19crawling from the wreckage1roaringraringracing haring home on the homes tretch now and the wind in my ears the sound of the crowd200 on the speedo... 210... 215... 220... and oh the sky runningspilling blue smokeeverything moves so slowand i should have seen itthe oil slicki should havesaved iti saved iti saved the beautiful bitwell now...dreaming about our accident again, are we?that's what happens...... when we refuse to take out medication.get lost.come on now, rise and shine! i've brought you a fresh nutrient tank.now where are we going to put it?"we" can shove it where the sun doesn't shine.hard.you've got a real bad attitude problem, mister. i'll tell you that for nothing.shut up.get out.just leave me alone.alamance memorial hospital... yes, this is eleanor poole... well. if you like.. the eleanor poole.... of course... well, your reputation precedes you ... i'm afraid so, yeah...what?... you read that? oh, well... now you're embarrassing me.anyway, what can i do for you?larry trainor, right.well, you'll be glad to know that he's in great shape and we hope to send him home in the next day or two... that's right...yeah... uh, listen, something's just... yeah.great talking to you, too... sure, fine.you, too.bye.5well.two calls covered everything, i think. larry's fine, rhea still hasn't come out of her coma, and i have an appointment with my physiotherapist on friday.have you considered my offer yet, joshua?i don't think so, caulder. that's not why i'm here.i really just dropped by to see how everyone was, you know?and to say goodbye to the old place.6so you won't join my new doom patrol, is that what you're saying?look, the doom patrol's dead, caulder. why not let it rest in peace this time?and as for me, i'm finished with all this. really.it's just not funny anymore.arani's dead, scott's dead, rhea's in a coma, larry's hospitalized, val's resigned, and no one's even mentioned cliff...cliff signed himeself into a psychiartic hospital. he felt he needed help.i shouldn't worry. i've asked a good friend to pay him a visit.and i'm sure it won't be long before robotman is back with us again.jeez, but you're an iceman, caulder.why thank you, joshua, and please.... call me chief.7that lays an egg with the face of christ imprinted on the shell, inhuman voices whispering through the static on an empty radio waveband.don't these things fascinate you, joshua?not really. i can get that kind of stuff from the nationl enquirer.and i don't see what i has to do with the doom patrol.i have plans, joshua. all the time i've been away, i've been studying reports, filing information, making preparations.and don't tell me whether i like it or not, i'm part of the big plan, right?oh, yes.you all are.8mr. steele?mr. steele, you have a visitor here to see you.cliff?cliff, it's me.it's will will magnus.you remember me, don't you?i made the metal men, cliff. i made your body, too, remember?cliff?uh... right.yeah.9i knew i recognized that patronizing tone from somewhere.there's no need for that, cliff.when i heard you'd come in herer, i... well, i undertand what you're going through. i've been there.and i think you and i can lick this thing together.how about it, cliff?you're a good guy, doc.you're sensitive and caring and compassionate.and if i could, i'd spew in your face.10so. all set to go home tomorrow, larry?alamance memorial hospitaltomorrow? and i was just getting used to all the attention.we noticed.so give it to me straight, doc.how long have i got?same as everyone else, larry. no more, no less.you still have what everyone's calling the "hero gene," but apart from that, you're perfectly normal.you bet i am!when all this is over, you and me ought to get together, doctor, you know that?listen, it could be over sooner than you think...... if my boyfriend hears you talking like that.and remember, that bell beside the bed's only for emergencies, okay?yeah, sure thing, doctor.see you.laarreee11oh, god.what do you want?... what...i am the spirit in the bottle the invisible fire that works in secret there is tick among the roofs of the oaktreeopen the window nowopen the window larry let me inlet me in12... why d'you keep following me about, magnus?why don't you just leave me alone?you've got to pull yourself through this, cliff!believe me, i know what it's like...how the hell can you know what it's like?how can you know what it's like to have your brain transplanted into a metal body? it's life imprisonment!can you imagine how crude robot senses are, compared to human ones, huh? all i have are memories of the way things used to feel or taste.you know, they say that amputees feel phantom pains where their limbs used to be. well, i'm a toal amputee.i'm haunted by the ghost of my entire body! i get headaches, you know, and i want to crap until i realize i don't have any bowels.and... when i look at a woman, sometimes i...but surely the doom patrol helped to...the doom patrol? don't talk to me... it... the doom patrol kills people. it chews them up and vomits out the bits.it killed rita and arani and scott...cliff...i just can't stand anymore... i can't get through it... really...i can't.13listen, cliff, you've got to pull yourself together. there are drugs... antidepressants...i can't stand by and watch you destroy yourself!me? how cani destroy myself?watch! cliff!see!!cliff, for god's sake!nothing! i can't fell anything!!!can't fell anything.can't fell anything oh, god.oh, god, make it stop.please.stop.14... but you've never spoken before, i don't undertand...perhaps i had nothing to say larryi've lived a black black dream of slience for so long i am awake now wide a wakewhat do you want? i mean...to continue to perpetuate to generateyou're not so clever larry you think im un aware you pressed the alarm i made you do itwhat?i need the woman hereit's necessary for my purposepurpose? what purpose?you know larry the union the fusionthe alchemical marriage15take my hand now no... i...oh, no, please... don't do this to me...please... wait... i...take my hand larryits time to golarry?larry, what's happening?are you in there?hello doctor poolewe've been waiting for youtake my hand16and now we are threenow we are oneoh, god.get helpsomeone get help!17don't you have a business to run or something, magnus?... jesus bids us shine with a pure clear light like little... uh... candle...what? don't you get tired following me arround like a bad smell?aw, c'mon, ralph! you cut yourslef again?c'mon, you can't sit here.just talk to me, cliff.i can't stand it.you don't understand, no, you don't not one it.it's the scissormen, see? they're here. they come through windows in the air.i can't stand it in here.yeah, sure thing, ralph, gimme a break, huh?right here in the hospital.you're free to leave whenever you...no, i mean in here, in this body.... jesus had a twin who knew nothing about sin...goddamnit, cliff! i refuse to let you go under like this!this world, it can't afford to lose even one good person, you know.if you could hear yourself...i'm sick of this self-indulgent crap, damnit! there are people with worse problems than your!show me one.18okay.listen... what is this?her name's kay challis, but most of the time she refers to herself...... as crazy jane.she was abused by her father whe n she was a child... very badly abused.her experiences resulted in what psychiatrists call dissociation. basically, that means she developed multiple personalities to cope with the trauma.her therapists tells me that so far they've identified sixity-four separate personalities, each with its own name and function.and following the effects of the "gene bomb"...... each with its own distinct metahuman ability.you want to talk about problems, cliff?hello, kay.isn't it a bit wet to be painting?kay's down in the underground, where there's no rain.you're talking to the hangman's beautiful daughter.19do you like it?it's called "the white darkness."its a picture of maya deren at the moment of her death, possessed by maitresse erzulie.she was a brilliant woman, maya derenshe was only fortythree when she died.massive brain hemorrhage.it's moving! the thing's alive!it's psychically active. she's been able to do this since the invasion.you have experience with the difficulties of coming to terms with unwanted super-powers, don't you, cliff?kay could use someone to talk to.hey! where d'you think you're going?i've got a business to run, remember?i'll see you, cliff.20what do normal people have in their lives?what?what do normal people have?you're asking the wrong person.i've tried to be like them, i really have.but what happens when you just can't be strong anymore? what happens if you're weak?my painting's ruined.everything's gone wrong.come in out of the rain.21... so anyway, we'd pulled this guy over to check his license when the next thing is, this chevy comes screeching around the intersection.he must've been do in' eighty at least, right through the red light and into the greyhound.guy didn't stand a chance.six years i've been doin' this job, man, and i don't think i've ever seen anything like what happened then.guy was a human torch, you know? literally, his hair... everyhting... but he kept on walking. real slow, like in a bad dream.before he died he said something weird, i... i got it writen down right here.scissormen...the scissormen!22i'm not ashamed to say it, man- i threw up right there on the sidewalk.you ever smell skin burning?and this is the book?sure is, god alone knows what the thing's made of.black pages, man, weird.your help's been appreciated, officer.we'll be in touch.my pleasure, pal.i don't know why i ever got into intelligence. this man in black stuff's really getting me down.how d'you manage to keep up the act.it's not an act.uh... right. so, uh... what happens to the book now?it's out of our hands. all we have to do is call the company. the company calls the pentagon. the pentagon calls the president.and he calls niles caulder.cautionary tales.
#201father mcgoarry has long sine ceased to believe in miracles.saturdays, he troudges out to the dump, looking for god among the debris.saturdays are always the longest days and, in the winter, chilly.he asks for very little.some trace, some evidence, soom spoor of the divine.some sign.have faith in godit begins to rain fish.2mackerel. herring. sea bass. pike. sturgeon. tench.plaice. salmon. from a clear sky.trout.no cod.cautionary tales.... you say this all happened last night?that's right.the two orderlies who found the crature are being treated for minor burns.creature? i thought we were talking about larry trainor here.it may have been larry trainor last night, mr. clay, but it's certainly not larry trainor now.you say it has both male and female physical characteristics?that's it exactly, yes.we think... we believe that the crature is some kind of amalgamation of mr. trainor and doctor eleanor poole.you'll see that it's also emitting some kind of radiation, we had to use treated bandages to...well, anyway...see for yourself.5larry?larry, do you know me?nothing pure...my race is mixed, my sex is mixed, i am woman and man and light with darkness, mixed, mixed.i am nothing special, nothing pure.i am mud and flame.i see.6in greenock.in the pouring rain.every hour, every minute, every second brings sunday closer.the confessional will smell of damp raincoats and wet hair and the priest's aftershave.father, it has been three weeks since my last confession and it was jamie belshaw that gave me the dirty books and i only looked at them a few times and...something moves in the wardrobe.hanging jackets jostle furtively for space.the dirty books.the dirty books have come to life.flesh-colored, seething, panting.pages chafe against finger marked pages.it has been three weeks.father.7stuart? i'm phonin' down the chinese for the dinner what you wantin'?stuart?stuart?no son now but a stencil shape in the air.oh jesus.a hollow wind in an empty room.there is no time.there is no space.8can you tell us, larry？can you tell us what happened?not larry nor yet eleanor...i..rebis.call us rebis.ah.we're tired now. please leave.9i can't belive this. it's like a nightware poor larry.that name he said.rebis, it was a term used by the medieval alchemists to identify the result of a chymical wedding.you should read more, joshua.whatever it is, the whole thing's a grotesque tragedy.yes, one momnet please gentlemen.rebis?yeshow would you like to join the doom patrol.10you're making progress, cliff.there's no denying that.what do you want, magnus, a medal?i'm not trying to take any credit for your improvement, i think you did that yourself.i'm told you've been spending a lot of time with crazy jane. her therapist says your help's been invaluable.what do you make of her? jane, i mean.i don't know. i'd never even heard of a multiple personality case like hers before.sometimes she can be six or seven different people in one conversation.i'm just trying to help her organize herself and start cataloguing the new super-powers she's been saddled with.keeps me off the streets, you know?yeah, i know.listen, cliff... one last thing...11i kind of took it to heart when you complained about the crudity of your robot body...... especailly when you think of the way cybernetics technology has improved recently.you made me think, cliff.so... ah... i'm going to build you a new body.i'll be in touch, okay?oh, hi there, jane.talk of the devil, huh?driver 8. we haven't met yet.what? ... oh... sure.how you doing?12it's not easy keeping track of all your personalities.we're not personalities, we're persons.can we walk a while?see, i drive the train, and...hold on, you're way ahead of me. what train's this?the train of thought. i monitor the stations of the underground.that's where you all live, right?... in janes' head... the underground.you're over-simplifying, but yes, that's about right.anyway, some of the others have asked me to tell you that... well, that they like you.rain brain says your voice is like an old back telephone and black annis told me to tell you that you're the first man she hasn't to castrate.tell, her she'd be too late anyway.oh, and baby dool likes your name: she calls you sheltering cliff now, she's always been really embarrassing like that.i think you're okay, too.yeah, it's got to be said...13... i'm a wonderful guy.ralph? listen, don't try to move...scissormen14it's not really stealing, is it?not when you just find something.it's not stealing at all.sometimes it makes you want to be sick just to look at it.the way it moves without moving. the way it folds and unfolds and enfolds.stations go by like beads on an abacus.he knows them all by heart; an urban catechism.chambers. franklin canal.houston. christopher.fourteenth.twenty third.15orqwith?bone.everything is made of bone.shadows shift on the bone platform.pray the doors don't open.pray.the poor flew poen.in he ran.the great long,redlegged scissorman.16blood of the lamb blood of the lamb blood of the lamb blood of the lamb17blood of the lamb jane?jane, what's...i warned you!didn't i say? didn't i?they're coming!who? who's coming?18scissormenthirdly be grimmer as fond brevitieseider with alders.and erethism safer.my god.here be no dragonet.we're out of here!move!19m a doctor please.i'm a doctorparto of me here, part of me there.what are they doing to my hands? they're touching myi'm a doctor they're cutting20they're cutting of my thumbs!his tradition becomes awaiting still.effte paling.humaner for decimation.hell!we don't havechance!it's okay. i teleported us out. my name's flit and...oh, cliff look look there!oh god.oh my god.what's happening here？in the name of god.what's happening?22in stuttgart, all the clocks chime fiftten.simultaneously.in kyoto, four stanless steel pyramids are found rotating five feet above ground.in patagonia, a library is discovered. the books it contains are unknow, unreadable.in johannesburg, a little girl named harriet inexplicably catches fire.in reykjavik. three shadows come to life and murder their owners.in london, madame tussaud's wax figure of john lennon begins to bleed from bullet wound stigmata.in rome, in leningrad in darwin.the door flew open, in he ran.the great, long, red legged scissorman.
worlds in collision
#21
1... and as for kansas city...3kanasas city was a nightmare.4at first, everything was dead quiet, like a graveyard.and then i heard whispering.scissormen!defeating breadfruit in adumbrate.crashland. for award primate.yucca or priority?lemur never hibernates.i was beginning to wonder how much longer we could expect to be lucky.5it took us an hour and a half to find union station.welcome to doom patrol head quarters.you can see we always try to make visitors feel at home.ah, i should have guessed there'd be no one here.i said it myself, the doom patrol's dead.i don't know what i was expecting, maybe just a...cliff.6rhode island?and then our luck ran out.dote over gantries!we were up the creek this time, that was for sure, and you know me' i'm not a sophisticated kind of guy.get back.get back!i couldn't think of one clever way to stop this guy, so i just trusted to mindless violence.7and i flattened the ugly bastard.now move it!we made for the sub basement.now i did have a plan.and all i needed was a plane.here! this one's fine.cliff! another scissorman!8just give me a second! i...and then something weird happened.jane?jane, are you...oh my god.there is no god.i killed me.it was the first time i'd seen one of jane's personalities actually physically transform her body.i'm telling you, it was the scariest thing i'd seen all night.and i guess the scissorman thought so, too.she took him apart.9all i can remember thinking is no blood there's no blood.and then it was all over.it took seconds.nothing!scarlet ribons!empty clothes!jane!has she gone? black annis? has she gone?it's okay. you did good.now, come on...it really is time we were out of here.10we hauled ourselves up into that jet like our tails were on fire.i just hope i can remember how to fly this thing.right.11and suddenly, i was pushed right back in my seat as the jets kicked into life.then jane spotted the hangar doors.cliff they're closedwhat? they're supposed to open automatically!we're going to crash!but like i said...it was our lucky day.12and that's it, until we arrived here.it's a nice place. very modest.it belonged to the orignial justice league of america. the government wanted to ust it to store nuclear waste, but i persuaded them to give ti to me.anyway, that's beside the point. it's good to have you back, cliff.now, how do we propose to deal with the current crisis?if we had any sense, we'd call superman.we don't need superman. we have a major clue in the black book that was passed on to me by the intelligence serveices.a man died in flames, clutching that book.i've finished.the last word he said was scissormen.now, if your friend is as good as you say she is, we may be able to start deciphering the book over the next twenty-four hours...excuse me.i've finished.13you finished already?mama pentecost translated it. she's pretty good at that kind of stuff-- codes, crossword puzzles...but it's totally black. what is there to read?it's been written using a tactile alphabet--- a bit like braille.it's a code system based on the feigenbaum sequence of imaginary numbers.great! but what's it say?well, the whole books is a kind of metafiction; a self-referring text. basically, it tells the story of a group of philosophers who decide to create a book whick will radically alter human thought.they propose to fill the book with parasite ideas which will enter human consciousness and transform it.oh, well that explains everything!she's talking about memetic theory.i think we may have to move quickly.would you follow me, please?go on, jane.okay, these philosophers decide to invent a world-city called orquwith that exists on a plane of reality whick intersects our own.they want to create an alternative to the materialistic world we live in, so they outline the entire history and geography od orqwith in a book. a black book.14orqwith is a city of miracles. a city of glass labyrinths and observatories made of bone.according to the black book, our reality is just a pale shadow of the splendor of orqwith.the city grows by implanting parts of its own reality into that of other worlds, you see, it infiltrates them, bit by bit.first in small ways, then in catastrophic fashion.until finally it engulfs them.and they become orqwith.yeah, but is this a book or is it real?what's supposed to have happened to these philosopher guys? in the book, i mean?in the end, they're devoured by their own creation.the book becomes the gateway between the imaginary and the real.and orqwith gets out.15the post script reads something like. and the book they created is called the book with no title.that's the name of this book.this is way beyond me.it's a kind of paradox, i guess.so everything in the book is actually happening in real life.how can that be possible?i don't know! i'm only telling you what mama pentecost said, that's all!what about the scissormen?apparently, they're some kind of religious sect. they worship a god who exists at at mythical crossroads where realities meet.the philosophers imagined them to be orqwith's answer to the inquisition.oh, terrific!i think they just based them on the bogeyman from heinrich hoffman's struwwelpeter.are they real or aren't they?they're both. don't you see, it's...cliff.why don't you judge for yourself?16my god.we ran into to it last night and, as you see, reb managed to restrain it.hello, cliff.larry...?the leaching will be novelistic for effacement!crudle your pilgrimage!what's he saying?how the hell should i know? what am i, an expert?17excuse me for living!oh, just ignore her, cliff! hammer-head's always like that.all i want is the answer to one simple question before i run screaming back to the bughouse:is this real or isn't it?reality and unreality have no clear distinction in our present circumstances, cliff.it might help to consider the zen koan, first there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.sure, that's really helped to clear things up.so what now?just tell me and i'll go along with it.first, i want to find out just how extensive the intrusion of orqeith has been so far and then i want to track down the philosophers who compiled the black book.and what do i do?you keep a close eye on that.18you know i've been through some weird stuff with this group but this...we're fighting guys that aren't even real, larry's turned into god knows what...... and you've been quieter than a trappist monastery.yeah.listen, i don't even know what i'm doing here.i keep trying to leave and then i realize there's nowhere to leave to.this super-hero stuff is getting me down, man. i don't know there it's all going to end.i know the feeling.but you fulled yourself through, cliff. look at you-- you thrive on all this tension and things happening... you've used it to get through.i admire that. i can't do it.yeah, well, you've really got to be made of metal.look, things could be worse. at least you're real. not like our pal.over there.cliff.19listen, they're easy to beat. just don't let them get too close, okay?you still got your powers, don't you?cliff, we got trouble.oh, yeah.i've still got my powers.20they just fade away.when you hit them, they just...cliff!behind you!21nice work, man.how many were there?did we get them?josh!narrate the armament!josh!22cliff! what's happening?they got him.one minute he was here...he was right here and then...interesting.interesting?what about josh?they're out therewhat?i can feel them.a strange mass absense of being.they're out there.waiting for us?23i'm going to get josh back.cliff, it may not be possible to retrieve joshua!we don't know enought about the nature orqwith.we'll just have to learn by experience.cliff listen to me...i'm going to get josh back.who's coming with me?cliff, there must be thousands.yeah, looks like it.let's go.reality and unreality have no clear distinction in our present circumstances.24first there is a mountain.then there is no mountain.then there is.
the ossuary.
#221orqwith, the city of bone, the city of miracles, is a city that has neither suburb nor boundary.walk a hundred miles, a thousand miles, in any direction, and you will still be in orqwith.the city has spread like ripples in a pond from one central point the quadrivium whick is itself the terrestrial image od the god of the crossroads.and in the center of the quadrivium stands the ossuary, the great cathedral of orqwith.the ossuary maintains a devout silence the very air worn thin by containuous prayer.in the serious light of stained glass and votive candles, two priests meditate.one is a liar, the other, an honest man.and they are waiting to answer the question that will unmake the world.2beyond the ossuary, the half-life of the city continues, sleepwalkers drift among marvels wrought in the bone of the unnumbered dead.empty orbits contain electric bulbs that light and go dim in response to changes in air pressure or humidity.here, the skull of a consumptive child becomes part of a great machine for calculating the motions of the stars.here, a yellow bird frets within the ribcage of an unjust man.around every corner is some fresh wonder: the weeping clock, the water gardens, the hymning birds, the mechanical orchards.yet, no matter how strange, no matter how beautiful, everything in orqwith is dulled by the taint of long familiarity.when you see it, you will know it.for all of us, in the end, come to the city of bone.and what was once a place of dreams is now only real.3you know all of a sudden i can't think of anything even remotely funny to say.4okay, okay. we're trapped in an unreal world that's slowly eating its way into the real world.how much worse can it.oh.look! those people...the hollow children of orqwith.they were mentioned in the black book. people from the real world transformed into citizens of the city of bone...cliff?my god it's josh...josh!josh!cliff! no!josh, it's me! it's cliff!oh, jesus, what have they done to you, man?... i'm looking for my house...... can't find it...... can't find it anywhere.listen, we'll get you out of this!it'll be okay...5still or be juddered!josh, no！ wait!leave him, cliff!i can't just...didn't you hear me?i said leave him!6flit had to teleport us out. i'm sorry, cliff.larry!what's the matter?negative spirit... has abandoned us momentarily... drained us to power its flight...... and please... cliff..we're not larry...oh, terrific!i've made a real big mistake this time. i should've listened to the chief. he always knows what to do.it's too late for that now.orqwith is consuming reality.you'd better think of something fast, bossman.7ah, reinmann, i presume.may i come in?8my god... you can't just...my government contacts tracked you down via a friend of yours he died in a car accident a few days ago.i want to talk about the black book he was carrying.i want to talk about orqwith.i'm not afraid of you!you think i'm afraid of a cripple? you think i...looks like you're a cripple, too.now.shall we talk.9defensibility!in the flowery hiatus!brushing for abscised fever!virtuous!deadfall!10they got him!let me go.larry, wait, you're too weak to...i told you.don't call me larry.part of you is still larry, so i'll call you what i want.now, are you okay?11we... i... have crucial information... thoughts torn raw from the head of a scissorman...jane, can you translate? the way you did before.jane can't translate, stupid! i can. mama pentecost, remember me...?it's all a whirl... concepts flying like this tle... like snow...also the tackier giant in the tarot another orange is already tainted...with its theatre sobriety freckles...it is through detection we hear all smothers and ginghams, yell herewith spins a yolked almanac;this is toil to a habit of cicada latherd sectarians.the encephalon glacier flies away on a nullifying wind that is ground from my legionsoil-ectoplasm retains trauma. on we go.load angle.load angle...what?we've got them!12it's only a flesh wound reinmann.stop whimpering and go on with what you were saying. you wewe talking about the book...it was a game really, just an intellectual joke. we got together and created orqwith its language, its religion... you know...and then somehow orqwith crossed over. the scissormen took pollock first, then schrader tried to destroy the book...it's too late now. our fiction's eating into the real world. soon the whole world will be orqwith...please my leg it'show do we stop orqwith?oh, for god's sake, i don't know! it shouldn't even exist at all!we... we build a logical inconsistency into the fiction, a basic contracdiction, upon whcik the entire world is founded.it's the fundamental problem of philosophy why is there some thing instead of nothing? the most basic of all questions.orqwith can be destroyed.it just has to be made to confront its own unreality, that's all.13...see, what we've been forgetting is that orqwith's not real.it's a fiction that's somehow been boosted into reality.yeah? so?so it's not as complext as the real world. haven't you noticed all the coincidences?what rebis just recited to us was a religious text that contains the way to collapse the city back into unreality.we just have to confront these two priests, okay? then we ask them, why is there something instead of nothing?it's simple.we just have to get in there.into the ossuary.no problem, huh?there must be a hundred scissormen out there!i can get in.14watch.the negative spirit has left us with enought energy for five minutes and some limited flying abilities. it should be enough.all we need is for you to cover us until we can ask the question.yeah, but what happens then?are you sure this is going to work?cliff!mycelium for the unsuitable!okay, it looks like weo don't get a choice.you got five minutes, larry.remember the last few seconds of butch cassidy and the sundance kid?then let's go!15just stay by me, jane don't get separated!you hear me...jane oh my god.16dusk!search for lyrical!come on, suckers!come on!17jane, we're nearly there!jane...what am i doing here?i can't fight...i...come on, larry don't let us down, man!where is he?where the hell's larry?18he's in!i think he's in！you okay?i'm fine.it was just spinning jenny have a panic attack...i'm in charge now.i'm glad to hear it. so what do we do now?we keep the scissormen out of the ossuary.the easy job, huh?19i've come to ask the question. one of you must have the answer.why is there something instead of nothing?i am a liar and i do not know why there is something instead of nothing.i am an honest man and i do not know why there is something instead of nothing.which one... i can't...think!wait. yes... the priest in black must be a liar...and?and if he's lying then he must know the answer.good.tell me then, the priest in black, why is there something instead of nothing.there is something instead of nothing.20too many of them janethen you can't possible exist.holly...21so the priest who knew the answer was a liar, you see, which meant that his answer to the question must also have been a lie.he said there is something instead of nothing. since that was a lie, then what he was really saying is that there wasn't something instead of nothing.that's when orqwith collapsed.i think that's how it happened anyway.well, you'll be glad to know that the world-wide anomalous activity caused by the intrusion of orqwith has now apparently ceased.we were lucky that the whole crisis was manmade and founded on human logical processes.how about you, joshua? how are you feeling after your ordeal?it was like a dream. i keep flashing on images and feelings, but i don't really remember what happened after i was snatched away this morning.just as well, i guess.so they all lived happily ever after, huhu?or do i get the feeling you want to say something, chief?22yes, yes, cliff, i do want to say something.i think it's clear from what's happened over the past few days that the world needs the doom patrol...needs us more than ever.don't you see? there are areas in whick only we are qualified to operate. when the rational world breaks down, we can cope...and delirium...because we've been there in ourselves.we have know madness...and we are no longer afraid.the world has turned its back on us, but it's time to stop being victims, time to show them we're more than just freaks more than just cripples, believe me, they need us.and we need each other.don't let the doom patrol die again.join me. please.what the hell. anything to avoid a quiet life.good.epilogue1fade up hospital acoustic: echoing whispers in long, overlit corridors. life support machinery, marking time.blipthis is the girl from the what? the doom patrol, is that what they're called?rhea jones, that's right. there's been no change in her condition i'm afraid.it makes me so angry... the way these people just throw themselves into dangerous situations and then expect us to...super-heroes.they make me sick!rhea.my sleeping beauty.epilogue2in paraguay, the season of rains has arrived.doctor?doctor bruckner?lie still! i'll get help!what?herr niemandout he got out!look
#231did you think you could ever escape?do you dream of an end to pain?there is no way out.there is no end.especially not today.a smashed wing beats in slow motion.the wave of a hand conjures the music of vivaldi out of fresh air.
3for today is my wedding day!4rhode island. doom patrol headquarters.the wind from the east.good morning, joshua.unseasonably cold, don't you think? the temperature dropped dramatically...... at a quarter after three last night.yeah. what is that?it's what we call the lorenz attractor a computer image of the infinite hidden struture contained in a chaotic stream of data.a picture of the rules that govern weather, for instance.i'll take your word for it.weather is completely unpredictable, you see theoretically, a catastrophic cyclone in bangladesh can be traced back to something as simple as the tiny perturbations made in the air by the wing of a butterfly in south america.it's a chain reaction of event and consequence that...yeah, listen, it's not that i don't want to talk meteorology with you or anything, but i really came up to tell you that i'd... well, i'd like to accept your offer.i'd like to stay with the doom patrol.5fine. that's under the terms we agreed; i'm with the team purely in a medical capacity.no more super-hero stuff.okay?fine. i said fine, joshua.your expertise will be welcome.i think it's essential that the doom patrol has some good, solid in house back up.and now i'd like you to meet the second member of what i've come to think of as the outer team.she arrived ten minutes ago.i believe you already know dorothy spinner.6really eleanor i can't handle this ...i ...it's... you come here covered in bandages and you're half-man, half-woman and you expect me just to... just to...this thing is so sick.it's sick.i remember the dools. i... didn't we... didn't i collect dolls?dolls?dolls?look!look at this!7bloodsymbolic, right... just like a movie it's...remember that old german guy took this the day before you hurt your foot going up to the acropolis?you were stuck in the hotel for three days... playing trivial pursuit ...i...this is us!this is us!the dolls are very beautiful, dan.i'd like to take one away with me.that's if you don't mind.8and you remembered to bring those tapes, yeah?how many times do i have to tell you, cliff? i brought everything!i don't know... i can't see country music bringing anyone out of a coma. i mean, it'd put me into one.i wish i'd never worn this costume...flaunt it, baby, flaunt it!fourth floor, pal. i'm here to complain to my plastic surgeon.that's it there...cliff! something's wrong.hey, what's going on here? we're cliff steele and crazy jane from the doom patrol. we're here to see rhea jones.this is her room isn't it?yes... well... i think you'd better.we've had some problems.9so what do you think of the new doom patrol headquarters, dorothy?pretty smart, huh?i didn't see the old one, mr. clay.no... no, i guess you didn't... so, what brings you out here anyway?well, it was professor caulder, i guess. he called my dad after the invasion and all.he must have heard about what happened to me when the gene bomb went off.yeah? so what did happen?oh... well, it was kind of...wait a minute!i'm sorry, dorothy, but is it just my ears or do you hear something? kind of like squishy...foot stepoh my god.10get back, dorothy!get back!you go away!leave us alone!for god's sake, dorothy! i just said...you hear me now?go away!i'm real sorry, mr. clay.sometimes these things just jump right out of my head.11we were going to get married, two months time.you're taking me apart, eleanor...rebis. not eleanor.listen, just go, will you?please just...oh, god, eleanor.i don't...what am i going to do?what am i going to do?don't get blood on the coat.12england: high clouds and summer thunder.holly mckenzie went to sleep in a squat in brixton.holly mckenzie wakes up on egypt beach.cast up on the tidal reaches of the thames, bathed by shallow and temporary waters.the air is bitter with smoke.smoke and the distinctive smell of burning policemen.oh, holly.how could you?13i'me over here, holly.you've been a bad, bad, girl, holly. so terribly bad.i like that.i can't see you properly.i don't understand what i'm...who are you?nobody.call me mr.nobody.14we think it all happened sometime between three and four this morning.rhea was in a coma! how could she have done this? i mean...there's something here!can't you smell the blood? the heat of the knife on the whetstone?can't you feel the presence of something departed?here.it came through here.15it took rhea.a house with no doors... i can't...bookstore!quick! where's the nearest bookstore?it's... ah... it's just...oh.oh, what are you doing to me?reading your mind. you speak too slowly.booksbooks ineedbooks.i'd... ah... i'd better stay with her.jane!jane, come back!what d'you think you're...16ow. dumb move.bookslisten, it's okay.she's a super-hero.jane... i... your hair's full of glass...hurts like hell.still got what i need.17it's the doom patrol, okay? here's the address. we'll take care of the damage.sorry about the writing. robot fingers, you know?and remember, kids: don't walk through plate glass windows!jane!jane! wait!jane!damn!18scissors.i need a pair of scissors.chief?... yeah, listen... something weird's happened down at the hospital...yeah... rhea's vanished... possibly abducted...random words. cut phrases.it's a kind of divination, like casting the runes or reading the flight of birds.only with words.as soon as rebis get back, send him down here...i've got a feeling about this one, chief...yeah straight away...shuffle them.see how they fall like snow.excuse me, are you with that woman who...don't worry about it. she's a super-hero.19you see now? ther presence begins to reveal itself in the casual rearrangement of the text fragments.it becomes a kind of seance. to contact the living.listen:strange doctors of pain.history, wake up!alchemy starts in the hour of the knife. the butterfly labyrinth was no accident.the skinned retina i plucked from my mother's forehead when a boy.o have you seen the devle with his violet mikerscope and aesthetic scalpul.the stanic dr.stanley favours the entrails of fear.the appeal of the michaelmas girls subjected to the murdering martyrs.only a grave in mitre square.the mortuary in old montague street in which he weights the souls of fireworks or galaxies.the autumn of terror falls to pieces. ruthless prophecies of the secret city. the blue signature of strange attractors.good night, mary.up sidles jack.the word is murder, old boos.20you see?jack the ripper?the works are the key... the names of the victims open the door... mary anne nichols.annie chapman. elizabeth stride. catherine eddowes. marie jeanette kelly.rhea jones. R.Jred jack.my god21jane, wait! don't just go...listen... we'll try not to be too long.okay?no, don't... wait...i have to see... we can't just...22it can't be the scissormen again, can it?jane?rebis?jane?hell!23the music comes in waves.freakbeat vivaldi sampled and spliced together with the screams of murdered women and butterflies.petals?and wedding bells.the clamor of wedding bells.you're late.you're too late.24the wedding's over.rhea?the house that jack built.#241light.we need light.there must be a switch.are you sure?try here.where?here. on the wall.it's here some...ah.there.3ultravilet strobe chandeliers.nice.what's that music?sounds like vivaldi. scratch mix. digital sampling.oh, right.so. what now?search for the oterhs?they must be in here.some...where.6cliff?ribis?5what the butler saw6what is this place?this? this is my house. and i believe you know my wife. not in the biblical sense, of course.just rhea and me and baby makes three...we're happy in my blue heaven...what?this is insane! you can't marry her. she... she's in a coma, for god's sake!admittedly, her conversation is a little dull.but then again, love conquers all.i've had enough of this crap!7temper!i should really introduce myself red jack's the name. you may, however, be more familiar with my other title...god. pleased to meet you.8poor butterflies.9it's an old, old story. the original story, in fact.i created the universe and they told me i had to be punished. punished!and all because i had stained the beauty of perfect nothingness with gross matter.i was cast out. set to wander endlessly through this endless prison.who are they?i beg your pardon?if you created everything, who imprisoned you?oh, don't try to confuse the issue!i imprisoned myself.and if i'm god, this must be heaven!heaven, i'm in heaven...and my heart beats so that i can hardly10speak...sing my favorite song, rhea. you know the words.along came jack, not my type at all... you'd meet him on the street and never notice him...sing!rhea?rhea?he's just my jack!11the negative spirit.what?the negative spirit!release the negative spirit!well? shall we go?12don't fret.nothing actually dies here. here, there is only suffering.pain sustains my exstence.butterflies. do you like butterflies?pretty, fragile things with wings like church windows.they have fairly rudimentary nervous systems, of course that's why i need so many.pinned in their millions feeding me with their agony.i've been collecting them for a long time.once in every hundred years, the endless orbiting path of my wandering takes me into that part of my house which is your world.one hundred years ago... haunting the fogbound, gastlit streets of whitechapel.oh, i was jack then..... red jack, spring heeled jack, saucy jack, jack from hell, trade-name..13jack the ripper.i had a plan, you understand.the old urge to create was still strong.so i cut them up.annie and catherine and pretty mary.long liz and sweet marie jeanette in the fever room. with my knife.dividing their flesh.they were nothing.cheap harlots and sleepwalkers.did i say sleepwalkers?streetwalkers. sleepwalkers. they're all the same to me.i thought that if i cut them up and reassembled the flesh in new configurations...well, i thought that i could create a beautiful new form of life. something better than human.plan didn't work.typical.14oh, not another one!you're all wasting your time.look out forsee?15anyway.what was i saying?yes, yes... i've decided to marry. all work and no play makes jack a dull boy, after all.i can't say i chose rhea for her personality, but i saw her potential. i recognized what she was becoming while she slept.and look at those hips!think of the children we'll have.how many times must i tell you?handsoff!16that's all very easy for you to say.wait! what are you doing?you can't just shut down your nervous system like that! i need your pain!you're a curious creature, aren't you? a thing of parts.strange... i feel there's something not quite right about you. an absence.something missing...17steady.do you never learn?can't you just stop?18don't worry.you'll look back and laugh.as for you!there.not so clever now, eh?not so clever now!my knife.where's my19oh, rhea we could have discussed this...is this it?is... this... what it feels like?this emptying... black fireworks inside... and wind...such a wind...roaring a hurricane...of wings?21no, don't leave me.... you'll die... with me you live forever...this isn't happening...it can't...no pain... no pain anywhere light fails... music falters...i need pain...oh, the dark comes on in waves...i.. thought i was part of the grand story...the story that... that would at last give meaning to this senseless trajectory... the loop and spin of being...instead... instead i have learned a horrible truth of... existence...some stories have...no meaning.oh, bugger...cliff?22cliff? have i missed something?nothing muchdid you set the butterflies free?was that okay?yeah. yeah.smart move, crazy jane.he was lying wasn't he?you don't think he was god?couldn't care less.23funny isn't it?hilarious.no, i mean the way red jack must have been here for so long and then it's over for him so quickly.the knife the butterflies.the things that killed him were here all the time, you know?we never see the things that are right under our noses, do we? still...that's life, i guess.there's only one thing that's really bothering me now.how do we get out?24detroit. hot skies. emergency sirens. falling glass. alcoholic sweat.loyd jefferson.din do nuthin no way din do it.that ole place just come down bang! all on its own sure did me i din do nuthin ipssst! lloyd.i din do it! really iit's all right. lloyd, i saw what you did.i'm a friend.what? i can't see you straight, man.who's there?it's me. lloyd. i'm the savior of the lost and dispossessed. the patron saint of insignificance.i'm mr.nobody.and i come to welcome you, to set you free.in the name of brotherhood.#24imaginary friends.2before i go, joshua-- maxwell lord of the justice league called yeaterday.apparently a bumber of items were left behind in the souvenir room when the original league abandoned this complex.lord is particularly interested in something called a materioptikon.a what?materioptikon. as far as i undertand, it's a device that doctor destiny used to externalize the subconscious.the league recently had some kind of tedious skirmish with destiny...... and lord is anxious to retrieve all copies of the materioptikon.you wouldn't mind taking a look in the souvenir room, would you?2if you like.you know, you don't seem too concerned about the fact that cliff and the others have been missing for almost two days...i'm not. wherever they are, the doom patrol can take care of themselves.you should know that, joshua.yeah.so where are you headed?washington, with a new president in the white house...... my government commitments are at an end. all that remains is to clear up a few items of business.there's also the matter of some debts that arani accum-ulated during her term as team leader.you know, i never could figure out why arani should have claimed to be your wife in the first place...the poor woman was hopelessly insane, joshua.what other explanation do you require?can you imagine me married?i mean really?yeah.4mr.clayexcuse me, mr.clay.dorothy! hi! how are you?you settling in okay?well, not really. there's something wrong with the teevee.i didn't really want to bother you.hey, no problem! i'm not too great with televisions, but i'll take a look.5it could be this weird weather we've been having.i don't think so, mr. clay.i don't think it's weather.and it's the same on every channel.yeah, that does sound a little strange.see?it's been like that for a whole day now. it's real boring.a whole day?and you didn't tell us?i didn't want to bother anyone.6you mean there's been nothing on the screen but this room and this table>on every channel? for a whole day?you must have been pretty bored.it was okay for a while. i kept thinking something might happen.it's weird. maybe we're picking up some stray satellite transmission.i don't know. it's too bad the chief just left...you like tv, don't you? i guess you'll feel kind of lost without it.yeah. i used to watch it all the time back at the farm. i never did get out much.y'know... looking the way i do and all...so what happened with school? your mom and dad teach you?ma and pa didn't ever have time for that.no. my imaginary friends taught me.7what? sure. they taught me how to read and write and all kinds of stuff.imaginary friends?didn't you have imaginary friends, mr.clay?doesn't everyone?i guess... yeah, well, now that you mention it... back in the orphanage,i used to imagine i had a kind of magical dog.mr. vinegar. i used to talk to him all the time.i had a whole family; there was damn all, the daddy, darling-come-home, who was like the mom, and this little kid called flying robert.they used to play with me and tell me stories.it was real fun at first.this is the first time i've heard of someone being educated...... by imaginary people.8yeah, well, it got so i didn't like the stories they started to tell me.they were giving me bad dreams.they told me about the little mermaid and about the girl who couldn't stop dancing till they cut off her feet...so i shot them.you shot your imaginary friends?with what?an imaginary gun! what else?i told them i wanted to show them something. then i took them round behind the barn and i shot them.well, i suppose that's one way of doing it...what age were you when this happened?about eleven, i guess.eleven?dorothy, listen... the chief asked me to check something out and i'd better do it now before i forget.can we talk again in a couple of minutes?surei'll be back as quickly as i can.don't go away!10inky boys.11no.oh,yes.12oh, blacky, you're as black as ink.13the great tall tailor always comes to little boys who suck their thumbs; and ere they dream what he's about.he takes his great sharp scissors out!14you're a bad girl, dorothy dear! willful and wicked with a head just crack-full of dirty thoughts!look at me when i'm talking to you! i'm your dear, departed darling-come home, back from the deep dead to haunt you for ever!isn't that right, pa?i'm damn all, i am! my newspaper body alive with financial reports and crossword puzzles that fill themselves in as if by magic!my grotesque, smiling head and swarm of eyes turned, as ever, in your direction! a remorseless and surreal grin!needle and thread!flying robert!flying robert!ghost balloon baby thing!sewing up the door!sewing up the door!it's time now, dorothy.shoe time.15put on the shoes, dear dorothy.put on the red shoes.beautiful red shoes.no! don't make me look at them!don't make me look!put them on.it's just like knives, dorothy, dear. just like walking on knives.remember the shoe song?i wish i were an angry shoe, a bodiless balloon. cut off my covenat with god the pain of orthopedic glue.heels and nails on dancing shoes the odor of hammers, of pretty knivesall sewn up tight.she danced again, again and again though every step cost her excessive paingo away!oh, please go away!ghosties never go!sew up! sew it up!sew up your mind to stop dirty thoughts getting in.16dorothy.let's go.no!darling come home!17my god.okay.we'd better talk about this, dorothy.is it your psychic power? is that what's making these things happen? the way you made that monster appear when you arrived two days ago?dorothy, can you make these things go away, like you did with the monster?i can't!i didn't make this happen i don't have power that strong.18i killed them, mr.clay. i killed my imaginary friends and they're real mad about it.it's not psychic power. they're real and they've come back to punish me.for god's sake, dorothy! ghosts of imaginary people can't possibly exist!don't shout at me!i feel sick.i feel sick.my god! that noise!oh, it's them! it's them!they're coming to get me! they're going to make me wear the shoes!they're going to make me wear the red shoes!19oh, my head! my head's splitting open...everything's getting out!then let it out!tell me about the red shoes, dorothy! quickly!i can't! i can't say!the bad witch cut out my tongue!tell me!i... oh, god... i only wanted ruby slippers... ruby slippers like dorothy in the wizard of oz...that's all...i just wanted other kids to like me and not to laugh and be cruel and... i wanted to be grownn up and not to be scared all the time.but darling-come-home said i couldn't have ruby slippers... only red shoes...like in hans christian andersen...... the bad little girl with her feet cut off and the shoes, the shoes still dancing at the church door in horrible red shoes...like the little mermaid walking on knives... and ginger rogers in top hat when she danced so hard that her white satin shoes turned red... oh, god, i'm ripping, i'm ripping open...ohhh... the walls are turning to butter... they're coming through...20everything's tearing inside... i was eleven... blood running down my legs... turning my white shoes red...i was elven!no one told me about the blood!dorothy, listen to me. please. what you're describing is what some people call an engram or an involute, okay? it's... it's a whole bunch of feelings and emotions that cluster together.the red shoes have turned into a kind of charged-up symbol...of growing up...dorothy, you must understand... only you can make it stop!i don't want... i don't want to grow up... i don't want to...i don't want to think about... boys...i'm so ugly! it's not fair! i don't want to grow up! it hurts!oh, mr.clay, it hurts real bad!you have to face it, dorothy! confront it!your mind is causing all this.it's all just guilt and fear and it's been externalized in the form of these imaginary friends.it's like something has boosted your own image-making power so that...my god!why didn't i think?
22give me the shoes.23dorothy?you put them on?you put on the red shoes?the ruby slippers, mr.clay.they were ruby slippers all along.there's no place like home.epiloguesomewhere else.well?i'm here. (let me out of this place!) shut up!sorry. (no he's not. he's a nogood lying sh)quiet!i'm here. like you said. (no-good)what do you(creep!)want?what do any of us want, mr.shelley? a decent standard of living, a little respect, a quarter ton of chocolate mousse.but for the moment we want simply and sincerely to... to welcome you.
#26to the brotherhood of evil.japan!i didn't expert to see you again quite so quickly, sunburst.is it customary for you to devote so much time to your captured enemies?she's hardly an enemy, doctor. granted , the poor gril appeared from nowhere on monday and started to hit me...but that doesn't make her an enemy.a figure of speech, nothing more.yes. i watched the battle on television, she certainly gave you a hard time...only at first. she calmed down after i broke her arms and legs.yes. do they follow you everywhere?everywhere.2the must be rather disconcerting...it's the price one pays for the privilege of being japan's greatest super-hero.the adventures of the new sunburst is the country's most popular television show.true. my own son watches every episode. reads the manga, too. sometimes i wonder if all the violence is healthy.i don't mean to interrupt, doctor, but if we might return to the subject of the girl.you mentioned that you'd worked out how her power operate.as a matter of fact, yes. yes we did.it's very strange. very strange indeed.the thing is, you see, she seems to have every superpower you haven't thought of.i beg your pardon?yes. the only way to strip her of her abilities is to think of all the super-powers you can.as you think of them, she loses them.ah... well, there's flight, of course, and super-strength...don't forget super-breath. it's a real killer.super-breath. yes.3you may also find that she's a little paranoid about dirt.invulnerability. super-speed. super-ventriloquism... um...telescopic limbs?go away!get out!now, then, there's no need to...you're letting in dirt! i hate it! clinging, filthy dirt everywhere.oh, there's no dirt here. not one bit of it.now, why don't you say hello to...hey!look! look here!see?4yes! super-villains on the rampage! big trouble for sunburst!what!super-villains! coming this way!a fight seems imminent!total nuclear frenzy!no, wait.this women's asleep.she's asleep.5you! (you swallowed me!) quiet! (but you swallowed me!) oh, for god's sake, shut up! (he swallowed us, too, you know. it's not just you who)shut up!you. you're coming with us.6get the camera! i'll show you a--sunburst! look there!oh,no.now, wait a minute! listen! why don't we...stop!it's wild! it's crazy! it's live!the adventures of sunburst!7back after these messages!8groovy.9rhea's still in a coma, but i suppose she's better off here with us than back in the hospital...i was beginning to think you guys were never going to get back.jane got us out of red jack's house in the end. she used some sequence of names a key.she's good at that kind of stuff.well, you know, we had our own little bit of excitement while the rest of you were away.yeah, i heard.how you feeling now, dorothy?i'm fine, mr. steele.anyway, no one has any idea what we can do to help rhea?i wouldn't say that, cliff.10i've been studying the printouts, monitoring the readings, and i'm convinced that there's something very strange taking place herer.i've observed certain curious physiological and nerological changes.this is no ordinary coma.what exactly do you mean, no ordinary coma?i believe rhea has entered a chrysalis state, joshua.and i believe that her body is about to undergo some kind of metamorphosis.into what, however, i scarcely dare imagine.you sure know how to kill a conversation stone dead, chife.11so here we are.here we are, safe beneath the streets of gay paree.safe in this secret, sacred sub-educational sanctum.safe.and the mission was, i take it, a screaming success?yeah. hey, i used to (i'm getting really) have one of (angry) these when i was (in here) a kid.the thunderbird 2 car...all the toys, all the comic books, all the silly, useless things that people lose or throw away= they all end up with me.but now it's time to welcome...the latest addition to our merry band.don't touch me! don't touch me with your flithy, dirty hands~let me go!12have to wash my hands! wash everything!dirt! the air's thick with it! sticking to my skin and the flods in my brain!oh, i do so love the musical sound of the japanese tongue.it's like listening to a busy typewriter.ladies! dirt need never again be a problem when you slip into this fabulous filtered gown and gas mask!insulate yourself against the whole wide world in this attractive outfit.go on! be a devil!for me?yes. for you.now go and try it on.lovely.now. lloyd! wake holly up will you?holly wake up!13oh. are we back in paris? where have i been?tokyo.you what? i've been in tokyo?i've been in japan and i missed it?oh noood.take a seat, holly.but i've always wanted to go to japan.always.ohm holly! holly! when we're finished...you'll be able to go anywhere beacause it will al be yours!let me tell you. i have oh! such plans for us all!but first, a story. the true life storr of mr.nobody-who he is and how he came to be. you'll laugh, you'll cry...listen! you can almost hear the screeching of exotic birds. you can almost hear the rain drumming on the skylight, on the verandah! splash! the fish jump in the choked pond. the clocks tick tock tick tock.listen...14meryy andrew?so, how many of your personalities have male characteristics.jane?a fre sun daddy is another driller bill.and please, cliff, you're not talking to jane now, i'm driver 8.yeah, sorry.listen can we stop fro a while? this is like writing out the telephone directory.sure.it was your idea. remember?i know. i just didn't realize what i was letting myself in for. next time it get a good idea, tell me to shut up.we must have about fifty names here.a lot of them won't come out, even for me. some refuse to say their names.those are the badly traumatized ones, in the deep stations of the underground.you know, what i'd really likt to do is to build up some kind of a map of the undergound. it's a hard concept for me to grapple with.it's like this whole landscape is in your head, but it's difficult to visualize how it all fits together...15well, i suppose if.jane...?you shut your horrible clanking clockwork mouth!weld it tight, cliff steele!jane, listen! who am i talking to now?no one! no one talks and the trains run on time on the shiny old trickery tracks in the kkkjane, for god's sake!it's waiting in the painting! waiting to get me get me !ohhh, something bad's going to happen.something really bad's going to happen to poor jane...oh god.not again.16are you sitting comfortably?then i'll begain.so there i was in south america, in steamy, surly paraguay, bored brainless!i wasn't mr. nobody then. oh, no, i was mr. somebody! mr. morden, to be precise.you've probably never even heard of me. i was a menmber of the original brotherhood of evil. i was the member nobody could remember, if you know what i mean.and i was in hiding.two of my former colleagues, two heartless devils known as the brain and the monsieur mallah had sworn to kill me if i ever again showed my face anywhere.and so i spent years, years! in paraguay, driven to distraction by hideous latin-american soap operas, out of data newspapers, bananas and mosquitos and magic realist paperback novels!me! whose genius was responsible for the big red robot that once kicked the crap out of the doom patrol.my host. i must confess, was not blind to my suffering, his name, by the way, was bruckner, doctor bruckner, no less.was criminal on the run. strange psychological experiments in the death camps.the least said, the better.17this bruckner, this docter bruckner, said that he thought he might be able to help me. there were, he said, certain methods.certain forbidden techniques.he mentioned the infamous white room of auschwitz, gibbered in german about how, if i was willing, he would transform me into a new man.i imagined plastic surgery, perhaps, the careful construction of a new identity.i imagined freeedom.and so, like a fool, i agreed.18i was desperate, you see, willing to try anything that would allow me to return to civilization unmolested.anything.the chamber wasn't large, but it was spherical and it was white and these two qualities conferred upon it the illusion of endless space.i was strapped into a body suit which inhibited both movement and hearing.and i was given a powerful epidural injection.into the spine.it anesthetized everything below the neck.by now, i must admit, i was rather regretting my earlier eagerness.it was, however, as it so often is, too late for regrets.bruckner made his exit, closed the door behind him.i could not move could not speak. could not hear. i could noly see.i could only see white.and i was alone. all alone.in the white room.19by the end of first day, i was completely insane.those initial hours were very bad. i was assailed by doubts, by terrors and by hallucinations of every conceivable configuration.i endured a horror show of sensations.and the nothing white.white forever in every direction.minuties became centuries, became millennia, became eons.i learned later that i was in there for only three days and three nights the traditional celtic period of mystical trial.it was like forever. like forever piled on forever and forever, world without end, yahoo!after several billion centuries, i was thoroughly convinced of my own serene divinity.like the ascended buddha, i was beyong maya, beyong the veil of illusion. i knew the purity of infinite absence.and then on the third night something happened.20just a dot, a speck, a mote.moving.right to left, slowly.eons passed.the dot moved on.it occupied all my thoughts. i evolved whole cosmologies around this supremely mysterious and graceful presence.and then i was struck by a terrifying thought.i wondered if the dot was something small and very near.or something big and far away.i began to imagine it as some vast, black horror, hunders, thousands of milles across.a world sized monstrosity so far away in that white void that is seemed minute.and i beg an to wonder what might happen if it caught sight of me.might it not turn and come closer growing larger?larger.blotting out the infinity of white with blackness.larger and larger and larger. and21in that moment, in that catastrophic final instant, all taht i was, had been, would be, the whole infinity of my being was erased.mr, morden was gone wiped out like a chalk drawing on a slate.i had become the spirit of the twenty first century, the abstract man.the virtual man.the notional man.or as bruckner hime so aptly put it...herr niemandmr. nobody.22i killed them all, naturally, and then i made my way acroos the whole wide world, collecting the debris of society, the human detritus cast ashore in the wake of the gene bomb. a whole new generation of super-powered outcasts.i'm referring to you, by the way.my dear, ludicrous friends, standing there like lost property no one wants to claim, with stupid names and .... and even more stupid costumes.sleepwalk!the fog!frenzy! the quiz!god bless them every one!so what (let me out!) are we going to be now? (i've a wife and family to) quiet!the new brotherhood fo evil?no!23no!i've changed my mind for a better one.good! evil! outmoded concepts for an antique age.can't you see? there is no good, there is no evil in our new world!look at us! are we not final proof that there is no good, no evil, no truth, no reason?are we not proof that the universe is a drooling idiot with no fashion sense?from this day on we will celebrate the total absurdity of life, the gigantic hocus-pocus of existence.from this day on, let unreason reign!the brotherhood of evil is dad!long live the brotherhood of dada!and the pants of the vicar are closing rataplan rataplan#271why is?who is?where is?how is?when is?what is?meantime- if i might resume the thread of my wandering narrative-on this most exquisite summer evening of 1808, in the noble company of mr.coleridge, i continued my slow ascent of rydal fell.about us, the stars of the northern constellation trembled in the blue, immeasurable chambers of the central heavens and silence and solitude prevailed as in some lofty cathedral...whose solemn vaults were lost in the atmosphere.in such circumstances of repose and rest from the world's strife, my thoughts, suspririosae cogitationes, were turned naturally to the contemplation of the infinite mystery of god's creationin that same moment, i chanced to see the weight of dejection which sat upon coleridge's shoulders suddenly lift a though all his gloom and despondency had takedn flight on invisible wings.it seemed to me that the solitary, majestic splendor of that prospect over which we now spred our gaze, had somehow contrived to lift from his spirit the chains which opium had set there.this sublime evening had become a and like a man inspired, coleridge began to speak.3he spoke of a great many things and i do not wish to bore my reader with detals...but one aspect of our conversation has remained fixed in my thoughts for many years- viz, that there exists in italy a certain painting:a painting which, it is said, possesses the power to physically devour those who behold it.this painting, as coleridge described it, is the work of piranesi, that same artist whose delirious visions of vast engines, splendid stairs, abysmal chasms, have so haunted my own dreams.for my own part, i could scarcely believe that the story contained any truth, but coleridge had it in mind to commence a long poem based on the subject.he saw in it a reflection of the fatal fascination of opium, the power to charm the soul with glorious visions and then ensnare it forever.on that evening of cloudless beauty, with the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them laid out before our eyes...these images swept coleridge into such a continous strain of eloquent dissertation, that i imagined myself come into the compay of angels.4to my knowledge, however, the work was never completed.so wrote thosma dequincey. five feet all and a bundle of fun!that's our man!early 19th century (creepy!) philosopher.(isn't it a bit) wrote confessions of an(unfair to call him a creep?) english opium eater.(oh, so you like it in here. do you?)don't you(no, i don't mean) shut up!don't you know anything.no, i don't, smatter of fack.how come you're sewntelligent, man?it was my mom and dad, okay?(if you don't mean it) bastards were into all that romanic poetry crap.why d'you think (don't say it!) they called me byron, huh? byron shelley? can you imagine what school was like?5so what's this dequincey bloke gotta do with us, then?well, little sleepwalk, well...what i've just read has everything to do with us and with our dreams of global absurdity.i want the painting, you see.the painting that eats people.that painting still exists.oh, piranesi's original was destroyed in 1814, shortly before the defeat of napoleon.lost forever amid the flame and trumoil of war!but many years later a duplicate was created.6as an interesting aside, oscar wilde mentions the story of the painting in his unpublished confessions of sebastian melmoth, in which he claims that it inspired him to write the picture of dorian gray.the second painting, howere, was the work of the brillian, unstable max bordenghast. this young icelandic artist had a certain cult following in the early years of this century and was wellknown for his esoteric interests.the story goes that he locked himself in his garret room and, using shamanistic techniques which, they say, date back to man's infancy, emerged after several days with a... how can i put it?with a hungry painting.in the end, experiments like these sent him absolutely loopy and he spent the rest of his short life scribbling on the walls of a lunatic asylum.the painting, along with much of bordenghast's other work, vanished completely.it is nex referred to by the english occultist austin osman spare. using his automatic drawing technique, spare attempted to produce a similar painting.needless to say the attempt failed.finally, in 1923, the painting surfaced as part of the collection of the enigmatic and sadistic comte d'aguille.7it was seized by the nazis when they occupied france in 1940 and from there passed into the hands of one horst eismann, so-called scientist of the strange.eismann is a multibillionaire arms dealer, a pale, frail asthmatic who's spent the last twenty-five years collecting bizarre artifacts from all around the globe.this collection of weird relics and mysterious, forbidden books is currently stored in a converted observatory, high in the french alps.and you want us to steal the painting, right?bravo, mr.shelley!nobody can accuse you of being a complete spaz!oh, yest! time to take your sleeping pils, holly! time to pop a barry manilow tape into your headset.i want you out for the count!but first, gather round...here's the pan...8push. pop. stack.jargon of recuresive sequence.wait, slow donw.why? life is too short.every dool an isomorphic mapping of every other doll.i don't undertand all this. not all at once. i only collect them.we collect.yes. remember.electrons propagating... emission and reabsorption of virtual photos, decaying into annihilating electron positron pairs...what?we inhabit a virtual universe. recursion at the level of...larry.9i keep telling you, cliff, i'm...not larry anymore. i know, i know.i've got to call something.look, i just want to talk to you, man! i mean, we've know each other for years!i worry about you, that's all.you talk to yourself all the time, there's no furniture in your room...and to tell the truth, you're starting to smell funny.what's going on under those bandages, larry?nothing.nothing you would undertand.don't patronize me!i get enough of that from ordinary people!i don't mean to. i'm simply telling you the truth.10even i.... even we... have difficulty undertanding all the changes that are taking place.these new perceptions... synaesthetic flood of ideas i...this body... part man, part woman... this body is perfect. this perfect, glorious body.only the mind remains fragmented sometimes. disorganized. there are three of us in here and the integration is slow.but please, cliff... please don't worry.about me.the aenigma regis is about to unfold.i'm very happy.did i tell you that sometimes i see through time as though through a clear window? my brain is lit by mantic fire.it's happening now.as i was going up the stair i met a man who wasn't there. he wasn't there again today. i wish, i wish he'd stay away.that verse was written by hughes mearns.we must beware of men who aren't there.11mr. ballard!doctor silence!it's a pleasure to welcome you both to my little retreat.one so very rarely gets the opportunity to meet fellow connoisseurs of the curious.the feeling's mutualyou must excuse my mask- i suffer from a rather unusual disease.such is the nature of my condition that were i to see any reflection of my naked face, i would immediately cease to exist...i understand, doctor please.come this way.12quite some place you have here, eismann.yes... i find it... comfortable.i hope you can forgive the presence of the guards, but many of the items in my museum are priceless.yes, we've heard rumors... dare i mention the ghost-skin shirt, the fourth secret off fatima...the yodelling skull of tavistock?you may indeed mention them but not, i would advise, in polite company.surfacesub-surfacebasementsub-basementvault.here we are.i bid you welcome.13to my cabinet of curiosities!of course, much of my collection must remain sealed in the vaults. but i think you may find a few items here to interest you.there, for instance, the very bullets used in the assassinations...of gandhi, kennedy, and lennon.in placed under the tongue they stimulate visions of the future.there, a television set on which one can view broadcasts from hell.the previous owner cut her own throat with a sharpened key and the key itself is now rumored to provide access into the dreams of children.here, also, the infamous dresden madonna, which bleeds sour milk every twenty-eight days.now.you say you may be interested in trading?14morning, gustav.be like that, then.morning, paulgustav?my god.hey!15hey what the hell do you think you're...dirty.dirty.clean now.the lights are down!there's someone in the complex!this way! the rest of you follow...me.16my god, eismann! what's going on?we appear to be under attack, gentlemen.i shouldn't worry unduly. my guards will...my god.what is it?don't let it near my face!my face!look!over there!the painting. now.17i'm not entirely sure i...you know exactly what we want!the painting that eats people.i can't... it's...in the vault. there's a time lock...the painting, eismann, or we trash this whole place.18don't shoot!for good's sake, don't shoot!let them pass!i don't think you people know what you're doing. that painting is highly dangerous.dunno what we're doin'?course we dunno what we're doin'！we're totally crazy, man!we're the brotherhood of dada.mr. eismann. sir!we've found two men down by the boiler room...they've been turned into statues, sir.glass statues. it's horrible.statues of glass? how very odd.bring them down to the museum, poulsen.the day may not be a complete disaster after all.19and now! ladies and gentlemen. children and microbes and all listening gods!the brotherhood of dada bids you welcome!but what is dada, i hear you say?dada is a state of mind. dada applies itself to everything and yet it is nothing; it is the point at which yea and no and all opposites meet.dada is useless, like everything else in life.and dada has no pretentions, just as life should have none.thus do we present this absurdist ritual for your entertainment.very shortly, this drab, workaday world and everything in it will be changed forever!follow us into the goledn country, into the empire of senseless!20yes indeed!in the name of duchamp and tzara dan breton, in all the names of that sweet celestial host but most of all in the blessed name of saint arthur cravan, the nihilist martyr, we offer you...the painting that ate paris!i plan now to compose an instant...okay, that's enoughbreak this up!you! i want to see your...there! we have now taken over the world.what are you going to do about that?what?you think that's funny, en?well, i'm not laughing.i'm not laughing at all.21cliff.what's going on?is something wrong?in here, quickly!make yourself ready to leave immediately, cliff.i'll alert the others.what is it?what's up?check the monitors, mr. steele.it's paris.something real weird's going on in paris...22i'm afraid i can't understand a word you're saying.i don't speak fascist.that's it! stop moving or you're...23as i was saying. i am about to compose an automatic poem to active this marvelous painting.ah, poetry! the language of paradise!i shall call it the presian red railway...the persian red railway bound in chains of sightless harmony.sudden clamor threatens the sweating windmills!winding,winding, oh radiant ferry!dismember me in black strap suicide.in winding iron wrought railing!this sick circumference bound in chains, bound in egg white!colliding bishop! cuddle my brain! it works!
#281paris trapped inside a painting? this is way too weird for me!weird? don't talk to me about weird! i've been living my in the twilight zone.so what do we do? we can't go in after them, can we?who are these guys, anyway? the brotherhood of what?...dada. the brotherhood of dada. some bunch of nutcases nobody took seriously until they did this...hey. talking of nutcases...here comes the doom patrol.2there!you must be robotman...and you must be the guy who states the obvious.so this is the painting, yeah?yeah... that's right.the painting that ate paris. some of our temmates are trapped in there, too.in the jle embassy...any idead?it's activated by paradox modulation.any contradicatory ideas or images can be used to open a way into the painting.and what d'you think you're looking at?me?nothingi'm nothing, am i?jane, we need some help here.i didn't say...don't get upsset. that's just hammerhead.that's crazy jane. the one with multiple personalities.3so what do we do?meditate on me. meditate on what i am.i am the avatar of contradiction; black and white, male and female, in one body.can you feel it?can you feel it opening like a door?listen, do you guys know what you're...doing?those guys give me the creeps.i mean whose side are they on anyway?check it out!how did they do that?4how do we do that?5i feel weird.it's like i'm kinda flat and unreal they way i get sometimes when i'm drepressed.it's part of being in the painting.this brotherhood of dada has been here they've left psychometric traces.vibrations subtle scents. traumatic after-images.there were four of them.five?one of them is... vague...sleepwalk... london girl. her thoughts wrapped in wool. in cotton wool. she's asleep!and when she sleeps, when she sleepwalks, she has terrible power.frenzy is another. his real name...his name is lloyd. such energy. uncontrollable. cyclonic. elemental blur...is that?... yes... quiz. the quiz. afraid of dirt. so much. contamination. so much power. she. she has every super-power you haven't thought of.and the fog. psychedelic death cloud. absorbs enemies.his mind a seething turmoil of captured, restless souls.6and the fifth... nothing there... a non-being...cliff?cliff, there's something funny about this place...jane, do you remember you said something about a painting...you said there was something bad in the painting...did i?i don't remember.over here.the door is unlocked.and there's something else.what d'you mean, something else?we're not alone in the painting. there's something in here. some terrible power. ancient. trapped. an inhuman intelligence.it's waking now. i can feel it.that's just what i wanted to hear right now!7so what is this intelligence? what are we talking about here?does the brotherhood know about it?i don't think so.don't think about it. to think about it gives it strength.i'll take your word for it. let's change the subject.what is it with this place? i mean, it looks real enough...but it has no heart.yeah. we're inside a photorealist painting.what else can we expect?i shudder to think.this looks familiar.yes.it should do.8i knew it!i knew this wasn't going to be easy.how far down does this thing go?it's infinite.an infinite recursive structure.beautiful.what d'you mean, beautiful? we could be lost in there forever.and what about paris? the real paris. where's paris?it's there.it's in there somewhere.and it's not alone.9cliff! rebis!something coming!moving fast! it's coming! it's...frenzy! that's the one called...10divide an' conquer, man.divide an' conquer.11perfumed air and light on the leaves.light falling like snow, like chamber music.light as snow.what's going on?i can't see you properly.of course you can't i'm mr.nobody. i'm not really here.and everyone has their own way of seeing me.you might remember me from when i was boring old mr.morden.no. you probably don't. nobody does.anyway, here you are in our secret world, our maze of possibilities.this is the impressioinist department, but there are others.why don't i send you on a sight-seeing tour?you'd like that, wouldn't you?well? wouldn't you?12interesting.how far down are we? how deep into the structure?i don't know.how many levels?how about taking a look outside?good idea.from the street, the sound of great engines, of shining factories in untiring labor.the clashing, violent music of ceaseless traffic and distant thunder of vast aircraft in smokefilled skies.the sizzle and shock of molecular motioin. hammers and pistons and strobing, multiplying images of velocity.time becomes space.electricity sings in the power lines.13this multicolored polyphonic city!this whole level seems to be based on the principles of futurist art and architecture.i wonder what...dirty.14economy. utility.engineering precision.function.expediency.spatial construction.terrific.sound.are you asleep?you're...15stop it!for god's sake, stop it! wake up!stressed metal.16the sound a key makes when hovering.the beautiful landscape of naked amnesia.crazy jane on a haunted beach.the voice of melancholic spirit gum.jane?crazy jane.disorienting, isn't it?hard to (oh, don't be such a) think (bully!)shut up in there!your thoughts (creep!) are all surrealist images.17your...(listen, are we ever going to get out of here?) shut up!you can't (i only asked) concentrate, can you, crazy jane?you just don't (i think he's) know what (asking a perfectly reasonable) to do next. (question.)will you all be quiet, for god's sake! i'm trying to (creep!) i'm trying to be menacing here.there's nowhere to run. (nowhere to run! what a cliche!) i'm going to swallow you (oh, not another one!) whole.don't you feel (isn't it) like you're running in a dream? you get slower and (crowded enough) slower, no matter how hard you try. (in here?)slower and slower.and i'm right behind you.18dirty!remember. she only has every super-power we haven't thought of.if we can think it. she loses it.yes. yes.flight.19super-strength.telepathy!heat vision.x-ray...what's she doing?dematerialization!dematerialization!where is she?undergroundtremors underground...20there! release the spirit!release the negative spirit!and keep thinking!invulnerability.force fields.teleportation...heat visionwe did that one!i'm sure we...21the doom patrol pathetic.i wonder what it'll be like to absorb your...keep wondering, asshole!you'll never never what are you(haha) doing?(that's pissed you off, hasn't) shut up in there!all right, so i can't touch you in that abstract state. i don't (yes you) care.(do!)i don't mind.you'll have to change back sometime.i can wait.22super-breath.telescopic visioin.what are you doing?sonic powers. super-speed.metamorphosis.rain brain. don't leave me!come back!you forgot the power to create escape proof spirit jars.23well. so much for the new doom patrol. f-minus for effort, i'd say.and as for you.why are you doing this?why? because i love youand since you adn the doom patrol are the only super-heroes mad enough to fight us, we really must get you out of the picture as soon as possible.now...that ugly jam jar is, i take it, the nutrient tank that feeds your human brain?without it, you will die, am i right?quiz.24heavens above! that was too easy...you know, i wonder what happened to the fog.it's not like him to miss out on the fun, is it?so whaddawe do now, man?good question, lloyd! i'm all for some synchronized swimming, but i suppose it will have to wait.why don't we just reactivate the painting and have it devour the world this time?yes! there's room enough in here for everyone!the whole world, lloyd! we could do anything we wanted!paint faces on superman's bare bottom! use batman as an ashtray!yes! let's make them all suffer!awake.i'm awake. it's awake. it's coming!yes! let's make them all suffer!let's do it.let's do it now...the buried rider! the fifth horseman!#291deer momman...i no yo a in heer to reed this but enyho heer it is.yor my momma an i lov yo (evn tho yo ran awy with that roch exterminator) but i'm ritin this to prov yo olwas did tok crapyo use to tell me i wodnt evr mak it big. yo spen to much tim at the moovis yo use to sayto much imajinashon an no street sinse. yo live in a world liv yor own yo sedan wen i tol yo i wos gon be kign uv the wurld sum day to jus sed yo lern to ty yor sholases befor yo think abot been kign uv the wurld.well momma. yo nevir had me proply ejacated an i stil cant ty my sholases but i hop yor laffin on the other sid uv yor fass now, momma.cos i did it.its ol min! i did it!2the kingdom of notop o'the world, ma!3top o'the world.sins we tuk oyr, thigns have ben much mor funevrythins brit an new an its ol for freei lik mornin best.mornins wen the bathoven burds fly down sqwakin for food.i mosly fed tham musical nots.they eat the nots an tern tham into buotiful musci.the sky is fool uv buotiful music ol the tim.its a buotiful wurld mommayod be reel prod uv me thas for thurenyho this is the story uv ho we got the wurld in the furs plass.4wy don i jus start at the end an see wer we get from ther?so we stole a painting. so we turned a policeman into a toilet.worse things happen every day in el salvador.the painting's falling apart, for god's sake!we've got to get out!don't you understand? we just wanted------ to break the crushing monotony of life!to set the world free! to make each moment an event instead of a drudgery.every man his own master with the freedom to say "no".and you call us criminals?i can't believe this! it all started off so well.there we were the brotherhood of dada. apostles of absurdity. disciples of the daft.didn't we steal bordenghast's infamous hungry painting?well, didn't we?and then when the doom patrol attempted to rescue paris from the painting, didn't we fight them and win?yes. we did.and that might have been the end of it, if it hadn't been fore sleepwalk waking suddenly from her superpower trance.it's awake!the buried rider! the fifth horseman!it's coming!5oh. yes! there's no shortage of excitement when we're around.so we hurried on down through the worlds nested within the painting's structure and this is what we found...what is it?is a hoofprint, man. a totally humongous hoofprint.well, we are in the surrealist level of the painting.you expect that sort of thing here.no, it's the thing from my dream!i told you, didn't i? it's been in here for years and now we've woken it up!the fifth horseman. it was in my dream.that's what i dreamed about.it's awake! now!6that plaintive ohhhh emanated from none other than our dear old missing pal, byron shelley, also known as the fog.whoops! there was another one!anyway, out came the horrible truth...sleeping on the job, mr.shelley?good man! there's nothing like a nice long rest in the middle of a crisis!i feel nauseous.i tired to absorb that... whatever her name is... crazy jane from the doom patrol okay?i mean, it's no big deal i've done it a million times.it didn't work.it was running really smoothly, you know? i had her pretty much terrorized and there i was, moving in for the kill.7i don't like to complain, really i don't, but i went in there in good faith and that's not fair.i should have been warned.somebody should have told me she had multiple personalities! there they were, breaking into my head, yammering and screaming.i mean, i have to put up with enough pf that kind of stuff!so anhyway... i vomited.heeeurk! just like that. sicked her up whole.the only good thing was that she totally traumatized all the other people i've absorbed. all those moaning bastards who keep arguing with me and butting into my conversation.ha! she shut them up!anyway, next thing is, the horse appears... well, it doesn't actually appear... except in my head, that is.i think.what do you mean, the horse?how big can a horse be?it's like a spirit, a force that's taken the shape of a horse.i told you!jesus, i don't know!8when it hit me, i flashed on all these pictures...it's one of the angels of the apocalypse. you know-- death, war, famine, plague, and... ah...belgian sitcoms?it's the fifth horseman. spoken of in certain gnostic gospels. and his name that sat on him was extinction. and oblivion.he bringeth the end of all time, all space, all life! the end of all gods!somehow, the spirit was trapped when the painting was originally completed, over sixty years ago.trapped by the ritual that gave the painting power...i don't remember asking for your opinion.anyway, it's gone now and we have a world to conquer.no.no, that's what i'm trying to tell you. it didn't go away.it went in there.it went into the sea.see?that's a big horse.11its gettin pritty excitin now huh? momma.i bet you cant nevir gess what happind nex.well mr.nobudy figired that hors wos jus to big a problim.i lok lik weed need sum help.i gess yo thot therd be a big fite with the dom patroll but it dint turn out that way atoll.its probly juss as well. i aint much good at fitin even sins i got soperhero poers.the robot gy wo nerly ded wen we got ther.it wos relly sumthin wen the quiz use her poer to mak time run backwars.fixd up that robot gys tank lik it hant evir bin broke.12then we got the othir gy out a the bottil.they wer reel pissed becos we had to sav em.ha? servs em riht.an then we brot em whar mr. nobudy wos in anuthir levl of the pantin.this wos the simbolis levl. (simbolis is a kin of art wich yo probly wodn understan an wich ida nevir non about excep for mr nobudy seen as how yo didn hav me ejacted. momma)enyho...are you trying to deny that you'd have died if we hadn't saved you...?listen, we'd have got out of it eventually.we always do!oh, no! i don't think so! we beat you fair and square and you're just not man or prawn enough to admit it!13i don't know why i'm arguing with a guy who looks like you're seeing him out of the corner of your eye all the time!the team's a little inexperienced. so what?it's hardly the end of the world!it is.it will be.when the rider grows strong enough to break out of the painting and into the real world , it will extinguish everything.and when only void remains, it will destroy itself.she's right.we're up to our hairlines in serious stuff here.it's taking power from the worlds within the painting.it tooks from and expression from the surrealist world and each new level gives it something else it needs.it's feeding on the power of ideas.look! it's entering this level now! this symbolist world will supercharge the horseman with enormous iconic energies.look!14my god.how are we supposed to fight that?it's affecting the painting, too. can't you feel the whole structure shaking itself apart?you know, i can't help thinking about the sour grapes bunch.do you remember? they used to dance into the banana splits clubhouse and fleagle, bingo, drooper, and snork would go absolutely crazy!i don't believe this!well, if we're all going to die, we may as well be thinking about something stupid...i don't believe this!wait.it's me. i know it's me.an intelligence placed inside the rider. guiding it.15i have to do it!ride the horse! save the world!it's me!jane?jane! what are you...it's flit now. bye, cliff.jane, for god's sake!i wish was a spaceman, the fastest guy alive...ah! in my head. she's broadcasting.jane.reverberating voices. static.jane?rebis? rebis, is that you?i'm in it. rebis. i'm inside it. i'm in its heart.16the empty cage of its heart.oh, god, it's too big!it's too big!they're plunging through a fauvist world, gathering rage and violent energy, gathering speed.she can't conrol the horse. she doesn't have the strength.it's rising through the levels towards the real world.what are we going to do?we can't just stand here.i know!we all have super-powered energy to spare, don't we? so why not joint hands and send it to her!let's have a groovy love-in!17instead of fighting, we all join hands! like ebony and ivory living together on a piano!you're nuts.it's so embarrassing it has to work!i think he's right. i think we might be able to help jane guide the horse.yeah? so what now?each of the level of the painting, eachself contained world, gives the horseman power, am i not right?it takes ideas and converts them into energy. surrealism, symbolism, cubism, futurism they all provide strength for the rider.my god! what a fabulous mind i possess! i know how to destroy the horseman and make it feel stupid at the same time.what are you talking about?the dada world! guide her to the dada world!18and you say paris just disappeared into the painting?yeah. and then the doom patrol went in after it.i see.i don't suppose anyone can tell me anything about the energy field around the canvas? why has it begun to spark?what?i don't think it was doing that before...excuse me one moment.i'll just take a closer...good grief.it's infinite. it goes down forever and...something's coming... a horse? gigantic...it's coming.19is she there? is she there yet?send her your strength!yes. plunging towards the threshold. jane's mind. the strain!never mind the strain! they're through! they're through into the dada world! our world!and now that pompous, concept-album horseman will learn a new trick!the rider requires ideas and meaning to give it power, but dada is the anti-idea! dada destroys meaning.dada strips away all sense! all significance!dada is the kingdom of no, where even language fails! where words become futile!blago bung blago bung wulubu ssbudu dadadada!god!20it's coming through!we're all that stands between this thing and the world!it's coming it's...we've done it!hooray!that's it?21an so wer bak at the end wer we started...and now, after all we've been through together- the good times and the bad, the tears and the laughter- what are you going to do?take us to jail?we'll decide that if we get out of here.out? out? i'm not abandoning the painting! i'm going down with the ship!well, you do what you like, but everyone else is leaving.no! no, wait a minute, man!let me tell you somethin' bout this man: this man here gave us self-respect.yeah, you tell 'em, mate.this man said, you don' have to belong in the gutter. we're all super-heroes, man.he cared about us. he made us somethin'.it's true. i'm lovable and wonderful.well, you are, man.cliff, the painting's disintegrating.so if he's goin' down wit' th' ship, we're goin' down, too.yeah.we're getting out.now.lloyd. lloyd, i was only joking when i said that.i don't actually want to.22oh. did we?are we out?like pigs from a gun.and paris, too?apparently so. vomited back into reality.so what about the brotherhood?what happened to them?in here.trapped in the painting.or what's left of it.yeah, but the horseman...hey, you guys...you want the good news first?23then i guess you'll be looking for that.it came through the painting just before you did.what?that's the fifth horseman?stripped of meaning. reduced to absurdity.neat trick.she did it!jane did it!she just...where is jane, anyway?well... it's like i said, guys. there's good news...and... well...i'm sorry.24an so i reech the end of my stoyr, momma.after we got ot uv the pantin we fond the hol wurld in a reel mess. i stil don no wat happind to the pepul?enyho it beter sins we rebilt it.the qwiz keeps everthin kleen, hollys in charg of doin nuthin an i get to be king uv the hol thign.an i don ned ejacatin to do it. ol it taks is sens an smartnes wich i got plenyt uv.ye, its reely gud heer. its much beter than the old wurld thas for shur.thers no cops an nowon tels yo wat to do.ol my freins are heer.im lernin mor an mor eech day.an im hapyer than iv evr ben.in a wurld uv mi own.sined yor lovin(ha ha)sun lloyd malcolm jefferson frenzy
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