What Mr Tan doesn’t know abt the Internet – Part 1

So you people have come all this way just to ask me the fucking question – who is going to win? Let me put it this way – no, let me for once compress my explanation into something as compact as a pill. 

Many believe this is a grand show down between the Internet and the apparatus of mass assimilation, that we all call the mainstream press. But nothing can be further from the truth. 

You can only buy into that proposition, if you believe sites such as wayang party aka temasek review aka temasek review emeritus and recently satay club are trully independent and do not harbor a hidden agenda. I’ve never believed in that idea. I have always believe these are sites that are sponsored directly by the government to gain a beach head in the internet. That’s one reason why they take pot shots at everyone except us. They know we have enough incriminating to blow them till kingdom come twice over with half to spare Gentlemen.

I understand if most netizens view this theory as counter intuitive; after all sites such as temasek review seem to be irredeemable as they often display a very clear anti establishment slant. But what did you numbskulls really expect if the goal is to control the ebb and flow of thoughts and states of mind in the Internet. This goes back to the prisoners capper – I am sure many of you have heard how it works- in this hypothetical scene – the objective is get incriminating evidence from a suspect that’s holding out- and this is accomplished is by putting a policeman masquerading as a criminal in the same cell as the suspect. This hardly requires any elaboration. As far as the psychologic aspects are concerned they too hardly require any elaboration. I shall leave the details to your imagination Gentlemen.

So coming back to the question of who will win – it’s clear as day, TT will win. As for TKL, he will be torn to shreds by the same medium which he is trying to seek support from, the Internet. That’s because most dummies out there can never ever conceive the remote possibility of Temasek review being anything other than an anti establishment site that emerged from the online fraternity. In reality, Temasek review is none of these things. It is nothing short but the sum of all our fears Gentlemen, I warned you all of this. 

Nonetheless if Temasek Review is dumb enough to stir shit against TKL and brazen enough to character assasinate TKL without rhyme or reason. Then I might just throw my support behind that muppet, that’s to say, I’ve write and write and write like a man shoveling coal into the furnace and I care not whether it burns down the entire neighborhood.

The way I see it, we have always stood for fair play. If someone wants to win, play it fair and square. That has always been our credo, that’s why we have thrived for over 4,000 years. If any quarter believes otherwise, we will simply have to knock on their door. And they have no one to blame after we have finished with them. It matters very little to me what happens thereafter or whether it was worth it – some battles, we (the brotherhood) will simply have to fight till the last man and material.

Do you understand me Gentlemen?

Now you have my answer. Go now. And tell this to the Council of the dumb. I kid you not, when I say to you that if TR is silly enough to go down this road named perdition. We will simply have to close ranks, form a neat line and blunt their efforts. This we can do with remarkable ease. Don’t even need to reach out to many either. A little goes a long way…a very long way. Gentlemen, believe me, when I tell you all I much prefer to spend the remainder of my days tending my palm oil estate than to fight for someone that I care very little for. But it seems, I may not have a choice.

Now they know the score.

Darkness 2011
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Darkness: “There are ten packages of information relating to Wayang Party. Each one is triple encrypted using a series of vending machines that I have connected to 15 different servers around the world. Each packet of data never stays in one place for more than 30 seconds. If an authorized code is keyed more than 3 times. It will automatically go back to a place called home. Only I know where this place is. I am telling you all this Gentlemen. You need not force it out of it. Or even pay me a dime. Take it because this is proof that TR is what I say it is. Go now! Meanwhile find out who is behind this smear campaign. Remember everyone reports to everyone, so work the channels and sniff high and low. Do you all understand?”

3rd stage Navigator: “No quite Darkness. Are you asking us to prepare for war?”

Darkness: “Not in so many words Mr Navigator. Not in so many words. Only let us say, good must win over evil.”

3rd stage Navigator: Long live the Brotherhood!

Darkness: “Yes, that too.”

Recorded very recently by the Chronicler of the Brotherhood in the Book of Ages under the Chapter: The Suriman Expedition / transcript of conversation intercepted by the deep space mineral cruiser KDD Dr Zhivago – The Brotherhood Press 2011  

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Controller of Northern Sector in Ursala Major: “61, we are requesting a link to sector 51.”

Shalimar the Clown: “Sector 51, we have closed all operations in Singapore.”

Controller: “We are requesting a streaming link to sector 51. This is priority red over.”

Shalimar the Clown: “Rodger that! I will prepare for you guys to land as soon as I can find a blog.”

Controller: “Long live the Brotherhood!”

Shalimar the Clown: “Long live the Brotherhood!”

Message transcript recorded by an auto-bot crawler at sector 51 / The Brotherhood Press 2011

Get Darkness Back! – Part II

Council of the Wise: Singaporedaddy share with us the progress on the search for Darkness and his crew.

Singaporedaddy: Your Excellencies, 3 days ago our first expedition team discovered a Rolex Explorer 1. We believe it may have belonged to Darkness.

Council of the Wise: How do you know?

Singaporedaddy: It bears an engraving. A gift from the Interspacing Guild.

Council of the Wise: And the bugger flogged it off!

Singaporedaddy: Yes, for a river boat it seems. So we know he is making his way into the interior through the canals.

Council of the Wise: Find him Singaporedaddy. We need a speaker to represent us in the Confederation meet in Munich.

Singaporedaddy: Your Excellencies. I assure you all that we are doing everything within our power to search for Darkness.

Council of the Wise: Everything?

Singaporedaddy: By every practical definition of the world that is. But there is one proviso…..

Council of the Wise: Out with it man!

Singaporedaddy: You see Gentlemen. It is like this when a captive lion breaks free of his cage, he comes into a wider world. While he was in captivity, there were only two worlds for him – the world of the cage, and the world outside the cage. Now he is free. Roar he will. Perhaps eat human flesh even. But Gentlemen, what I feel duty bound to inform your Excellencies – is the theoretical possibility that lion may never be satisfied – for there is no third world that is neither the world of the cage nor the world outside the cage that can somehow restore order to his troubled soul. Gentlemen Darkness is not so different from that lion. Council would do well to heed my warning.

Council of the Wise: So you believe when he comes out, he will seek revenge against us?

Singaporedaddy: That your Excellencies remains a theoretical possibility. Besides we all know it is easy to take a man out of the jungle. But taking the jungle out from the man is another story.

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Guan Eng was at the threshold of consciousness that permitted him to see the world only prosaically. These days he saw the world only in terms of constrains. This he attributed to maturity. Guan Eng had never always seen the world in such cut and dried terms, not so long ago as a oppositional politician he saw the world through rose tinted glasses – during those days in the wilderness, Guan Eng regarded politics as the art of possibilities. But 3 years is a long time and an eternity in politics and within that span of a mellinia Guan Eng had assumed the coveted office of chief minister of Penang – an occupational liability of being in power meant all illusions he may have once harbored about the world as a good place had distilled into one realization: the world is full of compromises. Sometimes Good triumphs over evil. At other times one simply needs to seek cold comfort in the hope good will triumph over evil. And this meant whatever possibilities pivoted on how one was able to walk the tight rope of placating the many factions  who were responsible for putting him in power. 

If the art of compromise had a name and face; if it had such a thing as a form. That afternoon, it assumed the strange image embossed on the cufflink that Guan Eng rolled between his thumb and index finger. Guan Eng had seen that insignia before some 3 years ago when he was a struggling nobody opposition politician. At first he dismissed them as lunatics. After all what sane person would invest his time and energy in imaginary planets, galaxies and fiefdoms – surely those people had to be off their rockers! During those early days the opposition had no hang up’s cultivating the friendship of even the lunatic fringe – Guan Eng saw no problems in entertaining them; when they offered him what they referred too as “technical” assistance. He accepted – what could possibly come of this? He remembered saying to himself. As Guan Eng moved to the full length glass window in his office, he muttered to himself again – “what could possibly come of this?

Guan Eng would not have been so disturbed had he realize what was offered was not indeed real. During the heady days of the elections, the internet had been hit hard by the ruling party; they had spared no expense and effort to fix them as his father once shared with him – but every time it went down – it was as if a mysterious hand was furiously at work repairing the broken linkages. Guan Eng was left in no doubt part of the reason why he was able to secure his mandate was due to the influence of those who his father referred to as the “hidden hand.”

“We don’t know who they are. But does it matter? What’s important son is, they are on our side for some reason.” His father, a seasoned politician once quipped.

Till now Guan Eng basked in the cold comfort, those who once helped him would never appear in the flesh before him – they couldn’t he reasoned; they were terminally rooted in that other realm of consciousness that could never see the light of day – the internet. Guan Eng reasoned he had nothing to fear from these malevolent forces – so long as they remained trapped in the internet; they were as benign as a genie trapped in an oil lamp – providing no one polished it; that same force would remain forever apart from his existence, never ever once intruding into his present or future life as the newly minted chief minister of Penang.

But that was before the stranger pressed the cufflink into the palm of his hands with the words, “we need your help minister to find a lost friend.”

Guan Eng peered at the strange image embossed on the cufflink – he wondered to himself why these people had suddenly jumped right out from the pages of a fairytale – at that moment an undercurrent of thought seeped into his consciousness – one that Guan Eng found impossible to resist – the possibility that if these people could put him in power; they too could cast him out in the next general elections. 

At that moment Guan Eng picked up the phone and brusquely asked his secretary to show the strangers into an annex where he conducted secret meetings. No sooner had he placed the receiver down – Guan Eng was seized by another more menacing thought – one that instinctively told him, he may not be able to say no to these strangers.

Record recently by the Chronicler of the Brotherhood in the Book of Ages 2011.

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Somewhere in the outskirts of the forest canopy in Sri Manjung
In the moment of his youth Iskandar had always believed spirits roamed the depths of the jungles – thought the local Imam who ran the local Madrasah would have nothing to do with such hocus pocus.

Iskandar the honey hunter knew better; so just as his father and grandpa before him had always done when one reaches the confluence where the river gives way to the mouth of the sea; the place where the murky river water gives way to the paraffin blue of the straits of Malacca. Iskandar knelt before the tall durian tree and asked the spirits to allow him to past safely – usually there would be no answer; but that day, Iskandar sensed someone was watching him. As a boy, Iskandar had heard tales of the Orang Bunyan. Those friends who lived in that other dimension of time and space; he had even heard of incidences where some of his friends from his kampung had slipped into that other world only to reappear again mysteriously, so that day when strangers suddenly appeared before him demanding that he lead them to the Suriman trail. Iskandar the honey hunter led the way obediently.

Recorder recently by the Chronicler of the Book of Ages / the Brotherhood Press 2011

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His name is John Pitcairn, and if he were any more Texan, he’d hop or eat a cactus before you could say Jack Daniels. Though he’s only about five feet and 6 inches, he’s a giant of a man—all blunderbust and fiercely proud of his country and accomplishments.

Pitcairn had been a trucker for 27 years, 6 monts and 3 days in Michigan, pulling in and out of cities was his thing. One day in 2010, he hit the motherload. The red neck American’s magic numbers lined up in the Kentuck lottery and he became an instant multi millionaire.

Shortly after Pitcairn struck gold, he decided to start a heavy life service to shuttle oil well heads from Dallas to the outlying mines that dot two thirds of the world. Incredibly, whenever a wellhead bursted or a digging machine bit the dust. And when everyone stood around wringing their hands at several million lost a day. John Pitcairn would step right up to the plate and save the day.

Unknown to even his closest friends. John Pitcairn was also a gamer who once donated the spacestation he christened after his only daughter Mary Sue. John loved to game and he gamed hard. So when a message popped up in his intray asking him to ferry oversized remote control toys to Malaysia. John instantly recognized the seal of the four houses and cried out loud.

“Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeet Jesus. They’ve finally called me up after all these fucking years of waiting! You hang on there buddy, we’ve find that sucker faster than you could hump a jack rabbit. I kid you not – either that or my name ain’t John Pitcairn!”

One week later a converted Antanov heavy lift landed in KLIA. The manifest read: oil well heads, though one digit was missing from the release note, the man who approved the shipment was heard saying, “these Mat Salleh’s are all alike, they aren’t like us Asians.” Coincidentally the American was wearing a ship embossed with a flying saucer with a caption that said it all, “I want to believe!”

Recorded very recently by the Chronicler of the Brotherhood – 2011

  

Get Darkness Back!

Council of the Wise: Get Darkness back. Surely even you would understand Singaporedaddy that we need a speaker to represent us in Munich!

Singaporedaddy: Your Excellencies, what you all ask is impossible. You see we have lost contact with Darkness and his entire team, it’s as if they have all disappeared from the face of the planet.

Council of the Wise: Yes, we have heard as well…but surely there is a way Singaporedaddy.

Singaporedaddy: Gentlemen, its been nearly 8 months. I can only imagine what it would be like to spend such a length of time in the interior of the jungle.

Council of the Wise: If we cannot find Darkness, perhaps he can find us.

Singaporedaddy: What do you mean Sir’s?

Council of the Wise: Have you heard of the Sarah project.

Singaporedaddy: Yes, we all have your excellencies. If memory serves, it was one of Darkness’s crackbrained plans to bring back to life his dead girlfriend. Unfortunately, he pulled the plug on that project.

Council of the Wise: So it seems. What if I said to you the Sarah Project was never ever cancelled. What if I went on to say a break through has been made and according to our Dusseldolf chapter, they have managed to bring her to life.

Singaporedaddy: Then I would have to say….love will find a way and we already have our star speaker to represent us all in Munich.

Council of the wise: Yes. Love will find a way.

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Life it seemed stretched out in one solitary thin line for Lim Teck Hing aged 47. In his youth, he had once played a game where he manned an obscure space station in mining sector of Ursula Ibanada. Mr Lim enjoyed the game immensely. Though the affairs of Ursula Ibanada can only be described as mundane and required him to track deep space mining vessels, Teck Heng reveled in his role as a 3rd class Navigation officer of the Brotherhood. He would often say to his wife, “it’s an acquired taste, like playing with oversized train set only there aren’t any rails.” One could say the nature of the game appealed precisely to the character Mr Lim as it mirrored his own life. An existence that was played out in the forgotten hamlet of Termelok – where Mr Lim manned the only meteorological outpost in the district of Sri Manjung on the outskirts of the forest reserve in Air Terjun.

Like many others who had heard of the Brotherhood. Mr Lim frequently entertained the remote possibility the fictitious characters who colored the game were real – from time to time; Mr Lim would look out into the desolate night sky and ask of the depths of infinity: “where are you people? When will you come for me in this desolate rock called Ursula Ibanada? I am the 3rd officer. A loyal servant who serves the Brotherhood. When will you people come?” Usually the question would be met with only muted silence.

One day, the 386 computer that Mr Lim usually played the game every morning and evening could not boot up. He wondered perhaps whether it was time to get another motherboard from Ipoh – after all, the circuits were old and the message that kept appearing every time he tried to boot up the program was odd – 706 URL. 

For days Mr Lim wondered to himself what 706 URL meant – then it occurred to him that it may be an access code. A message that was sent from afar. A message that could even be dispatched from the distant galaxy where Primus Aldentes Prime was located. That evening Mr Lim opened the safe where he had dutifully kept the operating manual for the space station he manned all by himself – the cover of the yellowed operating manual read, “steadfast, loyal and ready.” – perusing the manual for the code 706 URL, Mr Lim eventually realized that the message he had received the day before was an order to start up the stargate in the fictitious space station he controlled – he would work for 3 days and nights to prepare for the space jump.

“Yes, they are going to project into the real world…they are coming!” 

That evening 4 Toyota Hilux’s pulled up to the only kopitiam in Termelok. Though Mr Lim had never ever seen any of the characters in the game in the flesh. He immediately recognized the insignia of the four houses when the stranger placed a Zippo lighter on the marbled table. He had heard of guildsmen, those fabled warriors who had once fought the biggest cyber battle in the history of the internet, gamers called the Ascension Wars – and he knew enough of the culture of to realize the stranger who sat before him in dark glasses came from the ranks which the Brotherhood described as the “serious men.”

“You are to take us to through the Suriman Trail. We need to find Darkness.” The stranger said while leaning forward.

“I’ve been waiting all my life for this one day 1st officer. I thought none of you existed. I thought it was just a game, all smoke and mirrors. You know like a fairytale… make belief. Its been so many years 1st officer…..do you want to go now? I have a fake MC that allows me to get away from work for 3 days that should be enough time for us to make it to the river. After that you guys are on your own.”

“Thank you 3rd officer…long live the Brotherhood.” the stranger dressed in fatigues replied while drawing deeply on his cerut.

Mr Lim stood up to attention and exclaimed loudly, “long live the Brotherhood!”

In the same coffee shop a group of old men who may have once bore witness to more strange events than he cared to share for fear of being labelled the village dunce looked on at this curious exchange turned to another. 

“Wasn’t he the boy who once said that there were aliens and flying saucers? You know the one everyone considered crazy?”

To which another replied, “Yes, he was an odd boy then and he is an odd man now…he stayed on here…the others all went to the big cities to look for cushy jobs. But he stayed on and got a job at the top of a hill manning a weather station. He said, they would come one day…how odd.”

And those seated in the long bench nodded in silence, except one who asked,

“They?”

“Yes, they,” the eldest amongst them replied. An old man with a shock of white as he looked up into the starry night sky.”

Entry 80439 – The Book of Ages – recorded by Sarhabat – The Brotherhood.

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Nestled somewhere in the bustling city of Munchen. Hans Chritensen laid the final touches to the Sarah 3D rendition. Since its inception some 10 years ago, funding had been sporadic and the resolve mixed. Hans Christensen cared not for the game or for that matter many of the illusions that clothed it. He viewed himself as one of the clear minded, those who knew the game from the inside out – hence he often be heard recounting in the cafeteria in Bavaria Motor Works,

” Ein Betahaurst technilk!,”

Hans Christensen belonged one of the few who did not believe in the game or for that matter harbor any infantile illusions that the game could somehow be more than itself; just as a man can never be expected to step outside his skin – Hans Christensen had long since come to terms with this reality – to him the game was simply a means to fund many of his programs and experiments for free – in the weekends, Hans Christensen would often recount to his friends in the local pub overlooking the Square in Bandesburg – “you have no idea how many idiots there are in this planet; who are prepared to waste good money on imaginary cars and girls – it seems they are content to pay out without ever bothering with whether anyone at the other side is really doing any serious work…what a bunch of losers!’

That reality would be shattered one day, when a group of strange men turned up unexpectedly in the BMW plant where Hans Christensen worked as a programmer – it may have been providence or as his grandmother said, “Mazahtov,” – fate – that somewhere in between this chance encounter and the iron willed belief the game could be nothing more than a game; that Hans Christensen recognized the seal of the four houses stamped on the tiny gold lapel pin of one the visitors who had taken a special interest in his department and – from that moment onwards, the grandson of the survivors of the holocaust – or the ‘shoal’ realized that those who formed the imaginary ranks of the Brotherhood had projected into the real world – with this realization, Hans Christensen realized that they had come to see for themselves the outcome of the Sarah Project – they had come to square the accounts – and this was clearest when Hans Christensen found himself seated in a ramrod chair in a room as one of the men – the serious men turned to him and asked non chalantly.

“You know why we are here don’t you?……Science officer 2nd class.”

“Yes. I knew you would all come one day. I knew it from the very moment I played the game that one day, this day would come Proconsul. The money that was sent all these years. I realized it could not be for nothing. I want to show you all what I have created in my spare time…”

“Thank you Brother…long live the Brotherhood!”

“Long live the Brotherhood!…shall we say after work…I know a delightful place where they serve fabulous knuckles and real Bavarian beer.”

“Thank you Brother. But we are here on business not pleasure!” 

Entry 88400 – The Book of Ages – recorded recently by the Chronicler of the Brotherhood.

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Some 5 kilometers East, where the river gives way to the infinity of sea in the state of Perak – Kupusamy scanned the horizon with his field glasses as he regularly did after his morning prayers. This the policeman who also doubled as the marine officer and sometimes the forestry officer did 5 times a day, twice to read the datum of the tide that was marked on a tree trunk on a kelong some one nautical mile out at sea; and usually thrice to make out the registration numbers of the barges that ferried supplies from the mainland to the 200 or so inhabitants who occupied the tiny fishing village of Kampung Sungai Rotan – that day Kupusamy registered 4 instead of the 3 barges; another barge had slipped through this narrow stretch where the river gives way to the straits of Malacca in the cover of darkness. As the only figure of authority in the river town of Kampung Sungai Rotan, it was the job of Kupusamy to make enquiries as to the nature and business of those who berthed – but that day, Kupusamy realized it was futile to ask those strangers questions any questions – 3 days ago while giving alms to the elephant deity, Ganesha – the Brahmin priest, a young man who had once studied in MIT only to return back to continue the family tradition of priesthood in Kampung Sungai Rotan had mentioned the coming of the fifth equinox when the moon would turn blood red, strangers would arrive and it would be best if he did not ask too many questions. Before the puja, the young Brahmin had scrawled the insignia of the four houses only to utter the words,

‘Remember somethings we are not meant to know.”

Kupusamy had hardly begun to understood the hidden meaning of those cryptic words – nor was he inclined to try too either; like the pantheons of technicolor Gods that had featured through out his life; Kupusamy realized only too well, it would be futile to ask questions especially when the fate of men were intertwined with that other wheel of life; where fortunes would rise and fall, life and death, joy and happiness and all the contradictions that made up the story of life.

That day as the strangers stepped on the jetty; Kupusamy could just about make out the insignia of the four houses on the baseball cap of one of them. From that moment onwards he remembered the words of the young Western educated Brahmin priest – and so he remained silent recounting some happy tune that swirled in his head from some Hindi movie. Kupusamy did not ask for their papers; he paid them no heed; they were as the Brahmin priest said to be

 “left alone as if they were ghost.”

At the end of the day the policeman entered 3 registration numbers into the only computer in Kampung Sungai Rotan and deliberately left out the fourth. It seemed strange to Kupusamy that the young Brahmin would accompany this group of strangers into the mangrove thicket; stranger still that he was attired in Western clothes. But these were things that Kupusamy, the fifth son of a rubber tapper who hailed from Air Terjun could never ever fathom – the idea that the young Brahmin was none other than a gamer who played the game called the Brotherhood.

This event has been recorded very recently by the Chronicler of the Brotherhood in the Book of Ages.

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Somewhere in Yosemite Park was Jason Lee’s one and only love, LAURA. He had tried to locate what was left of her. If only he could find her. The responder must have run out of juice Jason figured, that could be the only reason why the wreckage wasn’t transmitting – Jason had developed LAURA with seed money from the Interspacing Mercantile Guild. Jason had first tinkered with LAURA when he worked in Hughes, only to be kicked out one day when a security guard discovered a restricted microchip in his locker that should have never left the work hangar. The same thing happened in Phathom works. And that revolving door of in’s and out’s was all Jason had ever knew. The door that Jason passed through was the parting of waves with the Singapore government. Jason was a bondbreaker. And at age 39, the failed engineer had one last throw of the dice – following his dismissal from Hughes. Jason had sold his house and invested everything into LAURA. Now it seemed the crash of his only prototype would see his dream being blown into a million pieces.

That evening as a defeated Jason pulled up to his mountain trailer in Olympiad; he noticed a letter peeking out from the corner of the kitchen sill – he recognized the seal of the four houses and realized it must have been important. An emergency perhaps. That evening Jason would log on into the game, hardly had he entered his seven digit code. A message popped up into his intray.

“Here is the money for 3 units of LAURA. You have crashed the only one we needed, you bloody idiot. So start building the other 3 pronto. Pls bring the LAURA’s and haul your arse to Malaysia. Exact RDZ point will be made known to you later. Obey this.”

That week Jason started to rebuild the three LAURA’s – Low Altitude Unmanned Reconnaisance Aircraft. He reckoned someone important in the game was lost in the real world.

A recent entry in the Book of Ages documented by the Chronicler of the Brotherhood.

 

The Things You Hear in Darkness

Controller: “Sir, we detected an USR at sector 16”

Commander: “Is that one of ours?”

Controller: “Rodger that.”

Commander: “Get an exact fix on the source of that USR.”

Controller: “We can’t do that, responder has activated stealth mode.”

Commander: “Well trace the IP of the call sign then.”

Controller: “Rodger that.”

Commander: “Well.”

Controller: “It can’t be.”

Commander: “Who is it?”

Controller: “It’s Darkness.”

Commander: ” Sound the General alarm.”

Controller: “Rodger that.”

Excerpt of an intercepted deep space communication between the Controller of Space Statin 384 @ sector 4099 in the Strangelands and the commander of the deep space mineral cruiser KDD Californian.