CONDEMN AN APE, SAVE A 'BILLY'... 3/2/15

They sat 'round a table in a room within The Residence. Doctor Franklin had quite commodious quarters within his Anti-Enchantment Bureau. Vampires and other exotic quests visit from time to time. Please don't go by the name, but in the early days of scientific inquiry around here 'pro' enchantment sentiment was a problematic viewpoint to have. Rougher sorts and backwoods types were not adverse to burnings. Though by the late eighteenth century they were not usually publicized. Mustn't scare away settlers.

Tonight his guest was Jonathon. They sipped hot spiced gin in the 'tavern' room, as they pondered Billy's dilemma and how he might escape 'possession.' ..... Doctor Franklin said - Since the being, when mortal was 'mantid' or arthropod, a large crustacean might do the trick... maybe something like a king crab, or a coconut eating crab might suffice. Have you ever seen them? (Jonathon shook his head) Big ones can reach ten pounds with thick, muscular legs. Believe me, a horrific sight. They'll take meet too. Wouldn't want to be a lost, little Pacific Islander. I can tell you that.... Can you get one? - asked Jonathon..... I have merfolk, Jersey Devils and Yetis in there (gestures toward the specimen wing). I can get anything. You know that - said the old scientist.... But do you really think it would work? - asked Jonathon.... The scientifically preserved patriot shrugged and said - The number of limbs might be wrong. Even seven hundred and fifty thousand year old entities have memories, you know. We need something smart and something agile. I'm thinking a chimp or  an orangutan. Don't tell anyone I said that. Not to politically correct these days. You know the P.E.T.A. people wanted to come through here? They know about this place. What don't they know?.... How do you keep them out? - said Jonathon...So far, copious, luxuriant amounts of money. Nothing unseemly. Not to individuals. I mean to the organization. So they tolerate an incarcerated merman, or Jersey Devil, or Yeti. Besides, those things are not animals. (thinks for a few moments) I'm going to use an orangutan. Smart, but not too smart. And they move with a slow, precise mantid grace. Have you ever noticed that? - asked Franklin..... No - said Jonathon. I believe they're diurnal (active in daylight). How could I?..... Good point, my boy. Good point - whispered the Doctor. Then he said - Have him ready when next the moon shines bright. The van will be outside. Let my people in. They'll get him out. None will see. And should a nosy parker pepper the household with questions, let them say some sort of television or electronic device is being returned to the vendor. I've seen your eyes and by 'you' I mean all night-folk. None can fight such eyes.

So they finished their drinks and went to hob-nob with outlandish examples of lifeforms best kept in the dark. The Yeti trilled an alpine song in exchange for nuts and apples. Three pens down a Circassian Bear ate convicts, as right next door the replacement sea hag (the earlier aged mermaid died) sang sad songs of the depths.

One night hence, the magic begins. All prayed for success....

<more next time>

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Sub Pub Music - Creep (Massive Dark Ambient Sinister Orchestral Horror) ..Things rarely mentioned 3/1/15

This is part of an album and there are rumors about how it was recorded. But we won't discuss that now. We're here for other things. This is an intermission.... a break from our vampire drama. Night-folk are really quite tame. They're not like ghouls. They're not like zombies. Those of you who've been with us for a while know that. Real terror lies elsewhere, in souls quite human, though contorted into strange shapes. Every city has them. But they hide. And the thing is... you don't want to look.



Witness 'the ice cream man.' Listen for his bell. Ah, there it goes, serenading children on hot summer nights. The route is very special. And the schedule rather late. If you live on a block with lots of people, don't look for 'the ice cream man.' Crowds frighten him. Monsters have phobias to, you know. He frequents leafy lanes on the outskirts of town, with wide lawns, old trees and large stone houses. Most people go in after dark, breathing in the artificially cooled air. It's expensive to retrofit old houses. Occasionally there might be a lawn party, but they're around back and far away. What with all the trees, there's not much light. Street lamps can only do so much. 



Sometimes a child comes out. Every place has it's loners. Which is not to say they have no friends. But certain individuals relish the dark and the quiet. A door opens... a side door... leading from a small library out to a grey stone porch. A child comes out... a little girl, but not that little... perhaps eleven. She crosses the lawn, taking care lest she trip on tree roots. Lights are for flower beds, or driveways. There are none here. Only shadows. A boy once sailed from the heights of that tree, smashing his skull on a bough toward the bottom and thus already dead by the time he hit the grass. But that was in nineteen twenty one. The current family knows nothing of it, though his spirit flickers through the grounds on warm summer nights. Fireflies say hello. So do the bats. The eleven year old girl runs right by him, noticing nothing more that a cool breeze and an exceptionally dark shadow. He whispers a greeting, though she's deaf to it. 



There by the curb is the truck... an old, small, white, ice cream truck. There's no roof. The driver sits out in the open with a big freezer in back. It was once a GOOD HUMOR truck, but that was long ago. Tiny, exterior lights up toward the top make it glow... an oasis of soft illumination on an other wise still, dark street. Not even a car goes by. Little gnats swarm 'round the lights. The man stands there in his while pants and white shirt, smiling a well rehearsed smile.He has a hoarse voice and thick, leathery skin. His hands are boney. His nails shiny and thick.



What is thee wish? - he says... The girl asks for a choco-taco. He opens one of the thick freezer doors and hums a little tune. A gnat bites the girl's forearm. She slaps it away and stands there politely waiting for her treat. But when he turns around there's no wrapped confection in his hand, but rather a wadded up rag dowsed with chloroform. Before she can resist, he grabs the back of her head and jams the dirty cloth into her face. She gasps... but that's good, for it forces the intoxicating fumes deep into her lungs. Then she lashes out, scratching his arms and kicking her feet. He twists her neck. Something cracks. Oh, it's not broken, but she realizes he could do that too, so she stops. Eight heartbeats later the girl goes limp... not dead... just drugged.... She smells his acrid stench, as he picks her up. And she hears a night bird sing, as he forces her body into the freezer through the small, open door. A wrist breaks... a clavicle ... Pelvis cracks a little. Oh, she feels the pain. Chloroform numbs it a little, but just a little. And the ice cream man's gotta do what he gotta do to get her in...Soon she's all scrunched up on top of a thick, canvas drop cloth. Then he slams the door, locking her in with another almost dead body.



But they ain't gonna die in there. He has to get 'em 'home' first. So the ice cream man hops in front, shuts the door, pops out his two glass eyes and puts 'em in a box he got. Feels better without 'em. Sees better two.



Then he starts the engine and drives away. Streets all quiet... few crickets, maybe, but that's it. Blue, TV lights vibrate from windows here and there.... maybe the noise of an old central air conditioning unit that needs replacing. No kids. No people. No nothing. Just dark. Every so often a ghost... not many, but they're around.



Family goes - Where'd the girl go?.... Somebody says - Oh, she's watching TV in the little library...



And that's it.



Truck don't stop no more. It just goes. Little exterior lights blink out too...



It's easy to sneak away...



<more next time>



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Billy Kravitz' vampire wonderland: DOCTOR FRANKLIN'S COMPOUND UNDER THE PHILADELPHIA ...

Billy Kravitz' vampire wonderland: DOCTOR FRANKLIN'S COMPOUND UNDER THE PHILADELPHIA ...: The Anti-Enchantment Bureau is in utter pandemonium. The Delaware River is expected to reach unprecedented levels. The underground compound...

This was written 28 months ago, just as HURRICANE SANDY roared into the Philadelphia/South Jersey area. Some coastal towns were flattened, Miraculously, the ones mentioned in our tale were not. Oh, minor damage... a low lying laundry room here... a flooded garage there. the eye passed right over, thus the relative calm. And soon after, the storm unraveled... There are those who say certain benevolent paranormal adepts caused that. Who knows? Que sera, sera.

Jump in... scroll around. See what you find.



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Billy Kravitz' vampire wonderland: A VAMPIRE TESTS THE BOUNDARY BETWEEN MAGIC AND SCI...

Billy Kravitz' vampire wonderland: A VAMPIRE TESTS THE BOUNDARY BETWEEN MAGIC AND SCI...: Long before the advent of the atomic age, musicians searched for 'the lost chord,' an elusive example of pure harmonics believed to...

To late to blog. Was doing the #ff over on Twitter all night. So here we have something from our commodious vaults you might like . And the science behind it is true.



This is the second one we post tonight. Hope you read the boaf a them.



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WHEN ENTITIES POSSESS BODIES, SOMETIMES THEY NEED TRAINING WHEELS . 2/27/15

Zebulon, the disembodied spirit, narrates, as he's done so many times before----

Billy slept on. Apparently the entity was having problems. It's not always easy settling into a new physical body, especially if the body in question stems from an entirely different genome. Doctor Franklin told us that. Jonathon called him. Who else did we have? Look, he already knew all about it. It's not like his Bureau doesn't watch this place round the clock. I know they get images from some kind of space probe. You know how real estate sites on line can focus all the way down to bird droppings on your car? Well, so can they. They have this device to detect and read gaseous emissions too. Can tell what's in here... who's in here and what (or who) they had for lunch. Saw the entity enter the house. Not the actual energy field, if that's the right word for it, but the battered Groucho Marx, Madame Tussaud's wax figure it inhabited. They're talking about that now.....

Edith lit a couple aroma candles in the den. Place didn't have any green apple, so she got spring meadow. Figured winter's lasted long enough. And you know how vampires are about aromas. didn't say anything, so I suppose it was alright. Fireplace was on. The good vodka was out. Doctor Franklin asked for Doritos. Three hundred and eight year old, harmonically preserved patriots have skewed tastes. That's just how it is. 

Jonathon said - How did he walk here? How did he control that Grougho thing? He... well, we call it a 'he,' can't effect matter. Can he? ...
Doctor Franklin interjected - I believe we went over this before. He doesn't move mater directly, but he can 'talk' to it.. communicate with the particles and if they're amenable, the matter moves. But he tires quickly and can only keep it up for short periods of time Maybe entities experience troughs and crests? Now he's in a trough. Who knows how long it will last?

Sarah said - What's going to happen to Billy?... The Doctor thought and said - It all depends on how long the entity 'keeps' him and other things too. The creature, when it was originally in physical form, was in no way human, or even remotely related to humans.
Alien life is like that. I know you're aware of Europa and what goes on out there. You know. Disembodied entities are most successful when they possess one of their own, or perhaps a form very closely related. This 'thing' was originally a praying mantis, a very civilized praying mantis, but an insect-like thing the size of Sea-biscuit. What can I tell you? His limbs were different than ours. His organs functioned differently. His nervous system, and that's like his switchboard, in no way resembles ours. He breathed through spiracles, for God's sake.
I don't think he can reconcile the way his mind works with a human body. It's like putting an octopus in a suit of armor, or a human skeleton in a jellyfish.

But he did this before? - asked Edith. How did he manage then?... Who knows if he did? - said Franklin. Maybe all those times were with creatures like him, or somewhat like him. And he will eventually create some type of interface. The only thing is, when that happens the unrelated body wears out fast. The entity loses interest, surrenders the deteriorating physical mess and the host dies.

They just sat there. For almost four and a half years the mortal blogger was one of the family. They didn't want to lose him.

Then the 'Discoverer of electricity' said - We can always find a more suitable host. We can lure it out of Billy.

Do you have any suitable candidates? - asked Jonathon. I don't think a garden variety Earth praying mantis would do.

Give me time - said the Doctor.

How much time? - asked Sarah.

I don't know - whispered Doctor Franklin.

While upstairs, in Billy's room, the disembodied spirit entity slowly learned how to play human genitalia by ear... which is pretty hard for a creature that never had any... Ears, I mean...

<more next time>

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They Hear KILL DA WABBIT As An Entity Settles In... 2/25/15

I'll take over now. It's me. It's Zebulon, your second favorite disembodied spirit. Thirteen when I died, but been doing this for twenty one hundred years, so, uh. I know what I'm doing.

Billy won't wake up. They try everything. Sarah dribbled a few drops of vampire blood between his lips. Edith threw hoo-doo's. Jonathon said prayers. He has this exorcism rite he does. But it didn't do anything. They called a doctor... a 'familiar' doctor. He helps them and they help him. Sometimes he screws up with a kid. Parents get sad and all. Doc gets scared he might be sued. So he gets a few drops of night-folk blood and stirs it into the kid's cough syrup. Twelve hours later, the little bundle wakes up, opens his eyes, smiles, gurgles and goes - Ya ya ya ya ya ya ya ya!.... And everybody's happy. Nobody knows what he did. nobody has to know. Now he's over here at the townhouse returning the favor. Got a portable cardiogram machine and everything. Some stuff for rudimentary blood test. Sets it up on the desk where the laptop usually is. They all stand around watching. Sarah's real scared. She actually knew Billy back when she first ran the book store. He used to go into Philadelphia After Dark. She was mortal then. They talked. She'd recommend books. Now she's a vampire and he's their designated blogger. Boy life is strange. Jonathon doesn't say much. But he's worried too.  Edith knits. She sits and knits. That's what she does when she's nervous. Makes scarves and gloves for the elferinos and elferinas. Makes little ones for the cherubs too. They don't talk about them much, but they're out there. 

Sarah quietly says - Is he alive?..... 
Doctor says - Sort of. If I go by the readings. Blood oxygenation within normal range. Brain waves make sense. He responds to stimuli. Not much, but he responds. Definitely not a vegetative state. Body temps a bit low, but that happens. Everything's as it should be.
Then what's wrong? - says Jonathon.
His heart. His heart's not beating- says the doctor.
What do you mean 'his heart's not beating?' -says Jonathon.
I mean there's no muscular contraction. No nothing. It's inert. Yet everything is normal, as if it was beating - says the doctor. And they can see how puzzled he is. 
Sarah says - What do we do now?
He just shrugs.
Give him some water. Not a lot. Just a little bit. See if he swallows - says Edith.
You want him to choke? You want him to aspirate it into his lungs? - goes the doctor.
You said his heart's not pumping. So I assume his lungs ain't workin' either - she says.
What are you? Are you a doctor? - he goes.
Look who's talkin'! You almost killed a kid, you son of a bitch. And now because a them, you're off the hook. Gonna submit a bill and grab plenty. Sure 'cause a what THEY done - goes Edith.
He makes like she's not even worth acknowledging. She picks up on that and continues - Let your mother make a fuss over you. We're done with that. .... Then he gulps. She can see him swallow. She hit home. She knows. Good.
Jonathon goes - Get some water.....
Sarah hurries into the bathroom, finds the paper cups, fills one and comes back.
Doctor goes - Give it to me. I'll give it to him. If he swallows... if he can still swallow, that's a good sign. If not... (he just trails off)...
Then he pinches the rim of the cup to make a little spout and goes to pour a drop or two in Billy's mouth. But his hand's shakin'. It's really shaking. And the water falls on his chin. Only thing is, it doesn't run down his jaw onto the pillow. Just seems to 'fizz' through his skin. Body just absorbs it.
Jonathon sees. He says - give him more. Pour it on his forehead. See what happens...
The doctor does. Same thing happens. It just 'goes in' through the skin.
Doctor goes - He, he's taking it. He's not swallowing, but he's taking it.
No shit, Doctor Bombay - goes Edith. You think witchy-woman don't know that. He's skin drinkin'. What's in him wants the water and that's how it takes it.
You know what I think it's like? - says the doctor (not to her, to Jonathon). It's like a pole change. Like a polar shift. Something's taking over. Everything's shifting. I don't know how to get him back... He looks toward Sarah and goes - Can I have a drink? Not water. Not that. Do you have any vodka?....
Well, you know how them vampires are with vodka?...
Sarah goes - Yes, what kind?
Orange? You have that? - he goes...
Give me a minute - she says. Then she runs downstairs to get it.
Edith chuckles, but never drops a stitch.

While deep within his body, sealed in darkness, the part that's Billy shrinks down into a singularity and keeps on going, as a vast smothering force presses in from all sides.

Sarah returns with the vodka and hands it to the doctor who gulps it down. But the TV remote fell, or something and BOOM, flat screen snaps on and  lights up with Elmer Fudd in a metal hat going - Kill da wabbit! Kill da wabbit!... Doctor almost chokes. Edith breaks into a fit of laughing and starts humming along. 

Jonathon picks up the remote and turns it off.

FADE TO BLACK

As deep within the prison of his hyjacked body, Billy weakly goes - Kill da wabbit. Kill da wabbit.

THEN SILENCE

As an alien voice whispers something in a strange, clicking tongue.

<more next time>

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A STRANGE LONG SLEEP .. 2/24/15

Jonathon came down just after sunset. The sky was a pale, somber, watery blue. Vampires like it that way. Some venture out when there's still quite a bit of light in the sky. People see them. Children are still playing. It all seems so natural. Night-folk are great at obfuscation. He was about to leave the house for a quick stroll... let the neighbors see him and all. Granted, their block was quiet. Not too many people about. But there's always a few. Though before he got to the door, Edith grabbed him. She said - Jonathon, Billy never got up. I listened at the door. He's still sleeping. Jonathon, it's a quarter to six (dusk comes later in February).

He turned and went back up. Edith followed. Sarah was coming down when they entered the hall... She knew something was wrong. Actually, Jonathon did too, from the moment he opened his eyes. Vampires are attuned to such things. Yet their brain is still a human brain and quite prone to denial. 

They stood by the door and listened. But these are not the hollow interior doors you may be used to. These are solid wood... historical accuracy, you know. Society Hill people are very picky about that. Some hide flat screens behind paintings and refrigerators behind cabinetry and skeletons in closets and dirty socks under the bed. But that's another story.

Jonathon knocked. He said - Billy? Billy? Are you alright?.... (no answer). He tried to open the door, but it was locked. So he sublimated his hand through the wood, reached back and fiddled with the latch. They went in. The room was dark, but they could hear the breathing ...and something else. Edith switched on the light. Small glistening shapes scurried everywhere. Billy slept on a mound of them. They explored his nostrils... his mouth... under his t-shirt and inside his tightie-whities. The three of them just stood there. Sarah said - Why can't I smell them? (vampires have a keen sense of smell). Jonathon went to the dresser and tried to brush them off, but his hand went right through them. Sarah said - Are you sublimating?... He shook his head and whispered - No, they're sublimating through me. 

It's a hoo-doo - said Edith. Like a dream, or ghost stuff. Something's in here. That thing from the wax figure. It never left.

Then she mumbled a prayer, or some kind of incantation and they vanished. Just turned to smoke and blew away.

The bed was just a bed. Billy slept under the covers. They tried to wake him... but he just slept.  That part of the 'ghost stuff' held true.

Entities have other ways to explore a host.

Billy trembled. He was cold. Edith got another blanket and covered him.

Jonathon looked concerned...

<more next time>

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