F20 I’m writing this for anybody who may b experiencing anything remotely similar to what I did because these last few months have been extremely fucking rough for me, and if I can help one person feel less alone it’s worth it.
I started fearing I had herpes Dec 2023. I was raped by a now ex boyfriend and he’s the only “sexual partner” whose status I was unaware of.
This scared me because he didn’t use a condom and I’m very diligent when it comes to my health, regular condom use, and I’ve always made my exes show me their results as it’s very typical that men will never get tested unless they experience SEVERE symptoms.
I never planned to have intercourse with him at that time, so this just threw me for a loop as everything was very unplanned. No knowledge of his status, no condom, no consent.
I experienced immediate issues during the act, I’ve never had lubrication issues EVER, quite the opposite (tmi ik but I want to give perspective of the immediate sexual changes that followed) but this time I was DRY like sandpaper rubbing inside me ugh I was so uncomfortable, and I’m really sorry and I want to hug anyone who knows exactly what I’m talking about. I had never experienced pain like that from intercourse before this, he refused to stop till I was actually screaming and writhing in pain and clawing at him.
I planned to never talk to him again, but not knowing his status was rlly eating at me, I asked him if he had ever got tested before and he told me no.
INSTANT PANIC
My vagina did not feel the same from that point onward. I was sore and swollen for a few days after, I later went to a clinic to get an STI full panel test (ik that’s too soon, but understand I was in a haze of confusion I was trying to do damage control) The results for that initial test came back completely negative.
I had a crawling sensation on my mons pubis and labia area as if something was moving through the hairs, I also felt like the hairs were moving themselves. I started being itchy all the fucking time, it was all I could think about, I didn’t get a break from it, my lower region was so uncomfortable and all these sensations were so foreign to me. I also would get very dry, like uncomfortable as fuck, this was also new, I couldn’t stand my panties rubbing against me, or even the skin touching itself or AIR. I would literally have to put a wad of wet toilet paper for a tiny bit of relief but nothing could relieve me mentally. I also would slather Vaseline all over my lower region for the tiniest bit of relief. At this point I was waiting for the 6 week mark so I couldn’t get retested literally counting down the days. One night I went out for drinks w my friends ( I don’t drink normally) and my vagina was on FIRE like itching burning all of it, not the lil scratchy dry I was feeling before. I was starting considering maybe I had a yeast infection, I had only ever had one before this (not diagnosed by a doctor) and I treated it w canesten so I ran to Walmart to get a tube and didn’t even wait till I got home, I used their washroom and slathered it all over me. I remembered the first time I had done this for my previous presumed yeast infection I felt some sort of immediate relief, but this time I did not. On my way home I was antsy and squirming in my seat, nothing was comfortable, sitting, standing, lying down.
I tried using the canesten for a couple days following but it just seemed useless, crawling sensation was still there and now I was feeling this popping sensation. Like the skin of my labia were sticking together cause of moisture then spreading apart and creating kind of like a pop, that’s the best way I can describe it idk. I hated leaving the house because I felt like I constantly had my hands down my pants to scratch or literally cupping my vagina, adding pressure, applying Vaseline, whatever I thought could bring relief. I started to notice bumps. This is when my STI research rabbit hole really took off. Initially they started on my pubic area, I assumed they were pimples or even boils but I have had pimples in my pubic area before and they either had a yellow top or a white head, these were shiny hard bumps that definitely looked like blisters. They would come and go…in the same spots. Some of them I would squeeze out of frustration and thick blood OR white or clear fluid would run out. Of course there were concerns coupled with the sensations but initially I wasn’t assuming these bumps were coming from any STIs (specifically herpes) because they were on my mons pubis and my research told me me that herpes likes to live in most areas although it was possible. I wanted to book with my family doctor, but honestly I was so scared because I was ashamed plus my doctor is a male and the icing on the cake was the receptionist are fucking rude pricks, one of them I knew their daughter (I hate that bitch) and I wasn’t willing to willingly open a potentially awkward ass situation like that.
Now I had sores to add to my symptoms, like raw skin on my labia, the hood of my clit and yes they burned and hurt but mostly when touched faintly when left alone. I was so sure I had herpes, I would be only every subreddit related to herpes, reading my exact symptoms, seeing outbreaks that strongly resembled what I had. I even a few times would post the pics of the sores and would always get a handful of comments telling me that they looked concerning and I should get them swabbed ASAP and a few saying they were nothing concerning. A couple times I had burning pee, but I honestly can’t remember if this was before or after the sores started to appear. I’m a working student who has no car so it’s not rlly the easiest thing for me to find time to go to a walk in and get swabbed and honestly the sores wouldn’t last longer than a week and they mostly seemed to occur right before my period, clear up with it only to appear a few days after. The itching and tingling were almost always there with maybe an occasional day of relief. I would take pics of almost every numb and sore that was irritating so I could bring to my appointments, at the 6 week mark, I tested again at the same walk in and everything was negative, I showed the doctor the pics I took and she said they don’t look like anything concerning as in herpes. Every time I got a chance to go to the doctor it would always be when I didn’t have a sore which was really unfortunate
Doctors rlly operate off their OPINIONS so I booked an appt w my university clinic and unfortunately, again, I had no sores to swab and I just had my red sores and bump pictures to show and my symptoms. This doctor was male so I won’t necessarily say I held him opinion in low regard but he almost seemed like uncomfortable? Idk
When I say I convinced myself I had herpes in telling u I was doing everything, lysine, diet changes, all of it. My symptoms and sores/bumps were soooooo fucking similar to everything I was seeing. Nothing rlly was alleviating my turmoil long term so I rlly thought I was one of those ppl who just had a bad case.
At this point I had sworn off sex, I was going to go celibate and never date for the rest of my life and was rlly working towards just making myself as comfortable as possible, scanning subreddits for advice, literally doing everything ever recommended with rlly not much luck. I was rlly hanging on to the “it gets better” that everyone was swearing by.
Over the months I’ve debated texting him and asking him to actually get tested just so I’m aware of his status but I literally can’t because there’s a no contact order unless there’s a lawyer involved, although this order applies to him, I believe I can’t initiate contact because him responding would equal him breaking the order (I reported the rape).
I spent my birthday crying and scratching and sleeping cause that was the only time I wasn’t thinking about it.
I tried everything, no underwear, loose clothing, changing soaps, more water, more exercise, more sleep, no stress (lol this was impossible), no certain foods, EVRYTHINGGGG, by now I had the nerve pain, the shocks, the zap, I had it all over my lower body sometimes upper. Numbness was there, as well as the static ans pins and needles
I had no idea what the “normal” state of my vagina was like. It was like my memory b4 December of that area was wiped. Discomfort was my new normal. I also couldn’t rmr what my discharge was like, during this time I experienced diff types, thick white discharge, watery, it was hard to track. My vaginal smell also got stronger, not a bad smell but the smell was STRONGER. Like immediately I took of my panties I could smell my vagina another symptom I had read about
Last week, I had sores and bumps that itched and burned outside of the “prodrome symptoms” I reg experienced and begged my boss to let me leave work early to go to the same walk in clinic I needed her to say yes bc I FINALLY had sores to swab.
I once again did a full panel STI test (this was my third time, I went again at the 3 month mark before this) blood, urine, and this time, a swab.
She said for sure there were bumps but she didn’t see any ulcers but she’d swab for both yeast and HSV. She asked me if I wanted to b on anti virals while waiting for the results and immediately I said yes (I had basically accepted it at this point and was working on just coping and I was looking at this appointment being final confirmation for me) and she advised me to drink lots of water and gave me the valacyclivir prescription.
Taking the prescription brought zero relief to my symptoms. Again, I thought I was one of those w people who had a bad case and was gonna finish the 10 days and wait till I got the results back before taking any other action.
Finally, this week I was called in bc my results came in. I came to the appt w the mindset that was finally gonna get the type of HSV and was gonna let her know that I wanted to try gabapentin and a diff antiviral.
GUYS. It was negative. BUT YEAST WAS DETECTED. My jaw DROPPED. I was so floored. I was prescribed clotrimazole but I haven’t even bought it yet cause I’m broke tn lol. But listen, when I say my symptoms basically disappeared overnight without it… I’m not kidding. Everything suddenly HALTED like EVERYTHING. All of it was psychological, and yeast (I’m still picking up the script when I get paid)
This experience did also educated me on HSV, the stigma, the experiences others have had, those who had it transmitted to them intentionally or carelessly, the immune system, healthy lifestyles, so in a way…I’m kinda grateful? HSV stigma needs to end. More ppl need to b educated on this it’s honestly disheartening knowing I knew virtually nothing about an infection as common as herpes. I used to think oral was the least riskiest sexual act but now idk if I could ever again knowing what I know now, and most people will never know their status if they’re carriers of the virus. Even now I’m not sure if I can ever have sex or date ever again but that’s not bc of the HSV. My point? Don’t assume, get swabbed, no matter what anybody says or what you think, looking back the alcohol probably flared up the yeast.

For last couple months I've noticed these small movable lymph nodes on each side of my jaw they're a bit bigger than a pea you can't see them just feel them and they can move quite freely I've also had a virus or something going on that has produced phleghm on and off since February which is subsided but now I get ear problems like popping and blocking on and off. I've been on two courses of antibiotics for "tonsillitis" but I don't feel like it is. The doctors can't feel them when examined but they're giving me anxiety I don't really know what to do (I've been to two Doctors both can't feel them ) should I be worried or should I accept the fact they're probably swollen because of the mucus ? Thank you in advance

1985-1986 (Oct. 18, 1985 to Dec. 31, 1986):

1. Duck Hunt (Launch Title)
2. Excitebike (Launch Title)
3. Pinball (Launch Title)
4. Stack-Up (Launch Title)
5. Super Mario Bros. (Launch Title)
6. Tennis (Launch Title)
7. 10-Yard Fight
8. Baseball
9. Clu Clu Land
10. Donkey Kong Jr. Math
11. Golf
12. Gyromite
13. Hogan's Alley
14. Ice Climber
15. Kung Fu
16. Mach Rider
17. Wild Gunman
18. Wrecking Crew
19. Gumshoe
20. Balloon Fight
21. Donkey Kong
22. Donkey Kong 3
23. Donkey Kong Jr.
24. Mario Bros.
25. Popeye
26. Urban Champion
27. Ninja Kid
28. Chubby Cherub
29. Tag Team Match: M.U.S.C.L.E.
30. Tag Team Wrestling
31. 1942
32. Commando
33. Ghosts 'n Goblins
34. Karate Champ
35. Gradius

1987 (Jan. 1, 1987 to Dec. 31, 1987):

1. Trojan
2. Pro Wrestling
3. Volleyball
4. Rush'n Attack
5. Track & Field
6. BurgerTime
7. Castlevania
8. Ikari Warriors
9. Athletic World
10. Kid Icarus
11. Mighty Bomb Jack
12. Rygar
13. Section-Z
14. Solomon's Key
15. Metroid
16. The Legend of Zelda
17. Arkanoid
18. Athena
19. Elevator Action
20. Slalom
21. The Legend of Kage
22. 3-D WorldRunner
23. Deadly Towers
24. Double Dribble
25. Lode Runner
26. Raid on Bungeling Bay
27. Ring King
28. Sky Kid
29. Spelunker
30. Spy Hunter
31. Sqoon
32. Stadium Events / World Class Track Meet
33. Star Voyager
34. Stinger
35. Tiger-Heli
36. Winter Games
37. Alpha Mission
38. Lunar Pool
39. Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!
40. Rad Racer
41. Zanac
42. Side Pocket
43. BreakThru
44. Gotcha! The Sport!
45. Jaws
46. Kid Niki: Radical Ninja
47. Star Force
48. Super Pitfall
49. The Goonies II
50. The Karate Kid
51. Top Gun
52. Mega Man
53. Wizards & Warriors

1988 (Jan. 1, 1988 to Dec. 31, 1988):

1. Karnov
2. Renegade
3. Contra
4. Gun.Smoke
5. R.C. Pro-Am
6. Town & Country Surf Designs: Wood & Water Rage
7. Dragon Power
8. Ice Hockey
9. Freedom Force
10. Ikari Warriors II: Victory Road
11. Major League Baseball
12. City Connection
13. Rambo
14. Double Dragon
15. Metal Gear
16. R.B.I. Baseball
17. Bases Loaded
18. Defender II
19. Gauntlet
20. Iron Tank: The Invasion of Normandy
21. Legendary Wings
22. Life Force
23. Adventure Island
24. Galaga: Demons of Death
25. Golgo 13: Top Secret Episode
26. Jackal
27. Jeopardy!
28. Lee Trevino's Fighting Golf
29. Milon's Secret Castle
30. Wheel of Fortune
31. Xevious
32. 1943: The Battle of Midway
33. Ghostbusters
34. Joust
35. MagMax
36. Mickey Mousecapade
37. Millipede
38. Pac-Man (Tengen)
39. Racket Attack
40. Seicross
41. Spy vs. Spy
42. Super Mario Bros. 2
43. Anticipation
44. Blaster Master
45. Bubble Bobble
46. Cobra Command
47. Dr. Chaos
48. Super Team Games
49. Bionic Commando
50. Blades of Steel
51. Bump 'n' Jump
52. Castlevania II: Simon's Quest
53. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
54. Othello
55. Paperboy
56. Platoon
57. Rampage
58. Robowarrior
59. Skate or Die
60. Superman
61. Xenophobe
62. Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

1989 (Jan. 1, 1989 to Dec. 31, 1989):

1. Bomberman
2. Sesame Street: 123
3. Star Soldier
4. Tecmo Baseball
5. WWF WrestleMania
6. Bandai Golf: Challenge Pebble Beach
7. Friday the 13th
8. Gyruss
9. Q*bert
10. Tecmo Bowl
11. Ultima: Exodus
12. Dance Aerobics
13. John Elway's Quarterback
14. Kung-Fu Heroes
15. Marble Madness
16. Ninja Gaiden
17. World Games
18. Adventures of Lolo
19. Amagon
20. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
21. Fist of the North Star
22. Legacy of the Wizard
23. Mappy-Land
24. Mystery Quest
25. Predator
26. Taboo: The Sixth Sense
27. The Guardian Legend
28. Operation Wolf
29. Tetris (Unlicensed; Tengen 1989)
30. Airwolf
31. California Games
32. Desert Commander
33. Guerrilla War
34. Hoops
35. Hydlide
36. Mega Man 2
37. Monster Party
38. Nobunaga's Ambition
39. Shooting Range
40. Street Cop
41. Super Dodge Ball
42. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
43. The Adventures of Bayou Billy
44. Track & Field II
45. Baseball Stars
46. Cobra Triangle
47. Defender of the Crown
48. Strider
49. Super Sprint (Unlicensed)
50. Thundercade
51. Adventures of Tom Sawyer
52. Dragon Warrior
53. Faxanadu
54. Flying Dragon: The Secret Scroll
55. Jordan vs. Bird: One on One
56. The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle
57. Adventures of Dino Riki
58. Air Fortress
59. Back to the Future
60. Bad Street Brawler
61. Castlequest
62. Disney's DuckTales
63. Fester's Quest
64. Hollywood Squares
65. King's Knight
66. NFL
67. P.O.W.: Prisoners of War
68. Sesame Street: ABC
69. Sky Shark
70. The Black Bass USA
71. Who Framed Roger Rabbit
72. Casino Kid
73. Goal!
74. Godzilla: Monster of Monsters!
75. Jeopardy! Junior Edition
76. Rolling Thunder (Unlicensed)
77. Romance of the Three Kingdoms
78. Stealth ATF
79. The Three Stooges
80. Twin Eagle
81. Wheel of Fortune: Junior Edition
82. 720°
83. Road Runner (Unlicensed)
84. Tetris (Nintendo; 1989)
85. Vindicators (Unlicensed)
86. After Burner (Unlicensed)
87. Alien Syndrome (Unlicensed)
88. All-Pro Basketball
89. Cybernoid: The Fighting Machine
90. Dig Dug II: Trouble in Paradise
91. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
92. Ironsword: Wizards & Warriors II
93. Kings of the Beach
94. Knight Rider
95. RoboCop
96. Robodemons (Unlicensed)
97. Shadowgate
98. Shinobi (Unlicensed)
99. Short Order + Eggsplode!
100. Silent Service
101. The Battle of Olympus
102. The Uncanny X-Men
103. Toobin' (Unlicensed)
104. Willow
105. The Adventures of Captain Comic (Unlicensed)
106. Baby Boomer (Unlicensed)
107. Crystal Mines (Unlicensed)
108. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (Unlicensed)
109. Master Chu and the Drunkard Hu (Unlicensed)
110. Metal Fighter (Unlicensed)
111. Raid 2020 (Unlicensed)
112. Tagin' Dragon (Unlicensed)

1990 (Jan. 1, 1990 to Dec. 31, 1990):

1. The Magic of Scheherazade
2. 8 Eyes
3. A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia
4. Archon
5. Bases Loaded II: Second Season
6. Clash at Demonhead
7. Demon Sword
8. Double Dragon II: The Revenge
9. Genghis Khan
10. Infiltrator
11. Rescue: The Embassy Mission
12. River City Ransom
13. RoadBlasters
14. Rock 'n Ball
15. The Chessmaster
16. Top Gun: The Second Mission
17. Top Players' Tennis
18. Twin Cobra
19. Super Mario Bros. 3
20. Batman: The Video Game
21. Dash Galaxy in the Alien Asylum
22. Destination Earthstar
23. Rollerball
24. Super Spike V'Ball
25. Abadox: The Deadly Inner War
26. Adventures of Lolo 2
27. Al Unser Jr.'s Turbo Racing
28. Astyanax
29. Baseball Simulator 1.000
30. Burai Fighter
31. Championship Bowling
32. Code Name: Viper
33. Conflict
34. Fisher-Price: I Can Remember
35. Fisher-Price: Perfect Fit
36. Heavy Barrel
37. Jack Nicklaus' Greatest 18 Holes of Major Championship Golf
38. Kid Kool and the Quest for the Seven Wonder Herbs
39. Magic Johnson's Fast Break
40. Target: Renegade
41. Terra Cresta
42. Vegas Dream
43. Wheel of Fortune: Family Edition
44. Win, Lose or Draw
45. Double Dare
46. Dynowarz: The Destruction of Spondylus
47. Ghostbusters II
48. Ivan "Ironman" Stewart's Super Off Road
49. Phantom Fighter
50. Pinbot
51. Snake's Revenge
52. Snoopy's Silly Sports Spectacular!
53. Super C
54. Tecmo World Wrestling
55. To the Earth
56. WCW World Championship Wrestling
57. Wrath of the Black Manta
58. Xexyz
59. Final Fantasy
60. Ninja Gaiden II: The Dark Sword of Chaos
61. Remote Control
62. Adventures in the Magic Kingdom
63. [219]
64. Arkista's Ring
65. Bad News Baseball
66. Boulder Dash
67. Cabal
68. Captain Skyhawk
69. Castle of Dragon
70. Disney's Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers
71. Dragon Spirit: The New Legend
72. Heavy Shreddin'
73. Jeopardy! 25th Anniversary Edition
74. Mechanized Attack
75. Michael Andretti's World Grand Prix
76. Pinball Quest
77. Puss 'n Boots: Pero's Great Adventure
78. Rad Racer II
79. Rocket Ranger
80. Shingen the Ruler
81. Silkworm
82. Solstice: The Quest for the Staff of Demnos
83. Starship Hector
84. The Last Starfighter
85. The Mafat Conspiracy
86. Wall Street Kid
87. Bad Dudes
88. Battle Chess
89. Bigfoot
90. Circus Caper
91. Crystalis
92. Dungeon Magic: Sword of the Elements
93. Dusty Diamond's All-Star Softball
94. Image Fight
95. Klax (Unlicensed)
96. Little League Baseball: Championship Series
97. Mad Max
98. Pictionary
99. Snake Rattle 'n' Roll
100. The Adventures of Gilligan's Island
101. Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord
102. Barker Bill's Trick Shooting
103. Dick Tracy
104. NARC
105. Punch-Out!! Featuring Mr. Dream
106. Swords and Serpents
107. Total Recall
108. Back to the Future II & III
109. Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse
110. Classic Concentration
111. Destiny of an Emperor
112. Dragon Warrior II
113. Garry Kitchen's Battletank
114. Gauntlet II
115. Journey to Silius
116. Kickle Cubicle
117. Little Nemo: The Dream Master
118. Low G Man: The Low Gravity Man
119. M.U.L.E.
120. Maniac Mansion
121. Mission: Impossible
122. NES Play Action Football
123. Pipe Dream
124. Rally Bike
125. RollerGames
126. Skate or Die 2: The Search for Double Trouble
127. Solar Jetman: Hunt for the Golden Warpship
128. Spot: The Video Game
129. Street Fighter 2010: The Final Fight
130. The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout
131. Thunderbirds
132. Time Lord
133. Ultimate Basketball
134. A Nightmare on Elm Street
135. Caveman Games
136. Days of Thunder
137. Dr. Mario
138. Gremlins 2: The New Batch
139. Loopz
140. Mendel Palace
141. Orb-3D
142. Sesame Street: Big Bird's Hide & Speak
143. Super Glove Ball
144. Arch Rivals: A Basket Brawl!
145. Conquest of the Crystal Palace
146. Formula One: Built to Win
147. Mega Man 3
148. Muppet Adventure: Chaos at the Carnival
149. Palamedes
150. Puzznic
151. Silver Surfer
152. The Immortal
153. The Punisher
154. Werewolf: The Last Warrior
155. WWF WrestleMania Challenge
156. Yo! Noid
157. Bandit Kings of Ancient China
158. Déjà Vu
159. Digger T. Rock: The Legend of the Lost City
160. Dirty Harry
161. Dragon's Lair
162. Jackie Chan's Action Kung Fu
163. Little Ninja Brothers
164. Ninja Crusaders
165. Nintendo World Cup
166. North & South
167. Shadow of the Ninja
168. StarTropics
169. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game
170. The Adventures of Rad Gravity
171. Thunder & Lightning
172. Ultima: Quest of the Avatar
173. Bible Adventures (Unlicensed)
174. Blades of Steel
175. Castle of Deceit (Unlicensed)
176. Challenge of the Dragon (Unlicensed)
177. Chiller (Unlicensed)
178. Deathbots (Unlicensed)
179. Double Strike (Unlicensed)
180. Dudes With Attitude (Unlicensed)
181. Exodus: Journey to the Promised Land (Unlicensed)
182. F-15 City War (Unlicensed)
183. Fantasy Zone (Unlicensed)
184. Galactic Crusader (Unlicensed)
185. Impossible Mission II (Unlicensed)
186. King Neptune's Adventure (Unlicensed)
187. Krazy Kreatures (Unlicensed)
188. Menace Beach (Unlicensed)
189. Mission Cobra (Unlicensed)
190. Moon Ranger (Unlicensed)
191. Ms. Pac-Man (Unlicensed; Tengen 1990)
192. P'radikus Conflict (Unlicensed)
193. Pesterminator: The Western Exterminator (Unlicensed)
194. Puzzle (Unlicensed)
195. R.B.I. Baseball 2 (Unlicensed)
196. ShockWave (Unlicensed)
197. Silent Assault (Unlicensed)
198. Skull & Crossbones (Unlicensed)
199. The Miracle Piano Teaching System
200. The Ultimate Stuntman (Unlicensed)
201. Tiles of Fate (Unlicensed)

1991 (Jan. 1, 1991 to Dec. 31, 1991):

1. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes of the Lance
2. Fun House
3. G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero
4. Kabuki: Quantum Fighter
5. Peter Pan and the Pirates: The Revenge of Captain Hook
6. Qix
7. The Hunt for Red October
8. The Krion Conquest
9. The Untouchables
10. Wayne Gretzky Hockey
11. Adventure Island II
12. Conan: The Mysteries of Time
13. Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones
14. Flying Warriors
15. Galaxy 5000: Racing in the 51st Century
16. Ikari III: The Rescue
17. Isolated Warrior
18. Magician
19. Metal Storm
20. Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom
21. Ski or Die
22. Super Cars
23. The Last Ninja
24. The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants
25. Touchdown Fever
26. Harlem Globetrotters
27. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
28. Kiwi Kraze
29. Metal Mech: Man & Machine
30. Power Blade
31. Totally Rad
32. Whomp 'Em
33. Bill Elliott's NASCAR Challenge
34. Nobunaga's Ambition II
35. RoboCop 2
36. World Champ
37. Beetlejuice
38. Family Feud
39. Flight of the Intruder
40. Monopoly
41. The Rocketeer
42. Times of Lore
43. Battletoads
44. Castelian
45. Cyber Stadium Series: Base Wars
46. Faria: A World of Mystery and Danger!
47. Laser Invasion
48. Rainbow Islands
49. S.C.A.T.: Special Cybernetic Attack Team
50. Tombs & Treasure
51. Uninvited
52. Videomation
53. Frankenstein: The Monster Returns
54. High Speed
55. KlashBall
56. Disney's The Little Mermaid
57. Bill & Ted's Excellent Video Game Adventure
58. Ninja Gaiden III: The Ancient Ship of Doom
59. The Lone Ranger
60. Adventures of Lolo 3
61. Bases Loaded 3
62. Captain Planet and the Planeteers
63. Gun-Nac
64. James Bond Jr.
65. Magic Darts
66. Monster Truck Rally
67. NES Open Tournament Golf
68. Rockin' Kats
69. Romance of the Three Kingdoms II
70. Smash TV
71. Super Jeopardy!
72. Where's Waldo?
73. Zombie Nation
74. American Gladiators
75. Bo Jackson Baseball
76. Darkman
77. Home Alone
78. Pirates!
79. Roger Clemens' MVP Baseball
80. Trog!
81. Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego?
82. Wolverine
83. Eliminator Boat Duel
84. L'Empereur
85. Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves
86. Sesame Street: ABC & 123
87. Snow Brothers
88. Space Shuttle Project
89. Star Wars
90. The Bard's Tale
91. Uncharted Waters
92. Vice: Project Doom
93. Wurm: Journey to the Center of the Earth
94. Barbie
95. Batman: Return of the Joker
96. Captain America and the Avengers
97. Golf Grand Slam
98. Shatterhand
99. Disney's TaleSpin
100. Tecmo Super Bowl
101. The Flintstones: The Rescue of Dino & Hoppy
102. The Simpsons: Bart vs. the World
103. Tiny Toon Adventures
104. Toki
105. Tom and Jerry: The Ultimate Game of Cat and Mouse!
106. Treasure Master
107. Action 52 (Unlicensed)
108. Big Nose the Caveman (Unlicensed)
109. Death Race (Unlicensed)
110. Firehawk (Unlicensed)
111. Bubble Bath Babes (Unlicensed)
112. Micro Machines (Unlicensed)
113. Pac-Mania (Unlicensed)
114. Peek-A-Boo Poker (Unlicensed)
115. Quattro Adventure (Unlicensed)
116. Quattro Sports (Unlicensed)
117. R.B.I. Baseball 3 (Unlicensed)
118. Rad Racket: Deluxe Tennis II (Unlicensed)
119. Secret Scout in the Temple of Demise (Unlicensed)
120. The King of Kings: The Early Years (Unlicensed)
121. Venice Beach Volleyball (Unlicensed)

1992 (Jan. 1, 1992 to Dec. 31, 1992):

1. Attack of the Killer Tomatoes
2. Bucky O'Hare
3. Cowboy Kid
4. Die Hard
5. Dragon Fighter
6. KickMaster
7. Legends of the Diamond
8. Mega Man 4
9. Monster in My Pocket
10. Motor City Patrol
11. Nightshade
12. Rampart
13. Sword Master
14. The Addams Family
15. Wheel of Fortune: Featuring Vanna White
16. Hook
17. F-15 Strike Eagle
18. Godzilla 2: War of the Monsters
19. Hudson Hawk
20. M.C. Kids
21. Sesame Street: Countdown
22. Star Trek: 25th Anniversary
23. Super Spy Hunter
24. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III: The Manhattan Project
25. Terminator 2: Judgment Day
26. Dragon Warrior III
27. Fisher-Price: Firehouse Rescue
28. G.I. Joe: The Atlantis Factor
29. Gemfire
30. Ghoul School
31. Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
32. Town & Country Surf Designs: Thrilla's Surfari
33. Wizards & Warriors III: Kuros: Visions of Power
34. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Pool of Radiance
35. Hatris
36. Paperboy 2
37. The Mutant Virus: Crisis in a Computer World
38. Toxic Crusaders
39. Ultimate Air Combat
40. Wizardry: Knight of Diamonds - The Second Scenario
41. Alex DeMeo's Race America
42. Roundball: 2 on 2 Challenge
43. Wacky Races
44. Disney's Darkwing Duck
45. Day Dreamin' Davey
46. Ferrari Grand Prix Challenge
47. King's Quest V
48. Power Punch II
49. Yoshi
50. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: DragonStrike
51. Baseball Stars II
52. Defenders of Dynatron City
53. Greg Norman's Golf Power
54. The Blue Marlin
55. Capcom's Gold Medal Challenge '92
56. Danny Sullivan's Indy Heat
57. Might & Magic: Secret of the Inner Sanctum
58. RoboCop 3
59. Adventure Island 3
60. Contra Force
61. Krusty's Fun House
62. Tecmo Cup Soccer Game
63. The Blues Brothers
64. WWF WrestleMania: Steel Cage Challenge
65. Crash 'n' the Boys: Street Challenge
66. Dragon Warrior IV
67. Felix the Cat
68. Gargoyle's Quest II
69. Ghost Lion
70. Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
71. Panic Restaurant
72. Power Blade 2
73. Spider-Man: Return of the Sinister Six
74. Stanley: The Search for Dr. Livingston
75. Goal! Two
76. Lemmings
77. Little Samson
78. Prince of Persia
79. Tecmo NBA Basketball
80. Widget
81. Best of the Best: Championship Karate
82. Caesars Palace
83. F-117A Stealth Fighter
84. George Foreman's KO Boxing
85. Joe & Mac
86. Mega Man 5
87. R.C. Pro-Am II
88. Swamp Thing
89. The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends
90. The Great Waldo Search
91. The Jetsons: Cogswell's Caper
92. The Simpsons: Bartman Meets Radioactive Man
93. The Terminator
94. The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles
95. Tiny Toon Adventures: Cartoon Workshop
96. 6 in 1 (Unlicensed)
97. Bee 52 (Unlicensed)
98. Big Nose Freaks Out (Unlicensed)
99. Blackjack (Unlicensed)
100. Cyberball
101. Joshua & the Battle of Jericho (Unlicensed)
102. Linus Spacehead's Cosmic Crusade (Unlicensed)
103. Maxi 15 (Unlicensed)
104. MiG-29: Soviet Fighter (Unlicensed)
105. Operation: Secret Storm (Unlicensed)
106. Pyramid (Unlicensed)
107. Quattro Arcade (Unlicensed)
108. Solitaire (Unlicensed)
109. Spiritual Warfare (Unlicensed)
110. Stunt Kids (Unlicensed)
111. Ultimate League Soccer (Unlicensed)
112. Wally Bear and the NO! Gang (Unlicensed)

1993-1994; 1995 (Jan. 1, 1993 to Dec. 31, 1994; 1995):

1. Batman Returns
2. Break Time: The National Pool Tour
3. Overlord
4. Ultima: Warriors of Destiny
5. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Hillsfar
6. Bomberman II
7. Rollerblade Racer
8. Alien³
9. Fire 'n Ice
10. Mickey's Safari in Letterland
11. Zen: Intergalactic Ninja
12. Bases Loaded 4
13. Casino Kid II
14. Kid Klown in Night Mayor World
15. Lethal Weapon
16. Tiny Toon Adventures 2: Trouble in Wackyland
17. Yoshi's Cookie
18. Kirby's Adventure
19. Battletoads & Double Dragon: The Ultimate Team
20. Cool World
21. Disney's DuckTales 2
22. Jurassic Park
23. Color a Dinosaur
24. Mario is Missing!
25. Mighty Final Fight
26. Bubble Bobble Part 2
27. The Addams Family: Pugsley's Scavenger Hunt
28. Battleship
29. Bram Stoker's Dracula
30. Star Trek: The Next Generation
31. Championship Pool
32. Last Action Hero
33. Nigel Mansell's World Championship Racing
34. Tetris 2
35. Cliffhanger
36. Jimmy Connors Tennis
37. Ms. Pac-Man (Namco; 1993)
38. Pac-Man (Namco; 1993)
39. Pro Sport Hockey
40. The Ren & Stimpy Show: Buckaroo$!
41. Wayne's World
42. WWF King of the Ring
43. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
44. Bible Buffet (Unlicensed)
45. Dizzy the Adventurer (Unlicensed)
46. The Fantastic Adventures of Dizzy (Unlicensed)
47. Bonk's Adventure
48. Disney's Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers 2
49. Alfred Chicken
50. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Tournament Fighters
51. Mega Man 6
52. Mickey's Adventure in Numberland
53. Zoda's Revenge: StarTropics II
54. Mario's Time Machine
55. Disney's The Jungle Book
56. The Flintstones: The Surprise at Dinosaur Peak!
57. The Incredible Crash Dummies
58. Wario's Woods
59. Trolls on Treasure Island (Unlicensed)
60. Sunday Funday: The Ride (Unlicensed)

Plus, there are 756 Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) video games in North America and including unlicensed games.

I want to see your chat formats pls. In case you're curious, I'm talking about how you write you chat memory thingy.
It's super helpful and makes jai more fun and realistic, but I sometimes feel like the bot still forgets things. (I'm in a multi char RPG most of the time)
Example, my format is first writing my character description including detailed appearance, personality, preferences, strengths, weaknesses and etc, then writing my storyline on top of the bio.
VISUAL REP
Blah blah blah blah I did this blah blah blah blah he was my father blah blah blah blah I was bombarded one day blah
I am Name, 19 years old with a 15 pack and 17 jaw muscles blah blah blah
Or do y'all not rlly care abt ur chat memory and its js me... 😭
BTW i really love the j.ai maintainers/creators/mods idk like they rly get no sleep jus for us delulubears, they put lots of hard work into the most random annoying viruses istg thank you genuinely

23M, 5'10, 165lb, previously very healthy with no previous medical condition. I caught a flu about 6 weeks ago which totally knocked me out for a couple days, I was uncontrollably vomiting and had strong fever symptoms. As I was a very fit and active person, I rarely got sick or even suffered from headaches before this so I just prioritised rest and patiently waited for my health to recover. However since then I have only felt new and worse symptoms, stopping me from working and living properly.
After the fever subsided, it was intense fatigue and exhaustion(walking would even be too difficult) that I felt, with shooting and intense headaches focused mainly in the lower back of my head and neck, causing it to become very stiff. Initially I feared it might be meningitis but a visit to the GP and the fact that I could still move my neck despite the pain eased my worries. These pains continued for weeks and I was mostly bed bound during this time. I wanted to understand why I was having these symptoms and decided to get my blood work done to find any potential vitamin deficiencies. I have attached my results but it showed no clear deficiencies in regards to nutritional health.
Results of interest:
H pylori 3.75 u/ml Immunoglobulin E (IgE) 233.6 kU/I
I tried to pace myself and increase my activities, but any attempts would only cause me to feel lightheaded and dizzy and took a whole day to recover. I felt for a small while that I was making incremental improvements to return to previous health but the last two weeks have left me with very little hope.
Recently I began to feel nerve related pain that I have never felt before (numbness, tingling, firey pain) in my all my limbs and extend to my feet and hand including my neck and jaw. I have started to feel heart palpitations again severely that I have been to the GP for previously and after an ecg and echo said that it was non cardiac related. I also feel pain in my lymph nodes in the neck and groin area but no swelling can be seen. The neck pain has still remained but the headaches felt as though painful pressure was building up in my skull which would affect my hearing at times and I went to the ER to have this examined. A ct scan showed no damage to the brain and my blood work was fine again (only reported a low white blood cell count)so the doctors were happy to discharge me which was a massive relief. Also, I began having digestion issues which causes me to feel gas trapped in my esophagus area every-time I would eat anything (has triggered a few panic attacks for me also which I have also never felt before). The brain fog that I feel now has also become too intense, at times I struggle to conversate effectively when it is at is worst
I am trying to do everything I can to improve my health by maintaining my strict diet(restricting carbs and no sugar)+supplementing, resting through sufficient sleep, quitting caffine while pacing myself through walking where I can. The worst symptoms I am currently facing is the headaches and nerve pain as they limit me the most. After multiple visits to the ER and GP, they are unable to provide an explanation for what I am experiencing and wanted any advice on what I shall do at this point or what this might be. From trying to get a clearer idea online, I understand some people experience these similar prolonged effects after battling a virus (similar long covid) and this has had some effect on the vagus nerve system but unsure.

I had minor scratch 4-5 days not even bleed until i got home and put pressure to it (even then just one drope of blood). Couple days later first I got neck stiffness on right side which now I dont have, forehead muscles I could move easily put there was pressure. Next day I had pressure on my cheekbones and around them and in back and later that day around my chest. Today I have pressure like around jaws but I can fully open jaws it is not pain, it is like my teeth are numb or have pressure or something. I probbly had tetanus shoot about 5 years ago… I am just little bit concerend because my symptoms revolve around jaw but I can open it fully . Today scratch is tiny red with one red dot…..
My whole year has been a mess I can not for some reason stay healthy and for my whole life I have been the healthiest individual I know… I got COVID couple of times not once did it bother me… then this year I had random viruses twice and also food poisoning and neck pain… to add to that IBS issues from the end of last year…. Also last five years I have been under a lot lot of stress

So this time last year I came down with concurrent pancolitis and pancreatitis (believed to be the result of a nasty virus or infection). It took just over 4 months for my major symptoms to go away, and for my health to rebound to 90%. When I was dismissed from GI I had a few lingering symptoms (which my doctor attributed to PI-IBS) that I'm still dealing with today.
I'm inclined to believe my GI, but my symptoms seem strange compared to what I've read about online. I'm hoping somebody here can tell me whether or not this is par for the course, or if I should get a second opinion.
Symptoms I'm still dealing with today (8 months later)...
-Dull lower right side backache that's worst in the mornings (from under rib to tailbone) -Tenderness on right side of throat/under jaw & dry eyes/nose/mouth -Stinky yellow/tan malabsorption stools & difficulty gaining weight
Oddly enough, I do not get abdominal pain regardless of what I eat/drink. It also seems like any form of medication makes my BM's and back pain worse for about a week. I know IBS is different for everybody, but hopefully somebody here can shed light on whether or not this is within the realm of normal for IBS/PI-IBS goers? Thank you!

SYNOPSIS: Walking your OP monster girlfriend home is easy. No one messes with you. Getting back to your house on your own? That's the tricky part.
Amy gets an unexpected call from the prime minister. That's ... good, right? (Nervous sweating).
First Previous (See NEXT>> in comments)
Chapter Cover Art (From Mood Writing Sample)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beatrice Barton, A.K.A. ‘Momma Bar’. She prided herself on her image as strict but warmly motherly figure. However, as far as prime ministers went, Beatrice was built different. She was the only woman Amy knew who was more physically imposing than her mother. Beatrice often boasted of her time in the army. She had more than enough bulk to prove it.
Amy recalled when the parliament was in uproar over one of Beatrice’s more controversial moves. Sure, Sargasa was a colony of Barbados, but she tended to step in and yank the chain of command from its government at any given time. “Thoughtless, shameless and overbearing!” That’s what the Sargasan president called it.
For a while, the woman sat quietly, taking in the criticism with indifference. Finally, she got up, calmly walked to the main entrance and locked the door. Flabbergasted into silence, most of the other politicians didn’t know how to react. Those who did tested the other exits and realised they too were locked. Standing before them all, Beatrice cracked her girthy neck and gargantuan knuckles. Then came her iconic bellow.

“WE GINE DO THIS LIKE BRITISH!”

Officially, what happened next was only hearsay. She claimed Sargasa had its first bout of legislative violence: a total free for all. Tensions were high and one thing led to another. She firmly believed the Sargasan government was better than this, quick to learn from its mistakes and move on. Most importantly, it would never. Happen. Again.
She said it while smiling, while being the only politician without a single bruise. The others weren’t so lucky. Broken bones abounded. The president was little more than a cocoon of casts propped up in the hospital. It looked like someone would need to step in and pick up the slack! She was willing to make the sacrifice.
Weeks later, a viral video surfaced. Supposedly, it was footage of The Incident, captured on a smartphone. Making heads or tails of the chaos was difficult. The feminine form at the forefront of it all moved too fast. Bodies went flying as she bowled through several people at a time. The camera couldn’t keep up, but it caught the moment when the president was yeeted across the room from offscreen. Then a massive, meaty hand reached for the phone.
The video ended there.
When asked to comment, Beatrice chuckled. It was an amusing little CGI animation, she claimed. No one could move that fast, or hurl people across a room. That was long before The Night Shift, after all.
Reporters interviewed the only politician with a crushed hand, conspicuously missing his smartphone. His silence was loud. It’d take a crowbar to pry open his lips.
Calling Beatrice queen of the girl bosses would be an insult. She was no mere ‘girl’. That’s how Amy once saw it, but Amy’s perspective had shifted since then. Now? Beatrice Barton was on her phone screen, staring her in the face. Or … was she? A glance confirmed that the camera was on. Yup. Amy explicitly remembered turning it off before answering the call. Somehow, that hadn’t made a difference.
Eyes wide, stock still, Amy stared back at Beatrice. She felt small. Ironic, since she was bigger than a house.
“GMM!!!”
In the distance, Amy heard the hunting cries of what sounded like an eyescraper. Ordinarily, she’d rush out there to deal with the pest, but the person before her riveted all attention.
Beatrice frowned. “Sweetheart, I can’t see your face.”
“P-pardon me?” Amy stammered.
Wasn’t the camera on? Oh, right … another glance revealed that although she did show up in the tiny corner screen, her features were blurred. It was that passive ability to mess up footage of herself. Amy mostly used it so that her mother couldn’t identify her on the news. Oftentimes, it was a nervous reflex. She almost always used it in public … and near open windows. How did Beatrice even know she could turn it off? What else did Beatrice know? Had she found out what Amy did to the agents?
The Prime Minister frowned. She was growing impatient.
Amy dropped the self-censorship filter. Her hair tendrils wrung each other nervously.
Beatrice scrutinised her for a moment. “Hm. You’re very pretty.”
“Oh, um … thank you, Honourable Beatrice Barton,” Amy replied.
Beatrice had a way of saying things. It was the holy grail of political charisma. Amy felt compelled her to drink up the complement. It was a far cry from the constant suspicion and discrimination of being a monster. However, Amy was well aware of ‘Momma Bar’s Honey’. Sometimes, it came before ‘The Bar Trap’.
“Please, call me Beatrice … or Momma Bar. Whichever suits you,” Beatrice chuckled. “I must say, I’m impressed with your work. Single-handedly taking on the night, despite rampant ingratitude? You could be alone, despised by everyone, and you’ll still do the right thing. It’s a testament of what a strong woman can be. I suspect we may have a new national hero in the near future, because frankly, you are mine.”
Amy swallowed her giddiness. “Wow, I … appreciate that, but I don’t need any special recognition.”
“I admire your humility, but this isn’t a matter of ego,” stated Beatrice. “There are many who still don’t know what you do for them. You don’t deserve to walk the streets under verbal assault born of ignorance. It’s time for people to learn the truth. In light of recent incidents, your P.R. could use some help.”
Amy had a sinking feeling. “What incidents?”
Rather than answering, Beatrice sent a slideshow of images across the screen. Amy perused them with confusion. Then her tendrils stopped moving. The rosy avatar paled close to white. Disgust and horror plastered on her face. Tears fell. Beatrice studied her every reaction intensely.
The slideshow ended, but Amy’s glazed eyes remained. The pounding in her chest and rapid breaths slowly subsided, even if she didn’t have a heart or functional lungs.
“What … was that?” Amy asked, her voice ragged and small.
“You should recognise the signs,” Beatrice stated. “It’s the work of an A.M.E.”
“A.M.E.s don’t operate like this,” Amy argued. “Th-they’re efficient, but not smart. This was a systematic massacre ...”
“Precisely,” Beatrice declared with the air of a ‘gotcha’. “No one even saw this A.M.E. before it struck. You’re the only one capable of this.”
Amy quailed. “I … I would never-! Th-that’s not my colour!”
“The public doesn’t know that,” Beatrice stated. “You just demonstrated the ability to change colour too, and that hunger of yours ... We’re keeping this under wraps. My agents are investigating the matter. Speaking of my agents … well, never mind for now. In the meantime, why don’t you collaborate with us? Prove that you’re on Sargasa’s side. With our intel and your capabilities, we could do a lot of good. We could find the monster responsible.”
Amy was still reeling. The Prime Minister had handed her a lifeline: the only lifeline. She raised her chin in the beginning of a nod.
“Classic Bar Trap,” Pseudo Mom declared, stepping into view with her arms folded. “Create a scenario in which there’s no way forward except your outstretched hand. Assuming those images were genuine, it truly is a tragedy, but you will not weaponise them to bring my daughter into your orbit.”
Beatrice blinked, staring down the new arrival. A shadow of a smile twitched at her lips.
“Amy … did you assimilate your mother?” she asked.
Amy paled again. “No! She’s just a figment, like an imaginary friend! That’s something I can do now!”
“A.M.E.s aren’t known to do that,” Beatrice calmly countered. “They mimic their victims.”
“But my mother’s not even in the city!” Amy reasoned.
Beatrice raised a finger. “Ah, but how can we know for certain? She’s made multiple declarations of intent on social media to find a way through the quarantine dome. What’s to say she didn’t somehow succeed, and your instincts ran their course? After all, A.M.E.s target the loved ones of their victims. We must check on her whereabouts. If she cannot be found in the outside world, well …”
It wasn’t blatant, but Amy saw the signs. Beatrice was practically drooling.
She had her.
The world seemed to slow as Amy’s mind accelerated. She spawned an avatar outside. Rain, falling in slow motion … she’d never seen that before. Individual raindrops were clearly visible. They weren’t shaped like tears, but glassy little spheres. She didn’t have time to marvel, though.
In the garden, she found The Predator sitting under the flamboyant tree, sulking. Its hair tentacles hung limply, drenched and dripping. The sight brought to mind a puppy in the rain.
Amy almost felt bad for her.
“Help me, you filthy animal!” demanded Amy.
Not bad enough, apparently.
“Beatrice Barton’s threatening Mom! Closing the ‘Bar Trap’ on me … o-on us!” Amy explained.
A smile slinked across The Predator’s face. “Well, well, well, look whose come crawling back. I’d rather watch you stew in your own juice.”
“Grrrrrr, OM NOM!” blurted an agitated Amy.
The Predator raised an eyebrow. “Excuse you?”
Amy grappled The Predator. Her hair engulfed its head in a feeding frenzy.
“OM NOM-NOM-NOM!”
With its head gone, Amy squeezed what remained of its body into herself. They became one.
Amy paused for a milli-second to think about what she’d done. Was it necessary? Not really. Subsuming The Predator was like swallowing her own saliva. Why was she so weird? Oh well. The deed was done.
Inside the house, Amy’s panic drained away. Old thought processes geared up like the engines of a great, terrible machine. It felt good to be back. So, so good. She knew what she had to do. First, she set the conversation to ‘save’.
Beatrice sensed the change. She looked Amy up and down as though trying to spot what had happened. The woman wouldn’t find it until too late. One of Amy’s tentacles slithered under the phone, seeking out any anomalies. It found a dedicated surveillance program and deleted it. Then it sifted through other apps, shutting down functions that could be used to spy. Her aerosol constructed several optical organs outside, monitoring the area omnidirectionally.
“I understand what you’re trying to do,” Amy declared coolly. “Projecting the illusion of control is a big deal, especially now. The eyes of the Caribbean are upon you. What would they do to you if you bungled this debacle? You can’t have someone like me running around without a leash, but honey, trust me, sometimes it’s best to let sleeping giants lie.”
Now, it was Beatrice who paled: quite a feat, with her dark complexion. Amy soaked it up: the sweet smell of fear. To think, she’d made Momma Bear balk. It was a delicious thought.
Beatrice gave an inconspicuous nod to someone offscreen.
Amy sensed a hidden program come to life. It tried to delete the conversation and wipe the phone. Her hair tendril snatched it out of the software. Several viruses leapt through her data to fulfil the same purpose. She snapped them up too. It was a good thing she’d consumed some memories with software expertise.
When the phone didn’t die, Beatrice’s eyes bulged. She fumed.
Amy chuckled.
Her optical organs picked up something incoming, fast. The biomass atmosphere caught it like a net. It seeped inside to touch and taste the payload.
Oh, how interesting.
She floated the object in through the window: a half-a-metre missile once aimed at her room. The thing would have flown right in.
Amy spotted the drone plane that launched it. Time to retort. Aerosol biomass condensed to a node, which blossomed into a solid construct. Neon arteries, organs and a structural shell came together to form the sleek, long object. It could be taken for an exotically complex floral bulb the size of two cars. Gill-like structures on its underside sucked and compressed air. As it floated above the house, tracing the plane’s path, its purpose became clear.
A big gun.
A pressurised blast of air tore from its muzzle. The rain scattered behind it as it ejected a wider, backwards blast to remain in place. The atmospheric round ripped through the sky with a thunderous roar.
Bullseye.
It crashed through the drone. A wing flew off. Down came the multi-million dollar aircraft in a ball of fire. If she’d estimated correctly, no one really lived at the crash site.
Amy returned her attention to the missile. Her aerokinesis carried it into her hands.
Amy ran her claws along it. “Apologies for the distraction. Some idiot was lobbing firecrackers.”
Beatrice smirked.
The missile detonated.
The blast stopped, a broiling ball of dull, sickly moon-yellow. It hovered over her claws, bubbling and surging against aerotelekinesis. It wasn’t easy to hold it at bay and look like she wasn’t even trying. Her entire biomass clenched to get the job done. There were better ways to contain the blast, but it was as she’d said: the illusion of control was important. It had to seem like no big deal.
Amy looked oh so smug about herself.
Beatrice looked about ready to scream.
Ordinarily, the flash of an explosive might have messed her up. Luckily, it didn’t blow up as brightly as a regular bomb. It was a ‘dim bomb,’ a biochemical explosive no doubt harvested from certain nyctals. Had it destroyed her house, it would look like a monster attack. The missile was launched at her phone, though. It’s trajectory was surprisingly accurate. The goal was to destroy the evidence. They weren’t trying to kill her.
Yet.
Amy caressed the blast. There was a child-like part of her that gawked at the deed. She was touching an explosion!
Alright, enough fun.
Amy gripped it with both hands and squeezed. Her aerotelekinesis strained and compressed the blast into an angry ball the size of an apple.
Hmm … there was an idea!
Amy moved it to her mouth, suppressing second thoughts. She bit into it. The taste was like the smell of toe jam. Amy pretended not to notice. Her aerosol smothered and absorbed the explosive energy as she chewed. Once it was inert, she absorbed the residual chemicals. Amy polished it off, dusted her claws and beamed at Beatrice.
How boring. The Prime Minister had reigned in her emotions, feigning deadpan unamusement.
“Let me be perfectly clear,” Beatrice declared. “You assaulted agents. You stole confidential information, and shot down a 15-million-dollar aircraft. Any one of those is enough to bury you, and here you are, doing parlour tricks.”
Amy blinked innocently. “Agents? You mean dem fellas I caught snooping on my property? Oh, I had to know who they were, so I rifled through their memories. It turns out that one of them knew a little too much. You should handle your secrets more carefully.”
“Which is why you consumed him,” stated Beatrice.
“Quit jumping to conclusions. He’s safe. From you,” Amy chirped. “The last time we chatted, he had a nice little dead man’s switch. Touch him, me, or my loved ones, and everyone finds out what you did to this country.”
Beatrice’s face wrinkled. “Loved ones? Is that what they are to you?”
“GMMGM!!!”
That eyescraper in the distance again. With The Predator’s mental clarity, Amy had some breathing room to actually think about it. Maybe she should call Norman, check on him. She moved a claw to hang up.
“Don’t. You. Dare,” growled Beatrice.
Amy giggled. How on Earth did that woman know she was going to hang up? Hidden cameras, probably. Her biomass swept the room, finding and crushing them.
Beatrice went off on a tangent. Threats, ultimatums, the whole shebang. Amy was only half paying attention. She thought back a bit. ‘Loved ones’? In this state of mind, did she really love Norman? Well, he was attractive. Moreover, he was fascinating. Irresistibly fascinating. In a world of chess pieces, Norman was the only one that moved on its own, that could disappear and reappear behind her. Instead of a back stab, he’d tap her on the shoulder and say: “Hey. What are you doing? Stap.” If that didn’t work, he’d move her. He didn’t let go his morals to match her wits. Somehow, that didn’t make him weak or stupid.
She could bare her fangs, dripping saliva and viscera.
He’d still boop her on the nose.
Irresistible.
She wanted to see what he could do, how far he could go. If anything happened to him, ‘anything’ would be in for a bad day. He was hers. Did that mean she felt warm and fuzzy about him? No. Would she cry for him? No. Not in this state.
In other words, she’d made no progress at all.
Amy pushed a little affection into her thoughts about Norman. She smiled fondly. Love was a doing word. She loved him because she chose to love him.
It was easy to forget: Beatrice was still talking.
“I’m sorry. Were you saying something, Honey Bar?” Amy interrupted far too casually.
Beatrice looked as though she’d reach through the screen and throttle Amy. Then an aide whispered something into her ear. Her anger evaporated. She actually seemed pleased.
Amy didn’t like that.
Beatrice appraised her. “Look at you, back chatting Momma Bar. Word of advice: if you want to run with the big dogs, work your way up. Start small, like managing your boyfriend a bit better.”
“He doesn’t need managing,” Amy dismissed.
Her expression remained indifferent, but her hue deepened from raspberry to blood-red. Her coloured atmosphere reflected the change. Predatory pupils appeared in her eyes. Hair tentacles curved around the phone like jaws poised to close in. The video feed warped and flickered ominously as Amy’s tentacles nipped at the signal. Beatrice ignored it. In fact, it made her look and sound all the more m̷͕̗̅̾ë̵̲́͠ǹ̶̾ac̴͔̬̗̏̃iṇ̶̑g.
“Reã̴̡̫̭͆͂͑lly? Then where is he nǫ̵̠͍̈́͆́͠ͅw?” Beatrice leant forward. “Why didn’t he call you? Do you think you will seẹ̴́ him again? It’s a dangerous cit-”
Amy hung up.
She shot through the window. The house shook, almost imploded. Loose objects flew about inside it as she dragged her biomass from within. Gale-force wind battered the garden.
Up into the sky she flew, scanning the city. The rain limited visibility. Her biomass configured massive, sensory organs like spiraling satellite dishes decked with eyes. They pierced the downpour, seeing and listening. She noticed several peeping buildings and eyescrapers on the move. They appeared to be coordinated.
Landlords.
Amy picked the largest, leading building and zoomed towards it. She moved through the streets like a ravening storm. Cars overturned and tumbled. Streetlights surged and exploded as she yanked away their energy. Vicious nyctals saw her coming, cowered, fled and hid. She wasn’t there for them. Not yet.
Like a crimson star burning through the night, she blazed forth at the forefront of her biomass. At a distance, her atmosphere’s outline could be seen. No longer was it a mere amorphous aerosol. It swam through the air like a jellyfish. Ethereal tentacles the size of streets wedged between buildings to pull it forward faster.
Then her biomass thinned.
Her winds died down. She melded with the night. Amid the cloak of heavy rain, she was a nearly imperceptible presence.
They would never see her coming.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Chapter 28 - Shadows among the Stars
Previous Chapter
“Okay. I think we better start with our side, mainly because I suspect if Trix doesn’t get to explain her story she may very well pass out from overexcitement.” Alex took a seat and accepted a glass of water from Sophie with a grateful nod. “We went to Kiveyt just as you suggested. We landed and did our big musical number, which was a massive hit. Met the matriarchs, had some pushback on the whole ‘Avekin’ suggestion mainly due to some friction with Kyshe. Rather than push the issue, we went ahead and just went to your Teff as you suggested. And who do you think got assigned to be our guide?” He gestured with the cup towards his pilot.
“That’s unsurprising, now that I think about it. Few others are of appropriate age to act in that regard.” Sophie sat down beside her niece, and reached out to pat her shoulder. “Not to mention that Trksehn and I learned Universal together, so she’d be the best translator available.”
Ji piped up immediately, “Trix, I thought you said you learned Universal so you could buy and mod an Aircar.”
Trix nodded and reached up to touch her aunt’s hand. “I did. I just didn’t do it alone. We were planning to mod it together, but she got chosen to go off-world.”
“So does that mean you’re into the racing and firelands and everything too?” Alex asked Sophie.
“Immensely!” She immediately leaned forward. “I was actually hoping to be able to take a break back on Kiveyt after Trks…. Trix?” She smiled. “A human ‘nickname’, I take it. I like it. I was going to take a break back at Kiveyt so we could take apart the Soranet Ten, but unfortunately events here were… hectic.”
Trix beamed back at her aunt. “I love the nickname. And when the crew arrived, we started talking about Aircars because I had NO idea what to talk to a bunch of pink featherless aliens about. Turns out that Ji and Min love that stuff too. We spent days modding my car like you wouldn’t believe.”
Sophie looked a bit taken aback at this. Visiting foreign dignitaries on the station were typically dry and dull. Very much not the sort to be interested in mechanics. “You all helped her mod the car?”
Ji grinned and kicked his feet up, before his sister smacked him on the arm. “We made some suggestions that she liked. They turned out really, really well.”
“They turned… Hold on.” She looked down at her hands for a moment. “The challenge was, what, eleven days ago? Niece, did you compete?”
Trix stood up at that, and whipped out her personal quickboard. “Take a look at THIS!”
The entire race had been recorded by Par, but at Trix’s request he’d dubbed over the original audio with the source track for the music. Sophie watched in awe as her niece walked the unrecognizable car out alongside Ji, mounted it and began her run. Her jaw fell as she watched the performance of the vehicle as it dashed through each flame of the course, eyes huge as right at the end the perspective went to slow motion and the final impact while crossing the flames was displayed.
“By the stars. You… did you win? Your first attempt and you won?” Sophie was beyond amazed by all this.
“That’s… not decided yet.” Trix launched into the convoluted explanation of the conflicting rules, and the proposed vote. “We left before the vote could be completed, but by the time I get back we’ll know for sure.”
“Either way, your first attempt and you reached the very end of the fourth flame. That’s… incredible!” Sophie reached out and grabbed her niece in a tight hug, wrapping both arms AND wings around her. “But what was that car?”
“Oh, it was the same car we bought. But Ji and Min helped me lower the weight so we could give the thrusters and turbine extra power, and they decided to replace the frame when I told them I wish it didn’t look so ugly.”
The quickboard zoomed in to show the car in greater detail. “It IS beautiful." Sophie remarked. "I wish I could have been there to see it all first hand.”
Alex jumped in instantly. “There’s a bit more to the trip but I gotta ask. What in the galaxy is going on here?”
Sophie let go of Trix and moved over to sit near the Captain. “That is not a pleasant tale.” She gestured off into the distance. “Shortly after you left, Nehg was replaced and Gurd came aboard.”
“Wait. Who’s Nehg?”
“The Administrator when you were here. The one you helped me, ah, convince to upgrade security?” Sophie smiled at the memory, but quickly her mood turned dour again. “After the attacks, he was recalled and Gurd arrived. Immediately he began blaming all of you for the chaos. The Tanjeeri visit, the empty pod, the Qyrim attacks here on the station. He accuses you of having incited it all.”
Ma’et made an indistinct noise, and Alex shook his head. “That’s idiotic. If we were the reason for the attacks, why would they have killed the survivors of the trade ship?”
“According to him, you had ‘contaminated’ them. With what he won’t say. Either way, he was building up a lot of public sentiment against you all when, ah…” Sophie hesitated, trying to find the best way to put it. “Well, when all the Qyrim died.”
Silence slammed down on the room for a few moments, before Josh blurted out “They died? Of WHAT?”
Sophie shook her head. “We don’t know. One day they didn’t show up for any shifts. After six hours of waiting a detail was sent to the Qyrim living quarters. All of their living pools were drained, and of them were dead. Fourty six thousand in total.”
“Jesus Christ.” Alex mumbled, his mind racing. “If it was that fast, it couldn’t have been like a virus or anything, could it Josh?”
Josh had his quickboard out and was perusing the data he’d downloaded from their previous trip to the station. “It’s Alien physiology. We just don’t know. When we came here we only had samples from Cetari, Bunter, and Fwenth. If we brought something on board that killed off the Qyrim…”
Sophie shook her head at that. “Pathology reports showed no unusual foreign contaminants, biological or otherwise. No toxins, no unusual contagions, no consistent injuries on any of the dead. To the best of our ability to tell, they all died within minutes of one another. It was almost as though the entire contingent on the station just… keeled over dead. They weren’t all together or lined up or anything. Some of them looked like they died mid-meal or mid-stride. And it was very literally every one. Men, women, and children. We have no burial facilities here that can address such situation. All we can do is space them. It’s… not ideal. But neither is letting them rot in the holds.”
Sophie gestured around her. “There was a small exodus from the station after that. Over thirty thousand others fled or left the station. There was panic about a biological weapon, or some kind of secret neutrino weapon. Between the deaths and the people fleeing, Gurd became even more vocal and wanton about trying to blame you all. He thinks you killed off the Qyrim in retaliation for the attacks.”
“But we were long gone.” Alex shook his head at that. “And even if we were still here… That was genocide against tens of thousands. I don’t like the Qyrim, but I’m not willing to massacre THAT many unrelated people just because of a stabbing. No offense, Josh, I love ya man but not enough to butcher that many people.”
“Al, if you were the kind of person who could do that you and I both know I wouldn’t have stuck around this long.” Josh waved away the concern. “But it’s just, it’s gotta be related to everything else, right? An entire species just doesn’t die off overnight for no reason?”
Sophie pulled a wing around and tapped on the wingtip control there. “We are certain that yes, all of the incidents are related. The Tanjeeri incursion and the pod it deployed. The attacks on both the survivors of the trading ship as well as your crew. The deaths of all of the Qyrim aboard the station. In some way they are all linked, we are absolutely certain of that. We just don’t know how or why. Even the attack against the Skees ship that brought you here, may be a part of it.”
The crew sat there in silence trying to absorb it all. Alex, in particular, was racking his brain trying to find the common thread in all of them. Failing that, he decided instead that a change of topic was in order. He reached over to tap the wingtip control. “I see at least you’re using our gift. How do you like ‘em?”
Sophie's dour mood brightened immediately, and she leaned in closer to the Captain. “It took a week for our tech experts to ensure there was nothing malicious in it. And I haven’t removed them since.” She smiled hugely. “I can’t tell you how many hours I’ve spent listening to the songs on it. And the versatility!” She actually laughed at this, and pulled her wingtips in closer. “You know, the other Sovalin on the station have been begging me to ask you to make some for them?”
Alex shook his head. “They’re gonna hafta wait their turn. Those were special, just for you. Once we get back to Proxima we’ll be sure to find a company willing to produce ‘em in mass quantities for your people, but until then they’re your privilege alone. Well, yours and Trix once we get a pair made for her.” He amended the thought quickly.
“So now that you’ve visited Kiveyt you plan to head back to your territory?” Sophie inquired.
“Nope. Par, privacy mask please.”
The sphere near them began to emit a low static hum, and Alex leaned in. “We’re heading back to JR692 where we picked up the survivors from the trading ship. Going to complete the survey and give the mineral rights over to your people. From what we can tell, the Bunters screwing you guys over? That was part of a ploy meant to subjugate you all financially. They put you in their debt and will force you all to work it off. I took offense to that, so we’re going to work on getting some mineral wealth back to your people until Proxima can get involved.”
Sophie was stunned by that. “Wait. They were trying to subjugate us?”
“Well, we believe so. There’s a pattern to what’s going on that we’ve seen before. They stole your system’s resources away from you, right? Then they got you all dependent on their tech, on purpose. So you needed their tech and they stole your ability to pay for it. That’s why they started requesting you all perform labor for them - like here. But you guys keep having to buy more tech, meaning the debt never goes away no matter how hard you work at it.” Alex gestured around him. “We’ve seen that before in our species. And it caused major, major conflicts. Massive wars, blood feuds that lasted generations, societal divides that took centuries to heal. So when we saw the same pattern beginning here we decided to stop it.”
“Those… they were trying to…” Sophie’s mouth thinned and she closed her eyes, taking several deep breaths to calm her emotions. “And so you’re stopping them?”
“Yeah. We go to JR692. We survey for minerals and grab whatever is the most expensive. Take it back to Kiveyt to give you all some breathing room. Then we head to Proxima and start in on all the bureaucratic side of things. One way or another, I refuse to allow your people to be sold into servitude.” Alex shrugged and gestured over to Trix. “We are getting along incredibly. Letting the opportunity go to come together as friends would be quite possibly the biggest loss ever to both of our species. I’m not gonna let that happen.”
Sophie gave the Captain a huge smile, and reached out to put her hand on his. “Thank you, Captain. Is there any way we can help you here?”
Alex glanced around at everyone in the room. “Right now the best thing we can do is keep our plans secret. If the Bunters find out what we’re doing they could move to try to stop us or slow us down. But if they don’t know about it and we can get you guys enough wealth to stave off any further labor requests, that’ll make things much easier in the long run.”
“Then it won’t be spoken of. At all. But you are certain this is what they are doing?”
"Not certain, no. But it's immaterial. If we're right and they are actively trying to subjugate you financially, we stop it. If they aren't then your people get an economic boost. Either way, there's no real down-side. So the smartest thing to do is just proceed as if the conspiracy against you all is real and act accordingly."
Sophie nodded with understanding. She stood up, and moved to each of the Sovalin guards that were in the VIP room with them, speaking to them individually, then walked back over to her niece. “Now, we only have a few hours before Gurd has you removed from the station. Do you mind if I spend some time catching up with my favorite niece?”
—--
“I didn’t believe you when you were talking about it before, Min.” Trix was back in the cockpit flying the shuttle out into space. “I thought you were just exaggerating about the whole thing.”
“I know, right? Now do you get what we were saying?”
“I nearly burst into laughter! I don’t know how you all could keep a straight face!” Trix grinned and shook her head. “I know how much you all like to tease him so I thought it was more of that, just making fun of him. But seeing it in person…”
Trix was at the Pilot’s controls and Min was copiloting for her. Ma’et was behind them both, in the jump seat. The door leading from the cockpit back to the shuttle interior was closed - “Ladies chat only” was Ma’et’s excuse for that.
“I think today he was even worse than when we were here a month ago.” Ma’et commented. “Back then he was always looking for excuses to meet up with her. I’m still not convinced his big tantrum with the Bunters was anything other than him wanting an excuse to get out of the meeting and go back to security.”
“Just the LOOKS he was giving her. My god.” Min was snickering as she pulled up some photos of the Captain she’d surreptitiously taken on her quickboard, tilting it so that Trix and Ma’et could share in the humor.
“I’m just stunned by it all. Him fawning over her was one thing, but her reaction… No offense, you two, but most of your bodies are bald and pink and ugly. There’s a disease that does that to people, you know. Some Teffs scare little kids by telling them they’ll catch it if they misbehave. So seeing her fawn over him like that was beyond strange.” Trix shook her head at that.
“Wait. Sophie is into the Captain?” Min paused in her laughter as the significance of Trix's comment hit.
“Totally! Didn’t you see how she was behaving? She was ignoring the males behind her and focusing entirely on him. She let him touch her wingtip without warning him to keep his hands to himself. She even reached out to touch him on his hand.” Trix glanced over at the other women. “You guys missed all that?”
“Well, no. But to us stuff like that isn’t a big deal. A casual touch or gesture or even a hug is nothing to us.” Ma’et tapped her foot against the the deck plating. “We’re not so good with your body language yet.”
“Yeah, that’s fair. So the big thing to note is that within a Teff everyone is family. Being familiar within the Teff is fine. It’s expected. Hugging or touching or whatever is no big deal. But outside of a Teff, we don’t like to touch others and don’t like to be touched. If someone’s not in a Teff they’re strangers. The Captain and Sophie may be friends but they’re not in the same Teff so she should have been telling him to back down.”
“Shit. I didn’t know that. I’m usually pretty handsy and I know I touched you a few times. That’s my bad.” Ma’et apologized.
“You guys stayed with the Noarala as our guests so you’re sort of… in between. Not family but familiar. That’s standard when courting someone who isn’t in the same Teff, so being a guest with good standing means you’re an exception. Familiarity is allowed, to an extent. The thing is, Auntie Sffffheeno wasn’t around when you were guests. Even if they spent time together out here, she should just treat him like a stranger.” Trix put the shuttle through a slow rotation as it flew back to the ship, just for kicks.
“Huh.” Min tapped a finger on the quickboard idly. “So there’s mutual interest there you think?”
“Well, I can say this for sure - Autie was definitely being very familiar with him, and outside of the Teff that should only happen with someone you want to explore a relationship with.” Trix leveled out and started decreasing the speed as the Arcadia finally came into visual range. “And even though he always says that Kyshe and Me and the others are beautiful, he’s never looked at me the way he was making eyes at her.”
“Yeah, his body language was definitely in the realm of ‘I’d like to explore you’ as well.” Min leaned back in the copilot chair. “But it’s very, very interesting that she was responding to him. Gonna hafta say though, for the sake of the sanity of everyone on the ship, that tidbit stays with the three of us. If Alex actually finds out…”
“What would he do?” Trix inquired.
“Not sure about what he’d actually DO, but I can tell you that when he gets in a really good mood he becomes insufferably obnoxious so we try to keep him… grounded.” Min glanced back at the third occupant of the cabin. “Ma’et usually steps in if he gets too annoying to deal with. She’s good about getting him to back off and calm down when he gets too exuberant.”
Ma’et said nothing at this, but instead raised a hand. She slowly curled each finger down into a fist, cracking each knuckle as she did so.
“Got it. But we can still tease the Captain about HIS reactions, so long as we don’t really go into details about her response. Right?” Trix punched the remote bay door button, as the shuttle glided towards the ship.
“Oh, absolutely. You can and should give him as much crap as you possibly can. Keeps him humble.”
—--
“That was an unnecessary risk, Chief.” Gurd glared down at the Chief through the vidscreen. “The Humans are a dangerous, violent species. I do not appreciate that you went against me in allowing them to dock.”
Sophie bit her tongue as she reigned in her temper. The immediate response would have been vulgar and crude, and done her no favors. “By our own laws and regulations we lacked standing to deny them docking rights. The only action they took that would have warranted refusal was killing the Qyrim, and that was offset by the fact that they were defending themselves. The video evidence we have PROVES, beyond a doubt, that the Qyrim attacked first. Our investigations have produced zero evidence of any instigation whatsoever by the Humans.”
“It is quite obvious that the humans instigated that attack!” Gurd’s fist slammed down on the console next to the vidscreen pickup. “Their ‘defense’ was a thinly veiled excuse for slaughter! And then, not content with simply butchering the attackers, they went and killed off the rest of the Qyrim on the station! How can you possibly justify ANY of that?”
“Administrator.” Sophie took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I will be happy to deny them entrance if you can provide me any solid, concrete evidence that the humans are directly responsible for what you claim they are. Inference and supposition are not solid evidence.”
Gurd glared down at the pickup. “Don’t you dare speak to me like that, Chief. Your position may afford you some authority here, but you retain it at my discretion. Do I need to rethink keeping you on in this capacity?”
Sophie actually smiled at this. “What you choose to do regarding my position is entirely up to you. While I am the Chief of Security here, I will continue to perform my duties to the best of my abilities. I will apply the laws, rules, and regulations of the station fairly to everyone, as I swore to do the day I took this position. If that is not satisfactory for you, then it is your right alone to find someone else to do it.”
“I dare you. I dare you to fire me. I want to see one of you cowardly slugs try to stand up to a furious gambler who just got cheated at one of the casinos. I want to see one of you actually stand your ground against one of my people when we’ve reached the breaking point. Just. Try. It.”
The diatribe went unsaid in her mind, but the reason that her species was used for security was lost on neither of them. Sovalin were quite simply the largest, toughest, bravest, and by FAR the strongest species on the station - and Sophie was quite easily the largest, toughest, and strongest of her species present. Even back on Kiveyt she was on the taller side, and working the farms in the Presh valley had toned her physique tremendously. That was why she, in particular, had been chosen for this particular task.
“Good. You understand your place then.” Gurd smiled sickeningly at that. “Stupid. My place is on the front lines of confrontations. YOUR place is hiding on a screen half the station away while acting big.” She thought.
“I understand that you can replace me. I also understand that my replacement will be duty bound to uphold the same laws I am. If you are so absolutely adamant about restricting the Humans from the station, all you need to do is present evidence of your accusations.” Sophie crossed her arms as she gazed at the face on the screen.
“I will be doing exactly that, then. And Chief…” Gurd leaned in close to the pickup. “You WILL not endanger this station any further. If anything, at all, further happens here upon the station then rest assured that you will be held personally responsible.”
—--
“Emergence in ten.” Trix’s fingers flew across the console as the ship smoothly flew through the darkened gate, exiting from the brilliant chaos of d-space into the empty, inky black of normal space.
“Excellent, helm. Distance to the local star?”
“Gravitics are putting it at…. Three billion, 7 million, two-hundred and sixty five thousand kilometers.” Trix grinned and leaned back in her modified chair. “Now I’m still not as good at math as Par or Ma’et, but I’m PRETTY sure that since the target number was 3 billion exactly, that puts the margin of error at… what. A third of a percent?”
Josh punched it into the calculator on his station. “Looks like it’s closer to one quarter of a percent. WELL below one percent.”
Alex sighed, and rubbed his face. “Fine. You win. I’ll cover your shift next Sunday.”
There were no ‘rest days’ on a ship, but Alex believed firmly that a well rested person made fewer mistakes and was more productive than a tired one. As such, every Sunday he strictly enforced two rules. 1) No work is to be done except a single Bridge Shift. 2) Every member of the crew works a single Bridge Shift on Sunday. The split was, now that Trix had joined, a perfectly even 8 crew members and as such shifts were only a mere 3 hours. Except, apparently, for next Sunday when Alex would be working 6.
As he thought about it, he smiled inwardly. It would have bothered him greatly having to do it, except for one teeny tiny little detail - his new Pilot had just made a MAJOR achievement by breaking the 1% margin of error. It had been all of 7 days since the ship left Farscope, 10 total since leaving Kiveyt. With the most recent Sunday rest, that meant that after 9 days of diligent study Trix was already growing into her role.
There was still a long, long ways to go until she would be truly considered an expert but Alex’s hunch had proven right. Underneath the aircar adrenaline pilot was a natural born talent for flight both in and out of the atmosphere. Now the big question wasn’t COULD she become a great pilot, but WOULD she?
Piloting an Aircar or a Shuttle was a rush. Full of adrenaline and excitement. Piloting a ship was the opposite. Slow, methodical. Power beyond power, sure, but you couldn’t exactly FEEL that power at your fingertips in the same way you could a personal vehicle. Would it hold her interest? Or would she want to soar back in the skies?
He shook himself out of the mental cul-de-sac he had wandered into and sat up straight in the command chair. “If we came out where we planned, then the derelict trade ship should be roughly 100 million kilometers away. Josh, any sign of it yet?”
“Not yet. No response from spectrometers and…”
“Captain.” Amanda’s voice suddenly called out over the intercom. “My instruments are picking up something unusual. Best guess is a debris field. I suspect that the Tanjeeri may have scuttled the ship entirely.”
“Roger that ‘Manda. Josh, any EM or Radio in the system besides the local relay? Anything at all outside the background noise?”
“Nope. Just background noise. Couple little pulses from the local star when we arrived but it’s been quiet since then.”
Alex tapped the armrest idly and nodded. “Okay, unless they’re powered down somewhere or have a cloaking system of some kind then the Tanjeeri aren’t here. If it’s the latter, we won’t be able to do anything about it. But if it’s the former we’ll hopefully spot them on Radar or Lidar as we travel. Amanda, go ahead and send Trix the coordinates for the debris field. Trix, when you get ‘em let’s go in for a closer look.”
“System shows roughly 16 hours travel time. 8 for accel and 8 to come to a relative stop.” Trix was glad that the math was being done for her. During the past 10 days she’d learned she COULD do the calculations herself, but they’d take several minutes to complete instead of the microseconds the system could do it. “We could pop through d-space to get a little closer.”
“No need. Go ahead and plug in the coordinates, then get some rest. In the meantime Ma’et, Myself, and Par will be monitoring for any signs of the Tanjeeri. Amanda, when you’ve got all the data you can get remotely from the debris field go ahead and start doing a more in-depth analysis of the hot spots in the system likely to contain the most valuable shinies. We’ll spend a few hours at the field to gather any info we can there, then get back to our original mission.”
Trix nodded, and stood up to leave the bridge. “In that case, I’m going to get some study time in and some sleep before we arrive. Wake me up if any bloodthirsty aliens show up and start shooting at us.”
—--
Trix walked into the bridge at the start of her new shift. The captain and the rest of the crew were missing, which was an eerie feeling - until she spotted the sticky note on her console, directing her to the briefing room off to the side of the bridge. As she walked in, most of the crew were lounging around.
“Good morning, Sleeping Beauty.” Alex commented as she entered the room. “We were going to start without you but Min threw a fit.” Min didn’t respond to that verbally, but she did give the captain the middle finger which was explanation enough, really.
Trix glared over at the Captain. “Sleeping Beauty? Thought you weren’t going to be trying to court any of us? Or was that a lie to Kyshe?”
“Neither. It’s an old Human story. What we call a fairy tale. Which I won’t go into greater detail about.” Alex gestured to an empty seat and stood up as she sat down. “Okay, just a quick meeting to bring everyone up to speed. Still no signs of the Tanjeeri. The debris field is definitely the remnants of the derelict ship. Looks like the Tanjeeri looted the shit out of it and blew it to hell. The pieces they left are in such bad shape they’re useless for anything but scrap, and since Amanda has found several high-test sites for our survey, that means that salvage is actually a waste for us right now.”
“Any signs of the engine room?” Ji asked. “Now that we know what an FTL core looks like, even a damaged one would be worth a fortune when we get it back to Proxima.”
“Nothing recognizable. Can’t even tell if it was looted or destroyed.” Alex shrugged. “All I know is we can’t find it in all that shit.”
“So what do we do now?” Trix inquired. “If it’s useless to us, why even bother to stay here?”
“Well, I had planned to find a low-test area to introduce you to the ship’s armaments. No missiles, just laser and kinetics only. Missiles are too slow to produce in the fabber and we have very few on board, so I want to keep those in reserve for if we actually need them. This gives us plenty of targets of varying shapes, sizes, and compositions. It’s not perfect but neither is an errant asteroid cluster so it’s as good as option as anything else.”
Trix swallowed involuntarily. “So we’re going to be sticking around her to shoot a bunch of garbage out in space?”
“Not the most diplomatic way to put it, considering what that garbage used to be. But not inaccurate either. In a perfect universe we wouldn’t have to fight at all and there’d be no dangers out in space. This isn’t a perfect universe so we’re going to get you some experience with the worst that can happen. In the meantime, there’s a few other major and minor things to go over.” Alex gestured to Amanda.
Amanda stood up and walked over to a screen. “Okay people. I’ve discovered three points of interest for our survey.” A large close-up view of the system appeared, and three large bright glowing disks were outlined on it. “That’s down from five from our initial scans when we first arrived here weeks and weeks ago. I’m fairly sure Point 1 is going to be the Motherlode. Preliminary spectroscopy and measurements indicate the presence of Osmium, Palladium, and Platinum. If that’s accurate, then we’ve struck it rich. The Bunters need those as desperately as earth, meaning that even the small cargo hold we have here can hold over a billion moyu of minerals.”
“Points 2 and 3 are much more modest. Nickel, Iron, a bit of water and some cobalt are the big ones. Still more than worth the trip, and even if we focus on Point 1 the others will be vital in establishing as much orbital industry around Kiveyt as possible. So the plan is, we spend a week at each point. We’ll start with 2, then 3, then 1. Get some good samples and cores going. Stake a claim at each location - maybe the species out here will respect a claim, maybe not.”
Amanda set her quickboad down on the table and looked around it. “Either way, we grab the absolute highest grade we can before we leave, and we send our E-Beacon back to Nexus as we go. None of us will be seeing a payday directly for the survey, but when we return to Kiveyt we’ll be handing over enough rare metals to float their economy for a couple years while the bigwigs back in Proxima make more permanent arrangements.”
“And with that, the Bunters get screwed and the Sovalin get a new start in space.” Alex blanked out the screen and stood up. “Don’t worry about the payday. I’ve got you all covered. Biggest thing about all this is, unlike previous surveys we’ve done we’re gonna be on high alert during the entirety of this one. No telling if or when the Tanjeeri might show. So unlike previous surveys, 2 people per shift. Min, Ji, Amanda, I know you three rarely do bridge duty but I’m not taking any risks. Min, you’re pairing up with Trix on bridge duty at Point 2. Ji, you’ll be with Josh. Amanda can pair up with Ma’et and Par, you’ll be my bridge buddy. We’ll rotate after a week at each of the two other points. Anything, and I mean ANYTHING out of the norm gets reported to me. Day or night.”
Alex locked eyes with each and every crew member waiting for them to nod or acknowledge the statement, before he walked over and opened the door. ”Good. We’re here for 8 hours to do the weapons testing and familiarization then we’ll head over to Point 2 to get started.”
As they walked back out on to the Bridge proper, Trix was about to take a seat at her usual console when Josh interrupted. “Nope, not now. Over there.”
The console he gestured to was normally unoccupied. Off to the Captain’s side instead of directly in front of him where she usually sat. “We usually leave Tactical empty since there’s not much point in having someone man the guns and shields in empty space. Technically you could control the guns from your console, but Tactical has a much better layout for that.”
The station over there was drastically different than what she’d grown accustomed to. In lieu of the usual readouts giving her thrust vectors, reference points (usually large gravitic objects like the local star, planets, and moons) and power readouts this one was had a holographic 3D map of the nearby field of debris.
Alex took his seat up on the Command Chair and swiveled to speak to Trix directly. “So here’s what we have. The biggest, or sturdiest pieces of the derelict ship are your targets. Par’s selected the seventy-five choicest objects out there to unleash mayhem on. We’re going to walk you through the main armaments to get you familiarized.”
Trix glanced around, and realized that unlike before where only she, Josh, and Alex were usually present now Ma’et, Ji and Min were here watching as well. The only one who hadn’t stayed for the show was Amanda.
Trix turned back nervously to the controls. “Okay, I uh… don’t even really know where to start?”
Ma’et was at her side at once. “I normally handle ECM during fights since it’s easier to attack digitally than physically. But I’ve done a stint at tactical several times. So the first thing you do, is prep the gatling rail.” Ma’et indicated the relevant buttons, and the entire ship shuddered slightly as the armored plate slid away and the massive, 16-foot-long armament slid out into firing position.
A cone shape appeared on the radar in front of Trix. “The cannon’s firing arc is pretty limited, which is why it’s so important that you understand your role in combat here.” Alex explained. “We’ve only got about a 12 degree movement either side laterally, and a 30 degree declination on the gun. So if we’re going to be hitting anything outside of that cone, that means our pilot,” Alex gestured towards her, "will need to adjust the ship's heading in order to do so."
Ma’et gestured at the radar. “Go ahead and pick out a target in the cone.”
Trix gazed out at that, and decided more or less center was the way to go. As soon as she had the targeted piece of debris bracketed in, two screens immediately lit up beside her. “The screen on the left is the Railgun’s targeting system. Visually enhanced real-time image of whatever we have lined up for obliteration. On the right is the scanner info giving you as much details as we can about distance to target, velocity, composition, energy readings, and tons of exciting things that don’t apply to powerless floating space junk.” Ma’et ran down the list of the various systems. “On the aiming screen over there you can see the computer telling you where the shot will land. Approximately. If you want to fine tune it use the ball just below the screen to adjust. And when you’re ready…” the firing key itself was hard to miss. A large, bright-red glowing indicator made it impossible to be overlooked.
Trix studied the image on the targeting screen briefly. It was a part of some kind of compartment. Some surface - a table, or cabinet perhaps - was jutting out of it at an odd angle. There was some kind of marking visible on it, which made for a perfect target. She used the small ball to fine tune the aim until it was directly in the center of the marking, and pressed the firing key.
She could feel the vibration of the shot as it was hyper-accelerated along the 5-meter rails and shot into the void, and on the targeting screen the debris she’d shot at vanished in a brilliant display of sparks and glowing fragments that shot out in every direction. Alex punched in a command into his console, and the image froze before rewinding to play out in slow motion. The massive kinetic strike impacted the floating debris and instantly she could see the metal spalling into hundreds of thousands of brightly glowing shards. Molten metal spewed out in all directions and the shot continued through to spear another piece of metal off in the distance.
Trix stared at the devastation the single shot had produced and the incredible display on the screen as the wreckage was sent spinning off into the night. When she did turn to the Captain, she had a massive smile on her face. “Can I do that again?”
—--

My love a poison coursing through my veins search for a way to one day eventually contaminate you.
My love A toxin tainting blood and saturating everything im almost certain even my soul too.
My love A infection waging war and my temperature raging got me sweating lava throught and through.
My love A virus on my lips corroding anything living on which it drips an acidic flu.
My love A plague that could consume us whole a fatal attraction with satisfaction my ultimate taboo
My love A disease Crippling so easily spreading its roots deep in my humanity I've succumb anew.
My love A pathogen unknown to you
My love lives and dies too
My love is through and through
My love is true
A endogen born within a Devine pantheon of sin taboo.
My love might be deadly to you
So I don't know what to do should I tell you?
Or do I keep a distant view
And stay far from you?
My love a heart full of every rue
My love Engulfs all I love digesting itself without a clue
My love Cancers desecrates cremates then necromancers itself as team mates and crew.
My love A shark and your affections blood in the water you smile is a beacon in a pretty hue.
My love A glove sticky inside and the outsides rough with a grip of animalistic imbue.
My love Sickly withers quickly then carbon copies thickly starving stem cells to breed hells deepest blue.
My love A gift of the trogen hourse variety sleek surface voodoo.
My love A whirlpool sucking in residual fuel leaving volatile gruel its a noxious smelling brew
My love itself has no clue
My love clones skeleton crew
My love has a grip true
My love is a sickly blue
My love has trogen voodoo
My love isn't fit for you
My love has jaws In a pretty hue
I'd love to someday really tell you But for now this is mearly all I can do.
I hope you don't understand I have no clue My love isn't good for you

(Edit: fair warning, this is a game centric theory so no Andrew or jake or anything. I am simply posing ideas)
So,
In the Curse of dreadbear DLC, the titular character is an obvious play on frankenstein’s monster: specifically the one popularized in the 30’s film adaptation.
And what exactly happens in that film? A scientist named Henry creates a monster composed of multiple combined dead things, then vows to destroy it in a fire.
Once laid out like that, it’s a pretty obvious hint. It lines up with Henry’s story in virtually every continuity, at least half of it. Desk guy (also from a Halloween DLC) was theorized to be Henry and his whole deal is that he made Baby, regretted it, then died. Book henry made baby, regretted it, then committed suicide. Who’s to say that pattern doesn’t extend to game Henry as well?
Basically what this boils down to is that Henry made the funtimes. Ryetoast talked about it in a video, in the insanity ending he goes on to describe molten MCI pretty much verbatim. With the added support of Henrystein, it’s very possible the “prisons of my making” were the funtimes. What is Ennard if not a monster made of several dead things stitched together?
It’s very likely that Henry had no idea what they were for. He said that he “unwillingly helped to create” them, and that he “doesn’t know how those tiny breaths of life came to inhabit those machines”.
The funtimes are The only things that you could reasonably trace back to Afton given what they’re for and the huge ass bunker with his name plastered on everything. A strong connecting thing throughout the short stories is the idea of fazbear entertainment hiring out independent roboticists to make animatronics. What if Afton was pulling a Steve Jobs?
Afton is cited as a “local entrepreneur” in the canceled due to leaks teaser, and seems to derive a great amount of pleasure in being the genius behind the beloved characters. William made Henry make the funtimes and took all the credit. But why stop there?
In the novels there is a bunker directly under Henry’s house, similar to the sister location facility. That facility is also where the twisted animatronics are stored, which are essentially the nightmares. That is everything detailed in the sister location building map all belonging to Henry. It would also make a ton of sense for Henry, someone characterized by being too wrapped up in his work to be a present father, to want to have surveillance on his children. It’s also a point that in both the movies and the novels Henry, or someone equating Henry, has a bigger family while Afton only has one daughter. In game as well, Elizabeth has green eyes and red hair while Mike, BV, and Charlie have darker hair. All this to say, Elizabeth has some rare traits that would be recessive if she was really Mike or BV’s sister
You know what other game has a Halloween DLC? Fnaf 4. You know what other game has a Halloween DLC containing the aforementioned desk guy with the same general arc? Fnaf world. Both games largely dealing with the memories of the bite victim. There is this weird connection between Halloween, bite victim and Henry. It likely has something to do with Fallfest.
Speaking of fallfest, Carnie is just a reskinned rockstar Freddy. This leads me to believe that the rockstars as models are old as hell. And with old as hell models, they may be springlock animatronics. The 5 fingers would certainly suggest that, though their endos are pretty barebones. My own mechanical dissection of springlocks aside, look at the nightmares and the rockstars side by side.
You can definitely see it with rockstar foxy, ditch some of the pirate decorations and the face shape is nearly identical, including the lighter ring around the eyes. Same with Bonnie and Chica, same chunky face shape with similar eyeholes. Same jaw mechanism. That, plus the 5 fingers and 4 toes (except for rockstar chica for some reason). You can see how the rockstars could be reasonably warped into the nightmares.
The one outlier here is nightmare Freddy, who doesn’t have a solid look alike. Rockstar Freddy looks more like nightmare fredbear, complete with purple accessories. Rockstar Freddy also has a darker recolor with strong connections to the puppet in LEFTE. If the rockstars (or at least a model using their molds which likely would have been mass produced) and the nightmares are one in the same, that would mean that Henry made them too.
Furthermore: the Twisted animatronics, which are one in the same with the nightmares, were explicitly made to kidnap people from their homes. We litterally see them in the opening screen coming out of the woods towards a house. The trailer for fnaf 4 also says “what have you brought home”. This would imply their aim was not too dissimilar to the funtimes, but they’re their own thing. I raise you: yendo.
Yendo is a very oddball character, which very well might not even be canon. He is an endoskeleton of Funtime Freddy who was made to store kids in his stomach. What do we see on nightmare fredbear and nightmare? A stomach mouth.
Nightmare Fredbear and yendo also behave in ways similar to golden Freddy. Throughout the various books spirits are also known to induce audiovisual hallucinations. What if instead of illusion discs, or whatever, bite victim: Henry’s son, had his supernatural properties weaponized by Afton in an early attempt to automate the kidnapping of children. Afton had Henry make a prototype for Funtime Freddy, and dressed it in a rockstar costume.
I’d also really like to shout out this theory by dual process theory, I think they hit the nail on the head: https://youtu.be/7ykDrYPAkkw?feature=shared
Summary: altered text/bite victim’s name is Cassidy, Charlie is faded text, and Mike is the vengeful spirit; pissed enough to literally reanimate his own corpse and hunt down Afton in order to put him through the same stuff he tricked him into doing for all eternity, all the while taunting him with the visage of Cassidy. The HW2 death order as the MCI and Charlie dying in-between the week when when Cassidy was bit and when he died; this gives William the info necessary to conclude that throwing Cassidy into fredbear will bring him back. 10/10, no notes in my book. Though, the SL night 4 springlock suit being fredbear is a bit of a stretch imo. Just kinda copy paste the bits that fit.
He starts with Henry’s oldest and only remaining child: Michael. Bite victim’s spirit would contort onlookers perception of the frame into how he remembered the characters in the week leading up to his death: scary, grotesque, and full of teeth. Afton would exploit the spirit’s desire to get revenge on his brother, to lure him out and capture him.
Henry was now belligerent from losing 2 children in the span of a week, and being convicted for the disappearances of 4 more. Not only that, but Afton was completely undermining him and taking over his robotics company while he did all the work. His life was falling apart at the seams. He had been keeping a close eye on Mike to ensure nothing happened to him as well. At this rate he couldn’t stand another tragedy, even if he did blame the kid.
Mike was lured out to the visage of fredbear, and ran out to his brother’s unmarked grave out of repentance. It was there the thing captured him and took him to the nightmare chambers. Henry assumed he would be back soon enough, and that he’d be sorry when he got back.
From there, Afton would use nitrous oxide (as seen in RUIN and the gas canisters all around the sl facility) to sedate Mike and make him more susceptible to hallucinations. He would use the rockstars to conduct experiments on the effects of prolonged fear à la Dittophobia. at the end of it he could brainwash mike into believing that he was his father, everything was his fault, and he needs to do everything he says to atone.
At this point, Henry assumes mike is dead. Out of his grief for losing all 3 of his children, his reputation, and his whole livelihood, he made Baby in the likeness of Charlie with the intent to kill himself with it (see Fuhnaff’s video on baby being a recreation of Charlie). He doesn’t, but he abandons robotics altogether and falls off the face of the earth Until Fnaf 6.
At this point for Afton it was only a matter of hiring technicians to reverse engineer yendo and baby, as well as add a few of his own modifications, to create the Funtime series of animatronics. Elizabeth dies, etc. etc.
Id also like to stop and appreciate the narrative depth this adds to the story.
(Edit: I originally said some stuff in support of frights fiction, I removed it because I don’t want people to fixate on it. TLDR: I think it’s a cool meta way for the stories to remain In a vacuum while maintaining their utility as providing anchor points and a glossary for the more supernatural stuff, this is a game centric theory after all)
Also, mike being vengeful spirit gives such a cathartic ending for this character we’ve been playing as for most likely all of the previous games.
I also really like the Afton that this story paints. It keeps in line with his novel characterization of trying to surpass Henry, going so far as to steal his entire family. He is this ever present perverting force, it’s allegorical in a way. He’s a caricature of the power hungry CEO: sitting at the top, pushing ideas in the name of reckless expansion and innovation regardless of the consequences. extinguished the spark of life that his partner was able to imbue into his creations, so he took it upon himself to recreate that spark by any means necessary: substituting metaphorical soul for literal soul. He takes a keen interest in his legacy, he believes he is on the brink of discovering the secret to immortality. The ends justify the means but his means are deeply flawed. He’s not a tragic father. He expands, infecting every part of the company (figuratively and eventually literally) like a virus.
This theory props up something I like to believe: spring lock suits were William’s idea. Henry simply had to make them despite his better judgement; a brilliantly executed absolutely terrible idea by a man trying to save money. It adds even more potency to William’s death, because he was so insistent on them. He was killed by his own hubirus more than anything else.
Henry also becomes a far more poignant character. His passion to create was being actively used to sap everything away from him. All of his incredible advancements in artificial intelligence and Servo motor technology being used by one greedy man looking to prolong his life and legacy. His creations were accomplices in the murder of his family and so many others. And all for what? We don’t even know if William recorded the results of any of his “experiments”, he just kept literally industrializing the production of agony in a business supposed to produce joy. He was unknowing of the full scope yet complicit on the promise that he could regain his children. He held onto that tragedy, as many else did. He let the memory fester and tear him apart. It would take years to realize, but it’s best to move on. Let it fade, as the agony of every tragedy should.
Frankenstein has to deal with obtaining forbidden knowledge. While I don’t feel like we as a society shouldn’t pursue that knowledge, Scott probably intended it as Mary Shelly did. We shouldn’t play god, especially in pursuit of profit or glory.
Is Scott a good writer? Who knows, I could be completely wrong.

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So I was just wondering if this sounds like it is good. We begin the year 2940, humans has finally made technology which made the earth go back to its glory again. Sadly one day a swarm of 11 meteors was observed outside earths atmosphere, 2 of them were destroyed butvthe rest crashed down on earth in full force. That day 70% of the population was wiped from earth. Cities and countries were destroyed 90/195 countries were completly destroyed. After a while scientist began ro search the meteors to see if they could find anything of interest. Those who survived and remained in the affected areas were suddenly infected with a virus that instantly killed them. Many died and scientist agreed to make these areas as contaminated areas. After many years of research the scientist found out that it was a virus from outer space and named it X-V short for Xenovirus. Then remearkable things began to happen, people who survived the virus achieved powers of all kinds. X-V virus fuses with your dna and takes over the 1% that is you and in return you get a random power. Meaning if your father had fire it wouldnt be a 100% chance for fire to be your power. There are many different species in the world such as Genetors= people who have an elemental power. Emanos= Wizards made from tears who roam the world in search for people to teach and show magic spells to. Pocantias= They look human but arent, if they see you they wont stop before they catch you or kill you. Many of them can shapeshift or worse stretch their jaw,leg or bend it make themselves into human spiders with crambeled legs. Very dangerous and not to be aporoached. Oparist= are made of liquid and can liquidfy themselves and take control of objects and organisms. Desireist= their body can fuse with materials and organisms to make themselves stronger Mutants= scrambeled dna humans that can turn into anything, some have red dots on their arms and have the ability to change your dna into a mutant. Awakenings= achieved through hard work and someone who found themselves. These people can master one part of their body or mind to perfection.
Now to my characters: Imala,Zalid,falacar,Akira,Sachin,Linaria,Arlena,Borchin,Clarissa,Mochdan,Ark,Erk,Burchina,Mr Luis,Marina,Cariea,Rico,Ooki,Oria,Gaileo the wise,Mariann,Gorchathe galactic emperor,the general,G.W.D and many more

I am not the OOP. The OOP is u/SRBias posting in relationship_advice
Ongoing as per OOP
1 update - Long
Original - 10th May 2024
Update - 13th May 2024
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I (50 M) just learned my spouse (47 F) was unfaithful years ago in marriage. She came clean from guilt. Where do I go from here?
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This will be quite a lengthy read because I'm laying out everything to get honest opinions with all the context. There's a TLDR at the end for those who'd rather skip the backstory. I know that most people go incognito with a throwaway account for this kind of post. But I wanted this to be authentic, using my real account. I didn't want anyone to think this was disingenuous. If we know each other in real life or you find me on my other socials, let's keep our chats here or in PMs. I don't want anyone harassing anybody, and I have a sixteen-year-old daughter who has been spared this drama so far.
I tied the knot shortly after high school, and let's just say, if my marriage were a collegiate course, it would be "F*** Up - 101." It was a masterclass in what not to do, featuring every red flag in the book. I was fresh-faced and barely off on my life journey, thinking I'd hit the jackpot. I'd assumed I'd accomplished what my parents did, that being the poster couple for marital bliss. I was so naive, always giving the benefit of the doubt. Meanwhile, my then-wife, fresh from escaping her parental fortress of solitude, went bat s*** crazy, deciding that 'living life to the fullest' didn't include me in the picture.
Before I knew it, I was Mr. Mom with our toddler while she was trapped underneath a few individuals, making up for lost time. After finally catching her in the act, I filed for a divorce and braced for the impact. Divorcing in '97 in the heart of the bible belt was not favorable towards the husband back then. What followed was straight out of a horror movie. I paid my attorney five thousand dollars to watch her take everything from my guitars and video games. She even claimed keepsakes from a departed relative, and the judge seemed happy to grant her every wish. Not only did I bid farewell to everything I owned, but my time with my son got slashed to a mere Wednesday afternoon and alternating weekends.
My faith in women was broken. I went on a few dates here and there but mostly kept it to casual encounters and dinners. I never let anyone get too close. But, in early 1999, at a friend's birthday party, I met a woman whose marriage had crashed harder than mine. She'd had a stillbirth six months into her pregnancy, and her husband dared to bring his girlfriend to the funeral. She was heartbroken, to say the least, to learn about her husband's affair and the end of her marriage on the day they laid her daughter to rest. We sat on a couch that night, swapping tales of romantic ruin. She was clever, and to me, that is an instant connection. It's rare for me to find someone who makes me laugh instead of vice versa. As I headed home, I couldn't shake her from my thoughts, kicking myself for not asking for her number.
The next, my phone rang, and it was her! She'd gotten my phone number from someone we both knew and asked: "Would you like to get food sometime?" I said, "Now sounds great!" So, I drove to her grandmother's house, and off we went on what turned out to be what I still consider the perfect date. Now, I get it; we were both lonely and had our hearts broken, but trust me, this was no spark; it was an inferno. And believe it or not, we've been inseparable since that day. We have not spent a night apart. That was twenty-five years ago, with us marrying a year after our meeting. Go ahead and facepalm, I know how it sounds, but it's hard to put the connection between us into words. Even I'm still shaking my head in disbelief.
Our families adored the two of us together. I was certain I had found my soulmate, if you believe in that, and I was certain she felt the same. We enjoyed each other's company, and our lives meshed perfectly. As with life, however, it finds those moments of bliss to take a giant s*** on you. In 2006, I began feeling ill; eating resulted in violent illness, which I initially thought was a virus. But after a week with no improvement, it was clear this was something else. I was admitted to the local hospital and underwent numerous tests. When I was first admitted, I weighed 222 pounds at a height of 6'2". Within a year, I had dropped to 146 pounds, and my condition dumbfounded the doctors. My health was deteriorating rapidly. Throughout the ordeal, she never left my side, her hand in mine, begging me not to leave her.
In late 2007, a last-ditch effort sent me to the Cleveland Clinic, where a young doctor rushed me into surgery. When I awoke three hours later, she was there, hand in mine, with a smile. It was a success; I was cured. While I'll spare you the details, it involved my colon. Finally, I could eat and move without agony. My life resumed, and we were happy again. The following year, she received a lucrative job offer in her field, earning more than I did. That didn't bother me at all; she worked hard, and she'd earned it.
After her miscarriage, my wife was unable to conceive. We had been trying since 2000 and eventually came to terms with the fact that it might not happen. In 2010, we got a call from the state of Minnesota about a two-year-old girl who had been taken from her mother due to drug-related charges. They asked if we would consider adopting her because the mother had requested she be placed with family members before her parental rights were terminated. My wife and I drove for 30 hours to meet her, and after a few months, we adopted her and welcomed her into our home.
Our daughter faced social challenges and had endured abuse, leading the two of us to decide one of us needed to be at home with her. As mentioned, my wife earned significantly more, so it made sense for me to be the one to step into the role. I dedicated each day to supporting our daughter's mental health. While I played a part, I can't claim all the credit for this; her preschool, kindergarten, and therapist were instrumental in her learning to socialize and trust again. Eventually, I took up freelance journalism, so I was home when our little one finished her school day.
Our evenings were family time, and we took small trips on weekends. It was in 2017 that my wife returned from work one evening, deeply shaken by what she told me was a workplace argument. Despite my attempts to console her, she remained incorrigible. She was declaring her intent to find a new job. She'd never had any issues before, so I was stunned. For days, she was a mess and withdrawn. When I pressed for details, she'd say, "It would only upset you. Let me deal with it."
True to her word, she left for a new company within a week, accepting a 15 percent reduction in pay. I should have questioned it then, but she never gave me cause for concern. Once she began her new role, life returned to normal, and our family happily moved forward. In 2022, I published my first novel with an independent publisher, fulfilling a lifelong dream. I could sense the pride emanating from both my wife and daughter. I had achieved this milestone before my fiftieth birthday, and I couldn't wait to start on my second one.
And now, ladies and gentlemen, this is where my world breaks. In 2023, as I was finishing up my new novel, my twenty-seven-year-old son from my first marriage died suddenly of a heart attack. He had an underlying condition that none of us knew about. I want everyone to understand that when you say, "I couldn't imagine my child dying," you truly can't. There is no pain quite like it. My wife and daughter, who also felt his loss deeply, did their best to support me. But there is no way to deal with such a tragedy. In the months following his death, I immersed myself in my work, striving to complete my second book for him.
On the day I finished it in January, my father passed away after a long battle. Dad had been ill for a long time. You think you can prepare yourself for that, but that's a lie you tell yourself. The loss was hard, and my daughter was instrumental in getting me back on my feet. My second book was released in February, and I tried to smile as I had my release party. At the beginning of April, I started feeling better, writing outlines for my third novel and doing the same things I'd always done with my wife and daughter.
My wife and I have a Wednesday tradition where she picks a random recipe she finds online, and we cook it together. On April 3rd, while making crockpot chicken tacos, I thanked her for everything. She asked why, and I thanked her for everything she'd done to get me through the tough times. I shared a lot of pent-up emotions, telling her I couldn't have managed without her. She started crying, then weeping, and soon she was sobbing uncontrollably. I tried to comfort her with a hug, but she pushed me away. I apologized, not realizing my words would stir such a reaction.
Suddenly, she confesses her infidelity. I laughed, mistaking it for a joke. She grabs my shoulders and then details how, back in 2017, a 28-year-old at her former job started flirting with her, and she reciprocated. She believed it was innocent, yet it persisted. My wife has always feared growing old. Her birthdays were days she dreaded every year. She admitted that the attention from a younger man was exhilarating. She told me that turning 40 had sent her into a tailspin and that she couldn't talk to me about it because I would have just shrugged it off.
He invited her to leave work early and come to his place one day. She couldn't understand why she chose to; maybe it was the thrill. She said she didn't know, but she went and ended up sleeping with him. Afterward, she felt terrible, glaring at her keychain in his driveway because it had a photo of me holding our daughter. She drove home, and that's when she lied about having a workplace argument. She never wanted to return there. It's why she suddenly went somewhere else. She then told me she wanted to tell me but didn't have the fortitude to do it.
I remained silent, just wide-eyed and open-mouthed. She apologized, saying she couldn't live with it any longer. I just shook my head, unable to speak a single word. She offered to leave if that's what I wanted, to attend counseling, or even to beg for my forgiveness. Instead, I picked up my AirPods and phone and walked out. I wandered from six in the evening until almost eleven that night. When I returned, she was on the loveseat, asking if I was ready to talk. I shook my head again, went to my office, where I had a couch, and slept there.
The next day, after our daughter left for school, she asked if I had anything to say. I said yes. I questioned why she brought this up after the worst year of my life. Why couldn't she have kept it to herself until I could somewhat deal with something of this magnitude? She just looked away. I scoffed and told her to go to work and to try not to f*** anyone during her lunch break. That would have been April 4th; those were the last words I said to her until last night.
She had attempted to talk to me several times, but I would just walk past her into my office, trying to focus on my upcoming science fiction comedy book. Writing something funny is challenging when the thought of your spouse rolling around with another man stuck in her consumes your thoughts. A week ago, my daughter asked in the car if everything was okay, and I lied to her, which made me feel sick. Then, last night, my wife came to the office door and asked, "Are we getting a divorce?" I looked at her and replied, "Looks like it." She started crying and closed the door.
I haven't consulted an attorney, and the thought of divorce hadn't crossed my mind until she mentioned it. That's why I wrote this essay. Where do I go from here? How do I start to untangle this mess? I have no desire for therapy. I don't even want to step outside. I'm broken at this moment. The burden of everything has been overwhelming. There's been so much to bear this past year. What do you say to someone who has been by your side through it all, only to tear your heart apart?
Thank you for reading to the end. And for those who are part of the TLDR crowd, my wife decided to go home with a younger man, felt guilty about it, and quit her job. She waited eight years to tell me about it.
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Comments
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Foreign_Flight4566
Jesus, man. I’m sorry for your loss(es). Timing of your wife’s confession is mind-boggling. Realistically, this is above Reddit’s pay grade. I’ll recommend therapy, but probably above a therapist’s pay grade too. I know you also state you don’t want therapy, but that sounds like the exact time you need it. They can offer grief support, which is what you’ll need as you tease out emotions from losing loved ones and a very nasty betrayal. I hope you find happiness in whatever you decide.

OOP: I contemplated several different subs and I have no idea why I chose this one. I should have clarified above that after my son died, local hospice house around here has grief counseling, which I used extensively. I don't want to do couple's counseling is what I should have said. My apologies. I posted this to try and get outside perspectives from people, and maybe give me a different angle to look at this.

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cakivalue
Not couples counseling but individual therapy for you. You need the support right now after all you've been through and an unbiased third party to support you through the pain and demise of your marriage, next steps and co-parenting.
My unprofessional angle here is that this is most likely over. Had she come clean in 2017 you would have been able to make a choice regarding forgiveness, couples therapy etc. she held on to this secret for seven years and then dumped it on you at the worst time in order to ease her own guilty feelings. Especially knowing that you had both been hurt in this exact way in the past is especially jaw dropping that she did all of this.
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Magnum_tv
Fuck man! This is...just fuck...
Firstly, I'm so sorry for your losses. I extend my sincere condolences.
You need grief counseling. This would help you put things in perspective. At least you'll be able to eventually make decisions based on logic than just pure emotion.
Secondly, your spouse. She not only betrayed you, she lied to you for eight years. EIGHT YEARS! That's fucking scary, because now you're gonna be wondering what else she can be hiding.
Now I'm an asshole, I'd be out of that marriage tomorrow. You however, have truly built a life with her. If, and I mean a big fucking IF, she's regretful, you should divorce, it would be less stress in your life having to be her warden. Because the trust is gone.
If, she's remorseful, you could try to work it out. But she needs to put in the work. Not you, HER. Because she's the one who fucked up.
Remember, regret and remorse are two completely different things.
I'd recommend you still talk to a lawyer before making a final decision. The more informed you are, the better choice you'll be able to make.
I'm truly sorry you're dealing with this, best of luck brother.

OOP: Thank you so much. This is another thing in the back of my mind what else has she been dishonest about?

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Update - 3 days later
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UPDATE - After spending Saturday morning formulating and reading the staggering number of comments, I've made my decision. Some said my issue was far beyond the Reddit pay grade – they were mistaken. I deliberately avoided turning to family and friends, seeking a view from an outside perspective, and I think it worked. My gratitude goes out to all who sent private messages and responded; your thoughts on the matter helped me come to my conclusion.
On Saturday evening, I approached my wife to apologize for the silent treatment, I told her I wasn't attempting to punish her and acknowledged that it was childish. I told her if I would have opened my mouth, I would have been overly harsh and ruined any opportunity of a civil conversation. I promised we'd discuss it the next day.
On Sunday evening, I let it all out; I didn't cry, or raise my voice. I asked the man's name, which she provided. I asked her if the man was married when she betrayed us, and she confirmed he was. That hit me hard, because she knew he was also with someone. I asked if he was still married. She told me she had no clue, she hadn't seen him since the day she left for her new job. I told her I hoped they were, because I was going to make sure she knew. If my life had to be ripped apart, so would his. I thought that would get a rise out of her, it didn't. She just nodded.
I expressed my doubts about the affair being an isolated event, echoing the comments of several others. She maintained it was a one-off and was the sole reason she left her job. I explained that after eight years of this lie, it's natural for me to question anything she said. I then made it clear that if there's more to the story than what she's admitted, now is the time to be as open and honest as possible.
Any further revelations would be a deal-breaker for me, and there would be no excuse that could rectify it. She pleaded it was a singular occurrence and that she's been wanting to confess since it happened. I asked if he had reached out after her departure, she denied any contact. I responded that it didn't surprise me, assuming he got what he wanted and moved on to another person at work. It was the only cheap shot I threw.
I requested that she leave the house for a few weeks, I wasn't telling her it was over, but I wanted to be away from her. I suggested she could stay with her sister, her mother, or even rent a place—anywhere but here. I also informed her of my intention to discuss the situation with our daughter, who is 16 by the way, some people have commented believing her to be quite younger. To my surprise, my wife revealed she had already told her about a week ago, which I was completely unaware of. She inquired about the tone of the house, and my anger, and my wife confessed to her. Before my daughter went to bed, I asked her, and indeed, my wife had admitted that she had been unfaithful. I wanted to know why she hadn't come to me about it, and she told me she didn't want to make me feel worse.
I've decided to keep her home from school tomorrow to have a heart-to-heart about everything. It's important for me to understand her feelings and to emphasize that harboring hatred towards her mother isn't the goal. Her mother has always been loving and supportive. It's natural for her to feel angry, and that's okay, but picking sides isn't beneficial – nobody wins in this situation. It's a tough reality I'm coming to terms with, everyone loses. Tomorrow, I plan to contact three local therapists and reach out to the grief counselor I met after my son's death. I'm not interested in couple's therapy; I believe individual therapy is what I need, and since it's highly recommended, I'm going to pursue it.
My daughter's school year is ending soon, and I'm looking forward to spending quality time with her. I prefer to keep our plans private from family and friends; it's our personal matter. Someone advised me about controlling the narrative, but the only thing that matters now is that my daughter knows the truth. I need some time to come to terms if this relationship is salvageable. I need this time for self-reflection and to assess the situation. When she asked if we were going the route of legal separation, I clarified that it wasn't the case. I told her that when I look at her it brings up feelings of anger, which isn't healthy.
To my astonishment, she consented to everything. She doesn't want our relationship to end, and I reminded her that her actions with him forfeited that choice to me. She mentioned my wedding ring as a sign that she still matters to me, and I assured her that she does. I proposed we conclude things there. As I walked by, I touched her shoulder; she nodded in agreement. Later, she phoned her sister and made plans to stay with her the following evening after work.
TLDR. I want to express my gratitude to everyone for their support and guidance, except to the asshole that just wanted to pick a fight. I apologize for the length of my initial post; I believed the full context was necessary to help you understand why I'm so conflicted. To those who reached out privately and know my identity, your discretion is deeply appreciated. I'm looking forward to spending the next month with my daughter and starting therapy. Your messages are welcome, and I'll do my best to respond to each one. I'll provide another update in the future when I've made a decision about our next steps or if it's time to move on. I am not rushing into this decision lightly.
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Comments
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Bolt_McHardsteel
Clearly you have given this a lot of thought, and come up with a way forward that is best for you. Good luck in therapy, get yourself mentally right, there is no rush to make a final decision on your marriage. Take good care of your daughter! She seems like an amazing kid. Hang in there.
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I am not the OOP. Please do not harass the OOP.
Please remember the No Brigading Rule and to be civil in the comments

_ _ _ _ _
Impact and introduction
_ _ _ _ _
His first thoughts about his little predicament were that it was nothing like the anime he’d watched.
Finding yourself suddenly free falling from hundreds of thousands of feet in the sky was significantly more terrifying than it had seemed while cozied up in his bed, wrapped up in three-plus blankets and contently slurping his microwave ramen.
That said, he felt justified in screaming like a little girl. “Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit! Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit!” What was happening? Where was he? He had just stepped out of his house for a ramen run at the nearest gas station, and now this was happening. Great, just great, now he wasn’t going to be able to watch anymore anime- he stopped suddenly. “Oh, of course,” he muttered to himself, “That’s what’s going on here.” He was suddenly as stoic as a knight in shining armor as he plummeted through the sky, and he pushed the slightly problematic matter of falling out of his mind and focused on what would be important: His story. First: his name was Caen Eloso. He came from a strange other world with wondrous technology that left nothing to the imagination. Caen was what was in his third year at his school, Hansen Academy High School in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where teenagers his age were taught arithmetic, science and language punctuation before they went off into the world on their own. Colorado was one of fifty individually operating states in his home country called America, which was home to more than three hundred million people and overseen by a President.. America was located on one of 7 continents in his world, called Earth. There were a great many other countries besides America, of which he knew varying amounts about their cultures that he could give little tidbits of information about, but he figured he knew the most about Japan. Japan was basically heaven. The Japanese people were responsible for creating the best possible thing that his world had to offer, a wondrous thing called anime. He had dedicated his life to exploring every nook and cranny that was connected to the world of anime, and there was nothing that brought him more happiness than binging.
However, he figured he oughta remember some cooler stuff about Earth (he couldn’t really expect many people to weeb out with his stories without watching anime in person) if he ever found himself in a tight spot and needed to, say, entertain a dragon or something. Because…
He was ninety-nine percent sure that he had just been isekai’d.

That’s why, while plummeting to what seemed to be his inevitable doom, he kept a level head. Ignoring the previous screaming-like-a-five-year-old fit. Because, of course, anyone that was summoned to another world via falling from the sky always survived; it was kind of a given, otherwise the story wouldn’t get anywhere, duh. Whether it be due to some miraculous vitality, impossible superpowers, a one-time “safe-landing” provided by the dude that summoned them, or (and what he personally was hoping for) a rescue from some either super-shy or super-pissy elf hottie in possession of a huge rack… of swords, you pervert, that dressed in some skimpy armor (that really would do nothing to protect the vital organs, from a defensive standpoint) and who would kick off the protagonist’s harem.
When he actually gave it thought, he realized he wasn’t really all that interested in a harem, and kinda found the thought of one IRL gross. Like, did he even have to explain? But he knew that if he’d said that in an online chat with one of his internet buddies, they would definitely try to overrun his laptop with viruses. In what was now his previous life, he had had little to no experience with talking to girls, let alone “getting some action”. He really hadn’t seen the point, considering how difficult 3D girls were to handle. That said, he never really got into the hardcore otaku-type 2D obsession stuff, like buying lewd figurines and pasting posters all over your room and buying body pillows of your favorite waifu. He was just a hardcore watcher, and that kind of made-up for his lack of other tendencies. He would frequently spend 12+ hours a day shacked up in his room in 6 hour sessions of binging anime at 1.5 times speed; (he wanted to get in as much watching as possible) and that was only on weekdays. Yeah. With school. (Needless to say his grades weren’t exactly top notch) But weekends were another story, with him usually staying up till four in the morning on Friday night and then sleeping until twelve, when he would wake up and choose whether or not to eat before watching until he was told to get off, and then stuffing his fat face in the kitchen to his heart’s content. The point was, he had originally decided he didn’t want to “waste time” on a girlfriend. (Not that he was exactly confident he would be on anyone's radar if he were to try)
Anyways, more and more, (before he found himself falling from the sky of his new world) Caen had found himself feeling lonelier and more depressed as time went by, and so, he decided that in his new life he was going to quit his otaku and introvert tendencies and find the love of his life in what was to be his new world. Quite the goal.
With his mind made up, (this was some relatively quick thinking given the situation; he’d been falling for about four and a half minutes before coming upon this decision and entirely giving up on his old world and everything he had loved in it) (Besides his love of anime) he realized something… interesting. He hadn’t noticed it due to being lost in thought and not being capable of feeling it (probably his magical protection or something that came with being summoned), but he was currently a ball of flame. If he had been wearing clothes earlier during his fall, and he hadn’t actually bothered to check because of his little fit, they were long since burnt to a crisp. Even though he was certain he had a grasp on the situation, he couldn’t stop himself from freaking out just a little bit, especially as he felt himself growing closer and closer to the ground. ‘Alright, you can rescue me now,’ he muttered to himself, though his words were lost to the wind. His eyes widened. He realized he was too fast, far too fast. This entry was apparently going to be very flashy, which he wasn’t against, but… He could hardly gauge distance before he had halved it. Twenty thousand feet, ten thousand feet, five thousand, he broke through low hanging cloud cover, two thousand.. He shut his eyes as tight as he could and pulled his limbs in tight while covering his ears to brace himself and-
Boom.
_ _ _ _ _
Learning to walk and not-squirrels
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The sound of impact deafens him. He instantaneously loses awareness of anything else besides the sound, but somehow remains conscious, unaware of if he had completely shattered into a million billion pieces or not. For time out of mind he couldn’t move any part of himself. His ears ring and his head throbbed something awful. He could not conceive what would make him capable of surviving a fall like that. Then, slowly, ever so slowly, he opened an eye to gauge his surroundings…
He was in a crater. Caen had expected as much, but his jaw literally dropped in surprise, something he thought no one actually did. It was at least eight hundred feet from edge-to-edge and four hundred feet deep, the ground smoldering, red-hot and smoky, but surprisingly only warm where he lay (thank you, summoners). He must’ve stayed stagnant longer than he thought for it to have cooled enough to touch. He slowly pushed himself into a seated position, sitting on his right leg and letting his left arm rest on his left leg, which he had bent at the knee. He once again surveyed his crater by twisting his head around.
Quite the entrance. “I guess this fits into the one-time no fall damage category…” he muttered to himself, running his hand through his hair, making note that it was surprisingly silky. “Cause there’s no way this is a vitality thing, right? Way too overpowered.” For a minute he sat like that, until he realized that something was tugging on the back of his mind. At first he ignored it like he would a buzzing insect, but it kept poking at his subconscious. And then he was hit with it with as much force as when his sister sent him to Jupiter for accidentally breaking her new phone; that wasn’t his voice. ‘Huh?’ Neither was that. His eyes darted to the sides of his vision where it gently rested on the sides of his face. His hair. It was much, much longer than it was in his old world, reaching as far as to hang below his pecs. It was shiny and straight, and didn’t look like it had ever been cut. But that didn’t startle him as much as its color did.
Caen thought back to the fairy tales and stuff of his childhood, and about how they tended to over exaggerate the features of their characters and the objects in them so that the average kid could understand it better, with phrases like “as beautiful as a freshly-picked flower”, “as strong as a bull”, “as bright as the sun itself”, and “as white as snow”. Well, now he wasn’t so assuming that those were mere stories and not just incredible experiences from the writers, because he was witnessing something impossibly… beautiful. Because his hair was white. A stark white, with an almost silvery sheen to it. Like when you wake up the morning after a snowstorm and open your window to see if school is canceled, and the snow blinds you when you look at it because it's reflecting the morning sun. Beautiful. He quite literally couldn’t think of another word for it. Slowly, he reached up to touch it again, once again feeling the impossibly smooth sensation. It glided over his fingers like water. And then he saw the fingers of his hand. Long and slender, perfect and unblemished. He was dumbfounded. ‘Are these really… mine?’ he asked quietly with his new voice. ‘A new body was always possible, I suppose, but I thought if that were to happen I would first have to be reincarnated and grow up with it myself. Did this body… come into existence just for me when I got here? I would hate it if I kicked out someone's soul so mine could stay here or whatever.’ He stood shakily. He was tall. Taller than in his other life, where he’d stood at around five-ten, Caen figured he was now around six-two. And, what he found almost as shocking as his hair, was that he was fit. Or perhaps thin would be a better word, something he had never been before. His stomach felt strange to him as it no longer bulged, and when on a whim he attempted the stretches he wasn’t close to being capable of before, he did so with ease. He could reach his feet when he sat and stretched out his legs, and he could even easily touch his toes. He was in the middle of attempting to put his foot behind his head when he realized he should probably get a move on and get out of there. He guessed that he most likely looked like a meteor for any settlement within a few hundred miles of his crash site. He quickly tapped his foot on a particularly smoldery-looking piece of earth to test if he could withstand the heat like before. He once again found it to be only pleasantly warm. With that reassurance in mind, he decided to get himself out of the crater. That was, before he realized he’d need to learn to walk again. He fell hard and broke his fall with his arms. His muscles felt unused and unfamiliar, though the movement of his arms came more naturally than the rest. At first, his legs were very wobbly and his knees shook and moved sharply if he strained them too much or too little, causing them to buckle and him to fall and roll back down to the center of the crater when he tried to walk out. It didn’t help that it was a pretty consistently steep climb to the edge. He must have been at it for at least an hour. But the distance was good practice for him, and with a lot of rolling in the scorched earth he finally managed to get himself to the edge. The adjustment period wasn’t that awful, considering, and he felt he should be kind of proud for learning so quickly. (At least that's how he thought of it) He stood up on the rim of the crater to see exactly where he was. A pretty considerable distance away he could see trees ringing the crater site, and he decided that he had landed in a forest. The further away from the edge the less burnt and bent the trees were, from the shockwave that came with the force of the impact, he decided. He sat down, leaned back and let his feet rest on the decline of the crater. It was incredible. It felt like he’d just woken up after twelve hours of sleep, and his mind was buzzing with activity like he hadn’t experienced before. Everything was so fresh. He didn’t feel tired or winded at all, and he saw everything in vivid detail, even though all there was to see was the smoldering earth and the forest in the distance. He even tried breathing in deep with his nose, but all he got was burnt dirt and he started coughing from the smokiness of it. Despite this, he smiled. He hadn’t felt like this in ages, a thought he had believed was reserved for seventy-year-olds after getting their backs adjusted by a chiropractor. He jumped up, deciding that the first thing he should do would be to find a settlement of some sort, or at least a stream so that he could drink some water. He wasn’t particularly thirsty, but the thought of a cool liquid down his throat made him shiver. He also wanted to eat something, and decided to keep an eye out for nuts or berries in the forest that looked innocent enough. And so he started his trek. Soon he was walking on long, springy grass and gazing at all kinds of fauna that was surprisingly familiar. He couldn’t really see a difference in the trees or bushes at first, but when he plucked a leaf from the low hanging branch of a tree that looked like the one in his backyard, he saw that the pattern of the veins was definitely different, if not by much. He could at least tell that, since he had played under that tree when he was little. He also saw a lot of strange forest critters, and his heightened senses picked up on their presences like a radar. Soon there were dozens of them watching him from the trees, giving him a wide berth but for some reason following, so he still caught a few glances. Most had bushy tails and large ears with short whiskers on their little snouts, and tiny little heads that looked like those of baby foxes. The overwhelming majority were a sandy brown, but a few times he also saw one that looked blue and one that looked red, and even one that was pink, but these were always directly in the shadows of the trees and bushes and would dart away as soon as he tried for a closer look. A different species that looked like a miniature boar no larger than a bowling ball, complete with tusks, a stubby tail and hooves, trotted directly trotted directly through his path with its head held high in what looked like a show of contempt before disappearing into a bush. It was totally adorable and he regretted not trying to pick it up before it had disappeared. He winced internally as he thought of how many of these balls of fluff were incinerated in his landing. Slowly, as he trekked on, the creatures became more and more daring, darting past him and soon getting in his full view shamelessly, but they didn’t seem to have any ill intent, so he really didn’t mind. At least, they didn’t look predatory. (though he inwardly didn’t trust that idea from his knowledge of anime) Suddenly, one that was much larger than the others, probably the pack leader, scurried directly in front of him and stood on its short hind legs, its arms drawn together. It was similar to the way squirrels “stood”. Caen paused mid-step. It had some sort of presence, and its pose seemed to indicate that it wanted him to sit down so they could have a conversation. Unlike the other not-squirrels, (as he decided to temporarily call them) this one’s coat looked much fluffier and was a rich, chocolate brown, and its ears had white tufts at the ends. Its tail twitched and he also noticed that towards the tip of it the hair was also white. It gave off some sort of aura. Caen crouched. ‘Hey there, little guy. What can I do for you?’ He asked in the same voice he would use for a cute dog or other friendly animal. It tilted its head and he had to stop himself from launching at it in a surprise hug attack. It stared at him for a little longer. Then, out of nowhere, it beckoned to him with a little arm, turned, and started running off. For a second, Caen stayed crouched, dumbfounded at what he’d just witnessed, until dozens of the hiding squirrels started running in the same direction as the big one. He shook it off and decided this was supposed to be his first big event in his story, and so he started sprinting after it, because these little guys were speedy. He ran for more than ten minutes, almost losing track of the pack until he caught glimpses of a bushy tail or fluffy ears that kept him on their trail. Since his endurance was off the charts now, he actually enjoyed the chase, and took the opportunity to breathe in the rich forest aroma as he ran. Soon, he broke out into a small clearing, where he saw the leader “standing” beside the mouth of a cave. The once again shy not-squirrels all hid in the trees and bushes that surrounded the clearing, and all he could see were their cute little button eyes glimmering in the leaves. There must have been hundreds of them. He hesitatingly walked over to the giant not-squirrel (because that was what it was in comparison) and crouched down again. ‘Do you want me to go inside there?’ He asked, pointing at the cave, and turning his gaze to the eyes of the creature. It stared at him uncomprehendingly, its black eyes giving no indication of some great intelligence that secretly lurked. He sighed. ‘Might as well,’ he muttered, walking over the cave entrance. It was as dark as one would imagine, but there appeared to be a faint candle light of sorts dancing on the walls around a bend about a hundred feet in. It also smelled heavily like some sort of crushed herb he was unfamiliar with. It almost overshadowed the rancid smell of rotting flesh. He narrowed his eyes at the giant not-squirrel and the rest of the pack hiding in the bushes before walking in. There was definitely something alive in here, and from the smell, it or they were dying.
_ _ _ _ _
Elf hotties and magic
_ _ _ _ _
The further into the cave he went, the more overwhelming the stench of death became. Caen gave himself a second to regain his composure, then covered his nose as he turned the bend. His eyes widened in shock. A pretty girl with silver hair and sharply tipped ears lay upon a bed of leaves, naked save several fern leaves that provided her the barest of modesty. Her form was softly illuminated by several low burning candles that framed her. A singular giant fern rested on her stomach, covering where James guessed the mortal wound was inflicted. Her eyes were closed and she breathed shallowly, and sweat was beaded all over her body. The different colored not-squirrels he had seen earlier were all gathered there, watching her intently, but quickly turned their heads as they heard his bare feet shuffling on the stone floor. All three of them were there, the red, blue, and pink furred not-squirrels, as well as a green one that he hadn’t seen before. They stared at him for several seconds before all but the green not-squirrels scurried behind him. The green one leaned its head down and seemed to whisper something in the ear of the elf. Caen’s world slowed. Her eyes crept open, a rich, deep purple that seemed to shimmer with silver dust like stars. She ever so slightly turned her head to look at the not-squirrel questioningly, and then her gaze drifted to Caen. As their eyes met, he felt a shiver and a volt of electricity passed invisibly between them through their gaze. Her eyes widened with what looked like disbelief, and she smiled at him ever so softly. Caen felt entranced. There was something special about this girl, something so very special, and he felt a stirring in his chest that made his stomach twinge, but not unpleasantly. She beckoned to him with a finger and he slowly approached her and knelt. Those few steps, with her eyes fixated on his, and his on hers, felt like eternity, and he couldn’t break the gaze if he wanted. ‘Greetings, White One.’ She said softly, still not breaking eye contact. Her voice sounded as though it were made to sing. ‘I apologize… I… was meant to be there to greet you upon your arrival. The best I could manage was providing you a safe entrance from the heavens.’ She said sadly, and a tear welled up in the corner of her eye. He hesitatingly reached out a hand and cupped her face, gently wiping away the tear with his thumb. She shouldn’t cry. He knew that, somehow, that it was wrong, that she shouldn’t ever have to experience sadness like that. She breathed in sharply at his touch, and then her gaze softened. ‘Who… are you?’ He asked quietly. She smiled sadly and tears flowed freely on the back of his hand. ‘Unfortunately, I don’t have the leisure to cry with you. I am glad that my friends were able to escort you here and provide you with safe company, for the forest is a very dangerous place, but… more than that, I am glad that I was able to see you… at… least once…’
Her eyes drifted closed. He quickly grabbed her arm and was hugely relieved to find a pulse, ever so faint.
She is so close to death, White One.
She has been holding out so that she could meet you, White One.
She has been waiting so very long for you, White One.
She spent what little mana she had left providing you safe entry into our world, White one.
These sweet-sounding voices echoed in his mind, though all of melancholy tone. He slowly stood and turned to face the not-squirrels.
Please save our Silver Lady, White One.
This voice was deep and strained with pain and suffering. In front of him stood the pack leader. He sat just in front of the other four not-squirrels, all mimicking his position. All Caen could do was nod, even though he was dazed and had no idea how he would be able to help her at all. ‘Show me the wound.’ he declared in a voice that sounded much more confident than he felt.
The four different colored not-squirrels glanced at the leader, and, the words still echoing inside of Caen’s mind like before, he said, ‘Do as the White One proclaims.’ They unhesitatingly scurried to their “Silver Lady” and carefully removed the large fern. Caen did not react how he thought he would. He saw it and his body shook, but not with disgust, or surprise, or horror, but with rage. He clenched his fists and the muscles in his arms grew taut as his fingernails dug into his palms. Her stomach had been ferociously torn open, revealing a sight that was best kept undescribed. His voice shook with power as he spat, “Who… Who did this… to her?”
His head snapped to the not-squirrel leader, his wild, hateful eyes boring into the creature. “We do not know, White One,

Previous case
We're back to business as usual at Orion. Sort of. I'll get into that in a minute. But first, I just need to put it out there that sometimes the clients drive me nuts. As much as I have an apparently irresistible desire to help everyone, some people really push it. Push it right off of a fucking cliff, that is.
I’m going to stop myself before I go off on an unhinged rant about the woes of dealing with the public. Instead, I’ll let yinz see for yourselves what I've been putting up with.
(If you're not familiar with what Orion Pest Control's services are, it may help to start here.)
We received a call from a client about mosquitoes running amok in her home. Since we had a few others to take care of that day, I informed her that the earliest that one of us could investigate the matter was in the afternoon. But because this woman is clearly so much more important than everyone else, her royal highness threw a hissy fit about having to wait like a common peasant.
I tried to be as nice as possible, “Ma’am, I understand that it’s frustrating, but there are others that called ahead of you, so we have to take care of their problems before we can take care of yours.”
The client huffed, “Okay, you clearly aren’t hearing me. There are mosquitoes in my house!”
“Yes, ma’am, I heard you. However, you are not our only client, so we ask that you please be patient and we will be there as soon as we can.”
I should also mention that this client talked out of the back of her nose, if that helps to paint a picture of how her cadence was equally as grating as her personality. “Okay, but do those people have mosquitoes? Like in their house, biting them and their kid over and over? My son could have Zika virus right now!”
Jesus Fucking Christ. I rubbed my temple with my free hand as I did my damndest to keep my customer service persona in place, “Again, ma’am, I understand that this is frustrating, but we have a wasp infestation and termites to deal with before you and those families want their kids to be safe, just like you. In the meantime, I recommend wearing bug spray or burning a citronella candle until we can get to you. We will be there as soon as we can.”
“You better be! And you really need to work on your customer service, sweetie!”
The client hung up on me.
I had to pace around the office after that one. Sweetie? Shove it up your ass, you entitled, snotty… You know what? Nevermind. I have many words to describe clients like that and none of them are pleasant. I hoped that she’d get mosquito bites in all of the most private areas of her anatomy.
It probably didn't help that I was saddled with some bitterness after the ‘dogging’ incident. I knew that there wasn't anything I could do about the mechanic other than stay out of his way going forward. And boy, did that eat me up.
On that note, I know what the mechanic is, however, even whispering the official title of these Neighbors is enough to draw them to you. I'm not sure if writing it counts and I'm not about to find that out the hard way.
Just know that if you hear wings beating from the west at night, hide and pray that you'll be passed by. Placing a line of salt on all of the doors and windows facing the west keeps them from coming inside. Once they set their sights on you, they'll never stop hunting you. Even death itself fears them. You'll still be running long after your heart stops beating.
But I promise, I’ll elaborate more on that later. I’m getting ahead of myself. Back to the case.
Reyna was at the point in her training where she could be trusted to deal with termites on her own. After I had the wasp nests taken care of, I set out to her royal highness’ home, and earlier than I’d told her, might I add. I will admit that I was tempted to dally a bit just to piss her off, but then I figured that it would be better and more professional to just get it over with.
She looked exactly like how I pictured her to look, complete with a weasley sneer that only the most unlikable of human beings are able to master.
“It’s about time.” She snapped.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “Where have you noticed the mosquitoes the most?”
“Everywhere.” She said unhelpfully,
Her husband stepped in. “In the kitchen and basement, mostly.”
To make this call even better, the husband decided to take it upon himself to follow me around as I did my inspection, asking me pointless questions and giving me advice that I didn't ask for.
It got to a point where his hot breath wheezed into my ear as I shined my flashlight under their sink.
Stiffly, but politely, I asked, “Sir, can you please keep your distance?”
His wife chipped in, “Will you let her do her job, Curtis? It took her long enough to get here, and if you keep pestering her, it's going to take even longer!”
The husband puffed up and snapped, “Well, it's my house! I need to know that the person working in it knows what they're doing!”
They began screaming at each other. As obnoxious and uncomfortable as it was to have to bear witness to it, at least they weren't focused on me anymore. I shook my head and kept searching for the source of the infestation.
What I was looking for was standing water, which is essential for a mosquito's life cycle; you eliminate the standing water, you eliminate the infestation. The space beneath the sink was completely dry.
With the argument going on, I almost didn't hear it. An odd little sound. The easiest way to describe it was that it sounded like, ‘Kudo! Kudo!’
My head turned to follow it. That's when I noticed that one of the floorboards was slightly raised up from the rest.
I interrupted their marital problems, “You said that your son was sick earlier? Would he happen to have chills and a high fever?”
The client spat, “Yes, because some people-”
Not in the mood for her nonsense anymore, I cut in, “Ma'am, please just answer the question. I am trying to help you, I really am, but I'm going to need some more information in order to do that.”
She looked taken aback, her face bright red. While she balked, her husband answered instead, “Our son said he was feeling under the weather, but he does that whenever he wants to get out of something. You know how kids are.”
Good lord. Parents of the year.
“Have you noticed your salt going missing?”
The wife blinked at me, “How did you know that?”
I told them that I'd be right back and went to retrieve a cage from the truck. This critter is an odd one in that not only is salt not a suitable repellent for it, but it actually loves the stuff. It can consume as much as ten grams of salt per day. So if you find that the salt in your home has gone missing, it could mean that a False Egg has made a nest.
I returned with the cage and advised the couple to either move into another room or wait outside. Would it surprise yinz when I say that they refused? Not in the mood to argue, I just shrugged. Okay. Suit yourselves.
I set the cage up next to the lifted floorboard, took my salt off of my toolbelt, and sprinkled some inside the cage. It would placate the False Egg once I got it inside.
Using my knife, I pried the floorboard up. From behind me, the husband began to protest, but his wife snapped at him to keep still.
Meanwhile, my eyes met the beady gaze of a False Egg from where it hid under their floorboard.
At first glance, it looks like a white chicken's egg. If consumed, it causes the host to lay more False Eggs. That's how it reproduces. The telltale signs that you're looking at a False Egg include two dark spots on the shell near the pointed top of the ovoid. Those are the eyes, which they can leave closed to camouflage themselves. You may also notice two small holes at the bottom of the shell, which is where its legs can retract in and out. Mosquitoes follow False Eggs wherever they nest, though it's unclear why.
Generally, they're more of an annoyance than anything. However, they can cause flu-like symptoms in those that they feel threatened by, so they do pose a slight danger to those with compromised immune systems.
To my surprise, the False Egg leapt out of its nest and into the cage, tucking its legs back into its shell comfortably. Even though it didn't seem to have any intentions of moving, I quickly shut the door of its cage.
For the first time since I arrived, the clients were speechless. The woman had a hand over her open mouth while the man stared at the False Egg in a mixture of horror and disgust.
It wasn't until I stood up with the cage that the man asked, “What the hell is that?”
“The source of the infestation.” I replied. “I’ll take this guy out to the truck. The mosquitoes should follow him, but just to be sure, I'm going to ask that you all leave the house for a few hours so that I can apply a chemical treatment that'll kill off any stragglers. And your son’s condition should improve in a day or two.”
The couple didn't give me any trouble. They quietly collected their sick teenaged son, saying something about getting ice cream, then fucked off to do whatever while I dealt with the rest of the mosquitoes.
Once I was done, I drove off to release the False Egg somewhere where it could complete its life cycle away from humans. It is able to reproduce in any mammal. While forcing other organisms to lay eggs is bizarre and can be alarming for the affected individual, it doesn't appear to hurt the hosts, other than causing some mild abdominal discomfort. Once the False Egg is laid, the host goes back to normal, which is why we generally don't feel the need to kill them.
Unexpectedly, the False Egg talked to me.
It had a small, soft, mousy voice. “Thanks for getting me out of there.”
I glanced at the False Egg. I had its cage on the passenger's seat. Its eyes were visible, along with its little white legs as it sat on the bottom of its cage. It looked up at me as it wiggled its small feet absent-mindedly.
Whenever it spoke, a small crack that resembled a toothy mouth appeared in its shell. That was something to add to our records: not only are False Eggs capable of speech, but their mouths are located below their eye spots.
Stunned, I said, “You're welcome.”
The False Egg continued, “Oh, those humans are vile! I hadn't realized it when I first made my nest. Do you want to know why I made the boy sick?”
“Why?”
So that's how I learned every aspect of this family's lives. I'm sure yinz care even less than I do about some suburbanites’ interfamily drama, so I'll just say that it wasn't bad enough to warrant a call to social services, but enough that I can see why that kid probably couldn't wait to turn 18. Overbearing mother, father trying to use his son to relive his glory days as a high school athlete. The False Egg had done the boy a solid, giving him just enough of a fever to excuse him from lacrosse tryouts.
“Where are we going?” The False Egg asked after telling me all that information that I didn't know what to do with.
“Back to the forest.”
The False Egg kept swinging its little feet, “Can you take me somewhere nice? If it's not any trouble?”
Why not? Maybe some scenery would improve my mood.
So me and my little egg buddy took a little drive to the pond. It was a picturesque area as well as a nice environment for a False Egg. They prefer caves, but as long as they're near water, they'll be fine. When I opened its cage, the False Egg hopped out, its little eyes and shelled body swiveling to take in the peaceful sight.
“Oh, this is wonderful! Thank you!” Before it skipped off, it paused. “I think it would only be right if I told you something that could help, since you brought me here.”
It turned, its shell splitting to form a mouth as it hesitated before speaking, “If you hear whispers in the woods, even if it sounds like someone you care about, don't listen. The louder they are, the safer you are. They get quieter as they get closer to confuse you.”
Hold on. That didn't make any sense. The whispers had gotten louder and more urgent as I approached the mechanic's clearing.
Unless I was wrong and he wasn't the one doing it.
I asked, “Is the whispering thing disguising itself as a mechanic?”
The False Egg tilted to the side thoughtfully, “I'm afraid not. It doesn’t like to pretend to be human.”
So there was something else out there with me when I went looking for Victor. I remembered then that the whispers had stopped once I got close to the mechanic's clearing. When I unintentionally allowed them to lead me astray, they took me in the opposite direction of where he'd been waiting. Interesting.
With the False Egg wandering off to establish a new nest that was far away from humans, I headed back to the office, unsure of how to feel about the information it had given me.
Victor looked annoyed when I came in. The clients had called to complain about my ‘poor customer service.’ Wow. Okay.
“Next time, just leave the False Egg there.” Victor said, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “They want to complain about poor customer service? We can show them bad service!”
“It's fine, Vic.” I replied. “Just let them leave their one star Google review and move on.”
“These fucking people…” He grumbled.
Victor's headspace hasn't been much better than mine. He's been pretty much stuck waiting by the phone for those ominous calls that the mechanic mentioned in the woods. They don't happen often, but when they do, he gets grim. Quiet. He hasn't told me in detail what has been requested of him. I don't know if he simply doesn't want to talk about it or if he's sworn to secrecy.
We'd had a long, uncomfortable talk during one of my days off while recovering from getting dogged. Victor stopped by with coffee and a box of donut holes. He drank the coffee, but left the donut holes untouched. We sat in my small kitchen, him staring intently into his black coffee, me quietly adding more sugar to my mocha.
I broke the silence. “What did you want me to see the other day?”
“I couldn't outright tell anyone that I was dead. Not without the mechanic finding out.” He continued after some hesitation. “It feels selfish saying it now, but… I just wanted someone to know what happened to me.”
Victor pulled the bandana aside with a finger, revealing that a jagged, red grin had been carved across his throat. I shuddered, being forcefully reminded once again how thin skin truly is.
He quickly pulled it back into place.
That prompted me to ask, “Is the mechanic the one that…?” I pointed to my neck.
Victor shook his head. I asked him who did.
His expression darkened, “Someone I used to use with. He didn't believe me when I told him that I was still clean and couldn't help him get his next hit. Everything happened so fast after that. Before I knew it, I woke up in his trunk. My chest felt empty. It's strange, you know? You don't notice your own heartbeat until it's not there anymore.”
I shook my head slowly, a knot in my stomach as I whispered, “Jesus, Vic. Where is he now?”
“He can't hurt anyone else. We'll leave it at that.” Victor muttered.
I took in a shaky breath. I couldn't believe that he'd been keeping all of this in. It was a lot to take in at once, so I could only imagine how much worse it was to be the one experiencing it.
Like I said, I don't blame him for what happened. He must've felt so alone.
After I regained my composure, I asked, “So… what does the mechanic have to do with this?”
Victor hesitated again, eventually saying, “He couldn't touch me while I was alive, so he made sure that death couldn’t get to me before he could. That's why I was trying to keep my condition quiet; I was hoping that I could outlast him long enough for the Reaper to catch up. Unfortunately, the fucker is good at what he does and knew that I’d drag someone else into my bullshit eventually.”
I shook my head, “I dragged myself into it. I could've just minded my own business, but I didn't. I chose to go out there, even though I didn't know what I was dealing with. And I chose to say the wrong thing to the mechanic to set him off.”
“You wouldn't have been in that position if I hadn't said anything.”
“So what happens now? You're just… forced to do these calls?”
Victor sighed, “It's either that, or I join the ones in the trees.”
The skulls. Grimly, I wondered if those trapped souls were still aware. If they knew what had happened to them.
I slumped down in my seat. “Is there anything we can do?”
“As of right now, no. We just go to work, keep our heads down, do what we have to do. And from now on, I'll deal with the mechanic, even if it's for something as trivial as changing a tire. He's my problem, no one else's.”
So that's where we're at. Victor's technically not alive or dead, but a secret third, worse thing.
Speaking of worse things, we got an emergency call in the middle of the night.
After we close for the day, Victor routes calls to his phone in case there is something that can't wait until the next day. Thankfully, this is an extremely rare occurrence; up until this incident, it's only happened twice since I've been with Orion. I joined Victor for one of those two emergency calls. Even though it's been two years since that night, I still hear the crunching of bones in my dreams.
Something yinz need to know about the farmers around here is that they know how to take care of themselves. They have more encounters with the atypical than anyone else and for the most part, they know how to live amongst things like the Neighbors in relative peace. They know about leaving cream out to appease them. They know about what measures to take to defend themselves and their animals. They're a tough bunch and they usually prefer to take care of things themselves. It's highly unusual for them to reach out to us.
So when Victor told me over the phone that the emergency call was at one of the farms, I knew it was going to be bad.
When he first described what the farmers were contending with, my stomach dropped. The client's brother was found on the porch with his chest entirely deflated, deliberately placed into a chair that was moved in front of the door where the family could see him.
The farmers were holed up in their home. The woman of the house was pregnant, due within the next few days, which made moving her extremely difficult. They could hear whatever killed the brother giggling and tapping on the windows, mocking them. Victor was already on his way there.
I arrived with my toolbelt along with a shotgun and shells filled with rock salt. This may sound ridiculous, but I also donned a collar that I'd made last summer by hammering long ass carpenter nails into the leather, then coating their pointed tips with silver. I looked a bit like a goth club reject, but when dealing with things that like to go for the throat, you gotta put your pride aside.
Victor's truck was in the driveway, but he was nowhere in sight. Shotgun at the ready, I glanced around as I approached the house. The body was still on the porch, untouched after the poor man had been posed there. It looked far worse than what Victor had described. His chest had caved in, like everything inside of him had been sucked clean out. His face was frozen in surprise rather than horror or pain. He'd been caught off guard and was dead long before he could react.
Wings. I turned, pulling the trigger just in time as the pest tormenting this family dove at me. It tumbled to the ground with an enraged shriek.
It appeared to be a woman. Well… half of one. Her legs were gone, brown entrails dangling sickeningly from her gray torso. Her leathery, hooked wings trembled as she used her bony arms to raise herself up to snarl at me, curling her lips to reveal doglike fangs. I shot at her again. She jolted as the shell took a chunk out of her skull.
That wouldn't kill her. Both her and I knew it. She skittered like a cockroach, an elongated tongue shooting out of her mouth, quick as a whip. I flinched, turning my head so she couldn't reach my face, grateful for the collar as I felt the proboscis slam into its spikes. The impact knocked me off balance, causing me to stumble. I leaned into it, hitting the ground and out of reach of the next swipe of her tongue.
I took aim again, knocking her back a few feet. A dark shape suddenly appeared from the barn, a glint of metal shining in the figure’s hand. Victor.
“I can't find the lower half.” He hissed when I was in earshot.
That meant we were going to have to keep her from rejoining the lower half of her body until sunrise. It was three in the morning.
Because nothing can ever be easy.
Victor had found chains and a padlock in the barn. They should be heavy enough to restrain her. We’d just have to get close. Without her sucking our insides out, preferably.
She was back in the air. I took another shot. I'd have to reload soon. I hoped that I'd have enough shells to last the next two hours. At the rate I was going, I'd burn through them in the next ten minutes.
Unfortunately, I missed as she soared towards the house. I used my last shot and thankfully knocked her out of the air. As I hurriedly reloaded, Victor rushed towards the fallen creature, kneeling on her chest to keep her from taking off again as he fought to get the chain around her.
I heard him make a terrible choking sound, followed by her retching. She'd gotten her proboscis down his throat, but had withdrawn it even quicker than she had gotten it down. I guess undead viscera doesn't taste very good.
As she gagged, Victor pressed his forearm against her throat, pinning her so that she couldn't sink her fangs into him. I raced over, setting the shotgun on the ground next to me so that I could help him restrain her. While he held her, I coiled the chain around her squirming torso.
She began to laugh. When she spoke, it sounded like an old woman and a young girl speaking in unison, “Do you think a chain will be enough to stop me?”
I kept going. She wiggled one wing out from beneath her, jabbing the hook into the hollow of my shoulder. I gasped as it pressed deeper into my skin. Victor roughly pushed her wing back down, the violent withdrawal of the hook making me see stars. Through all of that, I still kept going.
We turned her onto her side so that Victor could pin her wings against her back. She screeched the entire time, the proboscis shooting back to slap him in the cheek.
We almost had her. Then we heard a wail from inside the house. What now?!
The pest abruptly paused in her struggles to leer at us, then she sang, “The baby's coming!”
You've got to be kidding me.
Her fighting resumed with far more force than before. That man that she'd killed had merely been an appetizer for her. The baby was her true prize. Her eyes were wild with excitement, saliva dripping off of her fangs as she watched the front door open.
Shitshitshit!
“Go back inside!” Victor shouted as we both used all that we had to try to keep the pest in place.
The farmer yelled back, distress making his voice higher, “Something's wrong! I have to get her to the hospital!”
I risked a glance. The woman was white as a sheet, holding onto her husband for dear life as he half led half dragged her to his truck. Blood stained the inside of the woman's legs.
At the sight of it, Victor froze. I didn't like the way he looked at the woman then. Oh no. The creature went into a complete frenzy. She managed to get her fangs into Victor's arm, wrenching a cry of agony from him as she ripped a sizable chunk of flesh out. His hold on her loosened just enough that she could wriggle a wing out.
I screamed as I felt her beginning to slip away, frantically reaching for the nearest part of her, which was unfortunately her dangling intestines. It was like trying to hold onto oversized wet noodles, my hands slipping in her chunky blood as I struggled to slow her down.
They just needed to reach the truck. We just had to keep her here just long enough for them to get a head start.
I just hoped that I wouldn't end up having to protect them from my boss, too.
She roared as she turned and slashed me across the brow with one of her clawed fingers. My vision went dark in my right eye. Numbly, I wondered if she ripped my eye out, or if it was just from the pain. By some miracle, I didn't let go.
Fortunately, the bite seemed to snap Victor out of whatever had happened to him when he saw the woman’s blood. At least for the moment. He scrambled across the ground, seizing my shotgun. His first shot missed. The second one hit her left wing. The farmer had the truck's passenger side door open as he helped his wife inside. The pest reached a talon towards them, trying to drag herself closer. Victor was back on his feet and marched over to shoot her in the head. Once. Twice.
The truck's engine roared to life. With it, the pest screeched in rage, the sound warped by the damage done to her mouth after Victor had unloaded on her. She flailed as she watched her prize speed down the road.
But it wasn't over. The gunshot wound in her wing was already closing up. It wouldn't take her long to catch up to them if we lost her.
My cheek was wet. Turns out, I didn't lose an eye. I just had blood in it. Thank God. I crawled over her, trying the chains again as Victor went back to holding her wings against her body.
She called him every foul name in the book, words slurring from her destroyed jaw. One of them touched a nerve: “Bitch of the Wild Hunt.” He wordlessly snatched the salt from my belt and poured it over her face, holding her jaw to shove the container into her mouth. She gurgled and started to convulse as the salt was forced down her throat. That shut her up.
With the chain pinning her arms and wings against her body, Victor dug the padlock out of his pocket, using it to secure the links.
“I’m going to try to get her to the barn.” He yelled over the sound of her agitated howls.
I retrieved the shotgun and followed him as he carried the squirming, shrieking pest towards the barn. I pressed the palm of my hand to the cut on my brow. A flutter of unease went through my gut as it occurred to me that I could be in danger from Victor as well.
It didn't help that the pest had noticed it, too. She was goading him, “That girl smells sweet, doesn't she?”
“You want more salt in your mouth?” He threatened flatly. “We got plenty and we have some time until sunrise.”
She cackled, “You can't tell me that your mouth isn't watering thinking of her soft flesh between your teeth. Her blood warming your tongue. You long to feel warm again, don't you, dead man?”
The borderline pornographic way that she spoke about devouring me made me intensely uncomfortable.
“Keep it up and I'll pack the salt up your nose, too.” Victor retorted.
Once we got to the barn, we found an empty stall, which he tossed her into. I didn't follow him into the stall. My gut was telling me that something was off.
He drew a circle of salt around her. As long as it wasn't broken, it would trap her until sunrise.
I didn't think the boss would ever intentionally hurt me. But the way he looked at that woman…
What if he couldn't control himself?
Victor shut the stall door behind him, leaving the pest to wail and swear at us from her prison.
His eyes went to my forehead, “That looks like it hurts.”
I swallowed back the lump in my throat. There it was again. That look.
“Stay back, Vic.” I said calmly, my unease growing.
He took a deep breath, his eyes closing. I took a small step away from him, towards the exit to the barn.
I kept my voice even, “Vic, be honest with me. Is it safe to be around you right now?”
Victor stayed where he was, still not looking at me. He eventually answered, “Probably not.”
I took another step towards the door. “I'm going to leave.”
He nodded, eyes still shut, “I think that would be best. I'll make sure that she stays in the stall.”
As I backed towards the door, afraid to turn my back on him, I said, “I'll uh… see you at work tomorrow.”
“Yeah. See ya.”
I didn't dare turn my back on him until I'd left the barn. He didn't move a muscle the entire time. As I made my way back to my G6, I kept looking over my shoulder. Victor didn't follow me. I made it back to my car without incident.
I thought back to when I'd found him in the butcher shed. Looking back, I'm pretty sure that he'd been eating it.
Once I was in my apartment, I quickly drew lines of salt in front of all my doors and windows. It made me feel somewhat safer. I inspected the injuries on my forehead and shoulder. After cleaning them both up, I determined that I should probably see a doctor in the morning. In the meantime, I covered them both with gauze.
I painfully settled down onto my bed, my entire body aching. Even though I felt like a dish towel that had been wrung out over and over again, I knew that I wasn't going to be getting much sleep. My mind was racing too much.
Against my better judgment, I ended up texting Victor, ‘Are you a draugr?’
His response was, ‘i think so’
Draugr are known for their grotesque appetites. The joke Reyna and I had been making about him being a ‘high-functioning zombie’ wasn't all that far off, after all.
I reminded myself that Victor wasn't a complete monster. He'd at least had enough control over himself not to hurt me or either of the farmers. But the temptation had clearly been there. That begged the question of what his limits were.
Was it safe to work with him? Injuries aren't exactly uncommon at Orion. Maybe that's why he's been sending Reyna and I together for two person jobs rather than going on calls with us.
I received another message from him, ‘if you want to quit I understand’
I didn't, though. As stressful as working here can be, I do enjoy my job, weirdly enough. I've been treated better here than by any other employer and I like having only two other coworkers to worry about, especially since I get along well with both of them. But the biggest reason why quitting hasn't occurred to me is that I wouldn't be able to just walk away from all that I'd learned about the atypical cases. There was no way I could live a normal life after working at Orion.
I also wanted to keep an eye on Victor. Between whatever the mechanic was forcing him to do and his transformation, there was a lot that I was concerned about. As much as I didn't want to think about having to trap or kill Victor, if it came down to it... I'd do what needed to be done.
I sent back, ‘hazard pay? 👀’
His reply was, ‘😒’
A moment later, I received, ‘we'll discuss it when I don't have a manananggal mf'ing me’
Yinz see why I kept calling her a ‘pest’ rather than trying to type that long name out each time? I guarantee I would have misspelled it several different ways.
When the sun rose, I received another message from Victor, ‘it's over. thanks for your help’
We found out later in the afternoon that the hospital had been able to save the farmers’ baby. She was going to have to stay longer in the hospital, but otherwise, she and their newborn daughter were alright.
What was alarming was that the dead man's body had been desecrated at some point after I left. It was believed that the pest had been the one to take chunks out of his neck, shoulder, and chest. I wasn't going to be the one to tell the family the truth. They'd been through enough already without the news that the one they'd relied on for protection had gotten hungry.
I wondered if being exposed to so much blood had been the trigger. I suppose I should just be glad that Victor had eaten a man who was already dead instead of me or another living person.
Like I said, I'm going to have to keep an eye on him. In the meantime… maybe don't demand to speak to the manager.
Update: The mechanic took me on a drive.

Hello, I would like to describe my current health issue to you, including my hypotheses about what might be causing it. I would like to hear your opinions on what it might be and how I should proceed. Keep in mind that I am already undergoing medical consultations and will have more, but so far, I have not reached a conclusion, so I would like as many opinions as possible.
If you need more information, feel free to ask.
For about two years, I have been experiencing facial pain and throat inflammation. I have never had these issues before. They started occurring after I had COVID-19, and I'm not sure if this is coincidental or a consequence of the virus. Initially, these pains were infrequent and mild, but in the past few months, they have become much more frequent and intense, significantly affecting my productivity, energy, and concentration. The pain is mostly noticeable upon waking, but sometimes it persists throughout the day. When the pain is less intense, it almost completely disappears after breakfast or lunch. However, when it is more severe, it doesn't go away at all, forcing me to rest in bed. Sometimes, even taking Tylenol does not relieve the pain.
The facial pain is located under my cheekbones, along my jaw, behind my eyes, and when it's very intense, at the center of my head just above my nose. The pain is continuous on both sides of my face and does not worsen with touch.
As for my throat, it feels like there's a constant lump at the lower part, as if it were scratched. It hurts continuously, not just when I swallow.
These pains occur year-round, regardless of the season.
Regarding medical checks and existing conditions, here are the details:

• I’ve had an eye exam, and there has been no deterioration beyond my existing myopia and astigmatism.
  
• I’ve been checked and do not have sinusitis.
  
• X-rays have shown no issues with my cervical spine.
  
• I likely clench my teeth at night and should be using a mouthguard.
  
• I need to have my wisdom teeth removed (I’ve only had one extracted so far) because they have not fully emerged and are pushing against the other teeth.
  
• I am allergic to dust mites.
  
• I have L4-S1 discopathy.
  
• Blood tests for thyroid issues showed no problems.
  
• I am currently on a treatment of Nicetile 500mg (L-acetylcarnitine HCl) under the assumption it might address nerve inflammation post-COVID, but there have been no changes after 15 days.
  

These issues also cause poor sleep quality. Despite sleeping for 7-8 hours, I wake up feeling tired and as if I need more rest, even if I did not exert myself physically or mentally the previous day.
From the beginning of May onwards, I experienced two weeks where every day I had a sore throat, headaches, and excessive tiredness, despite having taken antihistamines and cortisone spray for more than 20 days in April. I had a flu in early May and felt very ill; all symptoms (sore throat, cold, headache) were amplified and kept me in bed for several days, as if I had COVID. Even after the flu passed, I continued to experience throat lumps and headaches, along with excessive tiredness that rest did not alleviate.
I maintain a fairly balanced diet and engage in regular physical activity. I am physically at a normal weight.
My hypotheses:

• Depression/anxiety
  
• Sleep disorders such as sleep apnea, insomnia, or hypersomnia
  
• Chronic fatigue syndrome
  
• Long COVID
  
• Symptoms of a dust mite allergy
  
• Dental malocclusion and teeth grinding at night
  

Thank you to anyone who provides suggestions.

Hello, I would like to describe my current health issue to you, including my hypotheses about what might be causing it. I would like to hear your opinions on what it might be and how I should proceed. Keep in mind that I am already undergoing medical consultations and will have more, but so far, I have not reached a conclusion, so I would like as many opinions as possible.
If you need more information, feel free to ask.
For about two years, I have been experiencing facial pain and throat inflammation. I have never had these issues before. They started occurring after I had COVID-19, and I'm not sure if this is coincidental or a consequence of the virus. Initially, these pains were infrequent and mild, but in the past few months, they have become much more frequent and intense, significantly affecting my productivity, energy, and concentration. The pain is mostly noticeable upon waking, but sometimes it persists throughout the day. When the pain is less intense, it almost completely disappears after breakfast or lunch. However, when it is more severe, it doesn't go away at all, forcing me to rest in bed. Sometimes, even taking Tylenol does not relieve the pain.
The facial pain is located under my cheekbones, along my jaw, behind my eyes, and when it's very intense, at the center of my head just above my nose. The pain is continuous on both sides of my face and does not worsen with touch.
As for my throat, it feels like there's a constant lump at the lower part, as if it were scratched. It hurts continuously, not just when I swallow.
These pains occur year-round, regardless of the season.
Regarding medical checks and existing conditions, here are the details:

• I’ve had an eye exam, and there has been no deterioration beyond my existing myopia and astigmatism.
  
• I’ve been checked and do not have sinusitis.
  
• X-rays have shown no issues with my cervical spine.
  
• I likely clench my teeth at night and should be using a mouthguard.
  
• I need to have my wisdom teeth removed (I’ve only had one extracted so far) because they have not fully emerged and are pushing against the other teeth.
  
• I am allergic to dust mites.
  
• I have L4-S1 discopathy.
  
• Blood tests for thyroid issues showed no problems.
  
• I am currently on a treatment of Nicetile 500mg (L-acetylcarnitine HCl) under the assumption it might address nerve inflammation post-COVID, but there have been no changes after 15 days.
  

These issues also cause poor sleep quality. Despite sleeping for 7-8 hours, I wake up feeling tired and as if I need more rest, even if I did not exert myself physically or mentally the previous day.
From the beginning of May onwards, I experienced two weeks where every day I had a sore throat, headaches, and excessive tiredness, despite having taken antihistamines and cortisone spray for more than 20 days in April. I had a flu in early May and felt very ill; all symptoms (sore throat, cold, headache) were amplified and kept me in bed for several days, as if I had COVID. Even after the flu passed, I continued to experience throat lumps and headaches, along with excessive tiredness that rest did not alleviate.
I maintain a fairly balanced diet and engage in regular physical activity. I am physically at a normal weight.
My hypotheses:

• Depression/anxiety
  
• Sleep disorders such as sleep apnea, insomnia, or hypersomnia
  
• Chronic fatigue syndrome
  
• Long COVID
  
• Symptoms of a dust mite allergy
  
• Dental malocclusion and teeth grinding at night
  

Thank you to anyone who provides suggestions.

Hello, I would like to describe my current health issue to you, including my hypotheses about what might be causing it. I would like to hear your opinions on what it might be and how I should proceed. Keep in mind that I am already undergoing medical consultations and will have more, but so far, I have not reached a conclusion, so I would like as many opinions as possible.
If you need more information, feel free to ask.
For about two years, I have been experiencing facial pain and throat inflammation. I have never had these issues before. They started occurring after I had COVID-19, and I'm not sure if this is coincidental or a consequence of the virus. Initially, these pains were infrequent and mild, but in the past few months, they have become much more frequent and intense, significantly affecting my productivity, energy, and concentration. The pain is mostly noticeable upon waking, but sometimes it persists throughout the day. When the pain is less intense, it almost completely disappears after breakfast or lunch. However, when it is more severe, it doesn't go away at all, forcing me to rest in bed. Sometimes, even taking Tylenol does not relieve the pain.
The facial pain is located under my cheekbones, along my jaw, behind my eyes, and when it's very intense, at the center of my head just above my nose. The pain is continuous on both sides of my face and does not worsen with touch.
As for my throat, it feels like there's a constant lump at the lower part, as if it were scratched. It hurts continuously, not just when I swallow.
These pains occur year-round, regardless of the season.
Regarding medical checks and existing conditions, here are the details:

• I’ve had an eye exam, and there has been no deterioration beyond my existing myopia and astigmatism.
  
• I’ve been checked and do not have sinusitis.
  
• X-rays have shown no issues with my cervical spine.
  
• I likely clench my teeth at night and should be using a mouthguard.
  
• I need to have my wisdom teeth removed (I’ve only had one extracted so far) because they have not fully emerged and are pushing against the other teeth.
  
• I am allergic to dust mites.
  
• I have L4-S1 discopathy.
  
• Blood tests for thyroid issues showed no problems.
  
• I am currently on a treatment of Nicetile 500mg (L-acetylcarnitine HCl) under the assumption it might address nerve inflammation post-COVID, but there have been no changes after 15 days.
  

These issues also cause poor sleep quality. Despite sleeping for 7-8 hours, I wake up feeling tired and as if I need more rest, even if I did not exert myself physically or mentally the previous day.
From the beginning of May onwards, I experienced two weeks where every day I had a sore throat, headaches, and excessive tiredness, despite having taken antihistamines and cortisone spray for more than 20 days in April. I had a flu in early May and felt very ill; all symptoms (sore throat, cold, headache) were amplified and kept me in bed for several days, as if I had COVID. Even after the flu passed, I continued to experience throat lumps and headaches, along with excessive tiredness that rest did not alleviate.
I maintain a fairly balanced diet and engage in regular physical activity. I am physically at a normal weight.
My hypotheses:

• Depression/anxiety
  
• Sleep disorders such as sleep apnea, insomnia, or hypersomnia
  
• Chronic fatigue syndrome
  
• Long COVID
  
• Symptoms of a dust mite allergy
  
• Dental malocclusion and teeth grinding at night
  

Thank you to anyone who provides suggestions.

What's up all! 4th Wall here! I finally have power returned to my home, and can play a little catch up! This one's a heavy hitter, No NSFW needed (I hope) but if you've got kids, be warned.
First, Previous, Next
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A bright flash of blues and whites spat a greyish black object into normal space a mere one hundred Clicks from physical asteroid cloud that provided a natural barrier into the Lurix system. USN Olyvia’s drives instantly flared to life, and she made for the outer edges of the asteroid field with a purposeful stride. The senior Crew was at hand, having alternated shifts so they were well rested for this endeavor. Captain Correllus Grarzia shifted in his chair slightly, watching with interest as his star helmsman switched from his standard control configuration to a more “analog” twin joystick and pedals. ‘The kid really should be piloting a fighter’ he mused just as the young lad turned to look at him. “Ready, skipper”

“Take us in. All ahead slow.” Cory ordered calmly, before keying up the ship wide broadcasting channel. “This is the captain. We’ve just entered the Lurix system. Rig for silent running. I repeat, rig for silent running.” All across the ship, nonessential systems were shut down; their lack of electronic signature aiding the stealth coating on the bulky former troop transport. In engineering. Patrick, Cammy, and the rest of their section powered down a large portion of the larger systems onboard.

Life support was set to emergency backup, with old school oxygen candles lit in special housings that allowed their life-giving emissions to be circulated throughout the ship. Each major section of the vessel had their own supplies of these low-tech solutions, and Olyvia carried enough of these candles to survive for several days without functioning life support if needed.

Only a few were lit this time, using them as an augmentation to allow for minimal use of their perfectly functioning life support systems; and Cammy returned from the compartment just in time to aid in shutting down two thirds of Olyvia’s fusion reactors. This was not usually part of the silent running protocol, but Cory had added it for this mission. While they knew where their target would be, they still knew very little about what defenses awaited them inside the system.

Patrick keyed up the mic, “Engineering reporting in, silent running.”

*acknowledged* came a voice back. And Patrick leaned back in his chair just as Cammy arrived. “Well, that’s that.” He sighed.

Cammy stepped behind his chair, rubbing his shoulders for a second, “candles are lit. Two per section. At this rate we won’t run out for a year.”

Patrick chuckled, standing before looking over at his team, “sandwiches are in the mess hall. Half go now, half after. We’ll wait and go with second shift.” The team nodded and soon. The room was half as full. “Hurry up, and wait” Patrick mused, and turned to the rest. “Hold’em anyone?”

Over the next several days, shifts were kept short with a high rotation frequency. Olyvia picked her way through the natural minefield created by a destroyed world, slipping between the dead planetary shards with deadly caution. She ran quiet, with all but minimal deflectors shut down, and a single detuned laser online on each of her flanks as a last resort against impacts. Cory, Jesse, Patrick, and Cammy met regularly to keep tabs on the ship’s progress. The admiral’s transmission had reached them in time, and the four of them, plus Jacky when she could pry herself from the infirmary, worked to formulate a plan to get into the freighter without killing everyone. They had Hera and Jacobs reports, but those reports also admitted to a certain degree of incredible luck on their part. Things could have gone very differently, and the murder of the freighter during the admiral’s capture operation hinted at a change in tactics from their foe.

Mackenzie’s Privateers had liberated several freighters since they began operations, keeping to their cover as “pirates” by leaving nothing big enough to betray their secrets behind. A few of the other captains had left pieces of inoperative Unity tech, strategically damaged and jettisoned after the fight, as red herrings to convince both the Vorath, and the Thermians that these “pirates” had somehow gotten ahold of Unity warships.


Cory stepped into the cargo bay to meet Patric and Camorra. They were tinkering, carefully he hoped, with one of Olyvia’s harpoon missiles. It was a project triggered by Cammy’s brilliant, if outlandish, idea. “We know these freighters all ran the same codes, and the same infrastructure in their computer cores. Why can’t we hack it. Human computing should be perfectly capable of it.” Cory remembered her words as he stepped up to the two, “at ease” he waved them away as they threatened to salute him, “how’s out little project coming.”


“See for yourself” Patrick smiled handing him a data pad.

Cory took the offered device, quickly scanning through the data, “All I see is Olyvia’s system logs. Did you give me the wrong one?”

Patric smiled evilly, “that is coming from the missile, we found a common power regulator chip that dam near all Delmar freighters use in their integrated core management. Our mole here mimicked that regulators protocols to get into one we installed in a conduit over there” he pointed to an open panel. “It’s designed to cycle through several common chip sets and protocols to get access.”

“You hacked Olyvia?” Cory asked, eyebrow raised in a combination of amusement and irritation.

“Well, “Cammy said calmly, “we had to test it, and Oly’s the only ship close enough…”

“I see…” Cory mused, “it will have to do, we will be reaching the edge of the field in three days, how many of these can you have ready?”

Patrick scratched the red stubble punctuating his jaw line. “Hmm two, maybe three, including that one.” He winced at his captain’s expression, “took us a minute to get the virus right, sorry.”

Cory sounded to himself like a broken record, “I guess that will have to do as well. I’ll leave it to you.” He turned to return to his office but was interrupted half way there by an urgent request for his presence on the bridge.

Jesse rose to greet him as Cory stepped into Olyvia’s command center, and he nodded towards the ready room off to the side. The two of them quickly stepped inside and Jesse closed the door. “Jesse, what’s this about” Cory asked, settling into his desk chair.

Jesse, his first officer, and battle born brother looked at him seriously, “The first of our stealth probes have made it into the system proper….. It’s not good” He tapped at his data pad before handing it to his captain, “The enemy is doing something big down there, and we don’t know what. What we do know, Is that there are three heavy cruisers in orbit, and three more destroyers in floating patrols around the system.”

Cory scrolled through the pad as his first officer made his report, pausing at the same information on the planet’s surface, “These are military installations. This makes no since. We haven’t had a use for Lurix in millennia. It’s always just been a haven for aquatic and semi aquatic species. Why didn’t our intel warn us of this.”

Jesse nodded grimly, “I don’t know for sure, but I have my suspicions.” He reached over, tapping at the tab to open a particular file Cory had yet to find. “We found these in orbit as well.” He pointed to a pair of Delmar constructed freighters, parked in orbit over the marsh world. “I authorized a single transmission to a single drone, uploading Patrick and Camorra’s hacking program into it, and we sent it to one of those freighters... this is what we found.”

Cory opened the indicated file, and felt bile rise in the back of his throat as he watched. “Ready a tight beam, send it back the way we came, Towards Simo.” Jesse looked at his captain in understanding. The risks of transmitting this close to the enemy was a grave risk. Measured against the information they just witnessed; however, it was an absolute necessity. Jesse took the offered tablet, “The Admirals need to see this…. Both of them.”

————————————————————


Clint Stevens groaned as his communicator beeped from his desk. It was a very early morning on a weekend, and Frie had let Natalie stay at her grandparents for the weekend. He quietly slipped from the entanglements of a profoundly comfortable Delmar goddess he had somehow been gifted with as his wife, and silently cursed the inevitable destruction of his plans. The Com was linked to his computer console, and Clint tapped the file as he sat down.

The file opened, beginning with a grim looking Corellus Grarzia who made an intro statement that froze Clint in his thoughts. Before he could begin to prepare himself, images flooded in that turned grogginess into razors edge consciousness ringing with a white hot fury. Frie was ripped from her slumber instantly, reaching for her biometric pistol safe as a response to the unbridled rage she experienced from her husband. It took her a moment to realize that they were not being attacked, and she rushed from their bed, neglecting even basic decency to be by his side.

The two of them watched the Horrors unfold. Children… small children of multiple different races, stacked in a freighter’s hold like cattle, being thrown food like one would an animal. Massive screens played, promising safety and full bellies should they only but kiss the hand of a severe looking Vorath female. All who had not, were treated to daily ice cold sprays mixed with random beatings. He watched as desperate older siblings attempted to shelter their kin from the abuse, often times paying the ultimate price for their valor.

Clint and Frie were spared a further assault on their senses by a beeping light, indicating an urgent call from Clint’s adopted brother. Frie slipped out of view, reaching for a night gown as a furious Mac, accompanied by an equal parts shocked and livid Lyrian, appeared on screen.


“You’ve seen it” Clint stated. There were no barriers between them, no formalities. Only pure truth.

“I have,” Mac rumbled. “Why is it always kids..”

Clint shook his head, “I can have a battle group there in two weeks. It’s not soon enough, but.”

Mac nodded sharply, “I’m redirecting everyone not on critical missions. Simo and Kid are already there with Olyvia. Wisconsin is enroute. We will await your arrival….. Clint…” Clint’s eyes met Mac’s in a joined promise that reached across time and space.

“No, there won’t.” Clint answered, responding to Mac’s unspoken statement.

___________________________________________________________

A week later, The Chancellor Thomas Durrant of the Sol Federation perused the latest transmissions from Unity space. He was due for reelection this coming fall, and it was a close race. His opponent was labelling him a Warmonger, as he was an outspoken proponent of a more active role in the struggle against the Vorath, and it was working. The points were closing in the polls, and The Chancellor had not come out on top with the latest debate results. Humanity simply was not interested in further conflict. For the first time in human history, the vast majority of the Human race was content with peace.

The Chancellor took a sip of his mug as he opened a file from Admiral Stevens marked priority, but not top secret and promptly spit the contents in his mouth back into the mug. It was a complete file on some kind of intelligence operation, and Durrant almost wondered if it had been sent to him in error. The gruesome cover video dispelled that notion as the leader of Humanity itself watched horrors thought long dead play out in front of him. Several minutes later, he closed the file, and opened a message prompt.


“Viktor, are you up.” He typed.

*Yea, Tom. I’m up, the campaign ain’t gonna run itself into the ground.*

Durrant snorted at the dark humor, “Viktor, I was sent something. It changes… everything” he typed, attaching the cover video, and the longer form surveillance recording he had found inside the file from Clint. Several minutes passed in tense silence before…

*Jesus Christ, Tom.*

Tom Durrant took a long slow breath, “Do you still have your man at The Post.” He paused before sending, knowing what he was asking.

*Yea… yea I do, Tom. Are you sure you want to do this. This has ‘it will blow up in my face’ written all over it.*

“I know, but this bigger than me. Do it, and announce a press conference to follow if The Post runs with it.” Durrant typed and sent the last message, closing down his console. He stood slowly, feeling his age for the first time in recent memory, and walked heavily to bed.

The Post ran with the story. In the next 48 hours, the “leaked” scenes of tortured children, some barely more than infants ripped its way into Humanities Psyche. The revelations of what exactly was going on behind Vorath lines assailed Humanity, spurring many to call for blood, and Others to cry hoax. Around and around the political commentators debated, and redebated the shocking footage.

Chancellor Thomas Durrant followed through on his word, and was now stepping up to the platform and the Microphone as promised. He stood there for a full minute, meeting the eyes of as many of the hundreds of reporters before him as he could. The weight of his expression prompted a flurry of flashes as camera drones captured the image. Durrant allowed all of this to happen, waiting until the din of activity settled into a heavy silence. “People of Humanity… By now, you have undoubtedly seen the shocking pictures from the far side of the galaxy. Many of you believe it to be a hoax, a desperate ploy for political points. Allow me to be clear. This is no hoax, I received these disturbing images directly from Admiral Clint Stevens, who is marshalling the forces at his disposal as we speak. He aims to do something about these orbital concentration camps, and I support his actions with the full backing of my authority as Chancellor of the United Sol Federation.”

Durrant paused, letting the information sink in before continuing, “to answer the question as to whether this is a political ploy for points. Let me be perfectly clear, I alone released the footage from inside those torture ships, and I do not care if you believe it to be a political ploy. If Humanity can see the atrocities committed to the young innocents in those images and refuse to stand up for them; I no longer would wish to lead that Humanity. Yes, we are few compared to what we once were, but we have a strength that cannot be fathomed by those who chose to side with pure evil. Make no mistake, any being that is capable of torturing and murdering children deserves the title.” The Chancellor of United Sol skewered the silent crowd with a withering gaze, “All of you here know that I have been an ardent supporter of taking a more active role against this pure evil, and my opponent has made a great many statements regarding my supposed “warmongering”. I believe that to debate him further on this matter is as wasteful as it would be irrelevant. As such, I am suspending my campaign immediately. Pending permission from donors and the campaign review board, I will be donating the totality of my campaign war-chest to the purchase of relief supplies and construction of rehabilitation facilities for these children.” Durrant paused as a wave of gasps swept through the room as a volley of flashes assaulted his eyes. “Holding the position of leader of the Human race seems so insignificant in comparison,” he said softly, almost to himself before scanning the crowd. “The election is 4 months away. If you wish to reelect me, so be it; but know this.” Thomas Durrant rose to his full height, “If you elect me this fall, know that I will use the full weight of this office to unleash the full might of Humanity upon this evil, or I will resign from my post and travel to Unity space myself.”

With that. Chancellor Thomas Durrant spun on his heals and marched off the stage.
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If you made it this far, Thank You! I hope you enjoyed the episode. If this if your first time seeing this series, I hope you will join us from the beginning. I do have a patreon that has extra content that is not main story arc, but still cannon shorts, as well as exclusive content from some of my other series. If you believe I've earned it, feel free to give it a look; but know that just coming to hang is already enough.
Have a wonderful rest of your day.
First, Previous, Next Patreon

A-to-Z Reasons For Not Smoking

Smoking damages almost every organ of the body, not just lungs. People are not aware of the extent of damage smoking causes. Following are 26 easy-to-remember reasons why smoking is so dangerous.

• A — Aging
  • Smoking speeds up one’s aging. Causes wrinkles prematurely.
• B — Bad keystone habit
  • Smokers are more likely to pick up other bad habits, like alcohol, hard drugs etc. They meet other smokers and might pick up their bad habits too.
• C — Cancer
  • Not just lung cancer. It can cause mouth cancer, throat cancer, and many other cancers.
• D — Diabetes Type 2
  • Smoking increases chances of getting Diabetes Type 2. Symptoms may include increased thirst, frequent urination, hunger, fatigue, blurred vision, poor wound healing.
• E — Erectile Dysfunction (ED)
  • Increases ED in males and infertility in both males and females.
• F — Fatigue
  • Smokers easily feel fatigued after a physical activity. They feel less energetic.
• G — Guilt
  • Smoking breeds guilt and shame. “What am I doing to my body? I have no control or what?”
• H — Heart diseases
  • Smoking can permanently damage your heart and blood vessels, leading to cardiovascular disease. Smoking can also cause coronary heart disease, which is the narrowing of blood vessels that carry blood to the heart.
• I — Immunity
  • Smoking reduces one’s immunity, making one more prone to falling ill to bacteria and viruses and other diseases easily.
• J — Jaw and TMJ problems
  • Smoking can lead to dental problems, including gum disease and tooth loss, which can contribute to jaw pain and temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorders.
• K — Kidney diseases
  • Leads to poor blood flow to the kidneys and causes kidney damage over time. Can also cause kidney cancer.
• L — Lungs problems
  • Diseases like Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and Emphysema. Above all, lung cancer.
• M — Memory and Cognitive Decline
  • Smoking can negatively impact memory and cognitive function. Smoking can lead to a decline in memory, cognitive flexibility, and global cognition. Smoking can also negatively impact attention, processing speed, and executive functions.
• N — Nicotine Addiction
  • Nicotine causes cravings and dependency. It reaches the brain within seconds, creating neurochemical hooks that lead to a strong addiction.
• O — Odour
  • Breath, clothes, car, house stink
• P — Passive/SecondHand smoking
  • A smoker is more likely to be with other smokers and thus inhale more secondhand smoke. As if first hand smoke wasn’t enough.
• Q — Quality of life deterioration
  • Smoking affects overall quality of life, leading to decreased physical health, mental well-being, and social interactions. Smokers often experience a lower quality of life compared to non-smokers.
• R — Restlessness
  • Smoking can cause restlessness and anxiety. Nicotine withdrawal symptoms include irritability and difficulty concentrating, leading to an overall sense of unease.
• S — Stroke
  • Smoking is a major risk factor for stroke, increasing the risk by three to four times. Smoking causes blood to thicken and clot in veins and arteries, which can block blood flow to the brain.
• T — Taste and smell
  • One’s sense of taste and smell deteriorates.
• U — Ulcers
  • Smoking can be a risk factor for peptic ulcer disease, which can cause stomach ulcers
• V — Vitamin absorption reduces
  • Smoking impairs the absorption of essential vitamins and nutrients, such as vitamin C and E, leading to deficiencies and associated health problems.
• W — Weakening of bones and muscles
  • Smoking contributes to osteoporosis and muscle degeneration. It reduces bone density and interferes with the body's ability to repair muscle tissue.
• X — eXtra effects
  • Smoking can cause negative cause-and-effects chain reactions in life. For example, somebody sees you smoking somewhere -> makes them see you in a bad light -> in turn causes them withholding a benefit in future. It’s like bad karma.
• Y — Yellowness and Discoloration
  • Smoking causes discoloration, leading to yellowing of teeth, nails, and skin. It also causes lips to darken and become discolored over time due to reduced blood flow and exposure to harmful chemicals.
• Z — Zzzz
  • Smoking affects Sleep quality.

A-to-Z Reasons For Not Smoking
Smoking damages almost every organ of the body, not just lungs. People are not aware of the extent of damage smoking causes. Following are 26 easy-to-remember reasons why smoking is so dangerous.

• A — Aging
  • Smoking speeds up one’s aging. Causes wrinkles prematurely.
• B — Bad keystone habit
  • Smokers are more likely to pick up other bad habits, like alcohol, hard drugs etc. They meet other smokers and might pick up their bad habits too.
• C — Cancer
  • Not just lung cancer. It can cause mouth cancer, throat cancer, and many other cancers.
• D — Diabetes Type 2
  • Smoking increases chances of getting Diabetes Type 2. Symptoms may include increased thirst, frequent urination, hunger, fatigue, blurred vision, poor wound healing.
• E — Erectile Dysfunction (ED)
  • Increases ED in males and infertility in both males and females.
• F — Fatigue
  • Smokers easily feel fatigued after a physical activity. They feel less energetic.
• G — Guilt
  • Smoking breeds guilt and shame. “What am I doing to my body? I have no control or what?”
• H — Heart diseases
  • Smoking can permanently damage your heart and blood vessels, leading to cardiovascular disease. Smoking can also cause coronary heart disease, which is the narrowing of blood vessels that carry blood to the heart.
• I — Immunity
  • Smoking reduces one’s immunity, making one more prone to falling ill to bacteria and viruses and other diseases easily.
• J — Jaw and TMJ problems
  • Smoking can lead to dental problems, including gum disease and tooth loss, which can contribute to jaw pain and temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorders.
• K — Kidney diseases
  • Leads to poor blood flow to the kidneys and causes kidney damage over time. Can also cause kidney cancer.
• L — Lungs problems
  • Diseases like Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and Emphysema. Above all, lung cancer.
• M — Memory and Cognitive Decline
  • Smoking can negatively impact memory and cognitive function. Smoking can lead to a decline in memory, cognitive flexibility, and global cognition. Smoking can also negatively impact attention, processing speed, and executive functions.
• N — Nicotine Addiction
  • Nicotine causes cravings and dependency. It reaches the brain within seconds, creating neurochemical hooks that lead to a strong addiction.
• O — Odour
  • Breath, clothes, car, house stink
• P — Passive/SecondHand smoking
  • A smoker is more likely to be with other smokers and thus inhale more secondhand smoke. As if first hand smoke wasn’t enough.
• Q — Quality of life deterioration
  • Smoking affects overall quality of life, leading to decreased physical health, mental well-being, and social interactions. Smokers often experience a lower quality of life compared to non-smokers.
• R — Restlessness
  • Smoking can cause restlessness and anxiety. Nicotine withdrawal symptoms include irritability and difficulty concentrating, leading to an overall sense of unease.
• S — Stroke
  • Smoking is a major risk factor for stroke, increasing the risk by three to four times. Smoking causes blood to thicken and clot in veins and arteries, which can block blood flow to the brain.
• T — Taste and smell
  • One’s sense of taste and smell deteriorates.
• U — Ulcers
  • Smoking can be a risk factor for peptic ulcer disease, which can cause stomach ulcers
• V — Vitamin absorption reduces
  • Smoking impairs the absorption of essential vitamins and nutrients, such as vitamin C and E, leading to deficiencies and associated health problems.
• W — Weakening of bones and muscles
  • Smoking contributes to osteoporosis and muscle degeneration. It reduces bone density and interferes with the body's ability to repair muscle tissue.
• X — eXtra effects
  • Smoking can cause negative cause-and-effects chain reactions in life. For example, somebody sees you smoking somewhere -> makes them see you in a bad light -> in turn causes them withholding a benefit in future. It’s like bad karma.
• Y — Yellowness and Discoloration
  • Smoking causes discoloration, leading to yellowing of teeth, nails, and skin. It also causes lips to darken and become discolored over time due to reduced blood flow and exposure to harmful chemicals.
• Z — Zzzz
  • Smoking affects Sleep quality.