Review

Today's episode of my ongoing novel BRYAN THE TYGER is just a recap of the events that have transpired hereto, because I took yesterday off and I needed to remind myself what I was doing with this thing.

Also note that the image below (which, as usual has nothing to do with the following text) is not the same as the one from the last post: they are subtly different. I don't know why I made two that look so similar.

[I got tired of graffiti-ing tygers onto junk ads, so, for the next few days, the obligatory images that accompany these announcements will be just lazy attempts at hand-drawing copies of ad photos with felt tip marker.]

P.S.

In other news: my Public Private Diary is fully printed; also I made a list of my latest novels that have been printed but not included in any collection.

Chapter Forty

Again, I feel that it would be good to offer a brief recap of our recent adventures, to help get back up-to-speed anyone in the audience who might have fallen asleep.

A few episodes ago, our hero Bryan the Tyger caused World Peace to erupt by annihilating all of futurity’s fighter jets. But then the deceased spirits of those jets attempted to avenge their death by overflowing Earth in the form of thick smoke that left the entire planet uninhabitable. Also, there was lava everywhere.

Eventually this environmental catastrophe cleared up on its own. So Bryan and his shadow-soul Myala the Black Panther went strolling at leisure one afternoon and encountered a sea jelly hovering in the air.

But here’s the rub. At this very instant, all the members of humankind’s Greatest Generation broke free from the past: they abandoned their then-current combat (in the War that Never Ends) and infiltrated the Eternal Peace.

So, just as Bryan and Myala were stopping to admire their newly met, ultra-aqueous entity, the aforesaid air-men found a way to revivify their air-planes and assassinate this air-jelly. They gunned down the floaty thing in broad daylight.

Yet every atrocity has an upside — here’s a direct quote from our Tyger’s adventure-journal:

The silver lining of this tragedy is that we refrained from eating the corpse of the deceased.

Our heroes then performed a suspenseful chase scene, complete with a variety of vehicles barreling down the highway. Weaving in and out of traffic, and even crossing the famous river that is the utmost border of the Land of the Living, our protagonists hunted the ghost of their murdered acquaintance to its final resting place in the Underworld; after which, our Tyger disclosed:

Then I suckt the sea-jelly up.

Now let me clarify a discrepancy that does not exist. The “tragic” slaying of the jelly offered a “silver lining” only because the jungle beasts abstained from consuming its flesh; however, in the very next episode, Bryan the Tyger did swallow the creature’s holy ghost. Note the difference in these two concepts – devouring a found item’s fallen body versus sipping its soul. The former is expressly forbidden:

That which dieth of itself, or is torn with beasts (such as fighter jets from heaven), you shall not eat to defile yourself therewith. (Leviticus 22:8)

So, it would be foolhardy to consume the jellyfish’s bullet-ridden corpse, as this would defile our hero. Whereas ingesting the slain being’s eidolon is a joyful act because, this way, the shade of the sea jelly gets to become the clear spirit of clear fire that fuels the Tyger’s fearful symmetry. So the fact that the jelly remained both uneaten AND eaten presents no problem; as Jesus himself saith:

the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak (Matthew 26:41);

also:

I am not come to abolish the law, but to fulfil it (Matthew 5:17).

NOTE:

·       spirit = willing

·       flesh = weak

·       abolish = fulfil.

So if we understand the jelly of the sea as a type or picture of the “law of commandments”, since the ocean is but a compendium of the Rules of Chaos, which our ex-marine jellyfish escaped by becoming (air)borne again, before the armies of heaven “fulfilled” him, then Paul the Apostle of Christ explains very clearly this salvific act of Bryan the Tyger:

He abolished in its flesh the enmity, consisting of the law of commandments in ordinances, so that in himself he could fashion the two into a single new being, thus reinstating bliss. Both were divinely reconciled in one body by the act of predatory communion; for, having been devoured, the spirit of this prey did cleave unto and become one with its partaker. As it is written: This is now breath of my breath, and mind of my mind.

(Ephesians 2:15-16)

Let us remember that “breath”, “wind”, and “spirit” are all synonymous, in the most ancient proto-tongue.

So our heroes had their cake and ate it too, when they opted out of carnally consuming the jelly but then agreed to ghost-bust its soul (when Tyger Bryan suct it up).

Let me stress that this offers no contradiction. Those who contradict themselves are large and contain multitudes, whereas our Tyger, being a minimalist, prefers to possess as few personalities as possible; so he now owns only the spirit of the deep-sea jelly, plus all the mutton that was recently consumed, and the cans of kitty chow that were eaten in the beginning. Also a few bystanders got mauled along the way, if I remember correctly (there was that deer that Diana hunted for us); but any saints who underwent the process of digestion received the award of having their blood transmuted into Tyger-strength; so their worm dies forever. And the same goes for Orangutans — when eaten, just like humans, they enter in at the mouth; then pass to the bowels, and are expelled into the powder room.

§

Additionally I should explain that there is an intimate connection between the chase scene of the previous episode and one of the staves in my Xmas text — actually, I think it’s at the end of the fifth chapter, but don’t quote me on that. For I have a novel titled Merry Christmas from Bryan Ray, which is divided into a number of sections, one of which, near the middle of the book, has this ordeal where I, the author, visit a mall and encounter a Man in a Santa Suit who is ringing a handbell: When I ask what’s the angle of this racket, the fellow explains that he’s trying to lure philanthropists to donate funds to his charity by way of a video arcade game, whose cabinet is installed beside him. I notice that this entertainment machine is called Frogger (1981). “Santa” further explains that all the profit that is gained from this chicanery will go to help some needy corporation, or something like that — I forget exactly what the deal was. My point is just to note that I, Bryan, playing the role of the story’s main character, decide to give the game a shot; so, after getting approval from my wife (who, by the way, is played by you, yes, you: the reader), I insert the requisite coins and use the joystick and pushbuttons to guide my frog to safety.

“What does that have to do with our Tyger-novel’s previous chapter?” you ask. And I answer you: “Everything.” For I imagine that, if we could see a filmed presentation of both scenes, it would become apparent that the travel-route taken by this current book’s jelly-shade, which comes to rest at its haven in Sheol, closely mimics that of my Christmas novel’s green avatar: Lo, when Myala and I pursue the deceased sea-jelly’s phantom over every single lane of the information superhighway and then even across the River Styx, all the specifics of our landscape are made in the image of Frogger, which consists of a busy road at the lower half of the display and a watercourse at the top.