SERENDIPITY 2000-2004

• Winter 2004/5: On Blimps and Brains in Boxes
• Winter 2003/4: Bad Rhad as Ahriman (Even More on the Ever Eminently Forgettable Devil)
• Autumn 2003: The VAM not in Vampires (Maya, Mithrandruj & More on the Forgettable Devil)
• Summer 2003: Vampires in pre-Columbian Honduras
• Summer 2002: Serendipitous Sightings (snaps reminiscent of PHANTACEA characters: Blind Sundown and Raven's Head; Sorciere and Granny Garuda; Wilderwitch and Wildman Dervish Furie
• October 2001: Pyrame & The Atomic Twins (Osiraq)
• February 2000: Xuthros Hor, the Genesea & the Grand Alignment

Summer 2005: Chernobyl Summoning Children?

Years ago, in the May 1997 edition of Serendipity Now, I made mention that, in the PHANTACEA Mythos, Chernobyl (Wormwood) may well turn out to be the site of the Soviet Supra City often referred to during the course of the 'Launching' serials. It was quite often referred to in 'Ringleader's Revenge', the second half of which ('Aspects of an Amoebaman') was set in late April, early May 1960, as well.

The Conqueror, an otherwise anonymous, silver-clad, Brainrock-helmeted supra, set up his headquarters in the Soviet Supra City during the Second World War. Rogue Crimefighters captured Sedon (Satan) St Synne there in the late Forties. Whereupon he was imprisoned at Spandau until released in time for 'Aspects'. The Soviet Supra Supreme long made it the location of its HQ.

Gunter von Alptraum (Prince Nightmare, also Prince Peashooter), one of the brats who appeared briefly in 'Coueranna Curse', started overseeing its running sometime in the mid-to-late Fifties. By the time 'Centauri Island' came along in late 1980, he may not have been anymore but he was definitely associated with Signal System's Silver Signallers by then. (System may yet prove to be what becomes of Sedon St Synne, aka the Judge Warlock referred to occasionally during the 2005 revision of 'The Trigregos Gambit'.)

All of which leads me to a brief snippet I spotted on pg. 53 of the September-October 2005 issue of "Atlantis Rising" #53 (Write: PO Box 441, LIvingston, MT 59047, USA). With reference to the so-called 'Chernobyl generation':

According to Russian doctors who have been keeping close track on the children exposed to radiation following the 1986 nuclear disaster in the Ukraine, ... kids growing up in areas damaged by the radiation are said to have higher IQs and faster reaction times. They also reportedly are growing faster and have stronger immune systems. [Research] showed the mental agility and health of kids in affected areas was clearly superior to those from unaffected areas.

Sounds a little like the Summoning Children who so dominate proceedings in the 1938 'Heliodyssey' serials, doesn't it?

I should make it clear I'm not advocating exposing kids to nuclear disasters. Mind you, I'm all in favour of the nuclear family.

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Winter 2004/5: On Blimps and Brains in Boxes

In my synopsis for Kore-6 I made mention that Conrad Schroff, one of the Germanic characters who occasionally shows up in the 'Heliodyssey' story sequences, gets some rare opportunities for a degree of decent dialogue in that particular chapter. Here's a sample of it:

Alexandros Kinesis was not about to let his granduncle [Magister Joseph Mandam] be spoken to in such a way. Still, at least in this case, he was careful to let his words rather than his actions show his displeasure. "Yet both the United States and Great Britain have abandoned the construction of all kinds of dirigibles."

"Ones with rigid design, perhaps," qualified Conrad, happy to be back on topic. "I happen to know the American navy is very big on blimps, non-rigid airships. It foresees tremendous potential for them in terms of antisubmarine surveillance in particular. They have many advantages over the airplane: conservation of fuel, the ability to hover, and the relative ease of landing. Which is the reason you are here."

Considering 'Coueranna's Curse' is set in January 1938 and wasn't written until 1997, I found it irresistibly serendipitous than on January 5, 2005, the very day I intended to up-load this season's update, there was an article in the Vancouver Sun entitled: 'Blimp to tackle 14-day around-the-world flight'. Apparently, to quote the article more or less precisely, the U.S. military realizes the potential of blimps to, among other things, 'vastly improve surveillance and telecommunications by providing blanket wireless coverage to cities for a fraction of the cost of traditional networks.'

And to think that, in 1938, Schroff was only referring to his company's airship, the Balder, and its capability of taking Magister Mandam and crew to the Congo (the Tholos Tomb for Pygmies) and back. Unfortunately, the Balder airbag, or soccer ball as the article would have it, was not filled with Helium. Here's another snatch of content from Kore-6:

Which was why Sundown was so ashen. If the Diver fought off Sorciere's seeming and bolted, he might have to reinforce yesterday's lesson. In something as fragile as a hydrogen-filled airship, with armed men and women everywhere, that struck him as a prospect to be avoided at all costs. Dragon Joe being between-space not far away did nothing to cheer him either.

What if he burped?

Obviously, if Dragon Joe did burp in 1938, John Sundown survived. I can safely say that because he, or someone who both bears his name and looks just like him, albeit without his eyesight, is still around in 'The Weirdness of Cabalarkon', which is set in late Tantalar 5980 on the Inner Earth of Sedon's Head (late December 1980 on the Outer Earth). Here's a sequence from near the end of Weirdness:

“Where’s your pretty little painted box, skinny Auntie Wildie?” wondered Tina, tears under control now that she felt, howsoever erroneously, safe in her mother’s arms.

Sundown let Wilderwitch go. Thought better of it immediately, picked her up bodily just as she started to swoon and carried her over to the nearest available sofa. Whereupon he laid her down, stepped back and let Mel-Illuminatus deal with redressing the seepage-drenched bandage around her right thigh.

He didn’t feel bad about her. Didn’t fell bad about what he’d been intending to do to her ever since Percy begged for her life by blaming the Witch. He felt bad for them, all of them, for himself as much as for her and everyone else, what was left of the Family Zeross and their just-this-morning, four lost fellows in D-Brig.

He knew what fit into a little lacquered box. The remnants of Psycho’s brain!

And how is it that such a seemingly whacked-out notion as a brain in a box merits an entry in Serendipity Now,? Hey, apparently it isn't such a whacked-out notion after all. From weirdness to wryness, here's a verbatim steal from the year-end issue of Maclean's Newsmagazine (December 27, 2004). I gather the writer is one Ken MacQueen, Maclean's Vancouver Bureau Chief.

"Thomas DeMarse: Florida professor creates Frankensteinian 'brain in a dish.' Seems rat neurons linked selves together to create 'living brain' able to control movements of aircraft simulator. Raises question. Does world need flying rats?'

Sooth said I believe the world already has flying rats. They're called bats and PHANTACEA on the Webis full of the buggers. So is Serendipity.

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Winter 2003/4: Bad Rhad as Ahriman

The very first time I put up an instalment of Serendipity, back in December 1996, I began it in this way: 'Honestly, I didn't make it all up, -- Just Most of It!' With that in mind, allow me to assure you I definitely didn't make up the VAM Entity; just didn't know much about the originally Vedic and ancient Persian deities often referred to in the PHANTACEA Mythos as Varuna, Mithras and Ahriman. (The A-Guy also goes by Rhadamanthys {"Bad Rhad"} and, when he does manifest himself, is usually addressed as the Judge.)

I did know Varuna was a cognate of Uranus, the original Mediterranean sky god (Mediterranean as in Cretan, Hittite and Greco-Roman); that his female counterpart was Gaea, Mother Earth, and that the Roman Mithras was born on the Winter Solstice after a bolt of lightning hit a rock or boulder. (Shades of Jesus Christ, -- but now's not the time to get into why the western world's mostly Christian rather than Mithraic.)

It isn't a stretch to identify the bolt of lightning with Varuna's sperm and the rock with Gaea's egg or ovum. It might have been a stretch to identify Mithras with Kronos, Saturn, Father Time, as I did in "Thrygragon", the opening chapter of 'The Trigregos Gambit'. Call it artistic license if you want but it made a degree of sense in that Kronos was the first of the Titans, the next generation of Mediterranean gods and goddesses.

As you're probably aware Kronos was the father of Zeus by his fellow Titan, Rhea, an embodiment of Mother Earth like Mama Gaea. By Kronos and Rhea, Olympian Zeus had two brothers, Poseidon and Hades, and three sisters, Hera, Hestia and Demeter, yet another Earth Goddess. There were a number of other Olympians, at least six by most counts, and in PHANTACEA they're considered devils. To be more precise they're described as Mithradite Master Devas; that is to say devils born in the third generation of devazurkind to Thrygragos Varuna Mithras and the Trigregos Sisters.

As we discovered in 'The Moloch Manoeuvres'their power focuses or talismans were contained in the Olympian Tantalus. In 'Helioddity' we discover most of the devils themselves (rather, to be absolutely accurate, their spirit selves) are contained in rings belonging to Angelo "Angie" Zeross, the first Ringleader (Oddity is set in 1938). Angie's often referred to as Ringkeeper for exactly that reason. So why isn't Thrygragos Varuna Mithras referred to as Thrygragos Varuna Ahriman Mithras? Answer is the A-guy has an interesting ability. No one can remember he exists unless he shows himself.

I've made comment on Bad Rhad previously in this space (October 1997: "The Smiling Fiend as Judge Druj"). What makes for an entry in the Serendipity section of six years later (Winter 2003/4) could therefore be considered a follow-up. According to Zaehner's 'The Dawn and Twilight of Zoroastrianism', the term 'mithrandruj' means 'he who lies unto Mithra' or 'he who breaks the contract'.

The author claims Mithra = contract whereas Druj = lie. Certainly Mithras was the guarantor-god of contracts from as far back as Pharaonic-Hittite times. (The Treaty of Kadesh, made between the Pharaoh Ramses II and the Hittite King Muwatallis, is the western world's oldest known peace treaty. It concluded the Battle of Kadesh, circa 1285 BC, and had Mithra as its guarantor. I've seen it in Istanbul and I've heard there's a copy of it in the foyer of the United Nations building in New York City.)

Zaehner further claims Varuna can be equated with the Zoroastrian top dog, Ohrmazd or Ahura Mazda ("Lord Wisdom"), while Mithra and Ahriman are his subordinates. In the author's interpretation, Mithra is the Zoroastrians' Holy Spirit and Ahriman (Angra Mainyu) is its Destructive Spirit. Be that as it may, for purposes PHANTACEA I have long held that Varuna, Ahriman, and Mithras are three equal yet initially separate individuals, the first born triplets of Thrygragos Sedon.

As told in 'Forever and 40 Days', which is still available for ordering, and again in Helioddity: "Helios Goes Nuclear", they fused into one solid Great God, Thrygragos Varuna Mithras, at least as long ago as when Heliosophos, the Male Entity, had his fellow time-tumbler, the Female Entity, Miracle Memory, nuke Weir Star. Hardly any one ever talks about a Thrygragos Varuna Ahriman Mithras because, as you've probably already forgotten, the A-Guy's an eminently forgettable devil.

(NOTE: The images to either side of this entry are details taken from postcards I purchased in Nemrut Kommagene in Turkey during a tour I took through the area in September 2003. The one on the left has been identified as Zeus-Oromasdes but, in terms of the PHANTACEA Mythos, it's more reminiscent of Thrygragos Varuna Mithras. As for the one on the right, which supposedly looks like Elvis Presley, it's been identified as Apollon-Mithras-Helios. However, again in terms of the PHANTACEA Mythos, to my mind it's more reminiscent of Thrygragos Lazareme.)

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Autumn 2003: The VAM not in Vampires

In "At Last, Magister Mandam", the final chapter of the 'Helioddity' web serial you'll find the following statement:

If Mandam was the equivalent of Mithras beyond the Dome then Mystery Might was equally the Kore of the Korant Sisterhood out here.

Mystery Might is the honourific often given to Clymene born Catreus Atreides, the old-time witch 'guru' of many of the gypsy and Etocretan women featured throughout the 1938 story sequences. Serendipitously, as I was revising Odd-15 for this time up's instalment of PHANTACEA on the Web I bought a copy of R. C. Zaehner's 'The Dawn and Twilight of Zoroastrianism'. It was originally published in 1961 and was released in paperback format by Phoenix Books, London, in 2002.

In it, the author claims Vedic and pre-Zarathustra Persian belief systems related to non-Roman Mithraism had a term, 'maya', that mean just that: mysterious might! He states that both Varuna and Mitra were 'mayin', that is to say they possessed mysterious powers. In the PHANTACEA Mythos Varuna and Mithras make up two-thirds of the VAM Entity. The third-third, PHANTACEA's A-Guy, appears throughout 'Helioddity'. (Though you'd be forgiven if you forget he's around. I always do.)

And to think last time up, in Summer 2003, I did a Serendipity segment about what looked to be a pre-Columbian, that is to say Mayan, vampire cult. Which at least partially explains the title of this segment. There's more, though.

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Summer 2003: Vampires in pre-Columbian Honduras

What was 'The Moloch Manoeuvres' about? Well, ostensibly it was about a Vampire Maker out to make boy babies before he turned himself. (Actually it was more about some of the stumble-bumbles various Summoning Children were making as they strove to cope with their newly emerging supranormal abilities.) Who was one of the main characters attempting to play a Trigregos Gambit in 'The Trigregos Gambit'? A certain Vampire Queen of the Dead, that's who. And what was the title of the fifth book in the 1938 cycle of stories? 'The Vampire Variations', that's what. Safe to say there's been a fair amount of bat-battling in PHANTACEA on the Web.

Back in January of 2003 the group I was in was making its way overland from Guatemala to Costa Rica. We stopped, unfortunately all too briefly, in a little town in northern Honduras called Copan Ruinas, which is about twenty minutes walk from, you guessed it, the Mayan ruins of Copan. While perhaps not on the scale of similarly aged crumblies in Mexico (Palenque or Chichen Itza, to name a couple I've seen) it does have its attractions, one of which seems to suggest the existence of pre-Columbian vamps in the New World.

According to a plaque I read and photographed in the museum there, the Copan Mayans had a bat cult that required of its initiates, who were mostly priests and ruler types, blood sacrifices and possibly ritual cannibalism, including the drinking of blood. Makes one wonder who really invented Dracula: Bram Stocker, the Carpathians or the Mayans, doesn't it?

The plaque was beside a handsome, if a mite chipped, statue of a vampire bat. I liked it so much I incorporated it into a couple of potential front covers for 'The Moloch Manoeuvres', a PHANTACEA on the Web Print Publication I'm still considering self-publishing. As for the other image in this entry, looking at the fangs on the snout-thing in the middle of it either it's representative of a changeling vamp or they had some even strangers gods or demons in Copan than just bats.

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Summer 2002: Serendipitous Sightings

| Blind Sundown and Raven's Head | Sorciere and Granny Garuda | Wilderwitch and Wildman Dervish Furie |

(Original text accompanying these pictures can be found in the topic section of the Summer 2002 Web-Publisher's Commentary)

In the 1938 cycle of stories a Summoning Child by the name of John Sundown is seemingly protected by what we presume is a demon and learn to call a Raven Fetishim. In the Launch Tetralogy and in the After Limbo sequences he (by now long Blind Sundown) and his fellow Creature of the Cosmos, Raven's Head, are effectively partners. The three snapshots in the row below struck me as being relevant to their his and her stories.
Mural spotted in Merida, Mexico, is reminiscent of Blind Sundown	Statue spotted behind Leighton House in London, England is suggestive of Blind Sundown & Raven's Head battling an Ophidian of some sort	Wooden Raven-like figure with a face on its belly is somewhat suggestive of Sundown's Raven Fetishim. However, it's more strongly suggestive of something Shaman Manitoulin might use as his totem
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The images on the row above are suggestive of Sorciere, Granny Garuda and their enmity for members of the Ophirant Sisterhood, lamiae and their Ophidian supporters. A Summoning Child wearing Granny's regalia causes considerable havoc in the Summer 2003 episodes of 'Helioddity'.
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Gentleman Jervis Murray and Wilderwitch are long-time lovers but the Witch refuses to go anywhere near him when he's in Wildman Dervish Furie mode, which he is throughout most of 'The Weirdness of Cabalarkon'. Oddly enough, that the Furie appears to be some sort of faun, like the two satyr masks above, which I spotted in Antigua Guatemala in 2001, doesn't make any difference to her. Oddly because, well, everyone knows what fauns are good at doing. They're as horny as they're horned.
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October 2001: Pyrame & The Atomic Twins (Osiraq)

Not sure how serendipitous this is given recent events on the birthday of one of my nieces but it occurs to me that this year marks the anniversary of something the Israelis did with respect to Iraq twenty years ago. Occurs to me also that as I launch 'The Damnation Brigade' (Month One - After Limbo), which starts out twenty-one years ago in December 1980, and 'Helioddity', which eventually picks up from where 'The Moloch Manoeuvres' left off in January 1938, that one of the featured characters in both serials is Pyrame Silverstar.

Also known as the Pauper Priestess, this Pyrame has a number of claims to fame within the PHANTACEA Mythos. For the purposes of this season's Serendipity I'll mention only one of them. In the Forty-Ninth Century of the Dome she not quite single-handedly stopped the expansion of the Empire of the Lathakra. Two of those who helped her were the Idiot Twins, Tammuz and Osiraq, who blew themselves up, with the result being Ghostlands, -- what had been up until that time the Laughing Lands of the Glorious Dead or, in terms of Outer Earth mythology, the Elysian Fields. As was described in one of the early chapters of 'Helios on the Moon' the Ghosts are now radioactive. Turns out the Idiot Twins were Atomic Twins.

And what was the name of the Iraqi nuclear reactor the Israelis destroyed twenty years ago? Well, it wasn't Tammuz. Could it happen again? Wouldn't want to speculate, would I? Especially not when I've already paid for my airline tickets to Guatemala next month. Hope there's still some airports left.

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February 2000: Xuthros Hor, the Genesea & the Grand Alignment

As the writer I somewhat immodestly have to tell you that, in my not at all humble opinion, 'Helios on the Moon': 'Yajur on the Moon' is replete with more than a few great lines. Some pretty good dialogue too. Here's a sample of it:

"Ironic, isn't it,[" the Female Entity told her male counterpart, "]Twenty years from now humans throughout the Outer Earth will be celebrating the start of a new millennium. They'll think it marks two thousand years after the birth of Christ, but what they really should be celebrating is the start of the seventh millennium after the Genesea and Dark Sedon raising the Cathonic Dome."

"How so?"

"Because, in early May Year 2000, the same conditions that allowed Hor to unleash the Flood will repeat for the first time since he pulled it off. It's called the Grand Alignment, which is to say the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, as well as the Sun, Moon, and Earth, will all be roughly in the same celestial configuration."

A piece I clipped out of the Vancouver Sun earlier this month had as its headline: "Doomsayers get new life as planets fall into line". To quote: "It's been 6,000 years years since this particular celestial configuration last occurred." Later on in the piece, to quote again, "Richard Noone, a Georgia-based futurist ..., says the conjunction of forces could magnify magnetic fields and trigger a huge solar storm." The Male Entity, being Helios and, as such, named after the Grecian Sun God, might like that.

Piece doesn't say anything about the Great Flood, or the possibility of it repeating, one way or another, but I figure that's why I've got a Serendipity Feature out here in Cyberia. Just thought I'd mention it is all.

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