Hi All,
My new mod, "Fusion Cores 76" is now up for download!
To put it shortly, this mod adds in a new way to obtain Fusion Cores: Making them yourself! With new crafting recipes, you can now craft multiple different Flux variants using both organic & inorganic matter as ingredients! Combining all Flux variants together with the use of perks Science 1, 3 & Nuclear Physicist 1, you can craft your own homemade Fusion Cores at a Chemistry Workbench. All Fluxes, and the Drained Fusion Core have been Integrated into the Levelled List. All Bosses and Boss chests have a small chance to drop a Flux variant and a Drained Fusion Core, and Junk Vendors will rarely have either available for purchase!
Please come check it out: https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/82491
Cheers!

What I have come up with so far Fo76 Hardcore •only eat homemade food •no fast travel •no camp •limited stash / legendary •limited stimpak (10) •can only repair at workbench

https://youtu.be/A-DNV3IE5k4
I dont know what mod adds it, here is my mod load order:

Mod_Priority,#Mod_Status,#Mod_Name

"0000","+","Unmanaged: WEATHER RUDY ENB"
"0001","+","DLC: TribalPack"
"0002","+","DLC: OldWorldBlues"
"0003","+","DLC: MercenaryPack"
"0004","+","DLC: LonesomeRoad"
"0005","+","DLC: HonestHearts"
"0006","+","DLC: GunRunnersArsenal"
"0007","+","DLC: DeadMoney"
"0008","+","DLC: ClassicPack"
"0009","+","DLC: CaravanPack"
"0010","+","NVAC - New Vegas Anti Crash"
"0011","+","JIP LN NVSE Plugin"
"0012","+","The Mod Configuration Menu"
"0013","+","Ogg Vorbis Libraries"
"0015","+","NVTF - New Vegas Tick Fix"
"0016","+","New Vegas Base ini files for nvse and nvts"
"0017","+","Minimal ENB Hair Fixes"
"0018","+","JohnnyGuitar NVSE"
"0019","+","Yukichigai Unofficial Patch - YUP"
"0020","+","Asterra's Many Fixes"
"0021","+","Precision Collision - Clutter NV"
"0022","+","Unnecessary Physics"
"0023","+","Unofficial Patch NVSE Plus"
"0024","+","ShowOff xNVSE Plugin"
"0025","+","AnhNVSE"
"0026","+","Navmesh Fixes and Improvements"
"0027","+","Sandbox's annoyances"
"0028","+","Placed Creature Corpses use Vanilla Skeletons"
"0029","+","FNV Mod Limit Fix"
"0030","+","lStewieAl's Tweaks and Engine Fixes"
"0031","+","Infinite Loading Screen Fix"
"0032","+","Combat Lag Fix (NVSE)"
"0033","+","ActorCause Save Bloat Fix"
"0035","+","FOV Slider"
"0036","+","NV Compatibility Skeleton"
"0037","+","Landscape Texture Improvements"
"0038","+","Perks Day Tripper and Chemist Survivalist Style Fix"
"0039","+","Vendors Containers Respawn Fix - Elaborate Edition"
"0040","+","Rebreather Tweaked"
"0041","+","Critical and Effects - Fixes and Tweaks"
"0042","+","Ammo Script Fixes"
"0043","+","KEYWORDS"
"0044","+","Gauss Impact Fix - ESPless"
"0045","+","JIP NVSE Perk and Challenge Tweaks"
"0046","+","Black Litter Pile Fix"
"0047","+","Strip Lights Region Fix"
"0048","+","Aqua Performa - Strip Performance Fix"
"0049","+","Canyon Rocks - Mesh FIX"
"0050","+","ENB Ceiling Fix"
"0051","+","Landscape Disposition Fix"
"0053","+","Base Object Swapper"
"0054","+","kNVSE Animation Plugin"
"0055","+","Yvile's Crash Logger"
"0057","+","Smooth True Iron Sights Camera"
"0058","+","Improved Console (NVSE)"
"0059","+","UIO - User Interface Organizer"
"0060","+","Pause Menu HD"
"0061","+","The Weapon Mod Menu"
"0062","+","One HUD - oHUD"
"0063","+","Clean Companion Wheel"
"0064","+","Some UI Sounds (SUS)"
"0066","+","JIP Improved Recipe Menu"
"0067","+","HUD Caps for FNV"
"0068","+","True Condition"
"0069","+","Clockwork Vegas - Calendar Overhaul and Time-based Mechanics"
"0070","+","Placeable Map Markers"
"0071","+","Faction Map Icon Overhaul"
"0075","+","Perk Sorter"
"0076","+","Better Explosives Indicator"
"0077","+","World Map HD"
"0078","+","Ending and Intro Slides HD"
"0079","+","New Vegas Script Extender (NVSE xNVSE)"
"0080","+","Bullet Casings Redone"
"0081","+","PM's HD Ranger Outfits"
"0082","+","IHWT - Improved Heavy Weapons Textures"
"0083","+","IHWT Red Missile Targeting Texture"
"0084","+","Reinforced Leather Armor Female Mesh Fix"
"0085","+","VGA - EVE script and various Weapon mods Patches"
"0086","+","IMPACT - Compatibility Edition (JIP LN) (DLC - TTW - All Mods)"
"0087","+","IMPACT"
"0088","+","HD Hi-Res World View Weapon Textures"
"0089","+","Weapon Mods Expanded - WMX"
"0090","+","Enhanced Blood Textures for NV v2_22c"
"0091","+","NMCs_Texture_Pack_For_New_Vegas"
"0092","+","NMCs_Texture_Pack_For_New_Vegas2"
"0093","+","OJO BUENO Texture Pack"
"0094","+","Bouncing Natural Botany(BnB)"
"0095","+","Animated Foliage for Fallout New vegas"
"0096","+","EXE - Effect teXtures Enhanced"
"0097","+","EVE - Essential Visual Enhancements"
"0098","+","EVE Laser Rifle Texture Recolor"
"0099","+","Shifting Shadows - 2k Assassin and Stealth Suit Retextures"
"0100","+","Metal Armors Metalized - 2K Metal Armor Re-textures"
"0101","+","Lore-Friendly Joshua Graham Armor Replacer"
"0102","+","HD Miscellaneous Musical Object Textures"
"0103","+","Critters Retexture Pack"
"0104","+","Creatures HD"
"0105","+","JLM - Just Loot Menu"
"0106","+","The Living Desert Leveled List Overhaul"
"0107","+","The Living Desert - Travelers Patrols Consequences Increased Population and more"
"0108","+","Bottle That Water"
"0109","+","Water Overhaul"
"0110","+","Dynamic Combat Styles"
"0111","+","JVS - Just Vanilla Sprint"
"0112","+","Hit - Binoculars Anim Set"
"0113","+","Hit - Codac R9000 Anim Set"
"0114","+","Super Mutants Blink Animation"
"0115","+","Animated Workbenches"
"0116","+","The Living Desert FaceGen Tint Fix"
"0117","+","ELITE Riot Shotgun Animation Overhaul (kNVSE)"
"0119","+","Better Stand Up Animation"
"0120","+","Diagonal movement"
"0121","+","Unarmed Animations"
"0122","+","Wasteland Warrior - A Melee Animation Overhaul"
"0123","+","Butcher Pete Complete - A Melee Animation Overhaul"
"0124","+","Fitz .45 Auto Machine Pistol"
"0125","+","Beretta 87 Target"
"0126","+","Beretta 92 FS"
"0127","+","Colt 1911"
"0128","+","FN M1905 pocket pistol"
"0129","+","GSh-18"
"0130","+","USP Match"
"0131","+","Homemade Chechen rebel SMG - Borz"
"0132","+","Custom Walther SMG"
"0133","+","Vz61 Scorpion"
"0134","+","9A-91"
"0135","+","Canvas Backpacks - FNV - TTW"
"0136","+","The Courier"
"0137","+","Coats of Fallout New Vegas"
"0138","+","MW2019 Roze Virago"
"0139","+","Fallout 4 Power Armor Features"
"0140","+","MW2019 Technician Gloves"
"0141","+","Wasteland Engineer Armor"
"0142","+","ADAM Reborn"
"0143","+","Raider Power Armor"
"0144","+","Graham's Armor"
"0145","+","T-60 Power Armour"
"0146","+","Enhanced Landscapes"
"0147","+","Minor Prerelease Objects Uncut"
"0148","+","Hoover Dam Bridge Overhaul"
"0149","+","The High Road - Building Density"
"0151","+","SmoothLight - Pip-Boy light enhancer"
"0152","+","High Resolution Screens"
"0153","+","Pip-Boy Shading Fix NVSE"
"0155","+","Natural eyes by zzjay"
"0156","+","Immersive Mouth and Teeth - FNV Version"
"0157","+","Menace of The New West"
"0158","+","Rainy Days (On-Demand Rain Mod)"
"0159","+","Colorado River Weather Tweaked"
"0160","+","High Noon Restored"
"0161","+","Dusty Distance Redone"
"0162","+","MoonlightNVSE"
"0163","+","New Vegas - Blade Runner 2049 Weather"
"0164","+","Powder Ganger Overhaul"
"0165","+","Old World Blues - Sweet Switches"
"0166","+","Old World Blues - Seedy Research Station"
"0167","+","Old World Blues - Toaster Of Doom"
"0168","+","Old World Blues - Roboscorpion Retextures"
"0169","+","Old World Blues - Unique Think Tank Members"
"0170","+","Improved ED-E Textures"
"0171","+","dead money radio - 4k - 2k"
"0172","+","Quality Carts"
"0173","+","Rectified Water Towers"
"0174","+","F4NV Repconn Souvenir Rocket"
"0175","+","Survivalist Rifle Replacer 4k"
"0176","+","Architecture Retexture Pack (4k - 2k)"
"0177","+","Hall Of Equipment"
"0178","+","Assorted NCR Armor Retexture"
"0179","+","Assorted Leather Armor Retexture"
"0180","+","Decaying Ferals"
"0181","+","Dinky the Deluxe Dinosaur - Definitive Dinky Retexture"
"0182","+","Pool Table and items - Redone"
"0183","+","Glowing Ghosts - Happy Little Holograms Emit Light"
"0184","+","Conor's Cool Doctor's Bag"
"0185","+","Physically Based Parkware"
"0186","+","Physically Based Kitchenware"
"0187","+","Physically Based Collection"
"0188","+","Physically Based Wood Crates"
"0189","+","Higher Poly Rocks"
"0190","+","Nut Water Overhaul"
"0191","+","Simply Upscaled Grass"
"0192","+","High Resolution Bloom NVSE"
"0193","+","HD One Hand Melee by Insanity Sorrow"
"0194","+","Mojave Nights - a moon and stars replacer"
"0195","+","2K HD Cloud Retextures"
"0196","+","Vanilla Graffiti Redone"
"0197","+","Casino Rugs HD"
"0198","+","Casino Posters and Signs HD"
"0199","+","Various Signs HD"
"0200","+","High Res Vanilla Posters and Graffiti"
"0201","+","Securitrons in CRT"
"0202","+","Super Mutants HD - 4k Retextures"
"0203","+","PM's HD Ammo Boxes"
"0204","+","Neglected Clutter and Other Things - Retex"
"0205","+","Brahmin Variant Redux"
"0206","+","HD Mist"
"0207","+","Weapon Retexture Project - WRP"
"0208","+","Improved Cyberdogs Textures"
"0209","+","Semi-transparent Door Glass"
"0210","+","HiRes Skill Books Retexture"
"0211","+","Hectrol Tumbleweed Deluxe HighRes Retex"
"0212","+","ENB Friendlier HD Dust Storms"
"0213","+","Magazine Redux"
"0214","+","Hi-Res Typewriter"
"0215","+","Chinese Stealth Armor Retexture"
"0216","+","Atompunk Vault Suits - HD Retexture"
"0217","+","HD Miscellaneous Utility Object Textures"
"0218","+","HD Memorial and Monument Textures"
"0219","+","HD Miscellaneous War Object Textures"
"0220","+","George's Landscape Retextured 4k 2021"
"0221","+","PM's HD Legion Overhaul"
"0222","+","Honest Hearts Overhaul"
"0223","+","George's Dead Money Retexture"
"0224","+","MGs Neat Clutter Retextures"
"0225","+","Classic AK-112 - The Adytum Rifle"
"0226","+","SYNC - Remade kNVSE Animation Set - Classic AK-112 - The Adytum Rifle"
"0227","+","Vault 953 - A Player Home"
"0228","+","Gear Lists - MCM"
"0229","+","Blue Moon - Main Menu and Theme Replacer"
"0230","+","B42 Inertia"
"0231","+","B42 Notify"
"0232","+","B42 Dropmag and One in the chamber"
"0233","+","B42 Descriptions aka Pip-Info"
"0234","+","B42 Inspect - aka Animated Ammo and Weapon Condition Checking"
"0235","+","B42 Inject - Animated Item Use - ESPless"
"0236","+","B42 True Leaning - Contextual - ESPless"
"0237","+","B42 Loot - Animated Physical Item Pickup - ESPless"
"0238","+","B42 Interact - Animated Items and Interactions Framework - ESPless"
"0239","+","Hit - B42 Interact Animation Pack"
"0240","+","Hit - B42 Interact Skinning"
"0241","+","Hit - B42 Inject Animation Pack - Season 1"
"0242","+","Vanilla Animations Weapon Scale Fix"
"0243","+","Asurah Reanimation Pack"
"0244","+","Asurah Reanimation AK Reload Patches"
"0245","+","Asurah Reanimation SMG Patches"
"0246","+","Asurah Reanimation Pistol Patches"
"0247","+","Fitz's .45 Machine Pistol patch for Asurah's Reanimation Pack"

I purchased plans for a workbench that will house a job site table saw and router (to be a mini router table). The plans, including cut list, are in millimeters. I'm based in the US, so I assume that the convention is to do most work in fractional inches. My original plan was to cut the pieces for this project myself, but the creator of the plans also suggested asking the plywood dealer to cut the pieces for me if I don't have the skill/accurate enough setup yet.
My assumption is that if I asked a US plywood dealer to follow a cut list in millimeters (and we're talking very nitty gritty measurements... 726 mm, 804 mm, etc...), they either wouldn't or couldn't. And frankly for a workbench, a few millimeters difference consistently shouldn't be much of an issue, right?
This will be the first legitimately nice piece of self-made shop furniture I make, and I want it to be as accurate as possible, since more furniture, jigs, etc. will be made using it. I also want to take into consideration that I have a tendency to overcomplicate and strive for perfection where it's often not achievable, or even necessary.
I used AI (ChatGPT) and Google Sheets to help me make conversions. Since the workbench is more or less a mobile cabinet, I thought rounding to the nearest 1/32" would be more than adequate - maybe even overkill. I basically tried to find out what the tolerances would be for high-end cabinets, and ran with that.
I ultimately don't care if my version ends up with slightly different dimensions. I just want to try to ensure that I'm converting and rounding measurements appropriately so that the end product will be straight, level, true... all that stuff.
Any sage advice out there on how to approach this in a level-headed way that's realistic but will also yield adequate results for future woodworking? Is rounding to the nearest 1/32" overkill for shop furniture? If so, what would you recommend?
---
For reference, the plans are for the Mobile Workbench with Table Saw & Router Table created by Suso over at Paoson Woodworking.
For more detail on how I made conversions, see below:
I used this formula =ROUND(CELL/25.4*32,0)/32 to convert mm to decimal inches, rounding 4 decimal places. I created a lookup table on a separate sheet that contained the corresponding decimal-fractional representations from 1/32" to 31/32". I isolated the remainders from the mm > decimal conversion and matched them to their fractional inch equivalent.
For example, an 1800 mm measurement converted to 70 7/8".
My main worry (because I'm not sure what rounding logic was used internally by Google Sheets and because I'm a woodworking noob) is that the proportion of pieces might get thrown out of whack.

The most important tips (TLDR):

1. DON’T use any traps excepts for empty bottles. This will get you killed.
2. DON’T use molotovs during the night or on enemies that are attacking you. This will get you killed.
3. DON’T try to save shells engaging dangerous enemies with weaker weapons. This will get you killed.
4. DON’T take Vulnerability to Poison debuff. This will get you killed.
5. DON’T go to Church Basement or Great Lake. This will get you killed.
6. DON’T sleep on Homemade Shotguns. This will get me dissapointed in you.

Obviously, this guide has spoilers.
After completing my fifth Nightmare run with around 70 shotgun shells left, I decided to share some of the most useful tips that can help you complete the game on this difficulty without struggle and even have some fun in the process.
Before I start, this guide is focused on the playing the game at normal speed. The easiest way to actually do it is to speedrun — less time wasted on failure, less time spent overall, but, personally, it just doesn’t feel as good as trying to do everything in the game while having only one life. That said, if you just want the achievement or smth, I recommend looking up any speedrun of the game and repeating what the runner does. You just go day 1 to the doctor’s house, then to the doctor, leave for chapter 2, then go immediately for radio tower.
Now, if you wanna do this in 20-40 days and really immerse yourself in one-life experience, this guide is for you.
Part 1. Choices.
Choose the Wolfman’s path. This gives you a free Hunting Rifle, ability to teleport to Doc’s house in the Old Woods, an additional vendor. Your stuff won’t be stolen in Chapter 2, and if you spare the Musician, you get a free night in the Swamp when he arrives in your hideout.
Help Piotrek build a rocket. Don’t forget to exhaust his reputation. If you get 3 rocket parts in Dry Meadow, you’ll only need one more in Silent Forest. It’s the fastest way to upgrade your Workbench to lvl5 (Chapter 1 max) and it makes Junkyard in Chapter 2 a way easier location, while also providing more loot and additional pliers.
Kill the Sow. Before reporting to Wolfman on your swinocide, make sure to have all the hotbar upgrades. You will now have 7 hotbar slots. My usual loadout top to bottom is shotgun-pistol-melee-pills-molotovs-lamp-armor.
Chapter 2 you can do however you want. Burning the tree is a lot more interesting and challenging, but Radio tower is doable whenever and arguably way easier. If you die in Chapter 2 and get really angry go to Radio tower immediately to just be done with the run.
Part 2. How to defend the hideout.
There’s basically two schools of thought.
One is barricading yourself in the most defended room with all the lamps, waiting for shit to break through — reactive defense. Staying still will make intruders unaware of you, but later they will still break barricades and engage your stealthy ass.
This is the easiest way to deal with shadows though — just in the room with all the lights, making flares essentially useless (expect for Old Woods hideout). It’s also generally cheaper, as barricades cost wood and nails, which are super cheap and plentiful everywhere, and you can also set up some traps (but not all of them — more on that later). Huge bugs can screw you over so much. You can get unlucky and none of them will come to the room you’re in, spreading worms everywhere around the base. Yuck. You also miss on most beneficial night events — shrooms, mysterious benefactor, shiny stones and etc.
Reactive defense seems to offer more in terms of survivability, but I found that proactive defense is actually safer. Let’s talk about that.
You don’t wanna find yourself in a small room with no way out except for a broken window, through which red chompers with black goo on them are pouring through. Granted, that may never happen. But when it does happen on day 60, you won’t be ready. Yeah, you could use Scream or Chameleon to get out of this, but guess what — you also stepped in your own bear trap. You can’t use skills or heal while your leg is in the bear trap — I learned that the hard way.
So, the alternative to reactive defense is proactive defense. Basically, walk around the hideout and look for enemies — find them before they find you. You won’t miss night events, you’ll have more options in panic situations and way more maneuverability, and you won’t be caught off-guard. You can barricade all the outer windows and doors and camp the open walls. But there’s a trade off — now shadows are an actual problem.
This problem is solved by flares. I replace molotovs in my hotbar with flares everynight and vice versa. See flickering lights – throw flare. You no die. Life good.
In terms of traps — don’t use anything except for broken glass. Never. More on that later.
Part 3. Skills.
You can pretty easily do Nightmare with no skills at all. After all, they come with some heavy side-effects, some of which can be potentially lethal. There’s no gain in ignoring the first tier of skills, as you’ll eventually still get Shadows.
Healing skills (Moth, Mushroom healing, Appetite) can be ignored altogether — for the exception of Moth, these skills just provide additional healing items which are really sub-par. If you’re playing correctly, you will rarely need to heal, so you’ll have a lot of default healing items. Moth can be used in reactive defense as a passive heal during a fight, but you will most likely forget to use it and also you stepped in your own bear trap. If you do want a healing skill, go with Appetite, as wood is very cheap and frequent. Eat log.
Tier by tier:

1. Shadows is the only negative option. Third eye for 10% more vision distance. Navigator because it’s slightly better than the other two. You can quickly find yourself on the map when time runs out before night, and mark containers and stuff. Not very useful. If you want, take a healing skill instead, won’t make much difference.
2. NEVER take Poison Vulnerability, because it will kill you. Poison is already bad without this debuff, but gets super deadly after you take it. Vines become almost a guaranteed death. If you took it by accident or you’re clinically insane — always have an antidote in you hotbar. Fearful is pretty bad too, but avoiding getting hit is the core of combat, and the sight debuff goes away very fast. All the positive skills are pretty good, but Runner somewhat falls off. Acid blood will save you a lot (very good vs Banshee babies and Burning Villagers), and Third Eye is the best combat skill in the game.
3. Weakness only affects melee weapons and applies when you have less than one pip of stamina — take it. Weak Lungs increases stamina regen delay THREE times, which is so much worse. Scream can and will save you from death. But only if you’re used to opening the skills panel in panic. If you’re not, you’re better off taking the other two skills, yes, even Appetite. Careful Step is a must-take in any case.
4. Shaky Hands is ass. Forget about ever hitting anything with your pistol or AK. Don’t take it if you use those. Weak Regeneration gets counteracted by the abundance of healing items, but it may get you in some bad situations if you get hit often. Vitality is a must-take. That extra bit of health could easily be what stands between dying and living. Adrenaline is useless even in a melee-only run. It activates when you are one hit away from death and doubles your melee damage. Use this skill if you don’t want to stay alive. Chameleon is a lot like scream, pretty OP and will save you from death, but I always forget to use it. You can attack while invisible, just don’t walk.

Part 4. Items that are not weapons.

1. All the hallucinogens and food.

Put em in the stove, get absolutely riggedy wrecked with shroom soup. Red Eggs give a very good vision buff for 60 secs, non-healing pills and most of food items reduce stamina usage on sprinting. Odd meat after update 1.4 is super good, gives you stamina boost and defence boost, coupled with light armor it makes you ignore around 30-50% of damage. After you get all skills, start eating Odd meat (don’t forget that it spoils) whenever you get it.

1. Healing

The ultimate healing item is the mighty pill. It heals super fast, heals a lot, can be found pretty commonly and also removes poison. Always have 3-6 on you, have 9-12 overall.
Bandages should be converted into Bandages with Alcohol. This is more of a regeneration tool than a straight up heal. 45 seconds of continued healing, great if applied before a melee battle. I personally don’t use them at all apart from melee-only runs.
Healing items you get from skills or drinking from the well is just a way to tip off a little bit of missing health or to save better healing items.

1. Crafting Materials.

Pretty self-explanatory. Don’t hoard too much, but also don’t sell stuff you may need in a couple of days. Try to think a few days ahead — for example, I buy a pipe everyday, even if I won’t have a use for it in the early game. Hoard weapon parts to carry them to Chapter 2 — it’s the best way to transfer rep, and also a good way to get pump-action shotties.

1. Light sources.

Flashlights and torches are useless, sell em. Lantern is the GOAT, it’s super cheap so you can just have one on yourself all the time, and they stack like gas cans. Basically a necessity in Old Woods. Flares for Shadows, but don’t keep more than 10.

1. Expendables. Gas, Wood and Nails.

Trust me — you will always have enough.

1. Traps. Don’t use anything except for thrown empty bottles. You WILL step in your own bear traps. You may think that you won’t, that you’re clever and careful, and you WILL step in your own bear traps. Gas canisters and barrels are dangerous and awkward, sell em.
   
2. Misc.
   

Watch is good. Always have a watch with you. I suggest carrying your watch to Chapter 2, because you won’t find one immediately. Buy it from Trader if you want. Lock pick is good. Carry with you always too. Rubber Boots are good but you WILL die trying to get them. Always have Light armor if possible. It saved me multiple times. If you get a bugs night event make sure to get those Bug Shells.
Part 5. Items that are weapons.
I will just copy my rant on firearms here with some changes.

• Single-shot pistol. While it’s usefulness is quickly surpassed by the homemade shotgun, making crafting one a waste of resources, it’s a great enemy deleter in Dry Meadow (vs the huge dog in the corn field, for example). Take a free one from the starting chest and obliterate the next thing you see.
• Homemade shotgun. Absolute GOAT. This shells-saving, chomper-unaliving, you-don’t-die-if-you-miss-once baddie is a great way to spend your pipes and metal scrap. Kills everything in one shot, you have two. Have one on you and prioritize using it instead of ammo-consuming firearms when possible. You also aim super fast with it, allowing you to escape near-death situations more often. If you have only one shot left, I suggest having a second one of these in you hotbar for if you miss. Use it on red chompers, in panic situations you can shoot savages and huge dogs too.
• Pistol (handgun). Don’t rely on it. Use it against savages mostly, huge dogs if you don’t have an axe. You could really throw it away if Banshees didn’t exist. But as long as they do, it’s your go-to weapon for dealing with babies. Trying to use a half-empty pistol against a strong enemy or multiple enemies is a good way to die. If you have 1-2 shots left, just reload the damn thing.
• Hunting rifle. While crafting it is not a wise choice, you can get one for free from dog dad if you play your cards right. While suffering from having no magazine, thus forcing you to reload it every shot, and being hard to use in close combat, it still has a few redeeming qualities: you can use it as a sort of binoculars (aiming with it lets you see furthest in the game), sniping an unaware swamper or spooder; it uses it’s own, unique ammo type, which allows you to save precious shells. It doesn’t one-shot chompers, which is a huge downside, and can get you killed if used improperly, so it’s pretty much okay to skip it entirely.
• Single-shot shotgun. Your first reusable shotgun. Try not to use in Chapter 1 to save shells for the Swamp, homemade shotties will carry you easily. But have one in any case. If you have no pipes, this is the thing that removes chompers in chapter 1.
• Double-barrel. It’s an overall upgrade over the previous shotgun - double the capacity. If you play correctly, you’ll upgrade you workbench to max level on day 1-3 in the swamp. Skip it.
• PUMP ACTION SHOTGUN. Easily the strongest weapon in the game. You can delete 8 of literally any enemy with it without reloading. As long as you conserve your shells, hit your shots, you will never die with this weapon. Also crafting it gives you 8 shells for free. Craft it multiple times. Be mindful when carrying two of these – better put both in the hotbar or you risk to run out of shells in a bad situation
• Assault rifle. Use it for Inferno or Radio tower.

Throwables are molotovs and gas bottles.

• Gas bottles are a great boon for a skill-less run. Best suited for a reactive defense play-style, you throw this at the barricade which is being attacked and the attacker dies while barricade suffers no damage from the gas. You can skip these otherwise.
• Molotovs are very strong, but also very dangerous. Missing a molotov throw leaves you exposed, and potentially also sets you on fire. Don’t use them at night, especially if staying in one room, you will destroy you own barricades and kill yourself. The best way to use these is on unaware enemies and groups of enemies.

Melee. Melee combat is a lot more dangerous, which makes focusing on it ill-advised in a nightmare run. However, you are forced to use melee in the beginning, so… I see no point in discussing anything other than the shovel and the axe.

• Shovel is good. Try to make it in Dry Meadow, or you will get killed by savages in Silent Forest. It is very slow with good reach, so rely on its range. It also starts serving as a tool for digging. I suggest digging up 8 shells and tubular magazine in underground entrance after you craft it.
• Axe is better. This is what you kill huge dogs and dormant chompers with. Possibly savages too. It has insane damage (more than two pistol shots worth), quick wind-up, but small range. Always upgrade from shovel to axe.

Part 6. Enemies and what you kill them with.
You can molotov anyone that doesn’t see you. You have a chance to miss otherwise.

• Dog – plank, shovel.
• Huge Dog – axe, pistol, hunting rifle, shovel if no other options.
• Elk – full pistol magazine.
• Savages (no stick) – preferably pistol, shovel if confident.
• Stick savage — same as huge dog.
• Chomper, Centipede – shotgun.
• Swamper – shotgun or hunting rifle.
• Spider-Man – pretty much anything long-range, it’s health is pretty small.
• Banshee – look at it scream, then remove its’ babies with pistol.

You can try to kill stronger enemies with weaker weapons/melee, but it will get you killed and you don’t really need to save shells. You will always have enough ammo if you’re even a little mindful about it.
In Chapter 2, just shotgun everything except Banshees. If you’re somehow low on shells, pistol Banshees, Human Spiders, Huge Dogs and Savages. As I said, use AK for Inferno night event and for Radio Tower (not necessary, just the best place to use this gun).
Final Part. Locations.

1. Dry Meadow — collect all resources, remove enemies with a plank. Remove groups of dogs with molotovs, remove huge dog in the cornfield with either a single-shot pistol, molotov or mad skillz. Wedding is pretty unnecessary. You don’t need to take alcohol for Bikeman with you, there will be a bottle in the next hideout.
2. Silent Forest — call Bikeman and give him happiness juice, then leave the hideout so the bag appears near the workbench. Nights can kill you now. The real threat are Huge Dogs and Savages. Don’t save you Pistol ammo, use it on them if they come in pairs. Actually shoot even single ones, even with Homemade shotgun, survival is a priority.
3. Old Woods. Don’t come here without a shotgun and a lantern. Shadows will get you killed in this hideout if you have no flares. Go to Doghouse, break a wooden door with a weapon or molotov, and meet Wolfman. Get your quest rewards and go to Doc’s house for the axe. DON’T go to church basement, even if you win the dream. It’s a super deadly place that offers very little reward, no need to put yourself under so much risk. Throw excess glass bottles on the floor in the hideout, you won’t be taking them to Chapter 2 anyway. This hideout is considered to be the hardest in the game. It’s possible to be attacked by four chomper at once, so don’t stay there longer than necessary.
4. Swamp. DON’T go to Great Lake. You can’t see shit, water is everywhere, and there’s like 10 chompers, half of them with black goo, who will attack you all simultaneously after you fire once. There’s also a bug when some of these chompers become immune to damage forever. You will die and get no boots. Try to upgrade your workbench to max as fast as possible. Best pliers locations are — Swamp Village (beware of Chomper with black goo, use Third Eye here), Junkyard (Pyotrek’s corpse) and Holes. You will also get all these locations marked on the map pretty early. Craft your pump shotty and win the game.

So there you have it. I hope some people will find this guide useful. Good luck!

For no discernible reason , despite not downloading a mod that turn ballistics into Projectiles , my game turns like that .Can anyone tell me if any of my mods are responsible ? .I am desperate for help .
​
Perfect landscape
.44 Magnum Double Resolution
.45 Pistol
Tactical Reload
Alternate Settlements
10mm Anims
10mm World Model Resized
12 Potted Trees
1911C
2287_Billboards and posters
2k Workstation
4K Posters retexturer
4K Textures
4k Adjustable Wrench ReplacePristine
65SeriesPistolsversion)-57194-1-0-1641644757.rar
9mm Pistol (Browning Hi-Power)
A New SteamPunk Camera Replacer
ADS No Fire Delay
AER15
AK Build Menu
AKM Complex
Nuka
ASE
Accuracy International AX50
AccurateHipFire
Achievements
Addres Library
Advanced Bubble Turret Set
Advanced Settlement Turret Set
Alien Toy
Alien UFO Retexture
All Double Action
All The Starcores
All-in-One Pack
Ammo Counter Framework
Ammo Retexture
Animated Ingestibles
Animated Radaway
AnotherOne CyberOut 77
AnotherOne IMI Uzi Addon
AnotherOne M1 Carbine
AnotherOne SKS Type 56
AnotherOne Soviet Assault Pack-
AnotherOne Sten
AnotherOne Sten MkII
AnotherOne Vanilla Weapon Replacer
Armor and Weapon Keywords Community Resource
Armorsmith Extended
Army Helmet Redux
Artillery - NMM Installer
Assault Marine Armor Retexture
AtomGreatnessMainFile
Attachment Pack
AutoDoors
B-35C
B.Y.O.P.
B85 Ham Radio Recruitment
BAM - Better Armory Mod
BFV M1918BAR
BFV PPK w
BFV Bonus Sidearm
BH Combat Knife
BH Kar98k- 4K-73799-1-0-1692161246.7z
BH_Kar98k - Tactical Reload Patch
Baka ScrapHea
Bakery ESL
Ballistic Weave Unlocked
BallisticWeaveStandardized
Battlefield 1 Animation Pack
Beretta M9A3
Better Bricks 4k
Better Duffle Bag Retexture
Better Quarry Sights
Better Rubble
Better Settlers
BetterCompanions
Bobbleheads
Bonsai ESP
Boston Area
Boston South
Bridges and Stairs
Brighter Settlement Lights
Brotherhood Fatigues 4k Texture
Buffout 4
Build High
Buildable Burning Campfires and Fireplaces
Buildable Lighthouse
Bullet Casings Redone
Bullet Counted Reload
Bullet Time - Slow Time
Burning Fusion Core Green
Burst Impact Blast
Business Settlements
CC's FUHD Institute Laser Weapons
CC's FUHD Sentry Bots
CC's UHD APC
CC's UHD Bloatflies
CC's UHD Power Armor Stations
CROSS_BreakActionLaser
CROSS_Jetpack
CS Beds
CS SnB
CW 10mm Pistol
CabinInTheWoodsMain
Cambridge Area
Canary
Capital Wasteland Workshop Master Pack
Caravan Shotgun
Castle Deep Clean
CastleInTheSkyMain
Cheat Terminal
China Lake and Holorifle
Chop That Meat
Church wall Re texture
Classic Alien Blaster Restored
Classic Computers Replacer
Classic Ghouls Redux
Classic Unarmed Pack
Classic V.A.T.S.
Classic Vats Sounds
ClassicCombatArmor
ClassicSuperSledge
Clean Barns Unpainted
Clean Dinner
Clean Goodneighbor
Clean Red Rocket Textures
CleanSettlements
Cleaner Diamond City Indoor and Outdoor (Default Fog)
Cleaner Nuka-World Environment
Climbable Ladders 1.1 ESL - Workshop Framework
CoconutCreamify's Texture Overhaul - First Aid Kit
Color Map 4K with Magazines and Bubbleheads
Colt Python
Colt_Single_Action_Army
Commonwealth Trash Collection
Commonwealth_coins
Companion Armor Buff Ring
Companion Fall Damage Immunity
Companion Infinite Ammo
Components Redone
Corvega Assembly Plant
Craftable Animated Flagpoles
Craftable GrassBushVine
Craftable Turret Stands
Craftable Vault Elevator for DLC
Crafting Framework
Crafting Fury 9000 GTX
Crecy-8149-1Crecy-8149-1.7z
Crimsomrider's Unique Furniture
CriticalHitsOutsideofVATS
CyberOut Animation for Vanilla Swords
DC Guard Armor 4K
DLCCoast - Textures
DLCNukaWorld
DLCRobot
DLCworkshop01
DLCworkshop02
DLCworkshop03
DOOM's FAL Redux
DP-27 Degtyaryov
Danse GTFO Power Armor
Deadly Laser Weapons
Delightful Dead Fish HD - Healthy Version
Deliverer Clean PPK Texture
Diamond City Area
Diamond City Guard Armor Retexture
DiamondTheWall Retexture
DoF Removal
Dogmeat Follow Behind
Double Barrel - Less spread More range
Double Barrel Rifle Anims
Double Barrel Rifle
Draklores Toolboxes (Yellow)
Drinkable Water Retextured
Dynamic Lights and shadows
Eiffel Tower Paramount Telephone
Electrical Tower
Elevator RETEXTURE
Emissary of Wind Pre-War Books
Enemies Don't Shoot So Good 75 DLC
Expanded Ballistic Weave-6681
F4NV .44 Magnum 4K Textures
F4NV Colt SAA - Tactical Bullet Counted Reload
FAC paintings
FAR - Default Resolution
FG's Deliverer Animation Overhaul
FLO 1.35
FN FAL - SA58
FSK
FTO-Quarry 4K
FallUI - HUD
FallUI - Icon Library
FallUI - Inventory
FallUI - Map
Fallout 4 AI
Fallout 4 Combat Shotgun and Rifle retexture
Fallout 4 HD Reworked Project
Fallout Instrument Pack
Fallout Themed Custom Paintings
Fallout4 - Textures1
Fallout4 - Textures2
Fallout4 - Textures3
Fallout4 - Textures4
Fallout4 - Textures7
Fallout4 - Textures9
Far Harbor Pine branches
Farming Resources (vanilla icons)
Femshepping's Minimalist Homewares
Filled Brahmin Feed and Water Troughs
Fire Axe
Fire Extinguisher - Retexture
Firnedlldyy Wolves
Flat Spectacle Island
Fountain of Olympus
Fountains and statues
Friday the 13th
Friffy_Fixed Curtains
Friffy_Fixed Rugs v4
Full Dialogue Interface
Package-67458-0-1-1672891805.zip
Functional Fridge
Functional Objects
Galactic Zone Repair'd-
Gauss Rifle Anims
Gauss Rifle Remastered
GiddyupButtercup 8k
Gladius
Globes 2K
Goodneighbor Area
Gore Overhaul 3.0
Grounded
HD Fusion Generators
HD Raider Armor Retex
HD Vertibird 4K
HD prewar money pristine
HK G3 Family
HK USP .45(New)
HK USP
HQ Gothic Towns
HUD Perk Menu Green HD
HUDFramework
Hamed Bridge
HaulD Out 4K -
HiPoly Faces REDUX
High FPS Physics Fix
High Poly NPCs
His Kingdom Com
Homemade Bread7z
Homemaker
Hopefully Fixed Version
Hopefully Fixed Version
Hotchpotch
Human Commons Teeth
IWBA All In One
ImmersiveCandles
ImmersiveTeleportationz
ImmersiveVendors300
Installer
Ithaca Model 37
JaL - Just a Ladder-
Jersey Brahmin
Kalashnikov - Tactical Reload
Kalashnikov
KicksAndPunches
King's Paintings
Kraggles Structures
Kremvh's Tooth Replacer
Kukri
LC's Mirelurk King - 4k
LC's UHD Bloatfly Meat
LC's UHD Bloodrage Mirelurk
LC's UHD Brahmin
LC's UHD Brahmin Remains
LC's UHD Brahmin Skull
LC's UHD Commander Statue
LC's UHD Fungus Brain
LC's UHD Kirby Head Statue
LC's UHD Pickman's Paintings
LC's UHD Radroach
LC's UHD Vault-Tec Statues
Laser Garand Final I hope
Laser Garand Munitions Patch
Laser Reanimation
Lasers Have No Recoil
Lever Action Shotgun (Munitions)
Lever-Action Mini Attachmentpack
Lewis Gun 1.0.1
Long use jetpack
Longer Power Lines 3x
LongfellowCabinBridge
LooksMenu
Lore Accurate Holotape 4k
Lots More Male Hairstyles
Lucid's Texture Upgrades
Luger - Main File
Luger P08 - Munitions Patch
LunchBoxRetexture - Clean
Luxor's Greenery 2k
M1 Garand
M1 Garand Satisfying Reload Sound
M1 Garand
M1014
M1928A1 Thompson
M2 Flamethrower
M2019 PKD Detective Special
M203
M24 Stielhandgranate
M26replacer
M29 Devil Revolver
M79 Grenade Launcher
MG42 Munitions
MG42
MIA
MMP4APA
MP-412
MW Combat Knife
MW RPG-7
Machete
Madminute
Makeshift Texturesz
Mannlicher 1905
Manufacturing Extended
Marlin Model 336
Martini Henry ICI
Materials bat
Mickey C's Yellow Flight Helmet Retexture
Militarized Minutemen - FOMOD Installation
Minutemen Arsenal (version 1.0.0)
Minutemen Takeover - Nuka World
Misc Melee Weapons
Mod Configuration Menu
Modern Replacer - Alarm Clock
Modern Replacer - Blowtorch
Modern Replacer - Butane Tank
Modern Replacer - Car Battery
Modern Replacer - Cement
Modern Replacer - Cloth
Modern Replacer - Rubbe
Modern Shipping Containers 2.0 Lore Friendly
Moon_Retexture
More Colorful Harvest Compilation
More Colorful Potted Plants
More Quest Dungeons
MoreEnemies
More_Minutemen-27251-1-1More_Minutemen-27251-1-1.zip
Multiple Followers Overhaul
Munitions - Additional Ammo
Munitions - An Ammo Expansion
Mutfruit Pies
NNA NAC - NMM Installer
Natural Landscapes 4K
Neo-Classic Nuka Cola
New Garage Cart
NewlyPaintedRobots
No Industrial Smoke
No Limits Jetpack
No Smoldering Turrets (ESL)
NorthlandDiggers
Nuclear Football
Nuka-Cola Machine Retexture
Nuka-World AK Replacer
ODW - Winchester Model 1873
Officer's revolver - Revolvers Reposition Patch
Officer's revolver
Old Robotics Overhaul
Oppressor's Alarm Clock
Oppressor's Typewriter
PAframe4k
PCPO - Power Conduits and Pylons Overhaul
PEACEKEEPER
Pavillons ESP
Peacekeeper LE and Craftable Addon
Peacemaker Western Revolver replacer
Pet Any Dog
Pickaxe
PigAAM1911
Pip Boy 2000
Pip-Boy Flashlight
Pipe Guns Are Still Guns
Pipe gun Reanimation
PipeGaloreMainFile-
Piper's Outfit Retexture
Place (Fallout4 1.10.163 - latest release)
Plasma Gun Reanimationip
Ponds ESP with custom Water
Pool Table HD - Green and Natural
PortRoyalMain
Power Armor Animation Changes
Power Armor to the People
Power Generator ReTexture
Pre War Workshop
Pre-War Codsworth
PreWarTextures
Prisoner Shackles
Pristine Workshop Assets
PrivateVertibirdEN220
Projectile v7
Protectron HD 4K
ProtoVaultSuit
Prydwen 2K
Queen of Hearts F4NV
RAW INPUT
RPG-7
Rad-X Buff for Fallout 4
Raider Armors Retextured
Railroad Uniform
RailroadRedone
Raze My Settlement
Real Throwing Weapons
Realistic Bar Items Pack
Realistic Radstags - Healthy
Realistic Roads - 4K
Reanimated Stimpak
Reapers Munitions Additional Ammo Patches
Reapers Munitions Patches
Red Shift PA
Redder Rocket 4K
Remington Model 11
Remington New Army Revolver and Carabine
Remote Explosives - Long Toss
Remote Explosives
Remove Interior Fog
Remove Ugly Flat Trash
Renovated Decorations
Renovated Furniture
Repaired Sanctuary Bridge
Reptilic DeathClaws
Retexture MainFile
Retro Fashion Main File
Retro Fashion PIP-Pad Patch
Retro Radio Replacer
Reverb and Ambiance Overhaul - ALL DLC
Right-Handed Far Harbor Lever Action Replacer
Right-Handed Hunting Rifle
Right-handed Lever Action Replacer
Rio Grande
Ripper Proper 1 Handed Animation
Roads Redone
RobCo Patcher
RobCo Recon Scope Replacer
Robot Armor Retexture 4K (Black)
Rocks and Trees
Rubblerock Redone
S.R.O. - Syringe Overhaul
SAA Revolver Fanning
SKSType56Addon1
SLRMainVersion
SOU All in one
SREP Redux
STRAC Hats - ANZAC Hat
SW Laser Bolts-25509-SW Laser Bolts-25509-.zip
SW Model 1905
Salvage Beacons
Sandbag Fortifications and Workshop Rearranged
SavrenX Creature Pack DLC REDONE
SavrenX Detailed Hair
SavrenX Food and Foodware
SavrenX HD 1K Buildings and Interior
SavrenX HD DLC Armor and Clothes
SavrenX HD Junk and Props DLC
SavrenX HD Settlement and Clutters DLC
SavrenX HD Settlement and Clutters
SavrenX HD Vanilla Armor
SavrenX HD Vanilla Landscape
SavrenX Organic Gore
SavrenX Organic Super Mutant-
SavrenX Synth HD
SavrenX Weapon HD DLC
Scavver's Backpacks
Schofield No.2-
Sci-Fi and Retro Paintings
Scrap Battle Rifle
Scrap Everything
See Through Scopes
Select Guitars
Select Revolver
Select Shotgun
Service Pistol Munitions
Service Rifle - Unofficial Update
Service Rifle
Settlement Electricity Overhaul
Settlement Frontiers
Settlement Objects Expansion Pack - All DLC
SettlementMenuManagerMainFile
Shaw Monument 4k
Showers ESL
SilentTurrets
Simply Water
Singing Settler
SinsGears
Sjogren Inertia
Small Town Shovel
Smoke And Flames Enhanced
Snap'n Build 2.0
SnapBeds
Snappy Housekit
Snappy_DLC03
Solar Power Version
Solar Street Lamps
Springfield Armory M1A-
Springtime Trees
Sprint Reload
Sprint Stuttering Fix
Squire Outfit-4737-1-12Squire Outfit-4737-1-12.rar
Stackable Brick Walls and Foundations
Sten And Friends Munitions
Sten Reanimation Redux
Stimpak Friendly NPCs ESL - Repariable Robots and Nick
Stimpaks help you breathe
Stone Workshop Objects
Stop Being a Burden
Sweetroll 5000 CLEAN
Swimming ESL
T 65 Power Armor
T454kUHD
Tactical Military Equipment
Tactical Reload Framework
Teddy Bear
Television Replacer
Textures
That Gun
The Eyes of Beauty Fallout Kaleidoscope Edition
The Laser Garand
The Laser RCW
The M2019 PKD Detective Special
The Master Plan
The Most Immersive Coffee Mod
The Tyrolean Landesknecht
The View
Thematic and Practical
Tidy Settlers
Toggle Revolver Fanning
Tomahawk
Traps Be Gone
Trash Be Gone - DLC
True Storms
UPDATE Attack A and B Together
Ultimate Window Overhaul (Main Version)
Ultra Interior Lighting
Unarmed Animations Redone
Under the Hood
Unicorn Farts and Godrays
Unlimited Companion Framework
Unlimited Followers
Unlimited Sprint
Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch
Untinted Scope Vision
Usable Wasteland Sink
Useful Grenades z
V1. New Bottle Caps Tin
VE Main-10032-2-6VE Main-10032-2-6.rar
VG Double Barrel
VOT - Increased VATS Distance
VUWR - Alternative Edition
VWSO - Double Barrel Shotgun Sound Replacer
Varmint Shotgun
Version
Version
Very Small Generators (10000)
Viking Battle Axe
Vintage Pistol MUNITIONS
Vintage Pocket Watch
Vintage Revolver Rifle
Vintage Shotgun
Visible Galaxy - Stars Sold Seperately
VividFallout - Landscapes - BestChoice
VividFallout - Rocks
Volkssturmgewehr - Radium Rifle Replacer
Volkssturmgewehr -TR
Volkssturmgewehr
WD_CR_Anims
WD_Katan
Walking Dead Ghouls Animation Fix
WareHouseExt
Warehouse Shelves for components and ammo
Warehouse4K
Wasteland Chaingun
Wasteland Imports
Wattz Laser Gun
We Are The Minutemenr
Wearable Backpacks and Pouches
Webley
West-Tek Optic Pack
Western Duster
Where Are You Now
Whirligig Sentry
Winterized Far Harbor
Wireless Power
Wolves Of The Commonwealth
Wooden Crate and Wooden Barrel
Workshop Decorations Pack
Workshop Framework
Workshop Plus
Workshop Workbench Marker
X-014KUHD
XM2010
XPR and Python
Xnjguy Filled Mods ALL in One
Yao Guai 2k
You and What Army - More Minutemen Patrols
You wash it you wash it you wash it
Zap Gun
betterbehemoth-24179-1betterbehemoth-24179-1.rar
broadsider hd-31611-1broadsider hd-31611-1.rar
cVc Dead Wasteland 6
clean_faction_flags_(bos_vanilla)
cryohd-31564-1cryohd-31564-1.rar
dinomore
dp T51 Renewal
dp buff_rad
dp inhalers
dp psycho_medr
f4nv 44 attapck patch
from plastic to metal-21296-from plastic to metal-21296-.rar
g2m_Workshop
hzy-newfurniture
hzy-newfurniture.
hzy-taffinton remake-original interior version
lever action rifle replacer
lewis gun munitions
m60
mbff-53153-1-1625855686mbff-53153-1-1625855686.zip
newmusket-
nominiglow
oDo Reanimated Laser Pistol
paintpeelingconcrete RETEXTURE
personal vertibird
t604kUHD
wd_mp5
All Weapons Hitscan
DOOMBASED's That Gun - Revolvers Reposition Patch
F4NV .44 Magnum
Workshop Rearranged
Quick Draw 2.0 - Tactical Reload
​

I am looking for a saw (miter, plunge, table, something else?) and I'm having trouble making the right choice for the tasks I want to do.
A bit of context: I have been fortunate enough to buy a house together with my girlfriend. We are going to do a lot ourselves when it comes to woodworking. I already have some experience with that, and I find it a pleasant material to work with. For the house, we will be making: (building) cabinets, a built-in bench at the dining table, an outdoor pergola, a greenhouse, a woodshed, and I will be converting my garage into partial storage (bicycles, etc.) and additionally my graphic/woodworking workshop with homemade cabinets, desks, workbenches. In addition, I make my own frames that I use for my artworks (graphic prints on handmade paper).
I will be working a lot with plywood and MDF, but I notice that I am increasingly (if the budget allows) working with hardwood. For outdoor projects, I will mainly be using typical outdoor wood.
I have access to a Festool plunge and table saw that I can borrow from my father. I'm thinking that a miter saw (which I then also own) could help me immensely, but I'm unsure if this is the right choice, hence this post.
It is important for me to be able to work very precisely, using certain joineries. In addition, it is important to me that the saw has good dust extraction because I also do graphic work in this space (equipment that doesn't handle fine dust very well). I will make a separation between the 'dirty' and 'clean' parts, but I still want to minimize dust dispersion as much as possible.
I am currently looking at Festool miter saws (Kapex 60 or 120 — good Lord, what a price), because I already have a Festool vacuum cleaner and the combination of the saw and vacuum cleaner provides the best dust extraction. In addition, they are very precise and I am used to them from home.
I would love to hear your experienced opinions, thanks in advance for your time. :)

I believe that the old recoil and balance of the weapon were better than the current one and I’ll tell you why:
1.Change of recoil: The change of recoil was supposed to remove scripters from the game. But the problem is that they haven't gone away. And if earlier, knowing how to shoot with a weapon, you had equal chances against a scripter, now they are not equal. Now you need to control the return, but besides that there is also game spread. And here’s the catch: in addition to the weapon’s recoil, you also need to try to control the game’s recoil (that is, when shooting, you don’t understand whether you’re not “drawing” the pattern of the weapon correctly or is it a game spread), while as a scripter you don’t need to control anything. He simply takes aim, confident that he will hit with the next round. And by the way, game dispersion is a huge problem in terms of training. Previously, when shooting, I saw where the bullet was flying and tried to train it, but now I don’t understand this, because there is randomness in the game. And the developers did this, as they say, in order to simplify the game for beginners. So if you decide to simplify the game for beginners, then why do 2 different returns in a crouch and standing? Accordingly, a beginner needs to train 2 recoil patterns, while a scripter does not need to train anything.
And because of this same pattern, you more closely equate the conditions of an experienced player and a beginner, but at the same time you should not forget about the scripter. That is, earlier, with experience, you could kill both a beginner and a scripter, but now it is much more difficult to kill a beginner, and it is practically impossible to kill a scripter.
And as a conclusion, I’ll give the example of m249: In the context of the game, this is a very expensive weapon, and with the help of this weapon, raids are mainly used because the conditions of use did not allow playing with it in open areas. But for this (before) you received an accurate and powerful weapon that could kill from a great distance. And now this is a gun with a completely random pattern, which doesn’t even make sense to use, because with the same AK you will do much more damage and the AK still allows you to move, unlike the m249

1. Weapon balance: I'll be honest, I think that due to the change in recoil and change in damage, weapons now have no balance at all. I will give examples of old weapons: MP5, Thompson and SMG. MP5 dealt 35 damage and had 600 BBM. Thompson 38 damage and 462 BBM and SMG 30 damage and 600 BBM. That is, the MP5 has 21,000 damage per minute, the Thompson has 17,556 damage, and the SMG has 18,000. What are the disadvantages of these weapons: MP5 is made on the 3rd workbench and is not designed for long distances. Thompson - the least damage of all weapons, more expensive than the SMG. SMG - not designed for long distances. What are the advantages of the weapon: MP5 - A lot of damage and relatively inexpensive (compared to the AK which has 22500 damage). Thompson - shoots very far due to the flight of the bullet. SMG - more damage than Thompson and cheaper than all of the above. That is, previously, because of wearing a Thompson, you “paid” with less damage, but at the same time received a huge attack range. The SMG is very strong, but only at close range; at a distance it did almost no damage. And the MP5 has a huge amount of damage and is quite versatile, but it was farther away than the SMG, more than the Thompson. Quite balanced, I think.

And now as it is now: Thompson is an absolute randomness, which you simply cannot predict, at long distances you can only shoot with 1 round, SMG is even worse than Thompson, because it’s the same randomness, but at the same time you also have a distance you won't cause any damage. And MP5 now deals 38 damage and has a burst module... That is, in HQM mask it kills with 3 rounds, in burst mode. This means that at close range it will not even give a chance to a player with AK. Because the MP5 has 1 BPS (bullet per second), and the AK has 0.75. So this is also true without burst mode, it has 1 air force, and with burst mode 1.5, that is, 2 times more than the AK. And at the same time, with the help of this burst mode, she can now shoot at longer distances compared to Thompson. And don't forget that there is SAR. And then the question arises: why do I need an SMG or a Thompson if I can learn SAR and have a better chance of outshooting an MP5. Although, with all this, I consider the SAR to be a generally “not healthy” gun. Previously, for 40 damage you paid with huge returns, but now you just tap with her the same way as with Thompson, only she has more damage and is cheaper. And at point-blank range it is quite possible to shoot a Thompson and an SMG with it, because, I repeat, the bullets of the Thompson generally fly along an inadequate trajectory. Accordingly, there is no point in walking around with a Thompson if you have SAR. Because the more versatile the weapon, the stronger it is.
I would like to add some thoughts about the homemade machine gun, but overall it’s just worse than the M249.
I love this game very much and in total I have played +- 9000 hours. It is on the Aim servers that there are 3000 hours. And I believe that I have something to share. I understand that this is a survival game and PVP is an integral part of the game. And the old return, although it was complex, but it equalized the chances of a cheater, a macro player and just a strong player among themselves in PVP. And just for beginners, it would be possible to increase the damage of the SAR or reduce the recoil of the SMG.
Thank you for your attention!
#Rust#Facepunch

Mister Haddock was always my least favourite teacher in Grade Ten. Balding, stoved-faced little man with a ratty ponytail behind his near naked pink skull. He was the only teacher I never saw smile or laugh, even around other teachers or adults. He was never even nice when parents came to visit – never had that put-on warmth most teachers do. With his diminutive stature and small miserable face, he looked like one of the seven dwarves from Snow White, if one of the seven dwarves were a closet alkie. He’d never let you go to the bathroom during class, whether it was an emergency or not, even if you were a girl. And if you requested an extension for an assignment – whether it was because you were sick, someone in your family had died, or you had to be excused for your soccer or football game – he would just respond with, “No” and “That’s tough.” As you can imagine, I wasn’t the only kid at John Haggert High School who harboured a grudge for the surly little troll of the JH High science department.
What really made the situation worse was that Mister Haddock taught science, a class in which I had to excel if I wanted to pursue my postsecondary dream of studying to become a veterinarian. Cliché, I know, but I’ve always loved animals and wanted desperately to understand and help them as best I could. That was another sticking point between Mister Haddock and I; he refused to give good marks no matter how hard you tried or how well you followed his instructions. “When you give me something good enough to get an A in university, I’ll give you an A,” he’d groan, his tired refrain to any nagging student. Like that was a reasonable bar to set for a high school junior or freshmen. Just my luck, Mister Haddock also taught Grade Eleven biology, another necessary course on my journey to guiding sick and dying pets into the afterlife.
And that’s another thing about Mister Haddock that bothered me; he clearly hated his job. I’d always planned on becoming a teacher as a back-up plan, especially since I’d always loved school. I was always on the honour roll, on at least three school teams, in multiple clubs, elected student rep for each grade I was in until making school president in Grade Twelve and would later be valedictorian. But Mister Haddock always acted like he’d rather be doing anything other than teach at our school. Like this job was somehow beneath him. Just for context, John Haggert High School is in the Meadowville neighborhood of Aakoziwin, the safest city in Ontario and one of the safest places in all of Canada – which would put in running for safest metropolitan area on the planet. It’s a bustling suburban town with lots to do, especially being so close to Toronto. Our school is neck and neck with Caramel Mountain Secondary for national reputation and university acceptances. We have one of the best hockey teams, one of the best arts and music programs, and are among the top performers in math and literacy. Our building is the typical squat, two-floor, lengthwise cinderblock affair, but our hallways are adorned with gorgeous wall murals painted by the arts students, festooned with colourful and accurate dioramas of the Globe Theatre, Greek coliseums, and DNA models. So why did Mister Haddock act like he was stocking the shelves at a grocery store? Why did he treat us like we were all riffraff, as my Uncle John would say?
The last straw that broke this camel’s back came when he docked me ten percent for being two days late on an assignment. My grandmother was in the hospital from a massive stroke, which is what caused me to be late. My mother had made sure to call reception to explain the situation on the very first day I was away from school. And even after I provided him with two letters, one from my parents, the other from the hospital, and even though all my other teachers accepted my homework without penalty, Mister Ian Warren Haddock refused to budge.
“Look,” he grunted, visibly cornered behind his particleboard desk, me standing before him with hands on hips, pleading my case. Demanding an explanation. “Look, I’ve already imputed the mark into the database and sent it out to the department head. I can’t change it right now. It’ll make me look bad.” I could feel my eyes grow moist. How could he do this to me? Me! Jennifer Wang Li, Grade Ten student rep and future saviour of all furry four-legged creatures!
Feebly, without meeting my misty gaze, he mumbled, “At least your gran’s alive, right? Isn’t that all that matters?”
Using my grandmother stroke against me? Trying to browbeat me away from demanding what was mine by guilting me into not appreciating my own family?
At this, I didn’t yell, didn’t storm off. Didn’t even bother complaining to my parents or the principal’s office. Instead, I coolly sat down at my lab table, and began plotting my petty revenge against Mister Haddock.
I knew all about the pranks kids pull on their teachers. The homemade stink bomb. The head in the jar. The dreaded toothpick in the door lock. I wasn’t about to bother with anything as cute or clever. During the lunch period, when I knew Mister Haddock was two kilometres away having a smoke near Meadow Woods Park, I would creep into the lab and simply swipe all his test papers and homework. I knew he wouldn’t bother keeping them secure, and even with the gas valves, there was a good chance the dope would leave the laboratory unlocked (he’d done so several times before).
In so many ways, it would be the perfect revenge; he’d have to admit to leaving the room unsupervised and unsecured, going against school policy and regulation, landing him in hot water with the office. Maybe even resulting in his eventual termination. And, when he asked the students to redo the test, someone would eventually complain to the school or a parent, resulting in him admitting that he’d lost the test papers, which would likewise get him in trouble – or at least so I figured at the time. He’d know what it was like to be punished for something that was not his fault. At least, not exactly his fault. To have every excuse in the world, only for each of them to fall on stone-deaf ears. It was perfect. I just had to be careful; I knew there were cameras in the hallways, but as far as I could tell, there was no surveillance in the classrooms themselves.
I snuck inside the unmanned lab at a quarter past noon. With the lights out and in the scant fluorescent glow bleeding in from the hallway through the open door, the lab looked almost eerie: the long tables, eye wash station, beakers, tongs and burners redolent of the abode of Doctor Jekyll in the movies. As though the lab were in preparation of some macabre, unnecessary surgery. But maybe that was just my imagination running away with me. I crept toward Mister Haddock’s desk. Sure enough, there were the unguarded test papers, lain plainly on the blotter.
Armed with the papers and loads of time before the vodka-reeking deadbeat returned, I felt compelled to poke around. Perhaps I’d find a pack of smokes or a micky of cheap rye lying around, getting Mister Haddock into some real trouble.
My curiosity piqued, I rounded the corner at the back and entered the supply closet, placing the test papers to the side. It was where they kept the textbooks, beakers, bunsen burners, and items meant to be hidden from teenage eyes. But no matter how hard I squinted or how furiously I rummaged through the boxes and bins, there were no incriminating objects for me to find. Not even a single cigarette butt.
I was about to turn and leave with my pillaged bounty when I spotted the slightest of movements out of the corner of my eye. Startled, I held my breath and jumped a bit before peering harder to the back of the closet. There, the slight movement, or trick of the light remained, just perceptible in the dark little room. It was so slight – a dribbling motion, that at first my brain registered a lava lamp. But that didn’t make sense; why would there be a lava lamp in a science lab? Much less one plugged in on a storage closet shelf.
I advanced further to inspect what lay at the back and that’s when I saw it. The most eldritch or horrors, like something straight from a pulp magazine. It was a two-foot anatomical model, showing the muscles and internal organs from the small intestine to the eyeballs. A jarring sight to begin with, but this particular model – it was bleeding. I mean, actively bleeding, pulsating with blood that dripped from red crevices and apertures, staining the beige metal platform on which it stood. My mind whirled at the sickening visual before me. How could that be? Wasn’t the model made of silicone? Not flesh or bone, surely. Unbelieving, I examined the ghastly little model, looking around to find some sort of power cord – certain this was some optical illusion or trick of the light. No such luck. As best I could tell, this was nothing but a regular artificial figurine. No means of moving – or in this case bleeding – on it own.
At my wits end to try and explain this thing before me, adrenaline barrelling through my veins, I deigned to touch the scarlet flow coming off it, getting some it on my fingertips. The wet sensation was enough to flip my stomach, but when I brought the smeared fingers to my nose, I discovered the unmistakable metallic odour of blood. It was real. As real as it could be. I looked down and saw the dark liquid begin to drip over the shelf’s edge onto the floor. Numb from scalp to chin, I peered back up at the vinaceous, pulsating face, at the fake blues eyes stuck to the front of the skull. The eyes which had somehow remained uncovered by the pouring crimson. They had been staring blindly away from me, but then, at that very moment, they came alive and swivelled around to glare at me. I shrieked before turning and fleeing from the lab, leaving Mister Haddock’s papers on the shelf where I’d lain them.
That night I couldn’t sleep. And the next day I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t chat with my friends or join them at any of our clubs. I just couldn’t get the image of that bleeding anatomical model out of my mind’s eye. And I couldn’t quiet the questions racing through my bewildered brain – those compelling echoes dinning off the inner walls of my skull. How could a silicone model’s inner working cause it to bleed like that? Or appear to bleed? Why did the fluid smell so unmistakably like blood? Why did I only see it bleeding like that after class had been dismissed? In the name of God, why was something like that in the science lab at all?
Resolved on getting to the bottom of this, I first had to be sure that what I saw wasn’t a mere figment of my imagination. To prove I wasn’t going crazy, I recruited my friend Jacqueline to come along with me the next lunch break, when Mister Haddock had gone out for his smoke. Having not been told the exact reason for sneaking into the science lab, Jackie giggled as I towed her along, inferring in whispers that our secret mission was owing to a crush I wanted to impart on her away from prying eyes and ears.
But when we arrived, the lab was closed. The yellow on gray stainless-steel doors were shut, the wooden door stop lying on the floor, discarded. I tried the handles, but it was no use. The hygienic doors wouldn’t budge. Mister Haddock hadn’t bothered locking up the lab since early September. Did he notice his test papers had been moved and got spooked?
Of course, Jacqueline balked at my expense, demanding I just tell her what this was all about. She then grew petulant when I insisted it was nothing, refusing, in her mind, to include her in what she was certain was a juicy bit of gossip.
We were then startled by a gruff voice growling behind us: “You two better move along.”
Startled out of our skin, we both spun on our heels, finding the groundskeeper, Mister Fanu, standing before us. He’d come up on us without a sound. He was a short compact man with a shapeless face behind black framed spectacles, today wearing his usual navy-blue coveralls. From his tan leather weightlifter’s belt hung a ring of what looked to be a thousand keys, like a silvery fist by his waist. “You shouldn’t be hanging out here now,” he grunted, his voice hoarse and low like dead leaves in the wind. He then proceeded into the mantra of all on or off duty school employees patrolling the halls, telling us to either go to the Caf or outside until the next bell. Neither intimidated or especially servile, Jacqueline droned her acquiescence and shuffled off without me, rolling her eyes before getting completely out of sight. Still with some resolve for my mission, I lingered. But what remained of my gumption withered under Mister Fanu’s icy parental stare.
But as I walked away, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that the janitor had not departed the hallway. He was standing on the spot like a sentry, presumably watching me go. As if he were guarding the lab. The hairs on the back of my neck sufficiently stood on end, I turned around, finding that he was not staring after me, but rather facing the laboratory doors, as though waiting to be let in. Lastly, I noticed his hands, which were wringing and wiping themselves on a dirty black rag. On his hands, unmistakably, was a shiny, visibly wet red liquid. Blood?
Terrified, fixated, but nonetheless afraid of being spotted, I turned the corner into the adjacent stairwell. But instead of descending the steps to the main floor, I waited. When I returned to the hallway, poking my head out but not my torso from around the corner, I saw that one of the doors to the lab was ajar, and the lights within were now on. Mister Fanu was no longer there.
On rubbery legs, I inched over to the cracked door and peered inside. Squeezing myself in, first my head then shoulders then one limb at a time, I felt my heart thundering in my chest, expecting at any moment to be pulled aside by an irate Mister Haddock who would proceed to chide me. But instead, all I found was the empty, brightly lit room, and a maddening odour assaulting my nostrils.
It was the common coppery smell of blood from before but now fetid and miry like a century-old field of cow manure. Like something excreted not from anything as natural as cattle or other livestock but from something otherworldly. From something evil.
I pinched my nostrils and breathed through my nose but that hardly worked to stymy the eldritch stench. But now my senses were alerted to another disturbance, a bizarrely pleasant sound issuing from the supply closet. The sound of waves. Reminding me of my last summer vacation at Myrtle Beach, I heard the distinct lapping of waves crashing onto a sandy shore. Oh sure, it might have just been from a video or an audio file, but something about the enormity and clarity of the sound was indisputably real. I then had tinnitus in my left ear, and had to steady myself on one of the workbenches from a palpable loss of equilibrium. It was as though I’d suddenly become sick. Or as if I’d been transferred from reality into a dream. It was then that I realized the sound of the waves was no longer emanating from the closet, but was all around me, churning around my head, sending me into a dizzy spell.
The putrid, rust smell was now overwrought, and again, Mister Fanu was nowhere in sight. The crashing of the waves was then intermingled with a shrieking sound. It was small at first then swelled to a piercing wail. It wasn’t female or even human. Yes…Yes, I was certain it was an animal’s cry. Like a horse whinnying. Yes, exactly like the sound a horse would make. The voice was pained and sorrowing, as though the beast of burden were being whipped or driven into the ground. It was so terrible – so pitiful that my throat seized up and my heart ached. My mind throbbing from the assaulting soundscape swirling around – or perhaps inside – my head, I staggered toward the supply closet, grasping at stools and bench tables as I did so to not plummet to the floor. As I did, I wondered if this was what it was like to be on drugs.
I was just about to reach my hand out for the steel door handle, when all at once the encircling cacophony stopped, leaving a deafening quiet over the room. Backpedalling, tinnitus still in one ear, I regained my balance and stood up straight, standing stationary until a sudden crash from behind me – like a stool being knocked over – sent me flying out of the room and down the hallway to the stairwell. I was so terrified – so confused – I ran home without asking for leave, resulting in a two-day suspension. I was informed by one of the vice principals that if I was suspended again, I’d lose my student rep seat. But that would be the last of my troubles.
After being allowed back in school, I discovered my science class was moved to another room. Also, I never saw Mister Haddock again. First, there were a string of substitute teachers, some subbing internally from the science department – like Mister Abruzzo who taught Grade Twelve physics. Some were unfamiliar faces. All of them assigned nothing but work straight from the textbook or divvied out worksheets two or three grades below us. But eventually, much to the relief of my hovercraft, high-expectation-laden parents, we were assigned a full-time teacher, Miss Goldman, after the Christmas Break. Miss Goldman was young, energetic, and very knowledgeable. Most of my class was very happy to have her – especially as a replacement to gin-reeking Ian Haddock. Conversely, I was bricked up with anxiety, ruminating fretfully on what had happened to him. Had he really been let go? Was this somehow my fault? Or did it have something to do with that bleeding anatomical model I’d found in the supply closet? The one that had been replaced by another far less gory silicone figurine and had not been seen since that fateful day? And on what on earth was the cause of all those noises I’d heard the last time? What did those have to do with Haddock or the bleeding model?
Worse was that sound I heard that had cut through the muffling waves. The sound of the whinnying horse, the torment and desperation plain in that voice. I know this won’t make sense to you reading this, but the sound haunted me. Made me tear up every time I thought of it. The thought that something so cruel could be happening to animal here at JH High – just, just drove me insane. Eventually, either driven by guilt for Mister Haddock’s firing or the compulsion seeded by that hideous apparition, I went to visit the science department office. But as it turned out, they had meant to speak to me.
Mister Schmeling, the head of the science department who taught Grade Eleven Chemistry, told me he’d been waiting for me when I arrived. This was a bit unnerving since I’d never had a class with him and also owing to the fact that he had neither a warm nor jocular demeanour. Bald and bespectacled with tufts of iron-grey around his ears, a rotund physique and wobbling gait, he reminded most students of a cartoon villain than an approachable teacher. He motioned me to an empty seat with a curt nod of his head.
“So, Jennifer, dear,” he began in his ice-box timbre. “I’ve been meaning to speak with you for some time.” He then began to plow through the typical teacher questions, usually reserved for guidance councillors during one-on-one consultations.
He then got to the meat of the conversation. “It’s come to my attention recently that you’ve been going into the Grade Ten science lab by yourself after lesson periods. I hope that that isn’t true.” Frozen in my seat on the concrete-hard plastic chair, a creeping fear waxing down my head to my nape, I said nothing and made no motion with my head or shoulders. I even kept my hands still inside my lap.
Relieving me of his glacial blue stare, Mister Schmeling clucked his tongue.
“I suppose you might have seen something which you shouldn’t have,” he said. My neck now a bed of bristled hairs. “Some test papers, perhaps? Some student progress reports Mister Haddock left lying around?”
I squinted hard and tilted my head. Another suspension or even expulsion for snooping around was the very least of my worries. What was this? A fishing expedition? Or a veiled threat?
Mister Schmeling carried on: “Perhaps you saw something in the supply closet? Something that startled you? Caused your imagination to run away with you?”
My eyelids peeled back inside my skull, the whites bulging from the sockets. He knew.
He scanned me over, a look that was not lustful but hungry and searching, making my skin crawl. “Did you tell anyone what you saw?” he asked after a long pause.
For the first time I answered him, shaking my head feverishly from side to side, my hair tremulous, strands slapping around my chin.
Mister Schmeling pulled back into his swivel chair, the metal spine creaking, evidently pleased with my answer. His furry stubs for fingers laced across his ample abdomen. “If other people learned about what you think you saw, we’d have no choice but to suspend you for violating school safety regulations. Or worse. You wouldn’t want that would you? Being such a serious and hardworking student? No, I didn’t think so, my dear. So, since you’ve been so good and we’d hate for you to get behind in your studies, this’ll just be our little secret. Okay, dear?”
And so concluded the bizarre saga of Mister Haddock and the bleeding anatomy model in the science lab. I never found out the exact cause of Haddock’s dismissal, though the school used the usual cryptic phrasing of him moving on and finding work elsewhere. Some kids told me they saw him in one of the local pubs around Lakeshore, testing out a few concoctions of Ocean Spray and Absolut.
I haven’t told anyone about what I saw, as per my agreement with Mister Schmeling. At least, I haven’t until now. Perhaps he’s right; maybe my imagination simply ran away from me that fateful afternoon alone in the supply closet. But then why swear me to secrecy? What did he care what I told people I saw? Why was that laboratory never used again and was all but boarded up? That being said, I would still see red speckles and smears of blood on Mister Fanu’s hands and coveralls some days, I would still sometimes catch a whiff of something coppery and fetid in the hallways, and every so often, I would hear the uncanny crashing of waves, accompanying by the strangled whinnying of a horse, emanating from the now empty Grade Ten science lab.

I’ve got my basic hand tools I’ve used the past few years but I gotta get what I used to have available to me at work.
My budget for phase one is 450$
I would like in this order: Wheeled workbench Air compressor, Shop vac, Belt sander, Miami vise Easy flux 125 (It’s good nuff for what I’m gonna need it for) Hydraulic bender Tabletop mill drill 7x14 lathe Horizontal bandsaw 12x12x12 treatment kiln Sandblasting station
Somewhere in there a homemade hot bluing station.
Lemme know what to get first.

“Bait” (Part 4/conclusion of a story that began here)
by P. Orin Zack
[09/05/2013]
Alphon’s jaw dropped. “Bait?” he said in disbelief. “What was he trying to catch?”
“Someone curious about the vanished past. Someone like you. But really, I’d forgotten that it was even there until I read your note.”
“Do you even know what they had to say about the Barrage design? Was there a flaw? Is that why it failed?”
Maira closed her eyes and lowered her head. Looking a bit unsteady, she reached down to the bench and eased herself down onto it. “That’s the key to it, really. There wasn’t exactly a design flaw, because ocean chemistry wasn’t even considered.”
Alphon sat down beside her. “Okay. Now I’m confused. Didn’t you tell me that the destruction of the Barrage was an act of war?”
She nodded. “It was. Not that anyone would believe it.”
“Why? Who did it?”
They both looked around when a flock of startled birds broke cover. “Uh-oh,” she said, and reached under the bench.
He mouthed a question.
Maira glanced up at him. Puzzlement became surprise when he saw her eyes grow fierce at the sight of something behind him. He stepped back and whirled around in time to see the hovercam dive to the right. She’d pulled out a homemade device of some kind and was pointing it at the drone. It wobbled and lost altitude. She pulled a trigger. It careened wildly, but not before it caught her face with an oddly colored laser flash. She dropped the device and fell on her side, clearly in pain, her fingers twitching. The drone smacked into a cypress knee, spun around and fell into the swamp.
Alphon was frantic. He knelt beside her and cradled her head in his hand. “What was that? Are you okay?”
She took a breath. “Ne… Neuroleptic laser.” She had trouble pronouncing the words. “Those drones aren’t just for surveillance.”
“Why? What did we do?”
“Not… what we did. What… we might do.”
“What we might do? For god’s sake, what’s going on here?”
She struggled to get up, so he helped her onto the bench. “Aren’t you paying attention? You told me yourself that you specialized in identifying event cascades.”
Alphon shook his head in confusion. “What does that have to do with—?”
“So do they.”
“Who?”
“The people who sent that drone.”
“What?”
She steadied herself and pointed a finger at him. “Social event cascades.”
He brushed the thought aside in the face of how she looked. “Later. Are you going to be okay?”
She nodded, the twitching abated. “For the moment. The surveillance drones are only equipped to immobilize their target for a while. It would have been worse if the thing had more time. But it would have reported our location, so my home’s not safe anymore. But we ought to have enough time to get a few things.”
“Your home?”
She gestured in the direction where the drone had crashed. “It’s that way. Let’s go. You take the controls.”
He complied, and they set off through the swamp.
She leaned over the edge and scooped up the drone as they passed, and dropped it on the raft. “Spare parts. Might come in handy.”
“Yeah, yeah. I get it. You’re a maker. So who are we up against?”
Maira grimaced. “Don’t laugh. It’s the international banking consortium.”
“The what?”
“Bankers.” She was deadly serious. “You didn’t really think national governments were top dog, did you?”
“All right, all right. Back up. A lot. They’re who destroyed the Barrage?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes.”
“As an act of war?”
“Well, yeah.”
“How?”
She looked at him as one might a backward child. “You rented an airboat yesterday, didn’t you?”
“Sure, but what does—?”
“And you paid for liability against chemical damage?”
He nodded understanding, and then shook his head in confusion. “They poisoned the water here, too?”
“The planet, Alphon. They poisoned the planet.”
“Why would they do that? Strike that. How would they do that?”
“The same reason they do anything. The same reason they’ve pit nations against one another for centuries. Profit. There’s money in it. There’s money in poverty, in crime, in prisons. Once they realized that swindling people in land deals and collecting interest on unpayable national debts was small change compared to what could be made by remaking the planet wholesale, they’ve been encouraging industries to rape the Earth, and forcing governments to institute policies that no sane person could possibly want to subject their children to living under. For nearly a century now, they’ve been encouraging activities that subvert the balance of nature. Why do you think the Barrage was needed in the first place? Global warming may have been triggered by accident, before people realized that increasing the carbon dioxide levels would melt the ice caps and glaciers, but when the bankers’ analysts presented their report, the biggest hoax in history was perpetrated on the planet. Alphon, they stopped the Gulf Stream. They pulled the plug on the only thing that was capable of driving the circulation of currents around the world. That’s why we’re floating on a toxic cesspool that will rot my raft if we don’t pull it out of the water and recoat it pretty soon.”
They’d reached her home, which was a spawling collection of cypress-colored sheds surrounding a large camouflaged geodesic dome, and she took the controls back.
“You’re saying that the Barrage failed because the ocean was changed?”
“I’m saying the Barrage failed because it was never designed to withstand the acids and other pollutants that have been eating away at it. Didn’t you wonder why the Hyperloop to New Orleans was in such bad shape?”
He blinked rapidly. “It’s not because they stopped maintaining it?”
“We have hurricanes, Alphon. Those tubes get coated with the same crud we’re floating on.”
They’d reached her boat ramp, and she told him to attach the tow-hook on a hoist she pointed at to the eye on the front of the raft. After the raft was dragged from the water, she grabbed the hovercam and led him into the nearest shed.
Once they were inside, he skipped ahead and turned to face her. “Okay, stop. I realize we have to get some things and leave before the bankers’ cleanup squad gets here, but there’s something I have to know.”
She calmed and looked at him.
“Social event cascades. You said they’re concerned about social event cascades. Why?”
“It’s their weakness.”
“What do you mean?”
Maira pointed at a nearby workbench. “I said I’m a maker. I build stuff. But there’s something else that I can make, and that frightens the hell out of them.”
“Oh? What?”
“Trouble. It only takes one person to bring down the biggest adversary you can imagine.”
He shrugged. “The ringleader? I don’t get it. If they were so worried that you’d do something to hurt them, why haven’t they taken you out before this?”
“Because I kept to myself. And besides, the ringleader isn’t the person I was talking about.”
“Who then?”
“The first follower. The person who realizes that the so-called leader has a point, and is willing to do whatever it takes to follow it through, to make something happen.”
Alphon shook his head. “So what?” He backed up a step. “They can kill that person, too! Me!”
“Whatever it takes,” she repeated, cradling the hovercam to her chest. “And what it takes is to make everyone a first follower. The puppet masters are paranoid about social event cascades because they know what will happen if one takes root. But that’s your specialty. And all the information you need to do it is right—.”
The hovercam exploded. What remained of Maira collapsed in front of him. He stared at her bloody remains in shock for a few seconds, and then started to hyperventilate. An instant later, he balled his fists and stiffened. “No! No! No! No! No!” he shouted at the walls. “That’s not going to stop this cascade, you cretins. You’ve picked the wrong guy.”
He raced from shed to shed, taking stock of what was where. He was surrounded by the means to stay alive. She said the information was here, too. And he knew their weakness. What remained was to prep all of the potential event cascades he’d already identified to get people’s attention, and use those events to show them what was really happening, and why. But most importantly, he needed to trick the greedy monsters into setting it all off themselves. He may have been Maira’s first follower, but he was about to set up the worlds biggest trap, with himself as the bait.
THE END
Copyright 2013 by P. Orin Zack
----- [The series continues in "Hollow Threat" -----

Hey all! Quick question - I'm doing some coasters that have an exterior lip on them, and I've already done a couple, but had some difficulty keeping the piece secure on those and wanted to ask for advice on the simplest way, perhaps some sort of jig or something.
So the situation is this: I've got a portable milwaukee router, and I'm using a homemade circular jig I made out of lexan. I screw a shallow hole in the center of the piece, route out the outside, and separate the piece from the rest of the board, then, I go in 1/4in and need to route out the interior edge, and then also clean the interior of the coaster out with the router by hand. To do all of the interior stuff, I need an easy way to secure the piece down to my workbench so that it doesn't vibrate and rotate in place when I'm trying to route.
I've tried double sided tape from a big box, but I've seen people here say that carpet tape is maybe more effective. I could run a screw into the bottom of the piece, but I'd have to be super careful to not pierce through the other side since the finished depth of the interior is gonna only really be about 1/4in. So I'd prefer not to use a small screw if I can help it. But the piece WILL get felt on the bottom at the end, so I'm not overly concerned about how nice the bottom of the piece remains, so if carpet tape is the way to go, then that would be fine if it does a bit of fiber damage.
So is carpet tape the way to go, or is there a way that I can build some sort of jig that will keep it strapped down? I tried to screw down some scrap pieces to the bench and press them firmly up against the piece and then use like, a half circle cut open piece to clamp down securely, but since the piece is a circle, nothing seems to 100% grab it enough to keep it in place.
Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

Mister Haddock was always my least favourite teacher in Grade Ten. Balding, stoved-faced little man with a ratty ponytail behind his near naked pink skull. He was the only teacher I never saw smile or laugh, even around other teachers or adults. He was never even nice when parents came to visit – never had that put-on warmth most teachers do. With his diminutive stature and small miserable face, he looked like one of the seven dwarves from Snow White, if one of the seven dwarves were a closet alkie. He’d never let you go to the bathroom during class, whether it was an emergency or not, even if you were a girl. And if you requested an extension for an assignment – whether it was because you were sick, someone in your family had died, or you had to be excused for your soccer or football game – he would just respond with, “No” and “That’s tough.” As you can imagine, I wasn’t the only kid at John Haggert High School who harboured a grudge for the surly little troll of the JH High science department.
What really made the situation worse was that Mister Haddock taught science, a class in which I had to excel if I wanted to pursue my postsecondary dream of studying to become a veterinarian. Cliché, I know, but I’ve always loved animals and wanted desperately to understand and help them as best I could. That was another sticking point between Mister Haddock and I; he refused to give good marks no matter how hard you tried or how well you followed his instructions. “When you give me something good enough to get an A in university, I’ll give you an A,” he’d groan, his tired refrain to any nagging student. Like that was a reasonable bar to set for a high school junior or freshmen. Just my luck, Mister Haddock also taught Grade Eleven biology, another necessary course on my journey to guiding sick and dying pets into the afterlife.
And that’s another thing about Mister Haddock that bothered me; he clearly hated his job. I’d always planned on becoming a teacher as a back-up plan, especially since I’d always loved school. I was always on the honour roll, on at least three school teams, in multiple clubs, elected student rep for each grade I was in until making school president in Grade Twelve and would later be valedictorian. But Mister Haddock always acted like he’d rather be doing anything other than teach at our school. Like this job was somehow beneath him. Just for context, John Haggert High School is in the Meadowville neighborhood of Aakoziwin, the safest city in Ontario and one of the safest places in all of Canada – which would put in running for safest metropolitan area on the planet. It’s a bustling suburban town with lots to do, especially being so close to Toronto. Our school is neck and neck with Caramel Mountain Secondary for national reputation and university acceptances. We have one of the best hockey teams, one of the best arts and music programs, and are among the top performers in math and literacy. Our building is the typical squat, two-floor, lengthwise cinderblock affair, but our hallways are adorned with gorgeous wall murals painted by the arts students, festooned with colourful and accurate dioramas of the Globe Theatre, Greek coliseums, and DNA models. So why did Mister Haddock act like he was stocking the shelves at a grocery store? Why did he treat us like we were all riffraff, as my Uncle John would say?
The last straw that broke this camel’s back came when he docked me ten percent for being two days late on an assignment. My grandmother was in the hospital from a massive stroke, which is what caused me to be late. My mother had made sure to call reception to explain the situation on the very first day I was away from school. And even after I provided him with two letters, one from my parents, the other from the hospital, and even though all my other teachers accepted my homework without penalty, Mister Ian Warren Haddock refused to budge.
“Look,” he grunted, visibly cornered behind his particleboard desk, me standing before him with hands on hips, pleading my case. Demanding an explanation. “Look, I’ve already imputed the mark into the database and sent it out to the department head. I can’t change it right now. It’ll make me look bad.”
I could feel my eyes grow moist. How could he do this to me? Me! Jennifer Wang Li, Grade Ten student rep and future saviour of all furry four-legged creatures!
Feebly, without meeting my misty gaze, he mumbled, “At least your gran’s alive, right? Isn’t that all that matters?”
Using my grandmother stroke against me? Trying to browbeat me away from demanding what was mine by guilting me into not appreciating my own family?
At this, I didn’t yell, didn’t storm off. Didn’t even bother complaining to my parents or the principal’s office. Instead, I coolly sat down at my lab table, and began plotting my petty revenge against Mister Haddock.
I knew all about the pranks kids pull on their teachers. The homemade stink bomb. The head in the jar. The dreaded toothpick in the door lock. I wasn’t about to bother with anything as cute or clever. During the lunch period, when I knew Mister Haddock was two kilometres away having a smoke near Meadow Woods Park, I would creep into the lab and simply swipe all his test papers and homework. I knew he wouldn’t bother keeping them secure, and even with the gas valves, there was a good chance the dope would leave the laboratory unlocked (he’d done so several times before).
In so many ways, it would be the perfect revenge; he’d have to admit to leaving the room unsupervised and unsecured, going against school policy and regulation, landing him in hot water with the office. Maybe even resulting in his eventual termination. And, when he asked the students to redo the test, someone would eventually complain to the school or a parent, resulting in him admitting that he’d lost the test papers, which would likewise get him in trouble – or at least so I figured at the time. He’d know what it was like to be punished for something that was not his fault. At least, not exactly his fault. To have every excuse in the world, only for each of them to fall on stone-deaf ears. It was perfect. I just had to be careful; I knew there were cameras in the hallways, but as far as I could tell, there was no surveillance in the classrooms themselves.
I snuck inside the unmanned lab at a quarter past noon. With the lights out and in the scant fluorescent glow bleeding in from the hallway through the open door, the lab looked almost eerie: the long tables, eye wash station, beakers, tongs and burners redolent of the abode of Doctor Jekyll in the movies. As though the lab were in preparation of some macabre, unnecessary surgery. But maybe that was just my imagination running away with me. I crept toward Mister Haddock’s desk. Sure enough, there were the unguarded test papers, lain plainly on the blotter.
Armed with the papers and loads of time before the vodka-reeking deadbeat returned, I felt compelled to poke around. Perhaps I’d find a pack of smokes or a micky of cheap rye lying around, getting Mister Haddock into some real trouble.
My curiosity piqued, I rounded the corner at the back and entered the supply closet, placing the test papers to the side. It was where they kept the textbooks, beakers, bunsen burners, and items meant to be hidden from teenage eyes. But no matter how hard I squinted or how furiously I rummaged through the boxes and bins, there were no incriminating objects for me to find. Not even a single cigarette butt.
I was about to turn and leave with my pillaged bounty when I spotted the slightest of movements out of the corner of my eye. Startled, I held my breath and jumped a bit before peering harder to the back of the closet. There, the slight movement, or trick of the light remained, just perceptible in the dark little room. It was so slight – a dribbling motion, that at first my brain registered a lava lamp. But that didn’t make sense; why would there be a lava lamp in a science lab? Much less one plugged in on a storage closet shelf.
I advanced further to inspect what lay at the back and that’s when I saw it. The most eldritch or horrors, like something straight from a pulp magazine. It was a two-foot anatomical model, showing the muscles and internal organs from the small intestine to the eyeballs. A jarring sight to begin with, but this particular model – it was bleeding. I mean, actively bleeding, pulsating with blood that dripped from red crevices and apertures, staining the beige metal platform on which it stood. My mind whirled at the sickening visual before me. How could that be? Wasn’t the model made of silicone? Not flesh or bone, surely. Unbelieving, I examined the ghastly little model, looking around to find some sort of power cord – certain this was some optical illusion or trick of the light. No such luck. As best I could tell, this was nothing but a regular artificial figurine. No means of moving – or in this case bleeding – on it own.
At my wits end to try and explain this thing before me, adrenaline barrelling through my veins, I deigned to touch the scarlet flow coming off it, getting some it on my fingertips. The wet sensation was enough to flip my stomach, but when I brought the smeared fingers to my nose, I discovered the unmistakable metallic odour of blood. It was real. As real as it could be. I looked down and saw the dark liquid begin to drip over the shelf’s edge onto the floor. Numb from scalp to chin, I peered back up at the vinaceous, pulsating face, at the fake blues eyes stuck to the front of the skull. The eyes which had somehow remained uncovered by the pouring crimson. They had been staring blindly away from me, but then, at that very moment, they came alive and swivelled around to glare at me. I shrieked before turning and fleeing from the lab, leaving Mister Haddock’s papers on the shelf where I’d lain them.
That night I couldn’t sleep. And the next day I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t chat with my friends or join them at any of our clubs. I just couldn’t get the image of that bleeding anatomical model out of my mind’s eye. And I couldn’t quiet the questions racing through my bewildered brain – those compelling echoes dinning off the inner walls of my skull. How could a silicone model’s inner working cause it to bleed like that? Or appear to bleed? Why did the fluid smell so unmistakably like blood? Why did I only see it bleeding like that after class had been dismissed? In the name of God, why was something like that in the science lab at all?
Resolved on getting to the bottom of this, I first had to be sure that what I saw wasn’t a mere figment of my imagination. To prove I wasn’t going crazy, I recruited my friend Jacqueline to come along with me the next lunch break, when Mister Haddock had gone out for his smoke. Having not been told the exact reason for sneaking into the science lab, Jackie giggled as I towed her along, inferring in whispers that our secret mission was owing to a crush I wanted to impart on her away from prying eyes and ears.
But when we arrived, the lab was closed. The yellow on gray stainless-steel doors were shut, the wooden door stop lying on the floor, discarded. I tried the handles, but it was no use. The hygienic doors wouldn’t budge. Mister Haddock hadn’t bothered locking up the lab since early September. Did he notice his test papers had been moved and got spooked?
Of course, Jacqueline balked at my expense, demanding I just tell her what this was all about. She then grew petulant when I insisted it was nothing, refusing, in her mind, to include her in what she was certain was a juicy bit of gossip.
We were then startled by a gruff voice growling behind us: “You two better move along.”
Startled out of our skin, we both spun on our heels, finding the groundskeeper, Mister Fanu, standing before us. He’d come up on us without a sound. He was a short compact man with a shapeless face behind black framed spectacles, today wearing his usual navy-blue coveralls. From his tan leather weightlifter’s belt hung a ring of what looked to be a thousand keys, like a silvery fist by his waist.
“You shouldn’t be hanging out here now,” he grunted, his voice hoarse and low like dead leaves in the wind. He then proceeded into the mantra of all on or off duty school employees patrolling the halls, telling us to either go to the Caf or outside until the next bell. Neither intimidated or especially servile, Jacqueline droned her acquiescence and shuffled off without me, rolling her eyes before getting completely out of sight. Still with some resolve for my mission, I lingered. But what remained of my gumption withered under Mister Fanu’s icy parental stare.
But as I walked away, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that the janitor had not departed the hallway. He was standing on the spot like a sentry, presumably watching me go. As if he were guarding the lab. The hairs on the back of my neck sufficiently stood on end, I turned around, finding that he was not staring after me, but rather facing the laboratory doors, as though waiting to be let in. Lastly, I noticed his hands, which were wringing and wiping themselves on a dirty black rag. On his hands, unmistakably, was a shiny, visibly wet red liquid. Blood?
Terrified, fixated, but nonetheless afraid of being spotted, I turned the corner into the adjacent stairwell. But instead of descending the steps to the main floor, I waited. When I returned to the hallway, poking my head out but not my torso from around the corner, I saw that one of the doors to the lab was ajar, and the lights within were now on. Mister Fanu was no longer there.
On rubbery legs, I inched over to the cracked door and peered inside. Squeezing myself in, first my head then shoulders then one limb at a time, I felt my heart thundering in my chest, expecting at any moment to be pulled aside by an irate Mister Haddock who would proceed to chide me. But instead, all I found was the empty, brightly lit room, and a maddening odour assaulting my nostrils.
It was the common coppery smell of blood from before but now fetid and miry like a century-old field of cow manure. Like something excreted not from anything as natural as cattle or other livestock but from something otherworldly. From something evil.
I pinched my nostrils and breathed through my nose but that hardly worked to stymy the eldritch stench. But now my senses were alerted to another disturbance, a bizarrely pleasant sound issuing from the supply closet. The sound of waves. Reminding me of my last summer vacation at Myrtle Beach, I heard the distinct lapping of waves crashing onto a sandy shore. Oh sure, it might have just been from a video or an audio file, but something about the enormity and clarity of the sound was indisputably real. I then had tinnitus in my left ear, and had to steady myself on one of the workbenches from a palpable loss of equilibrium. It was as though I’d suddenly become sick. Or as if I’d been transferred from reality into a dream. It was then that I realized the sound of the waves was no longer emanating from the closet, but was all around me, churning around my head, sending me into a dizzy spell.
The putrid, rust smell was now overwrought, and again, Mister Fanu was nowhere in sight. The crashing of the waves was then intermingled with a shrieking sound. It was small at first then swelled to a piercing wail. It wasn’t female or even human. Yes…Yes, I was certain it was an animal’s cry. Like a horse whinnying. Yes, exactly like the sound a horse would make. The voice was pained and sorrowing, as though the beast of burden were being whipped or driven into the ground. It was so terrible – so pitiful that my throat seized up and my heart ached. My mind throbbing from the assaulting soundscape swirling around – or perhaps inside – my head, I staggered toward the supply closet, grasping at stools and bench tables as I did so to not plummet to the floor. As I did, I wondered if this was what it was like to be on drugs.
I was just about to reach my hand out for the steel door handle, when all at once the encircling cacophony stopped, leaving a deafening quiet over the room. Backpedalling, tinnitus still in one ear, I regained my balance and stood up straight, standing stationary until a sudden crash from behind me – like a stool being knocked over – sent me flying out of the room and down the hallway to the stairwell. I was so terrified – so confused – I ran home without asking for leave, resulting in a two-day suspension. I was informed by one of the vice principals that if I was suspended again, I’d lose my student rep seat. But that would be the last of my troubles.
After being allowed back in school, I discovered my science class was moved to another room. Also, I never saw Mister Haddock again. First, there were a string of substitute teachers, some subbing internally from the science department – like Mister Abruzzo who taught Grade Twelve physics. Some were unfamiliar faces. All of them assigned nothing but work straight from the textbook or divvied out worksheets two or three grades below us. But eventually, much to the relief of my hovercraft, high-expectation-laden parents, we were assigned a full-time teacher, Miss Goldman, after the Christmas Break. Miss Goldman was young, energetic, and very knowledgeable. Most of my class was very happy to have her – especially as a replacement to gin-reeking Ian Haddock. Conversely, I was bricked up with anxiety, ruminating fretfully on what had happened to him. Had he really been let go? Was this somehow my fault? Or did it have something to do with that bleeding anatomical model I’d found in the supply closet? The one that had been replaced by another far less gory silicone figurine and had not been seen since that fateful day? And on what on earth was the cause of all those noises I’d heard the last time? What did those have to do with Haddock or the bleeding model?
Worse was that sound I heard that had cut through the muffling waves. The sound of the whinnying horse, the torment and desperation plain in that voice. I know this won’t make sense to you reading this, but the sound haunted me. Made me tear up every time I thought of it. The thought that something so cruel could be happening to animal here at JH High – just, just drove me insane.
Eventually, either driven by guilt for Mister Haddock’s firing or the compulsion seeded by that hideous apparition, I went to visit the science department office. But as it turned out, they had meant to speak to me.
Mister Schmeling, the head of the science department who taught Grade Eleven Chemistry, told me he’d been waiting for me when I arrived. This was a bit unnerving since I’d never had a class with him and also owing to the fact that he had neither a warm nor jocular demeanour. Bald and bespectacled with tufts of iron-grey around his ears, a rotund physique and wobbling gait, he reminded most students of a cartoon villain than an approachable teacher. He motioned me to an empty seat with a curt nod of his head.
“So, Jennifer, dear,” he began in his ice-box timbre. “I’ve been meaning to speak with you for some time.” He then began to plow through the typical teacher questions, usually reserved for guidance councillors during one-on-one consultations.
He then got to the meat of the conversation. “It’s come to my attention recently that you’ve been going into the Grade Ten science lab by yourself after lesson periods. I hope that that isn’t true.”
Frozen in my seat on the concrete-hard plastic chair, a creeping fear waxing down my head to my nape, I said nothing and made no motion with my head or shoulders. I even kept my hands still inside my lap.
Relieving me of his glacial blue stare, Mister Schmeling clucked his tongue.
“I suppose you might have seen something which you shouldn’t have,” he said. My neck now a bed of bristled hairs. “Some test papers, perhaps? Some student progress reports Mister Haddock left lying around?”
I squinted hard and tilted my head. Another suspension or even expulsion for snooping around was the very least of my worries. What was this? A fishing expedition? Or a veiled threat?
Mister Schmeling carried on: “Perhaps you saw something in the supply closet? Something that startled you? Caused your imagination to run away with you?” My eyelids peeled back inside my skull, the whites bulging from the sockets. He knew. He scanned me over, a look that was not lustful but hungry and searching, making my skin crawl. “Did you tell anyone what you saw?” he asked after a long pause. For the first time I answered him, shaking my head feverishly from side to side, my hair tremulous, strands slapping around my chin. Mister Schmeling pulled back into his swivel chair, the metal spine creaking, evidently pleased with my answer. His furry stubs for fingers laced across his ample abdomen. “If other people learned about what you think you saw, we’d have no choice but to suspend you for violating school safety regulations. Or worse. You wouldn’t want that would you? Being such a serious and hardworking student? No, I didn’t think so, my dear. So, since you’ve been so good and we’d hate for you to get behind in your studies, this’ll just be our little secret. Okay, dear?”
And so concluded the bizarre saga of Mister Haddock and the bleeding anatomy model in the science lab. I never found out the exact cause of Haddock’s dismissal, though the school used the usual cryptic phrasing of him moving on and finding work elsewhere. Some kids told me they saw him in one of the local pubs around Lakeshore, testing out a few concoctions of Ocean Spray and Absolut.
I haven’t told anyone about what I saw, as per my agreement with Mister Schmeling. At least, I haven’t until now. Perhaps he’s right; maybe my imagination simply ran away from me that fateful afternoon alone in the supply closet. But then why swear me to secrecy? What did he care what I told people I saw? Why was that laboratory never used again and was all but boarded up? That being said, I would still see red speckles and smears of blood on Mister Fanu’s hands and coveralls some days, I would still sometimes catch a whiff of something coppery and fetid in the hallways, and every so often, I would hear the uncanny crashing of waves, accompanying by the strangled whinnying of a horse, emanating from the now empty Grade Ten science lab.

Mister Haddock was always my least favourite teacher in Grade Ten. Balding, stoved-faced little man with a ratty ponytail behind his near naked pink skull. He was the only teacher I never saw smile or laugh, even around other teachers or adults. He was never even nice when parents came to visit – never had that put-on warmth most teachers do. With his diminutive stature and small miserable face, he looked like one of the seven dwarves from Snow White, if one of the seven dwarves were a closet alkie. He’d never let you go to the bathroom during class, whether it was an emergency or not, even if you were a girl. And if you requested an extension for an assignment – whether it was because you were sick, someone in your family had died, or you had to be excused for your soccer or football game – he would just respond with, “No” and “That’s tough.” As you can imagine, I wasn’t the only kid at John Haggert High School who harboured a grudge for the surly little troll of the JH High science department.
What really made the situation worse was that Mister Haddock taught science, a class in which I had to excel if I wanted to pursue my postsecondary dream of studying to become a veterinarian. Cliché, I know, but I’ve always loved animals and wanted desperately to understand and help them as best I could. That was another sticking point between Mister Haddock and I; he refused to give good marks no matter how hard you tried or how well you followed his instructions. “When you give me something good enough to get an A in university, I’ll give you an A,” he’d groan, his tired refrain to any nagging student. Like that was a reasonable bar to set for a high school junior or freshmen. Just my luck, Mister Haddock also taught Grade Eleven biology, another necessary course on my journey to guiding sick and dying pets into the afterlife.
And that’s another thing about Mister Haddock that bothered me; he clearly hated his job. I’d always planned on becoming a teacher as a back-up plan, especially since I’d always loved school. I was always on the honour roll, on at least three school teams, in multiple clubs, elected student rep for each grade I was in until making school president in Grade Twelve and would later be valedictorian. But Mister Haddock always acted like he’d rather be doing anything other than teach at our school. Like this job was somehow beneath him. Just for context, John Haggert High School is in the Meadowville neighborhood of Aakoziwin, the safest city in Ontario and one of the safest places in all of Canada – which would put in running for safest metropolitan area on the planet. It’s a bustling suburban town with lots to do, especially being so close to Toronto. Our school is neck and neck with Caramel Mountain Secondary for national reputation and university acceptances. We have one of the best hockey teams, one of the best arts and music programs, and are among the top performers in math and literacy. Our building is the typical squat, two-floor, lengthwise cinderblock affair, but our hallways are adorned with gorgeous wall murals painted by the arts students, festooned with colourful and accurate dioramas of the Globe Theatre, Greek coliseums, and DNA models. So why did Mister Haddock act like he was stocking the shelves at a grocery store? Why did he treat us like we were all riffraff, as my Uncle John would say?
The last straw that broke this camel’s back came when he docked me ten percent for being two days late on an assignment. My grandmother was in the hospital from a massive stroke, which is what caused me to be late. My mother had made sure to call reception to explain the situation on the very first day I was away from school. And even after I provided him with two letters, one from my parents, the other from the hospital, and even though all my other teachers accepted my homework without penalty, Mister Ian Warren Haddock refused to budge.
“Look,” he grunted, visibly cornered behind his particleboard desk, me standing before him with hands on hips, pleading my case. Demanding an explanation. “Look, I’ve already imputed the mark into the database and sent it out to the department head. I can’t change it right now. It’ll make me look bad.”
I could feel my eyes grow moist. How could he do this to me? Me! Jennifer Wang Li, Grade Ten student rep and future saviour of all furry four-legged creatures!
Feebly, without meeting my misty gaze, he mumbled, “At least your gran’s alive, right? Isn’t that all that matters?”
Using my grandmother stroke against me? Trying to browbeat me away from demanding what was mine by guilting me into not appreciating my own family?
At this, I didn’t yell, didn’t storm off. Didn’t even bother complaining to my parents or the principal’s office. Instead, I coolly sat down at my lab table, and began plotting my petty revenge against Mister Haddock.
I knew all about the pranks kids pull on their teachers. The homemade stink bomb. The head in the jar. The dreaded toothpick in the door lock. I wasn’t about to bother with anything as cute or clever. During the lunch period, when I knew Mister Haddock was two kilometres away having a smoke near Meadow Woods Park, I would creep into the lab and simply swipe all his test papers and homework. I knew he wouldn’t bother keeping them secure, and even with the gas valves, there was a good chance the dope would leave the laboratory unlocked (he’d done so several times before).
In so many ways, it would be the perfect revenge; he’d have to admit to leaving the room unsupervised and unsecured, going against school policy and regulation, landing him in hot water with the office. Maybe even resulting in his eventual termination. And, when he asked the students to redo the test, someone would eventually complain to the school or a parent, resulting in him admitting that he’d lost the test papers, which would likewise get him in trouble – or at least so I figured at the time. He’d know what it was like to be punished for something that was not his fault. At least, not exactly his fault. To have every excuse in the world, only for each of them to fall on stone-deaf ears. It was perfect. I just had to be careful; I knew there were cameras in the hallways, but as far as I could tell, there was no surveillance in the classrooms themselves.
I snuck inside the unmanned lab at a quarter past noon. With the lights out and in the scant fluorescent glow bleeding in from the hallway through the open door, the lab looked almost eerie: the long tables, eye wash station, beakers, tongs and burners redolent of the abode of Doctor Jekyll in the movies. As though the lab were in preparation of some macabre, unnecessary surgery. But maybe that was just my imagination running away with me. I crept toward Mister Haddock’s desk. Sure enough, there were the unguarded test papers, lain plainly on the blotter.
Armed with the papers and loads of time before the vodka-reeking deadbeat returned, I felt compelled to poke around. Perhaps I’d find a pack of smokes or a micky of cheap rye lying around, getting Mister Haddock into some real trouble.
My curiosity piqued, I rounded the corner at the back and entered the supply closet, placing the test papers to the side. It was where they kept the textbooks, beakers, bunsen burners, and items meant to be hidden from teenage eyes. But no matter how hard I squinted or how furiously I rummaged through the boxes and bins, there were no incriminating objects for me to find. Not even a single cigarette butt.
I was about to turn and leave with my pillaged bounty when I spotted the slightest of movements out of the corner of my eye. Startled, I held my breath and jumped a bit before peering harder to the back of the closet. There, the slight movement, or trick of the light remained, just perceptible in the dark little room. It was so slight – a dribbling motion, that at first my brain registered a lava lamp. But that didn’t make sense; why would there be a lava lamp in a science lab? Much less one plugged in on a storage closet shelf.
I advanced further to inspect what lay at the back and that’s when I saw it. The most eldritch or horrors, like something straight from a pulp magazine. It was a two-foot anatomical model, showing the muscles and internal organs from the small intestine to the eyeballs. A jarring sight to begin with, but this particular model – it was bleeding. I mean, actively bleeding, pulsating with blood that dripped from red crevices and apertures, staining the beige metal platform on which it stood. My mind whirled at the sickening visual before me. How could that be? Wasn’t the model made of silicone? Not flesh or bone, surely. Unbelieving, I examined the ghastly little model, looking around to find some sort of power cord – certain this was some optical illusion or trick of the light. No such luck. As best I could tell, this was nothing but a regular artificial figurine. No means of moving – or in this case bleeding – on it own.
At my wits end to try and explain this thing before me, adrenaline barrelling through my veins, I deigned to touch the scarlet flow coming off it, getting some it on my fingertips. The wet sensation was enough to flip my stomach, but when I brought the smeared fingers to my nose, I discovered the unmistakable metallic odour of blood. It was real. As real as it could be. I looked down and saw the dark liquid begin to drip over the shelf’s edge onto the floor. Numb from scalp to chin, I peered back up at the vinaceous, pulsating face, at the fake blues eyes stuck to the front of the skull. The eyes which had somehow remained uncovered by the pouring crimson. They had been staring blindly away from me, but then, at that very moment, they came alive and swivelled around to glare at me. I shrieked before turning and fleeing from the lab, leaving Mister Haddock’s papers on the shelf where I’d lain them.
That night I couldn’t sleep. And the next day I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t chat with my friends or join them at any of our clubs. I just couldn’t get the image of that bleeding anatomical model out of my mind’s eye. And I couldn’t quiet the questions racing through my bewildered brain – those compelling echoes dinning off the inner walls of my skull. How could a silicone model’s inner working cause it to bleed like that? Or appear to bleed? Why did the fluid smell so unmistakably like blood? Why did I only see it bleeding like that after class had been dismissed? In the name of God, why was something like that in the science lab at all?
Resolved on getting to the bottom of this, I first had to be sure that what I saw wasn’t a mere figment of my imagination. To prove I wasn’t going crazy, I recruited my friend Jacqueline to come along with me the next lunch break, when Mister Haddock had gone out for his smoke. Having not been told the exact reason for sneaking into the science lab, Jackie giggled as I towed her along, inferring in whispers that our secret mission was owing to a crush I wanted to impart on her away from prying eyes and ears.
But when we arrived, the lab was closed. The yellow on gray stainless-steel doors were shut, the wooden door stop lying on the floor, discarded. I tried the handles, but it was no use. The hygienic doors wouldn’t budge. Mister Haddock hadn’t bothered locking up the lab since early September. Did he notice his test papers had been moved and got spooked?
Of course, Jacqueline balked at my expense, demanding I just tell her what this was all about. She then grew petulant when I insisted it was nothing, refusing, in her mind, to include her in what she was certain was a juicy bit of gossip.
We were then startled by a gruff voice growling behind us: “You two better move along.”
Startled out of our skin, we both spun on our heels, finding the groundskeeper, Mister Fanu, standing before us. He’d come up on us without a sound. He was a short compact man with a shapeless face behind black framed spectacles, today wearing his usual navy-blue coveralls. From his tan leather weightlifter’s belt hung a ring of what looked to be a thousand keys, like a silvery fist by his waist.
“You shouldn’t be hanging out here now,” he grunted, his voice hoarse and low like dead leaves in the wind. He then proceeded into the mantra of all on or off duty school employees patrolling the halls, telling us to either go to the Caf or outside until the next bell. Neither intimidated or especially servile, Jacqueline droned her acquiescence and shuffled off without me, rolling her eyes before getting completely out of sight. Still with some resolve for my mission, I lingered. But what remained of my gumption withered under Mister Fanu’s icy parental stare.
But as I walked away, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that the janitor had not departed the hallway. He was standing on the spot like a sentry, presumably watching me go. As if he were guarding the lab. The hairs on the back of my neck sufficiently stood on end, I turned around, finding that he was not staring after me, but rather facing the laboratory doors, as though waiting to be let in. Lastly, I noticed his hands, which were wringing and wiping themselves on a dirty black rag. On his hands, unmistakably, was a shiny, visibly wet red liquid. Blood?
Terrified, fixated, but nonetheless afraid of being spotted, I turned the corner into the adjacent stairwell. But instead of descending the steps to the main floor, I waited. When I returned to the hallway, poking my head out but not my torso from around the corner, I saw that one of the doors to the lab was ajar, and the lights within were now on. Mister Fanu was no longer there.
On rubbery legs, I inched over to the cracked door and peered inside. Squeezing myself in, first my head then shoulders then one limb at a time, I felt my heart thundering in my chest, expecting at any moment to be pulled aside by an irate Mister Haddock who would proceed to chide me. But instead, all I found was the empty, brightly lit room, and a maddening odour assaulting my nostrils.
It was the common coppery smell of blood from before but now fetid and miry like a century-old field of cow manure. Like something excreted not from anything as natural as cattle or other livestock but from something otherworldly. From something evil.
I pinched my nostrils and breathed through my nose but that hardly worked to stymy the eldritch stench. But now my senses were alerted to another disturbance, a bizarrely pleasant sound issuing from the supply closet. The sound of waves. Reminding me of my last summer vacation at Myrtle Beach, I heard the distinct lapping of waves crashing onto a sandy shore. Oh sure, it might have just been from a video or an audio file, but something about the enormity and clarity of the sound was indisputably real. I then had tinnitus in my left ear, and had to steady myself on one of the workbenches from a palpable loss of equilibrium. It was as though I’d suddenly become sick. Or as if I’d been transferred from reality into a dream. It was then that I realized the sound of the waves was no longer emanating from the closet, but was all around me, churning around my head, sending me into a dizzy spell.
The putrid, rust smell was now overwrought, and again, Mister Fanu was nowhere in sight. The crashing of the waves was then intermingled with a shrieking sound. It was small at first then swelled to a piercing wail. It wasn’t female or even human. Yes…Yes, I was certain it was an animal’s cry. Like a horse whinnying. Yes, exactly like the sound a horse would make. The voice was pained and sorrowing, as though the beast of burden were being whipped or driven into the ground. It was so terrible – so pitiful that my throat seized up and my heart ached. My mind throbbing from the assaulting soundscape swirling around – or perhaps inside – my head, I staggered toward the supply closet, grasping at stools and bench tables as I did so to not plummet to the floor. As I did, I wondered if this was what it was like to be on drugs.
I was just about to reach my hand out for the steel door handle, when all at once the encircling cacophony stopped, leaving a deafening quiet over the room. Backpedalling, tinnitus still in one ear, I regained my balance and stood up straight, standing stationary until a sudden crash from behind me – like a stool being knocked over – sent me flying out of the room and down the hallway to the stairwell. I was so terrified – so confused – I ran home without asking for leave, resulting in a two-day suspension. I was informed by one of the vice principals that if I was suspended again, I’d lose my student rep seat. But that would be the last of my troubles.
After being allowed back in school, I discovered my science class was moved to another room. Also, I never saw Mister Haddock again. First, there were a string of substitute teachers, some subbing internally from the science department – like Mister Abruzzo who taught Grade Twelve physics. Some were unfamiliar faces. All of them assigned nothing but work straight from the textbook or divvied out worksheets two or three grades below us. But eventually, much to the relief of my hovercraft, high-expectation-laden parents, we were assigned a full-time teacher, Miss Goldman, after the Christmas Break. Miss Goldman was young, energetic, and very knowledgeable. Most of my class was very happy to have her – especially as a replacement to gin-reeking Ian Haddock. Conversely, I was bricked up with anxiety, ruminating fretfully on what had happened to him. Had he really been let go? Was this somehow my fault? Or did it have something to do with that bleeding anatomical model I’d found in the supply closet? The one that had been replaced by another far less gory silicone figurine and had not been seen since that fateful day? And on what on earth was the cause of all those noises I’d heard the last time? What did those have to do with Haddock or the bleeding model?
Worse was that sound I heard that had cut through the muffling waves. The sound of the whinnying horse, the torment and desperation plain in that voice. I know this won’t make sense to you reading this, but the sound haunted me. Made me tear up every time I thought of it. The thought that something so cruel could be happening to animal here at JH High – just, just drove me insane.
Eventually, either driven by guilt for Mister Haddock’s firing or the compulsion seeded by that hideous apparition, I went to visit the science department office. But as it turned out, they had meant to speak to me.
Mister Schmeling, the head of the science department who taught Grade Eleven Chemistry, told me he’d been waiting for me when I arrived. This was a bit unnerving since I’d never had a class with him and also owing to the fact that he had neither a warm nor jocular demeanour. Bald and bespectacled with tufts of iron-grey around his ears, a rotund physique and wobbling gait, he reminded most students of a cartoon villain than an approachable teacher. He motioned me to an empty seat with a curt nod of his head.
“So, Jennifer, dear,” he began in his ice-box timbre. “I’ve been meaning to speak with you for some time.” He then began to plow through the typical teacher questions, usually reserved for guidance councillors during one-on-one consultations.
He then got to the meat of the conversation. “It’s come to my attention recently that you’ve been going into the Grade Ten science lab by yourself after lesson periods. I hope that that isn’t true.”
Frozen in my seat on the concrete-hard plastic chair, a creeping fear waxing down my head to my nape, I said nothing and made no motion with my head or shoulders. I even kept my hands still inside my lap.
Relieving me of his glacial blue stare, Mister Schmeling clucked his tongue.
“I suppose you might have seen something which you shouldn’t have,” he said. My neck now a bed of bristled hairs. “Some test papers, perhaps? Some student progress reports Mister Haddock left lying around?”
I squinted hard and tilted my head. Another suspension or even expulsion for snooping around was the very least of my worries. What was this? A fishing expedition? Or a veiled threat?
Mister Schmeling carried on: “Perhaps you saw something in the supply closet? Something that startled you? Caused your imagination to run away with you?”
My eyelids peeled back inside my skull, the whites bulging from the sockets. He knew.
He scanned me over, a look that was not lustful but hungry and searching, making my skin crawl.
“Did you tell anyone what you saw?” he asked after a long pause.
For the first time I answered him, shaking my head feverishly from side to side, my hair tremulous, strands slapping around my chin.
Mister Schmeling pulled back into his swivel chair, the metal spine creaking, evidently pleased with my answer. His furry stubs for fingers laced across his ample abdomen. “If other people learned about what you think you saw, we’d have no choice but to suspend you for violating school safety regulations. Or worse. You wouldn’t want that would you? Being such a serious and hardworking student? No, I didn’t think so, my dear. So, since you’ve been so good and we’d hate for you to get behind in your studies, this’ll just be our little secret. Okay, dear?”
And so concluded the bizarre saga of Mister Haddock and the bleeding anatomy model in the science lab. I never found out the exact cause of Haddock’s dismissal, though the school used the usual cryptic phrasing of him moving on and finding work elsewhere. Some kids told me they saw him in one of the local pubs around Lakeshore, testing out a few concoctions of Ocean Spray and Absolut.
I haven’t told anyone about what I saw, as per my agreement with Mister Schmeling. At least, I haven’t until now. Perhaps he’s right; maybe my imagination simply ran away from me that fateful afternoon alone in the supply closet. But then why swear me to secrecy? What did he care what I told people I saw? Why was that laboratory never used again and was all but boarded up? That being said, I would still see red speckles and smears of blood on Mister Fanu’s hands and coveralls some days, I would still sometimes catch a whiff of something coppery and fetid in the hallways, and every so often, I would hear the uncanny crashing of waves, accompanying by the strangled whinnying of a horse, emanating from the now empty Grade Ten science lab.

Mister Haddock was always my least favourite teacher in Grade Ten. Balding, stoved-faced little man with a ratty ponytail behind his near naked pink skull. He was the only teacher I never saw smile or laugh, even around other teachers or adults. He was never even nice when parents came to visit – never had that put-on warmth most teachers do. With his diminutive stature and small miserable face, he looked like one of the seven dwarves from Snow White, if one of the seven dwarves were a closet alkie. He’d never let you go to the bathroom during class, whether it was an emergency or not, even if you were a girl. And if you requested an extension for an assignment – whether it was because you were sick, someone in your family had died, or you had to be excused for your soccer or football game – he would just respond with, “No” and “That’s tough.” As you can imagine, I wasn’t the only kid at John Haggert High School who harboured a grudge for the surly little troll of the JH High science department.
What really made the situation worse was that Mister Haddock taught science, a class in which I had to excel if I wanted to pursue my postsecondary dream of studying to become a veterinarian. Cliché, I know, but I’ve always loved animals and wanted desperately to understand and help them as best I could. That was another sticking point between Mister Haddock and I; he refused to give good marks no matter how hard you tried or how well you followed his instructions. “When you give me something good enough to get an A in university, I’ll give you an A,” he’d groan, his tired refrain to any nagging student. Like that was a reasonable bar to set for a high school junior or freshmen. Just my luck, Mister Haddock also taught Grade Eleven biology, another necessary course on my journey to guiding sick and dying pets into the afterlife.
And that’s another thing about Mister Haddock that bothered me; he clearly hated his job. I’d always planned on becoming a teacher as a back-up plan, especially since I’d always loved school. I was always on the honour roll, on at least three school teams, in multiple clubs, elected student rep for each grade I was in until making school president in Grade Twelve and would later be valedictorian. But Mister Haddock always acted like he’d rather be doing anything other than teach at our school. Like this job was somehow beneath him. Just for context, John Haggert High School is in the Meadowville neighborhood of Aakoziwin, the safest city in Ontario and one of the safest places in all of Canada – which would put in running for safest metropolitan area on the planet. It’s a bustling suburban town with lots to do, especially being so close to Toronto. Our school is neck and neck with Caramel Mountain Secondary for national reputation and university acceptances. We have one of the best hockey teams, one of the best arts and music programs, and are among the top performers in math and literacy. Our building is the typical squat, two-floor, lengthwise cinderblock affair, but our hallways are adorned with gorgeous wall murals painted by the arts students, festooned with colourful and accurate dioramas of the Globe Theatre, Greek coliseums, and DNA models. So why did Mister Haddock act like he was stocking the shelves at a grocery store? Why did he treat us like we were all riffraff, as my Uncle John would say?
The last straw that broke this camel’s back came when he docked me ten percent for being two days late on an assignment. My grandmother was in the hospital from a massive stroke, which is what caused me to be late. My mother had made sure to call reception to explain the situation on the very first day I was away from school. And even after I provided him with two letters, one from my parents, the other from the hospital, and even though all my other teachers accepted my homework without penalty, Mister Ian Warren Haddock refused to budge.
“Look,” he grunted, visibly cornered behind his particleboard desk, me standing before him with hands on hips, pleading my case. Demanding an explanation. “Look, I’ve already imputed the mark into the database and sent it out to the department head. I can’t change it right now. It’ll make me look bad.”
I could feel my eyes grow moist. How could he do this to me? Me! Jennifer Wang Li, Grade Ten student rep and future saviour of all furry four-legged creatures!
Feebly, without meeting my misty gaze, he mumbled, “At least your gran’s alive, right? Isn’t that all that matters?”
Using my grandmother stroke against me? Trying to browbeat me away from demanding what was mine by guilting me into not appreciating my own family?
At this, I didn’t yell, didn’t storm off. Didn’t even bother complaining to my parents or the principal’s office. Instead, I coolly sat down at my lab table, and began plotting my petty revenge against Mister Haddock.
I knew all about the pranks kids pull on their teachers. The homemade stink bomb. The head in the jar. The dreaded toothpick in the door lock. I wasn’t about to bother with anything as cute or clever. During the lunch period, when I knew Mister Haddock was two kilometres away having a smoke near Meadow Woods Park, I would creep into the lab and simply swipe all his test papers and homework. I knew he wouldn’t bother keeping them secure, and even with the gas valves, there was a good chance the dope would leave the laboratory unlocked (he’d done so several times before).
In so many ways, it would be the perfect revenge; he’d have to admit to leaving the room unsupervised and unsecured, going against school policy and regulation, landing him in hot water with the office. Maybe even resulting in his eventual termination. And, when he asked the students to redo the test, someone would eventually complain to the school or a parent, resulting in him admitting that he’d lost the test papers, which would likewise get him in trouble – or at least so I figured at the time. He’d know what it was like to be punished for something that was not his fault. At least, not exactly his fault. To have every excuse in the world, only for each of them to fall on stone-deaf ears. It was perfect. I just had to be careful; I knew there were cameras in the hallways, but as far as I could tell, there was no surveillance in the classrooms themselves.
I snuck inside the unmanned lab at a quarter past noon. With the lights out and in the scant fluorescent glow bleeding in from the hallway through the open door, the lab looked almost eerie: the long tables, eye wash station, beakers, tongs and burners redolent of the abode of Doctor Jekyll in the movies. As though the lab were in preparation of some macabre, unnecessary surgery. But maybe that was just my imagination running away with me. I crept toward Mister Haddock’s desk. Sure enough, there were the unguarded test papers, lain plainly on the blotter.
Armed with the papers and loads of time before the vodka-reeking deadbeat returned, I felt compelled to poke around. Perhaps I’d find a pack of smokes or a micky of cheap rye lying around, getting Mister Haddock into some real trouble.
My curiosity piqued, I rounded the corner at the back and entered the supply closet, placing the test papers to the side. It was where they kept the textbooks, beakers, bunsen burners, and items meant to be hidden from teenage eyes. But no matter how hard I squinted or how furiously I rummaged through the boxes and bins, there were no incriminating objects for me to find. Not even a single cigarette butt.
I was about to turn and leave with my pillaged bounty when I spotted the slightest of movements out of the corner of my eye. Startled, I held my breath and jumped a bit before peering harder to the back of the closet. There, the slight movement, or trick of the light remained, just perceptible in the dark little room. It was so slight – a dribbling motion, that at first my brain registered a lava lamp. But that didn’t make sense; why would there be a lava lamp in a science lab? Much less one plugged in on a storage closet shelf.
I advanced further to inspect what lay at the back and that’s when I saw it. The most eldritch or horrors, like something straight from a pulp magazine. It was a two-foot anatomical model, showing the muscles and internal organs from the small intestine to the eyeballs. A jarring sight to begin with, but this particular model – it was bleeding. I mean, actively bleeding, pulsating with blood that dripped from red crevices and apertures, staining the beige metal platform on which it stood. My mind whirled at the sickening visual before me. How could that be? Wasn’t the model made of silicone? Not flesh or bone, surely. Unbelieving, I examined the ghastly little model, looking around to find some sort of power cord – certain this was some optical illusion or trick of the light. No such luck. As best I could tell, this was nothing but a regular artificial figurine. No means of moving – or in this case bleeding – on it own.
At my wits end to try and explain this thing before me, adrenaline barrelling through my veins, I deigned to touch the scarlet flow coming off it, getting some it on my fingertips. The wet sensation was enough to flip my stomach, but when I brought the smeared fingers to my nose, I discovered the unmistakable metallic odour of blood. It was real. As real as it could be. I looked down and saw the dark liquid begin to drip over the shelf’s edge onto the floor. Numb from scalp to chin, I peered back up at the vinaceous, pulsating face, at the fake blues eyes stuck to the front of the skull. The eyes which had somehow remained uncovered by the pouring crimson. They had been staring blindly away from me, but then, at that very moment, they came alive and swivelled around to glare at me. I shrieked before turning and fleeing from the lab, leaving Mister Haddock’s papers on the shelf where I’d lain them.
That night I couldn’t sleep. And the next day I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t chat with my friends or join them at any of our clubs. I just couldn’t get the image of that bleeding anatomical model out of my mind’s eye. And I couldn’t quiet the questions racing through my bewildered brain – those compelling echoes dinning off the inner walls of my skull. How could a silicone model’s inner working cause it to bleed like that? Or appear to bleed? Why did the fluid smell so unmistakably like blood? Why did I only see it bleeding like that after class had been dismissed? In the name of God, why was something like that in the science lab at all?
Resolved on getting to the bottom of this, I first had to be sure that what I saw wasn’t a mere figment of my imagination. To prove I wasn’t going crazy, I recruited my friend Jacqueline to come along with me the next lunch break, when Mister Haddock had gone out for his smoke. Having not been told the exact reason for sneaking into the science lab, Jackie giggled as I towed her along, inferring in whispers that our secret mission was owing to a crush I wanted to impart on her away from prying eyes and ears.
But when we arrived, the lab was closed. The yellow on gray stainless-steel doors were shut, the wooden door stop lying on the floor, discarded. I tried the handles, but it was no use. The hygienic doors wouldn’t budge. Mister Haddock hadn’t bothered locking up the lab since early September. Did he notice his test papers had been moved and got spooked?
Of course, Jacqueline balked at my expense, demanding I just tell her what this was all about. She then grew petulant when I insisted it was nothing, refusing, in her mind, to include her in what she was certain was a juicy bit of gossip.
We were then startled by a gruff voice growling behind us: “You two better move along.”
Startled out of our skin, we both spun on our heels, finding the groundskeeper, Mister Fanu, standing before us. He’d come up on us without a sound. He was a short compact man with a shapeless face behind black framed spectacles, today wearing his usual navy-blue coveralls. From his tan leather weightlifter’s belt hung a ring of what looked to be a thousand keys, like a silvery fist by his waist.
“You shouldn’t be hanging out here now,” he grunted, his voice hoarse and low like dead leaves in the wind. He then proceeded into the mantra of all on or off duty school employees patrolling the halls, telling us to either go to the Caf or outside until the next bell. Neither intimidated or especially servile, Jacqueline droned her acquiescence and shuffled off without me, rolling her eyes before getting completely out of sight. Still with some resolve for my mission, I lingered. But what remained of my gumption withered under Mister Fanu’s icy parental stare.
But as I walked away, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that the janitor had not departed the hallway. He was standing on the spot like a sentry, presumably watching me go. As if he were guarding the lab. The hairs on the back of my neck sufficiently stood on end, I turned around, finding that he was not staring after me, but rather facing the laboratory doors, as though waiting to be let in. Lastly, I noticed his hands, which were wringing and wiping themselves on a dirty black rag. On his hands, unmistakably, was a shiny, visibly wet red liquid. Blood?
Terrified, fixated, but nonetheless afraid of being spotted, I turned the corner into the adjacent stairwell. But instead of descending the steps to the main floor, I waited. When I returned to the hallway, poking my head out but not my torso from around the corner, I saw that one of the doors to the lab was ajar, and the lights within were now on. Mister Fanu was no longer there.
On rubbery legs, I inched over to the cracked door and peered inside. Squeezing myself in, first my head then shoulders then one limb at a time, I felt my heart thundering in my chest, expecting at any moment to be pulled aside by an irate Mister Haddock who would proceed to chide me. But instead, all I found was the empty, brightly lit room, and a maddening odour assaulting my nostrils.
It was the common coppery smell of blood from before but now fetid and miry like a century-old field of cow manure. Like something excreted not from anything as natural as cattle or other livestock but from something otherworldly. From something evil.
I pinched my nostrils and breathed through my nose but that hardly worked to stymy the eldritch stench. But now my senses were alerted to another disturbance, a bizarrely pleasant sound issuing from the supply closet. The sound of waves. Reminding me of my last summer vacation at Myrtle Beach, I heard the distinct lapping of waves crashing onto a sandy shore. Oh sure, it might have just been from a video or an audio file, but something about the enormity and clarity of the sound was indisputably real. I then had tinnitus in my left ear, and had to steady myself on one of the workbenches from a palpable loss of equilibrium. It was as though I’d suddenly become sick. Or as if I’d been transferred from reality into a dream. It was then that I realized the sound of the waves was no longer emanating from the closet, but was all around me, churning around my head, sending me into a dizzy spell.
The putrid, rust smell was now overwrought, and again, Mister Fanu was nowhere in sight. The crashing of the waves was then intermingled with a shrieking sound. It was small at first then swelled to a piercing wail. It wasn’t female or even human. Yes…Yes, I was certain it was an animal’s cry. Like a horse whinnying. Yes, exactly like the sound a horse would make. The voice was pained and sorrowing, as though the beast of burden were being whipped or driven into the ground. It was so terrible – so pitiful that my throat seized up and my heart ached. My mind throbbing from the assaulting soundscape swirling around – or perhaps inside – my head, I staggered toward the supply closet, grasping at stools and bench tables as I did so to not plummet to the floor. As I did, I wondered if this was what it was like to be on drugs.
I was just about to reach my hand out for the steel door handle, when all at once the encircling cacophony stopped, leaving a deafening quiet over the room. Backpedalling, tinnitus still in one ear, I regained my balance and stood up straight, standing stationary until a sudden crash from behind me – like a stool being knocked over – sent me flying out of the room and down the hallway to the stairwell. I was so terrified – so confused – I ran home without asking for leave, resulting in a two-day suspension. I was informed by one of the vice principals that if I was suspended again, I’d lose my student rep seat. But that would be the last of my troubles.
After being allowed back in school, I discovered my science class was moved to another room. Also, I never saw Mister Haddock again. First, there were a string of substitute teachers, some subbing internally from the science department – like Mister Abruzzo who taught Grade Twelve physics. Some were unfamiliar faces. All of them assigned nothing but work straight from the textbook or divvied out worksheets two or three grades below us. But eventually, much to the relief of my hovercraft, high-expectation-laden parents, we were assigned a full-time teacher, Miss Goldman, after the Christmas Break. Miss Goldman was young, energetic, and very knowledgeable. Most of my class was very happy to have her – especially as a replacement to gin-reeking Ian Haddock. Conversely, I was bricked up with anxiety, ruminating fretfully on what had happened to him. Had he really been let go? Was this somehow my fault? Or did it have something to do with that bleeding anatomical model I’d found in the supply closet? The one that had been replaced by another far less gory silicone figurine and had not been seen since that fateful day? And on what on earth was the cause of all those noises I’d heard the last time? What did those have to do with Haddock or the bleeding model?
Worse was that sound I heard that had cut through the muffling waves. The sound of the whinnying horse, the torment and desperation plain in that voice. I know this won’t make sense to you reading this, but the sound haunted me. Made me tear up every time I thought of it. The thought that something so cruel could be happening to animal here at JH High – just, just drove me insane.
Eventually, either driven by guilt for Mister Haddock’s firing or the compulsion seeded by that hideous apparition, I went to visit the science department office. But as it turned out, they had meant to speak to me.
Mister Schmeling, the head of the science department who taught Grade Eleven Chemistry, told me he’d been waiting for me when I arrived. This was a bit unnerving since I’d never had a class with him and also owing to the fact that he had neither a warm nor jocular demeanour. Bald and bespectacled with tufts of iron-grey around his ears, a rotund physique and wobbling gait, he reminded most students of a cartoon villain than an approachable teacher. He motioned me to an empty seat with a curt nod of his head.
“So, Jennifer, dear,” he began in his ice-box timbre. “I’ve been meaning to speak with you for some time.” He then began to plow through the typical teacher questions, usually reserved for guidance councillors during one-on-one consultations.
He then got to the meat of the conversation. “It’s come to my attention recently that you’ve been going into the Grade Ten science lab by yourself after lesson periods. I hope that that isn’t true.”
Frozen in my seat on the concrete-hard plastic chair, a creeping fear waxing down my head to my nape, I said nothing and made no motion with my head or shoulders. I even kept my hands still inside my lap.
Relieving me of his glacial blue stare, Mister Schmeling clucked his tongue.
“I suppose you might have seen something which you shouldn’t have,” he said. My neck now a bed of bristled hairs. “Some test papers, perhaps? Some student progress reports Mister Haddock left lying around?”
I squinted hard and tilted my head. Another suspension or even expulsion for snooping around was the very least of my worries. What was this? A fishing expedition? Or a veiled threat?
Mister Schmeling carried on: “Perhaps you saw something in the supply closet? Something that startled you? Caused your imagination to run away with you?”
My eyelids peeled back inside my skull, the whites bulging from the sockets. He knew.
He scanned me over, a look that was not lustful but hungry and searching, making my skin crawl.
“Did you tell anyone what you saw?” he asked after a long pause.
For the first time I answered him, shaking my head feverishly from side to side, my hair tremulous, strands slapping around my chin.
Mister Schmeling pulled back into his swivel chair, the metal spine creaking, evidently pleased with my answer. His furry stubs for fingers laced across his ample abdomen. “If other people learned about what you think you saw, we’d have no choice but to suspend you for violating school safety regulations. Or worse. You wouldn’t want that would you? Being such a serious and hardworking student? No, I didn’t think so, my dear. So, since you’ve been so good and we’d hate for you to get behind in your studies, this’ll just be our little secret. Okay, dear?”
And so concluded the bizarre saga of Mister Haddock and the bleeding anatomy model in the science lab. I never found out the exact cause of Haddock’s dismissal, though the school used the usual cryptic phrasing of him moving on and finding work elsewhere. Some kids told me they saw him in one of the local pubs around Lakeshore, testing out a few concoctions of Ocean Spray and Absolut.
I haven’t told anyone about what I saw, as per my agreement with Mister Schmeling. At least, I haven’t until now. Perhaps he’s right; maybe my imagination simply ran away from me that fateful afternoon alone in the supply closet. But then why swear me to secrecy? What did he care what I told people I saw? Why was that laboratory never used again and was all but boarded up? That being said, I would still see red speckles and smears of blood on Mister Fanu’s hands and coveralls some days, I would still sometimes catch a whiff of something coppery and fetid in the hallways, and every so often, I would hear the uncanny crashing of waves, accompanying by the strangled whinnying of a horse, emanating from the now empty Grade Ten science lab.

Preface
I can remember being 14 years old, sitting on the couch, and seeing commercials for a new game coming, and I was simply awestruck. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. I had never played an Elder Scrolls game before, but something about the marketing just clicked with me. I waited and waited until November 11th, 2011, for my turn to drop that magical disc into my Xbox 360. The game booted up, and off I was on my adventure, all the while thinking it was the greatest thing I had ever experienced. Days turned to weeks, weeks to months, and months to years, and I kept coming back to Skyrim every now and again for a new playthrough even though I would never finish the last one. It was that sense of limitless wonder that kept me coming back, though eventually it waned. Fast forward a bit to me being 17 and buying myself my first proper gaming PC with money I earned working odd jobs around town. I had heard of game modding years prior through a friend, and we would take turns suggesting and playing old mods of Half-Life and Half-Life 2 at 720p, the only resolution our cheap laptops could run. When I finally got that PC though, the world was at my fingertips. I began scouring the internet for all the information about Skyrim mods I could cram into my head, and I was plugging away downloading, testing, fixing crashes, and playing what I thought at the time was my dream game. Years passed, Fallout 4 released, and the cycle started anew. Mod it till it crashes, fix the crashes, and continue on. I was getting better and more knowledgeable about modding along the way. Other games would pull me away, sometimes for a long while, but there was nothing better than coming back to Skyrim and FO4 and checking out all the fancy new mods to start a new load order with.
Just recently I was back on another Fallout 4 binge after a hiatus, and I had built a 350 mod load order centered around graphical fidelity, lots of weapons, and difficult gameplay. I went sort of overboard on the tactical Tarkov-esque gameplay with mods like MAIM, True Damage, SCOURGE, and Uneducated Shooter. They definitely made me play more attentively, but in a sort of unhealthy, 'eyes glued to the screen' sort of way of trying not to take a single point of damage so I didn't get massive internal injuries and have to sort through 10 different aid items in a multi-step chain of fixing myself in the middle of combat. I have no problem with players that enjoy gameplay like that; Tarkov itself is quite popular, but after a while it just became tedious to me, and I began not having fun. I scoured the Nexus for alternatives, and came across what I found to be everything I was wanting. It was something that slimmed down my load order substantially, but somehow seemed to flesh the game out more than it ever had been before.
The mods
Enter antistar's magnum opus: WARS and PEACE, 2 mods developed over the course of years. They come complete with a compat patch to make them work seamlessly together to completely overhaul Fallout 4's gameplay loop, designed entirely around the Survival Difficulty.
Now I know what some of you might be thinking: You don't enjoy Survival because it's just artificial busiwork tacked on to the base game with nothing interesting to keep you engaged. If you have that opinion, then we might just be two peas in a pod. I too am not a fan of vanilla Survival mode, but with these 2 mods installed you might just change your mind.
I have found that one of the core design philosophies of the WARS and PEACE experience is the concept of decisions, and making you consider your actions far more than in the base game, and surprisingly even more than a Tarkov-esque load order. Brutally difficult load orders are generally built around the flow of combat, and the repercussions of shooting and getting shot. Land a headshot, and insta-kill a raider, get headshot by a raider, and reload your last save. Shoot a raider in the torso and watch him bleed, get shot in the torso and frantically bandage yourself in the middle of combat so as not to bleed out yourself.
The flow of combat in WARS and PEACE is not like this though, though it is leagues more balanced than Vanilla, with damage being based mostly on caliber type like True Damage, and enemy HP and Damage Resist numbers being tweaked to combat bullet sponge fights such as in SCOURGE. The flow of thought is in the entirety of your tree of decision-making. Here are just a few of the decisions you will have to consider:
The Decisions

• Do I have a spare weapon cleaning kit or repair kit?

Guns get dirty with use, and using a very dirty weapon can risk damaging it to the next lower receiver quality, which decreases its damage output. Weapons can be cleaned in the field with a cleaning kit to prevent damage, and repaired to a higher receiver quality at a weapons workbench.

• Do I have enough free carry weight for clearing a couple locations when I include my tent and cooking pot?

The entire carry weight system has been overhauled to involve the concept of LBE (Load-Bearing Equipment) such as pockets, pouches, and backpacks. These holders and bags can be upgraded at an armor workbench, and will give flat carry weight, plus carry weight per Strength, such as +10 Carry Weight and +.5 Carry Weight per Strength. The default carry weight with WARS and PEACE is very low because your character barely has any pockets to put stuff, so no more magic butthole to shove stuff in anymore. All Vanilla clothing and outfits now have LBE slots, and the Pocketed and Deep Pocketed mods also give Strength-scaling carry weight. Power Armor grants high carry weight, and you can also craft on Cargo Carriers on to Power Armor torsos (separate from the normal torso mods, but in the same slot as Jetpacks) which grant massive amounts of carry weight at the cost of some movement speed, but certain leg mods can negate that.
In addition, there are new items to be crafted like portable cooking pots which can be placed anywhere as a cooking station and packed up afterwards, but require wood as fuel, which can be foraged for if you have a Camping Hatchet (or you can make a heavier cooking pot with an Atomic Hotplate with no need for wood).

• What junk items do I have to ignore for the more useful ones due to weight?

Same as above. No being a junk hoarder and picking up 20 Ball-peen hammers for next to zero reason. Consider what you want to keep.

• What perks should I take first so that I can get my feet under me survival-wise?

With tons of Vanilla perks being changed, and great craftable items which make surviving and thriving easier gated behind some of said perks, your perk priorities compared to normal might be radically different. You might want to get Science! 1 and 2 early so you can craft those Atomic Hotplate Cooking Pots mentioned earlier, as well as homemade portable water filters to get water in the wild when needed to save on weight by not carrying around a big supply of already purified water.

• Should I camp in the open and risk getting attacked?

Sleeping anywhere now has a risk of getting ambushed by enemies, which is reduced by using a tent, sleeping in indoor locations, or at settlements based on defense value.

• Do I risk attracting a deadly animal by butchering this Radstag?

There is now a Butchering system to receive much more meat from animals than Vanilla, as well as their hide, but it has a risk of giving you a disease, or even worse, attracting a hungry predator that you might not be ready to fight. Perks can reduce or negate the disease risk.

• Do I want to bring extra food in case some spoils?

Food now has a chance of spoiling over time if left in your pockets or in containers. You can craft powered refrigerators at settlements to store food and prevent it from spoiling.

• How many caps should I keep in the bank so that I get some interest but also have enough to keep myself stocked from vendors?

There are now Cap ATMs around the Commonwealth (can also be crafted in settlements), where you can deposit and withdraw caps and even earn interest on them.
Once again these are just a few of the decisions to be made. The extent of the overhauls are far-reaching.
The full feature lists for the mods can be found here if you want to have a look:
WARS: https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/articles/4507
PEACE: https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/articles/4510
The Point
I could go on and on, but it's these small 'micro-decisions' that are really getting me immersed in the game. They are all consequential, but none of them are overly stressful or needlessly punishing. Once you play a game long enough you eventually just want to relax a bit but still stay engaged with what's happening, and that's exactly the experience I have been having with these 2 overhauls in conjunction with each other. There are a countless number of features here that will make you stop and go "well yeah that makes sense". Antistar notes that they wanted to push Fallout 4 in a more 'immersive sim' direction, and I think that term hits the nail on the head. So many mods seem to discard what Fallout 4 was designed to be, and instead try to make it into a different game. That's not the philosophy here; it's built upon realism, but not at the expense of the RPG-Shooter framework it's standing on the shoulders of. This is still Fallout, but everything here makes sense. Guns are not magic wands, heavy weapons require more strength to move around with and control their recoil, armor has weight and therefore also has strength requirements to actually be able move around in, laser weapons have no recoil, and save for revolvers and direct ammo insert weapons, guns need magazines to function. Many of the features can be adjusted, tweaked, or even toggled on and off inside of an MCM menu if you feel as if a feature is not up your alley, but I implore you to at least try all of the features here, because you might be pleasantly surprised by your reaction.
All in all, I've been absolutely floored by the intelligent and well thought out game design philosophies implemented in these 2 mods, and the general overall quality of the work done to achieve it. To quote Todd Howard, "It just works". Everything is implemented in such a way that it feels natural to play with, and there's a great multi-faceted sense of progression not found in the base game. Getting your first backpack, upgrading your clothing and armor LBE pockets, finding your first solid gun with a receiver in great shape, getting a Fridge to store your food, unlocking those key perks for crafting useful and immersive survival supplies. My personal favorite so far has been building my first super carry weight Automatron follower, with the all new robot parts that can turn your electronic friend into essentially a giant metal suitcase complete with custom models and textures.
If you've been feeling stuck in a rut in your modding journey and want something brand new and interesting for a new playthrough, I can thoroughly recommend trying out WARS and PEACE.

This is the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvVrVdqA9OE
It is not my workbench or video; this is also not as a project submission (those are OC only), but rather a discussion of the techniques used and features.
Curious what other folks think of the implementation of

• Homemade pop-up bench dogs - as someone who doesn't use the dog holes much, is this a good compromise?
• Motorcycle lift instead of the flip-up wheels - is this really the best solution to hiding those flip up wheels?
• Will the burl veneer hold up over time? Looks great, feels like it would get trashed quickly?
• The chamfer on the "shark tail" dovetails looks attractive in the pic, but didn't see much closeup detail. Curious from others who have cut these. It's an appealing technique I want to try now.
• His solution to stopping the racking in the moxon vise -- I've been debating adding a moxon vise and this frustration has been one reason I've held off. Is there a better solution? It felt like in the video I was still seeing some racking. There's gotta be an elegant, simple solution someone has thought of.

I learn a lot here from other folks sharing experiences, and there's a lot here to look at. Hopefully this thread opens some interesting discussion. I'll just say up front - I get workbenches can be a trigger point and everyone has a view on what's overkill. But hopefully we can all share a view that's helpful and respectful, even if we all wouldn't make a workbench this nice/long/detailed/whatever-your-thing-is. I just ask if someone has an unhelpful rude remark, don't comment.
There is a lot about this workbench I can learn from, and it's a breath of fresh air from pallet wood and softwood benches with butt joints that youtube is constantly cramming down my feed.