder and into the backseat, scattering a pile of beer cans, and staining the eviction notice it landed on.

The radio was at full blast. Hailstorm riffs ripping through her speakers, Gatling-gun percussion echoing in her misting mind. The thunderous music mixed and mingled with the disarming warmth flowing through her. She was loving every plastered second of it.

Morgana rounded tumultuous curve after tumultuous curve, the slender, bug-eyed car gliding along best it could. They flew into a hairpin turn at 100, tires squealing as the music grew to a raucous roar. The tight bend smoothed out into a long stretch of road. It seemed to go on forever, a perfect straightaway lined with rich green summer foliage and not a single soul in sight.

Safe for one.

Further down the road, a darksome figure crossed the path. It was the shadow of a man; tall and cloaked, holding a rifle over his shoulder. He bolted from one side to the other, the morsel of moonlight revealing him to be a man out of his time. A cowboy hat sat upon his head as he readied his aim.

Behind him came another shadow. That of a lumbering, bestial thing. It thrust itself onto the road, felling all trees in its path with thunderous cracks and rumblings.

She couldn’t hear the strange creature’s calamitous carnage over the engine and the radio, nor the Gothic rifleman’s killing blow. She didn’t see them either, her eyes heavy with drunkenness, and her mind taken by the sonic psychedelia pounding away on the speakers.

110. 115. 120.

The needle flew well past the top speed as they careened down the long stretch. She had taken her eyes off the road for a second. Just one second.

A second long enough to plow through the beast.

The car tore through it like tissue paper, the body bursting into a million pieces, coating the busted-to-hell Polara in a viscous green substance. Morgana slammed the brakes, an alarmed disbelief overwhelming her.

She instinctively flicked a switch, wiper blades furiously wiping away the putrid blood from the cracked windshield. Slowly, she turned the car around to face what lay behind her. Looking back at her was the man, now in full view of the Polara’s headlights as she pulled up to the grisly scene.

His ensemble was the color of the night, from his flowing cloak to his harness boots. His belt, hatband, and harness straps were decorated with silver concho ornaments, and hung about his neck was a glistening silver crucifix which carried a light unto itself. The man’s flesh was pale, bordering on an outright pallor, and stood at a fit and lean six feet tall, though his face carried with it a gaunt quality at odds with his build. Most striking of all were his rich blue eyes that cut through the sickly green of the Polara’s light. They stared right into Morgana, the woman stupefied by the state of it all, though it wasn’t a glower of menace nor of anger.

They were the eyes of the compassionate.

The black-clad gentleman held up his hand to her, bent down and picked up a piece of the scattered creature, a peculiar blue orb that pulsated in his hand, beating as any heart would. He threw it up into the air and shot it out of the sky, shattering the object into a fine blue mist. The rifleman looked back at the shell-shocked woman and tipped his hat, a confident stride taking him to the car. He gently rapped at the passenger window, taking care to wipe the green gak off his knuckles with the cloak.

“May I come in?” he asked with a faintly English accent.

In a strange way, Morgana felt compelled to open the door, like she owed him something. The man stepped in and took a seat. He turned to face her, her black cropped top and cutoffs now a stark contrast to his head-to-toe garb.

“Are you alright?”

Morgana slowly nodded. “I think so,” came her soft, smoky reply.

The man’s eyes glance towards the back seat. “Do you drink often?”

She nodded. “Not that much in a night. Tonight was a ‘special occasion.’”

The man took hold of her right hand, gently clasping it in his firm, pallid palms.

“I can take you to my home,” he smiled, “Get you cleaned up and we can have a good chat. I do believe I have much to explain.”

She moved to let him take the wheel, but he ushered her back to her seat.

“I think you’ll find the route to my quarters most purifying.”

As she settled herself back in, he held out his right hand. Upon the ring finger was a silver band, a smaller ring within the center. He twisted until a soft click was heard.

Before the car formed a swirling mass, the visage of a heaven-sent galaxy greeting the two with a warm, white light. Tension filled Morgana where the kinder sensations of her liquor once stood. She went to protest, to gun the car in reverse, to throw him out and leave all this madness behind her. And yet she couldn’t.

She looked behind her, the eviction notice staring her in the face from the floor. The man gently turned Morgana’s head towards him. She gazed deep into his welcoming blue eyes, and he into her stunned jades.

“Everything will be alright. You have my word, a word I have not broken for many a year to all whom I grant it.”

She took a long deep breath, and turned her attention back to the portal. Something about it held an allure, an allure that had vanished from her life. With her ride revved up, she shifted into gear.

“Here goes nothing,” she sighed.

The remains of the bloated beast vanished as the car soldiered forward. In an instant, a bright flash of white overwhelmed her.

The Polara emerged onto a desert road. Dark sand as far as the eyes could see, with misty mountains off in the furthest reaches of the horizon. Above her was a purple sky, peppered with stars, and a blood-red moon shining down upon all, though the light around her remained the cool blue of any evening she had ever known. Her ‘64 was cleansed of all the bizarre beast’s remnants and seemed to be twice the car it was before. An engine that hummed warmly, a drive devoid of jockeying and bumps. Then came what stirred within her.

No anger, no pain, not even a drop of the whiskey's wicked magic left in her. For the first time in a long time, Morgana was at peace. A peace that sent a tear streaking down her face. Not of sadness nor of glee, but of sheer amazement. She brought the Polara down a few knots, having finally accepted this strange new world before her. The man patted her knee gently as she drove on.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“The name’s Ezekiel Lancaster,” the man quietly bowed, “I’m what is called a Venator, a hunter. Not of game nor bounty, but of evil.”

“Evil?”

“Yes,” he reiterated, “Of which we are free here in my quiet little corner of Christendom. The journey back from the mortal plain always quells the nerves. I imagine it has done the same for you.”

Morgana nodded gently, much to Lancaster’s relief. “And your name, my good woman?”

“Morgana,” she replied through the laughter, “Morgana Elster.”

“A pleasure to meet you, Miss Elster. My home is just at the road’s end. If you care to show me what more your beauty can do.”

Morgana beamed as she opened the Polara up, the car hurrying on until they found the home of which Lancaster spoke.

It was a discreet house, single story but of sizable length, with the wood-paneled sides and flat-black roof giving it a cozy appearance. A stable stood behind it, a white stallion enjoying a peaceful slumber in her hay-laden stall.

The Polara pulled up to the front door, a small set of steps sat before it. Morgana and Lancaster hopped out. No sooner had she marveled at her dark stranger’s domain, she found herself marveling at the ride’s snap restoration. Not a spot of rust nor a chip of paint to be seen.

The pale hunter patted the hood. “Good lad,” he smiled.

Morgana was rather amused by the gesture.

“Hey! Only I get to talk to him,” she quipped, “I didn’t realize you were just as nutty.”

“My dear Miss Elster,” came the reply, “He’s a beast of steel, but a beast, nonetheless. Though he may not have words to speak nor ears to hear, I sense you’ve a most dependable steed. He wouldn’t have made it if he didn’t care for you as you do him.”

Morgana looked down at the car. That’s impossible, she thought.

But the more Morgana thought of it, and her present locale, the more the impossibility of something stirring within the Polara slipped away. And the more impossibility slipped away, a pang of guilt grew in its stead. Her life wasn’t the only one she almost threw away that night, and the thought grew to overwhelm her. She thought of the steeled nerve it must have taken to throw himself into that wretched creature. And in a matter of moments, the pang became uncontrollable. She fell onto his hood, despondent and confused.

“Oh dammit,” she wept softly, “I’m sorry.”

“Trust me,” Lancaster soothed. “You would’ve made it through the night. He’d have seen to it. I know my stallion has for me, and we’ve been a team for as long as I can remember.”

Morgana recomposed herself and looked to Lancaster. The hunter’s eyes begged for belief in his words. She turned her attention back to her ride.

“Thank you,” she sweetly intoned. With a gentle kiss on the hood, she got back up and joined her newfound friend in his humble abode, though that depends on one’s definition of humble.

While plain on the outside, Lancaster’s home was as ornate as any stately mansion. Furnishings of velvet and gold, a cabinet full of firearms from across the ages, chairs whose comfort seemed to envelop the person who sat in them. A comfort Morgana enjoyed in the candle-lit living room.

Lancaster entered with a tray, ready to serve coffee. He poured themselves two cups and handed one over. “Made in the fashion of the Grand Old West,” he smiled.

It was the smoothest cup she’d ever had in her life.

“Gosh, I,” Morgana started, “Don’ even know what to say.”

“Well,” Lancaster replied, taking a seat, “I’ve already told you my name and purpose, so let’s go from there. In my youth, I swore an oath. To vanquish all evil from the land. However, I swore it not to the law nor Man, but to our Lord and Savior. And it was an oath not concerned with the villainy of Man in and of himself, evils the misguided and malevolent inflicted on the innocent. No. My ire is reserved for the root of the weed itself. The forces at play that bring Man to heel at the Devil’s side. Demons, my dear Miss Elster. Demons. Like the one I lured onto the old road where we found ourselves.”

The realization of what the creature was chilled Morgana. “How long have you been doing this?”

“What year is it?” Lancaster asked himself. “Ah yes, 1975, correct?”

Morgana nodded as she slipped in another sip.

“You’re looking at the face of 283.”

She jolted up, aghast.

“I was born in 1692,” he continued, “I swore my oath in 1720. The age I was then is the age I remain for all time. An eternal champion of Christ, able-bodied and fit for cleansing the land of its impurities. Going strong for three grand centuries.”

It was an existence Morgana couldn’t begin to comprehend. Lancaster had figured as much. “If you could have seen the nation rise as I did,” he nodded, “You’d be just as star-struck as you sit now. I know I am every day.”

“It must be somethin’,” she observed, her smoking Southern drawl slipping in, “Havin’ a gig that important.”

Lancaster chuckled. “It’s rewarding. Man’s blessed with a freewill that can set him on the path to great things. I’ve seen as such, and I know it has for me. And I know it can for you as well.”

Morgana grew dejected. “What great things? All you got here is a 20-somethin’ with a death wish.”

“Purpose my dear,” he calmly encouraged, “You’re young, you’ve a whole world to explore! And if you stick with your four-wheeled fellow out there, you’ll do good in it, I just know you will.”

“All I did good at,” she scoffed, voice wavering ever slightly, “Was getting evicted and shit-faced. Damn near drank myself outta everything now. Outta job, a roof over my head, outta every damn man I met. Only thing I couldn’t was Pop’s Dodge, but boy did I try tonight.”

Lancaster looked upon the young woman with concern. He crossed the living room and took a seat next to Morgana, kindly patting her back. “No need for despondence...maybe I could be of some help.”

He drew from the pocket of his jeans a note and handed it to her.

“What’s this?” she asked.

“The Oath,” he said with a wink, “Right there in black-and-white on the finest parchment to be spared.”

Morgana was speechless. She opened the note and read through the length of it. The dense cursive was hard to make out at first, but she got the hang of it soon enough. It was so fantastic it bordered on the absurd. A life fraught with danger, yet rich in solitude, though the prospect of existing for all time was an awfully daunting one.

“Why? Why me?” came the obvious question.

There was a blank look on Lancaster’s face before the question finally registered.

“Why? Why oh why indeed.” he smiled gently. “Well, for starters, practical matters. There are many great evils at work in this century, and more are enlisting in this most sacred role every year. Then there’s my insatiable altruism. You’re no wilting violet, Miss Elster, but at the core of my work, I help people. I help from the shadows and the black of night, but I help them. And I wish to help you.”

He patted her shoulder gently. “And lastly,” he sighed, “if we’re to put it in honest terms, it’s the request of a lonely old man. I am content in my role, but I do miss people. I miss them something awful some days. Such is the sacrifice Venators make, though there is nothing preventing partnership. It’s just been a few hundred years waiting on a partner. I hope that partner could be you.”

It was like a dream. A crazy, coked-up dream. And yet, every line of it rung true, and through his unpleading earnestness, Morgana was once more overwhelmed. He got down and held her tight, before guiding her misted young eyes to his. “If you’ve nothing left to lose, don’t throw a chance like this away. I know it all seems so fantastic now, but it will make sense, all in due time.”

It was all still so much to process, like a thousand arrows rammed into her head. The idea of her ride having...something within him, a world of demons unseen, and a slayer who had given up all the joys and sorrows of mortal life, now an eternal, solemn, but palpably lonely existence. The only thing that hit harder was the thought of going back. Nowhere to sleep, nowhere to go. Nothing left. Whether it was serendipity, chance or perhaps those oft-heralded “mysterious ways” in which He works, it seemed as though all roads pointed to this new, strange life.

Morgana dried her eyes and took a deep breath. “Got a pen?”

Lancaster beamed from ear to ear. “I’ve a most lovely set of quill and ink for the job.” He escorted Morgana to his study, a quiet oak-furnished room littered with books and papers. The Good Book chief among them, and a wealth of occult texts strewn about. He cleared a space on the desk and set out a small vat of blue ink with a ruffled quill. She dipped the feather in and signed on the bottom line. Her signature shone like brass. No sooner had it glistened than the parchment vanished into the ether.

“Where did it go?”

Lancaster simply cocked his head to the ceiling and winked. Morgana caught the drift.

“So,” she began awkwardly, “Where do we go from here?”

“Excellent question!” Lancaster replied, “One of two ways. I could train you here, or we can head back up the road to the next assignment.”

“Next assignment?”

“Yes,” he clarified, “Here, time never passes. Not a second goes by on the mortal plane for us. If I wanted to, I could leave after completing one assignment, and set right back out on the next. Did that quite often in my early days.”

Morgana nodded, mulling the options over. Having returned from her thoughts, she stood up to Lancaster. “Let’s learn on the job.”

Lancaster put both hands on her shoulders and grinned. “That’s the spirit!” he beamed, “Let’s get our gear and we’ll head out.”

Lancaster and Morgana hurried out of the study and towards the gun cabinet in the living room. The seasoned veteran grabbed his black rifle and a box of ammo. He thumbed through the rest of the collection. “Ah, perfect!”

The weapon of choice was a revolver, a Colt’s Dragoon. He handed over the ivory-gripped powerhouse.

“Man, would Pop have dug one of these,” she chuckled to herself. Though it was a touch big for her, Morgana took to wielding it well, and was handed a box of ammo for the road. “Quick question.” she pressed. “You want me dressed like this?”

Lancaster looked genuinely surprised, as if attire had slipped his mind all together.

“You are a bit exposed, aren’t you?” he observed. “Tell you what, my bedroom’s at the other end of the house. Rummage through the closet. Find a shirt, slacks, and boots that suit you, and they’ll fit.”

“But they’ll be too big—”

“Trust me,” he cut off with a gleam in his eye.

She did just that, emerging in suede cowboy boots, black jeans held up by a plain brown belt, and a black button-up. A simple arrangement, but true to his word, they slimmed up to her size the moment she slipped them on. He nodded with approval when he saw his compatriot in her hunting garb.

When they piled into her ride, he had two things left to address.

“First,” he said, “A warrior in our field needs some personal protection.”

Lancaster held out his silver crucifix, and as gentle as a lamb, pulled at the cross. In short sleight of hand, a second cross, complete with chain, was revealed. Lancaster draped it over Morgana’s chest.

“Second, I propose a name for our friend here, if he hasn't one already.”

Morgana shook her head. “Always meant to.”

“Well,” Lancaster began, “I propose the name Enoch. A name of dedication, of unwavering faithfulness.”

Morgana smiled. "I like it. I think Pop woulda too.”

She turned the engine over, and Enoch came alive, revved up to a full-bodied roar. She turned him around and faced the road. “This...portal’s just down that way?”

The pale cowboy nodded.

“Well,” she sighed, “no time like the present then, right?”

All Lancaster could do was tip his hat. She threw the throttle to the floor, and Enoch flew onto the road, hurtling towards the doorway as fast as his wheels could carry him. In no time, the portal was in sight. She shifted up and held him to course.

In another great flash of light, they crossed back over into...the woods!

Out of nowhere, a tree came careening towards them. Morgana slammed on the brakes and swerved Enoch away. The driver’s-side door was barely an inch from the tree trunk when they came to a stop. Catching their breath, they looked all around but could see no sign of any strange beasts or offbeat creatures.

“Hmph, same woods anyway.” Lancaster observed, “We met on the road, and now we’re thrown into the heart of the forest. Must be closer to the source. Beasts of the size we dealt with tonight aren’t natural, not even by Luciferian standards.”

Suddenly, there came a baying in the north. A howl that would give any wolf a run for its money. Lancaster pointed in its direction. “You two do what you have to, but follow that howl!”

“Right,” Morgana saluted.

Enoch bucketed away into the woods. The trees made the drive a minefield, but she clung tight to the wheel as her ride bobbed and weaved around them. The harrowing escapade brought them to an old, twisting dirt road. Though much clearer, Morgana’s work was cut out for her on the sharp bends.

As they journeyed, strange little creatures began appearing at the roadside. Tiny red beasts with the countenance of a gargoyle. Lancaster immediately rolled down his window and fired on all of them, each evaporating into the blue powder Morgana had seen before. “What are they?” she asked.

“Nativitas daemonium,” Lancaster replied, “The seeds sown from which our weeds grow. You might call them imps. Must be quite the source we’re after if they’re cropping up en masse.”

Soon, more popped up, many of them in the road. Morgana pushed the throttle down, Enoch gaining speed. But the second they struck one, the car jolted like it was the mother of all potholes, the hunters’ heads slamming into the roof with a thud.

“Unless his tires are made of silver,” Lancaster cautioned, “use the revolver!”

He loaded the six-shooter for her while Morgana rolled down the window. Though both her hands quaked; one on the wheel, one on the trigger, she steeled herself. Her first shot eviscerated the imp. She cleared the road with her newfound firepower, doing her best to steady her aim as she leaned further out the window.

Up came a sharp curve. Morgana swung back in and kicked the brakes, drifting on the bend. She opened him up wide, rolling up the window as she caught her breath. Lancaster patted her shoulder.

“You’re doing fine,” he smiled, “I’ll play pest control, keep following the path.”

Soldiering on down the dusty trail, the veteran slayer disposed of the nuisances as she held Enoch to course. He had just finished the latest rash when Morgana brought the Dodge to a grinding halt. Lancaster was about to speak when she gestured for silence.

The howl was coming from the woods shotgun side.

“We’re heading West,” she observed, looking at the thick brush on the side of the road. She swung Enoch around, front pointed to the woods. “You trust me?”

Lancaster nodded. “Roll on, lass.”

Enoch leapt into action, wheels furiously spitting leaves and dust as he roared into the untamed wilderness. The terrain throttled the Polara’s body as he bolted on, dodging trees and rocks at every twist and turn.

As they drove on, something caused a great stir in the forest. Leaves danced in its wake as branches dropped to the ground. It was a winged creature, with five dark blue orbs for eyes and prickly fur all along its body. It dove and soared, navigating the labyrinthine layout of the forest with ease, and it was gaining fast on their tail. Lancaster was the first to notice.

“Volans Mali at 6 O’Clock. Hold him steady, Elster.”

Lancaster readied his aim, swinging himself out of the car to face the pursuing beast. But each time he was ready, Enoch swerved past a contorted tree or a jagged stone. The jolts loosened Lancaster’s grip on the gun, the inveterate Venator fighting to maintain it.

A sudden swing left the hunter holding his prized rifle by its stock. Sweat coated his brow and palms, the pallid slayer growing red with strain. With a wide oak fast approaching, he tightened his fists and pulled the gun hard, bringing himself back into Enoch along with it. He looked at Morgana; her eyes focused on the drive ahead.

“If he isn’t steady, I sure as Hell ain’t. Too much uncertain—”

CRASH!

Iron claws smashed the rear window, jolting Enoch forward. The Volan reeled from the sudden movement, shattered glass careening out of the window’s frame as it vanished into the shadows.

Morgana grew furious, a rage she had never known before. It was a protective rage, that of a mother over her child. She stroked the wheel, the only consoling she could think of in the heat of the moment. It was in her wrath that a thought struck her.

“You know how he came out all fixed up in your world,” she started. “Renewed? You think the chrome could’ve been replaced with silver? It kills these things, right?”

Lancaster pondered the thought for a second.

“Pater Noster, Qui es in caelis,” he prayed under his breath, thumbing the cross about his neck. Morgana recognized the words; the Lord’s prayer, one her father old man had prayer with her many a time. She waited for Lancaster’s command as the fowl beast flew nearer and near.

“STOP HIM!” the slayer roared.

She slammed the brakes, Enoch skidding and sliding to a grinding halt. The Volan came crashing into him, the car sent rocketing forward. Morgana fought for control, but as she did, both hunter and apprentice heard the earth-shattering cry of the creature behind them. It had worked!

“Swing him around and get me close to it,” he ordered.

“Yessir!” she beamed.

The car spun around and leapt towards the singed demon. A righteous fire in her eye, Morgana kicked the gas down hard. Lancaster swung out the window, gun loaded, and put one between the Volan’s five eyes. The winged hell spawn fell to the forest floor. The Venator dropped back into Enoch just in time, the car powering through the corpse. Only there was no blood, no matter left to speak of. Only a cloud of thin blue mist. Morgana hollered with glee, “My baby’s a silver bullet!”

Lancaster smiled on the youth’s exuberance, if only for a moment. “Two of our evening’s battles are won, my dear, but we’ve a greater threat to unmask.”

Morgana recomposed herself and brought Enoch back around, racing in the howl’s direction once more. Bombing through the woods, the ride was somewhat straightforward compared to the creatures the trio had squared off against. Deeper they bolted, the Polara’s wheels tearing up the dirt and leaves beneath him.

A fire grew in the distance as the small troop rolled on. Lancaster sized up the innumerable number of outcomes that lay ahead. The words meant little to Morgana. All she could think of was seeing. Seeing what had created all the horror stirring about her. The horror that had led her to bring that leviathan beast to its gruesome end. The horror that was now her sworn duty to destroy.

The flames grew in height as they approached. Lancaster patted Morgana’s shoulder gently.

“Ready?” he asked warmly.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” came her plucky reply.

They made their final ride towards the pyre, Enoch valiant in his procession as they drew nearer and nearer to the flames. With a final leap, they bounded into a clearing. When they landed, the sight chilled both veteran and novice to their bones.

A circle of cloaked-and-hooded figures stood around the fire, guttural incantations flowing from their mouths as the flames howled and bayed. One member of the circle stood on a makeshift podium of dust and stone. Held within his clenched fist was a staff, an old oak stick. Contained within the top of the staff, another blue orb.

Enoch’s arrival did not disturb the circle, with nary a flinch nor motion made by anyone arrayed around the demonic pyre. Morgana held the throttle down, bounding towards the strange cult. Only to have Enoch bounce back like a rubber ball off a wall. She braked to get her bearings.

“They look just like regular folk,” she said. “How the hell is the circle so strong?”

“Potestas Diaboli,” murmured the old man beside her.

For the first time since she had met him, Lancaster’s demeanor grew grave and solemn. He parted Enoch’s door and stepped out. He looked back to her before shutting the door. “Crush the Leader when I deliver him unto you.”

He fixed his hat, brim shading his eyes from the rest of the world. Each step of his boots carried with them the weight of an anvil. He drew the crucifix around his neck. He thumbed it gently as he cried out, loud for all to hear.

“ADVENIAT REGNUM TUUM, FIAT VOLUNTUS TUA!” He hurled the crucifix into the fire. Morgana gasped, but nothing could compare to the display that came next, for the fire erupted into cool blue flames, a blinding white light at the center of it all leaping out in all directions, knocking every cultist back from the circle.

“He’s broken it,” they cried as panic consumed them.

“HALT!”

The cult members froze as the Leader, his robe a blazing red, held his staff aloft. He spoke an incomprehensible incantation and pointed the staff at Lancaster. A bolt of scorching red shot at the Venator, paralyzing him. His body froze, tense and static, the cultists descending upon him. Morgana watched in horror as they began to claw, their nails sharper than any mortal man’s, slashing at his cloak and shirt, drawing on his eternal blood from a flurry of gashes.

Only his eyes moved. His knowing gaze locked onto Morgana’s as the members carnivorously assaulted him. His strained eyes inched away from her horrified expression and towards the podium. The moment Morgana realized what he was after, it all happened at once.

Enoch rocketed towards the structure and slammed into it with every ounce of weight he had. The Leader was shaken off, falling onto the hood with a great crack!

The Leader looked up, utterly unfazed. From the shadows of the hood came the reddest eyes Morgana had ever seen. They called to her, beckoned her, drawing her deep into their malevolent maelstrom. She felt enraptured by their ever-watching gaze and darkest reaches of depravity held within them. But then, the cross! Her very own. Her hand touched the bottom of the crucifix.

“Pater,” she stammered, the Latin spilling out of her, “Noster. Qui es in...caelis, sanctificetur...nomen tuum.”

She thumbed the token gently before stepping out of Enoch. She filled her hand with the Colt, her cross glowing in the blackened fire’s light. The Leader chanted his incantations with a vigor that could bring mountains to the sea.

Morgana cocked the hammer back.

The Leader drew his staff.

The second he went to paralyze her, she squeezed off a sweet, single silver round. Right into the orb.

The staff shattered into dust.

“YOU FOOL,” the Leader wrathfully cried, leaping onto Morgana and wrestling her to the ground. He placed his fiendish, contorted hands over her neck and squeezed as tight as he could. The young woman tried to get away, but was held in his hellish grip. All around him, the flames collapsed, imploding into an earthbound fireball that bored beneath them all. The cultists arrayed around Lancaster, hands clawing at the hunter, decomposed rapidly. Flesh melting, bone crumbling upon revelation, hoods growing empty as the seconds passed.

The Leader began to melt over her as he tried to maintain his grip. The molten flesh repulsed her as the plasmatic fluid drained into the soil. His bones finally reduced to ash and his hood empty, Morgana leapt up, coughing and spluttering, bolting for Lancaster. When she reached him, he had collapsed to the ground, gasping for air. Morgana helped him back up, handing the hunter his rifle.

“Cut that one a touch close,” he observed, dusting himself and her off. Morgana fell into his arms, the veteran embracing her.

“I’ve never felt so frightened, terrified, thrilled, electric or—”

“Rewarded?” he quizzed.

Morgana wasn’t so sure about that one, though she never answered one way or the other. Lancaster held her tight. “I think you’ll make a fine Venatrix,” he assured, “Let’s return to the realm. There’s much to talk of.”

Morgana helped him back to Enoch, the remnants of all that had transpired dissolving into the ether. Both took their seats, Lancaster fixing his hat and Morgana dusting herself off one last time. The Venator gently removed Morgana’s crucifix, and just as before, parted the one icon into two, wrapping the duplicate about his neck, and replacing Morgana’s about hers. With a twist of his ring, the portal opened before them. He looked to her, and she to him, and with a gentle nod, the black ride backed away from the empty podium and turned to face the portal. Morgana patted the wheel and rammed the throttle down. Enoch thundered off and into their plane once more, his mistress and her mentor now ready to face evil wherever it next appeared.

If you can believe it or not, I can write about things other than wolves. Unfortunately, this will not be a demonstration of that rare talent (please refer back to such tales as What A War Does and The White Wire Sings for examples).

A fine chap and disk jockey under the nom de plume Detective Wolfman posted something that reminded me of a hazy synthwave fever dream idea I had in high school: a werewolf cop, but played dead straight. None of that neo-grindhouse Wolfcop/Kung Fury comedy crap. Genuine, straight-from-the-heart 80s action.

The second he said “now is the time,” out popped this. No apologies, no excuses, hell, no proofreading. I need to start writing for fun more often, and Universe of the Astounding will be come the local dispensary of this kind of fiction. A dumping ground for first drafts that can later be collected (and proofed) for publication proper seeing as most people prefer actual books.

Enjoy!

The slap of the windshield wipers cut like the claws of his hands as he clutched the steering wheel, the stressed leather of his harness boot grunting as the throttle dropped. Not even lycanthropy could override Officer Cain Martin’s sense of duty or justice as he saw the thugs tear away in their weaselly crotch-rocket bikes. Fortunately, Cain was a Charger man, his black beauty now a shock of a shadow on neon streets, the mist off the lake blanketing the city he served.

He could feel the footwell’s metal bend as the needle climbed to 95; his cue to shift. He wasn’t used to this newfound strength, nor the half-grafted primeval instincts colliding with his once well-adjusted mind. In fact, the only thing he was used to was the feral snarl on his face at the sight of the killers he hunted day and night. Like man, like beast came the thought before fading away into blind wolven anger.

The snarl ripped into a devilish smile on his snout as the muscle car was nipping at the crooks’ tailpipes. It was all up to that fine-tuned V8 now. If only you had my teeth, babe, he snickered in his mind. With a final thrust, the Dodge leapt on her prey, knocking both gangsters off their bikes. He couldn’t even remember the crime by now, only that they were the ones behind it. The tumble of one’s bike dealt the killing blow, the tire coming down on the head in a split second. The other was Cain’s.

The Dodge screamed, tires smoking as she came racing for the felled felon. She stopped an inch from the bastard’s bike as he vainly tried crawling away. The tinted windows were about to give the man the shock of his life.

Out stepped Cain, leather jacket and flared jeans billowing in the evening’s breeze, black fur misted by the fog, with his black Aviators hiding blood-red eyes, shielding them from the otherwise blinding blend of purples and blues radiating off the dead storefronts and street lamps.

Somehow, the thug, pale skin cut up by the fall, hadn’t had a heart attack. He just started screaming and crying and doing all the other shit pussies usually do when faced with their death-dealer. And what a death he had planned.

Cain snatch the gangster up with one gloved hand and took a bite, right in the neck where he had gotten it all those years ago. The dropped the man to the ground and let the black magic run its course. The man writhed, growled, howled in pain as the fur ripped through his pores and his body contorted and stretched. It was midway through the fun that the Beretta was drawn and a single shot fired.

A single, silver bullet.

Thank God for magazines, Cain thought as he strolled back to his metal beast, and drove over the dust of his evening’s prey.

If it wasn’t for the undeniable state of the world, I would’ve gone into the business for myself ages ago, and I’m not just talking about freelancing. To build something of meaning, of integrity, something that is at once the product of your vision and sensibilities, but also something you hope contributes culturally in fighting back against the rot of the modern world, is a lifelong commitment that shouldn’t be squandered on idle thoughts about miniscule problems. And yet, like a heap of parsley stuck in your teeth, I find myself picking through all the small stuff.

While it’s tempting to have made a “Stop the Indie Infighting” article in light of the collective unfurling of everyone’s sanity and sense, I’m holding off because I am in no position to run around wrangling people for a well-earned smack upside the head. Don’t fret though, that can of worms will be touched on later down the line.

No, my main issue at the moment is a matter of gross over-intellectualization of the arts by way of ourside™ and how you, dear reader, can help make things better without having to triple-guess your aesthetic preferences. And it all starts with a music genre.

Something quite recently got in the craw of certain dissident types: jazz. That uniquely American artform born from a cocktail of classical, spirituals, ragtime, and blues, where improvisation and experimentation melded with popular melodies and consummate musicianship on the parts of players and singers alike.

Now, not liking jazz in and of itself is not a problem. In fact I’ll go one step further and say that I detest taste policing. It’s the reason why my article on curation explicitly stated, “we’re all our own animals with our own ways of being, our own tastes, and our own approach to both our crafts and our support of others.” My goal was to encourage everyone to try all sorts of modes, genres, and artists, and to come to their own conclusions about their tastes, aspirations, and inspirations, and I stand by that sentiment. You can love or loathe jazz all you like, so long as you, in your heart of hearts, gave it a shot and were the ultimate arbiter of your own tastes.

But that’s not what I’m seeing.

When I hear people going on about jazz being a “failed genre,” deriding it as another example of “modern art” slop, with the quiet part outload being this insipid assumption that the entirety of the genre is just free jazz with no regard for harmony, rhythm, or melody, what I’m seeing is not “some people just don’t like it.” There are people who are actively attempting to dress it down from an intellectual perspective, and have become the town elders from Footloose.

This isn’t the first time I’ve seen this brand of nonsense before. From Michael Knowles’ little hand grenade a ways back bitching about Picasso moving away from realism towards cubism to this general lumping in of modernist art with postmodern art, ourside™ seems to have a preoccupation with trying to reconquer the aesthetic world not by reminding us of the beauty of classical, romantic, and baroque artistry, but by trying desperately to get every genie of the past century back in the bottle. And I’m here to tell you that not only can you not, but that in order to revive the classical aesthetics you so seek, burning every bridge back to the gallery is the last possible way you should do things.

First things first: the key to modernism is in knowing that it exists in contrast to classical standards, with those standards held as prior knowledge. Jazz gains its complexity and license to experiment from a musician’s ability to comprehend theory as laid down by Western classical doctrine. Cubism is a stylized distortion of form, established by artists who had to be able to understand form in the first place. On balance, modernist movements emphasized individuality and freedom of expression in their pursuits, looking to break away from conventions of their time, but often still working within frameworks established by the canons of their day. The surrealism of Dalí still relied on distinct and recognizable iconography, morphed and distorted into a symbol-laden tapestry of malformed objects and spaces existing in impossible arrangements. The clocks may be melting, but they are still clocks.

I make this distinction to emphasize that, while postmodernism (as its name suggests) was the phase that followed, the difference between the two in terms of value is night and day. The former understood that a world came before it, and that many of its practitioners came from that world. You cannot have impressionism without the Romantic era. You cannot have jagged-edged German expressionism in cinema without the knowledge of Chiaroscuro that dates all the way back to the Renaissance.

On the flip side, postmodernism does not care what came before, does not care what will come after, and does not care what is under its nose. It is a movement founded on questioning everything and answering nothing. There is a capacity for beauty in modernist work, but I wholly concede that it may not be to everyone’s liking. On the other hand, there is a borderline nonexistent capacity for anything resembling beauty in postmodernism, and it is no wonder that we have been treated to the deluge of minimalist nonsense and baseless performance art that inspires little more than the modern artist’s own ego. The risks taken by modernism had weight because they stood against the backdrop of centuries of traditional artistic practice. Postmodernism holds exactly zero weight because it does not acknowledge that the standard was there at all, or that any standard should exist. After all, nothing holds any inherent meaning, right?

All of this is to say that anyone hoping to revive the dying culture before us who goes on harping about jazz, cubism, and these other modernist inventions are barking up the wrong tree. Not just because these are forms and aesthetics that have held their own in the decades that followed, but because jazz need not fail in order for a great RETVRN to succeed.

The key to reviving classical aesthetics at this juncture is in equal parts practice and appreciation. Now, ourside™ seems to have the appreciation front locked down nice and tight (throw a stone, hit a Michelangelo profile pic), it is the practice front that seems to have bottled a lot of people up. Looking at centuries worth of tremendous fine art, literature, and music, and pining for more to be made, yet it seems that all the levers of production are perpetually out of reach. I described what follows as “academic zealotry,” the idea that you can will this revival through just appreciation and the browbeating of “modernity.” This is where poor old populist me who’s making the weird “furry” speculative fiction magazine tells you: if you want something done, and no one’s around to do it, get up off your ass and do it yourself.

If that means you having to spend years mastering a craft and honing skills, so be it. If that means you learn a grand repertoire of classical compositions so you can pick up their conventions before writing music, then so be it. If that means you stress, sweat, fail, and try again to take that lump of clay and at least make a pot out of it before you try to capture the essence of a man in stone, so be it. Not everyone will have the talent, but some of you will and some of you will be fine enough learners to go that extra distance and become that great, exciting writer of symphonies or sculptor of resplendence. You will work and strive to attain that purity through force of will and willingness to come up from the ashes of your failings and try, try again.

When you haven’t an institution at your back, nor a system willing to educate you, you have to take matters into your own hands, and the sad truth is that complete recapture is not happening anytime soon. While what I’m promoting also demands a great deal of time and dedication, the difference is in the rate at which the action can effect change. A long march back through the institutions is fraught with bureaucracy, backdoor politicking, and a million fail-safes the Cathedral have set in place. Not that it isn’t worth trying, but that it may take many more decades than people are aware of. Whereas today, it is now easier than ever to share, proliferate, and even profit on your own creativity and bring it to those who seek it.

It is at times like these where you learn who really wants shit done; the man who will put money where his mouth is and make something of himself, or a man who will spend the rest of his life writing diatribes into the void. If anyone tries to spin this practical-minded pitch as some kind of Pollyanna solution that “simply won’t do,” all I have left to say to you is this: would you rather spend the rest of your life worshipping the dead, or would you like to make them live again? And live through the work forged by your hand?

Here’s where Robert Norman Ross comes into play.

From his soft-spoken Southern voice to his iconic perm to his breathtaking ability to turn a canvas of white into a dazzling landscape in a half-hour’s time, Bob Ross and his beloved PBS program The Joy of Painting not only picked up where German painter Bill Alexander left off when his Emmy-award winning series The Magic of Oil Painting went off the air in 1982, but would go on to become a complete pop cultural phenomenon. While many will focus on the cult of personality arrayed around Ross himself, one that persists to this day, what many overlook is how, for over 10 years straight, Ross popularized the alla prima technique to millions after having learned from Alexander personally upon discovering his show.

Alla prima (Italian for “first attempt,” also known as wet-on-wet) is a style of oil painting where the artist applies wet layers of paint one on top of the other, working fast to keep ahead of the previous layers as they dried. Alexander and Ross both applied a base layer across the canvas, and would work fast in their half-hour to paint landscapes without any prior sketching. Minimal paint mixing would be necessary as the wet coats would blend easy on the canvas, resulting in seamless skies and richly textured foreground and background objects like trees and mountains. The end result can best be described as the Hudson River School by way of impressionism. The implication of rich detail is there, but is accomplished through swift action and careful blending to create said details.

While Ross’ instructional program might suggest a “paint-by-numbers” attitude, the quick-thinking necessary to accomplish the end product often lead to Ross emphasizing that viewers should choose to express themselves however they saw fit in the creation of the painting, reinforcing that what he was teaching was a technique, not a coloring-book approach to painting. Placements of finer details and the broader backdrop were all left up to the viewer, provided they adhered to basic concepts like consistent lighting.

I highlight all of this to say that it can be done. You can produce fine art in an efficient manner, and it needn’t be kitsch or amateur-hour playacting. Not everyone will have the knack, but there will be some who do, and some who take to it like a duck to water. Some who will finally find some purpose in their lives, and that ultimate purpose being the rekindling of beauty in their own way.

Now, let’s make this all painfully clear: this message is specifically for those who have lambasted the decadence and decay of the art and aesthetics of today, and should do something about it. We can spend decades reidentifying problems that have already been exposed, but that exposure means little if there’s nothing to be done to usurp these harbingers of ugliness.

I’m not talking about your average Joe or Jane in flyover America who are sick to death of the pabulum of Western entertainment. Hate to break it to you kids, but the normies aren’t coming to save you anytime soon. I believe in the Iron Age and in the work of NewPub and in the independent game devs, musicians, comic creators, and so on, but the truth is that we need to build up that parallel economy before we can reach the masses. These things don’t happen overnight.

I’m also not talking about overt political activists who, if we’re all being perfectly honest, should stay away from the levers of cultural restoration simply because they’ve thrown their lot in with understanding the levers of power more thoroughly.

I am talking to the people who know there is a problem in the world of the arts, see there are solutions, but have either learned their helplessness so deeply or hold a genuine ignorance of the road to that solution. I’m talking about the ability to be proactive in a deactivating world, and to work towards the restoration of these finer things in life in an increasingly decadent time.

Things are bad. As I said to a writer friend the other night, it's going to keep sucking until the straw starts making that godawful sippy sound. But you can't spend that time demoralized and holding out for the pendulum to swing back in the nick of time. Vote with your wallets, your ballots, your minds and hearts, and with your hands. Never give in, never surrender. When your institutions have failed you, you're going to have to learn what it is you're missing. For some that's survival skills, for others that's being able to recognize, relate to, and produce beauty. It won’t happen in a day, a month, or even a year, but it will happen if those who truly, desperately wish it to be so, will get up, go to the canvas, and work their ass off to learn, fail, try again, and succeed.

Will outside forces and political changes hasten this reviving of culture? Yes. But someone's got to keep the lighthouse burning in order for the ships to know which way to go. That's what we're doing. Right now, morale is in frighteningly short supply. That's where we come in.

I have faith that the communities encompassed and arraying around the idea of the Iron Age will help on the front of entertainment. They may bring us the pulp heroes of our time, spinning stories of great heroism and daring and adventure at a time where morale needs boosting, and chaining yourself to “the discourse” will only bring a heaping helping of misery. But the Iron Age cannot compensate in the realm of fine art. It just can’t.

We in this sphere are dealing in popular arts and mediums that have traces of lineage back to the masters, but their current forms do not represent that same purity we find in a great etching or a fine sculpture. The popular arts will be nourishing to the masses when they arrive, but entertainment alone is not enough. We also have a penchant for letting egos and menial bullshit supersede the cause we’re all working towards, but I’ve come to the simple conclusion that you have to let it blow past you, and keep going. Those determined to make an ass of themselves will either fade away in due time or retreat to their own communities. Those on the frontlines will keep fighting like hell ‘til we win.

The other truth of the matter is you can’t just legislate the fine arts back into being great either. You can hope and pray that 2024 produces a president who isn't liable to slip and fall onto the little red button in a dementia haze, and lobby him for better grants and initiatives to beautify architecture, but that can be a long 12 months, and even longer still when more prescient issues are on the ballots and weighing on the minds of millions.

All this is to say that we are living in an era where direct action is our only true course of action. We can’t wait any longer. We are starved, and may go on starving. And while I believe strongly in remembering, learning from, and appreciating the marvels of the past, the creation of beauty cannot belong to the dead alone. Beauty must replenish the souls of today, and must be drawn from and to the souls of today. I can’t think of a better way to do it than to take up that centuries-old banner and prove that, yes, beauty cannot only be appreciated today, but it can be made TODAY.

If you’re wondering where the hell Harlan Ellison fits into all of this (besides the drinking game), I’ve got a quote from one of Ellison’s appearances on Tomorrow with Tom Snyder. In response to the perennial complaint of “I have this great novel and nobody will buy it,” our mensch of the hour kicks down the door with this:

Today, it is easier than ever to bring that great work to market through tools of self-publishing and self-distribution. Getting it seen and read and appreciated may be another kettle of fish, but the truth is you can bring it on. And while these tools have often been wielded in the name of more popular forms of art, I do believe that, when galleries are few and the Ivory Tower is crumbling, these tools can be used to bring fine art into the world just as well.

Get busy.

I’m in the library writing this, and sat on my home-away-from-home (read also: the desk) is a 1988 book by Barbara Baer Capitman with photography by Steven Brooke. It’s called Deco Delights, and concerns itself with the Art Deco architecture of Miami Beach down in Florida. I had just finished thumbing through a coffee-table book about mid-century San Francisco, and this streamlined tome made for one hell of a chaser. Have a nip of the stuff:

Pretty cool, huh? I sat by a window thumbing through these two books. Not a note of music in my ears, just myself, the light of a morning sun shining through the third floor, and pages upon pages of time captured and beauty immortalized. And for once, I felt alive again. Felt alive in a way that I hadn’t since college, a feeling also felt in a library, working on something I cared about. Could’ve been anything at the time, but the sensations both then and now were the same. It came as a quiet revivifying of lifeblood, born not from the where and when of my own person, but of what I was delving into and that lone moment of purity to experience it.

Today’s essay is a prescription. What I’m writing about here has worked for me, and it can work for you. I acknowledge that we’re all our own animals with our own ways of being, our own tastes, and our own approach to both our crafts and our support of others, but what we’re about discuss transcends all of that by its very nature.

What I’m talking about has many names. I call it curation and tastemaking among others, but those are the keywords. And what they all mean to me is simple: to explore the works of all mediums, across all styles, and to identify that which speaks most to you and your vision as an artist. Whether in literature, film, music, fine arts, the works. It isn’t for the purposes of organizing an exhibition or for the sake of judging a contest. It is meant for you and you alone, a place of comfort and freedom to learn about the many crafts of the world and find what sings loudest of all. What sings loudest of all to YOU.

It is in this pursuit I feel the perpetual outsider.

There is nothing too high brow nor too low, no style beyond consideration. The only barrier to entry in my canon is the matter of what resonates with me. Some works do, and some don’t. It isn’t something you can fully intellectualize. A lot of it is a matter of sensation, that ephemeral feeling a work sparks within you. Works of abstraction can stir my soul just as readily as a masterstroke of Hudson River School romanticism. A feature-length Mahler symphony can light the fuse of my mind’s eye as readily as a two-minute punk song or a rap record can. I try out anything and everything I can get my hands on, and what really socks me in the gut and sets the brain alight, that’s the work to grab ahold of and hang on to.

This, again, is where I seem to lose a lot of people.

Some only care about contemporaneous relevancy, unaware that the most successful of contemporary craftsmen have a robust knowledge of their medium’s history and can actively trace the lineage of their work back through the past. To pull at a random thread, while certain corners were flipping shit over the billion-dollar metamodern toy commercial that was Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, the director herself mentioned in interviews an affinity for the pastel-colored musicals of French New Wave legend Jacques Demy, such as 1964’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.1

Others are the primitivists that go all hog-wild about “RETVRNING” to traditional pre-20th century standards, reviving the ghosts of Michelangelo and Rembrandt to “sAvE tHe WeSt.” And yet, they appear unable (or unwilling) to either learn these forms and techniques themselves, or finance those who can. And in the absence of action, they turn to what can best be described as academic zealotry, convinced that being passive-aggressively demeaning online will be a means of willing this Nouvelle Renaissance to fruition. The results have been less than promising.

I lay at least 90% of the blame for these opposite numbers at the feet of the deranged sociopolitical state of the West (the remaining 10 on the debasement of education). This isn’t a “left” thing, this isn’t a “right” thing, this is a matter of unvarnished cultural, critical, and creative illiteracy. The inability to savor all that is not “on my side,” the inability to go beyond what “the message” is, coupled with a life spent glued to “discourse” and current events. It is a state of being best described as sticking your head in a toilet bowl as it flushes in perpetuity.

In short, the mother of all swirlies.

I don’t seem to suffer from this though. I’ve been floating around circles where people lean remarkably far to the left at times, and I’ve been in places where plenty are on the hard right. And I don’t come in presenting myself as some centrist wunderkind either; I have my own ways about the world and I’m sticking to them. But in everything I do, I am an artist first.

This appears to be the big hurdle to clear, because for every one of me, there are dozens who put politics on the highest pedestal of their being, and when they realize the health of culture and arts intersects with such a matter, suddenly arts and entertainment become their problem…to bitch about. I think it is safe to say that the days of whining and crying about Star Wars and Disney and superhero films is coming to an end, but I don’t think the pundits and the many brains they’ve rotted in the interim will be going quietly into that good night. And yet, I also don’t think any of them have a damned clue what to do about it in the absence of pitching a fit.

If one truly wants to make a difference via the high and popular arts, then one must understand what their true power is. It is a strength that lies not in the propaganda of ideas, but in emotional power and aesthetic resonance. The arts are experiences through which Man comes to understand himself in a variety of ways. What turns us on, thrills us, inspires us, revolts us. The stories told, the moments in time captured, an ineffable magic that arrests one’s attention. The best way to improve your ability in reading and savoring these qualities is by exploring every medium. And the only way to find out what truly sings for you, entertains you, and reveals these parts of the human condition to you is by trying everything you possibly can! Read all sorts of poetry, dig into short genre stories as well as great literary novels. Take in all the films, albums, and games you can, savor every possible work of fine art you can behold.

For creators, these will be the keys to unlocking your true potential. When you’ve found yourself overflowing with a unique cocktail of influences and knowledge, shaken or stirred to your liking by that grayish-pink blob of yours we call the human mind, you will be able to do anything you set it to, so long as you remain dedicated to both your newfound vision and the honing of your technical abilities. You can write that story, record that song, make that film or game, all because you went out and saw the world through those ancient, eternal Technicolor eyes of this beautiful beast of Man’s design we call art. I learn from the abstract as well as the classical, the genre as well as the literary. I seek, I devour, and I come out the other end with a greater understanding of myself as a connoisseur, as a craftsman, and as a person.

And for audiences in need of an antidote to the mundanity of modern entertainment, guess what? You get to try all the cool shit! When you tuck away all the prejudices that modern technology and modern sensibilities have instilled in you, you may find yourself refreshed beyond belief when diving into works whose ideas and ways about the world have been made so alien, it’s like stepping into another dimension altogether. Where passions were sincere and a righteousness in conviction abounded. A time when a strong sense of aesthetic vision, matched by a powerful emotional core, conquered any haywire optical effect or monophonic mix dressed in vinyl static.

So, how does one curate for themselves? In the Information Age, it may seem daunting to the point of impossibility. If you’ve ever felt intimidated by a fully-loaded library, with shelves upon shelves exploring everything you could possibly want to know, then Information Age is like the final boss of your worst nightmares. It has blessed and cursed Man with an index to rival a thousand Libraries of Alexandria.

Fortunately, I got a helluva regime you should try, and it all starts with the wise words of an American legend.

Writer and dreamer par excellence Ray Bradbury gave us budding authors a few rules for good hygiene in our craft.2 Two big takeaways were to write one short story a week for a full year, and to read a short story, a poem, and an essay once a night for “a thousand nights,” which is Ray’s way of saying “do this for the rest of your goddamned life!” For the sake of self-curation, that second part of the regime is the foundation upon which I will base my own.

So every night, you’re digging into a short story, a poem, and an essay. No restrictions on topics, authors, nothing. You might find yourself pinballed from a story out of Ursula K. Le Guin’s Orsinian Tales to a romantic poem by Poe to an essay about the evolution of silverware. No limits, no restrictions, just start throwing these darts once a night, every night as routinely as possible. Hell, slip a chapter of a novel or a comic book in if you’re feeling adventurous.

Next up: listen to one full album of music a day. It’s tempting to hit shuffle on a playlist and just let the random mass of tunes wash over you, but take time out of the day, whether on commute, at home, or before you go to bed, to experience a record in full. Whether classical, popular, or leftfield, savor what the album means as a complete body of work. The way it sounds, the kind of songs sung and music played, the way the mood shifts from track to track. Listen and let it all sink in.

To switch from daily to weekly, the next item on Dr. Calta’s itinerary is a challenge. I challenge everyone reading this to watch at least one motion picture a week, more if you can swing it. In this workaday world, it’s a pain in the ass to sit down and watch a concentrated work of creative energy like a film. You’re pulled in a million directions, and when you get home some nights, it might feel impossible to pick up that book of Teddy Sturgeon stories or your Peanuts omnibus. Some placate the audiovisual beast by binging television, but that binging can easily become a passive consumption no better than listening to “lo-fi study beats.” After a while, you’re just not engaged with the work anymore. To experience a self-contained dramatic statement or a high-octane work of entertainment, without interruption, does the soul wonders. The real magic of the movies if you will.3

And lastly, the free-time prescription: something you do when you have the spare second. First, buy yourself a nice coffee-table book. A book of paintings, illustrations, photographs of sculpture, architecture, matters of mechanics or science, whatever you like. And on a day when you’re home and you have a moment, grab the book and just start thumbing through it. Don’t even read the captions; just savor the image.

The fine lines of a Googie-style café, the perfect form of a planet like Saturn, the jazzy jaggedness of a Cubist-era Picasso. Just look, and find one picture that knocks you out, a true love at first sight. Lock that in memory, dogear the page if you have to, and see if you can buy a print of it somewhere. If you can’t, try and find a high-res scan online, and print it off your home printer. Get yourself a nice frame for it, and put it up somewhere you can admire it, like your home office or your living room.

And the purpose of all that? You just found a muse!

It may not be of the classical variety, but if you “choose” wisely, it should be a particular work that you can turn to as a source of inspiration. The match to strike when you need to rekindle that flame of yours.

I do not impose demands of style, taste, or decade because that’s not what this exercise is about. It’s about finding what speaks to YOU! But you also can’t find that out if you haven’t tasted the breadth of Man’s artistic pursuits. The only thing you have to lose is maybe the odd two bucks on a streaming rental or a twenty if you’re smart and can find that artbook at a thrifty bookstore. But what you have to gain is seeing all that Man has been and all he has yet to be. There is no greater truth then that goddamned Scorsese line I keep going on about, but for posterity’s sake, let me reiterate: “Study the old masters, enrich your palette, expand the canvas.”4

Through this campaign of self-curation, you can enrich yourself beyond your wildest dreams, and through that enrichment, find the bedrock of your craft, and your support of others’ crafts. Those powerful muses and influences that will stir you to action, whether in creating your own great works or funding and buying the works of others. And together, if enough of us take up this centuries-old banner, the future will be brighter and more beautiful than you can ever hope to imagine.

I’ll leave you with the man who saw you at the door, Vincent Price. The Hollywood legend, renowned for his remarkable voice and brilliant blend of class and camp in his acting, was also an art collector. And in 1962, he took his campaign of bringing the arts down from on high to the people of America by partnering with a company seeking to do the same: department store giant Sears.

The end result of the partnership was The Vincent Price Collection of Fine Art, a uniquely populist program in which Price trotted across the globe, buying up original works of fine art, and making them available for sale through Sears at their prices, with their payment plans and money-back guarantees in tow. No reproductions allowed! The campaign lasted for nearly a decade, and in this promotional film, you will find what must have been one of the greatest coups in the art world at the time: Price’s purchase of The Angel Appearing to the Shepherds by Rembrandt.

Allow me to reiterate: an ORIGINAL Rembrandt etching, one of the Dutch artist’s most famous, one which in 1962 was already a staggering 328 years old and had been passed between some of the greatest collections in the history of art including that of the great English painter and collector Sir Thomas Lawrence, was made available for purchase at SEARS-ROEBUCK.5

I’ll let the rest of promotional film do the talking, but Price’s determination to bring art to the public is an inspiration I find endlessly rejuvenating. Collecting was not just for the wealthy elites of the world nor those locked away in their ivory towers. He believed it was a joy to be experienced by all people. To quote the man himself, “art is the visual experience of Man made exciting by talent.”

To that I add: if all people can have that chance to truly enjoy and experience art, without the burden of the day’s politics gnawing at your brain and replacing that capacity to savor brilliance and beauty with talking points and other nonsense, you’ll find that there are greater strides yet to be made by all of us.

Do your thing, Vinnie.6

This is a catch-all collection of thoughts that have me a bit perturbed, but ultimately steeled in resolve. There’s a great deal of people who seem hellbent on decreeing society’s entire submission to generative artificial intelligence. LLMs like ChatGPT, “art” generators like Midjourney, etc. Hell, I even went to bat for “A.I. art” myself as an artist’s tool in an article here on Universe.

And though I’m loathed to admit it, one of these is a fellow I’m fond of, Kyle Hill.

Now, everything I’m about to say is not specifically directed at him, nor a character assassination of him, nor particularly interested in him. He’s a rather fine fellow doing fine work. The video is merely a springboard, because when I hear a man ask the question “who will need architects when Midjourney can generate images no one has ever designed before,” I have to pause the video, pinch the bridge of my nose and remind myself that engineers and scientists can be some of the greatest brainlets when it comes to the arts.

At the risk of being cliché, never has there ever been a more appropriate time to bust out the Doc Malcom classic: “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn't stop to think if they should.”

That is currently where we stand with A.I.

To be grossly regressive, you have one half of the debate living in existential fear and seemingly unable to fight back with any sense of conviction, and the other basically begging for Skynet, communism, or some combination of the two to be ushered in for an age when artificially intelligent programs, combined with automated machinery, displace most of the work force, and we get everyone accustomed to a post-scarcity society, where all of the hobbies we were supposed to enjoy once the menial work was automated...are also automated.

What particularly rankles me is that people are willing to throw art under the bus too. And this is for a variety of reasons. One, there are the engineers and scientists too dense to comprehend anything they can’t statistically or molecularly analyze. (#NotAll, but the relevant parties still apply) Two, the uncaring “normie” populace force-fed enough drivel to make the pivot towards artificially generated entertainment potentially viable. Three, weak-kneed creatives who can only curl up in a ball at the very thought and hand over their brushes and pens, just like that. Not because the government said no more creativity, not because God snapped that trait out of the gene pool. Just because someone’s computer happened to generate some decent prose or a stylish picture.

It is times like these where I have to recall two things of utmost importance to all who look at this question in fear, terror, confusion, existential dread, the works.

1. Keep Perspective

2. Fight Dread with Dread

The first one is key. I create my work principally for my own gratification, amusement, and relief. I tell such strange stories because I find them entertaining, I write in a wide array of musical styles to express a variety of emotions and moods.

And I, once again, make films because I’m a sadomasochist.

All of my expressions of creativity are brought forth into the world because I willed them, I wished them to be, and I made it so. Furthermore, I am such an old man in my tastes, I’m ostensibly futureproofed because I barely watch or listen to anything new anyway. I will keep buying my records, my books, and my home videos, I will keep burning my mixtapes and my DVD-Rs, so long as I’m alive to do so, and you’ll have to pry ‘em from my cold, dead hands.

There is no reason for me to stop. I will never be given a good enough reason to stop. And to be perfectly cruel, the kind of people who would devour artificially generated content in near-exclusivity because “it’s the in-thing to do” are the kind of Jones not worth keeping up with, if only because their Wonderbread, plastic tastes are so malleable, you could dress up shit and serve it as filet mignon. And they’ll gobble it down right to the last corn kernel, believe me.

So no matter how advanced the technology becomes, how far it goes, it will never be enough to make me hang up my many wonderful worlds both now and yet-to-come. And the great part is, I can do all of these things in analog form, which will be important for my second point.

Now, when I say “fight dread with dread,” one must remember that we live in this thing called The Universe. And as the late, great Carl Sagan once said, “The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent.” But it is host a wonderful wealth of bizarre phenomena. Allow me to introduce you to your new friend, the Coronal Mass Ejection, via Kyle Hill once again.

To cut a long story short, a CME is an ejection of magnetic field and plasma from the sun that can reach Earth and, given it is of a certain magnitude, can potentially effect power grids worldwide and the internet at-large. Most famous example was the first observed solar flare in 1859, known as the Carrington Event, a geomagnetic storm of such devastating power, it crippled parts of telegraph systems at the time and even caused fires. And some killer Auroras too.

Now, the good news is that the human body is perfectly capable of withstanding such storms, so long as you don’t stare directly at the sun as you probably could see the discharge, as was observed in 1859. The better/worse news is that our current, centralized power grid would likely go tits-up.

Now here’s where the speculative fiction side of me gets-a-going. Imagine if you will, all of this hype, all this gung-ho push to integrate A.I. as rapidly and as quickly as possible, only for a CME to hit the Earth, and knocking the entirety of the power grid on its ass, internet included, and (most importantly) A.I. SYSTEMS INCLUDED.

Now you know what I mean when I say “fight dread with dread.” We are not alone in the Universe, and that doesn’t have to just mean extraterrestrial life. It means there are forces beyond our control which can do things no one anticipates. So while they may not hold true human fear or comprehend true human fear, these artificial intelligences are not infallible, and there is a hand-of-God failsafe waiting in the wings. And though it may not happen in our time, there is that sweet, succulent poetry about the possibility that helps me to keep some big-picture perspective.

So, what to do in the interim? Simply put, do not accept anything less than human in art. I can’t solve all the world’s problems, but I know a thing or two about the arts, and to leave everything up to A.I. is to forsake man’s true beauty. To Mr. Hill, I say that “intelligence” is not man’s last true defining feature. His capacity to dream, to aspire, to feel, to suffer, those are also qualities of importance, meaning, and definition. They are the mark of a true, living being. If all of Man was simply defined by intelligence, we would live in a world so dull, I’m not even sure we’d have had the gumption to even consider making artificial intelligence. I don’t think we’d have had the gumption to put a man on the moon. I dare say, the furthest we’d ever get was fire, and maybe the wheel if we were feeling infinitesimally inspired that day.

To all the tech nerds who think they can replace all artistic mediums with “A.I. art,” you are still fucking idiots. To all the pussies who can’t stand and fight for their place in the future, you’ll get what you deserve. And as for the public: I cannot condemn the masses anymore than to the fate that has already befell them, and can only hope they start to snap back to life, one by one.

And to address that elephant lingering in the room: I still think generative programs can be helpful. I’ll still generate textures, I’ll still use elements in my graphic design. I simply resent the implication that “helpful” means supplanting the soul of man merely because some pencil-neck geeks think it “can.”

Go make something of yourselves.

This is it. This is your final destination. Last stop, total terminus, all there is left to be.

Don’t like it? That’s fine, but God only knows what’s on the other side of those crystalline thresholds and airy synthscapes.

Only God knows.

This is a manifesto. Not a political, sociological, or economic manifesto, but one speaking of the arts and entertainment. I’m not here to cure cancer, solve poverty, or heal the world. Not yet.

I am here to warn, elucidate, and state in no uncertain terms why I create what I create, why I love what I love, and why you should be as adventurous, outgoing, and well-rounded in your taste-making as I strive to be. For the sake of yourself, your children, and your children’s children. Whether you are in the seats as the lights go down, or if you were there behind the camera when the film was fresh and the scene was ready. This affects and effects all of us.

Now, why have I threatened you all with a permanent stay in an early 2000s Czechoslovakian office complex? It’s less to do with the Czechs and more to do with the time. That office is at the tail end of a giant, chromium-plated tapestry known as the “Y2K aesthetic,” or as I like to refer to it: “Y2K futurism.”

The Tumblr blog I linked in the caption is a perfect, self-explanatory gallery that captures the concept in all its round-edged, pop art glory. A movement from the mid-90s championed in fashion, architecture, and music videos that came to an end in the early 2000s. In part because of world events like 9/11, changing economic tides, and, to quote Eldon Tyrell: “The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long.”

This is the end. The last possible thing we can have any semblance of collective nostalgia for, we being here in the West, and to some extent, across the globe.

Now I think it’s a handsome look. It has flair and flamboyance, backed by a positive vision of the future, a future equal parts colorful and sleek. But what lies beyond the glass door is…nothing. Everything we could possibly hold some inkling of vapid affection for has been wrung dry by every corporation on the planet.

The 70s and 80s adoring the 50s made sense; innocent affection for a bygone era when faced with so much change happening in such rapid succession. Sometimes for the better, and sometimes for the worse.

The 2000s and 2010s love of the 80s got…out of hand shall we say. Synthwave died the day “Blinding Lights” became a planet-smashing success, more franchises, fads, and cultural icons were mined for all they were worth, and as the 2020s dawned, we now sit with a heap of 90s nostalgia waiting around the corner, and some have already set about fitting the 2000s for their own pair of rose-tinted shades. A decade that stands built on the back of refined 90s aesthetics that were slimmed up even more during the 2010s while everyone was falling over themselves for legacy sequels, with returning franchises beginning to fall on the swords of their corporate owners, one by one.

To put simply, the 2000s was the first decade without a true identity of its own. Everything that made it what it was came from either extending aesthetic developments made in the 90s or clamoring for the return of the 80s. The 2010s took all that was done in the 2000s and set to cleaning it up even further. Popular music became more processed, voices grew weaker. Architecture lost not only the spark of classical design ages ago, but even the inspiring qualities of modern design in the mid-century. Fashion is a non-entity, now a reflection of any and all crazed delusions had by elites. Literacy declines, books grow more inarticulate. Comics and games find themselves mired in a trillion sociopolitical squabbles, ruining big-name legacy brands and setting the mediums adrift.

The corporate answer to a world without identity is to mine its past identities; to mine nostalgia. And what it will soon find is that it will not only run out of things for people to care about, but the growing distance between them and their audiences will continue to burn up any and all goodwill left. And when we turn towards the world of art, the truth is that our answers do not lie in that realm either.

The art world, when faced with a world without an identity, tucked tail and turned away. They gave us no solution, they sought no identity. So many subscribed to the postmodern open-endedness that they ceased producing work that could fill the void. Work without a backbone or a soul. And yes, it is important that an artist give of themselves and only themselves in their work, but the best works bring something to the rest of humanity through that act of individual expression. Enlightenment, joy, revelation. And these contemporary works cease to spark any or all.

Art and entertainment do more than coexist; they inform each other. The works of masters inform the workman, and in many such cases, it is the workman’s labor that pleases the masters most. Ingmar Bergman watched Creature from the Black Lagoon on his birthday, one of Akira Kurosawa’s favorite pictures was psycho-biddy classic What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? And on the flipside, B-picture legends like Roger Corman would help bring films like Bergman’s Cries & Whispers into the American market to terrific success and acclaim.

Creatives can draw on almost everything they can get their hands on, such as Ray Bradbury finding time for both Shakespeare and for Edgar Rice Burroughs, or Harlan Ellison learning from the pulps and comics of his day as he grew up. This is all natural and important to every craft, from the game designer to the fine painter. To be well-rounded in your interests, to learn and appreciate the fresco and the pop album.

For audiences, it is just as important. For all the crowing there can be for “learning about the human condition,” you cannot half-begin to comprehend such a condition without looking to what drives us, and it may not be as profound as a fear of death itself, or grand existential horror lurking in the rawest nerve of our mind. We can be driven purely through aspiration. We can be touched by something as simple as godforsaken television program, or a song played at just the right time. The intellectual richness of art is not where the human condition can only be found. It can be found in the courage of the superhero and the fantasy of genre fiction without lapsing into pretense.

And yet, both worlds have failed us. The corporations show no sign of giving pause and reconsidering what they’re doing to these legacy properties, and the art world continues to grow more insular by the day.

The only remedy is to make like time-travelers and return to the true past. Not any of this Mickey-Moused, half-assed remolding of the past. Learn to appreciate the John Colliers of the world just as much as the Sophocleses, the ancient myths of the world as well as flights of fancy born of the pulps and the comic books. Learn to love the Moebiuses and the Jack Kirbys of the world as you would the Rembrandts and the Monets. To listen with the care and attention demanded of Bach and Handel as you would the kickass rock record or the coolest platter of jazz.

As creatives, there is nothing that the modern world can provide you other than a reminder of where you will be if you persist in malnourishing your soul with this half-baked, half-hearted dreck.

As an audience, there is but one thing the modern world can provide you; the works of creators who know this and can cut a path for all who wish to be free of this cultural purgatory. A purgatory of undead franchises and of empty-headed creations.

There is a quote by the man himself, Mr. Martin Scorsese, that continues to ring as true as eternity is long:

The only way forward through this mire is to heed the man’s words. Learn from and cherish the jewels of the centuries and eons gone-by, and carry with you their spark of brilliance and imagination into your craft, whatever it maybe. It’s your only hope at this point. Until we unlock the fourth dimension and can craft enjoyable, ineffable works, we have reached the absolute limit of every medium we have.

For the artists reading this: you have been warned.

For the audience member reading this: go and seek out those treasures of the past, and brace yourself. The coming years will be wild.

And as for myself, I’m learning more everyday. And as I learn, I grow. And as I grow, the strength of my work grows. And as the strength of my work grows, that’s the time when magic is truly made. Now get out there and make some for yourself.

Addendum: July 4th, 2023

I had a lot of really terrific conversations yesterday thanks to this article, and I want to bring up a salient point made over their course. While it doesn’t change much, it does extend the timeline a bit further.

There are a few possible avenues for this heavily strained nostalgia to maintain a foothold in the zeitgeist. There are localized cultural touchstones specific to certain countries, and on a global scale, the advent of dark-and-gritty productions like Game of Thrones or the works of Zack Snyder, as well as internet culture of the 2000s during the so-called “Wild West” days and the advent of platforms like YouTube. These were all mentioned over the course of discussions I had in private.

On one hand, these are certainly factors to take into consideration, but on the other, they will only extend this unsustainable cycle by 20 years at the most. Certain things like early internet culture are so aesthetically fractured and fragmented that the only real appeal is in reexamining it, something currently done by YouTubers like Justin Whang and Wavywebsurf, and what could be gleamed was partly adopted by vaporwave, though there are certainly those who pine for the days of early YouTube.

And while grimdark-looking productions do have a concrete aesthetic vision, there’s something in my gut that tells me its 15-minutes of public love-in will be short-lived. There’s a time and a place for cold realism, there’s a time and a place for grit and grain-laden texture, but something just tells me it won’t hold in the same way the colorful excess of the 80s or the psychedelia of the late 60s/early 70s has held.

In short, we will become faced with pickings so slim, even the suits will have a trying time in their attempts to repackage and resell us these visions. It doesn’t change much, but it is some food for thought, to consider what we may collectively find ourselves attracted to.

I recently recorded an interview with for his podcast series Iron Age Marketing, mostly about work on my own Iron Age pulp series 365 Infantry (knock one off the bingo card of “things Jake mentions ad nauseum”).

While he’s off cobbling it together, my performance on it gave me pause. It was one of the most natural interviews I’d given yet, but to say I batted a thousand is to lie. I flubbed, I gaffed, I lost my train of thought, I didn’t get off the lines or ideas I wanted to from time to time. But that’s okay. Not in your “everyone gets a participation trophy” way, but in the sense that I’m a 21-year-old hauling ass in the world of independent art and entertainment. I don’t know it all (yet), and provided the world doesn’t cave in anytime soon, I’ve got decades to get better and other shit to worry about now. The past is the past, etc. etc.

It was that realization that made me kill at least five essay drafts here on Universe. I’ve tried talking about everything from how the Iron Age should approach cinema, the issue of audiences on the macro level in many fields, and all of it went from my mind and into the bin. And it’s simply because I don’t know.

I had reached a point where I didn’t know what I was writing about. I know loads about film, but I don’t know how we can adequately transmogrify it into a fully accessible medium in terms of production and distribution, though there are promising voices on the horizon like Christopher Moonlight and the cult-cinema antics of The Quantum Terror, or Paul Roland’s feature-length debut Exemplum, a stylish microbudget thriller with an overtly religious story at its core, both available for free via Tubi.

I know a great deal about curating art and entertainment, but to tell you the truth, trying to change the viewing habits of millions is a fool’s errand.

Shocking, I know!

What we can hope to achieve in the spaces we reside within is to produce the better work, pray history will be kind to our achievements, and outlast the foot-pounds of corporate-backed drivel hurled at the masses through volume, force of will, and quality above all else.

I was blessed to have had such clarity when I did, and not embarrass myself with 2000 words a piece of absolute rubbish. That could’ve been 10,000 words waisted on foolhardy pontificating and mad ramblings. 10,000 words that may now be put to better use on fine stories, pointed reviews, or a million other endeavors worth more than trying to convince readers of things we have neither the ability to control nor a firm handle on as of yet.

One of the aforementioned misspeaks of mine during the interview was “the market is worse than competitive; it’s apathetic.” I failed to assemble the right verbiage during the raw recording, so I’ll explain here as it ties into the bigger picture.

When I say “the market is apathetic,” I mean you are up against forces you cannot control. Algorithms, marketspaces, and plain old fate.

Your audience is part of the market, but they are not the totality. Amazon, regardless of their politicking, do not care who you are on an individual level. Bandcamp does not care. The conduits through which you conduct business and push product in the indie sphere, short of small business and direct lines of communication with fans (fundraiser updates, newsletter, social media, etc.) are simply too large in scope by nature to facilitate competition. Sure there are leaderboards and sales lists, but odds are 9-to-10 you don’t convince people to buy solely on the back of being an “Amazon bestseller” or taking a regional crown on Bandcamp. Like the once-coveted title of “New York Times bestseller,” it’s a title devalued by virtue of saturation alone.

Now my point about this wasn’t to bitch about limited reach within the entertainment market nor define some cockamamie get-rich-quick solution to gaining mass appeal. My point is to take charge of your identity as a creative, hit the ground running on pushing your vision, and grow your audience through personable interactions. Things such as podcast appearances, Discord servers, newsletters and social media. A hard-won and devout following who believe in your vision and yourself as a creative are worth more than a diluted product made to appease trends in the world of traditional entertainment.

The key to this all is having that self-awareness in the first place, to realize where you are in the grand scheme of things, and how best to make the most of that. It does you no good trying to patch the whole planet up in broad, ill-informed strokes. It does you no good trying to control that which you can’t. It does you no good to try and play a game populated by fewer and fewer players, and played with a deck of cards you can’t even touch.

The moment I realized all of this, it was like someone killed the fog machine in my mind and I could actually see. I don’t know it all, and that’s okay. I don’t have everything reined in just yet, and that’s okay. I used to wake up everyday and feel like I’m at least a decade older than I am, that I’m one foot in the grave, that there’s never enough hours left in the day, nor the year, nor my life. I had no reminder that I was 21.

Now I do, and as the old saying goes: “knowing is half the battle.”

He had more wires than most men, but few were actually within. Ivor Tremblay had enough wires to reach to the heavens if cabled end-to-end, but for his purposes, floor-to-ceiling was far enough.

Wires upon wires; red, green, blue, yellow. All patched into a million holes across the maple-paneled masses. In the old days, he'd look the part of a switchboard operator, a one-man rig fit to connect an entire country. Now…well now, the only wire he need connect was his own. Two thin wisps of cable that came out both temples, plugged directly into the part that made it all sing.

Ivor Tremblay, tall, thin, and pale, ran the wires from his head into the 88-key rig before him. 88 keys, now capable of any sound he could possibly want. All thanks to that beautiful white wire at the top, and the immaculate rainbow web woven across the three leviathan panels. He set the dozens of knobs to their proper place, every envelope and filter exactly where it should be, and set the great electric organ a humming, the megasynth ready to record.

The melody was delicate, oh so delicate. A high whistling as pads hummed beneath, a tranquility undisturbed as Tremblay relished every note he played. The sonority of his soft and tender reverie would’ve brought a concert hall to weep, to get lost with him as he danced across the keys and made the twin speakers glow in their plush blues with such grand, incomparable work.

So enraptured was he, that he never heard the door open, nor the marching boots at his back. The many marching boots out of time with his largo.

"Look, up there!" shouted one of the officers. He pointed up to the white wire atop the rig. ‘Twas the bloody stains on the pearl strand that gave it away.

"Ivor Tremblay, you're under arrest for the murder of Senator Carlisle Edrich." came the sharp call of the Captain.

Nothing. No monologue, no crazed ramblings. For Tremblay was getting all he wanted out this bargain. The wire was his, it sat high on his machine where only he could reach it, and as he savored the twinkling neon glow of his 88 keys, the stimulating shiver of his ice-cold composition showered him clean of any ill conscience left.

The task force stood ready to light into him, guns all drawn, only for a strangeness to take hold of Mr. Tremblay. Slowly, as if felled by a bullet unseen, the pallid man, white suit clean as a cloudless sky, slumped onto his side. His limp body took care to switch from recording to playback, and while the synthesist had seemingly perished of his own accord, the melody lingered.

Though befuddled at first, the Captain ordered the silencing of the towering organ. First they tried switching back to record. The song couldn’t be unwritten.

Then they tried ripping at the chords and cables. Nothing could stop its opulent timbres and radiant sounds, the barcarole now swaying strong. Even ripping the damn power cables did nothing to end the incessant composition.

At last, they reached for the white wire. They shot at both ends, the thin cybernetic augmentation landing on the keyboard with the thud. At first, it seemed to do the trick, the melody near silence. Except it was just that; NEAR silence.

In a last ditch effort, the Captain raised his rifle and barked at his men. "FIRE!"

The blitzing blaze of bullets rocked the towering oscillators and every wire jacked therein. The firing squad drowned the melody out, only for Tremblay's song to crescendo into a deafening roar, the gain blown out into a crackling, cruel contortion of the once sensitive melody. When the guns stopped, the music swelled and fell, back into a soft, eternal tune once more. It was the officer holding the white, bloodstained strand of twisting metallic fiber who realized at last; that was the source. The song haunted the stolen chord.

It went up for auction yesterday. I heard they paid an awful lot to hear that white wire sing. And they'll get their money's worth, I have no doubt about that.

As long as the earth spins, Ivor Tremblay will play.

Here it is. The big one. The shit-stirrer supreme I’ve been teasing. I feel like whatever I’m about to say, I have to:

1. Come bearing arms.

2. Make it clear that I’m just here to speak my piece, not make converts. Fight amongst yourselves, I’ve already made up my mind.

3. State the following in no uncertain terms: I regularly and routinely employ living breathing artists whose skills and vision are paramount to the success of my projects. Every artist I have worked with thus far is a wonderful and gifted human being, and has proven their abilities and talents in realizing my ideas. Without them, I would be dead in the water.

Exhibit A for a recent example.

Exhibit B for your delectation.

Whenever a certain kind of new technology comes to prominence, some find themselves inclined to lash out, to thrash away in anger, desperate to stop the threat barging in their front door. That response has clearly been the tact taken with “A.I. Art,” the term used to described digital artwork generated via artificially intelligent programs. For every ridiculous cry of “Hollywood is over man!!1!,” there is an equal response of people frothing at the mouth and decrying the concept’s very existence.

And to be frank: both sides have a point.

Though not perfect, the ability to generate digital imagery that can not only approximate human form and figure, but also innumerable styles across the ages is rather impressive. And for all their nightmarish qualities, the crude animations conjured up have shown some mild promise too.

And at the same time:

IT AIN’T ART.

Never has been, never will be. It can be digital illustration, computer-generated imagery, but “A.I. art” on a fundamental, ontological level can never be true art. It lacks soul, it lacks passion, it lacks any true human input beyond the prompt’s construction and the dice roll of clicking “create.” It is the very generation of the “art” that disqualifies from being art.

So…why do I use it? I’ve shown myself to be a studious engager of history, I clearly have an appreciation for fine art. I frequently employ artists whom I’ve kept faith with in all my major projects, and I’ve even gone as far as personally doing graphic design work if unable to hire an artist on short notice:

The answer: when I know what I want made, I have it made.

Setting aside the technology’s inability to handle anthropomorphism (though there are models being developed), I have exacting demands for every project I have commissioned art for. Specific aesthetics, color palettes, lighting designs, and items such as wardrobe, buildings, and other minutiae. Those demands can only be met by having a real collaborator in the room. I need to know there’s a human being there to help bring the vision to life, and bring something special and unique I would never have considered. Something as simple as the color of sunglasses or a unique hairstyle, or as the great Bob Ross once said, “happy accidents” that look tremendous.

But most importantly, never have I ever demanded realism. I love Tem because he has this classic animated look, right down to a touch of Don Bluth, and it makes my spirits soar. I love Kevin because he is a versatile komik artist who takes his skills in manga and bends them towards Western sensibilities in a terrific way. You can tell by the wolves he’s drawn for me, and by his work on forthcoming “Southern-fried manga” Paladin Dragoon.

The greatest con in “A.I. art” is the promise of uncanny semblances of real-to-life people and objects. Like the Mysterons painting Dorian Gray, you see man refracted in any number of abominable ways that, yeah, after a solid Photoshop job, can start to look real, but will never truly sit right. In short, that’s the kind of shit I run from like the bubonic plague.

When I turn to “A.I. Art,” it is because I’m looking for something I cannot readily or affordably commission. What is this most obscure style, you may be asking?

Shit like this.

I am a geek when it comes to science fiction and fantasy art of the mid-to-late 20th century. That sweet nugget of time (largely in the 1970s and early 80s) when realist space art came to the fore and masters like Steve Dodd and Tim White were all over the damn place. But the beauty is that it was real up to a point. The kernel of truth was there, but so was the imagination behind the imagery.

The fact I can, warts and all, conjure up a surreal approximation of this niche style in under two minutes is something beautiful I wouldn’t trade for all the world. It doesn’t beat the original (it’s almost an impression of an impressionist genre), but at the risk of sounding cruel, unless someone drops a quarter-million in my lap, I won’t be able to piss on the same street as the original, let alone own or commission one.

I’d wager that 95% of my 1% usage of “A.I. Art” is purely for the sake of admiring it and using it as a springboard for my creative work. A private gallery of moods to gaze into as the vintage electronica washes over me. Nothing public, no one gets hurts, and it helps me craft the stories I love telling.

That remaining fraction of a fraction is reserved for stunts like these:

With this, I reveal the only commercial use I have for A.I. art: graphic design.

With the approximation acting the part of canvas, I have a mid-century-style tapestry upon which I can weave any manner of shapes and creative typography to capture the essence of the song. It brings production value, it brings the aura I seek, and if I’m being perfectly honest: it just looks cool.

Now, for those salivating over some of the current lawsuits at play, I’m not sweating any of the litigation facing A.I. at the moment. My big reasons being:

1. The imagery conjured up is distinctive enough

2. The imagery is often buried under geometry and text

3. When the final word is had, that will determine the fate of this tool in my work

If it’s found these models have violated copyright law, I’ll stop using them. If it’s found they haven’t, I’ll use them sparingly, but they will remain a tool under my graphic design belt. Especially for the underrated purpose of texture generation.

Surfside Sin is a sanguinary whirlpool of madness as a young woman falls for a mysterious drifter in her local surf scene in mid-century California. A man who may not even be mortal, and seeks pleasure through pain. All transpires against the backdrop of lurid murders and a crowd littered with suspects.

This WIP cover was made in free image editors using free assets, clipart, and some A.I. generated psychedelia, and it captures everything this seaside slasher is about. I’m still working on this humble little novella, but wanted a temp cover to help recall the mode in which I’m writing. The ability to use A.I. generated elements within a larger piece of design work is something I find exciting because it gives me a level of freedom I didn’t have beforehand. It expands the tool set and increase the chances of crafting something striking and dynamic.

If the qualm to have with A.I. art is on the matter of art, I’ve ceded that ground and fully admit the only purpose I have for it is snapshotting my imagination and for low-stakes work on a small handful of projects. Everything I’ve generated is not art.

Michelangelo is art. Picasso is art. Your grandmother’s crocheting is art.

“A.I. Art” is not art.

If the qualm taken is on the matter of employing artists…recall what I said at the outset. 99% of all illustrative work done on my projects is done by people. 365 Infantry is completely illustrated by real people with real talent. I commission concept art from real people with real talent. I’m in talks to have a kid’s book illustrated by a real person with real talent. I’m not here choking on Bitcoin and deluding myself into thinking I just made Guernica in the time it takes me to drop a load in the toilet.

If I ever use A.I. generated imagery for a project, it is because I seek something more than mere graphic design, but the project is not worth shelling out the cash for. I only commission art I know I can afford up front, and recoup in some manner, whether through print-on-demand services like TeePublic or book publication. I’m not in a position to fulfill Kickstarter campaigns, so I try to keep my money close and my money belt latex-tight. A sensible position to hold as an indie creator, because at the end of the day, we’re all fucking poor and the lion’s share of us are unable to afford bare necessities, let alone thousands of dollars worth of interior art.

Simply put, I’d rather not screw someone over by asking them to make art on short notice that I can’t afford. I’d rather roll the dice, generate something that captures the essence of the work, or provides an element thereof, and incorporate that. The hope is that, as all good commercial art should do, it catches eyes and captures the imagination, thus leading to the product selling. And when the product sells, after a while, I don’t need “A.I. Art” because I can afford to have someone come in and draw the damn cover.

“A.I. Art,” for all its flaws, faults, and the cult arrayed around and against it, is a stepping stone. A facsimile that, if used properly, can provide aesthetic value to a project and serve as a designer’s tool. If anyone starts coming on like Albert Bierstadt because Midjourney dropped them a dandy landscape, those people are kidding themselves and are what the French call “les imbéciles.” And at the same time, people poo-pooing others for using the tool to help market their book or single should either put up the couple hundred to get real art made, or mind their own business.

The tech bros and hustlers trying to grift their way into the arts are to be laughed out of the room, but so are the people losing it at the thought of A.I. being used at all. When you use this tool, do not kid yourselves: you’re not painting a fresco, you’re making an ad. And if you’re smart about it, you make an ad so damn good, the product sells like hotcakes and you won’t need it the next time.

So until Skynet reigns supreme and all are cast in atomic shadows, I’ll gladly do whatever it takes to get my vision from my cockamamie head to your starved senses. Whether by hook, crook, bot, or the second coming of Frazetta. And in the words of California Senator Vernon Trent: “You can take that to the bank!”

I’ve been looking for you all goddamn day.

Hell, I’ve been looking for you all damn year. Been looking since Svania when you wiped that village off the map. Been looking since Hedalga when you took the platoon out so fast, Sarge didn’t have time to cut you down with swearing, let alone his rifle.

I’ve been following your trail all this time. The ashes of all you’ve destroyed are white, mixed with bones from out of the hillsides, ground to dust beneath you. I’d even wager none of this stuff is snow. Not anymore.

Last I heard they were writing about you in the papers. They always do. Were showing those short grainy snippets on the evening news, showing everything you done, and how far you’ve gotten. How far I was behind.

It’s easy for me to kick myself. Kick myself for not stopping you sooner. I sit here in this fortress of iron, and I indeed couldn’t stop you. None of us could. We tried guns, planes, tanks, bombs, and the mother of them all. And yet you persist. You stand there staring without a light in your eyes, only a vacant skull sat upon fatigues and wrapped in the tools of destruction.

I’m out of everything. We’re out of everything. That means you too. You can’t claim anymore lives if there are none left to claim, not out here. And you ain’t taking mine. When you look down this barrel, know that I’ll be drawing the last breath of the two of us. I’ve got nothing left. Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, just a shell with your name on it. And I mean YOUR name.

Everywhere I go this shell changes. Changes colors, changes words. It can be all shades of a rainbow or it could be a cold, blinding white. It can read “San La Muerte,” “Śmierć,” or “Horseman 4 of 4.”

It’s black now, and in bold print reads: Death.

Before you are six of the most prolific human beings to ever walk the face of the Earth in the past 100 or so years.

From left-to-right on the top are musicians Michael Jackson, Prince, and James Brown. From left-to-right on the bottom are filmmaker Jesús Franco, writer Walter B. Gibson, and writer Harlan Ellison.

These six are inspirations to me.

Michael Jackson was a multimedia tour de force, combining genre-bending pop with inventive choreography and continually pushing the medium of the music video forward with each album he produced. Someone who managed to, in many ways, marry his own love of higher culture with his love of popular art. Thusly, he was crowned by the public as the King of Pop.

If MJ was the King, Prince was, as the great Stevie Wonder once put it, the emperor. A multi-instrumentalist demigod who not only crafted a decades-long library of funk-infused records, but also wrote more songs for others and made more bands within his own musical scene. In the end, he had truly forged his own sonic empire, one that changed the fabric of modern American music forever.

James Brown is where the boys both learned it from. A wild-eyed dancer, a tight band leader, and gifted singer/songwriter who once clocked five albums in a year, and managed to still give it his all right until the end, breathing life into the funk genre just as American rock began to go beyond its rhythm-and-blues roots. The Busiest Man in Show Business, The Godfather of Soul, and a juggernaut of the rock-n-roll era.

Jesús Franco was a machine. A Spanish filmmaker who thrived in low-budgets and on continental Europe creating exploitation films at such a frequency, he could have his name on 10 pictures within a year. While no one bats a thousand, Franco developed a lyrical style of surrealism that blurred the lines between lurid genre fiction and inspired experimentation, making his films more than just exploitation films, but never quite enough for the hoity-toity arthouse sect.

Walter B. Gibson, was the machine to end all machines. The man who took The Shadow from a nondescript radio framing device to a darksome specter of justice who never failed to prove that crime has not and never will pay. The man who managed to take on the awesome task of The Shadow Magazine’s twice-a-month publication schedule, and more often than not, delivered the goods with few guest writers brandishing the pen of Street & Smith’s “Maxwell Grant.”

To better clarify, THE MAN WROTE TWO NOVELS A MONTH.

And then there is dear old Harlan Ellison. Hundreds of stories, essays, scripts, and more to his name. Ellison was a defining voice in “New Wave” speculative fiction, and the only thing more overpowering than his sheer volume of work was the steadfast, singular voice behind each page. A forthright, bold writer who drew on a fount of unending knowledge, and brought forth a style of prose and a magnetic brand of storytelling that could only come from the mind of one Harlan Ellison.

I cite these six as being terrific inspirations for me because, for all you can talk about their God-given talents, any and all luck that befell them, or other such matters of circumstances, I look up to these men because they worked. They busted their asses off. Went to the grindstone and came up sharp as an axe, ready to swing down on every problem that came their way. Jackson would loose pounds of sweat over the course of a concert, Prince never stopped recording music, making dozens and dozens of tracks that would never see the light of day.

These were people who fought long and hard to have their vision seen through. This point goes out especially to Ellison, whose honesty, while wielded like a blunt-force weapon, was backed by a conviction you could sense in every word he spoke. In the case of Jackson, he had to stump for his 1983 single “Billie Jean” to be included on the landmark pop record Thriller, and in the end, came away with perhaps the grandest jewel in his crown.

They were all indeed gifted in some way or another, but those gifts mean nothing without the motivation and drive to see them used in the name of realizing your work. And these six had it in spades.

My reason for relaying this to you is because, to those wishing to see their culture changed for the better, be they left, right, center, or pear-shaped, I keep seeing the pundits and talking heads doing nothing but bitching and moaning about shit. This is perhaps more an indictment of right-leaning parties, but I swear to God, I keep seeing this nonsense. Michael Knowles whining about Prince’s music not being good, or yesterday Scott Greer was bitching about Luc Besson’s The Fifth Element and decided to write the man’s entire career off.

I won’t even dignify them with titles of employ because, quite frankly, I don’t care what hole they crawled out from. I have no more patience for people with all problems and no solutions. I’m sick of them making fusses over Cubist art and why we can’t return to classical forms.

I already ranted and raved about all this horseshit here:

I probably shouldn’t even be writing this article because I got too much shit to get done. I’ve got 365 Infantry #5 due out in two weeks, I’m busy helping get Anvil #1 pieced together for all those wonderful folks out there in Iron Age Land, I got music to write and movies to review.

But that’s the point. While these kvetches keep yammering on and on about “why does the culture suck, why does the culture suck,” I’m out there making it happen. I’m out there moving and shaking like a Saturday night. I tell tales of grand adventure and heavy metal hair-raising, I write music that captures the mind. And when the time comes, I’ll be back in the saddle reviewing the arts on YouTube, Dailymotion, Rumble, and Bitchute. And maybe Odysee if I can get some synchronicity going.

But I come to you all with a simple plea. If you want me on my knees for it, I’ll get down on both and bow like Alice Cooper’s in the room:

Don’t Let These Guys Run The Show.

Fuck them, and fuck you for letting them. This is why nothing ever gets done. You all have to constantly keep justifying yourselves as if there’s any conversation left to be had. The choices have been made, the beliefs of those in power are cast in iron, and their only true tenant is their self-interests. What’s good for THEM, not YOU.

This is the era of ACTION. Getting down, getting dirty, getting into the weeds. If you don’t like something, “see something and say something” don’t cut it anymore, Jack. You hate the movies on the marquee, go watch the works of John Ford, Orson Welles or Howard Hawks. You hate the music on the radio? Honey, we got millennia’s worth at home. Classical, jazz, funk, rock, blues, country, folk. You name it, it’s yours. Can’t find anything good to read on the B&N shelves? Try Bradbury, Huxley, Fleming, or good old Bill Shakespeare himself.

None of that float your boat? Pick up a guitar or an electric keyboard. Grab a camera. Brandish a pen and stab at the heart of the world you find swamped with mediocrity and hate, and draw the one you want to live in. There is no one to stop you, and everything there to help you send that vision of yours into the world.

There’s a brilliant line from Mr. Ellison I’m quoting in my 365 show bible, my handy pitch for a proper animated program or any potential A/V production. It’s an extremely truncated version of a beautiful screed, but it gets to the point all the same:

Those six men I call heroes, idols even, were not perfect. Not in the ways you are thinking either. We’re not talking about cruel allegations, ill-tempers, or omnipresent addictions. I mean they were human. Flesh and blood. And it is that humanity that gave them the soul and wit needed to create masterpieces. Maybe not on the caliber of Rembrandt or Shakespeare or Bach, but masterpieces nonetheless.

Those six changed the world through the stories they told and the music they made. They did it through conviction, commitment, and bulldog determination. They did it for themselves, and contributed to the world through their art and their belief in it.

What the hell are you doing for your culture?

The corridor lapped at my heels, my body feebly outrunning it as it grows narrower and narrower and narrower. First it takes me by the waist, then the legs, then at last those heels. I felt every organ jolt forward, slamming against the backside of flesh as all my progress, all my momentum leapt forward, beyond me.

There I stood, stuck. The monotone voice echoed up the corridor, chilling my spine as the words came up at the waist.

"That all you got Hector, a lousy 5.7 meters/second?" the voice roared. No anger came through the deadpan strains of the PA system; it was the volume that chilled me. I felt the corridor snapback off of me, revealing the grid in which I stood, the same ratty shorts, socks, and kicks I was sent out in on these endless training sessions. I felt only the hoarse warmth of a hard day's work without the satisfaction.

Revealed to me was the grid, the usual prison of geometry, of black tiles and glowing green lines. What normally was the signal of a break or, heaven forbid, the end, had now become a wire-walk. The green lines flexed and wavered beneath my shoes as the tiles became null and void. I could have cast myself off, if I cared to, but by now the muscle memory had taken hold, and my body had become the machine they desired.

I really tried for it. Tried jumping. But it seemed as if only the brain wished to leap headlong out of the skull, with out the levers of power to get ahold of the rock-steady legs and perfectly even arms.

One step, one step; direct, straight, and true. I kept going until, by mercy or recognition, the door parted at the end of the room, a searing white light blazing my eyes as my body continued to soldier on and on. I felt the door and heaved myself through, landing on the cool white floor in an exasperated, short-lived plummet. Maybe it was my last chance to cast off, only taken too late.

I looked up to see the matte black loafers and white lab coat to match.

"Pay no mind to the P.A., Johnson," he said, fixing his glasses, "I'd argue you're in tip-top shape."

A tech came up to him, clipboard in hand. "Fit enough for the next Martian raid?"

The observer's brow furrowed, and he looked me over once more. "Think you got another round in you?"

God I wanted to say no, but my body snapped to attention. Muscles ached, bones felt fit to crack. But like a dog I turned and went for the training chamber door. Before I entered, I heard an exchange between the observer and his assistants.

"Don't we have enough Model 10s to handle it?" one asked.

The observer, his smile audible, replied. "With a chance at evolution like this, you'll find bots are least controllable by comparison."

The body stepped forward into the chamber, and I, into darkness.