Category: story

Civet Servant

Written

200 degrees of boiling water distilled with a concentrate of magnesium sulfate and sodium bicarbonate, ordinator-programmed for exact temperature control, heated in an industrial-class boiler, blasts through a stainless steel metal filter into Riparian’s cup, spurting from the leather and mahogany and rose gold $4000 coffee maker, complete with burr grinder and steam wand.

The dark-haired man dips his nose into the darkness of the cup, and inhales. His heart beats faster, as if the caffeine was already in his bloodstream. His eyes dilate over the ceramic rim, stark and creased as if sleepless from the womb.

☕

cunt toward enemy [s3e1] business casual

Written

Parsani notes that the premature birth of Ahriman is in fact an allegory for the self-introspection of Time (Zurvan) into its more abysmal scales…
— Reza Negarestani, Cyclonopedia

✦

Greenwich is showering. The concrete floor and gritty sand makes her think of a beach shower. But there is no ocean, only the black sea of petroleum beneath her feet in this desert bunker.

She opens her eyes and her skin gives her vertigo. Serpents barely visible in the murk of deep waters. The qatran is feeding off the violence like a school of red garra. She remembers going with her mother to a salon (the lull of fans and a corner-mounted TV and some toys sticky with other children’s fingers) and her mother’s feet going in a basin of fish which nibbled away the dead skin.

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processes

Written

Something had changed in the world and it had become bad. Going outside was dangerous. It was very bad in the field across from the parking lot. The ground was covered in sluggish lobes and it was easy to step inside the openings. I stayed in the house. I don’t think it was my house but it was where we were when it started. We didn’t remember things, or we didn’t have the ability to act on what we remembered.

He was showing me something in the second room down the hall. There was clutter everywhere and it was a small room. I stood outside and looked in. He had a large pot of soup and he opened the lid and particles or vapor came from it and filled the air like a disc of steam. It was difficult to see. It felt wrong. The soup had been in the refrigerator and was cold and congealed. He smiled and was not alarmed and was stupid and amused. He was “showing me something” but not thinking much about it. The cloud of air or particles or moisture above the pot seemed to be getting brighter or more “active” in a way that brightness does not describe. It was a kind of “bubbling” that was “dirty”. I had a really bad feeling. I reached for a white cord that was on the floor and pulled on it. Even though I was pulling it sideways and would bend the prongs, I didn’t want to go inside the room. If I went inside the room something permanent might happen to me, that had already happened to the world. I pulled the cord and I think the process stopped. But there was no way of knowing which processes had started or ended.

cunt toward enemy[13] terrorism is magic

Written

There is a minefield in Golan Heights.

A pack of wolves lives among them, too light to trigger the sensors.

If they leave the minefield, they will be shot.

If the mines are removed, their ecosystem will be destroyed. And they will be shot.

Your paw on my sensor. Lithe, watchful. Just delicate enough to keep yourself alive. As long as you don’t push too hard.

*

Rubicon clings naked to the damp body, his finger wiggling inside a bullet hole. His bony legs kneel on either side, his toes curling, what’s left of them. The sun is starting to creep into the room, hot with the smell of gunpowder. His soles are blinding, two side-view mirrors.

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Your Mother Has Fallen Out of Love With You

Written

Rain sweeps cold and black from the sea, palm fronds slithering across the hotel parking lot. It’s the holidays and people sing in a church across the street.

The man is slim and dark-haired and wears a suit under a transparent rain jacket. The boy wears a black poncho covering most of his body, black wet hair plastered over his face so it looks like a ragged fringe of the hood.

“A room for me and my son.” He wraps his arm around the boy with a warm smile, clear insulation over glistening black.

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cunt toward enemy[12] disassociated portions

Written

She doesn’t recognize her own voice. Nine months without anyone to talk to. And when she did, it was in a voice changed by the burning substance. As if her time underground had transformed her into a demon.

Time streams black from her head. Hair shaved at different lengths for topical testing. The caustic wax burning into her skull. Somehow more freakish and dehumanizing than if she was shaved completely. Prickly patches and dark chopped lengths.

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