TED ROCKSON: ULTIMATE AMERICAN (Barbarian Snark #6)

[Maithanet]

Hooray!

Are you sure half mast bloodshot orbs refers to eyes?

Ha great minds Kah!!

Agreed, I have only heard the term "half mast" as referring to flags and penis. So maybe he just woke up and is looking at the Sikh flag (sure they brought one, if not several). Or maybe he's looking down at his crotch and things are...not quite at 100%. It's OK Rock, as you get older this sort of thing will happen more and more.

[MinDonner]

To be fair to Ryder Stacy (cos he doesn't really need my help to make him look ridiculous), he did make it sorta clear that it was eyes he was talking about. And if he'd said that Rock's eyelids were at half-mast, I wouldn't have even mentioned it. But the combination of bloodshot orbs and a possible penis metaphor was too tempting to resist. :devil:

[MinDonner]

Before I start on Chapter Seventeen, I spotted this phrase while flipping through to find where I'd got to, and had to share:

Their eyes focused on Rockson's face as if he was a mixture of the Almighty saviour and a warthog all rolled into one.

Anyway. The chapter begins, as "all across America" various allied bands of Freefighters and Sikhs begin their assault on all the different KGB fortresses. "At the stroke of 1:00am, they struck". So I'm guessing that Ryder Stacy doesn't know about time zones? Though, given the somewhat haphazard geography of the place and the perpetual uncertainty about what season or even what year it is, it's possible that either all that nuking has compressed the country into just one time-zone, or that the entire fabric of space-time has been warped such that 1am is the same everywhere. :dunno:

Rock and his gang at Fort Minsk are feeling pretty helpless, not knowing even what the purpose is of all Ragdar's wooden catapult-things. They want to be charging in and fighting! All this planning and strategising just seems wrong! But at last, the catapults launch.

The loads shot like rockets through the night air, the boxes spinning wildly, end over end, with none of the perfect trajectories or geometric purity associated with the smooth arc of an artillery shell.

So not much like rockets at all, then. But I digress.

But then beauty doesn't matter much when you're trying to blow the other man into mush.

The packages rain down upon the walls "like a shipment of supermarket goods lost in space" (he's really pulling out all the stops with the metaphors today!), and of course they are full of TNT, and fortress go BOOM. But the metaphors keep on coming!

Another load of the careening crates took off with all the grace of a one-legged orangutan.

Eventually, it's time to send in the cavalry, whose arrows are mounted with sticks of dynamite. It's gone all Looney Tunes in here! Somehow the dynamite-arrows are used to take out the flares that the KGB send up to light up the battlefield?

The dynamite-laden barbs filled the air like a swarm of locusts, looking for a field of vegetation.

And once more into the breach, dear friends, once more! The commies make a trembling attempt to fend off the incursion, but "Turgenev revolvers are no match for swinging swords cutting off limbs like a human scythe". Heads fly off in all directions, blood spurts everywhere and forms widening puddles, that sort of thing, and Panchali is having the time of his life, whirling around in his jewelled robes and hacking commies to pieces. Tremendous fun!

Then of course there's Chen with his starknives, Rock riding on Snorter and shooting everyone with his shotpistol, Detroit chucking grenades about, etc etc etc. Even Rona and Kim are getting some killing done. Yay battle!

Whole skulls split apart, leaving headless corpses to topple over at their leisure. Spinal columns shattered right out the backs of black leather jackets, bent and twisted like the spokes of a broken bicycle wheel dipped in red. They came - they saw - and they left behind a field of corpses plowed into their own blood. What the KGB had sowed, they would now reap - and the crop would be their own destruction.

"I can't deny it, Rockson," says Panchali. "I love every damn minute of it. I haven't felt so alive for months."

Our heroes, ladies and gentlemen. But still no sign of Killov! Don't worry, Panchali and Rock are off to look for him right now...

[KAH]

The commies make a trembling attempt to fend off the incursion, but "Turgenev revolvers are no match for swinging swords cutting off limbs like a human scythe".

That's right, Indiana Jones showed us the truth of that in...oh, wait a minute, he showed us the exact opposite.

Oh well, I guess they were just the common commie junk that misfires at the crucial moment (and yet said commies are so dastardly, they're able to overrun AMERICA!).

Alternatively, they've outsourced their production to the Nazis of Düsseldorf, for whom Stacy has shown his appreciation before. (or after? I get confused!)

[Maithanet]

Eventually, it's time to send in the cavalry, whose arrows are mounted with sticks of dynamite. It's gone all Looney Tunes in here! Somehow the dynamite-arrows are used to take out the flares that the KGB send up to light up the battlefield?

Ah yes, a weapon so ridiculously anachronistic and impractical that it has never been used outside of a Mythbusters context. Are we to assume that this is cartoon standard, hot dog shaped dynamite, and that they have a fuse to blow them up? Are the cavalryman lighting a match or using butane lighter, do you think? Do they light them before they start the charge, or as they lighting them as they gallop towards the Russians? Was any mention at all made of the need to light dynamite? Or should we assume that they are using unlit dynamite and the flares themselves are providing the necessary spark? Seems like lit dynamite raining down would be unpleasant for a cavalry charge.

Regardless of the specifics, something tells me that friendly fire is going to be a rather serious problem with this “strategy”.

"Turgenev revolvers are no match for swinging swords cutting off limbs like a human scythe".

Let’s take this in parts. Turgenev revolvers are no match for swinging swords

First of all, why are the Russians equipped with revolvers rather than rifles and machine guns? And why aren’t the revolvers a match for the swords again? Dramatically superior range, killing power, and ease of use seems like a significant advantage, not to mention the fact that this is described as a “fortress”. Because like our good friend Sand dan Glotka, cavalry have a little trouble with stairs. Also walls, fences, wire, and many other things quite commonly associated with the any type of “fortress”.

Swords cutting off limbs like a human scythe

A human scythe? Is that a scythe made out of a person? I don’t think that would work very well. I assume that he means “like a scythe through wheat”. Which, oddly enough, is exactly what a sword does already. No need to bring innocent scythes into this.

[Seventh Pup]

IT LIVES

And is glorious!

[Sophelia]

Thanks Min - read it yesterday but wanted to come back today to thank you. Another classic post.

Thanks for picking this one out:

Their eyes focused on Rockson's face as if he was a mixture of the Almighty saviour and a warthog all rolled into one.

:rofl:

The obsession with gruesome deaths has not changed I see:

Spinal columns shattered right out the backs of black leather jackets, bent and twisted like the spokes of a broken bicycle wheel dipped in red.

Riiight. Full marks for imagination. I rack my brain for memories of all those times I have seen broken bicycle wheels dipped in red. (red what?) No. Bicycle wheels of any kind? No. *imagines bicycle wheel dipped in red paint" Does it look like a spinal column? Um... Not unless they had scoliosis worse than Richard III's. I have no idea a spine can be ripped* out through a black leather jacket - sounds like Terry Goodkind's speciality.

* Well it says 'shattered out' but then it would look even less like a broken cycle wheel.

[Vampire Squid]

Their eyes focused on Rockson's face as if he was a mixture of the Almighty saviour and a warthog all rolled into one.

All hail Pumbaa Christ!

and Panchali is having the time of his life, whirling around in his jewelled robes and hacking commies to pieces.

Didn’t he used to work for the commies? No qualms about turning on his former comrades? Nothing?

Is anyone else wondering how Killov’s hallucinogen-heightened vision of the battle could be any different from Stacy’s actual prose?

[MinDonner]

There are only about 10 pages left of this book now, but given that the series continues for at least another ten books, I don't think I'm spoiling much by saying that Killov somehow manages to escape this latest assault. So, before I finish it off (probably this weekend), another guessing game: How does Killov escape this time?

(is the answer something ridiculous? Of course it is! So guess away!)

[Jon AS]

I'm going with the secret Aztec tunnel that leads all the way to "Bielefeld".

[Alytha]

Abducted by aliens!

[lacuna]

Nazi-excavated hovercar?

[Vampire Squid]

Turns into a demon?

[Antonius Pius]

Rides a brainwashed camel into the nuclear sunset?

[KAH]

So, before I finish it off (probably this weekend), another guessing game: How does Killov escape this time?

(is the answer something ridiculous? Of course it is! So guess away!)

Well, I imagine he'll find a chopper and machinegun down the usual contingent of KGB Redshirts (heh) who tries to board it in order to escape the assault...but somehow, it lacks in ridiculousness.

He could ride out on mutant fauna, but that would suggest too much friendliness towards animals (even mutant ones) for a cardboard villain, so scratch that. It has to be mechanical of some sort.

OK, here goes - Killov escapes on the latest Soviet invention, a giant mechanical spider. It will be powered by a mix of dirty coal, plutonium and toxic waste (the toxic waste is not strictly necessary for propulsion, it's just added to the exhaust because Killov hates Life). The pilot compartment will be complete with black leather upholstery, Stalin picture set into the roof (for when you wanna kick back, put down the seat, and have some 'Me' time), the appropriate pill dispensers for Killov and loudspeakers to hurl threats against Rock.

[Rorshach]

He disguises himself as a Sikh and rides away in the aftermath of the battle.

[Derfel Cadarn]

Another 10 books?? However will you get them all finished before Christmas?

[Maithanet]

Killov points a flamethrower at the ground to determine if they also double as jetpacks. Answer: yes.

[Bearbert Dondarrion]

He dresses up as a samurai and starts dancing haka, so naturally, Rock will believe he's a Sikh

[Galactus]

He flies away in a blimp.