As a new artist myself i find the biggest things I crave are feedback and the opportunity to talk about my music and what inspired me to create it.
I'd like to create a community that helps give new, growing artists that. I have thoughts on the shape that could take. At the moment a discord server would be most likely.
In the meantime I'll be posting in a number of forums giving people the opportunity to be heard and hear new music creators.
You can reach out to me on reddit in the dms, or on my sound cloud.
CJMusicUK on #SoundCloud https://on.soundcloud.com/SgsHt

Hi guys, I’m an insurance agent since almost 1 year ago and wanna share my history.
I came from Cuba 2 years ago, On August 2023 I joined an insurance company by accident, I wanted to become a realtor but I needed a job to get by so I joined an insurance company where I became pretty successful. I’m here in Miami, South Florida and here there are this big Hispanic Insurance Companies where they basically just sell auto insurance (I.e: Univista Insurance) and basically you just need to answer the phone, find the most basic and cheapest policy for your Latino client and convince the client to buy it, In my company I got to the top 3 within 3 months in sales (About 125000 in monthly premium) and I also got my 220 and 215 license within 3 months which also surprised everyone.
After only 6 months in that company and in the industry I decided I wanted to open my own agency, there was plenty of franchises opportunities but I WANTED my own brand and name so I just registered an LLC and started looking for appointments (At that time I asked for advice here and everyone told me to not do it, I did it anyway because I’m stubborn). Long story short ( I only got 1 appointment) at the time I considered a cluster or something like that like Renaissance but they didn’t have the markets I needed ( non standard auto insurance companies in Florida) and also I only had experience in Auto Insurance so I ended working independently but with only 1 appointment for like 2 months until I decided that I needed to get another job because I wasn’t making enough (Bills in Miami are not gonna wait for you).
My own company was a great experience (I GREW UP as an agent) having to get so many documents, account etc on my own was good and I still have it (I make around 500 dollars a month and I close 1-2 new clients a month but at this point is more like a hobby.
So I got a new job, this time in an American independent agency where they don’t serve the Latino community, they help the American community (Which is more literate about insurance and only buy quality) so I had to remove from my head the concept of selling the cheapest and instead I learned to sell the best VALUE to the clients. At this company I also learned about the other personal lines since I only knew auto insurance, now I know auto, homeowners, flood, boat etc but I find myself 95% of the time working on HO, the main difference between this company and the first one where I worked is that in the first one they didn’t pay commissions (only salary and like 0.00004 of the commission) but they DID provide all the clients, in the current one (I get 40% of the commission and a higher salary) but they don’t provide any kind of leads, clients or anything so I gurantee my salary since I’m quoting Homeowners all the time for the agency but if I want to make commission I need to find clients.
Of, if you have read until here thank you and you are finally in context about my experience as an insurance agent so I have a question?
I really need to make commissions doing homeowners and I wanna know what kind of group of people should I target in the community so I can get referrals ( the realtors, the mortgage lenders, the title insurance companies?) I don’t know and that’s what I need to know, at what point of buying a home does the clients need the insurance and who is responsible for helping the buyers sending the referral to a company and also what’s the compensation I should give to this person for every client I get from them? Please, I hope you can help me with this since I NEED to make commissions ASAP. I’m also a registered real estate agent so in case that helps let me know.
Thanks community. Help me liking this post (I really need the k**ma)
*Also sorry if there is any mistake in the text, it’s so long that I don’t wanna correct it now and I also don’t want to use chat gpt to fix it since I think chat gpt takes the emotion off the text.

Mega Man 9 is a game released in the year 2008 (3 years before I was born) for the PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii consoles to commercial and critical success. So what is my opinion of Mega Man 9? It's my favorite Mega Man game! (Until maybe the X and Zero series.)
The story is simple yet effective: Dr. Wily frames Dr. Light in a video, and Mega Man needs to prove Dr. Light is right and stop Dr. Wily.
First, let's talk about the controls. OH MY GOD, THEY ARE SO GOOD! In Mega Man 9, Mega Man is back to his control style from 2, which means no charge shot or slide. I noticed a lot of people have problems with it, but I'm going to be a bit of a devil's advocate for this one. The fact they only had the regular shot and no slide meant they could focus on the great level design while not having to worry about people sliding through it all. Think about it: how many times have you just mashed the slide button in Mega Man 4, 5, or even 7? I'm not saying it's bad, but it just goes to show how well-thought-out this game was even without them.
The level design feels like a mix of 2 and 4 with a hint of 7. This is indeed the hardest Mega Man game I have played, and yet it still feels fair. Since the controls are perfectly tuned, every mistake feels like your fault, kind of like Cuphead (though I think Cuphead is a solid 7.9). The only "bad" level I would say is Splash Woman's when I first played her stage, but now I really like it!
Boss order:
Galaxy Man
Jewel Man
Plug Man
Tornado Man (.exe)
Magma Man
Hornet Man
Splash Woman (for some reason she's weak to it, I guess she has allergies)
Concrete Man
The bosses feel fair and well-designed in Mega Man 9 and have some of the best boss designs I have ever seen. The futuristic look of Galaxy Man, Concrete Man being dummy thicc, Hornet Man looking like the perfect bee robot master, and I simp for Splash Woman. The boss weapons are also very useful: Galaxy Man's black hole, Jewel Man's shield (which is the best shield in the series), Mega Man's weapon being a great 3-shot you can charge, and Tornado Man being a screen clear and making you floaty.
The music is HOLY SHI- this is my favorite Mega Man soundtrack with music such as "Flash in the Dark," "Strange World," "Hornet Man's Theme," "Tornado Man," "Plug Man," "Concrete Man," the final boss theme, "Castle of Evil," and so much more.
This game also introduces the spike protector which protects Mega Man from spike death once, brings back E-Tanks, and the M-Tanks from Mega Man 7. Let's fricking go! The Eddie Call is pretty useless until you get to the Wily stages, and warning: DON'T BUY ROLL'S HEAD FOR 200 BOLTS!
The game also has a Hero and Superhero mode for extra challenge, a Proto Man mode which brings back the charge shot and slide but with more damage and no shop, and an endless mode (which I can't find in the Legacy Collection).
Overall, Mega Man 9 is a masterpiece of a Mega Man game and is, to me, a perfect way to bring the Blue Bomber (I hate that name) back to the spotlight at the time and is perfection of Mega Man.
Rating: 10/10
(Playing,editing,writing and everything done by Nathanthehazingdaze007 aka me)
(post for the Mega man fan community)
this is a repost of my review on fandom which you can find here.

As a new artist myself i find the biggest things I crave are feedback and the opportunity to talk about my music and what inspired me to create it.
I'd like to create a community that helps give new, growing artists that. I have thoughts on the shape that could take. At the moment a discord server would be most likely.
In the meantime I'll be posting in a number of forums giving people the opportunity to be heard and hear new music creators.
You can reach out to me on reddit in the dms, or on my sound cloud.
CJMusicUK on #SoundCloud https://on.soundcloud.com/SgsHt

Hello Eris!
This thread is the spot on the subreddit where you can discuss anything you like! Chat about what's happening in your life or what you're loving in the world of KPOP & EXO lately. We welcome discussion on former members Luhan & Tao and ask to keep it within this thread.
If you are new, please take the time to introduce yourself below or in our Monthly Intro Thread!

Helpful Links:

• EXO Video Masterlist
• EXO Discography List
• EXO Discord Server
• EXO-L Ladder Discussion Series
• EXO's Showtime Throwback Series
• Caption this EXO Meme!
• Song of the Week

We are currently looking for mods to join our mod team, please apply here!
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Weekly Digest

• Chen - The 4th Mini Album 'DOOR':
• 'Empty' MV
  • Behind the Scenes
  • Live Clip
• Fanmeeting Vlog
• Suho - The 3rd Mini Album '1 to 3':
• Killing Time Performance
• The Seasons Performances
• 'Mayday' on
  • M Countdown
• '1 to 3':
  • Music Bank
  • Inkigayo
  • M Countdown
  • MusicCore
• Lay - 'STEP:
  • Teaser Photos
  • Tracklist
• EXO for Scarlett
• Lay: 'A Legend' Movie Trailer
• Baekhyun on tour in Jakarta
  • Practice Vlog
• Xiumin performing in Vietnam
• Suho: 'Welcome to SU:HOME' Tour Schedule
  • Suho on stage in Seoul
• Suho for ‘Cosmopolitan Indonesia’ Magazine
• Lay x Lauv: Q&A with Vogue Thailand
• Xiumin goes hiking
• Chanyeol & Kai at the gym

EXO-L, Let's Love! ♡

As a new artist myself i find the biggest things I crave are feedback and the opportunity to talk about my music and what inspired me to create it.
I'd like to create a community that helps give new, growing artists that. I have thoughts on the shape that could take. At the moment a discord server would be most likely.
In the meantime I'll be posting in a number of forums giving people the opportunity to be heard and hear new music creators.
You can reach out to me on reddit in the dms, or on my sound cloud.
CJMusicUK on #SoundCloud https://on.soundcloud.com/SgsHt

Hi guys, I’m an insurance agent since almost 1 year ago and wanna share my history.
I came from Cuba 2 years ago, On August 2023 I joined an insurance company by accident, I wanted to become a realtor but I needed a job to get by so I joined an insurance company where I became pretty successful. I’m here in Miami, South Florida and here there are this big Hispanic Insurance Companies where they basically just sell auto insurance (I.e: Univista Insurance) and basically you just need to answer the phone, find the most basic and cheapest policy for your Latino client and convince the client to buy it, In my company I got to the top 3 within 3 months in sales (About 125000 in monthly premium) and I also got my 220 and 215 license within 3 months which also surprised everyone.
After only 6 months in that company and in the industry I decided I wanted to open my own agency, there was plenty of franchises opportunities but I WANTED my own brand and name so I just registered an LLC and started looking for appointments (At that time I asked for advice here and everyone told me to not do it, I did it anyway because I’m stubborn). Long story short ( I only got 1 appointment) at the time I considered a cluster or something like that like Renaissance but they didn’t have the markets I needed ( non standard auto insurance companies in Florida) and also I only had experience in Auto Insurance so I ended working independently but with only 1 appointment for like 2 months until I decided that I needed to get another job because I wasn’t making enough (Bills in Miami are not gonna wait for you).
My own company was a great experience (I GREW UP as an agent) having to get so many documents, account etc on my own was good and I still have it (I make around 500 dollars a month and I close 1-2 new clients a month but at this point is more like a hobby.
So I got a new job, this time in an American independent agency where they don’t serve the Latino community, they help the American community (Which is more literate about insurance and only buy quality) so I had to remove from my head the concept of selling the cheapest and instead I learned to sell the best VALUE to the clients. At this company I also learned about the other personal lines since I only knew auto insurance, now I know auto, homeowners, flood, boat etc but I find myself 95% of the time working on HO, the main difference between this company and the first one where I worked is that in the first one they didn’t pay commissions (only salary and like 0.00004 of the commission) but they DID provide all the clients, in the current one (I get 40% of the commission and a higher salary) but they don’t provide any kind of leads, clients or anything so I gurantee my salary since I’m quoting Homeowners all the time for the agency but if I want to make commission I need to find clients.
Of, if you have read until here thank you and you are finally in context about my experience as an insurance agent so I have a question?
I really need to make commissions doing homeowners and I wanna know what kind of group of people should I target in the community so I can get referrals ( the realtors, the mortgage lenders, the title insurance companies?) I don’t know and that’s what I need to know, at what point of buying a home does the clients need the insurance and who is responsible for helping the buyers sending the referral to a company and also what’s the compensation I should give to this person for every client I get from them? Please, I hope you can help me with this since I NEED to make commissions ASAP. I am also a registered real estate agent so in case that helps let me know.
Thanks community. Help me liking this post (I really need the k**ma)
*Also sorry if there is any mistake in the text, it’s so long that I don’t wanna correct it now and I also don’t want to use chat gpt to fix it since I think chat gpt takes the emotion off the text.

The today’s Edie vs Susan poll and the stark results made me realise something.. a lot of people who like Edie (and other horrible ladies) generally think they are supporting badass or boss-babes because they are snarky and “own” the horrible self. But Edie was not even a girl’s girl. Edie wasn’t anything what woman empowerment should look like. She was a predator, neither a good friend, mother or partner, nor respectful to other women. She did not have a single redeemable quality, and yet if she is preferred over a clearly more moral and better human, who was a single mother raising her daughter, after taking a stand for herself by kicking out her cheating partner, is a good friend to her close friends and has a career even if it’s not as high paying as a realtor.. then no one should get fooled by this woman empowerment and bad-bitch nonsense.
Same is the case for Bree and Gaby too, atleast Edie made her own money and took care of herself.. they both couldn’t live a day without a man who will satisfy their physical emotional and financial needs. They didn’t work hard to have all that money and worked the least in the show.. Bree’s business was all due to Katherine’s efforts and recipes and her ex-husbands funds both on whom she cheated.. she couldn’t restart it neither did she have any intention to do that. Working for 5 years in your life and fraudulently taking credit of someone else’s work and earning money is not comparable to working for years over years to make your family financially secure and stable like Lynette, or Susan, who worked across all the seasons, even had a closed mindset for money where they were pinching pennies or acting petty.. that’s what people who fall short of money often have to do. Gaby and Carlos kept getting lucky with money, either someone died at the right time and left them with inheritance or they got settlements from hospitals. Their snarky comments do not make them nice or appealing. You would not want people like that around you in real life and no they are not badasses. They are snarky selfish shits who get away with saying things only privileged people can get away with. It’s not self awareness, it’s the opposite of it.

Hey everyone,
I’m just going to come out with it and say I’ve really struggled recently with not being in a relationship. I thought I was okay with it for a while but, as people I was at school with start getting engaged, I really feel like I’m missing out. I know it’s silly, but it does get me down. I have tried dating apps and they really don’t agree with me, so I’m now trying Reddit because…well, I don’t know, but I guess I may as well try.
In past relationships, I have been very physically affectionate. Of course, I don’t go past boundaries that are set, but I do like giving hugs and kisses to the person I love. So, if that’s your thing, I’m your guy! I can also cook quite a bit so, if you need feeding, let me know. I like a wide variety of music if you’d like to start a conversation about that, and I do play a couple of instruments, though it’s mostly guitar these days. I’m quite into politics (and rather left-wing, I can show you my SapplyValues results if you want? 😂) and I like video games as well. At the moment, I’m replaying Tears of the Kingdom (I’m a Nintendo kid and probably always will be), but I do like other games too. Again, if you want to chat about that, feel free!
What am I looking for? Well, I would prefer someone who’s fairly local (within the UK), but I wouldn’t be totally averse to a long-distance relationship either! At this point, I just want a connection with someone special. Ideally, you’d be a little on the shorter side (I’m 5’7” for reference), but I have dated people taller than me as well. I don’t really care about hair or eye colour or anything like that. As for personality, just be genuine—be yourself, and I’ll get to love you for you. Have a good sense of humour, but don’t be afraid to show your vulnerable side either. I’ll always listen and take care of you if you need me to!
Anyway, that’s about it I think! If you read this far, include the ✨ emoji somewhere in your message. I look forward to talking to you soon! 🤞🏻

I'm not sure where to begin. I'm 35. Female. All my life I felt abnormal and was labeled weird. At 25 (after graduating college, go figure) I was finally diagnosed with ADHD and screened for autism. Never got a complete test for that but the doc said she was 90-something percent sure I had it, but was worried if getting the information on my records was worth it at this point. Might do more harm than good.
I should also state that when I was born I had a subarachnoid hemorrhage. A bad one that required me to be in the hospital for a few weeks. Even then the doctor was worried it would effect me later. But it seems that slipped through the cracks? When I was younger (somewhere between 3-5 grade) a teacher noticed my oddities and suggested I get tested. Apparently I had been. But my mother refused to believe the results. Loathed the very idea of putting me on something like Adderall and such meds and buried it.
There's also a bunch of trauma from when my dad had a head injury and completely changed.
So long story short, I've always been weird, felt out of place, and very insecure eitha lot of trauma dumped on top of that. But I was still able to function somewhat. But after having my second child.... even almost 5 years after, I feel like I can't function at all. Taking care of my self is a struggle. Thankfully I'm able to somehow manage taking care of my children, but I also recognize it's not at the level I wish it were.
It's better at the moment, but for almost 2 years there I hardly moved from the couch. Only to help the kids with something did I move. I was always tired, no matter how much or how little I slept. I felt worthless. And honestly, if not for my children I might have killed myself. I'm not like that now. It's a bit better. But I know for a fact that stuff I used to be able to do without much thought, I simply can't do now or it frustrates me so much I snap. A few times I got super stressed/triggered by them and snapped horrible. So now whenever something upsets me I try and push it down and detach. Breathing exercises in the moment don't work because I simply can't remember them when I'm in the throws of fight/flight.
Worse in all of this is that I'm very self aware of all of this. I know the problem. I see them. I breakdown exactly how I got there and through research know the psychological factors. But then that triggers the imposter syndrome. Is it all just some lame justification for being difficult and lazy?
But this too I recognize as not truth. Who the hell would willingly put themselves in this position? I'm not happy. I'm not comfortable. My life isn't easier if I was an imposter pretending to have all this. Is that not the point of pretending?
So I'm aware of all of this... and yet nothing ever changes. I'm still stuck here.
And getting help? If you know anything at all then you should know the task of finding someone is daunting alone without the issue of insurance (i'm talking about adhd issues here). I loath meeting people. Zooms not better because then I can't read the person's body language, and i'm still overwhelmed with sensory overload issues.
Texting is a little better since I can stop amd think what I want to say... but are there even doctors that work like that? Not to mention so much information then gets lost...
I dont know. And now, after all this I'm second guessing whether I should even do this. What's the point? I know from dealing with my dad's issues that there isn't a cure or any real solution. Most times the go to answer is medication. And while I have that and it sometimes helps, it's hit or miss. And usually I'm suffering from insomnia so I can't even take it.
I'm either ranting or making excuses now. I can't tell...

I worked hard and it feels like it’s paid off and I’ve gotten to a place in life where I’m comfortable and should have no worries. But, I feel incredibly lonely. Maybe I settled because my relationship feels very hollow and unhappy. I put so much into trying to meet their needs and their constant unhappiness that I let myself be taken for granted. Here I am in my early forties and I’m lonely and miserable.
I’d like to get to know people. To chat with others about things we get passionate about. I’m so tired of ‘hmmm’. I’m tired of every conversation being responded to with negativity. I’m tired of evenings consisting yawns and sighs and not giggles and laughter.
I’m into photography, digital art, design, cinema, games, politics, music, books. I’ve a very technical job and I get excited by all kinds of technology. I love watching stupid B movies and artsy stuff. I love making things. I love fixing things. I want to feel excitement with someone for being excited. I want to don dumb silly things and not feel like I’m being judged for just wanting to be happy.
I’d happily chat to anyone. Tell me about you and your interests. I’d love to learn about what makes you happy. If we don’t click that’s fine, I’m happy to talk all the same.

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⭐ Video Notes :

%22)
Hi Everyone,
For my Masters Psychology dissertation, I am conducting a study into how music affects people’s wellbeing and how individual differences in personality traits, music genre preference and the ways of listening to and uses of music influence this.
This research involves answering some surveys and then being randomly assigned to listen to 1 of 3 15 minute audio sections. You will be presented with your OWN personalised scores for Personality Traits, Music Genre Preference and uses of music at the end, along with explanations of your scores and population averages to compare your scores to.
If you are between 18-25 years old and are interested in taking part in my study or would like to find out more information, follow the link below which will take you to the study. (Due to technical restrictions please ensure that you open the link in a browser).
All responses are completely anonymous. The study will take approximately 30 minutes to complete.
Thank you in advance for your time!
Survey Link: https://hud.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_6FFI6pBRrwW8aeq

Everyone is always looking for that next big thing. Roaring Kitty posted about GME a year or two before the initial breakout happened. I posted about 2.5 years ago about $ELTP going CFP. So, why is $ELTP, positioned for a squeeze?
First and foremost, there are known agitators on the Ihub boards - two of which have openly admitted to shorting the stock and bragging that they can do it from outside the United States. They have infiltrated the moderator spots, just like the in GME where those in naked shorting positions were placing employees in locations to create horrible customer service experiences. For GME, the goal was to drive customers away, and it sounded crazy when first posited, but, like many conspiracy theories over the last few years, it was eventually shown to be true. For $ELTP, the main moderator deletes many positive posts, restricts posting of those in long positions or outright bans their accounts. He will send you messages bragging about the fact that you can't do anything about it. Hubris is always the last step before downfall.
I watched this stock for 3.5 years before I bought a single share. Ironically, the antics of these agitators helped clue me in on this potentially being a good stock. Once the company turned a profit - clearly amazing news for a company on the OTC, the most astounding thing happened. All the naysayers and agitators whipped themselves up in to this religious fervor. Accounts with similar names but that hadn't posted in 10 years suddenly started spam posting negative stuff about a stock...that just had incredibly positive news? That's odd. The more positive news that came out the more they started banning people and spamming negative posts. And the more I saw this, the more shares I accumulated. Then last year, $ELTP popped over 600% from it's low. It was like swatting a bee hive. The agitators went full tilt.
So, how can we profit, and how can we make these guys feel the pain? There are about 400 million shares held by execs/employees etc. that I don't think are moving. That leaves about 600 million shares. The people who have borrowed shares (hard to tell the amount since this is outside of the US and most likely outside of our ability to purvey) are going to be in an increasingly tough position if we can start accumulating all of the shares. At 10,000 people, we would need to each accumulate 60,000 shares - a cost of around $10k at current prices. 10,000 people - that's all and we can drive this thing through the roof. The best part? The CEO has stated that he expects a buyout within 2 to 2.5 years. So, we have our exit. Preferably, it would be by Pfizer (they lost a manufacturing plant in a hurricane last year and could use $ELTP manufacturing capacity) so we could swap shares instead of paying the capital gains.
I've posted my position before on here when discussing this company so that I was as transparent as possible. Going forward though, I will personally commit to $15,000 a month in purchases. I continue to say this stock is worth $1.60 ish on the low side and $10 on the high side. At 17 cents, each share would be one more little soldier fighting for my retirement.
If this gets over 2,000 likes, I'll assume I've got soldiers marching with me, and I start my $15k buy per month which I will post screenshots of every month.

Like all haunted house stories, this took place right after I moved in. Cliché, right? My wife and I saved up enough money from our rental to finally put down on a house of our own. So we moved in and everything seemed right...at first.
It wasn’t until later that I realized there were warning signs. The seller seemed really anxious to close, and we were offered a much cheaper price than we expected for the space we got. While there was a moment of doubt, we brushed it off as some weird circumstance that ended in a great deal for us.
How could we possibly pass that up?
The strange occurrences were small at first. I would be up late watching TV and swore I heard something. I’d pause the show and make out what sounded like dragging noises. After investigating, I wouldn’t find anything. Even stranger was that no matter where I walked in the house, the noise always sounded the same distance away. When I focused on it, I noticed the particular noise was rhythmic.
Tap, tap...sliiiiiiide.
It was like that every single time. My wife never heard it, it was only me. None of us believe in ghosts, mind you. But as I said before it was a small thing, so I brushed it off.
One night, I woke up in a startle. I listened intently but could hear nothing. I decided to grab a late night snack from the kitchen since I was awake anyway.
Halfway down the hall, I heard something. This time, it sounded like dirt being sifted und. I knelt down and swore that the sound was louder. Before I knew it, I had my ear pressed to the hardwood floor, listening intently.
Schht, schht.....sccchhhhhhh...
I jumped up from the floor. It was that same pattern of noises, but this time it sounded like someone in the dirt. Trying to ignore the chills washing over me, I took a step towards the kitchen when…
…something grabbed my ankle.
I fell forward, almost busting my chin on the floor.
“What the...”
Flipping over, I turned to face my assailant, but there was no one behind me. I brushed it off and chalked it up to poor balance from a sleep-hangover. My wife got a good chuckle out of that one.
After that, the house began to feel.....heavier. It was this weight over me that would come and go. This was accompanied by feeling cold no matter how much we turned up the heat, and this was the middle of the summer. Even stranger, the cold seemed to only be in certain spots, particularly on the floor itself. I liked to walk around barefoot no matter what time of year it was, but it was even too cold for me.
Another night, I woke up again. My ears stood at attention, but couldn’t hear any evidence of what woke me up. I got up just like before, except I never made it to the kitchen.
I only made if halfway down our hall before I suddenly felt a horrible pain in my right leg. I had to limp to keep moving, then my other leg was wracked with a wave of pain. It was so bad I found myself face down on the ground, writhing in agony.
Then I heard it again…that awful succession of noises.
Tap, tap....sliiiiiide.
The sliding sound was coming from the hardwood floor this time, not from underneath. And the sound was getting closer and closer until...
I watched in horror as a hand came around the corner in front of me. It was soon joined by another, and they tugged at the floor. My heart hammered in my chest as a person slowly came into view.
It was a woman with long black hair, her disheveled clothing smeared with dirt and hanging off in shreds. Her mouth was crudely stitched shut. She looked up at me with empty, lost eyes and I instantly felt a lifetime of pain and misery. It took my breath away, and I had to focus on my breathing to keep myself from fainting.
Tap, tap....sliiiiiide.
That awful sound repeated as she grabbed the floor and pulled herself towards me. I was in a terrified trance, eyes locked with her as she slowly closed the distance. I could now see that she dragged herself because her legs were horribly mangled. A low moan emanated from her throat, sending ice through my veins.
Her very presence seemed to drain me, and I couldn’t move no matter how hard I tried. She made this awful gurgling sound as she got within arm’s reach. In seconds, her face was right up to mine. I tried to scream, but couldn’t make any sound.
Then...I woke up.
“AAAAHHhhh!” I shouted as I sprang up in bed.
My wife tried to console me, but it did very little. I’d never had a dream that felt so real before. Shaking, I walked out into the hallway where I had collapsed in my dream. I put a hand on the floor, expecting it to be freezing cold as usual.
But it was warm...
“Honey?” I felt the soft hand of my wife touch my shoulder.
“What’s going on? You look white as a sheet.”
“I’m okay...I just...”
On the floor in front me, I noticed the faint trace of fingernail marks.
“Was that there before?” My wife inquired.
“I’m...I’m not sure.”
“Let’s go back to bed. We’ll talk more about it tomorrow.”
I tried to hold back my stubborn expression, but she still saw it.
“C’mon, you need to rest.”
With an exasperated exhale, I went back to bed with the strange occurrence replaying incessantly in my brain.
In the morning, I told my wife about all the strange experiences. To my shock she actually believed me.
“What do you want to do, then?” She asked.
“Well...I have a theory I want to check out.”
“Theory of what?”
“Well, let’s just say that ghosts exist, and there are certain reasons why they haunt certain places. If that is true then...I think there could be a body in our crawlspace.”
“What, are you crazy?”
“I know how it sounds, but what would it hurt to look?”
“You really think there’s something down there?”
“More someone, but I’m not sure to be honest. Hopefully I can get a confirmation either way it goes.”
That afternoon, I found myself standing at the door to our crawlspace. It felt ridiculous, but so many details pointed to it. The sounds and cold spots were all related to the floor. The ghastly woman’s clothes were smeared with dirt. It was obscure, but it was all I had to go on.
I had to pry the door open with a crowbar, but I managed after a minute or two. A wave of unnatural cold air blasted me, so strong that I had to throw on a coat just to stop from shivering so badly.
I clicked on my flashlight, illuminating the eerie underbelly of our home. The dirt sifted under my feet as I crouch-walked around. After hearing it, it only confirmed what I thought I heard from under the floor.
Expecting to see more, I was almost disappointed that the crawlspace was completely bare. Not believing it entirely, I shined my light around more. The back part of the crawlspace led to concrete and it was there that I noticed one section of the wall looked different than the rest.
Hands quivering, I pushed against the section of concrete and felt it shift under the pressure. It continued to wobble around in place the more I pushed. Holding my flashlight between my teeth, I had to use both hands to pry the piece away from the wall. To my astonishment, it pulled away very easily. It was no coincidence that the section of wall fit the hole exactly, like a puzzle piece.
After leaning the piece of concrete against the wall, I found that the concrete was covering a door with a padlock.
There’s no way anything good is behind this...
Minutes later, I returned to the mysterious door with a pair of bolt cutters. I debated whether or not I’d go in. There was no reason I shouldn’t satisfy my curiosity, because if there wasn’t anything then great, but if there was something terrible, I’d simply have to deal with it. Either way, I had to know.
I clipped the metal bar off the lock and it thudded softly to the dirt floor. Taking in a deep breath, I dared to aim my beam down the opening. The crawlspace extended much further into the house, and I had a good guess where it led. I now had to crawl on my hands and knees as a knot of dread formed in my stomach.
“You always tell people not to do this in movies, why are you doing this now??!” I chastised myself.
I knew all too well how stupid this was but the part of my brain that can’t look away from a car wreck pushed me to carry along regardless.
It was difficult to navigate with the flashlight and crawl. A mild claustrophobia settled in that pushed me along with a sense of urgency. The temperature couldn’t have been any more than a meatlocker. My hands shook despite my thick jacket. Eventually, I came to a dead end.
Is this all?
I stopped for a moment and checked around with my light some more, hoping a more thorough search would bear some fruit. Yet, there was nothing.
Sighing in frustration, I decided that perhaps I was losing my mind and was just having really vivid dreams after all. How could I have been so stupid?
I made it halfway across the hidden area when I felt my legs suddenly give out. They weren’t tired or sore before this. It was as if they stopped working of their own volition. I attempted to cry out, but my mouth felt as if some force held it closed.
Just like a stitched mouth...
One of the few things I could move was my neck and I turned to the side to see...
…a tuft of a blanket?
Due to the narrow space, I must have missed it. I slowly reached for it with all the internal alarms in my body going off at once. Ignoring the warning, I pulled the cloth back to reveal a skeletal hand.
In this moment of revulsion, something turned on my motor skills again as I regained control of my legs, crawling out of there as quickly as I could muster. Heaving, I stumbled out of the crawlspace and instantly felt the rise in temperature. I sat on the porch and stayed there as I called the police and explained the situation.
It turns out that one of the previous owners of the home was a major suspect in the disappearance of a young lady fifteen years ago. There wasn’t enough evidence to conduct a home search so they were never able to find the body. And what they found was something I wish I had never known.
From examining the body, they found that her captor had broken both of her legs so she couldn’t escape and sewn her mouth shut to keep her from screaming. It was hard to tell how long she’d been locked down there before she died, but they hypothesized it was a month or two. The cause of death was unclear. This was clearly enough to pursue the former owner.
When they picked him up, the guy tried to play the ignorance card, pretending as if he didn’t know what house they were referring to. This of course made it even more suspicious.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything concrete enough to tie him to her death...until they searched his current home. Blueprints of the home showed that the crawlspace was supposed to end ten feet where the concrete wall was. No contractors were hired to do any work on the home, so someone had personally busted it up and created the door going further in. The last part of it was the padlock on the door.
When the police searched the man’s home, they found a shoebox full of seemingly innocent keepsakes. Among the keepsakes were some heirlooms, pictures of close family members, and a key. As suspected, the key matched the padlock to the crawlspace door. It was apparently enough to make him crack. It wasn’t long before he confessed to the kidnapping and murder, albeit without a hint of remorse. Turns out the bastard kept the key as a sick trophy.
They even questioned him about other possible victims since this was a trait commonly shared by serial killers. He denied it, but the police couldn’t feel any truth from it. If anything they knew that they solved one case, put a guilty man behind bars, and put a family at peace. Justice was served and he was locked away for the rest of his miserable life. Poetic justice, if you ask me. The poor girl’s parents buried her remains on a family plot.
After all this, we had serious doubts about staying in the home. Knowing something this egregious happened in our home was almost unbearable. I can’t tell you how much we cried when we heard the story of what happened to that poor girl. We were on the brink of selling the house for about a week, but one night changed all that.
I woke up from a dream, one so vivid yet it somehow escaped my thoughts like a fistful of sand. There was a strange feeling in my gut as if something was going to happen.
It was neither good nor bad, just....strange.
After drinking a small glass of milk, I meandered down the hall and stopped in my tracks. A woman stood in front of me, half-transparent with a bluish luminescence. I felt as if I knew her, although I didn’t recognize her appearance at all. She smiled, and I instantly knew who she was. Compared to her previous horrific manifestation, the woman was almost unrecognizable.
Never speaking, she motioned to her legs and I saw that they were in perfect condition. In a mild state of shock, I managed to form a smile. She beamed even wider and ran her fingers across her lips, pointing out her lack of stitches. A blanket of warmth wrapped around me, and I couldn’t resist the salty tears that streamed down my face.
Right before she waved goodbye, a voice spoke within my mind.
"It’s over now. Thank you..."
She faded away, and for the first time since we moved into that house, all hints of the oppressive energy dissipated. That was the last time I ever saw her.
It’s been 30 years now, and we’re still in that house to this day...
May she continue to rest in peace...

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
We pulled off I-51 a little after midnight, stopping at a truck stop which was couched between the highway and a large forest.
We waited in the van for ten minutes or so. Trent had increased the sonar radius to its maximum of 30 miles a little over an hour ago. Somehow the red pings had kept up with us, holding a steady distance of around 20 miles. Considering we were averaging around 80 mph, and a coyote's top speed is only around 40 mph, we figured they had been enhanced in some way. Either that, or they shape-shifted into something faster. Regardless, now that we had stopped, we waited to see if the demon spawn would try and close the distance. Luckily, or unluckily, they didn't. They kept their 20 mile buffer, but we noticed they were beginning to spread out along the circumference of that boundary.
"We're close. They know that, so they're trying to trap us in." Trent said.
"Trying to?—more like they have."
We considered whether we should stay in the van and keep watch, but we figured that would do us little good. At their speed, they could be on us in ten minutes, which means we would need to stay up all night and keep tabs on their positions. Trent offered to stay up, of course, but I shut him down.
"The demon doesn't want to kill us now. You said it yourself. Plus, we need our rest. If they come, they come."
Trent didn't like it, but he acquiesced.
The truck stop had all the essentials: a gas station and mini mart with showers and an attached McDonald's, a large parking lot for truckers to idle and sleep, and even a section with lodging for those who wanted a more comfortable night's rest. I told Trent that he should take advantage of the showers, and after a little convincing, he agreed. While he was cleaning himself up, I patrolled the dingy, half-stocked aisles of "Daisy's Quick Mart". I probably would have been appalled at the quality of the store had I actually been paying any attention to it whatsoever. But I wasn't. I was thinking hard about what awaited me tomorrow.
During the drive, I had asked Trent why the demon would want us to return to the crash site. What did he mean that I would be 'confronting a dark entity in a place he couldn't help me'? He seemed hesitant to answer, but my little stunt outside the storage facility seemed to have sufficiently motivated him.
"When I said I've never done this before, I meant it." Trent started. "I've never done this exact thing before—meaning I've never projected someone into the past."
"So, I'm time traveling?" I asked.
"No—don't think of it like that." Trent paused, trying to come up with a good explanation. "It's more like I'm opening a window for you to look through: not a door. You're going to see the past, but you can't interact with the physicalities there. But that doesn't mean you can't interact with anything."
There was a space of silence as Trent tried to let me work out his meaning for myself. "I don't get it. Are you saying there's something I can interact with? Like what?" And then it hit me. "The demon. The demon can interact with me? Meaning what? It can kill me?"
"Meaning… I'm not exactly sure. You're going to be in a kind of psychic space. If it does damage, it won't be to your body. It'll be to your mind—or spirit. But I don't know what the limits of that damage could be. I just don't have those answers."
"If you've never done this, how do you know any of it will work?"
"That's an easy one." Trent answered. "Because it's been done to me."
There was silence.
"Look, if I know anything, I know my tech. Don't doubt that this will work. It's my job to make sure it does. I just need you to be in the right mental for this. Just because it knows your coming doesn't mean it automatically has the upper hand. It won't be able to see you unless you make contact with it first. In other words, you have to initiate contact. As long as you remain a spectator, you should be okay. Trust me. Just don't make contact."
I started pacing faster—fast enough to catch the attention of the overnight shift worker, a young man whose name I can't quite remember. I know it started with a "J". Jake, maybe? Anyway, he asked if I was alright, to which I responded in the affirmative. He left me alone for another couple passes, but when I almost ran into one of the shelves, he stood up and said, "Uh—I'm going to have to ask you to stop running around. I don't want you to hurt yourself."
I must have stared daggers at him, because he recoiled from my gaze. What's gotten into me? I thought. Then, steadying myself, I apologized. I looked around and grabbed the nearest edible looking piece of merchandise: a bag of Swedish Fish, and placed it down on the counter. "Just this, please."
The cashier rang me up. It was surprisingly cheap.
"Are you sure you're alright?" the young man asked. He was tall with brown hair. He seemed tired—maybe even more tired than me. But he also seemed kind.
I smiled as best I could and said, "No, I'm not. But there's not really anything you can do. Hell, there might not be anything I can do." I furrowed my eyebrows at my own response, realizing that imminent death may have broken my verbal filter.
On the other hand, the cashier did not seem surprised at all. "Ah, I see. It's one of those problems." He responded. "Well, hey, for what it's worth, you seem like one of the resilient ones. I think you'll be alright."
I only smiled and nodded at his mildly cryptic comment. Looking back, the whole interaction was a bit strange, but I had way too much mental clutter to recognize that in the moment. I took my Swedish Fish and walked through the anteroom which led to McDonald's. I found an open yellow booth that wasn't littered with crumpled straw sleeves and sat down, chomping mindlessly on my little red fish until Trent returned. When he arrived, he took my place, and I went to shower. After we were both clean and fed, we returned to the van. The pings were still pushed safely out of harm's way. But that didn't mean we were out of harm's way. Trent asked me if I wanted to sleep in the van, saying that "it'd be the safest place."
I thought it over. He was right, obviously. The van was not only outfitted with weapons I couldn't even begin to understand, but it was also our escape, and it would be just as difficult, if not more difficult to break into than the studio-style motel rooms with their wood doors and big windows. Still, if this was going to be my last night on earth, I wanted to sleep in a bed. A real bed. Trent understood and said he'd stay parked right outside my room for the night.
After purchasing a key from the night attendant, I moseyed over to the cement walkways which connected the twenty or so rooms. Mine was room #56, which I thought was odd since, like I said, there were only 20 rooms. I lugged in my tomato plushie and dad's old book and placed them on the queen mattress.
"I'll be right outside." Trent said after I collapsed onto the bed.
"Trent," I called out, stopping him half-way through the door.
"Yeah?"
All the blood in my body rushed up to my face as I realized my unfiltered mouth almost reflexively said the word "stay". I stared at Trent, my heart beating, my face hot. I considered asking him to sleep on the floor like my dad, but that would be childish and impolite. The alternative was to share my bed… Or I could take the floor.
"I'll just be right outside." Trent said before my mind processed a solution. "Come by if you need anything. I'll be up most of the night anyway."
"Okay," I replied in a faint voice.
Trent shut the door.
I sat atop the bedsheets and acquainted myself with my new living space. A feeling of regret closed over me as I considered that even sleeping on a carseat would have been better if it meant I didn't have to be alone. With a sigh, I turned on the bedside lamp and grabbed the book and stuffed tomato, using the tomato as a backrest as I slipped my legs under the covers and situated the book upright on my thighs. I cracked it open and was immediately blasted with a puff of dusty, old book scent. It was ripe at first, and I turned my head away to sneeze, but as I perused through the pages, the scent grew on me. It reminded me of the days growing up when I'd step into dad's study and read through one of the many volumes on cryptic topics which were at least two college degrees above my Lexile range.
I was only a couple minutes into browsing the collection of different scientific and philosophical works when I came across a page which contained highlighted text. This was unusual, as my dad would never mark up his books. He was a purist on that point. I rubbed my thumb over the yellow lines, and sure enough, it was highlighter.
The highlighted text was part of a small book by Carl Jung called "Synchronicity". There were a total of three pages that were marked, and they advanced like this:
Page 5:
The philosophical principle that underlies our conception of natural law is causality*. But if the connection between cause and effect turns out to be only statistically valid and relatively true, then the causal principle is only of relative use for explaining natural processes… That is as much to say that the connection of events may in certain circumstances be other than causal, and require another principle of explanation.*
Page 19:
…there are events which are related to one another experimentally, and in this case meaningfully*, without there being any possibility of proving that this relation is a causal one, since the "transmission" exhibits none of the known properties of energy…a situation which does not yet exist and will only occur in the future could transmit itself as a phenomenon of energy to a receiver in the present…Therefore, it cannot be a question of cause and effect, but of a falling together in time, a kind of simultaneity... "synchronicity"*
Page 22:
A young woman I was treating had, at a critical moment, a dream in which she was given a golden scarab. While she was telling me this dream I sat with my back to the closed window. Suddenly I heard a noise behind me, like a gentle tapping. I turned round and saw a flying insect knocking against the window pane from outside. I opened the window and caught the creature in the air as it flew in. It was the nearest analogy to a golden scarab that one finds in our latitudes, a scarabaeid beetle, the common rose-chafer… which contrary to its usual habits had evidently felt an urge to get into a dark room at this particular moment.
I flipped through the rest of the pages of the book. There was no more highlighted text, but there was a message on the last page which read:
Matthew 7:7-8
I'll meet you in the darkest place.
He also included his typical smiley face which had an ovular shape and three sprouts of hair which I now realized kind of resembled my tomato plushie. It was my dad's writing, of course. But why? And how? What did this mean?
The motel had a Bible stashed away in the nighstand drawer. I got it out and looked up the verses which read the following:
Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
I spent maybe an hour ruminating on all of this. The whole discourse on energy and causality and a "falling together in time" just seemed so right. It was clear that my dad definitely did know what I was going through, but for whatever reason, he made it seem like he was oblivious. Why had he hidden that from me? I felt like I was being pulled in two directions. On the one hand, my dad loved me enough to leave this note, maybe even knowing the exact moment I'd need it. But on the other hand, he had neglected my struggles throughout my entire childhood. He even lied at times. Was this really enough to make up for all of that?
And then there was the section about the future transmitting energy to the past. I read back through the whole paragraph and the original writer had meant it to say this as something that wasn't possible, but my dad's highlighting made it seem like he wanted to flip the meaning. The future does affect the past. I thought about where I was headed and wondered if I would soon discover that for myself.
Lastly, dad's message. The Bible verse reminded me of the first time I prayed; how I reached out to God and received peace as an answer to my prayer. Now I feel like I'm actively seeking… something, but I don't know yet what I'll find. And then there's knocking. At first that reminded me of the story with the beetle tapping on the window, but then I went back even deeper in my memory and dug out the monster tapping at my window, and the words my dad spoke to me in order to set my mind at ease: "you're a superhero. And you know what your greatest superpower is? Your greatest power is you get to tell the monsters what to do. Because the monsters are only as strong as the stories you tell about them…so if you're ever scared, honey, just dream up a better story."
I was crying into my stuffed tomato now. I felt like all the blinking pieces of my life had finally been pulled together into a completed puzzle. This was all by design. My entire life, filled with so much chaos and confusion, was actually preparing me for this moment. And my dad thought I had the tools and strength enough to get through it. I flipped through the book one more time, thinking maybe he had left some other hidden comment—some formula to defeat this demon and return home. But there was nothing. Only that one comment: "I'll meet you in the darkest place."
What's the darkest place, dad? Is that where I'm going? Are you saying you'll be there, too?
With those thoughts in mind, my eyes became heavy shutters which, with a slight pressure on the pulley, winded shut. My swimming thoughts and firework-like fears dissipated, and I returned to a precious childhood memory. It was after an evening soccer practice. Summer. Dad was driving me to Dairy Queen. I got a cherry-dipped twist cone. I was happy.
So, so happy.
***
I woke up to sunlight blaring through my windows. Shit, I overslept, was my immediate thought. I threw off my covers and opened the front door. A glance at the clock showed 1:13 PM. I shouldn't have even been allowed to stay checked in this long. Damn, am I gonna get double-billed for this?
I heard a rummaging sound around the corner of my motel room. It sounded like a squirrel was trying to find an afternoon snack in one of the garbage bins. I stepped outside. The sun was extremely bright, to the point where I had to squint and put my hand over my eyes to even see the ground in front of me. I was trying to walk toward the van, but somehow I ended up in front of the trash bins where the animal's tail was sticking out from a turned-over, silver garbage can. Its tail was wagging excitedly, and I remember thinking that it was much too large to be a squirrel.
The animal bent down as if biting onto something, and I heard the sound of its growl as it struggled to tug whatever it was free from the barrel. Inch by inch, the creature backed out of the canister, and more of its sharp, sticky hair was revealed. I heard something snap, then the creature leapt back and I saw what it was chomping on. My eyes widened in horror as the pink tube of a human intestine was pulled taut like the end of a tangled hose. Blood and entrails were spilling out of the human's opened gut. And then, behind the canine, I saw the person's face. His face was pale white, his eyes closed, and his hair was slicked back… It was Trent.
Before I could react, I heard footsteps approaching from behind. I whirled around and saw my dad. But—no, it wasn't him. It was someone wearing a paper-mache face mask that was painted to look like my dad. The forehead of the mask was already beginning to crack, white specks breaking off like sawdust. Through the cracks, I could see the figure's true form. I didn't know darkness had its own type of light, but that's the only way to describe it. It was as if malevolence itself was reified into a skin which was actually an amalgamation of millions of little, oozing parasites that leached into the nearby light. When it finally spoke, the demon's voice was a full octave lower than the old man's at the deli. And it had an earth-stilling gravitas.
"Today's the day!" He sang and reached into his pocket. His lips curled upward into a foxy smirk. "You have no idea how long I've waited for this day." He said and held up a razor blade. Half his facade had already fallen apart, and now I could see the bugs up close, writhing in what was either horror or ecstasy. And his scent… it was somehow more rank than the rabid coyote rummaging through the trash can with Trent's cut open body inside. The demon closed in on my position, and in one, decisive motion, he brought the blade close to his chin, then sliced it across my throat. "Wake up!" He screamed.
I jumped out of my bed and grabbed my throat, feeling the cold sting of its quick slice. Hyperventilating, I patted the area down, trying to hold the blood in, but when I removed my hands, I saw they were dry. It was only a dream, I thought. Gray light was only beginning to filter in through the drapes. I'm in my hotel room. I'm safe. I tried consoling, but the pragmatic mental massages weren't enough to hold the force of my knees buckling. I dropped onto the carpet and cried for a long while.
Outside, rain was beginning to fall.
***
By the time I met up with Trent, I had already composed myself and decided to keep my dad's message and the nightmare to myself. None of it seemed particularly productive from a logistical standpoint, anyway. And I wanted to focus on the mission.
We stopped by McDonald's and bought a couple cups of coffee. Trent asked if I wanted any food, and I declined. Black coffee seemed like the only thing my stomach could take at the present moment. I could tell Trent was hungry, but he tried playing it off (I guess to be respectful of me?) I told him to knock it off and get something to eat. I didn't need my Charon getting lightheaded and dropping the paddle before he finished rowing me to Hell. He didn't care much for my joke, but he ordered a couple Chicken McGriddles at the kiosk anyway.
There were maybe ten patrons spread throughout the restaurant. We sat down at the same booth from the prior night, this time across from one another. Trent spent the first ten minutes or so babbling about our fuel supply and the logistics of the trip from here on in. Practical stuff. I've come to realize that's how he deals with his stress. He talks it out in short, durable sentences. I mostly nodded and watched as what looked like a storm front closed in on the truck stop. The sky was overcast, and there were darker clouds in the distance. The rain was still only a patter, but a middle-aged man wearing a yellow bow tie on the wall-mounted TV confirmed that there would be heavier rain and thunderstorms very soon.
After the worker delivered Trent's food and he ate it in record time, I posed the one question that was still on my mind.
"How do I fight him?" I asked.
Trent finished a large gulp of his coffee, then looked at me. It was the first substantial thing I'd said all morning; Trent could tell something was off with me, but he figured there was no point in asking what it was. "By 'him', I assume you mean the demon?"
I nodded.
Trent licked his teeth clean. "You could try praying again."
"I'm serious," I responded.
"I'm serious, too. It worked before, didn't it?"
"You mean at my house?"
Trent nodded.
"I thought you weren't a religious man?"
"I'm not. Just a practical one. If praying worked before, maybe it'll work again."
"That's the best you've got? A maybe?"
"No, I've got a lot of shit better than a maybe." He answered. "It's just not accessible where you're going. Which is why I recommend not making contact on the first run."
"First run? So we're going to do this more than once?"
"At least," Trent answered. Then, seeing my expression, he continued. "What? You thought this was going to be a one-and-done? We have to conduct some research first. I did tell you this was new for me, right?"
Somehow Trent's response had set my mind at ease a little. I was going to have more than one chance. Of course, why wouldn't I be able to go back more than once?
"Why didn't you tell me this earlier? It would have gone a long way in easing my mind."
Trent lifted his hands in defense. "Sorry, I just thought that was a given. I mean, what we're doing is dangerous, just like I said, but it doesn't mean we aren't going to approach this as safely and scientifically as possible. However, there is a different problem with running multiple trials."
"The Organization?"
"That's right," Trent said like a proud parent. "Our little experiment will be like a giant spotlight, and the longer we wait around after it's on us, the greater the chance we'll have unwelcome company."
"So, safe but speedy."
"Safe but speedy. Exactly."
***
We fueled up and were back on the road a little after 8:00. From that point on, Trent and I were absolutely silent. I had the distinct feeling of being in the eye of a storm. The pings moved closer commensurate with our progress toward the crash site. The cloudfront continued its advance. And I noticed a haze beginning to descend onto the road ahead of us. It was fog.
We meandered further inland, the forest thickening around us until the rain almost stopped entirely—the leaves drinking it up before it fell onto our windshield. I kept my eyes on the radar. We were approaching the large yellow circle which indicated we had arrived. As we pulled closer, I began to feel things. Fear. Eeriness. Doubt. Then happiness. Hope. Love. Normally feelings like these had a clear source to picture, but these sensations came on in waves without any discernible reason. It was almost as if they were blinking into existence inside me.
"Here we go," Trent said like an airline pilot readying his crew for turbulence.
I still recall the exact moment we crossed the boundary into the area of higher energy. It was like something just "clicked" in my brain, and all of a sudden everything felt so much closer. The sound of the rain against the trees was almost right next to my ear. The trees in the distance would oscillate between their position a half-mile out, then suddenly seem five meters away. If I focused on something long enough, it began to radiate those same ethereal particles as when Trent released Ava's "phase lock". I checked to make sure the shifter wasn't set to "TD". Sure enough, it was still in drive.
"Can you see them?" Trent asked. "The shifts?"
"Yeah," I said in a dreamy voice. I felt like I was driving through a wonderland.
"It's the energy. I barely notice a difference. A bit of movement in the trees, but not much else. But I'm sure for you, it's a whole experience."
"What is this?" I raised my hand and caught some of the pixel dust dripping off the sun visor. It disappeared when it made contact with my hand.
"It's a kind of radiation. Everything emits it, just in different quantities. I'm still not exactly sure how it relates to the other realms, but I'm guessing it's a kind of primordial matter that helps connect our worlds."
"It's beautiful," I exclaimed. "I wish I could see the world like this all the time."
"Maybe you will," Trent whispered.
As we arrived at the crash site, I began to get glimpses of the past. My childhood dreams and memories were pushing their way out from my subconscious. I noticed an increased number of blinks, which were validated by Ava who reported the following: "Currently detecting 14,350 novel emergences and 2,777 controlled agents. Net anomalies: 2,777."
"That's a lot of blinks." I remarked. "Why doesn't Ava include them in the net anomalies?"
Trent turned his head so I could see his smirk. "Because blinks aren't anomalies."
I thought about it for a second. Blinks aren't anomalies. "I never thought about it that way."
"It's hard to think about it that way when 'normal' for most people means not picking up on a fundamental aspect of reality. But that doesn't make it any less real."
We continued past the epicenter of the yellow circle. "Are we not stopping?" I asked. "I think we already passed the crash site."
"It doesn't have to be exactly at the site," Trent said. "Plus, we don't want to stop on the side of the road and risk getting some civilian involved. There's a field about half a mile up ahead. I'm going to pull off the road and set up camp there.
The "field" that Trent was referring to was actually a large clearing that dipped down into several trench-like troughs which were filled to the brim with fog like witches cauldrons. Further on in the distance, I saw open fields, probably used for farming, and then a large hill where the trees once again reasserted themselves. We had pulled off the road and up a small incline where the trees had already been broken down, leaving a trail for us to drive through. When we surfaced at the edge of the clearing, Trent pulled us onto a flat bed of dried mud which was maybe thirty yards long.
"Here," he said with a sigh.
We both sat for a minute, looking around at the field. We had finally arrived. The rain was beginning to pick up, and the dark sky made it almost impossible to discern the time of day.
"You ready?" Trent asked.
I looked at him. Really looked at him. In his blue eyes. Was I ready? Did it even matter?
"Let's do this," I said.
***
This was the first time I was really able to inspect the back of Trent's van. He had talked up his gear a lot, and honestly, I was impressed. Not in the way that a scientist is impressed by another scientist's lab—I wasn't any kind of expert—but it still seemed remarkably well managed. Now that I was in a state where my vision had been enhanced, I could actually see the enigmatic particles circulating through the pneumatic tubes which were coiled like the pipes and valves of an elaborate wind instrument. The walls of the van, itself, were glistening white, making it easier to make out everything else inside. Along the floor were five overturned columns. Each column was dark and had a vibrating quality, as if they were charged with energy. Then atop the center three columns was a small altar which supported an apparatus with two skinny, metal arms holding a silver halo. At present, the arms were folded and the halo was suspended a few inches above the altar, faced-down. I thought maybe I'd see particles exuding from it, but instead it was emitting visible waves which bent and warped everything they touched.
"That thing is emitting a lot of energy." I remarked, gesturing toward the halo.
Trent stepped in between the columns and started pulling out the packages he had stuffed in there yesterday. "Just wait till' it's on."
Most of the packages contained only a single piece of equipment, and were otherwise packed with foam peanuts. We carefully removed each box and set them on the ground outside. I asked if the rain would damage any of the stuff inside, to which Trent only laughed and continued lugging out the boxes. When they were all out, Trent removed a box cutter from his pocket and went one-by-one opening them. There were eight pieces in total.
"What is it?" I asked as we fished the first item out.
"It's another apparatus, like the one inside. Except it'll mount on the ground out here."
I pulled out what looked like a metal tripod.
"Good, that'll go on the bottom."
"Where are we setting it up?"
"Over here," Trent said and stepped five paces away from the van. He coordinated himself up so he was centrally aligned with the inner ring, then stomped a few times. "This is the spot."
As we continued to work, I asked Trent about how the whole contraption works.
"Do you remember the first time we were in the van? When we had to escape from the semi-truck?" Trent asked and connected a secondary mounting apparatus on top of the tripod. It had four spider-like legs that made right angles and stuck into the ground.
"Of course," I said. "The 'phase lock'."
"Yeah," Trent said and gestured toward the metal stick that was in my hand. I handed it to him. "The phase lock is a seal on the level of energy that the van is allowed to release. It also controls its dispersion pattern so that it releases its energy in a steady wave. This allows Ava to scan for anomalies without causing us to become an anomaly." Trent stuck the plank into the neck of the tripod.
"So when you released the phase lock, we started emitting more energy."
"That's right." Trent confirmed. "Enough to create an alternate route through a different realm."
"So we blinked into a different realm, then back, just to avoid that truck?"
"That's right."
"But why couldn't we just move out of the way?"
"Because it had locked onto us. It was tracking our motion and adjusting its course based on the amount of energy we were emitting. So in order to escape, we had to radically skew our potential energy and then use it to shift."
"Couldn't he have just followed us?"
Trent connected four more pieces to the device which now looked like an elaborate teepee. He was fishing in the last box when he spoke again. "Yeah, he could have. But it was highly improbable that he would have found us." Trent returned from the bottom of the box with another silver ring in hand. "Think of it like this. Let's say you're trying to escape from some bad guy who's coming after you, and you enter a new room you've never seen before. Would you prefer this room to have three doors to go through, or ten?"
I thought about his riddle for a second, then responded, "It depends where they go."
Trent fastened the ring atop the teepee. "Let's say they all lead to random places, or let's say they're all closets that lead nowhere. The key is that more is better, because the more doors he has to check, the less likely he is to pick the correct one. Make sense?"
"So we opened up a bunch of doors and escaped through one at random?"
"Hence the gear 'TD', for 'Trap Door'."
I marveled at the insights, but not for long. Trent hopped back in the van and pulled a lever that I hadn't seen until now. The two metal arms raised the inner ring until it was perpendicular with the altar. Then Trent clicked one of three red buttons along the back wall, and I saw what looked like a large, glass eye suspended in a magnifying glass protruding from the wall, aligned with the center of both rings. A couple seconds later, the glass eye began to focus the energy which was being fed to it from the pneumatic tubes, and a blue pyramid of light projected from it into the first ring, then from the first ring into the second ring. All three pieces were aligned at slightly diminishing heights, so the cylinder of light beamed through the second ring, into the ground.
"Alright, time for the first trial."
I felt the nerves starting up in my stomach. Trent sensed this and hopped out of the truck. It was raining quite hard now, though it was still warm. Both Trent and I were soaked, but that hardly concerned us. He reached out and put his hand on my shoulder. "I know you're feeling scared." He said. "But trust me on this. You're going to do fine. Just keep in mind what we talked about. Stay a spectator. Okay?"
I looked into his blue eyes, which seemed especially gray in the dark. Still, Trent's voice was reassuring. All I had to do was trust him. Trust myself. Trust my dad. And it was all going to turn out right.
"I'm ready," I said.
Trent was still for a second, holding my eyes in his. Then he guided me behind the outer ring and into the cylinder of light.
"I should step into it now?" I asked, afraid I'd be called away immediately.
"It's not on yet, so don't worry. I still have to press another button."
I followed Trent's instructions and stood in the blue light which was centered on my chest. Then I watched as Trent ran into the back of the van and posted up next to the glass eye. "Ready?" He yelled out. It was hard to hear him over the rain, but I yelled back. "Ready!"
The next thing I saw was a blinding blue light beam from the van. I heard what sounded like a laser, then saw the cylinder oscillate, expanding and compressing. When the energy reached the second ring, I saw everything around me light up—it looked brighter than noon on a cloudless day. Then the oscillations made their way to me, and I was swallowed up whole.
***
When I came to, I was in the backseat of a car. I felt my butt rumbling. Everything was dim and quiet. And then I heard a woman's voice from in front of me.
"Mark, please, not with Lauren in the back."
The man, who I now identified as my father, pulled the cigarette away from his lips and blew the smoke at my mom. He eyed the back seat where I was sitting, using one of five markers that hadn't rolled off my lap to color a rabbit in my animal color book.
"The kid's fine." he said and took another drag.
"Mark," my mom repeated.
I saw my dad raise his hand in a rapid motion. "I said she's fine, Cheryl. Now check the map and make sure we're going the right away. I can't see shit with all this fog."
I took a moment to make sure I was really in the back seat. I patted myself. I clearly had weight. Then I tried touching the car. At first, my fingertips met a solid surface, but when I tried to press through, my hand slipped into the car. I quickly pulled my hand away as if I had reached into a fire.
That's when I heard the little three year old next to me start crying. I turned and saw that little-me had dropped another couple markers onto the ground and was struggling to reach them.
"Hey!" my dad shouted. "What did I say about crying?"
"Quit it, Mark. She just dropped her markers." said my mom; she turned to help me pick them up.
"What did you say to me?" Mark spat with a voice full of guile. He reached out and pushed her back into her seat. "Don't," he commanded. "She has to learn how to deal with life."
"Deal…" My mom started in disbelief. "Deal with life? Do you hear yourself? What's gotten into you?"
"Sometimes shit happens. It doesn't give her the right to cry. You helping her is just going to reinforce her behavior."
"Her behavior? What about your behavior? You're acting like a total dick."
I didn't even have a moment to react before my dad's hand was across my mom's face. I felt the slap more than I heard it, my own face seeming to swell with the force of the blow. I saw my mom cover her mouth and lean away. Then little-me began to cry even louder, which only challenged my dad to step up his own volume.
"Everyone needs to get a fucking grip before I crash this car." My dad shouted and took another drag. The scariest part was I couldn't tell if he was warning us or threatening us. I felt the sudden urge to do something. There was no way this was real. I was definitely in some fantasy concocted by the demon. He wanted to turn me against my dad. That was the only explanation for something like this. My dad was a good man, not… this.
As I contemplated what to do, I saw a small, golden light appear behind little-me's window. Apparently she saw it, too, because her cries hushed as she traced the wisp with her eyes. After a second, the wisp transformed into a bunny rabbit, reminiscent of the one she was coloring. The rabbit hopped alongside the window, then did a couple circles in place. I watched little me let out a playful laugh and reach toward the window.
"What's going on back there?" my dad asked with a scowl. Apparently the only sound more disturbing than cries were laughs.
I looked back to the front and saw my mom wiping blood from her lip. Her expression was miserable. "Leave her alone, Mark."
"I'll do whatever I damn well want to do, Cheryl. It's my kid back there."
My mom was quiet.
When I looked back toward the rabbit, it was no longer a rabbit but a person. Or at least it looked like a person. The figure radiated pure gold, and atop his head was what appeared to be a King's crown. I recalled Allison's experience of seeing the sun-like figure in her moment of distress. Was that what was happening here? Was this really all true?
"Hey!" My dad shouted, eyeing little-me from the rear-view mirror. "What are you reaching at?"
I looked and saw the golden figure extending his hand toward the window, and little me's hand was reaching back. "Mom, dad, it bright." little-me said.
"What's bright, honey?" my mom asked.
"Don't encourage her, Cheryl."
"Someone there!" little me shouted happily and dropped the rest of the markers and the coloring book onto the ground.
"Who's there?" asked my mom.
"Cheryl, I swear to God. Sit the fuck down."
Everything from that moment on happened so quickly I barely had any time to process it. My mom lifted out of her seat to either get little me's attention or help me pick up my coloring book. My dad responded by grabbing onto her throat, letting go of the steering wheel entirely. He threw her back against the car door, and her head hit the window so hard, the glass cracked. My dad had dropped his cigarette, and I could smell smoke coming from under his seat, but that didn't seem to bother him at all. He turned toward little-me at the same moment my three-year-old hand reached out and grabbed onto the golden figure, whose hand diffused through the window. When my dad turned, I got a whiff of the most awful smell that I wouldn't have been able to place had I not had that nightmare last night. He grabbed onto little-me's shoulder and tugged her away from the golden figure that was trying to pull her the other way. My dad's facade began to crack, and I could see those dark bugs crawling out from the pores in his arms, marching down toward little-me.
I reacted.
I grabbed onto my dad's arm and pulled him off little-me. I heard the sound of my shirt ripping as she was torn from his grip and pulled out of the car, diffusing through it like a ghost. My brief victory was immediately overturned as I saw what was now clearly the demon smiling at me, his wretched fingers curled around my forearm.
"Caught you," He sneered.
Then the whole world once again diffused into countless numbers of particles, only this time, instead of riding through it, I felt like I was falling through an elevator shaft with each floor darker than the last. The further I fell, the less I became aware of my surroundings, and the more I felt a deep sense of loneliness. It was as if I was the only person in the whole world: and the whole world was a prison designed entirely for me. This went on for so long, I began to forget who I was. Where I was. What was.
And then I landed.
***
Source Used:
Jung, Carl. Synchronicity. Translated by Sonu Shamdasani, Princeton University Press, 2010.

I just wanna talk to some people about my sexuality towards music and plushies.