Ernest Hogan's Blog, page 66

BRAINPAN FALLOUT: 6. DOWNTOWN DAYMARE

©Ernest Hogan 2014
When they got a good look at me, the homeboys -- as Little Richard would put it -- screamed like white ladies.
"Allah have mercy!" "What the hell!" "Let's get out of here -- he might be radioactive of something!"  "He's bleeding --he's gonna give us AIDS!" they yelled as they flowed back into the Cadillac and left in a cloud of dust and grime.
I felt my bandages, carefully. I must have looked like an old-fashioned horror movie monster. If there was a mirror around, I'd probably scare myself. Dumb luck saved me.
Or was it the Krell chip?
What was this thing they put in my head? And who are they, while I'm at it. Just another Information Age problem.  The right data could solve it, but where to look . . .
The hospital-bunny-suit pajamas I was wearing didn't have any pockets. I didn't have any underwear. No sign of my wallet or my pager. I was downtown, miles from home. What was I supposed to do?
My throbbing brain (or was it the chip?) lurched into action. I found myself looking around, scanning for information. I wasn't really that far from the Mercado. Maybe an offering to the concrete Quetzalcoatl would help. My girlfriend Vampiko would be proud. I picked a flowering weed from an eruption in the asphalt and walked.
In the middle of an unpaved parking lot was a saguaro, a phoney-looking one, like the gun-totters that chased us out of the desert. I waved at it. It didn't wave back. I walked on, and when I looked back the giant cactus was gone.
The Mercado was empty, as usual, and hot from all the pavement, the pseudo-Mexican architecture, and the lack of shade. Nobody noticed when I tossed the flower into the larger-than-life replica of the feathered serpent's mouth. A bus with the Great God Barkley painted on the side passed.  If I didn't feel like I was going to die it would have been like a religious experience or something. Vampiko would have seen it as a sign of spiritual development.
Vampiko. If I called her she'd come get me. She did love me, as she often said.
I wandered around for a few blocks, trying to bum a coin. A dressed-for-success citizens took off at the sight of me. Finally, a toothless homeless guy gave me a quarter.
Suddenly, something hissed. A lizard the size of a pit-bull was licking up a trail of blood that I was leaving.  It looked at me, then licked its lips and leaped.
NEXT WEEK:  PHONE CALL TO A VAMPIRE

CHICANONAUTICA VOYAGES TO A DAY OF LATINO SCIENCE FICTION

It's my Chicanonautica take on the Day of Latino Science Fiction over at La Bloga.
Here's a sample of what went on:


Jesús Treviño really knows his science fiction:

Mario Acevedo is doing mad science:

You can watch this L.A. dystopia online:

BRAINPAN FALLOUT: 5- OFFRAMP TO DOOM

©Ernest Hogan 2014
The driver cold-bloodedly punched the accelerator, causing the limo to lurch ahead just before the Magnum coughed up a slug. His hand hovered over a red blinking button as he asked, "Should I nuke 'em?"
"Just get us off the freeway," said the man.
"And don't lose them," said the woman, "just keep far enough ahead to be a difficult target."
We sped away in a path that was lightning fast and just as crooked. The g-forces and bodily collisions nearly killed me.  My head, my head . . . 
"Let's take advantage of this situation," the man said, "and start the field experiment now."
"Excellent idea," she said.
The Cadillac kept on our tail, far back, but dead on.  The triggerman kept taking aim, but couldn't get a bead on us.
"This area looks suitable," said the man.
We were in that industrial area next to downtown Phoenix that could be used to film a low-budget remake of Bladerunner.
"Pull over and park somewhere," she told the driver.
We became stationary over cracked asphalt and broken glass so fast if felt like my brain crashed into the top of my skull, pulling my spinal cord and all my nerves up to fuse with it in an implosion of pain.
"As we were saying," the man said, "you are a lucky young man, escaping death to become a prototype for the 21st century."
"The Krell chip should allow you to survive in the chaos of the fractalized Information Society," the woman said.
The Cadillac screeched to halt nearby, taking a bite out of a chain-link-topped-with-razor-wire fence.  The homeboys piled out, and they all had guns.
"In some ways," the man said, "I envy you; I really do."  
The woman smiled, and opened the door that wheezed like an airlock.
The man gave me a swift kick, sending my ultra-sensitive head into the post-holocaust pavement.  I kept thinking that I couldn't possibly hurt any more; then, I would hurt more. I was getting sick of it.
Through some weeds growing through the cracks, I saw the limo skid around a corner.  With my other eye I could see the homeboys, glaring at me.
Something, maybe the Krell chip, made me stand up.
NEXT WEEK :  DOWNTOWN DAYMARE

BRAINPAN FALLOUT: 4- FREEWAY ENLIGHTENMENT

©Ernest Hogan 2014
He didn't have to touch me. My bandaged head already hurt like hell. I screamed at the sight the gleaming pliers.
"Okay," I said, "what would like to talk about?"
"Very good, darling," the blonde said, squeezing my hand. "What were you delivering to Brunhoff?"
"Brunhoff? Oh, you mean Doc Burnout. I don't know," I said, which the brought the chrome pliers closer to my face. "It was a sealed-package, no-questions-asked deal! Honest!  I'd swear on an autographed copy of Neuromancer!"
They did a quick exchange in what didn't sound like German or Japanese.
He let the pliers hover in front of my eyes, and asked, "Then what about Project Brainboost, and the Krell chip?"
"Nothing. Nada. Please believe me. I do know some things -- like local business opportunities in high-speed delivery via bike."
She stroked my arm, and asked, "Were you involved in Burnout's experiments?"
"What experiments? He just piddles around with all kinds of incomprehensible stuff.  Like every other computer geek who thinks he's a cyberpunk."
Again they conferred in the unknown language.
He put the pliers away. My throbbing head was relieved.
Letting go of my arm, she said, "Then we made a good choice.  You are a perfect subject for our little experiment."
"Experiment?" I repeated, flashing on horror movies and/or me as human guinea pig turned monster.  Would my girlfriend be repulsed or turned on?
"You see," he said. "We've had to perform some surgery on you. Most of it reconstructive, because of your . . . accident, but we also implanted . . ."
The limo was then rammed from behind. The impact cranked my pain up to max. Then there was some rapid-fire horn-honking, with the booming of a rap backbeat.
The driver rolled down the partition from the passenger area and his window with a couple of keystrokes on his NASA control panel dashboard.
Beside us was a red, battle-scared Cadillac Seville full of homeboys all wearing red bandanas.  Then one riding shotgun had his head out the rolled-down window, said, "We like your bullet-holes!  Like some more?" and pulled out a .357 Magnum, took aim and . . .
NEXT WEEK:  OFFRAMP TO DOOM

CHICANONAUTICA LOOKS TOWARD THE FUTURE IN CA AND AZ

Chicanonautica gets futursitic about California and Arizona over at La Bloga.
A new reality? Que sci-fi, 'mano!

And in L.A., the marketers are getting ready for the new majority:


And Arizona is learning about pan dulce:


And lucha libre is breaking out in Phoenix:

BRAINPAN FALLOUT: 3- ATTACK OF THE SAGUARO PEOPLE

©Ernest Hogan 2014
The brown-skinned Asiatic man looked out the porthole at the heavily-armed cacti that had surrounded the limo.
"How on earth did they find us?" he said.
His blonde companion screamed into the intercom at the driver, "Get us out of here."
The limo lurched into a dust-vomiting start. I was thrown back into the seat that I was strapped into. The g-forces made my headache explode. I grabbed my head; it was covered with bandages -- what had these people done to me?
Through the windshield and portholes and cloud of dust I could see saguaros firing their assault rifles, running for cover, and tumbling over the limo's hood.  They were rather funny-looking saguaros -- too fat and squat to be real, but about the right size for an average-sized human to fit inside. Years ago, when I was but a child, not yet the Flash that I am now, I saw a news report about how somebody in Washington had the brilliant idea to dress DEA agents in saguaro suits along the border to stop smugglers from bringing drugs into Arizona. I laughed, but then I was young, and still believed that the world made sense.
Soon the driver was making some impressive high-speed turns through suburban-looking streets. So, we hadn't left Phoenix after all, we were in one of the mountain preserves, probably not far from the heart of town. This is the sort of city that gives you the impression of being in the middle of nowhere in certain pockets.
"Head for the freeway," the man said in his L.A. Accent.
The limo soon charged up an onramp. I imagined Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries as suitable background music. Like the helicopter assault in Apocalypse Now.  Or the Klu Klux Klan coming to the rescue in Birth of a Nation. My blood ran cold, but it didn't help my aching head.
"How are you feeling?" asked the blonde woman, her German accent sounding so European and civilized.
"Awful," I said.
"Well, you are a very lucky young man," she said. "If it wasn't for us, you would be dead."
"I've always found freeways to be good places to talk," said the man, "especially at 60 miles per hour and up.  Do you feel like talking?"
"I don't feel like doing anything," I said. "My head . . ."
The woman took my hand. The man picked up an oversized pair of chrome-plated pliers and aimed them at my nose.
NEXT WEEK:  FREEWAY ENLIGHTENMENT

BRAINPAN FALLOUT: 2- MUTATECHNIC RESURRECTION

©Ernest Hogan 2014
After a few centuries of cool, sticky darkness I figured that I wasn't dead, but somewhere, somehow, somebody was doing some serious messing around with my body and brain.
Then my mother was there, cradling my head in her lap, picking chunks of asphalt out of my exposed brain with plastic chopsticks, saying, "I always told you to wear a helmet, but no, Flash, you never listen to me. Tisk, tisk!"
Then she changed into Doc Burnout, who dug into my gray matter with a crusty spork, saying, "Nothing like a fresh pineal gland to chase those blues away!"
Then there was light. Bright, painful light. It gave me a murderous headache, but did prove that there was a little more left of me than brainpan fallout. I hoped.
"How many fingers am I holding up?" a sexy female voice asked. It had a German accent.
There were fingers in front of me. They were long, thin, soft and pink with nails the color of a TV set jammed between channels.
"Uno, dos -- one, two -- tres, cuatro," I said. "I mean four."
"How do you know Rudolph Brunhoff?" asked another voice, this one with a distinct L.A. accent.
"Rudolph Brunhoff?" I said. "Oh, Doc Burnout. He's a delivery client and sometime technical advisor to me."
The man with the L.A. voice -- who was either a suntanned Asian or a Hispanic or Native American -- nodded and said, "What do you know about Project Brainboost?"
"What?" I answered, fixing my eyes on a nearby porthole. We were in a stretched limo, outside was the Sonoran desert -- we couldn't be far from Phoenix -- with lots of saguaro cacti.
"How about the Krell chip?" asked the woman, who was a beautiful blonde with hair like a silk helmet.
"Hunh?" I said. The saguaros were moving around. Some of them were holding things.
"You better be more cooperative, or things could become unpleasant for you," said the man.
Then he pressed a button causing a section of imitation wood paneling to slide open, revealing an array of diabolical-looking medical instruments.
The things the saguaros were holding were assault rifles, and they were pointing them at us.
Suddenly, an amplified voice said, "GET OUT OF THE VEHICLE. YOU ARE SURROUNDED. RESISTANCE IS USELESS."
NEXT WEEK:  ATTACK OF THE SAGUARO PEOPLE

CHICANONAUTICA MEETS BRAINPAN FALLOUT

Over at La Bloga, Chicanonautica reveals that Brainpan Fallout is about a Chicano.
Brainpan Fallout has cockroaches:

Saguaros:

Computer chips in the brain:


And mysterious Nigerians:

BRAINPAN FALLOUT: 1- SHOOT-OUT AT SMITTY'S

©Ernest Hogan 2014
Death? Dismemberment? Brain-damage? I was gleefully flirting with them all at 60 mph as I kept pedaling my customized Chinese Flying Pigeon into the downhill slope of Cave Creek Road. Adrenaline spurted into the RC-Cola-spiked-with-Folgers-Coffee-Crystals that had my heart pounding a serious hyperrhythm.  Since I can cut in and out of traffic, down sidewalks and alleys, etc., I can get any small package I can strap onto the Pigeon or put in my backpack from point A to point B in Phoenix faster than any motored vehicle can -- especially during rush hours.
I usually deliver disks, sometimes documents, sometimes sealed packages that I don't ask about -- hey, we all gotta make a living somehow, and there simply ain't enough time to looksee if it's legal this week. And how else am I gonna get my burger bucks AND save up for the virtual reality system of my wettest dreams?
This time it was one of those mysterious packages picked up from a nervous taser-toting Nigerian in a Moon Valley parking lot to my long-time, not-quite-a-friend Doc Burnout, who for some reason would be waiting for me in the coffee shop of the Smitty's in Sunnyslope rather than masturbating over the latest Mondo 2000 in his sleazy little apartment across the street, as usual.
Go figure. I shoulda known.
When I zipped into the Smitty's parking lot, past a faded yellow Honda that screeched its brakes as both the driver and passenger gave me the finger, I heard Burnout's raspy voice straining at full volume:
"FOR TOFFLER'S SAKE, FLASH, GET OUT OF HERE!"
And the Nigerian threatened to give me his own special electroshock treatment if I didn't get the package to Doc muy pronto. I was confused.
Then there was the sound of automatic gunfire.
I put the Pigeon into a sideways skid, pointing my left workboot to catch my fall as everything went into slow-motion. I was soon part of a high-tech Hollywood-style macho ballet, trying to kill my forward motion while the Doc and several Asian guys in expensive Italian suits blasted away at each other with Uzis. Tattooed bystanders took off to take extra doses of their medication as I lost control, and tumbled across the sizzling asphalt until I skidded on my skull into an overflowing dumpster.
No pain, not at that moment. Just a gooey blackness engulfing me as I heard:
"We can rebuild him.  We have the technology."
NEXT WEEK:  MUTATECHNIC RESURRECTION

WAY TO GO, JOE!

Another Captain America movie is raking in the bucks at the box office. We should take time to remember Joe Simon, who with Jack Kirby created the character. A good way is to read Simon's book, My Life in Comics .
It takes us back to the days when superheroes weren't corporate porperty, and comics were created by lively individuals in a mad race to come up with something new to capture the audience's attention. If they were lucky, they could make a living, too.
My Life in Comics captures this phase in the history of American pop culture, and the personalities behind it. It starts with Simon's early days working as an artist and sports reporter for the newspapers, and how he got into comic books when things changed, technology allowed for the use of more photographs – he compares it to what's happening with the internet today. We see behind the scenes of the origin of comic books as we know them today. He also tells of the struggle to keep the rights and get credit for his creations, including Captain America.
As I work on a comics/illustraton project, this book makes me yearn to be a work-a-day cartoonist. Yeah, things are changing. New media means new opportuinities. A fella can dream, can't he?
Meanwhile, Marvel, and DC are becoming faceless corporate entities, like Disney. Will they ever do anything besides reboot their creaky, old franchises?
Guess I better get back to work.