Atlas Web Design
Hey everyone, check out ATLAS Web Design! Premiere web and graphics developer for the Cleveland, TN area.
The Death of a Soldier
The following is a transcription of a recording that was taken from the audio journal attached to Corporal Yama’s person when his body was found.
October 15th, 2009
I have been assigned my first solo mission. Over the past three weeks command has sent out six scouts, each alone, and none have reported back yet. Each scout was sent out three days after the last, their mission was pretty routine, just to check out sector 7 and make sure it is still secure, in and out the assignment should take no longer than two days tops. They say that there are a number of reasons that the scouts are MIA, they could have gotten lost (most of them have never been that deep in the red before), they could have been injured in a bad landing, or they could be KIA. The last one is what has me worried. My mission is to give it one more shot, I am to fly in, assess the situation, and find those five scouts, or at least what’s left of them. If anything goes wrong I am to fly straight home, no looking back, to report whatever intel I can manage to gather. Yama out.
October 16th, 2009
So far, so good. I left base with no problem at all, there hardly ever are any problems now with it getting colder, most of the feathers are bunkered down for the winter and we wiped out the last of stripes six months ago, heck of a battle that was, most of it took place in sector 7. The only bad thing about it getting colder is that means the crawlers are mobile and they aren’t exactly on friendly terms with us. Anyway I can see sector 7 now, time to get to the bottom of this. –radio silence– This is insane. I found two bodies, just laying there. My location is deep in sector 7, sub-sector 4, I don’t understand, they are just laying here dead. No obvious cause of death, no wounds, nothing. Wait, there’s another about 40 k’s east. This is not good. –radio silence– It’s been 4 hours since I found the three bodies, no I.D. on any of them, though I did find a report on the third, it’s only partly complete but it’s definitely not good news. He wrote that he saw what seemed to be a crawler carrying several smaller ones but he also writes that he can’t confirm that’s what it was because something distracted him and when he turned around it was gone. I really hope he was wrong. It’s getting dark and I think I may have found something. There’s a big tube above here that’s putting out some kind of beam, I can see several civilians already heading towards it, I’m having to fight some unknown urge to go to it. This is ridiculous I just can’t seem to get away from it, I don’t understand. –radio silence–
October 17, 2009
It’s light out again and the beam has finally lost it’s affect on me. All of last night is a blur. I have to find those other two scouts and get out of here. I’m going to sub-sector 9 to see if there is anything, I think that was the last place the fifth scout was supposed to check. –radio silence– I’m in real trouble, I flew right through a crawler net. I’m got out ok but I can’t fly anymore, I can still manage to glide a bit but I’m surrounded by crawler nets and it’s too risky. This wall I’m on keeps swinging open and shut randomely, the large creatures I’ve never even heard of come out and go in. And this huge thing is always in the hole when the wall opens. I think this is my only chance, better in there with them than out here with the crawlers, they are closing in on my position. The next time the wall opens I’m going for it. –radio silence– I made it in, and I don’t think anything saw me, but I’m out in the open, I need to get out quick. Wow there are huge gusts of wind coming from all directions. Crap I think the big thing saw me. I have to get out. –crashing noise– I’ve been hit, I’m down. I don’t think I’m going to make it. Ok, if anyone finds this, tell command to abort, I repeat, sector 7 is gone. It’s over. And if anyone can please, please just tell my wife that –crashing noise– –radio silence–
El Fuego
Wild and bright it floats side to side, raging on and on without ceasing. It is not controlled, nor is it tame. Beautiful it is, and yet so terrifying. It makes one wonder why such a thing exists. You cannot control it, not without hurting it. It destroys everything it touches and leaves dusty remnants in its wake. It runs wild and free until nothing is left. Perhaps the most beautiful thing about it is its persistence for destruction. It refuses to give up, it never relents, it will break down everything in its path or die trying. Even when reduced to its most minimized and basic form, it holds the power to roar out again and continue its terror. It is so powerful even the shadows flee from it. It refuses to let anything hide, relentless to find and destroy anything and everything. You can run all you want but it will never give up, it will find you, and it will destroy you, if given the chance. Running is not an option, you must stand and fight it. If you don’t, then all you have ever known will be destroyed.
Lessons of Loneliness
My parents have been out of town for about a week and a half and I have learned three things.
1. The entire world goes out of town at the same time. (And surprisingly none of them go to Cleveland, TN)
2. It is not possible to get even slightly healthy nourishment without a mother or a wife.
3. I don’t like being alone and video games are surprisingly boring after a few days. (yes I know that’s really 4 things but I’m technically a Baptist and that has to come out one way or another)
To those of you who aren’t alone, enjoy it. As for you who are alone, yeah…it sucks.
Life Lessons from a Rubik’s Cube!
Rubik’s Cubes are amazing, I don’t care who you are. These cubes are ingenious, I mean they rotate in six different ways. There are 54 squares in four different colors that can be manipulated to virtually any position. To be more specific, there are 4 cubes that have 3 sides, 10 cubes that have 2 sides, and 6 cubes that have 1 side (of course each side is a different color). The object of the cube (in case you live a sheltered life and don’t know) is to ruin the cube’s color scheme completely and then painstakingly try to return it to its normal state. When you first open the Rubix Cube package, there is a Rubik’s Cube completely solved (each side is completely one color; the colors are blue, yellow, red, white, green, and orange). You are supposed to twist it until all the colors are completely mixed up, then you try and twist it until it is returned to its original state. The trick is you have to ruin one side to fix another. There are a lot of memorizable patterns of twists that one can use to manipulate certain cubes to do as one wills but it is a very tedious job.
So here is the lesson, our lives are very much like a Rubik’s Cube. We are brought into this world through procreation and through our mother’s womb (the package) and as soon as we enter in we are immediately messed up and are much less than perfect. We are pretty much a big colorful mess with no symmetrical pattern, metaphorically speaking of course. So all through life people (including ourselves) try to fix us and bring us back to that state of perfection we were before life took hold of us. The problem is once we fix part of us we get all excited and try to fix another part; in doing this, we forget about what fixed us the first time and we mess up the previously fixed problem while trying to work on the second. We basically repeat this until we either give up or die. Now what I have learned through my favorite toy is that it’s good to fix one side, but after that pay very close attention to what you are doing. Don’t just run off to fix the next side. You have to carefully plan what you are doing and watch how you do it, the fixed side is going to suffer a bit of damage in the process but in the end the first and second sides will be complete. So you keep this process up until you are back to a six sided cube that has all its colors in all the right places. But here’s the kicker, make sure you read the instructions. The beautiful thing about the instructions for the Rubix Cube are that they tell you exactly how to solve every situation you might run into; but they don’t do it for you, you have to work for the outcome. So make sure you read your Bible, and don’t just read it, memorize it because it’s a lot easier if you don’t have to look for the instructions and stare at them forever trying to figure out the diagram every time you mess up your cube. It’s important to remember you are just like a Rubik’s Cube and only God and one of His miracles can completely fix you!!! =)
Boredom A.K.A. The Absence of Joy
When boredom sets in, all falls away. You long for the joy that seems to have strayed. You enter this realm of perpetual lame. You wish that the darkness never had came. You feel all alone, though there’s people around. The light leaves your eyes, and darkness abounds. You cannot find fun, wherever where you look. You feel when light left, joy is not all it took. Your guard is down, your mind starts to wander. Inside your head, of dark thoughts you grow fonder. Depression sets in, you no longer can see. Your heart grows weary and tries to break free. It’s too late now, you are too weak to fight. The battle you have already lost for tonight. You were not prepared, and so you fell. Next time maybe you will do well. What will you do in order to win? Or will you just sit and surrender again? My advice to you is to take hold of joy. This from the mind of a not-so-young boy.
If ignorance is bliss, does that mean bliss is ignorance?
Do you ever wish you were standing in the middle of the desired, yet unreachable perfection of society that is in the back of everyone’s mind? The utopia of influences and entertainment that seems to put itself just out of our grasp, yet thrusts itself into the innermost desires of our being. Sure it is impossible to achieve but everyone seems to go about life as if this unattainable goal is, in fact, attainable. My explanation for this sense of “hope” is that we just want to be in that state, in that utopia, that we were intended to exist in. Think about it, man was created with the intention of living in the Garden of Eden which was the perfect place, the perfect society, the utopia, that we all desire. Our desires are focused on a more modern version of this utopia but it is essentially one and the same. It seems amazing to me that after thousands of years of being away from such perfection that the human soul still longs for that perfect world that we left so long ago.
