philosophicaltherapist

Thorns – Part 19

When Elwin eventually arrived at the café in his condominium building later that afternoon Kylie had drifted off to sleep, her head resting in her arms on the table. Elwin cautiously sat down but bumped his knee on the table leg waking the sleeper. Kylie jerked upright her face contorted from much crying she stared at Elwin for a few moments before she managed to speak.

“Elwin! You came! I thought you had forgotten me, here is your lunch,” she passed him the sandwich which was now soggy. Elwin didn’t complain, but thanked her quietly for the sandwich and for waiting for him. Wearily he started to eat the sandwich. Kylie watched him and slowly it occurred to her how dirty and soot covered he was. Although Elwin often worked in the coal mines he didn’t typically look this bad. She inquired and he related to her the incident with the Kellite engineer. He did so in flat even tones betraying no anger.

“I have listened to you telling me of the Kellite engineer and how he treated you. I can tell that you are not angry, but allow me to say that I feel angry. I do not know why because this engineer was one of our betters and one shouldn’t question them. Yet all the same part of me burns with fury that he should do this to you.”

Elwin felt too uneasy to make eye contact with her so he continued to focus on the remains of his soggy sandwich. He felt a sense of confusion: on one hand he was pleased that she was angry, on the other hand he felt angry with her for speaking ill of a Kellite. It scared him think that perhaps the treatment he had received was somehow unjust. If the Kellite engineer had been unjust then many other threads threatened to come loose from Elwin’s mental fabric. He did not know why, but it still felt somewhat important to keep those threads safe, and so he pushed the idea aside and focused again on the sandwich. Besides, the thorn in his chest hurt less when he avoided thinking about such things. Continue reading “Thorns – Part 19”

The Monk – Part 20

Kent shook his head slowly.

“Show me or I will kill you now!” shouted Nix.

“No. You won’t do that. You have been ordered not to kill me.”

“Are you so sure about that?” said Nix, bringing the gun back up to Kent’s face again.

“Yes, I think Peterson would have been very particular about that. Especially to you.”

Nix stared down the sights of his gun, his resolve fading away. Eventually he put the gun down and nodded.

“Yes, Sophim Peterson has specifically told me not to kill you. He wants to kill you himself.”

“Has he told you this? That he wants to kill me himself?”

“No. But I think I know him well enough. I think he enjoys the killing and doesn’t want to share the fun. Which is fair enough, I intend to do the same thing when I am his rank one day.”

“Hmmm, so Peterson doesn’t trust you to know the truth then. Interesting.”
Nix laughed, “You’re trying to spread suspicion into the ranks of the Tyranni? Have you any idea how ridiculous that is?” Continue reading “The Monk – Part 20”

The Monk – Part 19

Kent’s custom was to eat lunch at his home between work shifts on a Friday and as such he was pedalling down Cutters Court when he caught sight of Nix sitting in a car near the entrance. Pretending not to have noticed him Kent pulled over and parked his bike on the opposite side of the street from the factory he lived underneath, and chained it to the fence leading to the park and brick kiln beyond. Knowing he was being observed he made a subtle spectacle of looking out towards the path leading away, and started walking towards it. It wasn’t long before he heard the sound of a car slam to a halt at the end of the street. Jerking his head back there was Nix erupting from the car and preparing to dash after him. Kent quickly sprinted straight for the path that went out towards the lake area beyond the kiln. Behind him Nix was following.

The brick kiln was originally built next to a clay quarry so it could be supplied with the raw materials for making the bricks. With the closure of the brick kiln this area had been turned into an artificial lake. Since it wasn’t a natural lake, minerals had seeped into the water and turned it opal green. There was no top soil around the edges but hundreds of pine trees grew up around the banks, obviously not affected by the minerals in the water as much as the other plants were. A local environmental group had built boardwalks along the edge of the lack and through the forest of trees growing up around it. On the weekend there might have been people around, but on a Friday afternoon it was deserted. This was the place Kent had fled into and the place he was leading his hunter. Continue reading “The Monk – Part 19”

Thorns – Part 18

Kylie arrived back at the condominium for lunch and found herself a bench at a table. The waiter took down her order and was surprised that she was ordering two lunches. She explained that she was waiting for a friend. The waiter grinned obscenely and made a sexually suggestive motion with his hand. On any other day Kylie would have giggled at this but today she felt different. She stared blankly at the waiter not responding at all to his lewd gesture. He didn’t notice her lack of reaction, and informed her that the two lunches would take about an hour to prepare. Kylie nodded, that was about right. Service was typically this slow and that’s why she ordered the lunch she promise Elwin before he had even arrived.

Making her way to a free table she tried to read the Paradise Times, a weekly newspaper produced for circulation amongst the Delforians, but found herself distracted. Looking up from the newspaper she spotted Edith at her usual table working feverishly away sorting through documents. Kylie found herself staring at her crown of blonde hair neatly tied up. Edith noticed her looking and stopped what she was doing to glare at her. Kylie didn’t notice she just kept staring fixated on the intricacy of her hairdo. Edith grumbled, tried briefly to get back to her work, but decided to get up and walk over to Kylie who was still in a trance.

“Excuse me,” grumbled Edith.

Kylie looked up at her blankly, a soft, ‘yes’ passed Kylie’s lips in acknowledgement.

“I noticed that you’ve been staring at me. Is there something you would like to tell me?” Continue reading “Thorns – Part 18”

The Monk – Part 18

I am feeling really bad about the lack of updates over the past two weeks. So today I am giving you a special super long update (over 2,500 words). I hope you enjoy it.

Oriana walked into her father’s factory that morning, still wearing the same clothes from the day before. This wasn’t out of the ordinary for her. She would often be out all night and instead of coming home just head back to the factory. She expected that her father would just give her his usual nod and say “hi, honey,” as she walked in but instead he looked at her sternly and used his finger to indicate that she was to follow him to his office immediately. She sat down opposite her father’s desk while he stood for a few moments with his back to her facing the white board behind his desk. Oriana thought she saw his hands tremble slightly as he opened and closed them.

“Ana, I had a conversation with two policemen yesterday evening.”

Oriana gasped, she could hear the fury in her father’s voice.

“What? Peterson and Nix-,” she was cut off.

“They told me that you interfered with their investigation into a religious cult they believe are operating in this area and they are considering pressing charges against you for your own safety.”

“Dad, there’s something you should know, those men aren’t cops. I have a video of what really happened.”

Her father just shook his head slowly in disgust.

“Ana, shut up.”

Oriana’s mouth gaped open, “Excuse me?”

“Shut up. I don’t want to hear any of your lies. You are just like your mother. You don’t care at all how your actions could impact other people.” Continue reading “The Monk – Part 18”

The Monk – Part 17

(Because I missed last week, this is a special longer episode of the Monk. Sorry for the disruption)!

Peterson smiled gleefully at the strange audience in attendance to him. He spread out his palms before him in a gesture of welcome.

“May no good deed go unpunished!”

Nix and the two women immediately started chuckling at Peterson’s joke.

“It is good to meet fellow Tyranni, when I put out the call for help I was surprised to find that our order already had two agents living and working in this city. We have a problem. There is a monk living in this city: a young man by the name of Kent. He is studying to become a druid and he has some sort of missionary work here for the Aeshir.”

Nix produced a tablet computer and sent a file labelled “Kent Andrews” to the two women present. Each woman pulled out a similar looking tablet and examined the photos of Kent in the files while Peterson continued talking.

“Kent appears to be working to recruit three young growkons into the Aeshir. We know these growkons are working with him because when we tried to apprehend him yesterday they conspired with Kent to acquire some damaging video footage of Nix and myself carrying out our work for the Tyranni. Kent is now threatening our order with this footage and the growkons he is trying to recruit are continuing to assist him.

“Our primary objective is to first secure the footage at the earliest opportunity. The best approach for doing this would be to corrupt Kent’s growkons and initiate them into the Tyranni. This way if anyone releases the footage we can have someone counter any claims they make about us by saying they are fake. Ideally they would help us delete all copies of this video and murder anyone who is hostile to the Tyranni. If we can get just one of these growkons to convert to the order then we can act to destroy all opposition, but I see no reason why we shouldn’t try to recruit all three if possible.” Continue reading “The Monk – Part 17”

Thorns – Part 17

Looking out the window Elwin felt fearful that the old man he had just turned his back on was boring a hole in his back with his eyes. Elwin wanted to look back at him, and at the same time wanted avoid looking in his direction ever again. The train hit a bump and Elwin sneaked a surreptitious peek over his shoulder while everyone was struggling to regain their balance, but the old man was looking elsewhere as though he had already forgotten Elwin had even existed. Relieved by this Elwin looked out the window again and this time with enough presence of mind to notice something as if for the very first time: There by the entrance to the coal mine was a colossal machine.

The machine was technically a vehicle, yet it was taller than most buildings. It could have easily stood eight, nine, or even ten stories high. It towered by the side of the train yard like a gigantic sauropod made from steel and rubber. Instead of jaws it had a huge wheel with a series of buckets built into it. A large conveyor belt ran along the neck section into the body. An immense platform for caterpillar tracks supported the massive apparatus. It had been said in the old times these machines could dig through entire mountains and do the work of ten thousand men in a single hour. Whoever the ancient people were who built these great machines, the secrets of their technology were now long forgotten. No one alive could recall this machine being used. Instead it had been left to gather rust outside the train yard standing as a constant reminder that giants had once walked the Earth. Continue reading “Thorns – Part 17”

The Monk – Part 16

(this is a direct continuation from the conversation started at the end of part 15)

“The fox in the field will run, the fox in the forest will hide, but the fox in a cage will fight,” said Suvarin repeating the Aeshiric idiom.

Kent was confused, “What do you mean?”

“I mean, for now the Tyranni see an option to beat us that is non-violent, so they will most likely take it – just as a fox will run or hide if it has those options. So long as they think they are getting somewhere in their attempts to turn the three growkons* against us they will not carry out any acts of violence. However, if those three growkons succeed in protecting themselves against the Tyranni’s rhetoric, they will escalate to violence because they can’t risk them becoming spiritual or joining the Aeshir; despite the harm that video recording might do to them.”

“I see what you’re getting at now,” Kent sighed deeply, “Since the Tyranni have been humiliated by me, and are intolerant of being humiliated even though they will happily dish it out to other people, they are unlikely to just let this go, so violence might be needed by us to get them to leave.” Continue reading “The Monk – Part 16”

Thorns – Part 16

As the sun rose over the horizon of the city, thousands of Delphorian workers crept out of their district housing towers and trudged down to the train station. They trudged down the shadow clad streets in pairs; for gathering in the streets in numbers greater than two were forbidden. They all wore the same style of blue working overalls. About half of them wore clothing that was worn and tattered from excessive wear and tear, while the other half were wearing fresh clean pairs of overalls. There was however no pair of Delphorians with one person neatly attired, and the other raggedly so. It was as though Delphorian society were divided into two different sub-species. Along the roads patrolled Groods brandishing wooden maces ready to pounce on any Delphorians wandering too closely to another pair.

Normally, Elwin would travel down to the station with Erian, but this morning, Elwin was traveling alone. The Groods eyed the one lone Delphorian suspiciously, as though at any second he would join up with a pair of Delphorian commuters and commit a public offence: One that the Groods openly relished correcting by pouncing on all three or four offending Delphorians and beating them with their maces. The other Delphorians nearby detected the anomaly and the increased danger the non-conformer presented to them and consciously made an effort to maximise their distance from Elwin. Thus an invisible circle of exclusion surrounded Elwin as he made his way down to the station. Continue reading “Thorns – Part 16”

The Monk – Part 15

After Kent had finished telling the others his parable there were scarce seconds of silence before Kelly, who had been struggling to contain herself, spoke up.

“Kevin, come and change your clothes… you’re very smelly!” shouted out Kelly laughing hysterically.

“Kevin, come and change your clothes again! You’ve been a naughty boy getting dirty underground!” cried out Oriana.

Paul laughed along with the girls, only Suvarin was unaffected by the intense jovial laughter coming from them. Kent, shielded from scrutiny thanks to the blind folds kept silence.

“Thank you, Kent,” said Suvarin warmly, “I like that parable. It is coming along nicely.”

Kent thanked her, and they continued on for a couple more minutes before Kent announced they had arrived. Paul, Kelly, and Oriana were relieved to have their blindfolds removed. They were still underground, but underneath a ladder up to a manhole. Kent went ahead and opened it up for them to climb out, Paul needed help to climb out but was starting to manage better. They were on a quiet backstreet in a suburb over from where Oriana lived. Kelly recognised it immediately and announced she knew a friend nearby who could give them a room to stay for the night. They said goodbye to Kent and Suvarin who departed back down the manhole, closing it behind them. The trio then set off with Kelly in the lead. Continue reading “The Monk – Part 15”