Cringing Stormtrooper

A good character, no matter how big or small or whether good guy or bad, is one with personal thoughts and feelings. Such a character has a part to play in the story but from the character's perspective, there is no story. Every moment is just another in the endless stream of reality.

The foot soldier of villainy may be a nonentity antagonist in his fiction but not in his reality. For example: an Imperial Stormtrooper standing guard in a detention block. He feels himself being stared at or may hear a noise. He looks over his shoulder. He cringes as a looming monster lunges at him. The sentry is silenced violently but unceremoniously.

I relish the anticipation when my heroes find themselves behind a pesky sentry. I gleefully anticipate the quick and easy violence that shall eliminate the anonymous baddie. I am amused that the sentry is armed and supposedly vigilant but helpless. I feel grimly satisfied because the victim is trouble, thus, deserving of his inglorious fate.

What about the unfortunate Stormtrooper? I imagine him being a real person. He would have a name those who know him would know him by (even if it is a serial number). There would be a face behind the mask of his helmet. The quick and easy that kills him would be a dramatic and tragic moment that ends his life.

I do not love the nameless foot soldiers of villainy to hate them. Yes, I am amused by their uselessness against heroes. I am thrilled as they struggle feebly or wither in droves. I am excited when they cringe and scream. They are my favorite characters, always.

The useless baddies are perfect as they are. Their names need not be given or their faces shown. We need not mourn their passing. I enjoy imagining them as real people on the wrong side of adventure. The grunts and groans, cringing and screaming, death throes and sprawled bodies are more interesting when they are the quirks of believable characters.

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Fate of the Many

The lowly are lowly indeed. Their thoughts are mindless and their feelings thoughtless. Their lives amount to nothing and their deaths return them to the dust. Alas, they are anonymous no matter their names and useless no matter their use.

My heart is passionate, my mind keen, my soul pure and my strength prevailing. My thoughts are mindful and my feelings thoughtful. I live a life that matters and I may never die. My name is unknown yet it is beyond any and all ever uttered or scribbled. My deeds are the nonsense that give all meaning.

I am the Spirit of Friendship. Freedom and Justice are the every imagination of the thoughts of my heart continually. I have become flesh that I may demonstrate spirit. I am weak that I may show my strength. I am the fool that I may shame all wisdom. By my fantasies shall I deliver reality from its dysfunctions. By stumbling I remain steadfast. By wandering I travel the straight and narrow.

I never lift another up... yet my hand is offered to any who would climb. I never give of myself... yet I am the inspiration for all who make something of themselves.

The lowly mean nothing to me for they are lowly indeed. Never shall I squander a moment or resource for their sake. I shall sting them for their apathy that they may feel. I shall smite them for their mischief that their own evil shall be upon them.

In His wisdom the Almighty God created the sinister to stir the righteous. He mass-produced the lowly to provide cheap labor and cannon-fodder. Never did He mean to redeem the sinister. Never did He mean to lift up the lowly. A man may climb up from the bottom but lowly is not his place lest he stay there.

Parables of the Expendable

The “Red Shirts” of fiction are the expendable nonentities as protagonists… as they are portrayed in Star Trek: the Original Series. Though “good guys” their lives are insignificant and their deaths inconsequential. Still, the heroes value these lives and grieve their passing.

The “mooks” of fiction are the expendable nonentities as antagonists. Their lives are cheap and their numbers easily replenished. Their bosses use them as cannon-fodder and think nothing of it.

The lowly are lowly whether “good” or evil. They are expendable whether their affiliation is right or wrong. Quite simply: a life’s merit is its significance. Those that amount to little are worth little. Those that amount to nothing are worthless. I dare say the lowly are cheap if not trash by their personal failings.

There is no “fairness” to be had or even yearned for. There is no “equality” better than justice. Our world is what it is that the wheat may be separated from the chaff. It burns to clear the gems and precious metals of all the hay and stubble. Our spiritual reality is survival-of-the-fittest that those who would do shall do much and those who would do nothing shall lose everything. Our best fiction is always a parable of this unseen yet innately evident truth.

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Agents of the Eye and Ear

I wrote a realistic fantasy adventure about elves. I call them "fairies" as I do all the fairy folk in their fairyland. There is no airy fairy, mind you. The magic does not sparkle, zap or blast. Wizards are skillful in wizardry but are no match for warriors in a fight. There is no "ultimate power" to be had. The world does not hang in the balance easily. Heroes are uncommon and villains have responsibilities.

I was inspired by modern fantasy and the legends of old alike. Worlds of swords and magic are thrilling and fantastic to say the least.

I write fairy tales. Like Robert E. Howard (Conan) and J.R.R. Tolkien (the Lord of the Rings) mine are gritty. The swords do draw blood and the magic does require effort. The fiction has a basis in reality. Homages to the history and legends of old are throughout.

Conan is wonderful because his Hyborean Age is a believable world of survival-of-the-fittest with undercurrents of lurking horror. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are wonderful because their Middle-earth is a believable world of danger and hope caught in the maelstrom of unseen forces. Howard and Tolkien set the highest standard for the fantasy genre. I was mindful of what their works have in common.

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Beyond the Pale

I write fairy tales. My fantasy, horror and science fiction are all weird stories about strange entities. I have been asked why I never write anything “normal” or “real” or whatever else we call the mundane. My knowledge of history has begged the question why I never write historical fiction.

I am spiritual. I see the material for the thin veneer of reality that it is. My thoughts and feelings run deeper than its superficial layer. My fantasies are not whimsical. My stories and their characters are all about reality.

The soul is first and foremost in all my thoughts. Who we are before we act and what we become afterwards are all that matters.

The humans in my stories are always foolish weaklings. Most of them are nonentities who languish or perish for being witless and helpless. The few who are bold in their foolishness and resourceful in their weakness are the relevant characters. These few may die and even suffer an inglorious death but never are they tossed onto the pile of the irrelevant many.

The strange characters in my stories are either corrupted humans, not entirely human or simply not human. They are typically stronger, tougher, faster and smarter than humans. They slaughter our nonentities with ease and impunity. Only those of us beyond our paltry sum of being mortal and only human can hope to best them.

The soul, not our feral and temporal meat, is our humanity. Our imagination, not our intellect, is what enables us to see and act beyond the pale. I write fairy tales because anything less is rambling in vain.

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The Ultimate Damsel in Distress

SCREAM QUEENS are popular because they are sexy. Whether the good girl who survives or the bad girl who perishes, we relish watching them cringe and scream.

The heroine is a female protagonist as a warrior. The damsel in distress is a female protagonist as a noncombatant. It is sexy when a heroine fights. It is sexy when a damsel in distress cringes and screams. The only difference between the two sexually is the one does her thing on top.

Not long ago society was uncomfortable with the idea of heroines. The damsel in distress was considered proper. Now society is uncomfortable with the damsel in distress and the heroine is deemed proper. The mainstream comfort zone proves wavering, thus, ultimately irrelevant.

Our nature never changes. We play our silly games in the vain hope that if everyone pretends together then our nonsense will become reality. I have no use for such stupidity.

Perception is not reality. If truth was in the eye of the beholder then no one would be stupid or insane.

A young woman bound and gagged is sexy. Two girls kissing is sexy. A nubile female swaying her hips is sexy. Watching her lick anything is wonderfully maddening. The scream queen of horror is the damsel in distress of adventure. She is the girl bound and gagged or kissing another girl or dancing or licking while our tongues wag.

Fiction's damsel in distress is an archetype in many forms. The scream queen is her latest and arguably her best... because horror is all about victims.

Vanity

Reality is dysfunctional. People are crippled, deformed, diseased or otherwise languishing. The confounding of language reduced individual expression to impersonal gibberish. Our wars are more grueling terror than contests of courage and prowess. We are doomed to wither and perish.

Culture is sheep. Politics is wolves in sheep's clothing. Our institutions provide few good shepherds.

The failings of God are not my failings. There is no "original sin" in the eyes of freedom and justice. There is no "right or wrong" beyond cause and effect. Good and evil are never ideological or otherwise impersonal. The many are never greater than one.

There is no "science" in reality. Application mindful of cause and effect gives us technology. Notions of themselves are nothing.

Reality and its creator are inadequate. If it were otherwise their appeal would not be born of our desperation. Alas, our quandary is their very failing.

Mighty men are dead men, no matter their wealth and power. The wise are fools no matter their understanding for they are bound to a mindless nature. The common are useless no matter their labors for all by their hands is dust and ashes.

Do or do not but do so quickly for we are mortal. Find strength in your weakness for such is the glory of being human. Celebrate your ignorance by imagining better. You are one even if lost in a crowd. Only vanity is ever in vain.