Short and stacked haircuts

hairstyles for men and hairstyles for women

2014.05.14 11:14 hairstylestrends hairstyles for men and hairstyles for women

New and trendy haircuts for men and hairstyles for women. Trendy short haircuts and cute hairstyles. Hairstying ideas and hair growth products.
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2020.10.10 16:34 1aleynatilki Short haircuts for women

short haircuts for women (pictures and videos). Must-Try Short Hairstyles and Haircuts in 2023. Medium Bob With Wispy Bangs. Apple Cut. Chin-Length Bob. Pixie Cut With Side Bangs. C-Curl Bob With Curtain Bangs. Curly Bob. Curly Pixie Cut. Wolf Cut. Asymmetrical Bob. Choppy Bob With See-Through Bangs. Pixie Cut With Undercut. Bob With Side Part. Bob With Layered Bangs. Medium Bob With Side-Swept Bangs. Short Blunt Bob With Blunt Bangs. A-Line Bob. Blunt Wavy Bob With Bangs. Scrunched Bob.
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2015.05.22 20:49 new ASMR channels with low subscriber count and new ideas

In this subreddit you will find new, interesting, (initially) unpopular and possibly experimental ASMR videos/audios or ASMRish things. Or discussions concerning those and new ideas.
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2024.05.14 23:36 Ian_costco What haircut should I get?

What haircut should I get?
I want an easy haircut with short sides, but I wonder if short sides would screw me up bc of my huge ears and big forehead, no hate pls
submitted by Ian_costco to Hair [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 23:29 smartybrome List of FREE and Best Selling Discounted Courses for 15 May 2024

submitted by smartybrome to udemyfreeebies [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 23:28 smartybrome List of FREE and Best Selling Discounted Courses for 15 May 2024

submitted by smartybrome to udemyfreebies [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 23:04 drithius Is there anyone still in charge of UI/UX at GGG?

Because this is ridiculously tedious:
https://i.imgur.com/e3lDxjj.png
Or, what's likely been lambasted several thousand times this league, a completely unnecessary UI blocking out literally half a user's screen mid-combat:
https://i.imgur.com/yyjTlYQ.png
Every few leagues I come back to PoE and plunk down an inordinate amount of time. And every few leagues, this issue continues to get worse and worse, swept under the development rug. The one short-lived ray of hope was the addition of currency stacking.
Single worst aspect of the game for me. Why in the world can't currency (and now scarabs) get auto-collected Expedition-style????
submitted by drithius to pathofexile [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 22:54 Free-Selection-3454 Observations after changing schools. Is it just me?

Hi all,This year I moved to a new school after 7 years in a previous school (Catholic college - primary and secondary). I left due to 2 colleagues I once admired, respected, enjoyed working with and called friends either bullying, excluding and/or undermining me in front of my students and theirs across the whole school year.Moved to a new school (Catholic and systemtic) and am finding many of their ways of operating very foreign, adding to my work and time and am constantly frustrated by lack of consistency, lack of standards and zero acknowledgement of my noticeable student progression and improvement since my arrival.
A few factors that are frustrating and aggravating:
-Apart from myself and one other staff member, ALL other staff (teachers, Teacher Assistants, the Deputy, office admin, specialists) are ALL part-time in the primary campus. In and of itself this is not a problem, however it leads to a lack of consistency and stability for me as I am constantly playing catch-up due to the rotating nature of the year-level team. It affects student behaviour (not so much mine, but the other classes) due to no consistency with teachers. Seems to be a high level of rotating teahers on LSL (short stints) and staff on and off from parental leave. No staff nmeeting I have been to yet has had all staff there.
-Behaviour of students is atrocious when compared to other schools in the area and previous schools from my decade + experience. Students are verbally rude, cannot settle and focus and there are often physical altercations in the playground. I've spent a term and a half really breaking down behaviour expectations, routines and standards. I am making progress, but there is so much stacked against us.
-Parent copmmunity is INTENSE. Moreso than I have ever experienced. Teachers are consistently told their "tone"when talking to parents is rude/negative/insert critique here, parents are constantly emailing teachers to complain about other children and flat out ignoring any and all comunication about their own child. When I asked leadership about this, the reasoning given is either, "Parents at this school have always been like this" or "It's the culture of the area. We get families from all over"meaning the greater metropolitan area. I persoinally do not think this argument holds up as previous schools I've been at have accepted students from relatively large areas in terms of distance.
-EVERYTHING is done as a team." While this sounds great on the face of it, it adds so much to personal workloads when reporting, individual lesson planning, unit planning, NCCD work, resouirce development and/or sourcing, sending emails to parents, responding to emails from parents and more all has to be done as a committee of 7 people. Nothing gets done efficiently or within a desired timeframe.
-Classes - For each year level (double-stream), we routinely mix and match students. Not just for programs (e.g. Spelling) but for ALL subjects and curriculum areas. This means that in theory, I have a class of 31 (e.g. my roll call list), however in any given lesson I could be receiving students from the next-door class. Sometimes the classes stay the same (students) but we (teachers) swap. This makes assessing and reporting a nightmare, as it is unproductive, inefficient and there is no consistency.The reason for this has nothing to do with student learning, outcomes or development. It occurs "to stop parents complaining about which teacher they do/do not get for their child," "to stop parents emailing and complaining about if child x or y is in their child's class."It also means that due to the way the "team-teaching" works, I will never teach certain subjects (e.g. Science or Geography) this year. I have been given subjects the other teachers on Year 5 do not want: Religion, History for example
-Students miss out on opportunities for growth, e.g. in Science as we need to fill out risk assessments for items like using the school oval outside of lunch times and for simple, basic Science experiments (e.g. mixing two liquids - liquids that are not hot, cold). EVERY science experiment of any category needs a risk assessment.I came in so excited about subjects like Science... no more. Can't take the class outside for a brain break as we'd have to book the oval and fill out a risk assessment.
-Class sizes are 31+ and the school has a high volume of EAL and students with various diagnoses. In a class of 31, 20+ are either EAL and/or have a diagnosis (e.g. autism, ADHD, etc)-Zero autonomy. I have to go through 3 supervisors just to respond to a parent email (even if it is wholly positive), I am told what kind of visual aid posters I can/can't have in my room (e.g. a times table chart or a poster on English contractions).
-Release time a joke. I have to sit in my class cupboard as this is the only place in the school that is:--Free of gossiping staff--Free of staff talking in general--The only place staff and/or students will not interrupt me.-Staff are friendly (cheerfully greeting/seeing how my day is/was, seeming interested in me as a person and educator) but there is so much gossip about each other and parents/families. I could go to a staff member with a purely work-related question (e.g. planning or how a school process works) and the conversation almost always ends up being twisted to a poorly behaved student/complaining/gossiping. Even after I have point blank made it clear I do not engage in gossip and find it fractures teams/colleagues and do not have the time for it.
-Multiple duties each day of the week (as we are únderstaffed'' - same as every other school in Australia)-Duty roster (playground) changes every single week due to the high volume of absent staff, staff with multiple roles, etc So no stability or consistency there either.-Foced to pay money into a school social club each week for amenities (e.g. milk/coffee/biscuits) which I never use in a staffroom I never visit or for gifts of departing/retiring/staff going on parental leave.... Yet every time a staff member fits these categories, we get emails from leaders asking if we would like to choose to put towards a gift.... so unsure why I was told the social club goes to gifts. Tried getting out of it in writing (I pay more being one of the few full-time staff) only to be told, "In your contract, you signed that you will be paying money into the social club." Nothing in my contract at all, and I asked the state union to have a look just in case I am blind and having a man's look. They too clearly stated there is nothing in there.
My question is, after 7 years in a school I enjoyed (apart from the aforementioned 2 colleagues changing how they interact with me) is this the norm in Australian Catholic schools (primary and/or combined primary/secondary colleges). I used to be so effective, productive and built strong and positive student relationships. I am now ineffective, unproductive, my time and experience is wasted and my experience seems to be for naught.
*Is this the new normal?
*Is anyone else so utterly heartbroken, soul-crushed and demoralised (and I guess, angry and frustrated) by red tape/inefficiency/unproductiveness, etc?
Any thoughts? Cheers, legends.
submitted by Free-Selection-3454 to AustralianTeachers [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 22:47 B_Wolf91317 The End…. of Us All?

Long time reader, first time commenter (lol remember when people would say this on the radio?)
As someone who is relatively deeply enthralled into the conspiracy space compared to a lot of my friends (due to being terminally online for work, and, having a deep interest and thirst for knowledge outside of regularly scheduled programming) does anyone else get the feeling we are on the cusp of some cataclysm that is unavoidable?
I feel like this can be seen and felt from all angles, take your pick.
Russia has drawn their red lines and NATO/Ukraine seems increasingly willing to test and prod (Listen to any recent update from Scott Ritter)
Israel will likely escalate and face consequences for what is happening in Rafah
Between the recent meme stock resurgence in holding short positions the market cannot maintain without heavy manipulation that is already on top of our fiat system likely coming to either its inevitable collapse, or, switch into dystopian digital currency since so many global markets are now directly linked together.
The complete lack of transparency and blatant corruption of the US Government to the point where the collusion between it and the media plays as a complete farce to anyone paying attention with 2 brain cells. Of which the participants of said Gov’t are much more concerned with lining their own pockets at the expense of the people they are charged to govern.
The overwhelming influx and invasion of the US and other European countries who are teetering on their own destruction on their own let alone these tens, hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people who are all invading us at unprecedented levels from a numbers perspective, but also demographically being very concerning.
The veiled threats of an ‘attack’ on the way that have increased ten fold in the last 6 months from within whether it be an attack on the grid or something akin to 9/11.
Our healthcare system (which is also directly linked to Gov’t) is also just as poised to poison us at every turn for the sake of return on profit, again, at the expense of the people.
The hyperactive solar activity that could realistically at the very least wipe out our grid any time the sun wants to snap its fingers and wants a reset.
The seemingly never ending threat of bio-designed viruses that always seem to be on the brink of a new outbreak that both demand stricter lock downs and again, depopulation.
Rental, property ownership, and just in general city living has become out of control to a degree where people can barely afford to sustain a moderate existence.
The more you dig, the more you learn just how stacked the cards are against you, and even if you somehow do manage to create something successful that allows you to ‘escape’ the rat race that is our current mouse dystopia - if the world is going to burn, does it really matter?
I, like many of you I assume, day dream about unplugging from it all and escaping into the woods to either die trying to survive, or thrive knowing I have no obligation or responsibility beyond ensuring my own survival and anyone that were to come with me…..
But recently these dreams just seem like exactly that, dreams, like there is no escape from the armageddon we are slowly walking towards.
I guess I just feel a sense of both hopelessness and restlessness because as of now it just seems like a liminal waiting game. I feel lonely in these thoughts because try as I may to discuss these things more openly amongst people I trust and care for, they don’t seem to care, or scoff at the idea as though I am Chicken Little.
And I didn’t even mention the upcoming election… lol
Anyways, just wanted to post in hopes of maybe someone else feeling the same way, or to just not feel as lonely in sharing and someone connecting the same dots I am. Honestly I’ll likely delete this because in the end, it doesn’t matter.
Whelp - hold and love the ones you dear most while you can.
submitted by B_Wolf91317 to conspiracy [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 22:16 naftalibp How using GPT at work makes me a 10x developer

Ever since ChatGPT-3.5 was released, my life was changed forever. I quickly began using it for personal projects, and as soon as GPT-4 was released, I signed up without a second of hesitation. Shortly thereafter, as an automation engineer moving from Go to Python, and from classic front end and REST API testing to a heavy networking product, I found myself completely lost. BUT - ChatGPT to the rescue, and I found myself navigating the complex new reality with relative ease.
I simply am constantly copy-pasting entire snippets, entire functions, entire function trees, climbing up the function hierarchy and having GPT just explain both the python code and syntax and networking in general. It excels as a teacher, as I simply query it to explain each and every concept, climbing up the conceptual ladder any time I don't understand something.
Then when I need to write new code, I simply feed similar functions to GPT, tell it what I need, instruct it to write it using best-practice and following the conventions of my code base. It's incredible how quickly it spits it out.
I've done this to quickly implement tasks that would have taken me days to accomplish. Most importantly, it gives me the confidence that I can basically do anything, as GPT, with proper guidance, is a star developer.
I've written elsewhere about how I've used this in my personal life, allowing me to build a full stack application, but it's actually my professional life that has changed more.
submitted by naftalibp to agi [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 22:16 naftalibp How using GPT at work makes me a 10x developer

Ever since ChatGPT-3.5 was released, my life was changed forever. I quickly began using it for personal projects, and as soon as GPT-4 was released, I signed up without a second of hesitation. Shortly thereafter, as an automation engineer moving from Go to Python, and from classic front end and REST API testing to a heavy networking product, I found myself completely lost. BUT - ChatGPT to the rescue, and I found myself navigating the complex new reality with relative ease.
I simply am constantly copy-pasting entire snippets, entire functions, entire function trees, climbing up the function hierarchy and having GPT just explain both the python code and syntax and networking in general. It excels as a teacher, as I simply query it to explain each and every concept, climbing up the conceptual ladder any time I don't understand something.
Then when I need to write new code, I simply feed similar functions to GPT, tell it what I need, instruct it to write it using best-practice and following the conventions of my code base. It's incredible how quickly it spits it out.
I've done this to quickly implement tasks that would have taken me days to accomplish. Most importantly, it gives me the confidence that I can basically do anything, as GPT, with proper guidance, is a star developer.
I've written elsewhere about how I've used this in my personal life, allowing me to build a full stack application, but it's actually my professional life that has changed more.
submitted by naftalibp to PromptEngineering [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 22:04 lilmissmeow88 Emotion Support Chicken - Visible line where I start my short rows

Emotion Support Chicken - Visible line where I start my short rows
Hi! I've jumped on the bandwagon and am making an emotional support chicken. I am an experienced knitter but this has been a fun intro to short row w&t for me. I did both the head short row series and noticed a visible line between my rows where the series began. Thinking it must be a "me" issue, I tinked all the way back to the start of series 1 short rows and redid both series again. Same issue. Is this just something that happens when you have so many rows stacked like you do here? Thanks!!
submitted by lilmissmeow88 to knitting [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 21:46 PunyFlash [Opinion] Why V Rising is not as good

As for me, the release of V Rising, touted as the ultimate vampire-themed PvP+PvE survival experience, falls short of expectations. As someone eagerly awaiting its arrival, I had hoped it would fill the void left by the lack of updates to my old favorite, Battlerite. However, the PvP aspect of V Rising pales in comparison, leaving much to be desired. Merely adding a new zone so that all 10 online players farm there during incursions will not fill the server's void.
Despite spending considerable time conquering bosses on brutal difficulty and engaging in PvP encounters, I found myself asking again and again, "Is this all there is?" The repetitive nature of gameplay, coupled with the seemingly meaningless PvP objectives, detracts from the overall enjoyment. Additionally, I hate that Behemoth walks through the forest now – he randomly stacks on everything when charging at you, deaggroing all the time, and overall making "Lair of the Behemoth" meaningless. However, the fourth phase of the Dracula fight is fun.
Also, please, localizers, be aware that the word "close" has different words for verb and adjective forms in most languages. This was not a problem before. I hated every "close" button on every menu during my playthrough.
Overall, the game was fun and totally worth its money to challenge yourself to kill all bosses. But I probably will not play it again, even if devs change their minds about releasing new content – it's a pain in the *ss to start everything over again each update.
P.S. Please revive Battlerite, Stunlock Studios, as you have nothing to do now.
submitted by PunyFlash to vrising [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 21:40 SleepTightLilPuppy I've been putting off posting here for years, finally gained the confidence to do so. I struggle with facial dysmorphia and never considered a haircut I've had "good", wether it's short sides long on top, buzzcut or whatever this currently is. Please give advice on what you think would look good!

I've been putting off posting here for years, finally gained the confidence to do so. I struggle with facial dysmorphia and never considered a haircut I've had submitted by SleepTightLilPuppy to malegrooming [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 21:34 NonChronCrone13 Twenty-something daughter's angst

My daughter is now 26. She's had a history of anxiety, meltdowns, social challenges, short-term part-time jobs, isolation, conflict with absent dad, heartbreak stretching months after each boyfriend. We got along ok living together until she was 20, when I asked her to start helping more with paying household expenses. After complaining to her new boyfriend, he invited her to move in with him in a big rooming house where everybody pays a share of the rent.
She stepped up for it, starting a couple of moneymaking enterprises and paid her share. Seemed great for a year, but then as autumn 2019 progressed, multiple roommates moved out and the share the remaining roomies paid went up quite a bit.
They decided to move out too, setting their sights on a remote island community where he thought he could get carpentry work. In discussing this move just before winter, I suggested that she, with him, move back into her old room at my place, just for the winter, so they could work hard and save up money to be better prepared for moving in the spring. I offered to spend more time at my boyfriend's house, so they'd have more space and privacy at our apartment.
Well, they liked that idea and started moving in. I would be gone for several days and come home to a mess in the kitchen and living room with stacks of tools and possessions and building supplies. The boyfriend kept bringing more stuff, even after I asked them to stop. They repeatedly agreed to keep things cleaner, occasionally there was a cleaner moment, but then back to disaster zone that kept getting deeper.
Pandemic meant the regular twice yearly housing inspections didn't happen, so I was the only one advocating for cleanliness. They kept taking my things out of the kitchen cabinets and communal areas and stacking them in my bedroom. They let a friend of theirs sleep in my bed. Brought rabbits and pigeons inside, creating a farm-partment atmosphere. I was less and less welcome in my own home, and not comfortable there either.
That situation came to a head when Housing inspected the mess, when after all the mailed notices were hidden from me, I finally got notice of impending eviction. They vacated without cleaning, spewing blame and much conflict, the boyfriend being large and loud. After two weeks of constant effort I was able to clear out and clean up enough to pass the second inspection.
They moved into the basement of his parent's rental duplex nearby, were given permission to stay for six months. A similar mess occured there, with similar conflict with his parents, chaos dragging on and piles of garbage, ending with hatred and anger. Same thing after that with a family friend. At least I knew it wasn't all me...
OK, a few years have passed now. They have stayed in the area, spent two rough winters living homeless. She's still with the boyfriend, and I see them from time to time in my neighborhood. Coupla months ago I flagged her down, saying she had mail at my place and I'd found some of her possessions, asked her to come by. That went ok, she was subdued, accepted the items.
A few weeks later we spoke again, this time she got triggered and I asked what she was still so upset about, so she recounted a long list of mistakes I made as a mother, plus my many failings as a person, before storming off. She said I might have a selective memory but she doesn't. Few weeks later she passed me on her bike as I was walking, she recognized me and looked back to flip me off.
It was admittedly a stressful period for many people and for many reasons. Transition to adulthood can also be rough, especially for two late launchers like this couple. I've accepted that I'm not likely to understand why they've made these choices, and I'm willing and hoping to establish a more peaceful relationship based on us both being adults with a common background.
In some ways it could be mutually helpful to work together, such as her mail coming here until she gets a longer-term address. But I don't see it working out unless she can get over this stuck on angst gig.
Rather than having a selective memory, it's selective focus that I'm aiming for.
Seeking suggestions on how to de-escalate and find our way to a better system, or how to let her know her mail will no longer be accepted here if we can't even have a civil passing relationship.
submitted by NonChronCrone13 to Parenting [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 21:23 Gambit-Accepted Wehr Battlegroup And DLC Ideas

Wehr Battlegroup And DLC Ideas
Continuing this series on Battlegroup ideas, today is Wehr. Here are my DAK Ideas. To reiterate, I wanted to make these ideas thematic, different from existing battlegroups, unique and mostly historically accurate. Here I use the units that are already in the game files and propose how they could be implemented in an interesting way. Relic seem to have developed several bunker types which they intend to use, so when designing my battlegroups, I did it in a way where these bunker types were used but didn’t make the battlegroup Italian Coastal 2.0, rather fed into a larger idea. I introduce and expand a number of mechanics I have discussed in my other threads:
https://preview.redd.it/5pxs8daqzf0d1.png?width=1281&format=png&auto=webp&s=62517c6b48c79fe9ea3cdf8a8794e81cb8fd7ecb
Central Idea: All in prevention, counter attack. Your opponent would have a hard time overwhelming you in one all in push. The left side of the tree consists of mostly callins and quick dispatch units for handling flanks quickly, the right side is more logistics themed with multiple reactionary abilities.
BMW R75: Not a lot to say here, similar to the DAK bike except with an MG 42. It could be made to have no reverse, like the Coh1 bike, that was a fun mechanic.
4-Man Pios: Again, self-explanatory.
Sd. Kfz. 251 Variants: This gives you access to other 251 variants, either by upgrading the 251 directly or by calling them in. I’ve chosen these 2 versions that I feel open up a lot more strategies, Mortar HT and Luft tier would be quite good, that tier lacks indirect. Pakwagen Panzer Gren tier would also be strong, as that tier lacks mobile AT. The ATHT would have the same AT performance as the Marder, but would have less HP and no lockdown ability.
Panzer III H: As a unit to add to Wehr’s roster, this makes a lot of sense on many levels. In terms of performance, this would be closer to the Crusader medium tank. In terms of the timing, it would arrive at the same time as the Stug and the Wirbel, but unlike both of those specialists, this would be a generalist for that timing.
Temporary Armour Assignment: This is exactly like the mechanic I described in my DAK designs. How it works is that this munitions only ability is used and a Stug, P4 pair arrive from off map. Neither unit requires fuel, manpower, upkeep or population. They benefit from all the upgrades that affect the normal version, ie vet and armoured skirts. You have direct control over them but after a set period of time, they will turn to AI control and leave. This makes them really good as a reactionary ability (your opponent is doing an all in) or as your own all-in, especially if you’re already maxed out on population. You’re especially incentivised to make risky plays with them as armour preservation is not so important. The number of use cases for this ability are so numerous that I won’t explain it anymore, it should be obvious how strong this is. I think to balance this out, it needs a heavy munitions cost and a long recharge timer.
AI Temporary Elephant Assignment: One of the questions I’ve been asking myself since Coh3 came out is how do you add heavy tanks to the game in such a way that it’s not frustrating to play against and doesn’t break it. Given that the game is set so much earlier in the war and a number of the factions don’t have ready access to tank destroyers like the SU-85 and the Jackson, you can’t simply throw in the Elephant and hope for the best. To be completely explicit, I don’t see how the US with their current roster are expected to deal with a Coh2 style heavy tank destroyer. However, in Halo Wars 2 Blitz game mode, how it works is that you can call in a Scarab and its an incredibly strong unit but after a certain period of time, it spontaneously explodes and the game returns to normal. Why wouldn’t something similar work for Coh3? The risk reward calculus of using it would be; can you get enough damage done in the period available to justify the expenditure? There are a few ways that this could be implemented, you could, for instance, give the player direct control over the Elephant but I’m in favour of doing this slightly differently. Like the Infantry Assault ability for the US Advanced Infantry Doc, I think this should be AI controlled, should be on attack move and should be targeted on a position. After the timer, the unit would drive off map. This way you get the power fantasy of using a heavy tank without the game breaking potential of a heavy tank camping for the entire game between 2 VPs and zoning out all tanks. The reason I prefer this method of implementation is 2 fold; the first is that counterplay is much simpler, you just avoid the area and wait for it to time out. The second is that it has that appeal of being somewhat like a mini campaign mission within the game, you have to defend the tank with your forces as it advances. Your opponent would be easily able to flank it if its on it’s own, but when you support it yourself its more potent. The one exception to this AI control that perhaps should be considered is allowing the player to control the tageting directly, You wouldn’t want the Elephant to shoot at some random infantry while your opponent moves double Archers into position. In terms of relative strength of the abilty, I think if it was implemented in this fashion, the Elephant ability wouldn’t be that strong. I feel direct control over a P4 and a Stug is much stronger than an AI controlled Elephant. To me this is the best way of getting heavy tanks into the game.
Logistics Field Officer: The right side of the tree very much has a logistics theme to it, starting with the officer. The Resource Priority ability works well with a variety of units, one could see this being handy in a situation where you want to increase the ROF of an MG, Mortar or Pak being extremely useful. Situations where you want to increase the ROF on a tank to help it win the engagement would also be strong. Speeding up the recharge on a Nebelwerfer would also be a common use. Source Replacements I could also see being a heavily used ability, either on the field or in base. Finally, given this battlegroup is munitions intensive, the Supervise Resource Extraction ability will allow you to increase your income like a cache does. You could even have some rush strat builds involving the officer, but unlike caches and trucks, the unit can be repurposed to do other things afterwards.
Panzerschreck Trailer: This is another type of trailer unit. I’ve talked about trailer units a few times in my other posts, but here is the rundown: My thinking with this is that its a brand new unit type, which loosely can be defined as a support weapon. How it works is that infantry squads can crew it, push it around, vehicles can tow it, etc. When in a position, it provides an aura which in this case recharges nearby snares faster. However, the unit shouldn't require pop cap and moreover, you can actually manually decrew it and it will still provide you the benefits. So for example, let's say it spawns in your base and you want to setup a strong point, you can crew it with a squad, wheel it over to a house near the frontline and then decrew it. Units within its vicinity would still be benefiting from the aura. When you want to move it, recrew it again, or tow it, to a new location. The beauty of this dynamic is that your opponents can steal these units from you like an ATG, so while they don't take up popcap and would be relatively cheap (say 100 to 150 manpower), you're still incentivised to protect them. You can also attack move them with AT guns etc, would be interesting to play around it. I think it would make for a fun dynamic, but would need to be coded from scratch. It also indirectly makes tow yet more useful. With this trailer specifically, it’s aura will recharge nearby snares faster, however squads can also collect a Panzerschrek from the trailer for a munitions cost. This Panzerschrek is timed, so after a duration the squad will drop it. This is going to really strong in situations where your opponent is doing an all in dive with light vehicles and/or tanks and you need to bolster your AT immediately to hold on. Picking up these Panzerschreks is not cheap, but it makes it much harder for your opponent to dive you and also allows you to go for low AT builds with this trailer as the backup. The way I see this until being used is wheeling it behind a hedge or building near your cutoff and running over to grab a Panzerschrek if its needed. Let’s say your opponent does a double M8 dive, your 2 Grens and a Panzergren pick up 3 schreks between them and your opponent is basically able to do nothing but wait for them to time out. This could buy you enough time to reach T4 or whatever else you were doing. It’s a tool that adds a lot of flexibility to your composition, but remember if you get forced off, your opponent can just steal it and then its your problem!
Weapon Stores: This gives your pios the ability to build Riegel mines but also Weapon Supply Bunkers. Now, the bunker has a straight forward aura that increases ROF of infantry and their grenade recharge times, but it also has another more expansive mechanic of temporary weapon upgrades. I’ve talked about this mechanic at great length in my Luftwaffe Field Division faction design, where the faction essentially revolves around that mechanic, but here I use a simplified version for a Wehr battlegroup. The TLDR is that infantry squads can pick up weapon packages from the bunker to either augment their current DPS or completely change the role of the squad for a short period. For instance, Jagers can pick up Beretta 38s to transform the squad from a mostly mid range unit, to a short range one. Grens can pick up G43s to improve their mid to long range performance and Pios can pick up an MG34. All the options are avialable to you. However, the upgrades are not timed, but depletable. This means that if the squad is not in combat, the upgrade duration doesn’t tick. You have to be in combat to expend the upgrade. The situations where something like this would come in useful are numerous, but to name a few; giving all your grens weapons at any point in the game, augmenting your jagers with MG34s, giving Stosstruppen Berettas so they become a close range powerhouse, or even double MGs. Relative to normal weapon upgrades, these upgrades are inefficient, but for rush strats they can be strong, as well as augmenting your units in the lategame with the extra munitions you have in the bank.
HE Shell Delivery: Improves the splash and anti infantry power of all your vehicles at the cost of penetration. This could be somewhat tricky to use, as your opponent will become aware of its activation immediately and will come in with their vehicles. But situations where your opponent has dug in with ATGs and AT infantry, this ability will be devastating.
https://preview.redd.it/n3ou7kaxzf0d1.png?width=1208&format=png&auto=webp&s=5bc267deaae4b64ba1bb97c294b92a5056835443
Central Idea: Team weapon play, heavy fire power and artillery. Good for just battering your opponents head on.
SD-2 Line Drop: This is similar to the equivalent ability in Coh1, however the big difference is that you can customise the area where the mines will fall. For instance, you could do a relatively small field on a VP for 50 munitions, or you could do a large line of mines to completely block off a flank with mines. This flexibility allows you to employ the ability in a number of situations and adds some nuance to its employment. It terms of how this would work in game, I feel click and drag would be sufficient, the munitions cost being visible on the cursor. In the context of this battlegroup, it can block off the flanks of your team weapons.
Pre-Sighted Terrain: This feeds into that team weapon focused gameplay, having extra range on your Paks and MGs in an area is going to be really strong. You could even use it with Mortars and Nebels for an extra long range barrage.
7.5cm Flak 264/3(i) AA/AT: The Flak 264/3 is an Italian medium AA piece that fits into what I will refer to as the ‘premium anti tank gun’ category. Similar to how the MG42 and DSKH were premium MGs, this ATG will be better than your standard ATG, at a higher price point. On the scale of ATGs, this will lie between the Pak 40 and the Flak 36 in terms of raw firepower. The damage should be exactly as the Pak 40, however it should also benefit from 10 more range and also the ability to shoot down air. The drawback however is that it should be relatively slow to move, like a Pak 40 in camoflage mode. For small adjustments, this should be fine, but to move it across the map, it would be easier with a tow vehicle. This means there are tradeoffs with this option relative to the Pak 40, the situations where the Flak 264/3 would be better is when you don’t want to invest in a wirbel but still want AA on demand when you need it (2 of these should take down planes pretty quickly), or situations where you’re camping 2 VPs and don’t expect to have to move around much, allowing you to utilise the greater range. Paks are going to be better when you need to move around a lot and expect your opponent to invest in indirect fire.
Flakvierling 38: This gun is exactly as on the Wirbelwind, except it’s a team weapon. Relative to the Flak 30, this would have the advantage of suppression and probably better anti infantry performance. Perhaps starting with the same stats as the DAK Flak halftrack and going from there would be a good place to start.
28cm K5(E) Barrage: Heavy railway barrage, not much to say here.
7.5 cm IG 37: This is essentially work like the LeIG for DAK, it’s a later version of the same concept. Wehr don’t have anything like the Heavy Mortar equivalent and this would be it. This would be handy if you wanted to go Luft tier or tier 4 without having to tech to get Nebels.
Springer Remote Controlled Bombs: Conceptually, this is identical to the Goliath remote controlled bombs, except these bombs are twice the size and are significantly more dangerous as a result. For me, one distinction that could be made would be dialling up their effectiveness against your opponent’s base structures. One thing I feel Coh lacks are tools for crippling your opponent’s tech. Kane’s wrath has a plethora of units and abilities for exactly this purpose and their employment is great to use and even more exciting to watch. So the Spinger should be able to knock out 75% of the health of a base tier structure. So conceivably, you could get a 251, drive it over to or into the base, deploy a Springer and blow it up next to T4, finish it off with Paks or Stugs. This will reinforce that whole dimension of the game, camping on 2 VPs will be much easier to punish.
Sd.Ah. 57 Munitions Trailer: Another style of trailer, as discussed above. Here it would be used directly with team weapons to increase their ROF. It can also be used with indirect, so Rocket artillery would recharge faster. I feel the situations where this would be useful are fairly obvious but one extra way of making it interesting would be if it had an AOE explosion on death. So your opponent would be incentivised to move in with vehicles and target it down. They could also just steal it for themselves.
Wurfrahmen 40 UE (f): Standard rocket artillery. One question I would expect a Wehraboo to ask is ‘why this and not the Panzerwerfer?’. The way I see it, this only has 4 rockets, so its damage per barrage is less. This leaves scope to make the barrage recharge time shorter, meaning you need to micro it more, but also, its less of a wipe machine or do nothing unit. You can also give it a lower price and require less population. Looking at the Walking Stuka in Coh2, that unit either killed everything or missed and was largely a waste of resources and popcap. If you can have the same unit, but with less alpha damage, at a cheaper price and popcap, it should be more consistent over the course of a match. It would also be easier to fit into your composition and would see greater use as a result. This essentially is why I picked this unit. That and because its new and different.
AI Double Wespe Temp. Assignment: Like the Elephant assignment above, this is where double Wespe artillery pieces come onto the field and are controlled by the AI. They attack move to the target, shelling your opponent’s units within range. This ability should be much easier to employ, as they barrage from long range, but also they should be easier to counter (you can just dive them). Since we’re not using new vehicle models, it should be cheaper to develop and its different from the existing off-maps.
https://preview.redd.it/ioj0msg40g0d1.png?width=1651&format=png&auto=webp&s=a0dad1a46e5e618833d25a2381033f0a0a9d10a6
Central Idea: Long range engagements.
MGZ34 MG42 Scopes Upgrade: Simple upgrade, improves range and sight of MGs once they upgrade themselves for munitions.
AI Double Sniper Temp. Assignment: This is most similar to the Wespe ability I just described, except with 2 snipers. What this ability would be strong aganst would be team weapon camp and entrenched infantry, as well as guarding VPs in the lategame. What this ability would be pretty bad against would be an opponent with several light vehicles and tanks which can drive up and elminate the snipers in 5 seconds. Its not like the AI will dodge. This ability is augmented by the numerous sight abilities and units in this battlegroup.
Panzerbeobachtungswagen III: This is most similar to the 254 artillery observer for DAK, except where the abilities are largely air based. The unit has an MG, so it can be used to attack troops early on, but its mostly used for the focus sight ability in conjunction with tank destroyers and team weapons. The SD-2 Ground Burst drop I see being more like the M83 Cluster Mine drop from Coh2. The Ju-88 P-4 Heavy AT Strafe, is actually a 50mm cannon, so different from the JU-87 we have now by having more alpha damage.
Fritz X Guided Bomb Strike: This is probably most similar to the Stuka Dive Bomb in Coh2, however, the big difference is that you can manually guide it to the target. The inspiration for this are the Predator missiles from MW2, however in Coh3, the easiest way of implementing this to my mind is that the player has to keep the cursor where they want the bomb to land. However, if they don’t want to do this, as it prevents other micro, you double click and it will go to where it was last targeted. So the situations where you’d want to perform this micro are quite niche, basically when nothing else is happening for 5 seconds. I think a sensible decision should be to cut off direct control from the player 2 seconds before it hits the target, so its still possible to dodge but harder.
Nashorn Tank Destroyer: Not much to say here, its basically the Archer.
Grenadier K98k Scopes Upgrade: Not a lot to say here, range and sight augmentation for grens.
Ranged Bunker Options: Here we use some of the bunkers Relic has already invented. The mortar bunker is simple enough, but the Observation bunker is a bit more interesting. This emplacement should have a long line of sight, but it should be restricted to a narrow arc which can be refaced. This encourages active micro of the emplacement. It would be strong in matches where this is placed behind team weapons and artillery for spotting targets but would not detect flanks. Somewhat reminds me of the child’s game ‘Spotlight’.
Fusiliers: These are another unit that Grens can be swapped out for. Unlike Jagers and Panzergrens, this unit is purely focused on long range DPS. You could use Gebirgsjager here instead, I use Fusiliers as one of my other designs uses Gebirgsjager.
Range Adjustment: This unit ability increases the squad’s accuracy after each model drop to a maximum of 30%, 5% per model. I could imagine in most situations, this would be a simple DPS boost, but there would be situations where fighting low health squads where this would be especially strong. The same kind of logic applies to the ATG and Tank Destroyer ability, where everytime they land a shot while the ability is active, it increases their accuracy and ROF.
Focused Gunnery: A global sight and range buff for vehicles, at the cost of speed. This blends well with the other abilities in the battlegroup.
https://preview.redd.it/i3wsbhz50g0d1.png?width=1520&format=png&auto=webp&s=84fee451b9cebfbd3b19a7800e36450932f17bbe
Central Idea: Area denial.
Grenadier & Pio Field Defences: Gives access to a number of build options. Panzer-Stabmine 43 AT Mines are a variation on normal mines, where the emphasis is placed on the heavy engine critical rather than the damage of the mine. So these mines would be relatively spammable, specialised against vehicles and would cause a heavy engine damage critical. The focus here is leaving your opponet’s vehicle stricken and being able to move in with your own vehicles to take it out. However, unlike say Riegel mines, it doesn’t do that much damage, so your opponent will have a much easier time of quickly repairing off the damage. It’s a variation on mines with its own drawbacks and strengths. However, the main structure you get access to is the Luftwaffe Relay Point. This emplacement can call in strafing runs within its vicinity, the AT strafe would be particularly strong if combined with the Stab mine as it would be far harder to dodge. The relay point though can also call in a variety of crate drops with different infantry buffs. Ammunition crates increase ROF, which is simple enough, but the Explosives Crate doubles the squads grenade ability the next time its used. For instance, Grens would throw 2 stick grenades for the price of 1 with a 0.5 second delay between each throw. Naturally, this is pretty strong and also munitions efficient, at the cost of extra micro. The mechanic could also be made to give squads that don’t normally have a grenade, a grenade. For example, it would be cool if Jagers/Pios got stick grenades after picking up one of these crates. I’m not sure what you would do with Stosstruppen, a bundle grenade assault? Sounds overpowered and incredibly fun. Double frangible sounds fine. Camouflage Crates give your squad moving camo for 60 seconds, so you could conceivably pick up this crate on the way to your opponent’s side of the map and use it to ambush or do all manner of things. One question that would need answering is whether or not is should be possible to stack these crate bonues, I could foresee camoed Panzergrenadiers with double bundle grenades being very very good. Perhaps the best way of soft nerfing this combination is to have a shared cooldown timer of 90 seconds on the crates, this should severely limit the number of times a player can get explosives and camo at the same time.
251/17 Halftrack: Exactly like Coh2.
Cannone Da 105/28 Howitzer Emplacement: A general howitzer emplacement, you could use the LeFH but this emplacement already exists.
Panzerturm IV: A mixed AT and anti infantry emplacement. This emplacement absolutely should take up pop cap but also have prioritise vehicles.
Bf109 WerferGranate 21 Rocket Strike: This would fire 4 rockets in unison, have fairly high alpha damage and flame dot damage. You would most use it against team weapons and infantry, especially in denying point caps, but potentially you could use it against vehicles, particularly if they hit a panzer stab mine, to cause them health damage and prevent them from being repaired.
Sd.kfz. 251/16 Flame Halftrack: Similar to the unit in Coh2, except you can also upgrade it with MGs. As a general comment, I feel this unit and flame weapons more generally should have bonus damage against base tech structures. Sneaking flame tanks into the base and burning down your opponent’s tech is so much fun in Kane’s wrath and I feel Coh3 would do well to capture some of that magic. So being able to burn down a tech structure in 30-45 seconds in would give this unit extra utility, currently it fees like the flame units lack flexibility relative to their autocannon equivalents.
Infantry Gestreckte Ladung: This ability is on infantry and it essentially is a grenade that sits between the Bundle Grenade and a Satchel charge on the spectrum. It would have the same damage as a bundle, but a longer fuse and shorter range. However, the charge would have bonus damage against emplacements, buildings and field defenses. The ideal use case would be against units behind sandbags and wire, as it would destroy them completely. Its much more likely to land than satchels, with its shorter fuse time, but is not as a good as bundle grenades which do the same damage with an even shorter fuse. So the bonus against field defences is the main advantage of the grenade. It goes without saying that this ability benefits from the Explosives crate from the other side of the tree.
Decima Squad Infiltration: This squad is most comparable to Stormtroopers in Coh2. You would largely use the squad to charge cutoffs and plant explosives on points, its going to be strong in VP wars. This squad has no camo out of the box but you can get that from the other side of the tree.
Communication Breakdown: This is activated in a circle zone and no off-maps can be used in it for the duration, nor do any global abilities like Designate Assault Position work there. There are many situations where something like this would be useful, for example, preventing someone from calling an off-map in during your assault, preventing an off-map being called in on a crucial VP in a close match. The main use I could see people using this is with their emplacements on the other side of the tree, preventing say bombing runs, etc.
In Deckung!: This abilly mixes well with a variety of the other abilities in the battlegroup. Getting cheaper grenades will allow you to spam them during the duration of the ability, if you combine that with the Explosives crates, it will be yet more efficient. 15 munitions Panzer Stab mines will be strong. The crucial thing with this ability is timing, as you need to use grenades and mines en masse to justify the initial munitions cost.
Other Unit DLC
As I discussed before, I think it would be a mistake for Relic not to include the substitute units feature. In terms of what units should be substitutable, this is what I feel makes sense:
https://preview.redd.it/dw9pq3w70g0d1.png?width=1121&format=png&auto=webp&s=e416e3e5bb9b982b1da5d5bd6177cd6f2ef87c71
Finally, as a general change, I feel we need to talk about the Pak 43. The Pak 43 is already in the game files and is presumably lined up for a battlegroup. I feel this unit should just be added to T4 so that stock Wehr has an answer to heavy tank spam (thinking about Matildas and Grants here). Wehr doesn’t have a great answer for dealing with heavy tanks, short of building 3 paks or several marders, neither of which are great from a faction design perspective. They come quite early, relatively, so improving their performance messes with the flow of the game and makes T4 less attractive, why bother going T4 if all the AT you need is in T2/T3? A Pak 43 in T4 has a pleasing symmetry between DAK, Brits and Wehr. If US got he M5 ATG (which they should), all factions would have this common tool. A number of players have been calling out for the Panther to be added to T4, I don’t think that’s the play here, as it would dominate so many other options. The situations where you would build a Pak 43 over a Panther are quite niche (look at Coh2), so having the more attractive unit in stock over the less attractive solution in a battlegroup, to me makes little sense. The Panther would also crowd out Flak 36 Emplacment play. However, the Pak 43 is easier to counter for your opponent, using indirect etc, while also giving you a reason to go for a battlegroup with Panther as the main attraction. Essentially what I’m getting at is that the Panther is too dominant of a unit to be in T4 and the Pak 43 should be there in its place.
https://preview.redd.it/jrapt7y80g0d1.png?width=452&format=png&auto=webp&s=8d4c8bae94945e100777c1b9d53278bfb3f7bfb2
submitted by Gambit-Accepted to CompanyOfHeroes [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 21:19 Skystalker815 Guys, I did it! I went to a town meeting today!

Long story short, there was a town meeting for people who work with culture and entertainment, which I do. Last year I didn't make it because of agoraphobia, I got there and stayed in the car because I wasn't brave enough to go inside.
Well, this year I told myself I'd do my very best to participate, last week I was feeling like shit, my hair looked horrible, I have those huge dark circles under my eyes for lack of sleep, so I decided to get a haircut, just a simple haircut but it increased my confidence so much.
Today I took a warm, relaxing shower, put on my favourite clothes (I don't know if you guys are like this, but I have a few clothes that make it slightly easy for me to be in public), used my best perfume, did a basic makeup and the final touch, red lipsticks. Not too red, because I didn't want to draw too much attention, but red enough to make me look like a confident person.
Then I went to the meeting. Well, my mum went with me, but I wasn't even ashamed, I mean, so what that I'm 28 and my mum goes places with me? At least I'm going, I haven't left the house by myself in a while and I didn't want to risk it today.
There were around 12 people there, which for most people is not a lot, but for me it was enough to make me scared. I got anxious, started shaking. Then I took my Clonazepam and in a few minutes I was chilled and relaxed. (My psychiatrist recommended me to always take Clonazepam with me in my pockets, so if I panic when I'm far from home I could take it to feel better, I avoid taking it as much as possible because I don't want to be dependent on it). I stayed there for almost 2 hours and even talked a bit in the meeting, I'm so proud of myself.
Part of my Agoraphobia comes from insecurities with my self image, which is why I mentioned everything I did to get confident to go. When I'm happy with the way I look like I feel so powerful, so confident, and it helps a lot with exposures.
I was home bound for a couple of years, I have been slowly leaving the house, usually twice or thrice per month now. But it's getting easier. If I can do you, I believe you can do it as well!
submitted by Skystalker815 to Agoraphobia [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 21:08 Itsunderthesauce22 Scared that I might have an HH

26 yrs old
About a month ago on a normal morning I went to get a haircut, (I was a little hung over too) but as soon as I sat down I felt like my stomach bloated like crazy. Almost like a hard stomach feeling,I suddenly got all light headed and my fingers and legs were tingling too. It was so strange and scary I was so close to passing out. Ever since that I’ve been experiencing crazy shortness of breath, extremely low appetite with how bloated my stomach and just overall don’t feel good. I’m not really nauseous but I can try to make myself burp like a million times (although not much comes out since it feels like something’s not opening down my throat). I ended up going to the ER and they kinda just gave me a PPI/anti nausea pills. But here I’m still suffering like everyday, although it varies day by day. I find my brain almost in a panic state 24/7 and if I sit down it makes the symptoms a million times worse. I’m not sure what to do, I can barely get on work calls or take the dog out without feeling my life is about to be over. I just want to go back to my normal fun self and but I’m not sure what to do. I barely eat now and I’ve lost weight. Should I go back to the ER or what can I do to make these symptoms go away. My stomach doesn’t even look huge just feels hard and bloated.
Might even be h pylori idk
Sorry for my terrible grammar but I’ve honestly been panicking for the last month. All started because I sat down in that salon chair…..
Thank you
submitted by Itsunderthesauce22 to HiatalHernia [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 21:01 Flagg1991 Children of the Night (Part 2)

The world was a boozy whirl of lights and sounds. Images, broken and fragmented, came and went. Voices, laughter, screaming. The ground pitched like the deck of a tempest-tossed ship, and he felt heavy, as though the ground were pulling him to it. C’mere, Dommy. He fell, lay on the pavement, and pushed himself up again, staggering like a drunk on his way home. His head spun, his body ached, and things seemed blurry, like half-formed images glimpsed underwater.
It was the light blue hour before dawn and Dom was…somewhere. He should have recognized the stores and street signs around him, but he didn’t. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and a sense of confusion gripped him so strongly that he was beginning to panic. Where was he? What happened?
The world spun away again and the next thing he knew, he was lying in a heap of garbage bags, used needles, and rubbish. He came awake with a jerk and sat up so fast that a bolt of pain jammed into his skull. He winced and pressed his hand to his forehead. He felt hot, clammy.
Something was seriously wrong.
Somehow he got to his feet again and started walking. The sun was up now and the streets were filled with people. They all sneered in disgust as he passed, and he wrapped his arms around his chest like a baby comforting itself. He was getting cold. His muscles were sore. Tears streamed down his face and he wanted to cry.
Going on instinct alone, Dom made his way back home and climbed the steps to his apartment. Exhaustion swept over him and he sagged against the door as he dug in his pocket for the keys. They shook in his hand and he had to focus really hard to get the key into the lock.
Inside, he collapsed onto the couch and his eyelids instantly drooped. He was so weary that he couldn’t lift his head, couldn’t form a single coherent thought. Dom felt himself starting to sink, and snapped his eyes open with a start. Something in his soul told him that if he slept, he would die.
He couldn’t help it, though. He was falling, tumbling, hands reaching up from hell to grab him. His eyes fluttered closed again and the world started to go dark, his heart slamming in fear. He tried to fight, but the pull of darkness was too strong, too alluring. Why was he fighting? Why not just…give up? Hadn’t he thought of killing himself before? Didn’t he hate his life and himself? What was there to fight for? A wife? Kids? A community that loved and respected him? Shit, affordable groceries?
No.
There was nothing.
He had nothing and was nothing.
A sense of peace blossomed from the darkness, and suddenly death didn’t seem so scary. In fact, it was warm…inviting.
It was life that was cold and hateful. Not death.
Death accepted you no matter who you were. It didn’t reject you…it didn’t ignore you. If you sought it, you would find it, and if you embraced it, it would embrace you.
With that thought in mind, Dom gave up.
And died.
***
Bruce Kenner, captain of the 5th Albany precinct, sat behind his desk on the morning of June 28 and lazily leafed through a stack of files as he sipped from a mug of coffee. A roughly built man with a dark goatee and graying blonde hair, he looked more like a small town southern sheriff than a low level public works functionary. In fact, he tended to act like it too. He liked to hunt, fish, and drink beer on his off time. Albany wasn’t a big city, but it was big enough that you never got a fucking break. Run here, run there, arrest this asshole, investigate that asshole. By the time Friday rolled around, he was so ready for the peace and tranquility of a fishing trip he could taste it.
Already this Monday morning, he was looking forward to another one.
Over the weekend, three kids went missing in the Pine Hills and Washington Park area, bringing the total for that summer up to eight. All were teenagers, all were troubled. Most were boys, but two were girls.
Troubled kids run away all the time. They might be gone a few days, sulking at a friend’s house over something their father or mother did, but they’d eventually come home. None of these kids had come back yet and from what he knew, a few of them weren’t the runaway types. They were shits at school and caused problems, but they had no reason to up and leave. Hell, Bruce himself raised hell as a kid, but he always found his way back home, even if he spent the previous night dying in a field from Mad Dogg 20/20 poisoning.
One or two kids going missing…okay, it happens. Eight? Over a span of four weeks?
Yeah, something was wrong here.
But what?
There was nothing on any of these kids. No one saw them, no one knew anything - one minute they were here, the next they weren’t. What could he or anyone else do with that?. The public broke cops’ balls all the time, but if you don’t have evidence, you don’t have evidence. What do you want? Door to door searches? Roadblocks? Dogs and helicopters? Yeah, then when you actually do it, they cry fascism. Guess I’ll just use my Spidey Senses.
Bruce wished he had spidey senses. He wanted to find these kids as much as anyone, and he was starting to get pissed off that he couldn’t. He took another sip from his mug and read on. The latest kids to go missing were three boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen.
They were all white, all thin (except for one). If there was a serial killer in town - and Bruce hoped to fuck there wasn’t - he had a type. What, black kids aren’t good enough to kill, cannibalize, and wear like a skin suit? They should charge him with a hate crime for discrimination.
That way he’d actually stay locked up.
The door opened and Vanessa Rodregiez, his deputy, came in. A tall, shapely Hispanic woman with dark eyes and a mouth poised always on the edge of a smile, she wore her black hair in a ponytail that would look stern and severe on anyone else, but on her, looked childlike. She was twenty-seven and had been on the force for three years, but you could be forgiven for thinking her much younger. “Bright and early, I see,” she said with a grin.
Bruce grumbled.
Vanessa held down the fort during the graveyard shift, acting to the night as he acted to the day. She was young and full of energy, which clashed with Bruce, who was old and just wanted to be left alone. Despite their differences, Bruce loved her like a kid sister…an annoying kid sister he wanted to throat punch sometimes.
“You missed all the fun last night,” she said and parked her butt on the edge of Bruce’s desk. He glared at her, but she ignored him.
“Good,” he said. Then: “What happened?”
“Big fight outside of Club Vlad,” she said. “It looked like a WorldStar video.”
For a moment, Bruce was lost. “Club what?”
“Club Vlad,” Vanessa said. “Where the Fuze Box used to be.”
Ah, right. The Fuze Box was an Albany landmark, a night club for punks…or goths…or someone. Certainly not for Bruce Kenner. It was small, dingy, and always had people in black waiting outside. On Friday and Saturday nights, it blasted strange music with lyrics about fighting The Man. Kids had been fighting the Man since before Bruce was even born and they hadn’t beaten him yet. Kudos to them for still trying.
Last year, The Fuze Box closed down and someone else bought it. It reopened last month and looked more or less the same: Posers, shitty music, and spiked hair. So much spiked hair. “Place is still a pain in the ass,” Bruce said.
“Yep,” Vanessa chirped. “It doesn’t know what it wants to be now. One minute they play nightcore, the next EDM. It’s all over the place.”
Bruce raised a quizzical brow.
“Not that I’ve ever been there in my free time,” Vanessa said in a tone that suggested she had,
Bruce gave a judgemental hum.
“Anyway,” Vanessa went on, “you see we have some new missing persons?”
Sighing, Bruce sat back in his chair. “Yeah. I did.”
“People are starting to ask questions,” Vanessa warned.
That brought a terse smile to Bruce’s weathered face. “Maybe they’ll solve it then.”
“Ha, fat chance,” Vanessa said. She got up and stretched. “Anyway, I’m bushed. Here’s my…” she trailed off and looked at her empty hands. “Damn, where’s my report? I just had it?” She turned in a confused circle as if she might be able to spot her report making a break for it. “Huh,” she said. She left the office and came back a moment later holding a folder. “Found it,” she grinned.
Bruce just looked at her.
“Um…here it is.”
He didn’t take it.
Her smile faltered. She carefully sat it on top of the files Bruce was looking at.
And his hands.
“I’ll just leave that right here.” She patted it for good measure.
“Thank you,” Bruce said.
“Okay. Night.”
“Goodnight,” Bruce said as she left through a shaft of morning sunlight. Alone, Bruce sat her report aside and went back to the missing kids. This case was giving him a headache and it wasn’t even nine. With a deep sigh, he slumped back in his chair and drummed his fingers on the armrests.
Was it Saturday yet?
He could really use a fishing trip.
***
Dom came awake in the cold purple twilight with a shocked gasp like a man coming up seconds before drowning. His eyes strained from his sweaty face and his mouth hung slack, twisted in a gruesome parody of The Scream. His mind was muddled, murky - he didn’t know where he was or even who he was, but he knew this,.
He couldn’t breathe.
He opened and closed his mouth like a fish, but his lungs did not fill with air. A great, unseen weight seemed to bear down on his chest, and panic gripped him. He tried to move, but his arms refused to heed his brain’s command. The weight seemed heavier, all over, crushing him like a bug. Confusion filled him and he started to pant.
Without warning, his bowels and bladder loosened, and horrible wetness filled his pants. He tried to sit up, but his body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. His chest rose and fell with the frantic labor of his breath, but his lungs remained inert. A cry of fear bubbled up inside of him, but escaped his mouth only as a breathy groan.
A bust of adrenaline shot through him and he tried to stand, but succeeded only in falling off the couch instead, landing face first against the cold tile floor. He felt his nose crunch, but the pain was muted.
Dom thought he lost consciousness after that, but wasn’t sure. His next memory was of shivering so violently that his teeth clacked together. A phantom chill - perhaps from the floor - had settled into his bones, and was colder than he had ever been in his life, colder even than the time he fell into a snowbank and got lost when he was two. Shudders racked his body, and though he tried to turn over, he was too fucking heavy. It was like every muscle in his body had turned to dead weight. Fragmented thoughts swirled in his head, faint colors in the dark, but he couldn’t put any of them together.
With great effort, he managed to push himself slightly up, but a wave of lightheadedness crashed over him and he lowered his head once more. He stopped trying and simply lay there. Shortly, his eyes began to burn and he realized that he wasn’t blinking. Jesus Christ, he wasn’t blinking.
For some strange reason, that brought a fresh bout of panic. He started to hyperventilate, but his lungs still wouldn’t work. He wasn’t blinking…he wasn’t breathing…what was happening to him?
A whimper burst from his throat and he started to cry.
He must have cried himself to sleep, because he woke sometime later to the most intense headache he’d ever had. It felt like something was eating his brain from the inside out. He was sore all over, and could feel his muscles twitching, as though a thousand living things were burrowing through his body. A cramp shot down his right leg, and the toes of his left foot curled involuntarily. Slowly, his jaw clenched closed, and the muscles in his neck began to strain…then to burn. His panic turned to terror, and Dom wiggled across the floor like a worm, his limbs screaming in red agony and his brain filling with heat. He somehow wound up on his right side, and his arms curled slowly up to his chest, crossing at the wrists like a mummy. He tried to pull them apart, but the slightest movement sent waves of excruciating pain cutting through his body. His knees began to draw up to his stomach, and his fingers clenched tightly.
Cramps and spasms attacked every muscle in his body. He screamed through his teeth and shook, resembling a man in the electric chair as 40,000 volts of justice coursed through him. The pain grew gradually, getting worse and worse as minutes ticked by like hours. Higher, higher, higher - he clenched his eyes closed and shrieked as it became unbearable. Disjointed thoughts flashed through his mind - prayers, threats, curses, Jesus fucking…FUCK.
What was happening? God, what was happening to him? Was it fentanyl? He’d seen videos of people high on fentanyl, and they leaned in weird positions. He didn’t do drugs but maybe he ingested it somehow.
His panic may have returned if all of his muscles hadn’t picked that moment to contract as one. His eyes bulged from their sockets and his jaw unclenched just enough for him to utter a high. Agonized scream that echoed through his empty apartment like thunder.
A human being can only take so much before giving out. When the pain reached a crescendo, and Dom mercifully sank into consciousness once more. The sun rose and cascaded through the apartment’s sole window, falling over his huddled form. Slowly, it tracked across the sky before setting again. As the last rays disappeared behind the horizon, Dom’s eyes opened. The pain of the night before was blessedly gone, replaced by a feeling of numbness - the cool ash after the hot fire. His thoughts were slow and thick like molasses, but he could actually think again. Nightmare memories flooded back to him, but he wasn’t sure they were real. He was lying on his side, his arms wrapped around his chest as if for warmth, and his teeth lightly chattered against the icy chill. He was so cold that he didn’t want to move, but he couldn’t stay here forever. He needed help. He needed…
A shower.
Yeah, a hot shower. That would warm him up.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly sat up, ready for a burst of pain.
But none came.
He did, however, feel heavy. Getting to his feet, he stumbled and nearly fell, catching himself against the counter. His limbs had no feeling. It’s like they weren’t even there. Head hung, Dom tried to catch his breath, but it felt like he wasn’t breathing at all. His eyelids drooped closed and he felt like he was going to fall down. Summoning all the might he could, he shuffled into the bathroom with the stiff gait of an old man. He snapped the light on, and cold, white brilliance filled the space, blinding him.
Leaning heavily against the sink, he gripped the cold porcelain. Suddenly, he was afraid of looking into the mirror. He was sure that whatever reflection he saw, it would be of something else, something monstrous.
Dom lifted his head and faced the glass.
His heart shrank.
The man in the mirror was him but different. His skin was white as milk, lacking all color whatsoever save for the ugly purple patch on the left side. IResembling a giant bruise, it started at the temple and extended down to the slope of his neck, disappearing beneath his T-shirt. He gingerly lifted the shirt, and moaned when he saw that his entire left side was discolored, the purple edged with a puffy shade of pink. His sallow skin clung tight to his ribcage, and his hip bones stuck out so much it looked painful. Back in the mirror, his cheeks were sunken, hollow, and his eyes were a hazy, dishwater gray. His skull seemed bigger, his hair longer. Dom wanted to whip his head away from the phantom before him, to never see it again, but he was transfixed.
There was no way that thing was -
Dom looked away, cutting that thought off before it could finish.
A shower.
He needed a shower.
Slowly, stiffly, Dom undressed, peeling off his shirt and his soiled pants. He dropped them in a heap on the floor and stepped under the spray. He could feel the water pounding against him, but it provided no heat. It was neither hot nor cold. It was simply there.
Dom pressed his head to the slick shower wall and stood there for a long time. He was spent, tired, and fried - he had no more emotions left to give. He got out after a little while, dried off, and put on a clean pair of shorts. He settled into bed and lay there with his hands folded over his chest and his eyes open. They felt gritty, dry. His stomach felt bloated, gassy. He was drowsy now, the weight of the past two days (or was it two weeks?) coming down on him all at once. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
He was still asleep - but aware - when the knocking on his door started the next morning. Time was funny in this state of being, fast and jerky but also slow and echoing. Keys rattled the knob turned. The landlord came in with a cop. They saw him on the bed, laid out like a corpse for a viewing, and the cop radioed in a code 35. Soon, cops were all around him, making noise and touching things. He had the vague sense of discomfort and embarrassment at the intrusion. A baling man in a suit stood over him, a cop who looked like a redneck beside him. “He didn’t die here,” the medical examiner said.
The cop looked at him questioningly. Dom caught the name KENNER on his name tag.
“See this?” the M.E. said and gestured to Dom’s face. “That’s livor mortis. When you die, your blood pools at the lowest point. If you’re on your left side, for example, it pools on the left.”
Kenner looked at Dom and then back to the M.E. “Someone moved him?”
“Looks like it,” the M.E. said.
“When did he die?”
The M.E. examined Dom as though he were nothing more than a side of beef. “At a glance? Three days. I won’t have a better answer until I open him up.”
Dom was still awake when they put him into a body bag and zipped it up. He felt a stirring of fear beneath the cold numbness, but he was too tired to worry about it now.
Later, he thought.
He would panic later.
For now, Dom slept.
submitted by Flagg1991 to LetsReadOfficial [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 20:57 Flagg1991 Children of the Night (Part 2)

The world was a boozy whirl of lights and sounds. Images, broken and fragmented, came and went. Voices, laughter, screaming. The ground pitched like the deck of a tempest-tossed ship, and he felt heavy, as though the ground were pulling him to it. C’mere, Dommy. He fell, lay on the pavement, and pushed himself up again, staggering like a drunk on his way home. His head spun, his body ached, and things seemed blurry, like half-formed images glimpsed underwater.
It was the light blue hour before dawn and Dom was…somewhere. He should have recognized the stores and street signs around him, but he didn’t. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and a sense of confusion gripped him so strongly that he was beginning to panic. Where was he? What happened?
The world spun away again and the next thing he knew, he was lying in a heap of garbage bags, used needles, and rubbish. He came awake with a jerk and sat up so fast that a bolt of pain jammed into his skull. He winced and pressed his hand to his forehead. He felt hot, clammy.
Something was seriously wrong.
Somehow he got to his feet again and started walking. The sun was up now and the streets were filled with people. They all sneered in disgust as he passed, and he wrapped his arms around his chest like a baby comforting itself. He was getting cold. His muscles were sore. Tears streamed down his face and he wanted to cry.
Going on instinct alone, Dom made his way back home and climbed the steps to his apartment. Exhaustion swept over him and he sagged against the door as he dug in his pocket for the keys. They shook in his hand and he had to focus really hard to get the key into the lock.
Inside, he collapsed onto the couch and his eyelids instantly drooped. He was so weary that he couldn’t lift his head, couldn’t form a single coherent thought. Dom felt himself starting to sink, and snapped his eyes open with a start. Something in his soul told him that if he slept, he would die.
He couldn’t help it, though. He was falling, tumbling, hands reaching up from hell to grab him. His eyes fluttered closed again and the world started to go dark, his heart slamming in fear. He tried to fight, but the pull of darkness was too strong, too alluring. Why was he fighting? Why not just…give up? Hadn’t he thought of killing himself before? Didn’t he hate his life and himself? What was there to fight for? A wife? Kids? A community that loved and respected him? Shit, affordable groceries?
No.
There was nothing.
He had nothing and was nothing.
A sense of peace blossomed from the darkness, and suddenly death didn’t seem so scary. In fact, it was warm…inviting.
It was life that was cold and hateful. Not death.
Death accepted you no matter who you were. It didn’t reject you…it didn’t ignore you. If you sought it, you would find it, and if you embraced it, it would embrace you.
With that thought in mind, Dom gave up.
And died.
***
Bruce Kenner, captain of the 5th Albany precinct, sat behind his desk on the morning of June 28 and lazily leafed through a stack of files as he sipped from a mug of coffee. A roughly built man with a dark goatee and graying blonde hair, he looked more like a small town southern sheriff than a low level public works functionary. In fact, he tended to act like it too. He liked to hunt, fish, and drink beer on his off time. Albany wasn’t a big city, but it was big enough that you never got a fucking break. Run here, run there, arrest this asshole, investigate that asshole. By the time Friday rolled around, he was so ready for the peace and tranquility of a fishing trip he could taste it.
Already this Monday morning, he was looking forward to another one.
Over the weekend, three kids went missing in the Pine Hills and Washington Park area, bringing the total for that summer up to eight. All were teenagers, all were troubled. Most were boys, but two were girls.
Troubled kids run away all the time. They might be gone a few days, sulking at a friend’s house over something their father or mother did, but they’d eventually come home. None of these kids had come back yet and from what he knew, a few of them weren’t the runaway types. They were shits at school and caused problems, but they had no reason to up and leave. Hell, Bruce himself raised hell as a kid, but he always found his way back home, even if he spent the previous night dying in a field from Mad Dogg 20/20 poisoning.
One or two kids going missing…okay, it happens. Eight? Over a span of four weeks?
Yeah, something was wrong here.
But what?
There was nothing on any of these kids. No one saw them, no one knew anything - one minute they were here, the next they weren’t. What could he or anyone else do with that?. The public broke cops’ balls all the time, but if you don’t have evidence, you don’t have evidence. What do you want? Door to door searches? Roadblocks? Dogs and helicopters? Yeah, then when you actually do it, they cry fascism. Guess I’ll just use my Spidey Senses.
Bruce wished he had spidey senses. He wanted to find these kids as much as anyone, and he was starting to get pissed off that he couldn’t. He took another sip from his mug and read on. The latest kids to go missing were three boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen.
They were all white, all thin (except for one). If there was a serial killer in town - and Bruce hoped to fuck there wasn’t - he had a type. What, black kids aren’t good enough to kill, cannibalize, and wear like a skin suit? They should charge him with a hate crime for discrimination.
That way he’d actually stay locked up.
The door opened and Vanessa Rodregiez, his deputy, came in. A tall, shapely Hispanic woman with dark eyes and a mouth poised always on the edge of a smile, she wore her black hair in a ponytail that would look stern and severe on anyone else, but on her, looked childlike. She was twenty-seven and had been on the force for three years, but you could be forgiven for thinking her much younger. “Bright and early, I see,” she said with a grin.
Bruce grumbled.
Vanessa held down the fort during the graveyard shift, acting to the night as he acted to the day. She was young and full of energy, which clashed with Bruce, who was old and just wanted to be left alone. Despite their differences, Bruce loved her like a kid sister…an annoying kid sister he wanted to throat punch sometimes.
“You missed all the fun last night,” she said and parked her butt on the edge of Bruce’s desk. He glared at her, but she ignored him.
“Good,” he said. Then: “What happened?”
“Big fight outside of Club Vlad,” she said. “It looked like a WorldStar video.”
For a moment, Bruce was lost. “Club what?”
“Club Vlad,” Vanessa said. “Where the Fuze Box used to be.”
Ah, right. The Fuze Box was an Albany landmark, a night club for punks…or goths…or someone. Certainly not for Bruce Kenner. It was small, dingy, and always had people in black waiting outside. On Friday and Saturday nights, it blasted strange music with lyrics about fighting The Man. Kids had been fighting the Man since before Bruce was even born and they hadn’t beaten him yet. Kudos to them for still trying.
Last year, The Fuze Box closed down and someone else bought it. It reopened last month and looked more or less the same: Posers, shitty music, and spiked hair. So much spiked hair. “Place is still a pain in the ass,” Bruce said.
“Yep,” Vanessa chirped. “It doesn’t know what it wants to be now. One minute they play nightcore, the next EDM. It’s all over the place.”
Bruce raised a quizzical brow.
“Not that I’ve ever been there in my free time,” Vanessa said in a tone that suggested she had,
Bruce gave a judgemental hum.
“Anyway,” Vanessa went on, “you see we have some new missing persons?”
Sighing, Bruce sat back in his chair. “Yeah. I did.”
“People are starting to ask questions,” Vanessa warned.
That brought a terse smile to Bruce’s weathered face. “Maybe they’ll solve it then.”
“Ha, fat chance,” Vanessa said. She got up and stretched. “Anyway, I’m bushed. Here’s my…” she trailed off and looked at her empty hands. “Damn, where’s my report? I just had it?” She turned in a confused circle as if she might be able to spot her report making a break for it. “Huh,” she said. She left the office and came back a moment later holding a folder. “Found it,” she grinned.
Bruce just looked at her.
“Um…here it is.”
He didn’t take it.
Her smile faltered. She carefully sat it on top of the files Bruce was looking at.
And his hands.
“I’ll just leave that right here.” She patted it for good measure.
“Thank you,” Bruce said.
“Okay. Night.”
“Goodnight,” Bruce said as she left through a shaft of morning sunlight. Alone, Bruce sat her report aside and went back to the missing kids. This case was giving him a headache and it wasn’t even nine. With a deep sigh, he slumped back in his chair and drummed his fingers on the armrests.
Was it Saturday yet?
He could really use a fishing trip.
***
Dom came awake in the cold purple twilight with a shocked gasp like a man coming up seconds before drowning. His eyes strained from his sweaty face and his mouth hung slack, twisted in a gruesome parody of The Scream. His mind was muddled, murky - he didn’t know where he was or even who he was, but he knew this,.
He couldn’t breathe.
He opened and closed his mouth like a fish, but his lungs did not fill with air. A great, unseen weight seemed to bear down on his chest, and panic gripped him. He tried to move, but his arms refused to heed his brain’s command. The weight seemed heavier, all over, crushing him like a bug. Confusion filled him and he started to pant.
Without warning, his bowels and bladder loosened, and horrible wetness filled his pants. He tried to sit up, but his body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. His chest rose and fell with the frantic labor of his breath, but his lungs remained inert. A cry of fear bubbled up inside of him, but escaped his mouth only as a breathy groan.
A bust of adrenaline shot through him and he tried to stand, but succeeded only in falling off the couch instead, landing face first against the cold tile floor. He felt his nose crunch, but the pain was muted.
Dom thought he lost consciousness after that, but wasn’t sure. His next memory was of shivering so violently that his teeth clacked together. A phantom chill - perhaps from the floor - had settled into his bones, and was colder than he had ever been in his life, colder even than the time he fell into a snowbank and got lost when he was two. Shudders racked his body, and though he tried to turn over, he was too fucking heavy. It was like every muscle in his body had turned to dead weight. Fragmented thoughts swirled in his head, faint colors in the dark, but he couldn’t put any of them together.
With great effort, he managed to push himself slightly up, but a wave of lightheadedness crashed over him and he lowered his head once more. He stopped trying and simply lay there. Shortly, his eyes began to burn and he realized that he wasn’t blinking. Jesus Christ, he wasn’t blinking.
For some strange reason, that brought a fresh bout of panic. He started to hyperventilate, but his lungs still wouldn’t work. He wasn’t blinking…he wasn’t breathing…what was happening to him?
A whimper burst from his throat and he started to cry.
He must have cried himself to sleep, because he woke sometime later to the most intense headache he’d ever had. It felt like something was eating his brain from the inside out. He was sore all over, and could feel his muscles twitching, as though a thousand living things were burrowing through his body. A cramp shot down his right leg, and the toes of his left foot curled involuntarily. Slowly, his jaw clenched closed, and the muscles in his neck began to strain…then to burn. His panic turned to terror, and Dom wiggled across the floor like a worm, his limbs screaming in red agony and his brain filling with heat. He somehow wound up on his right side, and his arms curled slowly up to his chest, crossing at the wrists like a mummy. He tried to pull them apart, but the slightest movement sent waves of excruciating pain cutting through his body. His knees began to draw up to his stomach, and his fingers clenched tightly.
Cramps and spasms attacked every muscle in his body. He screamed through his teeth and shook, resembling a man in the electric chair as 40,000 volts of justice coursed through him. The pain grew gradually, getting worse and worse as minutes ticked by like hours. Higher, higher, higher - he clenched his eyes closed and shrieked as it became unbearable. Disjointed thoughts flashed through his mind - prayers, threats, curses, Jesus fucking…FUCK.
What was happening? God, what was happening to him? Was it fentanyl? He’d seen videos of people high on fentanyl, and they leaned in weird positions. He didn’t do drugs but maybe he ingested it somehow.
His panic may have returned if all of his muscles hadn’t picked that moment to contract as one. His eyes bulged from their sockets and his jaw unclenched just enough for him to utter a high. Agonized scream that echoed through his empty apartment like thunder.
A human being can only take so much before giving out. When the pain reached a crescendo, and Dom mercifully sank into consciousness once more. The sun rose and cascaded through the apartment’s sole window, falling over his huddled form. Slowly, it tracked across the sky before setting again. As the last rays disappeared behind the horizon, Dom’s eyes opened. The pain of the night before was blessedly gone, replaced by a feeling of numbness - the cool ash after the hot fire. His thoughts were slow and thick like molasses, but he could actually think again. Nightmare memories flooded back to him, but he wasn’t sure they were real. He was lying on his side, his arms wrapped around his chest as if for warmth, and his teeth lightly chattered against the icy chill. He was so cold that he didn’t want to move, but he couldn’t stay here forever. He needed help. He needed…
A shower.
Yeah, a hot shower. That would warm him up.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly sat up, ready for a burst of pain.
But none came.
He did, however, feel heavy. Getting to his feet, he stumbled and nearly fell, catching himself against the counter. His limbs had no feeling. It’s like they weren’t even there. Head hung, Dom tried to catch his breath, but it felt like he wasn’t breathing at all. His eyelids drooped closed and he felt like he was going to fall down. Summoning all the might he could, he shuffled into the bathroom with the stiff gait of an old man. He snapped the light on, and cold, white brilliance filled the space, blinding him.
Leaning heavily against the sink, he gripped the cold porcelain. Suddenly, he was afraid of looking into the mirror. He was sure that whatever reflection he saw, it would be of something else, something monstrous.
Dom lifted his head and faced the glass.
His heart shrank.
The man in the mirror was him but different. His skin was white as milk, lacking all color whatsoever save for the ugly purple patch on the left side. IResembling a giant bruise, it started at the temple and extended down to the slope of his neck, disappearing beneath his T-shirt. He gingerly lifted the shirt, and moaned when he saw that his entire left side was discolored, the purple edged with a puffy shade of pink. His sallow skin clung tight to his ribcage, and his hip bones stuck out so much it looked painful. Back in the mirror, his cheeks were sunken, hollow, and his eyes were a hazy, dishwater gray. His skull seemed bigger, his hair longer. Dom wanted to whip his head away from the phantom before him, to never see it again, but he was transfixed.
There was no way that thing was -
Dom looked away, cutting that thought off before it could finish.
A shower.
He needed a shower.
Slowly, stiffly, Dom undressed, peeling off his shirt and his soiled pants. He dropped them in a heap on the floor and stepped under the spray. He could feel the water pounding against him, but it provided no heat. It was neither hot nor cold. It was simply there.
Dom pressed his head to the slick shower wall and stood there for a long time. He was spent, tired, and fried - he had no more emotions left to give. He got out after a little while, dried off, and put on a clean pair of shorts. He settled into bed and lay there with his hands folded over his chest and his eyes open. They felt gritty, dry. His stomach felt bloated, gassy. He was drowsy now, the weight of the past two days (or was it two weeks?) coming down on him all at once. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
He was still asleep - but aware - when the knocking on his door started the next morning. Time was funny in this state of being, fast and jerky but also slow and echoing. Keys rattled the knob turned. The landlord came in with a cop. They saw him on the bed, laid out like a corpse for a viewing, and the cop radioed in a code 35. Soon, cops were all around him, making noise and touching things. He had the vague sense of discomfort and embarrassment at the intrusion. A baling man in a suit stood over him, a cop who looked like a redneck beside him. “He didn’t die here,” the medical examiner said.
The cop looked at him questioningly. Dom caught the name KENNER on his name tag.
“See this?” the M.E. said and gestured to Dom’s face. “That’s livor mortis. When you die, your blood pools at the lowest point. If you’re on your left side, for example, it pools on the left.”
Kenner looked at Dom and then back to the M.E. “Someone moved him?”
“Looks like it,” the M.E. said.
“When did he die?”
The M.E. examined Dom as though he were nothing more than a side of beef. “At a glance? Three days. I won’t have a better answer until I open him up.”
Dom was still awake when they put him into a body bag and zipped it up. He felt a stirring of fear beneath the cold numbness, but he was too tired to worry about it now.
Later, he thought.
He would panic later.
For now, Dom slept.
submitted by Flagg1991 to LighthouseHorror [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 20:56 Flagg1991 Children of the Night (Part 2)

The world was a boozy whirl of lights and sounds. Images, broken and fragmented, came and went. Voices, laughter, screaming. The ground pitched like the deck of a tempest-tossed ship, and he felt heavy, as though the ground were pulling him to it. C’mere, Dommy. He fell, lay on the pavement, and pushed himself up again, staggering like a drunk on his way home. His head spun, his body ached, and things seemed blurry, like half-formed images glimpsed underwater.
It was the light blue hour before dawn and Dom was…somewhere. He should have recognized the stores and street signs around him, but he didn’t. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and a sense of confusion gripped him so strongly that he was beginning to panic. Where was he? What happened?
The world spun away again and the next thing he knew, he was lying in a heap of garbage bags, used needles, and rubbish. He came awake with a jerk and sat up so fast that a bolt of pain jammed into his skull. He winced and pressed his hand to his forehead. He felt hot, clammy.
Something was seriously wrong.
Somehow he got to his feet again and started walking. The sun was up now and the streets were filled with people. They all sneered in disgust as he passed, and he wrapped his arms around his chest like a baby comforting itself. He was getting cold. His muscles were sore. Tears streamed down his face and he wanted to cry.
Going on instinct alone, Dom made his way back home and climbed the steps to his apartment. Exhaustion swept over him and he sagged against the door as he dug in his pocket for the keys. They shook in his hand and he had to focus really hard to get the key into the lock.
Inside, he collapsed onto the couch and his eyelids instantly drooped. He was so weary that he couldn’t lift his head, couldn’t form a single coherent thought. Dom felt himself starting to sink, and snapped his eyes open with a start. Something in his soul told him that if he slept, he would die.
He couldn’t help it, though. He was falling, tumbling, hands reaching up from hell to grab him. His eyes fluttered closed again and the world started to go dark, his heart slamming in fear. He tried to fight, but the pull of darkness was too strong, too alluring. Why was he fighting? Why not just…give up? Hadn’t he thought of killing himself before? Didn’t he hate his life and himself? What was there to fight for? A wife? Kids? A community that loved and respected him? Shit, affordable groceries?
No.
There was nothing.
He had nothing and was nothing.
A sense of peace blossomed from the darkness, and suddenly death didn’t seem so scary. In fact, it was warm…inviting.
It was life that was cold and hateful. Not death.
Death accepted you no matter who you were. It didn’t reject you…it didn’t ignore you. If you sought it, you would find it, and if you embraced it, it would embrace you.
With that thought in mind, Dom gave up.
And died.
***
Bruce Kenner, captain of the 5th Albany precinct, sat behind his desk on the morning of June 28 and lazily leafed through a stack of files as he sipped from a mug of coffee. A roughly built man with a dark goatee and graying blonde hair, he looked more like a small town southern sheriff than a low level public works functionary. In fact, he tended to act like it too. He liked to hunt, fish, and drink beer on his off time. Albany wasn’t a big city, but it was big enough that you never got a fucking break. Run here, run there, arrest this asshole, investigate that asshole. By the time Friday rolled around, he was so ready for the peace and tranquility of a fishing trip he could taste it.
Already this Monday morning, he was looking forward to another one.
Over the weekend, three kids went missing in the Pine Hills and Washington Park area, bringing the total for that summer up to eight. All were teenagers, all were troubled. Most were boys, but two were girls.
Troubled kids run away all the time. They might be gone a few days, sulking at a friend’s house over something their father or mother did, but they’d eventually come home. None of these kids had come back yet and from what he knew, a few of them weren’t the runaway types. They were shits at school and caused problems, but they had no reason to up and leave. Hell, Bruce himself raised hell as a kid, but he always found his way back home, even if he spent the previous night dying in a field from Mad Dogg 20/20 poisoning.
One or two kids going missing…okay, it happens. Eight? Over a span of four weeks?
Yeah, something was wrong here.
But what?
There was nothing on any of these kids. No one saw them, no one knew anything - one minute they were here, the next they weren’t. What could he or anyone else do with that?. The public broke cops’ balls all the time, but if you don’t have evidence, you don’t have evidence. What do you want? Door to door searches? Roadblocks? Dogs and helicopters? Yeah, then when you actually do it, they cry fascism. Guess I’ll just use my Spidey Senses.
Bruce wished he had spidey senses. He wanted to find these kids as much as anyone, and he was starting to get pissed off that he couldn’t. He took another sip from his mug and read on. The latest kids to go missing were three boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen.
They were all white, all thin (except for one). If there was a serial killer in town - and Bruce hoped to fuck there wasn’t - he had a type. What, black kids aren’t good enough to kill, cannibalize, and wear like a skin suit? They should charge him with a hate crime for discrimination.
That way he’d actually stay locked up.
The door opened and Vanessa Rodregiez, his deputy, came in. A tall, shapely Hispanic woman with dark eyes and a mouth poised always on the edge of a smile, she wore her black hair in a ponytail that would look stern and severe on anyone else, but on her, looked childlike. She was twenty-seven and had been on the force for three years, but you could be forgiven for thinking her much younger. “Bright and early, I see,” she said with a grin.
Bruce grumbled.
Vanessa held down the fort during the graveyard shift, acting to the night as he acted to the day. She was young and full of energy, which clashed with Bruce, who was old and just wanted to be left alone. Despite their differences, Bruce loved her like a kid sister…an annoying kid sister he wanted to throat punch sometimes.
“You missed all the fun last night,” she said and parked her butt on the edge of Bruce’s desk. He glared at her, but she ignored him.
“Good,” he said. Then: “What happened?”
“Big fight outside of Club Vlad,” she said. “It looked like a WorldStar video.”
For a moment, Bruce was lost. “Club what?”
“Club Vlad,” Vanessa said. “Where the Fuze Box used to be.”
Ah, right. The Fuze Box was an Albany landmark, a night club for punks…or goths…or someone. Certainly not for Bruce Kenner. It was small, dingy, and always had people in black waiting outside. On Friday and Saturday nights, it blasted strange music with lyrics about fighting The Man. Kids had been fighting the Man since before Bruce was even born and they hadn’t beaten him yet. Kudos to them for still trying.
Last year, The Fuze Box closed down and someone else bought it. It reopened last month and looked more or less the same: Posers, shitty music, and spiked hair. So much spiked hair. “Place is still a pain in the ass,” Bruce said.
“Yep,” Vanessa chirped. “It doesn’t know what it wants to be now. One minute they play nightcore, the next EDM. It’s all over the place.”
Bruce raised a quizzical brow.
“Not that I’ve ever been there in my free time,” Vanessa said in a tone that suggested she had,
Bruce gave a judgemental hum.
“Anyway,” Vanessa went on, “you see we have some new missing persons?”
Sighing, Bruce sat back in his chair. “Yeah. I did.”
“People are starting to ask questions,” Vanessa warned.
That brought a terse smile to Bruce’s weathered face. “Maybe they’ll solve it then.”
“Ha, fat chance,” Vanessa said. She got up and stretched. “Anyway, I’m bushed. Here’s my…” she trailed off and looked at her empty hands. “Damn, where’s my report? I just had it?” She turned in a confused circle as if she might be able to spot her report making a break for it. “Huh,” she said. She left the office and came back a moment later holding a folder. “Found it,” she grinned.
Bruce just looked at her.
“Um…here it is.”
He didn’t take it.
Her smile faltered. She carefully sat it on top of the files Bruce was looking at.
And his hands.
“I’ll just leave that right here.” She patted it for good measure.
“Thank you,” Bruce said.
“Okay. Night.”
“Goodnight,” Bruce said as she left through a shaft of morning sunlight. Alone, Bruce sat her report aside and went back to the missing kids. This case was giving him a headache and it wasn’t even nine. With a deep sigh, he slumped back in his chair and drummed his fingers on the armrests.
Was it Saturday yet?
He could really use a fishing trip.
***
Dom came awake in the cold purple twilight with a shocked gasp like a man coming up seconds before drowning. His eyes strained from his sweaty face and his mouth hung slack, twisted in a gruesome parody of The Scream. His mind was muddled, murky - he didn’t know where he was or even who he was, but he knew this,.
He couldn’t breathe.
He opened and closed his mouth like a fish, but his lungs did not fill with air. A great, unseen weight seemed to bear down on his chest, and panic gripped him. He tried to move, but his arms refused to heed his brain’s command. The weight seemed heavier, all over, crushing him like a bug. Confusion filled him and he started to pant.
Without warning, his bowels and bladder loosened, and horrible wetness filled his pants. He tried to sit up, but his body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. His chest rose and fell with the frantic labor of his breath, but his lungs remained inert. A cry of fear bubbled up inside of him, but escaped his mouth only as a breathy groan.
A bust of adrenaline shot through him and he tried to stand, but succeeded only in falling off the couch instead, landing face first against the cold tile floor. He felt his nose crunch, but the pain was muted.
Dom thought he lost consciousness after that, but wasn’t sure. His next memory was of shivering so violently that his teeth clacked together. A phantom chill - perhaps from the floor - had settled into his bones, and was colder than he had ever been in his life, colder even than the time he fell into a snowbank and got lost when he was two. Shudders racked his body, and though he tried to turn over, he was too fucking heavy. It was like every muscle in his body had turned to dead weight. Fragmented thoughts swirled in his head, faint colors in the dark, but he couldn’t put any of them together.
With great effort, he managed to push himself slightly up, but a wave of lightheadedness crashed over him and he lowered his head once more. He stopped trying and simply lay there. Shortly, his eyes began to burn and he realized that he wasn’t blinking. Jesus Christ, he wasn’t blinking.
For some strange reason, that brought a fresh bout of panic. He started to hyperventilate, but his lungs still wouldn’t work. He wasn’t blinking…he wasn’t breathing…what was happening to him?
A whimper burst from his throat and he started to cry.
He must have cried himself to sleep, because he woke sometime later to the most intense headache he’d ever had. It felt like something was eating his brain from the inside out. He was sore all over, and could feel his muscles twitching, as though a thousand living things were burrowing through his body. A cramp shot down his right leg, and the toes of his left foot curled involuntarily. Slowly, his jaw clenched closed, and the muscles in his neck began to strain…then to burn. His panic turned to terror, and Dom wiggled across the floor like a worm, his limbs screaming in red agony and his brain filling with heat. He somehow wound up on his right side, and his arms curled slowly up to his chest, crossing at the wrists like a mummy. He tried to pull them apart, but the slightest movement sent waves of excruciating pain cutting through his body. His knees began to draw up to his stomach, and his fingers clenched tightly.
Cramps and spasms attacked every muscle in his body. He screamed through his teeth and shook, resembling a man in the electric chair as 40,000 volts of justice coursed through him. The pain grew gradually, getting worse and worse as minutes ticked by like hours. Higher, higher, higher - he clenched his eyes closed and shrieked as it became unbearable. Disjointed thoughts flashed through his mind - prayers, threats, curses, Jesus fucking…FUCK.
What was happening? God, what was happening to him? Was it fentanyl? He’d seen videos of people high on fentanyl, and they leaned in weird positions. He didn’t do drugs but maybe he ingested it somehow.
His panic may have returned if all of his muscles hadn’t picked that moment to contract as one. His eyes bulged from their sockets and his jaw unclenched just enough for him to utter a high. Agonized scream that echoed through his empty apartment like thunder.
A human being can only take so much before giving out. When the pain reached a crescendo, and Dom mercifully sank into consciousness once more. The sun rose and cascaded through the apartment’s sole window, falling over his huddled form. Slowly, it tracked across the sky before setting again. As the last rays disappeared behind the horizon, Dom’s eyes opened. The pain of the night before was blessedly gone, replaced by a feeling of numbness - the cool ash after the hot fire. His thoughts were slow and thick like molasses, but he could actually think again. Nightmare memories flooded back to him, but he wasn’t sure they were real. He was lying on his side, his arms wrapped around his chest as if for warmth, and his teeth lightly chattered against the icy chill. He was so cold that he didn’t want to move, but he couldn’t stay here forever. He needed help. He needed…
A shower.
Yeah, a hot shower. That would warm him up.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly sat up, ready for a burst of pain.
But none came.
He did, however, feel heavy. Getting to his feet, he stumbled and nearly fell, catching himself against the counter. His limbs had no feeling. It’s like they weren’t even there. Head hung, Dom tried to catch his breath, but it felt like he wasn’t breathing at all. His eyelids drooped closed and he felt like he was going to fall down. Summoning all the might he could, he shuffled into the bathroom with the stiff gait of an old man. He snapped the light on, and cold, white brilliance filled the space, blinding him.
Leaning heavily against the sink, he gripped the cold porcelain. Suddenly, he was afraid of looking into the mirror. He was sure that whatever reflection he saw, it would be of something else, something monstrous.
Dom lifted his head and faced the glass.
His heart shrank.
The man in the mirror was him but different. His skin was white as milk, lacking all color whatsoever save for the ugly purple patch on the left side. IResembling a giant bruise, it started at the temple and extended down to the slope of his neck, disappearing beneath his T-shirt. He gingerly lifted the shirt, and moaned when he saw that his entire left side was discolored, the purple edged with a puffy shade of pink. His sallow skin clung tight to his ribcage, and his hip bones stuck out so much it looked painful. Back in the mirror, his cheeks were sunken, hollow, and his eyes were a hazy, dishwater gray. His skull seemed bigger, his hair longer. Dom wanted to whip his head away from the phantom before him, to never see it again, but he was transfixed.
There was no way that thing was -
Dom looked away, cutting that thought off before it could finish.
A shower.
He needed a shower.
Slowly, stiffly, Dom undressed, peeling off his shirt and his soiled pants. He dropped them in a heap on the floor and stepped under the spray. He could feel the water pounding against him, but it provided no heat. It was neither hot nor cold. It was simply there.
Dom pressed his head to the slick shower wall and stood there for a long time. He was spent, tired, and fried - he had no more emotions left to give. He got out after a little while, dried off, and put on a clean pair of shorts. He settled into bed and lay there with his hands folded over his chest and his eyes open. They felt gritty, dry. His stomach felt bloated, gassy. He was drowsy now, the weight of the past two days (or was it two weeks?) coming down on him all at once. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
He was still asleep - but aware - when the knocking on his door started the next morning. Time was funny in this state of being, fast and jerky but also slow and echoing. Keys rattled the knob turned. The landlord came in with a cop. They saw him on the bed, laid out like a corpse for a viewing, and the cop radioed in a code 35. Soon, cops were all around him, making noise and touching things. He had the vague sense of discomfort and embarrassment at the intrusion. A baling man in a suit stood over him, a cop who looked like a redneck beside him. “He didn’t die here,” the medical examiner said.
The cop looked at him questioningly. Dom caught the name KENNER on his name tag.
“See this?” the M.E. said and gestured to Dom’s face. “That’s livor mortis. When you die, your blood pools at the lowest point. If you’re on your left side, for example, it pools on the left.”
Kenner looked at Dom and then back to the M.E. “Someone moved him?”
“Looks like it,” the M.E. said.
“When did he die?”
The M.E. examined Dom as though he were nothing more than a side of beef. “At a glance? Three days. I won’t have a better answer until I open him up.”
Dom was still awake when they put him into a body bag and zipped it up. He felt a stirring of fear beneath the cold numbness, but he was too tired to worry about it now.
Later, he thought.
He would panic later.
For now, Dom slept.
submitted by Flagg1991 to MrCreepyPasta [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 20:41 Zardotab Why are verbose UI specs so common and excepted? I miss DRY UI specs.

Before Dot Net I used to simplify UI maintenance by packaging common shop UI idioms behind compact methods. If one needed the "long cut", they could just paste-and-modify the text of the short-cut method, and thus I wasn't hiding the magic; they were just old fashioned methods that didn't prevent usage of the out-of-the-box long-cut when desired. It made web CRUD simple and easy.
But the equivalent in most Dot Net frameworks seems to require reflection rocket surgery that's above my IQ (especially when they "break"), or stack-specific templating gizmos, which are either buggy and/or poorly documented.
Most just seem to shuddup and accept the typical XML bloat in the UI code. Some people can indeed read bloated verbose code much faster than me, so maybe my eyes are just too slow? But a good many devs don't have fast eyes either. Is one expected to be a bloat-master now if using C# frameworks? Should I get out of C#?
Old fashioned subroutines/methods for shop-specific DRY have fell out of favor, and I don't understand why. C#'s optional named parameters are a wonderful abstraction tool, but we can't use them in UI's.
Example pseudo-code:
 var pocoRef = longCutToPocoReference(...); var pnl = New UiFramework.Panel(....); // pnl.addNum(pocoRef.EmployeeNo, decimals: 0, zeroPad: True, HideOnAdd: True); pnl.addText(pocoRef.LastName); pnl.addText(pocoRef.FirstName); pnl.addText(pocoRef.MiddleInitial, 1, altTitle: "M.I."); // override default grid columns* & title pnl.NewRow(); // explicitly start a new row (DIV) pnl.addText(pocoRef.Narrative, multiLines: 4) // Etc... (Who can NOT love this?!) // * alternative longer form is "gridCols: 1". Shown is a positional param. 
submitted by Zardotab to dotnet [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 20:39 SgtSlaughter1974 54.3 Million shares shorted yesterday 5/13, with 15 halts today.

This has been one heck of a day, but the numbers just are not adding up. 54.3 million shares shorted yesterday. Current "reported" short interest per FINTEL is only 9.8%. I have no idea what the FTD data is going to be, but I am sure it is going to be massive. Options prices are massively inflated. Max Pain is currently sitting at 6.78, and guess where we are sitting right now? The Market makers and Prime Brokers are making piles of cash because people are going nuts with FD's. I just do not understand the gambling mentality but OK. If you literally want to hand cash to the very people that are manipulating the stock, you do you. As for me, exercised my calls, kept my leaps, stacked my shares, and now just waiting to see what happens.
submitted by SgtSlaughter1974 to amcstock [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 20:27 Shot-Cryptographer85 Male Asian haircut recommendations

Hi all,
I'm a Chinese student and want to find a barbershop that has a good understanding of asian male hair. I tried a few different places in other towns(where I lived before), but none of them could manage my haircut properly as it is somehow different from British mens hair. My hair is typical east asian hair, super thick and very straight. Because of those, most of time it goes wrong when my side hair gets short, it starts to pitch like hedgehog and the barber cuts more and more to reduce volume which ends up very short on top.
Are there any asian people who managed to find a barber who cuts asian hair well and for a decent price? Or any other recommendations?
Thanks in advance.
submitted by Shot-Cryptographer85 to nottingham [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 20:19 _valtteri Installing SKY 1.6 made everything bad - how to revert?

I am new to AC and have been enjoying it immensely. I have been running CSP Preview, Pure and C13 Aegis. Have been getting 60FPS@4K consistently.
Just now I installed SKY (https://www.overtake.gg/downloads/sky-pure-sol.53935/) and ran the setup.
A couple of things happened: -FPS tanked -The in-game UI changed in appearance! (When driving ESC is pressed, the menu previously was vertically stacked, now it's looking like some sort of previous, older version of the UI with the buttons horizontally stacked)
At that point I wanted to revert everything back to where they were but quickly realised didn't know how or if it even could be done. I hadn't saved any of my settings and seems like SKY had loaded up a video settings preset I could not roll back.
Then I deleted the "assettocorsa" folder and reinstalled it from Steam. Used the previosly downloaded Content Manager and installed CSP and Pure again.
BUT: my settings were not reset the in-game UI still looks weird and seems like the video settings did not reset.
Long story short: how can I simply start over from a clean slate with everything in their default settings?
Please help, I just want to race!
submitted by _valtteri to assettocorsa [link] [comments]


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