The Adventures of Edmer

[Abishai100]

This work is based on ideas regarding metaphysics guidance and was inspired by both Paradise Lost and The Transformers: The Movie.

Edmer is a fictional warrior-robot, wolfish and cunning, and represents ruthless confidence.

I've used the iconography of the fictional robot Cyclonus (evil 'first knight' of the Decepticon army) from the A.I. fantasy-adventure franchise Transformers (Hasbro) to represent the character Edmer (a sort of demon!).

In this first chapter, Edmer confronts Shiva (Hindu god of destruction).


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CHAPTER 1: Edmer confronts Shiva

EDMER: You sit on your mountain-top and meditate for hours...why?
SHIVA: I like to brood about loneliness and prayer.
EDMER: What do your prayers concern?
SHIVA: Humility.
EDMER: Humility? No one likes to be humiliated.
SHIVA: True, but everyone is ennobled by humility and even how resilience/suffering creates humility.
EDMER: Do you think the mind is a 'humble' thing?
SHIVA: I think the mind likes to roam but always returns to considerations about self-improvement.
EDMER: Self-improvement does not always inspire humility.
SHIVA: What do you mean?
EDMER: The mind yearns for perfection and is willing to be competitive to attain it!
SHIVA: Competition is a game which requires an adherence to agreed-upon rules-of-play.
EDMER: Do you despise athletes who use performance-enhancing steroids to improve their chances?
SHIVA: Such athletes knowingly take long-term spiritual and medical risks, so it's not evil but certainly risky.
EDMER: What about Sunni-Shia relations/conflicts within the nation of Islam (in regards to modernism)?
SHIVA: Sunnis (e.g., Syria) and Shiites (e.g., Iran) both have to adapt to modern needs (e.g., wind energy).
EDMER: Do you think such 'civilization progress' mandates cooperative economics?
SHIVA: Collective-bargaining is a part of globalization-politics (e.g., UN), but survivalism creates greed.
EDMER: I don't think the mind can feel satisfied with humility when considering the reality of rivalries...
SHIVA: There's nothing evil about rivalries, but cutthroat behaviors must be tempered by bureaucracy!

After their long conversation, Edmer and Shiva parted ways, and Edmer decided to descend upon Earth and investigate serial-killers across history --- e.g., Jack the Ripper, the Zodiac killer, Charles Manson, etc.

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[Abishai100]

This one is about Edmer confronting Shylock.


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CHAPTER 2: Edmer confronts Shylock

EDMER: I see you've trapped someone in a terrible death-trap repayment-contract...
SHYLOCK: I was betrayed and now demand remuneration!
EDMER: You'll be outcast as a stickler and task-master...
SHYLOCK: I stand by my principles!
EDMER: They will say, "Shylock the Jew suffered from a 'flexibility handicap'!"
SHYLOCK: I need not be flexible about agreed-upon services and promised payments...
EDMER: Is money that important to you, Shylock?
SHYLOCK: Money controls everything, and no one should be lenient towards swindlers!
EDMER: What if your loan-repayment plan is revised by someone more shrewd than you?
SHYLOCK: I can not foresee anyone being more meticulous about my payments than me...
EDMER: Your arrogance will see you suffer!
SHYLOCK: You're very confident about contracts, aren't you?
EDMER: I never promise anything I'd rather not defend...
SHYLOCK: Well, you'll never run a casino, my friend.

After Edmer and Shylock parted ways, Edmer decided to travel through time (again) and visit Donald Trump.

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[Abishai100]

This one is about Edmer visiting Donald Trump.

The point of these blurbs/short-stories is to draw attention to the intriguing links between 'demonology' and dystopia.



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CHAPTER 3: Edmer visits Donald Trump

After much soul-searching, Edmer decided to take notes about his conversations with various colorful characters throughout the history of the Earth and its heavens --- Shiva, Shylock, Jack the Ripper, Steve Jobs, Joan of Arc, Thomas Jefferson, etc. Edmer concluded that the mind is its own place and can fashion humility out of humiliation and humiliation out of tragedy. Edmer was happy as a robot on his home-planet of Cybertron, but he decided to travel through time again to visit American venture-capitalist/entrepreneur and U.S. President Donald Trump, a man of questionable means but unquestionable successes.

EDMER: You must feel very luxurious in the White House!
TRUMP: The White House is more institutional than people realize...
EDMER: What do you think of being visited by a giant thinking alien robot (such as myself)?
TRUMP: Well, we humans love science-fiction, so I'll remember this encounter.
EDMER: Relax, Mr. Trump. I'm only visiting you in your dream (you're fast-asleep!).
TRUMP: Well, what did you want to ask me, Edmer?
EDMER: Are you satisfied with 21st Century consumerism-culture (e.g., Starbucks, Facebook, Wall Street)?
TRUMP: Good commerce requires strong leadership, and I'm up to the challenge.
EDMER: Many have protested your reign as American President.
TRUMP: There are countless people still suspicious about the modern free-market.
EDMER: I suppose you're 'protecting' Americans from rivals (i.e., China, North Korea, Europe, etc.)?
TRUMP: Precisely. The new market requires decisive stands.
EDMER: What is your 'stance' on renewable energy?
TRUMP: Wind farms and biomass fuels are unfortunately necessary...
EDMER: You don't blame industrialization for the depletion of resources and the pollution of the Earth?
TRUMP: Every problem as a solution...
EDMER: Well, I hope you remember this dream then, since Earthlings will be wary about toxic waste...
TRUMP: That will not be the legacy of Industrialization, Edmer.
EDMER: We'll see...
TRUMP: You should return to Cybertron and worry about your own problems and let humans worry about theirs!

Edmer returned to Cybertron, vowing to U.S. President Donald Trump never to return to Earth again. He kept all his notes about his various conversations and was stirred by Trump's passions about defending industrialization and the sovereignty of the human species. He was however concerned that American excesses caused by the emerging modern global 'free-market' could drive the species towards complacent arrogance and even sloth. Edmer asked one of his elder-robots on Cybertron what made Earth special, and the elder-robot explained to him that Earth's sovereignty was the best sign of its appreciation of biosystems homeostasis. Edmer concluded that his perspective on courage and self-reliance was too rageful for the likes of humans, but he did remember his poignant conversation (regarding self-control) with Shiva (Hindu god of destruction).

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[Abishai100]

This chapter was inspired by the film THX 1138.


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CHAPTER 4: Organics

Edmer travelled to a planet outside Earth's solar system which was controlled by a race of humanoid robots called THX-Manoids. These 'robos' created an experimental 'police-state' and used genetic engineering to design very beautiful humanoid women who were wrapped by snakes which protruded from their head. The snakes signified these women's attitude towards sensuality and carnal pleasure. The robos wanted the women to serve as models of obedience to the rules of state-controlled sensory pleasure and fertility submission.

Edmer met one of these women, a somewhat depressed lady named Elisha. Elisha believed she was forlorn, since the snakes around her head gave her a sweet and painless blood to slowly ooze out of her eyes. While other women on the planet of the robos had similar eye-blood sensory outletting, Elisha's mind was very sensitive to the outletting, so she believed she was cursed. Edmer started falling in love with her, since she was an ironic 'outcast' on a planet of absolute deviants. Edmer wanted to kidnap Elisha and take her with him.

EDMER: You are fascinating, Elisha.
ELISHA: I'm a servant, and I'm not for you.
EDMER: Come with me; defy your confines.
ELISHA: I was born with snakes.
EDMER: Let the snakes be your sensual charms...
ELISHA: You sound like a warrior.
EDMER: I'm a wanderer, but I'm searching for a witch like you!
ELISHA: I'm not a witch!
EDMER: I meant that in a good way --- a witch who casts a spell on me.
ELISHA: You're fascinated by my subservience and sensitivity.
EDMER: You would bring me great honor.
ELISHA: Edmer, you need a governess, not a wife!
EDMER: Why do you say that?
ELISHA: You are fascinated by philosophy and psychology, not religion.
EDMER: I've conversed with a god named Shiva and therefore have contemplated religion.
ELISHA: You need dexterity and drums...
EDMER: Very well, but I retain the right to remember your beauty, my dear.
ELISHA: As you wish!

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