HIGHWAY (a novel of sorts)

HIGHWAY

The Adventures Of Bjorn Fnord In The Twenty-First Century

Part 0: SLIGHT RETURN

January the first, Y2K!

A whole new day in a whole new week in a whole new month in a whole new year in a whole new decade in a whole new century in a whole new millennium in a … well, I suppose you can’t have a whole new Infinity – but nonetheless it seemed like an appropriate time for me to take a little trip back home and see what had been happening in the World since I last saw it.

            It took me about one whole new hour to regret that decision.

However I was stuck with it, so I’ll stick to it. 

The low-rent apartment that is home in this particular city was much as I left it, except a computer had been added and my cable tv had been upgraded.

Digital television…who’da thunk it.

Now for those of you who either didn’t know, didn’t notice, or didn’t care, I should mention that I Have Been Absent for the last few years and like Hamlet’s pappy I cannot disclose the details of where I’ve been or what I was doing there and if I did there’s maybe a half dozen of ya would believe me. Suffice to say it was not a vacation. During that Absence I have had only the barest, minimal, and essential contact with what was happening in Your Reality so as not to distract me from what I was There To Do. Only the Really Important …that is, Important to me…information was relayed to me so most of the technological advances and cultural changes  were new to me. O Crazed New World that risks such madness in it. Computers I knew – we had ‘em there, tho’ they were a lot easier to use than this thing. I’d heard cd’s too, but I didn’t like the remixes of most of the music I live by and I carry the essentials with me in cassettes from the vinyl at all times. But things like politics and fashion and suchlike had blundered on without my notice.

Now I was back…by special request as t’were. I was given the choice of going or staying, but if Those as were asking thought I should take the gig, I had to figure that They had a reason to make the offer and I knew wasn’t gonna be told what it was, so here I am, or was, and yet to find out why.

It was logical to figure if They wanted me to do something They were sending me because of my being me otherelse They’d have sent somebody other, so I started by settling back into my usual activities. For me that meant looking into what OmniCorp, the Secret Corporation that owns and controls all business and industry on Earth and is the foundation of establishing a Global economic Totalitarianism, was up to these days and that required an exploration of the media – there being no way to find out anything worth knowing in “the real world”, it being little more than a reflection of the information system.

            I snooped around on the Internet for a couple of hours and then disconnected my modem. Yucking fooseless. Well, there was still the Toob and I had a hundred plus channels of bullshit and propaganda to study. If I couldn’t find a Pattern in there somewhere, I’ll cut my hair, buy a tie, and go into advertising.

             The first thing I did was to lock out all the “news” channels, just to be sure I didn’t become contaminated by any disinformation systems. Then I arranged for food and other necessities to be delivered, dug out the Sacred Herb I’d stashed here prior to my ..uh… departure and, pipe a-smoke, settled in to watch as much television as I could stomach. If one genuinely wants to know what kinds shit is comin’, study what the masses are being fed. Movies and television are the arbiters of fashion and from fashion cometh the form of society. Once you know what people have been conditioned to want, to do, to look like, to conform to, to accept, and to consider “right and proper” it becomes simple enough to see which way the herd is being driven.

Finding the pattern of behavioural programming in media is the surest way to see how and where the world is being sent. 

            It took about another year to fit together the latest shifts in the Pattern, then I settled in to figure what to do about it. It was just as well that I’d rested up ‘cause this was gonna be long, hard, and disgusting.

            Just before my…departure, one Bill Clinton had just been settled in to the American Presidency and I’d caught enough of his act to see what was being set up. He was pretty obviously the official ex-hippie, a symbol of Pot-head Anti-War Consciousness now rejected in favour of conformity and materialism. It was easy enough to recognise that this indicated the end of the offer to “turn off, sell out, and join in” that had been the focus of the Reagan period and that whoever they stuck in that office after Clinton would be front-man for a new era of ruthless authoritarian control based on that most ominous of buzz-words: Zero Tolerance. Even …uh…where I was, there had been occasional reports that verified this, like Clinton’s  “I didn’t Inhale”, and his “sex scandal” and the general popularization of the idea that anything left over from the Psychedelic Era was a threat to the traditional good-ol’ Common Sense Values that Made America Great.

Essentially he represented the announcement that the Party was officially over and it was time to Get Back To Work or face chastisement.

            A quick look at the way things were proved we’d been accurate in that interpretation but what I was having trouble with was just how far along the whole counter-liberation had gotten in such a sort time. The acceleration was a sign of desperation, but its success was beyond what should logically have occurred, even considering the natural action/reaction that causes a period of contraction to follow any period of expansion. Things should not have gotten this bad that fast. Even with political manipulation at full tilt and virtually unopposed, it was hard to believe that Authoritarianism had gotten that much power again.

Something…else…was at work in this.

            And then it was September of 2K1

  

            Since I still avoiding the “news” I’d missed the actual details, but I felt the shift in the Vibe of the planet as clearly as an earthquake…when human consciousness drops that much that suddenly, there is definitely Something Very Wrong. Well, thinks I, seems to be time to gird my synapses, abandon my comfortable reclusion, and see what’s happened. To get a better view of the details I decided to find a pay ‘phone and make a quick call to the local A.R.F. Cabal, to check with Oberon D. Udderseid. A transcription of the conversation (courtesy of our mole in the CIA) follows:

Me: What’s up, Doc? (He supposedly is a Doctor, tho’ I don’t know of what)

Him: Fnord?? I heard you were dead…or retired…or had a sex change. I forget which. Are you anything like what I would consider as here?

Me: Back and as I ever was. I trust as much can be said of you.

Him: As well as can be expected in such times. Years of practice are paying off at last. I expect you’re looking for some insights into the Currant Situation?

Me: That’ll do for a start. I’ve got the general outline…

Him: Televangelists?

Me: No, I wanted to avoid the obvious. I concentrated on the flicks and ads exclusively. I don’t even know what they’re passing off as President of USA yet.

Him: Oh. Allow me. George W. Bush.

Me: Wha’?

Him: Not the one you remember. His son. Or maybe a clone…s’really hard to tell.

Me: Whoa…I remember him. Wasn’t he governor of Missouri or Georgia or one of those?

Him: Texas.

Me: inarticulate choking sounds

Him: And his brother Jeb is gov in Florida. Try Pranayama.

Me: I can breath, man…I’m just not sure I want to. Okay, it all makes hideous sense, but what I can’t figure is how they got George W. Bush into the Orful Orfus. They didn’t start the Compulsory Lobotomy plan ahead of schedule did they?

Him: No, but they’re still using the “War On Drugs”, and as you’ve may have noticed, it’s been bloody successful - crew cuts, dress codes, puritanical morality, can’t smoke tobacco anywhere, …and Disco’s back.”

Me: You’re shitting me!

Him: Nope. They call it “Dance Mix” or something, but it’s the same mechanical wank. If you go outside you can’t miss it. There’s all these adolessthans charging around in ugly machines with this endless BOOM BOOM BOOM shaking the windows of the houses. Bloody hideous. And that’s just the tip of the shitberg - why, there’s…

Me: Bush.

Him: Splendid. Bring it on over and we’ll fill and fire up the Sadhu’s Chimney. I’ve been rather Herbally embarrassed as it happens…

Me: No…Bush. Junior. The new Kermit. (This from a bon mot at a 1984 Gathering where someone- he says him, I say t’was me – remarked that Ronald Reagan was in charge of America like Kermit the Frog was in charge of the Muppet Show.)

Him: Oh…right. Yeah…“Shrub” we call him around here…our agent on his staff says he hates it. Seems he’s got a real hump about being a weasely runt. What was it you were asking about?

Me: “Outta Weed” my ass. How’d they get him elected? There’s no way that enough voters have gotten that stupid…we jammed the pulse from that Tesla generator back in ’87. There was enough residual to slip Bush Senior in, but at least it stopped em’ extending Pruneface for an additional term…and they had to put Clinton thru the Old Fashioned way. But another Bush!  No way they pulled that off using just Andrew Lloyd Webber muzak and professional sports.

Him: Right! Yeah, you missed that! It was hilarious. They gave a blatant peek at what a crock the Electoral Process is. Dig…Gore, who was running “against” him as the “Democratic Party” candidate, actually beat Bush at the polls but they set up this whole scam with “trouble counting the ballots”…it was on the toob for weeks. In the end, they didn’t even bother with the pretence that voting meant anything and pushed the Shrub in with a display of disregard and arrogance previously would’a been unthinkable. Just “Fuck you! He won! Live with it!”

Me: Sounds like a fine test of the Submission programme.

Him: Definitely a factor. They developed this new fashion called “Attitude”. It’s just self-centred rudeness, but the A-class ‘droids are gobbling it. You still avoiding the news media?

Me: Garbage in, garbage out as they say. Why? Did I miss something?

Him: Well, Bush now more popular than Kennedy.

Me: Scary, but not unexpected. Do you plan to tell me how?

Him: Uh…y’know, I think you’ll be able to dig the utter ruthlessness to a greater benefit if you piece it together yourself. If you ever had a nanosecond’s fretting that maybe you’re nuts and there really isn’t a vast and ancient evil controlling the world, prepare yourself for all the proof you’ll ever need. We’ve moved up to a whole new level while you were…uh…where were you anyway?

Me: Hmmm…what’s your currant O.X.A. Clearance level?

Him: What? Oh! Uhhh… “Venus in Aries” I think.

Me: Sorry. It’s “Chokmah of Atziluth” and up for that information… unless you want it by regular mail. They haven’t eliminated the Post Office yet, have they?

Him: Not quite. Best not tarry tho’. Sounds like you got a tale to tell.

Me: Fatter of mact, it’ll all be coded into the [classified /name of popular tv show] script in two weeks. I sent the outline soon as I landed.

Him: I thought our cat on their writing staff got moved to [classified/name of a different show].

Me: True, but we also supplied his replacement. Remember Soror Pallama? You met her in Seattle that night you got lushed on that Bavarian cough-medicine cabarfiedh crap. Ah! I suspect you don’t remember…

Him: Remember whom?

Me: Remember the eunuch. Dig, I must needs do the amoeba shuffle, man…this ‘phone booth ain’t heated and it smells like Clark Kent may’ve left his jockstrap in here somewhere.   

Him: As you will. You might consider a trip to New York. Big doin’s there…you should go have a sniff around. Say hello to all and any for me, will you, and don’t forget to …uh…shit…oh hey…bring some of that Bush by here if you get a chance. The air in my head is sneaking up on stale.

Me: Look under your doormat. I was by there last night. Pax vobiscum, Doc.

Him: Et tibi lux.

           

Now naturally that’s not what anybody listening in electronically heard.  Both the Doc and I had hooked in our Confusers which turned our actual chat into a conversation between two stock traders discussing which suit was appropriate for Casual Fridays and trading tips on skin lotions. About the same time that Omnicorp was switching to those easy-to-tap computerized ‘phone systems, one of our electronics geniuses developed The Confuser, an electronic scrambler rig that can be attached to any ‘phone and set to alter any monitored conversation. The really cool part is that any time we’re discussing things they’d be interested in, it can be set to provide some innocuous chatter but if we’re just having a casual chat, it can be set to “babble” and what’s recorded on the tap is random nonsequitors with every so often a key-word like “dope” or “explosives” added in so that everybody’s computer picks up on it…CIA, FBI, ATF, NSA…all those big-eared uglies. Drives ‘em nuts. I hear there’s an up-grade being developed that’ll have a setting that turns what we say into the voices of, say, Falwell and Robertson discussing plans to swap kiddie porn, or Reagan on a sex-line. Fun.

            Meanwhile, there’s a World in Danger again, and Time is Short and all the usual clichés of Adventure, so I suppose I’d better do something about it. Time to explore this chickenshit new world.

PART 2: PLAYED AS IT LIES

            I hate N.Y. and no sooner had I arrived than I found it was a thousand times worse than the last time I was here, which I think was ’85 or there’ bouts. Some folks from the Emperor Norton (East) Cabal picked me up at the airport and whisked me through the horror of Manhattan to a reasonably cool and pleasant space in an East Village loft where copious amounts of Weed and Good Music helped cool me out. The Vibe there was relaxing and after a couple of hours, I was together enough to actually forget where I was and enjoy myself. Some of the folks were old friends and some were new ones. My admiration for anyone who can live in that part of the world without becoming an insane and vicious robot is boundless. We did a New Moon ritual at 3 A.M. and then they took me to “Ground Zero”. Minutes later, we were headed back to their loft, with me curled foetal in the back of the car trying to insert my fist into my mouth all the way to the elbow while a really lovely Soror called Athenisis chanted purification mantras and generally kept me from falling into the Abyss like a frozen chunk of psychic debris.

Once we were safely back in the warded space, and I’d  sucked back most of a bottle of quite fine brandy, I was together enough to confirm their suspicions.  Nyarlathrotep, unbound but quiescent.

 “We thought so,” Frater A. told me, “but we had to be sure.” “So did I.” I answered, “And now I am.”. Soror M., the youngest of the Cabal, who’d been a squeegee kid just a few weeks earlier and wasn’t advanced enough in her Initiation to accompany the scouting party, was curious about what I’d “seen”. I figured I‘d best give her the edited version. “ A Force.” I explained. “A raw malevolent Energy older than time and one of a group of such called The Old Ones. We call it Nyarlathrotep to give it a name but that’s arbitrary. It can only be invoked by the vilest of Negative Magics, the ceremony of blood sacrifice. Traffic fatalities that could have been prevented, murders and suicides caused by deliberately unbearable social conditions, I’ve even heard it suggested that simulated killing on screen provides a form of energy. Any thing that produces the Energy of fear and death. Animal sacrifice too…that’s why we’re vegetarians. The “fast food” industry alone counts for millions of animals slaughtered…more than are ever eaten. It’s all really Ritual Sacrifice to summon Specific forms of cosmic Wrongness and set them into key positions around the planet. But so far nobody has been insanely stupid enough to try to summon and use any of the Old Ones. No human could be so utterly arrogant as to think they could control them. What we have here is a Thing, a very powerful and evil Thing and I suspect there’s more than one.”

 “And you’ve come to fight them?” she asked, her soft young eyes alight with awe and admiration.

 “Me? No fucking way!! I just confirm the situation, make a report and then haul my quivering nervous system to the safest place I can find and hide out ‘til it’s over. That …thing …would chew my soul like bubblegum and spit the pulp into some Pit I can’t even imagine. Fight it? Shit…nothing human can stand up to that sort of Evil.”

 “ But you’re a 9^th degree Adept, aren’t you?” she asked, with a charming lack of disappointment in her voice.

“Yup,” I replied, “Just a standard flesh’n’blood ol’ Mage who knows enough to leave the Heavy shit to the pros.”

“What do you mean?” she asked. By then I was hooting vigorously on some superb Tangier hash with Athenisis so Fra. A. filled in the details.

“ When a Cosmic Malignancy is manifest, a Cosmic Benevolence is summoned to counter It.” he explained. “ Nothing human would have a chance against something like Nyarlathrotep and its kin in a toe-to-toe battle. Frater Fnord here locates and confirms but it’s up to all of us to raise the Positive Vibes that allow a Cosmic Good to manifest. For the next as-long-as-it-takes, we will Celebrate. Sex, drugs, and music…all directed at a specific result.”

 “But I don’t know enough about Magic to do that” Soror M. lamented.

Athenisis, who was already beginning her part of the ritual now that we’d finished the first pipe of hash, assured her it was the sort of thing that lent itself well to on-the-job training.

“Will Frater Fnord be staying with us?” M. inquired with what I found a most flattering undertone of hope.

“Yours truly is off to sniff around the Pentagon and will away before the Rite of Ahathoor tomorrow.” I explained, “but ‘til then I will, in the words of Ram Dass, be here now.” Her smile caused me to give a short thanks to Uncle Albert for his Special Relativity theory before returning my attention to Matters At Hand.

Part 3: FIRST OF A THOUSAND STEPS

            The next morning…which actually didn’t happen until well after the Rite of Ahathoor which we performed “in the Astral”, being asleep at the time, and it was well nigh the hour of Tum and supper before I got together enough to attempt even any sort of planning …I was pleasantly surprised to find that both Athenisis and Soror M. had decided to join me in the trip to the Pentagon.

“We shall travel as a Happy Family. Fr. A has offered the loan of his trusty minibus and set the Vibe to make anyone who notices us experience it as seeing a bunch of Freex on the road…just harmless old hippies not worth anyone’s attention.” Athenisis announced as I absorbed my second coffee. “ You will be “Adam”, I will be ‘Beth” and M. will be “Gayle”, my sister’s daughter come to visit for the Summer.”  Sensible and well thought-out, I decided …particularly that “niece” part. Anyone even subconsciously hip to Vibe would pick up that my feelings to M. were not paternal and that sort of shit can backfire when you least need it.

            I should attempt to explain about Vibe Control. It’s possible to actually control the sensory reaction that most people have to you, within certain parameters. Its one of the side effects of the low-consciousness state that most people are kept in. I can be on a city street looking like the usual me, which tends to attract unwanted attention, but anyone who notices me will see what they expect to see. Most of ‘em see me as a “regular guy” probably unemployed and looking for a job. Some may see a musician or some sort of artist. Basically what they see is the most easily comprehended version of how much of my vibe they get. Cops are a problem. They’re so programmed for suspicion that no matter what they see, they think the worst and I have a pretty heavy outlaw energy. They tend to see me as a biker or a doper, both of which I am but not the one they see. Vibe control can’t make anyone approve of what they see…it just gives them a version they don’t have to think about much. You can’t project the idea of something radically different than what you are…like my appearing as some Yuppie or Military type or even an Average Consumer. This is Magic. It can’t lie.

            Together Athenisis and I could produce a stronger and more directable effect, plus M. would be helpful and get some on-the-road training and experience. As long as she believed we were who we pretended to be, she would add to the overall charge. That’s really all there is to it. After that it’s pretty much a matter of practice.

            The minibus was cool…a vintage ’64 VW with it’s Psychedelic decoration well cared for. Frater A. had driven to Woodstock in it, and he told me this would be its second trip to the Pentagon.

            “This is the same bus I drove to the Exorcism in ’67.” he told us. Soror M. did that politely baffled look that suited her so well, so he elaborated.

            “ Back in 19 and 67, when I was but a Neophyte” he explained, with a touch of Walter Brennan in his voice, “a gathering of Magi decided to hold a ceremony of exorcism to drive Evil forces from the Pentagon. They probably didn’t expect it to do much, but the attempt alone would be a Positive Act and that’s always worth the doin’…heh heh heh. So anyways, they sent out the word and on Oct. 21 o’ that year folks from all over got together there at the Pentagon and tried to form a Magic Circle around it. Not surprisingly, the cops got in the way of that. Still we linked energies and bombarded the place with Good Vibes. I remember young Ed Sanders from the Fugs howling out Invocations while we chanted “Out Demon Out”. We even managed to have a Tantric Ceremony in the middle of the crowd. It was a real Trip…”then his voice returned to its usual tone and he added, “ Actually, there’s a recording of it on the Fug’s “Tenderness Junction” album. Wanna hear it?” She did, so he went off to find the album and we rolled a few joints and next thing we knew it was well into the evening.

 Ah well then…we will set forth tomorrow.     

            The next day after breakfast, Athenisis…now “Beth” and young M., now “Gayle” and I, in my new “Adam” persona, split the pad to start our journey to the Pentagon. We piled into the bus and after a brevity of farewells we were headed for the highway. Gayle disappeared into the back and a few minutes later returned with a hand-lettered sign reading “HighWay”. We stopped long enough to tape it across the front of the bus above the windshield. Everybody took a deep Toke and blew the Smoke at the bus. “I re-Pagan thee “HighWay!” Beth giggled solemnly. Then we were off again. Beth did the driving…I’ve never learned how. As we rolled out of the city, I noticed that we got more scowls than smiles from them as noticed us. Oddly enough, the younger ones seemed to view us with the greatest contempt. I asked Gayle about it.

            “Kids are conditioned to see hippies as stupid losers.” she said, “Freak” is the worst thing you can call someone now.”

Beth elaborated. “Movies and TV are more specifically propaganda and programming         tools than before you…went wherever it was you went, and a lot of that is directed towards a negative reconstruction of the Psychedelic Renaissance. Freex are unfashionable now.”

            “Well, it’s nice to know we still scare the bastards. May they lie a-sweat every night in fear of the inevitable. I like “Psychedelic Renaissance”…a fitting title for the time.” It didn’t seem worth mentioning that I use since movies as a source of inside info and had noted that Freak was an obligatory insult. In fact while I was hunting Patterns in movies, I started videotaping examples of  “Freak” being used as an insult…not the whole flick, just the specific instances. Halfway through the second tape I decided the Pattern was established.

            “Our Greatly Honoured Frater Wat Zupdok came up with that.” Beth said. “I guess you haven’t had the chance yet to check out his new book THE ANACHRONISM OF NOW. Pretty cool…typical Wat. Rambles like a hobohemian but the overall effect is pretty effective.”

            “Is he still fronting the Anti-Serfdom League?” I asked.

            “As ever.” she assured me. “They got together with the Snakes to form The HeadLand Press.”, referring to a Cabal called the Untied Snakes Of Armorica, a  Breton-based neoPagan group focused on liberating the Celtic people by a return to Druidry. 

            Gayle wanted a reason for my fit of laughter and rather than wait ‘til I stopped, Beth supplied it.

            “The HeadLand Press is from Aliester Crowley. He thought of it almost a century before the term “Head” took on its Psychedelic meaning…or its sexual one.”

            “ Ol’ Wat was ever the quick one.” I agreed, wiping the laughtear from my eyes.

            “You guys know Wat Zupdok ?” said the obviously impressed Gayle. “Even before I met Frater A.  I was into his “Aether City Kazoo” newsletter. I’d really dig to meet him.”

            “ So shall you.” Beth decided. “He’s been living out at the Herbal Liberation Cabal’s farm just a few hours drive from the Pentagon. We’ll stop in there for visit after the gig.”

            “Far Out!” Gayle enthused.

She was getting into the spirit of things rather nicely.

Part 4: THE ARCANE TWO-STEP

            One cannot get too close to the Pentagon but then again one cannot be far enough away from it if you take my meaning. As it turned out, we didn’t have to. Five miles from it, I got hit with a wave of malignant energy that could only mean one thing. I didn’t have to mention it to Beth. She didn’t even turn the bus…just slammed it into reverse and stood on the gas until we could breath again. Gayle was unconscious. We linked and set Wards around her and a few minutes later she was back. Tough lil’ chick under all the young and soft surface.

            “What!” was about all she could say.

            “ Uh…sorry. Bit of a miscalc on our part.” I explained. “We should have been well safe of any effect for the next couple of miles. You and Beth were s’pose to wait while I footed in and shadow-danced. Sorry. You okay?”

            “What!!!” she repeated.

            “Oh! Another Force, another Old One. Yog-Sothoth we call it. It’s been there for years. The Pentagon was built to contain it. That’s the reason for its shape. That exorcism   trip back in ‘67 wasn’t just a joke. What I can’t figure is why so much of its Energy is able to reach out so far. The wall wasn’t breached, so it shouldn’t have been set loose to any degree. The only other real option is …Oh shit!”

            “What?” said Gayle for the third time, but as a question.                                  

            I was calculating, formulating, and looking for a plan of any kind so Beth answered.

            “Yog-Sothoth is stronger. It’s spreading. It’s still confined but its Power is moving out into the World. When the Old Ones are manifest on the material plane, their power is diminished. It’s still more than we can imagine but nothing like what they are on their own plane. Actually, they’re in both simultaneously and…opps. She’s fainted again.”

            “Just as well for now.” I decided. “Can you still remember how to drive this thing forwards?”

            “If necessary, I’ll drive it sideways. Next stop, Highgrass Farm.” and I swear she spun that bus around on its rear wheels and didn’t touch pavement for 50 feet.

Part 5: NIGHTLIGHT

            There wasn’t a whole lot said during the drive. Beth drove like Hell was chasing, as well she should, and I saw to calming Gayle with some Old Songs and by the time we got off the highway and onto the backroads that would take us to Highgrass Farm where the Herbal Liberation Cabal lived she was already feeling better. Very sturdy chick indeed, I decided again. First time I felt one of the Old Ones I screamed for 23 hours, gibbered for a week, and I still can’t stand to watch pro football… ‘course I never could before either.

            The Herbal Liberation Front was originally a commune started in ‘61 by one Ezekiel “Acapulco” Goldman and his partner Dave “Panama” Redbird, the two cats who almost single, well – double, headedly fed the public’s growing interest in Marijuana after the Beat writers introduced it to the general populace. This had, as a side-effect, brought them rather an immense amount of money which they, being hip to Karma, used to fund independent publishing of books and records, communes and sundry and various counter-cultural activities. History records that they both died in a ‘plane crash in “76 but this was actually faked to get the increasingly annoying government off their trail. Actually, they were both…uh..where I’d been, safe and in excellent health and spirits.

            They’d left their original several hundred acre home and Pot plantation to the Freex who’d been living and working there and over the years it had evolved into the H.L.F. The resident Magi (there to shield against and divert unwanted attention) had been given the task of keeping things going. It was one of several Positive Energy Centers located around the planet to counter the Negative Energy produced by the System.

            The Herbs were waiting for us. Frater D. is an 8=3 and knew we were coming as soon as we did. They’d set up the vibe of the farm to calm and cheer us, which is pretty much its usual state anyway.

The main building is a huge four story stone house Acky and Pan had moved out here years back and around it were the collection of domes, shacks, yurts, tipis, and assorted dwellings as well as the various outbuildings and barns. The Herbs are a pretty big Cabal…a few hundred of ‘em more or less and they produce and sell sufficient Weed at fair and decent prices to support not only their own Work but that of a lot of other Cabals as well. There was a huge bonfire in the yard, to burn off the Negative Energy still clinging to us. Folks were dancing around it…wild, shaggy, lean, primitive forms tripping the Light Pantastic to the music of drums and flutes. Gayle hopped out of the bus like we were back from a day at the beach but Beth just sat behind the wheel letting the tension dissipate. Then I heard That Voice.

            “Well met by moonlight, mad Fnord!” and there came Wat Zupdok across the yard with trailing clouds of glorious Smoke pouring from his ever-present churchwarden pipe. “Seems you stepped in it a bit back there. Well, not to fret. We’ll cop some altitude, scope the scene, and fix whatever seems broken with the usual heroic dash that we are both so justly known for. So Yog-Sothoth is out for a stroll, hmmm. We were about 93% sure that was the case but judging from the way you look like the survivor of an astral plane crash, I think we can add that last 7%. Introduce me to your lovely companions. Hey wow! Is that Soror Athenisis? Far out! Where have you been anyway? Cool bus. Want some Smoke? Come and eat…there’s a cauldron  of curry on the stove. New Weird Order are here, working on songs for their next album. They got a hot new kid on percussion…plays anything that can be rattled or banged. Short Chester’s kid…not the oldest one – his second son, the blonde. He’s 20 years old now! How the fuck that happened without my noticing is a certified mystery. Hi there!” he shouted as he caught sight of Gayle staring at him with her eyes the widest I’d ever seen them.

             I made introductions. Beth knew Wat from some adventure in Canada a few years back and he was old friends with Gayle by the time we got to the house. Inside it was all candles and oil-lamps…no electric lights, tho’ they had ‘em if they were wanted or needed. Incense was strategically placed, and high-grade Tibetan if my nose were any judge, which it is. Wooden bowls of ‘Shroom curry were waiting on the big rough table and ceramic cups of herbal tea…which meant with real Herb in this place. The H.L.F. Cabal dug the rustic and kept to a strong Psychedelic tradition. Their scene was based on George Metzger’s comix and I was relaxed before my ass hit the chair.

            “Wat,” I said before starting on the curry, “We are in Deep Shit. Tomorrow, or the day after at the absolute latest, we will have to start making some sort of plan.”

             He fired up the biggest joint I’d seen in years and nodded. “Now is when.”

Part 6: PRELUMINARIES

            It went on into the night. Gayle went off exploring with Short Chester’s second son Kether, and Beth was upstairs in discussion of Astrology with Soror Stefanie, not wanting to miss the chance to brain-pick an expert (she promised to share her notes with me) so I wound up sitting in the kitchen with Wat. The Herbs being who and what they are, folks wandered in and out, joints were smoked, and Wat brewed up several pots of his lethal coffee. In between all that, we set to figuring how to divert the tsunamic catastrophe looming before us.

            “It’s not my field,” Wat was saying, “but it looks like we’re a bit short o’ time for raising Positive Energy as a counter measure. Even with the Internet and telepathy we couldn’t get enough going before Nyarlathrotep and Yog-Sothoth make a connection and nobody knows better than you what that means.”

            “There’ll be others who are hip to what’s happening…other adepts, other Lodges, but we don’t have any contact with them. Still, unknown allies are still allies. We can’t ignore the possibility that this may bring a new unity to the … well, to Us.”

            “ I like to think of “Us” as the Ones Who Hope They’re The Good Guys as opposed to Those Who Pretend They Are.” Wat offered.

            “Good ‘un.” I agreed. “We also have to consider that the manifestation of that purpose is crucial to victory over the Old Ones.”

            “Or that it may well be a solo gig…one Hero to sort out the whole mess and all others in the supporting cast.” Wat contemplated.

            “ I hate those. You never know if you’re the hero until last minute so you have to full-tilt the whole time in case its you.”

            “And then if it turns out that you are the hero you got all that miserable responsibility for the fate of humanity riding on ya plus you know you’re gonna catch a serious pounding before it’s done.” Wat agreed.

            “Sheee-it! Dig the grumbling Bodhisattvas!” howled a voice from the doorway.

            “Short Chester!” Wat and I chorused. And there he was, all 6’9” of him with ancient overalls dangling from his lanky frame and the same straw cowboy hat he bought the year I first met him. Bit more grey in the three feet of beard but the same crazy eyes.

            “D’ja think I was gonna sit this one out? I may not be a Magician, but I ain’t among the napping. Cosmic Bad shit in a direct trajectory to the Ultimate Fan…every Head on the planet must be tuned into it to some degree.”

            Wat handed him a bowl of curry. “And thereby cometh unity.”

            “You seem to be an Omen, Chester.” I decided.

            “And not for the first time.” said he. “I thought I was just comin’ to meet up with Kether. He’s here with N.W.O. Got a percussion gig with ‘em.”

            “He’s off somewhere with my lady’s niece.” I told him.

            Chester paused, looked me over carefully, then said “Do I still call you Fnord?”

Part 7: PLANS AND PRECAUTIONS

            Chester caught up on the details then went looking for Kether, and Wat and I got back to considering.

            “The Old Ones.” Wat muttered, hitting rewind just for the sake of continuity. “They always try to open a Door to their Dimension and take over the Earth. Since you’re here, it seems reasonable that Omnicorp is somehow involved. They’ve already taken over the Earth so the moot root would be: Is Omnicorp with or against the Old Ones? If  “against” does that that mean we’re allies at some absolutely minimal level? OR! Has Omnicorp been so unfathomably idiotic as to try to use Them?

            “That would be the most likely.” I offered. “They’ve had Yog-Sothoth penned up for years and even if they originally did it to confine him…er…It, there’s no way that bunch of demented power-junkies could resist trying to put a leash on It. Now if they, Omnicorp, had Nyarlathrotep on the East Coast then there should be an equal Negative Charge on the West Coast. Any theories?”

            “ Cthulhu” said some kid who’d just come in to fortify himself with curry for a few more hours dancing and drumming. “I heard It was being held somewhere in California. Maybe Nevada. No one was sure about that part. But Cthulhu for sure, dude.”

            That made sense, Yog-S, Nyarlathrotep, and Cthulhu being a sort of Triad.

            “Well, Wat,” I decided. “Looks like next stop is California. Or Nevada.”

           

Part 8: ALL THE WORLD’S A  SECOND STAGE

            Beth, it seemed, had other ideas. “New England!” she stated, striding down the stairs and through the kitchen like she had everything we needed to know figured and worked out.   

            Now I’m as susceptible to that kind of confidence as the next Adept, so while I was ready to go along with the idea I still felt the circumstances required a tad more detail. She was headed for the bus so I trailed along, dodging around dancers that seemed to flow out of her path. She was there before I caught up. “Cthulhu” she said. “We’d got that far.” I told her, “Our next move was California tho’. ”  “New England!” she asserted, “Cthulhu is in California…or maybe Nevada…but the Key all this is in New England. “That makes sense,” Short Chester added as he danced past, “All those stories are set in New England.” This was true. Well, I decided. One might discuss with a Witch and one might question an Omen, but both…? Okay. New England.  “ So mote it be.” I consented. Wat, who’d stopped to accept a proffered pipe, strolled up…or maybe he was dancing, it’s hard to tell with him. “I,” he announced, “shall to California and with all due Caution make such investigation as I may.”  “I’ll join that expedition.” Chester boomed.

 “Me too.” From Kether, who was resting his hands from a lengthy percussioning, “Or is that We too?” he asked Gayle who pondered for slightly less time than it takes a hummingbird to flap once then said “We.”. She elaborated for Beth and I that she’d been in New England the previous Autumn and it was spooky. Beth gave me a look that was less “I told you so” than “Impressed with how you agreed to the right move so fast” to which I offered my best Thank You face.        “ Settled then.” she pronounced. “ We go to New England, Wat and co. recon California. Everyone else raises Positive Energy.”

“You’ll meet up again…” sang a voice from a second story window behind us. Soror Stefania. “…when Venus conjuncts Aries.” Gayle finished, surprising all there but especially herself.  Then she and Kether were back in the dance and the flames ate the darkness. Beth, Stef, and some friends were getting nude for some Ceremony…use the Energy generated by the Celebration to lay some heavy protection on the ‘bus and Chester’s truck was likely. Wat and Chester were into supplies and preparation. At that point the massive amounts of Cannabis that I’d consumed since arrival decided that since I was no longer in Focused Think mode they could redirect their influence to it’s other purpose and suddenly I couldn’t focus on anything.  The Energy around me poured through me, filled me and emptied me and absorbed me, picked me up and floated me into and away simultaneously. My connection to material Reality is tenuous at best and when it’s over-ridden, I go directly to surreal. The raw beauty of the flames and shadows, the flowing bodies, the intricate and powerful drums, the floating flute notes, the way the sparks sought to join their celestial kin, the really far out way that the house was swaying to the beat…I decided it would all be much more enjoyable if I were horizontal under that big oak over there and suddenly I was and wave upon wave of Joy and Positivity brought me peace and rest.

            I would be needing both.                       

  

Part 9: ALTITUDINOUS REFLECTION

            Now the thing about that kind of condition, which we of the Psychedelic Persuasion call “High”, is that if one doesn’t fight it there comes a sort of Transcendence, a independence from the mundane which can provide a temporary but profound experience actually Outside the usual and accepted in what we call Tripping [this should not be confused with the same term as used in Ebonics, to which it bears on the barest relationship.].

            Into this state I gratefully entered. The Energy filled me. Beneath my back, I could feel the immense depth of the Earth, and above me the endlessness of the Sky was as easy to comprehend as a well told joke. I could feel the Evil still loose all around us, but now it seemed a small, weak thing that might be chased off by a child’s laugh.

            A child laughed.

            A little girl of seven or so years was standing about three feet away. Her expression was serious, joyful, and aloof all at once. I knew her…Paloma, youngest of all my oldest friends and daughter of Meg the Wanderer. “Are you really here or is this a Vision?” I asked her.

“Both.” she said, “ Really here since we came for this Celebration…Mom caught the Vibe days ago. Most everyone has…there’s Gatherings all over the Planet. Fire and music fill this night. Also not really “here” ‘cause you’ve drifted Outside and I’ve come with a message so this isn’t the physical “me”. That’s asleep in our bus.”

 “Message? I could use any sort of insight. What is it?”

“A riddle. And a koan. ‘Bright by day. Equal by night. The one is many and not divided. When self is not, what is it?’. Just think about it at the right moment…don’t try to answer ‘cause the answer isn’t here or there yet. Are you gonna get up and dance now? I just woke up and I like dancing with you.” So I left the reverie and found I was still High as a star and then the solid and material  Paloma bounced up and caught me around the neck, kissed me on both cheeks and received one from me on the end of her nose before she took my hand and we joined the figures and the flames and the dancing sound.                                

Part 9: THE ROAD RETURNED TO

            Early evening of the following day found us rolling toward New England. Beth became more communicative, offering the following.

            “Stef had been charting all sorts of weird for almost a year. Damn but she’s good. She’s been monitoring world events and comparing them to Astrological activities to the most intricate degree. About a month ago, Frater N.I.C. turned up at Highgrass to show her some new Astrological-Tarot secrets he’d found…or “been shown” as he puts it.”

Now there was a cat we could benefit from having along, I thought…Frater Noli Inspiritu Cumbuere, a 10=1 Adept, an Ipsissimus, which is as high as a mortal can attain in Magic. They’re in a whole other Reality, tho’, and all this might well seem unimportant to them. Or maybe they were deep into something far more crucial than we could comprehend. I’m a 9=2 and the Ipsissimi I’d met were so beyond that I couldn’t measure it. Beth was still describing. “It seems that Stef’s son Shane had been trying some original ideas with N.I.C.’s Tarot programme and the two of them disappeared into Shane’s cabin for 48 hours and when they came out one of the things they’d created was a programme that could correlate a  pattern of Astrology and Geomancy and actually display it on a map. Stefanie got Shane…she’s not too good with computers. Can you believe she’s in her 60s tho’! Did you see her nude?” I had, and I assured her that the males of our generation were both well aware of and duly thankful for the way the females of our generation were maturing. “So Stef and Shane used this programme to check out the things she’d been collecting and everything was centred on a fishing town in Massachusetts called Cullisport.” she continued. “Some say it’s the model for “Innsmouth”. You boys were right about Cthulhu being in California, but we don’t have time to go there and verify it. The real Bad News is in Cullisport and so far as we know we’re the only ones who know it. Stef was going to contact the Inner Order but when we turned up, she figured that was the Sign so she turned me on to the Pattern and here we are, going there. Stef showed the Pattern to N.I.C. but he just did that famous nod of his and said he was glad the programme was proving useful and that Shane had done most of it. He was gone the next morning… arrived and went with none to notice. Is that why you’re going for the 10^th  Grade? ‘Cause you don’t drive? They sorta astral project in the physical if I understand the concept. N.I.C.’s the only one of The Ippissimi who still regularly keeps in contact with the world. But then, he’s the youngest, isn’t he? Actually IS about our age, not just looks it. He’s only been a 10^th  for a few years. Stef says he was sitting in with the jams at the farm, and playing jug, kazoo, and blues harp on the Incandescent Saffron Jug Band’s last album under the name “Natt Shurall”. Shane asked him if he were Human and he said that he was when he wanted to be, that what he’d become didn’t nullify what he’d been and he could shift back into those realities and inhabit them completely while was there. He left a scroll that said “Being able to fly doesn’t stop you from walking.” pinned to Shane’s door when he split. I’ve never met him. But that could be about to change. Anyway,  Stef showed me what she’d found and once I put it together with what we’d found it was pretty obvious that we had to get to Cullisport with more than our usual due haste. Did you hear what Gayle said about the Venus conjunct Aries thing? Gayle doesn’t know a Cardinal Sign from a billboard…she’s never been interested in Astrology so what do figure brought that on? I think there’s some natural link with Stef. They have their Moon’s in the precise same position. Do you feel like stopping to eat? ‘cause I feel like moving ‘til I get somewhere. The vibe out here is already getting nasty. There’s food in the back if you get hungry. I’m not.”

            I decided it might be time for me to turn this into conversation. “Do you have an immediate destination?” I asked.

            “Hitch-hiker.” She said.

            “Okay.” I agreed, “I have no idea where that is, but you seem to have the captaining of this voyage well in hand, so Hitschyker it is but…”

            “Hitch-hiker ahead” she went on, indulging my mild jesting. We were close enough for me to see…my eyes are less acute than Beth’s…that a female of most striking appearance was sitting on the side of the highway playing a recorder and oblivious to the passing cars. Beth slowed the bus to a stop with my window directly opposite this new enigma. There was something in my memory of a woman who wore skintight denim and a wide-brimmed midnight-blue hat and cape. By the time the window was open I had it. “Might we have the honour of offering transportation to the Loondancer?” I asked. “Gratefully accepted” she answered and sort of “grew” from sitting to standing rather than “stood”. She gathered her several cases and packs and I opened the side door so she could stow them. Some twenty minutes later we were back en route.

Part 10: DIVERSION THE FIRST

Our new guest settled into the back of the bus and regarded us curiously with her strange eyes, made still stranger by her neoEgyptian makeup and the small jewel over her Adjna. “Have we met?” she asked.

“Not as such.” I answered, “But I’ve heard tales of you. A friend of mine has a dulcimer you made. It is an exquisite piece of work. I’m Adam. This is Beth.”

            “If you like.” she said. “Other names occur to me but since you’re travelling incognito those will do.”

            “Where can we take you?” Beth asked.

            “About 25 miles along there’s a side-road. My bus is parked in grove of oak and willow about another mile in. I hitched into the city for supplies…the bus is a bit of a gas-hog. There seem to be a lot of Freeks on the road. I caught a ride with a woman named Meg and her daughter…”

            “Paloma” I finished for her. “Friends of ours. We just left them at Highgrass Farm.”

            “Something is happening.” she decided. “Is there anything I can do?”

            “Nothing specific or other than your usual.” I told her. “Stay High, generate Good Vibes, and keep your Head open. There’s a bit of nasty goin’ down but nothing to be immediately concerned of. There’s some Pot in that wooden box by your foot if you like.” She did. We shared a pipe in silence for the remainder of the ride and stopped by the road she indicated. We excused ourselves from a visit due to the need to reach our destination but hoped for some future meeting. She thanked us for the ride and began to blend with the trees. We watched her until she was invisible and just as that happened, a flock of birds flew from the circle of trees, circled above her and followed her on.

            “Pigeons?” Beth announced.

“Part of her legend.” I said.

Part 11: FLIP SIDE (TAILS)

            The next few hours were uneventful and would have been ordinary travel save for the ever-increasing sense of raw, mad Evil in the air. Beth commented that while the Loondancer was with us, she hadn’t felt it or even noticed that she hadn’t felt it. I agreed. “That’s one Strange Woman!” Beth decided and there we left it, not wanting to draw any undue attention to her since we were starting to feel there was some on us.

            “What’dya think?” Beth asked. “I’m reading it as human consciousness, low-grade Magic, bad Vibes and coming up quick.”

            “Well, so far all we’ve met are Good Folks so if  Isaac Newton and Lao Tze are right, we should be about due for some of the au verso.” And sure enough, a look in the side-view mirror showed me a big black Cadillac. “Heads up…we got M.I.B.’s”.

            The Caddy stayed on our tail for the next few miles, probably to try to intimidate us which was the dumb side of futile since the first thing you learn in any decent system of Magic is to banish fear. However, I was experiencing a degree of, call it, apprehension. These thugs were known to resort to violence, usually as a means of introduction, and they were now close enough for me to see that there were four of them, all large and surely brutes clad in their ominous black suits and shades, staring straight ahead with that robotic intensity such types favour. I have no fighting skills at all beyond a profound ability to leap into raw panic and go primate when threatened, tho’ I can throw a knife if I have one which I didn’t. I had once studied the martial sciences briefly but after a week my sensei had recommended I purchase a shotgun. I had a momentary intuition that Beth could, if necessary, do some serious damage should it come to battle.

            The Sun was setting. We did an abbreviated salutation to Tum without stopping. The Caddy suddenly dropped back about a quarter mile at that point. “Oh ho!” we decided, “Signs of weakness.”. As it began to approach again, Beth began to quietly chant. I couldn’t quite make out what but I could sense that our pursuers were growing uneasy beneath their androidal calm. As if to challenge their fear and stake their claim to the growing dark, they slowly pulled along side. The highway was deserted as far as could be seen. I was playing the casual, elbow resting out the open window, and waited until they were nose to nose with us then I turned my head toward them and gave them The Beatific Vision of St. Harpo – eyes crossed, cheeks puffed, nose wrinkled, and I even got my ears to stick out (fortunately my hair was tied back). The effect was interesting. The car actually jumped and swerved but the driver and passengers never even twitched. Beth was building intensity with her chant and I linked my energy to her for support then BANG. All four tires on the Caddy blew simultaneously. It danced wildly after the fashion its kind and left the road to throw itself into a small windbreak of sturdy trees on the edge of a field. Bye bye nasties. We teased the speed limit a bit in our celebration of escape.

Part 12: INITIAL OMENS

            “What’d you hit those clowns with?” I asked Beth as we devoured the highway.

            “Just solid Positivety” she answered and I wasn’t surprised. Anyone who hasn’t caught on that that is the most potent force humans possess just hasn’t been paying attention. The Forces of Repression use deliberately created Negativity to achieve their goals and then present themselves as the only cure to the problems they create. They depend on anyone opposing them to use the same kind of Energy in response. The Discordians call this a “Tar-baby Trap” ‘cause it works on the principle of what ever you fight you become stuck to. The Major Religions have variations on it – Christ said to “Resist not Evil”, Buddha taught Detachment, the Taoists have “Wu Wei”, the Path of Non-action, and Krishna spends the entire Gita trying to hip Arjuna to the idea of being outside of the battle he’s about to fight. This idea does seem oddly underplayed in Islam and the idea of Jihad…which may be why Moslems are so popular as manipulated scapegoats in global scams. We, and by that I mean our friends and any unmet allies, were going to try to raise enough Positive Energy to counter the power of a deliberate Negative attack but if we let any negativity slip into our actions, we weaken our own efforts. Beth had beamed a bolt of Positive Energy at our pursuers and they couldn’t handle it.

            “We are agreed then,” she asked, “that those were M.I.B.s?”

            “I found no difference, physical or psychic, from my previous encounters” I answered. “How ‘bout you?”

            “That was my first”. Not unexpected…she was essentially a Witch and the Men In Black don’t often get sent after Pagans. In fact..

            “Those boys don’t usually get sent out on this kind of gig.” I ruminated aloud. “ They’re part of the Industrial/Legislative gang. They scare off anyone who gets too close to some plot business and government is working. Shit…they’ve hunted my ass from Nome to Yucatan when I’m trying to make trouble for Omnicorp, but this is a different kind of Trip. This is way too Magical for such low-level thugs, so what are they doing chasing us? Their bosses know scare tactics aren’t gonna work on us.”

            “ Maybe they were just going to kill us.” she said.

            “ I never thought of that.” I admitted.

            “Well, since I’m driving why don’t you check the Astral?” and I couldn’t really object. The thing is, I’m not really that good at Projection. I can do it but it’s a long way from my specialty. Still, the idea was valid, so I dropped into Trance, popped out the top of my head, and went back to where we’d left our unwanted company. Its just as well that Time runs different there or I would have been gone a long time ‘cause I shot up about 300 feet before I managed to stop, then I sorta got pulled along by the connection to my body, which was going the other way in the bus. Like I said, this is not my forte. But I did finally get where I was going.

            The caddy was gone. Now the good part of Astral investigation is that you aren’t limited to material clues. The psychic residue was clear as a golden bell chiming on a Winter morning. I went up a hundred feet or so to get a bit a bit of range to see if the caddy was anywhere on the road which it wasn’t so I dropped back into the little windbreak. A Dryad was huddled in the roots of an oak rather older than the other trees, looking very frightened. She could see me since I was in her Realm but I lack the ability to actually communicate with her. Still, if she was aware of the car… I gave her what I hoped was a don’t worry smile and swooped back to the bus.

            “It was a Projection!” I told Beth as soon as I was bodified again.

            “That’s the low-level Magic I sensed.” Beth said. “I wondered why I was sensing that from M.I.B.s. Usually they just give off a vibe of violence and aggression …purely physical. Or so I’m told.”

            “ There was a Dryad in one of the tree where the caddy ended up.” I told her. “She was frightened by something and I can’t see it being anything but the car. Ergo, the car and its crew were not material or she would barely have noticed them.”

            “ Do you think you could steer this bus for about five minutes while I go back and see if I can get any info from her?” Beth asked. A chill shot up my spine to manifest as drops of cold sweat on my forehead, but the road was empty for miles ahead and seemed pretty much untroubled by bends, so I said that if she’d slow this thing to under 30 mph and not linger I would endure the trial. She was back in the longest three minutes I could remember. She said something and I apologized for my lack of  knowledge in classical Greek whereon she reverted to English. “The car went “poof”. Vanished in the into-thin-air tradition. Pure illusion projected by somebody somewhere to do something to someone, that last being the only part we know. Us. She also said that there was great strength and evil behind it, but human…not the Old Ones or even one of their servants.”

            “Oh jolly. Do you figure we’ve got a malevolent magician on our tails and trail? And if so, would you mind taking the wheel again ‘cause I think we might want to do a little better than 23 mph.”

            Now when a Magician goes bad there’s two things to consider: a) they don’t have a whole lot of Power, being negative ‘n’ all but b) they have no constraints on using the Power they do have, being evil. Most times they burn out fairly quick leaving varying degrees of damage behind them but sometimes a really resilient bastard turns up and those are deep trouble. Now if this were one of those and working independently of all the other elements in this game, we now had a wild card in play and no idea who or where or what they were up to. We didn’t even know…

            “The Dryad told me there was a human male behind the Sending.” Beth added. Okay, we did know what gender. “Very old…and when an Immortal says “old”, they don’t mean a mere few decades. She was hard to understand completely – it’s not like conversing with humans, but she gave me the impression that he was Babylonian or Sumerian, something like that. Not a shifter. He stays in the same body but it doesn’t age. You got any ideas about that?”

            “One very similar being comes immediately to mind, yes. My ol’ buddy Oliver Lee Garky.”

            “The Omnicorp C.E.O.?” she asked. “ I know the name but not the story.” Which was the usual case, Omnicorp being my turf and not widely detailed even among Us. No reason why she shouldn’t know tho’, so gave her the basics.

            “Olly is the front man for the real nasties behind Omnicorp. He was born in 1839 and grew up on what is amusingly called the “American Frontier”, part of the first wave of the Manifest Destiny scam. He was a snake-oil pusher when They found him, wandering around in a wagon selling a bottled laxative of his own invention. They liked his slogan “Shit Or Get Off The Pot!” so they offered him the gig as Head of what was to become Omnicorp since they needed a human to act as their agent. He jumped at the chance. They gave him an immortality treatment and he’s been their boy ever since, passing himself off as his own offspring by using clones as his “sons”. Those are destroyed…murdered, actually, since they are intelligent beings… once they serve their purpose of growing up in front of the public. When they get to Ollie’s age, he takes their place and just carries on, coming out of seclusion when needed and living in a hedonistic playground the rest of the time. The protoYuppie if you will. Human by birth and genetics but solid bad to the last atom. They own him and he loves it.”

            “So who are the “They”?” she asked and since she asked, I answered.

            “Aliens. OMNICORP is an Extraterrestrial Invasion here to enslave Earth and Humanity... been at a long time, too.”

            “Wow-Yipe” Beth decided. “So why isn’t all that better known…oh. Okay…Omnicorp  controls global commerce and therefore controls politics. So for all real intents and purposes, there is no difference or separation between politics and business.”

“None whatsoever. Two sides of a one-headed coin. Politics uses business to maintain its control of Reality.” I pontificated. “Dig…what are the two “social systems” the average person will recite if asked – “Capitalism” and “Communism”, right? What nobody seems to notice is that these are both actually economic systems. For centuries, humanity has been programmed to see society as a being based on an economic model that the idea of a society not based on the need for money is beyond their comprehension. That’s OmniCorp’s doing. That’s what Chao Tzu meant when he said that the NEED for money is the root of all evil. As long as society is based on money as the necessary element for survival, people are at the mercy of those who control the money and mercy isn’t what they’re known for. I could show you evidence that some of the most famous assassinations in history can be traced to an on-going programme of financial domination. The use of money as a means of controlling humanity, there is no difference between politics and business. Commerce controls the money and government creates and enforces the rules you have to obey to get some. Absolute control of Commerce equals absolute Power.”

“You and Wat really do have the same background, don’cha? Still, it would seem to me that all this craziness with the Old Ones is not part of OmniCorp’s plans and plotting. It’s more like something outside of that, wouldn’t you think. Maybe there’s another player in this game.”  

            “No way to tell at this point, but no reason not to pin a maybe on it either. Could be someone who was given the same deal as Ollie a few centuries back and was later discarded for some reason …abandoned but left to create random trouble for humanity by the O. Inc. bunch. Harmless to them, but bad for everyone else. There are rumours of a Babylonian of ill-repute. Anyway, OmniCorp is the most successful conspiracy on the planet, but it ain’t nearly the only one.  There’s a couple of dozen at least but I can’t figure any I know of being stupid enough to try to use the Old Ones. Besides, for the most part, The Old Ones tend to ignore regular humans…there’re enough of Their hybrids and mutants around to act for Them on the Material Plane. Immortals, tho’ - those they like. Through the centuries there have been immortals who’ve allied themselves with Them. Plus The Old Ones can bestow immortality, as can several other groups I can think of. Fact is, Immortality ain’t all that uncommon. I personally know one cat who hunted mastodon in his youth.”

            “I’d say that was pile of auroch-shit if anyone else said it.” she said.

It took me a moment to decide that was a compliment, then I continued.

“The world is changing. Humanity is entering a new Evolutionary phase and the one’s who are at the top of the currant System are doing any and everything to stop or even slow down that process. Negative energy produces fear, depression, stress…all of which, as psychology teaches, cause the mind to seek solace in simplicity and repetition, which makes it easy to manipulate. The System needs Negative Energy to survive. The Old Ones are the most powerful generator’s of Negative Energy known. If the Elite who rule The System are desparate enough…they might well risk allowing more freedom those Old Ones they’ve trapped.”

“That would be the unchallenged winner in the Stupidest Thing Ever Done category.”

“If they weren’t stupid, they’d be us.”

Part 13: THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE OTHER THING

The road scrolled on before and behind. Beth was watching it like it might disappear if she didn’t, obviously deep in the kind of thought it is most impolite to interrupt. Sitar music on the stereo, incense in the brass holder welded to the dashboard, an intricately carved antique bead from China dangling on a macraméd cord from the mirror, swinging back and forth and back and…  

            Those Old Chinese Cursers missed the mark. You really want to make someone suffer you curse them to be conscious of how interesting the that times they live in actually are. When I think of all those millions of Average types who try to bury discontent under a mountain of apathy and complacent psuedocontentment, I could feed them to Yog-Sothoth with a pitchfork.

            But then that would produce a Negative vibe.

Still, I felt I might indulge a mild degree of justifiable ire at being among the ones they were programmed to blame for that gnawing flea of quiet desperation they could never truly ignore. We are all of us drawn to Reality and the servants of Illusion who are the Masters of the World have to have a goat to scape for that. Us Realists do seem to be the obvious choice.

            Reality. We are trained from birth to accept the lowest common denominator of it and now that we’ve come to a point where we should be starting to explore options and alternatives, entering the Adolescence of our species’ evolution, those who declared themselves the Fathers in our childhood use every trick to maintain their authority. “The Reality War”. That’s what you sign on for when you step outside the Accepted, smoke that first joint, drop that first tab, chomp down that first ‘shroom, get that forbidden first taste of the Something More. You can jump off The Bus at any time, but you can no longer be satisfied with Illusion nor fully convince yourself that the Truth you once knew was a lie and a folly. Those of us who stay on the Bus out of commitment or curiosity or just  pure bullgoose stubborn orneryness are not to blame for that jiminy crick in your consciousness, Mr and Mrs Happyconsumer. That’s Life and it wants you ‘cause without you it may as well be dead.

            So here I am, rolling along some endless highway in a bus called HighWay and it’s Night now, full night with stars writing indecipherable runes between the gathering clouds and a Moon or two in Pisces or maybe Gemini or maybe both. The night sweeps by in a blur of swift,  like the road, like the clouds, like the stars, like the years and the moments that they hold and like me in this wave of motion in the rolling, in the night, toward some dark unseen and inevitable confrontation with forces that can devour those swift moments and those runic stars and who won’t notice me even if I find them. Amorphous Energies older than Time or stars or even motion, colder than the spaces between them, beyond our understanding, beyond even our most imaginative idea of beyond. Here I am there where I am where I was where will I be and what will I do when I get there? There between the darkening clouds are the celestial instructions written in star-runes, “How To Defeat Cosmic Evil In Three Easy Steps” but I can’t read them. I know the words but I’ve forgotten their meaning, I know the language but I can’t understand it, I can see the writing but the focus shifts before I can read it. No. Wait. There. I see it. The Secret. It’s simple…. I only have to…

            “Wake up.”

Part 14: PAST THE RECENT FUTURE

            “Wake up, man. There’s something in the road up ahead.” Beth had slowed the bus to as close to a sneaky crawl as it could get and sure enough there was something waiting just ahead of us. I was still bouncing between here, there, and whatever that other place is and as we got close enough for me to start making out details I got more and more convinced that this was definitely not the Reality I’d been anticipating when I woke.

“Uh…Beth? Do you see five guys dressed like 19^th Century Outlaws sitting on horses waiting in the road at the top of that rise just up there ahead of us? ‘Cause I do and I’d feel a whole lot easier if you do too.”

            “That much I can do for you.” she answered. “That is what I see and I cannot explain it.”

            The last wisp of dream poited out. “I think I can. Pull up - they’re Friendlies. They just shouldn’t be…here.”

By then we’d reached them. We stopped, and the three nearest us trotted the last few feet between us. Two stayed back. They were all armed with Civil War era blackpowder guns and rifles. The one coming toward us was lean and dressed in shabby elegance of frock-coat and waistcoat with a cravat at his neck, knee-high boots, a wide-brim hat a-top three feet of hair and a Remington from hip to knee. Slightly behind him a stockier figure similarly clad and topped with a soft gray bowler. A Henry repeater was cradled in the crook of his arm, a Colt Army in his holster. The third rider, on a horse near Clydesdale size, was moving to the other side of the first. He was older, full-bearded and heavy built, in a morning-coat of fringed buckskin and a Tam O’Shanter. He had a pair of matched sawn-off double barrelled shotguns hung from his saddle, a Colt Navy on his belt and a Bowie-knife in a knee to ankle sheath. How the fresh-fried fuck I knew I knew what all those guns were was already starting to wonder me when the first rider stopped at Beth’s window and said, “Welcome, travellers. We were asked to wait here for you and deliver a message. Not the next side road you come to, nor the one after that but the third, which will be on your left, is the one you want. Go along it ‘til you see an old abandoned roadhouse. You can stay there tonight and sleep sound and safe. It’s a Haven. Your enemies can’t find you there.”

“Uh...thanks.” was all Beth could manage. I was more curious. “ Much appreciated.” I agreed, adding, “Mind telling us who asked you to do us this kindness?.” He stopped looking at Beth long enough to shift his rather mocking gaze to me. “Gent called Noli.” he answered, “A mutual friend, as I understand it.”

“Are you headed there too?” Beth asked.

“Sadly we are not. Urgent need to be elsewhere, as t’were. A pity. Mayhap we’ll meet again.” And with a  tip of their hats he and the second rider turned their horses and trotted off. The third rider started with them, but paused long enough to peer in the window at me.

“ Ha’e yew e’er bin tae India?” he growled in a Scot’s burr thick as day-old haggis.

“ Not in this incarnation” I told him.

“ Aye,” he rumbled. “Tha’s wha’ I thought.” And he joined his company as they rode over the crest of the rise.

Beth waited a bit, lest the rather noisy bus should spook the horses. “That Scotsman seemed to know you.” she mentioned, to pass the time.

“Long story, best saved.” I decided.

“But you do you know them?” she asked.

“Longer story, harder to tell, and not really part of what we’re into Now. But yes, I do. Sort of. Suffice to say that the Ippsissimi are a LOT more powerful than we thought.”

Beth started the engine, “ If the world survives, I will want details. Well, let’s go find that roadhouse. Those riders should be far enough away by now.”

“You may of that be sure.” I muttered, and as we rolled over the top of the hill, there was no sign of them. Anywhere.

 “ I think I’d been dreaming of Time…” I said.   

 

Part 15: A MOMENT OF REST

The roadhouse was there and we could feel the security of it even before the bus had stopped. It was Warded and nothing human or un was likely to disturb us there. We had a brief glimpse of a Pentacle enclosing it completely and a diamond pyramid of Light above and below. “Wow.” Beth murmured. Inside was funky but clean, the most immediately attractive thing being a double-size futon spread with fresh linen. A bottle of red wine and two glasses waited on a low wooden table beside it. A few candles gave the old wood a soft glow. I’d brought the last of the curry and dark bread as well as the Weed.

“Food? Drink? Weed? Sex? Or sleep?” I asked Beth.

“Or?” she replied. “Make that a “then”. That’s an itinerary, not a list of options.”

Later, tho’, I found sleep was further from me than it was from Beth since she’d been driving while I had nodded out despite my intent to keep her company. She was fine to gaze upon, naked under the cotton India-print blanket with her long, dark hair reflecting the candlelight and I took full pleasure in the peace of that place to watch her sleeping. But after a time I felt an urge to explore. If our Thrice Honoured Frater Noli Inspiritu Cumbuere had not only Warded this haven for our comfort and protection but had called legends from the past to guide us to it, it seemed likely that there was more to be found here than safety and sleep. I wrapped myself in one of the other blankets and got nosy.

The hall was long built and low ceilinged. A small stage at the far end, a large kitchen area, and public washrooms were the only real signs of its original purpose. There was a single chair facing the stage with its back to me so I wandered over to it. On the seat was a small cut-glass bottle with an ornate crystal stopper, rather like a mini-decanter. Leaning on it was a note written in purple ink and an elegant hand with the words “Drink Me”. I did. Brandy, I decided, and the best I’d ever imbibed. Then I noticed a second note on the seat of the chair, and I was pretty damn sure that had not been there a moment ago. Same ink, same ornate hand. “Sit on me.” O-kay. No sooner was my butt on the wood than I felt that ol’ familiar reality-shift. You either knows it or you’ll have to find out on your own – I can’t really describe it.

There was a band on the stage, a folky duo of obviously Psychedelic vintage. One was skinny with long straight hair playing a small electric guitar painted with Stoned designs, the other was fat with dark fuzzy hair and an acoustic 12 string. Sundry instruments cluttered the stage…other guitars, hand-drums, mandolin, banjo, an electric bass and a few things I couldn’t quite focus on. The music was faint but grew louder as they played through the introduction of intricate interwoven guitar parts. The fuzzy one took the vocal.                                                       

            “Flame to the candle, moth to the flame

Everything is and will be if you give it a name.

            Cost of illusion - the impotent eye.

            Price of inclusion- to live in the lure and the lie.

All of it everywhere, and always there’s more.

You find the key and you find every wall is a door.

Time and Space narrow as the moment draws near.

Fluid reality flows and Infinity’s here.

            Hanging suspended in moment of birth,

            Fire above Water inverted above Air and Earth.

Mystery’s mother opens her door

One into Two becomes Three

And in Three there is Four.

Into the Morning, out of the Night.

Consciousness born of the soul is the seed of the Light.

            Wake to Becoming, the eye of the heart

            Opens. Confusion to what is and where begin starts.

What you hear now is Eternity’s call.

            All that you see is all real and all part of the All.”

The song ended in a surprising crescendo of sound considering only two guitars to make it. I sort of automatically applauded before I realised I was alone on this side of the stage. The musicians looked at me. The singer grinned and said “Well shit, Bobby – we outnumber the audience again.”. They lay their guitars on the stage and the skinny one said, “ That’s it for tonight’s set. We’re “Anomaly” and if we’re here all week nobody’s told me about it.” Then they picked up two tiny brass bells from a table decorated with a day-glo painted cow skull and an incense-burner with five sticks of amber rose smoking in it and rang them, chanting in unison,

               “Good night a-dingy dingy dingy dingy.”

               “Good night a-dingy dingy dingy dingy.”

               “Good night a-dingy dingy dingy dingy.”

I felt the reality shift again and they were gone.

I got up and went back to see if the music had disturbed Beth but she was still in the deep and peaceful. I felt a sudden need for sleep and snuggled in to catch some nap.

Part 16: BACK TO IT

The smell of coffee called me back to world. Beth, looking very cool in an improvised sari, was coming toward me with two cups and a pot. Cream and sugar were already on the wee table. “Good morning” she beamed, “but only just. Noon in three minutes.” So we did the Rite of Ahathoor, after I had attended to the physical necessities of waking, opting to piss outside to see how the day felt, and it felt fair and fine from inside the Pentacle, then we settled down to the necessity of caffeine and in my case, morning tobacco. As I rolled my daybreak smoke, Beth condimented the coffee.

“Were you playing a tape last night or did I dream of music?”

I contemplated the answer as I enjoyed that unique buzz that tobacco offers to the casual user. “Uh…first let me ask what sort of music you dreamed. I had an Experience while you were sleeping.”

She gave me her I’ll-play-along look. “ Well, I seem to recall it was a song I haven’t heard in years. Do you remember Anomaly? It was one of their tunes. I can’t remember the name. Yes I can…it was “A Bedtime Satori”. Good song…I forgot how much I liked it.”

“They were here.” I told her, along with story of the bottle and the chair and the concert and she told me that as pretty much her dream except for the bottle and the chair and there was a bigger audience tho’ she couldn’t recall who all were there, ‘cept it was a lot of her friends and mine. “What ever happened to those guys? They just sorta disappeared.”

I had to admit I didn’t know.

We weren’t anxious to resume our travels but fortunately there was a sense of slowed time to this place. Beth made casual mention of the fact that our supplies did allow for a second run of our itinerary from last night and I was more than pleased to see that she was entirely right. It was mid-afternoon before we finally were back on the road.

     The bad vibes that were spreading and thickening as we got nearer to our destination seemed to be less able to claw their way into the bus and we were appropriately pleased by that. The general population, however, were showing the inevitable effects. Our path was becoming more urbanized now and while we avoided entering cities, we still found the daytime highway traffic more hostile and rage-prone than usual. We saw more than a few fights and noticed an increasing number of them were becoming shoot-outs. A couple of times those involved noticed us and loosed a few bullets our way, but we weren’t surprised when none of them seemed to reach us.

As evening approached we found a quiet place to do the Rite of Tum, finish the bread and curry, and have a Toke in a deserted barn just off the main road. I expect my consideration of sex was most likely mutual but that was not to be. We could hear a car engine approaching and it stopped just outside. The bus being concealed in some nearby trees and bushes, we slipped into the rickety loft to see who was joining us and whether they be friend or foe. Five figures charged through the door, made the same futile attempt to close it that we had and then ran to the far end of the barn. Refugees from the growing badness, I decided, five youngsters in late teens and early twenties, three male and two female, with recognisable Pot-head style to ‘em. Before we could introduce ourselves one of them started to rant. “What IS this shit? Man…that lunatic opened up on us with an automatic fucking rifle for NO REASON, man! Crazy futhermucker tried to KILL us!”. “Chill.” said one of the girls, “ Ordinarily I’d be glad to join you in a full-out panic but since this may be our last chance to put some sort plan together, maybe we should leave the yelling and arm-waving for later and do some concentrated thinking about how to survive.” One of the older dudes agreed. “Things are getting worse out there, our car has been shot to shit and we can’t stay here indefinitely.” The third male kid sat down on a rusty heap of machinery just under where we were hiding. “Okay…planning first, panic later. I wish we’d saved a Joint.” I couldn’t resist. I slipped a Number from my jacket pocket and lobbed it over the mouldy hay-bale I was hiding behind in a high arc so that it dropped straight down and landed at his feet. He stared at it for a three count, picked it up, stared at it again, sniffed it and looked at his friends who were gathered at the door peeking out into the gathering dark. “Uh…you guys…” he stammered.

The others didn’t turn but the oldest looking one said “What, man?” The kid looked at the Joint in his hand again then repeated “ Uh…you guys!” “Willy,” said the one who’d answered him, “Unless you have a way out this mess or that Joint you wished for, perhaps you’d care to join us in a bit of Group Discussion over here by the door where we can see if anyone is coming,”

“Well guys, I don’t have a survival plan but it seems I did get my wish.”

There was a collective “Wha’?” from his companions, all of whom abandoned the door to check out his claim except for the oldest one who held position but put his attention to the mystery at hand. I decided I like their style and sense of priorities. Beth dug another Joint out of the pocket of her jeans and waited. I’d not seen her mischievous grin ‘til now. It suited her.

Below us the kids were staring at the Joint Willie was displaying. “ Ah man…you had that on you. This is no time for dumb-ass jokes.” one of the boys was saying.

“That’s why I believe him.” said the girl who hadn’t spoken ‘til now. “He’s as scared as we are and I don’t think he’s playing around.”

“Ah c’mon.” said the sceptic, “ I’m not gonna buy that he just said “I Wish For A Joint” and one appeared out of thin air.”

“That’s exactly what happened!” Willie asserted.

“Okay then,” said his friend, “Scientific Method. I Wish For A Joint…a lit one!” I slipped out my lighter, fired up the Number that Beth was holding and she sent it up and over. It landed about a foot from the kid.

“No Fucking WAY!” he exclaimed as he picked it up, tho’ he continued to maintain Scientific Method by taking an experimental toke. “Weed.” he announced and passed it to the girl, who sniffed the smoke then toked in turn before passing it on. “Good Weed.” she added. The kid at the door came over and joined them. “We are in Deep Weird.” he announced, but took his turn. I waited while the other girl, then Willie got a hit. Let ‘em get cooled out, I decided. The Joint fulfilled its purpose.

  “So…now what? We’re still trapped in a barn, the night is filling with homicidal maniacs and we have no transportation.” The sceptic-kid was saying.

 “Maybe we should wish for a car.” Willie suggested, returning to his seat on the machinery. Beth dropped the keys to the bus almost in his lap. He jumped a yard. Then all of them started looking around. I called out from behind my mouldy bale “Will a bus do?”

“Who’s That?” “Who’s Here?” “Who’s There?” etc. Beth and I stood up.

“Fellow Potheads and seekers of sanctuary.” I introduced us. “We need a place to go, and you need a way to get there. Shall we do a little mutual assistance?’                                                                                                                                                                          

Part 17: DIVERSION THE SECOND

Our new companions introduced themselves. The oldest was Michael, and Wille was his brother. The other cat was Gabe. The girls were sisters, Stacy and Pamela. They’d all been friends since they dropped out of High School the previous year and had teamed up to fight the cost of existence. They’d calmed down considerably after the Smoke and now that Beth and I were about to drive them to the relative safety of home, which was a house they rented together in the city…since I don’t like cities, I’ll forget which one…they were damn near relaxed, all things considered. Beth retrieved her keys and went to get the bus. I went with the kids to get the ‘shrooms and whatever else from their car. Willie started grinning as soon as he saw the bus. “Wow, man! A genuine Freek VW minibus!” He ran over to it as Beth drove up, staring at the paintings. “Did you do these? Far out!!” Beth told him it was a loaner but his enthusiasm did not wane. Michael gave him a big-brotherly slap in the back of the head and reminded him that were not yet out of danger. Once in the bus tho’ they seemed to catch the calm and settled in. Stacy and Pamela displayed an admirable perception. “ I sense something.” Pamela said to Beth. “Is there some sort of Magic here that makes us feel safe?” so for the next hour or so, we conducted a rolling seminar on Magic, the Old Ones, the Currant Situation, the basics of our part in it, and such related info as they seemed ready for. Willie, who was just turned 17, was becoming excited again. “We’re gonna have Real Magicians crashing at our place!!” “Easy, kid,” I cautioned. “We aren’t really into advertising that and tonight the clouds have ears.” Which was mostly bull, but it put him back to simmer. “You were around during the Psychedelic Renaissance, right? What was it like?” Beth laughed. “Jeez,” I asked no-one in particular. “What has Zupdok got? An international best-seller?” “Oh – have you read…” Pamela began, but Beth jumped ahead and explained about Magical groups and how Wat and Short Chester and Kether and Gayle were involved. Michael, who took the serious role to counter-balance the enthusiastic Willie commented that he’d heard tales of a web of Underground Magicians but never thought he’d meet any.

Meanwhile Stacy and Pamela had directed Beth to the house, and we were relieved to find it had a garage where we could stash the bus out of sight, it being now carless. As we were walking to the house, a raggedy figure suddenly rose up from the shadows in the back yard.

“S’okay” Gabe said quickly. “It’s just old Gandalf. That’s what we call him.- we don’t know his real name. He’s homeless and sorta crazy, but he’s cool. We let him sleep in the yard when he wants to and give him food. He speaks some sorta gibberish, but he’s harmless.”

“Co t’han so?” the old man growled.

“Daoine matha agus mnathan matha” I answered.

“Huh-wha?” said young Willie.

“Thig an so!” called out the raggedy man, so I did. He was very much the urban wizard, now that I could see him, with a long white beard and hair that even dirt couldn’t gray and piercing eyes under heavy brows, cloaked in a decaying blanket but fierce with pride and the dignity of freedom.

“ ‘S dona’n latha thann.” he called out.

“Is leam.” I agreed. He studied me a moment, then continued, “Ne leum air! An t’sraid le bhi gun bhi gu bhi an Solus.”

“Gun robh math agad.” I answered. “Thig astigh?”    

“Tha e anmoch. Seudar dhomh bhi falbh” he said, turning and wrapping his tatters about him, “Tapha leath”

“Agus thu.” I called after him as he blended with the shadows and was gone.

“Huh?” said Willie again. “Wha’?”

“Now that, young Willie, is gibberish.” I said. “Yon wanderer spoke an Ancient tongue.”

“My Gaelic is a bit rusty.” Beth admitted. “What was that about the spark becoming the Light?”

“ He said not to attack…solid Taoist advice. After that he said: The spark by being without being to be the Light. At least I think that was it.”

“Huh?” said Willie.

“Not “Gandalf”, Gabe.” I added. “ ‘Merlin-of-the-Borders’ would be more accurate. That’s the language of the Bards, young Willie. In my youth, I travelled in the Celtic Lands.”

As we entered the house, Michael asked me, “Are we in any danger? I mean, here, tonight.”

“Could be,” I admitted. “There’s a lot of Evil loose now. If you’d rather that Beth and I roll on, we will. Its not really the sort of trip where there’s likely to be an attack in the usual sense, with monsters breaking down the door and such. Then again, we had an encounter with M.I. B.s on the road yesterday and they are not known for their subtlety. Beth and I can Ward the house against psychic attack and that’s the most likely form to worry about, if you’re into worry. Better still not to. Worry is the kind of thing that attracts the Negative.”

“So what do recommend we do?” he asked.

“I recommend we Party.”

Part 18: BABBLE

“The thing you gotta remember about Negative Energy…it is countered by Positive Energy. Now neither one is stronger. They are exactly equal. There is an absolute balance of power made up of an incredibly complex inter-relationship of strengths and weaknesses. If one can learn to recognise and adjust these, then it becomes possible to actually make adjustments to the Physical/Material Reality. Dig…Reality is Four-fold. One of the heaviest anchors that humanity is dragging is the mis-indentification of “Spirit” and “Soul” as being more or less the same thing. Spirit is Pure Being, Manifestation of Archetypes where Positive and Negative exist in Perfect Balance not as competitors but as balances and counterpoints. in this state, this World, as Qabalists call it. It is Consciousness of Consciousness whereas Soul is Consciousness of Self, recognition of a Personal Identity. And as long as I’m giving away the Inner Teaching Secrets of Magic…which I can, since I’m a member of no Lodge or Order and I’ve not taken oath to conceal them since I figured them out for and by myself. There are two other Realities making up the four-fold formula of our Existence. There’s the Intellectual Reality. Call it “Mind”. This is the Subjective Really, the World as-you-know-it by interpretation of experience. Consciousness of Self in relation to others. The Personal Reality, where emotion becomes manifest. Then there is the Objective Reality, the Physical World which is essentially a manifestation of all the inter-relation of the billions of Personal Realities, the EcoSystem of bouncing off one another. This causes disturbances and imbalances in the Positive and Negative Energies. This in turn creates “Good” and “Evil”. It’s all in the Tarot. And in Genesis. And in the Vedas. And in “Star Wars”. So, when Negative Force gets the upper hand, the Positive force has to be strengthened to adjust the Balance. In the Material Reality, this has to be done by humans, and as we evolve into a sentient species, it becomes increasingly more the responsibility of humans to accomplish these adjustments as we become less dependant upon and in tune with the Higher (call ‘em) Powers (call ‘em). Check out the Mahabharata for the details. If you need a familiar analogy, compare the teachings of Christianity as to the Second coming. In Hinduism, Krishna aids Mankind to restore Balance instead of using “His” God-power to do it. If Humanity can’t get it done, then Shiva comes and cleans up for a fresh try. The Christian version may have picked up some heavy editorializing over the centuries, but that basic Idea seems to be lurking in the imagery. Now there is, as our friend and brother Wat Zupdok has pointed out in his lurching way, an Authoritarian System which is threatened by the idea of Balance in any form since they haven’t evolved past the need to feel superior to others. This results in the Reality War…and Wat got turned on to that by me, in 1982 in a bar in …uhhh…Halifax. Or was it Boston? Magic is the Reality War but in the Intellectual/Emotional “Worlds” between the Material and the Spirit “Worlds”. Dopers get there too, they live in Two Worlds, but without the knowledge of the concepts, they don’t have a map, dig? Still they’re more evolved than those who live in One world, or more precisely in Four Worlds with no idea it is Four. What we have happening now is that actual sentient manifestations of Negative Energy are loose in this world and therefore these are, to us humans, manifestations of Pure Evil. They don’t see themselves that way, but from our Reality, that doesn’t matter. If the Energy they generate becomes strong enough, it will strengthen the most base aspects of humanity, all the primitive relics we are too slowly out-growing. Smoother-talking, better-dressed versions of those louts who executed your car will be running the world and they won’t be running it for anyone who ain’t like them and that’s us and that us includes you.”

“Huh-wha’?” said Willie, but mostly ‘cause he was surprised that he understood.

Part 19: BABBLE CONTINUED (WITH REVELATIONS ADDED)

“Have you read “The Book of Floating Stones by Chao Tze?” Pamela asked.

“Yeah,” I answered, striving to be casual. “I sorta had to while I was translating it. I’m Bjorn Fnord…I was bullshitting you about the Adam thing. Sorry. We’re incognito.”

“That happens to me sometimes” Willie admitted. Everyone laughed.

“Feel that?” Beth said. “The negative vibe in the house just took a solid hit.” The kids put out their sensors. “ I can feel it!” Pamela announced. The others agreed. “ Oh man,” Dave grinned, “Evil is gonna get it’s ass kicked. No…wait. It won’t, will it? If we kick its ass, it still wins. We gotta…”

“Tickle it.” Pamela suggested, wriggling a stiff finger into his side-ribs.

“Let’s get some dinner.” Willie decided. “I’m starving.”

“Hope you folks like Vegetarian.” said Stacy.

All hands to the kitchen and in no time we’d a fine table before us. Shortly after, we had pretty well cleared it and I was scraping the finish off the bottom of a bowl previously containing the finest custard I’d tasted in a decade. Michael produced a bag of ‘shrooms from a previous day’s questing and asked, “A little après-desert?”.

“Oh a most profound Yes.” I told him.

Part 20: A VISIT OUTSIDE OR IN

“So you’re really Bjorn Fnord?” Pamela was asking me but what I heard was “ Oop soe yrlly phnort byorp?” so I answered by pointing at the bag of ‘shrooms, my ears, and my mouth. She smiled and turned into a really beautiful fish and swam away. Beth had Warded the house and very effectively. I felt totally safe. “Where did you get these “shrooms?” I asked Gabe. “Can you say that in English?” he requested. Apparently not, I decided. Well then. Let’s go exploring. I focused my eyes on a tiny point about three feet from the end of my nose. It grew into a door of solid oak carved with the image of two trees, their branches interwoven. The roots of one were growing from the Sun and the other was born of the Moon. There were neither handle nor hinges. It hung in the air before me. I stood up, leaving the rest of me sitting in the armchair staring into space. Beth noticed this and waved bye-bye. I returned it and walked through the Door. Literally through it, as if it were Air or Water or even Fire that does not consume.

Well now…this was somewhere I hadn’t been for a while. It was a city, with all the things I liked about various cities incorporated into it. The buildings were stone and ornate ironwork. The streets were cobblestoned and winding with lanes and alleys leading up and down into shadowy, gaslight distances. Night, I noticed. Not surprising…I am mostly nocturnal or perhaps it was night in both worlds and most of the others. One never knows. My Head led my feet into a wide alley. A few feet away a trio of women were looking through the contents of several large wicker hampers that seem to contain costumes. On the wall behind them was a poster in the style of Mucha advertising the MOONLIGHT TRAVELLING THEATRE COMPANY and heightened Intuition told me that these women were part of that troupe. There was something Parisian about the scene, a sort of Millett vibe. They were dressed in ragged, layered gowns and had scarves wound around their heads like turbans. They were all pretty, but one was exquisitely beautiful. She looked up as I approached.

“Hello.” she said. “You come from Out There. We have been waiting for you. We like it when someone comes from Out There.”

“Why’s that?” I asked.

“We can help. And we need your help. What happens Here is connected to what happens Out There.”

“Is there something you will tell me?”

“There is or there will be. But will you remember once you’re back Out There?”

“I may not remember, but I will not forget.”

And suddenly I was back, sitting on a sofa in the living room of the house and babbling at Willie, Gabe and Michael. Beth and the girls were in the kitchen, sitting around the table. The stereo was playing J. Airplane’s “Volunteers” –  I suspected Beth was behind that. I seemed to be in the middle of a lecture on Magic since I arrived in the middle of a sentence that ended, “…so by surrounding yourself with Lunar imagery, you stimulate the Right Hemisphere of the brain, which increases the Intuitive faculties.”

“And you can learn all that by Tarot?” Gabe asked. I had no idea what I’d been telling him, other than it was my usual rap on Tarot, so I said, “According to a Cat named Eliphas Levi the Tarot can teach you all the secrets of Magic, which is to say it will turn you on to a Higher State of Reality.”

“Is it a real Reality?” Willie mused, which gave me reason to upgrade my opinion of him.

“That’s The Question That Cannot Yet Be Answered. It may be the, or perhaps a, True Reality OR it may be that there is no True Reality…like applying the Smargadine Aphorism to Quantum Physics. Since the laws and rules break down at the sub-atomic level if you go In, it seems reasonable that the same should hold if you go Out if As Above, So Below is indeed Truth Without Lies, Certain Truth.”

At that point I remembered that I was Tripping on Mushrooms and decided to shut up. Beth came in and turned the tape to the other side – “Crown Of Creation”. I’d forgotten how much I dug that album. She went back to the hall then came in with an old wooden box full of comix that had been on the bus when we started and set it on the floor and after a bit of searching tossed one to each of the boys. Michael got “Moondog” by George Metzger, Gabe got “Harold Hedd 2” by Rand Holmes, and for Willie she chose Larry Todd’s “Dr.Atomic 3”. Excellent choices. I noticed the girls were entranced by some Wicca books in the kitchen.

“Conference.” she announced.

Part 21: EXPLANATIONS AND CELEBRATIONS

We adjourned to hall.

“So, Fnord – is there some reason you decided to tell these kids your real name?” she confronted.

“It was an intuitive impulse.” I decided.

“Okay.” she agreed, “but is there also an equally logical reason why you spent the last couple of hours telling those three uninitiated, not-even-neophyte, admittedly lovable boys most of the Inner Circle secrets of Magic that every Initiate is sworn by dire oaths never to reveal?”

“Mushrooms.” I replied. “I was tripping and sorta decided to check the Next Level. My body went on automatic and I guess my brain just ran that programme…probably one of ‘em asked a question that triggered it. When I’m not there to run the machine, it tends to wax metaphysical. Anyway, I didn’t tell ‘em – it did. Besides, they won’t consciously remember more than 1% . That stuff has a built in Arjuna virus. And anyotherway, I ain’t sworn nor oathed to any Order. I figured out all I know about The Art on my own. You look upon the entire Lodge when you look upon me. Technically, my 9=2 is a honourary Grade. My brain betrayed no trust, so anyandallways, I figure it’s cool.”

“Nothing there that I can disagree with.” she agreed.

“Besides, you don’t really think Bjorn Fnord is my real name do you?” I added.

“Why is everyone I know totally insane?” she asked someone other than me.

“I expect it’s ‘cause of the kind of folks you hang out with.” I suggested.   

“We should be getting back to the road.” was her response.

“Well…I was thinking that a mushroom-fuelled orgy might just generate some good Positive Energy…”

Beth was striding back to the living room “ But we leave first thing tomorrow…Hey you guys…”

Part 22: THE GEOMETRY OF AFTERMATH

The next morning it was only my years of intense mental discipline that allowed me to recognise my environment. Figuring out which of the naked limbs were mine was bit harder, but fortunately they were the furriest. Beth’s head suddenly appeared above the tangle. I hoped I looked that happy. We toe-tippyed around gathering our clothes and snuck downstairs, collected our gear, left a note, piled into the bus and were off.

The Negative Vibe started to increase as soon as we left the kids’ house. You either knows what it’s like or if you don’t, try to never find out. The bus seemed less effected than we were. It tripped along with a recognisable joy that actually cheered our spirits.

To make up for delays, Beth suggested that I navigate our way back to the highway, and after the third time I got us lost and/or going in the wrong direction we finally got out of the city and back en route. We’d gotten about 40 miles along when we topped the crest of a small hill and found ourselves side by side with a truck every bit as freeky as our bus, chugging along in the opposite direction.. Both of us hit the breaks and sat grinning in happy surprise. What we were grinning at was a ‘50’s flatbed 1-ton truck with a sorta combination cabin/shack/shanty built on the back and three grinning Heads in the cab. On the door was a splendidly worked Ar Nouveau design with the name “The Silver Smilers”. Deep Country Freeks, thinks I. Bet these cats ain’t seen a streetlamp in thirtyplus years.

“Hi there” the driver called out. “Let’s pull over and get acquainted. How ‘bout you folks swing around and meet us at our side of the bottom of this hill - what we’re leavin’ behind is best left as far as possible.” We decided it was not the moment to tell them that what they were heading into was as bad so Beth agreed and we did just that, pulling into a lane off the main highway. By the time we’d debused, they had a pipe filled and lit. Some pipe It was, too... near a foot long and carved stone of an elegant  design. Between tokes we made introductions. The driver was Steve the Eagle, compact and sandy. The others were Dudley M. Clearsky “The M is for Mushroom” and Sleepy John. Collectively, The Silver Smilers, Itinerant Survivors.

“Is it just us,” Dudley asked, “or has the World gotten really nasty in the last while? We’ve been getting the weirdest shit from Tarot and I Ching…like some sort of evil had manifested incarnate and was destroying all the Good Vibes in the world.” He told some tales of weird nastiness that had been invading even their relatively remote and secluded reality

“Funny you should mention that.” says Beth and gave them a remarkably concise-but- thorough summery of what was going on.

“…and so we’re on our way to Cullisport to see if there’s anything we can do.” was how it ended.

“ Well, actually you’re not.” Sleepy John informed us. “ It’s East of here and you are goin’ North… at least before you turned around to follow us. Just now you’re facin’ South, which still won’t get you to there.” They gave Beth directions and drew a route on our map that even I was likely to be able to follow. We were about to take our leave when a comely female appeared in the door of their mobile house. “Hey, boys and new friends.” she called out as she approached. “Jasper just woke up, looked at me, said “It’s okay. The monsters are gonna lose.” then went back to sleep. What am I missing besides a toke? Hi. I’m Sherry.” So we refilled the pipe and chatted a bit more before we all got back to travelling with regrets that our meeting was so short and expressed hopes that we’d have another.

If the world didn’t end.

Part 23: ANOTHER BAD PATCH

So now we were heading for Cullisport and with the map actually marked out I was doing a reasonable job of navigating. Beth had developed a sort of grimly determined style of driving with minimal conversation so I smoked a joint and dug the scenery which was lovely despite the increasing bad vibe what with the Moon coming through the autumnal clouds to light the multicoloured leaves. Pretty. Autumn in New England. I indulged a brief wondering as to which state we were in, with an even shorter consideration of asking Beth but she was thinking so hard I could almost hear it. She was also driving faster by the second…about 95 mph and no sign of slowing. Well, I admitted it was a bit late to be worried about…

“Cops.” Beth said. Sure enough, those flashing red white and blue lights were coming up behind us like we were parked. Beth didn’t bother to try out-running a cop car in a bus. She pulled over.

“Be ready for anything.” She advised…rather unnecessarily, I thought.

The cops pulled in about 15 feet behind us. An amplified voice barked out “You in the van. Show us your hands.” “ I got a Royal Flush, asshole.” I muttered, but I stuck my arms out the window. “Driver. Step out of the ve-hic-le. Keep your hands in plain sight. Lie on the ground.”, all of which Beth did. “Passenger. Exit the ve-hic-le. Keep your hands in plain sight. Face away from us.” “Play along.” I heard Beth whisper, so I did ‘tho every cell of me was in favour of a Fuck You response. If these bozos thought they were sneaking up on us they were dreaming. I could hear where either of ‘em was with just my regular ears. “Passenger. Turn around and face us.” Why not. Guns. I hate guns. These boys were deep in some dumb cop-flick fantasy, stalking toward me with two of the nasty things, one pointed at me, the other at Beth. “Passenger. Kneel on the ground.” Opps, I thought. That is a bit too much. “Can’t.” I replied. “Kneel on the ground NOW!” came the programmed response. “Can’t be done.” I repeated. “Uh…it’s …uh against my religion.” – it seemed best to stay with concepts they could comprehend. “I’m sworn never to kneel to any man.” “On your knees! Now!” Officer Snarl snarled, “or I’ll put a fucking bullet in your fucking head asshole.” By then he was close enough to get a good look at. His eyes were two empty black pits. Total possession. Well, no point to any further attempt at rational discussion, I decided. “Did you just call me an asshole?” I asked. “That’s not very professional. If you’re not acting professionally, I have to consider that this must be personal and if this is personal then there’s no reason for me to consider you any more than just another jerkoff trying to powertrip on me and that any official authority or status you claim is therefore null and void. If you continue to threaten me I will, by your own rules, be entitled to defend myself by whatever means I deem necessary.” “ON YOUR KNEES! NOW!” screamed Officer Brokenrecord. Now ordinarily I could get a robot like this to stick his gun up his ass and go buy me a six-pack with a single word but these clowns were gone, mind and soul totally given over to the Dark. These low-level authoritarian types have no resistance to negative energy…some of ‘em even dig it. Whatever degree of humanity these boys had once had, it was gone now, gobbled up by the evil loose on the world. Well, I know more than one Word tho’ there are those I won’t use on humans. Fortunately, these no longer qualified. I Intoned. They dropped like stones. Beth got up. “I didn’t know you could do that. What did you use, Mocambo voice magic?”

“A variation, a blend. Some Mocambo, bit of Tibetan, a little of a technique I picked up in Ecuador, and a whole lot of just good ol’ I-hate-bullies energy. They’ll come to in a few hours…maybe even be better for the experience.”

Beth went over to the recumbent forms and sang a song too soft for me to hear.

“They’ll be better for it.” she said. We left ‘em in healing slumber.

Back on the road and clearly nearer to our goal. The negative force was damn near solid, but that little bus cut through like it was on its way to a good meal and a toke.

Part 24: REVELATIONS IN A DIMINISHED KEY

“So,” Beth said as we snuck up on some sort of Hell, “How’d you end up in this time and place? What weird Karma has dropped you in the middle of the Reality War? What is your history, stranger?”

I hipped that she wanted distraction. “Can that be answered? When I was young and newly High, I offered myself as an agent of The Light and maybe It accepted. For all I know I may have been at for infinite incarnations…or maybe I just fucked up so bad in my last one that I have to do this now. I’ve always had this intuitive sense that the whole Judeo-Christian “Hell” trip was WAY too absurd to be something any reputable Deity would dream up, and Karma always seemed just short of being understood. It seems far more sensible that someone who does real serious Evil would be sent back to do some real serious Good. Inflicting suffering as punishment is a primitive and human idea. One would hope a God would be more intelligent. You don’t reincarnate a monster as a worm or a haemorrhoidal camel…you send ‘em back as a Saint. Invoke the Newton’s Third…equal and opposite reaction. For every Yang, a Yin. Can I borrow your lighter? It also seemed to me that maybe the idea of Karma should be considered as less personal. Dig – most people see it as “you do good, you get good” but there’s a larger aspect. Even if you’re a Perfectly Enlightened Being you can still get hit by a car driven by some jerk who can’t breathe and think at the same time yet he still thunders along mindlessly in a few tons of over-powered metal, talking on a cell ‘phone while listening to a baseball game on the radio while wondering how to get more lip contact with his boss’s ass and turn his kids into robots. Individual Karma has to be purty damn potent to over-ride the Collective Karma. Thanks. Now flip that. The more people conscious and aware of the actual responsibility of being Human…not the bullshit Official “responsibility” the System pushes… the sooner that Collective Karma will be less destructive. Anyway, that makes it tricky to figure how my Karma put me in this particular here-now. I think its outta fuel…got any matches? Historically, I just grew up in the right period in Evolution to find my way into the Real World and I found it was worth staying in. Unfortunately, it was under attack, so I found I  had to defend it. Thanks. I got lucky…in my Twenties, I fell in with a group who were blending Psychedelic and Arcane metaprogramming techniques into a sort of Improvisational Magic. It was mostly just woofin’ megadoses of Dope, but the focus was always on increasing Intelligence and expanding Consciousness, and again I got lucky, ‘cause I stayed with that. Some didn’t. It’s not easy  - if it was, everyone would be doing it. That was where I met Zupdok. He hipped me to the Discipline of Alchemy and the Alchemy of Discipline. In my Thirties, I got hooked up with the Discordians. I did some Work with Omar and Mal. I just sorta drifted into the Reality War. Around then I found out how Omnicorp was trying to create a global corporation where everyone was either and employee or a victim…turn the whole planet into a Company Town, as t’were.”

“I’ve always wondered how you got into that, being OmniCorp’s nemesis.”

“They killed a friend of mine in 1966. She was an economics major…and an Artist. She started to trace the interconnections between corporations, just out of curiosity at first but when she discovered that the more she traced connections, the more it appeared that all the major corporations seemed to be leading back to one ultimate source that owned and controlled them all she really got into it. Trouble was, she did it all in the open – against my advice -  and they noticed her. They sent some agents to scare her off, but she was the stubborn type. So they killed her. She’d been giving me copies of her research, so I took up where she left off, only I stayed sneaky until I had the info I needed. I was able to take it past the surface economics and link it to the Reality War. O. Inc. is the Material Plane manifestation of the ones who want to keep humanity mindless and servile. Its through Omnicorp that the System is set up and maintained. And they’re goin’ global. The System imposes a three option situation: Live Free, which means constant resistance to option 2, which is to Live in Illusion, which insures that you never reach a Higher State of Consciousness but also becomes impossible after you do reach a state of Higher Consciousness, hence the “War On Drugs”, which is really a War On Consciousness. Or you can take option 3 - Die, which offers, as Hamlet pointed out, absolutely no guarantee of any  kind of improvement. The only way out that I can see is to reject that second option, which also eliminates any immediate need for the third. So I got into Magic. Somehow it seems that the more you do for Magic, the more it’s able to help you do more. If you do enough, the Magic can really put you where you can do the most good. It would seem that right now I can do the most good where I am and where we’re going. Thing is, to the Magic I’m expendable. It’ll try to keep me alive, but in the end that’s up to me. No story-book guarantee of survival. This ain’t some Hollywarp fantasy. Want a Hit on this? Things could get red and ugly if we let ourselves get pulled into “their” Illusion, which, as I expect you are aware, is why Authoritarians are first and foremost Control Junkies.

“So how did you get to be a 9^th Grade?” Beth asked, doing a commendable job of controlling the increasing tension as we approached Cullisport. Her voice barely quavered.

“I was prowling around Europe in ‘71, hunting clues…er…clews to Omnicorp plots and I found myself in London. I was in Hyde Park, about 3 a.m. and I heard this Music so I went to see what it was. There was a kid, late ‘teens, sitting by the statue of General Flashman. He was playing a wooden flute. I went over and listened. Weird music, but beautiful. Then he finished, stood up, put the flute in his pack, smiled , said “Be here this same time tomorrow night. They’ll be waiting for you.” and walked away.  No way I could ignore that. So on the following night I went back. The park was alive with Guardians trying to scare me off, but I used the techniques I’d learned to get past ‘em…”

“ ‘Dune’?” she asked.

“Yup. I got back to the statue and that’s all I remember. There’s a vague image of three figure in 18^th Century tricorner hats and cloaks but nary a detail more. When I woke up the next morning…I was crashing with the ZZ Plural Z Alpha Cabal…I found a scroll declaring me a Honorary 9^th degree Grade in the Ordo Xenos Aeonius and a ticket to Scotland – by cheap-seat rail -  so I went there. The Pictish Free State Cabal met me and gave me some fantastic Acid – “Strawberry Fields” -  and left me up on Khaelton Hill by that unfinished copy of the Parthenon.”

“Did you know that’s where Pan is hanging out now?”

“Let’s say I found out. I  recall even less details of that. I did notice that afterwards my sexual prowess seemed to have improved tho’, or so I was told.”

“If you’re fishing for compliments, consider your line hereby tugged.”    

“Thank’ee ma’m. Anyway as near as I could figure it out, I’d somehow hit all the right bumpers on some sort of cosmic pinball game and the Order had decided to lay a Degree and some Instruction on me. After that, I just followed my karma and well, here I am.” 

“Any regrets?”

“Never a one.”                                                                                                                                                 

 

Part 20: A VISIT OUTSIDE OR IN

“So you’re really Bjorn Fnord?” Pamela was asking me but what I heard was “ Oop soe yrlly phnort byorp?” so I answered by pointing at the bag of ‘shrooms, my ears, and my mouth. She smiled and turned into a really beautiful fish and swam away. Beth had Warded the house and very effectively. I felt totally safe. “Where did you get these “shrooms?” I asked Gabe. “Can you say that in English?” he requested. Apparently not, I decided. Well then. Let’s go exploring. I focused my eyes on a tiny point about three feet from the end of my nose. It grew into a door of solid oak carved with the image of two trees, their branches interwoven. The roots of one were growing from the Sun and the other was born of the Moon. There were neither handle nor hinges. It hung in the air before me. I stood up, leaving the rest of me sitting in the armchair staring into space. Beth noticed this and waved bye-bye. I returned it and walked through the Door. Literally through it, as if it were Air or Water or even Fire that does not consume.

Well now…this was somewhere I hadn’t been for a while. It was a city, with all the things I liked about various cities incorporated into it. The buildings were stone and ornate ironwork. The streets were cobblestoned and winding with lanes and alleys leading up and down into shadowy, gaslight distances. Night, I noticed. Not surprising…I am mostly nocturnal or perhaps it was night in both worlds and most of the others. One never knows. My Head led my feet into a wide alley. A few feet away a trio of women were looking through the contents of several large wicker hampers that seem to contain costumes. On the wall behind them was a poster in the style of Mucha advertising the MOONLIGHT TRAVELLING THEATRE COMPANY and heightened Intuition told me that these women were part of that troupe. There was something Parisian about the scene, a sort of Millett vibe. They were dressed in ragged, layered gowns and had scarves wound around their heads like turbans. They were all pretty, but one was exquisitely beautiful. She looked up as I approached.

“Hello.” she said. “You come from Out There. We have been waiting for you. We like it when someone comes from Out There.”

“Why’s that?” I asked.

“We can help. And we need your help. What happens Here is connected to what happens Out There.”

“Is there something you will tell me?”

“There is or there will be. But will you remember once you’re back Out There?”

“I may not remember, but I will not forget.”

And suddenly I was back, sitting on a sofa in the living room of the house and babbling at Willie, Gabe and Michael. Beth and the girls were in the kitchen, sitting around the table. The stereo was playing J. Airplane’s “Volunteers” –  I suspected Beth was behind that. I seemed to be in the middle of a lecture on Magic since I arrived in the middle of a sentence that ended, “…so by surrounding yourself with Lunar imagery, you stimulate the Right Hemisphere of the brain, which increases the Intuitive faculties.”

“And you can learn all that by Tarot?” Gabe asked. I had no idea what I’d been telling him, other than it was my usual rap on Tarot, so I said, “According to a Cat named Eliphas Levi the Tarot can teach you all the secrets of Magic, which is to say it will turn you on to a Higher State of Reality.”

“Is it a real Reality?” Willie mused, which gave me reason to upgrade my opinion of him.

“That’s The Question That Cannot Yet Be Answered. It may be the, or perhaps a, True Reality OR it may be that there is no True Reality…like applying the Smargadine Aphorism to Quantum Physics. Since the laws and rules break down at the sub-atomic level if you go In, it seems reasonable that the same should hold if you go Out if As Above, So Below is indeed Truth Without Lies, Certain Truth.”

At that point I remembered that I was Tripping on Mushrooms and decided to shut up. Beth came in and turned the tape to the other side – “Crown Of Creation”. I’d forgotten how much I dug that album. She went back to the hall then came in with an old wooden box full of comix that had been on the bus when we started and set it on the floor and after a bit of searching tossed one to each of the boys. Michael got “Moondog” by George Metzger, Gabe got “Harold Hedd 2” by Rand Holmes, and for Willie she chose Larry Todd’s “Dr.Atomic 3”. Excellent choices. I noticed the girls were entranced by some Wicca books in the kitchen.

“Conference.” she announced.

Part 21: EXPLANATIONS AND CELEBRATIONS

We adjourned to hall.

“So, Fnord – is there some reason you decided to tell these kids your real name?” she confronted.

“It was an intuitive impulse.” I decided.

“Okay.” she agreed, “but is there also an equally logical reason why you spent the last couple of hours telling those three uninitiated, not-even-neophyte, admittedly lovable boys most of the Inner Circle secrets of Magic that every Initiate is sworn by dire oaths never to reveal?”

“Mushrooms.” I replied. “I was tripping and sorta decided to check the Next Level. My body went on automatic and I guess my brain just ran that programme…probably one of ‘em asked a question that triggered it. When I’m not there to run the machine, it tends to wax metaphysical. Anyway, I didn’t tell ‘em – it did. Besides, they won’t consciously remember more than 1% . That stuff has a built in Arjuna virus. And anyotherway, I ain’t sworn nor oathed to any Order. I figured out all I know about The Art on my own. You look upon the entire Lodge when you look upon me. Technically, my 9=2 is a honourary Grade. My brain betrayed no trust, so anyandallways, I figure it’s cool.”

“Nothing there that I can disagree with.” she agreed.

“Besides, you don’t really think Bjorn Fnord is my real name do you?” I added.

“Why is everyone I know totally insane?” she asked someone other than me.

“I expect it’s ‘cause of the kind of folks you hang out with.” I suggested.   

“We should be getting back to the road.” was her response.

“Well…I was thinking that a mushroom-fuelled orgy might just generate some good Positive Energy…”

Beth was striding back to the living room “ But we leave first thing tomorrow…Hey you guys…”

Part 22: THE GEOMETRY OF AFTERMATH

The next morning it was only my years of intense mental discipline that allowed me to recognise my environment. Figuring out which of the naked limbs were mine was bit harder, but fortunately they were the furriest. Beth’s head suddenly appeared above the tangle. I hoped I looked that happy. We toe-tippyed around gathering our clothes and snuck downstairs, collected our gear, left a note, piled into the bus and were off.

The Negative Vibe started to increase as soon as we left the kids’ house. You either knows what it’s like or if you don’t, try to never find out. The bus seemed less effected than we were. It tripped along with a recognisable joy that actually cheered our spirits.

To make up for delays, Beth suggested that I navigate our way back to the highway, and after the third time I got us lost and/or going in the wrong direction we finally got out of the city and back en route. We’d gotten about 40 miles along when we topped the crest of a small hill and found ourselves side by side with a truck every bit as freeky as our bus, chugging along in the opposite direction.. Both of us hit the breaks and sat grinning in happy surprise. What we were grinning at was a ‘50’s flatbed 1-ton truck with a sorta combination cabin/shack/shanty built on the back and three grinning Heads in the cab. On the door was a splendidly worked Ar Nouveau design with the name “The Silver Smilers”. Deep Country Freeks, thinks I. Bet these cats ain’t seen a streetlamp in thirtyplus years.

“Hi there” the driver called out. “Let’s pull over and get acquainted. How ‘bout you folks swing around and meet us at our side of the bottom of this hill - what we’re leavin’ behind is best left as far as possible.” We decided it was not the moment to tell them that what they were heading into was as bad so Beth agreed and we did just that, pulling into a lane off the main highway. By the time we’d debused, they had a pipe filled and lit. Some pipe It was, too... near a foot long and carved stone of an elegant  design. Between tokes we made introductions. The driver was Steve the Eagle, compact and sandy. The others were Dudley M. Clearsky “The M is for Mushroom” and Sleepy John. Collectively, The Silver Smilers, Itinerant Survivors.

“Is it just us,” Dudley asked, “or has the World gotten really nasty in the last while? We’ve been getting the weirdest shit from Tarot and I Ching…like some sort of evil had manifested incarnate and was destroying all the Good Vibes in the world.” He told some tales of weird nastiness that had been invading even their relatively remote and secluded reality

“Funny you should mention that.” says Beth and gave them a remarkably concise-but- thorough summery of what was going on.

“…and so we’re on our way to Cullisport to see if there’s anything we can do.” was how it ended.

“ Well, actually you’re not.” Sleepy John informed us. “ It’s East of here and you are goin’ North… at least before you turned around to follow us. Just now you’re facin’ South, which still won’t get you to there.” They gave Beth directions and drew a route on our map that even I was likely to be able to follow. We were about to take our leave when a comely female appeared in the door of their mobile house. “Hey, boys and new friends.” she called out as she approached. “Jasper just woke up, looked at me, said “It’s okay. The monsters are gonna lose.” then went back to sleep. What am I missing besides a toke? Hi. I’m Sherry.” So we refilled the pipe and chatted a bit more before we all got back to travelling with regrets that our meeting was so short and expressed hopes that we’d have another.

If the world didn’t end.

Part 23: ANOTHER BAD PATCH

So now we were heading for Cullisport and with the map actually marked out I was doing a reasonable job of navigating. Beth had developed a sort of grimly determined style of driving with minimal conversation so I smoked a joint and dug the scenery which was lovely despite the increasing bad vibe what with the Moon coming through the autumnal clouds to light the multicoloured leaves. Pretty. Autumn in New England. I indulged a brief wondering as to which state we were in, with an even shorter consideration of asking Beth but she was thinking so hard I could almost hear it. She was also driving faster by the second…about 95 mph and no sign of slowing. Well, I admitted it was a bit late to be worried about…

“Cops.” Beth said. Sure enough, those flashing red white and blue lights were coming up behind us like we were parked. Beth didn’t bother to try out-running a cop car in a bus. She pulled over.

“Be ready for anything.” She advised…rather unnecessarily, I thought.

The cops pulled in about 15 feet behind us. An amplified voice barked out “You in the van. Show us your hands.” “ I got a Royal Flush, asshole.” I muttered, but I stuck my arms out the window. “Driver. Step out of the ve-hic-le. Keep your hands in plain sight. Lie on the ground.”, all of which Beth did. “Passenger. Exit the ve-hic-le. Keep your hands in plain sight. Face away from us.” “Play along.” I heard Beth whisper, so I did ‘tho every cell of me was in favour of a Fuck You response. If these bozos thought they were sneaking up on us they were dreaming. I could hear where either of ‘em was with just my regular ears. “Passenger. Turn around and face us.” Why not. Guns. I hate guns. These boys were deep in some dumb cop-flick fantasy, stalking toward me with two of the nasty things, one pointed at me, the other at Beth. “Passenger. Kneel on the ground.” Opps, I thought. That is a bit too much. “Can’t.” I replied. “Kneel on the ground NOW!” came the programmed response. “Can’t be done.” I repeated. “Uh…it’s …uh against my religion.” – it seemed best to stay with concepts they could comprehend. “I’m sworn never to kneel to any man.” “On your knees! Now!” Officer Snarl snarled, “or I’ll put a fucking bullet in your fucking head asshole.” By then he was close enough to get a good look at. His eyes were two empty black pits. Total possession. Well, no point to any further attempt at rational discussion, I decided. “Did you just call me an asshole?” I asked. “That’s not very professional. If you’re not acting professionally, I have to consider that this must be personal and if this is personal then there’s no reason for me to consider you any more than just another jerkoff trying to powertrip on me and that any official authority or status you claim is therefore null and void. If you continue to threaten me I will, by your own rules, be entitled to defend myself by whatever means I deem necessary.” “ON YOUR KNEES! NOW!” screamed Officer Brokenrecord. Now ordinarily I could get a robot like this to stick his gun up his ass and go buy me a six-pack with a single word but these clowns were gone, mind and soul totally given over to the Dark. These low-level authoritarian types have no resistance to negative energy…some of ‘em even dig it. Whatever degree of humanity these boys had once had, it was gone now, gobbled up by the evil loose on the world. Well, I know more than one Word tho’ there are those I won’t use on humans. Fortunately, these no longer qualified. I Intoned. They dropped like stones. Beth got up. “I didn’t know you could do that. What did you use, Mocambo voice magic?”

“A variation, a blend. Some Mocambo, bit of Tibetan, a little of a technique I picked up in Ecuador, and a whole lot of just good ol’ I-hate-bullies energy. They’ll come to in a few hours…maybe even be better for the experience.”

Beth went over to the recumbent forms and sang a song too soft for me to hear.

“They’ll be better for it.” she said. We left ‘em in healing slumber.

Back on the road and clearly nearer to our goal. The negative force was damn near solid, but that little bus cut through like it was on its way to a good meal and a toke.

Part 24: REVELATIONS IN A DIMINISHED KEY

“So,” Beth said as we snuck up on some sort of Hell, “How’d you end up in this time and place? What weird Karma has dropped you in the middle of the Reality War? What is your history, stranger?”

I hipped that she wanted distraction. “Can that be answered? When I was young and newly High, I offered myself as an agent of The Light and maybe It accepted. For all I know I may have been at for infinite incarnations…or maybe I just fucked up so bad in my last one that I have to do this now. I’ve always had this intuitive sense that the whole Judeo-Christian “Hell” trip was WAY too absurd to be something any reputable Deity would dream up, and Karma always seemed just short of being understood. It seems far more sensible that someone who does real serious Evil would be sent back to do some real serious Good. Inflicting suffering as punishment is a primitive and human idea. One would hope a God would be more intelligent. You don’t reincarnate a monster as a worm or a haemorrhoidal camel…you send ‘em back as a Saint. Invoke the Newton’s Third…equal and opposite reaction. For every Yang, a Yin. Can I borrow your lighter? It also seemed to me that maybe the idea of Karma should be considered as less personal. Dig – most people see it as “you do good, you get good” but there’s a larger aspect. Even if you’re a Perfectly Enlightened Being you can still get hit by a car driven by some jerk who can’t breathe and think at the same time yet he still thunders along mindlessly in a few tons of over-powered metal, talking on a cell ‘phone while listening to a baseball game on the radio while wondering how to get more lip contact with his boss’s ass and turn his kids into robots. Individual Karma has to be purty damn potent to over-ride the Collective Karma. Thanks. Now flip that. The more people conscious and aware of the actual responsibility of being Human…not the bullshit Official “responsibility” the System pushes… the sooner that Collective Karma will be less destructive. Anyway, that makes it tricky to figure how my Karma put me in this particular here-now. I think its outta fuel…got any matches? Historically, I just grew up in the right period in Evolution to find my way into the Real World and I found it was worth staying in. Unfortunately, it was under attack, so I found I  had to defend it. Thanks. I got lucky…in my Twenties, I fell in with a group who were blending Psychedelic and Arcane metaprogramming techniques into a sort of Improvisational Magic. It was mostly just woofin’ megadoses of Dope, but the focus was always on increasing Intelligence and expanding Consciousness, and again I got lucky, ‘cause I stayed with that. Some didn’t. It’s not easy  - if it was, everyone would be doing it. That was where I met Zupdok. He hipped me to the Discipline of Alchemy and the Alchemy of Discipline. In my Thirties, I got hooked up with the Discordians. I did some Work with Omar and Mal. I just sorta drifted into the Reality War. Around then I found out how Omnicorp was trying to create a global corporation where everyone was either and employee or a victim…turn the whole planet into a Company Town, as t’were.”

“I’ve always wondered how you got into that, being OmniCorp’s nemesis.”

“They killed a friend of mine in 1966. She was an economics major…and an Artist. She started to trace the interconnections between corporations, just out of curiosity at first but when she discovered that the more she traced connections, the more it appeared that all the major corporations seemed to be leading back to one ultimate source that owned and controlled them all she really got into it. Trouble was, she did it all in the open – against my advice -  and they noticed her. They sent some agents to scare her off, but she was the stubborn type. So they killed her. She’d been giving me copies of her research, so I took up where she left off, only I stayed sneaky until I had the info I needed. I was able to take it past the surface economics and link it to the Reality War. O. Inc. is the Material Plane manifestation of the ones who want to keep humanity mindless and servile. Its through Omnicorp that the System is set up and maintained. And they’re goin’ global. The System imposes a three option situation: Live Free, which means constant resistance to option 2, which is to Live in Illusion, which insures that you never reach a Higher State of Consciousness but also becomes impossible after you do reach a state of Higher Consciousness, hence the “War On Drugs”, which is really a War On Consciousness. Or you can take option 3 - Die, which offers, as Hamlet pointed out, absolutely no guarantee of any  kind of improvement. The only way out that I can see is to reject that second option, which also eliminates any immediate need for the third. So I got into Magic. Somehow it seems that the more you do for Magic, the more it’s able to help you do more. If you do enough, the Magic can really put you where you can do the most good. It would seem that right now I can do the most good where I am and where we’re going. Thing is, to the Magic I’m expendable. It’ll try to keep me alive, but in the end that’s up to me. No story-book guarantee of survival. This ain’t some Hollywarp fantasy. Want a Hit on this? Things could get red and ugly if we let ourselves get pulled into “their” Illusion, which, as I expect you are aware, is why Authoritarians are first and foremost Control Junkies.

“So how did you get to be a 9^th Grade?” Beth asked, doing a commendable job of controlling the increasing tension as we approached Cullisport. Her voice barely quavered.

“I was prowling around Europe in ‘71, hunting clues…er…clews to Omnicorp plots and I found myself in London. I was in Hyde Park, about 3 a.m. and I heard this Music so I went to see what it was. There was a kid, late ‘teens, sitting by the statue of General Flashman. He was playing a wooden flute. I went over and listened. Weird music, but beautiful. Then he finished, stood up, put the flute in his pack, smiled , said “Be here this same time tomorrow night. They’ll be waiting for you.” and walked away.  No way I could ignore that. So on the following night I went back. The park was alive with Guardians trying to scare me off, but I used the techniques I’d learned to get past ‘em…”

“ ‘Dune’?” she asked.

“Yup. I got back to the statue and that’s all I remember. There’s a vague image of three figure in 18^th Century tricorner hats and cloaks but nary a detail more. When I woke up the next morning…I was crashing with the ZZ Plural Z Alpha Cabal…I found a scroll declaring me a Honorary 9^th degree Grade in the Ordo Xenos Aeonius and a ticket to Scotland – by cheap-seat rail -  so I went there. The Pictish Free State Cabal met me and gave me some fantastic Acid – “Strawberry Fields” -  and left me up on Khaelton Hill by that unfinished copy of the Parthenon.”

“Did you know that’s where Pan is hanging out now?”

“Let’s say I found out. I  recall even less details of that. I did notice that afterwards my sexual prowess seemed to have improved tho’, or so I was told.”

“If you’re fishing for compliments, consider your line hereby tugged.”    

“Thank’ee ma’m. Anyway as near as I could figure it out, I’d somehow hit all the right bumpers on some sort of cosmic pinball game and the Order had decided to lay a Degree and some Instruction on me. After that, I just followed my karma and well, here I am.” 

“Any regrets?”

“Never a one.”

Part 26: CULLISPORT

Cullisport.

We came in from the East with the Sun in our eyes, the highway winding down from the surrounding hills and when Beth murmured “Snakes and Ladders.” I knew just what she meant.

As a focal-point of cosmic Evil, the appearance of the place presented a deceptively bucolic front. If Norman Rockwell had designed a perfect American sea-side fishing village for the tourist trade and it had been constructed by Disney technicians, the place couldn’t have looked more unnaturally harmless and friendly. The buildings were spotlessly clean and prosaically quaint, the inhabitants looked like actors from some 50’s or 90’s TV series…even the Sun seemed artificial.

We adjusted our Vibe to project the appropriate image, two middle-aged tourists in a new S.U.V. - oddly, the nearer we got to Bad the stronger our Magic got - and checked ourselves in at the first Bed and Breakfast we came to. It was a huge old four story house, that should have emanated a vintage dignity but seemed instead to be made of plywood and cardboard, like a tasteless movie set. I don’t know what the existing record is for hauling luggage from a van to a third-story room is, but I’ll bet we broke it and if anyone is keeping track of the least amount of time spent in newly rented room, I think we might have a fair shot at that title as well. The Vibe in that place was unbearable. It clogged your senses like a psychic stench. We were 17 miles from the city limits before it was bearable enough for us to stop the bus and frantically dig out our well-concealed stash of Mary Jane’s Organic Herbal Purifier and, as the poets sing it, “Clutch the crisis pipe.” - and that had been filled thrice before we felt up to conversation.

“Just for the sake of clarification – that place is a total illusion. You agree” Beth finally said.

“That’s what I got.” I agreed. “Not one thing we saw there was what we were looking at. And I could not get a pucking feek at what was being covered…and it seems you couldn’t either.”

“ A what?” she answered. “Do we share a primary concern about what possibly generate that much Power?”

“Do we share a common desire not to admit that we know what could generate that much Power” I suggested.

“I was saving that one.” She answered. “I was going to keep it to use as a buffer against  the worst part.”

“We have to get past the illusion and see what’s really there.” I blurted.

“Well,” she sighed, “At least its been said. How’s your astral projection?”

“Miserable.” I admitted. “I’m mostly a theoretical Magician. I can OOB, but don’t expect me to dance. I stagger around like a drunk. I try to go North and I drift East. No directional control, which can be a real hindrance when Something is trying to eat your Soul.”

“I can lend you some Energy.” She said. “I’m considered rather potent at non-corporeal Magic.”

“Thanks. I should like to come out of this with my me intact. Well, it sounds like you’re ready to start and I never will be, so now is as good a time as ever. Shall we?” I extended my hand and she took it. 

Part 27: IN WHICH I MAKE AN ASTRAL OF MYSELF AGAIN

The sensation of going into the Astral can’t be described, and it doesn’t seem to be quite the same for any two people anyway. For me, there’s a shimmering and then you’re Somewhere Else. It’s the same place, but you and it are different. For me it’s a Lunar reality. I don’t do this very often, and when I had I usually found there wasn’t a whole lot of different as far as the environment was concerned.

This was totally different. One moment we were parked in a pleasant-enough clump of elm at the side of a typical highway and then ZAP we were surrounded by gnarled, leafless trees next to a mud road. I had a sensation of the early 19^th Century. We looked down at Cullisport. It was a gangrenous collection of warped buildings silhouetted against a Sun-less sky of rolling black-gray clouds. I figured it was Beth’s line, so I waited for her to say…

“We’re too late. All Three are here.”

We couldn’t “see” Them, which was just as well, but there was no mistaking Their presence.

“Uh…do you have any idea what can happen when three of The Old Ones gather in one place, cause I don’t recall having ever heard of it happening before…probably because if it had, we wouldn’t be here. Well, that’s it. We are in the Marina Trench of Deep Shit. I have never been so open to suggestions.” I babbled. Then I looked at Beth.

She was clad…and “clad” is the only word for it…in a flowing white Burnes-Jones Grecian robe with the silver horned Moon diadem on her brow. She was holding a glowing sword. Her eyes burned with determination.

“How do you do that?” I yelped.

“How do you not?” she asked. “You really don’t have much experience at this, do you. Just let it come through. You’ll manifest the appropriate Form for the Work if you stop being the you that you expect to be.”

“Right. I knew that. I forgot, is all. Sorry. Okay…”

Another shimmer. I found myself wearing a sort of knee-length kilt, tall boots, and a leather and brass helmet. My hair and beard were longer and thicker and I was holding a spear with runes carved into its head and shaft.

Beth actually chortled.

“What the Celestial Fuck could make you laugh at a time like this?” I wondered.

“You might wanna either make that kilt a couple of inches longer or that dick a couple of inches  shorter.” she suggested.

“Opps!” I admitted, deciding to adjust the physical attributes rather than the costume if only for safety, “Must’ a been my subconscious…hey, I told you I was no good at this.” and I walked right into a tree and got knocked on ass. Beth belly-laughed. Here we are, about to go hunting not one, not two, but three of the most powerful manifestations of absolute Evil in any form of existence and she was roaring with laughter. There was no taint of hysteria, either – she was genuinely laughing. My admiration of her courage was somewhat diminished by my bruised dignity.

“Why,” I asked as calmly as I could, “is that tree solid? I am no Master Of The Astral Plane, but I do distinctly remember than when I have had occasion to manifest in a Body of Light, I was able to pass through objects of the Material Plane like yer basic Casper, so perhaps you could control your amusement long enough to tell me why I bounced off that tree, and will I find a similar solidity to the rest of this reality? And, if you think we can spare the extra moments, I’d be interested to know if you really think it was all that funny.”

She gasped a bit, but finally got speech back. “Yes it was. Okay…this isn’t “the Astral Plane” as we know it. It’s a Separate Reality beneath the Projected Illusion, so it’s just as solid and considerably more “real” than that plastic Americana tourist-fishing village that the world sees. We have to be in the B.O.L. to get into it, but other than that it’s pretty much like being in our usual reality .You’ll get the hang of it. And I’m not laughing specifically at your pratfall. It just made me think of what a great sense of humour the Dharma has, bringing you and I to fight this particular Battle.” I went from guffaw to full-on howling in seconds and Beth got her second wind and we laughed ‘til we could laugh no more.

When we stopped, the world was still dark ‘n’ scary, but not as.

      

Part 28: INTO THE DARK, LIGHTLY

“Hey” I noticed. “It’s night.”

“Always, in this place.” she answered.

I was just about to ask why we’d left our trusty minibus parked back on the road and were walking into Cullisport through these really unpleasant woods when I heard this sound, a sort of humming that was producing a very Positive Vibe. Beth was already heading toward it, so I followed along. We went around a particularly big and grotesquely twisted tree and there they were. Gayle and Kether, locked in the “Yab-yum” Tantric position (which is sort of like sex in the full lotus) and they were floating about two and a half feet of the ground and chanting the OM MANI PAHDME HUM Mantra of Chenrazee, the Buddha of Compassion, and surrounded by an aura of Rose and Gold Energy. They sensed our arrival. Kether just gave us a grin and went back to his chanting, but Gayle called out, “Hey you guys! Everybody’s here and waiting for you. They’re just over there.” It seemed impolite to interrupt them to ask where there was, and once again Beth seemed to be already headed for it so I continued to tag along. Sure enough, in a little clearing was gathered our hardy little band – Zupdok, Short Chester, Stephanie, sundry and assorted friends and allies, all diligently smoking Weed and preparing for Battle.

“Well then,” said Wat, “Now that you’re here, we shall strategise and begin.”

“Strategy is pretty simple” Chester said. “Find the monsters, stop the monsters, escape alive.”

“Sounds right to me.” said Beth. “What about Gayle and Kether?”

“They’re the perimeter defence system.” Stephanie answered. “I sent the kids off to do Tantra. Lovely young hormone cases that they are, they’ll hardly even notice all the Negativity and they’re generating enough power hold back anything other than the Old Ones Themselves. It’s the best place for ‘em…and the safest. While you lot go send the Nasties back to somewhere else, our Coven will set up here and generate White Light.”

“Okay,” I announced. “Everyone whose up for a totally hopeless battle with Ultimate Cosmic Evil please come with Soror Athenisis and me.” and off we started, through the ugly forest and into the village.

Under the illusion, Cullisport was about as nasty a place as could be conceived. Every brick, every stone, every piece of wood radiated evil, the buildings were twisted, rotting shapes, and the people were…fishy. Or maybe froggy. Anyway they didn’t look human and they weren’t. They glared at us and shambled around menacingly, but didn’t seem eager to actually attack. I had the impression that the Runes on my spear might be keeping them back and I wondered what they meant. Beth probably knew, but I wasn’t about to lose any more points by admitting I couldn’t read ‘em. So we strode along the slimy cobblestone streets, dimly lit by foul-smelling torches. Essentially the place looked like the horror-movie set that countless directors had tried to create. To me, it looked a lot like the cartoons that Greg Irons drew when he did horror stories…he had a real way with decay. “Say, Beth…did you remember to pick up Frater A.’s comix when we left the kids’ place?” I asked “Oh shit.” she admitted. “Oh well…we can stop by on the way back. Meanwhile they can learn from ‘em.", which was true.

Now there are those who might experience some bewilderment at our having such casual conversation at this point in our adventures. All I can tell you is, until you are an experienced Magician about to confront cosmic malevolence with the fate of humanity and your own survival looking like an ice-cube’s chance in a microwave it’s pointless to speculate on how you or we would act.

The direction was easy to decide…we just walked towards where the Vibe was the worst. In a few horribly long minutes we were well into Cullisport. The inhabitants mobbed up, snarled and hissed at us, but the White Light that Steph and co. were sending kept them from getting close. Every so often I’d wave my Runespear at ‘em, but that was more to bolster my own confidence than anything else. I seemed to be leading this little group, which struck me as ludicrous since I had no idea where to go and less of what to do when we got there. Nonetheless, my feet seemed to be hip to something and I had got us almost to the harbour before I realised that Beth was directing ‘em (my feet, I mean).

This was just as well, ‘cause when we got there and saw what was happening in the water all we felt inclined to do was dive behind the nearest cover. We were all speechless, except for Chester.

“I’ll be buttered, battered, and buttfucked!” he muttered. I felt pretty much the same.

The sky above Cullisport harbour was a visual cacophony of iron-gray clouds and flashes of sheet lightening. The waters were whipped into a greasy froth and there in the middle of the ugliest waves imaginable were three Forms. Gigantic, amorphous, shifting Shapes, writhing in the waters about a mile off-shore. Three. Three of Them. Nyarlathrotep. Yog-Sothoth. Cthulhu.

“What the fuck are they doing?” Wat wondered aloud.

“Yep.” I answered.

“What yep?” asked Chester.

“They’re fucking” said Beth.

Part 29: THINGS COME TO A HEAD

“So…what do we do?” this from Respectabill, one of the biker contingent of the Herbs.

“It would seem useful to interuptus that coitus” I suggested. “Suggestions as to how are hereby welcomed.”

“As I understand it,” Beth considered, “Tantric Energy is about the one thing Humans and the Old Ones generate equally. Between the Coven and the kids, we should be actually ahead of Them. But we aren’t and there’s only one reason comes immediately to mind. They are not just balling…They are reproducing.”

Sure enough the three forms had pretty much merged into One and amid the continually shifting form the only relatively solid aspect was a rather obvious constructing of what were recognisably male and female genitalia in their appropriate union - hundreds of ‘em, appearing and disappearing, distorted, deformed, slimy, spurting, and, as for the male organs, big as redwoods.

“I never would have believed that sex could be Ugly,” commented G.T.C., the ace-buddy and partner in outlawry to Respectabill.

“Whatever gets done best get done soon.” Beth suggested, and since there was an obvious vaginal orifice forming in the middle of the mass and mess, none could disagree. Other than that there was little we could do but come up with other than plans so obviously futile that we didn’t even bother to vocalise them.

“That’s why there are so few of The Old Ones…it takes the union of three of Them to reproduce and unless something as stupid as it is powerful arranges it, it is impossible for more than two to occupy the same plane.”

This interesting if not particularly encouraging information came from a calm, utterly unperturbed voice a few feet above our crouching heads. There, floating peacefully, was Noli Inspiritu Cumbuere.

“You are about to be witness to what no mortal has ever before seen – the birth of one of the Old Ones.”

“Uh…shouldn’t we prevent that?” somebody asked. It might have been me.

“No.” he said.

Meanwhile a head was squirming out of the opening. Call it a head. The point is that Something was emerging and all we could do was refine our definitions of “disgusting.”

“Do we do anything?” somebody – and I don’t think it was me – asked.

“We wait”

I decided it was a head. No eyes, ears, or nose, but something that really did look like a mouth. There even seemed to be teeth or something like teeth some of the time. What seemed to be a throat was apparent. Oh yes..it must be a throat because a Noise came out of it. The only good part was that since nothing else could possibly make that Noise I’ll never have to hear it again…once I stop hearing it.

But there was another Sound. Not as loud, but just as strong and coming toward us. It cut through the foulness like a beam of light through the dark of a cave. It was a Song. If every freedom-loving voice that ever gave tune were to sing the same song all together, it would be that Song.

It was coming from our microbus. She came flying through that hideous town faster than I would have thought possible, glowing and strobing with a Light as pure as a new star. She cleared the crest of the hill above the harbour, launched herself into the air, flew over our heads, and shot like an arrow of Sound and Light right into that mouth and down that throat.

For an instant the entire Universe stopped.

In that head, a huge, red, very surprised looking Eye appeared.

Then the whole Thing disappeared.

“That’s that.” said N.I.C. “Nothing is any better, but we’ve avoided most of what would have been worse. What was being born there was the next stage in the evolution of the Old Ones. It would have had the power of all three of its parents. It would have eaten the soul of the Earth. Nature would have died. The power of the Earth that makes people human and keeps them from becoming robot-zombie Things would be gone. Consciousness, like everything, has a Spirit, a Soul, and a Mind and a Body. That Soul, like all Soul, is the progeny of  the Soul of the Above and the Soul of the Below. If that Entity had been born it would have consumed the Soul of the Below, which, on this plane is the Soul of the Earth. Humanity would exist half-conscious, the Yin part of them missing. All Mars, no Venus…aggressive, arrogant, increasingly brutal. Some day, aeons from now when two more were manifest, They would have bred a Thing that would have the power to consume the Soul of the Above. Then we’d really be in deep shit. That has been avoided, for now. Whether humanity improves shall have to be seen.”

“What just happened?” someone, or several someones, asked.

“The bus absorbed and manifested all the Positive Energy on the planet into itself. In the simplest, and therefore the best, terms, the Old Ones just dropped Acid. They aren’t “gone” but they’re not “here” anymore. In which case…” and he disappeared too.

“Hey” someone – and this time I’m pretty sure it was me – yelled. “So who WAS behind all this?”

“You already know. You just have to remember that you’ve forgotten.”

I think I was the only one who heard that.

Part 30: CONCLUSION AND ONWARDS

“Well,” said Chester, “Anyone else need a ride?”

As it turned out, only Beth and I were without transportation so as everyone returned to their individual rides, we piled in with Chester, Wat, Kether, and Gayle.

“I’m still Gayle, right?” she asked Beth, who was no longer attired for battle, and I also noticed that Cullisport was once again an obnoxious tourist-trap, if a bit seedier and more sullen than previous. And uninhabited.

“Until we are safely Home, yes.” Beth told her.

“I must admit, I had not expected that particular conclusion.” Zupdok admitted. “Who’da thought the bus would be the Hero.”

“Actually,” I said, “I should have. Considering the number of motor vehicles that are sentient beings, I should have anticipated that a few would be on Our Side.”

Zupdok, Chester, and Beth all started to speak, then recalled their cool and waited ‘til Gayle said

“Cars are sentient beings?”

“Yeah…cars, trucks, buses…most are just regular machines, but some are the synthetic sentient devices made by the Aliens that are behind the Omnicorp plot to conquer the Earth and enslave humanity.”

“Maybe,” said Beth accepting a Joint from Chester, “you should elaborate on that. But first could I have my lighter back?”

“Hey look!” shouted Wat, “It's..."

- 23 -

THE CRITICS RAVE AND BABBLE ABOUT “HIGHWAY”!!!

                                                             

                                                “FNORD?”

                                                                            Oberon D. Udderseid

                     “A BHAGAVAD-GITA FOR THE 21^ST CENTURY”

                                                                                                       Wat Zupdok

“FINALLY – A “STRONG FEMALE CHARACTER” WHO DOESN’TRY TO HAVE BIGGER BALLS THAN JOHN WAYNE”                                                                                      Sarah Mowney

                    

                     “DID I WRITE THIS?”

                                                      Shaky Spilbeer

                    

“I THINK HE MADE ALL THIS UP.”

                                                                                   Al E. Gorrie

                    “SO THAT’S WHAT HAPPENED TO MY VAN!”

                                                                             Frater A., Norton Cabal (East)