Benjamin R. Smith

“It isn’t easy when life tears away the one person in a million you thought you could always trust.”

“I haven’t got time for a love life and that’s usually frustrating to the would-be lovers. Care to make a run for it?”

“I see a cathedral, for instance, one that’s stood for centuries and I marvel and I wonder... How many people passed through the doors? What did they pray for? How many wars did they wish to see ended? How many christenings, weddings, and funerals? Same thing with a record, I guess. Who bought it? Did they ever make love while it was playing? How many times did they read the notes in the cover? Did a song on the album change their life? I suppose it's odd to think about things like that.”

“Madness doesn’t get off wearing gloves. It needs to feel skin on skin, smell the blood and shit as it brings itself off.”

“The name Atlantis came from an old book Victoria had never read. A lifetime residency in the ASM paradise was rumored to cost anywhere from 15 to 20 million dollars. The rich and powerful lived under the dome because they considered themselves separate and superior. Few of them left the comfort and security of Atlantis. To them the outside world was weak. Second Sector citizens where miscreant dregs of a defunct society. In order to enter the Atlantian dome one first had to be cleared by a resident. Gate security personnel strictly enforced this rule, even when outsiders carried a badge and gun.”

“Writing Vampire Erotica is like writing sex scenes for porcupines.”

“. “We’re both... I mean, you’re more so, but we’re both really fucked up emotionally. I mean, how do I know you’re not still loopy from being shot full of... of...”“Benzodiazepine,” he said.“Yes, that.” Victoria’s eyes met with his a moment and then looked away. “It’s been awhile for me,” she said at last. “I mean, I’ve slept with people...”“So have I,” he said.”

“Several things ran through my head as I watched this silent ballet: First, I was running low on pears, my favorite morning fruit. Second, I, as a woman, am much smarter than men, I having displayed foresight this male apparently lacked in regards to trash day. And finally, I desperately needed to see more of this man in his boxers.”

“I built them what they wanted and I made a profit off of it. Now they call me a god...What fools these mortals be.”

“Nice dress,” Victoria said.“Thank you,” Perpetua said. “Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?”Victoria blinked. “Uh, what?”

“The Angel of Death is always a young person, or a group of young people, you'll begin seeing them left and right soon.”

“I’m going to become a beat poet and a lesbian!”

“After a good roll in the hay, when he’s all peaceful and serene and he hasn’t a worry or a care in the world, and the euphoric calm of release is drifting through his cerebrum, that’s when you broadside him with the cold cruel fact that his life as he knows it is over!”

“Human’s aren’t concerned with reality, merely their perceptions of it.”

“In some literature, I’ve read, weather is used as a metaphor. The darker and stormier the weather outside the more diabolical the deeds done. When the clouds roll away, however, the rain has washed away all the blood in the streets and the world is clean and new again, as if all the violence and destruction of the storm served a divine purpose.”