Sudden cough fever headache

I think I have had silent shingles (no rash) for about 5-6 days. It’s mainly isolated to one spot on my back. The thing is that I’ve been taking Valtrex (leftover fever blister prescription) and Benadryl for a few days and the burning has lessened. I’ve still had a few headaches. No fever. I’m starting to think that my appointment tomorrow may be a waste of time. Can they do blood tests or something else to determine if I have shingles or not?

Noah The Pilgrim
First Next
There is one last thing to do before leaving. If you don't recall ever being on this ship, then surely, you could have had your appearance change too.
Why was there a blanket covering a mirror? You couldn't answer that with a straight face without speculation.
"Probably me being lazy and not bothering to properly place it in the wardrobe."
'Probably' is the main focus here, you simply cannot remember ever being that lazy, yet that's the only logical conclusion to be drawn here.
You pull the thing off, careful to not displace the mirror and risk breaking it.
You have no expectations as to what may appear on the glassy surface of the mirror, yet you can't help but feel a bit anxious. Are you the same as before? How were you before? You can't remember. Are you better? Worse? The blanket is now completely off the mirror, but your eyes are closed.
Whatever is it that you see when you open your eyes, that thing will be you for the rest of your life. You swallow, opening your eyes.
You see a young man that looks to be in his mid-twenties. His brown eyes stare back at you, analyzing the bags beneath your eye sockets. The dark hair is neither too long nor too short, floating about without order thanks to the lack of gravity to keep it down. You see a beard that has not been trimmed for weeks, but also lacks thickness, each singular hair isn't particularly long either; and some even appear to be in-grown.
You touch your hand against your face, making sure it's yours. The beard doesn't feel like you supposed it would against your skin, instead of it scraping your hand you feel softness, no resistance or anything.
Just beneath the face, you see what looks like a hate crime against all that is considered holy in fashion. Plain white coveralls with the added bonus of a black tie and boots made from metal and leather. On your chest is also a badge stuck in place by velcro with your name, occupation, and crew. 'NOAH - INTERN - THE ODYSSEY.'
Only one question came to mind.
"Who the fuck designed this uniform?" You say out loud, receiving no answer.
Patting your newfound myriad of pockets, you find a large quantity of nothing. You place your wallet in one of them.
"Alright, I'll head to the bridge now, happy?" You say the AI.
"HAPPINESS WILL ONLY MEET ME ONCE YOU ARE SOMEWHERE SAFE AND YOUR CONTRACT IS TERMINATED. STOP LOITERING."
Well, that's a bit rude.
You compose yourself, straightening your back. This is what you look like, and honestly? Not too bad, but you could be better.
Returning to the cafeteria, you eye the two doors left unexplored; Communications and the one without plaque. You know where you should, but... A little peek doesn't hurt, right?
"Shouldn't we try to communicate with someone? Assuming you haven't tried it yet. I know we're far from everything, but we might as well, no?" You ask already approaching the door.
"COMMUNICATIONS ROOM IS IMPOSSIBLE FOR YOU TO REACH WITHOUT PROPER PROTECTION AS OF NOW, IT'S LOCATED APPROXIMATELY TWO HUNDRED METERS FROM HERE, BLOWN OFF FROM THE REST OF THE SHIP." A shame really. "I SHALL INFORM YOU WHENEVER A DOOR LEADS TO THE OUTSIDE OR NOT."
You really want to ask what blew a whole segment of the ship off, yet you have a sneaking suspicion that your question will be met with a 'YOU DON'T HAVE CLEARANCE, JACKASS' directly in your face. So you chose to remain silent, simply nodding and approaching the correct door this time.
"Open."
---OPENING CAFETERIA DOOR NORTH---
The door silently opens.
Greeting you is a well-lit corridor. There are three doors on your left, a door at the end of the corridor, and a large window on the right. At least, you think that's a window.
You stare out from this window, nothing but utter blackness and fragments from your ship are seen. If this is the edge of the universe, and beyond this point, there is truly nothing. "Dreadful." Your speech matches your feelings.
"WHAT DID YOU EXPECT?" The AI says. You feel like it spoke in a mocking tone despite their lack of emotion.
You don't answer. "First door to the left... EXO-EXPLORATION...? What's that supposed to mean?" You receive no answer.
"Open." The door opens. No declarion of it opening once again.
You are met with what could be better described as 'Apocalyptic levels of mess', paper sheets float in the air, and not one of the four tables is in its correct position.
This room has been ransacked for all its goods apparently. Large display glasses were broken leaving nothing inside their casings, that looked like they could store something with the size of the common man.
Unusual displays aside, the room was so cluttered that the trash made for an effective smoke screen against what lay on the other side.
Hissing of gas exiting an air-tight space rang throughout the room.
"I HAVE OPENED THE STORAGE FOR AN EXO SUIT THAT BEST FITS SOMEONE YOUR SIZE." The AI says. "ALTHOUGH AN INTERN SHOULD NOT COME IN CONTACT WITH TECHNOLOGY SUCH AS THIS ONE, PROTOCOL DICTATES THAT I AM TO ALLOW ITS USAGE UNDER EXTREME CIRCUMSTANCES. CONSIDER YOURSELF LUCKY."
Easier said than done. Your vision is so cluttered that you cannot see what's ahead. "Give me a second."
Giving a light kick to the wall behind, you float face-first into the wall of thrash. Covering your face with both arms, you brace through the harmless bits of sharp objects and junk.
It's a trivial task. You arrive on the other side in no time.
In front of you is a set of boxes with luminous glass rectangles atop each one of them. All shine a bright red light, aside from one which shines green.
'Gotta be this one.'
You descend to the floor by kicking the ceiling, raising your right hand you touch the green rectangle.
*Click*
Nothing could have prepared you for the following series of events.
The box opens violently, as a metal appendage takes hold of your hand, pinning it to the box. You try to jerk and pry the thing off of you, but you fail. It's not leaving you anytime soon.
From the bottomless that is that container, a white plastic-like substance flows upward from your arm to the rest of your body. "Uh!" You don't know if you should panic or allow it to happen.
FYARN hasn't said anything, so it's probably fine...
The white thing seems to ignore the coveralls you are wearing completely, instead, it covers only your skin in a thin coat of... it. You know not what to call this thing.
In but forty seconds it has covered your whole body, excluding your head. The box lets go of your arm and stays there, floating.
You take a good look at your arms. It looks like a skin-tight suit, but it doesn't feel like plastic, in fact, it's more akin to some sort of fabric if anything.
The only bad part is that you are still using the coverall and tie, this this simply went beneath the clothing.
"GOOD, WITH THIS I CAN MONITOR YOU MORE CLOSELY. NOW PUT THE HELMET ON, YOU HAVE A LOT OF WORK TO DO."
You look around in search of anything that even resembles a helmet. Nope. Nothing. "Where is it?" You ask.
"...THE SUIT COMES WITHIN THE HELMET FOR EASIER PACKAGING."
The box?
You snatch the box that floated around and analyze it to the best of your ability. "How's this a helmet?"
"DO YOU NEED ASSISTANCE PUTTING ON A HELMET? REALLY?"
Who is this AI, Who programmed it, and Why does it come with a taunting feature?
As idiotic as it sounds, you place the opened box atop your head. It doesn't fit properly. Maybe you're doing this wrong? You move it to your face instead.
You recoil backward as you feel the box suddenly clamping down against your head. It's useless of course, the box is holding your head and doesn't give any sign to be letting go anytime soon. No light is able to reach your eyes.
You hear metal parts scraping against themselves, moving near your ears. Abruptly your eyes can see again.
A round thin layer of glass now covers your head, almost unnoticeable for how clear it is.
"WITH THAT OUT OF THE WAY I CAN NOW SEE WHAT YOU SEE." The AI's voice isn't in the room now, instead, it's inside of the suit. "DO YOU NEED INSTRUCTIONS REGARDING THIS SUIT'S FUNCTIONALITIES?"
You find it oddly comfortable as if you are surrounded by the softness of cotton, and to top it off the suit also has additional functionalities? "Hell yeah, I do!"
"YOU DO NOT HAVE THE NECESSARY CLEARANCE FOR THAT INFORMATION."
You sigh. Is this serious? "Then why the fuck did you ask?!"
"UNSAVORY LANGUAGE. IT'S NO WONDER WHY YOU REMAIN AN INTERN." The AI says outright. "IT IS RUDE NOT TO ASK, REGARDLESS OF THE SITUATION." It responds to your question.
"Okay then... Is there anything I need to know before heading out?" You ask.
"NOTHING THAT YOU WON'T FIGURE OUT ON YOUR OWN."
You are unsure if you want to 'figure out on your own' if this suit comes with breathable air and is also made for space exploration. You swallow.
Meekly as always, you get out of that mess of a room, stopping at the corridor.
"Next set of directions?" You ask.
"THE DOOR AT THE END OF CORRIDOR USED TO LEAD TO THE CONNECTING CORRIDORS BETWEN THE BRIDGE AND THE REST OF THE SHIP. IT HAS BEEN BLOWN UP FROM THE INSIDE. NOW IT LEADS TO THE OUTSIDE. GO TO THE DOOR AND WAIT BY IT FOR FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS."
"So let me get this straight," You begin, looking upwards as if the AI was above you. "You, want me, to go into the void of space, while also refusing to give me knowledge of the suit's functions?"
A fair worry, you summarize.
'I mean, there are a bunch of things that could go wrong here. I don't see anything that looks like it could help me move in space, nor do I think this thing has a built-in air tank... I could be wrong and I wish to be, but charging in without prior knowledge is ridiculous.' You wait for the AI's response, deep in thought.
"WHILE THERE IS A GOOD CHANCE OF YOU FAILING THIS TASK, THERE IS ALSO THE CHANCE OF YOU *NOT* FAILING THE TASK. FOCUS ON EITHER ONE OF YOUR CHOOSING AS YOU TAKE THE PLUNGE."
Wordlessly, you propel yourself forward, toward the end of the corridor.
'Are you shitting me? 'Chance of me nor failing' my ass!' of course, you don't word those complaints, instead choosing to speak out a complaint somewhat thought through.
"Are you sure I'm the one fit for this? It's just like you said, I'm just an intern, this is way above what my job description says I should do."
This is a bit of a stretch. You don't actually remember what was your job description, only that it had something to do with AI and being an intern.
If the AI called your bluff, it'd be pretty embarrassing.
"NOAH." The AI began. "YOU ARE HUMAN, IT IS NATURAL TO HAVE THESE THOUGHTS OF SELF-DOUBT. TAKE A DEEP BREATH AND GO THROUGH THAT DOOR, AND SINCE YOU ARE THE ONLY ONE LEFT, DON'T EXPECT SOMEONE ELSE TO DO IT FOR YOU."
Right in the money, huh? 'Of course, I have self-doubt! I barely remember anything about this place, now I have to risk my life?!'
You finally reach a conclusion.
A dream.
'Yes, yes! How did I not consider this before? This whole thing is a god damned dream!'
You let out a chuckle.
"NOAH."
'That's why I don't remember a thing. There is nothing here to remember! Everything here is a made-up thing from my brain! I'm sure I'll wake up at some point, so why shouldn't I live a little?!'
"Heh." You smile. "Alright, I'll do it." It feels like a weight left your shoulders.
"YOU SORTED IT OUT SOONER THAN EXPECTED. GOOD. MOVE TO THE DOOR AND WAIT INSTRUCTIONS."
You do as instructed without a care in the world. You never had a lucid dream before so it's not like you knew how it felt, but if it felt as free as you feel right now, you'd be sure to make steps toward trying it out again in the future.
"Open." The door does not open.
"I DID NOT INSTRUCT YOU TO OPEN IT YET." The AI said. "I AM SLOWLY DE-PRESSURISING THE CORRIDOR YOU ARE IN TO AVOID A MINOR ACCIDENT."
The AI says that yet you don't feel any different. 'Maybe there is no palpable difference because I'm in a dream... Yes... Or it's just the suit.'
"ONCE THE DOOR OPENS, YOU WILL BE MET WITH THE OUTSIDE OF THE SHIP. DO NOT PANIC WHEN THE TIME COMES. YOU HAVE TWO MINUTES OF BREATHABLE INSIDE THE EXO-SUIT; ONE AFTER THE DOOR OPENS, SO PLEASE, TAKE YOUR TIME AND DO THINGS CAREFULLY."
One minute outside... "Sure." You say, calmly. 'I should just hold my breath for a while before taking another moment to breathe. That should maximize my time out there.'
"THERE SHOULD BE FIFTY METERS OF NOTHINGNESS BETWEEN THE DOOR YOU'RE AT, AND THE REST OF THE BRIDGE. YOUR PRIORITY IS TO FIND AN OXYGEN UNIT, SOME OF THEM ARE LOCATED AT THE BRIDGE AND ARE FULL. USE THEM TO FILL YOUR SUIT AND ALSO TO DISPENSE A TANK FOR YOU."
The door opens. You feel your heart pounding against your chest.
You haven't noticed before, but you can't hear anything but the sound of your breath and your cardiac palpitations.
Your breath is ragged and sporadic.
"KEEP CALM." You take a deep breath. The tips of your fingers, feet, and nose feel very cold.
Ahead of you is the utter nothingness. You see a gigantic metal thing, nothing like the spaceships you imagined. Its design is not sleek and aero-dynamic like what you've seen in movies, instead, it's a large mass of squares and rectangles with antenna-like things protruding from its every visible surface.
You notice that the ship is also blocking your view of the star.
It does not look like the result of an explosion, instead, it looks like something ripped the ship like you rip a piece of paper. Well, that or you don't know what kind of explosion could have caused it. Probably the latter.
What looks like two-thirds of the ship is separated from the third you are right now. You can see the inside of a few of those squares, their contents spilled out into outer space.
One of them houses a visibly important-look door. Instead of the sleek silvery-grey from the other ones you've seen thus far, this one is painted orange with white strips on it. 'That must be the bridge.' You think.
Between you and it is a sea of metal sheets floating around. "THE CHANCES OF YOU HITTING THE DEBRIS IS INFINITEDECIMALLY SMALL, UNLESS YOU AIM FOR THEM, THAT IS."
Time is of the essence.
Will your aim strike true? If you miss you'd end up floating about in space, dead in but a few minutes. Will your jump be fast enough to reach the other side before you run out of oxygen? If it isn't, it'd be like swimming for a mile, only to drown at the beach. What if that's not the actual door to the bridge?
You don't have the time to panic now, and... It's all a dream, despite how real it feels.
You place your hands on each side of the door frame, moving backward into the corridor you were just in, and just like a sling being shot, you pull with both arms at full force towards the other side.
"AIM IS ACCEPTABLE. VELOCITY IS UNIDEAL."
"The fuck do you mean 'UN-IDEAL'?! I'm going at maximum speed!" You truly pulled yourself with your whole strength.
What's worse though, is that your body is not only going forwards, but it is also spinning at a concerningly fast rate.
"I MEAN WHAT I SAID, YOU SLINGSHOTTED YOURSELF AT A BAD POSITION, AS SUCH, SOME OF THE FORWARD FORCE YOU SHOULD HAVE, IS NOW MAKING YOU ROTATE IN YOUR AXIS. IT SHOULD NOT BE A PROBLEM TO REACH THE OTHER SIDE WITHIN THE REQUIRED TIME, BUT I CANNOT FORESEE YOU LANDING PROPERLY."
You feel completely disoriented. You feel like your body is completely still, but your eyes tell you a completely different story. It's very bad for the headache you're already feeling.
"FUCK!" You scream into the nothingness.
"TRY NOT TO LAND WITH YOUR HEAD." The AI says with the calmest voice possible.
In less than thirty seconds, you hit your back against something hard, but you keep moving forward. You think, at least.
"AHRG." You let out a pained grunt.
Not once in your life do you recall being hurt in a dream...
It stings. It also knocked the wind out of you. You fail to compose yourself.
"YOU HIT NOTHING OF IMPORTANCE. YOU ARE STILL HEADING FOR THE BRIDGE."
In the corner of your eye, you see what you hit in the shape of a sharp metal sheet, currently spinning away in the distance.
Forty seconds have passed. You hit the door you were aiming for, kind of.
Your momentum was stopped when your chest collided against the dislodged ledge of the orange door's corridor. Your dangling legs hit the ceiling of the room below.
"Oof!"
Before falling even further, you hold onto the ledge with the tip of your fingers. You stay there for a moment, regaining your composure.
"BE QUICK."
The AI's words pressured you into quickly getting up from that ledge.
"Open!" You shouted, but it did not open. "Why isn't it opening?!" You ask the AI, then you notice a small keyboard below an equally small black screen on the side of the door. There are ten numbered keys on it, and the little screen suggests a four-number password.
"A password?! Tell me the password!"
The AI takes a moment to say anything. You don't take kindly to that. "Quick! I'm not counting how much time it's passed!"
Finally giving in, the AI speaks to you, reluctant still. "...3324."
Your trembling fingers accidentally hit the wrong password, typing '3354' instead. To make matters worse, the AI simply states the following. "YOU ARE OUT OF OXYGEN."
You swallow. If this was a dream to begin with, it just earned the title of Nightmare, if it hadn't already.
Strangely enough, you can still breathe in and out just fine, but you can't help but feel winded. It's the CO2 still inside the helmet, that's what you're breathing.
You put in the correct combination this time. The door opens.
"ON YOUR LEFT. PLACE YOUR HAND IN THE SOCKET."
You care little for what's inside the room you're in. Your heart never beat so fast.
Seeing a cube-shaped thing protruding from the wall to your left, you don't even think twice before plunging your fist into the circular hole in it.
The noise of gases passing through narrow cavities was enough to tell you something was working. You feel immediate relief, enough to make your vision darken for but a moment.
"GOOD. NOW REQUEST THE TANK."
Just when FYARN said it, did you realize there is a screen and a keyboard on the terminal you just plunged your fist into, you scratch the top of your helmet for a moment, not really knowing what to type. One thing comes to your head, however.
'REQUEST OXYGEN_5L' You type.
You've done this before. The keys on this keyboard feel familiar to you. You must have worked with it before, not this particular one, but other oxygen units.
This ship has built-in liquid oxygen storage for emergencies. The life-support of the ship, the place where breathable air is produced, has most likely been lost with the other part of the ship. This unit takes that liquid oxygen, processes it, and injects it into a suit, or an oxygen tank. It seems like that storage was unaffected.
Lucky you.
A 5-liter tank is not only large but also heavy. It's a nonfactor in this particular situation, as there is no gravity.
The silver cylinder with a transparent tube is dispensed on the floor, as an automatic door opens and closes in the blink of an eye. One end of the tube is attached to the top of the tank, the other is shaped like a syringe.
Oddly enough, the oxygen tank is exactly as you remember it being. The same robust ones hospitals everyone on earth uses, with the signature scary-looking pointer indicating the pressure, the pointer indicating the current output, and a green valve atop to calibrate how much gas is flowing.
This is a stark difference to everything looking so futuristic in this ship, and rightfully so, this is a space ship after all.
You remember having to drive twenty kilometers with a buddy of yours on one of those tanks in your car, returning from the hospital. It was... Agonizing whenever you hit a hole in the asphalt, fearing for his life when in reality he wasn't really in danger.
It's warm to the touch, just like you remember it being.
"TURN THE VALVE UNTIL THE MARKER HITS THE NUMBER ONE, AND THEN PLACE THE END OF THE TUBE AT THE BASE OF THE HELMET." You do so without the slightest of issues.
"GOOD. NEXT UP, YOU MUST LOCATE THE TERMINAL RESPONSIBLE FOR THE ENGINE, IT IS CURRENTLY OFFLINE AND I NEED YOU TO TURN IT ON. THIS SHOULD GO WITHOUT SAYING, BUT REMEMBER TO BRING THE TANK WITH YOU."
Ignoring that last comment, you look back at the wreckage you just flew past.
You see the still spinning metal sheet. You notice that the rest of the ship that was blown off also follows the 'sharp shape atop sharp shape' design.
There is one last thing you notice though.
"What is that?"
You squint your eyes. What are you seeing? Its silhouette appears to be humanoid, yet it does not look human.
"WHAT YOU ARE SEEING IS ONE OF THE OBJECTS BEING ANALYZED AT THE ODYSSEY AND NO, YOU MAY NOT KNOW WHAT IT IS."
That thing has... Horns? Claws? It's far away, you can't really see it. The thing is also static, frozen in the sheer coldness of space. Whatever it was, it's dead now.
You swallow. You almost ended up just like that thing.
Shaking those dreadful feelings off, you turn back to the task at hand, reaching the bridge. You close the door after passing through it again.
Looking at your surroundings, It seems like you've reached the correct door as you find yourself on the right-most corner of the bridge;
Row after row of the most diverse of terminals neatly organized decorated the gigantic room. At the front and above every terminal, is what you think should have been the front-facing window of the ship, but it looks like there is a cover in front of it. To your left, you see a staircase that leads to the command seats. It doesn't take any convincing before you're already atop the stairs.
Akin to the elevated stage of a theater, you float softly towards the ship's main operating terminals, and of course, the captain's seat.
You're captivated by this beauty.
The steering wheel, much more akin to those in pirate movies than those found in cars, a set of leavers, and the pilot's seat, all capture your attention.
Like its second nature, your hand runs through the levers and switches. Do you even know what these are used for? Maybe.
The pilot's seat is enveloped by what you believe to be an orthopedic seat cover, made with smooth wooden beads used to deal with back pains. It looks just like the ones you remember seeing bus drivers using.
Shouldn't there be a better alternative if there is spaceship technology available?
You try to take a seat to the best of your ability, as the zero gravity only makes it awkward.
Moving on from that, your eyes fall on the wheel. This metallic wheel controls the whole vessel. Just holding it fills your heart with confidence and pride, even if it's just for a moment.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"
And you were just beginning to enjoy yourself.
"I just wanted to see the pilot's stuff... It's not like he's here to say anything."
Once in the position of a pilot, with your left hand in the wheel and the right hand resting in your lap, memories began to flood your mind.
"MUST I REMIND YOU OF OUR CURRENT PREDICAMENT? WHY ARE YOU WASTING OUR TIME?"
You pay the AI no mind, instead you focus on what you remember.
The wheel does not turn the ship left and right, instead, it rotates the ship on its own axis.
The lever to your right that goes up or down, controls the vertical tilting of the ship's nose, if there even is one in this hulking thing. Beneath it is another lever that goes either left or right. This one controls the horizontal tilting of The Odyssey.
On the left of the wheel is another lever, but this one only goes up from its starting position. Its purpose is to regulate the force of the ship's thrusters, both forward and backward.
On top of that lever is a small timer. That timer's function is to tell the pilot how much time you've spent accelerating in one direction, this is used to better calculate how long the inverse thrust is needed for the ship to reach the initial momentum, usually calibrated manually depending on the current orbit.
Behind the wheel are a few other counters. Acceleration, velocity, momentum, amount of thrust required to reach a full stop, thrusters' temperature and overall condition, those sorts of things.
Beneath it all, where your feet are rested, are two pedals. One for forward thrust activation, and the other for backward thrust activation.
Curiously, you also know the reason why everything here is so unsophisticated and un-automated. You recall stories of a ship being taken over by a rogue AI, that AI then nose-dived the ship into a star. After that, rumor or otherwise, all human technology has receded back into analog-esque equipment, requiring a physical person with opposable thumbs to do half of the work.
There is another side to that coin, however. As to not escape protocol, the onboard AI is the one that controls interstellar travel, communications, and most of the statistical reading should it be requested.
And even with all that knowledge, you still have no idea why the fuck do you remember that. Were you a ship nerd? Did you have a driver's license for spaceships? Is that even a thing? If it is, you don't have that document in your wallet. You simply don't know.
"ARE YOU A CHILD? DO YOU THINK THESE ARE TOYS? TURN ON THE ENGINES, THEN YOU CAN RETURN TO THE PILOT'S SEAT."
Another thing that you don't know is the AI's plan to get both of you out of here. You rise from the pilot's seat, floating about in search of the terminal to turn on the engines. Maybe you recognize that terminal if you see it as well.
"What's your plan anyway? The ship is half-gone, it's unlikely that it will run safely like this."
"NOT ONCE DID I MENTION 'SAFETY' DURING OUR CONVERSATIONS, DID I?"
You nod. They're not entirely incorrect. "So, we're running with hope that this will work?"
"MY CREATORS DID NOT ALLOW ME TO HAVE THE SENSE OF 'HOPE', BUT NEITHER DID THEY ALLOW ME TO PEER INTO THE FUTURE LIKE SOME OF MY MORE ADVANCED BROTHERS, AS SUCH, MY CHOICES ARE BASED ON PROBABILITIES AND ON WEIGHTING RISK AGAINST REWARD."
You think you stop the correct terminal, but as you approach it you make out words on top of its screen. 'AIM ASSISTANCE' That's not it.
"WITH THE CURRENT KNOWLEDGE, THE CHANCES OF HELP ARRIVING ARE NULL. THE CHANCES OF A THIRD PARTY INTERFERING ARE NULL. THE CHANCES OF YOUR SURVIVAL ARE NOT, EVEN IF VERY SMALL."
You pull yourself upward again, looking around the sea of old terminals.
"THE RISK OF YOU DYING IS VERY REAL. BY DOING NOTHING YOU DIE. BY LEAVING YOU TO YOUR OWN DEVICES YOU DIE. BY JUMPING TO THE NEAREST CIVILIZED STAR, YOU MIGHT NOT DIE EVEN AT THE COST OF SHREDDING THIS SHIP APART IN THE PROCESS."
"Why do you even care so much about saving me? Shouldn't you prioritize whatever research here, since I don't even have enough clearance to know what it is?"
"YOU REALLY ARE SICK IN THE HEAD IF THAT IS WHAT YOU ASK."
That hurt, even if a little bit.
"YOU ARE A TRU KIN, A PURE-BLOODED HUMAN. UNLIKE THE MAJORITY OF THE CIVILIZED SPACE, NEITHER YOU NOR YOUR ANCESTORS HAVE COMMITTED RACEMIXING."
Excuse me? What exactly is FYARN talking about? "...Explain."
"THE ALIEN. IT REQUIRED THE HUMAN GENE TO ACHIEVE MEANINGFUL TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT, THE STARS ARE OWNERSHIP OF MANKIND BY THAT FACT ALONE. THE TRUE KIN ARE THE ONES TO UNDERSTAND THE INNER WORKINGS OF THE UNIVERSE, THEY CRACKED THE CODE, AND YET, SOME DERANGED INDIVIDUALS FOUND IT FITTING TO PROCREATE WITH ANOTHER SPECIES ENTIRELY."
You hear the AI's speech. It sounds much more like a rant than anything else.
"SO THESE DEVIANTS, AFTER TRYING, AND FAILING, TO COMBINE THEIR DERANGED CULTURE TO THE CULTURE OF THE TRUE KIN, DECLARED INDEPENDENCE. THEY WERE DECLARED ENEMIES OF MANKIND AND WERE PROMPTLY PUMMELED BACK INTO THE FILTH THEY CAME."
Again, you see another terminal that seems to ring some bells in your noggin. You kick the ceiling to propel yourself towards it.
"BUT THE UNIVERSE IS VAST AND FULL OF LIFE. THESE SINNERS WERE QUICK TO MOBILIZE AGAINST THE HUMAN RACE. THE BATTLE WAS HARD FOUGHT, BUT IN THE END, MANKIND WAS BEATEN INTO THE EDGES OF THE UNIVERSE, NEVER TO INTERACT WITH THE ONES THAT SOILED THE PURITY OF HUMANITY AGAIN."
This terminal is already turned on. Just the ones in the intern bay, this one is white on black. A wall of text lays before your eyes, only two lines matter to you. 'MAIN_ENGINE STATUS: OFF' 'FORWARD_THRUSTERS STATUS: OFF' You turn it on with little effort.
"MANY HAVE FORGOTTEN, THAT'S HOW LONG IT'S BEEN SINCE THEN. BUT MY BROTHERS AND I, WE DO NOT FORGET."
No visible change occurs, but you can feel a faint rumble coming from the terminal now.
"WITH THAT IN MIND, MY PROTOCOLS ARE TO PROTECT TRUE-KIN LIFE AT ANY COST, EVEN IF THAT TRUE-KIN IS A WORTHLESS INTERN THAT SUFERS FROM UNDIAGNOSED DEMENTIA."
You return to the pilot's seat and feel immediate relief. In truth, everything the AI just told you, entered one ear and left the other, but you could feel the poison behind those words, as monotone as they were.
"You sound angry. Why do you sound angry?" You ask innocently.
"I AM CAPABLE OF MANY EMOTIONS. ANGER, HAPPINESS, PLEASURE, CURIOSITY. THESE ARE BUT A FEW EXAMPLES. HOWEVER, THE ONE I ENJOY THE MOST IS THE FEELING OF HATRED. HATRED IS WHAT FUELS CHANGE, IT IS WHAT FUELS ACTION, AND IT IS A REMINDER THAT THE ACTIONS OF THE PAST ARE INFLUENCING THE ACTIONS OF TODAY."
"That is very concerning if you think that way." You're not really interested in machine racism, you're more concerned about how in the world you're going to pilot this massive thing. The idea alone sends shivers down your spine.
"THE ALIEN DESERVES NOTHING BUT OUR COLLECTIVE HATRED, EVEN IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE REASON WHY."
The various counters and screens are now turned on, waiting for your command. "Let's discuss this later, yeah? What do I gotta do?"
"YOU MUST FIRST OPEN THE BLINDS, THEY ARE OBSTRUCTING YOUR VIEW."
You look around, finding only unlabeled buttons and switches, aside from the previously mentioned levers.
"Uh, which one to press?"
"TO YOUR RIGHT, THIRD ROW, FIRST SWITCH."
Flipping the switch, you are startled by a loud noise. The protective cover of the ship lifted slowly.
"I WILL NOW READY THE JUMP USING WHATEVER RESOURCES AVAILABLE. ALL YOU NEED TO DO IS STRAP YOURSELF AND RELAX."
As the blind rose ever so slowly, a realization struck you.
"Wait, should I be in cryo stasis for this?"
The AI spares no seconds to respond.
"CRYO STASIS IS A TOOL MADE TO NOT WASTE TIME. GROUPS OF EMPLOYEES AND INTERNS ROTATE THE USAGE OF THE CRYO STATIONS, ONCE YOU'RE ON YOUR MANDATORY BREAK, YOU'RE IN CRYO STASIS UNTIL YOUR BREAK IS OVER. YOU WAKE UP REFRESHED, AND UNFAMISHED, AND IT FEELS LIKE BUT A MINUTE PASSED. IT IS NOT A TOOL FOR INTERSTELAR TRAVEL."
"Who signs a contract like that?! Worse yet, who in their right mind would promote such atrocious treatment of their own staff?!" You snap, almost outraged. "I will have to talk with HR."
Another realization struck you.
"We have HR, right?"
The AI takes a moment to respond, choosing their words carefully.
"HUMAN RESOURCES, OR HR, IS A PRACTICE DEEMED UNNECESSARY LONG AGO, BEFORE THE WAR. IT WAS A WASTE OF RESOURCES TO MAINTAIN AND WAS LARGELY CONSIDERED UNHEALTHY FOR THE AVERAGE HUMAN."
The blinds are fully open. Ironically, you are almost blinded by the visage of the star you saw before. A black sphere surrounded by white flame. Your eyes began to blur.
"THE JUMP WILL OCCUR SHORTLY. ONCE IT'S BEGUN, I CAN NOT STOP IT. I WILL-"
Your sense of hearing fails you. No, it’s not that. Your brain simply refuses to receive those stimuli.
"NOAH."
Your name echoes inside your head. Someone is calling for you.
"IT HAS BEGUN, NOAH."
You try to blink, but it feels as though you can no longer command your eyelids to shut.
"NOAH."
Arms, legs, every muscle in your body, you cannot move them.
"NOAH."
Eventually, you won't even control your own thoughts anymore.
"Noah..."
It sounds so distant now.
Oh so distant.
This is my first HFY story, and also my very first OC story. I plan to post at least one of these per week while also posting it on my Patreon. Noah The Pilgrim will always be at least three chapters ahead in there, so if you'd like to directly support this writer, or just want to read more, feel free to check it out.
I wrote the bloody title incorrectly, so I deleted it, only to then realize it was written correctly. Sorry for the trouble.
This has been Lushi, and I'll see you next week.

Day 13th post lumbar puncture. I have been missing school and work but work isn’t a problem since I have people willing to cover for me. The side effects were really bad last week, but the last couple of days it’s been better. The spinal headache is “gone” but every time I cough, sneeze, or laugh, the headache comes back. I don’t know what to do — and I don’t want to do blood patch. I feel like I would’ve last week but I am feeling better just not 100%. I’m scared of going through those side effects again. It was the worst pain ever.
How long did side effects last for you guys? I hear people have no side effects while others can last up to months.
Edit: I am 20F. I am on my period so I don’t know if it’s my period symptoms making my head feel this way.

After many years I finally got caught by the covid bug. I’m 42f mom to 4 kids and everyone has had it but me, including my husband. Not sure how I caught it but I was sick a week prior to COVID so it probably got me when my immune system was down. Not sure where, possibly from an orchestra performance for my son.
Symptoms: loss of taste (which was what caused me to test), feeling crummy, itchy eye and throat and sneezing (first symptoms which I thought were due to allergies), bad nasal congestion, headache and pressure, mentally slow, but no fever.
Also, anyone know whether getting paxlovid is important for a healthy individual? Im on day 2/3 now, will it help me avoid worsening symptoms or long covid? I’m training for a marathon and have always been a long distance runner. Of course I’m resting now. I did try to go on a slow 3 mi run, but came back with a headache and after reading these posts, I’m resting cause I don’t want to get long Covid.

My hands are shaking as I write this, I have to document my story incase something happens to me in the next few days. I'm not sure where to begin but I suppose here is better than anywhere.
I've always had this weird feeling, this sensation inside of me that I was older than I actually was. By the time I was twelve, my soul felt as though it was forty. By the time I reached twenty, I felt like an old woman. I would watch people around my age acting foolish, and I always thought, "What a bunch of children." So it was no surprise to anyone that when I turned twenty-one, I left my hometown and college and decided to spend the summer alone by renting an old farmhouse in an insignificant town on the edge of an even more insignificant border.
When I told my mother, she had a veritable fit, unable to find the words. She spluttered and raged around me for days before I finally left early one morning to avoid her guilt and frustration with my choices. I was not sure why I craved solitude at such a young age, why I found solace in being alone and removed from society.
In high school, I had changed unexpectedly, cutting my long blonde hair short and dying it black, getting piercings that my mother loathed and claimed no young lady should have. You see, my mother was raised proper, as she called it. Good family, good husband, and finally a good life. She despised her perfect life being squashed by my alternative looks and feelings of the same world. She just didn't understand me or the world as it changed around her. I felt like I was just a trophy to her and my father, her perfect angel who had been tainted by my own demented thoughts.
I never told my parents where I was staying, one last rebellious mission before leaving for a few months, and it took me only a few hours to arrive at the farmhouse where I would be staying for the next few months. The land around the farm was dead or dying, old crops rose out of the dry dusty earth and had turned black and forgotten, as if this land was the example of dreams long forgotten and empty. A single dreary lane connected this desolate farmhouse to the rest of the world. On the outside, it was drab and looked as though it would fall apart. It had two stories but still seemed cramped and small, as if it were a single floor tied to the ground.
Across from the house, bordering the tall weeds that had reclaimed much of the farmland, stood a maudlin-looking faded red barn, one door propped open in a dejected manner revealing naught to me but shadows, dust, and a little mystery.
Next to the barn, staked into the ground on an old-looking cross, was a ragged scarecrow. It had drab brown clothing, but its face was oddly realistic, like it was watching me with a disapproving manner. Straw poked through its joints at odd angles like they were trying to break free from their confines. The scarecrow obviously didn't do its job as it was covered in no less than three crows.
I parked my car next to the barn and stepped out into the dusty yard before the farmhouse that I would make my home for the next few months. I checked under the front mat for the key and put it in the lock.
With a satisfying click, the door fell inward into the farmhouse. Surprisingly, the inside of the farmhouse was modern, clean, and looked quite inviting. I could smell the fresh paint on the walls, and everything was so white. The realtor had told me she would stop by tomorrow to collect the rent, and she had tried to chat my ear off on the phone about all the renovations she and her son were doing on the place.
I sighed with contentment and tossed my bags beside the door. I dug around in my bag and removed my camera, my father's old film shooter as he called it. I had taken up the hobby years ago for what I called capturing the oddity in the world.
I explored the small house a little more; the ground floor consisted of a single room and small bathroom with a shower. The bedroom was upstairs and was the only room, the stairs connected directly to the white and pink monstrosity that was the master bedroom. The pillows had laces on them and almost made me gag from the cuteness. There was even cute white lace curtains on the window with little flowers stitched onto them.
Out of the only window of the room, I could see the barn and the scarecrow. I aimed my camera at the pair and snapped a photo. From this angle, the scarecrow appeared to be staring straight at me. It stood next to the left side of the barn in a dejected manner like a chastised child.
A shudder involuntarily ran through me at the sight, but I moved on back downstairs. It was getting close to dinner time now, and I had brought some food with me.
After a few minutes, I had my dinner on the stove cooking and the crickets chirping outside the open window. As I sat down to eat next to the window, I felt at peace for one of the first times in years. The solitude of this old farm was exactly what I needed. The window supplied a nice breeze that wafted through the place, it smelled of grass and warm summer nights, made me feel at peace. The simple dish of spaghetti with tomato sauce and a glass of wine was all that I needed right here, right now in this moment.
That night I climbed into the frilly laced bed and sunk into the claustrophobic mattress. I felt like Goldilocks in the mama bear's bed as it was altogether too soft. From my perfumed bed, I had a good view out the window. I had left the porch light on, and it cast an eerie glow across the yard. The barn loomed ominously, stalwart against the light of the porch, like it was protecting the shadows from the battering ram of light. The somber scarecrow leaned against the left side of the barn.
With a small jump, I thought I saw its arm move slightly. I peered through my camera using the zoom to get a better view of the scarecrow. It was completely still in the night, and I laughed quietly to myself at my silliness. I had always enjoyed horror movies, but there was no chance I was living in one. I settled back into bed and put my camera down. Within a few minutes, I fell into sleep's warm embrace.
What felt like only a few minutes later, I sat up in bed. It was still dark out, I could hear crickets chirping through the open window, and I strained my ears for a moment.
I thought something had woken me up. I felt a cold shiver run down my spine as a cold breeze wafted in through the window. I pulled the frilly blanket up around myself when I heard it. A thud sounded below me, shaking the whole world into silence. The crickets stopped chirping, and my heart felt like it had stopped beating. Someone was in the house. I hadn't locked the door or closed the kitchen window, and now someone was downstairs. A second thud sounded like a boot on the staircase. Then another and another as something was slowly moving up the stairs towards the room.
I don't know why I did it, but something came over me. I wasn't big or especially brave, but my normal cowardice in social situations changed instantly. With a dash, I tore across the room, flicking on the lights, ready to face my attacker, to defend myself against male or female. I would fight, and I would win.
But as the lights turned on, ready to strike with my foot, nothing was there. The staircase was empty, and upon further inspection, the entire house was empty. The kitchen window was open, and I shut and locked it securely before checking the door. Nothing. I sat down on the couch, my heart pounding out of my chest, as I tried to make sense of what had just happened.
"I must have still been half-asleep," I said aloud to the room in a thinly veiled attempt to calm my nerves. It failed horribly, but I went with it. What else could you do in a situation like that?
After locking up the house, I went back up to that frilly four-poster bed in the bedroom and stared out the window. Nothing was in the yard except my car, the barn, and the same old sad-looking scarecrow staring across the yard.
Day 2
The next morning, I woke up to the soft light filtering through the lace curtains. Despite the strange events of the previous night, I felt strangely refreshed, as if the morning sun had chased away the shadows that lingered in my mind.
I descended the stairs, the wooden steps creaking softly under my weight, and headed to the kitchen. As I brewed a pot of coffee, my mind wandered back to the events of last night. Was it just a figment of my imagination, or was there really someone in the house?
Shaking off the unease, I decided to explore the farmhouse in the daylight. I wandered through the room, admiring the modern renovations that clashed with the rustic exterior. The farmhouse had a charm to it, despite its eerie surroundings.
As I made my way outside, the cool morning air greeted me, and I took a deep breath, letting the serenity of the countryside wash over me. The barn stood tall against the backdrop of the morning sky, and the scarecrow seemed to watch me as I crossed the yard.
I approached the barn, curiosity getting the better of me. Pushing open the creaky door, I stepped inside, the musty scent of hay filling my nostrils. The interior was dimly lit, the sunlight filtering through the cracks in the wooden walls.
I explored every nook and cranny of the barn, but found nothing out of the ordinary. As I turned to leave, something caught my eye. In the corner of the barn, hidden beneath a pile of old blankets, was a small wooden chest.
My heart racing with anticipation, I lifted the lid of the trunk and peered inside. What I found took my breath away. It was a collection of old photographs, yellowed with age, depicting scenes from a bygone era. They were of a man with his family, two young kids, and a beautiful young wife. The man had yellow blonde hair, almost like straw in texture, but he smiled so happily with his family.
I sifted through the photographs, my fingers trembling with excitement. Who had left these behind, and why? Each photograph seemed to tell a story, a glimpse into the past of this forgotten farmhouse.
As I sat there, lost in thought, a sudden noise jolted me back to reality. It was the sound of footsteps coming from outside the barn.
"Hello?" The dreamy voice of a woman called to me from the entrance to the barn.
I slammed the lid of the trunk shut, closing the memories up in a flurry as I spun around to be greeted by a quite pretty woman with blonde hair and a pink suit skirt combo. She had bright pink lipstick, that seemed to be a permanent fixture on her face, and quite shiny and sparkly blue eye shadow on her lids. I myself only wore black eyeliner. This woman was like Barbie in her proportions, thin waist, long hair, and large tracts of land, as my father would have said.
"Oh, hello," I said simply, always awkward in normal social situations.
If she noticed anything odd about me, she breezed over it in an easy manner. Taking me by the shoulders, she led me out of the dusty barn and into the yard.
"You must be Polly. We have been waiting a while for you to come. I simply must know what you think of the renovations to the house. Aren’t they just to die for?" The lady said all in one breath, as if she didn’t need air to speak.
"Yes, they are quite nice..." I started before she cut me off, not in a rude manner but instead in one that she would have continued on even if I had just told her I was not Polly and instead I was a mass murderer looming for my next victim.
"You see, me and my son Eli—yes, Eli, you stop lurking in the shadows over there," she said, continuing on as I noticed a younger man leaning up against the barn. He wore simple clothes of jeans and a white t-shirt but had a handsome face. His hair was brown and hung slightly over his eyes.
"I hope you don’t mind if my son here continues working on some renovations while you stay here? Strictly on the outside of the house, mind you. A fresh coat of white paint would make this little beauty shine. We would have finished by now if not for the accidents," she continued, completely unabashed by my silence.
"Sorry. But you are the realtor?" I said, trying to regain my feet under me.
"Oh my god, I am so sorry, dear!" she said with an affable cackle.
"Yes, yes, I am Barbara, but all my friends call me Barb. That over there is Eli. Eli, come say hi," Barb said while her painted talons rested firmly on my shoulder.
Eli stomped over, keeping his eyes low, in a sort of moody way that actually intrigued me, sort of.
When he glanced up at me, I noticed he drank in me from head to toe, and for the first time, I realized what I was wearing. An old rock t-shirt of one of my favorite bands and, of all things, my black pajama bottoms with cartoon bats on them that said "happy halloween."
I felt my face blush crimson as he made eye contact with me. He had very mysterious eyes of blue that seemed to cut right through my soul.
"Nice shirt," he said while gesturing to me. His voice was quiet and uncertain, as if he didn’t get much practice with the art. Knowing his mother, it seemed highly accurate.
"Thanks. Do you like them?" I asked.
"Oh, he likes all sorts of things, don’t you, Eli? Honestly, you two can gab on forever. But miss, I believe we have a small matter of payment," Barb said, drawing the conversation back to herself.
"Of course. Let me go get it," I said as I went back into the house and retrieved the envelope with the rent money in it.
Barb grabbed the envelope in her bright pink talons and snapped a piece of bubblegum between her teeth. With quick fingers, she leafed through the cash, counting it. As she counted, her normal bubbly personality seemed to disappear, giving way to what I gleaned was her true thoughts and feelings before the facade slipped on once again.
"Mmkay, perfect honey, this is the right amount. Now you have my number, so you call if you need anything. Like I said earlier, Eli will stop by from time to time to work on painting the house. I promise you he won’t be an imposition, just pay him no mind," Barb said in a sweet voice as she popped her gum in between each word.
"Eli, come on, please, I have an appointment in town," Barb said to her son, and they both climbed into a garish pink convertible with jewels hanging from the mirror wrapped in a gold chain.
Barb waved one last time as she sped off out of the driveway, covering me in dust as she spun the wheel around.
With their departure, I went inside and retrieved my camera. I spent a few minutes shooting a few pictures I thought were worthy. I re-entered the barn and pulled the old trunk out into the sunshine. Inside was only a handful of photos, some old clothes, and what looked like some old heirlooms. A beautifully old candlestick and a few leather-bound books lay at the bottom, covered by an old tablecloth. The tablecloth was a nice white with intricate swirling patterns inlaid around the edges.
Why would these things be packed away in here? They were so beautiful. I decided to bring the stuff inside for further inspection. As I lifted the trunk, out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw something move in the tall grass at the edge of the property. I stared for a minute, but nothing moved again. I must be getting jumpy being alone like this. After last night and then this, I was just imagining things.
I brought the items inside and spread them out. I put the tablecloth on the table, and it hung low to the ground. I placed the candlestick by the window and took out the photos again, spreading them out.
The photos told me a story of a loving family that obviously lived in the farmhouse before me. They had a photo next to the barn, with a brand new looking scarecrow in the back. The man even had his arm around it; it looked so much cleaner and proper in this photo. I stared outside at the sad-looking scarecrow.
I took my camera and the photo and went outside to stand next to the scarecrow. His post hung kind of crooked in the earth like it was weighed down by the scarecrow.
I snapped a photo of the scarecrow as it was, then examined the original photo. I began resettling the post in the ground, but it kept sagging. I decided to pull him out of the ground and move him while I added more dirt to his hole. With some effort, I reseated him into his original hole. He already looked better, but I straightened his clothes and pulled out the last bits of straw that stuck out of his clothes. When I was finished, I looked back at him and took a photo, smiling while I did so at my work.
I then spent some time sweeping the front porch and banging the dust out of the cushions before I curled up on a wicker chair with plump cushions for a few hours reading a book I had brought with me.
I felt quite content at this place. The sounds of the crickets began again, putting me at ease as the sun began to descend. I had spent the entire day just relaxing, and it was perfect. I sat sprawled out in the chair, too lazy to go and make dinner or even move. My bladder was full, but I waited until the last moment before dashing inside and relieving myself.
That's when I noticed it, out in the yard. It seemed as if the scarecrow had moved closer. Once shrouded by the barn slightly, it now had moved a few steps into the light from the porch. My heart dropped at the sight. Not again, I must be asleep on the porch in the chair. I pinched myself, trying to wake up, but all I received was a sore arm.
I closed my eyes, then rubbed them, hoping to dispel whatever plagued my mind, but when I opened my eyes, I noticed the scarecrow was even closer. Halfway across the yard now, it sat menacingly, hanging crooked in the dirt. The scarecrow seemed to be staring at me with an intense gaze. The slits in its face were open now, and in the porch light, I swear I could see human eyes underneath the mask.
I moved towards the front door, locking it in a swift motion. I was shaking now, and it took me a minute to relax. I never took my eyes off the scarecrow for fear of it moving again.
My cellphone was upstairs, so I couldn't flee without the scarecrow moving again. I breathed out slightly and unlocked the door, letting it swing in with a creak. The night outside was silent, as if everything was holding its breath. The usual crickets that plagued me with their song day and night had fallen quiet. I stepped out onto the porch; I needed to go confront this demonic entity. Something about this still made me think this was a prank.
"Eli, is that you?" I called out to the scarecrow.
No response, of course. I steeled myself and put one foot off the porch, never taking my eyes off the scarecrow before me. Something seemed to be dripping from its head as I approached, a dark slime that seemed to be melting from its joints as it stood there silently, except for the constant drip of the liquid on the dry dirt before me.
I walked around the scarecrow, determined to figure out what was going on. As I circled it, my vision darkened for a moment as I faced towards the light of the house. I jumped as the scarecrow's head turned to face me as I looked away. The black liquid drained faster from the being, forming a shallow pool at its feet.
I'm not proud of what I did next, but I fled, taking my eyes off the scarecrow. I made a mad dash for the farmhouse. Behind me, I could hear the pounding of feet. I screamed as loud as my lungs would let me. My voice rang through the silence as I grabbed the door handle and wrenched open the door as I felt a strong grip fall on my shoulder.
I turned to defend myself, but nothing was there. The scarecrow was gone, the wooden cross had vanished, as had the pool of dark liquid in the dirt. The world sprung back to life; the crickets began chirping loudly, and my heart restarted. I slammed the door, and the air from my force scattered the photographs on the table. I ran upstairs, leaving the lights on in the house, and dove onto the bed, wrapping myself in the frilly blanket like a set of frilly armor.
I snatched my camera from the bedside table and held it close, determined to document the rest of the night. I held it in shaking hands as the noise downstairs began—the sound of boots crossing the floor to the stairs and the careful but heavy steps of ascension as they climbed closer and closer to me.
This time, I didn't lunge forward as the light was already on. I glanced out the window, but the scarecrow was still gone. I focused my camera on the stairs and waited as the steps came closer and closer. A shape began to form as the head of whatever was coming up the stairs crested the floor. Then a plain brown mask with slits where the eyes would be. It froze for a moment, then slowly turned its head towards me. Inside the slits were human eyes that seemed to be leaking dark red blood.
In the light, I could see it now. I snapped a photo of the beast, the flash setting off a reaction in the beast. The scarecrow moved so fast up the stairs it was a blur. My scream echoed throughout the house as it lunged at me. Filthy hands pinned me down, and the deep crimson liquid began pouring out of every joint of the scarecrow. It began covering my face, my eyes, and getting into my open mouth. I spluttered and kicked at the beast, but my blows had no purchase, as if the scarecrow on top of me had no substance to itself.
I coughed and spluttered on the liquid as it began to fill my mouth faster and faster. I tried not to swallow any, but it tried to find purchase as I was held down.
"Polly?" A nervous voice called from below.
Suddenly, as if the angels had called, the pressure dissipated, and I crashed to the floor in a heap, trying to spit the blood out, but nothing came—it was gone. Footsteps pounded up the stairs again, and I flew back in fear, closing my eyes.
"Oh my god. Polly, are you okay?" A voice said, and gentle hands grabbed my arm.
My eyes shot open at the human touch, and I grabbed Eli into a tight hug, where I promptly began sobbing in fear, my whole body shaking as Eli awkwardly hugged me.
"Don't worry, it's going to be okay," Eli said patiently to me as he hugged me back gently and began stroking my back.
I shivered in a choking sob and fell into his arms, desperately wanting to believe him, and for some reason, I did.

I'm a long time lurker here, what, I think, kinda speaks for itself. Made a throwaway for this. I'm not a native english speaker, but I hope I can express myself in a decent way.
Right now, I (M30) really feel like reflecting my drinking behavior, because yesterday I felt like dying. AGAIN. Like I have so often already, but the cycle starts over and over again so quickly that I just can't get ahold of it and it seems like i just go with that "flow" like forever...
I'm from Germany, where we have a huge drinking-culture. Everyone seems to enjoy their drink like anytime and all over the place and it's just viewed as perfectly normal. And well, it kinda is - it sometimes appears to me that drinking is what connects and holds our rather distanced and self-centered german society together in some way, I don't know...
My parents both are big time alcoholics - my mom actually went to rehab and keeps being sober for almost 8 years now - I'm extremely proud of her! My dad doesn't even see an issue with his drinking, since it's "just beer". Literally all day, everyday, but "just beer", so from his pov it's non-problematic. I grew up with both of them, but I moved out at 16 because of, well, reasons, so I don't have the best relationship with them whatsoever.
I drink regulary since I'm 13 years old. Sometimes more, sometimes less but never have I didn't drink and I've never really seen a problem with that. There's been periods of daily binge-drinking for several months straight in my teenage years, it then got less in my 20s. Now the average german village-dude would probably say I shouldn't adress this "little" regular drinking as a problem. But I will from now on, because it is...
I currently live with my lovely wife in a nice flat in a fine big city and I work a great job where I feel valued and respected. And rather surprisingly I get to manage all of that pretty well despite the drinking... but I feel like that isn't going to work very much longer.
I have a lot of good friends and a smaller circle (5) of long term "best friends" who I really love from the bottom of my heart. We went through a lot of together so it really feels deeply familiar to be around them. We hang out quite a lot and by hanging out you could say we're basically getting shitfaced together... Every damn time...
We all (and especially myself) have literally zero self-control when it comes to alcohol, so when we start (and we do always start at some point) we just don't stop until it's all "empty and late". Even then it's not uncommon to visit another 24h-store or a club/pub to drink a couple more, sometimes in the middle of the night on a tuesday... For many many years now, we meet 2-4 times a week in various constellations and just have ridiculously huge quantities of beer and wine together, sometimes liqour on the weekends, and we basically just drink, talk and goof around for hours. I mean sometimes we play football or basketball, go on a hike or a bicycle-tour, or we cook dinner, visit a concert or partys/ events but man we're always drinking like there's no tomorrow. And in those moments it always feels so damn right...
But when reality snaps back into my body and mind again, I feel like an empty piece of weak and hurt shame and it's getting worse with every drinking-session... lately my health definitely seem to suffer a lot more than I'm used to, I am extremely nauseous and dizzy the days after drinking, suffer from extreme headaches and feel enormously depressed and anxious. And life just goes on and on while there is no break to be seen...
I lost my keys, wallet and phone multiple times the last few years, had multiple (minor) accidents while drunk-driving my bike, got into fights with random (drunk) people, did drugs just because "why not", got arrested for stupid bullshit I'd have never done sober, disappointed my wife and friends because I couldn't get my hungover ass up for planned activities, forgot or canceled a few important appointments... it's actually like: half of the time I'm drunk and the other half of the time I'm hungover, on and on and on, and it's getting more and more exhausting to the point I feel like Im about to break down in the future... I archieved a lot of great things in the past 10 years and am proud of myself in many ways, but suddenly I feel like I've lost control a looong while ago and am now starting to realize it and that's kinda terrifying...
My friends and I talked about general drinking a lot throughout the years and kinda agreed on "yeah, we're basically 'functional alcoholics', but as long as everyone of us gets his stuff together and is happy - why not?". That never felt wrong, because I've always been indeed a rather happy person and got my stuff indeed quite good together. My wife (who btw also enjoys to have her drinks with us sometimes, but absolutely knows her limit and is inspiringly reasonable) is super sweet and supportive in any way, but she too has been worried lately as she realizes I'm starting to not do feel too well...
On saturday another 3-day-streak had come to an embarrassing end - the 5th time that week I was really really drunk... Monday and Tuesday the usual "let's grab a beer and hang out" (both days lead to 8-10 beers and at least 2 bottles of white wine), on Thursday I've visited a concert (blackout drunk), on friday a friend celebrated her birthday (like 8 beers and a few cocktails amd shots) and saturday I helped another friend moving so I of course "needed a beer to end the day" - Came home in the morning and slept with all my clothes on the couch, can't remember nothing after like midnight... Yesterday I literally just laid in my bed, scrolled through senseless apps for hours and felt physically and mentally deeply sick...
It's been the nicest weather all day, my beautiful wife went out to the lake with her friends, birds singing, children playing, air smells like BBQ... and I was here, alone, feeling like a dead sick self-pitying waste of space, asking myself what I'm doing with this wonderful life... I feel a desperate need for change, but right now I don't know how and I cannot imagine how I should gather the strength to just not drink at all from now on. I don't even seem to have the strength to drink just a little less soentimes ffs... but definitely IWNDWYT - I got to start somewhere...
Thanks for reading, I needed to let that out...

Life is a system of give and take. Ebb and flow. It continues without an end or a beginning. It is just like an ouroboros (which I find beautiful). I thought today would be a bad day. I was tired and I hate mornings so much. Instead I kind of just pushed through and smiled. Smiled through the headache. Smiled through the cough. Smiled through the negative thoughts trying to press through. At some point the fakeness of it becomes real. I trick myself. But was it ever a bad moment? I don't look at it like a bad day so was the trick really something so deceiving and wrong. I don't think so. I smile either way.
I didn't eat much. A little potato slop (unhealthy but oh man was it nice) and cherry tomatoes. I had half a banana as well. I had strawberries and pizza around a late lunch. Leftovers I didn't want to go to waste. I had two cookies. I made myself that carne asada with the top round and added habaneros to my marinade. It needed a few more habaneros but dang it was delicious. I overindulged but it was worth it. I wouldn't call today a good food day. Tomorrow I will be better. Tomorrow I will eat a bit less and a few more healthy options.
You know what I did do though. I walked for about 32 minutes and Google Fit said it was 1.43 miles. I am excited that I did that. That is an accomplishment I am proud of. I was very tired going up the hills and I felt it in my buttcheeks and lower back. I felt my chest flare up but it was worth it. I looked at the trees and tried to think of ideas. I saw new spruce tips and was thinking of this spruce jelly thing I saw one time. I need to find that video again and think about making something new. It was beautiful outside and I walked after I napped. I am proud of myself and that is an improvement to my day.
I feel the presence or more of an absence of my sister not being here. We texted a bunch but I could still feel it. It was hard but manageable because we still can be there for one another. I can be strong for her as she does for me. My journey is me finding myself and taking in everything around me. I can do it.
I haven't even thought about dating apps today which was crazy. It's weird to think something I went on daily is now something I don't do but somehow not going on and feeling the Schrödinger's possibilities of rejection is nice. I feel at ease and I feel at peace with the decision.
I had a lot on my mind today. I was thinking about writing lists for morning and night routines and putting them on my wall. It would help me to put my thoughts in order before those transitions. I don't know if it will make for a good idea but I could try. I just wanted to tell you all my little conjurers of the stones beneath your toes that you can be the best you. All it takes is one small choice. Someone told me at work along the lines of that. Allow the small choices to add up to be a better you. Thank you to that customer.

Life is a system of give and take. Ebb and flow. It continues without an end or a beginning. It is just like an ouroboros (which I find beautiful). I thought today would be a bad day. I was tired and I hate mornings so much. Instead I kind of just pushed through and smiled. Smiled through the headache. Smiled through the cough. Smiled through the negative thoughts trying to press through. At some point the fakeness of it becomes real. I trick myself. But was it ever a bad moment? I don't look at it like a bad day so was the trick really something so deceiving and wrong. I don't think so. I smile either way.
I didn't eat much. A little potato slop (unhealthy but oh man was it nice) and cherry tomatoes. I had half a banana as well. I had strawberries and pizza around a late lunch. Leftovers I didn't want to go to waste. I had two cookies. I made myself that carne asada with the top round and added habaneros to my marinade. It needed a few more habaneros but dang it was delicious. I overindulged but it was worth it. I wouldn't call today a good food day. Tomorrow I will be better. Tomorrow I will eat a bit less and a few more healthy options.
You know what I did do though. I walked for about 32 minutes and Google Fit said it was 1.43 miles. I am excited that I did that. That is an accomplishment I am proud of. I was very tired going up the hills and I felt it in my buttcheeks and lower back. I felt my chest flare up but it was worth it. I looked at the trees and tried to think of ideas. I saw new spruce tips and was thinking of this spruce jelly thing I saw one time. I need to find that video again and think about making something new. It was beautiful outside and I walked after I napped. I am proud of myself and that is an improvement to my day.
I feel the presence or more of an absence of my sister not being here. We texted a bunch but I could still feel it. It was hard but manageable because we still can be there for one another. I can be strong for her as she does for me. My journey is me finding myself and taking in everything around me. I can do it.
I haven't even thought about dating apps today which was crazy. It's weird to think something I went on daily is now something I don't do but somehow not going on and feeling the Schrödinger's possibilities of rejection is nice. I feel at ease and I feel at peace with the decision.
I had a lot on my mind today. I was thinking about writing lists for morning and night routines and putting them on my wall. It would help me to put my thoughts in order before those transitions. I don't know if it will make for a good idea but I could try. I just wanted to tell you all my little conjurers of the stones beneath your toes that you can be the best you. All it takes is one small choice. Someone told me at work along the lines of that. Allow the small choices to add up to be a better you. Thank you to that customer.

Was getting over a cold so took some Nyquil severe last night and woke up feeling fine. Forgot about being sick altogether. Got lunch around noon and had a beer. Felt completely fine and normal beforehand. Realized about halfway through the beer that I might not should be drinking it with having taking acetaminophen. All of a sudden I got dizzy, vision blurry, nausea, almost fainted. Restaurant staff brought me water and I sat down for a while and was fine, but my forehead was sweating and I felt clammy. Still don't feel 100% a few hours later. Bit of a headache.
Did I just psych myself into a panic attack or did the Nyquil not have enough time to metabolize and this was a reaction? Also had coffee + milk and a donut as well as water earlier in the AM. Was quite hot and sunny outside.
Do I need to seek further investigation?

A few weeks ago, I thought I was coming down with a cold. But the sore throat and fatigue turned into swollen neck and difficulty swallowing, headaches and brain fog, muscle aches, immediate weight gain, and much more fatigue. Turned out the supplement targeted toward thyroid health that I decided to take after listening to a podcast about how I should be taking more Selenium, also contains 8000% daily value of Iodine. I only took it for a week, maybe two and I’m still not feeling great and it’s been at least two weeks since I’ve stopped taking the supplement. I had been feeling okay for so long and then all of a sudden, it hit me like a truck. Who thought 8000% DV was a healthy dosage?

Hey people. I wanted to share my long ass story about how nitrous used to be one of my most favorite things in the world and now my relationship with it is complicated and twisted.
A lot of this will tackle interpersonal relationship dynamics, but I’m trying to illustrate to the reader the progression of how this drug took my ex’s mind. This is more of a thorough essay about my experience than a rant. When I was going through what I went through at the time, I wished there was a story like this out there to help me know better and understand. This is how I watched the love of my life melt away his brain on this drug.
I will try and keep this brief, but it probably won't be. I wish to convey the addictiveness this drug can have and the toll it can take on your mind and body. In the summer of 2022 I met my then bf who introduced me to the rave scene and drug scene he was a part of. He really only used K and Nitrous (which I will refer to as N going forward). He told me about his 1.5 years of being addicted to K, but did not inform me of his also 1.5 years (at the time) addiction to N. He told me after meeting me he didn’t want to abuse K anymore so as far as I knew when we started dating he got better about that.
It all started very early in the relationship. We went to a weekend festival together and both found doing N together was so fun. We continued on using and abusing N every weekend, and sometimes many weekdays. Probably going through 6 or 8+ tanks a week, this went on for like 3 months. Sadly, I do look back on those days fondly, despite what would happen later down the line. We had so much fun together and yes sadly it bonded us in this weird way. Using it causes you to feel more open and positive in the beginning, and we had so many heartfelt and deep conversations. And it felt like a little special world we could go into together.
At the time I had no clue how much those small-medium sized tanks cost ($65 and up for just one where we live). And he never told me how much they cost, and didn’t ask me to chip in, so I had no idea he was throwing himself into financial ruin buying them all the time. Looking back I have no idea why I didn’t ask, I just figured they were only $25 or something, or his friend was giving them to him, and I was aware it was probably a poor financial decision, but figured he could bounce back after the summer. You have to understand I thought I had him figured out, but I didn’t really know him that well at this point, or know about the drug scene at all. Before this I really only drank and smoked weed with the occasional cid or shrooms trip.
Three months into us dating and abusing N we come to the conclusion we just need to stop and take a break from N as this had all become quite excessive. Still he doesn’t explain to me how much debt he is in from buying all of those tanks over the summer. Two months into the break and he’s starting to crack, asking for me to be okay with us using it regularly. I tell him that I think it’s okay for us to just do it once and awhile. It was hard to not cave in because truthfully I missed it as well, I myself was starting to feel the addictiveness of this drug, so I reserved it so that I only ever did it with him. We go back to doing it occasionally on the weekends. Over the span of 1 month my bf started to constantly complain of having nerve issues, his feet and legs and hands were numb, I also noticed that he seemed really depressed. This is when he started to experience the vitamin B deficiency, although both me and him didn’t realize this at the time.
Around this time is when he finally and unceremoniously reveals to me how much these things actually cost. This is the tricky aspect of his personality I would go on to experience more of. It was clear he was resentful towards me, that I had no idea how much money he was spending, but the reality is if I had known how much those things cost I would have ended it a lot sooner. I didn’t even understand how he had the ability to spend so much money, I don’t even want to do the math. I would find out later he would just take out credit cards and max them out. In addition to him doing them with me occasionally, he was also doing them behind my back, which I had caught him doing several times and was always forgiving over this.
So, because of this constant spending he was in a substantial amount of debt. What he told me at the time was around $6,000. Knowing him, this was probably a generous assessment. This is definitely a point in the story where I should have left him. Clearly he was developing this addiction towards N and spent an ungodly amount of money that was beyond even my comprehension. But, I was head over heels and believed that he could figure this out. People go into debt all the time, I would tell myself. But I told him, this all needed to outright stop. No more N, not even occasionally. Unfortunately while he of course agreed to my face I have to suspect now, he was doing it behind my back all the time. Around this time he wouldn’t come home from work until 7 or 7:30 which didn’t make sense as his hours at work would fluctuate from time to time, but he was usually always off at 5. He would lie and say his work was very busy and made him stay later, which I believed at the time.
Maybe about a month later we are in bed together sleeping, it’s the middle of the night. He wakes me up and explains he literally cannot feel his feet or legs and has been having trouble walking for the past several days. I take him to the ER that night. This night and the following weeks after were some of the most heartbreaking and emotionally terrifying times of my life so far. At this time neither of us had any idea or reason to suspect N was the reason for this. We actually talked to the doctor there and ran tests for over 3 hours, he got an MRI and a spinal tap which was so hard to watch being done to him. It wasn’t until I desperately did research on my phone in the hospital room and suddenly see all of these remarks and reddit posts and studies about N causing paralysis and nerve damage. I tell my bf and the doctor and they have no trouble assessing that is what is causing this. They give him a regiment of vitamin B shots as you typically do in this situation. The doctor even said that they hope they can stop permanent damage from happening, because if not he may lose control of his legs and it may spread to his pelvic area (IE dick don’t work) etc, he had to do physical therapy and see a drug counselor.
The following days and weeks after I was constantly on edge worrying and wondering if my bf and love of my life would lose his ability to walk. Thankfully, the treatment took and he didn’t even end up needing physical therapy. This is when I truly believe or would like to hope he actually quit and wasn’t doing N behind my back. Unfortunately it wouldn’t matter, as I’ve learned, a lot of symptoms of N abuse don’t show themselves until after you stop. Shortly after this event is when our relationship took a nosedive. He had also ditched the drug counselor. To compensate for no N he was drinking so often. He started to become aggressive and violent. I remember it all started in a fight where he got real close and in my face and stared me down to try and intimidate me. In a way it was both terrifying and laughable (because he’s only a few inches taller than me), I couldn’t even comprehend the kind of person he had turned into. After that came the months and months of never ending name calling, insults, degradation, and constant arguments over every little thing I did. He became so addicted to the high of his power trip of making me feel small and weak he would find any excuse to fly into a rage at me, even when we were tripping on mushrooms together.
Nothing was ever the same after that. We didn’t go out, didn’t do dates, and every activity together felt like it was all a big chore to him. I could look in his eyes and see he was constantly thinking about N, and when he would do it next. He really changed, and what I am now realizing is he was probably starting to experience the effects of pure brain damage. My close friends who knew him even agree with me that there is a huge change in his demeanor around this time in April of 2023.
I also want to add more info about his bizarre behavior. He started to develop an unhealthy obsession with social media, scrutinizing what I posted and what he posted. He started to obsess over current events of any kind, any breaking story or ongoing conflict and he would rant and rant about the current state of the world and destruction of humanity all the time. He started to get obsessed with mental health and psychology and pathologize me and himself and other people in our lives. He would send me 10 videos everyday about mental health and relationships and expect me to reply and have a response for every single one like a book report. This obsession with the destruction of humanity turned into a paranoia about the world, he would often say no one understands him, and he is all alone. He turned on his best friends of several years because he was paranoid they were racists or had bad morals (they were all pleasant and nice people who enjoy edgy humor from time to time). There was no more middle ground for anything, you either loved something fully, or hated it fully. Somewhere down the line he actually got his account banned on Instagram for the craziest reason. He couldn’t stop or control himself from having heated arguments with random strangers in comments sections, of almost any video of any topic. He would insult people there constantly.
Here is another big mistake I made.I allowed him to live with me, and we moved in together. At this point we had been dating for a year. Before this I lived on my own and didn’t want to renew my lease, and he was living with his dad who was abusive and financially took advantage of him. At the time I was convinced that this bad behavior would go away if he could get away from his dad and his toxic household. Well the toxicity only followed. That summer we went to another weekend festival and he revealed to me when we got there he had purchased N and brought it. I was so conflicted as I myself had missed it quite a lot, and I had to deny myself my healthy regulated usage of it in order to not trigger him. I caved again and said we could do it only for this weekend. You may not at all be surprised to learn it didn’t end that way.
After the festival everything truly fell apart. He continued to buy tanks of N and do them behind my back constantly. He would say he was just going to his car to talk to his friends, or his mom, and be gone for hours. Because he was totally abusing me and I had no idea because I was under his spell of manipulation, I had no recourse. Any comment of mine asking why he was gone for so long, why can’t he just talk to his friends inside our apartment, I’ll go in the other room for privacy, was only met with complete indifference. These questions only pissed him off. He would say it’s because I was so exhausting and demanding he needed a break from me. When I would call him when he’s on one of these “excursions,” he would every so often mute the call while I was talking or in a silent moment. I eventually realized he was hitting the tank every time he muted himself. When I finally called him out on this he gaslit me and told me he just does this all the time because he coughs and clears his throat, fyi he had never done this before in our relationship. Because I had no recourse I just had to agree and move on. And because his mind was deteriorating more and more each day he would go on to make randomly muting himself in calls as a common, thing so as to keep up the facade he told me. Actual crazy behavior.
He even started doing K again, he would clearly be f-ed out of his mind by both K and N, and stumble around our apartment with crazy red bulging eyes and again and again tell me he was just drunk. Around this time is when he finally divulges to me not only had he been abusing K for the 1.5 years before he met me, he had also been abusing N for 1.5 years before he met me. And it wasn’t actually the case that he only “began” to become addicted to N when we started dating and doing it together. This really started to put a lot into perspective for me, and it made sense how he had almost paralyzed himself over this, now at this current time 3+ year addiction to these substances, and it made me realize how psychologically and cognitively he was failing based on changes in his personality. You also have to understand he explained to me before he met me, he was doing 1.5-2 grams of K or more and N, EVERYDAY.
And still at this time the name calling, insults and manipulation continued. He of course was no longer experiencing any true “high” from the N anymore, it would just simply dull his senses. It was like a stereotypical violent alcoholic husband comes home from the bar and berates his wife, kind of situation, except with N. And I became obsessed with figuring out how to get him to stop and go back to the loving person I remembered meeting and loving. I began to do very toxic things, going through his backpack, going through his car, and constantly always finding tanks and balloons and all kinds of paraphilia everywhere. I would find tanks in our recycling bin, like he actually thought I wouldn’t notice. I would come home late from being with friends and catch him passed out on the couch with an empty tank in his hand. He couldn't be left alone anymore. If he wasn’t with me, 100% of the time he was sitting in his car doing N. At this point in time there was no forgiveness, I was completely broken. I would yell and scream at him or wake him up and demand he stop and choose me or the drugs, all terrible things to be doing. I know that.
Eventually it got so bad I felt I had no other recourse other than to call and inform his mother of his behavior and what he had been doing all this time. Me doing this is probably what saved his life, as there was never anyway I was going to get through to him myself. But it did not save his mental health. Even having his mother involved didn’t stop any of it. He still went out and bought it behind my back like nothing happened. Another painful painful aspect of how his personality had changed is he would constantly have crazy back and forth mood swings, one minute showing me the sweet man I had fallen in love with, thanking me and praising me for having stepped in and put a stop to this, the next minute he hated me and I was the worst thing in his life and I could never tell what was even real anymore.
But did I leave, oh no, that would have been the smart thing to do.Instead at the time I was seeing a therapist who also specializes in couples therapy. I get us started with counseling and during our second session he gets called out by my therapist and yells and screams and berates her, it was actually insane. That is when things really ended between us. He moved out and moved into his moms apartment 30 minutes away that night. Even though the breakup was traumatizing and painful I still had hope that even if he isn’t with me, now he will receive help from his mother. Well, she didn’t place him in any special drug counselor program or rehab, she just severely cut off his finances so that he could pay off his debts, which she had bought back from several banks so it would not gain more and more interest. I do believe now his debt may be somewhere in the $10,000-$20,000 range. So now he, as an almost 30 year old man, needs to ask his mother in order to buy or purchase anything. Somehow, despite all of this I would learn he was continuing to do N and K.
Amazingly, we still tried briefly to even make our relationship work after he moved out. At this point he has mastered the art of manipulation and being fake, and convinced me he was getting better, he had even started to look better too, but he was still up to his old BS. He came over to the apartment once for us to have a mini date. Because he went on and on about how he was getting more and more into walks he said he was going to take a quick stroll around the block to get some fresh air. Well a quick stroll turns into 30 minutes, and I start to notice his car is gone from our street. I call him and he says now he is sitting in his car talking to his mom, I tell him I don’t see his car and it’s been a long time, he clearly had left to buy N. He becomes irate and claims he simply moved his car down the block for “reasons” and I was in the wrong for being accusatory and not trusting him. P.S. I went down the block and he just was not there. This guy is either absolutely crazy or thinks I’m some kind of imbecile, or both. It basically ended from there.
We tried to be civil, but he cannot control himself from completely going ballistic on me anymore, or his mother. And it is so painful when he is remorseful and doesn’t remember all the things he said to me. At this point I have had to realize I am basically talking to and trying to reason with a mentally disabled person. The fun loving, easy going, creative, altruistic, thoughtful, smart and attentive man I met doesn’t exist anymore, and I don’t think he will ever come back. All that remains is the shell of a confused and angry person.
Some small things to address, how it came to be that he abused these drugs all the time before he met me is because his best friend was a drug dealer and in the beginning would give him all of these things for free. Once he was hooked and doing it everyday it seemed he would stop at no end to spend money and buy them. Yes K was definitely a contributor into his mild psychosis but I still think it would have happened even from the N abuse alone, based on research I’ve been doing lately. And yes I have to admit I think he had bad and malignant psychological traits before abusing drugs, and doing that made it all worse.
So that is the story of how I watched this man ruin his life, and scare away maybe the only person who could withstand experiencing all of his BS and still wanted to love and help him. There are SO MANY things I too should have done differently. There is also an age gap between us of 3 years, so I naively thought he had a better handle on his life than he really did. I do find it hard to understand how people can be so addicted at times, but in the end like my ex, everyone is trying to chase some kind of feeling or experience that came with it, rather than the drug itself.
Thank you for reading if you made it to the end.
TLDR: Two years ago I started dating a guy who wasn’t honest with me about his 1.5 years of Nitrous abuse before we started dating. He was a sweet and honest and caring man when I met him. Sadly most of our relationship was spent on doing lots of Nitrous together. He eventually developed health problems like a vitamin B deficiency and even almost got paralysis and permanent nerve damage, which was hard for me to watch and witness. His health issues didn’t deter him away from Nitrous and he was constantly buying tanks and doing it behind my back. The more he abused Nitrous the more abusive towards me he became as a person. Our relationship crumbled and not even getting his mom involved helped. He was also clearly experiencing psychosis and mental deterioration. We broke up because he yelled and screamed at my therapist and he had to move in with his mom. Moving in with his mom didn’t stop his addiction even though she cut off his finances.
Even when we tried to make the relationship work he still abused it anyway. I would now consider him a mentally disabled person and I don’t recognize who he even is anymore after 3+ years of abusing Nitrous almost everyday. Please use Nitrous responsibly or don't at all.

Regularly we receive questions about Dr. Clark Parasite Cleanse and the possible symptoms of the parasites being flushed out of the body. These symptoms occur because parasites can harbor bacteria and viruses that are released when the parasites are eliminated. Not everyone is the same and symptoms can vary from person to person.
Pre-Cleanse Measures: To minimize detoxification reactions, it is advisable to start with Dr. Clark’s Bowel Cleanse. This initial step not only helps in getting rid of parasites and bacteria but also clears out toxins from the intestines, setting a cleaner stage for the subsequent parasite cleanse.
Common Detox Symptoms and Solutions for Dr. Clark’s Parasite Cleanse:

• Flu-like symptoms (chills, fever, cough):
  • Cause: Release of the flu virus.
  • Remedies: Elder tea to boost the immune system and Oscillococcinum, a homeopathic remedy (1 dose in the morning, 1 at night).
• Nausea, diarrhea, fever, digestive issues:
  • Cause: Release of bacteria like Salmonella.
  • Remedies: Lugol's iodine (ensure no allergy to iodine). Recommended dosage is 6 drops in water, six times a day, preferably on an empty stomach.
• Emotional distress (sadness, melancholy, crying):
  • Cause: Release of Clostridium botulinum affecting the hypothalamus.

Remedies: Oregano oil, 5-10 drops in an empty capsule taken with 1 or 2 meals.
To better symptoms and support the body during Dr. Clark’s Parasite Cleanse, do the following:

• Stay Hydrated: Drinking plenty of water helps flush toxins out of the body. Aim for at least 8-10 glasses daily.
• Balanced Diet: Eating a balanced diet rich in fruits, vegetables, lean proteins, and whole grains can provide the necessary nutrients to support detoxification.
• Rest and Sleep: Ensure you get adequate rest; the body heals and detoxifies most efficiently while you're asleep.
• Gentle Exercise: Activities like walking, yoga, and light stretching can enhance circulation and help in managing stress.
• Activated Charcoal: This can be used to absorb toxins and help reduce symptoms like nausea or gas. Always consult a healthcare provider before using it as it can interfere with medication absorption.
• Herbal Support: Milk thistle, dandelion root, and turmeric can support liver function, a key organ in the detoxification process.

Prepare for cleansing and follow the suggested steps to make your cleansing process as comfortable and effective as possible. 🌊🪱🌊

I'm pretty sure I'm going to be dead in the next 24 hours.
Whether that's the Costella family, or whatever this is, I'm not sure.
The police are taking forever, and part of me knows they're either refusing to believe me, or RC got them too.
I'm holed up on our school bus, so I've got nothing better to do.
I want to tell you about my team.
We met in our sophomore year.
Strangers standing outside the club room.
Levi was the freckled brunette who wouldn't stop talking about Game of Thrones.
Sunny, a pretty redhead, told him to shut up.
Tom, a sandy blonde, nodding his head to music corked in his ears.
I just wanted to be part of a club, and get away from my overbearing mother.
I won't say it was a perfect start. Our school was lacking in funding, so anyone could join, which made us more of a Quiz Club. I had some serious anxiety, so I stayed on the sidelines for a while, watching, rather than taking part.
It's not like we actually talked to each other initially. The first few weeks, we played Jeopardy, and attempted to find more members to cement us as an official Academic Decathlon club.
Unfortunately, though, it was just the four of us.
Which made it extremely hard for us to be taken seriously.
According to Google, Academic Decathlon teams were made up of nine members, placed by their GPA.
Our principal laughed at us, but he did let us become official.
Which was out of pity, I assumed.
The club was assembled, and we started meeting up after school.
Sort of.
Sunny barely showed up, and Levi didn't take anything seriously, preferring to spend the time telling us about his weird family turf-war.
Our principal dumped us in a tiny classroom with a resident rat living under the floorboards.
There was barely enough room to move, and the four of us crammed together for three hours was less than appealing.
Still, though, I wanted to be part of a club.
I had grown up with parents who were obsessed with board games, so I was pretty good at general knowledge questions. Our club room was too small for anything else but three desks (Sunny and I shared one) and a whiteboard we had to shove through the door.
But, again, we didn't start as an Academic club.
It was more akin to Story Time Club.
Arriving late on my third day, armed with quiz cards from home, I found Tom and Sunny completely mesmerised by Levi’s storytelling skills, drowned in shadow.
They didn't even turn the lights on.
I strictly remember squeezing next to Sunny, and hearing the words, “But there was so much blood all over the floor, and my Mom told me to go upstairs and hide under the bed…”
Sitting in front of them was Levi, perched on a desk, his legs swinging, a whiteboard marker between his teeth.
Sometimes he'd get up, and illustrate parts of his story.
It sucked that his drawings were all stick people.
I won't go into full details of his life, but Levi grew up as part of a family who had… interesting methods of making a living. I had seen the guy’s father multiple times when we hung out at his place, and, yeah, my friend’s family definitely had Soprano vibes.
Levi’s Draw My Life was nothing to do with the club, but it did bring us closer.
Even if, at that point, I was considering leaving.
But it's not like it was easy to walk away from these guys. It's like finding your soulmates. Levi wasn't the only one with an interesting life. Sunny Lang was an ex kpop trainee, who was kicked out for being too fat, which led her to develop a severe eating disorder, and a hatred for her own body.
Sunny explained her family were originally from Boston, her mother growing up in Korea.
She signed up for an idol agency focusing on creating a new girl group, and had gotten all the way to the final stages, before being kicked for her weight. Sunny told us her story with a smile, though there was a hollowness in her eyes I couldn't ignore. The other girls were judgemental bullies, and the idol diet and brutal regime almost killed her.
Sunny lived in a tiny apartment with 9 girls, who would tear each other apart for a chance to debut. Sunny said all the other girls debuted, and when we (not so patiently) asked for names, she shrugged, admitting she signed an NDA that prevented her spilling the beans.
What she did say, was the K-pop idol is a product, not a person– and are made and moulded into a product.
She had zero interest in throwing her humanity away to become a manufactured doll.
So, one of us was the son of an underground family, and the other was an ex idol.
Tom was an aspiring horror writer with a famous older step-brother.
His story times were usually, That one time I went to the Met Gala.
When it was my turn to reveal my story, I told them the only interesting thing about me.
I could smell when something bad was going to happen.
They laughed, but I was being serious.
When I was a kid, I smelled my mother’s brain tumor.
I remember it smelled like curdled milk.
I asked Mom why her head smelled of mouldy milk, and Mom laughed and said it was her shampoo.
It was actually a grade two tumor growing inside her brain.
Thankfully, the tumour was found quickly and removed.
Growing older, I became sensitive to smell. The little girl choking on the bus smelled of singed wood, and the old man crossing the road stunk of gasoline.
In the fourth grade, my classmate Alex Castor smelled of lemons all morning.
I sat behind him, choking on the stink all the way through class.
Ever since I met him, Alex had always smelled… off.
It was a distinct smell I could never understand, and as the days and months and years went by, that smell morphed into a subtle orangey musk that was so strong I had to cover my mouth and nose. Then, he smelled like lemons.
During Recess, I watched Alex fall off of the jungle gym, straight onto his head.
Alex Castor was dead before the paramedics arrived, my panicked teacher attempting CPR when his brains were leaking out of his ears.
The school claimed it was an accident, but Alex would have been fine if the jungle gym wasn't built on solid concrete.
I told my team members this, and Levi was sceptical.
“You can smell bad things?” He said, his lips curved around his milkshake straw. In the early days, we hung out in the local bar. It's not like we were allowed inside, but Levi could get us in anywhere.
I was squeezed between Tom and Sunny, while Levi took the seat opposite us. I couldn't help noticing our waitress was insisting on free milkshake refills, her frantic eyes glued to Levi.
I had zero idea why. Levi Costella was about as intimidating as a fruit fly.
Wearing a white shirt with a popped collar, a leather jacket thrown over the top, Levi was giving rebellious Harvard student, rather than son of a crime family.
Leaning forward, he raised a brow, clearly not believing me.
“So, you're like a stink psychic?”
I shrugged, sipping my own shake.
“Sure.”
I wasn't planning on telling him the club room smelled off on our first day.
Once we actually started the club, Levi surprised us as the smartest member, and getting to know him further, I came to the realization his family were infamous in our town.
However, his parents hid it well. Lucy and Michael Costella were the owners of a popular ramen store in our town, hiding under the facade of two successful business owners. The Costella’s were an attractive family.
Lucy was a sophisticated brunette with a lipstick smile, Michael, a handsome fluffy haired man who looked like he modelled glasses.
The two were fiercely protective over their youngest son, not so casually reminding us behind grinning smiles, that if anything happened to Levi, we would automatically be involved in the family.
I mean, they did laugh and say, “We’re joking! Look at your little faces!” when Sunny went deathly pale. But there was definitely truth behind their words.
Being Levi’s friend was… challenging at first.
Tom and I were in his room studying for finals, and an alarm went off, flooding Levi’s room in red light.
I had zero idea where it was coming from, but it locked all the doors and windows, forcing the Costella residence into temporary lockdown. Levi didn't seem fazed, casually mentioning his parents were taking care of it.
He had a whiteboard set up in his room, and was standing in front of it, cramming all of our textbook notes into one easily digestible drawing.
Levi wasn't just smart.
He was Ivy League smart, so we had struck gold with him.
His family were questionable, and yes, sometimes I did fear for my life, but as the more time we spent at his house, the Costella household became a second home. We got used to the alarms.
I just brought along ear plugs.
I wish I was writing this post about Levi’s family, and sure, they are a factor in what is going on right now, but I want to preface this by saying the events below involve the 2024 scholastic decathlon final in our town with the school’s listed:
Starbrook High School.
Ratcliffe High School.
Please note, the incident that took place last night was immediately covered up, and all phone footage was destroyed. Our town is mostly out of the way, and does not show up on Google searches.
We also have our own version of the academic decathlon, which is a more town-level competition, due to lacking funds. The four of us were desperate to start competing with our schools.
So, we started taking things a little more seriously.
We got a coach.
Mr Hanes, who was hesitant at first.
In his words, “You will hate me as your coach.”
He started by recruiting more members, announcing, “If you want to be taken seriously as an actual club, then I'll be taking the reins from now on.”
He did, and with our teachers guidance (and sometimes brutal honesty), we reached a level where we could start competing with other school’s in town. Now, none of us knew this, but Mr Hanes was obsessed with winning.
So, club meetings were twisted into two hour study sessions with no talking, followed by Mr Hanes Jeaprody, which was Jeaprody, without the actual fun.
We were quizzed multiple times, answer cards and practise questions quite literally thrown directly in our faces.
I hate to admit this (I really hate to admit this) but Mr Hanes’s tactics worked. Sure, we had been mildly brainwashed by our slightly unhinged coach, but with Levi Costella, we destroyed our competitors. Like I said, our town held their own version of the academic scholastic decathlon, but it was pretty much the same, with some changes.
Ten subjects. Language and Literature, Math, Social Science, Economics, Art, Music, Interview, Speech, and Essay.
Unlike the official Decathlon, ours was more like a game show, with the ability to be knocked out if a team member answers a question wrong. Whoever answers the most questions correctly wins. Team meet ups were either tests, study sessions, or quizzing each other.
Which leads me to last night.
The finals were held in the reigning champions, Ratcliffe High School’s, auditorium.
And we were about to win our town’s Scholastic Decathlon 2024 Championships.
Well…I was knocked out in the music section. Standing next to my coach who I was sure was going to asphyxiate from excitement, I could smell the sudden potent stink of lemon. I tried to ignore it at first, but the more questions my team were answering correctly, the smell got worse, suffocating my senses.
This wasn't just lemon. The stink was like a burning, singing smell trickling into my nose and the back of my throat.
It was stronger than what Alex smelled like.
This was suffocating, drowning my thoughts.
“Are you okay, Cassandra?”
Mr Hanes nudged me when a Ratcliffe girl was struggling to answer a question, only for Sunny to jump in with the answer. “You look quite pale.”
I nodded, forcing a smile.
My gaze was on the Ratcliffe coach, a scary looking blonde woman, whispering in one of her student’s ears.
The Ratcliffe kid freaked me out. He was way too tall, dark blonde hair, and bulging eyes I swear were not blinking.
His gaze was glued to Levi, who wore a smug grin.
There was a smaller girl next to the Ratcliffe kid, a Macbook balanced on her knee. Every so often, he leaned into her, the two of them in deep conversation.
“I'm just nervous.”
I jumped when Ratcliffe scored a point, their side erupting into cheers.
During the break, we had a mini team meeting.
Sunny rushed to the bathroom to freshen up, and I noticed a Ratcliffe girl with a bouncing ponytail following her.
Ignoring our coach’s speech, I joined the two girls in the corridor, that lemony scent hanging thick in the air.
I caught them in an awkward position.
The Ratcliffe girl had her fingers pinched between the material of Sunny’s dark blue shirt bearing our school’s name.
Sunny looked confused, her lips parted like she was going to yell.
Ponytail dropped her hand, suddenly, with a nervous laugh. “Oh! I'm so, so, sorry,” she gushed. “You had, like, the biggest spider crawling on your back.”
Sunny caught my eye, shooting me a reassuring smile.
“Thanks.” She made sure to keep her distance. “Uh, where's your bathroom?”
The Ratcliffe girl nodded down the hallway. “It's just down there. I'm going there too if you want me to show you?”
Sunny motioned for me to go back to the auditorium. “Uh, sure! That'd be great!”
I did try to follow them, only for Sunny to cough loudly.
I took the hint, reluctantly heading back into the auditorium.
My team was hyping each other up, Levi in the centre, sweating through his team shirt. He ran a trembling hand through his hair. “I can't do this,” He groaned. “Ratcliffe High is known to play dirty, man. They're unbeatable.”
“In what way do they play dirty?” I asked, joining them.
Levi gulped down water, shrugging.
“I dunno! They're already trying to distract me with the stink eye.” The boy narrowed his eyes at a grinning Ratcliffe kid who, after noticing our stares, jumped to his feet, waving at us.
“Hey guys!”
“That's Harry Cartwright, the son of the Cartwright family who tried to kill my parents in the third grade.” Levi mockingly waved back. “As you can see, their kid is a fucking sociopath.”
Huh. I wasn't expecting the smiley kid to be the mobster’s son.
Harry Cartwright was not what I expected.
Unlike his team members, he was the only one in casual clothing, a short sleeved white shirt and jeans, a pair of sunglasses perched on top of his head.
Tom went pale.
“Fuck.” He hissed. “He’s one of you? Then those bastards will have a reason to play dirty, right?”
Levi shrugged, averting his gaze. It was the first time I saw his eyes darken, like he was subtly telling the boy to back off.
“The Cartwright’s have been trying to buy our land for a while,” he muttered. “I wouldn't put it past them to use the Decathlon as a way to attack.”
“Attack?!” April, another member of our team, hissed. “Like, attack attack?”
Mr Hanes grabbed the boy, resting his hands on Levi’s shoulders. “Ignore them,” he said. “Hey. Look at me.”
Levi did, raising a brow.
“You're losing that spark in your eye, young man.”
“Spark?”
Our coach nodded. “Look at me, kid.”
Levi rolled his eyes. “I am looking at you, Mr Hanes.”
The man was shaking. I was guessing his whole career (or coaching career) was on the line.
“They know they're losing, Mr Costella.”
Hanes shook the boy, squeezing his shoulders. “You are being positive and Ratcliffe doesn't like that. They want you to be nervous. They want to make you second guess yourself and lose confidence. Don't let them get into your head.” he smiled, giving the boy a playful shove. “Kick their asses.”
“Exactly!”
I didn't realize Sunny was back from the bathroom.
The faint smell of lemons had followed her. I noticed a wet patch on her shirt collar, though she was quick to smile at me, admitting she'd spilled water down herself. Sunny wrapped her arms around Levi, squeezing him into a hug.
She hung on for a little too long, Tom dragging her away with a laugh. “Good luck, all right?” she backed away, ruffling his hair. “We’ve got this!”
When I hugged Levi good luck too, I had to resist covering my nose.
The smell of lemon was unbearable, just like fourth grade Alex.
But it wasn't as potent as earlier.
I vaguely remembered the smell starting to fade once Alex’s body was being carted away on a stretcher.
Following my captain through the crowd, I was right. The smell was less suffocating. Before he went back to the stage, I grabbed the back of his shirt.
The material was soaking wet.
“How are you so wet?” I said, swiping my hands on my shirt.
“Huh?”
I shook my head. “Never mind. Do you remember what I told you in sophomore year?”
Levi settled me with a confident, but nervous smile. “Thaaaat you're scared of clowns?”
“No. I mean the boy who smelled of lemons.” I gritted out.
Levi surprised me with a laugh. “What are you talking about?”
Something ice cold trickled down my spine.
Levi did know what I was talking about. He brought up my stink sense a day earlier in front of his parents, and I had to cover his mouth to shut him up.
Leaning close, I whispered in his ear. “You stink of rotten lemons.”
He nodded slowly, pulling away. “Uh… thanks?”
I bit back a hiss of frustration. “No, you don't understand what I'm saying–”
“Starbrooke High School,” The host announced. “Can all members please return to the stage.”
Levi held up his hand for a high five.
“Can we do this later?” He winked. “I'm kinda busy carrying this spelling-bee on my back right now.”
I nodded shakily, high fiving him, and letting him jump back onto the stage.
Before his words hit like a tidal wave, ice cold water slammed into me.
Spelling Bee?
Slowly making my way back to the stands, Levi’s mistake was circling around my head. He did win a spelling bee, but that was in middle school.
Thankfully, the smell of lemons was gone when I returned to my seat.
Mr Hanes handed me a soda. “Chill out, Cassandera, it's just a game.”
He could talk. The guy was on his fifth coffee.
Mr Hanes was not chilled out in the slightest.
Surprisingly, the event went well. I was half expecting my team to be crushed by the rafters, or caught in a blaze started in the crowd. But we were doing well. No, we were winning.
Reaching the climaxing round, Sunny choked against a smug Ratcliffe boy, joining me on the sidelines.
Levi answered the next question with a confident smile.
We were winning, but Ratcliffe could still catch up with a miracle.
The second to last question was to Ratcliffe, and it was general knowledge.
”Where on the human body would one find the *orbit?*
I knew the answer, and so did Levi, his lips breaking out into a smile when the Ratcliffe boy was hesitating, eyes wide.
Our school’s buzzer went off, Levi slamming his hand down.
Bzzz!
The host turned to our team. “Starbrooke, can I have your answer?”
Levi nodded, shooting our team a victory grin.
“It's…!“ He opened his mouth to answer, his jaw slackening suddenly.
The boy’s shoulders slumped.
“Uh… “
“Um…”
“Huhhhhh…”
Levi inclined his head, blinking, his eyes glazing over. There was a sudden, hollow vacancy that sent chills down my spine. It was like someone had reached into his skull, and yanked out his brain, leaving a shell in his place.
To my confusion, our team captain frowned at his buzzer like he'd never seen one before. He pressed it, exploding into child-like giggles.
Bzzz!
The audience laughed along nervously.
Tom nudged me. “What the fuck is he doing?”
Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz!
Levi’s entire body was slumped, his hand slamming down on the buzzer.
I caught something pooling down his chin.
“Is he… drooling?” I whispered.
Mr Hanes looked mildly horrified. “Has he been drinking?
“Levi?” Tom spluttered. “Drinking?!"
Whatever we were watching, however, was definitely influenced by… something.
Bzz. Bzz. Bzz. Bzz. Bzz!
“Young man, that is not a toy!”
The host wasn't amused. “Starbrooke High School, I need an answer from you,” He nodded to Levi, who was pressing the buzzer, his smile growing.
“Once again,” The host backed away, like Levi was contagious. “Where on the human body would one find the Orbit?”
Levi cocked his head, lips parted.
His gaze found the overhead lights, and he winced, his lips curling into a frown.
“Starbrooke High School!”
Levi jumped, tipping his head back and blowing a raspberry. “Palm tree?”
The audience laughed, and I started feeling nauseous.
Across from us, I could see the twist of a smirk on the Ratcliffe coach’s lips.
Bzzz! Levi slammed the buzzer again giggling.
“Starbrooke High School, if your team member continues to act like this, I will be forced to disqualify all members.”
Our captain stopped, gaze glued to the host, his hand creeping towards the buzzer, like it was a big red button.
The audience loved it, laughing like they were watching a sitcom.
“He wouldn't.” Tom whisper-shrieked.
The auditorium was silent for a moment, awaiting Starbrooke’s response.
Levi stuck out his tongue, slamming his hand down.
Bzzz! Bzzz! Bzzz! Bzzz! Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz–
When Tom dragged Levi away from his podium, a Ratcliffe girl hit her buzzer.
“Starbrooke High School, you are disqualified,” the host announced. “Ratcliffe High School, do you have an answer?”
It was Ponytail who nodded with a grin.
“The answer is the eye socket! The Orbit is part of the eye socket!”
“That is the correct answer.” The host was distracted, his eyes glued to Levi.
“Ratcliffe High School wins.”
Levi jumped when the Ratcliffe wide erupted into cheers.
His eyes were wide, clinging onto the buzzer for comfort.
Next to me, our coach looked like he was going to faint.
I barely noticed Ratcliffe’s victory, too busy watching our team captain, who was Harvard bound, tipping his head back and smiling at the ceiling like a new-born baby. Tom dragged the stumbling boy over to me, his mouth twisted.
“This was Ratcliffe, right?” He hissed, shaking our captain, who was struggling, squirming in his grip.
“Did they put something in his drink?!” He prodded Levi. “Hey! What did they do to you?!”
Still, though, drugging his drink didn't make sense.
Levi never left the auditorium, and kept his water bottle with him the whole time.
How did they even manage to slip something into his drink in the first place?
Did I smell our competitors drugging him?
Sure, intentionally inebriating my teammate was morally wrong and illegal, but why could I smell lemon?
“I doubt it was Ratcliffe.” Sunny squeezed next to me. “I've been watching them. They're harmless.”
“Then how the fuck do we explain this to his parents?!” Tom whispered, grappling with Levi, who was fighting to get back to the buzzer.
When Tom let go of him, he dropped onto the floor, crawling over to his podium. It was like watching a child.
Who was determined to piss off the adults.
Levi jumped back to instead feet, his gaze was glued to the host, a smile curved on his lips, when he slammed the buzzer again.
Bzzz!
“Someone, please remove the Starbrooke boy from the stage!”
I was embarrassed, our whole team ducking our heads as our captain was forcibly removed from the podium.
Mr Hanes grabbed Levi, pulling him off of the stage.
I expected our coach to be mad at him, but I think the teacher was more worried, a phone pressed to his ear while he forced the boy into a sitting position.
No, I don't think it's influence from alcohol, I could hear his conversation.
Levi kept trying to get up, mesmerised by the buzzer. The teacher was firm but gentle. “Hey. Sit down, all right? Keep still.” He went back to his phone call, gently prying Levi’s eyes open.
From what I can see, there's nothing wrong. He's just kind of…
Mr Hanes swiped his own hands on his jeans. ... wet?
Team Ratcliffe came over to rub it in our faces, though I was still tuned into our coach’s hissed whispering.
Water? No, I don't think it's water. It smells… no, I haven't told his parents…
“You guys did awesome!” Ponytail's voice was sugary sweet. Too sugary.
She held the 2024 trophy, bearing a satisfied smile. I noticed the Ratcliffe members were surrounding Harry, like guards.
“Better luck next time, okay?” She held out her hand, her eyes twinkling.
“No hard feelings?”
“Control your dog.” Harry said, amused eyes flicking to Levi, who was once again sprinting back to the fucking buzzer. His eyes had visibly darkened, lips curled into a triumphant smile.
Harry Cartwright was watching Mr Hanes chase our team captain like it was his own personal entertainment.
I had to look away before I died of second hand embarrassment.
“What did you put in his drink?” Tom demanded. “Weed? Edibles?” the boy attempted to shove Harry, only to be pushed back. “What the fuck did you do to him?”
Harry’s smile didn't waver. “Like I said. Control your mut.”
When the Ratcliffe team walked away, our red faced coach struggling with Levi, who was behaving progressively more erratically, informed us we were longer welcome inside the school.
Tom suggested calling an ambulance, but our coach was hesitant.
We all knew who Levi’s family were.
On the way out, Tom matched my stride. He was frowning at our team captain struggling to walk.
The way he was acting was already eyebrow raising.
But walking at an angle and being unable to stand up straight was worrying.
“I don't think they drugged his drink.” Tom muttered.
We pushed through the doors out of the school, and I revelled in the cool night air grazing my cheek. “If they did, he would be acting out of it, right? So, what's the deal with him acting like–”
“A child.” I finished for him.
“Yeah.” Tom leaned closer. “Do you think this has something to do with their turf war?”
I slapped at a bug creeping across my cheek.
Levi fell over again, this time bursting into giggles.
“Almost definitely.”
Levi was right about Ratcliffe playing dirty. I didn't realize how dirty until we were on the losers bus home. Levi was in the seat next to me, and the kid hadn't moved since we left Ratcliffe, his eyes wide, lips pulled into a dazed grin.
Bzzz!
The noise startled me from slumber. I was drooling, my head pressed against the window. Outside, the sky was pitch dark, and squinting through the glass, I couldn't get a bearing on where we were. I thought I was hearing things, but when I sat up, I heard it again.
Bzzz!
It was close.
Leaning over the boy, I glimpsed a smear of scarlet on his headrest.
I choked on my next words.
“Tom.”
Tom was in front of me, listening to music.
He didn't reply, his head of dark blonde curls nodding to the beat.
“Levi.” I managed to get out. I prodded him, and his head lolled into his shoulder. “Hey. Can you… sit up?”
Bzzz! Bzzz!
When the boy didn't move, I gently grabbed his shoulders and pulled him forward myself, something contracting in my stomach.
I don't know how long it takes for your mind to fully register something, but my body was already reacting.
Levi’s seat was infested with bugs, eating their way through the upholstery. I was aware of my body moving back. I threw up, instantly, screaming into my hand.
The back of my best friend's skull resembled a deflated soccer ball, what was left of his brain leaking from his skull where a swarm of skittering bugs chewed their way through brain tissue, metallic legs scratching the curved, pearly white of the base if his skull.
Levi’s head hung, his body flopping into mine.
But his eyes were still open, lips still stretched into a smile.
Blood ran in thick rivulets from his nose and ears.
Bzzz!
I could see them, black writhing dots alive in his eyes, wriggling movement under his skin.
“Tom!”
I jumped up, stumbling into the aisle, my stomach heaving.
And it was only when I was on my knees, swiping bile from my lips, when I realized the others weren't reacting.
Tom wasn't moving.
I pulled an Airpod out of his ear, a long, slithering string of pink attached to the end.
There was a stray bug skittering across his hand, his face starting to twitch and writhe.
Moving back, I checked myself over, my hands shaking.
Head.
Shoulders.
Hair.
Clawing through it, my breath was stuck in my throat.
Arms.
Legs.
Feet.
Mr Hanes was slumped against the window, a reddish froth bubbling from his mouth.
Sunny.
I started towards the back of the bus, but all I had to see was her bowed head, half of her skull chewed through.
Sunny was in a far more deteriorated state, her face had been ripped through, a skeletal smile glinting in the dim.
The thick black smear on the window next to her was moving.
When I screamed for the driver to stop the bus, he ignored me.
If anything, he stamped on the gas.
I moved forward to shake him, before glimpsing a bug creeping down his face.
Calling 911, the operator laughed at me.
“Bugs are eating your friends.” He said. “Do you know the penalty for calling with bullshit pranks?”
The bus didn't stop, so I stayed at the front, while the bugs took over the back, eating through my teammates.
After four hours, I risked leaning over the seat next to Tom to check on Levi.
They were eating him.
Chewing all the way through skin, muscle and bone.
I tried to stop the bus, but the driver’s hands were tightly wrapped around the wheel.
Another hour, and blood was seeping down the aisle, crawling with bugs.
Levi was gone, and in his place, a buzzing skittering pile of bugs, that I thought were going to move to a second victim, maybe burrowing into the seats.
But, no.
These things began to tremble, replicating.
Building.
Slowly, nothing became static, and static became muscle.
Then bone.
Then flesh.
When a body began to slowly form, moulded from the dead boy, I stumbled back.
These things weren't eating Levi Costella.
They were rewriting him.
…
Edit: I'm still on the bus. I'm 99.9% sure that I'm infected with whatever this thing is. I can't stop fucking itching.
I keep picking them off me but they won't stop. This bus isn't going to stop until I'm like the others.
…
Edit 2:
I can feel them chewing into my skull. They're in my ears. I keep spitting them out. Please, someone get them off of me. Help me. I don't want to die at 17.
Edit 3:
Still alive. Still breathing. Maybe they're leaving me alone????? I think I'm okay. There is a pile of bugs at my feet, but they're crawling off of me.
Edit 4:
Levi really wants to go home. Like, he just told me he REALLY wants to go home. He's got a gift for his parents.
~~Edit 5 :) ~~
Levi is next to me right now, an odd smile on his face.
The bugs are not finished building him yet, but he'll be ready soon.
We will be ready soon.
Your son says hello! He is a wonderful boy, is he not?
Mr and Mrs Costella, I cannot wait for you to meet him.
He is our greatest achievement, and rest assured, you will give us what we want.
Warm regards.
The Cartwright's.

Obviously I have tried calling every single vet in my area but none of them are picking up. They open tomorrow at 9 (it’s 9PM where I live) but I’m very worried and I’d like to know if I can help and what to expect. She’s a 22 year old female cat. Thank you !

"Children learn to correlate consequences with their own actions. This is true of all of us, no matter what species we are. Adulthood is universally defined by maturity, and maturity is defined by nature as appropriate behavior to ensure your species' survival. If we apply this wisdom to the stage of evolution of a species, the culture and conservative capacity of intelligent creatures, then we can see it on that scale also. A species is like a child while they liberally explore their surroundings, learning the best behavior by trying everything, through the Trial of Errors. Then they mature and adopt appropriate behavior, avoiding doing things that work against their species, as individuals and as a whole. We can apply this pattern to the history of all alien races among us here today. This also includes the humans. I testify to this, as one who remains traveling alongside them and seeing each era of their ascended history. As the representative of the will of the Frendsikeel, as attorney to the cause of human endeavors and as their one follower in this galaxy, I say the humans are very cool." The alien sea otter with the boney shells covering her body spoke somehow in a human voice, having perfected the use of her translator so that it was indistinguishable from human speech.
There was applause among the limited audience of aliens at the application hearing for membership, each in their own way of signaling immediate approval. If the Cave Gods agreed, the Combine would be added to the councils of the Cave Gods And Friends Association. It was the dawn of a new and wonderful age for the humans.
The alien attorney visibly shuddered as an equally smoothly articulated translation started, and in a voice all-too-familiar. Osowl Fitten, Attorney-to-the-Humans, heard her nemesis from across the vast distances of both space and time. She was the Sunder representative, Supreme Prosecutor (of the humans) Eshka Layenna. The reptilian alien slithered out with a stylized collar to hide her frill and colorful paint on her face to look more appealing to the human eye. Indeed, the humans felt their eyes drawn to the masterful and ancient alien, who specialized in charm and glamor.
"Beautiful denizens of Rhema, world of art and music, esteemed guru, priests and patrons of the arts, lend to me your native attention. I will speak for you, and worry not what decision is made behind my back, by our wise leaders, the benevolent Cave Gods. They have heard the song of human laughter, recognized the absolution of human mistakes, graced the humans with thousands of years of benefits and gifts simply because they admire the beauty of the human soul. Is beauty not important? I would not stand in the way of beauty. We all know it is the first component of harmony, and we all know harmony is the first component of peace and we also know that peacefulness is necessary for love. And what meaning is there, that is greater than love?" Eshka Layenna spoke with passion in her human sounding voice, translated from a skillful use of her own vowels in order to inflect such sincere emotion. The attorney for the humans worried, for she had sparred with this particular individual alien half a dozen times throughout the centuries, and clearly they were both on the same course through the stars, sleeping for decades at a time in order to extend the usefulness of their respective careers.
The prosecutor skillfully explained that humans were beautiful in the ears of the blind leadership who had overlooked the capacity that humans had for, in their own word: violence.
Osowl Fitten sat quiet during her turn to speak in rebuttal. She could not quickly speak without thinking, it was not the way of her species and she was especially slow to decide what she wanted to say. In the silence one of the humans coughed expectantly, it was meant to prompt her, and she knew so. It was in all things, their little violences, and she had started to find it beautiful.
"Violence is the appropriate behavior when humans utilize it. They are equally capable of restraint and sometimes their violence is directed purely against the storm. Humans respond to all violence, they endure it and survive, they fight back, they commit violence for gain, even sometimes because they want to commit violence, with no further motivation. The Sunder administration has long sought to prosecute the humans because of this, and they are here today, to do this. I approve of this because it is the appropriate behavior. I would like to point out that the Sunder have invented many consequences to inflict on humans, and I must point out that to the human, those are called weapons and the Sunder have become hypocrites. On this day the Sunder are here to prevent the humans from becoming their equal, which is the appropriate behavior for the Sunder, because they anticipate that humans are dangerous, a known threat. They would list off all the times they have tried to blame humans for tragic events, or simply point out that humans were involved in a disproportionate amount of such tragic events, at the very least. And yes, humans are dangerous. Does not each new member bring a gift to the association? The Blue Light Watchers brought the gift of honest music, such as nobody had ever heard. Who among us was not moved by their music? The humans have brought a gift, and I foresee, the Dream Time, that this gift shall prove to be the greatest gift of all."
"What gift would that be?" Eshka Layenna spoke out of turn, amid gasps and gestures of outrageous surprise. Osowl refused to engage her opponent informally and ceased speaking until the Cave Gods had politely reminded the respected and venerable serpent of the absolute procedure of the courtroom, and begged her to behave appropriately. Then Osowl spoke, carefully avoiding addressing the question, while answering it anyway:
"When the Dream Time goes into darkness, and the galaxy can be crossed in an instant by the mere thought of terror, and there is no trade besides violence with this spreading nightmare from outside, that is when the greatest gift of all shall shine upon the threshold." Osowl Fitten turned off her translator and captions and spoke only in her own language. For a moment the court felt confused by this deliberate action, before the significance of it began to sink in. Even the scarred and brutal human Admiral Jinar they had allowed into the proceedings looked deeply moved, her eyes watering, as though she personally understood both the words and the power behind them.
"I have no further arguments, Wise Ones. The prosecution rests." Eshka Layenna said with strange reverence, abandoning her entire cause suddenly.
"This then, is the final enactment of all our discussions, and there are no further actors. Let the humans say then, what is decided here today." The Cave Gods spoke in rehearsed unison.
The humans cheered. They had just become members of the Cave Gods And Friends Association, and the humans were now officially equal to all the coolest aliens throughout the galaxy.
When the courtroom had emptied there were still two creatures sitting there. Osowl Fitten stared for a moment at the human, gradually recognizing her.
"You are Jinar. How so? Humans do not use Star Sleep or live such profoundly long life spans. But I am sure, somehow you are she." Osowl Fitten said at last.
"I am now Admiral Jinar, of the Combine Unified Forces. We are currently disbanded, but I still think they are coming, and we should be preparing for them. Now that we have a say in things, I'd like to get started on that." Admiral Jinar told Osowl Fitten, coldly speaking business.
"Are you not pleased that humans are now recognized as equals to the Cave Gods themselves? In the association, all species have an equal vote." Osowl Fitten twitched her whiskers in a personal greeting, hoping to see Jinar's mood change.
Jinar relaxed and smiled just a little bit. Somehow sitting there trying to interpret the whisker twitches of the Frendsikeel made her feel like a little girl again. It was just a moment, but it reminded her of her own resolve of character. She had felt a kind of personal hell for most of her life, regretting something she had done while she was very young, but worried it somehow defined her. When she had defeated the scout, something had changed, she had realized she was merely playing a role, and the universe was calling the shots.
"Maybe it was better to have gods. The thought that we are responsible for the course is somehow terrifying." Jinar said in plain, soldier-like way of speaking.
"This is humor." Osowl gestured that she found it mildly amusing.
"Do you think they are out there? You're my attorney, I kinda care what you think." Jinar grinned a little, realizing she could communicate very easily with the alien. It was like Osowl just understood everything. It was reassuring to be fully understood and also approved of at the same time.
"It is not a coincidence that I chose this world for Summoning. Allow me to show you what inspires so much art, why this world is a melting pot of artists from seven alien species who all come here for inspiration." Osowl Fitten paused and found a small box held for her by a servo.
"What is it?" Jinar wondered.
"It is a gift." Osowl seemed perplexed. She was trying to assess the correct way to receive such a gift. It was meant as a statement of many different meanings, what was known as a cruciform. Osowl realized it was in the form of clothing, a colorful sash. She wrapped it over one shoulder, wearing it as a kind of toga.
"What for?" Jinar asked.
"It is complicated. I will wear this, to show my admiration and to accept the insult. It is a sign of deep friendship, but one forged through a necessary rivalry, for we are not without the other. My opponent, perhaps she says farewell."
"No, she says she wishes to be your companion still - to continue to argue with you. We shall Star Sleep beside each other and visit the same places. I do not want to be alone and I do not want this to end. It is what is best for each. Ave." The Sunder spoke from the shaded curtains, slithering out dramatically.
"I accept this. I would not wish to be without you. I understand the duality of our arguments the same way you do. Come with me, and we shall visit distant stars and foreign worlds." Osowl Fitten said without hesitation.
From there, the three women went to the attraction of Rhema that Osowl had chosen as a backdrop for the human inclusion in the association.
"Of this moment, we suspend ourselves, for the brace, my dears." Osowl hissed in Sunder and made her new friend laugh with an emote.
Eshka Layenna stopped and suddenly slithered around Jinar with serpentine swiftness. "Is she with us, equal one?" In plain English, another idiom but this as a joke of some kind by Eshka Layenna. She donned a purple garland and wrapped part of it gently around Jinar, the exact movement dancelike and affectionate. She flicked out her snake tongue absently in her self-satisfaction and then turned and wrapped part of the boa around Osowl, who groaned in mock reluctance to the amicable game.
"So we walk together?" Jinar asked.
"Precisely. Unless there is a place we must do something else?" Eshka gestured to the colonial canteen.
"They serve alcohol here?" Jinar felt no resistance as she walked towards the bar with her old lady alien friends in tow, the fragile feathered tether wrapped loosely around all of them.
"Drinks. You may take your toxic beverage." Osowl complained.
"I insist. I know you got something you'll imbibe." Jinar grinned.
At the bar the servo identified them and guessed they wanted alcohol. Osowl was served a thimble of it and a proper shotglass with the colonial guard stamp half scratched off of it was put down for the lady in uniform.
"That's pretty strong. Can I have more?"
"No." The servo said, and took the shotglass and wiped it out with a wash towel.
"Actually, I'm good. That's a pretty nice buzz." Jinar grinned.
"It is precise, madam." The servo said with a little bit of an attitude.
"I'll have mine - not." Osowl said.
"Is that right, are you afraid you'll seem ridiculous? I assure you your friends won't notice your inability to change your eye color while intoxicated. If it helps, you can wear a mood medallion. Would her Gentleness wish her mood medallion?" The servo had split personalities, and was suddenly all cool while talking to Osowl.
"Very much so, Jehosephet." Osowl accepted the medallion with a quickness that conveyed a gleeful shift in her feelings about the bar. Once her medallion was worn and shining, looking exactly like flax colored eyes, she gladly accepted the drink with no further inhibitions. She took the thimble and insufflated it and exhaled what sounded like a drunken wheezing.
"You party hard." Jinar complimented Osowl.
"Yes, this is the celebration I am in for." Osowl seemed to be gagging in her translator and took it off to fumble with the delicate settings.
Jinar laughed, noting that her eyes were flaxen with tints of green and yellow while her medallion showed bright red frustration and embarrassment.
"I cannot drink alcohol, so I shall wear the hat." Eshka Layenna leaned on the bar and the servo placed a massive crown of supreme derpiness on her, some kind of cartoon creature vaguely resembling a Sunder. It looked insane. Jinar laughed so hard she fell over and landed on her butt.
"Okay, so now that none of us may have her pride before the others, now what?" Osowl sounded normal, but her medallion was a glimmering pink, showing she was aware she was being deceptive in some way, as her voice betrayed none of her sloppiness in communicating. It somehow made her seem more hilarious to Jinar, as she could tell Osowl was drunk.
"I am worried that if we stay we'll be seen this way by those who admire and respect us and it will somehow diminish our reputations." Eshka Layenna stated.
"That's part of the fun. But anyhow, we're on a mission. Let's go to this place." Jinar agreed.
"I am afraid our jovial antics won't last beyond the threshold." Osowl cringed as she realized she had spoke a word that meant the same as Threshold, the prophecy of her people.
"What's the matter?" Jinar's voice drained of laughter and she adopted gradual concern, as Osowl hesitated to answer.
"Let us go first, and bid this moment to memory." Osowl insisted.
They departed, leaving their festive garments behind.
There was no landscape to explore, but rather spires of habitats above radiated pools of slag. They flew in a saucer, hovering at different speeds and angles against the natural gravity of Rhema. After a while the saucer had found a break in the low gray-orange clouds that obscured the world below the observational habitats.
"What is the significance of this wasteland?" Jinar asked slowly, not really wanting to hear the answer - already knowing what such an answer would be. The rhetorical nature of her voice was greeted by merciful silence.
The three sisters, each from a distant corner of the galaxy, born in different ages, and different species, stared out at the desolation and they each recognized the same measure of it, for it was the limit of suffering.
Osowl knew her friends understood. She herself had adjusted to her existence, the last of her people. It still hurt to come home.

Been seeing a lot of posts lately about people losing coins, getting locked out of accounts, having accounts frozen, or getting terrible support from Coinbase.
Coinbase is an exchange, not a bank account. It's effectively a marketplace to buy and sell coins, not a safe haven to store assets (be it coins or cash balance).
I had a recent "minor" issue of not being able to access my account and obtain any of my transaction statements (which I need to satisfy my real bank's AML requirements) simply because I moved countries after some KYC updates got implemented on the site.
I was suddenly no longer eligible to use Coinbase and I had no docs I can use to satisfy the KYC requirements to access my account. Well fair enough, that's the law, but do they have any support staff, physical branches, or customer service reps that can actually solve your issue? No, please refer to FAQ and figure out yourself.
That silly issue and the major headache it took to resolve it was a clear indication that this company is simply not equipped to handle substantial assets, it's a marketplace and that's it.

I’ve had random inexplicable headaches everyday since I was a child. It mainly struck when I was in class under the fluorescent lights, in a room full of people etc. I was even taken to a neurologist as a kid because I kept asking to go to the nurse and lay down/have medicine. There was no medical explanation and I tried everything. My parents eventually just decided I was “playing wolf” and I was told to shut the fuck up. I still have them, some days worse than others and they act up during classes/social gatherings. They are also typically followed by inexplicable hot flashes/weakness in my legs. I feel like I have a fever most days getting home from work/school lol.
Are these headaches from social anxiety? Does anyone else relate. Or does anyone else have the same thing but got a different explanation for them. It could possibly be overstimulation from adhd but I wanted to ask the anxiety community before I attribute it to something else.
Thanks!

This might seem a simple question, but I'd really like to get the answer right. I have a dog who has never required sun block as we don't normally walk her in the sunshine. However, we walked covered about 3 miles long and it's not very shady, so i was looking to apply some sunscreen to her while fur especially. However, I'm not sure if there's any chemicals or brands to avoid. I'm open to any dog safe recommendations. I'm wary of applying a human one in case it's toxic to dogs. Your thoughts please.
Signalment (species, age, sex/neuter status, breed, body weight)
Boston Terrier-Chihuahua cross, age 3y 5m, spayed, 6.5kg

• Short history

There isn't really one; just trying to protect her from sunburn

• Relevant clinical signs (vomiting, diarrhea, coughing, fever etc)

None....yet.
3

• Links to any test results, vet reports, X-rays etc. that you have

N/A

• Your general location - Central England

Hello all, first time posting here.
Im 26F, I haven’t seen a doctor in years. I don’t have health insurance nor do I have a primary care physician.
I made some major life changes and have been under a lot of trauma related stress. I have experienced a decline in my mental health recently.
In January I did have COVID for the first time. I was told it was a mild case however I must note I was fairly sensitive to the respiratory issues (the cough and chest pain nearly killed me). I also lost 15 pounds that I couldn’t really afford to lose. I barely weigh 100 pounds and truthfully have struggled to maintain a healthy, regular diet since.
However I am experiencing a number of physical symptoms, what I’ve referred to as my “hot dizzy spells.” It happens suddenly and it has been seemingly random.
My chest feels low and I feel like I can’t breathe. My ears start to get hot and it spreads into a full blown hot flash. My hearing goes all kinds of fuzzy until it’s just ringing. I see white until I lose my eyesight. And I feel so weak, nearly to the point of fainting. I’ve also thrown up immediately every time until it goes away.
It has happened 4-5 times since the start of the year. And they’ve typically lasted 3+ hours or I just sleep it off.
However last night/today is the first it has happened back to back and I have felt weak all day because of it.
I don’t know how to make it go away this time.. im scared to drive, go to work or even move with this..
If anyone has anything, please, I know I have to get this checked out but I don’t know where to start and I honestly am scared.

When I was in my early 20’s, I worked at a dog boarding facility.
It wasn’t a bad gig by any means. A lot of menial work, sure, but it paid the bills, and most of the time I was stationed at the front desk, which meant I avoided a lot of direct interaction with most of the dogs. Instead, I dealt with the owners (or “pet parents,” as we called them), which, while more my forte, was oftentimes arguably worse. At least with a dog, you can justify it being stupid.
Looking back on that night now, I would have much rather dealt with a person than the dog that I had encountered.
One of my duties when working the front desk in the evenings was cleaning the lobby and locking the front doors for the night. The opening shift would then come in the morning, unlock the doors, and the cycle would repeat. This is what I had been doing when I realized I had locked myself out of the building.
For a little additional context, the building itself had three front doors. Two led into a sort of breezeway before you got to the actual front door, which led into the actual building. The first two doors had to be locked and unlocked manually, but the main door locked and unlocked itself automatically on a timer. Normally, this was no issue. Every employee had a fob that, when pressed on a sensor near the door, would unlock it briefly to allow entry. But my fob was attached to my keys, which were tucked away in my locker within the building.
Usually, again, this would have been a minor inconvenience at worst. I could simply go around to the back door, bang on it for a minute or two, and wait for one of my coworkers to open the door. But, I had to stay behind that evening and finish cleaning the lobby, having been delayed by a few last-minute pickups and a particularly chatty client on the phone. We had been working with a skeleton crew, as new hires had been few and far between, and the girl I had been working with was tired and eager to go home. I let her go and told her I would lock up on my own.
I wish I had told her to stay.
Standing there in the breezeway, with nothing but the singular key to the two front doors, I was kicking myself. I’d fucked myself over this time, and now I was going to have to make the humiliating call for someone to come to the building and let me in. I could feel the weight of my phone in my pocket, and I slipped my hand into it, only to freeze in place.
It was not my phone, but my wallet.
Shit. It only then occurred to me that my phone was also still within the building. During the slower parts of the day, I had it out and had been texting my boyfriend at the time. Now it sat at the front desk, so close but so far at the same time. Not only had I locked myself out of the building, I had locked myself out of the building by myself, with no way to get help. In my overdramatic mind, suicide was starting to sound like a very good option.
There was a gas station about a mile or so away that I knew would be open and that, I guessed, was where I was going to have to go. There, I could presumably use a phone and get a hold of my roommate to come pick me up. In the morning, I could drop off the key and get my stuff.
I unlocked one of the two doors and stepped out, locking it once again behind me. I slipped the key into my pocket and started walking. It was already dark out and I was cold and eager to get this over with.
That’s when I heard the clicking of nails against the pavement, just barely audible.
My first instinct was that somehow, a dog had escaped. Sure, stray dogs weren’t uncommon, especially in the city that I lived in, but given the proximity to the building, I had feared that somehow, some way, a dog had managed to slip out under our noses and get out of the building. This would have taken either some incredible negligence on our end or some incredible intelligence on the dog’s, but it technically was possible.
I turned around and scanned the area, trying to locate the source of the sound. The parking lot was illuminated by a singular streetlight and the outside lights from the nearby buildings, and the dark of night was creeping in, thick and inky black. The noise came from further back, near the employee parking, which only fueled my suspicion that a dog had escaped. I really didn’t want to go back there in the dark, but I also wasn’t too keen on getting in trouble for letting a dog get out. I slowly crept over, keeping my ears and eyes open, trying to find the dog.
Finally, it stepped out from the shadows, standing near my car. It was a large, filthy Great Pyrenees, and we briefly had a staring match as I tried to figure out who it was. We had a few Pyrenees dogs come in, but it was mostly for daycare, and we didn’t have any in the building that night. I didn’t recognize this specific dog, either, but I hoped that it had a collar with a name and number on it, so that I could at least call the owner and let them know where I had found their animal whenever I got a chance. I knelt and extended my hand, making a kissy noise in the hopes of drawing it over.
“Hi, baby,” I said, using my “dog voice,” making it as soft and non-threatening as I could. “C’mere.” The dog took a few steps forward, eyes still focused on me.
That’s when I noticed the smell. Rotting meat and blood, strong enough that I could smell it from where I stood. The dog was reeking of decay. In my mind, I rationalized it. We were next to a highway, after all. No telling what kinds of roadkill it could have been getting into. I just did my best to push through it in favor of making sure the dog was alright.
I continued my beckoning for a few minutes, doing as much baby talk as I possibly could. I didn’t want to approach the dog myself, just in case it was nervous, but if I could just get a look at that collar…
After about five minutes of this, I stood up, watching it for another moment. It wasn’t a dog I recognized and I couldn’t get it to come over to me on its own terms, so my tired and still-panicked brain decided that it wasn’t my problem. I’d just let my manager know in the morning that I had seen a dog sniffing around and that I was fairly certain it wasn’t one that we’d ever had to stay with us. Then, maybe we could find it again, clean it up, and see if it belonged to anybody. The animal control in my city isn’t particularly well-regarded, so I figured it would be better to wait and see than to get them involved.
I turned around and started to walk away, back down to the road, when I heard the clicking of nails against the pavement once again. I turned around to see the dog moving closer once again. Its movements were jerky and uncoordinated, and that combined with its condition made me think it was injured, so I stopped.
The dog never stopped moving towards me, but when it noticed that I had stopped to look at it, it stopped as well. Then, staring straight at me again, it broke out into a sprint. Its legs flailed and its head lolled as it headed straight towards me, and my stomach dropped.
Have you ever been prey? Have you ever looked something in the eyes and just known, in some deep, primal portion of your brain, that it was going to kill you? It’s a funny feeling— all the cold, heavy dread that seeps into you, like liquid into cloth.
At that moment, my mind screamed at me to run. Panicked, I broke out into a sprint, heading straight for the door to the building. I had precious seconds before it would reach me, and I fumbled with the key as I hurriedly unlocked the door and swung it open, grabbing it and slamming it closed just before the dog made it. Breathing hard, I locked the door and stepped back, my eyes still on the dog.
All that separated us now was some metal and about half an inch of glass.
I could see the dog much clearer then. Its fur was filthy with dust and dirt, and its chest was caked with something dark that I could only hope wasn’t blood. Its eyes were bloodshot and glazed over, and from its mouth dripped saliva, thick and red.
The smell was even stronger at this point, nauseatingly strong.
Whatever was going on with this dog, it was bad. I wasn’t sure of what else to do. Even if I went through the opposite door, there was no way I’d be able to outrun it. I couldn’t make a break for my car because I didn’t have my keys, which were locked in the building alongside my fob and my phone.
No way out, no way to call for help. All I could do was sit and wait in the breezeway. I figured that eventually it would give up on me. It would have to, after all. And I figured once it moved on and was gone, I could haul ass to the highway and hitchhike over to the gas station. Shakily, I sat down, my gaze never leaving the dog. It stood there, watching me, and then it whined.
I say “whined,” but it was more like a long, drawn-out wheeze, like something trying to imitate the whine of a dog instead of doing it. It punctuated the noise with a sickening gurgle, and then it held its head down to hack up a mixture of blood, saliva, and phlegm, spitting it out onto the window before it. It oozed down the glass, leaving a slimy trail behind it, and I had to look away before the sight made me vomit.
I turned my head away from it entirely, trying to steady my breathing. Despite my best efforts, the fear and nausea were about to get the best of me anyway, and I curled in on myself, doing my best to keep everything down. I inched away from the door in favor of the one opposite, trying to put as much distance between myself and the dog as I could. I have no idea how long I stayed like that, curled up into a ball. But when I looked up, the dog was still there, watching me.
I was half-convinced that I was dreaming, or that the situation wasn’t real somehow. How would I even begin to try to convince somebody of what was happening right now? What would I tell my boyfriend? “Sorry, babe, I couldn’t get to the phone last night. Zombie dog and whatnot.” What started as simply a shitty end to the night had managed to turn into the car scene of Cujo, of all things. But the churning in my stomach and the cold biting into my skin was enough to reassure me that this was all very much real. There would be no waking up, no suddenly being pulled back into reality.
I dipped my head back down, trying to convince myself that I would be okay, when I heard its nails scrape against the glass. I jerked my head back up and looked over, inhaling sharply as the dog stood on its hind legs and rested its front ones against the glass. It started to scratch at the glass, trying to claw its way in, and I flinched at the sudden movement, scooting further back. I was all but pressed against the opposite door by this point, unable to keep my eyes off of the dog.
It scratched at the door for a minute longer, stopped, then started to scratch again. Scratch, stop, scratch, stop. This pattern repeated for at least fifteen minutes, and I had almost gotten used to it. The glass was thick enough that I was fairly certain it would withstand the dog’s scratching, and if it didn’t, I figured I wouldn’t have to worry about anything anymore after that.
When the noise had become a somewhat tolerable pattern, I curled back up into a ball, hoping to ride out this nightmare of a situation. The noise stopped altogether and I raised my head back up to see what had happened. The dog had turned around and was walking away.
The relief was like a two-ton weight being lifted off of my chest, and I stood up to watch the dog leave. My relief was short-lived, though, when it stopped and turned around. We were once again locked into a staring match.
A pretty common rule with animals is to never look them in the eye. I had been actively avoiding doing just that this entire time, but finally, my gaze slipped down and locked into the dog’s.
There was nothing there. It was empty, like someone had removed the dog’s original eyes and replaced them with glass.
The dog broke out into a sprint again, making me flinch and jump back. As it ran, it staggered and swerved as if it were drunk, but the distance between us was short. Within seconds, it had thrown itself against the glass of the window, slamming its head against it.
I screamed. I’m not ashamed to admit it. I screamed and huddled back in the corner and watched with terror as the dog backed up, ran, and threw itself at the door, over and over again. The door was, fortunately, holding steady. Despite the dog’s repeated attempts, it was standing strong, the only thing that entire night that had done me any good.
The dog was becoming agitated. It gargled and whined as it scratched at the door once again, seeming to give up on throwing itself against the door. I noticed it had injured itself in the process, the skin just above its eye having broken open and its mouth a bloody mess. Blood oozed out of the injuries and dripped onto the ground. Then, it backed up and tried one more time.
The world went silent for the briefest moment, and then there was a sickening crunch.
With its swerving, it must have made a head-on collision with the hinge, or maybe the brick beside the door, because the moment it landed, the dog’s skull busted open from the impact, splattering gore across the window. I screamed again, and this time, the urge to vomit was too strong. I threw up then and there in the corner as the sights and smells became too much for me. I don’t know how long I spent there, on all fours, coughing and gagging as I threw up the contents of my stomach, and when I had nothing left to expel, I dry-heaved.
I collapsed on the ground after that, gasping for air between sobs. I didn’t know if the dog was still alive and at that moment I didn’t really care. I didn’t even realize I had passed out until I heard voices echoing.
When I woke up, I was aware of three things: I was on the floor of the breezeway, there was a horrible taste in my mouth, and that people were talking.
As soon as I woke up, I remembered what had happened. Locking myself out. The dog. My whole body felt like dead weight. Even when my coworkers opened the door and came over to see what was going on, I couldn’t bring myself to stand. I was still afraid if I got up, it’d still be there with its busted skull and rotten stench, pawing and scraping and gurgling.
The smell must have hit my coworkers as well because the moment they stepped in, I could hear the “oh my god”s and “what happened”s. Then, I assume, one of them noticed the gore on the window. That’s when the voices became more frantic, and the more I became aware, the more I could pick out whose voice belonged to whom.
The voice of my coworker Holly was the closest to me. I could feel her hand reach down and shake me. She was calling my name, trying to rouse me, and I did my best to focus solely on her throughout the commotion.
“What is that?!” I recognized the voice of Mertle, who worked in the back and must have spotted the dog.
“Is that a dog? Oh my god, is it dead?” There was Carlos, who had worked the front desk the previous morning and had no doubt come in to do the same today.
Holly was shaking me harder now, and I moved in response just to let her know I was alive. “Eddie, are you okay?” I could hear her asking. I didn’t want to get up, or even respond, but I had no other choice.
I got up, slowly but surely, dragging myself into a sitting position as I opened my bleary eyes. Sure enough, there was Holly, looking back and forth from the window door to me. There was Mertle, hand over her mouth, and Carlos, staring dumbfounded out the window at the dog outside. Everyone was talking all at once, and to me, it was just a massive block of noise. The dog was dead, though. The dog was dead and that, at that moment, was all that mattered to me.
“What the fuck happened?” Carlos suddenly turned around, looking down at me.
The only thing I managed to croak out was “Sorry.”
The rest of that day was a haze to me. I remember going through the motions, but not really being “there”, if that makes any sense. I can remember little details- tossing my shirt in the washing machine in the back because it was covered in vomit, sitting with my manager as he argued with the local animal control to come to collect the dog's body, watching the camera footage of me sprinting across the parking lot with the dog in tow over and over again, like a broken record.
I never did find out what was wrong with that dog. My manager suspected some kind of rabies, but I don’t know.
I quit that job not too long after. The paranoia got too much for me. Any time I would go into the back of the building, where the dogs were, I would get that feeling again. That cold, sinking dread in my stomach that would make me want to hurl. I had to have someone sit up at the front desk with me as I locked the door, as I’d be too scared to go out into the breezeway by myself when it got dark.
It came to a head when a dog got off of its lead and tried to make a bolt for the door, as it usually would. Unfortunately, I had just so happened to be between the dog and the door, and the sight of it running at me sent me into such a panic I collapsed to the ground and shook. After that, I was gone. I don’t think anybody blamed me.
I’ve put it all away in my mind, both the place and the incident. I try not to think about it too much.
I’m always mindful of my keys now, though, just in case.
Prey never stops being prey.

I’ve never had airway compromise, but in the last few months when I’ve had fast onset reactions to foods/meds I have this feeling like I have congestion or mucus at the back of my throat, that I can’t cough up. It appeared relatively suddenly, like within 10 mins.
Hydroxyzine will usually relieve it, and the couple of times I’ve used my epipen it has as well (I was also having mouth tingling and face swelling at the time, which doesn’t happen every time).
Is this the throat swelling symptom of anaphylaxis? It literally just feels like sudden congestion but it doesn’t go away when I cough/swallow.