(10) ‘Gargoyle’

-The City Alive
-The Gargoyle
-k1 stories, 2016 ‘Genie’
-‘And Why We’ll Never Get the Moon Back’
-‘The Knights’ by Aristophanes

‘Bad boys’ song, by inner circle.

“Bad boyz. Baaaad boyzzz! Whatch’ya gonna do?
Whatch-YA gonna DO?!
Whatch’ya gonna do–when they come for you?
Baaaad boyzzz!
Bad boyz. 
Whatch’ya gonna do?

…

See ‘Genie’, below.

…

Start: ‘The City, Alive’

     From here, the City looks alive. It looks wild and more threatening than just alive–a beast.

 The City across the valley, of yellowed grasses, autumnal leaves showing the seasonal progressions that the city appears immune from, although not biological–the City has its organs. One of those buildings are its lungs, expelling black smoke; the blue and white collared ‘depleted-oxygen cells’ enter in, exchanging one form of currency to produce another…

     The city’s hundred tendrils snake out concrete bridges and asphalt roadways. Jettisoning pathways verge off into many various directions. There is a system behind all of this. Roadways leading off on toward other important cities, although appearing, perhaps, to a stranger as if it all were quite random; organic, not engineered. It is un-tamed, un-checked, the roadways are moving about in ‘no distinct’ direction. The freeways, that look like veins, feed into and out of the city beast–we’ve all observed this before–allocating motorized blood cells between large metallic organs. The heat waves make the city pulsate.  Heaving outwardly, the hundred-headed organism breathes deeply and expands. 

     Amongst the heat waves this breathing entity expels energy like a blurred fog. Moving and  shifting parts within itself, the breathing, energized, pulsating  life-form slowly becomes aware of itself–and the product of man is now the master of him. 

     Transmutation, a metaphorical chemistry shows itself, manifesting on every level. Under the microscope some understand: a necessary Industry. Fevered giants grow at the thankless expense of lesser bodies. The City amongst the valley inspires something in me. The human hand is one of the most complex muscular structures within the physiology of the human body. Fingers are but those cells which remain, once the encoded genocide has ceased. It’s almost laughable, but true! We can hardly relate to this microscopic magnitude, but I wonder if death might be death, nonetheless. Death by design (the coordinated cell death), serves an important function when studied on the growth and development of the human hand–on this: the cellular level. During fetal development, these massive, coordinated deaths will form our fingers and hands, starting off as some fleshly pancake blurb; the end result is astounding. Has this fact ever inspired a man’s tear? No moisture shed for something so tiny–and with such astoundingly intricate and complex a future form. 

      We see not death here, in that there is no obvious ‘ending.’ Instead, we see it as an opposite, a new door opening; we see a swarm in which we recognize as important, and we see a school directed toward a particular avenue and we understand it is wrong to interfere. We know that the RNA will inform the cell clusters to eradicate thousands of healthy cells–merely doing what they had previously been told up until now–and now the fingers can form on schedule… 

      There is teething life, a rainforest diversity of life–in the city beast. 

    I see the city, alive. The motorized blood cells reduce men to a decision-making organelle. Their daily errands and chores are akin to the destinies of genetic RNA, within the soupy cytoplasm—as they build up their little worlds of regurgitated sequences, communication by him may-or-may-not be useful. If not, well, hopefully, you’ll at least read what truth he’s mustered, the suffering homeless, written on his cardboard sign in black felt pen, amongst his habitat of trash, alleyways, and maybe, depending on the town, a soup kitchen. 

     Down further, past the valley from which I view the city, we like to think that man is the master of what he’s created, but, from way up here, I can see only Red Fords, White Toyotas, and Blue Chevrolets; four-tired microscopic swimming paramecium, and the black marks of tires streaked upon manufactured ground. The men are hidden inside. I cannot even see them. Time, energy, all types of currency directed at that golden exchange–the ability for action. ATP energy cloaked in a language of culture, adenosine tri-phosphate with important men painted in green–mutually agreed worth notes. Daily expenditure of minor energy creates a promise for a potential tomorrow, and those, often toxic, uses. 

     Yet…I still hold a feeling of this image as beautiful. My mind-forms have these dystopian symbols of Living Death and notions of the benefits of mutation, ceaseless expansion and cancers, streaming morbidly as dark parallels to the human condition and the cellular condition. But for some reason…my heart is yet warmed. I feel a sort of nostalgic sense of ease and appreciation here for what nature has accomplished. It is, I suppose, the way that life has ALWAYS been. I wonder, sometimes, if I want to have any part of it. To either peacefully observe it from afar, staying upon this quiet, unaffected hill of observations, or do I want to exist within the world of action, once again, amongst it all? My mind races on and on, thoughts congest like the freeways below. 

     Heaving…this is an adequate word for describing the city; heaving, with a still-primal motion, the city-beast pulls in as many of those motorized human units as the roadways can fit, and in some places, often, much more…anxiety-ridden congestion. Up here, by the setting sun, I watch the living city as it exhales once again. The eternal ball of fire overhead is clearing, and the ball of pale blue emptiness makes its approach. The emerging Moon has always served as symbol of reflection—reflecting the light of the Sun—an opposing symbol of brilliant action. 

     To the common unit of the school, accidental genetic mistakes, mutations, are the unsung cause for all growth. These leaps, when supplying a possible advantage, are NOT rooted in-line with those programs, with which it has for its life been running—not which curriculums were standardized within the schools. Biologically, in terms of each and every step of evolution, improvements are made solely by mutations. We see individual cells acting as individual cells often do. Carving out currency, craving materials like some 21st century oxygen—the giants and their ants will do almost anything for it, when deprived of it. Even for just the fear that they ‘might’ be deprived of it, they become insured, paying heavily for that chance rainy day. 

      Death of the unnecessary and accidents in deciphering code are the ONLY means towards positive change… Think about this: accidents are the very building blocks on which life’s complexity comes about. 

     Cars exiting the city return home for momentary rest. It is silent here, at the top of the hill. From up here, all of those tiny micro-sounds are lost on the city. Those firing pistons, the screeching tires, clunking metal on carpet brake-pedals, fork-lift hydraulics, steam-heat chimneys, and here—just this wonderful, utter, silence. I listen patiently; here, there is only reflection and contemplation by the setting sun. Here, the Moon perpetually rises in my heart as I make my daily ode to Morpheus. Over the rolling hills of its background, I tell you the city is breathing! I wonder, as human beings often do, about that elusive and abstract notion: “Purpose.” Cosmic purpose, individual purpose—if there really is any. It’s the city, it would seem, that was meant to be.

-end-

…

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


Start: ‘The City, Alive’ *******************

…

     From here, the City looks alive. It looks wild and reckless–a beast. The City across the valley, of yellowed grasses, autumnal leaves showing the seasonal progressions that the city appears immune from, although not biological–the City has its organs. One of those buildings are its lungs, expelling black smoke; the blue and white collared ‘depleted-oxygen cells’ enter in, exchanging one form of currency to produce another…

     The city’s hundred tendrils snake out concrete bridges and asphalt roadways. Jettisoning pathways verge off into many various directions. There is a system behind all of this. Roadways leading off on toward other important cities, although appearing, perhaps, to a stranger as if it all were quite random; organic, not engineered. It is un-tamed, un-checked, the roadways are moving about in ‘no distinct’ direction. The freeways, that look like veins, feed into and out of the city beast–we’ve all observed this before–allocating motorized blood cells between large metallic organs. The heat waves make the city pulsate.  Heaving outwardly, the hundred-headed organism breathes deeply and expands. 

     Amongst the heat waves this breathing entity expels energy like a blurred fog. Moving and  shifting parts within itself, the breathing, energized, pulsating  life-form slowly becomes aware of itself–and the product of man is now the master of him. 

     Transmutation, a metaphorical chemistry shows itself, manifesting on every level. Under the microscope some understand: a necessary Industry. Fevered giants grow at the thankless expense of lesser bodies. The City amongst the valley inspires something in me. The human hand is one of the most complex muscular structures within the physiology of the human body. Fingers are but those cells which remain, once the encoded genocide has ceased. It’s almost laughable, but true! We can hardly relate to this microscopic magnitude, but I wonder if death might be death, nonetheless. Death by design (the coordinated cell death), serves an important function when studied on the growth and development of the human hand–on this: the cellular level. During fetal development, these massive, coordinated deaths will form our fingers and hands, starting off as some fleshly pancake blurb; the end result is astounding. Has this fact ever inspired a man’s tear? No moisture shed for something so tiny–and with such astoundingly intricate and complex a future form. 

      We see not death here, in that there is no obvious ‘ending.’ Instead, we see it as an opposite, a new door opening; we see a swarm in which we recognize as important, and we see a school directed toward a particular avenue and we understand it is wrong to interfere. We know that the RNA will inform the cell clusters to eradicate thousands of healthy cells–merely doing what they had previously been told up until now–and now the fingers can form on schedule… 

      There is teething life, a rainforest diversity of life–in the city beast. 

    I see the city, alive. The motorized blood cells reduce men to a decision-making organelle. Their daily errands and chores are akin to the destinies of genetic RNA, within the soupy cytoplasm—as they build up their little worlds of regurgitated sequences, communication by him may-or-may-not be useful. If not, well, hopefully, you’ll at least read what truth he’s mustered, the suffering homeless, written on his cardboard sign in black felt pen, amongst his habitat of trash, alleyways, and maybe, depending on the town, a soup kitchen. 

     Down further, past the valley from which I view the city, we like to think that man is the master of what he’s created, but, from way up here, I can see only Red Fords, White Toyotas, and Blue Chevrolets; four-tired microscopic swimming paramecium, and the black marks of tires streaked upon manufactured ground. The men are hidden inside. I cannot even see them. Time, energy, all types of currency directed at that golden exchange–the ability for action. ATP energy cloaked in a language of culture, adenosine tri-phosphate with important men painted in green–mutually agreed worth notes. Daily expenditure of minor energy creates a promise for a potential tomorrow, and those, often toxic, uses. 

     Yet…I still hold a feeling of this image as beautiful. My mind-forms have these dystopian symbols of Living Death and notions of the benefits of mutation, ceaseless expansion and cancers, streaming morbidly as dark parallels to the human condition and the cellular condition. But for some reason…my heart is yet warmed. I feel a sort of nostalgic sense of ease and appreciation here for what nature has accomplished. It is, I suppose, the way that life has ALWAYS been. I wonder, sometimes, if I want to have any part of it. To either peacefully observe it from afar, staying upon this quiet, unaffected hill of observations, or do I want to exist within the world of action, once again, amongst it all? My mind races on and on, thoughts congest like the freeways below. 

     Heaving…this is an adequate word for describing the city; heaving, with a still-primal motion, the city-beast pulls in as many of those motorized human units as the roadways can fit, and in some places, often, much more…anxiety-ridden congestion. Up here, by the setting sun, I watch the living city as it exhales once again. The eternal ball of fire overhead is clearing, and the ball of pale blue emptiness makes its approach. The emerging Moon has always served as symbol of reflection—reflecting the light of the Sun—an opposing symbol of brilliant action. 

     To the common unit of the school, accidental genetic mistakes, mutations, are the unsung cause for all growth. These leaps, when supplying a possible advantage, are NOT rooted in-line with those programs, with which it has for its life been running—not which curriculums were standardized within the schools. Biologically, in terms of each and every step of evolution, improvements are made solely by mutations. We see individual cells acting as individual cells often do. Carving out currency, craving materials like some 21st century oxygen—the giants and their ants will do almost anything for it, when deprived of it. Even for just the fear that they ‘might’ be deprived of it, they become insured, paying heavily for that chance rainy day. 

      Death of the unnecessary and accidents in deciphering code are the ONLY means towards positive change… Think about this: accidents are the very building blocks on which life’s complexity comes about. 

     Cars exiting the city return home for momentary rest. It is silent here, at the top of the hill. From up here, all of those tiny micro-sounds are lost on the city. Those firing pistons, the screeching tires, clunking metal on carpet brake-pedals, fork-lift hydraulics, steam-heat chimneys, and here—just this wonderful, utter, silence. I listen patiently; here, there is only reflection and contemplation by the setting sun. Over the rolling hills of its background, I tell you the city is breathing! I wonder, as human beings often do, about that elusive and abstract notion: “Purpose.” Cosmic purpose, individual purpose—if there really is any. It’s the city, it would seem, that was meant to be.

-end-

…

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

…

The Gargoyle

Gargoyles typically drive around a lot at night… Insanity still exists, in their world… and so does crime… it’s the wild west in a lot of ways… we’ve had a ton of expansion in these decades, and it seems like all kinds of growth have been unleashed without reservations and all at once… it is an experience they grapple with, just like the imperfect societies before them… 

Rorshach’s Journal:

And so the Gargoyle is a police force, they keep an ear out for things. They keep men in line. They protect the innocent. They’re concerned with Justice. They punish the guilty, and bring them back for processing…

They  like to play around with the latest in surveillance technology. The surveillance operative tends to work alone, and distrusts assistance, by reflex, or reliance, on any others, yes there’s usually some trauma there, but they dont accept too much help in any form. 

They are involved in the world of espionage, inherently, and implementation of justice and of the unraveling of conspiracy, an audio recording expert, and accruer of video evidence, so it would logically follow suit that they are naturally distrusting. 

The Bat Signal:

The Gargoyle has many tricks and gadgets by which to survey from… and have a knowledge of hidden places… all around the city… anonymity… they look a little dishelved, maybe nobody wants to know them… They are organized, though, and they are archival creatures, packrats by nature. 

All data recorded is stored, and archived. 

They’re loners… as you might imagine… when they’re working. But so are writers. As you might also expect nobody really wants to interact with them anyways, for obvious hygenic reasons. They don’t waste much thought on hygiene, there’s no time for it, or for fresh breath, or diplomacy… the hard way is best. Some of these guys aren’t even mildly pleasant.

They can escape when things get hairy, when a …

 … using all conceivable forms of shadows to their advantage, their hiders. They’re real good hiders. 

They are also masters of the Law. Unfortunately, for some. They’re natural lawyers, some of them. They know… how to throw the damn book at you. Some lawyers are universally feared within the law courts. 

… Some are just ‘born’ that way. 

… instead they desire the hunt…

… and maybe unconsciously revel in the …

… psychoanalysis of it all…

… wherever the vigilante can be revealed,
and the vigilant ones among them 
have been found
 on account of this mistake.
*produces evidence*
-a Gargoyle short story

…


The Gargoyle’s favorite films are noir-inspired. They listen to the music of their enemies. They even grow to like it some of the time. In their obsessive studies, of the target or targets, a homicide detective is the preferred kind of profession—if one can make any money at it. There weren’t a ton of murders, but it happened. The Gargoyle know things about people, places, and things–things which have during daily routines, or who runs what chores when, who’s making deliveries, or who’s also taking reconnaissance, who else is on the bounty, or they know things like how no matter how nice and good it’s been there’s always going to be another terrorist attack. How often do you think about that? Well the guy from Gargoyle thinks about it all the time. Statistically, there’s many statistics in the world of things to become more attendant upon than others, it’s for each of us to decide, and that may well be true of anything, but it’s a fact that Gargoyle will think about these data, and that’s not debatable. It’s something they’re always making themselves concerned about, and ultimately that’s a good thing. They’re looking out for us. Their ethos is the protection of the innocent.

So let’s give the boys at least that. Throw ’em a bone. They’re creepy.

Most of them, and the beauty of these little sub-culture qualifiers is that they mostly maintain normal family and social lives, there’s police chiefs and public relations Gargoyles as well, and seem to bring no bearing to their dinner table, but perhaps maybe a little understanding of the domain of Pluto… an understanding of the underworld, but someone that’s got to know how to stay cheery… but somehow even when they’re at their best it’s tinged with just a little of the grim.

Some are more street level, and they go to the pubs and they establish connections with regulars at places. The Gargoyle in this station knows how to connect, and how to find a way to work with the right people to get their hostile found, and bound, and im-pound-ed…

The higher view Gargoyles coordinate with these on-the-ground guys, the initiates, acolytes, to the dark order, and they are going to-and-fro pursuant upon their own investigations, individually trying to catch the big fish they’re after. God bless ‘em.

It’s good to get those kind of guys off the streets before they hurt another one. There are big scary evil men in every period of history, what can I say? There’s are always some that go a little too far, call it hubris call it human nature, there’s some badness in a myriad of ways, but that’s a price of freedom, and of liberty–what would be the alternative, suffocating authoritarian compliance and abolishment of Free Will?–and so rather than add a third element, evil, into the equation, we don’t add an authoritarian government on top of it. Gargoyles are watchdogs.

The Gargoyle is free too. He can fall victim, to the same addictions his assailants do. There are dangers. There are pitfalls for the Garoyles, and sometimes they’re stumbling off of their parapets. Some fall for temptations, in different ways, a myriad of ways as well, but rather than a teenage problem, as is that moody and rebellious phase which would naturally couple to this umbrella, of temptations, it is actually almost exclusively in the older male demographic, who dies of old age of some righteous Gargoyle shit, like in an action movie, or Taxi Driver or something…

…

Aleon and Raeff’s first term was a year in Manticore. They spent almost all of their time in training within the Gymnasium. The gang wars would now…

Might as well; if there was going to be violence now, and more held in store for the future, they would prepare to … here. 

The two boys would principally be involved in detection. They learned about planting bugs, tracking the news, and stakeouts and clue-finding. The secret was finding a good case to pursue. There are rarely brutal killings. There are dozens per year that are crimes of passion. There are accidents. 

There are liars.


…

In a typical simulation in Gargoyle you’re a cop a la Lethal Weapon, and you’re subject to days off if you’re injured. The chief is gonna force you to take your sick days. No hero shit. And so in some games you can’t log-in for days at a time. You can check in, and receive some updates from your hospital, maybe by your partner or your wife, if your character’s married, but stuck there in a full body caste–it made for a good close to an episode, for a laugh–but there isn’t much else you can do… And some of these Total Immersion simulations are addicting. If there weren’t limitations imposed they would be all-consuming. We were just testing these things, humanity, and we were careful observing, and making scientific observations. We didn’t want to push anything too far. Especially considering these are children, and science now a days always takes a back seat to Life.

Sometimes the police chief has had enough with you… and suspends you for a few days. Maybe it was for property damage. Or a harassments complaint. The public was so soft, it made you sick sometimes. And sometimes the mayor’s had it up to here with all of you! 

And so now you have to turn in your badge and your gun, but you’re not gonna stop. You know the chief will cave, or the mayor, eventually, and they’re gonna reinstate you. Hell, one day they’re gonna build you a statue. If they knew what was good for ’em. You’re a loose canon, sure, but you’re just that damn good. You’ve brought down the big fish, and you’ve shown mercy to the small fry. You’re a good cop, and a fine husband–and if your character isn’t married then you’d probably make a fine one–but maybe you’re too roguish for that. That’s alright. But even the Blade Runner needed a little action every once in awhile.

I know he’s not called “the Blade Runner.” 

It was the police chief. Talking. He was on the line… the phone… Your partners’ the family guy, anyway, and you’ve got the RV, on the beach, and the dog. And a six-pack. With a carton of smokes. You’re married to the job. 

At least if you get tagged tomorrow nobody’s gonna be cryin’ about it.

…

‘The feats of climbers…’

Gargoyles will stalk their ‘prey’ for extraordinarily lengths of time–hoping to catch their foe in the act. 

…to be honest, it’s kind of ironic that it sometimes takes a peeping tom in order to catch one–in secret, the Gargoyle fantasizes often about this moment, a moment valued maybe above all, and some have been criticized for being too eager to fight, too eager in ‘apprehending’ a violent criminal, somebody’s who has hurt someone, even so maybe too much force was used than was necessary… sometimes even Batman had to blow off some steam, but he never killed anybody, never crossed certain lines… but then again, to actually maybe have saved some innocent people, with vigirosity required, so… 

Some of the lazier Gargoyles, more delicate, simply stay in their neighborhood. Usually they sit in their vehicle, and spy, so let them… their the salt of the earth of the criminal justice system… typically they stick around near their house, or the house of a family member who’s helping them out, or renting to them, and…well…sit there, catching small fish forever. 

They think themselves sentinels, or something, of their own backyard, but this is not the dream for the man in the arena, and usually a delusion for the younger Gargoyles who either haven’t gotten serious about being a police officer–yet–or simply idolizing too much and in the fantasy of the Gargoyle, gazing dumbfounded upon the image of the Gargoyle, from the movies magazines and legend, and therefore didn’t really understand the work, the world, or themselves as was required in the idyllic vision of the predatory Gargoyle, the beast of legend who inspires fears to keep the virtuous in line, and a persona of power that they had created for themselves. 

The fantasy becomes quickly apparent, usually, and then the citizen moves on… humiliated. 

There are roving bands of social media influencers now. They commit crimes en masse in order to get it on film and boost their fame or credibility. They’ve overtaken the countryside. Large bands of them will wear their trademark gear, or theme, one obvious and overused theme might be clowns, but the clown thing represents no clear association so it is most effective to have some theme which is set apart, recognize-able, even by a simple color-coupling as sports teams do.

The social media influences are marauding bands of scavengers in the countrysides now… there isn’t hardly a corpse left to pick for the crows anymore. I heard they’re all cannibals.

Odo from Deep Space 9, the polic comissioner, would be a Gargoyle. He’s an icon. One of many, like Dick Tracy or Batman. There was also that one Gargoyles cartoon tv show in the 90’s. In Deep Space 9 Odo becomes a solid. The Changelings turn him into one. Somehow on the changeling planet they are able to turn him into a ‘solid’ or a typical humanoid. He’s appreciating a beer, and how pouring and hearing the bubbles was actually a very enjoyable experience that he had never really considered before, seductive he says, and he talks to captain Sisco about how seductive food and drink could be, and how he hadn’t never had a chance to appreciate that as a changeling, and also I’m sure as a constable, strict and principled, and the Bajoran elect head of security of the entire station. He had had many weapons as a changeling with which to defend Deep Space 9, the Star Trek space station, but now, as a solid, he could be seduced into consuming… too much food and wine… and whatever else he might drop his guard and endulge on. “Show no fear,” says Dr Bashir, that’s my motto too. He could get hurt now, though. He could take on permanent damage as a solid, like we can. And then I realized that there’s no medical class in the creature-taxonomic program, because each of them had their own system of administering the healing arts. If something extreme needed to be done, there were surgical professionals in every creature society. There’s someone there to treat any ailment. Injuries exists in all fields of life. In Deep Space 9 medical is part of a select handful of senior officers who meet with the command deck. There is a designated uniform for the medical officer. In this asteroidal society they don’t view health the same way as the Federation. There are facilities for taking care of all possible procedures, and they are specialized and diversified in medicine, and the application of healing processes, but a person who you go to see on a regular basis, maybe a dentist, but a traditional ‘doctor’ is dead. So for instance if you race cars or do something in car racing in general you have an elder or a mentor in that field and they will have friends who are professionals of those fields, if it comes to that, but where in racing injuries are the primary focus of the wisened and elder professionals of those types, a Gargoyle type may take injuries, cuts, stabs, bruises, black eyes and concussions with a grain of salt, and maybe patch up some flesh wounds with a roll of cloth and move on. The prowling gargoyle will take a shot of alcohol and kick the street. They’ll go on a stakeout, and sit longer than anything other guy will, any sane square, and he’ll find something to do while he’s bleeding and drinking.

Gargoyles are the least willing to seek medical attention, classically.

The sports guys, Centaurs, are always getting injured… and some of the biggest medical cases of hiding a medical ailment come from the Centaurs. They draw bigger crowds most of the time than the big racers did, but there were many more races and racers making money than athletes. Most of the athletes were stars. A lot of the common Centaur make money on the ancillary industries surrounding sports, and the state of current athletics, and indeed some subsidized governmental assistance to people who wish to train and to some degree master some discipline, but they can be cutthroat in their requirements to remain in the program, and at most it is a free to anyone couple month or so get in shape for free program.

The Manticore don’t have as many showy spectacle type things, and are more interested in a thing relative to the Tao than the star-power clamor of sports.

Manticore looks at the reality, the reality of weapons and matter colliding with matter, when or when not playing games.

The people who ascribe to Manticore have many more jobs such as small scale farming, and maybe you could say subsistence level forms of income, in private though, or they sold gear and merchandise and had your own studio, with students, and the most marked difference is there no sense of showboater-y of sports. This is for the self, a battle with the self, and in a way so is sport, but this is for a private discipline, something someone does solely for one’s self, for inner demons, but also so as to protect others in life and to be prepared to fight with anything you can get your hands on in the environment.

Sometimes that is another guy’s coat arm, or the fabric around his collar, and sometimes it’s gonna me a wrestling match anyways, and who chokes out who first. Sometimes you find something in the surrounding area, a broken piece of wood the size of a club, or some long pole, or a rope, or bare hands you’ll know to some degree what to do with yourself. Martial arts is big in Manticore, and throwing a kick into your boxing routing is what they are all about. They want you to have an arsenal of weapons, techniques and exercises, to become the inner Tiger or Dragon we all know we can become. 

….

Gargoyle 2

     The types of crimes that you might find on the asteroid have more to do with things like posting something ignorant on the public domains, or enduring some social chastisement by having weak arguments, or ideas, or when claiming knowledge of the major mysteries before a clear grasp, of the obvious. Knowing the greater mysteries, but ignorant of all the minor ones… although it might seem that the Internet would emerge free, one must still be held accountable for what one says within the public domain… 

Only these aren’t laws broken to land you in horrific jails or financial ruin, no! They see punishment as treatment; the philosophical men turn the sick into philosophers…

       Aleon perhaps idly watching a view screen, noticing the scandal over the slanderous claims, or whatever: Any claim should be open for argument, this legislation simply requires one to prove the logic of their claim. As far as Aleon’s interests goes, it just seems as though a society as abstract as this would almost hardly even have any particular use for “Law,” since people are so wrapped up in simulated worlds, acting out whatever petulant little fantasy they feel the need to act out there, and there is hardly any crime in the ‘actual’ reality, and plenty of excitements, that only the darkest of criminals will from time to time erupt.

but still, there Are many aspects of this societal behavior, this new-wave which mankind on the Asteroid were riding, was still within its own sort of infancy. It was a culture just beginning, and they were there doing a job–a majorly impressive job

…

…

Aleon was finished putting on his gear, his team’s armored truck …

Raeff doesn’t join Gargoyle for awhile… and maybe Aleon goes into Gargoyle for several, maybe every, term. (Age 13 – 18).

…

…

In Gargoyle, after a few years, Aleon is so ingrained in investigations , whenever Raeff visits him he is in his lab-home, researching, analyzes, and studying, he is involved in something a gliding around the room on a chair and only able to spare about 50% of his attentions. The cases he obsesses on are both from simulated reality as well as true investigations, homicides occuring in reality, to be clear.

…

Gargoyle

Even the gang wars never result in a large amount of death.
It does happen, but most of the combat is designed with at least a modicum
of respect towards human life, even the criminals are elevated in this higher civilization, though imperfect, and the ability for a soldier to fall for a mistake in a single battle, but then allowed to arise again, and to learn how to be even better, more valuable as well, instead of wasted away needlessly altogether… 

Most of the weaponry and tactics used in these street sorties are based off of neutralizing the enemy, but not eliminating the fellow citizen, or taking someone’s life.

It sounds a bit mad to make these considerations, on behalf of the criminal as well as on behalf of the police, but I think there’s a method to the madness.

Because the execution of law is more benign than things were in the previous decades of the 21st Century, the criminal element isn’t as desperate, and perhaps this is a little bit of a pressure relief valve for society, and humans in society, this small element of the wild-west aspect allowed in the blueprints of society is supposedly permitted, to some degree, by the Algorithim…

    

At the end of the Gargoyle stage AL has one term at Hydra. He then joins Gorgon, and uses his skills from Hydra in his military service. He then gets into relationships with the brass running intel and cybersecurity as well as the top brass in offensive warfare capabilities of the AI and nanotech variety. They had a brief stint in the Gorgon ranks, a couple of faceless grunts in mob suppression, where they saw some action and are able to exercise their gymnastic skills and mixed martial arts.

But this doesn’t last long, and Raeff decides to head back to Sapphire for awhile and Aleon goes up the ranks as a Hydra-style officer in The Asteroidal Defense Fleet known under the umbrella monicker of Gorgon.

…

genie

K1 Stories, 2016

Welcome to the Asteroid!
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[ F I R S T ] Term, Primary Education program.

     -1st term of G.e.m. societies,  [ ‘G E N I E’ ].

          -prior to successful passage into the infamous) b.b.b (the blood/brain barrier) or as it’s also known to the optimistic-inclined, as the: dawn of the ‘super software second renaissance.’ The corporation called this software the L.I.G.H.T. technology.

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Table of Contents:

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[ ‘G E N I E’ ]

Introduction, ‘‘Why We’ll Never Get the Moon Back’’

–>> Simulations #1-2:

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-She begins with… G E N I E… Mollie was supposed to be in… but…

-Mollie protects her radical childhood energy and becomes the most spirited character in the whole story. She is like jumping off the page, like a crackling arc of electricity. She seems a cartoon.

Mollie is the true Phoenix, like a glowing fire-spirit that can never be contained. Aleon is the grand juxtaposition to this principle, drawing his power as if by the moody moonlight. There is something a little bit ‘dead’ about the written word, compared to the spoken, or to the style of science as life versus an artist conception of lifestyle, and the written word and the science are a bit, as imagined landscapes, more like graveyards than anything…


-Settings Index for Emerald:

     (At end of document).

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Intro – ‘And Why We’ll Never Get The Moon Back…’    

Welcome, once again, back to the Asteroid!

On the ’Great Rock,’ the great rock being a gigantic Asteroid hurtling toward nothing in particular in deep space has a thriving civilization populating and propagating out there as space-faring Mankind. The enterprising settlers entangle themselves among the mineralized curvatures, the peaks and valleys of this enormous asteroid: the denizens of which now live there quite happily. The majority of these visible domestic structures serve as a vanguard against the empty vacuum of space: bone-white, organic-looking, the structure’s inside is made up entirely with nay a sharp angle to be found within the white coral reef. To be clear: due to the organism-structure which grew here in order to create these air-sealed enclosures started off as mere membrane–a membranous blob, with co-developing specialized organs, as assemblage of specialized tissues, of a fertilized embryo– sort of the same as we all did at one point.

Throughout the formations of the asteroid, and the boulder formations themselves sharp and coral-like compositions, of the asteroid in large expanses where square mileage of rocky asteroid face whereby the bone-white, air-tight seals of the  coral housing structures where a majority of the population resides to sleep in these. The buildings flow around like a flowering field. These structures, although it may sound odd, are grown rather than constructed. The bone-white domiciles which pepper the gigantic Asteroid of quick-moving space rock are the standard civilian living quarters and the majority of their civic centers. It’s a sight often compared, by the Earth-borne residents, to the barnacles which cling on the underside of some great Earth whale. Although not all the residents of the Asteroid were born, or have even visited, the Earth planet where humanity had started, they were however well aware of what an Earth-whale is, as well as the propensity of barnacles to grow under them. The citizens of the Asteroid also probably know quite a bit more about the inner workings and reproductive mechanisms of the barnacle, and the whale, for that matter, than most human beings who have been born and died on planet Earth have ‘ever’ known about these functions in its great history. 

And yet, without ever having even the remotest chance of coming across one (that’s barnacle, whale, or Ocean), still is is thoroughly known by them.

     Out of a force of necessity, the inhabitants of the Asteroid were forced to develop the most efficient production means possible…The construction of these domiciles is quite fast and efficient. They are a self-assembling structure, after all…and while colonies, of man were able now to reside within what air-tight seals these petrified creatures afforded, the population growth is strongest in its quality, not quantity, and that is partly how all of this began…

     Population growth was steady, but the quality of life for the citizens seemed astronomical–and steadily rising still. The people there are quite fulfilled, happy, and eager yet for more of life and is saddened only for the fact that there is not infinitely more time with which to live this joyful, contemplative life.

And the Asteroid; the enormous rock, floats in silence, and stillness, amongst twinkling outer-space…

     The civilization there had outgrown their own planet, and now they need never return. 

     The Asteroid is  the size of a small European country. It’s hard to wrap your head around that kind of size, as far as traveling rocks are typically concerned.

The structural architecture of this ‘Coral Kingdom’ is, upon plain sight, as alien to Earth’s architecture as one could possibly imagine. The biological organism decays: going out of life almost as quickly as it had self-erected. What’s left behind is a mineralized structure–like bone.

     –and is it true that what ‘they’ say–

     –there: look now–and you can see them, there!

     –is it really ‘true’ that all these structures are grown?

     These small structures have survival’s architecture. Becoming sizes many multiples its original form by puffing out its chest, the organism will try to appear greater than it is. It is…a reaction……no more than a code swap…a modification technique…they are cultivated with an instinct for survival, an application of genetic mimicry…whatever you want to call it…and initially they spread outwardly by forming into a cluster of octopus tentacles–and petrify. The growing torso of the complexifying tissues into organ systems becoming a sort of organic dome; and a bulbous structural foundation is in its adolescence. 

Providing shelter…like a petrified jellyfish…it was at one point attempting to ward off any possible threat which this stress-response was originally intended to do…and dies suddenly.

     The Asteroid-World is a bustling swarm of individuals amongst the massive collective. 

With such limitations on the consumable-type resources, inherent in their cause of self-reliance and isolationism…it was inevitable that they find a quick and affordable means of providing…shelter….interwoven, chiseled within the gargantuan rock,…or they will surely die. 

It wasn’t easy, but the dire necessity pushed them onward–the race of man–and they managed to pull it off–survival. These Asteroidal inhabitants…mining crews, military patrols, vacating civilian transports: all walks of life, flying about, engaged in fundamental operations.

The principle education of the youth is unquestionably, the…the…the single! solitary in its…above all-ness! the most pressing mission objective! Peering now within and inside one of these classrooms, we see some children during a typical day of their burgeoning learned careers, as scholars, as lovers of wisdom, today, in…

…

…

First term: (Genie) Manticore*

2nd term: (Pegasus) Gargoyle*

3rd term: (Beholder) Genie*

4th term: (Golem) Pegasus*

5th term: (Manticore) Beholder*

6th or 7th (Basilisk) or Minotaur or Gorgon

The Academy Spreadsheet for:

-Raeff-

misuse of the VR simulators, insanity (unique to each crystal sector), new diseases?, arrogant citizenry (or cold/uncaring, psychopathic), …

…people become obsessed with partying in Ruby, obsessed with their work in Emerald, some become too isolated and lonely in hermetic Sapphire.

… hoarding wealth is no longer an issue so greed must come from addictions, there’s no real family unit: hoarding stuff?

…

‘The Knights’
by Aristophanes:

‘The Knights’ as the fourth play written by Aristophanes, who is considered the master of an ancient form of drama known as Old Comedy. The play is a satire on the social and political life of classical Athens during the Peloponnesian War, and in this respect it is typical of all the dramatist’s early plays. It is unique, however, in the relatively small number of its characters, and this was due to its vitriolic preoccupation with one man, the pro-war populist Cleon. Cleon had prosecuted Aristophanes for slandering the ‘polis’ with an earlier play, The Babylonians (426 BC), for which the young dramatist had promised revenge… and it was in The Knights (424 BC) that his revenge was exacted. The Knights won first prize at the Lenaia festival when it was produced in 424 BC.

The Knights is a satire on political and social life in 5th-century BC Athens. The characters are drawn from real life, and Cleon is clearly intended to be the villain.

… the villain in this context is Paphlagonian, a comic monstrosity responsible for almost everything that’s wrong with the world. The identity of the Paphlagonian as Cleon is awkward, and the ambiguities aren’t easily resolved. This summary features the real-world names Cleon, Nicias, and Demosthenes (though these names are never mentioned in the play). A sausage seller, Agoracritus [‘agora’ Greek for marketplace], vies with Cleon for the confidence and approval of Demos (“The People” in Greek), an elderly man who symbolizes the Athenian citizenry. Agoracritus emerges triumphant from a series of contests, and he restores Demos to his former glory. 

Detailed summary: Nicias and Demosthenes run from a house in Athens, complaining of a beating that they have just received from their master Demos, and cursing their fellow slave Cleon as the cause of their troubles. They inform the audience that Cleon has wheedled his way into Demos’s confidence, and they accuse him of misusing his privileged position for the purpose of extortion and corruption. They advise us that even the mask-makers are afraid of Cleon and that not one of them could be persuaded to make a caricature of him for this play. They assure us, however, that we are clever enough to recognize him even without a mask. Having no idea how to solve their problems, they pilfer some wine from the house, the taste of which inspires them to an even bolder theft – a set of oracles that Cleon has always refused to let anyone else see. On reading these stolen oracles, they learn that Cleon is one of several peddlers destined to rule the polis and that it is his fate to be replaced by a sausage-seller. As chance would have it, a sausage-seller passes by at that very moment, carrying a portable kitchen. Demosthenes informs him of his destiny. The sausage seller is not convinced at first, but Demosthenes points out the myriads of people in the theatre, and he assures him that his skills with sausages are all that is needed to govern them. Cleon’s suspicions, meanwhile, have been aroused, and he rushes from the house in search of trouble. He immediately finds an empty wine bowl, and he loudly accuses the others of treason. Demosthenes calls upon the knights of Athens for assistance, and a Chorus of them charges into the theatre. They converge on Cleon in military formation under instructions from their leader…

Cleon is given rough handling, and the Chorus leader accuses him of manipulating the political and legal system for personal gain. Cleon bellows to the audience for help, and the Chorus urges the sausage-seller to outshout him. There follows a shouting match between Cleon and the sausage-seller with vulgar boasts and vainglorious threats on both sides as each man strives to demonstrate that he is a more shameless and unscrupulous orator than the other. The knights proclaim the sausage-seller the winner of the argument, and Cleon then rushes off… to denounce them all on a trumped-up charge of treason.

The sausage-seller sets off in pursuit, and the action pauses… the Chorus steps forward to address the audience on behalf of the author. 

The Chorus informs us that Aristophanes has been very methodical and cautious in the way he has approached his career as a comic poet, and we are invited to applaud him. The knights then deliver a speech in praise of the older generation, the men who made Athens great, and this is followed by a speech in praise of horses that performed heroically in a recent amphibious assault on Corinth whither they are imagined to have rowed in gallant style. Returning to the stage, the sausage-seller reports to the knights on his battle with Cleon for control of the Council: he has outbid Cleon for the support of the councillors with offers of meals at the state’s expense. Indignant at his defeat, Cleon rushes onto the stage and challenges the sausage-seller to submit their differences to Demos. The sausage-seller accepts the challenge. 

The sausage-seller makes some serious accusations in the first half of the debate: (i) Cleon is indifferent to the war-time sufferings of ordinary people, (ii) he has used the war as an opportunity for corruption, and (iii) he prolongs the war out of fear that he will be prosecuted when peace returns. Demos is won over by these arguments, and he spurns Cleon’s wheedling appeals for sympathy. Thereafter the sausage-seller’s accusations become increasingly absurd: Cleon is accused of waging a campaign against buggery in order to stifle opposition (because all the best orators are buggers), and he is said to have brought down the price of silphium so that jurors who bought it would suffocate each other with their flatulence. Cleon loses the debate, but he doesn’t lose hope, and there are two further contests in which he competes with the sausage-seller for Demos’s favour… 

In tragic dismay, Cleon at last accepts his fate, and he surrenders his authority to the sausage-seller. Demos asks the sausage-seller for his name, and we learn that it is Agoracritus, confirming his lowly origin. The actors depart and the Chorus treats us to another parabasis.

The knights step forward and they advise us that it is honorable to mock dishonorable people. They proceed to mock Ariphrades, an Athenian with a perverse appetite for female secretions. Next they recount an imaginary conversation between some respectable ships that have refused to carry the war to Carthage because the voyage was proposed by Hyperbolus… Then Agoracritus returns to the stage, calling for respectful silence and announcing a new development – he has rejuvenated Demos with a good boiling (just as if he were a piece of meat). The doors of Demos’s house open to reveal impressive changes in Demos’s appearance – he is now the very image of glorious “violet-crowned” Athens, as once commemorated in a song by Pindar.

Demos invites Agoracritus to a banquet at the town hall and the entire cast exits in good cheer – all except Cleon, who is required to sell sausages at the city gate as punishment for his crimes.

…

430 BC: The Plague of Athens resulted in the deaths of many thousands of Athenians, including leading citizens such as Pericles.

427 BC: Aristophanes produced his first play The Banqueters at the City Dionysis.

426 BC: The Babylonians won first prize at the ‘City Dionysia’. Cleon subsequently prosecuted the young playwright for slandering the polis in the presence of foreigners. 

425 BC: … [another performance] at the Lenaia. Cleon criticized Athenian generals for procrastination and incompetence and he replaced Nicias in time to assist Demosthenes in the victory at the Battle of Sphacteria.     •    He later increased the tribute payments of allied states and also increased juror’s pay from two to three obols per day.

* 424 BC: Aristophanes won first prize at the Lenaia with The Knights

…

Cleon, knights and Aristophanes

Cleon’s political career was founded on his opposition to the cautious war strategy of Pericles, and its highpoint came with the Athenian victory at Sphacteria, for which he was feted and honored by the majority of his fellow citizens… Cleon’s entitlement to these honors is continually mocked by Aristophanes in The Knights, and possibly Cleon was sitting in the front row during the performance. Aristophanes makes numerous accusations against Cleon, many of them comic and some in earnest. He mocks Cleon for his questionable pedigree, but inscriptions indicate that the social origins of demagogues like Cleon were not as obscure as Aristophanes and other comic poets tried to make out. He appears to have used the law courts for personal and political ends, but it is possible that he was neither venal nor corrupt.

He had prosecuted Aristophanes for an earlier play, The Babylonians, but an attempt at political censorship during a time of war was not necessarily motivated by personal malice or ambition on Cleon’s part. The play depicted the cities of the Athenian League as slaves grinding at a mill, and it had been performed at the City Dionysia in the presence of foreigners. The knights (citizens rich enough to own horses) were the comic poet’s natural allies against a populist such as Cleon.

… they had recently forced him to hand over a large sum of money, implying that he had obtained it corruptly. As an educated class, knights occupied many of the state offices that were subject to annual audits, and Cleon specialized in the prosecution of such officials, often using his rapport with jurors to obtain the verdicts he wanted. This abuse of the auditing system is one of the complaints made by the Chorus when it enters the stage and it accuses Cleon of selecting officials for prosecution like figs according to their wealth and psychological vulnerability (lines 257–65). The play also accuses Cleon of manipulating census lists to impose crippling financial burdens on his choice of victims (lines 911–25).

Places and people mentioned in The Knights

Old Comedy is a highly topical form of comic drama and its meanings are often obscured by multiple references to contemporary news, gossip and literature. Centuries of scholarship have unriddled many of these references and they are explained in commentaries in various editions of the plays. The following lists are compiled from two such sources.

Pylos: A bay in the Peloponnese, shut in by the island of Sphacteria, it is associated with Cleon’s famous victory and there are many references to it in the play: as a cake that Cleon pinched from Demosthenes (lines 57, 355, 1167); as a place where Cleon like a colossus has got one foot (76); as an oath by which Cleon swears (702); as the place where Cleon snatched victory from the Athenian generals (742); as the origin of captured Spartan shields (846); as an epithet of the goddess Athena (1172); and as an equivalent of the hare that Agoracritus stole from Cleon (1201). Pylos is mentioned again in three later plays.

Carthage: or Carchedon: A Phoenician city, it marks a western limit of Athenian influence (line 174) and it is somewhere that the ships don’t want to go (1303); an eastern limit is marked by Caria (173). 

Chalcidice: A region in the northern Aegean that was under Athenian control but where the cities were increasingly rebellious. The wine bowl that the two slaves steal from the house is Chalcidian in design and Cleon subsequently accuses them of stealing it to provoke a Chalcidian revolt (line 237). Ironically, Cleon later perished in a military campaign to quell the revolt there.

Chersonesos: The Gallipoli Peninsula, it is mentioned by the Chorus as the sort of place where Cleon fishes for people he can put on trial in Athens (line 262).

Miletus: One of the principal cities of Ionia, it is famous for its fish (line 361). Cleon is imagined choking on a fried cuttlefish while contemplating a bribe from Miletus (932).

Potidaea: A rebellious city in Chalcidice, it was recaptured by the Athenians in 429 BC. Cleon offers Agoracritus a bribe of one talent not to mention the bribe of ten talents he is said to have taken from there (line 438).

Boeotia: A northern neighbour of the Athenians but an ally of Sparta, it was famous for its cheeses. Cleon accuses Agoracritus of making cheese with the Boeotians (line 479). Boeotia is mentioned extensively in The Acharnians and receives other mentions in two other plays.

Argos: A Peloponnesian state, it had remained neutral throughout the war. Agoracritus claims that Cleon used negotiations with Argos as an opportunity to negotiate a bribe from the Spartans (line 465) and he murders a quote from Euripides in which the ancient state is apostrophized (813). Argos is mentioned in four other plays.

Corinth: A Peloponnesian state, it had recently been attacked by marines under the command of Nicias. The cavalry had played a decisive role in the expedition. The horses had even rowed the ships and their attitude had been meritorious throughout the campaign (line 604). Corinth is mentioned again in two later plays.

Pnyx: The hill where Athenian citizens assembled to debate state issues, it is said by Agoracritus to have a bad effect on Demos – ordinarily the cleverest chap in the world, he often gapes at the speaker’s platform like someone tying wild figs to a cultivar (line 749–55).

Pindar: A renowned lyrical poet, he is quoted in praise of Athens (lines 1323,1329).

Hippias: The tyrant of Athens, whose wife Myrsina is here pronounced Byrsina (‘made of leather’) because one of their foreign mercenaries is said to be Cleon’s father (line 449), who made his fortune trading in leather. Hippias is mentioned again in Lysistrata.

Cerberus: The watchdog of Hades, it is an oracular metaphor for Cleon (line 1030) and it receives a mention in two other plays.

Nicias and Demosthenes and/or two slaves: The two slaves are listed as Demosthenes and Nicias in ancient manuscripts. The lists were probably based on the conjecture of ancient critics and yet there is little doubt that they reflect Aristophanes’ intentions. Demosthenes summons the Chorus of knights as if he were a general in command of cavalry. Moreover, he says he made a Spartan cake in Pylos that was later pilfered by Paphlagonian (lines 54–7) and this seems to be a reference to Cleon’s success in taking the lion’s share of the credit for the victory at Sphacteria… Demosthenes [delivers] a short valedictory speech congratulating Agoracritus at the end of the play (lines 1254–56) – a speech that is otherwise assigned to the leader of the Chorus. However this is a token appearance after a long absence and it still leaves the audience in the dark about how Nicias feels at the end.

Imagery: It has been observed that imagery is the most important aspect of Aristophanes’ comic poetry. In this play, the imagery provides a context in which the ambiguities mentioned above can be resolved. Paphlagonian is a monstrous giant (74–9), a snoring sorcerer (103), a mountain torrent (137), a hook-footed eagle (197), garlic pickle (199), a mud-stirrer (306), a fisherman watching for shoals of fish (313), a butchered pig (375–81), a bee browsing blooms of corruption (403), a dog-headed ape (416), a storm by sea and land (430–40), a giant hurling crags (626–29), a storm surge at sea (691–93), a thieving nurse (716–18), a fishermen hunting eels (864–67), a boiling pot (919–22), a lion fighting gnats (1037–8), a dogfox (1067), a beggar (182–3) and finally a sausage seller in the city gates (1397). These mixed metaphors present Paphlagonian as a versatile form of comic evil whose relevance transcends any particular place or time. Thus Cleon can be understood as one of Paphlagonian’s many manifestations and the satire is subsumed in the larger allegory without contradiction.

…

The Knights is one of the earliest of Aristophanes’ surviving plays and generally it obeys the conventions of Old Comedy. There are some significant variations in this play:

* Agon: An agon is a symmetrical scene in which a debate is conducted in long lines, typically anapests. In a few cases however anapests are used to indicate arguments that the poet wants to be taken seriously while iambs are used to indicate arguments not to be taken seriously.

Examples of this are found in The Clouds… and in The Frogs… The agon in The Knights is another example. It takes the form of a debate on the Pnyx between Cleon and the sausage-seller. The first half is in anapests and it features serious criticisms of Cleon (lines 756–835) but the second half is in iambs and the criticisms of Cleon are comically absurd (lines 836–940).

Concluding episodes: It is typical for an agon to result in the protagonist’s victory and thereafter the action becomes a farcical anticlimax characterized by the comings and goings of ‘unwelcome visitors’. The agon in The Knights results in the conventional victory for the protagonist but the anticlimax involves a highly comic variation – the only unwelcome visitor in this play is Cleon, who will not accept defeat and who thus inflicts upon himself a series of defeats that is conventionally reserved for a series of secondary characters.

Exodos: Old Comedy mandates a happy ending that culminates in a final song to mark the cast’s departure. There is no such song in The Knights and it is possible that it has been lost in the transmission of the ancient manuscripts.

…

The Birds (Next)