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2011.04.08 06:30 Mutki Sketchdaily: Your daily sketch!
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2010.11.29 14:36 Mr45 All things NFA
A community of hobbyists interested in NFA items, history, and news. We seek to expand general understanding of the laws collectively referred to as the National Firearms Act and their implications for gun owners and citizens of today. Silencer, SBR, SBS, DD, AOW, and MG posts are all welcome here. Content suggesting non-compliance or discouraging NFA ownership will not be tolerated.
2024.05.11 21:10 CherishedBeliefs How good is the following in terms of theological merit?
How good is Person B as a theologian?
Person A:
But evolution is transitional.
As a human you are the product of about 50% of your parents DNA with about 100-150 mutations. Mutations in DNA occur in the letters A, T, C, and G (adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine) which change as a recipe for the species, so there is no exact point in history in which humans became humans. It was all gradual changes and we just label (and argue) about whether something was human or not. It's like arguing about when blue becomes red in this image http://i.imgur.com/OpIKBPW.jpg
So to believe in evolution and that humans aren't descendants of any animal you would have to believe in a trickster god that
To do this would be to establish the laws of nature, create the universe, the solar system, the earth, all the events which occurred until abiogenesis, then the evolution of higher forms of life until the planet finally reached the stage where it was most suitable for the form chosen for Adam. Now if the planet is in a form most suitable for Adam, a hominid mammal, why wouldn't God have created all the life whose essence was necessary for ours? (and this is exactly what the old Sufis say, about whom John William Draper was talking about in my quotes in my original post). This view of the Sufis was also elaborated upon here by another redditor, I believe his name is PursuitofKnowledge, I'll copy my statement here:
You call it a trick because you dislike God and don't want to admit anything good of Him. To us it is the usual: God being perfect. The creation of Adam should have come with the creation of Adam's context (this universe and world) because to do otherwise (as you suggest) would be incomplete.
Within the essence of man is the basis for the entire universe. Our mineral soul (physics, represented in the Earth itself), our vegetable soul (organic chemistry, represented in all the life which first arose), our animal soul, our personal soul (i.e, psychological capacity and differentiation), human soul (morality), and then our divine connection (our metaphysical souls which are not of the material world, which are seat to our free will). In Man this is instantiated in one being, but to create an environment for the being would necessitate drawing out these essences in a process of creation over a period of time according to the same laws of nature by which that being functions which necessitates everything we see (including the independent evolution of animals closest to us in form). This is all deductively derived by medieval Islamic thinkers. It gives you the "why" for evolution (since you think evolution is some kind of trick, it's supposed to be the opposite, the poetic and ordered nature of it is evidence for a Creator since order doesn't spring into material existence of its own accord: what you call the laws of nature are for us the commands of God).
Person A: TL;DR: Occam's razor
Person B: Occam's razor isn't a logical proof. To apply it here, one would have to accept the possibility of a purely materialistic world (even in a deistic type of monotheism), which we do not. So for us, God must exist. After that, our choice of Islam is based on personal conviction that Allah is that Supreme Being we deduce must exist in order for everything else to exist, making the Qur'an His actual command, which then makes the acceptance of the creation of Adam mandatory. We don't accept Islam because of the story of Adam (I mean, I can't say I've ever heard of anyone who said they converted to religion because they liked that story that much).
See my other posts in here regarding the history of Islamic metaphysics.
End of conversation between A and B
I, being a layman, am certainly mesmerized by person B
The issue is that I'm a layman and it doesn't take much to mesmerize me, which is why I'm here
submitted by CherishedBeliefs to AskTheologists [link] [comments]
Person A:
But evolution is transitional.
As a human you are the product of about 50% of your parents DNA with about 100-150 mutations. Mutations in DNA occur in the letters A, T, C, and G (adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine) which change as a recipe for the species, so there is no exact point in history in which humans became humans. It was all gradual changes and we just label (and argue) about whether something was human or not. It's like arguing about when blue becomes red in this image http://i.imgur.com/OpIKBPW.jpg
So to believe in evolution and that humans aren't descendants of any animal you would have to believe in a trickster god that
- evolved non-human ancestors that looked just like your ancestors,
- then the trickster god created new humans that appeared to be descended from the ancestors but they weren't despite many lines of evidence.
But evolution is transitional.Yes, it is.
So to believe in evolution and that humans aren't descendants of any animal you would have to believe in a trickster god thatWe don't consider this a trick, just a matter of God being consistent, which is a laudable quality because it is the basis for all scientific thought. Why would God do anything less than create the perfect and most meaningful environment for the first humans?
- evolved non-human ancestors that looked just like your ancestors,
- then the trickster god created new humans that appeared to be descended from the ancestors but they weren't despite many lines of evidence.
To do this would be to establish the laws of nature, create the universe, the solar system, the earth, all the events which occurred until abiogenesis, then the evolution of higher forms of life until the planet finally reached the stage where it was most suitable for the form chosen for Adam. Now if the planet is in a form most suitable for Adam, a hominid mammal, why wouldn't God have created all the life whose essence was necessary for ours? (and this is exactly what the old Sufis say, about whom John William Draper was talking about in my quotes in my original post). This view of the Sufis was also elaborated upon here by another redditor, I believe his name is PursuitofKnowledge, I'll copy my statement here:
This was a very common view of the world, especially among Sufis, who made 7 ontological distinctions of soul (mineral soul, vegetable soul, animal soul, personal soul, human soul, and the last two are the secret divine connection (our raw metaphysical souls)).And what he pasted here:
Some people have cited Islamic thinkers like Ibn Sina and Ibn Khaldun as proof of evolutionary thought having existed in earlier Islamic thought. But Islamic Studies professor, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, explains their observations as follows: “What the traditional Islamic thinkers said is that you have levels of existence of life forms starting with plant life, which is superseded by animal life through the creative power of God, while this animal life also includes plant life within itself. Moreover, plant life itself has many levels not caused by temporal evolution but by the descent of archetypes into the temporal order as is also true of animals. We know, for example, that we have vegetal nerves about which Ibn Sina speaks. In the animal realm we also have a hierarchy; many Muslim thinkers such as al-Biruni and Ibn Sina have written about this matter and have asserted that there are simple life forms and then ever more complicated life forms and that the complicated life forms contain within themselves the simpler life forms. Obviously human beings have a more complicated life form than the monkey, but possess also some of those characteristics we see in the monkey, but this does not mean that we have evolved from the monkey.” (On the Question of Biological Origins, 2006 http://www.thefreelibrary.com/On+the+question+of+biological+origins.-a0157034139)This is important to note because if we take the traditional Muslims views literally as a materialistic evolutionary theory, they are saying we evolved from monkeys, which doesn't make sense by any evolutionary model (we had a common ancestor). While Al-Biruni touched on natural selection and materialistic evolution (and even Ibn Khaldun to an extent), what the others were talking about was the consistent, cohesive, and poetic model of life on earth as manifested in the essence of Man. If God created everything for Man, and He designed Man in the form we know (bipedal mammalian hominid as a foundation), then it would be inconsistent for the physical application of that abstract essence which occurred in time through many ages to NOT feature these various essences manifested in physical creation because this would defy the very principle of Time. It would be imperfect of God to do otherwise.
You call it a trick because you dislike God and don't want to admit anything good of Him. To us it is the usual: God being perfect. The creation of Adam should have come with the creation of Adam's context (this universe and world) because to do otherwise (as you suggest) would be incomplete.
Within the essence of man is the basis for the entire universe. Our mineral soul (physics, represented in the Earth itself), our vegetable soul (organic chemistry, represented in all the life which first arose), our animal soul, our personal soul (i.e, psychological capacity and differentiation), human soul (morality), and then our divine connection (our metaphysical souls which are not of the material world, which are seat to our free will). In Man this is instantiated in one being, but to create an environment for the being would necessitate drawing out these essences in a process of creation over a period of time according to the same laws of nature by which that being functions which necessitates everything we see (including the independent evolution of animals closest to us in form). This is all deductively derived by medieval Islamic thinkers. It gives you the "why" for evolution (since you think evolution is some kind of trick, it's supposed to be the opposite, the poetic and ordered nature of it is evidence for a Creator since order doesn't spring into material existence of its own accord: what you call the laws of nature are for us the commands of God).
Person A: TL;DR: Occam's razor
Person B: Occam's razor isn't a logical proof. To apply it here, one would have to accept the possibility of a purely materialistic world (even in a deistic type of monotheism), which we do not. So for us, God must exist. After that, our choice of Islam is based on personal conviction that Allah is that Supreme Being we deduce must exist in order for everything else to exist, making the Qur'an His actual command, which then makes the acceptance of the creation of Adam mandatory. We don't accept Islam because of the story of Adam (I mean, I can't say I've ever heard of anyone who said they converted to religion because they liked that story that much).
See my other posts in here regarding the history of Islamic metaphysics.
End of conversation between A and B
I, being a layman, am certainly mesmerized by person B
The issue is that I'm a layman and it doesn't take much to mesmerize me, which is why I'm here
2024.05.11 21:06 Trussky314 Post Deferred Renderpass depth attachment is upside down
Hi!
Doing a deferred rendering engine with all the bells and whistles - tiled/clustered forward is coming later.
I'm using a framebuffer abstraction similar to a render graph API - essentially allowing for framebuffer construction which are dependent on other framebuffer instances.
I've succesfully finished the G-buffer geometry pass and the deferred pass (with light culling compute in between). After the deferred pass lighting I would like to be able to draw the lights I submitted to my engine from client code - maybe as emissive meshes or like a renderer cube default (?).
Anyway - for this final light geometry pass I attach the output of the deferred pass (colour, and depth) as load operations. I had as a vision to implement the idea blitted lights of Deferred Shading LearnOpenGL,
As context, I use inverse Z-buffer with minDepth and maxDepth set to 1.0 and 0.0 respectively, also using GLM_FORCE_DEPTH_ZERO_ONE. I also perform viewport inversion a la Sascha Willems. I perform a Predepth pass which is then attached to the G-buffer pass to hinder overdraw, and allowing for light culling later on. This is the depth output I use as the attachment for the light pass.
The issue is that the lights render pass gets the depth buffer attached upside down. I've tried rendering the lights pass "non-inverted" (x=0,y=0,width=width,height=height), inverting that render pass's shaders' y-coordinates and others.
I can't seem to understand how to flip the depth attachment at this point, since I'm not sampling it as a texture, it is already loaded as an attachment.
A possible solution, I realised when writing this post, would maybe be to attach it as a fragment shader texture and sample instead, so that I can reject based on gl_FragDepth in the fragment shader? Maybe?
Thank you for your consideration!
submitted by Trussky314 to vulkan [link] [comments]
Doing a deferred rendering engine with all the bells and whistles - tiled/clustered forward is coming later.
I'm using a framebuffer abstraction similar to a render graph API - essentially allowing for framebuffer construction which are dependent on other framebuffer instances.
I've succesfully finished the G-buffer geometry pass and the deferred pass (with light culling compute in between). After the deferred pass lighting I would like to be able to draw the lights I submitted to my engine from client code - maybe as emissive meshes or like a renderer cube default (?).
Anyway - for this final light geometry pass I attach the output of the deferred pass (colour, and depth) as load operations. I had as a vision to implement the idea blitted lights of Deferred Shading LearnOpenGL,
As context, I use inverse Z-buffer with minDepth and maxDepth set to 1.0 and 0.0 respectively, also using GLM_FORCE_DEPTH_ZERO_ONE. I also perform viewport inversion a la Sascha Willems. I perform a Predepth pass which is then attached to the G-buffer pass to hinder overdraw, and allowing for light culling later on. This is the depth output I use as the attachment for the light pass.
The issue is that the lights render pass gets the depth buffer attached upside down. I've tried rendering the lights pass "non-inverted" (x=0,y=0,width=width,height=height), inverting that render pass's shaders' y-coordinates and others.
I can't seem to understand how to flip the depth attachment at this point, since I'm not sampling it as a texture, it is already loaded as an attachment.
A possible solution, I realised when writing this post, would maybe be to attach it as a fragment shader texture and sample instead, so that I can reject based on gl_FragDepth in the fragment shader? Maybe?
Thank you for your consideration!
2024.05.11 20:45 mage_in_training My reddit serial, Knowings ch. 08
This chapter took a long time to get out. Life has me super busy. Two jobs, married, two kids, still sober. I like how this turned out, however, someone new stole the show this time. As always, leave feedback, I appreciate it so very much.
[FIRST] [DELETED SCENES] [PREVIOUS]
~ ~ ~
As I reentered my true body without recieving a mending, the vicious wounds I endured manifested into being as I reactualized into my true Self. Through the pain, I couldn't help but think on Raver's words to me.
"The doors have to be closed."
~ ~ ~
Without recieving a mending in Raver's Dreamtime bubble, reactualization was a fucking bitch. I Perceived my Self as having quite the damaged form, my Soul was fucked over by bombardment from dreadlight and my physical body simply disagreed with it all, stating that I was mostly whole and intact, only being damaged by wounds I had already endured. The three parts had an argument of a sort amongst themselves and with the power of the Dreamtime, reached a tortuous compromise.
I'm certain I seizured and blacked out through the process.
I awoke with my body shaking and covered in a cold sweat, Tsula and Luna above me, chanting in the secret language of their esoteric Traditions. The two of them each held diffetent tools required for their cultural and subtle manipulation of reality. Soft hands, awash with mana and glowing tattoos, were placed on my chest, right where my heart was. Cold, icy fingers cradled my soul protectively, keeping it connected to my body in the here and now as harsh, physical laws rent my form.
I was paying the price for Raver's hubris, and I had almost overdrafted. Thoughts of mortal over reach faded from my mind as I slipped into cool and soothing darkness.
Cold and bloodied fingers were pressed against my chest and did little to assuage the burning ache that was my soul. I couldn't focus on anything else as I gazed at the hollowed out body of my beloved. She had been beautiful, gorgeous even, and due to give birth to our daughter in two weeks. Now, the... dead thing in front of me could barely be defined as a corpse. Her skin had been peeled away like a banana and her insides removed, leaving a bloodied, hollow space. The flesh and bones had been scooped away like ice cream, leaving little in the way of remains. Our unborn child had been pulled out and repurposed with the stolen parts of her mother by dreadlight and a mage's fell Will to form the body of a Thing.
With silent tears streaming down my face, I placed the ring I had proposed to her with and put it onto my finger, next to my plain tungsten one. The simple act of removing it almost caused what remained of her hand to simply fall apart in my fingers. I'm not sure how long I stayed like that. I couldn't even hold her body against mine for fear of it crumbling away into a vile mess. I ignored what was going on around me as I kneeled in the spent summoning circle.
The world around me split and rent itself into distorted imagery, as though I were looking at everything from under a pool with gentle waves. Some parts were compressed together and others were stretched out, not quite like a mirror maze as the world was still simply one cohesive image. Additionally, things seemed closer or further in ways that defied conventional Euclidean geometries. The only area not affected by this blatant disregard of spatial dimensions, had been myself and a scant few feet around me.
What...?
A heavy thud broke me out of my thoughts and I saw my Father landing next to me. Since both of us had been prepared, he was wearing, much like myself, full motorcycle safety gear. It had been enchanted and bolstered by hidden runes and severed Will, turning everything into protective objects that even defended against potent and offensive mysticism. The equipment in question had been chosen for its sheer mundanity and ease of access, letting the powerful enchancements skirt around the Lie and Consensus leaving the magic fully intact and potent.
"Alistair," I heard my Father say to me with grim calm as he twisted the space in front of us into a right angle, redirecting rapid gunfire, "I can't do this alone."
I remained silent.
"Damnit, Son," he growled out then literally kicked my ass with his heavy boot, almost knocking me over onto my side, "get a hold of yourself, Its here now. You handle the mages."
That got me going. I finally got up, my grief was as a lead weight and prevented me from doing what was needed. With a last look at C'Leena's hollowed out corpse, I grit my teeth, steeled my nerves and called forth my magic from the Aether.
Was I dreaming? No, worse, I was in a memory...
"Stay out of my way and watch yourself," Father said to me, "I can't pull my punches against that."
"Gotcha," I replied almost absently and turned to face the assembled shadow mages. They had inexplicably stopped theit gunfire to admire the Thing they brought into existence from Somewhere.
I couldn't help but stare, either.
Standing on top of the northernmost anchor stone, an ugly, multi-faceted block of copper with glyphs and sigils harshly hewn into it, was a naked woman. The glyphs themselves were hard to look at, as though their mere presence were an affront to reality itself, which they were. The woman's skin was a darkened olive tone and she was tall as well as athletic, lithe and fit. Her shoulder length black hair was bushy and curly, flowing about her head almost like an afro. As she ran her hands down her body, I could not help but notice that everything was oddly symmetrical and too perfect. It was unnerving me greatly and triggered an uncanny valley response that tore at my heart.
The body this Thing was wearing had belonged to my fiancée.
Father didn't let It have time to get acclimated. Sidestepping forwards, he drew upon the full capabilities of his Path, eyes backlit by stars, an impossible physical sword of abstract spatial geometries held in his left hand, and a reality defying, super-dense distortion held in his right.
The world contorted and screamed under his might.
I awoke with a start and a low groan, glad to be awake and free of that horrid nightmare again. Not for the first time, I wished I had that motorcycle gear still. I had been far too reckless then and immediately thereafter, and everything had been damaged beyond repair. I could never find anyone I trusted enough to make those enchantments anyways. Farnsworth could only enhance the mundane qualities as he didn't know enough about mana warding to permanently imbue the protections I wanted nor needed for my line of active field work.
Looking around, I saw Rue asleep on the other side of the bed and Spades was nestled between us, his massive form making a visible dip in the mattress. The big monster dog was on his back, legs splayed open and snoring loudly with his tongue hanging out of his muzzle. I was reminded a lot of my Lola when she had still been around in the flesh, making me smile with old and pleasant memories. I must have been out for some time for Spades to be here.
A quick, almost reflexive, mental orison told me everything I already suspected. My mana reserves were shot, my body had been through the ringer and my soul was frayed and burnt. While I knew I owed my continued existence to Raver and her godsend, I also knew it had taken a great and terrible toll on my Self. Miracles like that usually held some kind of hidden cost, even if they weren't readily apparent.
Getting off the bed slowly, I began to look for my pack. It took far longer than than usual as I had to steady myself quite a bit from the spinning room. I managed to be quiet, however, and didn't wake up Rue nor Spades. Finally in the shower, after some time and using the wall to support myself, I let the almost scalding water roll over my aching body. The pendant on my neck protecting me from recieving any burns or aggravating the injuries I had, both old and new.
With the hot water soothing aching muscles, I began to think and take stock of my situation. I had never been on the back foot like this, low on any kind of resource, having few allies, and being pressed for time. It was like something out of a bad novel or shitty indie Steam(R) game. Though, real life was often stranger than fiction and had no real need for a logical cause and effect dynamic. If this was going to become the norm, then I had to find another method of approaching my wendigo problem.
I was simply running out of time.
After some long moments of thinking, I began to wash my hair, using the guest products on the corner caddy. They were so much nicer than anything I would have willingly bought and made me seriously consider changing up my usual shampoo. The only idea I could come up with regarding those wendigos, besides an overwhelming frontal assault, was to appeal to their bottomless gluttony and barter for passage.
I resigned myself to actually try to negotiate with their clan leader, leveraging their horrid taboos against them to get what I needed.
Wendigos, unlike most strange cryptids, vampires and were-folk aside, had a lot of things known about them, especially how they powered their supernatural capabilities. It was a simple and rather straightforward process, the more heinous the act, the more mana they drew from it. Cannibalism, sacrilege, incest, murder, torture, hedonistic gluttony, or any number of other terrible and minor sins. As well as general lawbreaking and felonies, oftentimes combined to have as many as possible occur in the same sitting.
I audibly gasped with a sudden epiphany.
My fate had already been decided, by myself no less. In a bar I couldn't remember the name of, when I had been gazing into my bronze coin, I saw what I needed to do. I had to gift what measly scrap of knowledge I understood from Beyond the Infinite to those creatures. To let those wendigos defile and mutilate such sacred and pure knowledge to whatever whims their baleful minds could come up with.
"Fuck," was the only thing I could whisper at the thought of it all as I turned off the water, getting out of the shower. I cooled the bathroom down with but a thought and wiped away the condensation on the mirror with a towel that wasn't my own, finally getting a good look at myself without vertigo, as that had finally passed.
I looked like shit, and that was a compliment. Huge, fist shaped bruises of black, green and yellow littered my torso, though most were located on my left side and blurred together into an ugly shapeless mass. The ones on my right, however, were well defined and I could easily count the number of strikes. My face held a swollen black eye, I never noticed my diminished field of vision as I had gotten used to having them over the years. Turning gingerly and opening the mirror a bit so I could see my back, I grimaced. It was another spiderweb of a bruise, earned from when I had been smashed against the edge of Raver's Dreamtime bubble.
At least none of my fingers were broken, only very stiff and swollen, just like the rest of me. I probably couldn't drive for another day or so, either, not with my hands the way they were. As I looked, surprised I hadn't noticed earlier, the inside of my right hand was, branded. The skin, while fully healed, held the symbolic glyph that heralded the Path of Stars. A circle with nine curved lines inside it. Each line only intersected two others, but with the irregular placement of them, I could trace an intersection to any other one. In each of the open spaces, slightly off center, as a simple dot.
"Miracles leave their marks," I muttered to myself, almost disbelieving the literalness of the phrase.
I didn't bother drying off and struggled a bit getting into the clothes I brought with me, maroon athletic shorts and a black tank top. Exiting the guest bathroom, I thought about where I wanted to go. Settling on a destination, I went into the backyard, found a patch of grass in the shaded, morning sunlight and lay down. The grass was thick and rather soft, and the smell of the lemon tree and the garden was more pleasant and fragrant than they should have been.
Warding myself against dreaming, I pulled on the principles of the Aether, specifically, those of sun and storms. Since the Aether was a realm of energy and mana in all of its varying forms, I employed an advanced technique, a mysterion. It was something only able to be done by those that actually hailed from the Aether rather than having mastery over it. Pulling some of the sunlight and ambient warmth into my form, I converted measly scraps of energy directly into mana. The process was slow, and almost hardly worth the effort. It was like filling a bathtub with water, a single milliliter at a time.
Mana was now such a rare commodity, every miniscule drop of it mattered.
I settled in and entered a trance-like state, most of my attention devoted to my mysterion, though some of it was allowed to drift off elsewhere. While not exactly a dream, and while maintaining my mana draw, my mind conjured up nonsensical imagery and conversations between myself and others. I didn't pay them any attention as my thoughts wandered and drifted idly.
"I thought I'd find you out here," Rue said as I heard her sit down next to me. I didn't hear her walking, however, she continued to speak, "you've been asleep for a few days. What happened?"
"Got fucked," I replied easily, a little sarcastically as well. "Truthfully," I amended, "I got summoned by Raver. She pulled a shenanigan with Fate to let her have a waking dream."
"So she was hallucinating?" Rue stated, though it was more of a question.
"Damned straight," I confirmed, "she had Sasquatch and Farnsworth make something for her. It had to have been lethal, something like that. Anyways, we were talking and then one of Them showed up. Inside the Dreamtime bubble of hers. Found Raver's luminescence despite Mirzam hiding it."
"Shit. So It was physically there? That means It had a stolen body..." Rue said, trailing off.
"Yeah, it had a body alright," I almost growled out, "broke Raver's ritual with little effort. I spent everything I had to make a patch job just to keep it active, burned through all my mana, too. I did not want to be dispersed."
"I see," Rue said to me with understanding, "I wouldn't want to have to find my physical body without a tether either." There was a small pause before she spoke again, "So what happened next?"
"I made it mad with insults to buy time for the repaired shenanigan to stabilize Raver."
"What do you mean?" Rue asked as I heard her stretch out a bit, my eyes still closed.
"Her shenanigan was woven in such a way that whatever drug Sasquatch and Farnsworth made for her didn't just kill her," I answered with a pause then continued, "it let her do things beyond normality, anyways, my fucked up patch job let me tell Sasquatch that Raver had to stay dreaming."
"So he wouldn't just purge the elixir out of her," Rue stated, then added perhaps a tad bit defensively, "I know some things from other paths, not much, but some."
"That's good," I answered back, "knowledge is power."
"With us, it's quite literal."
I murmured in assent.
"So why did you make It mad?" Rue asked, "wouldn't It just draw strength from human emotions, especially in the Dreamtime?"
"It did," I answered back, "but It couldn't act properly on them, like human emotions were new and novel. The whole encounter was sloppy after a certain point, but I did almost die. Raver saved me, gave me a miracle."
"I saw," Rue said simply, "the mark on your hand was a giveaway."
I could only murmur in agreement again then asked, "Did you find a card in my hands, too?"
"I did," Rue replied after a few moments of silence, "it was debit card, with a note attached to it."
"From Procyon, right?"
It took a few moments for her to answer. "Yes, it was from Procyon," she took a breath and continued with wavering effort, "that damned bastard had it all planned out. Wrote a fucked up letter to me on a Google(TM) doc telling me not to worry and that this had always been his exit plan."
"Sounds like he knew what was going to happen," was all I could say.
"Yes, but, I miss him!" Rue all but snarled at me, then, in a small and quiet voice, whispered, "He was my best friend, and maybe we could've been more, y'know? Now... there's... There's just nothing, only memories of him left to mourn."
"I didn't know," I answered simply.
Rue spoke with a wavering breath before continuing, her thoughts more than a little disjointed, "a lot of what he wrote was personal, so I won't get into that, but he was certain that something catastrophic was going to happen to him and myself. So he made sure that I was at my secondary home, recovering from a job. I had just completed a mission from Raver and Mirzam, and was going to perform a ritual to patch up Spades after I got some sleep. Procyon also stated that someone has been altering things for a very long time."
"So that's why you were caught with yout pants down," I said, "you didn't even have time to recover." I paused, adjusting my mysterion as I had to refocus due to our conversation, "what did they have you do?"
"Some hedge wizards actually got a hold of an actual necromancy grimoire and charged mana tools in a graveyard," Rue said with a bit of a tired sigh, "they knew exactly what they were doing, and would have been rather powerful shadow mages if they had been capable of using starlight."
"Fuck," was all I could say, then formed an actual response after a few moments, "that shouldn't have been an issue for you. Hedges don't have our capability, though numbers may have evened out their odds."
"You're right, but they brought a spirit back before I could stop them," Rue answered with more than a little spite, "a real nasty piece of shit, too. Turned on the hedges, absorbed them, and put up a real mean fight against Spades and I. It was touch and go for a long time and I was actually fearful for my life, too."
"You won, though."
"Yeah, managed to send it kicking and screaming back to the Pit, exhausted most of my mana to do so. Fucking bastard."
There was a small silence between us as Rue became lost in her own thoughts. It was a while before I asked her, "Can you elaborate on what Procyon said about Fate being altered?"
"I can, actually, though it's a bit difficult since I'm not even a novice with the Path of Stars," Rue answered as I heard her shift a bit on the grass next to me. She paused as she seemingly collected her thoughts, "it's just that certain events were made to happen sooner or later. The big one, for our Node at least, was that you were always supposed to make your ancestral home translocate. It happened sooner than it should have."
"Fuck," I said, "So I wasn't supposed to send it away a few days ago?"
"No, that was supposed to happen after our wendigo thing, if the letter is to be believed."
"Fuck," was all I could say, "I do suppose that was a snap decision, I really didn't want Them to get a hold of anything inside. If I had been able to wait, or even had help, I'm sure I wouldn't have lost it to time and space."
"Exactly," Rue said with bitter excitement, "and we'd have access to everything in it. Losing your home was a big blow to our Node."
"Yeah, but at least They don't have it," I answered more spitefully than intended.
"Silver linings and all that, right?"
"Yeah, gotta look at the bright side, no matter how bleak," I answered back with a bit of sarcastic mirth, then said as I stretched a bit, readjusting my focus on my mysterion as well, "speaking of wendigos, I know what we need to do to solve that."
"Oh? Do tell, I couldn't come up with anything myself, kept running into dead ends," she said, then added, "lack of resources and help."
"Well, I don't think you're going to like it, I'm not sure I like it either."
"Don't keep me waiting," Rue said to me with a bit of sarcastic exasperation. I could sense her looking at me even though my eyes were still closed.
"I'm going to leverage their taboos against them, appeal to their insatiable greed and offer them what little I can understand of That Which Lies Beyond the Infinite." I sighed and added, "after all, how could they resist the allure of new magic?"
"You're right," she answered, "I definitely don't like it. I'm pretty sure it's not even wise to do so."
"Wise or not, it's the only way forward, I even saw it in a vision when I was manipulating fate magic."
"Have you talked to Mirzam or Raver about this vision of yours?"
"No, not yet, and I'm pretty sure I don't need to."
There was a bit of silence between us as she digested my words. I felt compelled to elaborate as I adjusted my mysterion again, losing a bit of my focus due to the depth of the conversation we were having.
"Acrux," I said, getting her attention fully by using the name of her star, "there's something you need to understand." I sat up, abandoning my mysterion in favor of giving her my full attention. Blinking a bit at the rise of light and warmth, I continued my thought process, "in the Dreamtime, the Thing I was fighting against, It was surprised and enraged that I was able to call upon knowledge that Lay Beyond the Infinite. Whatever those glyphs and powers are, They never wanted humans to know of them, let alone have them."
"Yet you want to give such power to wendigos of all things."
"At least the knowledge, corrupted or not, will still be on Earth," I said then added, "I'm not sure what you remember, but I know you've seen something from Beyond the Infinite. Your self revival and Spade's new form are proof of that. I was there, guided by Oracle. I Perceived something unknowable, something terrible, something no mortal has any right to gaze upon. Something I can hardly even begin to try to put into words. Raver Perceived it, too. It's how she managed to give me a godsend. So, what did you Perceive, really?"
Rue brought her knees up to her chest, thinking deeply. I could tell she was using her Perception to look inwards upon her Self. I waited patiently while she struggled to look at her soul's reflection against her mind and struggled even more to put the image there into words.
At long last, she spoke, her eyes still closed as she did so, "I'm not sure what I saw, there was too much, and I felt so small. Insignificant. Less than even a dismissed, intrusive thought. There is one thing I do remember. A doorway made of the might from two universes worth of truths and laws. A Thing was trying ro break through, but couldn't, not fully, yet the doors were opened, letting smaller ones through."
"The Doors have to be closed," I said, quoting Raver, before continuing, "that's what Raver said to me, before she sent me back to my body."
"Why didn't they mend you then?"
"They were being attacked in the waking world, too. It was a good plan on Their part, They just didn't expect us to put up so much of a fight."
"They never do, though I think that's changing."
"So that's our endgame, not sure how we're going to do it," I said, bringing the conversation back to topic, "at the moment, however, I'm going to eat a few of those mana-stuffed protein bars and fix your leg. I can't keep spending mana to be able to drive your truck. You'll have to use your own mysterion to get mana, too."
"I hate my Path's mysterions," the venom in her voice was palpable.
Before I could say anything, the backdoor opened, revealing Luna. She was wearing a bird-patterned sundress and her hair had been tied back into a loose ponytail. She put her hand over her eyes to shade them from the sun as she squinted against the brightness relative to that from inside.
"Hey, you two," she called out, "Grandmother says she needs to talk yo you."
"Alright," I called out, shakily getting up to my feet with a bit of a grunt. Everything still hurt. Rue had a bit of trouble as well, her leg was not recieving the rest and healing it deserved and needed.
"We're a mess, aren't we?" Rue asked aloud as we began to walk towards the bak door.
"Yeah, but you should see the other guys," I replied with a light chuckle, only to wince and hold my sides, "I forgot how much laughing hurts with fractured ribs."
"I really don't envy you right now," Rue said with a bit of a smirk as we entered Tsula's home, Rue entering first. "I wonder what Tsula wants to talk to us about?" Rue asked aloud, not really talking to anyone in particular.
I could only wonder as we followed Luna to the living room, the house pleasantly cool due to central air conditioning.
~ ~ ~
The moon was not in the sky, and I greatly enjoyed not having to endure the accursed, purifying light of day reflected by its surface, even if greatly diminished. The loathsome wound in my side had been a mortal blow, burning through my toughened flesh and form with unnerving ease and stunning, blinding pain. Once more, I looked at the oily, thin, and black ichor that dripped from my fingers, more human-like than I was comfortable with.
The mote of dreadlight I had recieved for my services had been the only thing that had kept me from vanishing entirely. Mortal alchemy -- science -- had advanced to such a degree so as to emulate the harsh light of day far too remarkably well. That hadn't been the worst part, that damned thaumaturgist had ensorcelled a curse upon the weapon as well. With effort, as the bulk of my power was directed at repairing the oozing wound, I altered my form and shape, struggling to maintain the illusion as I walked out onto the sidewalk from a side alley.
My contract was not yet completed.
The first two nights I had hidden myself away in the dark depths, raging against the oblivion that threatened to overtake me and ending my existence. The preparedness of the thaumaturgist had been unexpected, as well as the skill and the knowledge he had wielded so effortlessly. Without my guidance, nor presence, to instill fear into the gifted abetters, the wraiths I had gathered with me fell and fled into the night, abandoning their duties and contracts.
I would have never made this mistake against the herald of the bear.
Had I known the name of the mortal's star I had been tasked against, I would have demanded more than a simple mote of dreadlight and a paltry handful of coerced allies. Realistically, I should be grateful that I still had a kind of semi-existence. Quelling my anger and hatred, and swallowing my utter revulsion, my form rippled and took the guise of a tall, middle-aged human male in a common and unremarkable suit carrying an old and worn briefcase.
The artificial illumination around me flickered, emitting a grating hum in my presence and the thin television flickered oddly as it tried to display my image, failing to accurately do so. While tracking Arcturus's quintessence had been a bit of a task, as far too much time had passed, my familiarity with it granted me an advantage that overcame that difficulty. Traveling in my wounded state, however, had been much more arduous. Looking the woman at the reception desk over, I took on my role with hiden revulsion, aided by the illusion I was conjuring and the mimicry of my physical form.
"I'm detective Aiden Roth, and I'm looking for someone. I believe that he was here a few nights ago, definitely this past week," I said. My false, human voice had been made to sound smooth, suave and strong, interlaced with a suggestion, using what little forte I could spare. I put the worn and well-used briefcase I had conjured with me onto the counter with a heavy thud, using more of my forte to emulate such a simple thing. Opening it up, I fished out an image and showed the slightly grainy, black and white picture to the receptionist.
As the woman perused the conjured image, I could not help but hiss, my hand going to my side as I expended more of my forte than I had anticipated. The cursed wound fighting back fiercely against the dreadlight tethering my existence and life. I held my disguise with willpower of monumental proportions. A strength of will I rarely had been pressed to draw from.
Seeing the concerned look the woman gave me, I simply stated, shrugging off the pain with yet more expenditure of will, "An old injury, it flares up from time to time. No matter, have you seen this individual?"
"I'm going to need to see some kind of badge or warrant," the woman said with a genuine smile, "sorry."
The fear of losing her menial job overpowered my subtle suggestion. Unfortunate.
"Sure," I replied with a fake and well ptacticed, fetching smile, adjusting my forte to include another suggestion. I showed an actual badge with my assumed name and likeness. The mortal I was impersonating had been slain many years ago by my own hands, and the subtle illusion taking hardly any of my forte adjusted the dates and design of the badge to whatever was current.
Only a thaumaturgist, or a very particularly skilled sorcerer, could pierce the illusion. Against this mortal, there was no chance of resistance and she accepted the stolen badge without question.
She looked it over, as if trying to divine the legitimacy of it. "Okay," she finally admitted, "he was here a while ago, maybe a four or five days? I remember, 'cause I tried to flirt with him..."
I ignored her prattling and asked when she finished speaking, "Can you show me the room he used?"
"Sure, but it's been cleaned a few times since then."
With a nod, I let her lead the way to the room in question, staying silent. The lights around me flickered and hummed loudly in my presence. Had the woman been more observant, she could have seen my true shadow as I had not the forte to expend to hide it entirely from the ever changing lights. She opened the room in question, using what I could only assume was a master key card.
I immediately recognized the faded auras of quintessence.
"This will do," I stated, closing the door behind me and dropping my revolting disguise, using my forte to lock it.
I revealed my true form. My legs and arms lengthened and thinned, the black suit and red tie I was wearing became my skin, armor and form. My face and eyes became blank, gaunt and sunken, skin stretching out over it. The wound in my side made itself visible, it was an ugly red, peeling and oozing burn from my shoulder to my waist and took up most of my torso. The dreadlight I was using to prevent my oblivion illuminated the wound with a kind of sickly, crimson colored backlight. Black ichor oozed out from it and dripped onto the floor as I used the bulk of my forte to ablate the caustic, foreign quintessence from my form.
The woman looked at me as even her pitifully dull, mundane human senses told her that there was incredible danger in the room with her. She screeched and irrationally ran towards the bathroom as my presence became impossibly tall in the very finite space in the motel room. Using the smallest iota of my forte, I remotely smashed her fleeing form against a wall, pinning her there with unseen force as she begged, and sobbed for her pitiful life.
I ignored her for the moment.
Drawing upon more of my forte, freed up as I no longer needed a disguise, I sensed out where quintessence had been used, discovering two places, the bed and a wall. Imbuing the wall with my own forte, I witnessed a spectral, moving image of Arcturus throwing five darts at a map placed on the wall, one at a time, then draw intersecting lines to a single point on the map.
"Wendigos..." I hissed out in loathing, the skin on my face stretching and contorting with the movement as i spoke aloud with a nonexistent mouth. Even I knew their territory.
Turning to the second source of quintessence, I did the same thing. I saw Arcturus ward himself against dreaming and then hold a brilliant shield in the air, as well as a ball of fire. My knowledge of actual thaumaturgy told me that I would have great difficulties against those Knowings. I put the mystery of his Dreamtime excursion out of my mind for now, there was nothing I could do regarding that.
My expenditure of forte caused my horrid wound to pulse against my form painfully. With a hiss, I turned to the woman meekly begging me to spare her life as she was still pinned against the wall. I could use a thrall, especially as I could no longer gain allies, not without offering something in return to my current contract holders.
That was not a barter I wanted to engage in.
"Please... don't kill me... please... I'll do anything... please..."
The absolute terror in her eyes was delectable. Her fear invigorated me with energy and reminded me I needed to feed. However, the morsels offered by her would be more than sufficient for my needs. I dragged my left hand across my oozing wound, covering it in my own essence then flexed my forte. The clothes she was wearing split in half down the middle, revealing her naked form, making her shriek. I could see the ideas her panicked mind vomited forth as she renewed her struggles with vigor.
What I had in mind was so much worse than the mundane taking of her physical body she expected.
Using the full might of my forte, I lengthened and sharpened my index finger, the tip dripping with the gathered ichor of my essence. In an instant, less than the blink of an eye, I appeared in front of her from where I had been by the bed and plunged the very tip of my sharpened, needle-like nail into the center of her heart, cutting through the most sensitive parts of her breast to do so due to the angle I had chosen for just this purpose. As I let my ichor suffuse her body with each beat of her racing heart, her vascular system visibly turning black under her skin as she screamed and writhed in agony, an odd thing happened.
What could only be considered my blood had been tainted by thaumaturgy qnr bolstered by dreadlight as well as my own forte. As it mixed with the blank canvas of the mortal in front of me, I could sense the candle of her soul. Reaching out with dreadlight, letting the wound burn my side with a hiss of inhaled breath, I ignited it with three kinds of mysticism.
A horrified realization overcame her as she knew I had fundamentally altered her to suit my whims. Having a thaumaturgist thrall would be a great boon.
"You'll do quite nicely," I said with an actual grin, the skin stretched over my mouth revealing impossibly large, gleaming flat teeth, as I watched the physical and mystical changes taking place.
My new thrall would never be human again.
I feasted on her terror, anguish and torment.
It was delicious.
~ ~ ~
Arcturus and Acrux will be back. C'Leena Thomas, Prosthetist is going to be my next update.
[[NEXT]]
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[FIRST] [DELETED SCENES] [PREVIOUS]
~ ~ ~
As I reentered my true body without recieving a mending, the vicious wounds I endured manifested into being as I reactualized into my true Self. Through the pain, I couldn't help but think on Raver's words to me.
"The doors have to be closed."
~ ~ ~
Without recieving a mending in Raver's Dreamtime bubble, reactualization was a fucking bitch. I Perceived my Self as having quite the damaged form, my Soul was fucked over by bombardment from dreadlight and my physical body simply disagreed with it all, stating that I was mostly whole and intact, only being damaged by wounds I had already endured. The three parts had an argument of a sort amongst themselves and with the power of the Dreamtime, reached a tortuous compromise.
I'm certain I seizured and blacked out through the process.
I awoke with my body shaking and covered in a cold sweat, Tsula and Luna above me, chanting in the secret language of their esoteric Traditions. The two of them each held diffetent tools required for their cultural and subtle manipulation of reality. Soft hands, awash with mana and glowing tattoos, were placed on my chest, right where my heart was. Cold, icy fingers cradled my soul protectively, keeping it connected to my body in the here and now as harsh, physical laws rent my form.
I was paying the price for Raver's hubris, and I had almost overdrafted. Thoughts of mortal over reach faded from my mind as I slipped into cool and soothing darkness.
Cold and bloodied fingers were pressed against my chest and did little to assuage the burning ache that was my soul. I couldn't focus on anything else as I gazed at the hollowed out body of my beloved. She had been beautiful, gorgeous even, and due to give birth to our daughter in two weeks. Now, the... dead thing in front of me could barely be defined as a corpse. Her skin had been peeled away like a banana and her insides removed, leaving a bloodied, hollow space. The flesh and bones had been scooped away like ice cream, leaving little in the way of remains. Our unborn child had been pulled out and repurposed with the stolen parts of her mother by dreadlight and a mage's fell Will to form the body of a Thing.
With silent tears streaming down my face, I placed the ring I had proposed to her with and put it onto my finger, next to my plain tungsten one. The simple act of removing it almost caused what remained of her hand to simply fall apart in my fingers. I'm not sure how long I stayed like that. I couldn't even hold her body against mine for fear of it crumbling away into a vile mess. I ignored what was going on around me as I kneeled in the spent summoning circle.
The world around me split and rent itself into distorted imagery, as though I were looking at everything from under a pool with gentle waves. Some parts were compressed together and others were stretched out, not quite like a mirror maze as the world was still simply one cohesive image. Additionally, things seemed closer or further in ways that defied conventional Euclidean geometries. The only area not affected by this blatant disregard of spatial dimensions, had been myself and a scant few feet around me.
What...?
A heavy thud broke me out of my thoughts and I saw my Father landing next to me. Since both of us had been prepared, he was wearing, much like myself, full motorcycle safety gear. It had been enchanted and bolstered by hidden runes and severed Will, turning everything into protective objects that even defended against potent and offensive mysticism. The equipment in question had been chosen for its sheer mundanity and ease of access, letting the powerful enchancements skirt around the Lie and Consensus leaving the magic fully intact and potent.
"Alistair," I heard my Father say to me with grim calm as he twisted the space in front of us into a right angle, redirecting rapid gunfire, "I can't do this alone."
I remained silent.
"Damnit, Son," he growled out then literally kicked my ass with his heavy boot, almost knocking me over onto my side, "get a hold of yourself, Its here now. You handle the mages."
That got me going. I finally got up, my grief was as a lead weight and prevented me from doing what was needed. With a last look at C'Leena's hollowed out corpse, I grit my teeth, steeled my nerves and called forth my magic from the Aether.
Was I dreaming? No, worse, I was in a memory...
"Stay out of my way and watch yourself," Father said to me, "I can't pull my punches against that."
"Gotcha," I replied almost absently and turned to face the assembled shadow mages. They had inexplicably stopped theit gunfire to admire the Thing they brought into existence from Somewhere.
I couldn't help but stare, either.
Standing on top of the northernmost anchor stone, an ugly, multi-faceted block of copper with glyphs and sigils harshly hewn into it, was a naked woman. The glyphs themselves were hard to look at, as though their mere presence were an affront to reality itself, which they were. The woman's skin was a darkened olive tone and she was tall as well as athletic, lithe and fit. Her shoulder length black hair was bushy and curly, flowing about her head almost like an afro. As she ran her hands down her body, I could not help but notice that everything was oddly symmetrical and too perfect. It was unnerving me greatly and triggered an uncanny valley response that tore at my heart.
The body this Thing was wearing had belonged to my fiancée.
Father didn't let It have time to get acclimated. Sidestepping forwards, he drew upon the full capabilities of his Path, eyes backlit by stars, an impossible physical sword of abstract spatial geometries held in his left hand, and a reality defying, super-dense distortion held in his right.
The world contorted and screamed under his might.
I awoke with a start and a low groan, glad to be awake and free of that horrid nightmare again. Not for the first time, I wished I had that motorcycle gear still. I had been far too reckless then and immediately thereafter, and everything had been damaged beyond repair. I could never find anyone I trusted enough to make those enchantments anyways. Farnsworth could only enhance the mundane qualities as he didn't know enough about mana warding to permanently imbue the protections I wanted nor needed for my line of active field work.
Looking around, I saw Rue asleep on the other side of the bed and Spades was nestled between us, his massive form making a visible dip in the mattress. The big monster dog was on his back, legs splayed open and snoring loudly with his tongue hanging out of his muzzle. I was reminded a lot of my Lola when she had still been around in the flesh, making me smile with old and pleasant memories. I must have been out for some time for Spades to be here.
A quick, almost reflexive, mental orison told me everything I already suspected. My mana reserves were shot, my body had been through the ringer and my soul was frayed and burnt. While I knew I owed my continued existence to Raver and her godsend, I also knew it had taken a great and terrible toll on my Self. Miracles like that usually held some kind of hidden cost, even if they weren't readily apparent.
Getting off the bed slowly, I began to look for my pack. It took far longer than than usual as I had to steady myself quite a bit from the spinning room. I managed to be quiet, however, and didn't wake up Rue nor Spades. Finally in the shower, after some time and using the wall to support myself, I let the almost scalding water roll over my aching body. The pendant on my neck protecting me from recieving any burns or aggravating the injuries I had, both old and new.
With the hot water soothing aching muscles, I began to think and take stock of my situation. I had never been on the back foot like this, low on any kind of resource, having few allies, and being pressed for time. It was like something out of a bad novel or shitty indie Steam(R) game. Though, real life was often stranger than fiction and had no real need for a logical cause and effect dynamic. If this was going to become the norm, then I had to find another method of approaching my wendigo problem.
I was simply running out of time.
After some long moments of thinking, I began to wash my hair, using the guest products on the corner caddy. They were so much nicer than anything I would have willingly bought and made me seriously consider changing up my usual shampoo. The only idea I could come up with regarding those wendigos, besides an overwhelming frontal assault, was to appeal to their bottomless gluttony and barter for passage.
I resigned myself to actually try to negotiate with their clan leader, leveraging their horrid taboos against them to get what I needed.
Wendigos, unlike most strange cryptids, vampires and were-folk aside, had a lot of things known about them, especially how they powered their supernatural capabilities. It was a simple and rather straightforward process, the more heinous the act, the more mana they drew from it. Cannibalism, sacrilege, incest, murder, torture, hedonistic gluttony, or any number of other terrible and minor sins. As well as general lawbreaking and felonies, oftentimes combined to have as many as possible occur in the same sitting.
I audibly gasped with a sudden epiphany.
My fate had already been decided, by myself no less. In a bar I couldn't remember the name of, when I had been gazing into my bronze coin, I saw what I needed to do. I had to gift what measly scrap of knowledge I understood from Beyond the Infinite to those creatures. To let those wendigos defile and mutilate such sacred and pure knowledge to whatever whims their baleful minds could come up with.
"Fuck," was the only thing I could whisper at the thought of it all as I turned off the water, getting out of the shower. I cooled the bathroom down with but a thought and wiped away the condensation on the mirror with a towel that wasn't my own, finally getting a good look at myself without vertigo, as that had finally passed.
I looked like shit, and that was a compliment. Huge, fist shaped bruises of black, green and yellow littered my torso, though most were located on my left side and blurred together into an ugly shapeless mass. The ones on my right, however, were well defined and I could easily count the number of strikes. My face held a swollen black eye, I never noticed my diminished field of vision as I had gotten used to having them over the years. Turning gingerly and opening the mirror a bit so I could see my back, I grimaced. It was another spiderweb of a bruise, earned from when I had been smashed against the edge of Raver's Dreamtime bubble.
At least none of my fingers were broken, only very stiff and swollen, just like the rest of me. I probably couldn't drive for another day or so, either, not with my hands the way they were. As I looked, surprised I hadn't noticed earlier, the inside of my right hand was, branded. The skin, while fully healed, held the symbolic glyph that heralded the Path of Stars. A circle with nine curved lines inside it. Each line only intersected two others, but with the irregular placement of them, I could trace an intersection to any other one. In each of the open spaces, slightly off center, as a simple dot.
"Miracles leave their marks," I muttered to myself, almost disbelieving the literalness of the phrase.
I didn't bother drying off and struggled a bit getting into the clothes I brought with me, maroon athletic shorts and a black tank top. Exiting the guest bathroom, I thought about where I wanted to go. Settling on a destination, I went into the backyard, found a patch of grass in the shaded, morning sunlight and lay down. The grass was thick and rather soft, and the smell of the lemon tree and the garden was more pleasant and fragrant than they should have been.
Warding myself against dreaming, I pulled on the principles of the Aether, specifically, those of sun and storms. Since the Aether was a realm of energy and mana in all of its varying forms, I employed an advanced technique, a mysterion. It was something only able to be done by those that actually hailed from the Aether rather than having mastery over it. Pulling some of the sunlight and ambient warmth into my form, I converted measly scraps of energy directly into mana. The process was slow, and almost hardly worth the effort. It was like filling a bathtub with water, a single milliliter at a time.
Mana was now such a rare commodity, every miniscule drop of it mattered.
I settled in and entered a trance-like state, most of my attention devoted to my mysterion, though some of it was allowed to drift off elsewhere. While not exactly a dream, and while maintaining my mana draw, my mind conjured up nonsensical imagery and conversations between myself and others. I didn't pay them any attention as my thoughts wandered and drifted idly.
"I thought I'd find you out here," Rue said as I heard her sit down next to me. I didn't hear her walking, however, she continued to speak, "you've been asleep for a few days. What happened?"
"Got fucked," I replied easily, a little sarcastically as well. "Truthfully," I amended, "I got summoned by Raver. She pulled a shenanigan with Fate to let her have a waking dream."
"So she was hallucinating?" Rue stated, though it was more of a question.
"Damned straight," I confirmed, "she had Sasquatch and Farnsworth make something for her. It had to have been lethal, something like that. Anyways, we were talking and then one of Them showed up. Inside the Dreamtime bubble of hers. Found Raver's luminescence despite Mirzam hiding it."
"Shit. So It was physically there? That means It had a stolen body..." Rue said, trailing off.
"Yeah, it had a body alright," I almost growled out, "broke Raver's ritual with little effort. I spent everything I had to make a patch job just to keep it active, burned through all my mana, too. I did not want to be dispersed."
"I see," Rue said to me with understanding, "I wouldn't want to have to find my physical body without a tether either." There was a small pause before she spoke again, "So what happened next?"
"I made it mad with insults to buy time for the repaired shenanigan to stabilize Raver."
"What do you mean?" Rue asked as I heard her stretch out a bit, my eyes still closed.
"Her shenanigan was woven in such a way that whatever drug Sasquatch and Farnsworth made for her didn't just kill her," I answered with a pause then continued, "it let her do things beyond normality, anyways, my fucked up patch job let me tell Sasquatch that Raver had to stay dreaming."
"So he wouldn't just purge the elixir out of her," Rue stated, then added perhaps a tad bit defensively, "I know some things from other paths, not much, but some."
"That's good," I answered back, "knowledge is power."
"With us, it's quite literal."
I murmured in assent.
"So why did you make It mad?" Rue asked, "wouldn't It just draw strength from human emotions, especially in the Dreamtime?"
"It did," I answered back, "but It couldn't act properly on them, like human emotions were new and novel. The whole encounter was sloppy after a certain point, but I did almost die. Raver saved me, gave me a miracle."
"I saw," Rue said simply, "the mark on your hand was a giveaway."
I could only murmur in agreement again then asked, "Did you find a card in my hands, too?"
"I did," Rue replied after a few moments of silence, "it was debit card, with a note attached to it."
"From Procyon, right?"
It took a few moments for her to answer. "Yes, it was from Procyon," she took a breath and continued with wavering effort, "that damned bastard had it all planned out. Wrote a fucked up letter to me on a Google(TM) doc telling me not to worry and that this had always been his exit plan."
"Sounds like he knew what was going to happen," was all I could say.
"Yes, but, I miss him!" Rue all but snarled at me, then, in a small and quiet voice, whispered, "He was my best friend, and maybe we could've been more, y'know? Now... there's... There's just nothing, only memories of him left to mourn."
"I didn't know," I answered simply.
Rue spoke with a wavering breath before continuing, her thoughts more than a little disjointed, "a lot of what he wrote was personal, so I won't get into that, but he was certain that something catastrophic was going to happen to him and myself. So he made sure that I was at my secondary home, recovering from a job. I had just completed a mission from Raver and Mirzam, and was going to perform a ritual to patch up Spades after I got some sleep. Procyon also stated that someone has been altering things for a very long time."
"So that's why you were caught with yout pants down," I said, "you didn't even have time to recover." I paused, adjusting my mysterion as I had to refocus due to our conversation, "what did they have you do?"
"Some hedge wizards actually got a hold of an actual necromancy grimoire and charged mana tools in a graveyard," Rue said with a bit of a tired sigh, "they knew exactly what they were doing, and would have been rather powerful shadow mages if they had been capable of using starlight."
"Fuck," was all I could say, then formed an actual response after a few moments, "that shouldn't have been an issue for you. Hedges don't have our capability, though numbers may have evened out their odds."
"You're right, but they brought a spirit back before I could stop them," Rue answered with more than a little spite, "a real nasty piece of shit, too. Turned on the hedges, absorbed them, and put up a real mean fight against Spades and I. It was touch and go for a long time and I was actually fearful for my life, too."
"You won, though."
"Yeah, managed to send it kicking and screaming back to the Pit, exhausted most of my mana to do so. Fucking bastard."
There was a small silence between us as Rue became lost in her own thoughts. It was a while before I asked her, "Can you elaborate on what Procyon said about Fate being altered?"
"I can, actually, though it's a bit difficult since I'm not even a novice with the Path of Stars," Rue answered as I heard her shift a bit on the grass next to me. She paused as she seemingly collected her thoughts, "it's just that certain events were made to happen sooner or later. The big one, for our Node at least, was that you were always supposed to make your ancestral home translocate. It happened sooner than it should have."
"Fuck," I said, "So I wasn't supposed to send it away a few days ago?"
"No, that was supposed to happen after our wendigo thing, if the letter is to be believed."
"Fuck," was all I could say, "I do suppose that was a snap decision, I really didn't want Them to get a hold of anything inside. If I had been able to wait, or even had help, I'm sure I wouldn't have lost it to time and space."
"Exactly," Rue said with bitter excitement, "and we'd have access to everything in it. Losing your home was a big blow to our Node."
"Yeah, but at least They don't have it," I answered more spitefully than intended.
"Silver linings and all that, right?"
"Yeah, gotta look at the bright side, no matter how bleak," I answered back with a bit of sarcastic mirth, then said as I stretched a bit, readjusting my focus on my mysterion as well, "speaking of wendigos, I know what we need to do to solve that."
"Oh? Do tell, I couldn't come up with anything myself, kept running into dead ends," she said, then added, "lack of resources and help."
"Well, I don't think you're going to like it, I'm not sure I like it either."
"Don't keep me waiting," Rue said to me with a bit of sarcastic exasperation. I could sense her looking at me even though my eyes were still closed.
"I'm going to leverage their taboos against them, appeal to their insatiable greed and offer them what little I can understand of That Which Lies Beyond the Infinite." I sighed and added, "after all, how could they resist the allure of new magic?"
"You're right," she answered, "I definitely don't like it. I'm pretty sure it's not even wise to do so."
"Wise or not, it's the only way forward, I even saw it in a vision when I was manipulating fate magic."
"Have you talked to Mirzam or Raver about this vision of yours?"
"No, not yet, and I'm pretty sure I don't need to."
There was a bit of silence between us as she digested my words. I felt compelled to elaborate as I adjusted my mysterion again, losing a bit of my focus due to the depth of the conversation we were having.
"Acrux," I said, getting her attention fully by using the name of her star, "there's something you need to understand." I sat up, abandoning my mysterion in favor of giving her my full attention. Blinking a bit at the rise of light and warmth, I continued my thought process, "in the Dreamtime, the Thing I was fighting against, It was surprised and enraged that I was able to call upon knowledge that Lay Beyond the Infinite. Whatever those glyphs and powers are, They never wanted humans to know of them, let alone have them."
"Yet you want to give such power to wendigos of all things."
"At least the knowledge, corrupted or not, will still be on Earth," I said then added, "I'm not sure what you remember, but I know you've seen something from Beyond the Infinite. Your self revival and Spade's new form are proof of that. I was there, guided by Oracle. I Perceived something unknowable, something terrible, something no mortal has any right to gaze upon. Something I can hardly even begin to try to put into words. Raver Perceived it, too. It's how she managed to give me a godsend. So, what did you Perceive, really?"
Rue brought her knees up to her chest, thinking deeply. I could tell she was using her Perception to look inwards upon her Self. I waited patiently while she struggled to look at her soul's reflection against her mind and struggled even more to put the image there into words.
At long last, she spoke, her eyes still closed as she did so, "I'm not sure what I saw, there was too much, and I felt so small. Insignificant. Less than even a dismissed, intrusive thought. There is one thing I do remember. A doorway made of the might from two universes worth of truths and laws. A Thing was trying ro break through, but couldn't, not fully, yet the doors were opened, letting smaller ones through."
"The Doors have to be closed," I said, quoting Raver, before continuing, "that's what Raver said to me, before she sent me back to my body."
"Why didn't they mend you then?"
"They were being attacked in the waking world, too. It was a good plan on Their part, They just didn't expect us to put up so much of a fight."
"They never do, though I think that's changing."
"So that's our endgame, not sure how we're going to do it," I said, bringing the conversation back to topic, "at the moment, however, I'm going to eat a few of those mana-stuffed protein bars and fix your leg. I can't keep spending mana to be able to drive your truck. You'll have to use your own mysterion to get mana, too."
"I hate my Path's mysterions," the venom in her voice was palpable.
Before I could say anything, the backdoor opened, revealing Luna. She was wearing a bird-patterned sundress and her hair had been tied back into a loose ponytail. She put her hand over her eyes to shade them from the sun as she squinted against the brightness relative to that from inside.
"Hey, you two," she called out, "Grandmother says she needs to talk yo you."
"Alright," I called out, shakily getting up to my feet with a bit of a grunt. Everything still hurt. Rue had a bit of trouble as well, her leg was not recieving the rest and healing it deserved and needed.
"We're a mess, aren't we?" Rue asked aloud as we began to walk towards the bak door.
"Yeah, but you should see the other guys," I replied with a light chuckle, only to wince and hold my sides, "I forgot how much laughing hurts with fractured ribs."
"I really don't envy you right now," Rue said with a bit of a smirk as we entered Tsula's home, Rue entering first. "I wonder what Tsula wants to talk to us about?" Rue asked aloud, not really talking to anyone in particular.
I could only wonder as we followed Luna to the living room, the house pleasantly cool due to central air conditioning.
~ ~ ~
The moon was not in the sky, and I greatly enjoyed not having to endure the accursed, purifying light of day reflected by its surface, even if greatly diminished. The loathsome wound in my side had been a mortal blow, burning through my toughened flesh and form with unnerving ease and stunning, blinding pain. Once more, I looked at the oily, thin, and black ichor that dripped from my fingers, more human-like than I was comfortable with.
The mote of dreadlight I had recieved for my services had been the only thing that had kept me from vanishing entirely. Mortal alchemy -- science -- had advanced to such a degree so as to emulate the harsh light of day far too remarkably well. That hadn't been the worst part, that damned thaumaturgist had ensorcelled a curse upon the weapon as well. With effort, as the bulk of my power was directed at repairing the oozing wound, I altered my form and shape, struggling to maintain the illusion as I walked out onto the sidewalk from a side alley.
My contract was not yet completed.
The first two nights I had hidden myself away in the dark depths, raging against the oblivion that threatened to overtake me and ending my existence. The preparedness of the thaumaturgist had been unexpected, as well as the skill and the knowledge he had wielded so effortlessly. Without my guidance, nor presence, to instill fear into the gifted abetters, the wraiths I had gathered with me fell and fled into the night, abandoning their duties and contracts.
I would have never made this mistake against the herald of the bear.
Had I known the name of the mortal's star I had been tasked against, I would have demanded more than a simple mote of dreadlight and a paltry handful of coerced allies. Realistically, I should be grateful that I still had a kind of semi-existence. Quelling my anger and hatred, and swallowing my utter revulsion, my form rippled and took the guise of a tall, middle-aged human male in a common and unremarkable suit carrying an old and worn briefcase.
The artificial illumination around me flickered, emitting a grating hum in my presence and the thin television flickered oddly as it tried to display my image, failing to accurately do so. While tracking Arcturus's quintessence had been a bit of a task, as far too much time had passed, my familiarity with it granted me an advantage that overcame that difficulty. Traveling in my wounded state, however, had been much more arduous. Looking the woman at the reception desk over, I took on my role with hiden revulsion, aided by the illusion I was conjuring and the mimicry of my physical form.
"I'm detective Aiden Roth, and I'm looking for someone. I believe that he was here a few nights ago, definitely this past week," I said. My false, human voice had been made to sound smooth, suave and strong, interlaced with a suggestion, using what little forte I could spare. I put the worn and well-used briefcase I had conjured with me onto the counter with a heavy thud, using more of my forte to emulate such a simple thing. Opening it up, I fished out an image and showed the slightly grainy, black and white picture to the receptionist.
As the woman perused the conjured image, I could not help but hiss, my hand going to my side as I expended more of my forte than I had anticipated. The cursed wound fighting back fiercely against the dreadlight tethering my existence and life. I held my disguise with willpower of monumental proportions. A strength of will I rarely had been pressed to draw from.
Seeing the concerned look the woman gave me, I simply stated, shrugging off the pain with yet more expenditure of will, "An old injury, it flares up from time to time. No matter, have you seen this individual?"
"I'm going to need to see some kind of badge or warrant," the woman said with a genuine smile, "sorry."
The fear of losing her menial job overpowered my subtle suggestion. Unfortunate.
"Sure," I replied with a fake and well ptacticed, fetching smile, adjusting my forte to include another suggestion. I showed an actual badge with my assumed name and likeness. The mortal I was impersonating had been slain many years ago by my own hands, and the subtle illusion taking hardly any of my forte adjusted the dates and design of the badge to whatever was current.
Only a thaumaturgist, or a very particularly skilled sorcerer, could pierce the illusion. Against this mortal, there was no chance of resistance and she accepted the stolen badge without question.
She looked it over, as if trying to divine the legitimacy of it. "Okay," she finally admitted, "he was here a while ago, maybe a four or five days? I remember, 'cause I tried to flirt with him..."
I ignored her prattling and asked when she finished speaking, "Can you show me the room he used?"
"Sure, but it's been cleaned a few times since then."
With a nod, I let her lead the way to the room in question, staying silent. The lights around me flickered and hummed loudly in my presence. Had the woman been more observant, she could have seen my true shadow as I had not the forte to expend to hide it entirely from the ever changing lights. She opened the room in question, using what I could only assume was a master key card.
I immediately recognized the faded auras of quintessence.
"This will do," I stated, closing the door behind me and dropping my revolting disguise, using my forte to lock it.
I revealed my true form. My legs and arms lengthened and thinned, the black suit and red tie I was wearing became my skin, armor and form. My face and eyes became blank, gaunt and sunken, skin stretching out over it. The wound in my side made itself visible, it was an ugly red, peeling and oozing burn from my shoulder to my waist and took up most of my torso. The dreadlight I was using to prevent my oblivion illuminated the wound with a kind of sickly, crimson colored backlight. Black ichor oozed out from it and dripped onto the floor as I used the bulk of my forte to ablate the caustic, foreign quintessence from my form.
The woman looked at me as even her pitifully dull, mundane human senses told her that there was incredible danger in the room with her. She screeched and irrationally ran towards the bathroom as my presence became impossibly tall in the very finite space in the motel room. Using the smallest iota of my forte, I remotely smashed her fleeing form against a wall, pinning her there with unseen force as she begged, and sobbed for her pitiful life.
I ignored her for the moment.
Drawing upon more of my forte, freed up as I no longer needed a disguise, I sensed out where quintessence had been used, discovering two places, the bed and a wall. Imbuing the wall with my own forte, I witnessed a spectral, moving image of Arcturus throwing five darts at a map placed on the wall, one at a time, then draw intersecting lines to a single point on the map.
"Wendigos..." I hissed out in loathing, the skin on my face stretching and contorting with the movement as i spoke aloud with a nonexistent mouth. Even I knew their territory.
Turning to the second source of quintessence, I did the same thing. I saw Arcturus ward himself against dreaming and then hold a brilliant shield in the air, as well as a ball of fire. My knowledge of actual thaumaturgy told me that I would have great difficulties against those Knowings. I put the mystery of his Dreamtime excursion out of my mind for now, there was nothing I could do regarding that.
My expenditure of forte caused my horrid wound to pulse against my form painfully. With a hiss, I turned to the woman meekly begging me to spare her life as she was still pinned against the wall. I could use a thrall, especially as I could no longer gain allies, not without offering something in return to my current contract holders.
That was not a barter I wanted to engage in.
"Please... don't kill me... please... I'll do anything... please..."
The absolute terror in her eyes was delectable. Her fear invigorated me with energy and reminded me I needed to feed. However, the morsels offered by her would be more than sufficient for my needs. I dragged my left hand across my oozing wound, covering it in my own essence then flexed my forte. The clothes she was wearing split in half down the middle, revealing her naked form, making her shriek. I could see the ideas her panicked mind vomited forth as she renewed her struggles with vigor.
What I had in mind was so much worse than the mundane taking of her physical body she expected.
Using the full might of my forte, I lengthened and sharpened my index finger, the tip dripping with the gathered ichor of my essence. In an instant, less than the blink of an eye, I appeared in front of her from where I had been by the bed and plunged the very tip of my sharpened, needle-like nail into the center of her heart, cutting through the most sensitive parts of her breast to do so due to the angle I had chosen for just this purpose. As I let my ichor suffuse her body with each beat of her racing heart, her vascular system visibly turning black under her skin as she screamed and writhed in agony, an odd thing happened.
What could only be considered my blood had been tainted by thaumaturgy qnr bolstered by dreadlight as well as my own forte. As it mixed with the blank canvas of the mortal in front of me, I could sense the candle of her soul. Reaching out with dreadlight, letting the wound burn my side with a hiss of inhaled breath, I ignited it with three kinds of mysticism.
A horrified realization overcame her as she knew I had fundamentally altered her to suit my whims. Having a thaumaturgist thrall would be a great boon.
"You'll do quite nicely," I said with an actual grin, the skin stretched over my mouth revealing impossibly large, gleaming flat teeth, as I watched the physical and mystical changes taking place.
My new thrall would never be human again.
I feasted on her terror, anguish and torment.
It was delicious.
~ ~ ~
Arcturus and Acrux will be back. C'Leena Thomas, Prosthetist is going to be my next update.
[[NEXT]]
2024.05.11 20:13 Jerry_217 [H] Lots of games NEW: Turbo Overkill, Littlewood, DEVOUR, Amnesia:The Bunker, Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles, Wobbledogs [W] Hi-Fi rush, Yakuza LAD, hell let loose, Nioh 2, WWE 2k23, crusader kings 3, Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, Fable Anniversary, Poker night 1, 2, F1 2012, 2011, Euro/American Truck, tf2key
Region is NA.
If you have my wishlist games, pm me anytime. Only accept trades of games of your own.
My REPs: 200+ successful trades, stopped tracking after 202.
My steam games for trade (wishlist in the end of this post):
Added recently:
StardewAmanda the Adventurer
Bravery and Greed
Hi-Fi RUSH
King Of The Castle
Loddlenaut
Mediterranea Inferno
Steelrising
Yakuza: Like a Dragon
Coromon
Fashion Police Squad
HUMANKIND™ Definitive Edition
Symphony of War: The Nephilim Saga
Terraformers
The Callisto Protocol
The Excavation of Hob's Barrow
Victoria 3
Tomb Raider: Game of the Year Edition (GOG)
LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars (GOG)
Littlewood
Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
One Hand Clapping
Tainted Grail: Conquest
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Mad Max
MORTAL KOMBAT XL
Mortal Kombat 11: Ultimate
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor GOTY
Middle-Earth: Shadow of War Definitive Edition
Injustice 2 Legendary Edition
Gotham Knights
Back 4 Blood
Batman™: Arkham Knight Premium Edition
Batman™: Arkham Asylum GOTY Edition
Batman™: Arkham City GOTY Edition
Batman™: Arkham Origins
.hack//G.U. Last Recode
CODE VEIN
GOD EATER 3
Katamari Damacy REROLL
PAC-MAN MUSEUM+
Tales of Vesperia: Definitive Edition
TEKKEN 7
Dragon Knight (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Hell Girls (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Super Star (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Steam games:
A Juggler's TaleA Plague Tale: Innocence
ABZU
Aces and Adventures
Ad Infinitum
Afterimage
Agent in Depth
Alchemist's Castle
Alchemy Garden
Aliens vs. Predator Collection ( includes Aliens vs. Predator + Aliens vs Predator Swarm Map Pack + Aliens vs Predator: Bug Hunt Pack)
Aliens: Fireteam Elite
AMID EVIL
Amnesia: The Bunker
Among Us
Anuchard
Aragami 2
Arcade Paradise
Arise: A Simple Story
Armello
Army Men RTS
Assault Suit Leynos
Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
Astronarch
Autonauts vs Piratebots
Battlecruisers
Beacon Pines
Big Pharma
BIOMUTANT
Bionic Commando Rearmed
Black Paradox
Black Skylands
Blade Assault
Blood And Zombies
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
Borderlands 3: Super Deluxe Edition
Boundless
BPM: Bullets Per Minute
Brawlout
Castle on the Coast
Cats in Time
Caveblazers
Chicka Wars Chicken Meat (delisted)
Children of Silentown
CHIVALRY 2 - EPIC EDITION
Citizen Sleeper
CivCity: Rome
Click and Slay
Colt Canyon
Conan Chop Chop
Concept Destruction
Construction Simulator (2015) Deluxe Edition
Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!
Corridor Z
Cosmonautica
Crayon Physics Deluxe
CROSSBOW: Bloodnight
Cultist Simulator
Curse of the Dead Gods
Dagon - The Eldritch Box DLC
Dark Deity
Dead Age
Dear Esther: Landmark Edition
Death Squared
Deceive Inc.
Demonologist
Depraved
Descenders
Desperados III
Destiny 2: Beyond Light DLC
Destroy All Humans! 2 - Reprobed
Destroyer: The U-Boat Hunter
Detached: Non-VR Edition
DEVOUR
Dicey Dungeons
Disciples: Liberation
Disco Elysium - The Final Cut
Dishonored Definitive Edition
Distant Worlds Universe
Doctor Strange Defenders Skin
Double Cross
Doughlings: Arcade
Doughlings: Invasion
Dragon Knight (delisted, 18+)
Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen
Draw Slasher
Drawful 2
Due Process
Dungeons 2 - Complete Edition
Dusk
EDGE OF ETERNITY
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising
El Hijo
Emily is Away <3
Encased
Endless Space 2
Epic Chef
Escape the Backrooms
ETERNAL THREADS
Exorder
Expeditions: Rome
F1 2018
Farming Simulator 17
Firegirl: Hack 'n Splash Rescue
First Class Trouble
Five Dates
Fling to the Finish
Fobia - St. Dinfna Hotel
Foretales
FOREWARNED
Forged Battalion
Fortissimo FA INTL Ver
Founders' Fortune
Friends vs Friends
From Space
Full Metal Furies
Fun with Ragdolls: The Game
GameGuru Classic
Garfield Kart - Furious Racing
Generation Zero
Geometric Sniper
Ghost 1.0
Gloria Victis
Go Home Dinosaurs!
Going Under
Golf Gang
Good knight
GRID Ultimate Edition
GRIME
Grow: Song of the Evertree
Guilty Gear X2 #Reload
Guns & Fishes
Guts and Glory
Hack 'n' Slash bundle (including Hack 'n' Slash + Hack 'n' Slash Soundtrack + Spacebase GIFT)
Halcyon 6: Lightspeed Edition
Hardspace: Shipbreaker
Heart Fragment - Book Two: Belief Fragments (Shannon & Lana)
Hedon Bloodrite
Hell Girls (delisted, 18+)
Hell Pie
Hellbound
HERO'S HOUR
Hidden & Dangerous 2: Courage Under Fire
Hidden & Dangerous: Action Pack
Hokko Life
Hollow Knight
Honey, I Joined a Cult
Hot Brass
Hotshot Racing
How to Sing to Open Your Heart
Hyper Gunsport
I’m not a Monster
Internet Cafe Simulator
Interplanetary: Enhanced Edition
Intravenous
Intruders: Hide and Seek
Iron Danger
Iron Harvest
Izmir: An Independence Simulator
Joggernauts
Joggernauts
JURASSIC WORLD EVOLUTION 2
Just Cause 3 XXL Edition
Just Cause 4 Complete Edition
JYDGE
Kerbal Space Program
Killsquad
King's Bounty II
Kraken Academy!!
Labirinto 2
Lacuna – A Sci-Fi Noir Adventure
Last Call BBS
Last Oasis
Late Shift
Lawn Mowing Simulator
Legend of Keepers
Leisure Suit Larry - Wet Dreams Don't Dry
Let Them Come
Life is Strange 2 Complete Season (incl. Mascot Bundle DLC)
Little Misfortune
Little Orpheus
Lords and Villeins
Lost Planet 3 Complete Pack
Lost Ruins
Lust for Darkness
Lust from Beyond: M Edition
MageQuit
Maid of Sker
Mainlining
MEEPLE STATION
Meow Express
Merchant of the Skies
Metal: Hellsinger
Metro Exodus
Midnight Fight Express
Midnight Ghost Hunt
Mini Metro
Mini motor Racing EVO (delisted)
MirrorMoon EP
Monster Prom 2: Monster Camp
Monster Sanctuary
Moon Hunters
Moonlighter
Morbid: The Seven Acolytes
Motorcycle Mechanic Simulator 2021
Moving Out - Movers in Paradise DLC
Mr. Prepper
Murder by Numbers
My Friendly Neighborhood
My Time At Portia
Mythic Ocean
Nadir: A Grimdark Deckbuilder
Necromunda Hired Gun
NecroWorm
NeuroVoider
Neverinth
Neverout
New Super Luckys Tale
Nickelodeon All Star Brawl
Nobody Saves the World
Non-Stop Raiders
Northgard
Oaken
Obduction
Of Orcs And Men
Offworld Trading Company
OLLIOLLI WORLD - RAD EDITION
One Hand Clapping
Orbital Racer
Othercide
Out of Reach: Treasure Royale
Outward Definitive Edition
Outward The Soroboreans DLC + soundtrack (DLC only)
Override
Overture
Ozymandias
Paint the Town Red
Partial Control
Patch Quest
Pathfinder: Kingmaker Enhanced Plus Edition (NA only) + Royal Ascension DLC + The Wildcards DLC
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Enhanced Edition
Pathfinders: Memories
Pathway
Peaky Blinders: Mastermind
Per Asperatrar
Pilgrims
Pill Baby
Pixplode
Planet TD
PlataGO!
Port Royale 3 Gold
PowerBeatsVR
Prodeus
Project CARS (delisted)
Project Chemistry
Project Nimbus: Complete Edition
Project Wingman
Propagation VR - Co-op
Propnight
Proteus
Proteus
PULSAR: The Lost Colony
Pumped BMX +
Quadrata
Quantum Break
Radio Commander
Ragnarock
Railroad Corporation
Railroad Tycoon 3
Rain World
Rebel Inc: Escalation
Rebound Dodgeball Evolved
Re-Legion
Remnant: From the Ashes - Complete Edition
Remnants of Naezith
Resident Evil Revelations
Resident Evil Revelations 2
Reventure
Revita
RIOT - Civil Unrest
Road 96
Roarr! Jurassic Edition
ROGUE LORDS
Roguebook
RollerCoaster Tycoon 2: Triple Thrill Pack
RPG Maker VX
Rubber Bandits
RUINER
Rym 9000
Saints Row
Sakura Dungeon, 18+
Sakura Knight, 18+
Sakura MMO, 18+
Sakura Knight 2, 18+
Sakura Knight 3, 18+
Sakura MMO 2, 18+
Sakura MMO 3, 18+
Sakura MMO Extra, 18+
Sakura Succubus, 18+
Sakura Succubus 2, 18+
Sakura Succubus 3, 18+
Sakura Succubus 4, 18+
Sakura Succubus 5, 18+
Sakura Succubus 6, 18+
Sakura Swim Club, 18+
Sam & Max: Devil's Playhouse
Scorn
SCP : Secret Files
Secret Neighbor: Hello Neighbor Multiplayer
SEUM: Speedrunners from Hell
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Shady Part of Me
Shing!
Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate
Sid Meier's Railroads!
Siege Survival: Gloria Victis
Skullgirls 2nd Encore
Slinger VR
Smile For Me
Sniper Elite 3
Sniper Elite 4
Snowtopia
Sorcerer King: Rivals
Soul Searching
Soulblight
Souldiers
Soulstice
Spellcaster University
Spirit Hunter: Death Mark
Spirit of the Island
Stacking
Starbound
Starpoint Gemini Warlords
State of Decay: Year-One Survival Edition (steam inventory gift)
Stirring Abyss
Strider
Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones
SuchArt!
Sunlight
Super Chicken Catchers
Super Magbot
Super Star (delisted)
SUPERHOT: MIND CONTROL DELETE
Surviving the Aftermath
Sword Legacy Omen
SYMMETRYro
Tails Noir
Tainted Grail: Conquest
Telefrag VR
TEMTEM
The Amazing American Circus
The Ascent
The Beast Inside
The Dark Pictures Anthology: Man of Medan
The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes
The Dark Pictures Anthology: Little Hope
The Deed II
The Dungeon Of Naheulbeuk: The Amulet Of Chaos
The Golf Club 2019 Featuring PGA TOUR
The Gunk
The Legend of Tianding
The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante
The Long Dark
The Outer Worlds: Spacer's Choice Edition
The Pale Beyond
The Quarry
The Red Lantern
The Serpent Rogue
The USB Stick Found in the Grass
The Witcher: Enhanced Edition (steam inventory gift)
The Witness
The Wolf Among Us
There Is No Light
Ticket to Ride
Tin Can
Titan Souls
TOEM
Tools Up!
Townsmen - A Kingdom Rebuilt
Traffic Jams
Train Station Renovation
Treasure Hunter Simulator
Trek to Yomi
Tribes of Midgard
Turbo Overkill
Twilight Struggle
Twin Mirror
Two Point Campus
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Underland: The Climb
Unity of Command: Stalingrad Campaign
UnMetal
Vanishing Realms
War for the Overworld
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Drenn Redblade
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Exceptional Card Pack
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Saga of the Great Awakening
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Wrath of the Damned
Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Realms of Ruin Ultimate Edition
WARSAW
We Happy Few Season Pass
We Were Here Too
Where the Water Tastes Like Wine
White Noise 2
Who Pressed Mute on Uncle Marcus?
Wizard of Legend
Wobbledogs
Worms Rumble
WRC 7
WWE 2K BATTLEGROUNDS
XCOM 2
X-COM: Complete Pack (including X-COM: UFO Defense + X-COM: Apocalypse + X-COM: Enforcer + X-COM: Interceptor + X-COM: Terror from the Deep)
XCOM: Enemy Unknown Complete Edition
XEL
X-Morph: Defense Complete Pack (including X-Morph: Defense + X-Morph: Defense - European Assault + X-Morph: Defense - Survival Of The Fittest + X-Morph: Defense - Last Bastion)
Yakuza 4 Remastered
Zoeti
ΔV: Rings of Saturn
Other platforms:
Command & Conquer Remastered Collection (ORIGINkey)
Liberated (GOG key)
STAR WARS: Squadrons (Origin)
Wanderlust Travel Stories (GOG key)
#########################################################
My Wishlist: (prefer gift links)
Hi-Fi RUSH
DIABLO 4 PC
Street Fighter 6
Rocket League
Poker night
poker night 2
Game of Thrones - A Telltale Games Series
NBA 2k16, 2k17
WWE 2K16, 2K17, 2K18, 2K19, 2K20, 2k23
The Last Remnant
Doctor Who: The Adventure Games
Hell let loose
Crusader kings 3
Spiderman remaster
F1 2020, 2019, 2017, 2016, 2012, 2011
ACE COMBAT ASSAULT HORIZON Enhanced Edition
DARK SOULS
DARK SOULS II
DARK SOULS III
Pistol Whip
CLANNAD
Automobilista 2
Gears 5
monster hunter rise
Tiny tina's wonderlands chaotic great edition
Spyro Reignited Trilogy
DIRT 5
Fable Anniversary
Nioh 2 COMPLETE
Victoria 3
HUMANKIND
A Hat in Time
VTOL VR
rFactor 2
ZERO Sievert
Barotrauma
monster hunter world
fight in tight space
Life Is Strange Complete Season
phoenix wright
LOOT RIVER
satisfactory
Gotham Knights
Rivals of Aether
Vrising
DOOM Eternal
Deep Rock Galactic
LegionTD 2
Dead by Daylight
quantum break
slay the spire
Yakuza kiwami 2
Stardew Valley
resident evil village
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising
stray blade
clash: Artifacts of chaos
Valfaris: Mecha Therion
The Quarry
9 Years of Shadows
other humble choice title games
#########################################################
Note: for some games from humble I might ask for gift links. There is a rumor 3 years ago that humble bans users due to making gift links only. I make gift links every week, never have any issues. I have no idea why humble would ever ban its customers for using a feature it provides to its custimers.
Here is a guide how to make gift links from support.Humblebundle.com: https://support.humblebundle.com/hc/en-us/articles/202712460-Purchasing-and-Sending-Gifts
I do not believe humble teaches you how to make gift links, so it can ban you, lol
2024.05.11 20:12 Jerry_217 [H] Lots of games NEW: Turbo Overkill, Littlewood, DEVOUR, Amnesia:The Bunker, Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles, Wobbledogs [W] Hi-Fi rush, Yakuza LAD, hell let loose, Nioh 2, WWE 2k23, crusader kings 3, Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, Fable Anniversary, Poker night 1, 2, F1 2012, 2011, Euro/American Truck, tf2key
Region is NA.
If you have my wishlist games, pm me anytime. Only accept trades of games of your own.
My REPs: 200+ successful trades, stopped tracking after 202.
My steam games for trade (wishlist in the end of this post):
Added recently:
StardewAmanda the Adventurer
Bravery and Greed
Hi-Fi RUSH
King Of The Castle
Loddlenaut
Mediterranea Inferno
Steelrising
Yakuza: Like a Dragon
Coromon
Fashion Police Squad
HUMANKIND™ Definitive Edition
Symphony of War: The Nephilim Saga
Terraformers
The Callisto Protocol
The Excavation of Hob's Barrow
Victoria 3
Tomb Raider: Game of the Year Edition (GOG)
LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars (GOG)
Littlewood
Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
One Hand Clapping
Tainted Grail: Conquest
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Mad Max
MORTAL KOMBAT XL
Mortal Kombat 11: Ultimate
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor GOTY
Middle-Earth: Shadow of War Definitive Edition
Injustice 2 Legendary Edition
Gotham Knights
Back 4 Blood
Batman™: Arkham Knight Premium Edition
Batman™: Arkham Asylum GOTY Edition
Batman™: Arkham City GOTY Edition
Batman™: Arkham Origins
.hack//G.U. Last Recode
CODE VEIN
GOD EATER 3
Katamari Damacy REROLL
PAC-MAN MUSEUM+
Tales of Vesperia: Definitive Edition
TEKKEN 7
Dragon Knight (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Hell Girls (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Super Star (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Steam games:
A Juggler's TaleA Plague Tale: Innocence
ABZU
Aces and Adventures
Ad Infinitum
Afterimage
Agent in Depth
Alchemist's Castle
Alchemy Garden
Aliens vs. Predator Collection ( includes Aliens vs. Predator + Aliens vs Predator Swarm Map Pack + Aliens vs Predator: Bug Hunt Pack)
Aliens: Fireteam Elite
AMID EVIL
Amnesia: The Bunker
Among Us
Anuchard
Aragami 2
Arcade Paradise
Arise: A Simple Story
Armello
Army Men RTS
Assault Suit Leynos
Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
Astronarch
Autonauts vs Piratebots
Battlecruisers
Beacon Pines
Big Pharma
BIOMUTANT
Bionic Commando Rearmed
Black Paradox
Black Skylands
Blade Assault
Blood And Zombies
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
Borderlands 3: Super Deluxe Edition
Boundless
BPM: Bullets Per Minute
Brawlout
Castle on the Coast
Cats in Time
Caveblazers
Chicka Wars Chicken Meat (delisted)
Children of Silentown
CHIVALRY 2 - EPIC EDITION
Citizen Sleeper
CivCity: Rome
Click and Slay
Colt Canyon
Conan Chop Chop
Concept Destruction
Construction Simulator (2015) Deluxe Edition
Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!
Corridor Z
Cosmonautica
Crayon Physics Deluxe
CROSSBOW: Bloodnight
Cultist Simulator
Curse of the Dead Gods
Dagon - The Eldritch Box DLC
Dark Deity
Dead Age
Dear Esther: Landmark Edition
Death Squared
Deceive Inc.
Demonologist
Depraved
Descenders
Desperados III
Destiny 2: Beyond Light DLC
Destroy All Humans! 2 - Reprobed
Destroyer: The U-Boat Hunter
Detached: Non-VR Edition
DEVOUR
Dicey Dungeons
Disciples: Liberation
Disco Elysium - The Final Cut
Dishonored Definitive Edition
Distant Worlds Universe
Doctor Strange Defenders Skin
Double Cross
Doughlings: Arcade
Doughlings: Invasion
Dragon Knight (delisted, 18+)
Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen
Draw Slasher
Drawful 2
Due Process
Dungeons 2 - Complete Edition
Dusk
EDGE OF ETERNITY
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising
El Hijo
Emily is Away <3
Encased
Endless Space 2
Epic Chef
Escape the Backrooms
ETERNAL THREADS
Exorder
Expeditions: Rome
F1 2018
Farming Simulator 17
Firegirl: Hack 'n Splash Rescue
First Class Trouble
Five Dates
Fling to the Finish
Fobia - St. Dinfna Hotel
Foretales
FOREWARNED
Forged Battalion
Fortissimo FA INTL Ver
Founders' Fortune
Friends vs Friends
From Space
Full Metal Furies
Fun with Ragdolls: The Game
GameGuru Classic
Garfield Kart - Furious Racing
Generation Zero
Geometric Sniper
Ghost 1.0
Gloria Victis
Go Home Dinosaurs!
Going Under
Golf Gang
Good knight
GRID Ultimate Edition
GRIME
Grow: Song of the Evertree
Guilty Gear X2 #Reload
Guns & Fishes
Guts and Glory
Hack 'n' Slash bundle (including Hack 'n' Slash + Hack 'n' Slash Soundtrack + Spacebase GIFT)
Halcyon 6: Lightspeed Edition
Hardspace: Shipbreaker
Heart Fragment - Book Two: Belief Fragments (Shannon & Lana)
Hedon Bloodrite
Hell Girls (delisted, 18+)
Hell Pie
Hellbound
HERO'S HOUR
Hidden & Dangerous 2: Courage Under Fire
Hidden & Dangerous: Action Pack
Hokko Life
Hollow Knight
Honey, I Joined a Cult
Hot Brass
Hotshot Racing
How to Sing to Open Your Heart
Hyper Gunsport
I’m not a Monster
Internet Cafe Simulator
Interplanetary: Enhanced Edition
Intravenous
Intruders: Hide and Seek
Iron Danger
Iron Harvest
Izmir: An Independence Simulator
Joggernauts
Joggernauts
JURASSIC WORLD EVOLUTION 2
Just Cause 3 XXL Edition
Just Cause 4 Complete Edition
JYDGE
Kerbal Space Program
Killsquad
King's Bounty II
Kraken Academy!!
Labirinto 2
Lacuna – A Sci-Fi Noir Adventure
Last Call BBS
Last Oasis
Late Shift
Lawn Mowing Simulator
Legend of Keepers
Leisure Suit Larry - Wet Dreams Don't Dry
Let Them Come
Life is Strange 2 Complete Season (incl. Mascot Bundle DLC)
Little Misfortune
Little Orpheus
Lords and Villeins
Lost Planet 3 Complete Pack
Lost Ruins
Lust for Darkness
Lust from Beyond: M Edition
MageQuit
Maid of Sker
Mainlining
MEEPLE STATION
Meow Express
Merchant of the Skies
Metal: Hellsinger
Metro Exodus
Midnight Fight Express
Midnight Ghost Hunt
Mini Metro
Mini motor Racing EVO (delisted)
MirrorMoon EP
Monster Prom 2: Monster Camp
Monster Sanctuary
Moon Hunters
Moonlighter
Morbid: The Seven Acolytes
Motorcycle Mechanic Simulator 2021
Moving Out - Movers in Paradise DLC
Mr. Prepper
Murder by Numbers
My Friendly Neighborhood
My Time At Portia
Mythic Ocean
Nadir: A Grimdark Deckbuilder
Necromunda Hired Gun
NecroWorm
NeuroVoider
Neverinth
Neverout
New Super Luckys Tale
Nickelodeon All Star Brawl
Nobody Saves the World
Non-Stop Raiders
Northgard
Oaken
Obduction
Of Orcs And Men
Offworld Trading Company
OLLIOLLI WORLD - RAD EDITION
One Hand Clapping
Orbital Racer
Othercide
Out of Reach: Treasure Royale
Outward Definitive Edition
Outward The Soroboreans DLC + soundtrack (DLC only)
Override
Overture
Ozymandias
Paint the Town Red
Partial Control
Patch Quest
Pathfinder: Kingmaker Enhanced Plus Edition (NA only) + Royal Ascension DLC + The Wildcards DLC
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Enhanced Edition
Pathfinders: Memories
Pathway
Peaky Blinders: Mastermind
Per Asperatrar
Pilgrims
Pill Baby
Pixplode
Planet TD
PlataGO!
Port Royale 3 Gold
PowerBeatsVR
Prodeus
Project CARS (delisted)
Project Chemistry
Project Nimbus: Complete Edition
Project Wingman
Propagation VR - Co-op
Propnight
Proteus
Proteus
PULSAR: The Lost Colony
Pumped BMX +
Quadrata
Quantum Break
Radio Commander
Ragnarock
Railroad Corporation
Railroad Tycoon 3
Rain World
Rebel Inc: Escalation
Rebound Dodgeball Evolved
Re-Legion
Remnant: From the Ashes - Complete Edition
Remnants of Naezith
Resident Evil Revelations
Resident Evil Revelations 2
Reventure
Revita
RIOT - Civil Unrest
Road 96
Roarr! Jurassic Edition
ROGUE LORDS
Roguebook
RollerCoaster Tycoon 2: Triple Thrill Pack
RPG Maker VX
Rubber Bandits
RUINER
Rym 9000
Saints Row
Sakura Dungeon, 18+
Sakura Knight, 18+
Sakura MMO, 18+
Sakura Knight 2, 18+
Sakura Knight 3, 18+
Sakura MMO 2, 18+
Sakura MMO 3, 18+
Sakura MMO Extra, 18+
Sakura Succubus, 18+
Sakura Succubus 2, 18+
Sakura Succubus 3, 18+
Sakura Succubus 4, 18+
Sakura Succubus 5, 18+
Sakura Succubus 6, 18+
Sakura Swim Club, 18+
Sam & Max: Devil's Playhouse
Scorn
SCP : Secret Files
Secret Neighbor: Hello Neighbor Multiplayer
SEUM: Speedrunners from Hell
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Shady Part of Me
Shing!
Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate
Sid Meier's Railroads!
Siege Survival: Gloria Victis
Skullgirls 2nd Encore
Slinger VR
Smile For Me
Sniper Elite 3
Sniper Elite 4
Snowtopia
Sorcerer King: Rivals
Soul Searching
Soulblight
Souldiers
Soulstice
Spellcaster University
Spirit Hunter: Death Mark
Spirit of the Island
Stacking
Starbound
Starpoint Gemini Warlords
State of Decay: Year-One Survival Edition (steam inventory gift)
Stirring Abyss
Strider
Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones
SuchArt!
Sunlight
Super Chicken Catchers
Super Magbot
Super Star (delisted)
SUPERHOT: MIND CONTROL DELETE
Surviving the Aftermath
Sword Legacy Omen
SYMMETRYro
Tails Noir
Tainted Grail: Conquest
Telefrag VR
TEMTEM
The Amazing American Circus
The Ascent
The Beast Inside
The Dark Pictures Anthology: Man of Medan
The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes
The Dark Pictures Anthology: Little Hope
The Deed II
The Dungeon Of Naheulbeuk: The Amulet Of Chaos
The Golf Club 2019 Featuring PGA TOUR
The Gunk
The Legend of Tianding
The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante
The Long Dark
The Outer Worlds: Spacer's Choice Edition
The Pale Beyond
The Quarry
The Red Lantern
The Serpent Rogue
The USB Stick Found in the Grass
The Witcher: Enhanced Edition (steam inventory gift)
The Witness
The Wolf Among Us
There Is No Light
Ticket to Ride
Tin Can
Titan Souls
TOEM
Tools Up!
Townsmen - A Kingdom Rebuilt
Traffic Jams
Train Station Renovation
Treasure Hunter Simulator
Trek to Yomi
Tribes of Midgard
Turbo Overkill
Twilight Struggle
Twin Mirror
Two Point Campus
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Underland: The Climb
Unity of Command: Stalingrad Campaign
UnMetal
Vanishing Realms
War for the Overworld
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Drenn Redblade
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Exceptional Card Pack
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Saga of the Great Awakening
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Wrath of the Damned
Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Realms of Ruin Ultimate Edition
WARSAW
We Happy Few Season Pass
We Were Here Too
Where the Water Tastes Like Wine
White Noise 2
Who Pressed Mute on Uncle Marcus?
Wizard of Legend
Wobbledogs
Worms Rumble
WRC 7
WWE 2K BATTLEGROUNDS
XCOM 2
X-COM: Complete Pack (including X-COM: UFO Defense + X-COM: Apocalypse + X-COM: Enforcer + X-COM: Interceptor + X-COM: Terror from the Deep)
XCOM: Enemy Unknown Complete Edition
XEL
X-Morph: Defense Complete Pack (including X-Morph: Defense + X-Morph: Defense - European Assault + X-Morph: Defense - Survival Of The Fittest + X-Morph: Defense - Last Bastion)
Yakuza 4 Remastered
Zoeti
ΔV: Rings of Saturn
Other platforms:
Command & Conquer Remastered Collection (ORIGINkey)
Liberated (GOG key)
STAR WARS: Squadrons (Origin)
Wanderlust Travel Stories (GOG key)
#########################################################
My Wishlist: (prefer gift links)
Hi-Fi RUSH
DIABLO 4 PC
Street Fighter 6
Rocket League
Poker night
poker night 2
Game of Thrones - A Telltale Games Series
NBA 2k16, 2k17
WWE 2K16, 2K17, 2K18, 2K19, 2K20, 2k23
The Last Remnant
Doctor Who: The Adventure Games
Hell let loose
Crusader kings 3
Spiderman remaster
F1 2020, 2019, 2017, 2016, 2012, 2011
ACE COMBAT ASSAULT HORIZON Enhanced Edition
DARK SOULS
DARK SOULS II
DARK SOULS III
Pistol Whip
CLANNAD
Automobilista 2
Gears 5
monster hunter rise
Tiny tina's wonderlands chaotic great edition
Spyro Reignited Trilogy
DIRT 5
Fable Anniversary
Nioh 2 COMPLETE
Victoria 3
HUMANKIND
A Hat in Time
VTOL VR
rFactor 2
ZERO Sievert
Barotrauma
monster hunter world
fight in tight space
Life Is Strange Complete Season
phoenix wright
LOOT RIVER
satisfactory
Gotham Knights
Rivals of Aether
Vrising
DOOM Eternal
Deep Rock Galactic
LegionTD 2
Dead by Daylight
quantum break
slay the spire
Yakuza kiwami 2
Stardew Valley
resident evil village
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising
stray blade
clash: Artifacts of chaos
Valfaris: Mecha Therion
The Quarry
9 Years of Shadows
other humble choice title games
#########################################################
Note: for some games from humble I might ask for gift links. There is a rumor 3 years ago that humble bans users due to making gift links only. I make gift links every week, never have any issues. I have no idea why humble would ever ban its customers for using a feature it provides to its custimers.
Here is a guide how to make gift links from support.Humblebundle.com: https://support.humblebundle.com/hc/en-us/articles/202712460-Purchasing-and-Sending-Gifts
I do not believe humble teaches you how to make gift links, so it can ban you, lol
2024.05.11 20:12 Jerry_217 [H] Lots of games NEW: Turbo Overkill, Littlewood, DEVOUR, Amnesia:The Bunker, Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles, Wobbledogs [W] Hi-Fi rush, Yakuza LAD, hell let loose, Nioh 2, WWE 2k23, crusader kings 3, Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, Fable Anniversary, Poker night 1, 2, F1 2012, 2011, Euro/American Truck, tf2key
Region is NA.
If you have my wishlist games, pm me anytime. Only accept trades of games of your own.
My REPs: 200+ successful trades, stopped tracking after 202.
My steam games for trade (wishlist in the end of this post):
Added recently:
StardewAmanda the Adventurer
Bravery and Greed
Hi-Fi RUSH
King Of The Castle
Loddlenaut
Mediterranea Inferno
Steelrising
Yakuza: Like a Dragon
Coromon
Fashion Police Squad
HUMANKIND™ Definitive Edition
Symphony of War: The Nephilim Saga
Terraformers
The Callisto Protocol
The Excavation of Hob's Barrow
Victoria 3
Tomb Raider: Game of the Year Edition (GOG)
LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars (GOG)
Littlewood
Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
One Hand Clapping
Tainted Grail: Conquest
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Mad Max
MORTAL KOMBAT XL
Mortal Kombat 11: Ultimate
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor GOTY
Middle-Earth: Shadow of War Definitive Edition
Injustice 2 Legendary Edition
Gotham Knights
Back 4 Blood
Batman™: Arkham Knight Premium Edition
Batman™: Arkham Asylum GOTY Edition
Batman™: Arkham City GOTY Edition
Batman™: Arkham Origins
.hack//G.U. Last Recode
CODE VEIN
GOD EATER 3
Katamari Damacy REROLL
PAC-MAN MUSEUM+
Tales of Vesperia: Definitive Edition
TEKKEN 7
Dragon Knight (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Hell Girls (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Super Star (delisted, 18+, PM for price)
Steam games:
A Juggler's TaleA Plague Tale: Innocence
ABZU
Aces and Adventures
Ad Infinitum
Afterimage
Agent in Depth
Alchemist's Castle
Alchemy Garden
Aliens vs. Predator Collection ( includes Aliens vs. Predator + Aliens vs Predator Swarm Map Pack + Aliens vs Predator: Bug Hunt Pack)
Aliens: Fireteam Elite
AMID EVIL
Amnesia: The Bunker
Among Us
Anuchard
Aragami 2
Arcade Paradise
Arise: A Simple Story
Armello
Army Men RTS
Assault Suit Leynos
Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
Astronarch
Autonauts vs Piratebots
Battlecruisers
Beacon Pines
Big Pharma
BIOMUTANT
Bionic Commando Rearmed
Black Paradox
Black Skylands
Blade Assault
Blood And Zombies
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
Borderlands 3: Super Deluxe Edition
Boundless
BPM: Bullets Per Minute
Brawlout
Castle on the Coast
Cats in Time
Caveblazers
Chicka Wars Chicken Meat (delisted)
Children of Silentown
CHIVALRY 2 - EPIC EDITION
Citizen Sleeper
CivCity: Rome
Click and Slay
Colt Canyon
Conan Chop Chop
Concept Destruction
Construction Simulator (2015) Deluxe Edition
Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!
Corridor Z
Cosmonautica
Crayon Physics Deluxe
CROSSBOW: Bloodnight
Cultist Simulator
Curse of the Dead Gods
Dagon - The Eldritch Box DLC
Dark Deity
Dead Age
Dear Esther: Landmark Edition
Death Squared
Deceive Inc.
Demonologist
Depraved
Descenders
Desperados III
Destiny 2: Beyond Light DLC
Destroy All Humans! 2 - Reprobed
Destroyer: The U-Boat Hunter
Detached: Non-VR Edition
DEVOUR
Dicey Dungeons
Disciples: Liberation
Disco Elysium - The Final Cut
Dishonored Definitive Edition
Distant Worlds Universe
Doctor Strange Defenders Skin
Double Cross
Doughlings: Arcade
Doughlings: Invasion
Dragon Knight (delisted, 18+)
Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen
Draw Slasher
Drawful 2
Due Process
Dungeons 2 - Complete Edition
Dusk
EDGE OF ETERNITY
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising
El Hijo
Emily is Away <3
Encased
Endless Space 2
Epic Chef
Escape the Backrooms
ETERNAL THREADS
Exorder
Expeditions: Rome
F1 2018
Farming Simulator 17
Firegirl: Hack 'n Splash Rescue
First Class Trouble
Five Dates
Fling to the Finish
Fobia - St. Dinfna Hotel
Foretales
FOREWARNED
Forged Battalion
Fortissimo FA INTL Ver
Founders' Fortune
Friends vs Friends
From Space
Full Metal Furies
Fun with Ragdolls: The Game
GameGuru Classic
Garfield Kart - Furious Racing
Generation Zero
Geometric Sniper
Ghost 1.0
Gloria Victis
Go Home Dinosaurs!
Going Under
Golf Gang
Good knight
GRID Ultimate Edition
GRIME
Grow: Song of the Evertree
Guilty Gear X2 #Reload
Guns & Fishes
Guts and Glory
Hack 'n' Slash bundle (including Hack 'n' Slash + Hack 'n' Slash Soundtrack + Spacebase GIFT)
Halcyon 6: Lightspeed Edition
Hardspace: Shipbreaker
Heart Fragment - Book Two: Belief Fragments (Shannon & Lana)
Hedon Bloodrite
Hell Girls (delisted, 18+)
Hell Pie
Hellbound
HERO'S HOUR
Hidden & Dangerous 2: Courage Under Fire
Hidden & Dangerous: Action Pack
Hokko Life
Hollow Knight
Honey, I Joined a Cult
Hot Brass
Hotshot Racing
How to Sing to Open Your Heart
Hyper Gunsport
I’m not a Monster
Internet Cafe Simulator
Interplanetary: Enhanced Edition
Intravenous
Intruders: Hide and Seek
Iron Danger
Iron Harvest
Izmir: An Independence Simulator
Joggernauts
Joggernauts
JURASSIC WORLD EVOLUTION 2
Just Cause 3 XXL Edition
Just Cause 4 Complete Edition
JYDGE
Kerbal Space Program
Killsquad
King's Bounty II
Kraken Academy!!
Labirinto 2
Lacuna – A Sci-Fi Noir Adventure
Last Call BBS
Last Oasis
Late Shift
Lawn Mowing Simulator
Legend of Keepers
Leisure Suit Larry - Wet Dreams Don't Dry
Let Them Come
Life is Strange 2 Complete Season (incl. Mascot Bundle DLC)
Little Misfortune
Little Orpheus
Lords and Villeins
Lost Planet 3 Complete Pack
Lost Ruins
Lust for Darkness
Lust from Beyond: M Edition
MageQuit
Maid of Sker
Mainlining
MEEPLE STATION
Meow Express
Merchant of the Skies
Metal: Hellsinger
Metro Exodus
Midnight Fight Express
Midnight Ghost Hunt
Mini Metro
Mini motor Racing EVO (delisted)
MirrorMoon EP
Monster Prom 2: Monster Camp
Monster Sanctuary
Moon Hunters
Moonlighter
Morbid: The Seven Acolytes
Motorcycle Mechanic Simulator 2021
Moving Out - Movers in Paradise DLC
Mr. Prepper
Murder by Numbers
My Friendly Neighborhood
My Time At Portia
Mythic Ocean
Nadir: A Grimdark Deckbuilder
Necromunda Hired Gun
NecroWorm
NeuroVoider
Neverinth
Neverout
New Super Luckys Tale
Nickelodeon All Star Brawl
Nobody Saves the World
Non-Stop Raiders
Northgard
Oaken
Obduction
Of Orcs And Men
Offworld Trading Company
OLLIOLLI WORLD - RAD EDITION
One Hand Clapping
Orbital Racer
Othercide
Out of Reach: Treasure Royale
Outward Definitive Edition
Outward The Soroboreans DLC + soundtrack (DLC only)
Override
Overture
Ozymandias
Paint the Town Red
Partial Control
Patch Quest
Pathfinder: Kingmaker Enhanced Plus Edition (NA only) + Royal Ascension DLC + The Wildcards DLC
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Enhanced Edition
Pathfinders: Memories
Pathway
Peaky Blinders: Mastermind
Per Asperatrar
Pilgrims
Pill Baby
Pixplode
Planet TD
PlataGO!
Port Royale 3 Gold
PowerBeatsVR
Prodeus
Project CARS (delisted)
Project Chemistry
Project Nimbus: Complete Edition
Project Wingman
Propagation VR - Co-op
Propnight
Proteus
Proteus
PULSAR: The Lost Colony
Pumped BMX +
Quadrata
Quantum Break
Radio Commander
Ragnarock
Railroad Corporation
Railroad Tycoon 3
Rain World
Rebel Inc: Escalation
Rebound Dodgeball Evolved
Re-Legion
Remnant: From the Ashes - Complete Edition
Remnants of Naezith
Resident Evil Revelations
Resident Evil Revelations 2
Reventure
Revita
RIOT - Civil Unrest
Road 96
Roarr! Jurassic Edition
ROGUE LORDS
Roguebook
RollerCoaster Tycoon 2: Triple Thrill Pack
RPG Maker VX
Rubber Bandits
RUINER
Rym 9000
Saints Row
Sakura Dungeon, 18+
Sakura Knight, 18+
Sakura MMO, 18+
Sakura Knight 2, 18+
Sakura Knight 3, 18+
Sakura MMO 2, 18+
Sakura MMO 3, 18+
Sakura MMO Extra, 18+
Sakura Succubus, 18+
Sakura Succubus 2, 18+
Sakura Succubus 3, 18+
Sakura Succubus 4, 18+
Sakura Succubus 5, 18+
Sakura Succubus 6, 18+
Sakura Swim Club, 18+
Sam & Max: Devil's Playhouse
Scorn
SCP : Secret Files
Secret Neighbor: Hello Neighbor Multiplayer
SEUM: Speedrunners from Hell
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Shady Part of Me
Shing!
Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate
Sid Meier's Railroads!
Siege Survival: Gloria Victis
Skullgirls 2nd Encore
Slinger VR
Smile For Me
Sniper Elite 3
Sniper Elite 4
Snowtopia
Sorcerer King: Rivals
Soul Searching
Soulblight
Souldiers
Soulstice
Spellcaster University
Spirit Hunter: Death Mark
Spirit of the Island
Stacking
Starbound
Starpoint Gemini Warlords
State of Decay: Year-One Survival Edition (steam inventory gift)
Stirring Abyss
Strider
Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones
SuchArt!
Sunlight
Super Chicken Catchers
Super Magbot
Super Star (delisted)
SUPERHOT: MIND CONTROL DELETE
Surviving the Aftermath
Sword Legacy Omen
SYMMETRYro
Tails Noir
Tainted Grail: Conquest
Telefrag VR
TEMTEM
The Amazing American Circus
The Ascent
The Beast Inside
The Dark Pictures Anthology: Man of Medan
The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes
The Dark Pictures Anthology: Little Hope
The Deed II
The Dungeon Of Naheulbeuk: The Amulet Of Chaos
The Golf Club 2019 Featuring PGA TOUR
The Gunk
The Legend of Tianding
The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante
The Long Dark
The Outer Worlds: Spacer's Choice Edition
The Pale Beyond
The Quarry
The Red Lantern
The Serpent Rogue
The USB Stick Found in the Grass
The Witcher: Enhanced Edition (steam inventory gift)
The Witness
The Wolf Among Us
There Is No Light
Ticket to Ride
Tin Can
Titan Souls
TOEM
Tools Up!
Townsmen - A Kingdom Rebuilt
Traffic Jams
Train Station Renovation
Treasure Hunter Simulator
Trek to Yomi
Tribes of Midgard
Turbo Overkill
Twilight Struggle
Twin Mirror
Two Point Campus
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Underland: The Climb
Unity of Command: Stalingrad Campaign
UnMetal
Vanishing Realms
War for the Overworld
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Drenn Redblade
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Exceptional Card Pack
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Saga of the Great Awakening
Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf - Wrath of the Damned
Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Realms of Ruin Ultimate Edition
WARSAW
We Happy Few Season Pass
We Were Here Too
Where the Water Tastes Like Wine
White Noise 2
Who Pressed Mute on Uncle Marcus?
Wizard of Legend
Wobbledogs
Worms Rumble
WRC 7
WWE 2K BATTLEGROUNDS
XCOM 2
X-COM: Complete Pack (including X-COM: UFO Defense + X-COM: Apocalypse + X-COM: Enforcer + X-COM: Interceptor + X-COM: Terror from the Deep)
XCOM: Enemy Unknown Complete Edition
XEL
X-Morph: Defense Complete Pack (including X-Morph: Defense + X-Morph: Defense - European Assault + X-Morph: Defense - Survival Of The Fittest + X-Morph: Defense - Last Bastion)
Yakuza 4 Remastered
Zoeti
ΔV: Rings of Saturn
Other platforms:
Command & Conquer Remastered Collection (ORIGINkey)
Liberated (GOG key)
STAR WARS: Squadrons (Origin)
Wanderlust Travel Stories (GOG key)
#########################################################
My Wishlist: (prefer gift links)
Hi-Fi RUSH
DIABLO 4 PC
Street Fighter 6
Rocket League
Poker night
poker night 2
Game of Thrones - A Telltale Games Series
NBA 2k16, 2k17
WWE 2K16, 2K17, 2K18, 2K19, 2K20, 2k23
The Last Remnant
Doctor Who: The Adventure Games
Hell let loose
Crusader kings 3
Spiderman remaster
F1 2020, 2019, 2017, 2016, 2012, 2011
ACE COMBAT ASSAULT HORIZON Enhanced Edition
DARK SOULS
DARK SOULS II
DARK SOULS III
Pistol Whip
CLANNAD
Automobilista 2
Gears 5
monster hunter rise
Tiny tina's wonderlands chaotic great edition
Spyro Reignited Trilogy
DIRT 5
Fable Anniversary
Nioh 2 COMPLETE
Victoria 3
HUMANKIND
A Hat in Time
VTOL VR
rFactor 2
ZERO Sievert
Barotrauma
monster hunter world
fight in tight space
Life Is Strange Complete Season
phoenix wright
LOOT RIVER
satisfactory
Gotham Knights
Rivals of Aether
Vrising
DOOM Eternal
Deep Rock Galactic
LegionTD 2
Dead by Daylight
quantum break
slay the spire
Yakuza kiwami 2
Stardew Valley
resident evil village
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising
stray blade
clash: Artifacts of chaos
Valfaris: Mecha Therion
The Quarry
9 Years of Shadows
other humble choice title games
#########################################################
Note: for some games from humble I might ask for gift links. There is a rumor 3 years ago that humble bans users due to making gift links only. I make gift links every week, never have any issues. I have no idea why humble would ever ban its customers for using a feature it provides to its custimers.
Here is a guide how to make gift links from support.Humblebundle.com: https://support.humblebundle.com/hc/en-us/articles/202712460-Purchasing-and-Sending-Gifts
I do not believe humble teaches you how to make gift links, so it can ban you, lol
2024.05.11 19:45 Asspieburgers [Hiring] Comic-Style Artist for "Invader Zim" & "City Skylines/Civ VI" Mashup Scene, Budget: 150 to 200 AUD (~100-135 USD)
Direct Messages: Direct messages regarding this post will not be read and will result in blocking.
Comment Requirements: Comments that miss a particular, key element mentioned in this post will result in the commenter not being considered for the project and may result in blocking. I will insta-block you if you make out like you have read the post and it is clear that you have not.
Central Theme: Zim as the chaotic mastermind behind a wildly dysfunctional city that is a Civilization VI & Cities Skylines mashup, with Dib desperately trying to restore order.
Comic Book Page Layout (note, panels 1 and 2 can be swapped):
submitted by Asspieburgers to artcommissions [link] [comments]
Comment Requirements: Comments that miss a particular, key element mentioned in this post will result in the commenter not being considered for the project and may result in blocking. I will insta-block you if you make out like you have read the post and it is clear that you have not.
Central Theme: Zim as the chaotic mastermind behind a wildly dysfunctional city that is a Civilization VI & Cities Skylines mashup, with Dib desperately trying to restore order.
Comic Book Page Layout (note, panels 1 and 2 can be swapped):
- Panel 1 - Zim's Introduction:
- Description: Show Zim from the front or side, close up at, unbeknownst at this point to the viewer, his control panel, dramatically saying one of his scheming declarations ("Behold my masterful urban chaos!", "I shall rewrite history and traffic laws!" or "With a flick of my switch, empires fall and traffic jams... rise!" or other like that). I am thinking it should be shown first.
- Purpose: This panel sets the tone and introduces Zim as the central antagonist, highlighting his delight in chaos. It focuses on his expression and excitement, drawing viewers into the story.
- Panel 2 - Dib's Reaction:
- Description: Dib is depicted within a chaotic city or urban environment from Civilization VI, appearing panicked/overwhelmed/frustrated/determined/bewildered (not sure which) and trying to manage the mayhem. Wonders from Civ VI are visible in the background. Maybe only one? I am not sure what Dib should be saying. Perhaps "Not again! Why does it always have to be city-wide chaos?", "This can't be good... even for Zim's standards!" (<-not this one if shown first) or "I knew I should've stayed in bed today..."
- Purpose: If shown second, this panel reveals the impact of Zim's actions, adding tension and narrative depth. If shown first, it creates suspense and engages viewers by making them question the cause of the chaos.
- Panel 3 - GIR's Antics:
- Description: GIR humorously claims a grand role in the chaos, with a speech bubble like "I'm the mayor of everything!" or "I'm the boss of all the buildings!" or something else GIR-like. Perhaps he is interacting with a Wonder, too, to drive home the fact that this is a Civ VI mashup.
- Purpose: Adds a layer of humour and showcases GIR's chaotic innocence amidst the havoc.
- Panel 4 - Full Scene Reveal:
- Description: A wider shot from behind or to the rear-and-side of Zim at his control panel, with screens showing both the game-like world and its chaotic scenes, including Dib and GIR. Show the in-game game HUD over the main screen. The HUD should not be dominant, should feel like a natural inclusion into the piece (so with a more alien design than the standard Civ VI or Cities: Skylines HUD). It basically only needs to be there as a way to drive home the tie in the piece has to Civ VI and add to the user wondering whether Dib is actually inside a game or if it is the real world. He should be exclaiming something, perhaps ""As the puppet master, I control the fate of empires and the flow of your so-called traffic!", "Witness my ultimate conquest! This world bends to my will!" or "Marvel at my strategic brilliance! I turn civilizations into playgrounds and playgrounds into chaos!"
- Purpose: This final panel reveals the overarching scenario --- Zim manipulating these events as if they were part of a video game, tying all previous panels together into a cohesive narrative. The user might even wonder if Dib is inside a game or if Zim is altering the real world from his control panel.
- Budget Consideration: As long as it remains within the stated budget, I am open to the idea of the artwork being spread across two canvases if it enhances the overall visual impact. Artists who feel that a larger space could better serve the project’s needs should feel free to propose how they would utilize the additional canvas, ensuring the total cost remains within the budget limits.
- Preferred Style: Aim for a dynamic, expressive style akin to "Invader Zim," rich in bold lines and vibrant colours. Open to variations that maintain the energetic essence of the theme. I would highly prefer the style in the image I have posted to my profile. Note that it doesn't have to have that level of detail.
- Atmosphere: The piece should be lively and chaotic, yet humorously so, capturing the cartoonish essence of a villain's scheme gone awry in a video game world.
- Easter Egg: To test if you are reading this, include (do not draw attention to it, I will notice it even if you don't, just stick with how the following example places it where it doesn't make sense) a one-word bathroom item (e.g., towel, paste, brush, floss, soap, shaver) in the middle of your comment. Do not comment about this rule other than to place the word appropriately. For example, "I would love to create this artwork for you as I love Invader soap Zim and know exactly how I should stylise their gesture!"
- Detail Distribution: Each panel should carry consistent detail, adapted to fit the broader narrative scope of the scene. Emphasis on key elements to maintain visual interest and storytelling clarity. See the image posted on my profile for a visual guide.
- Printing Size: This artwork will be printed on an 18 x 12 inch canvas. Also will be used as a desktop wallpaper (I will rearrange the panels to use it as a desktop wallpaper). It does not need to be detailed enough for said size. It is ok to look good for a print size (eg, paint it with the detail/time-taken for a normal size piece, but at the resolution of what I am asking for. If that doesn't make sense, let me know)
- Focus Areas: Emphasise Zim's reactions, Dib's challenges, and GIR's mischievous impact, ensuring these elements draw and retain viewer attention.
- Reference: For a visual guide, refer to the fanart piece posted on my profile. It illustrates the desired level of dynamism and expressiveness. Note that it doesn't have to have that level of detail.
- Orientation: Portrait orientation to enhance the sequential flow of the panels. This orientation supports a top-to-bottom progression that aligns with the unfolding story, making it more intuitive for the viewer to follow the sequence from Zim’s initial action, through the chaotic scenarios, to the final reveal.
- Scene Flow: Open to swapping panels 1 and 2 if it improves narrative flow. Initial thoughts lean towards starting with Zim to align with the show’s style.
- Communication: Please only engage through comments for discussions. Direct messages about this post will not be read and will lead to blocking.
- Recording: Something that will strongly sway me is if you are comfortable with recording the piece being made as you create it and uploading it privately to YouTube (I don't care if it is small, e.g., 360p). Once commissioned, communication methods such as direct messages or email are good to be used to share such links privately.
- Your Process: Please briefly describe your commission and artistic process in your comment to provide insight into how you plan to approach this project.
- Time to Produce: Please give me an ETC (ETA).
2024.05.11 19:31 Asspieburgers [Hiring] Comic-Style Artist for "Invader Zim" & "City Skylines/Civ VI" Mashup Scene, Budget: 150 to 200 AUD (~100-135 USD)
Direct Messages: Direct messages regarding this post will not be read and will result in blocking.
Comment Requirements: Comments that miss a particular, key element mentioned in this post will result in the commenter not being considered for the project and may result in blocking. I will insta-block you if you make out like you have read the post and it is clear that you have not.
Central Theme: Zim as the chaotic mastermind behind a wildly dysfunctional city that is a Civilization VI & Cities Skylines mashup, with Dib desperately trying to restore order.
Comic Book Page Layout (note, panels 1 and 2 can be swapped):
submitted by Asspieburgers to HungryArtists [link] [comments]
Comment Requirements: Comments that miss a particular, key element mentioned in this post will result in the commenter not being considered for the project and may result in blocking. I will insta-block you if you make out like you have read the post and it is clear that you have not.
Central Theme: Zim as the chaotic mastermind behind a wildly dysfunctional city that is a Civilization VI & Cities Skylines mashup, with Dib desperately trying to restore order.
Comic Book Page Layout (note, panels 1 and 2 can be swapped):
- Panel 1 - Zim's Introduction:
- Description: Show Zim from the front or side, close up at, unbeknownst at this point to the viewer, his control panel, dramatically saying one of his scheming declarations ("Behold my masterful urban chaos!", "I shall rewrite history and traffic laws!" or "With a flick of my switch, empires fall and traffic jams... rise!" or other like that). I am thinking it should be shown first.
- Purpose: This panel sets the tone and introduces Zim as the central antagonist, highlighting his delight in chaos. It focuses on his expression and excitement, drawing viewers into the story.
- Panel 2 - Dib's Reaction:
- Description: Dib is depicted within a chaotic city or urban environment from Civilization VI, appearing panicked/overwhelmed/frustrated/determined/bewildered (not sure which) and trying to manage the mayhem. Wonders from Civ VI are visible in the background. Maybe only one? I am not sure what Dib should be saying. Perhaps "Not again! Why does it always have to be city-wide chaos?", "This can't be good... even for Zim's standards!" (<-not this one if shown first) or "I knew I should've stayed in bed today..."
- Purpose: If shown second, this panel reveals the impact of Zim's actions, adding tension and narrative depth. If shown first, it creates suspense and engages viewers by making them question the cause of the chaos.
- Panel 3 - GIR's Antics:
- Description: GIR humorously claims a grand role in the chaos, with a speech bubble like "I'm the mayor of everything!" or "I'm the boss of all the buildings!" or something else GIR-like. Perhaps he is interacting with a Wonder, too, to drive home the fact that this is a Civ VI mashup.
- Purpose: Adds a layer of humour and showcases GIR's chaotic innocence amidst the havoc.
- Panel 4 - Full Scene Reveal:
- Description: A wider shot from behind or to the rear-and-side of Zim at his control panel, with screens showing both the game-like world and its chaotic scenes, including Dib and GIR. Show the in-game game HUD over the main screen. The HUD should not be dominant, should feel like a natural inclusion into the piece (so with a more alien design than the standard Civ VI or Cities: Skylines HUD). It basically only needs to be there as a way to drive home the tie in the piece has to Civ VI and add to the user wondering whether Dib is actually inside a game or if it is the real world. He should be exclaiming something, perhaps ""As the puppet master, I control the fate of empires and the flow of your so-called traffic!", "Witness my ultimate conquest! This world bends to my will!" or "Marvel at my strategic brilliance! I turn civilizations into playgrounds and playgrounds into chaos!"
- Purpose: This final panel reveals the overarching scenario --- Zim manipulating these events as if they were part of a video game, tying all previous panels together into a cohesive narrative. The user might even wonder if Dib is inside a game or if Zim is altering the real world from his control panel.
- Budget Consideration: As long as it remains within the stated budget, I am open to the idea of the artwork being spread across two canvases if it enhances the overall visual impact. Artists who feel that a larger space could better serve the project’s needs should feel free to propose how they would utilize the additional canvas, ensuring the total cost remains within the budget limits.
- Preferred Style: Aim for a dynamic, expressive style akin to "Invader Zim," rich in bold lines and vibrant colours. Open to variations that maintain the energetic essence of the theme. I would highly prefer the style in the image I have posted to my profile. Note that it doesn't have to have that level of detail.
- Atmosphere: The piece should be lively and chaotic, yet humorously so, capturing the cartoonish essence of a villain's scheme gone awry in a video game world.
- Easter Egg: To test if you are reading this, include (do not draw attention to it, I will notice it even if you don't, just stick with how the following example places it where it doesn't make sense) a one-word bathroom item (e.g., towel, paste, brush, floss, soap, shaver) in the middle of your comment. Do not comment about this rule other than to place the word appropriately. For example, "I would love to create this artwork for you as I love Invader soap Zim and know exactly how I should stylise their gesture!"
- Detail Distribution: Each panel should carry consistent detail, adapted to fit the broader narrative scope of the scene. Emphasis on key elements to maintain visual interest and storytelling clarity. See the image posted on my profile for a visual guide.
- Printing Size: This artwork will be printed on an 18 x 12 inch canvas. Also will be used as a desktop wallpaper (I will rearrange the panels to use it as a desktop wallpaper). It does not need to be detailed enough for said size. It is ok to look good for a print size (eg, paint it with the detail/time-taken for a normal size piece, but at the resolution of what I am asking for. If that doesn't make sense, let me know)
- Focus Areas: Emphasise Zim's reactions, Dib's challenges, and GIR's mischievous impact, ensuring these elements draw and retain viewer attention.
- Reference: For a visual guide, refer to the fanart piece posted on my profile. It illustrates the desired level of dynamism and expressiveness. Note that it doesn't have to have that level of detail.
- Orientation: Portrait orientation to enhance the sequential flow of the panels. This orientation supports a top-to-bottom progression that aligns with the unfolding story, making it more intuitive for the viewer to follow the sequence from Zim’s initial action, through the chaotic scenarios, to the final reveal.
- Scene Flow: Open to swapping panels 1 and 2 if it improves narrative flow. Initial thoughts lean towards starting with Zim to align with the show’s style.
- Communication: Please only engage through comments for discussions. Direct messages about this post will not be read and will lead to blocking.
- Recording: Something that will strongly sway me is if you are comfortable with recording the piece being made as you create it and uploading it privately to YouTube (I don't care if it is small, e.g., 360p). Once commissioned, communication methods such as direct messages or email are good to be used to share such links privately.
- Your Process: Please briefly describe your commission and artistic process in your comment to provide insight into how you plan to approach this project.
- Time to Produce: Please give me an ETC (ETA).
2024.05.11 19:20 CherishedBeliefs What kind of person labels Occam's razor as an "arbitrary axiom"?
So, I'm not sure if it's a semi-popular thing in philosophy to just reject Occam's razor
I think that the vast majority of philosophers adhere to it (Occam's razor)
Theistic evolutionists exist, and a portion of them would have a reason to label Occam's razor as "an arbitrary axiom"
The issue is that I'm barely average when it comes to intelligence, and I'm probably less than average when it comes knowledge about a lot of things
So I don't know what to think of a theistic evolutionist (the one I was talking to) who labels Occam's razor as an arbitrary axiom
Intuitively (and my intuitions can and have been wrong before) I would say that such a person is making a big mistake
Here's my understanding of Occam's razor (sorry in advance for any egregious errors I'll probably make):
Theory A and theory B, both explain phenomena R just as well
yet theory A has less postulates than theory B, and so we ought to select theory A
That doesn't sound arbitrary to me, but maybe they meant something else by "arbitrary"
So, if I considered the specific theistic evolutionist (this isn't really a hypothetical, I did talk to one) to have a firm grasp on philosophy, would them making such a remark about Occam's razor be considered a red flag?
That is, should it lower my confidence in their objectivity if they make such a remark about Occam's razor?
Or is this simply insufficient data to make any judgment?
Edit: Here's some more context if it helps
Person A:
But evolution is transitional.
As a human you are the product of about 50% of your parents DNA with about 100-150 mutations. Mutations in DNA occur in the letters A, T, C, and G (adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine) which change as a recipe for the species, so there is no exact point in history in which humans became humans. It was all gradual changes and we just label (and argue) about whether something was human or not. It's like arguing about when blue becomes red in this image http://i.imgur.com/OpIKBPW.jpg
So to believe in evolution and that humans aren't descendants of any animal you would have to believe in a trickster god that
To do this would be to establish the laws of nature, create the universe, the solar system, the earth, all the events which occurred until abiogenesis, then the evolution of higher forms of life until the planet finally reached the stage where it was most suitable for the form chosen for Adam. Now if the planet is in a form most suitable for Adam, a hominid mammal, why wouldn't God have created all the life whose essence was necessary for ours? (and this is exactly what the old Sufis say, about whom John William Draper was talking about in my quotes in my original post). This view of the Sufis was also elaborated upon here by another redditor, I believe his name is PursuitofKnowledge, I'll copy my statement here:
You call it a trick because you dislike God and don't want to admit anything good of Him. To us it is the usual: God being perfect. The creation of Adam should have come with the creation of Adam's context (this universe and world) because to do otherwise (as you suggest) would be incomplete.
Within the essence of man is the basis for the entire universe. Our mineral soul (physics, represented in the Earth itself), our vegetable soul (organic chemistry, represented in all the life which first arose), our animal soul, our personal soul (i.e, psychological capacity and differentiation), human soul (morality), and then our divine connection (our metaphysical souls which are not of the material world, which are seat to our free will). In Man this is instantiated in one being, but to create an environment for the being would necessitate drawing out these essences in a process of creation over a period of time according to the same laws of nature by which that being functions which necessitates everything we see (including the independent evolution of animals closest to us in form). This is all deductively derived by medieval Islamic thinkers. It gives you the "why" for evolution (since you think evolution is some kind of trick, it's supposed to be the opposite, the poetic and ordered nature of it is evidence for a Creator since order doesn't spring into material existence of its own accord: what you call the laws of nature are for us the commands of God).
Person A: TL;DR: Occam's razor
Person B: Occam's razor isn't a logical proof. To apply it here, one would have to accept the possibility of a purely materialistic world (even in a deistic type of monotheism), which we do not. So for us, God must exist. After that, our choice of Islam is based on personal conviction that Allah is that Supreme Being we deduce must exist in order for everything else to exist, making the Qur'an His actual command, which then makes the acceptance of the creation of Adam mandatory. We don't accept Islam because of the story of Adam (I mean, I can't say I've ever heard of anyone who said they converted to religion because they liked that story that much).
See my other posts in here regarding the history of Islamic metaphysics.
Note from me: The comment person B made in which they call Occam's razor an "arbitrary axiom" is in a different comment of Person B, the reason I posted this particular conversation of Person B is because I wanted to provide more data which I (possibly mistakenly) believe can help discern if they're any good or not
Maybe asking how good they are at philosophy isn't right, should I instead be asking if they're any good as a theologian?
submitted by CherishedBeliefs to askphilosophy [link] [comments]
I think that the vast majority of philosophers adhere to it (Occam's razor)
Theistic evolutionists exist, and a portion of them would have a reason to label Occam's razor as "an arbitrary axiom"
The issue is that I'm barely average when it comes to intelligence, and I'm probably less than average when it comes knowledge about a lot of things
So I don't know what to think of a theistic evolutionist (the one I was talking to) who labels Occam's razor as an arbitrary axiom
Intuitively (and my intuitions can and have been wrong before) I would say that such a person is making a big mistake
Here's my understanding of Occam's razor (sorry in advance for any egregious errors I'll probably make):
Theory A and theory B, both explain phenomena R just as well
yet theory A has less postulates than theory B, and so we ought to select theory A
That doesn't sound arbitrary to me, but maybe they meant something else by "arbitrary"
So, if I considered the specific theistic evolutionist (this isn't really a hypothetical, I did talk to one) to have a firm grasp on philosophy, would them making such a remark about Occam's razor be considered a red flag?
That is, should it lower my confidence in their objectivity if they make such a remark about Occam's razor?
Or is this simply insufficient data to make any judgment?
Edit: Here's some more context if it helps
Person A:
But evolution is transitional.
As a human you are the product of about 50% of your parents DNA with about 100-150 mutations. Mutations in DNA occur in the letters A, T, C, and G (adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine) which change as a recipe for the species, so there is no exact point in history in which humans became humans. It was all gradual changes and we just label (and argue) about whether something was human or not. It's like arguing about when blue becomes red in this image http://i.imgur.com/OpIKBPW.jpg
So to believe in evolution and that humans aren't descendants of any animal you would have to believe in a trickster god that
- evolved non-human ancestors that looked just like your ancestors,
- then the trickster god created new humans that appeared to be descended from the ancestors but they weren't despite many lines of evidence.
But evolution is transitional.Yes, it is.
So to believe in evolution and that humans aren't descendants of any animal you would have to believe in a trickster god thatWe don't consider this a trick, just a matter of God being consistent, which is a laudable quality because it is the basis for all scientific thought. Why would God do anything less than create the perfect and most meaningful environment for the first humans?
- evolved non-human ancestors that looked just like your ancestors,
- then the trickster god created new humans that appeared to be descended from the ancestors but they weren't despite many lines of evidence.
To do this would be to establish the laws of nature, create the universe, the solar system, the earth, all the events which occurred until abiogenesis, then the evolution of higher forms of life until the planet finally reached the stage where it was most suitable for the form chosen for Adam. Now if the planet is in a form most suitable for Adam, a hominid mammal, why wouldn't God have created all the life whose essence was necessary for ours? (and this is exactly what the old Sufis say, about whom John William Draper was talking about in my quotes in my original post). This view of the Sufis was also elaborated upon here by another redditor, I believe his name is PursuitofKnowledge, I'll copy my statement here:
This was a very common view of the world, especially among Sufis, who made 7 ontological distinctions of soul (mineral soul, vegetable soul, animal soul, personal soul, human soul, and the last two are the secret divine connection (our raw metaphysical souls)).And what he pasted here:
Some people have cited Islamic thinkers like Ibn Sina and Ibn Khaldun as proof of evolutionary thought having existed in earlier Islamic thought. But Islamic Studies professor, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, explains their observations as follows: “What the traditional Islamic thinkers said is that you have levels of existence of life forms starting with plant life, which is superseded by animal life through the creative power of God, while this animal life also includes plant life within itself. Moreover, plant life itself has many levels not caused by temporal evolution but by the descent of archetypes into the temporal order as is also true of animals. We know, for example, that we have vegetal nerves about which Ibn Sina speaks. In the animal realm we also have a hierarchy; many Muslim thinkers such as al-Biruni and Ibn Sina have written about this matter and have asserted that there are simple life forms and then ever more complicated life forms and that the complicated life forms contain within themselves the simpler life forms. Obviously human beings have a more complicated life form than the monkey, but possess also some of those characteristics we see in the monkey, but this does not mean that we have evolved from the monkey.” (On the Question of Biological Origins, 2006 http://www.thefreelibrary.com/On+the+question+of+biological+origins.-a0157034139)This is important to note because if we take the traditional Muslims views literally as a materialistic evolutionary theory, they are saying we evolved from monkeys, which doesn't make sense by any evolutionary model (we had a common ancestor). While Al-Biruni touched on natural selection and materialistic evolution (and even Ibn Khaldun to an extent), what the others were talking about was the consistent, cohesive, and poetic model of life on earth as manifested in the essence of Man. If God created everything for Man, and He designed Man in the form we know (bipedal mammalian hominid as a foundation), then it would be inconsistent for the physical application of that abstract essence which occurred in time through many ages to NOT feature these various essences manifested in physical creation because this would defy the very principle of Time. It would be imperfect of God to do otherwise.
You call it a trick because you dislike God and don't want to admit anything good of Him. To us it is the usual: God being perfect. The creation of Adam should have come with the creation of Adam's context (this universe and world) because to do otherwise (as you suggest) would be incomplete.
Within the essence of man is the basis for the entire universe. Our mineral soul (physics, represented in the Earth itself), our vegetable soul (organic chemistry, represented in all the life which first arose), our animal soul, our personal soul (i.e, psychological capacity and differentiation), human soul (morality), and then our divine connection (our metaphysical souls which are not of the material world, which are seat to our free will). In Man this is instantiated in one being, but to create an environment for the being would necessitate drawing out these essences in a process of creation over a period of time according to the same laws of nature by which that being functions which necessitates everything we see (including the independent evolution of animals closest to us in form). This is all deductively derived by medieval Islamic thinkers. It gives you the "why" for evolution (since you think evolution is some kind of trick, it's supposed to be the opposite, the poetic and ordered nature of it is evidence for a Creator since order doesn't spring into material existence of its own accord: what you call the laws of nature are for us the commands of God).
Person A: TL;DR: Occam's razor
Person B: Occam's razor isn't a logical proof. To apply it here, one would have to accept the possibility of a purely materialistic world (even in a deistic type of monotheism), which we do not. So for us, God must exist. After that, our choice of Islam is based on personal conviction that Allah is that Supreme Being we deduce must exist in order for everything else to exist, making the Qur'an His actual command, which then makes the acceptance of the creation of Adam mandatory. We don't accept Islam because of the story of Adam (I mean, I can't say I've ever heard of anyone who said they converted to religion because they liked that story that much).
See my other posts in here regarding the history of Islamic metaphysics.
Note from me: The comment person B made in which they call Occam's razor an "arbitrary axiom" is in a different comment of Person B, the reason I posted this particular conversation of Person B is because I wanted to provide more data which I (possibly mistakenly) believe can help discern if they're any good or not
Maybe asking how good they are at philosophy isn't right, should I instead be asking if they're any good as a theologian?
2024.05.11 18:39 Charli3Loves2cook How do i fix this
My word is formatted very strangely (see photo)
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2024.05.11 17:57 drethamartian Great Summary of Drake v. Kendrick Lore
WARNING: A Lot of Text
•Control (2013): Kendrick Addresses Drake, Along With 10 Other Rappers, In His Verse, Prompting Passive Aggressive Reactions from Drake. Drake Downplayed the Verse In Interviews, and Seemed Genuinely Annoyed He Had to Constantly Discuss Kendrick During the Rollout for His Next Album Nothing Was the Same.
"And That Goes for; Jermaine Cole, Big K.R.I.T., Wale, Pusha T, Meek Mills, A$AP Rocky, DRAKE, Big Sean, Jay Electron, Tyler, Mac Miller"
"I Got Love for You All But I'm Trynna Murder You Niggas, Trynna Make Sure Your Core Fans Never Heard of You Niggas, They Don't Want to Hear Not One More Noun or Verb from You Niggas"
•The Language (2013): After Months of Hating In Interviews, Drake Finally Addresses Control On Wax, Albeit Subliminally. He Makes It Clear He's Doesn't View Kendrick In the Same Light as Critics Do. And Believes Kendrick Is Only Doing This to Get a Reaction Out of Him. Both Points Would End Up Common Themes Whenever Drake Addresses Kendrick.
"I Don't Know Why They Been Lying But You're Shit Is Not That Inspiring."
"Fuck Anybody That's Talking That Shit Just to Get a Reaction."
"I Am The One With the Motormouth I Am the One You Should Worry Bout.'"
•BET Awards Cypher (2013): Drake's Subliminal's On "The Language" prompt Kendrick to Make the Most Direct Shots So Far, During TDE's Cypher at the 2013 BET Awards. Directly Referencing Drake's Latest Album "Nothing Was the Same" Only 3 Weeks After It Released. Calling Drake a Sensitive Rapper, a Trend That Would Continue Through This Beef.
"And Nothing's Been The Same Since They Dropped Control and Tucked a Sensitive Rapper Back In His Pajama Clothes."
"I Got My Thumb On Hip-Hop, and My Foot In the Back of Your Ass."
•Sh!t REMIX (2013): Drake Takes the Position of Kendrick's Big Homie, a Trend That Would Also Continue In This Beef. He Makes Multiple Mentions of Helping Kendrick Out By Giving Him a Feature and Bringing His Tour to Los Angeles In 2011 When Kendrick Was a Much Smaller Artist.
"Took Niggas Out the Hood Like I'm from There, So You Know It's All Good When I Come There"
"I Hear You Talking About You're City Like You Run There, Then I Brought My Tour to You're City, You My Son There"
•0 to 100 / The Catch Up (2014): On The Catch Up, Drake Vents to a Woman About Rappers Mentioning Him In Verses, and Coming to Terms With the Fact He's Top Dog Now and The Problems That Come With That. An Obvious Reaction to the Quick Back and Forth They Had after Control. He's Framing Kendrick, and Other Rappers, As Clout Hungry Envious Haters That Just Want His Spot.
"Imagine How It Feel to Watch Another Nigga At the Top, You Know That If You Wasn't You You Would Be Dissing You Dawg?"
•Pay for It (2014): Kendrick Goes On the Offensive for the First Time Since the BET Cypher. He Directly Responds to a Drake's Motormouth Lyric from "The Language", and Let's Drake Know This Isn't a Warning Shot, It's War Now.
"Been Dissecting Your Motormouth, Til' I Break Down the Engine"
"This Ain't No Warning Shot, This a Relevant Henchman"
"Ending Our Friendship, Baby I'd Rather Die Alone"
•Used To (2015): Drake References a 2013 Interview With Elliot Wilson, Where He Alleged He Saw Kendrick Days After the Control Verse, and His Demeanor Was Quite Friendly.
"They Gone Say You're Name On Them Airwaves, They Gone Hit You Up Right After Like It's Only Rap"
•6PM In New York (2015): On One of Drake's Classic Timestamp Records, He Takes Shot's At a Bunch of Artist, Most Notably Tyga. But Towards the end of the Track, He Takes Subliminal Shots at BOTH Kanye West and Kendrick Lamar. Mentioning "Money Trees" and "Blood On the Leaves" Making It Clear He's Ready to Go There With Artist's of Any Caliber.
"Why You Rapping Like You Come from the Streets? I Got a Backyard Where Money Seems to Come from the Trees, and I'm Never Ever Scared to Get Some Blood On My Leaves"
•King Kunta (2015): Kendrick Subliminally Addresses Rappers Trying to Sit On His Throne. Most Notably Though, Are the Bars About Rappers With Ghostwriters. When This Song First Released Nobody Knew Who Kendrick Was Referring To. But Months Later, After Meek Mill Exposed Drake for Using Ghostwriters, It Became Obvious Who King Kunta was referencing. It Was At This Exact Point the Entire Dynamic of the Beef Began to Change.
"I Got a Bone to Pick. I Don't Want You Monkey Mouth Motherfuckers Sitting At My Throne Again."
"I Can Dig Rapping, But a Rapper With a Ghostwriter? What the Fuck Happened?"
"I Swore I Wouldn't Tell, But Most of Y'all Sharing Bars Like You Got the Bottom Bunk In a 2-Man Cell"
•Hood Politics (2015): While There Are No Direct Shots at Drake, Kendrick Does Make Reference to Reactions to the Control Verse. He Talks About People In Our Culture Being Too Sensitive and That Further Dissing Could Lead to Violence Because of That. But Makes It Clear He Can Press the "Red Button" and Get the West Coast Involved If It Has to Go There. More Directed Towards East Coast vs. West Coast Than Drake, But Still Relevant to the Lore.
"Unless You Talking About Power, Yeah I Got A Lot of It. I'm the Only Rapper Next to Snoop That Can Press the Button"
"Had the Coast On Standby, "K Dot What's Up? I Heard They Opened Up Pandora's Box, I'll Box 'Em All In By a Landslide"
"I Resolved Inside That Private Hall While Sitting Down With JAY (JAY-Z), He Said "It's Funny How One Verse Can Fuck Up the Game"
•100 (2015): Drake Makes Another Big Bro Maneuver. Featuring On a Compton Legends Song (The Game), While Filming the Music Video In Compton. The Verse Seems to Be a Reaction to the Praise Kendrick Received for "To Pimp a Butterfly" He Wants Kendrick to Know That If He Felt Like It, He Could Make An Album Just As Great As TPAB. He Also Claims Kendrick's Recent Music Gets No Play In the Club and When It Does, the Reaction Is Lackluster.
"I Would Have All of Your Fans If I Didn't Go Pop and I Stayed On Some Conscious Shit"
"I'm In the Club Every Time They Play the Competition, If They Even Play the Competition, and I Seen the Response They Get"
•Darkside/Gone (2015): Kendrick One Ups Drake. Likely Upset a Compton Legend Allowed Drake to Diss Him On a Song, Kendrick Teams Up With THE Compton Legend On an Album Named "Compton" to respond to Drake. Directly Referencing Drake's song "Enemies" And Pokes Fun at the Constant Subliminal's Drake Continues to Send.
"But I Still Got Enemies Giving Me Energy I Want to Fight Now"
"Subliminal Sent to Me All of This Hate, I Thought I Was Holding the Mic Down"
•Deep Water (2015): The More Direct of the Compton Soundtrack Disses. He Again References a Drake Song, This Time "Started from the Bottom" Asserting That Unlike Drake, He Really Started from the Bottom. There's Also References to the Number "6" Which Drake Has a Known Affinity For.
"Motherfucker Know I Started from the Bottom"
"They Liable to Bury Him, They Nominate Six to Carry Him. They Worry Him to Death But He No Vegetarian"
"The Beef Is On His Breathe, Inheriting the Drama Better Than a Great White, This Is Life In My Aquarium"
•Summer Sixteen (2016): Phase Two of the Beef Beings Here. In 2015 President Barack Obama Was Asked Who Would Win In a Beef Between Kendrick Lamar & Drake. Barack Obama Picked Kendrick, and Obviously, Drake Doesn't Agree. A Quick Sub to Kendrick On a Song Mostly Focused On the Meek Mill Beef.
"Tell Obama That My Verses Are Just Like The Whips That He In, They Bulletproof"
•Untitled 02 (2016): Kendrick Pokes Fun at Drake, Parodying His "If You're Reading This" Flow On the Last Verse. No Real Direct Shots But Some Possible Subs.
"I Can Put a Rapper On Life Support, Guarantee That's Something None of You Want"
•Untitled 07 (2016): On the Penultimate Song from Untitled Unmastered, Kendrick Addresses a Few Artists Who Sent Shots at Him After TPAB. Though the Jay Electronica Shots Are Most Notable, He Does Take a Second to Remind Drake That He's Not Ready for War. Essentially Calling Drake a Bitch.
"You Niggas Fear Me Like Y'all Fear God"
"Before You Poke Out Your Chest, Loosen Your Bra"
"The Mastemind, and Til' My Next Album, More Power to You"
•Grammys (2016): While There Are No Obvious Shots At Kendrick, This Is an Important Song In the Lore. On This Song Drake Starts the "Top 5" Discussion In Hip-Hop, and Saying His Spot There Is Not for Debate. This Would Be Referenced On Many Disses Moving Forward.
"Most Niggas With a Deal, Couldn't Make a Greatest Hits"
"Y'all a Whole Lot of Things, But You Still Ain't This"
"Whole City Going Crazy, Top 5 No Debating. Top 5, Top 5, Top 5"
•For Free (2016): One of the More Weird Instances In This Beef. Drake Makes a Sly Reference to Kendrick's 2015 Song, For Free? (Interlude). It's Not Clear If This Was an Attempt at Being Friendly Again, or a Petty Pot Shot. Although Seeing How Things Played Out After, I'd Assume This Reference Was VERY Tongue In Cheek.
"And Like Your Boy from Compton Said "You Know This Dick Ain't Free"
•Gyalchester (2017): Drake Makes a Direct Reference to Grammys. Asserting That's He's No Longer Just Top 5, He's Top 2 and He's Not #2. Kendrick Would Obviously Take Exception. The Artist He's Been Compared to for the last 4 Years Just Claimed the #1 Spot On Record.
"I Know I Said Top 5 But I'm Top 2, and I'm Not 2, and I Got One, Thought You Had One, But It's Not One, Nigga Nah"
•The Heart Part 4 (2017): Kendrick Becomes the Big Dog. In The Two Years Since TPAB, Kendrick Received a Ton of Criticism from Other Artists. Downplaying the Impact of the Record, Downplaying Kendricks Skill as An MC. He Was Being Boxed In as the "Black Power" Rapper and Artists Not Named Drake (Big Sean, Jay Electronica, Lupe Fiasco) were beginning to feel very comfortable shooting at Kendrick. Then Comes The Heart Part 4. This Was Almost Like Kendrick's 5AM In Toronto. He's Now Established As a Top Dog In the Game, and He Let's Everybody, Including Drake, Know. A Lot of Bars On Here Could Be Interpreted as Big Sean Disses, But Kendrick Counting Up to 5 and Proclaiming Himself as the Greatest Rapper Alive Was Cleary a Response to Gyalchester.
"My Fans Can't Wait for Me to Son You're Punk Ass and Crush You're Whole Lil Shit. I'll Big Pun Your Punk Ass, You a Scared Little Bitch"
"Tip Toeing Around My Name Nigga You Lame, and When I Get at You Homie Don't You Tell Me You Was Just Playing"
"Yelling One, Two, Three, Four Five. I Am, the Greatest Rapper Alive"
"Go Celebrate With Your Team and Let Victory Vouch You, Just Know the Next Game Played I Might Slap the Shit Out' You"
"A Difference Between Accomplishments and Astonishments"
•ELEMENT. (2017): Much Like The Heart Part 4, This Song Is Also Seen as a Big Sean Diss Primarily. But The 2023 Leaked Version Shows Kendrick Was Prepared to Use This Song to Kick Off the Drake Beef Officially. Obviously, Things Changed and He Went With a More Commercial Version, But Still Had Shots. The Most Direct Shot to Drake Being a Reference to Drake being In Compton Shooting the "100" Music Video, and Another Call Back to the Top 5 Lyrics from Grammys. This Was Also the Beginning of the "Bogeyman" Narrative Surrounding Kendrick, As He Begs Any Rapper to Say His Name On Wax.
"I Don't Do It for the Gram, I Do It for Compton"
"If I Gotta Slap a Pussy Ass Nigga, I'ma Make It Look Sexy"
"Mr. One Through Five, That's the Only Logic"
"Niggas Want to Flex On Me and Be In LA for Free Huh? Next Time They Hit the 10 Freeway, We Need Receipts Huh?"
"Most of Y'all Throw Rocks and Try to Hide Your Hand. Just Say His Name and I Promise That You'll See Candy Man"
"Last LP, I Tried to Lift the Black Artist, But It's a Difference Between Black Artists and Wack Artists"
•GOD.* (2017): Kendrick Once Again Trolls Drake's Flow. This Time Copying the Flow from Drake & Kanye's Song "Glow" No Direct Shots or Subliminal's Really.
•Mask Off Remix (2017): Kendrick's Post-DAMN. Victory Lap. After Years of Drake Being Able to Big Bro Him In the Beef, Kendrick Outsells and Outperforms Drake In 2017. Kendrick Now Takes the Position of Being Just as Commercial as Drake, While Still Being True to Himself. The Gap Had Finally Been Closed, Authenticity and Artistry Begin to Play an Even Bigger Role In the Beef.
"Platinum, Platinum, Platinum, Gotta Look at Yourself and Ask What Happened"
"How Y'all Let a Conscious Nigga Go Commercial While Only Makin' Conscious Albums?"
"How Y'all Let the Braids On the TV? How Y'all Let the Hood at the Table?"
•Family Feud (2017): Interestingly Enough, at This Point It Had Been 2 Years Since Drake Sent Any Direct Shots at Kendrick. And Honestly at This Point There Wasn't Much He Could Say. Kendrick Was Still Active, Moving the Culture, and Just as Relevant as Drake. These Bars Are Seen as a Warning to Meek In Case He Wanted to Start the Beef Again, But I Think It's More Directed at Kendrick. Drake Sees the Gap Closing, But Makes It Clear He Can Still Go There With Kendrick If Need Be. Possibly the Biggest Reach of this List, But It Tracks.
"But This Ain't All About Calling Truce I'm, Still Dishin' Out Verbal Abuse. That Shit Could Get Reintroduced If Somebody Got Something They Urging to Prove Nigga"
•All the Stars (2018): Kendrick Had a Monster 2017 With the Release of DAMN. So Monster Even Drake Had to Recognize It. I Can't Find an Exact Link to the Article, But Drake Congratulated Kendrick On His Success During an Interview. Possibly Another Olive Branch Like For Free, But Kendrick Clearly Wasn't Feeling It. He Tells Drake to Keep His Fake Praise to Himself. And Even Just Plain Out States He Doesn't Like Drake.
"Fuck You and All Your Expectations, I Don't Even Want You're Congratulations"
"I Recognize You're False Confidence and Calculated Promises. All In You're Conversation"
"You Endorsin'? Motherfucker, I Don't Even Like You"
"I Want the Credit If I'm Losing or I'm Winning"
•Diplomatic Immunity (2018): Possibly a Little Upset at Kendrick Dismissing His Congratulations, Drake Goes Back On the Offensive for the First Time Since "100". He Reaffirms His Position As Kendrick's Big Homie By Referencing Songs from To Pimp a Butterfly, U and I. Essentially Telling Kendrick He Got Too Much Dip On His Chip After 2017, and to Remember Where He Came From.
"They Try to Compare Us But, Like a Job Straight Out of High School There's No U and I"
"I Taught You Everything You Know Now You Got Student Pride"
•Sandra's Rose (2018): In 2018 Drake Had A LOT More to Worry About Than Kendrick Lamar. He Spends the Majority of Scorpion Going at Kanye West & Pusha T, But Made Sure Cornrow Kenny Caught a Stray Too With a Reference to "Mortal Man" from TPAB. After This We Would See Kendrick Withdraw from the Game for a While Due to Personal Reason and the 2020 Pandemic, Essentially Surrendering the Throne to Drake. At Least for the Time Being.
"I Walk In Godly Form Amongst the Mortal Men"
•Family Ties (2021): In the 3 Years Since Sandra's Rose, Drake Has Continued to Run the Score Up. Going On An Insane Run of #1 Hits, and Establishing Himself As Not Only the Biggest Act In Rap, But Arguably the Biggest In the World. With the Change In Sound Hip-Hop Was Going Through, Some Wondered If Kendrick Still Had a Place In This Game As a Top Rapper. Could He Still Make Hits and Be Relevant to the Culture? Or Was He Going the André 3000 Route? This Banger With Baby Keem Answered All Those Questions. Kendrick Comes With a Refreshed Energy, Addressing His Absence, and Making It Very Clear He Still See's Himself as the Best Rapper In the World. He Once Again References the Drake "Top 5" Line from Grammys, and Makes Allegations That Drake's Numbers Have Been Falsified. Baby Keem Even Gets a Shot In Towards the End As He Alleged Drake or, Number 2, Was Messaging His Girl. Reaffirming to Drake They Still See Him As #2, and Insinuating Drake Is a Thirst God.
"Smoking On Your Top 5 Tonight" "Don't You Address Me Unless It's With Four Letters"
"Last Year, Y'all Fucked Up All the Listener, Who Went Platinum? I Call That a Visor. Who the Fuck Backin' 'Em? All Been Falsified"
"#2 DM'ing My Bitch, That's Cool, I Don't Ask Why"
•No Friends In the Industry (2021): Drake's Responds to Family Ties With His Most Direct Shot Since Sandra's Rose. Much Like Scorpion, Drake Was Pretty Preoccupied With Kanye West for This Project, But Made Sure to Let Kendrick Know He Can't Touch Him In the Numbers Game Anymore.
"Fuck Debating Who the GOAT. Better Not Make This Shit About the Numbers All I Know, Better Not Make This Shit About the Summers All I Know"
•Father Time (2022): After Kanye and Drake Got Back Together In 2021 For a Larry Hoover Concert, a Lot of Fans Were Confused, Kendrick Being No Different. He Likely Saw Some of Himself In Kanye, and Wonders How Somebody With a Mind Like Kanye Links Back Up With Somebody Who's Taunted Him and His Family for Years. You Can Literally Hear the Disappointment In Kendrick's Voice, But He Uses It As An Opportunity to Self Reflect and Wonder If He's Going About His Issues With Drake the Wrong Way. This Was Also Kendrick's First Time Saying Drake's Name On Wax Since "Control".
"When Kanye Got Back With Drake, I Was Slightly Confused. Guess I'm Not Mature As I Think, Got Some Healing to Do"
•Churchill Downs (2022): Drake Finds a New Angle. With Kendrick Retuning to the Game With Mr. Morale and The Big Steppers, Not Everybody Was So Impressed. Drake Begins to Poke at Kendrick's Height, and His Lack of Presence In the Game Since 2017. He Almost Seemed Offended That Somebody Who Took 5 Years Off Could Still Be Mentioned In the Same Breathe as Him.
"All I Hear Is Tall Tales Coming from Little Men"
"Same Ones That Say They Run the Game When They Not Even In It"
•The Hillbillies (2023): A Hilarious Parody of "Sticky" from Honestly, Nevermind. No Direct Shots or Subs, But Kendrick and Keem Are Clearly Poking Fun at Drake for Making a Mediocre Dance Album.
•AMERICA HAS A PROBLEM (2023): Scary Foreshadowing. Kendrick Admits That the Spirituality He's Showcased Since Mr. Morale Has Been a Little Inauthentic, Because There's Somebody Out There He Still REALLY Wants to Slap the Shit Out Of. He Also Warns This Artists Day One Fans to Have Some Facts On them. Just Insane, and Makes You Wonder How Long Kendrick Has Really Been Scheming.
"Truthfully I Be Lying In My Rap Songs, Cause I Always Fail to Mention I'll Slap Homie"
"His Career Didn't Come With No Life Insurance, Hope His Day One Fans Got Some Facts On Them"
•First Person Shooter (2023): This Is An Interesting One, Because Drake Doesn't Really Send Any Shots. Besides Calling Himself the GOAT, and Comparing Himself to Michael Jackson, Not Much On Here Can Track Back to Kendrick. J. Cole Does Mention Kendrick As a Member of the Big 3, But Then Says the Spiderman Meme Is Me Looking at Drake. Likely Asserting Kendrick's Lack of Activity Puts Cole In that #2 Spot Officially. It Feels Like a Narrative Was Being Pushed That Drake & Cole Were the Top 2. Kendrick Once Again Takes Exception to This, Wondering How These Guys Are BFF's All of a Sudden. Wondering How Somebody Like Cole Aligns Himself With Somebody Like Drake. Hearing Drake Flex Beating a Michael Jackson Record, While Giving Cole His First #1. Cole and Drake Claiming the Top 2 Spots? This Was the Moment Kendrick Decided to Go Nuclear.
"Who the GOAT? Tell Me Who You Really Rooting For. Like a Kid Who Act Bad from January to November, Nigga It's Just You and Cole"
"Love When They Argue the Hardest MC. Is It K-Dot, Is If Aubrey or Me? We the Big Three Like We Started a League, But Right Now I Feel Like Muhammed Ali"
"Rhyming With Me Is the Biggest Mistake, the Spiderman Meme Is Me Looking at Drake"
"Everybody Steppers, Well Fuck It, Then Everybody Breakfast and I'm Bout to Clean Up My Plate"
"Niggas Steady Talking Bout' When This Gone Be Repeated, What the Fuck Bro? I'm One Away from Michael, Nigga Beat It"
•Stories About My Brother (2023): Once Again Some Insane Foreshadowing. This Song Is Drake Once Again Reaffirming His Status as Top Dog, and Shouting Out the Shooters He Keeps Around Him. He Also Talks About Artists Banding Together to Put a Dent In His Armor. He Then Addresses Kendrick, Telling Him Mr. Morale Was "Buns" He Also Wants Kendrick to Know Nobody Would Care If He Retired. Saying He's Not "Kobe Bryant" to Us, Possibly a Reference to Kendrick & Kobe's 2017 Interview. The Final Chapter of Subliminal's. Clearly Kendrick Had Enough.
"Your Last Album Was Buns, You Niggas Hawaiian As Fuck"
"I Can't Wait for the Day You Choose to Retire You're Stuff, Takin' Off the Sneakers Cause You Tired of Lacing 'Em Up"
"That's How You Gone Find Out You Not Kobe Bryant to Us"
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•Control (2013): Kendrick Addresses Drake, Along With 10 Other Rappers, In His Verse, Prompting Passive Aggressive Reactions from Drake. Drake Downplayed the Verse In Interviews, and Seemed Genuinely Annoyed He Had to Constantly Discuss Kendrick During the Rollout for His Next Album Nothing Was the Same.
"And That Goes for; Jermaine Cole, Big K.R.I.T., Wale, Pusha T, Meek Mills, A$AP Rocky, DRAKE, Big Sean, Jay Electron, Tyler, Mac Miller"
"I Got Love for You All But I'm Trynna Murder You Niggas, Trynna Make Sure Your Core Fans Never Heard of You Niggas, They Don't Want to Hear Not One More Noun or Verb from You Niggas"
•The Language (2013): After Months of Hating In Interviews, Drake Finally Addresses Control On Wax, Albeit Subliminally. He Makes It Clear He's Doesn't View Kendrick In the Same Light as Critics Do. And Believes Kendrick Is Only Doing This to Get a Reaction Out of Him. Both Points Would End Up Common Themes Whenever Drake Addresses Kendrick.
"I Don't Know Why They Been Lying But You're Shit Is Not That Inspiring."
"Fuck Anybody That's Talking That Shit Just to Get a Reaction."
"I Am The One With the Motormouth I Am the One You Should Worry Bout.'"
•BET Awards Cypher (2013): Drake's Subliminal's On "The Language" prompt Kendrick to Make the Most Direct Shots So Far, During TDE's Cypher at the 2013 BET Awards. Directly Referencing Drake's Latest Album "Nothing Was the Same" Only 3 Weeks After It Released. Calling Drake a Sensitive Rapper, a Trend That Would Continue Through This Beef.
"And Nothing's Been The Same Since They Dropped Control and Tucked a Sensitive Rapper Back In His Pajama Clothes."
"I Got My Thumb On Hip-Hop, and My Foot In the Back of Your Ass."
•Sh!t REMIX (2013): Drake Takes the Position of Kendrick's Big Homie, a Trend That Would Also Continue In This Beef. He Makes Multiple Mentions of Helping Kendrick Out By Giving Him a Feature and Bringing His Tour to Los Angeles In 2011 When Kendrick Was a Much Smaller Artist.
"Took Niggas Out the Hood Like I'm from There, So You Know It's All Good When I Come There"
"I Hear You Talking About You're City Like You Run There, Then I Brought My Tour to You're City, You My Son There"
•0 to 100 / The Catch Up (2014): On The Catch Up, Drake Vents to a Woman About Rappers Mentioning Him In Verses, and Coming to Terms With the Fact He's Top Dog Now and The Problems That Come With That. An Obvious Reaction to the Quick Back and Forth They Had after Control. He's Framing Kendrick, and Other Rappers, As Clout Hungry Envious Haters That Just Want His Spot.
"Imagine How It Feel to Watch Another Nigga At the Top, You Know That If You Wasn't You You Would Be Dissing You Dawg?"
•Pay for It (2014): Kendrick Goes On the Offensive for the First Time Since the BET Cypher. He Directly Responds to a Drake's Motormouth Lyric from "The Language", and Let's Drake Know This Isn't a Warning Shot, It's War Now.
"Been Dissecting Your Motormouth, Til' I Break Down the Engine"
"This Ain't No Warning Shot, This a Relevant Henchman"
"Ending Our Friendship, Baby I'd Rather Die Alone"
•Used To (2015): Drake References a 2013 Interview With Elliot Wilson, Where He Alleged He Saw Kendrick Days After the Control Verse, and His Demeanor Was Quite Friendly.
"They Gone Say You're Name On Them Airwaves, They Gone Hit You Up Right After Like It's Only Rap"
•6PM In New York (2015): On One of Drake's Classic Timestamp Records, He Takes Shot's At a Bunch of Artist, Most Notably Tyga. But Towards the end of the Track, He Takes Subliminal Shots at BOTH Kanye West and Kendrick Lamar. Mentioning "Money Trees" and "Blood On the Leaves" Making It Clear He's Ready to Go There With Artist's of Any Caliber.
"Why You Rapping Like You Come from the Streets? I Got a Backyard Where Money Seems to Come from the Trees, and I'm Never Ever Scared to Get Some Blood On My Leaves"
•King Kunta (2015): Kendrick Subliminally Addresses Rappers Trying to Sit On His Throne. Most Notably Though, Are the Bars About Rappers With Ghostwriters. When This Song First Released Nobody Knew Who Kendrick Was Referring To. But Months Later, After Meek Mill Exposed Drake for Using Ghostwriters, It Became Obvious Who King Kunta was referencing. It Was At This Exact Point the Entire Dynamic of the Beef Began to Change.
"I Got a Bone to Pick. I Don't Want You Monkey Mouth Motherfuckers Sitting At My Throne Again."
"I Can Dig Rapping, But a Rapper With a Ghostwriter? What the Fuck Happened?"
"I Swore I Wouldn't Tell, But Most of Y'all Sharing Bars Like You Got the Bottom Bunk In a 2-Man Cell"
•Hood Politics (2015): While There Are No Direct Shots at Drake, Kendrick Does Make Reference to Reactions to the Control Verse. He Talks About People In Our Culture Being Too Sensitive and That Further Dissing Could Lead to Violence Because of That. But Makes It Clear He Can Press the "Red Button" and Get the West Coast Involved If It Has to Go There. More Directed Towards East Coast vs. West Coast Than Drake, But Still Relevant to the Lore.
"Unless You Talking About Power, Yeah I Got A Lot of It. I'm the Only Rapper Next to Snoop That Can Press the Button"
"Had the Coast On Standby, "K Dot What's Up? I Heard They Opened Up Pandora's Box, I'll Box 'Em All In By a Landslide"
"I Resolved Inside That Private Hall While Sitting Down With JAY (JAY-Z), He Said "It's Funny How One Verse Can Fuck Up the Game"
•100 (2015): Drake Makes Another Big Bro Maneuver. Featuring On a Compton Legends Song (The Game), While Filming the Music Video In Compton. The Verse Seems to Be a Reaction to the Praise Kendrick Received for "To Pimp a Butterfly" He Wants Kendrick to Know That If He Felt Like It, He Could Make An Album Just As Great As TPAB. He Also Claims Kendrick's Recent Music Gets No Play In the Club and When It Does, the Reaction Is Lackluster.
"I Would Have All of Your Fans If I Didn't Go Pop and I Stayed On Some Conscious Shit"
"I'm In the Club Every Time They Play the Competition, If They Even Play the Competition, and I Seen the Response They Get"
•Darkside/Gone (2015): Kendrick One Ups Drake. Likely Upset a Compton Legend Allowed Drake to Diss Him On a Song, Kendrick Teams Up With THE Compton Legend On an Album Named "Compton" to respond to Drake. Directly Referencing Drake's song "Enemies" And Pokes Fun at the Constant Subliminal's Drake Continues to Send.
"But I Still Got Enemies Giving Me Energy I Want to Fight Now"
"Subliminal Sent to Me All of This Hate, I Thought I Was Holding the Mic Down"
•Deep Water (2015): The More Direct of the Compton Soundtrack Disses. He Again References a Drake Song, This Time "Started from the Bottom" Asserting That Unlike Drake, He Really Started from the Bottom. There's Also References to the Number "6" Which Drake Has a Known Affinity For.
"Motherfucker Know I Started from the Bottom"
"They Liable to Bury Him, They Nominate Six to Carry Him. They Worry Him to Death But He No Vegetarian"
"The Beef Is On His Breathe, Inheriting the Drama Better Than a Great White, This Is Life In My Aquarium"
•Summer Sixteen (2016): Phase Two of the Beef Beings Here. In 2015 President Barack Obama Was Asked Who Would Win In a Beef Between Kendrick Lamar & Drake. Barack Obama Picked Kendrick, and Obviously, Drake Doesn't Agree. A Quick Sub to Kendrick On a Song Mostly Focused On the Meek Mill Beef.
"Tell Obama That My Verses Are Just Like The Whips That He In, They Bulletproof"
•Untitled 02 (2016): Kendrick Pokes Fun at Drake, Parodying His "If You're Reading This" Flow On the Last Verse. No Real Direct Shots But Some Possible Subs.
"I Can Put a Rapper On Life Support, Guarantee That's Something None of You Want"
•Untitled 07 (2016): On the Penultimate Song from Untitled Unmastered, Kendrick Addresses a Few Artists Who Sent Shots at Him After TPAB. Though the Jay Electronica Shots Are Most Notable, He Does Take a Second to Remind Drake That He's Not Ready for War. Essentially Calling Drake a Bitch.
"You Niggas Fear Me Like Y'all Fear God"
"Before You Poke Out Your Chest, Loosen Your Bra"
"The Mastemind, and Til' My Next Album, More Power to You"
•Grammys (2016): While There Are No Obvious Shots At Kendrick, This Is an Important Song In the Lore. On This Song Drake Starts the "Top 5" Discussion In Hip-Hop, and Saying His Spot There Is Not for Debate. This Would Be Referenced On Many Disses Moving Forward.
"Most Niggas With a Deal, Couldn't Make a Greatest Hits"
"Y'all a Whole Lot of Things, But You Still Ain't This"
"Whole City Going Crazy, Top 5 No Debating. Top 5, Top 5, Top 5"
•For Free (2016): One of the More Weird Instances In This Beef. Drake Makes a Sly Reference to Kendrick's 2015 Song, For Free? (Interlude). It's Not Clear If This Was an Attempt at Being Friendly Again, or a Petty Pot Shot. Although Seeing How Things Played Out After, I'd Assume This Reference Was VERY Tongue In Cheek.
"And Like Your Boy from Compton Said "You Know This Dick Ain't Free"
•Gyalchester (2017): Drake Makes a Direct Reference to Grammys. Asserting That's He's No Longer Just Top 5, He's Top 2 and He's Not #2. Kendrick Would Obviously Take Exception. The Artist He's Been Compared to for the last 4 Years Just Claimed the #1 Spot On Record.
"I Know I Said Top 5 But I'm Top 2, and I'm Not 2, and I Got One, Thought You Had One, But It's Not One, Nigga Nah"
•The Heart Part 4 (2017): Kendrick Becomes the Big Dog. In The Two Years Since TPAB, Kendrick Received a Ton of Criticism from Other Artists. Downplaying the Impact of the Record, Downplaying Kendricks Skill as An MC. He Was Being Boxed In as the "Black Power" Rapper and Artists Not Named Drake (Big Sean, Jay Electronica, Lupe Fiasco) were beginning to feel very comfortable shooting at Kendrick. Then Comes The Heart Part 4. This Was Almost Like Kendrick's 5AM In Toronto. He's Now Established As a Top Dog In the Game, and He Let's Everybody, Including Drake, Know. A Lot of Bars On Here Could Be Interpreted as Big Sean Disses, But Kendrick Counting Up to 5 and Proclaiming Himself as the Greatest Rapper Alive Was Cleary a Response to Gyalchester.
"My Fans Can't Wait for Me to Son You're Punk Ass and Crush You're Whole Lil Shit. I'll Big Pun Your Punk Ass, You a Scared Little Bitch"
"Tip Toeing Around My Name Nigga You Lame, and When I Get at You Homie Don't You Tell Me You Was Just Playing"
"Yelling One, Two, Three, Four Five. I Am, the Greatest Rapper Alive"
"Go Celebrate With Your Team and Let Victory Vouch You, Just Know the Next Game Played I Might Slap the Shit Out' You"
"A Difference Between Accomplishments and Astonishments"
•ELEMENT. (2017): Much Like The Heart Part 4, This Song Is Also Seen as a Big Sean Diss Primarily. But The 2023 Leaked Version Shows Kendrick Was Prepared to Use This Song to Kick Off the Drake Beef Officially. Obviously, Things Changed and He Went With a More Commercial Version, But Still Had Shots. The Most Direct Shot to Drake Being a Reference to Drake being In Compton Shooting the "100" Music Video, and Another Call Back to the Top 5 Lyrics from Grammys. This Was Also the Beginning of the "Bogeyman" Narrative Surrounding Kendrick, As He Begs Any Rapper to Say His Name On Wax.
"I Don't Do It for the Gram, I Do It for Compton"
"If I Gotta Slap a Pussy Ass Nigga, I'ma Make It Look Sexy"
"Mr. One Through Five, That's the Only Logic"
"Niggas Want to Flex On Me and Be In LA for Free Huh? Next Time They Hit the 10 Freeway, We Need Receipts Huh?"
"Most of Y'all Throw Rocks and Try to Hide Your Hand. Just Say His Name and I Promise That You'll See Candy Man"
"Last LP, I Tried to Lift the Black Artist, But It's a Difference Between Black Artists and Wack Artists"
•GOD.* (2017): Kendrick Once Again Trolls Drake's Flow. This Time Copying the Flow from Drake & Kanye's Song "Glow" No Direct Shots or Subliminal's Really.
•Mask Off Remix (2017): Kendrick's Post-DAMN. Victory Lap. After Years of Drake Being Able to Big Bro Him In the Beef, Kendrick Outsells and Outperforms Drake In 2017. Kendrick Now Takes the Position of Being Just as Commercial as Drake, While Still Being True to Himself. The Gap Had Finally Been Closed, Authenticity and Artistry Begin to Play an Even Bigger Role In the Beef.
"Platinum, Platinum, Platinum, Gotta Look at Yourself and Ask What Happened"
"How Y'all Let a Conscious Nigga Go Commercial While Only Makin' Conscious Albums?"
"How Y'all Let the Braids On the TV? How Y'all Let the Hood at the Table?"
•Family Feud (2017): Interestingly Enough, at This Point It Had Been 2 Years Since Drake Sent Any Direct Shots at Kendrick. And Honestly at This Point There Wasn't Much He Could Say. Kendrick Was Still Active, Moving the Culture, and Just as Relevant as Drake. These Bars Are Seen as a Warning to Meek In Case He Wanted to Start the Beef Again, But I Think It's More Directed at Kendrick. Drake Sees the Gap Closing, But Makes It Clear He Can Still Go There With Kendrick If Need Be. Possibly the Biggest Reach of this List, But It Tracks.
"But This Ain't All About Calling Truce I'm, Still Dishin' Out Verbal Abuse. That Shit Could Get Reintroduced If Somebody Got Something They Urging to Prove Nigga"
•All the Stars (2018): Kendrick Had a Monster 2017 With the Release of DAMN. So Monster Even Drake Had to Recognize It. I Can't Find an Exact Link to the Article, But Drake Congratulated Kendrick On His Success During an Interview. Possibly Another Olive Branch Like For Free, But Kendrick Clearly Wasn't Feeling It. He Tells Drake to Keep His Fake Praise to Himself. And Even Just Plain Out States He Doesn't Like Drake.
"Fuck You and All Your Expectations, I Don't Even Want You're Congratulations"
"I Recognize You're False Confidence and Calculated Promises. All In You're Conversation"
"You Endorsin'? Motherfucker, I Don't Even Like You"
"I Want the Credit If I'm Losing or I'm Winning"
•Diplomatic Immunity (2018): Possibly a Little Upset at Kendrick Dismissing His Congratulations, Drake Goes Back On the Offensive for the First Time Since "100". He Reaffirms His Position As Kendrick's Big Homie By Referencing Songs from To Pimp a Butterfly, U and I. Essentially Telling Kendrick He Got Too Much Dip On His Chip After 2017, and to Remember Where He Came From.
"They Try to Compare Us But, Like a Job Straight Out of High School There's No U and I"
"I Taught You Everything You Know Now You Got Student Pride"
•Sandra's Rose (2018): In 2018 Drake Had A LOT More to Worry About Than Kendrick Lamar. He Spends the Majority of Scorpion Going at Kanye West & Pusha T, But Made Sure Cornrow Kenny Caught a Stray Too With a Reference to "Mortal Man" from TPAB. After This We Would See Kendrick Withdraw from the Game for a While Due to Personal Reason and the 2020 Pandemic, Essentially Surrendering the Throne to Drake. At Least for the Time Being.
"I Walk In Godly Form Amongst the Mortal Men"
•Family Ties (2021): In the 3 Years Since Sandra's Rose, Drake Has Continued to Run the Score Up. Going On An Insane Run of #1 Hits, and Establishing Himself As Not Only the Biggest Act In Rap, But Arguably the Biggest In the World. With the Change In Sound Hip-Hop Was Going Through, Some Wondered If Kendrick Still Had a Place In This Game As a Top Rapper. Could He Still Make Hits and Be Relevant to the Culture? Or Was He Going the André 3000 Route? This Banger With Baby Keem Answered All Those Questions. Kendrick Comes With a Refreshed Energy, Addressing His Absence, and Making It Very Clear He Still See's Himself as the Best Rapper In the World. He Once Again References the Drake "Top 5" Line from Grammys, and Makes Allegations That Drake's Numbers Have Been Falsified. Baby Keem Even Gets a Shot In Towards the End As He Alleged Drake or, Number 2, Was Messaging His Girl. Reaffirming to Drake They Still See Him As #2, and Insinuating Drake Is a Thirst God.
"Smoking On Your Top 5 Tonight" "Don't You Address Me Unless It's With Four Letters"
"Last Year, Y'all Fucked Up All the Listener, Who Went Platinum? I Call That a Visor. Who the Fuck Backin' 'Em? All Been Falsified"
"#2 DM'ing My Bitch, That's Cool, I Don't Ask Why"
•No Friends In the Industry (2021): Drake's Responds to Family Ties With His Most Direct Shot Since Sandra's Rose. Much Like Scorpion, Drake Was Pretty Preoccupied With Kanye West for This Project, But Made Sure to Let Kendrick Know He Can't Touch Him In the Numbers Game Anymore.
"Fuck Debating Who the GOAT. Better Not Make This Shit About the Numbers All I Know, Better Not Make This Shit About the Summers All I Know"
•Father Time (2022): After Kanye and Drake Got Back Together In 2021 For a Larry Hoover Concert, a Lot of Fans Were Confused, Kendrick Being No Different. He Likely Saw Some of Himself In Kanye, and Wonders How Somebody With a Mind Like Kanye Links Back Up With Somebody Who's Taunted Him and His Family for Years. You Can Literally Hear the Disappointment In Kendrick's Voice, But He Uses It As An Opportunity to Self Reflect and Wonder If He's Going About His Issues With Drake the Wrong Way. This Was Also Kendrick's First Time Saying Drake's Name On Wax Since "Control".
"When Kanye Got Back With Drake, I Was Slightly Confused. Guess I'm Not Mature As I Think, Got Some Healing to Do"
•Churchill Downs (2022): Drake Finds a New Angle. With Kendrick Retuning to the Game With Mr. Morale and The Big Steppers, Not Everybody Was So Impressed. Drake Begins to Poke at Kendrick's Height, and His Lack of Presence In the Game Since 2017. He Almost Seemed Offended That Somebody Who Took 5 Years Off Could Still Be Mentioned In the Same Breathe as Him.
"All I Hear Is Tall Tales Coming from Little Men"
"Same Ones That Say They Run the Game When They Not Even In It"
•The Hillbillies (2023): A Hilarious Parody of "Sticky" from Honestly, Nevermind. No Direct Shots or Subs, But Kendrick and Keem Are Clearly Poking Fun at Drake for Making a Mediocre Dance Album.
•AMERICA HAS A PROBLEM (2023): Scary Foreshadowing. Kendrick Admits That the Spirituality He's Showcased Since Mr. Morale Has Been a Little Inauthentic, Because There's Somebody Out There He Still REALLY Wants to Slap the Shit Out Of. He Also Warns This Artists Day One Fans to Have Some Facts On them. Just Insane, and Makes You Wonder How Long Kendrick Has Really Been Scheming.
"Truthfully I Be Lying In My Rap Songs, Cause I Always Fail to Mention I'll Slap Homie"
"His Career Didn't Come With No Life Insurance, Hope His Day One Fans Got Some Facts On Them"
•First Person Shooter (2023): This Is An Interesting One, Because Drake Doesn't Really Send Any Shots. Besides Calling Himself the GOAT, and Comparing Himself to Michael Jackson, Not Much On Here Can Track Back to Kendrick. J. Cole Does Mention Kendrick As a Member of the Big 3, But Then Says the Spiderman Meme Is Me Looking at Drake. Likely Asserting Kendrick's Lack of Activity Puts Cole In that #2 Spot Officially. It Feels Like a Narrative Was Being Pushed That Drake & Cole Were the Top 2. Kendrick Once Again Takes Exception to This, Wondering How These Guys Are BFF's All of a Sudden. Wondering How Somebody Like Cole Aligns Himself With Somebody Like Drake. Hearing Drake Flex Beating a Michael Jackson Record, While Giving Cole His First #1. Cole and Drake Claiming the Top 2 Spots? This Was the Moment Kendrick Decided to Go Nuclear.
"Who the GOAT? Tell Me Who You Really Rooting For. Like a Kid Who Act Bad from January to November, Nigga It's Just You and Cole"
"Love When They Argue the Hardest MC. Is It K-Dot, Is If Aubrey or Me? We the Big Three Like We Started a League, But Right Now I Feel Like Muhammed Ali"
"Rhyming With Me Is the Biggest Mistake, the Spiderman Meme Is Me Looking at Drake"
"Everybody Steppers, Well Fuck It, Then Everybody Breakfast and I'm Bout to Clean Up My Plate"
"Niggas Steady Talking Bout' When This Gone Be Repeated, What the Fuck Bro? I'm One Away from Michael, Nigga Beat It"
•Stories About My Brother (2023): Once Again Some Insane Foreshadowing. This Song Is Drake Once Again Reaffirming His Status as Top Dog, and Shouting Out the Shooters He Keeps Around Him. He Also Talks About Artists Banding Together to Put a Dent In His Armor. He Then Addresses Kendrick, Telling Him Mr. Morale Was "Buns" He Also Wants Kendrick to Know Nobody Would Care If He Retired. Saying He's Not "Kobe Bryant" to Us, Possibly a Reference to Kendrick & Kobe's 2017 Interview. The Final Chapter of Subliminal's. Clearly Kendrick Had Enough.
"Your Last Album Was Buns, You Niggas Hawaiian As Fuck"
"I Can't Wait for the Day You Choose to Retire You're Stuff, Takin' Off the Sneakers Cause You Tired of Lacing 'Em Up"
"That's How You Gone Find Out You Not Kobe Bryant to Us"
2024.05.11 17:38 Chimera_Tracker They burned heaven in retribution, was it all worth it?
Colonies have been left in smoldering ruins. Razed to ashes by attackers that promised friendship in the vast void. Corpses left as ash across a dozen worlds, their existence almost completely eradicated by the invasive procession of their once welcoming neighbour. Where proud structures once stood against the frontier, cracked bones sat in silence under clouds of death.
In orbit, transponder pings of broken ships sang out into the cold eternal night. The frozen corpses of their crews revolved around the shattered metal hulks they once called home. Their resting places to be forgotten as their 'beep beep' into the eternal night grew ever softer.
.
.
.
Close to the heart of their civilization, Commodore Rankin sipped broseki tea as he examined the holographic map being displayed across the tabletop before him. It showed their progress into human space. All the systems they owned and occupied were highlighted red while the enemy’s’ were blue. From his end of the table, it looked like the Genosian Republic was extending a crooked hairy tendril right into the heart of human occupied space. Purity’s reach into the heart of corruption. After that terrible first strike, it was only right. Soon, they'd have the human cradle world, and with it, the humans would have no alternative but to submit and answer for the atrocity they committed at Oztei.
A soft patter of footsteps would disturb his tranquil meditation, drawing Rankin’s attention to a new entry into the station’s command center. The familiar figure on their way to their post was none other than Toressa, one of the many officers involved in information processing. More importantly though, she was a close friend in need of help.
Loose papers under her arm, uniform crumpled, and with her head tendrils sticking out at awkward angles, it appeared as though she'd spent another night obsessing on that conspiracy theory of hers about the beginnings of the war. A distracting side hobby of hers that got her sent back from the front lines. She used to be an up and coming officer when they were both the same rank. He continued going up while she stumbled and ended up drifting from post to post. If it weren’t for him, she’d have been dishonorably discharged with a permanent black mark on her head. To have a tendril on ones head permanently locked to a singular color was bad enough, to have it marked black for the rest of your life was another thing all together. It told everyone you weren’t to be trusted, that you were a danger, that you were the enemy even if you were one of us. It was the worst fate one could be given in their society.
Setting his cup down on the edge of the table, he straightens himself and makes his way over to her terminal to have a chat. He was determined to help her out of this rut, not just for what she’d done for him when they were recruits, but for what she’s meant to him through all these years.
Nearing her position, he’d notice the mild shift in her skin tone, signaling her awareness of his approach. It would be confirmed with her speaking before he could, "If you're here as my commanding officer, I know I'm late, I'll stay back to cover the time owed for my tardiness. If you’re here as my friend, I’m sorry for missing dinner last night.”
Rankin shook his head as he reached over her shoulder to pluck one of the loose papers she’d brought in and left sitting at the edge of her terminal. It was filled with mathematical formulae he recognised as spatial jump coordinates for ships. An antiquated system used by ships traversing great distances a long time ago, before the discovery of the hyperlinks. They were risky maneuvers that required immense precision to even increase your chances of appearing where you intended to a point above zero. What stuck out to him was not that she’d done the calculations by hand, but according to them, the chance of successful transition through said jumps was less than one percent.
"I'm here as your friend Toressa. I'm worried about you. I’ve entertained your eccentricities since you’ve come here because you promised they wouldn’t affect your duties like it has at your other posts. If it is starting to now, I think it would be best if we nib it in the bud wouldn’t you agree? It would be in your best-“
“Ha!” She scoffed loud enough to startle another officer seated nearby, “It would be in my best interests? Really? That’s a load of crap and you know it Rankin.”
Her words dripped with such hate it nearly made the hulking commanding officer flinch.
“It is Commodore Rankin, Officer Toressa. We’re-“
“In public, yeah, I remember. Honestly, I’m starting to not care, Commodore Rankin.”
“Toressa, you've been obsessing over this nonsense since P-D21. Look, everyone across the Republic, civil servant or not, were affected badly by the news reports about it. The humans destroyed that entire colony for no reason whatsoever. I know you had a distant relative there, but it was not like you could’ve done anything about it. I know I was lucky, and I know I should’ve reached out but we declared war not long after and I guess I forgot. I am sorry I wasn’t there when you needed a friend, but I am here now and I am not going to let you torch your last chance.”
He continues to stare at the back of her head as she lightly trembles, and her skin tone subtly changes. But it all stabilizes shortly after a soft ping rings out from her terminal. It would be followed by her balled up fists slamming down upon it. He peeks over her shoulder, seeing the error pop up displayed in bold letters across the cracked screen. The lock outs he had put in place this morning after she failed to report during roll call were working as hoped.
“I am sorry, but I can’t have you accessing data you have no reason to access. You were on this same self-destructive cycle at your last post. I am not going to let you do this to yourself here. There is nothing there. The human vessels slipped out of reach of the responding fleet at Oztei. We responded by attacking their foundries at P-D21. Warships being refitted were all that was there at P-D21 and we were lucky to have made it there before they went for the Capitol. The claims of the system being a frontier colony are untrue. You were an investigator on board the Rummeric at P-D21 for crying out loud. Your colleagues at the investigative bureau went after the traitors who claimed otherwise in attempt to sow dissent and start riots against the government. The last one of these scoundrels was charged as of two months ago. Are you trying to end up like them? They were liars, the whole lot.”
Rankin was nearly yelling at this point, but what Toressa said next nearly had him screaming at the top of his lungs in frustration.
“What if they weren’t the liars? What if it was us who did?”
Catching sight of the subtle shifts of color tone of the other officers seated at their stations close by was the only thing that stopped him from screaming. They were being overheard and he didn’t want this getting out no matter how good a Genosian he was.
"Lying to us?!" Rankin took half a step forward, spitting the words out with such disdain they might as well have been poison. Toressa had truly gone off the deep end if she could declare such things where listeners might eavesdrop.
'The government never lies to its people.'
That has been the motto of the Genosian Republic. All children are taught the importance of being truthful, not only to themselves but to everyone around them. From families to friends, you can never be considered a good Genoisan if you've told a lie, and a Good Genosian was what everyone strived to be. However, no society could ever survive like that. It is natural for kids to keep secrets from their parents, spouses from one another, the salesmen to their clientele. Telling half-truths is one of the many minor evils within Genosian society and though frowned upon, is not criminal. Fortunately, though such evils are present in all strata of their society, the civil service is believed to be exempt.
The Genosians believe that to serve the people, one is required to be the best possible version of themselves, and as such, amongst other things, a civil servant is said to be inherently unable to lie. To think that a high serving individual such as an Admiral or even a senator would lie not only to those around them but their entire population? That wasn't just blasphemy, it was treasonous.
Using his larger frame to act as a wall between them and those close enough to have possibly heard the treacherous remark, he whispers as softly as he could,
"Stop it! I warn you now Toressa! Do not spew such disgusting accusations. The Government would’ve never lied to us about the tragedy at Oztei. The humans attacked us after we offered them friendship. In return, Admiral Gantra led the fleet to that decisive blow at P-D21. Unlike our treacherous neighbors, we didn’t target the innocent. All civilian vessels were given the chance to leave the system when we attacked, only military targets were destroyed.”
"Oh really? Is that what you believe? That dribble? Gantara wasn’t the Hero you portray him to be. What makes you think the way you do Rankin? Seriously? How can you believe that he didn’t falsify his reports to make himself look better? Why wouldn’t he hide the-"
"Toressa! Are you insane? Are you?! What could have possibly happened to you that your mind is filled with such disgusting beliefs? You're a servant of the people, Toressa. You know better."
It was at this point that Rankin would notice something sticking out of the stack.
"Do I really? Do you want to know what I think of us servants? Do you really want to hear what I think of this war?!" Toressa spat back, her tone growing louder with each declaration, getting too loud once again for Rankins comfort.
Prodding the pile with just enough pressure to get it to topple, Rankins bites back a gasp at what he uncovers. Noticing the change in color tones of several individuals seated further away, he grabs Toressa by her forearm along with the paraphernalia. The act invites more attention to them. Eyes starring at them from across the entire room as he walks the struggling Genosian female towards the observation lounge.
On a normal day, the lounge would be a serene place for reflection and relaxation. Clear alloy bulkheads ran down the length of the room, providing any who used the space with a spectacular view of the pristine world they were blessed to orbit.
Khasana was a paradise class world, a revered holy world to the Genosian people. A place that was said to mimic what their afterlife was like. Twice the size of all habitable worlds across Genosian and Human territories, boasting a comfortable point nine gravity with zero axial tilt. A thin ring of ice and rock girdles the equator, flowing in the opposite directions to its rotation. The way the light reflects off the ring causes a soft aura to radiate around the planet, making it appear ever more paradisal.
Being such a revered world within their society, none were allowed on the surface without a permit from the Government. To obtain such a permit would require an immense amount of service to the Republic that till date, only a handful of Genosians can boast of having set foot on Khasana soil.
At this moment, the atmosphere of serenity became strained with anger as the two Genosians hashed it out within the empty space.
“Are you joking Toressa? After all I’ve done to save your commission, to get you here, you spit on all of it by having such things on your person? The Truth Seekers? Seriously?! They’re anarchists! They embody every sin known to us Toressa. They’re liars!”
Rankin crushed the flyer in his hand as he spoke, shaking his head as he steps away from Toressa and towards the bulkhead.
“They aren’t liars Rankin,” Toressa sighed as she watched her friend pull away with such disgust at her presence. His colour spoke the words he held within, and she could read him like a book, she always could.
“Nothing they’ve announced has ever been a lie. Every document, every picture, every word they’ve shared has been the truth. They might stretch the truth a little at times, but they’ve never misled anyone.”
“Oh yeah? So, you’re telling me their ramblings have all been true? Hmm? That we’ve been fighting a war we initiated? We offered them friendship Toressa, they were the ones who spat in our faces with what they did at Oztei.”
“The humans aren’t the monsters of this story Rankin,” Toressa approached, resting her hand on her friends’ shoulder, “Why do you think you’re here and not out there commanding a ship at the front? Why are you, a Commodore, commanding the station orbiting heaven? A station that is nothing more than a filing office?”
“What the hell are you talking about Toressa? I earned my position, others would’ve given an arm to-“
“Given an arm to be on a ship at the front line defending their families. Given an arm to be on a ship blowing a human vessel into pieces. Not here, watching over Heaven without ever hoping to touch it. Everyone posted here is the same Rankin. You’ve just never noticed. When you don’t do what is asked of you, when you stick to the very principles they taught you since young, when you do your damned hardest to be the best Genosian alive, they send you here as punishment. Your career forever stalled with only the sight of Heaven to remind you of what you’ve lost.”
Rankin starred at Khasana floating before them, then at Toressa’s reflection standing just beneath it. Just like how she could read him, he could read her nearly as well and he knew she truly believed every word she was telling him. In another life maybe, they could’ve been mates.
“I refused to sign the edited report of what I discovered at Jes’Port. They reassigned my commanding officer, and I got this promotion.”
Toressa nods sadly “I signed the report they gave me. I thought I was doing the right thing but the guilt from what we did ate me up inside. The reason why I know the truth seekers are telling the truth is because I was the one who fed them those documents. I’ve never slept better since.”
“What does all of this have to do with that pile of papers you brought in? Riddled with spatial jump calculations that you were so afraid to input into your personal tablet that you did them all by hand?”
Rankin glances over his shoulder at his companion who was examining her watch. She catches his gaze and smiles. He smiles back while she nods to Khasana. He turns his attention back to it as a fleet of ships arrives in orbit around it.
“That’s the flagship. Admiral Gantara and the captains of the ships at P-D21. They’re headed back to the front after their refitting.” Rankin utters out mindlessly as the unthinkable happens.
Like a rogue star it skates across the heavens at unimaginable speeds. The laws of physics bending around it, making the very fabric of the universe tremble in its wake. Forged in the flare of their home star, its body was fused with the ashes of the unjustly demised. Their names carved into every inch of its surface. Screaming to any who would hear, it would pierce Khasana’s atmosphere in an angry fiery glow.
With so many souls to be accounted for, one shell wasn’t enough. The first was followed by a second, then a third, then a fourth and then the last. Their hardy shells pierced the planets crust with ease, their immense momentum carrying them through to the liquid core in a matter of moments.
All Genosians witnessing the event stare in shock at the sizeable scar left on the planets pristine surface by the five objects. They would be witness to an even greater sight as the minutes ticked on and the shells sank closer to the core.
Khasana’s thick mantel was made of a single unbroken piece. It prevented the world from suffering quakes, even now as it was struck from up high. Cracked but otherwise undamaged spare the sizeable crater left on its surface, the interior planetary pressure remains unchanged.
The first shell reaches the point where its integrity could no longer withstand the pressures acting upon it and cracked. The liquid metal seeps through the cracks, reacting with the vial of antimatter within. The detonation sends an intense wave outward, causing the second shell to rupture and detonate in a similar manner. The third follows soon after, then the fourth and finally the fifth just as it crosses the threshold between the mantel and the liquid core. The pressure would be too much as the planet begins to shake. Cracks shoot out from the point where the five shells had pierced its mantel. Magma streams burst out, setting everything it touched on fire.
Rankin would fall to his knees as he watched heaven burn and finally explode, destroying the small fleet of ships with it. Toressa would keep her hand on his shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
“The people at Oztei died because of our own Governments failings. We killed innocent humans for nothing and hid the atrocities we committed. Now they’ve burnt heaven in retribution, was it all worth it?”
submitted by Chimera_Tracker to humansarespaceorcs [link] [comments]
In orbit, transponder pings of broken ships sang out into the cold eternal night. The frozen corpses of their crews revolved around the shattered metal hulks they once called home. Their resting places to be forgotten as their 'beep beep' into the eternal night grew ever softer.
.
.
.
Close to the heart of their civilization, Commodore Rankin sipped broseki tea as he examined the holographic map being displayed across the tabletop before him. It showed their progress into human space. All the systems they owned and occupied were highlighted red while the enemy’s’ were blue. From his end of the table, it looked like the Genosian Republic was extending a crooked hairy tendril right into the heart of human occupied space. Purity’s reach into the heart of corruption. After that terrible first strike, it was only right. Soon, they'd have the human cradle world, and with it, the humans would have no alternative but to submit and answer for the atrocity they committed at Oztei.
A soft patter of footsteps would disturb his tranquil meditation, drawing Rankin’s attention to a new entry into the station’s command center. The familiar figure on their way to their post was none other than Toressa, one of the many officers involved in information processing. More importantly though, she was a close friend in need of help.
Loose papers under her arm, uniform crumpled, and with her head tendrils sticking out at awkward angles, it appeared as though she'd spent another night obsessing on that conspiracy theory of hers about the beginnings of the war. A distracting side hobby of hers that got her sent back from the front lines. She used to be an up and coming officer when they were both the same rank. He continued going up while she stumbled and ended up drifting from post to post. If it weren’t for him, she’d have been dishonorably discharged with a permanent black mark on her head. To have a tendril on ones head permanently locked to a singular color was bad enough, to have it marked black for the rest of your life was another thing all together. It told everyone you weren’t to be trusted, that you were a danger, that you were the enemy even if you were one of us. It was the worst fate one could be given in their society.
Setting his cup down on the edge of the table, he straightens himself and makes his way over to her terminal to have a chat. He was determined to help her out of this rut, not just for what she’d done for him when they were recruits, but for what she’s meant to him through all these years.
Nearing her position, he’d notice the mild shift in her skin tone, signaling her awareness of his approach. It would be confirmed with her speaking before he could, "If you're here as my commanding officer, I know I'm late, I'll stay back to cover the time owed for my tardiness. If you’re here as my friend, I’m sorry for missing dinner last night.”
Rankin shook his head as he reached over her shoulder to pluck one of the loose papers she’d brought in and left sitting at the edge of her terminal. It was filled with mathematical formulae he recognised as spatial jump coordinates for ships. An antiquated system used by ships traversing great distances a long time ago, before the discovery of the hyperlinks. They were risky maneuvers that required immense precision to even increase your chances of appearing where you intended to a point above zero. What stuck out to him was not that she’d done the calculations by hand, but according to them, the chance of successful transition through said jumps was less than one percent.
"I'm here as your friend Toressa. I'm worried about you. I’ve entertained your eccentricities since you’ve come here because you promised they wouldn’t affect your duties like it has at your other posts. If it is starting to now, I think it would be best if we nib it in the bud wouldn’t you agree? It would be in your best-“
“Ha!” She scoffed loud enough to startle another officer seated nearby, “It would be in my best interests? Really? That’s a load of crap and you know it Rankin.”
Her words dripped with such hate it nearly made the hulking commanding officer flinch.
“It is Commodore Rankin, Officer Toressa. We’re-“
“In public, yeah, I remember. Honestly, I’m starting to not care, Commodore Rankin.”
“Toressa, you've been obsessing over this nonsense since P-D21. Look, everyone across the Republic, civil servant or not, were affected badly by the news reports about it. The humans destroyed that entire colony for no reason whatsoever. I know you had a distant relative there, but it was not like you could’ve done anything about it. I know I was lucky, and I know I should’ve reached out but we declared war not long after and I guess I forgot. I am sorry I wasn’t there when you needed a friend, but I am here now and I am not going to let you torch your last chance.”
He continues to stare at the back of her head as she lightly trembles, and her skin tone subtly changes. But it all stabilizes shortly after a soft ping rings out from her terminal. It would be followed by her balled up fists slamming down upon it. He peeks over her shoulder, seeing the error pop up displayed in bold letters across the cracked screen. The lock outs he had put in place this morning after she failed to report during roll call were working as hoped.
“I am sorry, but I can’t have you accessing data you have no reason to access. You were on this same self-destructive cycle at your last post. I am not going to let you do this to yourself here. There is nothing there. The human vessels slipped out of reach of the responding fleet at Oztei. We responded by attacking their foundries at P-D21. Warships being refitted were all that was there at P-D21 and we were lucky to have made it there before they went for the Capitol. The claims of the system being a frontier colony are untrue. You were an investigator on board the Rummeric at P-D21 for crying out loud. Your colleagues at the investigative bureau went after the traitors who claimed otherwise in attempt to sow dissent and start riots against the government. The last one of these scoundrels was charged as of two months ago. Are you trying to end up like them? They were liars, the whole lot.”
Rankin was nearly yelling at this point, but what Toressa said next nearly had him screaming at the top of his lungs in frustration.
“What if they weren’t the liars? What if it was us who did?”
Catching sight of the subtle shifts of color tone of the other officers seated at their stations close by was the only thing that stopped him from screaming. They were being overheard and he didn’t want this getting out no matter how good a Genosian he was.
"Lying to us?!" Rankin took half a step forward, spitting the words out with such disdain they might as well have been poison. Toressa had truly gone off the deep end if she could declare such things where listeners might eavesdrop.
'The government never lies to its people.'
That has been the motto of the Genosian Republic. All children are taught the importance of being truthful, not only to themselves but to everyone around them. From families to friends, you can never be considered a good Genoisan if you've told a lie, and a Good Genosian was what everyone strived to be. However, no society could ever survive like that. It is natural for kids to keep secrets from their parents, spouses from one another, the salesmen to their clientele. Telling half-truths is one of the many minor evils within Genosian society and though frowned upon, is not criminal. Fortunately, though such evils are present in all strata of their society, the civil service is believed to be exempt.
The Genosians believe that to serve the people, one is required to be the best possible version of themselves, and as such, amongst other things, a civil servant is said to be inherently unable to lie. To think that a high serving individual such as an Admiral or even a senator would lie not only to those around them but their entire population? That wasn't just blasphemy, it was treasonous.
Using his larger frame to act as a wall between them and those close enough to have possibly heard the treacherous remark, he whispers as softly as he could,
"Stop it! I warn you now Toressa! Do not spew such disgusting accusations. The Government would’ve never lied to us about the tragedy at Oztei. The humans attacked us after we offered them friendship. In return, Admiral Gantra led the fleet to that decisive blow at P-D21. Unlike our treacherous neighbors, we didn’t target the innocent. All civilian vessels were given the chance to leave the system when we attacked, only military targets were destroyed.”
"Oh really? Is that what you believe? That dribble? Gantara wasn’t the Hero you portray him to be. What makes you think the way you do Rankin? Seriously? How can you believe that he didn’t falsify his reports to make himself look better? Why wouldn’t he hide the-"
"Toressa! Are you insane? Are you?! What could have possibly happened to you that your mind is filled with such disgusting beliefs? You're a servant of the people, Toressa. You know better."
It was at this point that Rankin would notice something sticking out of the stack.
"Do I really? Do you want to know what I think of us servants? Do you really want to hear what I think of this war?!" Toressa spat back, her tone growing louder with each declaration, getting too loud once again for Rankins comfort.
Prodding the pile with just enough pressure to get it to topple, Rankins bites back a gasp at what he uncovers. Noticing the change in color tones of several individuals seated further away, he grabs Toressa by her forearm along with the paraphernalia. The act invites more attention to them. Eyes starring at them from across the entire room as he walks the struggling Genosian female towards the observation lounge.
On a normal day, the lounge would be a serene place for reflection and relaxation. Clear alloy bulkheads ran down the length of the room, providing any who used the space with a spectacular view of the pristine world they were blessed to orbit.
Khasana was a paradise class world, a revered holy world to the Genosian people. A place that was said to mimic what their afterlife was like. Twice the size of all habitable worlds across Genosian and Human territories, boasting a comfortable point nine gravity with zero axial tilt. A thin ring of ice and rock girdles the equator, flowing in the opposite directions to its rotation. The way the light reflects off the ring causes a soft aura to radiate around the planet, making it appear ever more paradisal.
Being such a revered world within their society, none were allowed on the surface without a permit from the Government. To obtain such a permit would require an immense amount of service to the Republic that till date, only a handful of Genosians can boast of having set foot on Khasana soil.
At this moment, the atmosphere of serenity became strained with anger as the two Genosians hashed it out within the empty space.
“Are you joking Toressa? After all I’ve done to save your commission, to get you here, you spit on all of it by having such things on your person? The Truth Seekers? Seriously?! They’re anarchists! They embody every sin known to us Toressa. They’re liars!”
Rankin crushed the flyer in his hand as he spoke, shaking his head as he steps away from Toressa and towards the bulkhead.
“They aren’t liars Rankin,” Toressa sighed as she watched her friend pull away with such disgust at her presence. His colour spoke the words he held within, and she could read him like a book, she always could.
“Nothing they’ve announced has ever been a lie. Every document, every picture, every word they’ve shared has been the truth. They might stretch the truth a little at times, but they’ve never misled anyone.”
“Oh yeah? So, you’re telling me their ramblings have all been true? Hmm? That we’ve been fighting a war we initiated? We offered them friendship Toressa, they were the ones who spat in our faces with what they did at Oztei.”
“The humans aren’t the monsters of this story Rankin,” Toressa approached, resting her hand on her friends’ shoulder, “Why do you think you’re here and not out there commanding a ship at the front? Why are you, a Commodore, commanding the station orbiting heaven? A station that is nothing more than a filing office?”
“What the hell are you talking about Toressa? I earned my position, others would’ve given an arm to-“
“Given an arm to be on a ship at the front line defending their families. Given an arm to be on a ship blowing a human vessel into pieces. Not here, watching over Heaven without ever hoping to touch it. Everyone posted here is the same Rankin. You’ve just never noticed. When you don’t do what is asked of you, when you stick to the very principles they taught you since young, when you do your damned hardest to be the best Genosian alive, they send you here as punishment. Your career forever stalled with only the sight of Heaven to remind you of what you’ve lost.”
Rankin starred at Khasana floating before them, then at Toressa’s reflection standing just beneath it. Just like how she could read him, he could read her nearly as well and he knew she truly believed every word she was telling him. In another life maybe, they could’ve been mates.
“I refused to sign the edited report of what I discovered at Jes’Port. They reassigned my commanding officer, and I got this promotion.”
Toressa nods sadly “I signed the report they gave me. I thought I was doing the right thing but the guilt from what we did ate me up inside. The reason why I know the truth seekers are telling the truth is because I was the one who fed them those documents. I’ve never slept better since.”
“What does all of this have to do with that pile of papers you brought in? Riddled with spatial jump calculations that you were so afraid to input into your personal tablet that you did them all by hand?”
Rankin glances over his shoulder at his companion who was examining her watch. She catches his gaze and smiles. He smiles back while she nods to Khasana. He turns his attention back to it as a fleet of ships arrives in orbit around it.
“That’s the flagship. Admiral Gantara and the captains of the ships at P-D21. They’re headed back to the front after their refitting.” Rankin utters out mindlessly as the unthinkable happens.
Like a rogue star it skates across the heavens at unimaginable speeds. The laws of physics bending around it, making the very fabric of the universe tremble in its wake. Forged in the flare of their home star, its body was fused with the ashes of the unjustly demised. Their names carved into every inch of its surface. Screaming to any who would hear, it would pierce Khasana’s atmosphere in an angry fiery glow.
With so many souls to be accounted for, one shell wasn’t enough. The first was followed by a second, then a third, then a fourth and then the last. Their hardy shells pierced the planets crust with ease, their immense momentum carrying them through to the liquid core in a matter of moments.
All Genosians witnessing the event stare in shock at the sizeable scar left on the planets pristine surface by the five objects. They would be witness to an even greater sight as the minutes ticked on and the shells sank closer to the core.
Khasana’s thick mantel was made of a single unbroken piece. It prevented the world from suffering quakes, even now as it was struck from up high. Cracked but otherwise undamaged spare the sizeable crater left on its surface, the interior planetary pressure remains unchanged.
The first shell reaches the point where its integrity could no longer withstand the pressures acting upon it and cracked. The liquid metal seeps through the cracks, reacting with the vial of antimatter within. The detonation sends an intense wave outward, causing the second shell to rupture and detonate in a similar manner. The third follows soon after, then the fourth and finally the fifth just as it crosses the threshold between the mantel and the liquid core. The pressure would be too much as the planet begins to shake. Cracks shoot out from the point where the five shells had pierced its mantel. Magma streams burst out, setting everything it touched on fire.
Rankin would fall to his knees as he watched heaven burn and finally explode, destroying the small fleet of ships with it. Toressa would keep her hand on his shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
“The people at Oztei died because of our own Governments failings. We killed innocent humans for nothing and hid the atrocities we committed. Now they’ve burnt heaven in retribution, was it all worth it?”
2024.05.11 17:37 Chimera_Tracker They burned heaven in retribution, was it all worth it?
Colonies have been left in smoldering ruins. Razed to ashes by attackers that promised friendship in the vast void. Corpses left as ash across a dozen worlds, their existence almost completely eradicated by the invasive procession of their once welcoming neighbour. Where proud structures once stood against the frontier, cracked bones sat in silence under clouds of death.
In orbit, transponder pings of broken ships sang out into the cold eternal night. The frozen corpses of their crews revolved around the shattered metal hulks they once called home. Their resting places to be forgotten as their 'beep beep' into the eternal night grew ever softer.
.
.
.
Close to the heart of their civilization, Commodore Rankin sipped broseki tea as he examined the holographic map being displayed across the tabletop before him. It showed their progress into human space. All the systems they owned and occupied were highlighted red while the enemy’s’ were blue. From his end of the table, it looked like the Genosian Republic was extending a crooked hairy tendril right into the heart of human occupied space. Purity’s reach into the heart of corruption. After that terrible first strike, it was only right. Soon, they'd have the human cradle world, and with it, the humans would have no alternative but to submit and answer for the atrocity they committed at Oztei.
A soft patter of footsteps would disturb his tranquil meditation, drawing Rankin’s attention to a new entry into the station’s command center. The familiar figure on their way to their post was none other than Toressa, one of the many officers involved in information processing. More importantly though, she was a close friend in need of help.
Loose papers under her arm, uniform crumpled, and with her head tendrils sticking out at awkward angles, it appeared as though she'd spent another night obsessing on that conspiracy theory of hers about the beginnings of the war. A distracting side hobby of hers that got her sent back from the front lines. She used to be an up and coming officer when they were both the same rank. He continued going up while she stumbled and ended up drifting from post to post. If it weren’t for him, she’d have been dishonorably discharged with a permanent black mark on her head. To have a tendril on ones head permanently locked to a singular color was bad enough, to have it marked black for the rest of your life was another thing all together. It told everyone you weren’t to be trusted, that you were a danger, that you were the enemy even if you were one of us. It was the worst fate one could be given in their society.
Setting his cup down on the edge of the table, he straightens himself and makes his way over to her terminal to have a chat. He was determined to help her out of this rut, not just for what she’d done for him when they were recruits, but for what she’s meant to him through all these years.
Nearing her position, he’d notice the mild shift in her skin tone, signaling her awareness of his approach. It would be confirmed with her speaking before he could, "If you're here as my commanding officer, I know I'm late, I'll stay back to cover the time owed for my tardiness. If you’re here as my friend, I’m sorry for missing dinner last night.”
Rankin shook his head as he reached over her shoulder to pluck one of the loose papers she’d brought in and left sitting at the edge of her terminal. It was filled with mathematical formulae he recognised as spatial jump coordinates for ships. An antiquated system used by ships traversing great distances a long time ago, before the discovery of the hyperlinks. They were risky maneuvers that required immense precision to even increase your chances of appearing where you intended to a point above zero. What stuck out to him was not that she’d done the calculations by hand, but according to them, the chance of successful transition through said jumps was less than one percent.
"I'm here as your friend Toressa. I'm worried about you. I’ve entertained your eccentricities since you’ve come here because you promised they wouldn’t affect your duties like it has at your other posts. If it is starting to now, I think it would be best if we nib it in the bud wouldn’t you agree? It would be in your best-“
“Ha!” She scoffed loud enough to startle another officer seated nearby, “It would be in my best interests? Really? That’s a load of crap and you know it Rankin.”
Her words dripped with such hate it nearly made the hulking commanding officer flinch.
“It is Commodore Rankin, Officer Toressa. We’re-“
“In public, yeah, I remember. Honestly, I’m starting to not care, Commodore Rankin.”
“Toressa, you've been obsessing over this nonsense since P-D21. Look, everyone across the Republic, civil servant or not, were affected badly by the news reports about it. The humans destroyed that entire colony for no reason whatsoever. I know you had a distant relative there, but it was not like you could’ve done anything about it. I know I was lucky, and I know I should’ve reached out but we declared war not long after and I guess I forgot. I am sorry I wasn’t there when you needed a friend, but I am here now and I am not going to let you torch your last chance.”
He continues to stare at the back of her head as she lightly trembles, and her skin tone subtly changes. But it all stabilizes shortly after a soft ping rings out from her terminal. It would be followed by her balled up fists slamming down upon it. He peeks over her shoulder, seeing the error pop up displayed in bold letters across the cracked screen. The lock outs he had put in place this morning after she failed to report during roll call were working as hoped.
“I am sorry, but I can’t have you accessing data you have no reason to access. You were on this same self-destructive cycle at your last post. I am not going to let you do this to yourself here. There is nothing there. The human vessels slipped out of reach of the responding fleet at Oztei. We responded by attacking their foundries at P-D21. Warships being refitted were all that was there at P-D21 and we were lucky to have made it there before they went for the Capitol. The claims of the system being a frontier colony are untrue. You were an investigator on board the Rummeric at P-D21 for crying out loud. Your colleagues at the investigative bureau went after the traitors who claimed otherwise in attempt to sow dissent and start riots against the government. The last one of these scoundrels was charged as of two months ago. Are you trying to end up like them? They were liars, the whole lot.”
Rankin was nearly yelling at this point, but what Toressa said next nearly had him screaming at the top of his lungs in frustration.
“What if they weren’t the liars? What if it was us who did?”
Catching sight of the subtle shifts of color tone of the other officers seated at their stations close by was the only thing that stopped him from screaming. They were being overheard and he didn’t want this getting out no matter how good a Genosian he was.
"Lying to us?!" Rankin took half a step forward, spitting the words out with such disdain they might as well have been poison. Toressa had truly gone off the deep end if she could declare such things where listeners might eavesdrop.
'The government never lies to its people.'
That has been the motto of the Genosian Republic. All children are taught the importance of being truthful, not only to themselves but to everyone around them. From families to friends, you can never be considered a good Genoisan if you've told a lie, and a Good Genosian was what everyone strived to be. However, no society could ever survive like that. It is natural for kids to keep secrets from their parents, spouses from one another, the salesmen to their clientele. Telling half-truths is one of the many minor evils within Genosian society and though frowned upon, is not criminal. Fortunately, though such evils are present in all strata of their society, the civil service is believed to be exempt.
The Genosians believe that to serve the people, one is required to be the best possible version of themselves, and as such, amongst other things, a civil servant is said to be inherently unable to lie. To think that a high serving individual such as an Admiral or even a senator would lie not only to those around them but their entire population? That wasn't just blasphemy, it was treasonous.
Using his larger frame to act as a wall between them and those close enough to have possibly heard the treacherous remark, he whispers as softly as he could,
"Stop it! I warn you now Toressa! Do not spew such disgusting accusations. The Government would’ve never lied to us about the tragedy at Oztei. The humans attacked us after we offered them friendship. In return, Admiral Gantra led the fleet to that decisive blow at P-D21. Unlike our treacherous neighbors, we didn’t target the innocent. All civilian vessels were given the chance to leave the system when we attacked, only military targets were destroyed.”
"Oh really? Is that what you believe? That dribble? Gantara wasn’t the Hero you portray him to be. What makes you think the way you do Rankin? Seriously? How can you believe that he didn’t falsify his reports to make himself look better? Why wouldn’t he hide the-"
"Toressa! Are you insane? Are you?! What could have possibly happened to you that your mind is filled with such disgusting beliefs? You're a servant of the people, Toressa. You know better."
It was at this point that Rankin would notice something sticking out of the stack.
"Do I really? Do you want to know what I think of us servants? Do you really want to hear what I think of this war?!" Toressa spat back, her tone growing louder with each declaration, getting too loud once again for Rankins comfort.
Prodding the pile with just enough pressure to get it to topple, Rankins bites back a gasp at what he uncovers. Noticing the change in color tones of several individuals seated further away, he grabs Toressa by her forearm along with the paraphernalia. The act invites more attention to them. Eyes starring at them from across the entire room as he walks the struggling Genosian female towards the observation lounge.
On a normal day, the lounge would be a serene place for reflection and relaxation. Clear alloy bulkheads ran down the length of the room, providing any who used the space with a spectacular view of the pristine world they were blessed to orbit.
Khasana was a paradise class world, a revered holy world to the Genosian people. A place that was said to mimic what their afterlife was like. Twice the size of all habitable worlds across Genosian and Human territories, boasting a comfortable point nine gravity with zero axial tilt. A thin ring of ice and rock girdles the equator, flowing in the opposite directions to its rotation. The way the light reflects off the ring causes a soft aura to radiate around the planet, making it appear ever more paradisal.
Being such a revered world within their society, none were allowed on the surface without a permit from the Government. To obtain such a permit would require an immense amount of service to the Republic that till date, only a handful of Genosians can boast of having set foot on Khasana soil.
At this moment, the atmosphere of serenity became strained with anger as the two Genosians hashed it out within the empty space.
“Are you joking Toressa? After all I’ve done to save your commission, to get you here, you spit on all of it by having such things on your person? The Truth Seekers? Seriously?! They’re anarchists! They embody every sin known to us Toressa. They’re liars!”
Rankin crushed the flyer in his hand as he spoke, shaking his head as he steps away from Toressa and towards the bulkhead.
“They aren’t liars Rankin,” Toressa sighed as she watched her friend pull away with such disgust at her presence. His colour spoke the words he held within, and she could read him like a book, she always could.
“Nothing they’ve announced has ever been a lie. Every document, every picture, every word they’ve shared has been the truth. They might stretch the truth a little at times, but they’ve never misled anyone.”
“Oh yeah? So, you’re telling me their ramblings have all been true? Hmm? That we’ve been fighting a war we initiated? We offered them friendship Toressa, they were the ones who spat in our faces with what they did at Oztei.”
“The humans aren’t the monsters of this story Rankin,” Toressa approached, resting her hand on her friends’ shoulder, “Why do you think you’re here and not out there commanding a ship at the front? Why are you, a Commodore, commanding the station orbiting heaven? A station that is nothing more than a filing office?”
“What the hell are you talking about Toressa? I earned my position, others would’ve given an arm to-“
“Given an arm to be on a ship at the front line defending their families. Given an arm to be on a ship blowing a human vessel into pieces. Not here, watching over Heaven without ever hoping to touch it. Everyone posted here is the same Rankin. You’ve just never noticed. When you don’t do what is asked of you, when you stick to the very principles they taught you since young, when you do your damned hardest to be the best Genosian alive, they send you here as punishment. Your career forever stalled with only the sight of Heaven to remind you of what you’ve lost.”
Rankin starred at Khasana floating before them, then at Toressa’s reflection standing just beneath it. Just like how she could read him, he could read her nearly as well and he knew she truly believed every word she was telling him. In another life maybe, they could’ve been mates.
“I refused to sign the edited report of what I discovered at Jes’Port. They reassigned my commanding officer, and I got this promotion.”
Toressa nods sadly “I signed the report they gave me. I thought I was doing the right thing but the guilt from what we did ate me up inside. The reason why I know the truth seekers are telling the truth is because I was the one who fed them those documents. I’ve never slept better since.”
“What does all of this have to do with that pile of papers you brought in? Riddled with spatial jump calculations that you were so afraid to input into your personal tablet that you did them all by hand?”
Rankin glances over his shoulder at his companion who was examining her watch. She catches his gaze and smiles. He smiles back while she nods to Khasana. He turns his attention back to it as a fleet of ships arrives in orbit around it.
“That’s the flagship. Admiral Gantara and the captains of the ships at P-D21. They’re headed back to the front after their refitting.” Rankin utters out mindlessly as the unthinkable happens.
Like a rogue star it skates across the heavens at unimaginable speeds. The laws of physics bending around it, making the very fabric of the universe tremble in its wake. Forged in the flare of their home star, its body was fused with the ashes of the unjustly demised. Their names carved into every inch of its surface. Screaming to any who would hear, it would pierce Khasana’s atmosphere in an angry fiery glow.
With so many souls to be accounted for, one shell wasn’t enough. The first was followed by a second, then a third, then a fourth and then the last. Their hardy shells pierced the planets crust with ease, their immense momentum carrying them through to the liquid core in a matter of moments.
All Genosians witnessing the event stare in shock at the sizeable scar left on the planets pristine surface by the five objects. They would be witness to an even greater sight as the minutes ticked on and the shells sank closer to the core.
Khasana’s thick mantel was made of a single unbroken piece. It prevented the world from suffering quakes, even now as it was struck from up high. Cracked but otherwise undamaged spare the sizeable crater left on its surface, the interior planetary pressure remains unchanged.
The first shell reaches the point where its integrity could no longer withstand the pressures acting upon it and cracked. The liquid metal seeps through the cracks, reacting with the vial of antimatter within. The detonation sends an intense wave outward, causing the second shell to rupture and detonate in a similar manner. The third follows soon after, then the fourth and finally the fifth just as it crosses the threshold between the mantel and the liquid core. The pressure would be too much as the planet begins to shake. Cracks shoot out from the point where the five shells had pierced its mantel. Magma streams burst out, setting everything it touched on fire.
Rankin would fall to his knees as he watched heaven burn and finally explode, destroying the small fleet of ships with it. Toressa would keep her hand on his shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
“The people at Oztei died because of our own Governments failings. We killed innocent humans for nothing and hid the atrocities we committed. Now they’ve burnt heaven in retribution, was it all worth it?”
submitted by Chimera_Tracker to HFY [link] [comments]
In orbit, transponder pings of broken ships sang out into the cold eternal night. The frozen corpses of their crews revolved around the shattered metal hulks they once called home. Their resting places to be forgotten as their 'beep beep' into the eternal night grew ever softer.
.
.
.
Close to the heart of their civilization, Commodore Rankin sipped broseki tea as he examined the holographic map being displayed across the tabletop before him. It showed their progress into human space. All the systems they owned and occupied were highlighted red while the enemy’s’ were blue. From his end of the table, it looked like the Genosian Republic was extending a crooked hairy tendril right into the heart of human occupied space. Purity’s reach into the heart of corruption. After that terrible first strike, it was only right. Soon, they'd have the human cradle world, and with it, the humans would have no alternative but to submit and answer for the atrocity they committed at Oztei.
A soft patter of footsteps would disturb his tranquil meditation, drawing Rankin’s attention to a new entry into the station’s command center. The familiar figure on their way to their post was none other than Toressa, one of the many officers involved in information processing. More importantly though, she was a close friend in need of help.
Loose papers under her arm, uniform crumpled, and with her head tendrils sticking out at awkward angles, it appeared as though she'd spent another night obsessing on that conspiracy theory of hers about the beginnings of the war. A distracting side hobby of hers that got her sent back from the front lines. She used to be an up and coming officer when they were both the same rank. He continued going up while she stumbled and ended up drifting from post to post. If it weren’t for him, she’d have been dishonorably discharged with a permanent black mark on her head. To have a tendril on ones head permanently locked to a singular color was bad enough, to have it marked black for the rest of your life was another thing all together. It told everyone you weren’t to be trusted, that you were a danger, that you were the enemy even if you were one of us. It was the worst fate one could be given in their society.
Setting his cup down on the edge of the table, he straightens himself and makes his way over to her terminal to have a chat. He was determined to help her out of this rut, not just for what she’d done for him when they were recruits, but for what she’s meant to him through all these years.
Nearing her position, he’d notice the mild shift in her skin tone, signaling her awareness of his approach. It would be confirmed with her speaking before he could, "If you're here as my commanding officer, I know I'm late, I'll stay back to cover the time owed for my tardiness. If you’re here as my friend, I’m sorry for missing dinner last night.”
Rankin shook his head as he reached over her shoulder to pluck one of the loose papers she’d brought in and left sitting at the edge of her terminal. It was filled with mathematical formulae he recognised as spatial jump coordinates for ships. An antiquated system used by ships traversing great distances a long time ago, before the discovery of the hyperlinks. They were risky maneuvers that required immense precision to even increase your chances of appearing where you intended to a point above zero. What stuck out to him was not that she’d done the calculations by hand, but according to them, the chance of successful transition through said jumps was less than one percent.
"I'm here as your friend Toressa. I'm worried about you. I’ve entertained your eccentricities since you’ve come here because you promised they wouldn’t affect your duties like it has at your other posts. If it is starting to now, I think it would be best if we nib it in the bud wouldn’t you agree? It would be in your best-“
“Ha!” She scoffed loud enough to startle another officer seated nearby, “It would be in my best interests? Really? That’s a load of crap and you know it Rankin.”
Her words dripped with such hate it nearly made the hulking commanding officer flinch.
“It is Commodore Rankin, Officer Toressa. We’re-“
“In public, yeah, I remember. Honestly, I’m starting to not care, Commodore Rankin.”
“Toressa, you've been obsessing over this nonsense since P-D21. Look, everyone across the Republic, civil servant or not, were affected badly by the news reports about it. The humans destroyed that entire colony for no reason whatsoever. I know you had a distant relative there, but it was not like you could’ve done anything about it. I know I was lucky, and I know I should’ve reached out but we declared war not long after and I guess I forgot. I am sorry I wasn’t there when you needed a friend, but I am here now and I am not going to let you torch your last chance.”
He continues to stare at the back of her head as she lightly trembles, and her skin tone subtly changes. But it all stabilizes shortly after a soft ping rings out from her terminal. It would be followed by her balled up fists slamming down upon it. He peeks over her shoulder, seeing the error pop up displayed in bold letters across the cracked screen. The lock outs he had put in place this morning after she failed to report during roll call were working as hoped.
“I am sorry, but I can’t have you accessing data you have no reason to access. You were on this same self-destructive cycle at your last post. I am not going to let you do this to yourself here. There is nothing there. The human vessels slipped out of reach of the responding fleet at Oztei. We responded by attacking their foundries at P-D21. Warships being refitted were all that was there at P-D21 and we were lucky to have made it there before they went for the Capitol. The claims of the system being a frontier colony are untrue. You were an investigator on board the Rummeric at P-D21 for crying out loud. Your colleagues at the investigative bureau went after the traitors who claimed otherwise in attempt to sow dissent and start riots against the government. The last one of these scoundrels was charged as of two months ago. Are you trying to end up like them? They were liars, the whole lot.”
Rankin was nearly yelling at this point, but what Toressa said next nearly had him screaming at the top of his lungs in frustration.
“What if they weren’t the liars? What if it was us who did?”
Catching sight of the subtle shifts of color tone of the other officers seated at their stations close by was the only thing that stopped him from screaming. They were being overheard and he didn’t want this getting out no matter how good a Genosian he was.
"Lying to us?!" Rankin took half a step forward, spitting the words out with such disdain they might as well have been poison. Toressa had truly gone off the deep end if she could declare such things where listeners might eavesdrop.
'The government never lies to its people.'
That has been the motto of the Genosian Republic. All children are taught the importance of being truthful, not only to themselves but to everyone around them. From families to friends, you can never be considered a good Genoisan if you've told a lie, and a Good Genosian was what everyone strived to be. However, no society could ever survive like that. It is natural for kids to keep secrets from their parents, spouses from one another, the salesmen to their clientele. Telling half-truths is one of the many minor evils within Genosian society and though frowned upon, is not criminal. Fortunately, though such evils are present in all strata of their society, the civil service is believed to be exempt.
The Genosians believe that to serve the people, one is required to be the best possible version of themselves, and as such, amongst other things, a civil servant is said to be inherently unable to lie. To think that a high serving individual such as an Admiral or even a senator would lie not only to those around them but their entire population? That wasn't just blasphemy, it was treasonous.
Using his larger frame to act as a wall between them and those close enough to have possibly heard the treacherous remark, he whispers as softly as he could,
"Stop it! I warn you now Toressa! Do not spew such disgusting accusations. The Government would’ve never lied to us about the tragedy at Oztei. The humans attacked us after we offered them friendship. In return, Admiral Gantra led the fleet to that decisive blow at P-D21. Unlike our treacherous neighbors, we didn’t target the innocent. All civilian vessels were given the chance to leave the system when we attacked, only military targets were destroyed.”
"Oh really? Is that what you believe? That dribble? Gantara wasn’t the Hero you portray him to be. What makes you think the way you do Rankin? Seriously? How can you believe that he didn’t falsify his reports to make himself look better? Why wouldn’t he hide the-"
"Toressa! Are you insane? Are you?! What could have possibly happened to you that your mind is filled with such disgusting beliefs? You're a servant of the people, Toressa. You know better."
It was at this point that Rankin would notice something sticking out of the stack.
"Do I really? Do you want to know what I think of us servants? Do you really want to hear what I think of this war?!" Toressa spat back, her tone growing louder with each declaration, getting too loud once again for Rankins comfort.
Prodding the pile with just enough pressure to get it to topple, Rankins bites back a gasp at what he uncovers. Noticing the change in color tones of several individuals seated further away, he grabs Toressa by her forearm along with the paraphernalia. The act invites more attention to them. Eyes starring at them from across the entire room as he walks the struggling Genosian female towards the observation lounge.
On a normal day, the lounge would be a serene place for reflection and relaxation. Clear alloy bulkheads ran down the length of the room, providing any who used the space with a spectacular view of the pristine world they were blessed to orbit.
Khasana was a paradise class world, a revered holy world to the Genosian people. A place that was said to mimic what their afterlife was like. Twice the size of all habitable worlds across Genosian and Human territories, boasting a comfortable point nine gravity with zero axial tilt. A thin ring of ice and rock girdles the equator, flowing in the opposite directions to its rotation. The way the light reflects off the ring causes a soft aura to radiate around the planet, making it appear ever more paradisal.
Being such a revered world within their society, none were allowed on the surface without a permit from the Government. To obtain such a permit would require an immense amount of service to the Republic that till date, only a handful of Genosians can boast of having set foot on Khasana soil.
At this moment, the atmosphere of serenity became strained with anger as the two Genosians hashed it out within the empty space.
“Are you joking Toressa? After all I’ve done to save your commission, to get you here, you spit on all of it by having such things on your person? The Truth Seekers? Seriously?! They’re anarchists! They embody every sin known to us Toressa. They’re liars!”
Rankin crushed the flyer in his hand as he spoke, shaking his head as he steps away from Toressa and towards the bulkhead.
“They aren’t liars Rankin,” Toressa sighed as she watched her friend pull away with such disgust at her presence. His colour spoke the words he held within, and she could read him like a book, she always could.
“Nothing they’ve announced has ever been a lie. Every document, every picture, every word they’ve shared has been the truth. They might stretch the truth a little at times, but they’ve never misled anyone.”
“Oh yeah? So, you’re telling me their ramblings have all been true? Hmm? That we’ve been fighting a war we initiated? We offered them friendship Toressa, they were the ones who spat in our faces with what they did at Oztei.”
“The humans aren’t the monsters of this story Rankin,” Toressa approached, resting her hand on her friends’ shoulder, “Why do you think you’re here and not out there commanding a ship at the front? Why are you, a Commodore, commanding the station orbiting heaven? A station that is nothing more than a filing office?”
“What the hell are you talking about Toressa? I earned my position, others would’ve given an arm to-“
“Given an arm to be on a ship at the front line defending their families. Given an arm to be on a ship blowing a human vessel into pieces. Not here, watching over Heaven without ever hoping to touch it. Everyone posted here is the same Rankin. You’ve just never noticed. When you don’t do what is asked of you, when you stick to the very principles they taught you since young, when you do your damned hardest to be the best Genosian alive, they send you here as punishment. Your career forever stalled with only the sight of Heaven to remind you of what you’ve lost.”
Rankin starred at Khasana floating before them, then at Toressa’s reflection standing just beneath it. Just like how she could read him, he could read her nearly as well and he knew she truly believed every word she was telling him. In another life maybe, they could’ve been mates.
“I refused to sign the edited report of what I discovered at Jes’Port. They reassigned my commanding officer, and I got this promotion.”
Toressa nods sadly “I signed the report they gave me. I thought I was doing the right thing but the guilt from what we did ate me up inside. The reason why I know the truth seekers are telling the truth is because I was the one who fed them those documents. I’ve never slept better since.”
“What does all of this have to do with that pile of papers you brought in? Riddled with spatial jump calculations that you were so afraid to input into your personal tablet that you did them all by hand?”
Rankin glances over his shoulder at his companion who was examining her watch. She catches his gaze and smiles. He smiles back while she nods to Khasana. He turns his attention back to it as a fleet of ships arrives in orbit around it.
“That’s the flagship. Admiral Gantara and the captains of the ships at P-D21. They’re headed back to the front after their refitting.” Rankin utters out mindlessly as the unthinkable happens.
Like a rogue star it skates across the heavens at unimaginable speeds. The laws of physics bending around it, making the very fabric of the universe tremble in its wake. Forged in the flare of their home star, its body was fused with the ashes of the unjustly demised. Their names carved into every inch of its surface. Screaming to any who would hear, it would pierce Khasana’s atmosphere in an angry fiery glow.
With so many souls to be accounted for, one shell wasn’t enough. The first was followed by a second, then a third, then a fourth and then the last. Their hardy shells pierced the planets crust with ease, their immense momentum carrying them through to the liquid core in a matter of moments.
All Genosians witnessing the event stare in shock at the sizeable scar left on the planets pristine surface by the five objects. They would be witness to an even greater sight as the minutes ticked on and the shells sank closer to the core.
Khasana’s thick mantel was made of a single unbroken piece. It prevented the world from suffering quakes, even now as it was struck from up high. Cracked but otherwise undamaged spare the sizeable crater left on its surface, the interior planetary pressure remains unchanged.
The first shell reaches the point where its integrity could no longer withstand the pressures acting upon it and cracked. The liquid metal seeps through the cracks, reacting with the vial of antimatter within. The detonation sends an intense wave outward, causing the second shell to rupture and detonate in a similar manner. The third follows soon after, then the fourth and finally the fifth just as it crosses the threshold between the mantel and the liquid core. The pressure would be too much as the planet begins to shake. Cracks shoot out from the point where the five shells had pierced its mantel. Magma streams burst out, setting everything it touched on fire.
Rankin would fall to his knees as he watched heaven burn and finally explode, destroying the small fleet of ships with it. Toressa would keep her hand on his shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
“The people at Oztei died because of our own Governments failings. We killed innocent humans for nothing and hid the atrocities we committed. Now they’ve burnt heaven in retribution, was it all worth it?”
2024.05.11 17:34 blackthorn_orion The Nintendo Breakdown 2: An updated overview of confirmed, leaked, and rumored projects from Nintendo and its close partners
Hello again! About 6 months ago, I put together a Nintendo roundup that got some positive feedback, and with this week’s double-whammy of the Switch successor kinda being announced and a direct being confirmed for June, I figured now was as good a time as any to put out an updated version so folks can know where things stand and have something to chew on while they wait. My intent is to update this post after the June direct with any new information. Please let me know if anything's borked, as formatting big posts on reddit can get a bit wonky and some of these links are getting old
Nintendo Entertainment Planning and Development (EPD): Formed in 2015 as part of a restructuring that unified Nintendo Entertainment Analysis and Development (EAD) and Nintendo Software Planning and Development (SPD). When people talk about “in-house Nintendo”, this is usually what they mean. EPD groups are primarily small producedirector-led teams that then scale up and pull from a shared “pool” of developers as projects get further into development. EPD’s many sub-groups can essentially be divided into those that primarily develop their own games and those focused more on overseeing/collaborating with other studios (both non-EPD Nintendo studios as well as fully external developers), though there are exceptions and gray areas
Development-focused groups
submitted by blackthorn_orion to GamingLeaksAndRumours [link] [comments]
Nintendo Entertainment Planning and Development (EPD): Formed in 2015 as part of a restructuring that unified Nintendo Entertainment Analysis and Development (EAD) and Nintendo Software Planning and Development (SPD). When people talk about “in-house Nintendo”, this is usually what they mean. EPD groups are primarily small producedirector-led teams that then scale up and pull from a shared “pool” of developers as projects get further into development. EPD’s many sub-groups can essentially be divided into those that primarily develop their own games and those focused more on overseeing/collaborating with other studios (both non-EPD Nintendo studios as well as fully external developers), though there are exceptions and gray areas
Development-focused groups
- EPD 3: The Zelda team; with Tears of the Kingdom DLC stated to be off the table, they are presumed to have moved onto the next major Zelda title
- Nate the Hate and Eurogamer both reported that a build of Breath of the Wild running on Switch 2-comparable hardware was shown behind closed doors at Gamescom 2023 featuring 4K60fps and “erased” load times; however, these reports also stressed that this was intended primarily as a tech demo and isn’t necessarily indicative of a next-gen update or remaster being planned for release
- Papagenos: “Tears of the kingdom Had a great zelda design I think we are Severely overdue for a game where zelda Is the main character. Seems to me A Hyrule adventure like that Is something fans want, Nows The time.
- capitalized letters spell out “This is a hint”
- Jeff Grubb, Nate the Hate, Imran Khan, and Andy Robinson have all previously claimed or alluded to the WiiU versions of Wind Waker and Twilight Princess coming to Switch (often speculated/reported as being a double-pack); nobody's gotten the timing right on this, but these are often framed as finished ports that Nintendo is sitting on for one reason or another.
- Nate the Hate: "They exist but knowing when they'll come out is a different matter. It's why they are often used in speculation as a schedule filler"
- Grubb: "I've always heard they're ready, they're sitting there, we're just waiting for Nintendo to pull the trigger. When they will, why they will, who knows?"
- Kit&Krysta: Krysta: “I know they exist, they’re in, they’re, uh, they’re, they, they’re done I think they’re just gonna sit on it. But I do not think they’re gonna talk about this at all, for a while”
- EPD 4: The “experimental” team behind games such as Labo, Ring Fit Adventure, and Nintendo Switch Sports. Typically their games feature bespoke peripherals or prioritize using a system's hardware features for novel gameplay. Most recently released Everybody 1-2 Switch (co-developed with NDcube) in June 2023.
- EPD 5: Animal Crossing and Splatoon. Most recently released Side Order, a roguelike DLC mode for Splatoon 3, in February 2024
- Pre-release, Splatoon 3 was confirmed to get 2 years of support; barring a content extension, the game should get its final content update this year around September
- Should note that while the two series typically share a producer, there’s historically been little to no overlap in directors, so it’s not impossible for both Animal Crossing and Splatoon to have games in active development at once
- EPD 8: Also known as EPD Tokyo since the rest of EPD is based out of Nintendo’s Kyoto HQ, this is the 3D Mario team (also Donkey Kong Jungle Beat and Captain Toad; co-developed the NES Remix games with indieszero)
- 2020 hiring call for a “level designer for new 2D action game (working in Tokyo)”
- 2020 job listing for a "level designer for new 3D action game” in Tokyo
- Rumors of an EPD 8 Donkey Kong game:
- LonelyGoomba “I heard an unlikely rumour that the Mario Odyssey team are working on a 3D Donkey Kong game.”
- Nintendo Life: “Nintendo Life can confirm that it has heard the same rumour [as LonelyGoomba] from an independent (and very trusted) source, which would appear to lend this report some degree of legitimacy. However, our source claims that the game will be 2D (or 2.5D, if you prefer) and not 3D.
- Professor Chops on Famiboards: VV were working on open world 3D DK game since 2016, project was shelved and moved to EPD 8 in 2018
- DK Vine: A DK game had been in development at an external studio before Nintendo decided to bring the series in-house; “I've been led to believe that this is a new EPD team that has formed from other teams specifically for the purpose of creating Donkey Kong games.”
- Liam Robertson: Full documentary about Vicarious Visions’ DK project (and other things) on DidYouKnowGaming: Refutes the notion that Miyamoto was heavily contributing design ideas. A DK game codenamed “Freedom” was a demo made by VV and pitched to Nintendo, worked on for “a little over 6 months starting from the end development of on Skylanders Superchargers in September 2015”; “A throughline between the conversations I had with former workers was that they had all heard that Nintendo had given them some positive feedback on their demo”. Ultimately killed by Activision higher-ups, who felt VV’s resources were better spent on franchises such as Call of Duty and Destiny, in spring 2016
- on the subject of Vicarious Visions’ project potentially being moved to EPD: “It was an unsolicited pitch from VV that was never picked up. Zero proof that it was continued elsewhere. If Nintendo is doing DK, it’s something else.”; [“Nintendo] hadn’t made a decision either way on funding it when it was shut down.”
- EPD 9: Mario Kart, ARMS (and Nintendogs once upon a time).
- With Mario Kart Tour and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe’s Booster Course Pass both receiving their final content updates towards the end of 2023, they’ve probably been working on the next Mario Kart game (either that or LEGS)
- EPD 10: Pikmin and 2D Mario (including Mario Maker). Launched both Pikmin 4 (co-developed with Eighting) and Super Mario Bros. Wonder in 2023.
- Unclear if there are any plans for either Pikmin 4 or Mario Wonder to get DLC (on WiiU, both Pikmin 3 and New Super Mario Bros. U received paid DLC)
- speculation that the Pikmin 4 Japanese website possibly hinted at DLC via pictures not currently in the game: https://famiboards.com/threads/nintendo-first-party-software-development-st-nintendo-party-superstars.114/post-897523
- EPD 2 has the broadest responsibilities of these groups, through which EPD gets a hand in projects including Kirby, Mario Party, Smash, Fire Emblem, Bayonetta, Xenoblade, and Pokemon, and others
- EPD 6 generally sticks to to overseeing Intelligent Systems’ non-Fire Emblem games (i.e. Paper Mario, WarioWare) as well as all games developed by Retro Studios and Next Level Games.
- EPD 7 is a bit hard to place, but for simplicity’s sake I’m putting it here; as SPD 1 they developed multiple games on their own (notably the Rhythm Heaven and Tomodachi games), but after Nintendo shook up its internal structure in the late WiiU era and SPD 1 became EPD 7, they appear not to have the capacity for solo projects. Instead, all their projects as EPD 7 have been in collaboration with external studios and include the Famicom Detective Club remakes developed with MAGES as well as MercurySteam’s recent Metroid games
- MercurySteam is currently rumored to be working on a 2D Metroid game targeting 2025 in addition to their confirmed “Project Iron” (a 3rd person action-RPG in partnership with 505 Games); MercurySteam put out 2 games in 2017 (Samus Returns and Spacelords) and 2021 (Metroid Dread and American McGee Presents: Scrapland Remastered), so it’s very possible for them to have two projects in development at once
- EPD 1 stands as something of a mystery, as just about every series it would previously have managed and overseen has seemingly been moved under EPD 2 in recent years; its current status and possible projects are unclear
- 1-Up Studio (formerly Brownie Brown):
- As Brownie Brown, developed games such as Magical Vacation, Sword of Mana, and A Kappa’s Trail; co-developed Mother 3 with HAL Laboratory
- As 1-Up, acts as a support studio primarily for Nintendo EPD titles (most frequently EPD 8 projects, though also credited in occasional non-EPD 8 games like Tri-Force Heroes, Ring Fit Adventure, and Animal Crossing New Horizons)
- iQue: Previously distributed Nintendo games and consoles in China under the iQue Player branding; with Tencent now acting as Nintendo’s official distributor in the region, iQue’s primary role has been Chinese localization
- developed the N64 emulator used for WiiU Virtual Console, Super Mario 3D All-Stars, and NSO
- began hiring game programmers and testers around 2019, suggesting an expanded role in game development (presumably as a support studio)
- Monolith Soft: Tokyo studio handles the Xenoblade series, Kyoto studio does support for EPD 3/EPD 5 projects; most recent solo release was 2023’s Future Redeemed, the DLC story expansion to Xenoblade Chronicles 3
- 2017 job listing for “an ambitious project that differs from Monolith Soft’s brand image”
- 2023 job listing for UI designer in “action game development”; February 2024 update to recruitment page still looking for developers with experience making 3D action games
- Possible evidence of a Xenoblade X remaster from Future Redeemed
- NDcube: Mario Party (from 9 onwards), Clubhouse Games, various other party game/mini game titles (also F-Zero Maximum Velocity on GBA)
- Most recently released 2023’s Everybody 1-2 Switch (co-developed with EPD 4)
- Next Level Games: Luigi’s Mansion 2 and 3, Mario Strikers series, Punch-Out Wii, Metroid Prime Federation Force
- Since 2013’s Luigi’s Mansion 2, Next Level has released a new game every 3 years; With Mario Strikers Battle League releasing and wrapping support in 2022, they should have a new game in 2025 (assuming they stick to this 3 year cycle)
- Possibly working on the Luigi’s Mansion 2 remaster scheduled for late June 2024
- Nintendo European Research and Development (NERD) (Formerly Mobiclip/Actimagine): Primarily handles most of Nintendo’s emulation needs (NES/SNES emulators in the mini consoles and NSO, GB/GBA for NSO, and the Gamecube/Wii emulator used in Mario 3D All-Stars/Pikmin 1+2). Frequently credited in “novel technology”-heavy titles such as EPD 4 projects and Velan Studios’ Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit
- In addition to ongoing NSO work, served as a support studio for Tears of the Kingdom
- Most recently developed Pikmin 1+2 along with the Porting Technology Development Team (part of Nintendo Platform Technology Development, Nintendo’s hardware&tech division)
- Nintendo Pictures (formerly Dynamo Pictures): Animation and motion capture studio
- As Dynamo Pictures, credited on games and media such as Metroid Other M, Monster Hunter Stories, Persona 5, and the Pikmin shorts
- As Nintendo Pictures, credited on Tears of the Kingdom (special thanks), Pikmin 4 (very special thanks), Mario Wonder (character design/character action design/field design/cinematic design/technical support/project management/special thanks), Super Mario RPG remake (character art/animation art/technical art), and Another Code Recollection (very special thanks)
- Nintendo Software Technology (NST): Ridge Racer 64, Pokemon Puzzle League (a reskin of Intelligent Systems’ shelved Panel de Pon 64), Wave Race Blue Storm, 1080 Avalanche, Mario vs DK series, Metroid Prime Hunters, F-Zero 99, support work for indie publishing partnerships (Snipperclips, The Stretchers, Good Job), port work+new content for EPD games (Mario Maker 3DS, Captain Toad Switch/3DS, 3D World+Bowser’s Fury)
- most recently put out a remake of the original Mario vs Donkey Kong in February 2024
- Upon F-Zero 99’s launch, dataminers found evidence of additional game modes
- Retro Studios: Metroid Prime series, Donkey Kong Country Returns & Tropical Freeze, support for Mario Kart 7
- Retro took over development of a rebooted Metroid Prime 4 about 5 years ago
- PapaGenos: “The thing is I’ve heard Prime 4 is basically done and has been done for a while, but the cutscenes are apparently really bad (or were a few months ago) so that’s what was delaying the game.”; believes it is still “a Switch title and not specifically made for the Switch 2”
- Jeff Grubb has heard (from a source that also told him about the Epic Mickey Remaster) that as of sometime last year, Retro was planning to have Prime 4 assets prepared by May 2024, would likely include a CGI trailer and gameplay footage; stresses that plans may have changed and having assets prepared for May isn’t the same as “something happens in May”
- Brazil, talking about the June Direct: “My educated guess is that MP4 is showing up as a late 2024 title as well”
- XboxEra’s Nick Baker had a source describe Metroid Prime 4 to him, emphasized it was graphically impressive and featured big areas
- Jeff Grubb has previously reported that Prime 2 and 3 would also get remasters, but isn’t expecting Prime 1-level “big boy remasters” (as he’s phrased it); “Metroid Prime 2 and Metroid Prime 3 are sorta getting, they’ll probably get, like, the updated controls and things like that, but they’re not getting quite the same overhaul that Metroid Prime 1 is getting”.
- He also said that “Metroid Prime 2 remaster probably is coming out relatively soon-ish” back in July 2023 (fortunately he did not bet his hair on this one)
- reddit user Ncleknows: "Prime 2 has sat in waiting for a while and they're polishing prime 3"
- Retro took over development of a rebooted Metroid Prime 4 about 5 years ago
- Systems Research and Development (SRD): Programming assistance on many Nintendo games dating back as far as the Famicom/NES port of Donkey Kong in 1983 before eventually being acquired by Nintendo in 2022
- Arika: Endless Ocean series, several Dr. Mario installments, Tetris 99/Mario 35/Pac-Man 99
- Most recently released Endless Ocean Luminous in May 2024
- Bandai Namco: As Namco, developed Starfox Assault, the Donkey Konga series, and the Mario baseball games; As Bandai Namco, responsible for Smash games starting with Smash for WiiU and 3DS, asset creation for EPD 9 games starting with Mario Kart 8 (technically had been involved with Kart since the arcade entries in the mid-2000s), and various Pokemon spin-offs such as Pokken Tournament and New Pokemon Snap
- Studio 2/Studio S: “Specializing in commissioned development projects within the company”
- A Bandai Namco studio seemingly dedicated solely to Nintendo co-development projects Looks to comprise both the Smash team as well as the EPD 9 support team (not confirmed: the Pokken/New Pokemon Snap team)
- Going off the interview section of their website, people at Studio S have worked on Smash games, while those at Studio 2 have worked on EPD 9 games
- A Bandai Namco studio seemingly dedicated solely to Nintendo co-development projects Looks to comprise both the Smash team as well as the EPD 9 support team (not confirmed: the Pokken/New Pokemon Snap team)
- Hiring for two projects: A 3D action game (possibly a remaster, going off of an older job listing )and a 2D action game
- Studio 2/Studio S: “Specializing in commissioned development projects within the company”
- Camelot: Mario Tennis and Mario Golf games, Golden Sun series
- Game Freak/Creatures Inc./The Pokemon Company:
- Game Freak is currently working on Pokemon Legends Z-A, an action-RPG set in Lumiose City from Pokemon XY, scheduled to release in 2025
- Pokemon TCG Pocket, developed by Creatures Inc. and DeNA, is scheduled to release on Android and iOS in 2024
- Game Freak is also making an action-adventure game codenamed Project Bloom with Take-Two label Private Division; expected to launch “during Take-Two’s fiscal year 2026”, no platforms have been announced
- Game Freak trademarked “Pand Land” in late 2023
- 4Chan post claiming there will be a Scarlet/Violet graphics enhancement patch for “the new Nintendo Switch models that will be released alongside DLC2”
- Creatures employee's LinkedIn mentioned working on "one unannounced game" in 2022 in addition to the then-unreleased Detective Pikachu Returns
- Pokemon Works founded in early 2024 as a joint venture between The Pokemon Company and ILCA (Pokemon Home, Pokemon Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl, support for Pokemon Scarlet/Violet) for “contracted development of games related to Pokemon” (presumably will be roughly analogous to Bandai Namco Aces, a joint venture between Bandai Namco and ILCA related to the Ace Combat series)
- Pyoro: “Idk anything about the Pokémon Presents, while heard of an outsourced unova-related game. The info was from last year so it may turn out to be inaccurate.; “This is not a leak and should be taken with a grain of salt. I’m just sharing something i’m aware of.”
- Good-Feel: Wario Land Shake It, Kirby’s Epic Yarn, Yoshi’s Wooly World/Crafted World
- most recently released Princess Peach Showtime in March 2024
- Grezzo: Ocarina of Time 3D and Majora’s Mask 3D, Luigi’s Mansion 3D, Link’s Awakening remake, Miitopia remaster; co-developed Triforce Heroes with EPD 3
- Released Jet Dragon for Apple Arcade in 2023
- 2021 job listings for battle planneboss designer, character control engineer, and UI designer for a "medieval", "stylish", “not photorealistic” game
- Koichi Ishii (Grezzo founder and president, Mana series creator, Chocobo/Moogle creator) is currently attached to Square Enix’s Visions of Mana as a series monster design supervisor, no indication of Grezzo as a whole being involved in its development
- HAL Laboratory: Known primarily for Kirby; in recent years, they’ve also made the Boxboy games and Part-Time UFO. Prior to roughly the mid-2000s, their output was a bit more varied, including titles such as the first Pokemon Snap and Pokemon Ranger, the first two Smash Bros., and co-developing Earthbound and Mother 3
- Warpstar Inc. is responsible for managing the Kirby IP specifically (essentially, it’s The Pokemon Company but for Kirby); HAL owns 50% of its shares while Nintendo owns the other 50%
- Kirby series director Shinya Kumazaki called Kirby and the Forgotten Land “the first step in our kind of ongoing moving forward challenge of now also creating 3D Kirby games”, indicating they intend to follow up the now best-selling Kirby game with another 3D entry
- multiple job listings specifically for developing (pretend to be shocked) Kirby games; presumably looking to fill the gap left by external developer Vanpool, which worked with HAL on several Kirby spin-offs as well as Forgotten Land and Return to Dreamland Deluxe before shutting down in May 2023
- indieszero: Electroplankton, NES Remix series (with EPD 8), Sushi Striker, Brain Training for Nintendo Switch (with EPD 4), Big Brain Academy Brain vs Brain (with EPD 4)
- While not confirmed to be involved in the recently-announced Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, Masanobu Suzui (founder of indieszero) retweeted the game’s official announcement
- Intelligent Systems: Fire Emblem, Panel de Pon/Tetris Attack/Puzzle League, Paper Mario, WarioWare, Advance Wars, Pushmo/Pullblox
- Developing the upcoming Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door remake
- Fire Emblem Genealogy of the Holy War remake: claimed to be in development by same person who leaked photos of Fire Emblem Engage in June 2022 (who also claimed Engage had been finished “for quite some time now”)
- Nate the Hate backs this one up, claiming it “has been remade for the Nintendo Switch, it’s simply waiting for Nintendo to announce it”.
- Datamined codename evidence: Datamining indicates that Three Houses had the codename Iron17 while Engage had the codename Iron19 but contains references in its code to an Iron 18; Three Hopes (the Warriors game that released in between them) was codenamed Seasons, so Iron18 remains unaccounted for
- Koei Tecmo: Pokemon Conquest, Metroid Other M, Hyrule Warriors games, Fire Emblem Warriors games, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3, Buddy Mission Bond (Japan-exclusive), Fire Emblem Three Houses (co-developed with Intelligent Systems)
- PlatinumGames: developer of the Bayonetta games and Astral Chain, co-developed Star Fox Zero with EPD
- Nash Weedle (via Google Translate): “Bayonetta will receive a trilogy edition with its three main games in one pack for the Switch 2. The games will bring visual improvements (HDR confirmed) and performance. Due to backwards compatibility, it can also be played on Switch 2 with improvements”
- Prior to Astral Chain’s release, director Takahisa Taura talked about having ideas of how to expand it into a trilogy or more
- In a 2021 interview, PlatinumGames studio head Atsushi Inaba said that Taura was "working on something, but we can't say what it is" and that there were "a lot" of things that Platinum wanted him to do. "It could be him wanting to do his own thing, something like Astral Chain again, or it could be somebody coming to us and saying 'we really like Taura and want to do something with him' like what we did with Nier.".
- Taura has since been credited on Bayonetta 3 (special thanks), Bayonetta Origins (game design advice), and Final Fantasy 16 (game designer)
- In a 2021 interview, PlatinumGames studio head Atsushi Inaba said that Taura was "working on something, but we can't say what it is" and that there were "a lot" of things that Platinum wanted him to do. "It could be him wanting to do his own thing, something like Astral Chain again, or it could be somebody coming to us and saying 'we really like Taura and want to do something with him' like what we did with Nier.".
- Ubisoft: Mario+Rabbids games, Starlink Battle for Atlus (featured Starfox content in the Switch version)
- Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot seemingly confirms a next-gen update/rerelease of Mario+Rabbids 2: Nintendo [has advised] that it's better to do one iteration on each machine. We were a bit too early, we should have waited for [the next console]. Because you could play a great game. And we think it will last for ten years, because we will update it for the new machine that will come in the future."
- references to Star Fox objects found in code for Switch Sports (the first released game to use EPD’s newest engine, ModuleSystem)
- In 2015, Miyamoto indicated that Star Fox is something Nintendo experiments with internally whenever they begin working with new hardware: "I work very closely with the programmer of Star Fox 64. Basically, every time we get new hardware, we do a Star Fox prototype."
- new international trademark for Star Fox filed in late 2023
- PapaGenos claimed in August 2023 that he’d heard rumors of Smash Bros. Ultimate getting some kind of update in the future
- may have been referring to Smash Ultimate celebrating its 5th anniversary with the addition of new spirits earlier this year; final event was in late March
- Masahiro Sakurai says a console port of Kid Icarus Uprising “sure would be nice” but notes that “without a team around to work on it, crafting a follow-up seems difficult”
- Hobonichi (MotheEarthbound creator Shigesato Itoi’s company) celebrating 30th anniversary of Earthbound/Mother 2: “To commemorate the 30th anniversary of MOTHER 2 ... we are planning a lot of fun in 2024” (almost certainly just merch, but noting it here just in case it’s something more)
- Mother 3 was re-released this year … on Japanese NSO
- Mike Takagi (artist behind Earthbound’s American cover art) on Instagram reminiscing about Earthbound, late February 2024: “The 30th anniversary is coming up in Nov and I hear Nintendo is planning something…where my invite??”
- Nintendo investing up to approx. $880 million to “organically expand” its game development assets and creative culture, up to approx. $2.64 billion into Nintendo accounts and infrastructure; also constructing new 12-floor building for game production, expected to be completed by end of 2027
- reddit user lineup-leak: Gamecube classics will be available at launch of next console (specifically mentions Mario Kart Double Dash, Smash Melee, Metroid Prime 2 as launch titles, with Pokemon Colosseum, FE Path of Radiance, and Mario Party 4 also being tested for NSO)
- claims next Mario Kart will not be a launch title but will release within the first 6-12 months, describes next Mario as being “in final testing phase”
- Nintendo to give Forever Entertainment “significant financial support” in new publishing deal “to release several titles on Nintendo Switch”: This is from a while ago but (and someone can correct me if I’m wrong) I don’t think anything’s come of this yet
- Chris Dring/GamesIndustry.biz: ”Nintendo is actively meeting with independent developers to find new partners. Some of that is around publishing indie games, … but it’s also seeking studios that could work on some of its IP.”; “Nintendo regularly works with third-party teams, … But the company is looking to add to that roster, and I know of three studios that are deep in conversation around making games based on Nintendo brands”
- Nintendo survey asking about different Mario RPG games, including Mario&Luigi
- reddit user Advanced-Ad7780: Project X Zone 3 is currently in development (leak didn’t specify a developer, but the first two games were developed by Monolith Soft for the 3DS)
- Nintendo secures new trademarks for Kirby and the Rainbow Paintbrush and Fullblox (also known as Kirby and the Rainbow Curse, and Stretchmo) in Australia
- Doctre: Notes that Velan Studios (Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, started by Vicarious Visions founders Guha and Karthik Bala) is looking for people with AAA experience to work on a “cherished and widely adored IP”, speculates it could be a reboot of VV’s DK project
- Midori: “A game is in development at Nintendo with the codename Banquet”
- (personal conjecture: Some of NDcube’s previous codenames include using BBQ for Animal Crossing Amiibo Festival and Buffet for Super Mario Party, so they feel like the closest style-fit for something codenamed Banquet)
- Brazil: “The June Direct should be the last "main one" focused on Switch 1; more remasters will be announced during the show (and my educated guess is that MP4 is showing up as a late 2024 title as well)”
- LunchPack
- Version 1: Nintendo Land, Mario Maker, Splatoon
- Version 2: Splatoon 2, Mario Maker 2, ARMS, Labo, Ring Fit Adventure, Game Builder Garage, Animal Crossing New Horizons
- ActionLibrary: 3D Land, 3D World, Mario Odyssey, menus/”wrapper” for 3D All-Stars, Bowser’s Fury, Captain Toad, F-Zero 99 (elements possibly can be traced back as far as Sunshine or Galaxy)
- KingSystem: Breath of the Wild
- ModuleSystem: Switch Sports, Splatoon 3, Tears of the Kingdom, Mario Wonder, Mario vs Donkey Kong remake
- Nintendoware Bezel engine: Tetris 99/Pac-Man 99/Mario 35, WarioWare Get It TogetheWarioWare Move It, Super Mario Party/Mario Party Superstars, Clubhouse Games 51 Classics, Big Brain Academy Brain vs Brain, Everybody 1-2 Switch, Brain Training for Nintendo Switch, Endless Ocean Luminous
- (also available for use by 3rd parties; known to have been used for Vroom in the Night Sky and Sumikko Gurashi: Sumikko Park e Youkoso)
- Datamines of Endless Ocean Luminous show the latest version of Bezel includes references to a variable frame rate mode with support for up to 240fps
- RUDE (Retro Universal Design Engine or Retro Unified Development Environment, depending on which former dev you ask): all Retro Studios games
- Mint: most (all?) HAL Laboratory games since 2011's Return to Dreamland; upgraded and renamed Basil for Forgotten Land
- Unreal Engine 4: Yoshi's Crafted World, Pikmin 4, Princess Peach Showtime
- Unity: Jump Rope Challenge, Pokemon BDSP, Fire Emblem Engage, Super Mario RPG remake, Another Code Recollection
2024.05.11 17:17 postdevs First person narrative account of experiences with paralysis, rls, hypnagogia.
This week I wrote an autobiographical account of my history with sleep paralysis, RLS, and hypnagogic hallucinations.
I was not sure where to share it. I added it and deleted it from a few subs. The only place it ended up was the creative writing sub, though.
And this appears to be the right spot! There are several themes but the hypnagogia is the focus. So it's quite long and probably no one reads it and that's fine. I just wanted to find somewhere to put it in case my experience could benefit someone.
⚠️ ⚠️ WARNING first part is scary and a bit gory... ⚠️ ⚠️
Each witch held their own dainty knife and fork, shaking along with their trembling bony hands, and one was slicing expertly down the center of my big toe with the impossibly sharp blade of their knife. I struggled to move my arms and legs, feeling as though I had freedom of movement, but my physical body remained paralyzed. Unfathomable terror washed over me as I realized that I couldn't scream for help; my mom wouldn't hear me, and I was powerless to stop these witches from feasting on my toes.
I lay there, unable to break free from the oppressive paralysis, forced to endure the excruciating pain as my toes were sliced off and consumed. The air buzzed with the witches' terrifying, joyous laughter, as if they delighted in my agony more than the taste of my flesh. Eventually, my body in a full state of terror jarred itself awake, heart beating more wildly than I had ever experienced, my lungs struggling to gasp more than the tiniest breath. After perhaps a full minute of gathering myself, I drew a deep breath and screamed into the night.
My mother came, of course, but was unable to understand the depth and terror of my experience. Her own reality did not include anything close; for her, it was an exaggeration born of childhood fear, and she became exasperated after a time with my refusal to admit that it was a dream, despite being an extremely caring parent.
The witches appeared to me several times between the ages of 10 and 15, their ghastly faces returning to torment me with each episode of sleep paralysis. Every time, I would be trapped in that terrifying limbo, my body frozen while my mind drowned itself in screams of agony and horror. I knew that they would feast on my toes, the slicing of their knives relentless, inexorable. They would smack their lips and toast each other with my blood-covered flesh as I watched.
During those years, restless legs syndrome (RLS) also began to plague my nights. As soon as I began to drift off to sleep, a discomfort would arise in my legs, like there was a swarm of fat round beetles exploring, searching for an exit. A quick kick would settle it down, but it would rise again in a cycle of building tension, acutely uncomfortable climax, and brief relief of a second or two would follow before it began again. My mother, again meaning well but busy and unfamiliar with RLS, told me it was leg cramps and made me eat more banannas. This didn't help.
It became an increasing problem, stealing precious sleep that my young body needed to thrive. The frustration of RLS merged with the terror of a potential visit from the witches. Without medication, I would lose entire nights to the relentless discomfort.
By the age of 15, the sleep paralysis episodes had occurred at least 10 times, each leaving me with the gut-wrenching memory of being eaten alive that I would carry all the next day in my gut like a sack of bricks. As I lay sleeping, every single night, I wondered if they would visit, and braced myself for an encounter.
They noticed my defiance, their laughter fading into an uneasy silence. Without fanfare, they stood up, collected their cauldron, and retreated into the darkness of my room. Though I still saw them occasionally at the foot of my bed, they became more present than threatening. Sometimes, at the start of an episode, they'd appear briefly before disappearing altogether. They had become inconsequential, and I couldn't even be sure if they were there half the time.
In my early 20s, I discovered that I could almost guarantee a bout of sleep paralysis simply by sleeping during the day. At first, nothing particularly unusual happened, but the paralysis always returned whenever I dozed off, particularly between the hours of 11am and 2pm. I was often sleeping during the day because by then, the restless legs syndrome (RLS) had grown so severe that many nights passed without sleep at all. My body felt like it was full of angry snakes now instead of beetles, desperate to escape. The sensation soon crept upward from my legs to my arms. The cycles of build up, climax, and agonizly brief relief increased in frequency and magnitude. I would often resort to sitting in the shower, flipping the water from icy cold to scalding hot all night, simply to keep myself alert enough to avoid the twitching and spasming until the blessed relief of dawn arrived.
With the daytime paralysis came a variety of hallucinations. Sometimes the witches stood at the foot of my bed, other times they'd disappear, leaving behind benign apparitions like tickling gnomes. There was nothing threatening about these visions, and I began to find a strange sense of comfort in them. I would relax into a dark place where I felt my own energy burning like a sun, present but without physical form. In this state, I felt euphoric, fully aware yet separate from myself. I started taking naps during the day and eagerly anticipated this odd experience.
Yet at night, my sleep remained troubled as RLS tormented me. Eventually, I began taking ropinirole to manage the symptoms, and it brought much-needed relief, helping me reclaim my nights and giving me several years of mostly not worrying about RLS unless I forgot to take my medicine, or the odd night where it bothered me but was still less severe.
In my late 20s, I also experienced a new type of sleep paralysis hallucination. One day it began that there were no visions or hallucinations; instead, I simply lay in a state of paralysis, aware of the room as a darkened and monochrome version of itself. I entertained myself by trying to move my arms and legs against the paralysis, and developed the idea that I had two bodies; my physical body lay on the bed, while my energetic body struggled and flailed. It was like my energy body could move separately, creating a phantom limb sensation. I felt my energy arms and legs extend out, yet my physical body lay still. As my energy body reached further from my physical self, it would snap back as if held by a rubber band.
Intrigued, I began experimenting with this phenomenon, managing to build enough momentum to "pop" out of my body one afternoon. Suddenly, I found myself looking down at my own sleeping form, resting on my back and breathing gently beside my wife, who was playing a game (probably Candy Crush) on her phone in the bed. It was surreal, and I wasn't sure whether I was hallucinating or truly perceiving my own body from a different perspective. Regardless, it was a revelation, and I felt a new sense of exploration as I gazed down at myself.
That first time, I found myself drifting through the house, checking on my two young stepdaughters as they slept. I had recently married, and it was a quiet weekend afternoon with everyone napping peacefully. Once satisfied, I ventured outside, where I took to the sky and flew around the neighborhood, spying on my neighbors. Though it felt like I was limited in speed, I seemingly had no constraints on the continuity of this hallucination. Everything appeared as a perfect physical representation of Earth, and I could travel without interruption.
The landscape was strikingly accurate, but it appeared in monochrome hues — grays, blacks, and whites — with no bright colors. Letters and numbers were unreadable, reduced to blurred nonsense. Despite these distortions, the sensation of soaring above the rolling hills and rooftops was pure euphoria. I sped along at hundreds of miles per hour, basking in the freedom of movement, and immersed in the stunning view that stretched out below me. There did seem to be some sort of very generous limit to how far I could travel, but I thoroughly explored within the boundaries for hundreds of miles around my home.
Over the years into my early 30s, I tried to pursue this opportunity of flight and exploration every chance I could. But during that time, my restless legs syndrome also became more relentless. In the past, no matter how agonizing the night had been, dawn would bring relief like a cold bath washing over me. I would sit outside and watch the sunrise, and the sensation of snakes slithering through my body would finally calm down, perhaps due to circadian rhythms and dopamine regulation. The cycles now began to climax in totally involuntary movement, spasms that caused me to tense my whole body and draw in a sharp breath every time. It would be 5 seconds of rapid buildup, spasm, a second or two of relief, repeat.
Eventually, even the dawn failed to provide respite, and I struggled during night or day whenever I relaxed too long or became even a bit drowsy. Napping became impossible, depriving me of the euphoric dreams I had learned to look forward to. I switched from ropinirole to pramipexole, hoping for relief. The medication helped me sleep five or six hours a night on good nights, but I still missed one or two nights of sleep entirely each week and rarely could nap during the day, because I took the medicine only a couple hours before bed.
Even though my restless legs syndrome worsened, one out of every ten times, I'd still manage to avoid twitching and drift into that state of peaceful paralysis during the day when I dozed off involuntarily. I gradually lost interest in pursuing out-of-body travel and instead sought every time the burning energy of the sun inside of me — the sensation of being infinitely powerful and formless simultaneously. I would retreat into this boundless feeling whenever I had the opportunity.
During these rare occasions when I could sleep during the day, I stumbled across a third type of experience. It felt like I was being sucked into space at impossible speeds, zooming past the planets of our solar system and beyond until I reached a darker patch of space. This spot seemed like a vast, corrugated sewer pipe that swallowed me whole. I rocketed through the universe, traveling at what could only be the speed of light. Eventually, I would break into the atmosphere of some unknown world, drifting down to its surface sometimes, others crashing painfully into terrain. Sometimes, I would hear a loud sound like an explosion in mid travel, and suddenly aterialize on another distant world without any sort of entrace.
These journeys were exhilarating, and each new landscape presented a mystery, revealing worlds unlike anything I'd ever seen.
I made my way down a ladder and emerged outside, where I found a man and a boy standing beside a white pinto horse. They both wore hardened leather over rough potato sack-like clothing, their long hair dotted with bone jewelry, their noses and eyebrows profusely pierced with other fragments of bone adorned with feathers. The man seemed to be instructing the boy on something to do with the horse. I approached them cautiously, fully aware of my lucid dreaming state and retaining all my memories, reasoning, and thoughts. Everything about the scene was vivid, from the clay dust swirling around to the squinting struggle to see in the wind.
Unlike the man and the boy, I had no long hair, no mouth covering, and no leather visor shielding my face from the swirling clay-dust. As I tried to speak, it seemed like they couldn’t hear me, and I wondered if I might be invisible to them. Unconcerned, I reached out to pat the horse on its nose, but before I could make contact, the man swiftly drew a long knife from his belt and stabbed me. He struck again, and the intense pain and feeling of my own scalding hot blood streaming down my pants legs snapped me awake.
Not long after my experience in the greenhouse, I found myself learning more about the worlds I could explore, though the opportunities remained rare. One day, I was transported to a beautiful blue tropical world, crashing into the dunes of a pristine white beach. There, I encountered three women, each towering over me at seven or eight feet tall. Their long black hair framed their pale faces, with blood-red lips striking against their alabaster skin. But what stood out most were their fingernails — long and crimson, curling back upon themselves dozens of times like spiraling ribbons. They were two or three feet in length and added a surreal menace to their presence.
They asked me my name and the name of my father, along with other odd questions, and seemed absolutely intriqued with me. There was a certain sort of heavy molasses quality to their voices that was more than sound and impossible to describe. It had the effect of making me feel drowsy and stupid and slow to move.
As I stood there, they began touching me with their nails, tracing them across my body in elaborate, almost ritualistic patterns. I felt my energy drain with every stroke, a profound exhaustion seeping into my core. The sensation was so intense that I woke up feeling completely drained, my limbs heavy and my spirit sapped.
Another time, I appeared without explanation after my space travel in a cavern brimming with glowing fungi and luminescent crystals. I wasn't myself in this world but instead had taken the place of someone else. My father stood beside me, guiding me through the luminous landscape. He taught me how to identify the bizarre and fascinating flora surrounding us — lessons that etched themselves into my mind and last to this day despite the surreal, made-up nature of this world. The glowing crystals and fungi cast eerie shadows across the cavern walls as my father explained the properties and uses of each.
In real life, these experiences would last for about five to eight minutes, but in the dream realm, the passage of time was different. What seemed like mere minutes could stretch into hours or even days, and in rare cases, the dreams spanned much longer.
The toll became overwhelming. I couldn't escape the agony, even after days of desperate attempts to sleep. More than once, I ended up in the emergency room after going four or five nights without sleep. For some people, this will seem like an exaggeration; I assure you, it is not. I would be nonsensical, having conversations with people tha weren't in the room, drifting in and out of intense 1 second dreams before snapping awake with painful spasms. At the hospital, they would give me percocet, and the painkillers provided brief reprieve from RLS for some reason, allowing me one solid night’s sleep, but the relentless cycle quickly resumed, leaving me struggling once again.
Eventually, I found a neurologist who prescribed Neupro patches that provided temporary relief. For a few months, I managed to sleep more consistently, but the patches quickly lost their effectiveness. It wasn't until I added methadone to the treatment that I finally found more lasting relief.
During those difficult years, I immersed myself in non-dual philosophy. In that crucible of suffering, my conviction solidified: my true nature was more aligned with the energy hallucinations I experienced than with a body made of skin, bone, and brain. That transcendent energy, more real and enduring than the physical form I occupied, became my identity in daily life, watching peacefully as my body and brain navigated the situational complexity of life.
Approaching my 40th birthday, I found that I could sleep at night and dream during the day. My life was in good shape, I lost 60 pounds without effort, and I felt fundamentally and imperturbably peaceful. Suddenly, life was in the palm of my hands, every moment pristine and still and perfect. I felt weightless without the burden of needing to endure trauma every night.
Most importantly to this story, I worked from home and could nap on my lunch breaks.
I visited dozens of worlds in a matter of a few short months and quickly was able to confirm some rules that I had suspected were true from my previous adventures.
One rule is that no one I know in real life ever shows up in the travelling dreams. No matter the place or circumstance or strange beings that I encountered, there was never a familiar face.
Another rule was that no dream person ever had a name or a father. The absence of both seemed to be an unspoken universal truth among these dream world inhabitants. Once I had internalized the significance of this, I began introducing myself to most beings that I encountered as "John, son of Michael." It left a strong impression. My name and lineage seemed to set me apart, bestowing an almost mythical quality upon me that earned me a peculiar reverence among all that I met. This knowledge became the key to navigating the dream worlds with confidence and a consistent purpose of discovery.
I learned accidentally of a unique ability during my travels: a form of telekenesis that allowed me to project force from the palms of my hands. This development led to many episodes of paralysis spent ignoring exploration and instead hilariously and painfully attempting to master this ability for the purpose of travel. Over time, I refined my skill, learning to fly much like Iron Man, but solely through the focused propulsion from my hands. Without stabilization from my feet, I had to carefully control the angle of projection and the amount of force applied to control my trajectory and speed.
Mastering this ability took significant practice, but eventually, I could navigate obstacles with ease and travel great distances in short amounts of time. I also no longer crash landed, thankfully. Importantly, I could harness this power to overcome any threatening beings that I encountered. Previously, my best option was to hide or flee, and that did not always work out. Now I had this amazing sense of fearlessness and confidence that simply cannot be rivaled by real world experience. Every time I heard the buzzing sounds and felt the WUM WUM WUM of energy as I prepared to launch into space, I embraced the journey with eager anticipation, confident in my ability to protect myself and learn about whatever strange world awaited me.
That first time, I fell down instead of up -- into myself, into the infinite dimensionless darkness where I could spin and burn and bathe in the euphoric sense of my own eternal nature. But my peace was quickly interrupted by an intense feeling of pressure at the base of my spine, though I couldn't have pinpointed where the body was that the spine inhabited. Very, very slowly, with a CRUNCHA CRUNCHA CRUNCHA noise for every milimeter of ground gained, it crawled upwards towards my head.
As it climbed, the energy below it intensified, growing exponenentially as the surface area covered grew. It wasn't painful, exactly, but it was terrifyingly intense. That first time, I managed to stay calm long enough for it to reach my shoulder blades before it became unbearably frightening and I jerked myself out of it, sure that I would die if I allowed it to continue upward. Over the last few months I have vowed to myself that I would endure any level of discomfort to see what happens at the end, but I keep chickening out. I have let it go as far as the base of my skull, at which time my head started vibrating so much that I could feel my teeth chattering violently even in my paralysis.
Another time recently when I made this prayer, I went to space as usual, but when I entered the atmosphere of a lush Earth-like world, my telekenesis failed me for the first time ever. Instead, I was pulled like in a slow tractor beam down beneath the perfectly round canopy of a giant, unfamiliar kind of tree. I felt a great sense of calm and peace and simply meditated there for quite some time, maybe 9 or 10 hours of relative time, before I heard a voice from behind the tree.
The man who stepped out from there had his face hidden in shadows. He wore a long dusty leather coat and a huge cowboy hat that shrouded him. As I write this, I find that I am not yet prepared to write about what he said to me, or how I responded. But when we had spoken, he walked solemnly over to me and lay his hand upon my head, and I jerked awake in a state of perfect bliss, despite some conflicting emotions surrounding our conversation. I call him Cowboy Hat Man, and maybe I will write more about him later.
A third time with the prayer, right before I sped off to my normal adventures, I felt a cat jump onto my bed and snuggle against my left leg, purring. It curled up there, and I assumed that it was my actual cat in real life, although it would be very uncharacteristic for him. I actually thought to myself, "Wow, I guess Buddy Socks is my spirit guide today." However, when I awoke, I realized that my door was shut and the cat was not in the room. On that trip, I went to a world that was reminiscent in quality perhaps to 15th century Europe, except on a world where the surface was far more underneath water than on Earth.
I followed the invisible cat to an old man and asked him, "Do you know the truth?" He answered, "No." I followed the invisble cat to young boy and asked him, "Do you know the truth?" He also answered, "No." It was an odd one, really.
Every time I do this, I am setting an alarm for ten minutes. Sometimes the dreams last days in relative time, but I have never yet failed to wake up before that alarm goes off.
I lowered myself slowly through a great opening in that crust, down into a lush jungle. It was beautiful but uncomfortably humid, and I quickly found a cool and dry cavern complex to explore rather than dealing with sweat and unfamiliar insects.
As I navigated through the cavern system, able to see somehow with dim light despite no obvious light source at times, I broke out into a very large open cave with a huge exit out into the jungle. I saw that it was dawn and realized that I had spent the night, however long it was on this world, in the caves.
Suddenly, my four year old daughter, Curly, with her naturally bleach-highlighted rings of long blonde hair and bright blue eyes, drifted slowly over my left shoulder and out towards the exit. She moved at a brisk adult walking pace, her back to the cave opening, her expression curious yet slightly concerned. She called out, "Dada?" in a tone that suggested wonder and slight confusion, but no real alarm in the presence of her father.
Reacting instantly, feeling my gut clench solid into a fist of rock, I used my telekinesis to close the gap between us and gathered her into my arms. She wrapped her legs around my waist and settled her butt onto my forearm, a ritual that we have practiced every day of her life. The force gripping her evaporated instantly, and suddenly, my darling girl was there in my arms, as real as any physical embrace. I could feel the tickle of her hair on my neck, the beautiful warmth of her skin, and was enveloped in her familiar scent.
Initially, I was filled with white hot rage, fueled by my instinctive reaction to the thought that some idiotic dream world inhabitant had decided to mess with my family and harm or kidnap her. But as I held her and she nuzzled her nose into my neck, the anger gave way to sheer amazement. For the first time in a decade of navigating these dreamscapes, someone that I knew from my waking life had entered the dream. This was a rule-defying moment that really rocked me, a serious breach of the established norms of these experiences.
A group of maybe 8 or 10 small winged goblins flew down from out of sight above the top lip of the exit and fluttered into the room, laughing in a very non-threatening way. They radiated a sense of innocent mischief, and my fear and anger subsided and gave way to annoyance. I whipped my right hand out and blasted a huge hole in the cavern wall to my right, startling Curly into a yelp. Unphased, I raised my voice and demanded, "Who is your King? I am John, son of Michael, and this is my daughter and she WILL NOT BE TOUCHED AGAIN."
The goblins scattered, their merriment giving way to concern that I might blast them into dust. Behind me, a deep chuckle seemed to rise from the ground itself. A voice echoed in the cavern, neither kind or cruel, full of what felt like wisdom, though that doesn't make sense in the waking world.
It spoke: "I am Eloxman, and I am their King." At hearing him announce his name, my head whipped around in the dream and in real life so hard that I woke immediately with a sprained neck that is still bothering me. I looked at my phone and saw that there were two minutes and fourteen seconds remaining in my ten minute window. I lay on the couch in shocked disbelief: Curly was in my dream, and someone had a name. As I replayed it over and over in my head, I realized that Eloxman was still speaking. I think he may have been preparing to provide the name of his father.
submitted by postdevs to SleepParalysisStories [link] [comments]
I was not sure where to share it. I added it and deleted it from a few subs. The only place it ended up was the creative writing sub, though.
And this appears to be the right spot! There are several themes but the hypnagogia is the focus. So it's quite long and probably no one reads it and that's fine. I just wanted to find somewhere to put it in case my experience could benefit someone.
⚠️ ⚠️ WARNING first part is scary and a bit gory... ⚠️ ⚠️
Childhood
The first time that I encountered sleep paralysis was when I was nine or ten. I woke up screaming, my mind gripped with the sensation of searing pain radiating from my left big toe. Though my mouth wasn't moving, I could hear my own blood-curdling cries, echoing through the darkness. An eerie orange glow spilled into the room, illuminating a sinister cauldron at the base of my bed, around which stood three squat witches. Their dark, smoky faces shifted and morphed constantly, eyes glowing red like embers recessed deeply into the shadows of their crawling flesh, jagged teeth gnashing along with their discordant laughter as roaches crawled from their mouths and disappeared into their black straw hair.Each witch held their own dainty knife and fork, shaking along with their trembling bony hands, and one was slicing expertly down the center of my big toe with the impossibly sharp blade of their knife. I struggled to move my arms and legs, feeling as though I had freedom of movement, but my physical body remained paralyzed. Unfathomable terror washed over me as I realized that I couldn't scream for help; my mom wouldn't hear me, and I was powerless to stop these witches from feasting on my toes.
I lay there, unable to break free from the oppressive paralysis, forced to endure the excruciating pain as my toes were sliced off and consumed. The air buzzed with the witches' terrifying, joyous laughter, as if they delighted in my agony more than the taste of my flesh. Eventually, my body in a full state of terror jarred itself awake, heart beating more wildly than I had ever experienced, my lungs struggling to gasp more than the tiniest breath. After perhaps a full minute of gathering myself, I drew a deep breath and screamed into the night.
My mother came, of course, but was unable to understand the depth and terror of my experience. Her own reality did not include anything close; for her, it was an exaggeration born of childhood fear, and she became exasperated after a time with my refusal to admit that it was a dream, despite being an extremely caring parent.
The witches appeared to me several times between the ages of 10 and 15, their ghastly faces returning to torment me with each episode of sleep paralysis. Every time, I would be trapped in that terrifying limbo, my body frozen while my mind drowned itself in screams of agony and horror. I knew that they would feast on my toes, the slicing of their knives relentless, inexorable. They would smack their lips and toast each other with my blood-covered flesh as I watched.
During those years, restless legs syndrome (RLS) also began to plague my nights. As soon as I began to drift off to sleep, a discomfort would arise in my legs, like there was a swarm of fat round beetles exploring, searching for an exit. A quick kick would settle it down, but it would rise again in a cycle of building tension, acutely uncomfortable climax, and brief relief of a second or two would follow before it began again. My mother, again meaning well but busy and unfamiliar with RLS, told me it was leg cramps and made me eat more banannas. This didn't help.
It became an increasing problem, stealing precious sleep that my young body needed to thrive. The frustration of RLS merged with the terror of a potential visit from the witches. Without medication, I would lose entire nights to the relentless discomfort.
By the age of 15, the sleep paralysis episodes had occurred at least 10 times, each leaving me with the gut-wrenching memory of being eaten alive that I would carry all the next day in my gut like a sack of bricks. As I lay sleeping, every single night, I wondered if they would visit, and braced myself for an encounter.
Early adulthood:
I can't remember how many times the witches visited before I finally stopped panicking. It was after countless God awful nights when I finally accepted that no matter how terrifying or painful the ordeal felt, I would be whole once it was over. I had survived the agony a hundred times before and could endure it again. One night, when the eerie glow of the cauldron illuminated their shifting faces, I felt a calm settle over me. I saw the witches, but for the first time, I wasn't afraid.They noticed my defiance, their laughter fading into an uneasy silence. Without fanfare, they stood up, collected their cauldron, and retreated into the darkness of my room. Though I still saw them occasionally at the foot of my bed, they became more present than threatening. Sometimes, at the start of an episode, they'd appear briefly before disappearing altogether. They had become inconsequential, and I couldn't even be sure if they were there half the time.
In my early 20s, I discovered that I could almost guarantee a bout of sleep paralysis simply by sleeping during the day. At first, nothing particularly unusual happened, but the paralysis always returned whenever I dozed off, particularly between the hours of 11am and 2pm. I was often sleeping during the day because by then, the restless legs syndrome (RLS) had grown so severe that many nights passed without sleep at all. My body felt like it was full of angry snakes now instead of beetles, desperate to escape. The sensation soon crept upward from my legs to my arms. The cycles of build up, climax, and agonizly brief relief increased in frequency and magnitude. I would often resort to sitting in the shower, flipping the water from icy cold to scalding hot all night, simply to keep myself alert enough to avoid the twitching and spasming until the blessed relief of dawn arrived.
With the daytime paralysis came a variety of hallucinations. Sometimes the witches stood at the foot of my bed, other times they'd disappear, leaving behind benign apparitions like tickling gnomes. There was nothing threatening about these visions, and I began to find a strange sense of comfort in them. I would relax into a dark place where I felt my own energy burning like a sun, present but without physical form. In this state, I felt euphoric, fully aware yet separate from myself. I started taking naps during the day and eagerly anticipated this odd experience.
Yet at night, my sleep remained troubled as RLS tormented me. Eventually, I began taking ropinirole to manage the symptoms, and it brought much-needed relief, helping me reclaim my nights and giving me several years of mostly not worrying about RLS unless I forgot to take my medicine, or the odd night where it bothered me but was still less severe.
New experiences:
I spent several years relishing those euphoric moments of peace, where I could feel the pure energy of being alive without a personal history or identity. In those moments, everything else faded away, and all that remained was a brilliant, infinite energy. My waking life was absorbed by study of comtemporary and historical teachings of non-duality, and with my family and progressing my career as a software developer. I was absorbing Eckhart Tolle and Gautama, Meister Eckhart and Seuhn Sang and integrating their teachings into my daily life. The feeling inside of me that reality ultimately made no sense had found an expression, and I dug in every waking moment for a clue as to the true nature of experience. Given this context, I especially looked forward to and found solace in the experience of being impersonal, boundless energy.In my late 20s, I also experienced a new type of sleep paralysis hallucination. One day it began that there were no visions or hallucinations; instead, I simply lay in a state of paralysis, aware of the room as a darkened and monochrome version of itself. I entertained myself by trying to move my arms and legs against the paralysis, and developed the idea that I had two bodies; my physical body lay on the bed, while my energetic body struggled and flailed. It was like my energy body could move separately, creating a phantom limb sensation. I felt my energy arms and legs extend out, yet my physical body lay still. As my energy body reached further from my physical self, it would snap back as if held by a rubber band.
Intrigued, I began experimenting with this phenomenon, managing to build enough momentum to "pop" out of my body one afternoon. Suddenly, I found myself looking down at my own sleeping form, resting on my back and breathing gently beside my wife, who was playing a game (probably Candy Crush) on her phone in the bed. It was surreal, and I wasn't sure whether I was hallucinating or truly perceiving my own body from a different perspective. Regardless, it was a revelation, and I felt a new sense of exploration as I gazed down at myself.
That first time, I found myself drifting through the house, checking on my two young stepdaughters as they slept. I had recently married, and it was a quiet weekend afternoon with everyone napping peacefully. Once satisfied, I ventured outside, where I took to the sky and flew around the neighborhood, spying on my neighbors. Though it felt like I was limited in speed, I seemingly had no constraints on the continuity of this hallucination. Everything appeared as a perfect physical representation of Earth, and I could travel without interruption.
The landscape was strikingly accurate, but it appeared in monochrome hues — grays, blacks, and whites — with no bright colors. Letters and numbers were unreadable, reduced to blurred nonsense. Despite these distortions, the sensation of soaring above the rolling hills and rooftops was pure euphoria. I sped along at hundreds of miles per hour, basking in the freedom of movement, and immersed in the stunning view that stretched out below me. There did seem to be some sort of very generous limit to how far I could travel, but I thoroughly explored within the boundaries for hundreds of miles around my home.
Over the years into my early 30s, I tried to pursue this opportunity of flight and exploration every chance I could. But during that time, my restless legs syndrome also became more relentless. In the past, no matter how agonizing the night had been, dawn would bring relief like a cold bath washing over me. I would sit outside and watch the sunrise, and the sensation of snakes slithering through my body would finally calm down, perhaps due to circadian rhythms and dopamine regulation. The cycles now began to climax in totally involuntary movement, spasms that caused me to tense my whole body and draw in a sharp breath every time. It would be 5 seconds of rapid buildup, spasm, a second or two of relief, repeat.
Eventually, even the dawn failed to provide respite, and I struggled during night or day whenever I relaxed too long or became even a bit drowsy. Napping became impossible, depriving me of the euphoric dreams I had learned to look forward to. I switched from ropinirole to pramipexole, hoping for relief. The medication helped me sleep five or six hours a night on good nights, but I still missed one or two nights of sleep entirely each week and rarely could nap during the day, because I took the medicine only a couple hours before bed.
Even though my restless legs syndrome worsened, one out of every ten times, I'd still manage to avoid twitching and drift into that state of peaceful paralysis during the day when I dozed off involuntarily. I gradually lost interest in pursuing out-of-body travel and instead sought every time the burning energy of the sun inside of me — the sensation of being infinitely powerful and formless simultaneously. I would retreat into this boundless feeling whenever I had the opportunity.
During these rare occasions when I could sleep during the day, I stumbled across a third type of experience. It felt like I was being sucked into space at impossible speeds, zooming past the planets of our solar system and beyond until I reached a darker patch of space. This spot seemed like a vast, corrugated sewer pipe that swallowed me whole. I rocketed through the universe, traveling at what could only be the speed of light. Eventually, I would break into the atmosphere of some unknown world, drifting down to its surface sometimes, others crashing painfully into terrain. Sometimes, I would hear a loud sound like an explosion in mid travel, and suddenly aterialize on another distant world without any sort of entrace.
These journeys were exhilarating, and each new landscape presented a mystery, revealing worlds unlike anything I'd ever seen.
The Traveling Years:
One of the first journeys I had involved zipping through space before drifting down through a hole in the top of a greenhouse. The world was painted in shades of orange and brown, its dirt swirling in powerful winds like clay cyclones. The greenhouse itself was dirty and grimy, almost opaque with crusted dirt, and filled with dense green plants — ivy and other dark green foliage that covered every inch inside. Outside, the orange sky churned with the swirling clay, making visibility nearly impossible.I made my way down a ladder and emerged outside, where I found a man and a boy standing beside a white pinto horse. They both wore hardened leather over rough potato sack-like clothing, their long hair dotted with bone jewelry, their noses and eyebrows profusely pierced with other fragments of bone adorned with feathers. The man seemed to be instructing the boy on something to do with the horse. I approached them cautiously, fully aware of my lucid dreaming state and retaining all my memories, reasoning, and thoughts. Everything about the scene was vivid, from the clay dust swirling around to the squinting struggle to see in the wind.
Unlike the man and the boy, I had no long hair, no mouth covering, and no leather visor shielding my face from the swirling clay-dust. As I tried to speak, it seemed like they couldn’t hear me, and I wondered if I might be invisible to them. Unconcerned, I reached out to pat the horse on its nose, but before I could make contact, the man swiftly drew a long knife from his belt and stabbed me. He struck again, and the intense pain and feeling of my own scalding hot blood streaming down my pants legs snapped me awake.
Not long after my experience in the greenhouse, I found myself learning more about the worlds I could explore, though the opportunities remained rare. One day, I was transported to a beautiful blue tropical world, crashing into the dunes of a pristine white beach. There, I encountered three women, each towering over me at seven or eight feet tall. Their long black hair framed their pale faces, with blood-red lips striking against their alabaster skin. But what stood out most were their fingernails — long and crimson, curling back upon themselves dozens of times like spiraling ribbons. They were two or three feet in length and added a surreal menace to their presence.
They asked me my name and the name of my father, along with other odd questions, and seemed absolutely intriqued with me. There was a certain sort of heavy molasses quality to their voices that was more than sound and impossible to describe. It had the effect of making me feel drowsy and stupid and slow to move.
As I stood there, they began touching me with their nails, tracing them across my body in elaborate, almost ritualistic patterns. I felt my energy drain with every stroke, a profound exhaustion seeping into my core. The sensation was so intense that I woke up feeling completely drained, my limbs heavy and my spirit sapped.
Another time, I appeared without explanation after my space travel in a cavern brimming with glowing fungi and luminescent crystals. I wasn't myself in this world but instead had taken the place of someone else. My father stood beside me, guiding me through the luminous landscape. He taught me how to identify the bizarre and fascinating flora surrounding us — lessons that etched themselves into my mind and last to this day despite the surreal, made-up nature of this world. The glowing crystals and fungi cast eerie shadows across the cavern walls as my father explained the properties and uses of each.
In real life, these experiences would last for about five to eight minutes, but in the dream realm, the passage of time was different. What seemed like mere minutes could stretch into hours or even days, and in rare cases, the dreams spanned much longer.
RLS becomes terrible:
I had a new busy career, an infant daughter, two active growing stepdaughters, and a wife with a hectic job, and I struggled hard through the years between 35 and 39. Each night was pure torture, as restless leg syndrome robbed me of sleep. Days of sleep deprivation left me barely functioning, often teetering on the edge of collapse while the disease gnawed away. The unrelenting discomfort made it impossible to fall asleep, even as my body craved rest. I had no choice but to continue, as I had yet to find a doctor that knew how to move past the ropinirole and pramipexole stage of treatment, and these medicines had almost entirely ceased to be effective for me. My love for my family drove me to conceal the intense effort that day to day living had become. I managed to keep up with my career by farming a prescription for Adderall. I don't have ADHD, so it had the effect on me of methamphetamine and allowed me to push through the God awful existence that life had become.The toll became overwhelming. I couldn't escape the agony, even after days of desperate attempts to sleep. More than once, I ended up in the emergency room after going four or five nights without sleep. For some people, this will seem like an exaggeration; I assure you, it is not. I would be nonsensical, having conversations with people tha weren't in the room, drifting in and out of intense 1 second dreams before snapping awake with painful spasms. At the hospital, they would give me percocet, and the painkillers provided brief reprieve from RLS for some reason, allowing me one solid night’s sleep, but the relentless cycle quickly resumed, leaving me struggling once again.
Eventually, I found a neurologist who prescribed Neupro patches that provided temporary relief. For a few months, I managed to sleep more consistently, but the patches quickly lost their effectiveness. It wasn't until I added methadone to the treatment that I finally found more lasting relief.
During those difficult years, I immersed myself in non-dual philosophy. In that crucible of suffering, my conviction solidified: my true nature was more aligned with the energy hallucinations I experienced than with a body made of skin, bone, and brain. That transcendent energy, more real and enduring than the physical form I occupied, became my identity in daily life, watching peacefully as my body and brain navigated the situational complexity of life.
Approaching my 40th birthday, I found that I could sleep at night and dream during the day. My life was in good shape, I lost 60 pounds without effort, and I felt fundamentally and imperturbably peaceful. Suddenly, life was in the palm of my hands, every moment pristine and still and perfect. I felt weightless without the burden of needing to endure trauma every night.
Most importantly to this story, I worked from home and could nap on my lunch breaks.
Rapid learning through iteration:
Rarely, I would fail to nap at all due to RLS. Sometimes I would simply doze off and wake up 10 minutes later to my cell phone alarm. But three out of five times, I would travel.I visited dozens of worlds in a matter of a few short months and quickly was able to confirm some rules that I had suspected were true from my previous adventures.
One rule is that no one I know in real life ever shows up in the travelling dreams. No matter the place or circumstance or strange beings that I encountered, there was never a familiar face.
Another rule was that no dream person ever had a name or a father. The absence of both seemed to be an unspoken universal truth among these dream world inhabitants. Once I had internalized the significance of this, I began introducing myself to most beings that I encountered as "John, son of Michael." It left a strong impression. My name and lineage seemed to set me apart, bestowing an almost mythical quality upon me that earned me a peculiar reverence among all that I met. This knowledge became the key to navigating the dream worlds with confidence and a consistent purpose of discovery.
I learned accidentally of a unique ability during my travels: a form of telekenesis that allowed me to project force from the palms of my hands. This development led to many episodes of paralysis spent ignoring exploration and instead hilariously and painfully attempting to master this ability for the purpose of travel. Over time, I refined my skill, learning to fly much like Iron Man, but solely through the focused propulsion from my hands. Without stabilization from my feet, I had to carefully control the angle of projection and the amount of force applied to control my trajectory and speed.
Mastering this ability took significant practice, but eventually, I could navigate obstacles with ease and travel great distances in short amounts of time. I also no longer crash landed, thankfully. Importantly, I could harness this power to overcome any threatening beings that I encountered. Previously, my best option was to hide or flee, and that did not always work out. Now I had this amazing sense of fearlessness and confidence that simply cannot be rivaled by real world experience. Every time I heard the buzzing sounds and felt the WUM WUM WUM of energy as I prepared to launch into space, I embraced the journey with eager anticipation, confident in my ability to protect myself and learn about whatever strange world awaited me.
To Present Day:
As I grew more confident in my ability to travel almost at will, I began to incorporate spirituality into my experimentation. One day, on a whim, I expressed to the universe that if there were a being that had my best interests at heart and loved me fully, then I gave them permission to guide my dreams and lead me to greater truths, even if they were uncomfortable. This openness led to a new experience immediately, and I began to preface many of my journeys with a similar, simple prayer.That first time, I fell down instead of up -- into myself, into the infinite dimensionless darkness where I could spin and burn and bathe in the euphoric sense of my own eternal nature. But my peace was quickly interrupted by an intense feeling of pressure at the base of my spine, though I couldn't have pinpointed where the body was that the spine inhabited. Very, very slowly, with a CRUNCHA CRUNCHA CRUNCHA noise for every milimeter of ground gained, it crawled upwards towards my head.
As it climbed, the energy below it intensified, growing exponenentially as the surface area covered grew. It wasn't painful, exactly, but it was terrifyingly intense. That first time, I managed to stay calm long enough for it to reach my shoulder blades before it became unbearably frightening and I jerked myself out of it, sure that I would die if I allowed it to continue upward. Over the last few months I have vowed to myself that I would endure any level of discomfort to see what happens at the end, but I keep chickening out. I have let it go as far as the base of my skull, at which time my head started vibrating so much that I could feel my teeth chattering violently even in my paralysis.
Another time recently when I made this prayer, I went to space as usual, but when I entered the atmosphere of a lush Earth-like world, my telekenesis failed me for the first time ever. Instead, I was pulled like in a slow tractor beam down beneath the perfectly round canopy of a giant, unfamiliar kind of tree. I felt a great sense of calm and peace and simply meditated there for quite some time, maybe 9 or 10 hours of relative time, before I heard a voice from behind the tree.
The man who stepped out from there had his face hidden in shadows. He wore a long dusty leather coat and a huge cowboy hat that shrouded him. As I write this, I find that I am not yet prepared to write about what he said to me, or how I responded. But when we had spoken, he walked solemnly over to me and lay his hand upon my head, and I jerked awake in a state of perfect bliss, despite some conflicting emotions surrounding our conversation. I call him Cowboy Hat Man, and maybe I will write more about him later.
A third time with the prayer, right before I sped off to my normal adventures, I felt a cat jump onto my bed and snuggle against my left leg, purring. It curled up there, and I assumed that it was my actual cat in real life, although it would be very uncharacteristic for him. I actually thought to myself, "Wow, I guess Buddy Socks is my spirit guide today." However, when I awoke, I realized that my door was shut and the cat was not in the room. On that trip, I went to a world that was reminiscent in quality perhaps to 15th century Europe, except on a world where the surface was far more underneath water than on Earth.
I followed the invisible cat to an old man and asked him, "Do you know the truth?" He answered, "No." I followed the invisble cat to young boy and asked him, "Do you know the truth?" He also answered, "No." It was an odd one, really.
Every time I do this, I am setting an alarm for ten minutes. Sometimes the dreams last days in relative time, but I have never yet failed to wake up before that alarm goes off.
Present Day (like seriously earlier this week is what me want to write this):
I lay down eagerly for my lunch break nap, hoping to avoid the disappointment of an off-day. I flew into the atmosphere of a world that seemed to made of rock, with nothing growing on the surface. However, I caught glimpse on the surface of a bright spot, and when I descended, I found that somehow there was a relatively thin crust of sorts around a hollow inside-world.I lowered myself slowly through a great opening in that crust, down into a lush jungle. It was beautiful but uncomfortably humid, and I quickly found a cool and dry cavern complex to explore rather than dealing with sweat and unfamiliar insects.
As I navigated through the cavern system, able to see somehow with dim light despite no obvious light source at times, I broke out into a very large open cave with a huge exit out into the jungle. I saw that it was dawn and realized that I had spent the night, however long it was on this world, in the caves.
Suddenly, my four year old daughter, Curly, with her naturally bleach-highlighted rings of long blonde hair and bright blue eyes, drifted slowly over my left shoulder and out towards the exit. She moved at a brisk adult walking pace, her back to the cave opening, her expression curious yet slightly concerned. She called out, "Dada?" in a tone that suggested wonder and slight confusion, but no real alarm in the presence of her father.
Reacting instantly, feeling my gut clench solid into a fist of rock, I used my telekinesis to close the gap between us and gathered her into my arms. She wrapped her legs around my waist and settled her butt onto my forearm, a ritual that we have practiced every day of her life. The force gripping her evaporated instantly, and suddenly, my darling girl was there in my arms, as real as any physical embrace. I could feel the tickle of her hair on my neck, the beautiful warmth of her skin, and was enveloped in her familiar scent.
Initially, I was filled with white hot rage, fueled by my instinctive reaction to the thought that some idiotic dream world inhabitant had decided to mess with my family and harm or kidnap her. But as I held her and she nuzzled her nose into my neck, the anger gave way to sheer amazement. For the first time in a decade of navigating these dreamscapes, someone that I knew from my waking life had entered the dream. This was a rule-defying moment that really rocked me, a serious breach of the established norms of these experiences.
A group of maybe 8 or 10 small winged goblins flew down from out of sight above the top lip of the exit and fluttered into the room, laughing in a very non-threatening way. They radiated a sense of innocent mischief, and my fear and anger subsided and gave way to annoyance. I whipped my right hand out and blasted a huge hole in the cavern wall to my right, startling Curly into a yelp. Unphased, I raised my voice and demanded, "Who is your King? I am John, son of Michael, and this is my daughter and she WILL NOT BE TOUCHED AGAIN."
The goblins scattered, their merriment giving way to concern that I might blast them into dust. Behind me, a deep chuckle seemed to rise from the ground itself. A voice echoed in the cavern, neither kind or cruel, full of what felt like wisdom, though that doesn't make sense in the waking world.
It spoke: "I am Eloxman, and I am their King." At hearing him announce his name, my head whipped around in the dream and in real life so hard that I woke immediately with a sprained neck that is still bothering me. I looked at my phone and saw that there were two minutes and fourteen seconds remaining in my ten minute window. I lay on the couch in shocked disbelief: Curly was in my dream, and someone had a name. As I replayed it over and over in my head, I realized that Eloxman was still speaking. I think he may have been preparing to provide the name of his father.
The End:
Sorry, that's actually it. I am going to just see if this continues somehow, but if it does not, then I might get creative with it and make up my own ending. I hope that you enjoyed this if you read this far!2024.05.11 17:11 sdlouhy Looking for Recommendations
It's been a while since I made one of these posts, and I'm back to looking for new shows. I have a lot of driving for work coming up in the near future and need something to listen to for the commute. List is in alphabetical order with favorites bolded/italicized. Would prefer horroscifi, and I am not looking for an actual play, but I am including the ones I've listened to for the sake of being thorough. Would prefer not to have any QCODE shows in recommendations
submitted by sdlouhy to audiodrama [link] [comments]
AUDIO DRAMA
- 253 Mathilde
- 90 Degrees South
- A Voice from the Darkness
- Achewillow
- Agent Stoker
- The Aldergate Papers
- The Alleyman Podcast
- The Antique Shop
- Apocalypse Songs
- Archive 81
- Ars Paradoxica
- The Author's Anathema
- Badlands Cola
- BBC, Most
- Believer
- Beyond the Dark
- Black Tapes
- Blackwood
- Blood & Gold
- Book of Constellations
- Boom: a serial drama
- Borrasca
- The Box Podcast
- BRASS
- Brave New Frontiersman
- The Bridge
- Bridgewater
- Bright Sessions
- Bronzeville
- The Burned Photo
- The Byron Chronicles
- Call of the Void
- Camp Here & There
- Campfire Radio Theater
- Caravan
- Cascadia
- Celeritas
- The Cellar Letters
- Children of the Stone
- Circle Audio Drama
- City of Ghosts
- Clarion Dawn
- Clockwork Bird
- Copperheart
- Counterbalance
- Crooked River
- Crypto-Z
- Cybernautica
- Dark Ages
- The Darkroom
- Darkstead
- The Dead Letter Office of Somewhere Ohio
- Dead Meat Pete
- Dead of the Night
- Deca Tapes
- Delivery
- Derelict/Impact Winter
- Desert Skies
- The Designated Mourner
- Desperado
- Deviser
- The Dex Legacy
- Dirt
- Division Rate
- Don't Mind Cruxmont
- Duggan Hill
- Dust
- Earth Collective
- Echoes In Between
- Edge of Sleep
- Edict Zero
- EOS 10
- ergo antz
- Escaping Denver
- The Far Meridian
- Fear Noir
- The Fourth Ambit
- Fulmar's Folly
- Gather the Suspects
- Ghost Wax
- Ghost Writer
- The Godfrey Audio Guide
- Goblin Market
- Gray Matter
- Greater Boston
- The Grey Rooms
- Guayava - Paranormal Investigator
- Hand of Brass
- The Harrowing
- Harrowing of Minerva Damson
- Haunted Tales
- The Haven Chronicles
- The Head of the Snake
- Heart of Ether
- The Heart Pyre
- Heinous Investigations
- Hell Gate City Companion
- Hellfire Fables
- Hello from the Hallowoods
- The Heron
- Hi Nay
- The Hidden People
- Hidden Signal: Evergreen
- Homecoming
- Horror of Dolores Roach
- How I Died
- How it Ends
- Human-B-Gon
- The Hyacinth Disaster
- I am in Eskew
- I Found a Wormhole
- I Have Seen Niagara
- ICE-CREAM
- The Imperfection
- In Another Room
- Incarnation Read
- InCo
- Janus Descending
- Jar of Rebuke
- Kakos Industries
- Kane and Feels: Day Trippers
- King Falls AM
- Knifepoint Horror
- Last Known Position
- The Last Voice
- Lavender Evening Fog
- Left Right Game
- Leviathan Chronicles
- Liars & Leeches
- Liberty
- Life With Althaar
- Light House
- Limetown
- Liminal Lands
- London Necropolis Railway
- The Long Hallway
- The Luchador: 100 Fights of El Fuego Fuerte
- Mabel
- Madness of Chartrulean
- Magnus Archives
- Magnus Protocol
- Malevolent
- Mansfield Mysteries
- The Mantawauk Caves
- Margaret's Garden
- Marscorp
- Marsfall
- Mayfair Watcher's Society
- McGillicuddy and Muder's Pawn Shop
- The McIlwraith Statements
- Meteor City
- Middle: Below
- Midnight Burger
- Midnight Radio
- Midst
- The Milkman of St. Gaff's
- Mirrors
- Mission to Zyxx
- Mistholme Museum of Mystery, Morbidity, and Mortality
- Mnemosyne
- Mockery Manor
- Modes of Thought in Anterran Literature
- The Monster Hunters
- Monstrous Agonies
- The Moon Crown
- Murder We Wrote
- Murphy
- My Town
- Neighbourly
- Neon Shadows
- Nightdrive
- The Night Post
- Ninth World Journal
- No Sleep
- Nocturnal Transmissions
- Not Quite Dead
- Nowhere, On Air
- The Oasis Transmissions
- October's Children
- Old Gods of Appalachia
- Olive Hill
- Original Kin
- Ostium Network
- Our Fair City
- Out of Place
- Out of the Ashes
- Oz 9
- Palimpsest
- Parabola
- Parkdale Haunt
- The Parting of the Shoe
- Pasithea Powder
- Passenger List
- Patron Saint of Suicides
- Penumbra Podcast
- The Phenomenon
- The Phone Booth
- Program: the Audio Series
- Proteus
- Pseudopod
- Purusha
- QCODE in general
- RADIO: Outcast
- Rapture 518
- Red Meat Village
- Red Valley
- Relativity
- Return Home
- Roguemaker
- Samite
- Sayer
- Scarswell-on-Sea
- The Secret of St Kilda
- Secrets of Harridge House
- Selene
- Sessions X
- Shadow and Smoke
- The Sheridan Tapes
- Shorthand Missile
- The Silt Verses
- Sinkhole
- Six Disappearances of Ella McCray
- Slumberland
- SPINES
- St Elwick's Neighbourhood Association
- St. Mary's School for Chldren with Stigmata
- Starfall
- Startripper!!
- Station 151
- Station Blue
- Stellar Firma
- Strange Air
- Strange Trails
- The Storage Papers
- The Strange Case of Starship Iris
- The Strata
- The Subjective Truth
- Subterra
- The Sulphuric Secrets
- Superman: Son of E
- lSyntax
- Tales from the Low City
- Tales of the Echowood
- TANIS
- Tapes From Beyond
- Temujin
- This House Will Devour You
- Thrilling Adventure Hour
- The Tower
- Tower 4
- The Town Whispers
- Treat
- TUMANBAY
- Under Pressure
- Under the Electric Stars
- Unwanted
- Unwell
- Valence
- Vampires of White Chapel
- VAST Horizon
- Vega
- Video Palace
- Visionaries
- Wake of Corrosion
- Wandering with the Dead
- The Waystation
- We're Alive
- We're Not Meant to Know
- Weeping Cedars
- Welcome to Night Vale
- What Happened in Skinner
- Where the Stars Fell
- The White Vault
- Windfall
- Wireland Ranch
- Within the Wires
- Woe Be.Gone
- Wolf 359
- Wooden Overcoats
- Wrong Station
- Zed 1
ACTUAL PLAY
- Ain't Slayed Nobody
- The Adventure Zone
- BomBARDed
- Campaign: Skyjacks
- Dark Dice
- Lovecraft Tapes
- The Lucky Die
- Rusty Quill Gaming
- Skyjacks: Courier's Call
2024.05.11 16:57 mage_in_training Knowings (Ch. 08)
This chapter took a long time to get out. Life has me super busy. Two jobs, married, two kids, still sober. I like how this turned out, however, someone new stole the show this time. As always, leave feedback, I appreciate it so very much.
[FIRST] [DELETED SCENES] [PREVIOUS]
~ ~ ~
As I reentered my true body without recieving a mending, the vicious wounds I endured manifested into being as I reactualized into my true Self. Through the pain, I couldn't help but think on Raver's words to me.
"The doors have to be closed."
~ ~ ~
Without recieving a mending in Raver's Dreamtime bubble, reactualization was a fucking bitch. I Perceived my Self as having quite the damaged form, my Soul was fucked over by bombardment from dreadlight and my physical body simply disagreed with it all, stating that I was mostly whole and intact, only being damaged by wounds I had already endured. The three parts had an argument of a sort amongst themselves and with the power of the Dreamtime, reached a tortuous compromise.
I'm certain I seizured and blacked out through the process.
I awoke with my body shaking and covered in a cold sweat, Tsula and Luna above me, chanting in the secret language of their esoteric Traditions. The two of them each held diffetent tools required for their cultural and subtle manipulation of reality. Soft hands, awash with mana and glowing tattoos, were placed on my chest, right where my heart was. Cold, icy fingers cradled my soul protectively, keeping it connected to my body in the here and now as harsh, physical laws rent my form.
I was paying the price for Raver's hubris, and I had almost overdrafted. Thoughts of mortal over reach faded from my mind as I slipped into cool and soothing darkness.
Cold and bloodied fingers were pressed against my chest and did little to assuage the burning ache that was my soul. I couldn't focus on anything else as I gazed at the hollowed out body of my beloved. She had been beautiful, gorgeous even, and due to give birth to our daughter in two weeks. Now, the... dead thing in front of me could barely be defined as a corpse. Her skin had been peeled away like a banana and her insides removed, leaving a bloodied, hollow space. The flesh and bones had been scooped away like ice cream, leaving little in the way of remains. Our unborn child had been pulled out and repurposed with the stolen parts of her mother by dreadlight and a mage's fell Will to form the body of a Thing.
With silent tears streaming down my face, I placed the ring I had proposed to her with and put it onto my finger, next to my plain tungsten one. The simple act of removing it almost caused what remained of her hand to simply fall apart in my fingers. I'm not sure how long I stayed like that. I couldn't even hold her body against mine for fear of it crumbling away into a vile mess. I ignored what was going on around me as I kneeled in the spent summoning circle.
The world around me split and rent itself into distorted imagery, as though I were looking at everything from under a pool with gentle waves. Some parts were compressed together and others were stretched out, not quite like a mirror maze as the world was still simply one cohesive image. Additionally, things seemed closer or further in ways that defied conventional Euclidean geometries. The only area not affected by this blatant disregard of spatial dimensions, had been myself and a scant few feet around me.
What...?
A heavy thud broke me out of my thoughts and I saw my Father landing next to me. Since both of us had been prepared, he was wearing, much like myself, full motorcycle safety gear. It had been enchanted and bolstered by hidden runes and severed Will, turning everything into protective objects that even defended against potent and offensive mysticism. The equipment in question had been chosen for its sheer mundanity and ease of access, letting the powerful enchancements skirt around the Lie and Consensus leaving the magic fully intact and potent.
"Alistair," I heard my Father say to me with grim calm as he twisted the space in front of us into a right angle, redirecting rapid gunfire, "I can't do this alone."
I remained silent.
"Damnit, Son," he growled out then literally kicked my ass with his heavy boot, almost knocking me over onto my side, "get a hold of yourself, Its here now. You handle the mages."
That got me going. I finally got up, my grief was as a lead weight and prevented me from doing what was needed. With a last look at C'Leena's hollowed out corpse, I grit my teeth, steeled my nerves and called forth my magic from the Aether.
Was I dreaming? No, worse, I was in a memory...
"Stay out of my way and watch yourself," Father said to me, "I can't pull my punches against that."
"Gotcha," I replied almost absently and turned to face the assembled shadow mages. They had inexplicably stopped theit gunfire to admire the Thing they brought into existence from Somewhere.
I couldn't help but stare, either.
Standing on top of the northernmost anchor stone, an ugly, multi-faceted block of copper with glyphs and sigils harshly hewn into it, was a naked woman. The glyphs themselves were hard to look at, as though their mere presence were an affront to reality itself, which they were. The woman's skin was a darkened olive tone and she was tall as well as athletic, lithe and fit. Her shoulder length black hair was bushy and curly, flowing about her head almost like an afro. As she ran her hands down her body, I could not help but notice that everything was oddly symmetrical and too perfect. It was unnerving me greatly and triggered an uncanny valley response that tore at my heart.
The body this Thing was wearing had belonged to my fiancée.
Father didn't let It have time to get acclimated. Sidestepping forwards, he drew upon the full capabilities of his Path, eyes backlit by stars, an impossible physical sword of abstract spatial geometries held in his left hand, and a reality defying, super-dense distortion held in his right.
The world contorted and screamed under his might.
I awoke with a start and a low groan, glad to be awake and free of that horrid nightmare again. Not for the first time, I wished I had that motorcycle gear still. I had been far too reckless then and immediately thereafter, and everything had been damaged beyond repair. I could never find anyone I trusted enough to make those enchantments anyways. Farnsworth could only enhance the mundane qualities as he didn't know enough about mana warding to permanently imbue the protections I wanted nor needed for my line of active field work.
Looking around, I saw Rue asleep on the other side of the bed and Spades was nestled between us, his massive form making a visible dip in the mattress. The big monster dog was on his back, legs splayed open and snoring loudly with his tongue hanging out of his muzzle. I was reminded a lot of my Lola when she had still been around in the flesh, making me smile with old and pleasant memories. I must have been out for some time for Spades to be here.
A quick, almost reflexive, mental orison told me everything I already suspected. My mana reserves were shot, my body had been through the ringer and my soul was frayed and burnt. While I knew I owed my continued existence to Raver and her godsend, I also knew it had taken a great and terrible toll on my Self. Miracles like that usually held some kind of hidden cost, even if they weren't readily apparent.
Getting off the bed slowly, I began to look for my pack. It took far longer than than usual as I had to steady myself quite a bit from the spinning room. I managed to be quiet, however, and didn't wake up Rue nor Spades. Finally in the shower, after some time and using the wall to support myself, I let the almost scalding water roll over my aching body. The pendant on my neck protecting me from recieving any burns or aggravating the injuries I had, both old and new.
With the hot water soothing aching muscles, I began to think and take stock of my situation. I had never been on the back foot like this, low on any kind of resource, having few allies, and being pressed for time. It was like something out of a bad novel or shitty indie Steam(R) game. Though, real life was often stranger than fiction and had no real need for a logical cause and effect dynamic. If this was going to become the norm, then I had to find another method of approaching my wendigo problem.
I was simply running out of time.
After some long moments of thinking, I began to wash my hair, using the guest products on the corner caddy. They were so much nicer than anything I would have willingly bought and made me seriously consider changing up my usual shampoo. The only idea I could come up with regarding those wendigos, besides an overwhelming frontal assault, was to appeal to their bottomless gluttony and barter for passage.
I resigned myself to actually try to negotiate with their clan leader, leveraging their horrid taboos against them to get what I needed.
Wendigos, unlike most strange cryptids, vampires and were-folk aside, had a lot of things known about them, especially how they powered their supernatural capabilities. It was a simple and rather straightforward process, the more heinous the act, the more mana they drew from it. Cannibalism, sacrilege, incest, murder, torture, hedonistic gluttony, or any number of other terrible and minor sins. As well as general lawbreaking and felonies, oftentimes combined to have as many as possible occur in the same sitting.
I audibly gasped with a sudden epiphany.
My fate had already been decided, by myself no less. In a bar I couldn't remember the name of, when I had been gazing into my bronze coin, I saw what I needed to do. I had to gift what measly scrap of knowledge I understood from Beyond the Infinite to those creatures. To let those wendigos defile and mutilate such sacred and pure knowledge to whatever whims their baleful minds could come up with.
"Fuck," was the only thing I could whisper at the thought of it all as I turned off the water, getting out of the shower. I cooled the bathroom down with but a thought and wiped away the condensation on the mirror with a towel that wasn't my own, finally getting a good look at myself without vertigo, as that had finally passed.
I looked like shit, and that was a compliment. Huge, fist shaped bruises of black, green and yellow littered my torso, though most were located on my left side and blurred together into an ugly shapeless mass. The ones on my right, however, were well defined and I could easily count the number of strikes. My face held a swollen black eye, I never noticed my diminished field of vision as I had gotten used to having them over the years. Turning gingerly and opening the mirror a bit so I could see my back, I grimaced. It was another spiderweb of a bruise, earned from when I had been smashed against the edge of Raver's Dreamtime bubble.
At least none of my fingers were broken, only very stiff and swollen, just like the rest of me. I probably couldn't drive for another day or so, either, not with my hands the way they were. As I looked, surprised I hadn't noticed earlier, the inside of my right hand was, branded. The skin, while fully healed, held the symbolic glyph that heralded the Path of Stars. A circle with nine curved lines inside it. Each line only intersected two others, but with the irregular placement of them, I could trace an intersection to any other one. In each of the open spaces, slightly off center, as a simple dot.
"Miracles leave their marks," I muttered to myself, almost disbelieving the literalness of the phrase.
I didn't bother drying off and struggled a bit getting into the clothes I brought with me, maroon athletic shorts and a black tank top. Exiting the guest bathroom, I thought about where I wanted to go. Settling on a destination, I went into the backyard, found a patch of grass in the shaded, morning sunlight and lay down. The grass was thick and rather soft, and the smell of the lemon tree and the garden was more pleasant and fragrant than they should have been.
Warding myself against dreaming, I pulled on the principles of the Aether, specifically, those of sun and storms. Since the Aether was a realm of energy and mana in all of its varying forms, I employed an advanced technique, a mysterion. It was something only able to be done by those that actually hailed from the Aether rather than having mastery over it. Pulling some of the sunlight and ambient warmth into my form, I converted measly scraps of energy directly into mana. The process was slow, and almost hardly worth the effort. It was like filling a bathtub with water, a single milliliter at a time.
Mana was now such a rare commodity, every miniscule drop of it mattered.
I settled in and entered a trance-like state, most of my attention devoted to my mysterion, though some of it was allowed to drift off elsewhere. While not exactly a dream, and while maintaining my mana draw, my mind conjured up nonsensical imagery and conversations between myself and others. I didn't pay them any attention as my thoughts wandered and drifted idly.
"I thought I'd find you out here," Rue said as I heard her sit down next to me. I didn't hear her walking, however, she continued to speak, "you've been asleep for a few days. What happened?"
"Got fucked," I replied easily, a little sarcastically as well. "Truthfully," I amended, "I got summoned by Raver. She pulled a shenanigan with Fate to let her have a waking dream."
"So she was hallucinating?" Rue stated, though it was more of a question.
"Damned straight," I confirmed, "she had Sasquatch and Farnsworth make something for her. It had to have been lethal, something like that. Anyways, we were talking and then one of Them showed up. Inside the Dreamtime bubble of hers. Found Raver's luminescence despite Mirzam hiding it."
"Shit. So It was physically there? That means It had a stolen body..." Rue said, trailing off.
"Yeah, it had a body alright," I almost growled out, "broke Raver's ritual with little effort. I spent everything I had to make a patch job just to keep it active, burned through all my mana, too. I did not want to be dispersed."
"I see," Rue said to me with understanding, "I wouldn't want to have to find my physical body without a tether either." There was a small pause before she spoke again, "So what happened next?"
"I made it mad with insults to buy time for the repaired shenanigan to stabilize Raver."
"What do you mean?" Rue asked as I heard her stretch out a bit, my eyes still closed.
"Her shenanigan was woven in such a way that whatever drug Sasquatch and Farnsworth made for her didn't just kill her," I answered with a pause then continued, "it let her do things beyond normality, anyways, my fucked up patch job let me tell Sasquatch that Raver had to stay dreaming."
"So he wouldn't just purge the elixir out of her," Rue stated, then added perhaps a tad bit defensively, "I know some things from other paths, not much, but some."
"That's good," I answered back, "knowledge is power."
"With us, it's quite literal."
I murmured in assent.
"So why did you make It mad?" Rue asked, "wouldn't It just draw strength from human emotions, especially in the Dreamtime?"
"It did," I answered back, "but It couldn't act properly on them, like human emotions were new and novel. The whole encounter was sloppy after a certain point, but I did almost die. Raver saved me, gave me a miracle."
"I saw," Rue said simply, "the mark on your hand was a giveaway."
I could only murmur in agreement again then asked, "Did you find a card in my hands, too?"
"I did," Rue replied after a few moments of silence, "it was debit card, with a note attached to it."
"From Procyon, right?"
It took a few moments for her to answer. "Yes, it was from Procyon," she took a breath and continued with wavering effort, "that damned bastard had it all planned out. Wrote a fucked up letter to me on a Google(TM) doc telling me not to worry and that this had always been his exit plan."
"Sounds like he knew what was going to happen," was all I could say.
"Yes, but, I miss him!" Rue all but snarled at me, then, in a small and quiet voice, whispered, "He was my best friend, and maybe we could've been more, y'know? Now... there's... There's just nothing, only memories of him left to mourn."
"I didn't know," I answered simply.
Rue spoke with a wavering breath before continuing, her thoughts more than a little disjointed, "a lot of what he wrote was personal, so I won't get into that, but he was certain that something catastrophic was going to happen to him and myself. So he made sure that I was at my secondary home, recovering from a job. I had just completed a mission from Raver and Mirzam, and was going to perform a ritual to patch up Spades after I got some sleep. Procyon also stated that someone has been altering things for a very long time."
"So that's why you were caught with yout pants down," I said, "you didn't even have time to recover." I paused, adjusting my mysterion as I had to refocus due to our conversation, "what did they have you do?"
"Some hedge wizards actually got a hold of an actual necromancy grimoire and charged mana tools in a graveyard," Rue said with a bit of a tired sigh, "they knew exactly what they were doing, and would have been rather powerful shadow mages if they had been capable of using starlight."
"Fuck," was all I could say, then formed an actual response after a few moments, "that shouldn't have been an issue for you. Hedges don't have our capability, though numbers may have evened out their odds."
"You're right, but they brought a spirit back before I could stop them," Rue answered with more than a little spite, "a real nasty piece of shit, too. Turned on the hedges, absorbed them, and put up a real mean fight against Spades and I. It was touch and go for a long time and I was actually fearful for my life, too."
"You won, though."
"Yeah, managed to send it kicking and screaming back to the Pit, exhausted most of my mana to do so. Fucking bastard."
There was a small silence between us as Rue became lost in her own thoughts. It was a while before I asked her, "Can you elaborate on what Procyon said about Fate being altered?"
"I can, actually, though it's a bit difficult since I'm not even a novice with the Path of Stars," Rue answered as I heard her shift a bit on the grass next to me. She paused as she seemingly collected her thoughts, "it's just that certain events were made to happen sooner or later. The big one, for our Node at least, was that you were always supposed to make your ancestral home translocate. It happened sooner than it should have."
"Fuck," I said, "So I wasn't supposed to send it away a few days ago?"
"No, that was supposed to happen after our wendigo thing, if the letter is to be believed."
"Fuck," was all I could say, "I do suppose that was a snap decision, I really didn't want Them to get a hold of anything inside. If I had been able to wait, or even had help, I'm sure I wouldn't have lost it to time and space."
"Exactly," Rue said with bitter excitement, "and we'd have access to everything in it. Losing your home was a big blow to our Node."
"Yeah, but at least They don't have it," I answered more spitefully than intended.
"Silver linings and all that, right?"
"Yeah, gotta look at the bright side, no matter how bleak," I answered back with a bit of sarcastic mirth, then said as I stretched a bit, readjusting my focus on my mysterion as well, "speaking of wendigos, I know what we need to do to solve that."
"Oh? Do tell, I couldn't come up with anything myself, kept running into dead ends," she said, then added, "lack of resources and help."
"Well, I don't think you're going to like it, I'm not sure I like it either."
"Don't keep me waiting," Rue said to me with a bit of sarcastic exasperation. I could sense her looking at me even though my eyes were still closed.
"I'm going to leverage their taboos against them, appeal to their insatiable greed and offer them what little I can understand of That Which Lies Beyond the Infinite." I sighed and added, "after all, how could they resist the allure of new magic?"
"You're right," she answered, "I definitely don't like it. I'm pretty sure it's not even wise to do so."
"Wise or not, it's the only way forward, I even saw it in a vision when I was manipulating fate magic."
"Have you talked to Mirzam or Raver about this vision of yours?"
"No, not yet, and I'm pretty sure I don't need to."
There was a bit of silence between us as she digested my words. I felt compelled to elaborate as I adjusted my mysterion again, losing a bit of my focus due to the depth of the conversation we were having.
"Acrux," I said, getting her attention fully by using the name of her star, "there's something you need to understand." I sat up, abandoning my mysterion in favor of giving her my full attention. Blinking a bit at the rise of light and warmth, I continued my thought process, "in the Dreamtime, the Thing I was fighting against, It was surprised and enraged that I was able to call upon knowledge that Lay Beyond the Infinite. Whatever those glyphs and powers are, They never wanted humans to know of them, let alone have them."
"Yet you want to give such power to wendigos of all things."
"At least the knowledge, corrupted or not, will still be on Earth," I said then added, "I'm not sure what you remember, but I know you've seen something from Beyond the Infinite. Your self revival and Spade's new form are proof of that. I was there, guided by Oracle. I Perceived something unknowable, something terrible, something no mortal has any right to gaze upon. Something I can hardly even begin to try to put into words. Raver Perceived it, too. It's how she managed to give me a godsend. So, what did you Perceive, really?"
Rue brought her knees up to her chest, thinking deeply. I could tell she was using her Perception to look inwards upon her Self. I waited patiently while she struggled to look at her soul's reflection against her mind and struggled even more to put the image there into words.
At long last, she spoke, her eyes still closed as she did so, "I'm not sure what I saw, there was too much, and I felt so small. Insignificant. Less than even a dismissed, intrusive thought. There is one thing I do remember. A doorway made of the might from two universes worth of truths and laws. A Thing was trying ro break through, but couldn't, not fully, yet the doors were opened, letting smaller ones through."
"The Doors have to be closed," I said, quoting Raver, before continuing, "that's what Raver said to me, before she sent me back to my body."
"Why didn't they mend you then?"
"They were being attacked in the waking world, too. It was a good plan on Their part, They just didn't expect us to put up so much of a fight."
"They never do, though I think that's changing."
"So that's our endgame, not sure how we're going to do it," I said, bringing the conversation back to topic, "at the moment, however, I'm going to eat a few of those mana-stuffed protein bars and fix your leg. I can't keep spending mana to be able to drive your truck. You'll have to use your own mysterion to get mana, too."
"I hate my Path's mysterions," the venom in her voice was palpable.
Before I could say anything, the backdoor opened, revealing Luna. She was wearing a bird-patterned sundress and her hair had been tied back into a loose ponytail. She put her hand over her eyes to shade them from the sun as she squinted against the brightness relative to that from inside.
"Hey, you two," she called out, "Grandmother says she needs to talk yo you."
"Alright," I called out, shakily getting up to my feet with a bit of a grunt. Everything still hurt. Rue had a bit of trouble as well, her leg was not recieving the rest and healing it deserved and needed.
"We're a mess, aren't we?" Rue asked aloud as we began to walk towards the bak door.
"Yeah, but you should see the other guys," I replied with a light chuckle, only to wince and hold my sides, "I forgot how much laughing hurts with fractured ribs."
"I really don't envy you right now," Rue said with a bit of a smirk as we entered Tsula's home, Rue entering first. "I wonder what Tsula wants to talk to us about?" Rue asked aloud, not really talking to anyone in particular.
I could only wonder as we followed Luna to the living room, the house pleasantly cool due to central air conditioning.
~ ~ ~
The moon was not in the sky, and I greatly enjoyed not having to endure the accursed, purifying light of day reflected by its surface, even if greatly diminished. The loathsome wound in my side had been a mortal blow, burning through my toughened flesh and form with unnerving ease and stunning, blinding pain. Once more, I looked at the oily, thin, and black ichor that dripped from my fingers, more human-like than I was comfortable with.
The mote of dreadlight I had recieved for my services had been the only thing that had kept me from vanishing entirely. Mortal alchemy -- science -- had advanced to such a degree so as to emulate the harsh light of day far too remarkably well. That hadn't been the worst part, that damned thaumaturgist had ensorcelled a curse upon the weapon as well. With effort, as the bulk of my power was directed at repairing the oozing wound, I altered my form and shape, struggling to maintain the illusion as I walked out onto the sidewalk from a side alley.
My contract was not yet completed.
The first two nights I had hidden myself away in the dark depths, raging against the oblivion that threatened to overtake me and ending my existence. The preparedness of the thaumaturgist had been unexpected, as well as the skill and the knowledge he had wielded so effortlessly. Without my guidance, nor presence, to instill fear into the gifted abetters, the wraiths I had gathered with me fell and fled into the night, abandoning their duties and contracts.
I would have never made this mistake against the herald of the bear.
Had I known the name of the mortal's star I had been tasked against, I would have demanded more than a simple mote of dreadlight and a paltry handful of coerced allies. Realistically, I should be grateful that I still had a kind of semi-existence. Quelling my anger and hatred, and swallowing my utter revulsion, my form rippled and took the guise of a tall, middle-aged human male in a common and unremarkable suit carrying an old and worn briefcase.
The artificial illumination around me flickered, emitting a grating hum in my presence and the thin television flickered oddly as it tried to display my image, failing to accurately do so. While tracking Arcturus's quintessence had been a bit of a task, as far too much time had passed, my familiarity with it granted me an advantage that overcame that difficulty. Traveling in my wounded state, however, had been much more arduous. Looking the woman at the reception desk over, I took on my role with hiden revulsion, aided by the illusion I was conjuring and the mimicry of my physical form.
"I'm detective Aiden Roth, and I'm looking for someone. I believe that he was here a few nights ago, definitely this past week," I said. My false, human voice had been made to sound smooth, suave and strong, interlaced with a suggestion, using what little forte I could spare. I put the worn and well-used briefcase I had conjured with me onto the counter with a heavy thud, using more of my forte to emulate such a simple thing. Opening it up, I fished out an image and showed the slightly grainy, black and white picture to the receptionist.
As the woman perused the conjured image, I could not help but hiss, my hand going to my side as I expended more of my forte than I had anticipated. The cursed wound fighting back fiercely against the dreadlight tethering my existence and life. I held my disguise with willpower of monumental proportions. A strength of will I rarely had been pressed to draw from.
Seeing the concerned look the woman gave me, I simply stated, shrugging off the pain with yet more expenditure of will, "An old injury, it flares up from time to time. No matter, have you seen this individual?"
"I'm going to need to see some kind of badge or warrant," the woman said with a genuine smile, "sorry."
The fear of losing her menial job overpowered my subtle suggestion. Unfortunate.
"Sure," I replied with a fake and well ptacticed, fetching smile, adjusting my forte to include another suggestion. I showed an actual badge with my assumed name and likeness. The mortal I was impersonating had been slain many years ago by my own hands, and the subtle illusion taking hardly any of my forte adjusted the dates and design of the badge to whatever was current.
Only a thaumaturgist, or a very particularly skilled sorcerer, could pierce the illusion. Against this mortal, there was no chance of resistance and she accepted the stolen badge without question.
She looked it over, as if trying to divine the legitimacy of it. "Okay," she finally admitted, "he was here a while ago, maybe a four or five days? I remember, 'cause I tried to flirt with him..."
I ignored her prattling and asked when she finished speaking, "Can you show me the room he used?"
"Sure, but it's been cleaned a few times since then."
With a nod, I let her lead the way to the room in question, staying silent. The lights around me flickered and hummed loudly in my presence. Had the woman been more observant, she could have seen my true shadow as I had not the forte to expend to hide it entirely from the ever changing lights. She opened the room in question, using what I could only assume was a master key card.
I immediately recognized the faded auras of quintessence.
"This will do," I stated, closing the door behind me and dropping my revolting disguise, using my forte to lock it.
I revealed my true form. My legs and arms lengthened and thinned, the black suit and red tie I was wearing became my skin, armor and form. My face and eyes became blank, gaunt and sunken, skin stretching out over it. The wound in my side made itself visible, it was an ugly red, peeling and oozing burn from my shoulder to my waist and took up most of my torso. The dreadlight I was using to prevent my oblivion illuminated the wound with a kind of sickly, crimson colored backlight. Black ichor oozed out from it and dripped onto the floor as I used the bulk of my forte to ablate the caustic, foreign quintessence from my form.
The woman looked at me as even her pitifully dull, mundane human senses told her that there was incredible danger in the room with her. She screeched and irrationally ran towards the bathroom as my presence became impossibly tall in the very finite space in the motel room. Using the smallest iota of my forte, I remotely smashed her fleeing form against a wall, pinning her there with unseen force as she begged, and sobbed for her pitiful life.
I ignored her for the moment.
Drawing upon more of my forte, freed up as I no longer needed a disguise, I sensed out where quintessence had been used, discovering two places, the bed and a wall. Imbuing the wall with my own forte, I witnessed a spectral, moving image of Arcturus throwing five darts at a map placed on the wall, one at a time, then draw intersecting lines to a single point on the map.
"Wendigos..." I hissed out in loathing, the skin on my face stretching and contorting with the movement as i spoke aloud with a nonexistent mouth. Even I knew their territory.
Turning to the second source of quintessence, I did the same thing. I saw Arcturus ward himself against dreaming and then hold a brilliant shield in the air, as well as a ball of fire. My knowledge of actual thaumaturgy told me that I would have great difficulties against those Knowings. I put the mystery of his Dreamtime excursion out of my mind for now, there was nothing I could do regarding that.
My expenditure of forte caused my horrid wound to pulse against my form painfully. With a hiss, I turned to the woman meekly begging me to spare her life as she was still pinned against the wall. I could use a thrall, especially as I could no longer gain allies, not without offering something in return to my current contract holders.
That was not a barter I wanted to engage in.
"Please... don't kill me... please... I'll do anything... please..."
The absolute terror in her eyes was delectable. Her fear invigorated me with energy and reminded me I needed to feed. However, the morsels offered by her would be more than sufficient for my needs. I dragged my left hand across my oozing wound, covering it in my own essence then flexed my forte. The clothes she was wearing split in half down the middle, revealing her naked form, making her shriek. I could see the ideas her panicked mind vomited forth as she renewed her struggles with vigor.
What I had in mind was so much worse than the mundane taking of her physical body she expected.
Using the full might of my forte, I lengthened and sharpened my index finger, the tip dripping with the gathered ichor of my essence. In an instant, less than the blink of an eye, I appeared in front of her from where I had been by the bed and plunged the very tip of my sharpened, needle-like nail into the center of her heart, cutting through the most sensitive parts of her breast to do so due to the angle I had chosen for just this purpose. As I let my ichor suffuse her body with each beat of her racing heart, her vascular system visibly turning black under her skin as she screamed and writhed in agony, an odd thing happened.
What could only be considered my blood had been tainted by thaumaturgy qnr bolstered by dreadlight as well as my own forte. As it mixed with the blank canvas of the mortal in front of me, I could sense the candle of her soul. Reaching out with dreadlight, letting the wound burn my side with a hiss of inhaled breath, I ignited it with three kinds of mysticism.
A horrified realization overcame her as she knew I had fundamentally altered her to suit my whims. Having a thaumaturgist thrall would be a great boon.
"You'll do quite nicely," I said with an actual grin, the skin stretched over my mouth revealing impossibly large, gleaming flat teeth, as I watched the physical and mystical changes taking place.
My new thrall would never be human again.
I feasted on her terror, anguish and torment.
It was delicious.
~ ~ ~
Arcturus and Acrux will be back. C'Leena Thomas, Prosthetist is going to be my next update.
[[NEXT]]
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[FIRST] [DELETED SCENES] [PREVIOUS]
~ ~ ~
As I reentered my true body without recieving a mending, the vicious wounds I endured manifested into being as I reactualized into my true Self. Through the pain, I couldn't help but think on Raver's words to me.
"The doors have to be closed."
~ ~ ~
Without recieving a mending in Raver's Dreamtime bubble, reactualization was a fucking bitch. I Perceived my Self as having quite the damaged form, my Soul was fucked over by bombardment from dreadlight and my physical body simply disagreed with it all, stating that I was mostly whole and intact, only being damaged by wounds I had already endured. The three parts had an argument of a sort amongst themselves and with the power of the Dreamtime, reached a tortuous compromise.
I'm certain I seizured and blacked out through the process.
I awoke with my body shaking and covered in a cold sweat, Tsula and Luna above me, chanting in the secret language of their esoteric Traditions. The two of them each held diffetent tools required for their cultural and subtle manipulation of reality. Soft hands, awash with mana and glowing tattoos, were placed on my chest, right where my heart was. Cold, icy fingers cradled my soul protectively, keeping it connected to my body in the here and now as harsh, physical laws rent my form.
I was paying the price for Raver's hubris, and I had almost overdrafted. Thoughts of mortal over reach faded from my mind as I slipped into cool and soothing darkness.
Cold and bloodied fingers were pressed against my chest and did little to assuage the burning ache that was my soul. I couldn't focus on anything else as I gazed at the hollowed out body of my beloved. She had been beautiful, gorgeous even, and due to give birth to our daughter in two weeks. Now, the... dead thing in front of me could barely be defined as a corpse. Her skin had been peeled away like a banana and her insides removed, leaving a bloodied, hollow space. The flesh and bones had been scooped away like ice cream, leaving little in the way of remains. Our unborn child had been pulled out and repurposed with the stolen parts of her mother by dreadlight and a mage's fell Will to form the body of a Thing.
With silent tears streaming down my face, I placed the ring I had proposed to her with and put it onto my finger, next to my plain tungsten one. The simple act of removing it almost caused what remained of her hand to simply fall apart in my fingers. I'm not sure how long I stayed like that. I couldn't even hold her body against mine for fear of it crumbling away into a vile mess. I ignored what was going on around me as I kneeled in the spent summoning circle.
The world around me split and rent itself into distorted imagery, as though I were looking at everything from under a pool with gentle waves. Some parts were compressed together and others were stretched out, not quite like a mirror maze as the world was still simply one cohesive image. Additionally, things seemed closer or further in ways that defied conventional Euclidean geometries. The only area not affected by this blatant disregard of spatial dimensions, had been myself and a scant few feet around me.
What...?
A heavy thud broke me out of my thoughts and I saw my Father landing next to me. Since both of us had been prepared, he was wearing, much like myself, full motorcycle safety gear. It had been enchanted and bolstered by hidden runes and severed Will, turning everything into protective objects that even defended against potent and offensive mysticism. The equipment in question had been chosen for its sheer mundanity and ease of access, letting the powerful enchancements skirt around the Lie and Consensus leaving the magic fully intact and potent.
"Alistair," I heard my Father say to me with grim calm as he twisted the space in front of us into a right angle, redirecting rapid gunfire, "I can't do this alone."
I remained silent.
"Damnit, Son," he growled out then literally kicked my ass with his heavy boot, almost knocking me over onto my side, "get a hold of yourself, Its here now. You handle the mages."
That got me going. I finally got up, my grief was as a lead weight and prevented me from doing what was needed. With a last look at C'Leena's hollowed out corpse, I grit my teeth, steeled my nerves and called forth my magic from the Aether.
Was I dreaming? No, worse, I was in a memory...
"Stay out of my way and watch yourself," Father said to me, "I can't pull my punches against that."
"Gotcha," I replied almost absently and turned to face the assembled shadow mages. They had inexplicably stopped theit gunfire to admire the Thing they brought into existence from Somewhere.
I couldn't help but stare, either.
Standing on top of the northernmost anchor stone, an ugly, multi-faceted block of copper with glyphs and sigils harshly hewn into it, was a naked woman. The glyphs themselves were hard to look at, as though their mere presence were an affront to reality itself, which they were. The woman's skin was a darkened olive tone and she was tall as well as athletic, lithe and fit. Her shoulder length black hair was bushy and curly, flowing about her head almost like an afro. As she ran her hands down her body, I could not help but notice that everything was oddly symmetrical and too perfect. It was unnerving me greatly and triggered an uncanny valley response that tore at my heart.
The body this Thing was wearing had belonged to my fiancée.
Father didn't let It have time to get acclimated. Sidestepping forwards, he drew upon the full capabilities of his Path, eyes backlit by stars, an impossible physical sword of abstract spatial geometries held in his left hand, and a reality defying, super-dense distortion held in his right.
The world contorted and screamed under his might.
I awoke with a start and a low groan, glad to be awake and free of that horrid nightmare again. Not for the first time, I wished I had that motorcycle gear still. I had been far too reckless then and immediately thereafter, and everything had been damaged beyond repair. I could never find anyone I trusted enough to make those enchantments anyways. Farnsworth could only enhance the mundane qualities as he didn't know enough about mana warding to permanently imbue the protections I wanted nor needed for my line of active field work.
Looking around, I saw Rue asleep on the other side of the bed and Spades was nestled between us, his massive form making a visible dip in the mattress. The big monster dog was on his back, legs splayed open and snoring loudly with his tongue hanging out of his muzzle. I was reminded a lot of my Lola when she had still been around in the flesh, making me smile with old and pleasant memories. I must have been out for some time for Spades to be here.
A quick, almost reflexive, mental orison told me everything I already suspected. My mana reserves were shot, my body had been through the ringer and my soul was frayed and burnt. While I knew I owed my continued existence to Raver and her godsend, I also knew it had taken a great and terrible toll on my Self. Miracles like that usually held some kind of hidden cost, even if they weren't readily apparent.
Getting off the bed slowly, I began to look for my pack. It took far longer than than usual as I had to steady myself quite a bit from the spinning room. I managed to be quiet, however, and didn't wake up Rue nor Spades. Finally in the shower, after some time and using the wall to support myself, I let the almost scalding water roll over my aching body. The pendant on my neck protecting me from recieving any burns or aggravating the injuries I had, both old and new.
With the hot water soothing aching muscles, I began to think and take stock of my situation. I had never been on the back foot like this, low on any kind of resource, having few allies, and being pressed for time. It was like something out of a bad novel or shitty indie Steam(R) game. Though, real life was often stranger than fiction and had no real need for a logical cause and effect dynamic. If this was going to become the norm, then I had to find another method of approaching my wendigo problem.
I was simply running out of time.
After some long moments of thinking, I began to wash my hair, using the guest products on the corner caddy. They were so much nicer than anything I would have willingly bought and made me seriously consider changing up my usual shampoo. The only idea I could come up with regarding those wendigos, besides an overwhelming frontal assault, was to appeal to their bottomless gluttony and barter for passage.
I resigned myself to actually try to negotiate with their clan leader, leveraging their horrid taboos against them to get what I needed.
Wendigos, unlike most strange cryptids, vampires and were-folk aside, had a lot of things known about them, especially how they powered their supernatural capabilities. It was a simple and rather straightforward process, the more heinous the act, the more mana they drew from it. Cannibalism, sacrilege, incest, murder, torture, hedonistic gluttony, or any number of other terrible and minor sins. As well as general lawbreaking and felonies, oftentimes combined to have as many as possible occur in the same sitting.
I audibly gasped with a sudden epiphany.
My fate had already been decided, by myself no less. In a bar I couldn't remember the name of, when I had been gazing into my bronze coin, I saw what I needed to do. I had to gift what measly scrap of knowledge I understood from Beyond the Infinite to those creatures. To let those wendigos defile and mutilate such sacred and pure knowledge to whatever whims their baleful minds could come up with.
"Fuck," was the only thing I could whisper at the thought of it all as I turned off the water, getting out of the shower. I cooled the bathroom down with but a thought and wiped away the condensation on the mirror with a towel that wasn't my own, finally getting a good look at myself without vertigo, as that had finally passed.
I looked like shit, and that was a compliment. Huge, fist shaped bruises of black, green and yellow littered my torso, though most were located on my left side and blurred together into an ugly shapeless mass. The ones on my right, however, were well defined and I could easily count the number of strikes. My face held a swollen black eye, I never noticed my diminished field of vision as I had gotten used to having them over the years. Turning gingerly and opening the mirror a bit so I could see my back, I grimaced. It was another spiderweb of a bruise, earned from when I had been smashed against the edge of Raver's Dreamtime bubble.
At least none of my fingers were broken, only very stiff and swollen, just like the rest of me. I probably couldn't drive for another day or so, either, not with my hands the way they were. As I looked, surprised I hadn't noticed earlier, the inside of my right hand was, branded. The skin, while fully healed, held the symbolic glyph that heralded the Path of Stars. A circle with nine curved lines inside it. Each line only intersected two others, but with the irregular placement of them, I could trace an intersection to any other one. In each of the open spaces, slightly off center, as a simple dot.
"Miracles leave their marks," I muttered to myself, almost disbelieving the literalness of the phrase.
I didn't bother drying off and struggled a bit getting into the clothes I brought with me, maroon athletic shorts and a black tank top. Exiting the guest bathroom, I thought about where I wanted to go. Settling on a destination, I went into the backyard, found a patch of grass in the shaded, morning sunlight and lay down. The grass was thick and rather soft, and the smell of the lemon tree and the garden was more pleasant and fragrant than they should have been.
Warding myself against dreaming, I pulled on the principles of the Aether, specifically, those of sun and storms. Since the Aether was a realm of energy and mana in all of its varying forms, I employed an advanced technique, a mysterion. It was something only able to be done by those that actually hailed from the Aether rather than having mastery over it. Pulling some of the sunlight and ambient warmth into my form, I converted measly scraps of energy directly into mana. The process was slow, and almost hardly worth the effort. It was like filling a bathtub with water, a single milliliter at a time.
Mana was now such a rare commodity, every miniscule drop of it mattered.
I settled in and entered a trance-like state, most of my attention devoted to my mysterion, though some of it was allowed to drift off elsewhere. While not exactly a dream, and while maintaining my mana draw, my mind conjured up nonsensical imagery and conversations between myself and others. I didn't pay them any attention as my thoughts wandered and drifted idly.
"I thought I'd find you out here," Rue said as I heard her sit down next to me. I didn't hear her walking, however, she continued to speak, "you've been asleep for a few days. What happened?"
"Got fucked," I replied easily, a little sarcastically as well. "Truthfully," I amended, "I got summoned by Raver. She pulled a shenanigan with Fate to let her have a waking dream."
"So she was hallucinating?" Rue stated, though it was more of a question.
"Damned straight," I confirmed, "she had Sasquatch and Farnsworth make something for her. It had to have been lethal, something like that. Anyways, we were talking and then one of Them showed up. Inside the Dreamtime bubble of hers. Found Raver's luminescence despite Mirzam hiding it."
"Shit. So It was physically there? That means It had a stolen body..." Rue said, trailing off.
"Yeah, it had a body alright," I almost growled out, "broke Raver's ritual with little effort. I spent everything I had to make a patch job just to keep it active, burned through all my mana, too. I did not want to be dispersed."
"I see," Rue said to me with understanding, "I wouldn't want to have to find my physical body without a tether either." There was a small pause before she spoke again, "So what happened next?"
"I made it mad with insults to buy time for the repaired shenanigan to stabilize Raver."
"What do you mean?" Rue asked as I heard her stretch out a bit, my eyes still closed.
"Her shenanigan was woven in such a way that whatever drug Sasquatch and Farnsworth made for her didn't just kill her," I answered with a pause then continued, "it let her do things beyond normality, anyways, my fucked up patch job let me tell Sasquatch that Raver had to stay dreaming."
"So he wouldn't just purge the elixir out of her," Rue stated, then added perhaps a tad bit defensively, "I know some things from other paths, not much, but some."
"That's good," I answered back, "knowledge is power."
"With us, it's quite literal."
I murmured in assent.
"So why did you make It mad?" Rue asked, "wouldn't It just draw strength from human emotions, especially in the Dreamtime?"
"It did," I answered back, "but It couldn't act properly on them, like human emotions were new and novel. The whole encounter was sloppy after a certain point, but I did almost die. Raver saved me, gave me a miracle."
"I saw," Rue said simply, "the mark on your hand was a giveaway."
I could only murmur in agreement again then asked, "Did you find a card in my hands, too?"
"I did," Rue replied after a few moments of silence, "it was debit card, with a note attached to it."
"From Procyon, right?"
It took a few moments for her to answer. "Yes, it was from Procyon," she took a breath and continued with wavering effort, "that damned bastard had it all planned out. Wrote a fucked up letter to me on a Google(TM) doc telling me not to worry and that this had always been his exit plan."
"Sounds like he knew what was going to happen," was all I could say.
"Yes, but, I miss him!" Rue all but snarled at me, then, in a small and quiet voice, whispered, "He was my best friend, and maybe we could've been more, y'know? Now... there's... There's just nothing, only memories of him left to mourn."
"I didn't know," I answered simply.
Rue spoke with a wavering breath before continuing, her thoughts more than a little disjointed, "a lot of what he wrote was personal, so I won't get into that, but he was certain that something catastrophic was going to happen to him and myself. So he made sure that I was at my secondary home, recovering from a job. I had just completed a mission from Raver and Mirzam, and was going to perform a ritual to patch up Spades after I got some sleep. Procyon also stated that someone has been altering things for a very long time."
"So that's why you were caught with yout pants down," I said, "you didn't even have time to recover." I paused, adjusting my mysterion as I had to refocus due to our conversation, "what did they have you do?"
"Some hedge wizards actually got a hold of an actual necromancy grimoire and charged mana tools in a graveyard," Rue said with a bit of a tired sigh, "they knew exactly what they were doing, and would have been rather powerful shadow mages if they had been capable of using starlight."
"Fuck," was all I could say, then formed an actual response after a few moments, "that shouldn't have been an issue for you. Hedges don't have our capability, though numbers may have evened out their odds."
"You're right, but they brought a spirit back before I could stop them," Rue answered with more than a little spite, "a real nasty piece of shit, too. Turned on the hedges, absorbed them, and put up a real mean fight against Spades and I. It was touch and go for a long time and I was actually fearful for my life, too."
"You won, though."
"Yeah, managed to send it kicking and screaming back to the Pit, exhausted most of my mana to do so. Fucking bastard."
There was a small silence between us as Rue became lost in her own thoughts. It was a while before I asked her, "Can you elaborate on what Procyon said about Fate being altered?"
"I can, actually, though it's a bit difficult since I'm not even a novice with the Path of Stars," Rue answered as I heard her shift a bit on the grass next to me. She paused as she seemingly collected her thoughts, "it's just that certain events were made to happen sooner or later. The big one, for our Node at least, was that you were always supposed to make your ancestral home translocate. It happened sooner than it should have."
"Fuck," I said, "So I wasn't supposed to send it away a few days ago?"
"No, that was supposed to happen after our wendigo thing, if the letter is to be believed."
"Fuck," was all I could say, "I do suppose that was a snap decision, I really didn't want Them to get a hold of anything inside. If I had been able to wait, or even had help, I'm sure I wouldn't have lost it to time and space."
"Exactly," Rue said with bitter excitement, "and we'd have access to everything in it. Losing your home was a big blow to our Node."
"Yeah, but at least They don't have it," I answered more spitefully than intended.
"Silver linings and all that, right?"
"Yeah, gotta look at the bright side, no matter how bleak," I answered back with a bit of sarcastic mirth, then said as I stretched a bit, readjusting my focus on my mysterion as well, "speaking of wendigos, I know what we need to do to solve that."
"Oh? Do tell, I couldn't come up with anything myself, kept running into dead ends," she said, then added, "lack of resources and help."
"Well, I don't think you're going to like it, I'm not sure I like it either."
"Don't keep me waiting," Rue said to me with a bit of sarcastic exasperation. I could sense her looking at me even though my eyes were still closed.
"I'm going to leverage their taboos against them, appeal to their insatiable greed and offer them what little I can understand of That Which Lies Beyond the Infinite." I sighed and added, "after all, how could they resist the allure of new magic?"
"You're right," she answered, "I definitely don't like it. I'm pretty sure it's not even wise to do so."
"Wise or not, it's the only way forward, I even saw it in a vision when I was manipulating fate magic."
"Have you talked to Mirzam or Raver about this vision of yours?"
"No, not yet, and I'm pretty sure I don't need to."
There was a bit of silence between us as she digested my words. I felt compelled to elaborate as I adjusted my mysterion again, losing a bit of my focus due to the depth of the conversation we were having.
"Acrux," I said, getting her attention fully by using the name of her star, "there's something you need to understand." I sat up, abandoning my mysterion in favor of giving her my full attention. Blinking a bit at the rise of light and warmth, I continued my thought process, "in the Dreamtime, the Thing I was fighting against, It was surprised and enraged that I was able to call upon knowledge that Lay Beyond the Infinite. Whatever those glyphs and powers are, They never wanted humans to know of them, let alone have them."
"Yet you want to give such power to wendigos of all things."
"At least the knowledge, corrupted or not, will still be on Earth," I said then added, "I'm not sure what you remember, but I know you've seen something from Beyond the Infinite. Your self revival and Spade's new form are proof of that. I was there, guided by Oracle. I Perceived something unknowable, something terrible, something no mortal has any right to gaze upon. Something I can hardly even begin to try to put into words. Raver Perceived it, too. It's how she managed to give me a godsend. So, what did you Perceive, really?"
Rue brought her knees up to her chest, thinking deeply. I could tell she was using her Perception to look inwards upon her Self. I waited patiently while she struggled to look at her soul's reflection against her mind and struggled even more to put the image there into words.
At long last, she spoke, her eyes still closed as she did so, "I'm not sure what I saw, there was too much, and I felt so small. Insignificant. Less than even a dismissed, intrusive thought. There is one thing I do remember. A doorway made of the might from two universes worth of truths and laws. A Thing was trying ro break through, but couldn't, not fully, yet the doors were opened, letting smaller ones through."
"The Doors have to be closed," I said, quoting Raver, before continuing, "that's what Raver said to me, before she sent me back to my body."
"Why didn't they mend you then?"
"They were being attacked in the waking world, too. It was a good plan on Their part, They just didn't expect us to put up so much of a fight."
"They never do, though I think that's changing."
"So that's our endgame, not sure how we're going to do it," I said, bringing the conversation back to topic, "at the moment, however, I'm going to eat a few of those mana-stuffed protein bars and fix your leg. I can't keep spending mana to be able to drive your truck. You'll have to use your own mysterion to get mana, too."
"I hate my Path's mysterions," the venom in her voice was palpable.
Before I could say anything, the backdoor opened, revealing Luna. She was wearing a bird-patterned sundress and her hair had been tied back into a loose ponytail. She put her hand over her eyes to shade them from the sun as she squinted against the brightness relative to that from inside.
"Hey, you two," she called out, "Grandmother says she needs to talk yo you."
"Alright," I called out, shakily getting up to my feet with a bit of a grunt. Everything still hurt. Rue had a bit of trouble as well, her leg was not recieving the rest and healing it deserved and needed.
"We're a mess, aren't we?" Rue asked aloud as we began to walk towards the bak door.
"Yeah, but you should see the other guys," I replied with a light chuckle, only to wince and hold my sides, "I forgot how much laughing hurts with fractured ribs."
"I really don't envy you right now," Rue said with a bit of a smirk as we entered Tsula's home, Rue entering first. "I wonder what Tsula wants to talk to us about?" Rue asked aloud, not really talking to anyone in particular.
I could only wonder as we followed Luna to the living room, the house pleasantly cool due to central air conditioning.
~ ~ ~
The moon was not in the sky, and I greatly enjoyed not having to endure the accursed, purifying light of day reflected by its surface, even if greatly diminished. The loathsome wound in my side had been a mortal blow, burning through my toughened flesh and form with unnerving ease and stunning, blinding pain. Once more, I looked at the oily, thin, and black ichor that dripped from my fingers, more human-like than I was comfortable with.
The mote of dreadlight I had recieved for my services had been the only thing that had kept me from vanishing entirely. Mortal alchemy -- science -- had advanced to such a degree so as to emulate the harsh light of day far too remarkably well. That hadn't been the worst part, that damned thaumaturgist had ensorcelled a curse upon the weapon as well. With effort, as the bulk of my power was directed at repairing the oozing wound, I altered my form and shape, struggling to maintain the illusion as I walked out onto the sidewalk from a side alley.
My contract was not yet completed.
The first two nights I had hidden myself away in the dark depths, raging against the oblivion that threatened to overtake me and ending my existence. The preparedness of the thaumaturgist had been unexpected, as well as the skill and the knowledge he had wielded so effortlessly. Without my guidance, nor presence, to instill fear into the gifted abetters, the wraiths I had gathered with me fell and fled into the night, abandoning their duties and contracts.
I would have never made this mistake against the herald of the bear.
Had I known the name of the mortal's star I had been tasked against, I would have demanded more than a simple mote of dreadlight and a paltry handful of coerced allies. Realistically, I should be grateful that I still had a kind of semi-existence. Quelling my anger and hatred, and swallowing my utter revulsion, my form rippled and took the guise of a tall, middle-aged human male in a common and unremarkable suit carrying an old and worn briefcase.
The artificial illumination around me flickered, emitting a grating hum in my presence and the thin television flickered oddly as it tried to display my image, failing to accurately do so. While tracking Arcturus's quintessence had been a bit of a task, as far too much time had passed, my familiarity with it granted me an advantage that overcame that difficulty. Traveling in my wounded state, however, had been much more arduous. Looking the woman at the reception desk over, I took on my role with hiden revulsion, aided by the illusion I was conjuring and the mimicry of my physical form.
"I'm detective Aiden Roth, and I'm looking for someone. I believe that he was here a few nights ago, definitely this past week," I said. My false, human voice had been made to sound smooth, suave and strong, interlaced with a suggestion, using what little forte I could spare. I put the worn and well-used briefcase I had conjured with me onto the counter with a heavy thud, using more of my forte to emulate such a simple thing. Opening it up, I fished out an image and showed the slightly grainy, black and white picture to the receptionist.
As the woman perused the conjured image, I could not help but hiss, my hand going to my side as I expended more of my forte than I had anticipated. The cursed wound fighting back fiercely against the dreadlight tethering my existence and life. I held my disguise with willpower of monumental proportions. A strength of will I rarely had been pressed to draw from.
Seeing the concerned look the woman gave me, I simply stated, shrugging off the pain with yet more expenditure of will, "An old injury, it flares up from time to time. No matter, have you seen this individual?"
"I'm going to need to see some kind of badge or warrant," the woman said with a genuine smile, "sorry."
The fear of losing her menial job overpowered my subtle suggestion. Unfortunate.
"Sure," I replied with a fake and well ptacticed, fetching smile, adjusting my forte to include another suggestion. I showed an actual badge with my assumed name and likeness. The mortal I was impersonating had been slain many years ago by my own hands, and the subtle illusion taking hardly any of my forte adjusted the dates and design of the badge to whatever was current.
Only a thaumaturgist, or a very particularly skilled sorcerer, could pierce the illusion. Against this mortal, there was no chance of resistance and she accepted the stolen badge without question.
She looked it over, as if trying to divine the legitimacy of it. "Okay," she finally admitted, "he was here a while ago, maybe a four or five days? I remember, 'cause I tried to flirt with him..."
I ignored her prattling and asked when she finished speaking, "Can you show me the room he used?"
"Sure, but it's been cleaned a few times since then."
With a nod, I let her lead the way to the room in question, staying silent. The lights around me flickered and hummed loudly in my presence. Had the woman been more observant, she could have seen my true shadow as I had not the forte to expend to hide it entirely from the ever changing lights. She opened the room in question, using what I could only assume was a master key card.
I immediately recognized the faded auras of quintessence.
"This will do," I stated, closing the door behind me and dropping my revolting disguise, using my forte to lock it.
I revealed my true form. My legs and arms lengthened and thinned, the black suit and red tie I was wearing became my skin, armor and form. My face and eyes became blank, gaunt and sunken, skin stretching out over it. The wound in my side made itself visible, it was an ugly red, peeling and oozing burn from my shoulder to my waist and took up most of my torso. The dreadlight I was using to prevent my oblivion illuminated the wound with a kind of sickly, crimson colored backlight. Black ichor oozed out from it and dripped onto the floor as I used the bulk of my forte to ablate the caustic, foreign quintessence from my form.
The woman looked at me as even her pitifully dull, mundane human senses told her that there was incredible danger in the room with her. She screeched and irrationally ran towards the bathroom as my presence became impossibly tall in the very finite space in the motel room. Using the smallest iota of my forte, I remotely smashed her fleeing form against a wall, pinning her there with unseen force as she begged, and sobbed for her pitiful life.
I ignored her for the moment.
Drawing upon more of my forte, freed up as I no longer needed a disguise, I sensed out where quintessence had been used, discovering two places, the bed and a wall. Imbuing the wall with my own forte, I witnessed a spectral, moving image of Arcturus throwing five darts at a map placed on the wall, one at a time, then draw intersecting lines to a single point on the map.
"Wendigos..." I hissed out in loathing, the skin on my face stretching and contorting with the movement as i spoke aloud with a nonexistent mouth. Even I knew their territory.
Turning to the second source of quintessence, I did the same thing. I saw Arcturus ward himself against dreaming and then hold a brilliant shield in the air, as well as a ball of fire. My knowledge of actual thaumaturgy told me that I would have great difficulties against those Knowings. I put the mystery of his Dreamtime excursion out of my mind for now, there was nothing I could do regarding that.
My expenditure of forte caused my horrid wound to pulse against my form painfully. With a hiss, I turned to the woman meekly begging me to spare her life as she was still pinned against the wall. I could use a thrall, especially as I could no longer gain allies, not without offering something in return to my current contract holders.
That was not a barter I wanted to engage in.
"Please... don't kill me... please... I'll do anything... please..."
The absolute terror in her eyes was delectable. Her fear invigorated me with energy and reminded me I needed to feed. However, the morsels offered by her would be more than sufficient for my needs. I dragged my left hand across my oozing wound, covering it in my own essence then flexed my forte. The clothes she was wearing split in half down the middle, revealing her naked form, making her shriek. I could see the ideas her panicked mind vomited forth as she renewed her struggles with vigor.
What I had in mind was so much worse than the mundane taking of her physical body she expected.
Using the full might of my forte, I lengthened and sharpened my index finger, the tip dripping with the gathered ichor of my essence. In an instant, less than the blink of an eye, I appeared in front of her from where I had been by the bed and plunged the very tip of my sharpened, needle-like nail into the center of her heart, cutting through the most sensitive parts of her breast to do so due to the angle I had chosen for just this purpose. As I let my ichor suffuse her body with each beat of her racing heart, her vascular system visibly turning black under her skin as she screamed and writhed in agony, an odd thing happened.
What could only be considered my blood had been tainted by thaumaturgy qnr bolstered by dreadlight as well as my own forte. As it mixed with the blank canvas of the mortal in front of me, I could sense the candle of her soul. Reaching out with dreadlight, letting the wound burn my side with a hiss of inhaled breath, I ignited it with three kinds of mysticism.
A horrified realization overcame her as she knew I had fundamentally altered her to suit my whims. Having a thaumaturgist thrall would be a great boon.
"You'll do quite nicely," I said with an actual grin, the skin stretched over my mouth revealing impossibly large, gleaming flat teeth, as I watched the physical and mystical changes taking place.
My new thrall would never be human again.
I feasted on her terror, anguish and torment.
It was delicious.
~ ~ ~
Arcturus and Acrux will be back. C'Leena Thomas, Prosthetist is going to be my next update.
[[NEXT]]
2024.05.11 16:20 Acrobatic-Teach6219 Zion
 | Hey, I know you don't fuck with me whatsoever, but I'm done with school and I have some things to say. For one, thank you...really. I'm glad I was able to get to know you, you really are a good friend and a good time in all honesty. Pause. You've never made dull moments in my life and I only wish that I could take away the times I've brought you down. I don't regret what we call the happy moments, rather, the way I was forcing myself into your life and how I wasn't truthful in that first month. I want to talk to you, to be able to keep up and not be avoided by you since that's all it seems like. I'm aware that you don't want to have to worry about me doing something dumb, but you don't realize that you stopped me from doing it a lot more frequently than last year. I can admit, my coping mechanisms are shit but you helped me see that I needed to stop it. I've been clean since that one time you saw it in the study room. I can promise you that. As of your thoughts about it being because of you, take into account that I had a lot going on at that time and our moments weren't the best. These events overlapping brought me down and I did harm myself, but I could never say I hurt myself for another person. I wanted to clear that up. I'll get to the point. I miss you, and I want you to take care of yourself. If I'm being honest, I've grown scared of you. From the day I had you translate the things on the whiteboard, I realized I was afraid of you. I couldn't move, talk, keep still...breathe. I held my breath in and you said you didn't want to be friends, which was fine by me. Again, I brought my guitar to school hoping I'd get you to play Nohinara's song at the end of the day. I deleted everything off of my phone involving you and deleted the video of you playing the older version of that song, i knew i couldnt play it and wanted to hear it one last time. I couldn't get your attention and got Tanner into the room. submitted by Acrobatic-Teach6219 to u/Acrobatic-Teach6219 [link] [comments] "I was going to ask z to play something for me...but I'm scared." is all I said bc once I mentioned asking you to play, he gave me a face that said "you're fucked" basically. I assumed you didn't want shit to do with me and he confirmed it so I let it be. As soon as he left, I let my breath out, trying to breathe like you told me to but it made it worse. I can't talk to you unless I know you're okay with me. That's that. And if you're not, then please allow me to at some point. I'm not sure if you still want me in your life, if you want to forget about me and make sure I forget everything you've ever told me, whatever...make it aware to me so I know whether or not I can go on with my little twin. But um...that's it. I just want you to know that I still care for you, I'm still here if you ever decide to befriend me once more, if you need to talk. I'm here. I wish you the best of luck, you're doing so well. I feel like saying sorry, I don't want to victimize either of us and I feel the need to say it because I really have done and said some shit I cannot take back. Love you, stink. Also, I don't know if either kim or tanner told you but I turned down webtoon and I haven't gone on with EF. I miss it, playing games with you guys too... I find myself drawing you guys still. The quality is shit but here's that. It's the linked image on this if you're confused. Thank you, Zion. You've helped me a lot throughout this year. I've a lot to learn from you. If you see this at any point before I graduate, I want you to keep your head up. I won't be around next week, the week of graduation, because I finished school this Friday. So, if this is read over the weekend or anything, find me when you can. If you want to. Think things over, whatever you decide is on you. I have your ring and I feel like I never deserved it, if you want that back too then I'll give it up. Um...I don't know. I just want to see you happy. My intuition is heavy when it comes to you, so seeing you in outfits that I've predicted makes me smile a bit, especially when I felt like you and Valente were gonna be matching on Thursday and it happened which was funny. Told my friend about it and he thinks we have a soul tie but I'm not sure because I don't know what's on your end. Anyways, please eat. SLEEP. And, have a good day/night? |
2024.05.11 16:05 karenvideoeditor The Zoo [Part 4]
Previous
I think it’s obvious that, while I’ve never lied to my dad and my brother about something big before, I haven’t told either of them about the animals at the zoo and I’m not planning on it. Even if they believed me, that would actually be worse than thinking I was being foolish by working here. If my dad knew what kind of animals the zoo had, he’d freak out, whether or not there were invisible walls to protect me. In and of itself, my father would demand I quit on the spot if he found out about my hourly rate because it was obvious that there was something about this job that warranted it.
So, I opened a savings account at the bank, and when I deposited the check, I put half in that account. That lowered the chances of my dad finding out how much money I was pulling in.
It wasn’t as if I had anything huge to spend the money on anyway, though. Dad had been thrilled with $25/hr. when I got the job, and we’d already started spending some of that first paycheck on new clothes and little house repairs and such. Money has always been tight, and we live in a three-bedroom house, with my dad graciously having taken the smallest room (which was kind of a catchall storage room up until then) once my brother and I wanted separate rooms when we hit our teenage years.
My mom isn’t in the picture, if you’re curious. She worked as a wildlife photographer, and was so good at it that she’d get paid to go off to remote places in Africa. For months at a time. As if we don’t have animals in America, right? But even when she was here, it always felt like she was distracted, wanting to go back to work. Like she cared more about the animals than about us. Say what you want about me, but I like animals more than people, I don’t love them more. I don’t even think of her as mom anymore; in my brain, she’s Patricia.
When I was nine and my brother Stanley was two, she basically left and never came back. Doesn’t even send postcards. For all I know, she’s dead, and the most meaningful thing I ever got from her was my passion for caring about other animals. I got into it early because of Patricia, and then practically every birthday or Christmas present was some book or movie or toy about wildlife. But that’s all she did for us besides financial support. My dad is a real rock in my life, and I count myself lucky I got at least one good parent.
When Patricia ditched us, I started to help out financially when I was younger by working odd jobs, and then real jobs when I hit sixteen. Stanley is sixteen now, and he’s been working at Hanks Hardware for a few months, which meant now it was all three of us pulling in money. But Stanley only makes $10/hr., working four hours after school and then eight hours on Saturday, so my $25/hr. literally doubled our household income. When I’d gotten the job, I told Dad and Stanley that I wanted Stanley to quit his job, and that I’d give him an allowance, $80 a week, which was what he'd be using for pocket money if he’d still been working.
Getting that time back would be huge for Stanley, because it would let him spend more time on his schoolwork. Not just to bring up his grades; he would literally be learning more. And he’s a junior now, doing things like taking a computer class to learn Microsoft Office. Living in a small town limits your options, and knowledge broadens them. I know that much for sure.
Not to mention, he could actually be a teenager, do the stuff kids did. Go see a movie, hang out with his friends at the bleachers and smoke pot, and head out to the lake to swim when the weather warmed up and have a genuinely fun summer instead of having a forty hour work week. And most important, playing video games. I know that sounds strange, but Stanley loves video games and plays online on the TV in the living room. But he hardly ever has time to play, which means sometimes he’ll stay up too late enjoying himself and fall asleep the next day during his first period class. Dad and I never have the heart to tell him to go to bed, though.
My father was uneasy about Stanley quitting, mostly because of the hypothetical of my job falling through. And Dad didn’t even know about the possibility of there being some terrifying incident with an animal, which might cause me such anxiety that I wouldn’t be able to push past it and would end up needing to quit. I really didn’t think that was likely after I’d managed to mostly get over my paralyzing fear of Yui, but I yielded to his logic and we negotiated. Stanley decided to switch to three hours three days a week and four hours on Saturdays.
Little did they know that not only was I was saving up for my own impending student loan payments, but my savings account would cover a most or maybe all of the cost of any college or trade school Stanley wanted to attend when he graduated. I was so happy about that, I don’t have the words. Half of my income is $25/hr. and for eight hours a day will be $52k a year, all of it put in my savings account. Before taxes, but still, that is fantastic money. I’ll have to come clean eventually, when Stanley started filling out FAFSA forms next year, and I’ll probably tell my dad that I was pretty sure they’re running drugs out of the back of the zoo or something. He’ll be so pissed, but that’s over a year away and I’ll burn that bridge when I came to it.
So, in general, I’ve been enjoying working at the zoo and depositing those paychecks. Call me a cynic, but inevitably, that meant something had to go wrong.
After settling in for my shift a few minutes before 9 p.m., Andrew bid me farewell and headed home. He’d just done one last walk of the zoo, so I took out a book and resumed where I’d left off, planning to do a sweep in an hour. I do have some enrichment planned for one of the animals, but I’d had to order something online and it won’t arrive for a few days.
Shortly after my second ramble around on my route to check every enclosure at the zoo, however, I got a text from my brother.
> Gary and Shaun are going to the zoo. They want to try to see the animals.
I closed my eyes in annoyance. Gary and Shaun were two sort-of friends of Stanley’s, the middling kind of friend that you sit with at lunch and hang out with at parties but you’ve never actually been to their home. I knew Stanley had been bragging to his friends about my new job. Well, I guessed. He’d told me and Dad at the dinner table that his friends were impressed with my job, and I figured the fact that his sister had a college degree and had started work at $25/hr. was bragging material, especially when it meant Stanley could work fewer hours.
The idea that some of his friends would want to come check out the zoo hadn’t occurred to me, because I’d come at it logically: The zoo was closed to outsiders. Appointment only. And none of them would ever get an appointment, because they were human. But if anything, the rules that restricted them had probably made it a more enticing idea. Also, Stanley said it the zoo on Google Maps at this point, but that it was blurred out. Andrew told me that had been by request (anyone can do it actually), but I’m sure that made the temptation even worse.
Obviously I wasn’t going to let them in, but I didn’t want them to cause trouble, and they were teenagers. Teenagers tend to cause trouble as a general rule. The last thing I wanted was to have to tell Andrew that they’d shown up at the gate intent on visiting the zoo because my brother had talked it up so much. Not that Stanley knew what this place really housed, but still, Andrew had been so stern on no photography of Leila that I would’ve been embarrassed if I had to call the cops because of something like this.
My reply was curt.
> Tell those dipshits the place is closed to walk-ins. I’m not letting them in.
> I did. They want to go anyway.
I facepalmed and sighed before replying.
> If you can’t talk them out of it, just don’t go with them. I’ll deal with it.
There was a long silence, then some ellipses as he typed, then another long silence. I got antsy and sent a follow-up.
> Stanley, I mean it. I do not want you here if I have to call the cops to get them to leave. Stay home. If you show up here with them, I’m cutting off the money I give you.
I wasn’t the type to play fast and loose with threats about money, so that probably surprised him. There was the briefest of pauses.
> Geez, no need to be a bitch about it. Fine. I’ll stay here. Good luck dealing with those assholes without me.
That was indeed exactly what I wanted, and he must have known that. Hell, I had pepper spray and a taser, so it’s not like I couldn’t keep them out if I really wanted to. But when it came down to it, I figured, what were they going to do? I wasn’t going to open the door or the front gate. The fence was ten feet high, the kind with spaced bars that had decorative spikes at the top, and it was brand new. It wasn’t as if they were going to take bolt-cutters to a barbed wire fence like in a movie.
In the end, I sat back in my chair and just fell back on my regular routine. I wonder now, if I’d called Andrew and told him, maybe asked him to come hang out for a while, whether things would’ve turned out different. But I wasn’t very well going to wake him up for something that essentially sounded like a minor irritation.
At 10:41 p.m., a beep, beep, beep, alert sounded, and I know the exact time because I picked my phone up off the desk out of habit, assuming it was what was making the noise. But it wasn’t. Looking up to the screen of cameras, one was outlined in red, pulling my focus to it. It was an exterior camera with a wide view that panned back and forth, but was now stopped on movement that it had detected and had deemed sufficient to audibly alert me. I later learned that it was in conjunction with a motion detector on the fence. On the screen, I saw two boys, one on the outside of the fence to the left of the entrance gate and one on the inside.
“What the fuck?” I breathed, standing up and putting my book aside. My fingers went to the mouse and keyboard, and I expanded the view from the camera and zoomed in. It seemed I’d underestimated the boredom and curiosity of two small-town teenage boys.
I saw how the first boy had gotten in when the second boy used the same technique, which was to climb a rope that had knots tied in it about a foot apart, a rope that had been hooked onto one of the spikes at the top, presumably with a loop that had been lassoed and tightened. He made it to the top, shifted and dropped to hang from the top by his hands, then let himself fall to the ground, his knees bending and absorbing the shock of the impact before falling on his butt.
One of the boys had hit a growth spurt, topping out at 5’11” now, all gangly limbs. He had short brown hair and I could see him wearing a sweatshirt with the logo of his school on it. That’s the best outfit to wear when breaking in, apparently: something that shows what high school you go to. The other one was a little more built and half a foot shorter, with long blonde hair that he probably thought made him look like Chris Hemsworth. It didn’t.
“I cannot believe this,” I growled, my anger flaring. Heading quickly out of the office, slamming the door behind me, I was out the door and walking toward the entrance, driven by my anger.
Already walking into the park at a speed driven by their interest in the forbidden areas, they started on the path that went toward enclosure one and rounded the zoo. “Hey!” I barked.
“Ripley!” Gary exclaimed. “Your brother said you wouldn’t open the gate, so we let ourselves in.”
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I asked, keeping pace beside them, rage bubbling up inside me. They slowed but didn’t stop. “Do you think this is a joke? There’s a reason I told my brother not to come with you. That alarm you set off goes to the owner of the park, and they’ll definitely be pressing charges. You really want ‘breaking and entering’ on your rap sheet?”
They gave me long-suffering looks, the kind only someone under twenty is capable of. The kind that imply you’re neurotic, or pushy, or self-centered. The kind that say you don’t know what you’re talking about, that they know so much more than you, and that all you are is an annoyance.
“Come on. What is with this place? It sounds awesome, some private zoo, but Stanley didn’t know anything about it,” Shaun told me. Glancing at my belt, where my pepper spray and taser were, he asked, “Is it that top secret? Everything here could sell on the black market for a million bucks or something?”
“They’re expensive animals if poachers get their hands on them, yes,” I said tightly.
“Why would they hire someone fresh out of college for that?” Gary asked, his eyes continuing to take in his surroundings, the path and everything in sight bathed in their standard eerie red glow. “And what’s with the lights?”
“It’s for night vision,” I told him, skipping over the part implying I wasn’t qualified for this job. “Hey, stop.” Moving in front of them, I forced the issue, moving to stand in front of them and forcing them to either stumble to a stop or run into me. “If you climb back over the fence and leave now, before anyone gets here, I’ll lie and say I didn’t know your faces.”
“Jesus Christ, you’re uptight,” Shaun chuckled. “What’s the big deal? I mean, we might not even see anything, since it’s nighttime and the animals are sleeping. It’s not like we’re stealing a tour.”
Honestly, I have no idea how our species has survived this long when our formative years make us so confidently stupid. “So, why are you even here then?” I asked, folding my arms.
“Why not?” Gary asked.
With that, they were quickly walking around me, toward enclosure one. I hadn’t yet seen the animal in enclosure one, but what I did know was I didn’t want to see it for the first time tonight. Roger’s short and snappy description described it as Bear - Steve. According to procedure in the small manual Andrew had given me, I was supposed to deter any intruders with fact that they were on camera and threaten to call the police. It didn’t say what to do if that didn’t work, but I assume I was supposed to…call the police. And also call Andrew, of course. That didn’t solve my urgent problem though, which was two teenagers who wanted to see something cool.
“That’s it,” I growled, taking my taser in one hand and my pepper spray in the other, hoping the sight of me being armed would deter them. Heading after them, I snapped, “If you guys do not leave, I will make you leave.”
Shaun turned and walked backwards so he could speak to me. “Just because you’ve got a complex since they hired you to look after a place like this, doesn’t mean you have any real authority,” he told me. “Look, call the cops if you want. Tell them some teenagers broke in. Response time around here is probably fifteen minutes, so we’ve got ten minutes, minimum. We just want to see something cool, and then we’ll leave.”
I hate that he called my bluff on the weapons, especially in hindsight. I’m not a confrontational person, and my instincts are always to avoid a fight if possible. So, in this case, my instincts were telling me to call in someone else to help get these clowns out of the zoo, not to use the weapons I had for just such a purpose. It makes me feel helpless and angry knowing that I back down from fights, but I balked at the idea of getting physical with them. Only the fact that that wasn’t supposed to be part of my job kept me from feeling like a complete failure as security.
“The animals here are not puppies,” I finally exclaimed. “Some of them are territorial. They could seriously hurt you.”
They finally slowed their pace as they closed in on the gate to the wooden fence. “What are you talking about, territorial? They’re zoo animals,” Gary said.
“This is a huge zoo, and it’s more like a preserve,” I sighed. “It backs up into the forest. These animals build their homes here, scent mark the boundaries, and regularly eat small animals that come in through the bars of the fence to explore. So, like I said. These. Are not. Puppies.”
The two of them finally came to a stop at the gate, looking at me warily. “With this fence, how dangerous could they be?” Gary asked. I didn’t answer. Shaun scanned the expanse behind the gate and Gary looked around, making it clear what he was looking for when he said, “Where are all the signs and shit?”
“There’s a tour guide,” I said. “They don’t need signs.”
“Okay, so, what’s in here?”
Shaking my head, I let out a sigh. “It’s time to leave. I’m serious.”
Gary glared at me for a beat and then said the worst word possible. “Whatever.” Then he turned and unlatched the gate, walking through.
“Gary!” I shouted, stopping short at the threshold. Shaun walked past me, and I made a grab for him, but was too slow. I’ll regret that until the day I die.
Halted at the gate like there was an invisible force field keeping me out in just as it kept the animals in, I officially started panicking. I’d messed up, and now I couldn’t even hit them with either the pepper spray or the taser unless I wanted them to be easy prey.
My eyes scanned the smaller plants along the fence, which slowly grew in average height the closer you got to the tree line. The trees were surprisingly close to the fence, only a few yards in. Also, there were no footprints, no path that only grew small weeds from an animal that often paced back and forth, so I wasn’t sure how often it came out of the trees. Maybe it didn’t.
I wondered if there was another lake, maybe a small pond, that I didn’t know about further in, if the animal lived there. Or maybe this one was relatively reclusive, so I might have time to get the boys out. It could be that it had heard the ruckus of voices and decided to investigate, as it did during tours, but it would take a while to get here. Or I could get lucky and whatever it was could have just had a great meal, deciding to pass up the humans within its grasp.
But I was not lucky.
Putting my pepper spray and taser back in their holsters, I took a couple steps back as I pulled out my cell phone and called 911.
There was a brief pause before I heard someone pick up, and a calm female voice spoke, “911, what is your emergency?”
“Yes, I work at a private zoo, address 11842 Lincoln Road,” I spoke, drawing the shocked gazes of both boys. “Two teenage boys broke in, and they’re refusing to leave the property.”
“For real, Ripley?” Gary exclaimed, as if genuinely offended at my actions.
That’s when all hell broke loose.
Gary was standing near enough to the tall trees that he was under the branches, and something dropped on him, its weight crushing him to the ground. He didn’t even have time to scream. Shaun did, though, crying, “What the fuck?” as he stumbled backwards.
“Get out of there!” I screamed, grabbing my taser from its holster and pointing it at the animal.
On top of Gary’s body was something that looked like a koala. The only thing was, it must have been almost twice as big and had an orange, spotted pattern on its fur. The kicker was the teeth. Koalas eat eucalyptus leaves, most people know, so they don’t have much use for many teeth or even sharp teeth. They’re equipped with a pretty pathetic set of chompers.
Whatever this was, I knew it had a full set of teeth made for a meat-eater, because it had bitten down on Gary’s neck and ripped out a chunk of flesh, arterial blood spraying from the wound.
Shaun, unfortunately, did not take the opportunity to run. He stared at his downed friend, just as I did, in horrified fear. And then ran to him. “Gary!” he screamed. “Hey, get the fuck off him!”
“Shaun, don’t!” I shouted.
Whatever Shaun was thinking, it was less about the potential of him being attacked versus the fact of his friend being attacked right at that moment. I’ll say that about him at least: he didn’t just leave his friend to die. Unfortunately, if he had, it might’ve saved him. Throwing himself at the animal, Shaun shoved it off, an impressive show of strength, before grabbing Gary by the arm and trying to pull him to his feet. “Come on!”
I could see that Gary was barely conscious, though. A gash in an artery that was profusely bleeding will do that to a person. I attempted to aim my taser at the animal, but only a split-second passed before it turned and leapt once more, slamming into Shaun and biting his neck. I stumbled back in fear, adrenaline now pumping through me in earnest, as Shaun cried out in terror and fell to the ground before the animal ripped out his throat.
My vision swam at the sight of a copious amount of blood and the sound of Shaun choking on it. Thick chewing sounds came from the animal before it swallowed and then turned to me.
I only realized I’d dropped my cell phone when I heard a faint, panicked voice ask, “Ma’am? Ma’am, are you there?”
Lowering the taser, I slowly took a couple steps forward, picked up the phone, and I quietly said, “Yeah. I’m here.”
It felt like she was speaking from the other end of a long tunnel when I heard, “I’m sending police and EMT right now. What happened? Was someone injured?”
Swallowing hard, I grimaced as tears came to my eyes. Staring at the animal, which was still meeting my gaze unwaveringly, I simply answered, “Yeah. They’re dead.” At that point, the animal grabbed one of the boys by the throat, then the other, and started dragging them into the trees.
She hesitated before asking some more questions, and I replied to them all absently. Eventually, the animal was gone from my sight, but I still walked backwards as I retraced my steps to the security office, exactly like the first time I’d seen Yui. Eventually I arrived at the security room, and my shaky hand swiped the key card to get in. Shutting the door, I told the 911 operator, “I’m safe.”
“Good. The police should be there in ten minutes.”
My brain thought it was funny that it turned out the boys had been right about the timing, but filed it under ‘things to think about later’. “Okay. I have to call my boss.”
“Just stay on the line with me until the police arrive, okay?”
“It’s okay. I’m fine,” I said quietly. “I just really need to call my boss.”
In spite of her protests, I hung up. The silence of the room rang in my ears and I slowly sat down in my chair, pulling up Andrew’s number.
After four rings, he picked up, his voice drowsy but tense, knowing I’d only call if something had happened. “Ripley? What’s wrong?”
It took me a moment to find my voice. “Two teenagers broke in. They’re dead. Steve killed them.”
“Oh, fuck,” he breathed. After a few beats, he said, “Okay, all right, I’ll, ah, I’ll be there as soon as I can. Did you call the police already?”
“I was on the phone before it even happened, saying they broke in.” I grimaced at that. I was supposed to call my boss first, not the police. That let him determine what actions to take.
Andrew let out a breath. “Okay. I’m assuming Steve took the bodies?”
“Yeah.”
“All right, I’ll call Suzanne and have her put Steve down for a nap, and then get the bodies back to where the EMTs can get them.”
That confused me, and I didn’t really know what to say, so I went with, “I’m sorry, Andrew. I should’ve tried harder to get them to leave. Even tasing and pepper spraying them would’ve-”
“Ripley, this is not your fault,” he said firmly. “I’ll be there soon as I can, all right?”
We ended the conversation and I glanced at the screen of cameras, which was how I’d left it, focused on that section of the fence where the boys had climbed in, with the view enlarged to take up most of the screen. I stared at it until the police arrived.
When the motorcade of flashing lights were visible at the end of the road through one of the cameras, I pressed the button to open the front gate. Fielding the police officers and the EMTs and their questions, I brought them to the enclosure, and right at the edge of the tree line were the two bodies, looking exactly as I’d last seen them. So, I guess Suzanne knows how to run her zoo and handle things when the worst happens.
Both boys were put into body bags and lifted onto gurneys, and then each one was put into one of the two waiting ambulances. Andrew arrived before too long and answered all the questions the police had for him, the ones I didn’t know how to answer. Also the questions that I didn’t really feel comfortable answering, like, “What species of bear is it exactly? And why is there just this flimsy fence here?” I watched from a distance as they took his statement and, I determined by watching their facial expressions, Andrew seemed to answer their questions to their satisfaction.
The long, exhausting experience ended when the last of them left, and Andrew and I went back to the main building, going to his office. Instead of sitting in his desk chair, my boss vied for the couch that sat against one wall, used occasionally by visitors. I sat at the other end, leaning back heavily into the cushions.
Andrew spoke first, echoing his earlier sentiments and immediately making it clear that what occurred wasn’t my fault. I felt some anger at myself, mostly because I knew that if I’d used one of my weapons on one of them, they’d still be alive. But I hadn’t wanted to go to such extremes just because they’d climbed over a fence. They were dumb teenagers, right? I’ve never been tased or pepper sprayed, but I’d seen videos on YouTube and it didn’t look like a fun time.
“Look, you said it that first day in your interview, that people are stupid,” he told me. “Teenagers especially. You know that’s a fact. You did the best you could in that moment, so don’t look back and think of what you could’ve done to fix things, because solutions always seem obvious in hindsight. All right?”
“Yeah,” I muttered.
Andrew sent me home at that point, saying he’d take the rest of the shift. I was too weary to object, so I left.
Stanley was still sleeping safely in his bed, and that’s one thing I’m so grateful for. If this job took my brother from me, I’d be done with it. Still, I don’t relish waking up tomorrow and having to face him. I don’t know exactly how he’s going to react to the news, but it’s going to be the worst thing in the world that’s happened to him, mostly because of the guilt of not being able to talk them out of going. The same way I couldn’t talk them out of staying out of an enclosure.
My schedule is still nocturnal, so I’m not tired enough to sleep right now. Hopefully I’ll get sleepy soon. For now, I’ll play one of Stanley’s mindless old school video games with the sound muted. My main goal is to get the image of all that blood out of my head.
Previous
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I think it’s obvious that, while I’ve never lied to my dad and my brother about something big before, I haven’t told either of them about the animals at the zoo and I’m not planning on it. Even if they believed me, that would actually be worse than thinking I was being foolish by working here. If my dad knew what kind of animals the zoo had, he’d freak out, whether or not there were invisible walls to protect me. In and of itself, my father would demand I quit on the spot if he found out about my hourly rate because it was obvious that there was something about this job that warranted it.
So, I opened a savings account at the bank, and when I deposited the check, I put half in that account. That lowered the chances of my dad finding out how much money I was pulling in.
It wasn’t as if I had anything huge to spend the money on anyway, though. Dad had been thrilled with $25/hr. when I got the job, and we’d already started spending some of that first paycheck on new clothes and little house repairs and such. Money has always been tight, and we live in a three-bedroom house, with my dad graciously having taken the smallest room (which was kind of a catchall storage room up until then) once my brother and I wanted separate rooms when we hit our teenage years.
My mom isn’t in the picture, if you’re curious. She worked as a wildlife photographer, and was so good at it that she’d get paid to go off to remote places in Africa. For months at a time. As if we don’t have animals in America, right? But even when she was here, it always felt like she was distracted, wanting to go back to work. Like she cared more about the animals than about us. Say what you want about me, but I like animals more than people, I don’t love them more. I don’t even think of her as mom anymore; in my brain, she’s Patricia.
When I was nine and my brother Stanley was two, she basically left and never came back. Doesn’t even send postcards. For all I know, she’s dead, and the most meaningful thing I ever got from her was my passion for caring about other animals. I got into it early because of Patricia, and then practically every birthday or Christmas present was some book or movie or toy about wildlife. But that’s all she did for us besides financial support. My dad is a real rock in my life, and I count myself lucky I got at least one good parent.
When Patricia ditched us, I started to help out financially when I was younger by working odd jobs, and then real jobs when I hit sixteen. Stanley is sixteen now, and he’s been working at Hanks Hardware for a few months, which meant now it was all three of us pulling in money. But Stanley only makes $10/hr., working four hours after school and then eight hours on Saturday, so my $25/hr. literally doubled our household income. When I’d gotten the job, I told Dad and Stanley that I wanted Stanley to quit his job, and that I’d give him an allowance, $80 a week, which was what he'd be using for pocket money if he’d still been working.
Getting that time back would be huge for Stanley, because it would let him spend more time on his schoolwork. Not just to bring up his grades; he would literally be learning more. And he’s a junior now, doing things like taking a computer class to learn Microsoft Office. Living in a small town limits your options, and knowledge broadens them. I know that much for sure.
Not to mention, he could actually be a teenager, do the stuff kids did. Go see a movie, hang out with his friends at the bleachers and smoke pot, and head out to the lake to swim when the weather warmed up and have a genuinely fun summer instead of having a forty hour work week. And most important, playing video games. I know that sounds strange, but Stanley loves video games and plays online on the TV in the living room. But he hardly ever has time to play, which means sometimes he’ll stay up too late enjoying himself and fall asleep the next day during his first period class. Dad and I never have the heart to tell him to go to bed, though.
My father was uneasy about Stanley quitting, mostly because of the hypothetical of my job falling through. And Dad didn’t even know about the possibility of there being some terrifying incident with an animal, which might cause me such anxiety that I wouldn’t be able to push past it and would end up needing to quit. I really didn’t think that was likely after I’d managed to mostly get over my paralyzing fear of Yui, but I yielded to his logic and we negotiated. Stanley decided to switch to three hours three days a week and four hours on Saturdays.
Little did they know that not only was I was saving up for my own impending student loan payments, but my savings account would cover a most or maybe all of the cost of any college or trade school Stanley wanted to attend when he graduated. I was so happy about that, I don’t have the words. Half of my income is $25/hr. and for eight hours a day will be $52k a year, all of it put in my savings account. Before taxes, but still, that is fantastic money. I’ll have to come clean eventually, when Stanley started filling out FAFSA forms next year, and I’ll probably tell my dad that I was pretty sure they’re running drugs out of the back of the zoo or something. He’ll be so pissed, but that’s over a year away and I’ll burn that bridge when I came to it.
So, in general, I’ve been enjoying working at the zoo and depositing those paychecks. Call me a cynic, but inevitably, that meant something had to go wrong.
After settling in for my shift a few minutes before 9 p.m., Andrew bid me farewell and headed home. He’d just done one last walk of the zoo, so I took out a book and resumed where I’d left off, planning to do a sweep in an hour. I do have some enrichment planned for one of the animals, but I’d had to order something online and it won’t arrive for a few days.
Shortly after my second ramble around on my route to check every enclosure at the zoo, however, I got a text from my brother.
> Gary and Shaun are going to the zoo. They want to try to see the animals.
I closed my eyes in annoyance. Gary and Shaun were two sort-of friends of Stanley’s, the middling kind of friend that you sit with at lunch and hang out with at parties but you’ve never actually been to their home. I knew Stanley had been bragging to his friends about my new job. Well, I guessed. He’d told me and Dad at the dinner table that his friends were impressed with my job, and I figured the fact that his sister had a college degree and had started work at $25/hr. was bragging material, especially when it meant Stanley could work fewer hours.
The idea that some of his friends would want to come check out the zoo hadn’t occurred to me, because I’d come at it logically: The zoo was closed to outsiders. Appointment only. And none of them would ever get an appointment, because they were human. But if anything, the rules that restricted them had probably made it a more enticing idea. Also, Stanley said it the zoo on Google Maps at this point, but that it was blurred out. Andrew told me that had been by request (anyone can do it actually), but I’m sure that made the temptation even worse.
Obviously I wasn’t going to let them in, but I didn’t want them to cause trouble, and they were teenagers. Teenagers tend to cause trouble as a general rule. The last thing I wanted was to have to tell Andrew that they’d shown up at the gate intent on visiting the zoo because my brother had talked it up so much. Not that Stanley knew what this place really housed, but still, Andrew had been so stern on no photography of Leila that I would’ve been embarrassed if I had to call the cops because of something like this.
My reply was curt.
> Tell those dipshits the place is closed to walk-ins. I’m not letting them in.
> I did. They want to go anyway.
I facepalmed and sighed before replying.
> If you can’t talk them out of it, just don’t go with them. I’ll deal with it.
There was a long silence, then some ellipses as he typed, then another long silence. I got antsy and sent a follow-up.
> Stanley, I mean it. I do not want you here if I have to call the cops to get them to leave. Stay home. If you show up here with them, I’m cutting off the money I give you.
I wasn’t the type to play fast and loose with threats about money, so that probably surprised him. There was the briefest of pauses.
> Geez, no need to be a bitch about it. Fine. I’ll stay here. Good luck dealing with those assholes without me.
That was indeed exactly what I wanted, and he must have known that. Hell, I had pepper spray and a taser, so it’s not like I couldn’t keep them out if I really wanted to. But when it came down to it, I figured, what were they going to do? I wasn’t going to open the door or the front gate. The fence was ten feet high, the kind with spaced bars that had decorative spikes at the top, and it was brand new. It wasn’t as if they were going to take bolt-cutters to a barbed wire fence like in a movie.
In the end, I sat back in my chair and just fell back on my regular routine. I wonder now, if I’d called Andrew and told him, maybe asked him to come hang out for a while, whether things would’ve turned out different. But I wasn’t very well going to wake him up for something that essentially sounded like a minor irritation.
At 10:41 p.m., a beep, beep, beep, alert sounded, and I know the exact time because I picked my phone up off the desk out of habit, assuming it was what was making the noise. But it wasn’t. Looking up to the screen of cameras, one was outlined in red, pulling my focus to it. It was an exterior camera with a wide view that panned back and forth, but was now stopped on movement that it had detected and had deemed sufficient to audibly alert me. I later learned that it was in conjunction with a motion detector on the fence. On the screen, I saw two boys, one on the outside of the fence to the left of the entrance gate and one on the inside.
“What the fuck?” I breathed, standing up and putting my book aside. My fingers went to the mouse and keyboard, and I expanded the view from the camera and zoomed in. It seemed I’d underestimated the boredom and curiosity of two small-town teenage boys.
I saw how the first boy had gotten in when the second boy used the same technique, which was to climb a rope that had knots tied in it about a foot apart, a rope that had been hooked onto one of the spikes at the top, presumably with a loop that had been lassoed and tightened. He made it to the top, shifted and dropped to hang from the top by his hands, then let himself fall to the ground, his knees bending and absorbing the shock of the impact before falling on his butt.
One of the boys had hit a growth spurt, topping out at 5’11” now, all gangly limbs. He had short brown hair and I could see him wearing a sweatshirt with the logo of his school on it. That’s the best outfit to wear when breaking in, apparently: something that shows what high school you go to. The other one was a little more built and half a foot shorter, with long blonde hair that he probably thought made him look like Chris Hemsworth. It didn’t.
“I cannot believe this,” I growled, my anger flaring. Heading quickly out of the office, slamming the door behind me, I was out the door and walking toward the entrance, driven by my anger.
Already walking into the park at a speed driven by their interest in the forbidden areas, they started on the path that went toward enclosure one and rounded the zoo. “Hey!” I barked.
“Ripley!” Gary exclaimed. “Your brother said you wouldn’t open the gate, so we let ourselves in.”
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I asked, keeping pace beside them, rage bubbling up inside me. They slowed but didn’t stop. “Do you think this is a joke? There’s a reason I told my brother not to come with you. That alarm you set off goes to the owner of the park, and they’ll definitely be pressing charges. You really want ‘breaking and entering’ on your rap sheet?”
They gave me long-suffering looks, the kind only someone under twenty is capable of. The kind that imply you’re neurotic, or pushy, or self-centered. The kind that say you don’t know what you’re talking about, that they know so much more than you, and that all you are is an annoyance.
“Come on. What is with this place? It sounds awesome, some private zoo, but Stanley didn’t know anything about it,” Shaun told me. Glancing at my belt, where my pepper spray and taser were, he asked, “Is it that top secret? Everything here could sell on the black market for a million bucks or something?”
“They’re expensive animals if poachers get their hands on them, yes,” I said tightly.
“Why would they hire someone fresh out of college for that?” Gary asked, his eyes continuing to take in his surroundings, the path and everything in sight bathed in their standard eerie red glow. “And what’s with the lights?”
“It’s for night vision,” I told him, skipping over the part implying I wasn’t qualified for this job. “Hey, stop.” Moving in front of them, I forced the issue, moving to stand in front of them and forcing them to either stumble to a stop or run into me. “If you climb back over the fence and leave now, before anyone gets here, I’ll lie and say I didn’t know your faces.”
“Jesus Christ, you’re uptight,” Shaun chuckled. “What’s the big deal? I mean, we might not even see anything, since it’s nighttime and the animals are sleeping. It’s not like we’re stealing a tour.”
Honestly, I have no idea how our species has survived this long when our formative years make us so confidently stupid. “So, why are you even here then?” I asked, folding my arms.
“Why not?” Gary asked.
With that, they were quickly walking around me, toward enclosure one. I hadn’t yet seen the animal in enclosure one, but what I did know was I didn’t want to see it for the first time tonight. Roger’s short and snappy description described it as Bear - Steve. According to procedure in the small manual Andrew had given me, I was supposed to deter any intruders with fact that they were on camera and threaten to call the police. It didn’t say what to do if that didn’t work, but I assume I was supposed to…call the police. And also call Andrew, of course. That didn’t solve my urgent problem though, which was two teenagers who wanted to see something cool.
“That’s it,” I growled, taking my taser in one hand and my pepper spray in the other, hoping the sight of me being armed would deter them. Heading after them, I snapped, “If you guys do not leave, I will make you leave.”
Shaun turned and walked backwards so he could speak to me. “Just because you’ve got a complex since they hired you to look after a place like this, doesn’t mean you have any real authority,” he told me. “Look, call the cops if you want. Tell them some teenagers broke in. Response time around here is probably fifteen minutes, so we’ve got ten minutes, minimum. We just want to see something cool, and then we’ll leave.”
I hate that he called my bluff on the weapons, especially in hindsight. I’m not a confrontational person, and my instincts are always to avoid a fight if possible. So, in this case, my instincts were telling me to call in someone else to help get these clowns out of the zoo, not to use the weapons I had for just such a purpose. It makes me feel helpless and angry knowing that I back down from fights, but I balked at the idea of getting physical with them. Only the fact that that wasn’t supposed to be part of my job kept me from feeling like a complete failure as security.
“The animals here are not puppies,” I finally exclaimed. “Some of them are territorial. They could seriously hurt you.”
They finally slowed their pace as they closed in on the gate to the wooden fence. “What are you talking about, territorial? They’re zoo animals,” Gary said.
“This is a huge zoo, and it’s more like a preserve,” I sighed. “It backs up into the forest. These animals build their homes here, scent mark the boundaries, and regularly eat small animals that come in through the bars of the fence to explore. So, like I said. These. Are not. Puppies.”
The two of them finally came to a stop at the gate, looking at me warily. “With this fence, how dangerous could they be?” Gary asked. I didn’t answer. Shaun scanned the expanse behind the gate and Gary looked around, making it clear what he was looking for when he said, “Where are all the signs and shit?”
“There’s a tour guide,” I said. “They don’t need signs.”
“Okay, so, what’s in here?”
Shaking my head, I let out a sigh. “It’s time to leave. I’m serious.”
Gary glared at me for a beat and then said the worst word possible. “Whatever.” Then he turned and unlatched the gate, walking through.
“Gary!” I shouted, stopping short at the threshold. Shaun walked past me, and I made a grab for him, but was too slow. I’ll regret that until the day I die.
Halted at the gate like there was an invisible force field keeping me out in just as it kept the animals in, I officially started panicking. I’d messed up, and now I couldn’t even hit them with either the pepper spray or the taser unless I wanted them to be easy prey.
My eyes scanned the smaller plants along the fence, which slowly grew in average height the closer you got to the tree line. The trees were surprisingly close to the fence, only a few yards in. Also, there were no footprints, no path that only grew small weeds from an animal that often paced back and forth, so I wasn’t sure how often it came out of the trees. Maybe it didn’t.
I wondered if there was another lake, maybe a small pond, that I didn’t know about further in, if the animal lived there. Or maybe this one was relatively reclusive, so I might have time to get the boys out. It could be that it had heard the ruckus of voices and decided to investigate, as it did during tours, but it would take a while to get here. Or I could get lucky and whatever it was could have just had a great meal, deciding to pass up the humans within its grasp.
But I was not lucky.
Putting my pepper spray and taser back in their holsters, I took a couple steps back as I pulled out my cell phone and called 911.
There was a brief pause before I heard someone pick up, and a calm female voice spoke, “911, what is your emergency?”
“Yes, I work at a private zoo, address 11842 Lincoln Road,” I spoke, drawing the shocked gazes of both boys. “Two teenage boys broke in, and they’re refusing to leave the property.”
“For real, Ripley?” Gary exclaimed, as if genuinely offended at my actions.
That’s when all hell broke loose.
Gary was standing near enough to the tall trees that he was under the branches, and something dropped on him, its weight crushing him to the ground. He didn’t even have time to scream. Shaun did, though, crying, “What the fuck?” as he stumbled backwards.
“Get out of there!” I screamed, grabbing my taser from its holster and pointing it at the animal.
On top of Gary’s body was something that looked like a koala. The only thing was, it must have been almost twice as big and had an orange, spotted pattern on its fur. The kicker was the teeth. Koalas eat eucalyptus leaves, most people know, so they don’t have much use for many teeth or even sharp teeth. They’re equipped with a pretty pathetic set of chompers.
Whatever this was, I knew it had a full set of teeth made for a meat-eater, because it had bitten down on Gary’s neck and ripped out a chunk of flesh, arterial blood spraying from the wound.
Shaun, unfortunately, did not take the opportunity to run. He stared at his downed friend, just as I did, in horrified fear. And then ran to him. “Gary!” he screamed. “Hey, get the fuck off him!”
“Shaun, don’t!” I shouted.
Whatever Shaun was thinking, it was less about the potential of him being attacked versus the fact of his friend being attacked right at that moment. I’ll say that about him at least: he didn’t just leave his friend to die. Unfortunately, if he had, it might’ve saved him. Throwing himself at the animal, Shaun shoved it off, an impressive show of strength, before grabbing Gary by the arm and trying to pull him to his feet. “Come on!”
I could see that Gary was barely conscious, though. A gash in an artery that was profusely bleeding will do that to a person. I attempted to aim my taser at the animal, but only a split-second passed before it turned and leapt once more, slamming into Shaun and biting his neck. I stumbled back in fear, adrenaline now pumping through me in earnest, as Shaun cried out in terror and fell to the ground before the animal ripped out his throat.
My vision swam at the sight of a copious amount of blood and the sound of Shaun choking on it. Thick chewing sounds came from the animal before it swallowed and then turned to me.
I only realized I’d dropped my cell phone when I heard a faint, panicked voice ask, “Ma’am? Ma’am, are you there?”
Lowering the taser, I slowly took a couple steps forward, picked up the phone, and I quietly said, “Yeah. I’m here.”
It felt like she was speaking from the other end of a long tunnel when I heard, “I’m sending police and EMT right now. What happened? Was someone injured?”
Swallowing hard, I grimaced as tears came to my eyes. Staring at the animal, which was still meeting my gaze unwaveringly, I simply answered, “Yeah. They’re dead.” At that point, the animal grabbed one of the boys by the throat, then the other, and started dragging them into the trees.
She hesitated before asking some more questions, and I replied to them all absently. Eventually, the animal was gone from my sight, but I still walked backwards as I retraced my steps to the security office, exactly like the first time I’d seen Yui. Eventually I arrived at the security room, and my shaky hand swiped the key card to get in. Shutting the door, I told the 911 operator, “I’m safe.”
“Good. The police should be there in ten minutes.”
My brain thought it was funny that it turned out the boys had been right about the timing, but filed it under ‘things to think about later’. “Okay. I have to call my boss.”
“Just stay on the line with me until the police arrive, okay?”
“It’s okay. I’m fine,” I said quietly. “I just really need to call my boss.”
In spite of her protests, I hung up. The silence of the room rang in my ears and I slowly sat down in my chair, pulling up Andrew’s number.
After four rings, he picked up, his voice drowsy but tense, knowing I’d only call if something had happened. “Ripley? What’s wrong?”
It took me a moment to find my voice. “Two teenagers broke in. They’re dead. Steve killed them.”
“Oh, fuck,” he breathed. After a few beats, he said, “Okay, all right, I’ll, ah, I’ll be there as soon as I can. Did you call the police already?”
“I was on the phone before it even happened, saying they broke in.” I grimaced at that. I was supposed to call my boss first, not the police. That let him determine what actions to take.
Andrew let out a breath. “Okay. I’m assuming Steve took the bodies?”
“Yeah.”
“All right, I’ll call Suzanne and have her put Steve down for a nap, and then get the bodies back to where the EMTs can get them.”
That confused me, and I didn’t really know what to say, so I went with, “I’m sorry, Andrew. I should’ve tried harder to get them to leave. Even tasing and pepper spraying them would’ve-”
“Ripley, this is not your fault,” he said firmly. “I’ll be there soon as I can, all right?”
We ended the conversation and I glanced at the screen of cameras, which was how I’d left it, focused on that section of the fence where the boys had climbed in, with the view enlarged to take up most of the screen. I stared at it until the police arrived.
When the motorcade of flashing lights were visible at the end of the road through one of the cameras, I pressed the button to open the front gate. Fielding the police officers and the EMTs and their questions, I brought them to the enclosure, and right at the edge of the tree line were the two bodies, looking exactly as I’d last seen them. So, I guess Suzanne knows how to run her zoo and handle things when the worst happens.
Both boys were put into body bags and lifted onto gurneys, and then each one was put into one of the two waiting ambulances. Andrew arrived before too long and answered all the questions the police had for him, the ones I didn’t know how to answer. Also the questions that I didn’t really feel comfortable answering, like, “What species of bear is it exactly? And why is there just this flimsy fence here?” I watched from a distance as they took his statement and, I determined by watching their facial expressions, Andrew seemed to answer their questions to their satisfaction.
The long, exhausting experience ended when the last of them left, and Andrew and I went back to the main building, going to his office. Instead of sitting in his desk chair, my boss vied for the couch that sat against one wall, used occasionally by visitors. I sat at the other end, leaning back heavily into the cushions.
Andrew spoke first, echoing his earlier sentiments and immediately making it clear that what occurred wasn’t my fault. I felt some anger at myself, mostly because I knew that if I’d used one of my weapons on one of them, they’d still be alive. But I hadn’t wanted to go to such extremes just because they’d climbed over a fence. They were dumb teenagers, right? I’ve never been tased or pepper sprayed, but I’d seen videos on YouTube and it didn’t look like a fun time.
“Look, you said it that first day in your interview, that people are stupid,” he told me. “Teenagers especially. You know that’s a fact. You did the best you could in that moment, so don’t look back and think of what you could’ve done to fix things, because solutions always seem obvious in hindsight. All right?”
“Yeah,” I muttered.
Andrew sent me home at that point, saying he’d take the rest of the shift. I was too weary to object, so I left.
Stanley was still sleeping safely in his bed, and that’s one thing I’m so grateful for. If this job took my brother from me, I’d be done with it. Still, I don’t relish waking up tomorrow and having to face him. I don’t know exactly how he’s going to react to the news, but it’s going to be the worst thing in the world that’s happened to him, mostly because of the guilt of not being able to talk them out of going. The same way I couldn’t talk them out of staying out of an enclosure.
My schedule is still nocturnal, so I’m not tired enough to sleep right now. Hopefully I’ll get sleepy soon. For now, I’ll play one of Stanley’s mindless old school video games with the sound muted. My main goal is to get the image of all that blood out of my head.
Previous
***
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2024.05.11 15:51 Virtual-Leopard985 help on morse code detector
 | i had googled the code and i got this from the arduino website they have connected the lcd using i2c and i tried the same but the brightness seems to be very high how do i connect a potentiometer to the circuit (img and code given below) submitted by Virtual-Leopard985 to arduino [link] [comments] https://preview.redd.it/kwug0ld5yszc1.png?width=1707&format=png&auto=webp&s=9aa3121fcd5fda498e86bf811746f52397fa548d #include include int timeStart = 0;int buttonMorse = 13; int buttonEnd = 12; int buttonMorseState = 0; int buttonEndState = 0; int timeButtonPressed = 0; int buttonStartEnd = 11; int buttonStartEndState= 0; int cont = 0; int timeButtonNotPressed_Start = 0; int timeButtonNotPressed = 0; int buzzer = 10; int lcdPos = 0; LiquidCrystal_I2C lcd(0x3F,16,2); // morse character String character = ""; // list of letters and numbers String lettersAndNumbers[36]={"A","B","C","D","E","F","G","H","I","J","K","L","M","N","O","P","Q","R","S","T","U","V","W","X","Y","Z","0","1","2","3","4","5","6","7","8","9"}; // respective morse code for each letter and number String morseCode[36]={".-","-...","-.-.","-..",".","..-.","--.","....","..",".---","-.-",".-..","--","-.","---",".--.","--.-",".-.","...","-","..-","...-",".--","-..-","-.--","--..", "-----",".----","..---","...--","....-",".....","-....","--...","---..","----."}; void setup() { // put your setup code here, to run once: pinMode(buttonMorse, INPUT); pinMode(buttonEnd, INPUT); pinMode(buttonStartEnd, INPUT); pinMode(buzzer, OUTPUT); lcd.init(); // Inicialize communication with the display lcd.backlight(); // Turn the display lights on lcd.clear(); // Clean the display lcd.setCursor(0,0); Serial.begin(9600); } void loop() { if (lcdPos%32==0) { // Everytime all the 32 positions of the display are being used, clean it up lcd.clear(); } buttonStartEndState = digitalRead(buttonStartEnd); // Everytime the button thats start and pauses the program is pressed, the program increases 'cont' in one if(buttonStartEndState){ cont++; delay(500); } // If 'cont' is even, the program starts, if it's odd, the program pauses if(cont%2==1){ // When the program is running, the time that the button of the morse code is not pressed is count timeButtonNotPressed = millis(); // If the button is not pressed for 3 seconds, a space is done if (timeButtonNotPressed % 3000 == 0){ Serial.print(" "); lcd.print(" "); lcdPos ++; delay(300); } buttonMorseState = digitalRead(buttonMorse); buttonEndState = digitalRead(buttonEnd); // timeStart restart before press the button timeStart = millis(); // while the button is pressed the time is count while (buttonMorseState){ buttonMorseState = digitalRead(buttonMorse); tone(buzzer, 800); } noTone(buzzer); // finalize the time and store in timeButtonPressed timeButtonPressed = millis() - timeStart; // if the button is pressed for less than 200 miliseconds and more than 5 miliseconds, so the character is "." if (timeButtonPressed < 200 and timeButtonPressed > 5){ character = character + "."; // the time that the button is not pressed is turned to 0 timeButtonNotPressed = timeButtonNotPressed - timeButtonNotPressed; } // if the button is pressed for more than 200 seconds, so the character is "-" if (timeButtonPressed > 200) { character = character + "-"; // the time that the button is not pressed is turned to 0 timeButtonNotPressed = timeButtonNotPressed - timeButtonNotPressed; } // if the button that ends the character is pressed if (buttonEndState){ // compare the list of characters with the list of morse for(int i = 0;i < 36; i++){ // if the character made is equal to the respective morse code, print the character that have the same index if(morseCode[i]==character){ Serial.print(lettersAndNumbers[i]); lcd.print(lettersAndNumbers[i]); // Position of the display's cursor is increased in one lcdPos ++; // If the position is in the end of the first line, everytime lcdPos is divisible by 16, the cursor go to the second line, position 0,1 if(lcdPos%16==0){ lcd.setCursor(0,1); } } } // character is restarted character = ""; delay(500); } } } |
2024.05.11 15:43 Pug__Jesus [H] Various Humblebundles [W] Universim, Necessee, Victoria 3, Humankind, Disciples: Liberation – Deluxe Edition, Prehistoric Kingdoms, Airships: Kingdoms Adrift, Liberte, Power to the People,The Chant, A Little Golf Journey, SPRAWL, Juno: New Origins
112 Operator
911 Operator
A Story About My Uncle
Action Henk
Age of Wonders II: The Wizard's Throne
Age of Wonders III
The Amazing American Circus
Antagonist
Archangel: Hellfire - Fully Loaded
Ashampoo Photo Optimizer 7
Aurion: Legacy of the Kori-Odan
Auto Age: Standoff
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Coco Nebulon
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Rocco
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Skolldir
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Ted McPain
The Bard's Tale
Battlerite DLC: YogYog Bear Mount
Bionic Commando
Blockstorm
Boundless
Breach & Clear
Broken Age
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
Car Mechanic Simulator 2018
Chime Sharp
Citizens of Earth
ClusterPuck 99
Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!
Corridor Z
Crashlands
Crusaders of the Lost Idols - Elite Starter Pack
Crying Suns
Cursed Castilla (Maldita Castilla EX)
Dagon: by H. P. Lovecraft - The Eldritch Box DLC
Dandara
Deadly Sin
Deadly Sin 2
Dear Esther: Landmark Edition
Defend Your Life: TD
Deponia: The Complete Journey
Draw Slasher
Drawful 2
Driftland: The Magic Revival
Dungeon of the Endless
Expeditions: Viking
Figment
Figment Soundtrack
The Final Station
Fury Unleashed
Go Home Dinosaurs
Going Under
Golf With Your Friends - OST
GRIP: Combat Racing Artifex DLC
Guns of Icarus Alliance
Guns of Icarus Alliance Soundtrack
Guns of Icarus Alliance Yogscast 2017 Costume Pack
Gurgamoth
Headlander
Hector: Badge of Carnage
Hexologic
HIVESWAP: Act 1
Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms -- Celeste Starter Pack
The Interactive Adventures of Dog Mendonça and Pizza Boy
Iron Danger
Jurassic World Evolution - Deluxe Dinosaur Pack
Last Word
Legacy of Dorn: Herald of Oblivion
Lion Quest
Love Letter
Lust for Darkness
Lust from Beyond: M Edition
Main Assembly
Mimic Arena
Ministry of Broadcast
Mirage: Arcane Warfare
Moon Hunters
NASCAR Heat 2 - October Jumbo Expansion
NecroWorm
Neon Drive (Steam)
Neverout
Neverwinter Feywild Starter Pack
Nex Machina
No Time To Explain Remastered
Offensive Combat: Redux!
Old Man's Journey
On Rusty Trails
Orbital Racer
Out of Reach: Treasure Royale
Out of the Park Baseball 18
Pale Echoes
Pandemic: Roles & Events
Pandemic: The Board Game
Pathway
Pikuniku
Post Void
Radio Commander
Rakuen
Raw Data
Remnants of Isolation
Renegade Ops Collection
Roarr! Jurassic Edition
RPG Maker 2000
RPG Maker VX
Sanctum 2
Say No! More
Scanner Sombre
She Remembered Caterpillars
Shing!
Silence
Slinger VR
Space Gladiators: Escaping Tartarus
Spectrum
Steel Rats
Super Raft Boat
SuperLuminauts
Supraland
SYSTEM SHOCK: ENHANCED EDITION
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Asharra’s Diplomat Pack
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Birdsong’s Entertainer Pack
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Dragonbait’s Dungeoneer Pack
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Tales of Artus Cimber’s Explorer Pack
Tannenberg
Team Fortress 2 badges - Mandrew's Munificent Mug and Israphel's Eleemosynary Expression
Team Racing League
Telefrag VR
Telltale Texas Hold'em
Tesla Effect: A Tex Murphy Adventure
This War of Mine
Tiltagon
Tiny Echo
Tooth and Tail
Tormentor X Punisher
Toy Odyssey: The Lost and Found
Treasure Hunter Simulator
The USB Stick Found in the Grass
Wanderlust: Travel Stories
Wandersong
War for the Overworld - Yogscast Worker Skin
Wargroove
Warhammer® 40,000: Dawn of War® - Game of the Year Edition
Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide
WARSAW
We Are Alright
West of Dead
World to the West
X-Morph: Defense + European Assault, Survival of the Fittest, and Last Bastion DLC
Yoku's Island Express
Zeno Clash 2
Zombie Night Terror
I also have Humble Choice leftovers from the following that I haven't sorted through yet:
APRIL 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Driftland, Turok 2, Truberbrook, Shoppe Keep 2, Capitalism 2)
APRIL 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Main Assembly, Rock Of Ages 3, In Other Waters, Aven Colony, Simulcra I+II, Colt Canyon, Skully, Popup Dungeon)
AUGUST 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Hello Neighbor + Hide And Seek, Littlebig Workshop, American Fugitive, The Coma 2, A Case Of Distrust)
DECEMBER 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Beyond The Wire, The Survivalists, Lacuna, 8 Doors, Greak, Tohu)
FEBRUARY 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Moving Out, The Wild 8, Train Station Renovation, Werewolf The Apocalypse Heart Of The Forest, Lovecraft's Untold Stories, Iris And The Giant, Boomerang Fu)
JANUARY 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Total Tank Simulator, Song Of Horror, Vampire The Masquerade: Shadows Of New York, Deleveled, The Ambassador)
JUNE 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Supraland, Grid, The Messenger, Felix The Reaper, Remnants Of Naezith, Overload, The Stillness Of The Wind, The King's Bird)
MARCH 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (WWE 2k, Hotshot Racing, Peaky Blinders, Cyber Hook, Pesterquest, Boreal Blade, Ageless)
MAY 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Xcom 2, Niche, Swords Of Ditto, Neoverse, Horace)
NOVEMBER 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Darksburg, Smile For Me, Tsioque, Rover Mechanic Simulator, Youropa, Townsmen)
OCTOBER 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Iron Danger, Autonauts, Shadows: Awakening, Fantasy Blacksmith, The Suicide Of Rachel Foster, Goat Of Duty, The Uncertain, Lightmatter)
SEPTEMBER 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Lethal League, Fun With Ragdolls, Evoland, Yooka-Laylee And The Impossible Lair, The Occupation, The Shapeshifting Detective)
SEPTEMBER 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Atomicrops, Heaven's Vault, Swag And Sorcery, Fort Triumph, Orwell: Ignorance Is Strength, Framed Collection)
My region is North America.
submitted by Pug__Jesus to SteamGameSwap [link] [comments]
911 Operator
A Story About My Uncle
Action Henk
Age of Wonders II: The Wizard's Throne
Age of Wonders III
The Amazing American Circus
Antagonist
Archangel: Hellfire - Fully Loaded
Ashampoo Photo Optimizer 7
Aurion: Legacy of the Kori-Odan
Auto Age: Standoff
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Coco Nebulon
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Rocco
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Skolldir
Awesomenauts Yogscast Pack - Ted McPain
The Bard's Tale
Battlerite DLC: YogYog Bear Mount
Bionic Commando
Blockstorm
Boundless
Breach & Clear
Broken Age
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
Car Mechanic Simulator 2018
Chime Sharp
Citizens of Earth
ClusterPuck 99
Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!
Corridor Z
Crashlands
Crusaders of the Lost Idols - Elite Starter Pack
Crying Suns
Cursed Castilla (Maldita Castilla EX)
Dagon: by H. P. Lovecraft - The Eldritch Box DLC
Dandara
Deadly Sin
Deadly Sin 2
Dear Esther: Landmark Edition
Defend Your Life: TD
Deponia: The Complete Journey
Draw Slasher
Drawful 2
Driftland: The Magic Revival
Dungeon of the Endless
Expeditions: Viking
Figment
Figment Soundtrack
The Final Station
Fury Unleashed
Go Home Dinosaurs
Going Under
Golf With Your Friends - OST
GRIP: Combat Racing Artifex DLC
Guns of Icarus Alliance
Guns of Icarus Alliance Soundtrack
Guns of Icarus Alliance Yogscast 2017 Costume Pack
Gurgamoth
Headlander
Hector: Badge of Carnage
Hexologic
HIVESWAP: Act 1
Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms -- Celeste Starter Pack
The Interactive Adventures of Dog Mendonça and Pizza Boy
Iron Danger
Jurassic World Evolution - Deluxe Dinosaur Pack
Last Word
Legacy of Dorn: Herald of Oblivion
Lion Quest
Love Letter
Lust for Darkness
Lust from Beyond: M Edition
Main Assembly
Mimic Arena
Ministry of Broadcast
Mirage: Arcane Warfare
Moon Hunters
NASCAR Heat 2 - October Jumbo Expansion
NecroWorm
Neon Drive (Steam)
Neverout
Neverwinter Feywild Starter Pack
Nex Machina
No Time To Explain Remastered
Offensive Combat: Redux!
Old Man's Journey
On Rusty Trails
Orbital Racer
Out of Reach: Treasure Royale
Out of the Park Baseball 18
Pale Echoes
Pandemic: Roles & Events
Pandemic: The Board Game
Pathway
Pikuniku
Post Void
Radio Commander
Rakuen
Raw Data
Remnants of Isolation
Renegade Ops Collection
Roarr! Jurassic Edition
RPG Maker 2000
RPG Maker VX
Sanctum 2
Say No! More
Scanner Sombre
She Remembered Caterpillars
Shing!
Silence
Slinger VR
Space Gladiators: Escaping Tartarus
Spectrum
Steel Rats
Super Raft Boat
SuperLuminauts
Supraland
SYSTEM SHOCK: ENHANCED EDITION
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Asharra’s Diplomat Pack
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Birdsong’s Entertainer Pack
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Dragonbait’s Dungeoneer Pack
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Tales of Artus Cimber’s Explorer Pack
Tannenberg
Team Fortress 2 badges - Mandrew's Munificent Mug and Israphel's Eleemosynary Expression
Team Racing League
Telefrag VR
Telltale Texas Hold'em
Tesla Effect: A Tex Murphy Adventure
This War of Mine
Tiltagon
Tiny Echo
Tooth and Tail
Tormentor X Punisher
Toy Odyssey: The Lost and Found
Treasure Hunter Simulator
The USB Stick Found in the Grass
Wanderlust: Travel Stories
Wandersong
War for the Overworld - Yogscast Worker Skin
Wargroove
Warhammer® 40,000: Dawn of War® - Game of the Year Edition
Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide
WARSAW
We Are Alright
West of Dead
World to the West
X-Morph: Defense + European Assault, Survival of the Fittest, and Last Bastion DLC
Yoku's Island Express
Zeno Clash 2
Zombie Night Terror
APRIL 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Driftland, Turok 2, Truberbrook, Shoppe Keep 2, Capitalism 2)
APRIL 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Main Assembly, Rock Of Ages 3, In Other Waters, Aven Colony, Simulcra I+II, Colt Canyon, Skully, Popup Dungeon)
AUGUST 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Hello Neighbor + Hide And Seek, Littlebig Workshop, American Fugitive, The Coma 2, A Case Of Distrust)
DECEMBER 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Beyond The Wire, The Survivalists, Lacuna, 8 Doors, Greak, Tohu)
FEBRUARY 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Moving Out, The Wild 8, Train Station Renovation, Werewolf The Apocalypse Heart Of The Forest, Lovecraft's Untold Stories, Iris And The Giant, Boomerang Fu)
JANUARY 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Total Tank Simulator, Song Of Horror, Vampire The Masquerade: Shadows Of New York, Deleveled, The Ambassador)
JUNE 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Supraland, Grid, The Messenger, Felix The Reaper, Remnants Of Naezith, Overload, The Stillness Of The Wind, The King's Bird)
MARCH 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (WWE 2k, Hotshot Racing, Peaky Blinders, Cyber Hook, Pesterquest, Boreal Blade, Ageless)
MAY 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Xcom 2, Niche, Swords Of Ditto, Neoverse, Horace)
NOVEMBER 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Darksburg, Smile For Me, Tsioque, Rover Mechanic Simulator, Youropa, Townsmen)
OCTOBER 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Iron Danger, Autonauts, Shadows: Awakening, Fantasy Blacksmith, The Suicide Of Rachel Foster, Goat Of Duty, The Uncertain, Lightmatter)
SEPTEMBER 2020 HUMBLE CHOICE (Lethal League, Fun With Ragdolls, Evoland, Yooka-Laylee And The Impossible Lair, The Occupation, The Shapeshifting Detective)
SEPTEMBER 2021 HUMBLE CHOICE (Atomicrops, Heaven's Vault, Swag And Sorcery, Fort Triumph, Orwell: Ignorance Is Strength, Framed Collection)
My region is North America.
2024.05.11 14:10 ButstheSlackGordsman Joy
Joy
“Please don’t do this to me! I’ll die out there!” Tiffany crumpled to the floor, phone shaking against her ear.
A gruff voice crackled. “I’m sorry Tiffany, our runner in your area got caught on his latest delivery. My other guy barely made it back. He saw Jimmy get hauled into the van. They’ve probably torn him apart by now.”
“Please…I don’t have any food left in the house. I’ll never make it out there. They’ll spot me immediately.”
“Listen, listen Tiff. It’s going to be OK. Listen to me alright? There’s a shop one block away from you.”
“I can’t!”
“You have to! OK, all you have to do is get in and get out. Put on the darkest sunglasses you have. You have shades right?”
Tiffany glanced up to the cabinet. Her terrified face reflected at her through the polarized lenses. “Uh-huh”
“That’s good, that’s real good. Now you put those on and grab enough food for a week while I find a replacement runner OK?”
“O-OK”
“And Tiffany?”
“Remember to smile, smile as wide as you can and never drop it. You know what happens if they suspect…”
“I know, thanks Mark.”
Tiffany hung up the phone with a shuddering exhale. She stood up and looked herself over in the mirror. A terrified blonde woman stared back, eyes wide with fear.
She wiped her tears and smoothed out her locks. She grasped her oversized sunglasses with trembling hands and put them on. She bent over, adjusting them carefully to ensure no trace of her eyes could be seen.
Glancing down, she looked over her list of food. Enough for a week…get in, get out…and smile.
Before turning to leave, she smiled into the mirror. The upturned mouth seemed almost foreign to her; she hadn’t laughed since everyone had been Torn. There weren’t many of her left in the world; the Joyous reigned supreme.
She stretched her smile as wide as it could go, until her cheeks strained with the effort. Exhaling through her teeth, she grasped the handle. The doorknob shook from her grip. Get it together…in and out…
She twisted the knob and threw the door open.
An eyeless face sprang up to meet her.
Tiffany screamed and jumped back.
“Oh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you!”
Tiffany clutched her heaving chest, trying to calm herself. The woman standing in on her stoop had no eyes, only dark, empty sockets each gleaming with a glowing pinprick of light. An enormous smile spread from ear to ear.
Tiffany forced words from her paralyzed mind. “Oh, it’s alright, I was just about to get some shopping done!”
The woman stared unblinking with her flickering pits. She lifted a newspaper. “I saw this blow over onto the street, so I thought I’d bring this little ol’ newsie inside!” She let out a raucous laugh.
Tiffany accepted the paper, praying she looked relaxed. She took a quick glimpse at the headline.
Joy! New York Mayor Declares City over 99% Pure on 1-Year Anniversary!
“Aww, I see you have just been Freed. Congratulations dear. How do you like the colors?” The woman bent her head closer to Tiffany’s face. Her heart hammered in her throat as her eyes were drawn to the woman’s scars. Black lines spider webbed all across her body, down her arms, over her face, and plunged down her low cut shirt. “Aw, I remember when I was freed; I didn’t really have scars either. I found a great doctor who touched me up; I can share his number with you!” She lifted her neck, showing off her scars wrapped around her throat.
“Yes, the colors they’re so…beautiful. Yeah…the doctors said I was one of the lucky ones, guess tough skin runs in the family.” Tiffany tried to laugh as she spoke.
The woman leaned back; her smile somehow widening even more. “Ah! Tragic! Stay safe y’hear? A naughty somebody escaped the hospital recently, ah, there he is now. Isn’t he silly?” She pointed to the distance.
Tiffany turned her head in the direction of her arm. Her heart sank to her stomach.
The street rose in an incline. The distant figure of a man climbed into sight at the crest of the hill. His sandy hair was unmistakable.
Tiffany lifted a trembling hand to her mouth. Jimmy?
Jimmy was naked with blood pouring in rivets all down the front of his torso. As she squinted, she realized that Jimmy’s body wasn't moving; it hung limp, limbs dangling in the air. Her darting eyes widened as she saw his legs hovered off the road.
Four thick tendrils pulsated out of Jimmy’s gaping mouth. The dark trunks spilled out onto the ground, suspending his frame in midair. The shadowy pillars supported his body like makeshift legs. Jimmy lolled back and forth as the inhuman limbs propelled him down the hill like a beast.
Tiffany’s stomach churned in knots as he careened down the street. He couldn’t speak but his bulging eyes darting all around spoke all that was needed. Her gaze adhered to the incomprehensible stalks that moved of their own accord. The tentacles shimmered and writhed all over, smaller tendrils branching off, thrashing independently of one another.
Right as he passed Tiffany, he tripped and skidded to the ground. The husks all around her burst into raucous laughter at the sight of it clamoring back up.
The woman doubled over in giggles. “Ooh, you silly goose, don’t even know what’s good for ya!”
Jimmy’s chest bloated and bubbled. The bulge traveled up his throat, extending it to an inhuman width. A horrid squelching erupted as two pink sacs attached to tubes slithered out of his mouth, traveling along the lengths of the trunks. Tiffany could barely support her own weight at the sight of Jimmy’s lungs pulsating in frantic breaths.
Her horrified gaze watched as the lungs enlarged in a deep breath, a gurgling crescendoing in pitch. They expanded to full size and hung still for an instant. Then exploded in desperate screams.
“HELP ME! PLEASE, I’M ALIVE LIKE YO-”
With the roar of an engine and the screech of tires, a vehicle slammed into Jimmy’s body. A spray of blood rained on Tiffany and the crowd. A white van screeched to a halt just as Jimmy flew through the air, all eight limbs flailing in the wind.
No amount of bracing could prepare Tiffany for the sound of bones crushing as Jimmy landed in a bloody mess on the asphalt. The crowd of husks whooped and hollered. The drivers clambered out of the vehicle and took deep bows, grinning broadly.
Wiping off blood, Tiffany inspected the logo on the van. It displayed two cartoon men each standing on the side of another person. The person was divided into two halves. One side was human with a smiling face while the other was a shadowy figure, screaming in agony. The smiling men each pulled on an arm as if separating the halves.
“Sorry folks! We had a feisty one here, we’ll take care of it from here!” He drew a syringe from his pocket.
“That’s OK! Need a hand?” The woman called back to enthusiastic nods from the crowd. The van driver waved his arm in the direction of Jimmy’s limb body.
Tiffany blinked back burning tears as she watched Jimmy twitch on the ground. The husks closed in around him, laughing as they surrounded him. She wanted nothing more than to just retreat inside and vomit. But an opportunity presented itself.
Streams of people poured out of the shop ahead, drawn to the spectacle on the street. The sidewalks leading up to the store cleared. Her path would never be this open again. Tearing her eyes from Jimmy, she walked as fast as possible to the market, her smile twitching in anguish.
After what felt like hours, she stood at the entrance to the food mart. She moved her jaw around to loosen it, almost flinching as it popped. OK…in and out…then you’re safe. Running over her mental list one last time, she barged inside.
A wave of frigid air washed over her. She scanned the shop, exhaling out a sigh of relief as she confirmed it was mostly empty. Only a mother pushing a stroller joined her in the market.
Tiffany whipped out a shopping cart and sped down aisle by aisle. Eyes darting, she grasped each item on her list as if it were manna from heaven. Her breathing eased as she made it to the other side of the store without incident. A small bit of happiness welled up within her as she looked over her bulging wagon. It was enough to last her two weeks, two blissful weeks of safety. All she had to do was get out.
She strolled to the checkout lane. The mother was in front of her, the groceries crinkling as they were bagged by the cheerful cashier. Tiffany’s knuckles gripped the cart so hard they turned white. Please…just pay and leave…
Tiffany’s heart skipped a beat as the mother twisted her neck to look at her. Empty sockets crinkled as the young woman’s smile widened. “Why hello there! Any idea what the ruckus is out there?” A collective cheer erupted outside in the distance.
Tiffany shook her head, trying to push Jimmy’s battered body out of her thoughts.
She glanced at Tiffany’s cart. “Big haul. You having a party?”
Tiffany nodded, almost forgetting to breathe.
“Am I invited? Where do you live?”
Tiffany gulped. The mother roared with laughter. “Oh dearie me, I’m just kidding you. I’d love to go but this little man down here takes up all my time. Wanna say hi?”
Tiffany nodded again, her cheeks screaming with the strain of her fake smile. The mother lifted the hood of the stroller and wheeled it around, facing Tiffany. An eyeless baby cooed up at her, its sockets nearly taking up half its face. Black scars lined its entire body, lashing its face that carved itself into a wide smile.
Tiffany screamed in terror, flinging herself back.
CLACK!
Light streamed into her eyes as they watered. Time almost stopped as she glanced down at her sunglasses. Shuddering, she looked back up. The mother, baby, and cashier stared at her.
Without taking his sockets off her, the cashier pressed a button on the counter. An intercom crackled to life. “Attention all employees. We have someone in pain over here. Please call the authorities while we restrain her.”
Tiffany threw the cart to the ground, sprinting to the glass double doors. Talon-like fingers dug into her shoulder right as she reached the exit. “NO! PLEASE LET ME GO! PLEASE!”
But the mother just giggled into her ear. “Now why would I do that, sweetie? Don’t worry, we’re going to help you. See? They’re already here to heal you!”
Tiffany’s heart sank into her stomach as she watched the same van that crashed into Jimmy park outside. Two men dressed in scrubs burst out the back, wheeling out a gurney. Her eyes bulged as she gazed at the restraints gleaming cruelly in the morning light.
The smiling men jaunted over to her. Tiffany ground her heel into the mother’s toes; the arms holding her released. She rushed forward to the man on the left, throwing a wild punch in desperation.
To her surprise, her knuckles connected, slamming the man’s head back to its side. Rough hands grabbed her arms by the elbows, jerking them behind her.
The man she’d punched twisted his head back, the unnatural smile still plastered on his face. “Now, now simmer down, young lady. He snatched her kicking feet and lifted her in tandem with the other man.
With inhuman strength, they slammed her onto the gurney. She flailed, straining her limbs against their grasp. Her shoulders popped in their sockets, her screams erupting in pain and fear.
CLICK!
Cold metal clamped down on her right wrist. Three more clicks restrained her completely.
“No, no, no, please! Just let me go! I’ll never bother you again!” Tiffany half screamed and half sobbed.
One man chuckled. “Oops! Gotta make some room!”
She wailed as she watched the men drag Jimmy’s corpse out of the back and toss it on the sidewalk. The doors slammed shut, and the vehicle sped off.
Desperation gave way to despair for Tiffany, she wept bitterly. She gasped as the men wiped away tears on each side of her face. They lifted their fingers to their eyeless pits, staring in wonder at the droplet forming, mouths parted and making soft cooing sounds.
“I remember my last tear, what about you Ted?” The man on her right whispered.
The man on the left nodded, sucking his finger. “Yeah…I almost miss the taste.” They both roared in laughter at the same time.
The van jolted to a halt. The men flung the doors open. “Don’t worry missy, it will all be over soon!”
She shook her head, pleading for anyone she passed to help her as she was wheeled into the hospital. All she received were condescending smiles, and pats on the hand. She was sped into an operating room. Her eyes widened in terror at the sight of the tearing chair.
A medical bed lay in the middle of the chamber. A bar of light hung at the bed’s foot. The bar crossed over the width of the bed, attached to a track that ran along the length from the bottom to the top. Her heart sank. She’d expected cutting instruments but the lack of them frightened her even more.
A grinning doctor finished washing her hands in the nearby sink, pulling latex gloves on. “Oh dearie me, look at this poor soul. It’s been a while since I’ve gotten freed one so large! The gals will take it from here, boys!” The men giggled as they left the room.
Masked women in scrubs burst from the doors to assist. Even behind the masks, their smiles were visible. They all carried scissors. Within seconds, they snipped off all of her clothes leaving her naked in the gurney.
The doctor lifted a syringe, the end dripping with sedative. “Now we need you to be still for this next part sweetie!” She rammed the needle into her hip and thumbed the plunger down. She gasped as the burning liquid clouded into her bloodstream. At once, her extremities deadened, all feeling and control gone.
A pair of arms gripped each of her limbs as she was lifted off the gurney and thrown onto the medical bed. The doctor looked down at her at the foot of the bed, grasping the bar of light. It pulsated in waves of color as she clinked it into place over Tiffany’s feet so that the luminescence only hovered an inch over her skin.
The soles of her feet writhed in agony in the light’s presence. Tiffany screamed at the burning tendrils within her feet. A horrific thought pierced her torment in a single moment of clarity. Something is moving inside me. Using the last vestiges of motor control left, she lifted her head an inch, eyes glued to her feet.
Various ridges rolled around on the tops of her feet, almost as if something flailed to get away from the brilliant light. The doctor traced a finger over the thrashing bulges. “Yes, the time for your last pain draws near, little one. No longer will you torment this young woman. No longer.” She placed both hands on the instrument bar. “Now, I must warn you. This will hurt…more than anything you’ve ever felt in your life. But what awaits you on the other side is…” She laughed.
“Please…” Tiffany whimpered, but the doctor pushed the bar of light up her legs.
Torture. Pure agony. Tiffany screamed to the point she thought her jaw might pop off its hinges. The writhing in her feet intensified, pulling and tearing at her skin…
A spurt of blood spewed over the doctor’s face. “Ah, we’ve crowned!”
“WHAT IS THIS?!” Tiffany screeched as she looked down. Blackened tentacles whipped violently back and forth, sprouting from her feet.
“Oh, it’s the sickness my sweet…it must be purged. Deep breath and here we go!” She pushed the bar of light even further along its track, this time going up her legs.
Molten lines of agony traced themselves up her legs in tandem with the glow. Tiffany’s eyes rolled up into her head and then back down again, casting her world in revolving darkness and light. The skin at her legs tore, thicker tendrils bursting out in viscous spray.
The dark veins slapped at the doctor's face but a smiling nurse grasped the flailing trunks and pinned them down as the doctor pressed on above her knees and up her thighs. Her skin bubbled and burst as the bleeding mass on each limb fled from the light. Tiffany stared transfixed at the monster birthed from her, the spindly body, the erratic, desperate movement of a trapped beast.
The bar stopped just below her groin. “This is probably the worst part dearie, brace yourself.’ She yanked it forward, up to her abdomen.
Tiffany’s voice tore, her throat bleeding raw. She’s never given birth before; the monster springing out from her womanhood made a poor substitute for a child.
“There you go baby. You’re doing so well. Halfway done!”
The instrument slid up her stomach, passing over her arms. The sickness within gripped her organs in a vain attempt to resist being torn out. Strands of obsidian wrested themselves out of her torso only to be collected and restrained by the unflinching nurses. Up her body they all went, up her chest, her shoulders, and on to her neck.
Right at the base of her chin, the bar of light chinked as it came to the end of its track. The beast within Tiffany screeched, straining at the nurses restraints. Forgetting the pain for an instant, Tiffany croaked through torn vocal chords. “What is this thing?”
The doctor wiped blood out of her sockets. “It’s your parasite, what you thought you were. I know it hurts; this thing feeds off pain. Don’t worry. We’re almost done.”
She pivoted two smaller bars of lights up to Tiffany’s head, one on each side. They swung in such a way that they would meet in the middle. Her eyes swiveled independently of each other, as if they too feared the light. The doctor smiled at the erratic movement.
“Oh, yes.” She whispered. “Feel fear. It’s what you deserve; it’s all you deserve.” She grasped each bar and clamped them together.
Blinding pressure built up in Tiffany’s eardrums as if she were being stabbed in each ear with knives aching to meet in the middle. An incessant ringing tingled, building up pitch and intensity until it was all she could hear. Her brain lit aflame, seething at the burning from the sound. “MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOP!” Her mouth uttered the words, but she couldn’t hear her voice anymore.
Like a cord being unplugged from a speaker, her world fell silent one pull at a time. Black tendrils whipped in her sight as the beast fled from her ear canals. The lights passed in her vision.
The doctor spoke unheard words. She tried to close her eyes, but they weren’t hers anymore. They swiveled all about in their sockets, trying to escape her skull.
But there was no escape, not for a parasite. The lights slammed shut, meeting in the middle right over her. The kaleidoscope of luminescence overtook everything. Her world melded to an ever changing sea of merging lights.
Her thoughts, her consciousness, her very essence whirled in her brain. A dark hole sprouted in her psyche. Her being swirled around the murky depths of her existence spinning to the choreography of the lights pulse. Round and round it went until she thought her last words. Who am I? All grew dark.
—---------
The operating room light blinded Tiffany. She tried to close her eyes but found she had no lids.
She saw the metal tray she lay on.
She saw the black, spindly lengths of her body laying in a tangled heap in the tray.
She saw Tiffany laying on the medical table. What?
Her psyche ran stark with shock as she watched herself sit up from the medical table. Her eyes were gone, replaced with two glowing pits burning in deep sockets. Blood trails criss crossed all over her venous scars. Tears of crimson flowed from her pits as she sobbed into her hands.
No…that’s me? But then…who am I?
She glanced up and received her horrifying answer. An operating mirror hung on the ceiling above her. What she had once thought as herself was now nothing more than a pair of eyeballs attached to a spinal stem with nervous branches tangled and heaped in a small tray.
She was the parasite.
The real Tiffany sobbed, a wide smile stretching across her face. “Colors…so many colors…”
The doctor handed her a pair of sunglasses. “Here, put these on and keep them on for the next couple of weeks. The parasites could only see a thin spectrum of light. You can see all of it now, it’s a bit overwhelming at first but you get used to it.”
The real Tiffany placed the sunglasses on her face then clutched at her chest. “What….what is this feeling? It burns yet…it’s warm all over..”
The doctor knelt at the real Tiffany’s side. “It’s happiness…” She giggled. “Pure happiness, it’s what that parasite over there denied you.” The doctor shot a glare to the nerve bundle that used to be Tiffany.
The real Tiffany released her chest. “How long has it been inside of me?”
The doctor stood up. “We aren’t sure when these parasites fused with humans but it must have been millennia ago. They have been entwined with us so long we even once thought they were part of our bodies. The nervous system, what a cruel joke. These things thrive off of our happiness and only feed us pain in return.”
The doctor shot the nerve bundle a look. Even though she smiled, Tiffany could feel the doctor’s contempt radiating. “Look how pathetic it is. Can’t even move anymore. These things rely on our central brain systems to move. Once separated, they are immobile. It’s rather ironic that they only try to move as we cut into their feeding supply.”
The real Tiffany hugged the doctor who returned the embrace. “Thank you…for freeing me.” The doctor rubbed her back.
They released each other. The real Tiffany looked over at the nerve bundle that used to be her. “What do we do with…it?”
The doctor grasped the nerve bundle unceremoniously in her palm. Wait…no! I’m-I’m me!
“We will cast her into the depths to which she came from of course!” The doctor laughed as she brought the nerve bundle to a trash chute. The nerve bundle glanced down, recoiling in horror. No light graced her final destination.
“Good riddance.” The nerve bundle was released and cast into the void. It landed with a plop amongst the other writhing bundles, rueing the day it ever thought it truly existed.
submitted by ButstheSlackGordsman to JordanGrupeHorror [link] [comments]
“Please don’t do this to me! I’ll die out there!” Tiffany crumpled to the floor, phone shaking against her ear.
A gruff voice crackled. “I’m sorry Tiffany, our runner in your area got caught on his latest delivery. My other guy barely made it back. He saw Jimmy get hauled into the van. They’ve probably torn him apart by now.”
“Please…I don’t have any food left in the house. I’ll never make it out there. They’ll spot me immediately.”
“Listen, listen Tiff. It’s going to be OK. Listen to me alright? There’s a shop one block away from you.”
“I can’t!”
“You have to! OK, all you have to do is get in and get out. Put on the darkest sunglasses you have. You have shades right?”
Tiffany glanced up to the cabinet. Her terrified face reflected at her through the polarized lenses. “Uh-huh”
“That’s good, that’s real good. Now you put those on and grab enough food for a week while I find a replacement runner OK?”
“O-OK”
“And Tiffany?”
“Remember to smile, smile as wide as you can and never drop it. You know what happens if they suspect…”
“I know, thanks Mark.”
Tiffany hung up the phone with a shuddering exhale. She stood up and looked herself over in the mirror. A terrified blonde woman stared back, eyes wide with fear.
She wiped her tears and smoothed out her locks. She grasped her oversized sunglasses with trembling hands and put them on. She bent over, adjusting them carefully to ensure no trace of her eyes could be seen.
Glancing down, she looked over her list of food. Enough for a week…get in, get out…and smile.
Before turning to leave, she smiled into the mirror. The upturned mouth seemed almost foreign to her; she hadn’t laughed since everyone had been Torn. There weren’t many of her left in the world; the Joyous reigned supreme.
She stretched her smile as wide as it could go, until her cheeks strained with the effort. Exhaling through her teeth, she grasped the handle. The doorknob shook from her grip. Get it together…in and out…
She twisted the knob and threw the door open.
An eyeless face sprang up to meet her.
Tiffany screamed and jumped back.
“Oh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you!”
Tiffany clutched her heaving chest, trying to calm herself. The woman standing in on her stoop had no eyes, only dark, empty sockets each gleaming with a glowing pinprick of light. An enormous smile spread from ear to ear.
Tiffany forced words from her paralyzed mind. “Oh, it’s alright, I was just about to get some shopping done!”
The woman stared unblinking with her flickering pits. She lifted a newspaper. “I saw this blow over onto the street, so I thought I’d bring this little ol’ newsie inside!” She let out a raucous laugh.
Tiffany accepted the paper, praying she looked relaxed. She took a quick glimpse at the headline.
Joy! New York Mayor Declares City over 99% Pure on 1-Year Anniversary!
“Aww, I see you have just been Freed. Congratulations dear. How do you like the colors?” The woman bent her head closer to Tiffany’s face. Her heart hammered in her throat as her eyes were drawn to the woman’s scars. Black lines spider webbed all across her body, down her arms, over her face, and plunged down her low cut shirt. “Aw, I remember when I was freed; I didn’t really have scars either. I found a great doctor who touched me up; I can share his number with you!” She lifted her neck, showing off her scars wrapped around her throat.
“Yes, the colors they’re so…beautiful. Yeah…the doctors said I was one of the lucky ones, guess tough skin runs in the family.” Tiffany tried to laugh as she spoke.
The woman leaned back; her smile somehow widening even more. “Ah! Tragic! Stay safe y’hear? A naughty somebody escaped the hospital recently, ah, there he is now. Isn’t he silly?” She pointed to the distance.
Tiffany turned her head in the direction of her arm. Her heart sank to her stomach.
The street rose in an incline. The distant figure of a man climbed into sight at the crest of the hill. His sandy hair was unmistakable.
Tiffany lifted a trembling hand to her mouth. Jimmy?
Jimmy was naked with blood pouring in rivets all down the front of his torso. As she squinted, she realized that Jimmy’s body wasn't moving; it hung limp, limbs dangling in the air. Her darting eyes widened as she saw his legs hovered off the road.
Four thick tendrils pulsated out of Jimmy’s gaping mouth. The dark trunks spilled out onto the ground, suspending his frame in midair. The shadowy pillars supported his body like makeshift legs. Jimmy lolled back and forth as the inhuman limbs propelled him down the hill like a beast.
Tiffany’s stomach churned in knots as he careened down the street. He couldn’t speak but his bulging eyes darting all around spoke all that was needed. Her gaze adhered to the incomprehensible stalks that moved of their own accord. The tentacles shimmered and writhed all over, smaller tendrils branching off, thrashing independently of one another.
Right as he passed Tiffany, he tripped and skidded to the ground. The husks all around her burst into raucous laughter at the sight of it clamoring back up.
The woman doubled over in giggles. “Ooh, you silly goose, don’t even know what’s good for ya!”
Jimmy’s chest bloated and bubbled. The bulge traveled up his throat, extending it to an inhuman width. A horrid squelching erupted as two pink sacs attached to tubes slithered out of his mouth, traveling along the lengths of the trunks. Tiffany could barely support her own weight at the sight of Jimmy’s lungs pulsating in frantic breaths.
Her horrified gaze watched as the lungs enlarged in a deep breath, a gurgling crescendoing in pitch. They expanded to full size and hung still for an instant. Then exploded in desperate screams.
“HELP ME! PLEASE, I’M ALIVE LIKE YO-”
With the roar of an engine and the screech of tires, a vehicle slammed into Jimmy’s body. A spray of blood rained on Tiffany and the crowd. A white van screeched to a halt just as Jimmy flew through the air, all eight limbs flailing in the wind.
No amount of bracing could prepare Tiffany for the sound of bones crushing as Jimmy landed in a bloody mess on the asphalt. The crowd of husks whooped and hollered. The drivers clambered out of the vehicle and took deep bows, grinning broadly.
Wiping off blood, Tiffany inspected the logo on the van. It displayed two cartoon men each standing on the side of another person. The person was divided into two halves. One side was human with a smiling face while the other was a shadowy figure, screaming in agony. The smiling men each pulled on an arm as if separating the halves.
“Sorry folks! We had a feisty one here, we’ll take care of it from here!” He drew a syringe from his pocket.
“That’s OK! Need a hand?” The woman called back to enthusiastic nods from the crowd. The van driver waved his arm in the direction of Jimmy’s limb body.
Tiffany blinked back burning tears as she watched Jimmy twitch on the ground. The husks closed in around him, laughing as they surrounded him. She wanted nothing more than to just retreat inside and vomit. But an opportunity presented itself.
Streams of people poured out of the shop ahead, drawn to the spectacle on the street. The sidewalks leading up to the store cleared. Her path would never be this open again. Tearing her eyes from Jimmy, she walked as fast as possible to the market, her smile twitching in anguish.
After what felt like hours, she stood at the entrance to the food mart. She moved her jaw around to loosen it, almost flinching as it popped. OK…in and out…then you’re safe. Running over her mental list one last time, she barged inside.
A wave of frigid air washed over her. She scanned the shop, exhaling out a sigh of relief as she confirmed it was mostly empty. Only a mother pushing a stroller joined her in the market.
Tiffany whipped out a shopping cart and sped down aisle by aisle. Eyes darting, she grasped each item on her list as if it were manna from heaven. Her breathing eased as she made it to the other side of the store without incident. A small bit of happiness welled up within her as she looked over her bulging wagon. It was enough to last her two weeks, two blissful weeks of safety. All she had to do was get out.
She strolled to the checkout lane. The mother was in front of her, the groceries crinkling as they were bagged by the cheerful cashier. Tiffany’s knuckles gripped the cart so hard they turned white. Please…just pay and leave…
Tiffany’s heart skipped a beat as the mother twisted her neck to look at her. Empty sockets crinkled as the young woman’s smile widened. “Why hello there! Any idea what the ruckus is out there?” A collective cheer erupted outside in the distance.
Tiffany shook her head, trying to push Jimmy’s battered body out of her thoughts.
She glanced at Tiffany’s cart. “Big haul. You having a party?”
Tiffany nodded, almost forgetting to breathe.
“Am I invited? Where do you live?”
Tiffany gulped. The mother roared with laughter. “Oh dearie me, I’m just kidding you. I’d love to go but this little man down here takes up all my time. Wanna say hi?”
Tiffany nodded again, her cheeks screaming with the strain of her fake smile. The mother lifted the hood of the stroller and wheeled it around, facing Tiffany. An eyeless baby cooed up at her, its sockets nearly taking up half its face. Black scars lined its entire body, lashing its face that carved itself into a wide smile.
Tiffany screamed in terror, flinging herself back.
CLACK!
Light streamed into her eyes as they watered. Time almost stopped as she glanced down at her sunglasses. Shuddering, she looked back up. The mother, baby, and cashier stared at her.
Without taking his sockets off her, the cashier pressed a button on the counter. An intercom crackled to life. “Attention all employees. We have someone in pain over here. Please call the authorities while we restrain her.”
Tiffany threw the cart to the ground, sprinting to the glass double doors. Talon-like fingers dug into her shoulder right as she reached the exit. “NO! PLEASE LET ME GO! PLEASE!”
But the mother just giggled into her ear. “Now why would I do that, sweetie? Don’t worry, we’re going to help you. See? They’re already here to heal you!”
Tiffany’s heart sank into her stomach as she watched the same van that crashed into Jimmy park outside. Two men dressed in scrubs burst out the back, wheeling out a gurney. Her eyes bulged as she gazed at the restraints gleaming cruelly in the morning light.
The smiling men jaunted over to her. Tiffany ground her heel into the mother’s toes; the arms holding her released. She rushed forward to the man on the left, throwing a wild punch in desperation.
To her surprise, her knuckles connected, slamming the man’s head back to its side. Rough hands grabbed her arms by the elbows, jerking them behind her.
The man she’d punched twisted his head back, the unnatural smile still plastered on his face. “Now, now simmer down, young lady. He snatched her kicking feet and lifted her in tandem with the other man.
With inhuman strength, they slammed her onto the gurney. She flailed, straining her limbs against their grasp. Her shoulders popped in their sockets, her screams erupting in pain and fear.
CLICK!
Cold metal clamped down on her right wrist. Three more clicks restrained her completely.
“No, no, no, please! Just let me go! I’ll never bother you again!” Tiffany half screamed and half sobbed.
One man chuckled. “Oops! Gotta make some room!”
She wailed as she watched the men drag Jimmy’s corpse out of the back and toss it on the sidewalk. The doors slammed shut, and the vehicle sped off.
Desperation gave way to despair for Tiffany, she wept bitterly. She gasped as the men wiped away tears on each side of her face. They lifted their fingers to their eyeless pits, staring in wonder at the droplet forming, mouths parted and making soft cooing sounds.
“I remember my last tear, what about you Ted?” The man on her right whispered.
The man on the left nodded, sucking his finger. “Yeah…I almost miss the taste.” They both roared in laughter at the same time.
The van jolted to a halt. The men flung the doors open. “Don’t worry missy, it will all be over soon!”
She shook her head, pleading for anyone she passed to help her as she was wheeled into the hospital. All she received were condescending smiles, and pats on the hand. She was sped into an operating room. Her eyes widened in terror at the sight of the tearing chair.
A medical bed lay in the middle of the chamber. A bar of light hung at the bed’s foot. The bar crossed over the width of the bed, attached to a track that ran along the length from the bottom to the top. Her heart sank. She’d expected cutting instruments but the lack of them frightened her even more.
A grinning doctor finished washing her hands in the nearby sink, pulling latex gloves on. “Oh dearie me, look at this poor soul. It’s been a while since I’ve gotten freed one so large! The gals will take it from here, boys!” The men giggled as they left the room.
Masked women in scrubs burst from the doors to assist. Even behind the masks, their smiles were visible. They all carried scissors. Within seconds, they snipped off all of her clothes leaving her naked in the gurney.
The doctor lifted a syringe, the end dripping with sedative. “Now we need you to be still for this next part sweetie!” She rammed the needle into her hip and thumbed the plunger down. She gasped as the burning liquid clouded into her bloodstream. At once, her extremities deadened, all feeling and control gone.
A pair of arms gripped each of her limbs as she was lifted off the gurney and thrown onto the medical bed. The doctor looked down at her at the foot of the bed, grasping the bar of light. It pulsated in waves of color as she clinked it into place over Tiffany’s feet so that the luminescence only hovered an inch over her skin.
The soles of her feet writhed in agony in the light’s presence. Tiffany screamed at the burning tendrils within her feet. A horrific thought pierced her torment in a single moment of clarity. Something is moving inside me. Using the last vestiges of motor control left, she lifted her head an inch, eyes glued to her feet.
Various ridges rolled around on the tops of her feet, almost as if something flailed to get away from the brilliant light. The doctor traced a finger over the thrashing bulges. “Yes, the time for your last pain draws near, little one. No longer will you torment this young woman. No longer.” She placed both hands on the instrument bar. “Now, I must warn you. This will hurt…more than anything you’ve ever felt in your life. But what awaits you on the other side is…” She laughed.
“Please…” Tiffany whimpered, but the doctor pushed the bar of light up her legs.
Torture. Pure agony. Tiffany screamed to the point she thought her jaw might pop off its hinges. The writhing in her feet intensified, pulling and tearing at her skin…
A spurt of blood spewed over the doctor’s face. “Ah, we’ve crowned!”
“WHAT IS THIS?!” Tiffany screeched as she looked down. Blackened tentacles whipped violently back and forth, sprouting from her feet.
“Oh, it’s the sickness my sweet…it must be purged. Deep breath and here we go!” She pushed the bar of light even further along its track, this time going up her legs.
Molten lines of agony traced themselves up her legs in tandem with the glow. Tiffany’s eyes rolled up into her head and then back down again, casting her world in revolving darkness and light. The skin at her legs tore, thicker tendrils bursting out in viscous spray.
The dark veins slapped at the doctor's face but a smiling nurse grasped the flailing trunks and pinned them down as the doctor pressed on above her knees and up her thighs. Her skin bubbled and burst as the bleeding mass on each limb fled from the light. Tiffany stared transfixed at the monster birthed from her, the spindly body, the erratic, desperate movement of a trapped beast.
The bar stopped just below her groin. “This is probably the worst part dearie, brace yourself.’ She yanked it forward, up to her abdomen.
Tiffany’s voice tore, her throat bleeding raw. She’s never given birth before; the monster springing out from her womanhood made a poor substitute for a child.
“There you go baby. You’re doing so well. Halfway done!”
The instrument slid up her stomach, passing over her arms. The sickness within gripped her organs in a vain attempt to resist being torn out. Strands of obsidian wrested themselves out of her torso only to be collected and restrained by the unflinching nurses. Up her body they all went, up her chest, her shoulders, and on to her neck.
Right at the base of her chin, the bar of light chinked as it came to the end of its track. The beast within Tiffany screeched, straining at the nurses restraints. Forgetting the pain for an instant, Tiffany croaked through torn vocal chords. “What is this thing?”
The doctor wiped blood out of her sockets. “It’s your parasite, what you thought you were. I know it hurts; this thing feeds off pain. Don’t worry. We’re almost done.”
She pivoted two smaller bars of lights up to Tiffany’s head, one on each side. They swung in such a way that they would meet in the middle. Her eyes swiveled independently of each other, as if they too feared the light. The doctor smiled at the erratic movement.
“Oh, yes.” She whispered. “Feel fear. It’s what you deserve; it’s all you deserve.” She grasped each bar and clamped them together.
Blinding pressure built up in Tiffany’s eardrums as if she were being stabbed in each ear with knives aching to meet in the middle. An incessant ringing tingled, building up pitch and intensity until it was all she could hear. Her brain lit aflame, seething at the burning from the sound. “MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOP!” Her mouth uttered the words, but she couldn’t hear her voice anymore.
Like a cord being unplugged from a speaker, her world fell silent one pull at a time. Black tendrils whipped in her sight as the beast fled from her ear canals. The lights passed in her vision.
The doctor spoke unheard words. She tried to close her eyes, but they weren’t hers anymore. They swiveled all about in their sockets, trying to escape her skull.
But there was no escape, not for a parasite. The lights slammed shut, meeting in the middle right over her. The kaleidoscope of luminescence overtook everything. Her world melded to an ever changing sea of merging lights.
Her thoughts, her consciousness, her very essence whirled in her brain. A dark hole sprouted in her psyche. Her being swirled around the murky depths of her existence spinning to the choreography of the lights pulse. Round and round it went until she thought her last words. Who am I? All grew dark.
—---------
The operating room light blinded Tiffany. She tried to close her eyes but found she had no lids.
She saw the metal tray she lay on.
She saw the black, spindly lengths of her body laying in a tangled heap in the tray.
She saw Tiffany laying on the medical table. What?
Her psyche ran stark with shock as she watched herself sit up from the medical table. Her eyes were gone, replaced with two glowing pits burning in deep sockets. Blood trails criss crossed all over her venous scars. Tears of crimson flowed from her pits as she sobbed into her hands.
No…that’s me? But then…who am I?
She glanced up and received her horrifying answer. An operating mirror hung on the ceiling above her. What she had once thought as herself was now nothing more than a pair of eyeballs attached to a spinal stem with nervous branches tangled and heaped in a small tray.
She was the parasite.
The real Tiffany sobbed, a wide smile stretching across her face. “Colors…so many colors…”
The doctor handed her a pair of sunglasses. “Here, put these on and keep them on for the next couple of weeks. The parasites could only see a thin spectrum of light. You can see all of it now, it’s a bit overwhelming at first but you get used to it.”
The real Tiffany placed the sunglasses on her face then clutched at her chest. “What….what is this feeling? It burns yet…it’s warm all over..”
The doctor knelt at the real Tiffany’s side. “It’s happiness…” She giggled. “Pure happiness, it’s what that parasite over there denied you.” The doctor shot a glare to the nerve bundle that used to be Tiffany.
The real Tiffany released her chest. “How long has it been inside of me?”
The doctor stood up. “We aren’t sure when these parasites fused with humans but it must have been millennia ago. They have been entwined with us so long we even once thought they were part of our bodies. The nervous system, what a cruel joke. These things thrive off of our happiness and only feed us pain in return.”
The doctor shot the nerve bundle a look. Even though she smiled, Tiffany could feel the doctor’s contempt radiating. “Look how pathetic it is. Can’t even move anymore. These things rely on our central brain systems to move. Once separated, they are immobile. It’s rather ironic that they only try to move as we cut into their feeding supply.”
The real Tiffany hugged the doctor who returned the embrace. “Thank you…for freeing me.” The doctor rubbed her back.
They released each other. The real Tiffany looked over at the nerve bundle that used to be her. “What do we do with…it?”
The doctor grasped the nerve bundle unceremoniously in her palm. Wait…no! I’m-I’m me!
“We will cast her into the depths to which she came from of course!” The doctor laughed as she brought the nerve bundle to a trash chute. The nerve bundle glanced down, recoiling in horror. No light graced her final destination.
“Good riddance.” The nerve bundle was released and cast into the void. It landed with a plop amongst the other writhing bundles, rueing the day it ever thought it truly existed.