Now I Have Taken Control (Kabuki Quantum Fighter, Karate Champ, The Karate Kid)

Come. Meditate with me for a while. Lay back under the soothing cool waters of the waterfall, and let the only sound to permeate your mental focus be the serene rush as the water cascades. Close your eyes and take deep breaths, and fly with me. Take a mental voyage to the stars, on a spaceship named Nintendo. Today our journeys take us to the beginning of a new galaxy, at the dawn of a new year. Come. Meditate with me, and you may find your own inner voice, your very own Valya, if it pleases you. She may encourage you, she may tease you a little even... but she means well. Come. Meditate with me, and hear her lesson. Today your inner voice wishes to teach you about control. Listen to her. Listen to me. Meditate, if only for a while.

In these private thoughts of ours, our imaginations sing and resonate with the imaginations of others. 1990. HAL Laboratory comes to us once again, a reminder that our future is a fixed point in time. Our battle with the dark will come, but do not focus on that. It will be defeated by the other half, the Demetria, if you will. Why am I smiling like that? Don't worry about it. Worry instead about a possible future imagined by the dreamers. The year 2056, and an attack within the cyber-dreaming itself. A brave warrior of Valya named Scott O'Connor digitizes himself to combat this, and falls out of the world, becoming something which does not exist; a Kabuki who fights inside a computer space. A glance at what the dreaming sees as the computer world is enough to unsettle. The mere idea that the machine code of something like Ikari Warriors could translate into this monstrosity is perverse. See the ten hearts of the dread beast GREED pulsing and beating, arteries clogged by currency. It is enough to send H.R. Giger screaming into the deadlights, the sanity leaving his eyes forever. Scott, now the Kabuki for time immemorial, is well-equipped. That is why I show you this. This is what your own Valya sings to you. Can you feel it? Her cool breath in your ear, sending shivers down your spine? I heard it as well. She said "control". The Kabuki has excellent control, when someone like you or I is in charge of his actions. He has committed himself to the machine, and it is only us who can guide the machine. Meditate. Synchronize yourself with the Kabuki. Resonate with your inner voice, and your fingers will become weapons of their own. He will march forward with a flick of your left thumb. Launch upward with your right. When the time is right, a different flick of your right thumb will send his hair into the space where the enemy lays, and damage it. Continue on this course and the Kabuki will prevail. I've done it. Can you?

Another world. Another sight. I show you this not because I hate you. Far from it. I want you to understand how a lack of control can lead you to ruin. See this man in the white. See him face his opponent in red. His goal is to land a blow on the man in red, while avoiding the man in red's attempt to do the same. It sounds simple, no? It is not. The flicking of your thumbs does not translate well to fluid movement. One wrong flick makes this man face backward, an awkward dance. The man in red approaches and easily deals his blows. He is of the machine. He knows what to do. You, my pupil, are not of the machine. You depend on the resonance to guide him... and sometimes the resonance just plain doesn't work. It all comes back to... ah, yes. You heard her again. Yes. Control. Or rather, a lack of it. This man, this... what does he call himself? A "Karate Champ"? He is far from it. He is also locked in an endless battle with this man in red. Someday, one more skilled than us at the resonance may discover the way to do it. Long ago, in a time when the world stood at the edge of oblivion, there were ancient tomes that told you how to resonate with these gods in the machine. This one may still be out there, awaiting discovery. Don't worry yourself about it. Now, you need to understand the full extent of control. Shield your eyes.

There it is. The dark rainbow, lurking in space. I travelled through it, once. Twice. Never again. What's that? Don't concern yourself with it. It is nothing that a pupil like you need fear. I've dealt with that darkness, and now all you need do is observe. Observe and meditate as the lesson continues. Here is a pupil, just like yourself! A bona fide "Karate Kid"! Time has not been kind, mind you. In reality, the pupil is now older than his teacher. What a sad thing time can be... but a powerful one as well. There is a dark power at work here with this one's adventure in Okinawa. The resonance is spotty and unclear, but not as bad as the braggart champ. It's the minions you need to worry about. The sentries of the darkness, that other half of our little Demetria. They come at you without mercy, ready to destroy you easily... and what can you do about it? Not much. You're only a pupil, after all. This is what we call "realism", my friend. What's that, you say? You attempted to resonate with this young student as an escape from realism? My dear pupil... the dark rainbow cares not. Its arc has done what it desired. It fed the ten hearts of the dread beast with cold hard cash and kept them pumping. It matters not to them if the resonance fails. All that matters is the money. Yes, I know, child. It's trash. You've learned something about the universe today. Most of it is just trash.

Have you found it, though? Your own inner voice? Your Valya? Does she sing to you the song of wisdom, passed down through time and space? Does she enlighten your mind with her words, bigger on the inside? Does your meditation broaden your perspective on things? Now, open your eyes. Open your eyes and come out of that soothing rush of water from the sacred waterfall. You've done well, my friend. Don't forget your inner voice. Don't forget that pop of cool breath in your meditative ear. Don't forget that word, the most important to an agent of the Valya, a dreamer.

Control.