The Short Story: My shot at Sci-fi - H.U.D.

Before I begin this story, this is very spur-of-the-moment. I got this visual of a man connected to a lot of wires, when I saw the myriad of wires coming out from my computer's CPU case. It might seem slightly inspired from Robocop. So here goes...

He just sat there, on his special chair. He looked around contentedly and had a smug smile on his face. He was very happy.

There were a lot of people around him. All of them wore a special suit, a sort of glistening, metallic suit. They all looked very important and "classified" in their attire. They were carrying around a lot of electronic equipment. Wires, transistors, chips, motherboards, the works. He looked down suddenly at his hand and noticed some wires jutting out from his wrist. They were small wires, the sort that bring the telephone connection to your homes. He looked at them with some curiosity, but was not altogether alarmed at their presence. "Nice!", he thought to himself. "I'm wired!", he joked to himself and chuckled at his seemingly intelligent joke. The truth was not far from what he had just stated.

A woman came to him, carrying a large bundle of cables with her. She came over to him and connected one end of cables to his neck. Mind you, "connected" them to his neck.

Now, behind his chair was a wall of metallic fluid. It seemed to continuously flow downwards. It was a circular wall of fluid and seemed confined to that perfect circle. And it had this appearance of a flow. Around this fluid was a lot of machinery, a huge mechanical being of some sort. Lots of wires and metal and pipes and gears and pistons and machinery basically! You get me, don't you? Just this big mechanical behemoth.

The woman thrust the other end of the cables into the fluid wall. They seemed to float for sometime, before being pulled in and made taut. One could hear a sound of some sort of connection on the other end, a loud click. All the workers stopped in their tracks and looked towards him. He looked back at them and waved at them, smiling all the time. It was at this time that he realised that he had wired attached to his arms too. A lot of thick wires. "Hmmm... Cute!", he said to himself, then turned to the workers and said aloud to them, "I've got a lot of wires attached to me!" They looked back at him with incredulity and carried on with their work. "Awesome!", he replied cheerily to their cold demeanour. He looked around him now, for the first time realising that there were wires coming out from almost every patch of skin on his body. He made an expression of being impressed and continued to smile. Then another woman came over to him, carrying a clipboard. She also carried some sort of sensor, which she thrust into his right eye. He complied without any fuss and continued to smile. Her elbow scraped his chest and he chuckled. "She likes me!", he thought to himself. He was still beaming brightly when she was done noting the results of her eye scan. She took a deep breath and asked him stand up. He enquired with actions, "Stand up? Me? Ok!" He was cheerful as ever. He stood up.

Creaks. Newly attached titanium joints were creaking as they moved for the first time. He was oblivious to these noises. "Please move forward" requested the woman. "Sure!", he replied. He took his first step.

A loud metallic thunk on the metallic grilled floor as metal foot met metal floor. He continued to walk. As he walked, the myriad of wires attached to him and flowing into the fluid wall started to unravel behind him. They started coming out from the fluid; long, continuous wires. He walked and the wires continued to follow him, still taut. Everyone was recording his progress in different contexts. He was oblivious to all the activity around him. He simply walked. Then suddenly, he could walk no more. The wires wouldn't allow him. They had stopped unraveling. He didn't understand what had happened. He wore a bemused smile as tried to move forward. And then, he had a vision.

Not "a" vision actually, it was his vision which had changed all of a sudden. It first acquired a greenish tint. Figures started appearing in his sight. A lot of numbers seemed to be juggling in a mess which he could not make out. Then, some coherence. The top left showed a battery symbol, with a full charge. The top right showed him that his current primary weapon was single fire semi-automatic pistol. The bottom left told him that he had at the present 5 flashbang grenades at his disposal. The bottom right told him that his body chasis was currently at a 100% with no physical damage. The center of his vision had a cross-hair. He lifted his right hand. He focussed on the top right of his vision and a drop-down menu appeared. Simultaneously, a compartment above his wrist opened and out popped a barrel. The drop-down menu had just two options at present. Single-fire and automatic fire. He selected automatic fire, because it was the other option and it seemed fun. The barrel rotated and a second, slightly different type of barrel came in its place. One of the workers pushed a button and a target appeared in front of our man. He aimed his hand at the target and let out a burst of automatic fire. Deafening sound resonated in the chamber. The target was riddled with bullet holes at all places. His top-right vision now told him he had 38 bullets left from a clip of 50 bullets. He looked at that portion of his screen again and felt like putting away the gun. The barrel shut itself back into its compartment. He looked around, all stunned and dreamy.

Then suddenly, he shuddered. The wires seemed to give him jolts of electricity. He sat down on his knees as the shuddering became unbearable. "Please make it stop!", he whined for the first time in pain, as he grabbed the leg of the nearest worker. The shuddering continued. And just as suddenly as it had started, it stopped.

The wires on his body went limp. One by one, they disconnected from his body and were dragged into the fluid behind him. His eyes closed for a while. When he opened them, his vision was once again full of the information that he had been fed a while ago. Text started appearing in front of his eyes.

WELCOME TO HEADS UP DISPLAY SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION SYSTEMS. THIS SYSTEM IS DESIGNED TO ASSIST YOU ON THE BATTLEFIELD AND PROVIDE WEAPONS SUPPORT AND STRATEGIC COMMUNICATION WITH ONLINE SYSTEMS.

More text followed, but it all seemed too technical for him. He only realised that it was all just to help him. Then, for the first time, a friendly woman stepped up to him, as all his displays were finished and he was in a stand-by mode, ready for action.

She said these helpful, re-assuring words, "Welcome, Hud!"

To be continued...

I'm sitting at my computer and this word pops up in my mind. Prior to this, I was surfing IMDb.com, looking at hot pictures of hot actresses in the updates, which mentioned they were brand new pictures from G.I.Joe: The Rise of Cobra. Alongside that, I was chatting to two sets of friends; one, a school friend, two, college friends. All three of them are doing some sort of management school/MS entry exam class (GRE and CAT). So are many others. My plan to meet an old friend tomorrow got cancelled because he has classes in the afternoon. And I'm here, slacking like a character from an Apatow movie! F***!!

Anyway, so this word pops up. Pretty cool word, I think. My keyboard's "r" is giving me a lot of trouble. I typed in 'Petty' twice in the line above before realising the 'r' is missing. The consequences of playing too many games, although I don't remember using the 'r' in too many games... Hmmm...

So this word pops up in my head. Pretty cool word, I think (got ya this time "r", you...!) I've got Chrome. My browser... is Chrome... You got that? Yeah, right, that. So, I've got Chrome and I press F6, type in xenophobia and Enter. Educated folk out there must be shaking their head (this guy is writing a blog and he doesn't know what xenophobia is?), but anyway, I searched it. First entry is the wiki entry. Clicked it, hmmm, ok, fear of people. Right, isn't that like misanthropy? (Yeah! I know that word!) No wait, that's hatred for people. This is FEAR of people. Right...

F***! I'm suffering from xenophobia! No, honest! Like I mentioned in my first post (first as in, after the makeover), I HATE MEETING NEW PEOPLE!! See xenophobia is actually fear of strangers. Ah, crap it, I'll put in the first paragraph from Wikipedia:

Xenophobia

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Xenophobia is an intense dislike and/or fear of people from other countries. It comes from the Greek words ξένος (xenos), meaning "foreigner," "stranger," and φόβος (phobos), meaning "fear." The term is typically used to describe a fear or dislike of foreigners or of people significantly different from oneself.

General

According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the word xenophobia consists of two parts: xeno, a combining form meaning "guest, stranger, person that looks different from you, foreigner", and phobia, "fear, horror, or aversion esp if... morbid...".

Ok! So I have an intense fear of strangers! Really! I'm always scared to meet new people. I'm very shy, and very rarely mix well with people. In parties where I don't know anybody, I'm sitting in the corner, with my soft drink in my hand, just looking at all those social butterflies socializing. I do not have the guts to go up and talk to someone new. I always wait for the other person to make the first move. Agar koi nahi aaya, kisi ne baat nahi ki, toh aur bhi acha! No tension. Damn!

This is serious! I'm suffering from a cool word...

Rant Over.

The types of post one might expect here

1.The Rant - When I'm mindf&%*#d. This post will be rambling with no coherence. If anyone finds coherence, then I'll thank that person for making me feel like a modern artist with words. This post will usually end with Rant Over.

2.The Film Review - I thought, why not? I see SOOOOOOOOO MANY movies. Might as well put what I feel about one in writing. This post will start with The Film Review.

3.The Script - I'll try coming up with some random scenes, short film scripts or something else of the sort. Interested parties can contact me and we can try and make some of these a reality. This post will start with The Script and end with The End.

4.The Short Story/Story - Structered version of The Rant. Hopefully will have some coherence and will be written when I'm in a better state of mind.

5.My Book - I'm trying to write a book. I started in 2006 (! :P) and have so far written only the prologue and one chapter. Arjun knows. Let's see if I can revive that. These will start with Chapter No. 

Now let's see if I can keep up with this format that I've put up for myself.

Cya on the other side, brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers and............... you get the picture...

That script I mentioned in the earlier post...

For your reading pleasure...

INT/NIGHT/HOTEL CORRIDOR

(We use a track-right camera movement, in a slow pace. We are focussed close to the ground, and we see a pair of legs walk into the frame. The trousers are gray in colour, formal trousers & black leather shoes are worn. Also to the top of the frame, we notice the lower portion of what looks like a briefcase. We are still tracking right, when a door opens and the man walks in.)

INT/NIGHT/HOTEL ROOM

(The briefcase is thrown on the bed; it falls right in front of the camera. In the background, we notice the man, out-of-focus, going into the bathroom.

We have a tight close-up on the tap, water is running from it. Hands in the water. Water is splashed on the face. The towel is pulled down from the rod. The face is wiped [the first time we see the face of the man] and we hear a phone ringing. The man looks down to his pocket. He whips out the phone, looks at the caller-id, grimaces and answers the call)

MAN

Haan Smita! Bolo...Kya?! Nahin, abhi nahin, mein busy hoon! Kaam kar raha hoon baba...!

(Man walks towards his briefcase, still talking. From the POV of the briefcase, phone between shoulder and ear, opening the briefcase, he continues.)

MAN

Ae, aise mat bol, maine kal hi bataya tha!! Haan! Ab tum sunti nahi toh...!Abhi... abhi.... arre! Accha... haan haan, le kar aaonga! Arre ghabra mat! Accha theek hai... Haan haan I LOVE YOU!

(Snaps the phone off. Goes back to his briefcase. Walks towards the window, surveys his surroundings, looks out, opens the window. Frame is from outside the window. Goes back to his briefcase, comes back with a frame of some sort. Places it and goes back.

We now see tight close-ups of equipment being snapped into place. We see his fingers calliberating meters and eye-scopes.

From behind him, he exits the frame, we realise, it's a SNIPER RIFLE.

Man goes to the fruit basket, gun behind him, out-of-focus. Takes a banana, starts eating. Again phone rings.

He is walking as he is talking.)

MAN

Haan sir, haan sir. Mein yaheen hoon. Haan haan, koi dikhat nahin thi, bahut aasaan the woh dono. Yeh thoda difficult lagta hai, kaafi door hai naa, isliye. Haan, sir. Ho jaayega. Theek hai sir. Ok sir.

(Snaps phone shut. Looks out the window. We see what he sees, OS [Over-Shoulder].

Focus on the building, across the road. We see a window light up.

Back to man. He sits at his position. Calliberating his scope. Now, we see his scope's view, with the cross-hairs, focussing on the lighted window. We notice there's another SNIPER on the other side.

Tight close-up of main man's pupil.)

MAN

OH SHIT!!

(BANG! Focus on man's back, he falls bacl towards camera, gun all alone. Now, we Dolly out [camera movement] from main man's window, go across the road and into the other SNIPER's room. He is dressed in T-shirt with some rock band's image printed on it, having long hair, like a rocker. He calls.)

SNIPER

Haan bhai! Rathod ka aadmi tapka diya, haan! Theek hai...

(Disconnects. His phone rings. He answers.)

SNIPER

Hmmm? Arre dudhi laya hai baba!!

(Now we see his side profile, man is in focus. He goes out-of-focus, foreground comes into focus, we see a plastic bag with dudhi in it.)

THE END

There might be some linguistic/grammatical errors. Deal with it!

Rant Over.

I am broken

People who know me, say I'm funny and a joker. That may be true. Wait, it IS true. I am a joker. Nothing like Heath Ledger, but nothing less either. If that makes sense.

Let me let you in on a secret. It's no secret actually (why am I doing this??), but the truth is that I'm a bit shy. I'm very scared to meet new people. Ask anyone whom I've met for the first time. So, when I meet new people, I'm all very shy and everything. And then when I get to know them, WHAM! I'm the Joker! No, really! I turn into this beast, who just can't stop cracking the worst jokes ever known to mankind!

And then there's this other habit. I stick to people. You see, I've only ever had this many real friends. They're the ones who don't mind me sticking to them. So, I just stick to someone who gets a little comfortable with me. And that sucks. The sticking bit. Everyone wants their space...

And this is the worst bit! I KNOW MY FAULTS!! I f&%*$)g know my faults! And yet...!

This has caused me to lose many prospective friends, the result of which is that I'm a very bitter man. I'm never anyone's confidante, never anyone's run-to guy, never anyone's come-over-let's-have-some-fun guy. Just a lonely bum. This is why I’m a bitter guy.

There's this person on Facebook, who's my "friend". Arjun introduced me to her writing. She tags me in her notes now and then. And I can't tell you how much I identify with her work. It's a different thing that I absolutely do not understand why she writes dark stuff in her work when she appears to have so many true friends who dote over her. Her pictures tab shows so many photos of her enjoying with a large group of friends. Try finding something like that in my photo area. And yet, her words fit my feelings of utter despair like a hand in a glove. Her name is Anisha Sharma. And I salute her.

So, even though my "friends" think of me as a funny person, I'm not. See my last two creative works, The Assignment and Neighbours. Short films that I've made. Both have grim endings. And people expect me to make comedies.

I act in comedies, that is, the school/college plays. But I'm just so full of shit!

I attended this script-writing workshop. At the end, the guy asked us to write a small script. Even there, I wrote one where someone dies. I'm so full of death and misery! The concept I have in my head right now also ends with the protagonist’s suicide. Oh God!

I need help.

 

Rant Over.

Setting the mood of this blog...

Rant begins.

Just so you know, these past few posts are just so yesterday and juvenile. This is just to show you the sort of change that you'll will see from me now onwards, atleast as far as the blog is concerned. Cliched and overused as it may seem, this time the blog is going to be regularly updated, so one might just feel like looking at it once in a while. And I'm really sad.

Rant over.