Scamology, part 3

"If I'd had more time, I'd have written a shorter letter" - Cicero

Well, maybe not shorter, but definitely better edited.

Chapter 3 (cont.)

Disclaimer: This is fiction. If you make anything of it, it’s your own dirty mind at work. Go sue yourself. You know who you are, and so do I.

The story so far: L. Jack Horner is a Fantasy Fiction writer who has decided to create his own religion. He is to be the prophet-in-charge and head priest of course. He is in it for the money. He is pissed off because his reams of dross do not make him the kind of cash that one blabbermouth holy roller can rake in. After some meandering philosophizing that he no doubt considers “pearls before swine”, he decides to get serious.

Next, L. Jack turns his attention to Secret Societies. He studies the mixed success of one of his contemporaries, Aleister Frawley. Aleister was an egomaniac that sprang fully formed from his mother’s loins in Angland. He was also a Right Bastard, and proclaimed by a sitting judge to be the nastiest man in what remained of the Brigish Empire. This was meant in the same way that a deeply ethnic Black woman means it when she says, “You Nasty!”

Aleister took a page from more ancient Secret Societies, but formed his around the principles of Tantric Yoga and the stage-magic offshoots of Zoroastrianism. He did this mainly because it gave him the kind of cachet he needed to pursue his favorite hobby, buggering younger men and women. He is credited for being the first to re-spell “magic” as “magyk”, and is indirectly responsible for the spelling of, “chemical white shit used to lighten coffee” as, “kreem”. His evil lives on.

At the height of his success, Aleister had a whole colony of followers that thought he was a god and liked to be buggered. They set up shop in Sisilia until the dictator Muscletini took one look and kicked them the hell out of his future Mafia theme park. Frawley was quick to credit his “magyk,” and karmic retribution for the fact that Muscletini never lived to see his dream realized.

After that, it seemed like the ministry of Aleister Frawley faltered into the tepid regions of the lunatic fringe, but there was one or two things about his later life that L. Jack found interesting. For one, he largely supported himself through book publications. For another, he always seemed to have a tight cadre of loyal friends who would support him in his hour of need.

This in turn, led L. Jack to study Frawly’s inspirations, Dyspensky, His wife “Dyspenskia”, and their mentor, the famous mystic Curdcheif (pronounced like kerchief with a “d”). This bunch went all through Europe during the time of the Ruskan Revolution, convincing everyone that happiness derived from concentration and joy in menial tasks. They got a lot of free drudge work done for them in consequence. The Ruskian revolutionary, Topsky, liked their message very much, and thought it promoted the right blend of service and servitude. He was heard to remark that they could all have become great friends if only Curdcheif and Company had shared his love of vodka. L. Jack was impressed with the clever way that Curdcheif and the Dyspenskys got other people to toil for them, and pay for the privilege besides.

Frawley, like Jacob Jones before him, claims to be privy to secret knowledge, and have divine (or demonic) help in the translation. He also surrounds himself with arcane symbols which he imbues with mystical “magykal” power. For this portion of Frawley’s inspiration, L. Jack turns his attention to a very old and reasonably successful and durable Secret Society, the Stonelayers.

(to be continued)