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Blastbeard

by D23thprog

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1.
Corvi breach the hull Boarding has begun Shields and armour donned Blasters primed...at the ready Mag-boots thud ‘cross the bridge Between the two ships Vacuum all around Space: the pirate frontier Lasers puncturing the skin Lung stuff is leaking out Shouting abounding Now all around all is sound For just one moment calm Descends, a quiet before a storm Plunder booty rape death A pirate frenzy carpe praedam Tricorne crowned He strides amongst The bodies of those His cohorts have made lie cold
2.
5 to 5 02:38
Double gloved, he turns the key Engine roars against the howl Tires grip on compacted snow The horizon white, unforgiving cold Another day begins, 5 to 5 The siren rings Another shift begins Turn the key, the engine stalls Wipers fight to subdue the squall He squints his eyes and sighs aloud His icy breath his only friend The siren rings As the longed-for weekend begins After hours Trudging home Bleary eyes Swaying legs Heavy head Tired mind Plenty of empty spaces But nowhere to hide From himself
3.
There was something not quite right about the dream, Something off about it at the edges. As if it was not fully formed, or rather had begun to decohere and drift off, As if it’s very fabric was unsettled. And there was a soundtrack building Somewhere off in the distance, A thumping tribal incessance, (Or perhaps, he mused, It was coming From inside his own head) Maybe it was blood pumping. And interrupting from within Maybe it was only mindless chatter A cacophonic and empty din
4.
res gestae 01:31
We shook the fiery citadels We subdued ovine proles We wrote our names in neon Were written in their scrolls We dared to dream, to linger As legends of the stars non omnis moriar exegi monumentum aere perennius regalique situ pyramidum altius They came for us Usurpers of acquisition They came for us To despoil that which was ours We bent the will of heavens Dragged planets in our thrall We thundered through the cosmos No orbit was too small
5.
Take a moment and breathe deeply Are you sure that things are as they seem? Gather thoughts Corrupted as you are By the emptiness of everything Count to ten and think Count again and ponder Count once more to ensure You haven’t confused What is with what is not Shake yourself To wake yourself To face yourself And see what’s there Embrace the dichotomy Of your every instantiation Pull on the threads of every past you Weave them together Pattern matching be damned There’s no need to fear Or to shed vain regret No one else ever saw What you thought of yourself See the past for what it was And the now for what it’s not Hold that thought Drink it down As if your life was all your own Hold that thought Drink it deep As if awake was really asleep Count back from 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2…
6.
Terraforming 03:08
import remprog remprog.connect(target = hippocampus) brain_recursion = remprog.map([remprog.map(neuron) for neuron in remprog.neurons]) dreamwaves = remprog.listen(state=REM).quantum_FFT() dreamwaves.autoencode(transform=hyperloglog) remprog.train(dreamwaves.latent_space.sample()) remprog.generate().filter(match = terrorforms.db(id=subject)) brain_recursion.incept(remprog.terrorforms.fractal_inversion()) remprog.recohere() disconnect() While the mind sleeps, the brain reprograms its neurons. Recalibrating the memories to fit your presumptions. We're interfering; this program erases identity. Exquisite torture; manipulation of the chem-trails. Pure terror forming in patterns of fractal recursion. N02 atmosphere collapse; event horizon crossed. Hypercosmic mag car park blast fear beard pride five remprog recohere
7.
Unshackled and free He gets to his feet The remnants of sleep Lie pooling beneath A thaw of a past life Once its snow has withdrawn A mask and disguise That were worn long afore He slews off the gown A former snake self The smile on his face Rewriting the frown Waiting just underneath A light dusting of snow An alternate other Him’s ready to pounce... (He) let’s that him in Flooded with sin Begins practicing Some self-distancing Dressed in new skin (Stitched) from deep down within Until there’s nothing No (more) self-distancing Anamnesis Remembers the sun Remembers the rain As it came gushing down Like their hate and their flames Remembers the times When he knew who he was What he wanted and who He thought he could have been Why so distant now Why so disparate Why so lost, afeared Why can’t he see a way forward What we are today, we have never been before.
8.
parce caedem 02:06
And once... He finds his feet again Gets up to speed again Plundering, pillaging Stealing to stay afloat Tricorne crowned, blood besmirched Grinding foes into dirt Doing whatever Or whomever floats his boat O to be feared ‘cross the whole Of time and space To be known as the one Blastbeard’s ancestral son O to be feared ‘cross the whole Of time and space An intergalactic Hypercosmic disgrace Ahoy and astern and athwart And aprowl again Render to Caesar All that is due to him Hyperspace, milky way Inter and intra space Booty both monetary And trans-planetary Wanted signs abound now His ugly mug, lopsided grin Wanted signs abound now His ugly mug, staring back at... o to be wanted
9.
I think we’re losing him, you know His breath seems shallower Brain activity Is descending sharply I can’t quite make out what he’s trying to say Some fumbled mumbled half sense “Wanted?” “Scrolls?” “Afloat?” “Hope?” I think we’re losing him, you know His breath seems shallower His body is rejecting The Remprog overlay In the rain there are air-drops In the sky there are grass stains Underfoot the sun’s burning on high rivers and lakes loom Lasers whistle from eye-lids Lungstuff issues from mag-boots All around there is dancing Fighting, grasping, 5 to 5 to 5 He’s convulsing His heartbeat’s arrhythmic Ready the paddles Prep the inhibitors Now stand clear And administer He’s flatlining Ready the charges again Blastbeard’s at the helm Are you listening? The course is set, The plan’s in motion now So fire up all the engines And let’s take them down This booty is all ours We shall not restrain our hands

about

‘What we are today, we’ve never been before.’

The words still rang in Blastbeard’s ears, as resonant now as they had been when his number two had awoken him from the operating table and orchestrated his escape from the Remprog facility. He had been groggy then and unsure of who he was. The words, though, had resurrected something lying dormant.

He had been recovering from a farming accident on Gellida 4 where the facility was situated, or that’s what his memories reported, but Nisus, his right-hand man and partner in intergalactic crime had later filled him in: he was Blastbeard, the most awesome, most successful, merciless and feared pirate of his generation; the Hannibalic scourge of pangalactic Nova Roma. He had taken some convincing—the cognitive terraforming had done a real number on him. But Nisus’ insistence and his vivid recollections of their shared escapades had eventually won him over.

And now here the two of them were in what was apparently the epilogue of their story, stuck in the inexorable gravity of the planet-sized xenopod. And the words of the ancient piratical philosopher came back to him, as he tried with all his might to hold on to who he was. It was not easy though.

The beast’s maw opened around them, as he wordlessly repeated the mantra, and its manifold tentacles swarmed, glistening with a self-lubricating and adhesive slime.

What we are today…

His memories coalesced and recombined as the final moments of coherence retreated. Like leaves falling, like branches snapped off, his thoughts were sampled, processed, deleted, subsumed, and repurposed by the creature and its chronoclystic cancer.

Wasn’t he a space pirate? Wasn’t he a brainwashed prisoner on an ice planet? Wasn’t he a newly integrated member of this space cephalopod?

What he was today, he’d always been…

credits

released August 7, 2021

All music written, arranged, mixed and mastered by D23thprog
All words: Wez [aside from lyrics and coding in track 6—Phil—and extracts from Horace’s imperious Odes 3.30 in track 4]
Wez: bass, synths, vocals
Phil: guitars, vocals
EZ drummer: drum loops
Conceived and recorded at Pirate studios

Cover art: Alex Hettel [https://www.facebook.com/alex.h.artwork]

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D23thprog London, UK

Wez: Vox, bass, synths

Phil: Guitars

Lockdown drums: EZDrummer

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