Aphelion

Lunarlucidity wrote:I loved the moral deformity in this. The point is a little convoluted though. The description of the pair is a bit vague. The over all theme of the story was amazing though, and honestly I could see an underworld like this somewhere in America!

It's sort of like a more literal version of the legendary "Hellfire Club"...

Damn -- !

Uh -- no pun intended . . .

I've long been a fan of human perversity, but only to a degree; mostly in its abstract form. Think of how the brain works: tricks like telling someone not to think of a pink elephant. Mark Twain is one of my favorite inspirations in this stuff.

These folks are sociopaths, incorrigible, whether by nature or training, no matter. David is clearly one of those who, given an opportunity, could become the typical dictator who slaughters masses of peasants on a whim, or maybe to alleviate boredom. The kind of person for whom "right" and "wrong" have no meaning, and the only rule is, "don't get caught."

McCamy said:

But when things get bad---i.e. when a glacier moves into our part of Europe and we have to pick and move south for a thousand or so years---we are ready to embrace the notion of every man for himself and step all over anyone who gets in our way.

I agree that we have that capability, but in this story, there is no emergency survival pressure, and even if there were, I don't think most humans would be willing or happy about doing unto others before they do unto you. These people embraced malignant behavior willingly, when there was no necessity involved.

I did like the line about the church being 'desanctified' . . . just had to wonder, by what method?

Disturbing, but very well done.

Lester Curtis wrote:Damn -- !

Uh -- no pun intended . . .

I've long been a fan of human perversity, but only to a degree; mostly in its abstract form. Think of how the brain works: tricks like telling someone not to think of a pink elephant. Mark Twain is one of my favorite inspirations in this stuff.

These folks are sociopaths, incorrigible, whether by nature or training, no matter. David is clearly one of those who, given an opportunity, could become the typical dictator who slaughters masses of peasants on a whim, or maybe to alleviate boredom. The kind of person for whom "right" and "wrong" have no meaning, and the only rule is, "don't get caught."

McCamy said:

But when things get bad---i.e. when a glacier moves into our part of Europe and we have to pick and move south for a thousand or so years---we are ready to embrace the notion of every man for himself and step all over anyone who gets in our way.

I agree that we have that capability, but in this story, there is no emergency survival pressure, and even if there were, I don't think most humans would be willing or happy about doing unto others before they do unto you. These people embraced malignant behavior willingly, when there was no necessity involved.

I did like the line about the church being 'desanctified' . . . just had to wonder, by what method?

Disturbing, but very well done.

I think the technical term is "deconsecrated". The Catholic church, in particular, does this when a church is closed and the property is sold off; presumably, other denominations do something similar. This is different than when a holy site is "desecrated", e.g., when murder is committed in a church.

Just by the way, welcome to the forum, Lunarlucidity.

Two new voices in the space of a week -- I hardly know what to do with myself. I know Mark has to be delighted. The more the merrier!