Eleven-ninety-nine

{This post is part of the "Tell a Story To Me" contest by @calluna, the 8th iteration so far. Click here to see it... Also I heard the "Tunak Tunak Tun" many times when creating this post, so forgive me for any sudden memeage... anyways, today's music-aide: "Halo Theme Mjolnir Mix"/"Halo 2 Theme" (Halo 2 OST)... Happy reading!}

Vincent Van Hoof

Eleven-ninety-nine

Today marks the infamous anniversary of a darkened Earth. Some call it a holy day, others doom and others a step forward in bringing the World towards the March of History. Whatever be our unholy predicament: we haven't seen the Earth die out despite the mishaps with city-destructive 'splosions and we haven't seen an ideology being predominant on this sacred Earth, yet. For sure, the Imperialists were wrong on the nature of humans. We ain't greedy bastards, else we would've died the day we experienced global blackout. We ain't kind folk either, some of the shit humans of past civilizations do to maintain their power is rather deafening. All it merely took to reproduce these extremes was a mere global blackout - yet I feel as if they expanded thanks to this.

But, getting back on track with us humans. I say along the lines of a scientific philosophy of which I forgot its name - but it matters not what it used to be called. Regardless, I rather agree we're determined wholly being our material conditions... but yet hypocritically, were we still agree with each other in that, we still have to act it out to help reproduce it - therein lies the problem of maintaining a thing forever. Some antsy bastard will eventually convince others to flip the bird to what has been here for a while and decide to supersede it to something that it wasn't - because they just have that ability to do so, despite having their consciousness being determined by their social being... A messy creature we humans are.

Heh, it reminds of a radical preacher that I listened in on when I visited suburbia in... what state was it called pre-blackout... ah, it was in Illinois. But I like to inscribe this speech here before I forget again:

"A black out they said reined in over the entire Globe... A blackout that destroyed civilization as we knew it? What lies they speak - for the elders of past society knew nae of humanity's spirit! Often they, with their coaxing thoughts of the end times, mistreated the category of humanity as unchangeable and always evil in their last breath! By the Rum o' Cap'n Morgan, do you hear the anti-empirical, unsound and anti-Dialectical philosophy havocking in your ears!..."

I chuckled a bit with the crowd that day, the preacher heard many jokes his way and tossed many back. But this is where he picks up the convo again:

"Haha... laugh now, but this was our reality back then. The constant propaganda of the evil human. For this was the Law, our universal spirit that was a part of us no matter who we were, a, might you say, human nature I suppose. No matter what they imagined it to be, the Big Other to them was Capital, this illusive Other they imagined into existence and let it control its life to a T. But I say it never existed, because, to quote a French Psychoanalytic, the Big Other doesn't exist. Yet before I ramble on about Psychoanalysis, lemme return to human nature. Shall I?"

Now the preacher listens to the crowd, the crowd shouts unanimously yes but without after adding profanities. Of course, these profanities were entirely inside-jokes that everybody accepted and meant only in good health. I written them not here, for I bear some poor memory on such and, because really, some were meant only as inside-jokes. As the preacher preaches on:

"So why do they spout this out, the infamous human nature? Because they obliged by their Big Other do so, of course no actual pressure but self-pressure. But before I go, I like to add that this takes on a particular form one must not forget, this form being the Myth. The Myth is what society sees itself in the mirror and tells itself about itself in such mirror. Without the Myth, all our social functions ceases to exist, at least with how their society was structured. Our society, we do rely on a Myth, but it possesses not the same class character as the previous one - we can deal with the Truth and our society won't crumble. Perhaps this is why they kept hush hush of human nature, for if everyone ideologically disagrees with you, then you can't run it effectively and will have to get the state to punish the revolters."

Now the preacher goes on to ask the crowd for questions, all are rather small talk - but one really stood out for me to inscribe here:

"So - why do humans scavenge the World for knowledge? Well deary it's rather simple, when you lack the ability to use your machine, then you get curious to look at a book. Like the one you and I have right now, but of course you want an answer not a vague throwaway. Lemme grant that, but be careful of my recklessness right now... Hmm, heh. Deary, and listen up you other people, we scavenge for books because we wanted to unfuck this gracious gift of God. We scavenged for articles and encyclopedias because we didn't had the means to look at past history and knowledge in our centralized data centers on the Web! We scavenged for written knowledge because we didn't want the flame of civilization... to die. If it died, so did we - or as we thought a mere two-three decades ago. I say the homo-sapiens rather survived the impossible."

A loud erupting clapping noise polluted the room and the preacher clapped along. I, with others, tear-jerked for a bit and the preacher jokingly said it was okay to cry because we didn't have to act like a stereotypical masculine in front of past society anymore. Which rather made us cringe but laughed - though a thought-provoking statement in past society, now it's just is... daily life. Continuing on:

"Yet why did the Global Blackout happen? Whether it be truly God's gracious gift or a technological fuck up unlike Y2K, we may never really know. As unfortunately throwaway this answer is, I cannot truly know how past society condemned us to this stage of history where we are at conflict to make the new society as the old one had killed itself for us. But let's rejoice that we live not in those times, even if ours is harsher. For we can be free for once, free from a ruling class that saw itself as rational but never knew of its irrationality and inconsistencies. Yet that shall be all for me today on our loving World. If you may, please pullout the scripture and prepare to listen to the deacon. Otherwise, you’re free to be what you want to be as long as you can actualize it."

Of course I shall not give the name of the society or the town's name - I fear I can die in these abandoned lands and have old-society scout convoys read up on this to then destroy this outpost. Anyways, I had been disconnected from my squadron for quite a while. Last we were together was mere days before this anniversary day, oh how we saw the multi-party raider gang and how we fought with honor. Yet driven away we were, for they were steadfast to their travels. Yet as we retreated, I managed to enter a vehicle while in flight to stumble across a mobile library full of tactics and military history. The knowledge was immense, but alas I could only snag a few - that's what been keeping me sane for quite some time.

Heh, you know I always thought raiders would be the most vicious but random ones. Yet my life tought me otherwise, for even the multi-party raiders have the highest honors and love for life. These ex-lumpenproles, or former poor workers, know what it means to lose everything - and their hopeless situation didn’t make them fear life, but, instead, gave them the courage to struggle forever. And while the end times didn’t make them richer, they grew wiser as they finally could practice what they have learned. Even with our dark times, they grew only stronger with the acquisition of these works and recruiting new humans on their travels.

But maybe I should recount that day - so I may remember them right and learn from that... My God, I was infiltrating a scout convoy with me squadron. We were contracted one task: shutting them down before they reached the Appalachian Mountains (not that they couldn’t survive it, but because they didn’t want them to test their new weaponry). We had the explosives to damn the entire convoy to the Earth, and their weapon unuseable. Yet, where does the multi-party raiders come in? Welp, lemme say that we had convinced those very multi-party raider to attack the convoy.

But why to do so? Well, not everything had to work - and I wanted to ensure that there would be no victory for this convoy even if we had died. Of course, why they’d agree? Well ‘tis nae shocker that they were friendly with the Appalachians and were great trading partners amongst each other. Yet why’d we still fought on that day? Because, quite simply, my cover could’ve been blown by a possible intruding spy and make the whole operation damned. We understood the risks, that’s why me squadron avoided fighting with them whenever possible - yet blood was to be shed if need be. Thankfully, we stopped the convoy and made it possible for the raiders to root out the damn scum of the World.

Of course, we would’ve stayed and had ourselves transported to the Appalachians, but the convoy called out an 11-99 all throughout. My gosh, 11-99 just had to be called! We couldn’t run away from the scene when we spotted the raiders, we had to prevent the effectiveness of 11-99. 11-99, the order to kill all prisoners in the brig, all guards were to be ready at the helm, they fought ‘til bled dry, fire the flares to warn the other convoys, torch the books on board and advance faster to their target destination.

11-99, had to be nullified as soon as we heard it. Of course we were split up like ants running in a complex maze, but I’m surprised we did a lot despite our disconnection. We released the prisoners as we killed the prison guards, had the backup fuel tanks leak profusely, exploded the armory while most of the scouts were still in and stopped the book-torchers with a good bullet. We demoralized them effectively, but we were danger close to the multi-party raiders. Then my little blurb of the split now comes in to explain why I am here now...

Our back-up if we were to be split was this: have some join the raiders and others go walk on alternate paths to the Appalachian Mountains. Heck, I spotted and rested in the outpost with the radical preacher. No kidding, I told of my squadron’s and that multi-party raider’s success over that convoy and the town celebrated - another victory over the past was won. That day people celebrated like it was a Carnivel - entertainment to walk and talks liken to Antiquity to even playing old-world music.

Yet here I am, walking to the Appalachians with the thought of them either dead or alive. Let it be they got lucky to change out of uniform to then have a cozy ride to the Appalachians. For if they died, this would be a nightmare to explain the awkwardness of the whole situation to them. Oh I wish walkie-talkies didn’t fry when the Global Blackout happened...

You know, as I write in this journel, Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” and Niccolò Machiavelli’s “The Prince” have been blasts to read. Though their works were bound to a time in history, they still carry relevance for updated projects and new military-political theory. My, my, they were living without our machinery and they developed in-depth theory that had very much good backings from all their experience and knowledge beforehand.

Heh, machinery that we possess really is a good topic to touch upon. We, the whole of the Earth, had to revert back to pre-electronicized machinery and rebuild entire industries from the ground up. Oh how the Earth suffered from not our new industries but from our old industries collapsing and releasing long-lasting pollution. But instead of repeating the Industrial Revolutions, we fixed on their ecological mistakes and struggled forward to make industry not an environment killer. But not of moral goodness but of socio-economic necessity to work around a permanent blackout and a damaged Earth. And books on these industrial-age machines along with reports of their outputs on our Earth was taken into heavy consideration and worker upon hard to make the two work together and not screw over what we have left.

In fact, the little mural piece I sticked inside the journal is a regular sight for post-contemporary militaries. Heck, I have a barely modified armour set - so do the raiders like the ones I mentioned earlier. And this came about as we had to make use of technology that wasn’t electronic and we could utilize fear as a real military stratagem again. Welp, this was one long journal entry. I best be packing and getting ready to march again at dusk - the night time advantage will give me body a rest and keep me mind at ease knowing that no old-society scout can snipe me off if they do inhabit these parts of the continent.

Cited posts:

@Calluna - "Tell a Story To Me, 8th iteration"

Cited images:

Vincent Van Hoof