Garth Ennis - Crossed: Badlands #50-56

Alabama man, kindly yet firm, hunches to sweep the crumbs from the deck of his career, trying to keep the rats from infesting the tidy space he has created. It has to mean something, he says to himself for the four-hundredth time, if not more. It has to mean that I haven't wasted my life, he says, while the owners smoke their cigars and plot new ways to exploit him. "The chemicals help with that."

Xavier peddles his brand, a marketer of peace, x marking the spot around the world. Hope haunts his efforts, a red phoenix at the end of all things. Clad in white leather, a potential avatar enters the scene. The pieces begin to fall. And the author lies for the sake of cheap thrills. "...I wonder if we have any control over our destinies, or if we are just biomass manipulated by an intelligent evolutionary process itself."

Under the useless watch of constant eyes, the meth lab churns its product, truck bound to mainland clubs. Hundreds of them. Haha never tells a lie and Uncle Bill is looking to make bank. Unlucky Haha and unlucky Bill. Unlucky because Timmy has turned turn coat and spilled the beans, trying to save his neck. The paramilitary, espionage arm of the state holds the noose before him, empty of any other purpose than to execute its mission. "Sorry, I only sell the candy. I never use it myself."

The beaverine buck toothed threatens the imperial servant. Sick sweat permeates the flesh of students and teachers alike. The consciousness of the headmaster fills the young woman he secretly loved in that retconned moment that lives underneath all that happens. The womb is the world and the battle is joined within woman herself. But not really. "There. The sentinels in your blood-stream..they are dead now."

The cage is locked. The project has begun. We enter the catacombs and descend. Our object? The supreme object of desire. A vessel in motion filled to the brim with suppressed feeling, manic and confusing. What are its habits and tendencies? What does it want? What rare bird awaits our eyes? Find out. "Carla was the prom queen."

He doesn't care about innocent bystanders. That's the part that rings strange. Flaming skull? Fine. Ethereal motorcycle? Okay. Spirit of Vengeance? I'm with you. But he doesn't care about innocent bystanders? Wouldn't that negate the righteousness of the Ghost Rider's cause? The first time he accidentally kills a kid, he's going to end up punishing himself, getting kicks from burning his own soul. And then we're looking at a recursive loop. Cold fire burning cold fire burning cold fire. Forever. "You're yella!"

Something is lost. The lost void, pin-pricked by bastard stars in a grim bastard universe. A universe of pathetic men enervated by a lack of ideological release. They either cum or become nothing, capable of such virility only so long as the Ideal is there. So long as the frontier continues to exist. So long as one does not agree to abide by trade routes only. "The freak who runs the boarding-house sold his remains on to the crabs to recoup his rent money."

"The Script. The Actors. Final performances, famous last words. Madame Roland: 'Oh, Liberty, how many are the crimes committed in thy name?'"

Inconsistent stamp of images placed side by side, depicting however possible the exploits of soap-opera heroes and heroines. Hank had a date and so did Charles, one woman inside and two without. Scott and Emma beside do little of use as Jean holds off a small invasion, while Logan, alone, fantasies hidden, acquires yet another protege. The world is fallen and as-yet unredeemed. "You're a mutant, the world hates you. Hell, even I hate you and we only just met. Deal with it."  

Stampeding brain-mad cattle, burning, gleefully defiling, massacre divine. That voice you hear in the back of your mind when someone cuts into line. That lust to twist the joint beyond the point of no return. That warm smile that welcomes you to atriocity. This is the beginning and end of everything. "Nice suit, you fruit."