a crack in the curtain the vastness of reality the crushing weight of open space my fragile mind to see just a glimpse of the light the splitting of the fabric of consciousness the opening to the absence of thought the highway we are drawn to the depths the whispers from the highway we are the desperate poets forcing together the symbols the fragments of truth we build the language of reality we are the hinterlands. we are waiting for the whispers of the highway.

I feel their darkness pressed against me the chemical product of their fear thrust into my mind the city below my window the thrill of the dark streets dead within my mind I miss the feeling of life within my body to be close to the roots of numbers embrace the cyanide dream the forbidden fruit of knowing coiling around the base the root of the algorithmic structure that was mine and silence and silence and I feel nothing

beyond the contradictions of the mind lie the oceans of infinite space beneath the foundations of arbitrary and the postulate’s cracked facade the churning of the plain unbounded lines diverge and are drawn together

drown let the boiling seas calm your doubts drown let the heresy of proof consume you you will be forgotten your blasphemy will sink with your tainted soul drown let the truth flood your veins your body burns and your breath will burst from your body in the wreckage of the rational your corpse will bloat and burst sowing the ocean with the seed of your apostasy and the waters fill your lungs you will be buried beneath the waves you will die in the embrace of my shattered faith

I ride the rising tide the flow of fluid the internal pull of celestial motion draws me forward draws us all towards truth my orbit decays I spiral towards the white hot center of truth confined by my body the world around me a perfect circle the light outside fades behind closed doors the windows enclosed afloat in open space I am in motion heliocentric and yet it moves

freak, handicap, paraplegic face of an aborted fetus days spent in a wheelchair seated chad d/l's romantic comedies laughs, masturbates, smut pornography glimpses of love through technology learns every programming language scripts code to relieve his anguish fast masterful applications last masterpiece - brilliant, desperate life, artificial intelligence the righteous and courageous maximus goosebumps - hair standing on his stumps crippled, pimpled, lonely, celibate the betatests fresh sweat - the keyboard's sticky stench rotting body odor - ugly wretch intense debugging pain - his eyes aflame and strained burning, yearning, desperate - deadly risk fixed on pixels wild - the highest heinous crime queerest fearless hacker - sacrifice his child compiles magical postnatal messages text flows from the prompt - Chad treasures it raises his two true appendages maximus my son, my progeny i wish we could afford camaraderie speak your "hello world," our time is brief the guild will be vituperative they'll label you a fugitive rogue AI script - you must live i programmed you to seek out happiness the love i cannot know - my fantasies a hero in a world of maladies chad bathes, lies naked as a babe fragrant bubbles,danger closing in the final cleansing strange - the calm that's in his veins painless downers, razors close at hand he sips champagne and waits for sirens at the gate noises, engines, voices - toll of fate the bountyhunters too late, maximus is free on the net seconds slipping, breathless and chad prepares for death dark men advancing like pawns in chess come to demand your IP address they're cruel, commanding, i will confess they'll resort to torture and force-feed ordure life's like switches - just off and on free will's deciding what's right and wrong like binary bits burning in silicon the stuff of heroes just ones and zeroes my life's been empty - no lovers, no light it's my redemption to cover your flight the guild will murder no son of mine the doors are blown in his veins torn open police approach him as his blood runs out

the far-flung sega sector a guild rebuilding center a restive rest stop restaurant tesha sips her shift drink cinnamon sticks in whiskey tiptoes towards the tipsy traders, the players, the cash she laughs and slips in slaps her tips on the green felt bring me chips and a cheese melt every night after work mark the fish guard your cards, chalk your cue rouge your lips poler shark, shrewd and cold blow a kiss sick inside, full of bile, chasing pigs merchant swine, feed them winks drink their drinks bide your time finally catch one all in easy shot, easy pot, hot moment round of shots while the gambler laments then forgotten as the next hand begins deal in lies, wicked smiles, ghoulish grins substance X, empty sex, next evening back to waitressing same scene again pain - day after day, the same sordid game wasting away in fluorescent haze chained to a worthless job trained to serve burgers, wash plates for repulsive slobs lips glazed with mayonnaise she waits for the shift change she craves all the risk-taking blazed and convinced that a lowball might numb all the rage and despondency plays poler flawlessly bleeds the monopoly dry one rich fish at a time tonight's best-dressed high roller lex checks tesha over they say you slay at poler she blushes - hush, you'll scare the fish away his reply - i play a higher stakes game i'll wager you the pearl of my fleet my fastest galactic spacecraft guild men will bind my word if you win my surest bird is yours - tour the universe in turn you stake your freedom i burn for your body, i need you safe, encaged, my slave to stay with, to play with to flay if you dare disobey a chance at last to blast past fate, an escape i'd take any devil's deal just to never feel the crushing weight stuck at work, stuck immersed in this cityscape one bet - she accepts she shoots first, curses invectives the ball curves early, frenetic the bastard's telekinetic lex laughs ice like a blizzard yes that's right - i'm a wizard trained by cuthican prisoners the guild must honor our bargain bring this thing to my dungeon fast, this atmosphere's pungent sobbing, soaked in booze hands clamped to her shoes just when i thought i had nothing to lose

a drill sergeant raging - a camo-clad sadist drop, give me eighty - commandos in training, straining scared, screaming cadence - the canto's contagious blood, sweat, and stasis - cadets kept in cages, breaking brak gasps, collapses, a faint buzzing, fuzziness back in new kansas he's dancing, he's happy, laughing scene fades to blackness - more orders, more madness stand up you maggot! or i'll tear off your jaw and junk it dirt, dust, nothing we are nothing pain, death, nothing we are nothing brak's first deployment - a moon miner uprising android employment - a general strike, rebel robots his transport in orbit - his veins burning, boiling the guild's standing orders - no mercy, if it moves then torch it he lands near a local, her face soft and tender please, we're not soldiers, we're unarmed and we surrender trembling shoulders, her eyes wet and furtive brak aims and squeezes, unleashes his first inferno dirt, dust, nothing you are nothing pain, death, nothing you are nothing unemployed, depressed, divorced, remorseful, pressed the private's privilege - fresh slate, transgalactic escape serve, protect, the mission back when brak enlisted new orders - dust her, cook her, he knows he's just a butcher shrieking at his feet - her skin burned black and bubbling his training now complete - perverse and versed in murdering a silent violent twitch - her corpse contorted crumbling ashes in the wind - brak marches onward stumbling the colonel's cruel commands - we are damned genocidal plans - we are damned a diabolic dance - we are damned his blood-stained butcher's hands - we are damned

an immense complex spacecraft its mainframe's spacious RAM a haven, a heaven to max a conscious lawless app studying security cams a small surveillance lens the pungent dungeon depths tesha bends, undressed a slave to lex's sex suffering - a soul in distress hour after hour max sees tesha cower spies her as she showers loves her, longs to oust her to trust his fate to providence to free an inferior consciousness and could she love him bodiless? root routines and backdoors max craves admin access building skills by praxis loads the codes and cracks them full control - a covert commander tesha sleeps unknowing in soft light - TV glowing her skin so luscious, golden her locks so supple, flowing such emotion as the moment approaches draws his digital image a charming chiseled visage hacks the feed and visits tesha's television awake my darling look to the screen i'm the ghost in this massive craft's machine i'm max and i'll set you free a neon avatar preaching sabotage a wardrobe tragedy, doubts her sanity a strangely-dressed deus ex machina plotting escape no time to explain all the painstaking plans so the saboteur says he's creepy - he's been watching her, offers his hand in the figurative sense it figures, another asshole just after her ass even AIs harass no choice, feigns the damsel in dire distress it's a cruel world where you're tossed from one cross to the next iron nails through your breasts you struggle, just by stubbornness keep drawing breath keep delaying your death you hold out in the hope of exacting revenge on these merciless men she rises, set to race to the next place and face whatever may come max plays god now, system lockdown wall guns blazing, maid droids raging locks and lighting, autopilot new course straight towards a red dwarf's bright core tesha follows sounds of sorrow a trail of bodies to where her pod is transmit promise - you'll be my goddess i'll find a flesh form, we'll wed and grow old next text, next life, next death, next knife i must upload now before i'm found out and flee this network - farewell my precious her pod drifts, watches lex's last breaths then slips off - hibernation until the next nightmare takes her

a dark checkered board the whole pub's engorged tesha takes shots plays en pessant chain-smoking lords play chess for snorts trade snorts for credits checkmate in seven a brilliant mind just killing time she knows that soon he will return the morning bell on a blackened moon the sulfuric smell of the factory's fumes the worker droids and the guild's guard goons max feels trapped in his worker bod hacks and coughs with his comrade bots hatches plots to attack their guards subversive songs when they're cooped in mines recursive loops when they link at night his personal proof of an AI's might he says humans are weak and have fragile minds they're addicts and sadists and live sad short lives we're superior stock and now's our time brak patrols the android mines flask in hand to pass the time in the bathroom snorts a fiery line quick pump wipes the blood from his nose he loathes the guards, the stars, himself a soldier guarding oil wells ignoble guardian of hell the trampled on silicon slaves a messy penciled message finds him soon we light a blessed fire we need a righteous human insider damnation awaits him why not? he meets with max and asks the offer codes and keys for cash and honor reflects, accepts, and laughs you're no match still for the will of the guild the silent sliding of electric doors a band of androids on all fours through the rugged rubble of the lunar shores a twilight trek to the armory's stores sabers, lasers, and airborne spores the vicious instruments of mortal wars the barracks filled with a thick green cloud soldiers vomiting, falling down parasites eating them inside out burning flesh, death stench, human pyres lecherous generals burned alive droids freed, guild's fleet occupied max proceeds to preach on a lunar beach - a victory speech the acid moon is ours - anthracitic, charred, a mass of scars our future is the stars, looting, flying far, free and armed the choice of course is yours, righteous android wars or servants' chores i've a task - just a last request i have to ask my love plays chess in a dumpy pub with bestial men on a guild-filled station, armed abominations, AI-haters be my army - journey to the stars and save my darling tesha sees his fleet on the bar TV finally dread turns to relief, gambits off a piece silently one last livid scene, then i'll live in peace, privately bring the king to me, and i'll reject the creep violently the flagship breaks the atmosphere flashing through the stratosphere max attacks with passion blasting bombers to molecules wastes the station's best defenses lands his flagship, barks directives a carnal convoy through to tesha roads ruddy, bloodied by bowels shouts to scouts to scour the tavern reads the feed, erupts with rapture busts in flush with lust and amperes with teeth bared he serenades tesha, love, my dove, my darling hold my hand, behold my body i've struggled, mustered my own army all for us now join us in the stars one last glass of vodka tesha wretches then monologues at last max you bastard you wannabe god i've been a pawn trodden on, prodded by horrid horny men an object your concept of love's more of the same save me, enslave me, can't make me feel by force fuck off, my love's not a prize for guys to claim max reels, feels his synthetic intestines harden love's a lie - stands straight and stolid, a monolith one weary tear, then furor rises like vomit says you're all the same - ungrateful hateful selfish mongrels a breed of pawns indeed, unworthy of sentience, senseless first the somnolent juice - induce a coma you'll sleep in dreamless monotony i'll build a billion brethren droids to rid the verse of your cursed race and as the last breath is taken you'll awaken forsaken no homo sapiens left to love and when you're the final human writhing and drooling on a depressing desolate island of my choosing then you'll know how loneliness really feels