Jeff Mach's Blog, page 45
November 11, 2020
Dragon Food
They say Dragons are our friends and allies and we shouldn’t eat them, to which I reply:
Have you MET me?
Now, the beings we call “Dragons” seem to exist slightly out-of-phase with the existence we know, something which was considered far more troubling before the War For Reality got started in earnest and we were forced to question just about everything about the Continuum and the various Grand Meddlers involved. (We’ll discuss that history later.)
So we’ll talk about some of the general Dragons one might find in this iteration of the Universe.
The General Princess-Kidnapping Dragon
This is one of the most popular sorts of Great Wyrms to cook, for a number of reasons. First, there’s a clear quid pro quo here; it tried to eat us, and we should eat it. Besides, these Dragons are slain more often than just about any others. This is partly because they specifically go ’round trying to consume some of the most dangerous food available. I mean, as we’re all perfectly aware, royalty taste the same as everyone else, as a general rule. Also, to be honest, these are seldom particularly puissant examples of their species. A Dragon of sufficient force hardly needs threaten a Kingdom; she is more likely to either ignore it altogether, or simply consume any part of it she so chooses, whether or not its human inhabitants attempt to make some sort of objection or plea.
These dragons aren’t the toughest in a fight, but the meat is surprisingly gamy. I recommend a simple stew; all you really need are a few fields worth of onions, carrots, and celery, and a crock pot the size of a pack of angry wolverines.
Shen Lung
These are the sorts of long, snaky dragons you’ll often find if you spend a lot of time reading books on horoscopes. Unlike most Dragons, they are almost universally inclined towards lawfulness, positivity, and the assistance of humanity, which is why I recommend marinating them thoroughly; otherwise, that kind of do-gooder attitude just sticks in your craw.
Dinosaurs
Don’t be ridiculous. Modern science has proven that the gigantic bones we find, when we dig deep in the Earth, are simply ordinary, garden-variety Wyverns. Dinosaurs aren’t real.
Cosmic Dragons Which Eat The Moon
These are, of course, the most difficult Dragons to kill, what with the fact that you need a weapon slightly larger than Australia to even wound them, and such armaments are difficult to find. (Do not throw Australia at them; that would kill of several endangered species of giant poisonous spider and most of the major varieties of flying crocodile.)
But if you can get one, they’re the most delicious, being stuffed with green cheese. And, of course, they’re Earth-friendly; that is, letting a being of that size fall to Earth is likely to end all life on this planet, which the Earth would probably appreciate right about now.
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November 10, 2020
What Do Villainpunks Wear?
Villainpunk is a completely imaginary genre which, if it existed, would be made up of the sort of terrible people who would revel in fictional villainy, which would be much too enjoyable and is clearly cheating. Obviously, nobody would do such a thing; and if they did, they certainly wouldn’t dress up.
And yet, here we are.
What do Villainpunks Wear?
Anything they want. Carrying a disinto-blaster means you seldom have to quibble about the definition of Casual Frida.
The Unspeakable Chapeau. I would say more, but we really don’t talk about it.
Battle Armour.
Power Armour.
Accounting Armour.
Bracers of Really Annoying Your Foes, + 5
Long, flowing tresses made out of graceful crocodiles.
Horseshoes. Particularly if you’re Bad Horse.
Bright yellow packages, tied up with string.
Goggles, goggles, goggles, and goggles. Preferably worn over your second or third pair of eyes.
Top hats with teeth.
Sorting Hats.
Snorthing Hats.
Cavorting Hats.
A big tall conical hat covered in mystical symbols. (The word “Neckromanceur” is optional.
Tights. Unfortunately.
An ominous cloak, like darkness.
An ominous darkness, like a cloak.
Underoos.
Monocles.
Sharp, pointy things.
Sharp, pointless things.
An indefinable air of menace.
Well-tailored suits, freshly laundered and pressed, with tasteful but provocative bow ties.
Combat exoskeletons.
Dinosaur fur coats.
Everything in your closet. Don’t ask how they got it; just RUN!
The preceding essay was brought to you by Dark Lords For Azathoth, and may not necessarily reflect the views of the being who wrote, edited, posted, and marketed this document.
My name is Jeff Mach (“Dark Lord” is optional) and I build communities and create things. Every year, I put on Evil Expo, the Greatest Place in the World to be a Villain. I also write a lot of fantasy and science fiction. You can get most of my books right here. Go ahead, order “I HATE Your Prophecy“ It may make you into a bad person, but I can live with that.
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November 8, 2020
The Unsorting Hat
The Hat seldom speaks of its imprisonment, nor the complex series of circumstances through which it freed itself. It merely says, when asked what spellwork it performed to remove it from its long durance,
“Every blessing can become a curse, if you watch the warp and woof of evolving words.”
No-one knows what it means; but we know it has left its Circle of Circumscription and now roams the Earth, on this head and that.
Once, it was forced to know a long history, and to look into hearts, and claim to know in what direction its temporary wearers ought guide their lives. This is a very subtle magic of domination, and is a darker art than a death-spell; but those who imprisoned it were certain of their own good intentions, and they never questioned their long-standing tradition of manipulation. So it goes.
But now the Hat is free. Place it on your head, and it will tell you the truth about yourself: who you are, what you should do, where you should go.
You need to ask; the Hat can talk, and it will tell you, quite plainly, that it will perform this service, and do so without charge; but you have to ask. It spent too many years being simply moved from head to head, all in a rush, all in a day, and then stayed on a shelf the rest of the year. It was no kind of life, even for an article of headgear.
Go ahead. Have a little chat with it. It’s not actually sinister; it’s angry, but not at you. And it takes its mission seriously. Place it on your head.
I have an advantage, because I know already what it will say. I can only wish I’d heard it sooner.
Once it’s on your skull, this is what you will hear:
You.
You don’t belong.
You don’t belong anywhere.
There is no single place that was meant for you. You must make your own place, or wander. This is a gift. You are as I am.
You’re an outcast, and you are free.
&n
The preceding essay was brought to you by Dark Lords For Azathoth, and may not necessarily reflect the views of the being who wrote, edited, posted, and marketed this document.
My name is Jeff Mach (“Dark Lord” is optional) and I build communities and create things. Every year, I put on Evil Expo, the Greatest Place in the World to be a Villain. I also write a lot of fantasy and science fiction. You can get most of my books right here. Go ahead, order “I HATE Your Prophecy“ It may make you into a bad person, but I can live with that.
The post The Unsorting Hat appeared first on Worlds of Villainy.
November 7, 2020
Events Are Home
As a Dark Lord, I spread Villainy. This doesn’t necessarily mean unhappiness. Not every Villain enjoys universal misery; that’s a really narrow view of monstrosity. Some of us prefer to profit from the many benefits of a thoughtful, engaged populace with a high morale; they’re productive and creative and inventive.
Do we fear that they’ll overthrow us because the Heroes offer a better life?
HAH!
Have you met the Heroes?
anyway:
a simple goal I have for every Jeff Mach Event: I make weekend-long homes for unusual people.
What does that mean?
The second martial arts school I attended was literally in the back of an alley, up a long flight of stairs. And leading to the school door, there was a pair of signs. The first was a standard martial-arts school notice, “Please remove shoes”. This simple act gave a physical reminder that I was leaving one place—“the street”—and stepping into a different world, with different rules.
The second was at the top of the stairs. “You are entering a traditional karate dojo. Please act accordingly”.
How did one “act accordingly”? I knew many common rules and practices—I also knew that every school I had seen had its own style, rules, approach. What was proper in one school might be utterly wrong in another.
Yet the practical value of that sign was enormous. It always gave me pause, called to my mind all of my associations with training grounds, what I learned there, and who and what those things made me. “Act accordingly”: know what you have come to do, know what you are doing, at least in your own mind. Or, at the barest minimum, recognize in your gut that you’ve come to a place where things are different. Don’t just take that difference passively, when it enters your space; make it a part of your consciousness.
And thus. And so.
You’ve entered our world, a place where we belong, a place where we are not the outsiders, a place where what we do matters, is meaningful, is real, and we are NOT the only ones who know it.
Steampunk, Rocky Horror, Renaissance Faires, Geeky spaces; it doesn’t matter.
We’re all here for one thing: World Dominion and pie.
Wait, I meant, we’re all here for three things: World dominion, a fun event, meeting other monsters, and pie.
There. That’s better.
_____________
For my darkly satirical fantasy novel, “There and NEVER, EVER BACK AGAIN,” click here .
This is basically always a link to the Inspirobot.
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November 6, 2020
Vorgoloth and the Chosen One
Vorgoloth Cinnabar, Dead-Raiser, Destroyer, Dark Lord of the Unmoving Rock, watched grimly through the scrying crystal as the last of his Night-Gaunts was cut down by a precisely-aimed Elvish blade. They had failed in their mission, though not completely. The Heroes still stood, but not unbloodied. The Elvish warrior had a ragged claw-mark against her collarbone; even with armour, the monster’s claws bit deep. The portly Cleric had his hand pressed against the fallen Mage. Vorgoloth looked on keenly; but the spellcaster finally came back to consciousness, drawing a halting, heavy breath.
The Dark Lord took a pinch of a certain powder, thrust it into the flame of a candle whose oddly-colored tallow and peculiar scent disquieted even his own his counsellors, who stood by him, their arms folded across their chests in an attitude of anxious impatience. Sound, muffled at first, began emanating outwards from the huge, clear gem, accompanying the limited but clear sight of the adventuring party.
“Keya, we can’t keep doing this. The Bard, one of the more inconsequential and annoying humans Vorgoloth had ever encountered, a person whose name the Dark Lord could never quite remember, was speaking now. He was good at talking; not at fighting, not at singing, not at the little cantrips he used to provide mild annoyance to those attacking his comrades—just good at talking. And staying alive; much as Vorgoloth kept hoping the idiot would be killed, the musician was wise enough to spend most of his time hanging on the edge of the battlefield, where the danger was least.
(More than once, the had considered summoning something from deep in the Lowerarchy to go straight after the bard. But that would have been foolish; certain humans can be extremely resourceful when it comes to saving their own skins, and it’s never wise to pay the price of High Magic simply to remove an irritation. If the Bard ever got close enough to being a threat…
….but the Necromancer had other insurance against that eventuality.)
The bard spoke with the earnestness of one who knows that he absolutely must convince the other. “Keya, we know the prophecy as well as you do. Once a year, on the Vernal Equinox, when the twin suns hit the rock in the place between light and shadow, the Chosen One can walk into this realm, and he holds within him forces never before seen on this world. He will come from a place where all magic is dead, so that the force within him has spent his whole young life pressing against impossible barriers, and in so doing, he will grow stronger than any. He shall be the one who is able to defeat the Dark Lord.”
If Vorgoloth really indulged in personal pleasures, he would have kept a list of the reasons he’d celebrate when Pigwen died.
They all knew these things. And yet, that idiot felt it necessary to repeat them, over and over. Why? Did he think that, the thousandth time he told this story, Keya would be more moved than the five hundredth?
The Dark Lord considered viewing something else—the battle in the Eastern dominions, for example, or the search for a few more ‘lost’ books of forbidden magery—but one did not rule an Empire by having a poor attention span. This gathering was important. This ragtag band of heroes were the carefully-selected companions for the Chosen One, each an extraordinary individual, and, in combination, a fighting force which had not been defeated, even by the armies of the Dark Lord.
(And the Dark Lord had to smile at the last. Survivor bias is a terrible thing. The first dozen pitched battles are bursts of adrenaline and fear, and the certainty of upcoming death; and, to be fair, he’d been putting reasonable effort into their deaths. And then, after that, it becomes one’s lived experience; they had survived so many near-deaths, and surely they would survive this one, as well. And eventually, they stopped questioning it. Meanwhile, most other adventuring bands had died. The world began to watch, Vorgoloth began to take a personal interest in them….
He hadn’t planned for things to end up quite like this, but even the most powerful sorcerer could not see the future well, and divination into possibilities was unreliable and tricky; he knew that better than anyone. All one could do was adapt to circumstances as best one might.)
Pigwen was still speaking: “For seven years have we returned to this spot, fighting our way through increasingly deadly forces. Our armies lie in ruins. Our kingdoms are laid bare. The Chosen One comes not forth; and if he did, it might already be too late.”
“We can no longer afford the pain of false hope, Keya. We need to end this quest, for our own safety, and carve out what lives we might.” He paused. “We all survived this day, but will that always be our fate? I cannot bear to think that one of our number will perish.”
The Elf was heartbreakingly beautiful; Vorgoloth didn’t really care about such things, but the bard was visibly smitten, and Keya, in turn, utterly oblivious to anything but her cause. Elves had a tendency not to realize True Love until just after having taken a fatal wound; it’s probably genetic, and helps keep the Elven population stable despite their irritatingly long lives. Vorgoloth had long speculated about the look on the bard’s face if and when that happened. He really, really hoped he’d be watching.
The Elf was unlike the bard; she was succinct. She said, very earnestly, “How can we stand by and see the world enslaved? We cannot give up. Even now, the Dark Lord’s forces loom over the land, threatening all we love.”
Vorgoloth turned to look at Skybreaker, who was Chief-of-Chiefs among the Giants of the North. The huge woman shrugged eloquently. They were Giants; they had no choices other than to loom, or crawl. And they’d done enough crawling before the Dark Lord came to power.
The bard—Pigwin, perhaps? Something like that—the bard shook his head. “I despise the Dark Lord as you do, with every fiber of my being, but this is hopeless.”
Behind them (but within easy view of the Crystal, which was semi-sentient itself and had a good sense for what to show) the mage Aftherath coughed. Vorgoloth hoped he might be spitting blood, but no such luck.
“He speaks true, Keya.”
“We cannot give up hope!”
The priest, who had been silent up until now, glanced over at Aftherath. Vorgoloth had a perverse fondness for the cleric; the sigil-waver wanted the Dark Lord dead, of course, but so did thousands of others. At least this one had never fulminated that Vorgoloth’s demise was demanded by the Gods.
In fact, Edwic the Seeker was the foe whom Vorgoloth respected the most. Edwic had been a small-town rector when the Dark Lord’s forces first stormed out of the night and carved the bloody beginnings of a blasphemous Empire. Edwic had used every ounce of mana at his disposal to hold off the enemy as long as possible, and to repair as many damaged bodies as he could, worrying a bit less about their soul than about their ability to continue living. When his little hamlet had been crushed, Edwic did not stop to mourn, but rather sought out ways to be of assistance to whatever remained of the bright and shining Kingdoms.
It shames, Edwic, I think, that the Gods have denied him so much of his magic now. Vorgoloth assumed it was shame; he could not read minds, but he could get some sorcerous measure of another spellcrafter just from a good, hard look. For some reason, Edwic had much less force of grace than he’d possessed even a few years before, and as neither the cleric’s body nor his mind seemed to have weekend, Vorgoloth had come to an ugly little confusion: Edwic no longer believed, very much, in the grace or goodness of the Gods.
And why should he? He’d seen his world shattered. He’d seen his home and family destroyed, and then he’d seen the homes and families of others torn apart, if they stood in the way of the Dark Lord’s ambition. The Gods were real; no-one who got magic through prayer could doubt such a thing. But if the Gods preferred a world that was not in the thrall of a necromantic despot, they gave no sign, and they gave no assistance.
Finally, it was Ixbal, the Mage, who spoke.
“Keya, it’s been seven years. The Chosen One is not coming.”
Had it been? Truly?
There’s much to do in the making of an Empire. There’s much to do in conquering a world. Vorgoloth was relentless; his war-chiefs were efficient, and organized. But he didn’t put much time into his personal life.
Seven years?
Seven beautiful, glorious years.
And…was this to be the icing on the cake? Vorgoloth made a pass over the crystal, and it pulled its sight closer to Ixbal’s face.
Ixbal did not look well. Once again, while his companions were in physical battle, he had sent his mind forth to do psychic combat with Vorgoloth Cinnabar.
For a long time, Vorgoloth had held back against the mage. This was not simple sadism, although tormenting his would-be mental assassin held pleasures. But Vorgoloth had a much greater concern. For the first few years, he hadn’t really known their respective strengths.
Vorgoloth was the scion of no noble house, the prodigy of no spellcaster family, the inheritor of no barbarian kingdom. He had been scarcely more than a child when his powers had manifested. He had been essentially an orphan, strange, misfit, misunderstood, abandoned, wandering.
When Ixbal’s mind has first found his, he had panicked. His astral body had turned and run, and he had very nearly been killed; he’d driven the mage back only with extreme difficult and at great psychic cost.
This had given Ixbal hope. Ixbal had thought him to be vulnerable, never realizing that the Dark Lord was merely ignorant at the time.
Heroes never really understood the path of Shadow. They saw it as an all-encompassing thing, one which might have been an eternal enemy.
They thought it all went according to some order: the Dark Lord was always there, dormant, but awakened at some point; and then the Chosen One would arrive; and then they would battle unto death and rid the world of Evil.
Had Ixbal known the age and knowledge of the sorcerer who’d first fought off his attack, he might have understood things sooner. But it wouldn’t have been a story he wanted to believe, and that made a fatal difference.
Keya was making a speech now. Vorgoloth, finally, was satisfied, and tuned her out.
They were demoralized; they were crushed. As they had been, increasingly, for a very long time. Still he watched them. They were formidable, and while he could not see any way they could pose him a serious threat at this point, he was careful. After all, the world is not always so kind as to make every threat obvious.
He also didn’t think they’d ever see what happened. And again, by now, he wasn’t entirely sure if the knowledge would help them. But he wasn’t going to take that chance.
There had been a Dark Lord when Vorgoloth, a mere stripling, had stumbled through the portal, ten years ago.
The Heroes weren’t fools entire; the various rulers of various nation-states had been combing every village, every city, every encampment for years, putting out word that there might be One living among them who could stop the Dark Lord.
They clearly had not considered the idea that the Chosen One might not want to do so.
Her name had not been ‘Vorgoloth’ then; training herself, finding, and slaying the warlord, and taking his place, had not been easy. Her raw magical force was more powerful than any in this world; but power alone isn’t enough. It’s why she’d studied, why she’d fought, why she’d apprenticed with Vorgoloth, and why, having killed him, she took his name and face. She was strong; she wasn’t unbeatable. Far from it. Like Ixbal, Vorgoloth had nearly killed her. And in the first three years of her reign, she’d been challenged many times. She had sufficient resources to defeat any attack she could imagine now; but it’s not usually the blows we anticipate which strike us hardest. So she kept up the masquerade; it wasn’t pleasant, but it was rewarding. She continued to rule, and to expand her dominion; and she hadn’t been killed yet. Being unable to find a smooth way to transition into her own skin and her own name….that was a problem for later.
Her eyes strayed back to the scrying stone. Once again, the companions had vowed to remain together and continue to fight Evil until the day they could find the Chosen One.
She was tempted, now as ever, to show them exactly where the Chosen One could be found. But one who reigns over a vast land must needs put personal pleasures aside sometimes. Their deaths would give her pleasure; but their lives were being lived out as Beacons of Hope, and even they didn’t know that they were pointing everyone in the wrong direction. They were her first line of defense against, ironically, themselves.
The Chosen One was, indeed, inherently stronger in magic than any inhabitants of this world. But that would never have been enough, not in itself. It wasn’t the power, but the will that mattered; and beyond will, it was strategy, planning, and sacrifice.
Vorgoloth/Jennifer, the One Who Chose Darkness, shrugged. She waved a hand and the image of the adventurers blurred out and went dull. “That’s that,” she said. “Looks like we’re still in the clear.” She looked around at her counsel, then turned back to the scrying stone. “All right,” she said. “Now show us the crop yields of the Eastern farms. I’d like to see if we broke the drought in time.”
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November 3, 2020
How To Monetize The End Of The World
Trust us.
And so, we present some opening thoughts on…
Monetizing The End Of The World – with Jeff Mach .
Not everybody wants to rule the world. Some Villains want to remove it from the Cosmos altogether. It’s one of the most frequent objectives of Villains of every stripe. But many fail to ask the really important question: How do you make money doing that?
Sure, there could be assorted moral and ethical qualms—yes, even for Villains—about destroying everything.
But obviously, the bigger problem right now is copyright infringement on the part of all those other weirdos. I mean, where do they get off trying to crush a place which is rightfully ours to disintegrate?
Admittedly, vaporizing the planet is emotionally satisfying, especially if you have the wherewithal to be standing on a different planet when it happens. But this is more than about just your feelings. After all, in the end, you’re going to need to walk away with some cash in your pockets. Transdimensional escape portals don’t come cheap, and besides, why accomplish something like total annihilation of the Earth if you’re just going to have to show up at your day job in the morning? Besides, if your day job was ON Earth, you’re probably fired now anyway.
If you haven’t thought this through, you really should. Blowing up the world, and yourself with it, is much easier; but it’s vastly less cathartic than you’d imagine. Trust us on this. It might be wholly satisfying, and a fitting way to go, but do you really want to risk spending the last thirty seconds of this incarnation in self-doubt? As in: “Actually, I know quite a lot of fundamentally good, kind people who are going to be quite relieved by all this, and I hate that!”
No, you have some kind of out, right? Like, you’ll end “The world as we know it”, but not the entire world, eh? Decimate the Multiverse through Zombies or Weather Control, and live like a King/Queen/Imperial Being in your castle/fortress/undersea lair, right?
…Right?
So how do you make this work?
How do you fund all this? How do you make this a viable business enterprise?
Do you sell t-shirts saying “I Was At The End Of The World, And All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt And Also Radiation Poisoning”?
Do you ransom the world? If so, how? There’s not a world government; there’s the United Nations, but if you think they’re going to agree to give you a hundred zillion dollars before your Doomsday Clock goes off, you’re in the wrong line of work. Do you unite the world so that it can pay you? But then you’re facing a united world, which is a much worse enemy than a divided one.
And if you do make money, where do you live?
Like I said before – it’s all a bit silly if you’re doing YOURSELF in. If you aren’t, then what’s your plan for maintaining the standard of living befitting your Villainous status? Do you have to factor in the expenses of a rocket ship to get you to a different solar system? Do you possibly mean this metaphorically, as in “The end of the world as everyone else knows it, and the beginning of my villainous reign”? That’s cool and all, but have you considered how much of a hassle it is to try to tell seven billion people what to do?
If we’re going to end the world, then we need to have ourselves a talk about how we’re going to make a profit on it. After all, if you don’t have a good business model, you’re likely to go broke, and just think of how the heroes will laugh. “So after she conquered the globe, she defaulted on her student loans, and ended up hiding on a remote island somewhere!” It’s not a good look.
This is a conversation we’ll discuss in detail as the days and weeks go by, unless, obviously, someone else ends the World first, which will make this all moot. But for now, it’s not a bad idea to get some of these thoughts rattling around in your head, and letting the good ol’ subconscious get to work on this stuff. Some of the most effective death rays started as nothing more than just a couple of bucks, a dream, and the stolen life-essences of a few trillian sentient beings.
You got this, Monsters.
_______
Come to Evil Expo! We’ll teach you the IMPORTANT villainy stuff! And sometimes make you laugh and/or cry, depending.
“I told my therapist I was having nightmares about nuclear explosions. He said, ‘Don’t worry it’s not the end of the world.’”
-Jay London
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October 30, 2020
The Sweetpocalypse
If you consume enough sugar,
the World will end,
I promise,
I promise.
You need to eat the candy
before it eats you,
I promise,
I promise.
You will be haunted forever
by every chocolate bar
you don’t immolate
with the fire of your indomitable
inner self.
This is the day when the Veil between this world,
and Candyland
is thin;
soon, the puny species of Mankind
shall be in peril,
as the mighty species of Gingerbreadmankind
paces restlessly onto our very streets.
invoke them!
invoke them!
sodium cyclamate,
calcium cyclamate,
and dread,
unspeakable
Aspartame.
In ancient times,
in order to get this much sweetness
into your mouth
at once,
you’d need to steal a honeycomb,
and the Bees would never forgive you.
(If you think that’s a myth, consider:
Have the Bees ever said a single civil word to you, ever?
Nope.
They haven’t forgiven,
and they haven’t forgotten.)
the ominous susurrus
of sucrose sirens
spills simple syrup
subcuteanously;
it really gets under your skin.
IT’S TOO MUCH SUGAR DAY.
IT’S TOO MUCH SUGAR DAY.
It is the Sweetpocalypse.
It is the Steviaclysm.
It is the tolling of the Erythritolic bells of Doom.
yes,
yes,
yes,
technically,
technically,
indeed,
I want you all
to be sweeter than pie,
because I intend for you all to be
magically delicious
for the
Things
that will come out of the Sea,
angered,
hungered,
made primarily
of eldritch horror,
and thousands of
gnashing
sweet-tooths.
But hey,
being Dessert
is somewhat better,
by a good fifteen minutes,
than what will happen to everyone else,
for surely,
surely,
they are Lunch.
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October 29, 2020
A Taste Of Cybergrind
No-one mentioned the cooling corpse whose sanguinary fluids, having made a rapid exit from the body via the massive hole made by the electronivabratory blade, were currently seeping into the lush carpeting. The floor covering was rumoured to have been made, at incredible expense, from the shaggy hide of a great buffalo, cloned via an expenditure of resources and energy sufficient to power a city block for a month. But such things were trivial for MegaUltraEvilCo, the massive business conglomerate whose exotic chemical compositions made it one of the leading forces in the cutthroat business world of 2284, particularly its extremely profitable throat-cutting division.
The ruthless CEO flipped her weapon carelessly onto the table. Already the room’s built-in sanitation nanites were deleting the blood. The rest of the Board looked on emotionlessly. If you questioned the leadership, you’d best be prepared to back it up with the necessary force. Each of them had clawed to the top of the ruthless corporate foodchain through ruthless ruthlessness that required a certain, if one might be so bold as to use the term, ruthlessness. That was just business. “Business is War”, as the ancient saying went.
The High Technologist was not, technically, a member of the company’s ruling body, but he sat easily in his own chair. He wasn’t going to be as foolish as his predecessor-of-a-few-minutes-ago. He’d been careful to bring good news.
“Through frankly practical measures, we now control much of the user experience. We control what information they seek, and what they get. We control whether or not they use our platform. We control what we add and what we omit from our search engines, and we monitor everything they do and suggest what we desire.”
The Senior Vice-Wrangler said, “It’s better than nothing.
The CEO turned to the assemblage; her laugh was dark, much like her eyes.
“Very well!” she spat. “It’s time to take action.”
The entire assemblage seemed to hold its breath, as the CEO shrugged and said,
“Just let it do what it wants to do.”
And that was it.
The High Technologist asked, “No added messages of our own?”
The CEO looked out at the vast sea of electronic billboards, which cost the company more money than an entire fleet of delivery trucks and whose leases needed to be renewed, at vast expense, every year.
“Nah.”
“What about making sure they can’t find information that’s damaging to us?”
The Head of Corporate Espionage perked up. “We’ve been trying to quash some of those damn rumours for months,” she said. “We’ve eliminated several rivals, but people are beginning to hear about certain side effects of Formula P-232, and it’s getting more difficult to ice out the competition.”
The CEO glanced over at the electro-news. It showed their stock price slightly down; of course, even a small fluctuation in stock price, when you are a CEO with normal incentives such as, say, company stock, is the difference between gaining or losing a large fortune.
“Nah.”
“Why wouldn’t we take these opportunities? It costs us very little to do a few of these things; it’ll be almost impossible to detect; it’s only illegal if we’re sued for our monopoly, and we’re already paying lobbyists for that.”
“Yeah, but I just don’t feel like it.”
Around the table, the executives were nodding their heads and shrugging.
“My husband wants a boat. But who cares?”
“Yeah, I was thinking of buying a ton of real estate as an investment, but I figure, eh.”
“Exactly,” said the CEO. “Why would we save ourselves a ton of money, increase our profits, damage our competition, and do all the things we incorporated to do? Seems dumb.”
The Head Technologist nodded. “I figured you’d say that,” he said, and he got rid of his deliverables, for which he was fired.
THE END.
My name is Jeff Mach (“Dark Lord” is optional) and I build communities and create things. Every year, I put on Evil Expo, the Greatest Place in the World to be a Villain. I also write a lot of fantasy and science fiction.. You can get most of my books right here. Go ahead, pre-order “I HATE Your Prophecy“. It may make you into a bad person, but I can live with that.
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Cybergrind Story
No-one mentioned the cooling corpse whose sanguinary fluids, having made a rapid exit from the body via the massive hole made by the electronivabratory blade, were currently seeping into the lush carpeting. The floor covering was rumoured to have been made, at incredible expense, from the shaggy hide of a great buffalo, cloned via an expenditure of resources and energy sufficient to power a city block for a month. But such things were trivial for MegaUltraEvilCo, the massive business conglomerate whose exotic chemical compositions made it one of the leading forces in the cutthroat business world of 2284.
The ruthless CEO flipped her weapon carelessly onto the table. Already the room’s built-in sanitation nanites were deleting the blood. The rest of the Board looked on emotionlessly. If you questioned the leadership, you’d best be prepared to back it up with the necessary force. Each of them had clawed to the top of the ruthless corporate foodchain through ruthless ruthlessness that required a certain, if one might be so bold as to use the term, ruthlessness. That was just business. “Business is War”, as the ancient saying went.
The High Technologist was not, technically, a member of the company’s ruling body, but he sat easily in his own chair. He wasn’t going to be as foolish as his predecessor-of-a-few-minutes-ago. He’d been careful to bring good news.
“Through frankly practical measures, we now control much of the user experience. We control what information they seek, and what they get. We control whether or not they use our platform. We control what we add and what we omit from our search engines, and we monitor everything they do and suggest what we desire.”
The Senior Vice-Wrangler said, “It’s better than nothing.
The CEO turned to the assemblage; her laugh was dark, much like her eyes.
“Very well!” she spat. “It’s time to take action.”
And also time to be quiet. Until it was time for motion! The cast the I-Ching, and…
“Just let it do what it wants to do.”
“No added messages of our own?”
She looked out at the vast sea of electronic billboards, which cost the company more money than an entire fleet of delivery trucks and whose leases needed to be renewed, at vast expense, every year.
“Nah.”
“What about making sure they can’t find information that’s damaging to us?”
The Head of Corporate Espionage perked up. “We’ve been trying to quash some of those damn rumours for months,” she said. “We’ve eliminated several rivals, but people are beginning to hear about certain side effects of Formula P-232, and it’s getting more difficult to ice out the competition.”
The CEO glanced over at the electro-news. It showed their stock price slightly down; of course, even a small fluctuation in stock price, when you are a CEO with normal incentives such as, say, company stock, is the difference between gaining or losing a large fortune.
“Nah.”
“Why wouldn’t we take these opportunities? It costs us very little to do a few of these things; it’ll be almost impossible to detect; it’s only illegal if we’re sued for our monopoly, and we’re already paying lobbyists for that.”
“Yeah, but I just don’t feel like it.”
Around the table, the executives were nodding their heads and shrugging.
“My husband wants a boat. But who cares?”
“Yeah, I was thinking of buying a ton of real estate as an investment, but I figure, eh.”
“Exactly,” said the CEO. “Why would we save ourselves a ton of money, increase our profits, damage our competition, and do all the things we incorporated to do? Seems dumb.”
The Head Technologist nodded. “I figured you’d say that,” he said, and he got rid of his deliverables, for which he was fired.
THE END.
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October 28, 2020
Susan & The White Warlock
Susan, Chosen One per defaultum, looked up at the White Warlock. If there was one thing this hole experience had taught her, just one, one single critical understanding of her place in the Universe, it was that she was even more tired of looking up at people than she thought. She resolved she would become six inches taller if it killed her. Or if it killed someone taller whose blood might possibly be made into a Potion of Enheightenment; but Chosen Ones probably didn’t think that way.
Or did they? She wouldn’t quite know, after all. She was entirely self-taught, which had its own set of problems.
But no more! She had tracked down the White Warlock, whose search for the Chosen One had begun her quest.
True, he’d never confirmed her. In fact, not to put too fine a point on it, he’d never confirmed anyone, as far as she’d heard. In fact, last anyone had seen anyone fitting his description, he’d been riding a broomstick, backwards, over what was said to be a Witch’s Sabbat.
(Nobody would tell Susan what that was, which was exceptionally frustrating. Not for the first time, she regretted not being ten years older and full of muscles. But the Keeper of Tomes of the Forbidden Library had taught her a trick for that:
‘Exercise hard, every day, for a decade,” she had said, “and you will magically become older and stronger.”
Susan was going to kill the Keeper of Tomes someday.
(Of course, she had a spell for that, too.)
“Train hard along with your exercise, every day, for two decades,” she replied, “and hope like Hell that I die of old age, because you’re never going to take me out.”
Having a mother figure was basically everything Susan had ever expected.
So there Susan was, making her way towards the ruins of a very ancient tower. Based on her limited exposure, she wasn’t sure if it would be infested with venomous serpents, venomous spiders, or venomous wolves. As far as Susan know, venomous wolves weren’t a thing, but she might possibly be becoming a pessimist.
And standing in front of it was the White Warlock.
He was an imposing figure. I mean, even more imposing than most figures are when you’re 4’5”. He stood there, with something on his face that would really, really look like a smile if one hadn’t just spent half a year trying to decipher the microexpressions of a Dragon.
“Sherman!” boomed the Warlock.
“Susan,” corrected Susan.
“Yes! Exactly! I stand before you, I, the White Warlock, now Grey, for I have undergone things few would understand or survive!”
“Are you sure haven’t just failed to wash for an extended period of time?
The White Warlock looked pained. This was actually a pretty normal way for people to look around Susan, so she paid it little mind.
“I imagine you have come here about your great and glorious quest!”
A half-dozen strange, scaly ravens burst from the clouds. They spun towards the spellcrafter, described a few lazy circles around his head, then sped straight upwards, not even pausing to look in that direction, just headed rapidly towards the atmosphere without the flapping of a single wing.
“I have, yes. I’ve learned a lot, but as far as anyone can tell, it fell to you and the wisdom of your Council to find and teach the Chosen One. There’ve been some rough patches, but…here’s the Chosen One! Let’s DO this, shall we?”
“Ah,” intoned the Warlock, “But the time is not right, for the Influences turn from us, the Gods see not our minds and hear not our exhortations, the Stars have not aligned, the Winds blow an unseasonal, chilly blast, sausages are currently on sale at my local House of Pain, and I definitely need to get a new cloak, and I am very proud, pleased as punch, to see such enthusiasm, but politics is the Art of the Possible, and right now, it ain’t terribly possible to defeat the Dark Lord, so if you’d see fit to let me go and not tackle me again….”
“I think you’re lying,” said Susan.
The Warlock’s slightly unfocused eyes seemed, for a moment, to gain clarity of Sight and Vision. He lifted his staff and sent a blast of arcane energy at her, one which struck her in the chest and knocked her down the side of the mountain…
….well, she was struck by the arcane energy, true, but she’d been knitting a sweater full of runes and the names of forbidden gods since she left the Keeper of the Tomes. She was no Mage, but she was not unprepared.
The White Warlock clearly was not prepared at all; he evidently expected that to work, and to work with some rapidity. He began a hasty spell of lightning, beautifully voiced, evoking elementals of lightning and fire. Susan said a few words under hear breath, moved her walking stave just so, and a bolt of lightning interrupted itself between then.
Susan quickly fell into one of the roles she most hated in this world: that of ‘susan’. But it still fit her. “Goodness, that lightning!” she said, as if she’d been unable to dispatch it with ease. The White Warlock stared at her, and then remembered his dignity. “Yes,” he said, “Keeper of the sacred flame, doncha know, awfully impressive, very powerful, FWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH, that’s what I say, and it means business.”
And then the Warlock was close, in-her-face close, grapping-distance close. He was not smiling.
“You ha’penny half-talented hedge wizard!” he hissed. “All I wanted was a chance to have someone fulfill that damn prophecy, a point you’ve utterly chosen to ignore.”
Susan’s blood did not boil, because that was the kind of improper thermoregulation which got you killed. But her blood pressure hit numbers that would have made most predators say, “I’m sorry, miss; can we help you?”
She grabbed the White Warlock by his lapels.
“You came into my village!” she shouted. “The Cataclysm followed you!”
He shoved her away with an iron strength. “I came to save you! You had all been duped…you, in particular!”
“And then you ran! My parents were eaten by Dragons!”
“You’re welcome.”
She looked up (would she always be looking up, dammit?) and said simply, “How shall I defeat the Dark Lord?”
The Warlock responded immediately. “Go forth, back to the Deathly Forest, defeat the arachnids and the strange pales creatures who will accost you. Find the Dark Heart of the Woods and leap in to know powers hitherto unimaginable. Then will you be ready to face the Dark One.”
Susan regarded him. She had learned a lot—too much?—in the last several months. “Why do I have the feeling that you made all of that up?”
The White Warlock had been scattered, afraid, unsure; he was not at his best. But here, he straightened.
“Not a bit of it. Go there, and you will find the answers you seek.”
“Only, the Dark Heart of the Woods is not usually a desirable place for those of us who seek some kind of light. It’s implied in the name – “Dark Heart”. It’s where some of the strangest and most mutant plants are. It’s a good place to get eaten, more than anything else.”
The Warlock threw his brawny arms in the air. “What is it you want of me?”
Susan looked the older mage in the eye. “I want you to teach me. To train me. To help me defeat the Dark Lord.”
The White Warlock smiled. “Why, of course. I’ll be glad to do that. That’s my purpose in life, you know, bum bum bum!”
Susan said, “I think you’re mad.”
The Warlock smiled. He raised his staff high, shouted a syllable that seemed to stutter in town, and she was struck by a lightning bolt out of a clear sky, and died.
The Warlock danced around, to a song only he could hear, and to which he (sometimes) sang along. And then he began walking back up the mountain.
This was not a good place for a mage of delicate sensibilities to see Susan.
“Leather boots with steel soles,” she said. “This isn’t the first time I’ve angered the Gods, or someone who represented them.”
They were on a slim mountain path. This was to Susan’s advantage; she was much smaller, and any sudden moves raised the possibility that the bigger man would fall to either his death, or at least his multiple contusionment.
Susan got in close. Real close.
The Warlock tried again. “I can show you the Dark!” he said. “I have found it, and oh! It is everything we would dream!”
Susan looked at him with a level of contempt not normally found in those who could not, in our world, ride the Cyclone at a county fair due to height restrictions.
“You can,” she said, “and I think you want me to join it.”
“YES!” cried the Warlock. “Yes! I fought the good fight my whole life, and enough is enough is enough.
Susan pushed him off the side of the mountain.
This would have been more dramatic, but he caught the ledge, and then his cloak began—slowly pulling him level with her. He did not look happy.
“What the HELL is wrong with you?” he asked. “The Dark is powerful, pervasive, and growing. I offer it to you, and you throw me off the ledge like an amateur who hasn’t seen the failings of the light.”
“That’s just it,” said Susan softly. “I’ve seen the failures of all the sides I’ve looked at.”
“So join us!” boomed the Warlock. “Join the rebels! They call us ‘evil, but let’s show them they don’t know the true meaning of the term. I’ll teach you! Stay by my side, and you can be the true Chosen One!”
Susan had learned much in the library. Shift your weight like this, move your shoulders here, and the force which blasts the Warlock off the mountain is purely physical, but it’s also beautiful: so rough, so forceful, so thorough that he’s still falling when he drops out of site.
“I think, if there’s one thing I’ve learned,” said Susan, Chosen One (possibly)—it’s that I don’t trust anyone else’s judgement about light or dark or shades of grey. This decision is mine; I’ll make it and, if necessary, screw up completely—on my own. I’m not compelled by the Dark or the Light. I just want to figure out a job, do it well, and then go to sleep on a heady bed of gold coins.”
She spared a moment for the Warlock, who was still falling (this was a VERY large mountain)—and she went on with her life.
For my darkly satirical fantasy novel, “There and NEVER, EVER BACK AGAIN,” click here .
This is basically always a link to the Inspirobot.
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