9mm Pandemonium

You know the steel bars they use in construction? Imagine someone puts a steel bar in a fire and makes it red-hot, then stabs you with that. It's a stabbing that enters and exits.

Reader's Digest published an article in December 2006 documenting an interview with a gunshot survivor.

Bullets leave the muzzle of guns at different velocities, depending on the type of gun. Rifles have muzzle velocities close to 900 metres per second, handguns have much lower velocities, around 400 metres per second. Wind resistance and obstructions slow down the bullet, which has to travel at around 60 metres per second to puncture human skin. The entry wound is usually small and round, but because the bullet is spinning, it tears through the tissue under that small wound.

When the bullets entered, I felt like something was expanding in me.

As the bullet tears through flesh, it starts to deform and tear through a larger cross-section area of tissue. Also, the force of the bullet causes the bullet hole to temporarily expand outwards; this is known as the cavitation effect. The bullet leaves "shock waves" in its wake and in some cases, this shock wave does more damage than the bullets themselves.

They came around and shot me in the head. It felt like a piece of steel. But it only grazed the top of my skull, leaving an indent.

90 percent of gunshot wounds to the head are fatal. If a bullet hits bone, the bone may fracture, sending fragments tearing within the body. Most gunshot victims die from internal bleeding. Even if a person was shot in a vital organ such as the heart, he still has up to 10 seconds of purposeful action before the brain suffocates from the shortage of fresh oxygen.

I looked at my wounds. The entrance would was like a little circle, about 1.5cm wide. The exit wound was like a tear, more than 3 cm wide, like a half-moon shape.

When someone fires a gun, he probably does not see the consequences of that action? The act of pulling the trigger will in all likelihood kill the victim. Beyond that, that bullet leaves broken hearts and families in its wake. That act tears through the fabric of society, of helping one another, of universal brotherhood amongst all men. -Jimmy

NovaMatrix Chapter 2

Unlike other ships of the same tonnage, the sub-stealth fast attack vessel ("sub") is lightly armed. However, that was the trade-off for the installation of a localized stealth field generator. The stealth field generator had a list of very specific requirements, including a maximum ship length of 70 metres, a maximum surface area, a minimum internal space to fit the generator and maximum traveling speed while the generator was engaged.

However, the stealth field allowed the sub to fire torpedoes while cloaked, and only momentarily reveals the sub's location when it fires its single 155mm beam gun.

The trick to successfully commanding a sub in a combat mission is to understand where it lay in the "food chain". Enothe always found it funny how by some great cosmic joke, the biggest battleships or carriers were so focused on their jobs that they lacked the offensive or defensive powers against subs. However, pit a sub against the lean destroyers or frigates and you get a very worried sub captain.

It was another ordinary mission for Enothe. One of the Great Nations wanted supplies to another Great Nation's fringe planet cut off. Colonel Woolf had given Enothe the juicy "Zenith" route to patrol, and Enothe knew that any cargo ships jumping into the system would want to make use of the strong solar winds along the route to make a quick entry and recharge for a jump outsystem. I heard that Woolf will get paid a tonnage bonus on top of the base pay, Enothe smiled to himself. Let's hope Woolfpack scores today, then.

"Contacts! Bearing zero-seven-one, grad minus two-two. Long range!" Enothe's sensorman reported with a tinge of excitement.
"Gavin, plot me an intercept route. I want us to engage as fast as we could, and I want the last 50 klicks in cloak."

Enothe could have called him Lieutenant Rato, but he went on first name basis with everyone on his ship. We're mercenaries. Among our kind, we earn our respect. We don't rely on little symbols on our epaulettes.

"Suggested route plotted, Nothe."
Enothe brought up the plot on his display. Using his stylus, he made some changes. He forwarded the edited route to his helmsman. "Mehl, bring us into intercept position."
"Aye, captain."

Enothe then scribbled a note and sent it to Gavin along with the edited route. "Gavin, you correctly accounted for the solar winds, but the gravitational pull of the sun would have reduced the effectiveness of the Shade particles, making it easier for them to sniff us."

Enothe saw Gavin look up at him and give a sheepish smile. He's got potential, that kid. He just needs more exposure. Enothe then leaned his head against his fist. Now we wait.

Part of understanding the concepts of a sub hunt was to understand the concept of stealth. Enothe had watched old video clips of lions hunting when he was a kid. His parents had died by then, and he was under the care of his grandfather, a well-decorated soldier with the former Inter-stellar Alliance and an avid nature lover. A lion never pounced on the attack until it was quite sure it could nail the prey with little effort. It stayed downwind, moved up close, and then…

"Fire tubes one and four!"
"Yes sir, firing tube one! Fire tube four!"

The dumbfire torps streaked away, eating up the distance between the sub and the behemoth class cargo chip. While Dumbfires lacked any intricate guidance system, they flew faster than any other torp in Woolfpack's arsenal, and they packed the most punch. They covered the five kilometer distance in mere seconds, punching two holes in the huge target's side.

Enothe held his breath as Mehl maneuvered for the next shot. Normal torpedo blasts rarely did enough damage on a ship as big as a Behemoth. However, if Enothe had correctly set the pulsed explosive and the torps had landed correctly, 2 torps could cripple even the mighty Behemoth. The pulsed explosives were custom orders by Colonel Woolf from his suppliers. Instead of one massive detonation, the explosives detonate in phases, creating concentric shockwaves. If two of these shockwaves meet in phase, they create a bigger shockwave, by principle of superposition. A line of explosions blossomed along the midpoint of the torp impact points, telling Enothe that shockwaves interfaced. The ship dipped towards the planet below, its main propulsion no longer powerful enough to fight the gravitational pull. Enothe half-smirked.

"More contacts approaching, Nothe! They're jumping in much closer to the planet!"
Enothe gaped at his display as it updated the new contacts. That's not possible! Only a madman will jump so close to the planet! The calculations required for a jump point that safely avoids the planet's path and pull is beyond any computer we have on our ships!

The ships were of unidentified design, but looked menacingly insectoid. They quickly moved in towards the convoy and opened fire with their beam guns. Scarlet hyphens dashed across the vacuum, igniting fuel cargo and fusion reactors. The convoy's escorts moved forward to form a protective screen, but were quickly crippled by the hail of beam fire.

Any ship spots us now, we're dead. Enothe frowned. "Mehl, creep us out of here and get us to a jump point." The sub crept away at a painfully slow pace. Enothe wanted to get away from the destruction as quickly as possible, but he also knew that moving too quickly will affect the shade particles keeping his ship cloaked, possibly revealing his position. He'd have to move slow and hope to move out of sensor range before anyone could pinpoint his position. -Jimmy

Change

Friend H, over the last half a year or so, changed a lot. He used to be the charismatic, bubbly founder of our JC ODAC's "bacehelor's club". Over a period of a few months, he took on several personalities, most of them being of the silent and withdrawn archetype.

The most notable of these was the "L" phase, when he mimicked L in so many ways. He'd squat on chairs instead of sitting, he'd drink lots of coffee, he'd suck the tip of his thumb when he was thinking and he'd pinch his mobile phone and hold it against his ear. (His hair already looked like L's before the episode, and thankfully, he didn't start wearing mascara.)

However, he became that same friend I knew about 2 months back. He's now more content and fulfilled. Gone are the L behaviours.

Friend F has been with his girlfriend for close to a year. He's spent about the same amount of time trying to change her. F reckons that she often likes things done her way, and even though F has given in to her a number of times, he wants to show her how to consider others' opinions.

Acquaintance K joined our bachelor's club activities a couple of years ago. Friend I brought him along. Unfortunately, K didn't quite fit in. It's not that we were being difficult; we really are quite a bunch of misfits. Birds of a feather flock together, but K probably fits closer as a reptile than a bird.

We couldn't understand why he'd ask the stupidest questions. Stupid questions like "Eh, so who from ODAC did you think was pretty?" from N, we could still handle. But K is a different animal. "I don't get the joke. So are you saying you'd rather jump off a building?" in response to a totally unrelated joke about fire extinguishers.

We couldn't understand why he'd never shave this long curly hair growing from his cheek. We'd tell him, "K, it looks gross. Could you please cut it?" The next time we saw him, it'll still be there, attention-grabbing as ever.

We tried. We showed him that beer should never be sipped, it should be gulped. We told him that old, fuzzy t-shirts shouldn't go beyond a certain distance from his house. We asked him why he kept asking such painfully lame questions that creep up our nerves and send jolts to our heads.

Recently, H asked K to come along for one of our outings, something he hasn't done in a long time. K was still the same. Same whiskers. Same dress sense. Same questions. Long fingernails, long toenails.

Some people change. Some of them change for the better, others become worse. Some people help others change for the better. And yet there are some people who stay the same. -Jimmy

A Rose by any Other Name...

Will smell just as sweet.

A rose by any other name

Will still prick and make you bleed. -Jimmy

Random Thoughts Collection - Silver Surfer

Has it occurred to you that the Silver Surfer, yeap, that uber cool dude in the upcoming Fantastic Four movie, the guy who could fly through anything cos he could cross trans-dimensional planes, the really well-built and shimmery guy... you get the picture.

Did you realise that he's bald?

Wonder how he'd look like in an advertisement for Beijing 101. -Jimmy