The Synapse Connections of a lifetime

The winds are beginning to feel chilly, the darkness is unfriendly to those outdoors. The sun has just set, some rays can still be seen in the distant horizon, residue of the light that illuminated them. A storm is forming, snowfall is fast turning into a blizzard.

Bunked in their buggy, the men held themselves close to their bodies to try to keep the heat. The ride is bumpy, and they took turns driving it towards the city. He looked into the darkening sky and wondered if she could admire the skies the way he is now. In their haste to reach the capital, there is still an ironic serenity that envelopes the surrounding. He wonders what awaits them for the next few hours.

"Tell me, why were you on the train?", asks Lee.

"I have to see someone"

"I take it's someone really important then, nobody travels much in this war"

"I've not heard from her for sometime, I need to get to her and tell her something I couldn't say in the past.", he said, looking down at his feet with his hands clasped tight.

He's not a man of many words, many thoughts forms in his mind, but only a fraction were expressed. He is like a man wearing a mask, always keeping his emotions to himself. Throughout their relationship, he had never expressed his feelings for her. They just happened to fall into a kind of unofficial relationship, tied by invisible strings of understanding. The distance didn't help, she felt apart, physically and emotionally from him.

The two buggies raced across the tundra of snow. Visibility was terrible and the ride was bumpy. In a few hours they would reach the bridge. If the capital isn't warned, they would be annihilated.

----------

The research is progressing rapidly. They've just passed through phase five of the experiment. Soon the weapon would be complete, and perhaps, they could change the tide of the war that had taken everything from her. There's nothing else that mattered, she still feels the devastation from the news.

She decided to retire to bed for the night, exhausted from the endless trials throughout the day. She looked at the picture of them together by her bed, collecting dust. She sat at the side of the bed, taking the frame of the only picture they've ever taken together, and thought about the times when they were closer together. Tears began to stream down the side of her cheeks, she held the picture closed to her chest and cried sorrowfully. It was a heartbreaking moment, the room were filled with an aura of despair.

At that moment, there was a faint knock on her bedroom door.

"Are you all right? I'm coming in"...

Max found her there and embraced her. "Everything will be okay"

She felt powerless. "It's not okay!", and pushed him away.

"Please leave me alone".

"Tell me if you need anything.", he said quietly.

"I just need some time for myself."

She slept that night with the picture of him by her side.

A day later, the weapon would be complete. They would feel her pain.

------------

"Hostiles!", screamed a soldier from the buggy behind him. Another forward scout team had tracked them down. They were good; it was almost impossible to follow their trail in this weather, yet they managed to keep up. The men began to get nervous, they might not make it in time or survive this encounter.

Captain Lee gestured to the other driver to split up, they would stand a better chance at reaching the bridge this way. He tapped the driver of his buggy on the shoulder and pointed towards the left. The driver nodded, they would head towards the woods. It'll provide some cover. He looked back at the enemy. "I see two buggies, they've split up as well. One is following us." Each buggy had a dozen soldiers. They've only got four passengers, giving them a slight speed advantage. The blizzard didn't feel like it's going to subside, at that time, low visibility is a friend. Rockets would miss more.

Bullets begin to zip pass them. Some missed by mere inches from the side of his body. Everyone tried to kept their heads down. The buggy had limited cover and no roof, exposing them to enemy fire. They began to shoot back, but the bad visibility is a double edged sword as they too cannot seem to hit the enemy. They strafed around the woods, dodging bullets and trees altogether. At random intervals, the enemy would try their luck on the rockets, but they would just hit the trees. The driver is good at his job. In a high speed chase around the woods, he managed to keep the enemy back and navigate through the dangerous turns.

----

The other buggy jumped through the foliage into a frozen lake. Ill equipped to move on ice, they skidded and drifted left and right as the driver struggled to keep the buggy moving. Miraculously, the buggy still manages to move at a high speed though control is limited. The enemy buggy in pursuit followed them into the lake. Their heavier buggy however was making slight cracks on the ice as they moved. It was like a dance of two butterflies, chasing each other in circular motion, each trying to get a clear shot at another. Gunfire was exchanged furiously. They managed to kill two of the enemy. The dead was heartlessly thrown out of the moving buggy to reduce the weight.

One of the soldiers suddenly shouted. "They're gonna fire rockets! Are they stupid!?"

The rocket left a trail of smoke as it traveled through the air towards them. The men saw their lives flash before them, thinking that their doom has come.

It didn't.

Their buggy skidded again and it swerved towards the left side. Missing the buggy, the rocket exploded instead on the ice, fracturing it. The enemy buggy noticed it too late and with their limited control, dived into the freezing water of the lake.

--------

"We can't shake them!", Captain Lee exclaimed. Bullets ricocheted at the back of the armored buggy. Occasionally, they would take pot shots at the enemy but they didn't managed to kill any. One of the soldiers saw a small package at the floor and took out a round object, about 15 centimeters in diameter. "What's this?", he asked Lee.

"There's some words on it, read it out", he answered.

"It reads.. erm... this side down." Then he flipped it to the other side, correctly orientating the object and read, "M, I, N, E".

"What's a MINE sir?", he asked, curious about the object.

"I have no idea, chuck it out the back and see what happens."

He threw it like a Frisbee to the back of their buggy, towards the enemy. It fell on the ground.

"What? it's just a piece of junk?"

The enemy buggy rolled over the mine and exploded into a furious ball of fire. It sent the buggy up the sky towards the side, hitting a tree trunk, killing everyone in it.

"WHOA!" Captain Lee says in disbelieve.

The buggy chugged and stopped.

The high speed chase had drained them of fuel.

--------

"We're set, let's move."

The men set forth to initiate their plan to escape from their predicament. Each of them knew exactly what they needed to do.

The two men continued to suppress the enemy. Three of the other men begin to plant the explosives they found on the train carriage nearest to them. The rest pulled back to an ambushing positions, hiding beneath trees and under the blanket of snow.

White flakes of snow begin to fall as they exchanged gunshots.

The two men on defense managed to kill at least three of the enemy. Everyone is at their positions. Captain Lee signaled at them with a hand gesture. They immediately stopped firing and went into hiding.

Then there was silence in the air. The snow is falling much heavier now. Visibility was reduced to about five feet.

Everyone was shivering, from the cold and the fear. They are going to confront 21 enemies. It won't be easy.

Unsuppressed, the enemy begin to close into their position quickly. They climbed through the wreckage where the men were hiding. They were greeted by silence and dead bodies scattered around. Something is terribly out of place.

"FALL BAC..."

"Now"

One of the men pressed a remote trigger. After about half a second of delay, the train carriage were consumed in a violent explosion of three explosives. Shockwave were heard from a few miles away. The whole area was engulfed in think black smoke. There wasn't even time to scream, the men simply perished. A whole squad of them was killed in that very moment.

The eight men sprung out from their hiding, taking the already stunned remaining enemies completely by surprise. They managed to kill all of them, leaving only one survivor.

Captain Lee planted his rifle on the ground and walked towards the soldier. He was already wounded by a shot in the thigh. Blood was oozing out from the wound. He grabbed the soldier on the neck and dragged him up. Then with much anger and hatred landed a solid punch on the face.

The soldier etched a wicked smiled and said, "We're coming, and you can't stop us. We will take everything from you." Captain Lee threw the soldier to the ground, grabbed his pistol in a swift motion and let loose three shots into the man's head.

Snow was piling up, it is time to move.

"They must have a vehicle nearby", said one of the men. True enough, the enemies travelled with a pair of snow buggies. With all the supplies they could carry, they settled into the buggies and moved on.

"Where are we going?", he asked the Captain.

"If there are here, it means they just took our town. They must be a forward scout team, which explains why they are so underequipped."

He stopped talking and suddenly looked shocked. Turning slowly towards him he said, "There is only one reason why they are here, the train travels through the only passageway into the capital city. They are planning a final invasion."

"We'll need to head towards the Bridge of Exen and warn the Capital."

With due haste, they eight of them sped towards the city. It is already dark by then, snow still falls lazily to the ground but visibility has improved somewhat. It was somewhat a peaceful and serene moment.

The journey would last about eight hours, they could only hope they'd have enough fuel.. Time is of the essence.

----------------

She was up earlier than usual today. The sky outside her window was still dark, dawn has not broken yet. Though small, the apartment doesn't feel cramped at all. In fact, funded by federal funds, it is well furnished and a relatively comfortable crib. Unfortunately for her, there was no time to enjoy it.

The room felt empty without him anyway.

After washing up she headed straight to the lab. Today an important breakthrough may be possible, she was sure of it. She started to work on the experiment straight away.

She was just about to initiate her experiment; one hand holding a test tube, the other holding a beaker. The professor entered the room, together with max, her research partner of two years. They have a gloomy look in their faces.

Something is terribly wrong, she can feel it.

"There's something you need to know.. twelve hours ago we lost contact with the town of Prixma. Reports were sketchy but we last heard that they were bombed"

"There are no survivors."

The last word echoed in her ears. There are no sur-vi-vors..

Prixma is her hometown, it is also where he lived. They had been friends since childhood. She still remembers the grass in the field where they used to play. Everything is gone. He's gone.

She dropped the test tube. It fell to the floor, shattering into many pieces.. the sound of the breaking glass echos in the silence of the room.

She kneels down on the floor, cutting her knees from the glass fragments. The pain from that injury pales in comparison with the pain in her heart. The loss was so sudden it was incomprehensible.. She can't accept it.

And she let out a scream. A scream of despair and pain. Her heart shattered like the test tube. The scream was filled with despair and terror that it sends shivers to everyone in that room. Tears began to flow, they drop to the floor mixed with blood and glass. It was tragic.

Her thoughts are filled with regrets. One month, that's how long she'd stopped contacting him. She thought it would be better if she drown herself in work. She thought she can suppress how much she misses him.

Max helped her to get on her feet again and embraced her.

"I'm sorry for your loss."

Max was his classmate back in graduate school. While he chose to serve the army, max decided to further his research. "There is more fame and fortune in research." They used to be best of best friends but circumstances had changed. The war had changed many things since then, he lost his family to the enemy and chose to seek his revenge by serving the army, even though it means it will put a distance between him and her.

Unknowingly to him, his relationship with her is the real reason why they were no longer friends.

----------

The train had turned into a barricade against the approaching enemy. Taking cover behind the burning wreakage, the survivors of the assault tried to hold them off as much as they can. The other civilians were dead, only eight survived. Of the nine carriages, three were completely destroyed, two was burning and the rest was overturned.

The man that saved him turned out to be a captain. Captain Lee was a war veteran, known for his charisma and his brilliant strategies. While the six of them got together to discuss their situation, mortar shells can be heard exploding around them. Dirt were thrown around from the impact. The remaining two soldiers tried to buy some time by pinning down the enemy with sustained fire.

"We have to get out of here, but just running is pointless. We'll be gunned down easily. A tactical retreat is the only way."

He gestured at the other two soldiers. "Gather as many weapons and ammunition as you can." They simply nodded and went in one direction each, covering as many grounds as possible. Fortunately for them, the train was a military train that carried some war supplies.

The air is getting cold as the breeze of early winter begins to take hold. Behind them was a tundra of snow, which began to built up since a month ago. There was a river and some trees scattered about. The burning train turned out to be a blessing in the blistering cold. The sky is getting darker as the sun sets beneath the horizon.

"What are we up against?" he questioned the two men on defense.

"I eye two squads of twelve men each. Both squads were equipped with standard rifles and mortars. They are approaching on a pincer formation."

"As we're still here, I guess they ran out of rockets, how fortunate.." Lee said to himself.

He looked up towards the darkening sky and close his eyes for a moment. Then looking back down on the ground he started to draw some figures on the snow.

"Here's the plan:"

---------

She had been consumed by rage. Never had she hated the enemy as much as today, never had she cared about the war. His death had struck the cord.

"They must PAY."

As if on a trance, she started to work endlessly around the clock in the lab. Now she barely sleeps, sometimes only taking 20 minute naps in between the experiments. There is only one aim in her mind, to destroy them the way they destroyed her heart. Even the professor had lost track of the experiment. She is now in control.

Through these times, she grew closer and closer to Max, who provided her with technical and emotional support. She felt guilty of being so, but her heart is too vulnerable now.

What happened on the day she heard of the news turned out to be an important breakthrough for the experiment. The chemical they were testing with were always producing negative results. Something was stunting the chemical process.

Now there is a solution. The shattered test tube, mixed with the chemical and blood appeared to accelerate the process. Shattered glass particles for some unfathomable reason acts as a catalyst for the reaction.

Nobody knew about it until the afternoon that day, when her blood were noticed to had frozen in place on the ground where it was left.

Exactly the reaction they wanted.

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Been a while since I've logged in to blog :P Was preoccupied with photography and ILP and I'm just plain lazy hehe!

Did my first wedding assignment last month for Camei, learnt quite a lot of things about lighting and using flash. Thanks to Zhong for loaning me his weapons :P

Pics can be seen here and here.

Overrall it was allright although some parts can be improved. Stupid me set F2.8 for all shots.. :P The wedding was unconventional as well as the theme was Gothic..

Then Bodhi Nite came and I joined in with Unibud's archive department as one of their official photographers. It was fun and pics were of acceptable quality, so I was happy. :)

The people there having huge rocket launchers I mean L lens makes me feel very small.. :P

Theirs:
Mine:
Pictures can be seen here:

Set 1
Set 2
Set 3
Set 4
Set 5


Will update on the trip soon, stay tuned :)

Been awhile since I last looked at the blog. I guess my attention was taken away by other priorities =)

Morning of day 1:
Christchurch winter's is at all time high that month. Coming from Sydney's weather really didn't prepare me for the wind chills. Decided to head on straight to our first attraction in Christchurch that morning about 10am. There was a free shuttle service from the airport to the International Antarctic Center. It's actually just about 5 to 10 mins walk away from the airport but not that convenient with all our bags and the cold.


Managed to find a place to store our luggage while entering the site. The rate is reasonable so we placed it for about 3 hours if I remember correctly.


There are three main highlight of the place.

The first one is a room to simulate an antarctic storm. It's basically a hugh fridge with a powerful fan to chill you down to negative temperatures.. Quite freaky to be honest.


Next is the Hagglund ride. It's basically a modified armoured personnel carrier from the people that brought you the swiss cheese.

The driver will take u through a quite cool ride like jumping across ledges, falling a bit, tilting a bit, floating a bit (it's amphibious). Quite cool and fun, I like.. Too bad they dun allow second rides..

The last thing there is the penguins. These guys are pain in the a*** to photograph.. they never stay still! The first time I wanted a tele lens begins here.. These penguins are apparently adopted and are deformed in one way or another. It's part of a rehab program or something.

There's also a section to see them swim underwater.

After this I was like.. what's next?

Then I realised we finished the whole attraction.. What a dissapointment..

Verdict: cool but not worth the price.. :P


And then we left on one of the shuttles. We took the coolest looking one for NZ4 a way.

So next we head on for the city.

Christchurch's cathedral square is quite impressive. Had our lunch there before checking in to our backpacker. The cathedral is quite pretty, so I made a HDR picture of it.

We booked a place at Cokers Backpacker.. it's simply the worse out of all the backpackers we're stayed in. The room is cold, there's only one small lamp and everywhere feels a bit dirty. Guess that's what we get for the price we pay.

Afterwards we head on to check out the city.

There's a weird cup thing in the square, didn't check out what it's really called or bothered to check out the history. But the design is weird.. haha!

Then we went to Pak & Save, something like Coles in Aussie and grabbed some stuff to eat. It wasn't enough.. haha! our attempt to cut cost failed.. coz that night we went to maccas to grab a burger.. Our fast food spree begins!

Day zero. Finally arrived at Christchurch airport.. it's quite cold this time of the year and the first thing that was obvious once we stepped into the place was the mist out of our mouths.. :P Arrived about 12.30 a.m and we're still hanging out at the airport until morning. It's already 5 am now but I can't sleep.. street sleeping just isn't my thing eh?

While back in Sydney I took some pictures from the observation deck, wished I had a tele lens then so I can take pictures of planes and such.. :P


Christchurch airport isn't the biggest of the airports the airports that I've been to. My favourite so far has to be Singapore's Changi airport. They provide free wifi internet access. Here, I'm limited to a 15 minute wifi access. 8 minutes has passed.. darn.. haha!



Once we arrived we were "sniffed" by this cute little guy.



Although it's cute, it's a bit annoying coz it leaves some of it's fur around our bags.. haha!

Anyway, time's up.. :( Day one will begin shortly come dawn, and it's time to put the D80 to the test ;) Will update if I can.

Woke up for breakfast today (it's a rare thing for me).

My orange juice froze in my cup.. -_- It's pretty bizarre..

Oops.. Gotta get ready to see my ILP supervisor.. So lazy to walk up to POW hospital..

Somewhere in my memory suddenly sparked a short vision of my primary school. I grew up studying in S.M.K Stowell, one of the earliest primary schools in mainland Penang. Anyway, while just sitting around in my room, I remembered what Cikgu Rosli told us back in Stowell. I don't remember the year but he was described to us a story about aliens in Stowell. Being young kids, we were really amazed by that story, but it was just buried in my memory until that day. I went to Google and searched "Bukit Mertajam, Alien", and to my amazement, there really is several articles about the Alien story that Cikgu Rosli told us about. It was widely reported in the local papers that day, and apparently similar episodes were encountered in several states as well.


The aliens of my former school was unlike normal aliens. They are miniatures, barely 3 inches tall. I remember Cikgu Rosli telling us about a book that has all these stories, but he never showed us. Someone in a forum posted this:

Apparently the aliens look like clowns with star pattern on their shirt and pointy boots. :P Kids back at those days have no imagination? :P

1970 - A ten year old student in Bukit Mertajam, Penang, Malaysia reported seeing about 25 landed small objects among the bushes just outside school grounds. From each of the objects emerged a three inch tall humanoid. As he approached the UFOs the school bell rang and he returned to class and did not see the objects depart. After school six school boys in the same village reported seeing a very small disc-shaped object, blue in color, land in some bushes near their school. Five little men described as merely three inches tall emerged from the object. One was dressed in a yellow suit and the other four wore blue uniforms. They were seen installing some type of aerial on a tree branch that apparently sent out signals. The boys became frightened and ran away. (Source: Albert S. Rosales, Humanoid Contact Database 1970, case # 812, citing Ahmad Jamaluddin, FSR, Vol. 28, # 5).

CASE 3: Bukit Mertajam, 1973

A group of boys playing football in a school field sighted a small UFO landed nearby. From it emerged tiny creatures which immediately one of the boys tried to catch. A beam of light was fired at the boy’s hand. The UFO flew away.

After toying for almost two years, I finally made the move to get a DSLR. Goodbye Panasonic FX-9, you have been an excellent camera. Hello Nikon D-80, you are so complicated I haven't finished reading your manual..

Got the camera off ebay at a reasonable price, the camera was shipped from Hong Kong within three days! The D80 is pretty heavy, but Nikon really knows how to build it so that it feels perfectly in my grip.

SLR photography is quite difficult, but it's really fun to learn all the tricks of the trade. The hobby does require a substantial amount of $$$$ though.. which I don't have.. lol!

Did a first test run in UNSW at night with choy the other day, results were not as good as I hope coz there's a few aspects that I needs to learn about. It's slow but I'm getting a hang of it.

The next thing I tried to do was to set up a mini-studio in my room for my Gundam. I dun have all the expensive lights, so I just use my kiam siap table lamps.

It turned out.. OK, but not very good, still have much to learn..

D80 is so exciting!

Dinosaurs are here in Sydney! Until 8th of June, the Australia Museum is holding an exhibition for dinosaurs.. :P It's all Kirby's fault, we got dragged to attend it last Saturday, but it was fun and worth it (only $5!).

Even before we went in there's this t-rex head wanting to eat the visitors already. We're like little kids, hehe! dinosaur! dinosaur!

The first thing they decide to show off was the big tall brontosaurus,

These guys are so tall, it's nearly impossible to take pictures with them..
Kirby was like, I want to see T-rex! But there's no t-rex that day, only this Giantosaurus, supposedly larger than the t-rex so t-rex got degraded already.. :P
The Raptors are also there trying to eat everyone,
Triceratops!


Then there's this 'siau kia', didn't got to read the description.. :P

I like this one the best, it looks so jurrasic park-ish
Finally, the one weird thing I noticed about most of the bones..

What's this?? How come the pelvic bone extend like that.. as if it forms the bone for something else.. haha!

There's also another skeleton section that's not part of the dino exhibition, it's quite cool actually. The most creative one is this:

The skeleton guy is sitting on the chair reading a book, holding a leash for a dog.

Look properly and then you'll see there's a cat and a mouse at the background..

This is so cool.. the mouse is even trying to crawl into a hole.. :P Even the bird in the cage is just bones..

It was a fun outing, anyway, thanks for reading! :)

Last Saturday there was this random event hosted by Red Bull called the Red Bull FlugTag. Apparently it was the first time this event was held here, and it attracted a whooping 60000 people!

According to the website, they say the event is:

A uniquely loony competition, Red Bull Flugtag, involves manpowered flying machines and crazy pilots attempting to launch themselves off a 6m ramp and into the water below!

The event wasn't that good though.. there were too many people that we can't get a good view at all. Initially we were standing in a really ideal location where we can see the whole ramp, but then this ferry came and parked right in front of it, blocking out way :(


The 'flying' machines they bought were really random.. they really put quite a lot of effort for something that will just drop into the water and break apart.. haha
This one is my favourite :P
This one is just.. wrong.. four men and a butterfly..

This one not bad, they have the best costumes IMO :P These guys are the grey nurses.. Just wrong..

I like these guys best, they have anime hairs! :P And lastly, I think this team won the competition in the end

The whole thing was pretty boring in the end, the teams just take turns falling into the water and that's it.. No idea how thing event could attract so many people..

After that we went for lunch in this place called wagamama.. It's the only restaurant we could find that were open around the place.. haha! we're so sap pai..


It's a japanese restaurant run by ang mohs with an indian cook.. Best combo..

I ordered this:

It's called Chilli Chiken Udon or something like that.. the bowl is huge but the portions aren't really.. haha!

Hope you've enjoyed the read ;)

Yeay! submitted my assignments, so I'm geared to focus on the ICE for the next two weeks. Hope I have enough time though..

Just some pictures for fun.. :P

These two guys are fighting out on my table while I was studying. My table is a dangerous battlefield.. :P




You know what this is? It's the law library!

I swear it's a spaceship in disguise!

Went to city for Thai with Tuck Seng, Wu Chuan and Keh Min today. On the way we saw a really peculiar sight of hundreds of bats migrating. At first I thought they were birds but it's actually large bats. The lines are endless.. wonder what's gonna happen to Sydney coz animals have some sort of six sense right? A little bit freaky now that I thought of it..


On another note, we realised that the University now has free uniwide service, means we have wireless connection on campus! There's no connection in my room though, it's a damn conspiracy so that the colleges can squeeze the juice from their students..

I have around a month left before D-day. Study progress is going well but there's still plenty to do.. I still have to finish up my medical case and find a patient for my surgical case.. Sutherland Hospital HAS NO SURGICAL CASE! I guess that's the downside of getting attached to a Shire, everyone gets transferred to major city hospitals to do their procedures..

Today was pretty hectic, got my first senior duty for the weekend and its driving me nuts.. Got so many calls today for so many random stuffs.. I'm developing phobia to the ringtone of the senior phone.. I swear my heart beat faster when it rings.. Can't study either.. everytime i settle down the damn thing rings!

Anyway, watched this anime not long ago and I really liked it! It's called 'The girl who leapt through time' or '時をかける少女, Toki o Kakeru Shōjo' in Japanese. Like the title, it's about a girl who found out suddenly that she could jump through time and repeats things she liked to do, reverse outcomes she doesn't like and so on. All until the end where the twist of the story comes, and the boy she didn't realise she loved had to dissapear. It's beautifully told in a semi-matrix like style and extremely well detailed in the arts department. The character is developed well too. It's filled with lots of emotions and expressions and it's definitely worth the watch.

Some screens:

Ok.. back to work again.. ;) Thanks for reading everyone!

By the way, had a most random search keyword that pointed to my blog: "korean barbecue klcc medical center". Korean barbeque then KLCC, then medical center??

Quote of the day: "A flower lasts a day, a smile lasts forever"