Adventure #15

When Najid was told that he could have the princess’ hand in marriage if he retrieved the eye of Mahaz from the cave of the treasure of Pukhraaj, he thought he was being sent to steal a giant emerald or ruby of some kind.  He didn’t know that “the eye” was the actual, singular eye of a giant, four-armed cyclops named Mahaz.

As Najid slowly entered the cave with his sword held aloft, he wondered if the Sultan intended the promise of his daughter’s hand to be just as literal.

Adventure #14

Everyday at 8:00 AM Jonathan Newbin shows up to work.  He processes unpaid back tax reports for KL&P Financial.  At noon he eats his lunch in the third floor lunch room.  (It’s the quietest one.)  At five o’clock he leaves for home.

Jonathan Newbin is a good employee.  Jonathan Newbin loves what he does.  The only thing Jonathan Newbin hates about his job is the commute.  It’s killer.

3rd Avenue is simply jam packed with zombies nowadays, and forget about crossing the Hanson Bridge now that the East Side Militants control it.  That leaves 10th Street as his only option, and he can’t get by without being attacked by at least one mutant cannibal a day.

Things just haven’t been the same since the world ended.

Adventure #13

Bomo strong.  Bomo stop Mago.  Mago bad four-legged river snake.  He try to eat pretty girl in boat.  Bomo’s sharp tooth cut even Mago’s hide.

Who is this primitive jungle boy?  What are the secrets of his true origins?  Bomo knows, but Bomo not say.  Bomo like jungle.  Bomo like freedom.

Adventure #12

In the land of Yoboshishi the sky is always turquoise blue, the kittens are always bubble gum pink, and the blood is always ruby red.

Hammi Hammi, kitten samurai, drops on her enemies in a blur of fluff and death.  Her fiercesome battle cry is the last sound her enemies will ever hear: “Me-ya!”

Adventure #11

This adventure is called “One Night In Moscow.”

It’s the winter of 1968 and international super spy, Roger Wright (whose catchphrase is, “I’m never wrong”), stands perched on the ledge of the Khalibastardstan Embassy in Moscow holding the stolen plans of the warmongering General Hutzpah.

All Roger has to do is get those documents over to his Russian informant by midnight and the General’s military coup can be stopped.  But as Roger stands still as the stones he’s pressed against in the bitter cold night air, silently watching his enemies search in vain for the documents, he fails to notice one small piece of paper drift away into the darkness.  One small piece of paper with the kind of information on it that could start another world war — a war that could only end in total nuclear annihilation.

Adventure #10

Though this particular situation wouldn’t make anyone’s top 10 prison breaks list, it was a daring escape from Honeycomb Penitentiary for the Warlblington Twins, two of the three members of the Hillside Hillbilly Trio–best known for their hit single, “Mama, Don’t You Swipe My Jug O’ Shine,” and for robbing banks .  Fiddlin’ Jack, the third member, was never imprisoned.  It’s rumored he’s hiding in plain sight as an assistant florist in the Licking Creek area.

Adventure #9

Luck is integral to any good adventure.  The hero finds a gun by chance.  The detective stumbles upon a clue.  The guard just happens to look the opposite direction so the spy can pass by.

Luck was also the entry point for many of the adventures of my generation’s youth.  Luck in the form of a twelve-sided dice, to be precise.  The right roll could increase your barbarian’s magic blade melee attack +20, or get you eaten by a troll.  The tumble of the die literally made and unmade your world.

Above Randy and Roger Walthwaite play a classic round of Dungeons and Dragons.  They should be out trying their luck with the young ladies, but right now they need to see if a 17th level cyclops can be brought down by conjuring an energy storm via their 3rd level Elvin wizard.  Their fate lies in the roll of the dice!

Adventure #8

How cool would it be to discover some ancient treasure like King Tut’s Tomb or Machu Picchu?

Well, Burton Cliff, explorer extraordinaire, knows how cool it’d be.  Here he is either discovering a bronzed statue of a long forgotten god, a bejeweled idol to a dead king, or his own death at the business end of a sacrificial knife!

Adventure #7

Ancient Europe was cool.  That’s all I have to say about that.

Adventure #6

He chases bears.  He’ll break yo gun on a stump.  He’ll step on your foot (ouch!).  He finds babies in the weeds (awesome!).  He’s been straight up mauled by a cougar (“Get outta here, kitty cat. Beat it!”).  He eats horses.  He’ll sneak up on you like a ghost.  He eats dumplings made by racoons.  He’ll shoot your glassware.  He’ll shoot you in the head and put a stove on your foot (ouch!).  He is, quite possibly, the sole reason the internet was created.  He is the Guy on a Buffalo (ooh, oh, oh)!

Adventure #5

Meet Jefferson Colt, fastest gun in the west.  Here he is taking down the Boot Hill Gang, the violent ruffians who’d been terrorizing Centerville for months.  Six outlaws, six shots, one rule… never cross Jefferson Colt!

Adventure #4

“Yo, ho! Yo, ho! A pirate’s life for me.”

Few criminal activities have been as romanticized as pirating.  Makes you wonder if in a hundred years kids will be singing songs about being in gangs.  Wait, I think they already do… but I digress.

Above is Captain Flintlock in a story called “Skullduggery!”  As you can see, he’s losing  command of his ship and his signature gun, but not for long!  Captain Flintlock’s name and reputation doesn’t just come from his weapon of choice (his real name is Hubert Corbinoff, a name no respectable pirate captain would keep), but for his fiery temper and explosive nature.  It is rumored that he once commanded a ship where the entire crew turned against him, but when that ship arrived in port Captain Flintlock was the only one to disembark.  The crew was never seen again.

Arrrgggh!

Adventure #3

At one point the whole world seemed as though it was full of adventure.  Everything was an unknown, everything was a mystery, and even the most basic of tasks, like providing food and shelter, took daring, ingenuity and courage.  Above is Gla, the Mammoth (yeah, I spelled it wrong in the picture) Rider.  He’s headed out to find diner in a prehistoric world.  Will he return a victorious hunter, limp back as a maimed and useless member of his clan, or just disappear into the  strange wilderness that is the ancient world?

Adventure #2

Behold! Roger Corbinson, the Most Daring Flying Ace of World War I!!

The craziest thing about the dogfights of the first world war to me wasn’t that a generation of men who’d been raised with their primary transportation being a horse and carriage had the bravado to get into a canvas and wood tube with a propeller and fly hundreds of feet in the open air, it was that within fifteen years of its invention the primary use of the airplane was to kill someone.  Like some modern day Icarus, we just don’t seem to be allowed to climb up to the sun and enjoy the freedom.   We create our own freedom and our own destruction simultaneously.

Adventure #1

I’ve decided to switch from mysteries to adventure for this next series since 2012 is proving to be a year of venturing into new territories around our house.  Some welcome, some unexpected, some pleasantly surprising, some tragically devastating.

Above is a jungle adventure scene.  If it was a pulp story, it’d be titled “What Lurks in the Darkness Above?”

Who knows what manner of unexpected creatures creep high in the  trees above Sir Raleigh Halifax and Professor J.P. Norton as they seek the lost treasure of the legendary Queen of Xanxibia?  Are they malicious cannibals intent on devouring them alive, or protectors of an ancient secret attempting to keep a pair of wandering adventurers from entering into their own doom?

Mystery #17

The myth of the feral child, whether he be raised by wolves, apes, sheep, cobras, or whatever, is fascinating in its effect on culture.  It’s produced some of the best selling modern stories (Tarzan, The Jungle Book), and the most compelling ancient stories (i.e. the founding of Rome).

Is it our own desire to reconnect with our ancient, wild roots that drives our interest in these tales, or are they a way for us to collectively contrast and reinforce our superiority over nature?

Rakik doesn’t care.  He was raised by a pack of wolves in the Canadian Rockies in the early 1800′s.  Above is one of his many encounters with fur trappers who are after the pelt of his adopted mother, the great white wolf.

Mystery #16

Welcome to 2012, the year the world is supposed to end… again.  Every once in a while the end of the world gets predicted, but none is more anticipated than the Mayan Calendar prediction of total earthly destruction on 12.21.12.

Above is the story of a few, select Green Beret troops sent back in time (with a doddering, bearded scientist as a historical guide, of course) to stop the predicted Mayan Apocalypse, whose origins have been traced back to a single human sacrifice by a wicked high priest to the god Bolon Yokte’ in 950 AD.  The blood of the Sofia-Vergara-esqe beautiful princess is the only thing capable of waking the terrible god of war, who will take exactly 1062 years to travel from the underworld to our world.

Mystery #15

How powerful is the human mind?  Can it really foresee the future?  Can it see through locked doors hundreds of miles away?  Can it lift and move objects?  Can it tell what you are thinking right now?  Will we ever truly know?

Above is the Great Zanzini, magician extraordinaire, or fraud.  Is he lifting the crystal ball with his mind, or with air blown through a mechanism hidden under the table?  You decide.

Mystery #14

 

Outer space.  Or should I say, outer spaaaaaace!  The infinite unknown, the final frontier, the grandest mystery of nature.  Have you ever looked up and wondered, are we alone?

Above is a quick story of four astronauts captured by giant aliens.  They’re bound and forced to watch the destruction of earth.  “You will be allowed to live,” the slug-like emperor, Gleb, promises, “provided you make no attempt to escape.”

But Captain Brash Granford can’t sit idly by when there’s still a chance to save mankind!

“No!” says his second in command, Susan Gallicknick, who was secretly looking forward to restarting the human race with the impetuous captain.

“Yikes!” says corporal Howie Corbin, brought along on this space mission to clean dishes and provide mild comic relief.

“Fools,” mutters Dr. Razinoff under his breath.  Then the Russian-born doctor begins to chuckle to himself as if he knows something the others don’t.

The title of this dime-novel space opera:  “Three, Two, One, Destroy!”

Mystery #13

For the thirteenth post in this series I decided to dig into the mystery surrounding the number thirteen itself.  One theory is that it’s infamy comes from the order given to arrest all of the Knights Templar on Friday the 13th, 1307.  Bonus! Two mysteries in one.  The Knights Templar have been the source of many a conspiracy theory virtually since their inception.  What were they really up to?  What did they really know?  What relics did they actually possess and where are they today?

Mystery #12

 

Belief is a powerful thing.  It shapes our perspective, it changes our actions, it alters the way we walk and talk, it can even change our identity.  What do you believe and why do you believe it?  Faith, experience, hope, despair, ignorance, education, tradition, rebellion?

The mystery of belief to me is why we believe anything at all, and conversely, why don’t we just believe everything.

Mystery #11

We’re so used to seeing ourselves nowadays, with mirrors on everything from walls to windows to sunglasses, yet how often do you catch a glimpse of yourself and wonder if you really look like that all the time?  What do you look like with no optic distortion or preconceived filter and flipped around the right way?  What do other people really see?  Is that the real you staring into the mirror or is the real you staring back?

Mystery #10

Dreams.  Some people receive messages in them.  Some people work out their issues in them.  Some people are baffled by them.  Some people claim they can control them.

Maybe they’re just a way to file away the days events via your subconscious.  Maybe they’re portals to worlds unknown.  Maybe they’re glimpses into the future, or past.  Who really knows?

Where do you go when you sleep? Why do you see what you see?

If you really want to get to know someone, ask them what their first memorable nightmare was.  Most of the time it will make you laugh, but to the person who experienced it, it still has the power to horrify.

Mystery #9

There’s something perpetually intriguing about Stonehenge and early  European paganism.  Heck, even the word “druid” is cool.  Maybe it’s because no one really knows what Stonehenge was for or if the druids really used it and what the druids really practiced in the first place.  You can look at the picture above and imagine yourself peering through the giant stones of a mysterious monument at a long forgotten, forbidden ritual on a cold winter’s night in ancient Britain, or just click here.

Mystery #8

There are few things more mysterious than teenagers.  We all were one at some point, yet none of us can explain exactly what we were thinking and why we did what we did.  Maybe that’s why the 1957 landmark film pictured above has become such a cultural touchstone (at least it’s naming convention did).