13 Stories, Forbidden Tales of the impending Apocalypse

HEY APATHY! Alternative Comics

In even the most pessimistic of tales, therein lies the brilliance of hope. For the act of putting pen unto paper is expressively optimistic, presenting others an opportunity to grow. That being said, I made a goal for myself to create 13 short illustrated stories before this upcoming New Year. I’d no real intention towards developing such nasty and hopeless fables as I did, in fact I’d no inclination towards writing anything at all,  it just sort of happened. Having abandoned street art performances as a means of promotion/communication in favor of working online and with arts councils & committees, I discovered a sudden and urgent dependency on the written word (stumbling through these poorly conveyed thoughts it’s a wonder I’ve survived this long!).

At first this meant endless hours of essay writings attempting to explain myself and persuade investors or patrons to give me money. That got boring but I knew my writing needed a lot of work so I started making things up. I decided to practice writing the same way tht I approach the development of visual artworks and decided on a series of 13 stories which, theoretically, could be compiled as a print publication. The process then involved a lot of sketching, unedited writing done directly in this blog. After a while some of the stories sort of stuck with me so I’d proceed to do drawings and prepare them for the “online book”. I went through a number of my drafts this evening and think I’ve all the shorts sorted now. Very early this January I’m going to take a few days to edit the h—l out of them and post all the work in it’s intended  format. Inspired by the prospects of completing this little experiment I laid down a quick pen and ink illuminated text drawing and a couple of weird faces (above). The rest of my day was spent working on animation stills and thinking about the “City of Gears” cartoon show pitch.
Here's an index/blurbs of the 13 stories:

1) SEEDS A commercial traveler searches the world over for new and marketable anomalies. His investigation eventually leads to a tribal village hidden deep within the jungles of Africa. Here he learns of secret vegetations capable of unimaginable feats. The discovery may prove enormously profitable, but can these surreal vines be safely transplanted back in the City of Gears?


2) THE ELEVATED CITY A sociological imperative to exist beyond earths’s capabilities has driven the soil barren and left the air void and toxically malodorous. In our infinite brilliance, man has moved upwards, away from his mess, developing a new architecture sprawling heaven bound. Levels upon levels of strange apartment communities annihilate the skyline as the sun fades into myth and nature is a forgotten word.

3) A TALE OF TWO TREES As the all encompassing MAKINGLIFEPERFECT Corp. reaches new scientific heights, useless and manipulatively destructive lifestyles rein supreme. However the industrial success has attracted unexpected enemies. Hear the cries of nature for two trees have assimilated a mechanical foliage battle armor in order to survive these terrifying technological times!

4) A SHOPPING SPREE NIGHTMARE A Surreal shopping spree incites strange nightmare visions of an amorphous globular macroverse. Enthusiatically overwhelmed, an unsuspecting shopper engaged in a world of unobtainable satisfactions becomes psychically imprisoned in a sanatorium padded with buyer's remorse!

5) BRIDE OF THE WORKHORSE An unusually surreal comics adventure involving a genetically modified centaur romancing a artificially ameliorated runway model. Can the fated love affair consummate or will mechanical deviations consume the once illuminated passion? Another strange and unrealistic interpretation of the way things actually are.

6) SHADOWS A young artist experimenting with shadow and light accidentally unleashes insidious creatures of the night. Are these nightmarish forms a merely imaginary brushstrokes or has the painter depicted something far worse?


7) THE AMORPHOUS GLOB MACROVERSE An apparently insignificant opaque puddle spilt in the night malignantly mutates proceeding to commit horrific telepathic invasions. The irregular and intrusive messages sent from the glob, reveal the most damnable and unforgettable of all unwanted insights, agonies and revealing reflections.

8) FASHION SHOW NIGHTMARE A Fashion shoot turns monster as the latest trends reveal mutilated depravity, terrifying trims, and people turned inside out. A step by step must read for all young upstarts entering the fashion business!


9) DIARIES OF A DEAD MAN An excerpt from an anonymous diarist regarding an extraordinary and hallucinogenic experience as a devout atheist witnesses firsthand the power of the almighty. A frightening account of religious awakening and the prowess of true faith.

10) NOTHING MATTERS An aging litterateur reaches an inexplicable enlightenment through a life time of meditative studies. Having finally read all there is to read and written his dissertations, the man becomes ill and for the first time, realizes how lonely it actually is inside the old and extravagant library.

11) THE BRAIN WORM THING Following an exclusive invitation a skeptical consumer attend the unveiling of an intriguing new digital breakthrough. The MAKING TECH PERFECT company is introducing the worlds smallest, most advanced and intelligent, virtual serfing technology. But will this new device impress our disgruntled protagonist or simply turn out to be another scam.

12) ANDROID MAN In the span of a few short weeks a successful landscape painter finds his business and his life going digital. With the aid of modern computers the artist rises to fame and fortune discovering, piece by piece, that he no longer needs his paints or even the landscapes he once rendered.

13) AFTER THE HARVEST Surreal Aliens invade earth only to question whether or not our planet is fit for assimilation! What will these beings make of mankind and what are their diabolical plans for earth’s future? Beware, these extraterrestrial vegetations having been plotting for millennia from way-outer space to the skyscraper skylines of our monstrous metropolis!

Just made this as a personal checklist but it's kind of interesting so why not share. I didn't actually "finish" all these but I do have at least solid 1st drafts and artwork  for every one. A few of them have been polished but I am happy that I got 13 of them done, I've had so many more important ( less amusing/ more lucrative) things to do over the past 10 months. Lot's of editing and more than likely a few new fables before I try to put the whole thing together proper like. See more work Heyapathy!

ALTERNATIVE COMICS Strange Day

HEY APATHY! Surreal Comics

Alternative Comics

HEY APATHY! Surreal Comics work in progress!

Alternative Comics an amorphous globular experience surreal

HEY APATHY! Alternative Comics

 This is a little scene from the upcoming surreal web comic in which a somewhat unsuspecting shopper experiences the most horrific of hallucinations, maybe. This amorphous globular thing is one of the major symbols in a lot of my recent works. I won’t reveal it’s meaning here because it would spoil the fun and is clearly apparent in the short stories. The Surreal stories are illustrated fables combining comic book style imagery with the written word. It was really just a way to be creative when I was too busy to actually draw  comic pages last winter. Though I still don’t have the time for full explorations, some of the stories are being featured as vignettes in the new strips. The drawing posted above is based on the short story “ A Shopping Spree Nightmare”. Keeping this sketchbook of comics while working on the major animation, has really helped keep my mind flowing while tackling the enormously repetitive task of drawing the cartoon.

ALTERNATIVE COMICS Technological Infiltrations

HEY APATHY! Alternative Comics Beware of Mass Hypnosis!

Following a long and dissatisfying day at the office, I returned to my lodgings beaten and worn. Nothing had gone right and although I still had a job, both my coworkers and employers have grown to despise what they openly define as my utter incompetence. In truth what they despise is my imaginative responses to the mundane and trivial occurrences which are best known in business circles as "work". So be it, I skipped out on the sympathetic invitations to join them in a bar and came directly home at the end of my shift.

Home is a 12 by 12 foot single room with a tiny window on the east that never receives any light. I have a small writing table and a mattress, a bar fridge and a hot plate, and enough room under the bedding to store all my clothes and belongings. So you can imagine very few items are ever miss placed and even the slightest disturbance to my personal possessions would be instantaneously noticeable. And that is exactly what happened when I peered through my door.

Someone, or something, had set up a little black box and television monitor on top up my desk. Shocked by the intrusion I surveyed the room but found no trace of the intruder. I called down to the lobby but no visitors nor deliveries had been reported. I began sweating profusely at the antagonizing perception of the invasion of my privacy. Infuriated to despair I resigned to telephone the police. That's when the monitor started to flicker.

Inside of the screen a young lady composed of cylinders and cones addressed me. She had a sly way of talking and easily persuaded my taking hold of the control panel attached to the box. I was seduced into various conversations and whisked off to numerous locations and well one thing led to another and our child was conceived.

At first I was nervous at the thought of parent hood but soon got into the game. Checking the bottles, changing the diapers, feeding times, baby fashion and such. Eventually I even took to building a community for the child. I set laws, made policies, increased taxes and raised war. Only the best for my child in a world under my control!

Dizzy and drunken on the simulated stimulation I passed hours and hours and eventually days then weeks. The office dare not disturb me for they knew that creationism was my only true work. In fact the government started sending me monthly wages to finance the experiment. I grew my beard long like a God and ceased strolling amidst the mortal denizens outside of my world. Each moment I obsessed, schemed and dispensed unto the great nation inspired by the birth of my first born son.

My son? Oh my son, I can't find my son! A perspiring panic overwhelmed me, in my virtual megalomanias I had built countries, executed criminals, tore down continents and amassed insurmountable fortunes, but I'd forgotten where last I put my son! In a fitted rage I searched the nursery, the schools, and the parks. I put up posters, newspaper ads, a megaphone out my window and even posted rewards on my blog. I retraced all of my steps but to no avail.

I found the child's mother walking half way across the kitchen, disappearing, then starting again. No matter how many times she crossed the floor she could not tell me the location of our son! Frantically I tore from the corners of my room. I tossed over the mattress, turned up my small desk, filed through the pockets of my coat and retraced all of those steps over again thrice in vain. I sat silent in the middle of my 12 x 12 foot apartment and ,before I could weep, passed out cold on the floor. When I awoke only moments ago I discovered the black box and the television have been removed from my room. In losing the device I feel compromised, and equalling despairing for my privacy as I did upon the initial intrusion, and although I cannot explain the reasoning, I am certain I will never set foot outside of that door again!


 

more art and stories at http://www.heyapathy-comics-art.com/

Alternative Comics of Dreams and Intuition

HEY APATHY! Alternative Comics

"of DREAMS AND INTUITION"

The following set of observations will be made without reference nor in depth research in regard to the subject at hand. Therefore the article you are hereby presented with will be of little literary or scientific value. However the anecdotal experiences which I am about to share, pertaining to notions beyond the vocabulary of language and of scientific models, may retain some pertinent information. I perceive that by expressing this wholly internalized hypothesis I may incite a dialogue involving like-minded experiences or open those unsatisfied with their own interpretations to new possibilities. The ultimate goal being to improvise my immediate reactions to the topic of dreams opposed to intuition unfettered by academic influence. A second stage of this analysis will to be the eventual research and discuss these notions in order to solidify any probable theories. But I digress, having now wasted an entire paragraph explaining that this post is a fact-less editorial, fit only for the news, I will now divulge my opinion on the matter.

Of dreams one often believes the midnight movies from the back of your mind to be one of three powers. Some of us see these visions as precognitive warnings presenting inescapable scenes from the near future, Others feel that the stories are mixed up puzzles meant to deal with ones inadequacies or confused state of being. While many others still,  think they are nothing but nonsense. In my experience the dreams are none of these things.

As of late, during my sleeping hours, I have been tormented by endlessly black feelings of helplessness and despair . Although I can recall but few details (such as the lizard dream accounted in the blog only days ago) the terrifying sensation of depression lingers long after my deep rest. Not to say that I wallow in my nightmares throughout the day time, rather that a small inkling of the desolation can be recalled at a moments notice when I think of the night. I know there is some terrible fate lurking not far from my conscious mind. Fortunately and in direct contrast to the darkness, nothing has gone wrong in my waking life, and especially nothing in particular has fallen out from the dreams and into reality ( I use the term "reality" freely and loosely).

When I dreamt of a car accident, there was none. Where my pet and friend lizard suffered, she remained healthy. Although my lover had proceeded to chop me into little bits which then churned into cubes of a thick blackened ooze, my body remains intact. The more monstrous the dreams become the less likely they appear to actualize. Of coarse it is more than likely my lover will one day butcher my physique but the hances of the fragments turning into tar blocks in highly unlikely. No these dreams do not reveal the future, nor am I secretly concerned about my ultimate demise nor the obvious bet on how it will occur. In some cases ( once again I refer you to the lizard ream) the grotesque consequences imagined were little more than exageratted reminders of mild anxieties.

I have paid attention to the symbols and attempted to co-relate them to the present and to the future. I have even attempted to dismiss them as utter fiction. But alas I cannot deny it. The visions appear only as indulgent and excessive tortures devoid of meaning aside from there own existence. They simply express the darkest places and derive a fuelling inertia from the pain inflicted by their presence. They mean to hold us down. I say "us" because I know you all have them too. The truth is dreams are pure evil, a truth both derived from and reflective of existence, pure evil.

Of intuition I am familiar with many definitions, interpretations and modes which popular culture has classified but science has dismissed. Generally one either believes in intuitions or one does not. I must disagree with the opposing ideas and say that it is both.

Over the past seven years I have taken a great interest in certain quantifiable intuitions. The first is the sensation or thought of someone you know followed by a surprise surfacing of that exact person. I found the incidents to be in high numbers and above coincidence. I had the notion that it was not some strange intuition rather a heightened animal sense we all share but remain unaware of. Could it be possible that I actually caught the scent of these friends or acquaintances long before I was consciously aware of their presence? To test the theory I plugged my nose from the insides so as to be able to roam the public streets without attracting attention. Although I often thought of particular people at particular moments, the phenomena of "oh my, why I was just thinking of you..." ceased to play a role in my daily routine. In fact I ceased bumping into any people thatI knew at all! Could it be that our social connections are telepathically communicated through an exchange of chemicals secreted from our noses? I dare not take the plugs out, just to be sure.

The second intuition that has never failed me in my ability to guess exactly how much money I was entitled to acquire on any given day. Almost always around 11 am, the beginning or the retail hours, a number  pops into my head, $300, $600, $5000, or whatever and sure enough when I count the till at seven the amount always matches. Unfortunately the number isn't always an optimistic one but it is correct. Again I hypothesized the notion of extra-ordinary senses and decided that through these senses and experience that I was actually able to predict the figures based on the weather, the news, the local events, and a little unconscious algebra calculating all these factors which obviously affect consumer traffic. To test this theory I had myself blind folded, beaten dizzy, and dropped off at work with out any of the hypothesized information necessary for the equation. On repeated attempts I failed to guess any sensible numbers and in fact broke into a brief fit of amnesia in which I even failed to guess my name!

So in conclusion to my experiments and experimental opinions I believe that dreams are nothing but nightmares and that intuition is in fact a provable entity borne of faculties of the senses which popular theories and the human consciousness utilizes often but is currently unable to identify. Regardless of this drivel I can promise you that no numbers regarding he lottery have ever appeared in my mind's sight but I do have a sinking intuitive feeling that there will be dark dreams again tonight.

 

 

visit http://www.heyapathy-comics-art.com/

ALTERNATIVE COMICS A Lizard Dream...

HEY APATHY! Alternative Comics dream hiatus

It has been said by the Buddhists "that the minute you speak of something, it is lost". In contrast, it is common knowledge amongst sorcerers and black magicians that quite often it is the verbalization of an action which ignites the consequence. For both of these reasons, (understanding and fear) I had decided it in the best interest of all parties involved not to share the following experience unless the matters at hand were first clearly resolved. Early this afternoon such actions were taken in order to reach a reasonable conclusion so as to permit me to tell you the tale of my recent Lizard dreams.

In my brief hibernation, taken to recover from this past weekends comic book convention, I endured the most terrifying of sensations. During my sleep I happened to notice that a small dragon creature had suffered a severe and almost certainly fatal injury. The lizard was nearly split in two at the gut and was writhing and projecting telepathic screams in a desperate fit attempt to relieve itself from pain. I could see no means of saving the monster despite all of my books and training ( I have performed numerous amateur yet necessary and successful surgeries on my own reptilian in the past) and so with a broken heart I decided to end the life of the dream lizard in the namesake of mercy.

You can probably get an inkling of the black feeling overtaking me if you remember your own pet's end, however it is more than likely that an emergency did not force the euthanization out of your own hands. But what was worse was my attempt to save the beast from it's suffering continued to fail. Neither the ringing of her neck, nor the injected poisoning, nor the attempted affixation I inflicted would take.

Instead of passing freely the tiny life perpetually agonized increasing from each attack. She shrank and withered, lost most of her skin, lost all of her colour and her eyeballs fell inside of her skull. But no ,the creature would not die, I could not release her from the pain, and my constant attempts had certainly pushed her past any hope of being saved.

I awoke in terror and immediately went to the tank to inspect my miniature dragon. She seemed happy and healthy and without a care in the world. I placed her in the sunny window and pondered the message dredged up from my unconscious. It did not take me long to analyse my guilty subconscious as I was full well aware that my lizard, named Goose, had not been fed since at least a week. I was also aware that my avoidance of feeding was correlated to my concern for another little dragon sitting in the pet store.

The lizard entrapped at the store was withering away, malnourished, discoloured and undersized in comparison to it's dominant sibling. I had been avoiding the store, and the purchase of Goose's food, for fear of seeing the other little one suffer. On my previous trips the proprietor of the shop had sensed my solicitude towards the situation and treated me with disregard shuffling me out of the shop quickly to avoid reparations.

Realizing my empathetic fears could potentially ignite disaster, I resigned to visit the store, purchase the food, and was determined to avoid checking on the small dragon. Upon arrival, the owner's greeted me with a more than usual enthusiasm (they'd always been friendly prior to their own dragon's illness). I ordered some crickets and unconsciously strolled over to the lizard aquariums. Much to my surprise and delight the dragon was looking proud and strong. Her colours were growing as was her tale. She had almost caught up to her brother, a magnificent specimen once three times her size.

 I returned home and watched the little Goose monster hunt and gobble the heard of insects like a giant Japanese monster awakening from a thousand year slumber. Having faced my fear of the pet store and alleviated my guilt, I  resolved the black terror which engulfed my being persistantly through out the night and early morning to such an extent that I am unashamed to share the occurrence and freed from the worry that talking about the problem might cause an imaginary horror to manifest.  more stories at  http://www.heyapathy-comics-art.com/

A picture of  my good friend Goose a happy, healthy lady lizard chilling out in the park.

p.s. I can't get the Wizard World Convention picks out of the camera due to minor technical difficulties but I promise to review the event tomorrow!!