Hi everyone. I'll try to keep it as short as I can.
I have a friend at work whom I love (platonically) a lot. This person has unknowingly saved my life, which is why I value our friendship so much. However, they seem to have a very hard time dealing with emotions, can be extremely short-sighted and sometimes downright hurtful. They'll say anything that comes up in their thoughts. Normally this doesn't phase me much and I can deal with it because I know they're just like that and 99% of their comments and remarks are playful, not malicious.
A lot of people like this person for their outgoingness, enthusiasm, always upbeat and bubbly personality. But the same people have told me they can be an absolute pain in the ass, self-centered, mean, oblivious to other people's feelings and very avoidant when it comes to conflict. I have never experienced this until yesterday.
I told them something that happened to me (my beloved cat died) and that I did very soon adopt another one, and they reacted in an extremely hurtful way. Told me I didn't have respect for my old cat, that I apparently only liked the 'idea of having a cat' and didn't love my deceased cat enough because I didn't take time to mourn her. That really struck a nerve with me because I can mourn and love at the same time and circumstances made me have a new cat so soon. But my friend never even asked about that, they just had their opinion ready to fire at me. I tried explaining it but they just kept repeating the same hurtful thing. I shut down and ignored them for the rest of the hour, and also left early because their remarks sat so wrong with me and made me very angry.
Then later that day this friend texts me asking what was wrong, so I told them that their blatant and harsh opinion didn't sit right with me and that I didn't expect such a hurtful thing coming from a friend whom I respected and valued. They responded with 'I thought it was that. That wasn't my intention. It's your life. You shouldn't care about others' opinions and just do whatever you want'.
To me, this just made it worse because they didn't say sorry, but rather emphasized that they still hold that opinion and that I just shouldn't care about it. That can be true and they can have whichever opinion they want to have, but why say it? Why say such a shitty thing when you know someone is hurting?
I replied again explaining why what they said was so hurtful to me and that I thought it was pretty disrespectful towards me as well. That I thought we were friends and you don't joke about the death of loved ones (even if they are pets), let alone make malicious comments about them. Not to anyone but especially not friends. It's not even about their opinion on the matter because they can think whatever, but is it really too much to ask a little compassion from a friend?
They said 'Well I'm only human!'
I again told them they just hurt me, and that sure they are human, but so am I, and humans have emotions.
They replied 'I hope you are doing well, take care of yourself'.
ZERO reaction to the things I said. None. Not an apology, not an explanation, not confirming/denying we were indeed friends and they may have crossed a line, NOTHING. Just literal empty words, a totally illogical reply to what I had sent them.
I'm seeing them at work again tonight and I don't know what to do. Apparently I completely misjudged our relationship (??) and they simply don't value me at all(??). I don't know whether to go up to them and ask to talk, juat completely ignore them or something else. I can't avoid them completely so ignoring them would be extremely uncomfortable and obvious. But will talking even help? What do I say??
I don't want to lose this friendship, if it even ever was one. I don't want to become strangers with this person and giving them the cold shoulder forever doesn't feel right. But I also don't want to just let this slide and let them get away with hurting me so badly as a joke.
If anyone has any ideas as to how to approach this conflict.. that would be very much appreciated. Thank you ❤️
Also please just accept that losing my pet was and is just very hurtful to me, and opening my house and heart for another cat in need has helped me a lot. Your opinions on how I am handling it are 100% valid, but please be a little gentle.

So basically my Mum died six years ago, around the same time as my Grandad, and at about the same time my husband nearly got deported when his visa was declined. We had a one year old at the time. They both died on ITU and I was an ITU nurse and found it too triggering so I left my job and changed area. My Dad has BPD and NPD so he was a total disaster and awful after Mum died and we had to worry about him and the inquest. Fell pregnant again, had a difficult pregnancy during COVID which was triggering because everyone on the TV was dying in the same way that my Mum had. Moved house during COVID which was stressful, our cat dropped dead after vomiting blood aged 4 with heart failure. Had baby, when he was 5 months old he became critically ill and we spent 7 months in hospital with him, he had sepsis 6 times nearly died several times from all the complications of a pancreas tear. I was signed off with stress. Work weren't supportive when I tried to return as I was having panic attacks and needed adjustments made, so I left. That, plus all the time off when baby was sick took its toll financially. Still, the year out of work was the best we have had. Nothing happened, it was bliss. I finally found a job I could return to and be trained up in and that was an extremely anxiety inducing year, since I was out of work (nursing) for three years by then and it was very stressful to get back into it. Fast forward to this year where my Nan had a stroke and deteriorated and died within 10 days. My Dad dealt with the whole process really badly so I had to step in several times to help her. Around the same time my wonderful father in law got diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and is very much end of life now. Which is heartbreaking. And my husband is up helping his family and saying goodbye to his Dad, and I am home with my two young kids and trying to work out how I can manage to work this weekend as we have the smallest support network ever, which is ever-diminishing, and work are putting pressure on me to turn up. They have been really patient in general but also, what do you want me to do?! I'm not a robot and I can't just ignore it all because you're short-staffed?! I am literally right at the end of my tether and when the stress gets too much, I get really bad abdomen pains and if that happens I wont be able to work anyway! I'm now at the stage where I just want a different life. This one is shit.

So we can all agree that meeting were/are mind numbingly boring. But most of us have at sometime had that moment where something has been said or done during the meeting that has made us get a fit of the giggles that have got the better of us and we've had to walk out and calm ourselves down. I'd be interested to hear your stories. I'll start with mine.
I was relatively newly married and so was my best friend, who just happened to be sitting behind me during the most boring public talk I've ever heard. This ancient elder gave a talk on how creation shows us God's love. He then said humans are the only animals that are designed to make love just facing their partners. Not much in that you may think. But then came a little whisper in my ear from my best friend who just said that just shows a complete lack of imagination to me. Might not sound much but to a new non-virgin it hit me really hard. I tried to control it but ended up with tears running down my face and making all those stupid noises where you are trying to keep laughter in and I ended up having to do the walk of shame to the back of the hall where I could get myself together. What made it even funnier was that an elder followed me out thinking I was crying because I was upset. I just said something about how it really hit me how much Jehovah loves us. To which I was giving an approving hug and pat on the back.
Come on then let's hear your tales of laughter!

It candidly sucked being surrounded by constant reminders that you’d lost the genetic lottery. Sure, it was easier than some people thought to get around the world without powers; it wasn’t like the government expected everyone to be a speedster or to be able to fly. Hell, a hundred years ago, nobody even had powers. The infrastructure was there. Life went on.
That said, staying cheery about the hand I’d been dealt was difficult. Enhanced perception was useful for a lot of things, from party tricks to always reading the fine print, but next to flight? Next to teleportation?
I’d gotten hung up on movement powers because I’d taken the bus to the bar, and the only superpower buses had was being late.
I was specifically at the bar for the sake of a blind date set up by my best friend; Todd was about two times my size and could throw a car across the street. His powers did nothing to help me with his current obsession with my dating life, but here we were. I supposed it was a fair obsession. I hadn’t been trying.
It honestly made sense that Todd had been keenly aware of romance since he’d met his soul mate. See, a strange thing with powers was that when you were around your soulmate, they were inexplicably stronger. Todd had met Soo-jung when she’d been on vacation in Crescent three years ago. They’d been inseparable since, and he’d been able to throw a car down three blocks instead of across the street.
Or so he claimed. Nobody was eager to volunteer their car for a demonstration, or anything else heavy and expensive, for that matter.
For my part, I hadn’t spent a lot of time guessing what would happen if I met my soulmate. It was a common train of thought for some, but I never found that it stopped at any fun stations. Instead, I indulged Todd’s meddling because he was my friend and bad dates at least made good stories.
“Gimme a sec, I’ll grab us another round,” Todd announced as he pushed out from our table. “Emma said she’s going to be here soon.”
“You bought the last one.”
“Yeah, now you can buy two in a row once Emma gets here and look generous. Think about it, man.”
“Sure,” I answered, but Todd was already walking away from the table and toward the bar.
Soo-jung leaned in. “You know he’s trying, right?”
“I know, maybe a little too much.”
“You don’t hear the half of it.”
“Oh, good.”
“I had to tell him to calm down when it came to buttering you up to Emma,” Soo-jung explained as she took a sip from her drink. “Sometimes I wonder about him.”
“I’m surprised he says anything nice about me.”
“He’d never say it to your face.” She watched Todd at the bar instead of looking at me during our conversation.
“Does that mean you’ll do it for him?”
“He trusts me to keep his secrets.”
“How about I suggest things and read your reaction?” I asked.
Soo-jung frowned in response before she pointedly rolled her eyes. She knew that reading reactions was one of my party tricks. If you couldn’t be powerful, you could at least read a room.
“Okay, fine. What do you know about Emma?”
“Her last name’s Tavish.”
“That’s it?”
“She works with Todd.”
“I knew that. He kept telling me she was a co-worker.”
“Todd thinks she’s cute.”
“He told you that?”
“No, but he has high standards for you.”
“That’s all the detail you have?”
“Todd’s not allowed to talk about work at hom- Hey, honey.”
Todd was back at the table holding all three pints in one arm; he passed one to each of us despite Soo being less than halfway finished with her current drink. Once he’d finished distributing, he turned to Soo-jung and asked her a question in broken Korean.
He’d been trying to learn, and he was still struggling. Not that I knew the language.
“Yes,” Soo-jung responded in English, “we were talking about Emma; no Korean around Toby. It’s rude.”
“I thought you wanted me to practice?”
“You can practice at home.”
“So we were talking about Emma,” Todd jumped back to the previous topic instead of discussing his inconsistent study of Korean. “Awesome woman, perfect for you, man.”
“What makes you say that?” I asked.
“Oh, she sucks too.”
“Ah, thanks.”
“He means powers-wise,” Soo-jung stepped in.
“So you do know something about her,” I pointed out.
“Something? I’ve been telling Soo everything since we got in the car to come here.” Just as Todd finished, he flinched. Soo had kicked him under the table. “But it wasn’t much, really.”
“What do I get to know?”
“I don’t want to taint your expectations.” He pushed his empty glass away, swapping it with the new one. “But can I be serious for a second?”
I considered it. “Sure.”
“She’s like my boss’, boss’ boss. So best behavior.”
“Wait. Seriously?” I leaned in. Todd worked for the CPRU, which meant that she had to be a heavy hitter if she was high ranked in the city’s power regulation department. “She’s—”
“Not quite.” He backpedaled. “We share a building. She’s straight DPR.”
I blinked twice at that. “Way to set me up to fail.”
“You should believe in yourself,” Soo cut in.
“Todd I w—”
“And she’s here.” Todd had turned his attention away from me and toward his phone. “Hope you’re ready to meet your soulmate.”
“Honey, don’t set that expectation.”
The bar’s front door opened, and I was the only one who could hear it over the atmosphere. I glanced over, and there she was.
She was stunning by any definition, but especially mine. Maybe it was a strange way to describe someone, but she looked beautifully meticulous, from brunette hair to olive skin, to her light blue jacket; everything was in place, and everything about her was gorgeous. Assuming that was Emma, I owed Todd big time.
“Okay, that can’t be her, right?” I asked Todd. After a second, without a response, I checked to see if he was waving at her, but he was stock still, a stupid grin plastered over his face. “Todd?”
Holy shit. The DPR had some crazy people on their roster, but this- I waved a hand in front of Todd’s face and snapped my fingers, then caught the sound of a single cautious heel clicking against the floor.
I stood up from the table and looked back at the door. She’d taken one step into the bar but had gotten caught in the same shock I had. “Emma?” I asked.
She snapped her attention to me -god, her eyes were- but she just looked confused.
“Toby,” I explained, “I’m Todd’s friend.” I motioned over to Todd’s still body and took the first steps to say hello. “This is really impressive. I didn’t think this was possible. It’s cool to meet someone wh—”
“I’m not doing this,” she said. “This is impossible. How are yo—”
“Trust me, this isn’t in my…” We stared at each other for a moment. Somehow, time stopped more than it already was.
“Holy shit.” We both said it at once.
“So this isn’t you?” she asked. Her eyes were still meandering around the frozen bar instead of staying in the conversation with me.
“No, it’s not,” I walked along her gaze and ended up against the bar counter, “did Todd tell you what my power was?”
“He just told me you wouldn’t mind having me around,” Emma answered, which somehow just brought up more questions.
“Enhanced perception,” I grabbed a drink off of the bar to see if I could; As soon as I touched it, it seemed to animate back to life. “What do you mean, ‘mind having you around’?”
“I dampen powers,” she explained, a little quieter than anything else she’d said, “make them weaker, hard to use. The technical definition is long and wordy so…” She sighed as she watched me slosh the beer around. “It’s a lot of trouble, really.”
“Probably good for work,” I offered.
“Pretty much the whole reason I have my job, but Callum wouldn’t admit that.” She approached, but there wasn’t an open seat near where I was standing, nor could we ask for someone to move. “Callum is—”
“Callum Rehsman, head of the D.P.R for the past six years,” I stepped in, “sorry, comes with the perception thing.”
“Honestly, I’m just glad I don’t have to explain it,” Emma took to leaning against the bar instead of walking over to a seat. She undid the top button of her shirt, which was probably too high for a date, anyway. “Emma Terish. Ring any bells up there?”
“No.”
“And you’re?”
“Toby Vander,” I put down the beer to offer my hand, and it froze as soon as I let go. We both paid attention to that instead of the potential formal hello.
“So this isn’t you.” Emma reached for the glass and picked it up; once she did, it animated just like it had with me. “And it isn’t me…”
I swallowed nothing. We’d both said holy shit for a reason, but it felt impossible to admit it. Wasn’t there supposed to be a — Well, something? Anything?
Then again, we were stopping time, and what else could you ask for?
“Do you want a drink, Toby?” Emma asked. She vaulted herself over the bar with a frankly shocking amount of grace for someone in a pantsuit.
“Uh, sure.”
“I’d ask what you were drinking, but we might have limited options,” she was considering her new vantage point from behind the counter.
I took the opportunity to grab the drink I’d left behind on the table. “I’ll use the one I had.” I tapped Todd’s hand for posterity, and nothing happened to him. “Any idea what this might—”
“No idea,” she answered without letting me finish, “but my job involves dealing with unknown powers, so…” She tried to use the soda-gun and swore when it didn’t work. “You learn to roll with it until people cooperate.”
“You still think I’m doing this?”
“I know it’s not me, and there aren’t many options here with us,” she said as she ducked behind the bar and came back up with a lemonade cooler, “but I came here for a date, and I plan to have one. Been a long week.”
I returned to the bar, finding a seat now that she was on the other side. “I just need to establish that this isn’t me. I’m not trying to—”
“If it isn’t you and it’s not me stopping time around us, then someone is giving us a very private venue for our first date.”
“Isn’t that nice?”
“It really is.” She took a sip of her drink, then pulled it away before she had time to swallow. “Shit. Do you have cash?”
“I’ll cover you.” She frowned at that; clearly she wasn’t satisfied with someone else paying for everything. “Plus, you’re serving me tonight. So…” That seemed to be enough plausible deniability to satisfy her. “Cheers?”
“Cheers.”
Throughout drink one, we were casting nervous glances around the paused bar; by drink five, we were laughing, just the two of us. Hours dripped by with the free beer… or they didn’t… It was hard to tell.
Emma added her sixth can to her pyramid and composed herself. “Okay, okay, okay. One second.” She took a deep breath. “This has been so much fun, but I told Todd I’d tell him when I got here so” — she needed another second to find her verbal footing — “can you stop this now?”
“Stop what?” I was halfway through a sip.
“This is the coolest power I’ve seen but—”
“It’s not me, I promise,” my insistence ended up sounding more like a drunk debate. The drunk part was accurate.
“So your power really is enhanced perception.”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Okay. You’re not lying.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because that’s lame and—” She stopped herself. “Shit, sorry.”
“I am so used to it.”
“You wouldn’t say that drunk if you could stop time is my point,” she almost ducked down to grab another drink but thought better of it. “So, that makes us…”
We’d reached this impasse several times in the last hours. I scanned her. The lines on her face. The size of her irises. She was worried. Apprehensive.
So I said it first.
“We’re soul mates.”
She looked down and to the left, considering instead of answering.
“Why else would one of us display a power we’d never seen before? Unless you’re right and someone was stopping time for everyone but me and—”
“And the woman who’s immune to powers,” she cut in. “Maybe we are soul mates, but turn it off.”
“It’s not—”
“Toby, please.”
“I don’t—” I stopped short and instead tried even though I didn’t know how. My perception was passive. I didn’t get to choose whether I used it. Was there supposed to be a switch somewhere inside my head? Was I—
How long had it been at this point? Six, seven hours? We’d planned to meet pretty late and it would almost be light out by now. She was right. We had to get—
“I don’t know how,” I admitted, “if it’s me.”
Emma opened her mouth to say something, then reconsidered. Her perfectly manicured nails were digging into the vinyl of the bar top.
“Okay. It’s been lovely, but if you getting here started this then,” I said as I stood up, “maybe I just need to leave, and that will turn it off so we can figure out what’s going on.” I took the first steps toward the door.
“That’s a good plan,” she nodded along with what she was saying, like she was convincing herself, “I’ll reach out to you. It was an excellent date.”
“Let Todd know for me,” I added as I reached the door; a second later, I stepped into the chilled early-fall air. The door didn’t shut behind me, so I kept walking until I would have been out of eyesight.
Then I stopped.
Should I have turned around? What were the chances that she was my soul mate? What was I leaving behind if I didn’t see her again? It was a dumb thought, but the idea of walking away started gnawing at me.
But what choice did I have? In front of me, a couple was frozen in the middle of a quiet conversation on the way to the bar. Soul mates only affected one another when they were close by. I took a few more steps and started to sprint.
I was three blocks away when the world stuttered around me. My vision blurred, and the moonlight was shattered by the sun. I stumbled, almost crashing into a woman dressed like she was on her way to brunch.
Shit. I’d left my jacket at the bar, but—
I checked my watch; 8:06 AM.
​
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Quick Summary:

This post will contain spoilers for both Season 15, and Restoration.
With the release of Restoration, Red vs Blue has finally come to an end, and it was a pretty solid ending for the most part amid a few flaws here and there, but most I think would agree it was a Satisfying ending. However as I said before it has a few problems. One being is that we don't know if Restoration actually happend, or if it's also a simulation much like The Shisno Trilogy, and Zero.
Secondly even though some people didn't like The Shisno Trilogy retconing it removes all of the major delevompment certain characters went through. Such as Grif, Donut, and Washington. I think The Shisno Trilogy defenitntly handled their characters better then Restoration did. So I'm going to give my version of what happend after the battle on The Staff of Charon, and see if we can fix some of the mistakes of both The Shisno Trilogy, and Restoration.

Season 15 Prelude:

So in my rewrite I'm going to have both Season 15, and Restoration happen, but there will be some tweeks, and changes added to them. One such change will be Tucker's descent into becoming The New Meta, rather then it just happening offscreen. We see this through Tucker behaving much more differently then he normally would. He often gets angry for unknown reasons, or behaves more violently then he normally would. All of this is a result of him being influinced by both Sigma, and Omega. Personally I think Omega would help Sigma with his goals as long as Sigma gave Omega something in return.

Season 15:

Now let's get into the actual Season. So Season 15 Episode 1 Prolouge goes the same as it does in the original, with The Blues and Reds attacking a UNSC base, and killing everyone there. Dylan Andrews then does her report with Frank, she deciedes to track The Reds and Blues down, Frank is replace by Jax, and together they head to Blood Gulch, meet sister, and VIC, Dylan makes a deal with VIC that he will give her "Three wishes", and then she, and Jax go to Sidewinder, meet Specncer, and Encounter The Blues and Reds. So far Season 15 seems to be going exactaly the same as it did before right, well here's where the first difference comes. Dylan doesn't immendidlty put together put together that they aren't the real Reds, and Blues. This is because Surge actually has a shotgun, and they all have voice filters to sound like the Reds, and Blues.
Anyways after all that instead of going to Chorus, Dylan and Jax decied to go to other places The Reds and Blues have been starting with Zanzibar. There they wouldn't find much, but I think Dylan would at least try to see if she could find any information on the computer Gamma hacked, but probably wouldn't find anything.
There next stop would be Valhalla. There they would first check out The Blue Base, find nothing, and then they would check out The Red Base, where they would find the holgraph training thing Sarge had Lopez built. Once again they wouldn't find anything they would help with their investagation.
Oh by the way the call between Dylan and James would still happen in Episode 4 at Zanziabar and it would go the same as in the original Season.
Anyways then then go to the sandy place with The Temple, then where the Reds and Tucker got destroyed by Tex, and even where they confronted The Director, but they find nothing, and Dylan is about to Give Up when Jax suggest that why not go to the place The Reds and Blues were last known to be, Chorus. Dylan calls Jax a genius, and they head of to Chours. Again this goes exactaly the same as it did in the original version, but with one major difference, Doc would be on Chours working at Donald Doyle General Hosptial as Doctor Grey's assisatant, but once he here's about The Reds and Blues he too like Sister, Grey, and Kimball believes that The Reds and Blues wouldn't go evil, despite all they've put him through. So after getting the info from Kimball, Dylan, Jax, and Doc would all go to The Reds and Blues are on. Doc apologizes to Grey for leaving, but she assures him it's okay, and that he wasn't really that good at opperating, no offense of course. Anyways they go to the planet, the same Star Wars Parody scene happens, and Dylan finally meets The Real Reds and Blues. Cabooose still falls of the cliff, The Reds and Blues kind of have a small reaction to Doc like "Oh Doc what are you doing here". Doc then tries to explain only for The Reds and Blues to say that "No one cares", then they tell their story. It's exactaly the same, but Carolina does point out Tucker's weird behavior from being influnced by Sigma, and Omgea, but they all just blow it off as a phase, and then they get the SOS from Church.
And that's where Season 15 would end. Now I'm sure some of you are going to question why I shorten Season 15 to only about 10 episodes instead of the Original 20, well that was because of Dylan and Jax. See one of my main issues with Season 15 was the lack of development the two new characters got. I mean what did we learn about either of them throughout the Season? Um Dylan was a reporter, Jax wants to make movies, Dylan has a husband she's distant from, and that's about it, and as soon as The Reds and Blues come back into the picture, both Dylan and Jax basically get sidelinded. For me that was my biggest disappointment from Season 15, and is the main reason why I added episodes of Dylan and Jax going to these other places The Reds and Blues have been was so we could learn more about Dylan and Jax.
One thing I think we could learn about is why Dylan is so distant from her husband, here's my take on the reason why. Dylan can't have kids. When Dylan gets the call from James, Jax could ask her why she's so distant from him, to which Dylan would say that it's none of his buisness, then Jax can drop it, and tell Dylan his life story, then in Chorus Lessons Dylan can tell Jax about her being unable to reproduce, she explains to him that other then being a reporter one of her biggest dreams was to be a mom, she and James tried so many times, but nothing worked, so they went to the doctors where they got the news that Dylan was infertal. This revlation devestated Dylan, and she started to distants herself from James, and burry herself in her work. James did suggest things like Adoption, or a Surragate Mom, but Dylan didn't want to do either of does. I know it's not the best story for Dylan, but I just wanted more from her and Jax, instead of them just being sidelinded after The Reds and Blues came back into the picture. Anyways onto the New Season 16.

Season 16:

So yeah Season 16 is just the rest of Season 15 honestly, and for the most part everything goes exactaly The Same. Grif quits still, Carolina and Washington go to search for their old Freelancer friends, and The rest of The Reds and Blues along with Dylan and Jax try to trace Church's message. Everything from their goes the same, including the meeting with Spencer. It's when they meet The Blues and Reds where it's different. When they first meet it goes basically the same where The Blues and Reds claim that they're the good guys, and its The UNSC who are the bad guys, but Tucker does not trust them one bit because they are still going around pretending to be The Reds and Blues, with Tucker even questioning how Dylan couldn't tell they were fakes. Anyways the go into the underwater base, and here's where we get some differences. First of all The Blues and Reds and not the originals, they are just copycats. Doc also never knew them, and there's a little moment of him asking if they have their own Doc, and getting kind of dissapointed that their isn't.
Here's another major difference. It's Sigma who convinces Tucker to not trust Dylan, and to instead trust The Blues and Reds, and espesically Temple. After that everything from Wash and Carolina's relationship getting forming, to The Blues and Reds capturing them goes the same.
Now we get to The Blues and Reds story of why they are doing all of this. Now like I said before they are not the originals like in the canon version of Season 15, and honestly coming up with a different story for them was hard, and this was all I could think of. They were part of The UNSC Resistance, and took part in the battle of the Sargaughcas in Season 9. We still get that whole think of Biff and Temple being friends, and Biff wanting to go home to be with his wife, but this time instead of him asking Temple to shoot him, he was already given permission to leave, and this would have been his last mission. Unfourtnetly he is killed during the battle by Carolina and Tex. As for why The Blues and Reds are pretending to be The Reds and Blues? They saw the article Dylan wrote and that's what gave Temple the idea to pretend to be The Reds and Blues.
Anyways The Reds, and Blues discover The Blues and Reds are evil, Doc, and Sarge join The Blues, and Reds, The Reds, and Blues are captured, Lopez gets launched into Space, runs into Locus, and gets Grif. Grif, Lopez, and Felix go to save The Reds and Blues, free Wash and Carolina, with Wash all loopy, Sarge apologizes, and the fire fight happens. Here we would also see more of Sigma, and Omega influnicing Tucker, primarily Omega during this part since Tucker is angry, and of course Wash gets shot in the Neck.
So after that everything goes exactaly the same as it does in the original with The Reds and Blues, Dylan, and Jax all heading to Earth to stop The Blues and Reds.
Okay now for the Final Battle aganist The Blues and Reds, for the most part it's the same. Sarge and Surge's fight to Sarge accidendtly killing Surge, Grif, and Simmons figthing Gene and leaving him, and Loronzeo getting kicked into space, as well as Cronut blowing up in The Tank, but surving.
Now for the differnces. First off Loco's machine is not a time machine, but it will still causes mass destruction, and possibly destroy the planet so it needs to be stopped. Tucker beats Buckey even worse then he does in the original, breaking nearly all of his bones. This is again because of Omega. Anyways once we get to the final battle against Temple it all goes the same. Temple accidently kills Loco, VIC dies stopping the Machine, and Loco gives Caboose some batteires for Freckles. Now for the differnces. First there's no door that opens to Blood Gulch, and Alpha Church, The Machine just gets destroyed by VIC. Donut still gets shot by a bolt of electricty, but it does nothig except give him a little jolt. Oh and everything that happend with Doc went the same.
Now for Temple's fate. This time Tucker actually kills Temple, quite violently to, shocking everyone. Carolina then says "Tucker, what have you done"? to which Tucker, who's voice is mixed with Sigma's says. "Tucker is gone, I am The Meta"! Tucker now complety controlled by Sigma runs off, gets into Dylan's ship and flies off leaving everyone in shock. Then The Chours crew comes with Sister who reuintes with Grif, and the others are informed of Wash's recover, but then Caboose ask what they are going to do about Tucker, which Carolina says she doesn't know. Season 16 ends with Tucker returing to the base where The Reds and Blues were stationed after Chorus. He opens a door, to a room where The Meta's old armor was stored. Tucker then puts on the Armor and faces the screen in a scene similar to when Maine became The First Meta.
So yeah Season 16 aka The Rest of Season 15 didn't have a lot of changes other then changing the Origins of The Blues, and Reds, and showing more of Tucker's desent into becoming The New Meta. So let's move onto The Final Season.

Restoration:

So I think the best place to start The Final Season is to have The Reds and Blues first go to Chorus to check on Wash. As for Dylan and Jax, they stay behind since they can't fight The Meta. Anyways The Reds and Blues arrive on Chorus, and Carolina goes to see Wash in the Hospital, she wants to tell him about what happend to Tucker, but Wash doesn't let her at first, and instead tells the story about his cat. He tells the story about five times, so Carolina ask Doctor Grey about what's going on, and she tells Carolina about Wash's Cerebal Hypoxia. Now here's where we get our first difference. Carolina tells Wash about his condition, and does not hide it from him. Wash of course is devestated after learning this, but isn't as angry as he was in the original Season since Carolina was honest with him, but then she tells Wash about Tucker, and this causes an argument between the two of them, Carolina wants Wash to stay behind on Chorus while she and the others take care of Tucker, but Washington is insitant that he comes along saying how Tucker is his friend, and he's not going to sit back while Tucker suffers. Try as she might Carolina cannot convince Wash to stay behind.
While that was going on The Reds and Blues come back with the Message from Church. Of coruse Carolina, is skeptical at first considering what happend with the last message from Church, but Epsilon, who somehow new about all of this is able to prove he is real.
Okay so that's basically it for differnces, as everything else goes the same as it does in the original film with the acception that Sister, Wash, Carolina, Donut, Lopez, and Doc are all there the whole time. There would also be more scences of Tucker trying to fight off Sigma's influnce
Now for The Battle on The Staff of Charon with The Meta, here is where we would see Wash's injury effecting him, and it gets to a point where The Meta is about to kill him, only for Doc to sacrfice himself to save him. So yeah Doc still dies, but this time it's onscreen. As for Sarge, he dies too, same way he does in the original film, but the difference is that Sarge doesn't choose to abandon Caboose at first, he dies saving Caboose.
Final battle in Blood Gulch is The Same, with Tex coming back, but also Junior too. They fight and defeat Sigma, and Free Tucker. Caboose then destroys the Memory Unit.
Now for the ending. Grif doesn't leave like he does in the original film, Simmons does still offer it to him, but Grif chooses to stay. One thing The Shisno Trilogy did good was Grif's character arc. He realized that he needs the others in his life, no matter how much he doesn't want to admit it, he went crazy when he was all alone. Washington's character was something else done well in The Shisno Trilogy, his struggle with Brain Damage, and having to come over it, which is one of the biggest reasons why I hate Zero when they just said that he somehow got cured from that offscreen.
Finally with everything fixed, The Reds and Blues all decied to remain on Blood Gulch. Red Base has Simmons, Grif, Donut, and Lopez, while Blue Base has Caboose, Tucker, Washington, Carolina, Sister, and Junior.
Oh one more thing, they also had a memorial for Doc too. Donut is the first one mouring Doc, with Simmons, and the others eventually joining as well, and it's here where they finally acknowledge all the terrible things they did to Doc over the years, and genuinally apologize to him, even if Doc can't here them

Conclusion:

And there we go, my rewrite of Season 15, and Restoration. I know it's not perfect, and believe me a billon other people could do a trillon times better then I ever could, but I just wanted to talk about my take on how I would try to handle The End of Red vs Blue.

I turned 26 yesterday and spent my birthday alone in my apartment. I cried on the couch as my cat tried to eat crumbs from my turkey sandwich. This loneliness made me realize my lack of community and genuine connections. Growing up, I constantly moved, preventing me from maintaining long-term friendships. I attended elementary school in one state, middle school in another, and high school across the country. After high school, we moved back to the U.S., settling in a new state where I've lived ever since. I have no family nearby; my parents are four hours away, and my extended family lives overseas. Despite being here for years, forming a strong social circle has been tough. I did my prereqs at community college and then joined a dental hygienist program with only 24 students, who were mostly older and married. Being the youngest, I missed out on bonding opportunities and the "quintessential college experience," which I still regret. I find myself lamenting the loss of that chaotic time of life where you're supposed to have fun and do shit you regret. Post-grad, connections faded as everyone moved on. I work in a small practice now, limiting any real social opportunities. Seeing others with more grounded upbringings or traditional college experiences makes me envious, like my coworker in her 50s, who is still close with her sorority sisters and even goes on annual trips.
My only close friend from my program moved away post-grad. I maintain contact with a few long-distance friends, but I really only have two solid local friends. But they're married with kids, while I'm single and childless, so just very different life stages. We still have infrequent meetups, like lunch or a catch up at their house, around 1-2x times a month. I've tried planning varied hangouts, but they're usually busy with family commitments or just not interested in a different vibe, so I let that go. I don’t have friends for spontaneous plans like drinks after work, wine-and-paint nights, or to ask to attend a concert with. There’s no one I can just call to hang out or invite over during the weekends.
I've been single for a year, and even during my previous two-year relationship, I longed for my own friends and a sense of community outside the relationship. My ex's friends were welcoming, but they never truly felt like mine, and those friendships vanished post-breakup. I never heard from them again, which I expected, but it was still hard. Despite thinking those friendships were genuine, I always knew they'd end if we broke up. My ex didn't get why I wanted my own connections, saying his friends should be enough for me. Even while with him, I tried meeting new people. I connected with some at my boxing studio; we had a group chat, mainly for session times. Those connections faded when I left. I had a hopeful start with a neighbor from the dog park. She asked for my number and we texted about meeting for brunch. She canceled the first time, then didn’t show up for the reschedule. I waited at the restaurant for 15 minutes before leaving. Hours later, she apologized, explaining her boyfriend came home early and she wanted to spend extra time with him. I had ditched plans with my then-boyfriend and his friends, excited to meet her, and felt like a dumbass afterward.
Navigating my twenties alone just feels isolating, like I’m missing out on an exclusive party while watching from the sidelines. My life revolves around work, my pets, and the gym, but otherwise, my social life is non-existent. My phone is as dry as the Sahara—I don’t get any regular texts or calls. Everything is routine and mundane. I deleted IG to stop the comparisons. I occasionally use Snapchat to keep in touch with some old friends. Tried Hinge last month, thinking dating may fill the void, but quickly realized that's not what I’m looking for. I want fulfillment through platonic connections, not romantic pursuits. I just feel like a passerby in my own life, craving spontaneity and excitement, but everything feels routine and mundane. Admitting this is a bit embarrassing, but I just hope I’m not alone in feeling this way. Any personal anecdotes or advice on making new friends and finding a sense of community later in life?

Xuefeng
First of all, we have to admit that the Bible is the accomplishment of the Ephraim which loyally records the Jewish history, explains the relationship between the God, Devil and human beings to the furthest degree, and gives the direction the human beings should take.
The Bible, the Koran, the Buddhist Scripture and the Tao Te Ching are the eternal and effective treasures and collections of human wisdom, teaching us how to behave and develop into the higher level of life space.
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”. The first sentence in the Bible did tell the truth. But the things covered by the cossack may not be the holly things. And the people wearing the sacred cassock may not be the abbot.
The problem with the Bible is that the God it introduces is not the genuine Greatest Creator.
We have known that the Greatest Creator has the 8 features. The Greatest Creator is unique and exclusive, amorphous, neutral, mysterious, impartial, merciful, supremely powerful and intelligent. The wisdom of the Greatest Creator is revealed through its creation of universe order, designing of LIFE program and knowing of the past and the future.
Then, does the God in the Bible have the above-mentioned 8 features?
Let’s explain this with examples.
The Betrayal of Adam and Eve
According to the Genesis, Adam and Eve were instigated to eat the fruit on the Wisdom Tree forbidden by the God in the Bible. Because they have violated the order of the God (in the Bible), they were repelled out of the Eden.
It indicates that the God in the Bible is a. incompetent; b. improvident; and c. unjust.
He is incompetent because he was a loser at the beginning. The first couple of human he created betrayed him. So can we still say it is supremely powerful?
Can we still believe in a “person” who often loses? The Great Flood had killed most of the human beings. What happened to them afterwards? They still wouldn’t listen to his words. The Moses Ten Commandments are actually the directives of the God in the Bible. Can you tell me how many of them are obeyed by the human being? Actually not even one. The God in the Bible seemed to know nothing about how to control the human beings. The only measure it takes is to voice warnings and threats against the human beings. Thousands of years has passed, the human beings remain the same. Is there no means to control the human beings? Or is there some other force constraining this Almighty God? If this is the case, is this God not sole or exclusive? For thousands of years, the human beings have been violating hisorder. What is he waiting for?
The God in the Bible is improvident because he didn’t know that Adam and Eve were going to betray him or the development trend of what he had created. Is this God, who is not able to predict the future or the past, still reliable? If the Earth is going to get out of the Solar System and this God knows nothing about it, how can he save the human beings? How can this GOD administer the deities, Buddha, celestial beings and Devils when he found it difficult to control the human beings? How can he manage the spacious Universe?
The God in the Bible is unjust because it cannot tell wrong from the right and because it is unreasonable.
Why would Adam and Eve betray the God in the Bible? There are three major reasons. First, the genetic structure of Adam and Eve had faults, or was imperfect. The life created by this God was now its own constraint. This angered the God very much. It is just like the house built by an architect who put every efforts was fallen and hit his own feet. Is the house or the architect that should be blamed?
The second reason they betrayed is that they were instigated and seduced by the snake. Adam and Eve are humans while behind the snake was the Devil Satan. The energy and wisdom of human beings can’t match those of the Devil. This God didn’t punish the Devil Satan. Instead, it imposed inflictions on Adam and Eve and drove them out of Eden. Is it fair? If a rapist raped an 8-year-old girl, would it be fair to blame the girl for her sexual organ and weakness instead of bringing justice to the rapist?
The third reason of betrayal, which is also the most important one, is the damned Wisdom Tree that can tell the good and evil. Who has planted it in the Eden and why? It’s just like putting a poisonous sweet on the dinner table for the kids. Or it’s like playing the porn video for the young girls while teaching them to retain their innocence. Would a moral person do such a thing? Isn’t this “person” who planted the Wisdom Tree in the Eden has caused the betrayal of Adam and Eve?
Besides, does this God, who had created Adam and Eve, has other measures to take rather than driving Adam and Eve out of the Eden? Is it fair not to give them a second chance simply because they have made only one mistake? Does one mistake justify their life-long sins?
Jesus came to the Mortal World to atone for the human beings’ sins. According to the Bible, all the people have their “original sin”. Where does the “original sin” come from? Actually, they are inherited from Adam and Eve, the ancestors of human beings, whose sins were formed because they had eaten the fruit on the damned Wisdom Tree.
When we are born, we have the “original sin” inherited from Adam and Eve. The “cross” on our back was much too heavy. According to this logic, “the son of a thief is always a thief”, “the son of a criminal is always a criminal”, and “the son of an emperor is always an emperor”. That’s why in ancient China, in the feudal period in particular, “If a man committed crime, all his family members would be sentenced to death”, or “If a man attained the Tao, even his pets ascended to Heaven”. This also explains why the thrones can only be passed on to the next generations of royal families. This is because it complies with the logic in the Bible.
If somebody has sins, the God in the Bible and the Satan sined first. Is it humanitarian to inflict on billions of humans throughout the history simply because of the wrongdoings of Adam and Eve? Why not executing Adam and Eve and creating a new pair of humans at the time? Is creating a new couple so difficult for the God in the Bible?
All the people are born with sins. This is why each of us comes to the Mortal World to endure the sufferings. But the sins are not inherited from our ancestors. They are made by oursleves in the previous cycle of life. If we don’t have sins, we would all have become Buddha or celestial beings.
Ten Plagues of Egypt
According to the Exodus, when Moses and Aaron, in the capacity of the GOD in the Bible, asked the Egyptian Pharaoh to let the Israelis leave Egypt, they were refused. Consequently, the GOD in the Bible imposed 10 plagues on Egypt. 1. Plague of Blood The water of the Nile will be changed into blood. The fish in the Nile will die, and the river will stink; the Egyptians will not be able to drink its water. 2. Plague of Frogs. The Nile will teem with frogs. They will come up into your palace and your bedroom and onto your bed, into the houses of your officials and on your people, and into your ovens and kneading troughs. The frogs will go up on you and your people and all your officials. 3. Plague of Lice.The dust of the ground became lice, lice came upon men and animals. All the dust throughout the land of Egypt became lice. 4. Plague of Flies The houses of the Egyptians will be full of flies, and even the ground where they are. 5. Plague of Livestock Death The fifth plague of Egypt was an epidemic disease which exterminated the Egyptian livestock; that is, horses, donkeys, camels, cattle, sheep and goats; 6. Plague of Boils The sixth plague of Egypt was Shkhin. The Shkhin was a kind of skin disease, usually translated as "boils".; 7. Plague of Hail The seventh plague of Egypt was a destructive storm; 8. Plague of Locusts Locusts will devour what little you have left after the hail, including every tree that is growing in your fields.; 9. Plague of Darkness Total darkness covered all Egypt for three days 10. Death of the Firstborn The tenth and final plague of Egypt was the death of all first born in Egypt — no one escaped, from the lowest servant to Pharaoh's own first-born son, including first-born of livestock.
It is understandable that the God punished Egypt because Egyptian Pharaoh wouldn’t obey his order. However, it was unreasonable and went too far to kill the first-born of all humans and animals in Egypt. You can punish the Egyptian Pharaoh for his disobedience. Why inflicting on the common people? Even worse, the God would kill the kids of the girl slaves working as donkeys in the lowest rank. Can we still say the God behaving like this merciful? It was behaving without humanitarianism just like a Devil.
Even more abominable, the Pharaoh of Egypt wouldn’t let the Israelis leave mainly because the God had hardened the Pharaoh’s heart. Before the Ten Plagues came, the God in the Bible had done something. According to 7:3 in the Exodus, Jehovah told Moses, “And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.”
It means the God in the Bible had prepared a trap for the Egyptians, trying to find an excuse for the following plagues. In Exodus 8:19, “Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, "This is the finger of God." But Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the LORD had said.”. In Exodus 9:35, “And the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, neither would he let the children of Israel go; as the LORD had spoken by Moses.” In Exodus 10:20, “But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go.” In Exodus 10:27, “But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let them go.” In Exodus 11:10, “And Moses and Aaron did all these wonders before Pharaoh: and the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go out of his land.”
It was the God in the Bible who let the Israelis leave Egypt. But it was the same God who had hardened the Pharaoh’s heart and sparked the conflicts so that the Israelis couldn’t leave Egypt easily. So what the God in the Bible was doing? It was encouraging the people to revolt while telling the authorities about the revolt and encouraging the government to oppress them mercilessly. Isn’t such a person a schemer and two-faced?
So is this the image of the Greatest Creator?
The Israelis Are the People of the Covenant
The Bible has the Old Testament and the New Testament. The part telling what happened before Jesus was born was called the Old Testament and the part telling things after Jesus was born was the New Testament. The Testament actually means agreement, covenant, and contract. The whole Bible is the agreement, covenant and contract between the Israelis and the Greatest Creator.
So here is a paradox. There are over 3,000 nations in the world and why the God has established the Testament with the Israelis? Does this mean the other nations are not the subjects of the God? If they are, why has the God only established the Testament with the Israelis while neglecting all the other nations? If they are not, what’s the origin of all the other nations? Are Adam and Eve only the ancestors of Israelis and not the other nations? The Israelis are created by the God. Does it mean the other nations are created by the Devil?
There are 1,656 years between the Genesis and the Great Flood. There are 857 years between the Great Flood and the Exodus. There are 396 years between the Exodus and the founding of the Israeli State. There are 510 years between the founding of the Israeli State and their captive to Babylon. There are 152 years between their imprisonment in Babylon and the reestablishment of Jerusalem. There are 450 years between the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the birth of Jesus. There are 2003 years between the birth of Jesus and today. So according to the Bible, the history of human beings is about 6,376 years.
According to the Bible, there were only 8 people survived the Great Flood on the Earth. They were the couple of Noah, their three sons and their wives. It means that 4,700 years ago, there was no one else living on the Earth except for the Noah family.
But this has brought some other questions. First, where do the American Indians come from? According to the theory of Continental Drift, America drifted away from the other continents. But it couldn’t happen within 4,700 years of time. Then how the Noah family reached America from the Middle East? After the Great Flood, there were only 8 members in Noah family. It was impossible for them to get dispersed. Noah couldn’t let one of his sons and his wife to cross the freezing Siberia and the Bering Strait to get to America.
Second, where did the African blacks come from? From the perspective of genetics, the blacks, yellows and whites have their separate ancestors. A couple of pure whites couldn’t generate the blacks and yellows. Even the evolvement couldn’t produce the blacks and yellows in 3,700 years of time. Besides, according to Darwin’s evolutionary theory, the survival of the fittest, could the Israelis able to write the Bible evolve into the African blacks? The blacks are not the matches of Israelis in the intelligence no matter how we exaggerate their abilities.
Now let’s come to the Chinese nation. The first Chinese King was born about 4,600 years ago. The story of Dayu‘s Flood Control happened about 4,200 years ago. It was impossible for the future generations of Noah to come to mainland China 100 years after the Great Flood. Even if they did it, how could they produce so many people who followed Dayu to control the flood?
Where does the Chinese nation come from? Are the Flood Control by Dayu were just the Great Flood?
From the perspective of the Bible, the biological evolutionary theory could never be accepted. But once we accepted the theory, it would deny the theory that the God created the human beings. But if we denied the evolutionary theory, there was no way to explain the origin of the blacks and yellows and we can’t say Adam and Eve are the common ancestors of all human beings.
The Story of Cain
The first child of Adam and Eve, after they were driven out of the Eden, was Cain, followed by Abel. “And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the LORD. And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the LORD had respect unto Abel and to his offering: But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect.” Out of jealousy, Cain killed his brother Abel.
We want to ask the God in the Bible some questions, “Why do you favor the offerings of Abel instead of those of Cain? Is Cain killing his brother Abel not your fault? If you had never favored one of them, how could it arouse the jealousy of Cain? Why the people created by you had so many troubles? Adam and Eve wouldn’t follow your orders and their kids killed each other. As the God, you don’t have the ability to solve these problems? Or is it what you have designed?
Cain was a murderer and deserved the punishment. But you told Cain, “Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.”
So what kind of the justice standard is it? It is hardly understandable not to levy the punishment on the criminal. But it is even more understandable to have revenge of sevenfold on those who would punish the criminal. Is it protecting the criminal?
That’s why the few thousand years of human history were full of blood, violence and crime. The God in the Bible has been protecting the criminals.
“Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.” Because Cain is a criminal, we can fully understand it as ““Therefore whosoever slayeth the criminal, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.””
We can conclude we had better become criminals because the criminals are protected and the good men are not. The good men have the risk of being revenged sevenfold.
The Prophet and the Dream
In the Bible, there are a large number of prophets and dreams. The prophets are the representatives of the God in the Mortal World. They have unimaginable wisdom and power, which sink the average people with average wisdom into the mist. If someone says, “I am a prophet”, should we believe him or not. If we don’t, we are standing against the God. If we do, how can we know the prophet is a fake or not?
Now let’s talk about the dreams. There are many dreams and dream analysis in the Bible, in particular in the Revelation. Of course, those who can analyze the dreams are all prophets. But they have also brought a lot of puzzles.
First, has the prophet had the dream at all? No one could see his dream and he could well compose some dreams and cheat us. If he really had the dream, was his analysis correct, or was he analyzing the dream on the reverse aspect?
I want to ask the God in the Bible, in the Old Testament, you used to talk directly with the human beings. Then why you stopped doing so later? Are the Adam and Eve on other planets also disobeying your orders? Why would you warn the human beings in the form of dreams? Why not tell us the truth directly? Don’t you have the ability to do so? Don’t you have time? Don you have some secret sorrow?
I can give many other examples to state that the God in the Bible does not have the features of being unique and exclusive, amorphous, neutral, mysterious, impartial, supremely powerful, merciful and wise as genuine Greatest Creator has.
So we can affirm that “the God in the Bible is not the genuine Greatest Creator”.

Xuefeng First of all, we have to admit that the Bible is the accomplishment of the Ephraim which loyally records the Jewish history, explains the relationship between the God, Devil and human beings to the furthest degree, and gives the direction the human beings should take. The Bible, the Koran, the Buddhist Scripture and the Tao Te Ching are the eternal and effective treasures and collections of human wisdom, teaching us how to behave and develop into the higher level of life space. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”. The first sentence in the Bible did tell the truth. But the things covered by the cossack may not be the holly things. And the people wearing the sacred cassock may not be the abbot. The problem with the Bible is that the God it introduces is not the genuine Greatest Creator. We have known that the Greatest Creator has the 8 features. The Greatest Creator is unique and exclusive, amorphous, neutral, mysterious, impartial, merciful, supremely powerful and intelligent. The wisdom of the Greatest Creator is revealed through its creation of universe order, designing of LIFE program and knowing of the past and the future. Then, does the God in the Bible have the above-mentioned 8 features? Let’s explain this with examples. The Betrayal of Adam and Eve According to the Genesis, Adam and Eve were instigated to eat the fruit on the Wisdom Tree forbidden by the God in the Bible. Because they have violated the order of the God (in the Bible), they were repelled out of the Eden. It indicates that the God in the Bible is a. incompetent; b. improvident; and c. unjust. He is incompetent because he was a loser at the beginning. The first couple of human he created betrayed him. So can we still say it is supremely powerful? Can we still believe in a “person” who often loses? The Great Flood had killed most of the human beings. What happened to them afterwards? They still wouldn’t listen to his words. The Moses Ten Commandments are actually the directives of the God in the Bible. Can you tell me how many of them are obeyed by the human being? Actually not even one. The God in the Bible seemed to know nothing about how to control the human beings. The only measure it takes is to voice warnings and threats against the human beings. Thousands of years has passed, the human beings remain the same. Is there no means to control the human beings? Or is there some other force constraining this Almighty God? If this is the case, is this God not sole or exclusive? For thousands of years, the human beings have been violating hisorder. What is he waiting for? The God in the Bible is improvident because he didn’t know that Adam and Eve were going to betray him or the development trend of what he had created. Is this God, who is not able to predict the future or the past, still reliable? If the Earth is going to get out of the Solar System and this God knows nothing about it, how can he save the human beings? How can this GOD administer the deities, Buddha, celestial beings and Devils when he found it difficult to control the human beings? How can he manage the spacious Universe? The God in the Bible is unjust because it cannot tell wrong from the right and because it is unreasonable. Why would Adam and Eve betray the God in the Bible? There are three major reasons. First, the genetic structure of Adam and Eve had faults, or was imperfect. The life created by this God was now its own constraint. This angered the God very much. It is just like the house built by an architect who put every efforts was fallen and hit his own feet. Is the house or the architect that should be blamed? The second reason they betrayed is that they were instigated and seduced by the snake. Adam and Eve are humans while behind the snake was the Devil Satan. The energy and wisdom of human beings can’t match those of the Devil. This God didn’t punish the Devil Satan. Instead, it imposed inflictions on Adam and Eve and drove them out of Eden. Is it fair? If a rapist raped an 8-year-old girl, would it be fair to blame the girl for her sexual organ and weakness instead of bringing justice to the rapist? The third reason of betrayal, which is also the most important one, is the damned Wisdom Tree that can tell the good and evil. Who has planted it in the Eden and why? It’s just like putting a poisonous sweet on the dinner table for the kids. Or it’s like playing the porn video for the young girls while teaching them to retain their innocence. Would a moral person do such a thing? Isn’t this “person” who planted the Wisdom Tree in the Eden has caused the betrayal of Adam and Eve? Besides, does this God, who had created Adam and Eve, has other measures to take rather than driving Adam and Eve out of the Eden? Is it fair not to give them a second chance simply because they have made only one mistake? Does one mistake justify their life-long sins? Jesus came to the Mortal World to atone for the human beings’ sins. According to the Bible, all the people have their “original sin”. Where does the “original sin” come from? Actually, they are inherited from Adam and Eve, the ancestors of human beings, whose sins were formed because they had eaten the fruit on the damned Wisdom Tree. When we are born, we have the “original sin” inherited from Adam and Eve. The “cross” on our back was much too heavy. According to this logic, “the son of a thief is always a thief”, “the son of a criminal is always a criminal”, and “the son of an emperor is always an emperor”. That’s why in ancient China, in the feudal period in particular, “If a man committed crime, all his family members would be sentenced to death”, or “If a man attained the Tao, even his pets ascended to Heaven”. This also explains why the thrones can only be passed on to the next generations of royal families. This is because it complies with the logic in the Bible. If somebody has sins, the God in the Bible and the Satan sined first. Is it humanitarian to inflict on billions of humans throughout the history simply because of the wrongdoings of Adam and Eve? Why not executing Adam and Eve and creating a new pair of humans at the time? Is creating a new couple so difficult for the God in the Bible? All the people are born with sins. This is why each of us comes to the Mortal World to endure the sufferings. But the sins are not inherited from our ancestors. They are made by oursleves in the previous cycle of life. If we don’t have sins, we would all have become Buddha or celestial beings. Ten Plagues of Egypt According to the Exodus, when Moses and Aaron, in the capacity of the GOD in the Bible, asked the Egyptian Pharaoh to let the Israelis leave Egypt, they were refused. Consequently, the GOD in the Bible imposed 10 plagues on Egypt. 1. Plague of Blood The water of the Nile will be changed into blood. The fish in the Nile will die, and the river will stink; the Egyptians will not be able to drink its water. 2. Plague of Frogs. The Nile will teem with frogs. They will come up into your palace and your bedroom and onto your bed, into the houses of your officials and on your people, and into your ovens and kneading troughs. The frogs will go up on you and your people and all your officials. 3. Plague of Lice.The dust of the ground became lice, lice came upon men and animals. All the dust throughout the land of Egypt became lice. 4. Plague of Flies The houses of the Egyptians will be full of flies, and even the ground where they are. 5. Plague of Livestock Death The fifth plague of Egypt was an epidemic disease which exterminated the Egyptian livestock; that is, horses, donkeys, camels, cattle, sheep and goats; 6. Plague of Boils The sixth plague of Egypt was Shkhin. The Shkhin was a kind of skin disease, usually translated as "boils".; 7. Plague of Hail The seventh plague of Egypt was a destructive storm; 8. Plague of Locusts Locusts will devour what little you have left after the hail, including every tree that is growing in your fields.; 9. Plague of Darkness Total darkness covered all Egypt for three days 10. Death of the Firstborn The tenth and final plague of Egypt was the death of all first born in Egypt — no one escaped, from the lowest servant to Pharaoh's own first-born son, including first-born of livestock. It is understandable that the God punished Egypt because Egyptian Pharaoh wouldn’t obey his order. However, it was unreasonable and went too far to kill the first-born of all humans and animals in Egypt. You can punish the Egyptian Pharaoh for his disobedience. Why inflicting on the common people? Even worse, the God would kill the kids of the girl slaves working as donkeys in the lowest rank. Can we still say the God behaving like this merciful? It was behaving without humanitarianism just like a Devil. Even more abominable, the Pharaoh of Egypt wouldn’t let the Israelis leave mainly because the God had hardened the Pharaoh’s heart. Before the Ten Plagues came, the God in the Bible had done something. According to 7:3 in the Exodus, Jehovah told Moses, “And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.” It means the God in the Bible had prepared a trap for the Egyptians, trying to find an excuse for the following plagues. In Exodus 8:19, “Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, "This is the finger of God." But Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the LORD had said.”. In Exodus 9:35, “And the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, neither would he let the children of Israel go; as the LORD had spoken by Moses.” In Exodus 10:20, “But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go.” In Exodus 10:27, “But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let them go.” In Exodus 11:10, “And Moses and Aaron did all these wonders before Pharaoh: and the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go out of his land.” It was the God in the Bible who let the Israelis leave Egypt. But it was the same God who had hardened the Pharaoh’s heart and sparked the conflicts so that the Israelis couldn’t leave Egypt easily. So what the God in the Bible was doing? It was encouraging the people to revolt while telling the authorities about the revolt and encouraging the government to oppress them mercilessly. Isn’t such a person a schemer and two-faced? So is this the image of the Greatest Creator? The Israelis Are the People of the Covenant The Bible has the Old Testament and the New Testament. The part telling what happened before Jesus was born was called the Old Testament and the part telling things after Jesus was born was the New Testament. The Testament actually means agreement, covenant, and contract. The whole Bible is the agreement, covenant and contract between the Israelis and the Greatest Creator. So here is a paradox. There are over 3,000 nations in the world and why the God has established the Testament with the Israelis? Does this mean the other nations are not the subjects of the God? If they are, why has the God only established the Testament with the Israelis while neglecting all the other nations? If they are not, what’s the origin of all the other nations? Are Adam and Eve only the ancestors of Israelis and not the other nations? The Israelis are created by the God. Does it mean the other nations are created by the Devil? There are 1,656 years between the Genesis and the Great Flood. There are 857 years between the Great Flood and the Exodus. There are 396 years between the Exodus and the founding of the Israeli State. There are 510 years between the founding of the Israeli State and their captive to Babylon. There are 152 years between their imprisonment in Babylon and the reestablishment of Jerusalem. There are 450 years between the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the birth of Jesus. There are 2003 years between the birth of Jesus and today. So according to the Bible, the history of human beings is about 6,376 years. According to the Bible, there were only 8 people survived the Great Flood on the Earth. They were the couple of Noah, their three sons and their wives. It means that 4,700 years ago, there was no one else living on the Earth except for the Noah family. But this has brought some other questions. First, where do the American Indians come from? According to the theory of Continental Drift, America drifted away from the other continents. But it couldn’t happen within 4,700 years of time. Then how the Noah family reached America from the Middle East? After the Great Flood, there were only 8 members in Noah family. It was impossible for them to get dispersed. Noah couldn’t let one of his sons and his wife to cross the freezing Siberia and the Bering Strait to get to America. Second, where did the African blacks come from? From the perspective of genetics, the blacks, yellows and whites have their separate ancestors. A couple of pure whites couldn’t generate the blacks and yellows. Even the evolvement couldn’t produce the blacks and yellows in 3,700 years of time. Besides, according to Darwin’s evolutionary theory, the survival of the fittest, could the Israelis able to write the Bible evolve into the African blacks? The blacks are not the matches of Israelis in the intelligence no matter how we exaggerate their abilities. Now let’s come to the Chinese nation. The first Chinese King was born about 4,600 years ago. The story of Dayu‘s Flood Control happened about 4,200 years ago. It was impossible for the future generations of Noah to come to mainland China 100 years after the Great Flood. Even if they did it, how could they produce so many people who followed Dayu to control the flood? Where does the Chinese nation come from? Are the Flood Control by Dayu were just the Great Flood? From the perspective of the Bible, the biological evolutionary theory could never be accepted. But once we accepted the theory, it would deny the theory that the God created the human beings. But if we denied the evolutionary theory, there was no way to explain the origin of the blacks and yellows and we can’t say Adam and Eve are the common ancestors of all human beings. The Story of Cain The first child of Adam and Eve, after they were driven out of the Eden, was Cain, followed by Abel. “And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the LORD. And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the LORD had respect unto Abel and to his offering: But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect.” Out of jealousy, Cain killed his brother Abel. We want to ask the God in the Bible some questions, “Why do you favor the offerings of Abel instead of those of Cain? Is Cain killing his brother Abel not your fault? If you had never favored one of them, how could it arouse the jealousy of Cain? Why the people created by you had so many troubles? Adam and Eve wouldn’t follow your orders and their kids killed each other. As the God, you don’t have the ability to solve these problems? Or is it what you have designed? Cain was a murderer and deserved the punishment. But you told Cain, “Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.” So what kind of the justice standard is it? It is hardly understandable not to levy the punishment on the criminal. But it is even more understandable to have revenge of sevenfold on those who would punish the criminal. Is it protecting the criminal? That’s why the few thousand years of human history were full of blood, violence and crime. The God in the Bible has been protecting the criminals. “Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.” Because Cain is a criminal, we can fully understand it as ““Therefore whosoever slayeth the criminal, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.”” We can conclude we had better become criminals because the criminals are protected and the good men are not. The good men have the risk of being revenged sevenfold. The Prophet and the Dream In the Bible, there are a large number of prophets and dreams. The prophets are the representatives of the God in the Mortal World. They have unimaginable wisdom and power, which sink the average people with average wisdom into the mist. If someone says, “I am a prophet”, should we believe him or not. If we don’t, we are standing against the God. If we do, how can we know the prophet is a fake or not? Now let’s talk about the dreams. There are many dreams and dream analysis in the Bible, in particular in the Revelation. Of course, those who can analyze the dreams are all prophets. But they have also brought a lot of puzzles. First, has the prophet had the dream at all? No one could see his dream and he could well compose some dreams and cheat us. If he really had the dream, was his analysis correct, or was he analyzing the dream on the reverse aspect? I want to ask the God in the Bible, in the Old Testament, you used to talk directly with the human beings. Then why you stopped doing so later? Are the Adam and Eve on other planets also disobeying your orders? Why would you warn the human beings in the form of dreams? Why not tell us the truth directly? Don’t you have the ability to do so? Don’t you have time? Don you have some secret sorrow? I can give many other examples to state that the God in the Bible does not have the features of being unique and exclusive, amorphous, neutral, mysterious, impartial, supremely powerful, merciful and wise as genuine Greatest Creator has. So we can affirm that “the God in the Bible is not the genuine Greatest Creator”.

I am looking for a lady between 25 and 35 years old, for a committed monogamous childfree relationship. My goal is to become a true team, supporting each other, caring for each other, nurturing each other and helping each other grow and realise our goals and dreams as much as possible. I'm hoping to find someone that values a relationship as much as I do and takes it seriously. It's not the only thing my life revolves around, but it's also not just something 'nice to have' for me.
I am 186cm tall, slim/fit built, dark brown hair, brown eyes. Both my arms are tattooed (full sleeve), as are my calves and the areas above my ankles. Regarding pictures see below. I am a runner, training multiple times a week. I'm also vegan. My love languages are physical touch and words of affirmation. While I am mostly securely attached, withdrawing from me triggers anxiety and I have made a horrible experience with an avoidant partner in the past, so that is something I fear I cannot deal with again.
I am also an atheist.
I am a very warm, soft and sensitive person, I think I am humorous, I am self reflecting a lot and I can also be really passionate and romantic. Those are traits that also are really important to me in a woman.
I can be quite social, I am a good talker, but also love to listen to really get to know someone on a deeper level. I can enjoy an evening out with friends just as much as the silence of sitting at the shores of the river and watching the sunset in solitude (although I've been craving to watch it together with a partner for a really long time now). I can be out in a pub, at a rave, a metal show or at a football game and have the time of my life, but I cannot do these things every day; I need recharge time (on the sofa, in the woods for a run, a lazy Sunday staying in bed etc.). This should give you an idea; basically, I am a homebody that thoroughly enjoys going out in moderation.
I won't say too much about hobbies; suffice it to say I am into the dark, the obscure, the macabre, the occult, the mysterious, the erotic. It won't surprise you that I had a gothic phase in my youth, bonus points if you did too!
What I'm looking for
Although similar hobbies and interests are a plus, emotional and intimate compatibility are more important to me. I am a very sensitive and emotional person (I do cry easily and by this point I don't think I'll ever be able to change that, sorry), so if you're too, we will definitely understand each other. I need someone who I can open up to (which I do rather quickly, anyway), be myself, bare my soul to and I need these things from you, too. I've had my share of emotionally unavailable women who were afraid of intimacy so I know I can't deal with that again because of the way how those things affect me. I am always emotionally invested with the woman I pursue and in those cases that was to my detriment. But my ability to feel so deep is also something I wouldn't want to change because as of yet, although it's getting harder, I haven't given up on finding someone.
With those emotional needs come two requirements that I found to be vital over the years: First, being able to be silly and cutesy together and to accept each other's inner child and care for it. I am not talking about having to deal with another person's immaturity or inability to perform basic adult skills, rather with the way sadness, hurt, anxiety and being overwhelmed manifests for me (and maybe for you, too?). I need someone who is able to comfort me, to hold me, to allow me to be weak and needy for a while until I've calmed down, and I'm more than ready to offer the same. Your inner child can come out for a while, no problem (: Also in a positive way: Thankfully, today everyone seems to be understanding of the cuteness overload cats (or any animal baby, really) can cause; I need that with a partner. I also still have plushies as comfort animals and ideally, you do too.
Apparently in every relationship, one person is the stronger one. In the past, I have been with women who obviously were stronger than me, but that doesn't mean they always had to be strong, far from it. I certainly need to be able to feel protected, but it's not like I'm a particularly needy partner, like everyone, I have my ups and downs, but I can pull my weight and have been told by past partners that I am very caring and that they felt safe and understood with me, and providing that for my partner is really important for me as well.
Second, intimate compatibility. I am rather insatiable and love to experiment when it comes to the bedroom, so you should, too, in order that we can explore and enjoy together. I found out how fulfilling living out those fantasies can be after years of never being able to try and in a relationship, this kind of fulfillment for both partners is a must for me. I found the term 'filthy best friends and partners' to be a perfect description.
I'm looking for a balance between healthy independence and being emotionally present. A relationship where we 'get' each other; we're both each other's number one and treat each other like royalty. Where a disagreement leads to more intimacy between us as we understand better, not to resentment. Where we're comfortable baring our souls to each other, becoming a safe haven and secure base for each other. I don't like the modern notion that you 'should never feel too safe in a relationship' because that sounds like running from the mafia (and believe me, I love mafia movies); you should always put in effort, yes, but safety is one of the things I always want to experience and provide in a relationship. We shouldn't fear that a disagreement leads straight to breakup. I know ‘self-sufficiency’ is trending right now, but I feel like as partners, we’re partly responsible for each other and not our own but also each other’s happiness. Being dependant and dependable at the same time is important; making each other’s wellbeing a priority. If you’re not able to healthily depend on someone and their support while you’re having a hard time, look elsewhere. If I have to be afraid you’ll run at the first major problem that surfaces, even if it’s a ‘you’-problem, it’s not going to work. I think that all things can and need to be talked about. If you think ignoring someone for days is a form of communication, please look elsewhere.
I am looking for someone real. We all have our problems, I don't want or need a 'perfect' person. You don't have everything figured out or 'all your shit' together. Be imperfect. Admit when you feel sad and angry, lonely, hopeless or even helpless – it's all relatable. Don't hide it. Be quirky, be dorky, be witchy, opinionated, be yourself. Don't pretend.
I'm looking for someone to share romance with. Not great gestures, but small, meaningful ones. Poems for each other, expressing our feelings; cards with heartfelt messages that we put our perfume/cologne on, and a symbol that means something to us only, the print of your lips with lipstick, the way I sign and seal my letters for you.
Just as important to me is agreeing on living a healthy life, staying in shape both for ourselves and for each other, regularly working out and eating healthy. I am drug and disease-free and expect the same of you. I do drink as I love a good beer or glass of wine, rum or whiskey, but I've never really been drinking much and especially during the past year have further reduced it. One vice I have is that I enjoy a couple of cigars a year, but I can definitely accommodate you in this regard.
Another important point is aligned life goals: I value safety more than adventure. I want to build a home together with my partner, a safespace for the both of us, where we always feel loved and protected, a place that we create together, make it cozy together so we just love to get back home there wherever we might have been, a home we decorate together for Halloween (my favourite holiday) or Christmas or Springtime, as we live in tune with the seasons, enjoying nature on a walk or the rain outside, reading in our cozy home. I value stability and harmony.
Appearance-wise, I am into ladies on the smaller side), so I'm looking for someone petite/slim/skinny/healthy-fit. Likewise, I am not really muscular and don't have visible abs; like I said, I'm a runner, so if you're more into the gym-type, I'm not a good fit.
I’d prefer to move from text to voice calls, videochat and then meeting up, all of that rather sooner than later. Not that there’s a need to rush anything, but I’d rather see earlier if we’re compatible or not; as someone who catches feelings fast I need to protect myself.
Caveats

• I don't like travelling as it stresses me out; I don't mind being somewhere else for a week or two, but the organisation part of it drains my energy very quickly and dealing with stuff that doesn't work out is overwhelming to me. Smaller trips are ok, but I'm not the right person to travel the world with.
• I am not the most awake person in the morning (i.e. I identify as nightowl)
• I don't want children and had a vasectomy
• I need space for my own projects/time to recharge after social interaction.
• While I feel like I am in tune with my inner child and working on/with it through therapy, I realise this is something that could be a turn-off for people.
• I have been diagnosed with depressive episodes in the past and am taking anti-depressants right now. I realise that I am a work in progress, maybe more so than in times past, but I manage and the fact that I'm putting myself out here is based on me being ready to get to know someone new.
• I want to create a home together here, as I'm firmly rooted where I was born; I realise this is a lot to ask, but I have seen many people here being open to moving, so I want to at least try reaching out to them.

If you're interested, feel free to message me and include some pictures of yourself and I will reply with my own. Have a nice day (:

General
I am looking for a lady between 28 and 35 years old, for a committed monogamous childfree relationship. My goal is to become a true team, supporting each other, caring for each other, nurturing each other and helping each other grow and realise our goals and dreams as much as possible. I'm hoping to find someone that values a relationship as much as I do and takes it seriously. It's not the only thing my life revolves around, but it's also not just something 'nice to have' for me.
I tried to be as concise as possible while still providing what details I think are crucial to know; I realise this post turned out very long, but I prefer those because I can get as good an idea as possible with detailed descriptions, bar actually talking to the person, and find that very valuable, so if that also applies to you, that would be awesome.
Basics
I am 186cm tall, slim/fit built, dark brown hair, brown eyes. Both my arms are tattooed (full sleeve), as are my calves and the areas above my ankles. Regarding pictures see below. I am a runner (ranging from 5k to full marathon), training multiple times a week. I'm also vegan. My love languages are physical touch and words of affirmation. While I am mostly securely attached, withdrawing from me triggers anxiety and I have made a horrible experience with a fearful avoidant partner in the past, so that is something I fear I cannot deal with again.
I am also an atheist.
I am a very warm, soft and sensitive person, I think I am humorous, I am self reflecting a lot and I can also be really passionate and romantic. Those are traits that also are really important to me in a woman.
I can be quite social, I am a good talker, but also love to listen to really get to know someone on a deeper level. I can enjoy an evening out with friends just as much as the silence of sitting at the shores of the river and watching the sunset in solitude (although I've been craving to watch it together with a partner for a really long time now). I can be out in a pub, at a rave, a metal show or in the stadium watching football and have the time of my life, but I cannot do these things every day; I need recharge time (on the sofa, in the woods for a run, a lazy Sunday staying in bed etc.). This should give you an idea; basically, I am a homebody that thoroughly enjoys going out in moderation.
I won't say too much about hobbies; suffice it to say I am into the dark, the obscure, the macabre, the occult, the mysterious, the erotic. It won't surprise you that I had a gothic phase in my youth, bonus points if you did too!
What I am looking for
Although similar hobbies and interests are a plus (and there have to be at least a couple things we have in common), emotional and sexual compatibility are more important to me. I am a very sensitive and emotional person (I do cry easily and by this point I don't think I'll ever be able to change that, sorry), so if you're too, we will definitely understand each other. I need someone who I can open up to (which I do rather quickly, anyway), be myself, bare my soul to and I need these things from you, too. I've had my share of emotionally unavailable women who were afraid of intimacy so I know I can't deal with that again because of the way how those things affect me. I am always emotionally invested with the woman I pursue and in those cases that was to my detriment. But my ability to feel so deep is also something I wouldn't want to change because as of yet, although it's getting harder, I haven't given up on finding someone.
With those emotional needs come two requirements that I found to be vital over the years: First, being able to be silly and cutesy together and to accept each other's inner child and care for it. I am not talking about having to deal with another person's immaturity or inability to perform basic adult skills, rather with the way sadness, hurt, anxiety and being overwhelmed manifests for me (and maybe for you, too?). I need someone who is able to comfort me, to hold me, to allow me to be weak and needy for a while until I've calmed down, and I'm more than ready to offer the same. Your inner child can come out for a while, no problem (: Also in a positive way: Thankfully, today everyone seems to be understanding of the cuteness overload cats (or any animal baby, really) can cause; I need that with a partner. I also still have plushies as comfort animals (some of which in quite a litteral sense as they make for really amazing pillows) and ideally, you do too.
There is a saying that in every relationship, one person is the stronger one. In the past, I have been with women who obviously were stronger than me, but that doesn't mean they always had to be strong, far from it. I certainly, like I said, need to be able to feel protected, but it's not like I'm a particularly needy partner, like everyone, I have my ups and downs, but I can pull my weight and have been told by past partners that I am very caring and that they felt safe and understood with me, and providing that for my partner is really important for me as well – this just to put the picture I'm (somewhat haphazardly) trying to paint into perspective.
Second, sexual compatibility. I have a high libido and I have kinks, so you should, too, in order that we can explore and enjoy them together. I found out how fulfilling living out those fantasies can be after years of never being able to try and in a relationship, sexual fulfillment for both partners is a must for me. Someone on here has coined the term 'filthy best friends and partners' which I have no shame to be stealing because it's such an apt description.
I'm looking for a balance between healthy independence and being emotionally present. A relationship where we 'get' each other; we're both each other's number one and treat each other like royalty. Where a disagreement leads to more intimacy between us as we understand better, not to resentment. Where we're comfortable baring our souls to each other, becoming a safe haven and secure base for each other. I don't like the modern notion that you 'should never feel too safe in a relationship' because that sounds like running from the mafia (and believe me, I love mafia movies); you should always put in effort, yes, but safety is one of the things I always want to experience and provide in a relationship. We shouldn't fear that a disagreement leads straight to breakup. I know ‘self-sufficiency’ is trending right now, but I feel like as partners, we’re partly responsible for each other and not our own but also each other’s happiness. Being dependant and dependable at the same time is important; making each other’s wellbeing a priority. I love the relationship model outlined in Stan Tatkin’s ‘Wired for Love’ and you should, too. If you’re not able to healthily depend on someone and their support while you’re having a hard time, look elsewhere. I know codependency is the latest thing everyone’s afraid of, but experiencing someone you’ve grown very attached to just bailing because they’re counterdependent and can’t stand working on themselves while simultaneously letting you in is something I’d rather not go through again. If I have to be afraid you’ll run at the first major problem that surfaces, even if it’s a ‘you’-problem, it’s not going to work. I think that all things can and need to be talked about. If you think ignoring someone for days is a form of communication, please look elsewhere. If you think’s it’s okay to lovebomb someone and then leave after a couple of months with the minimum amount of information and no proper conversation because you’re not ready to own up to what’s happening to you emotionally, please look elsewhere.
I am looking for someone real. We all have our problems, I don't want or need a 'perfect' person. You don't have everything figured out or 'all your shit' together. Be imperfect. Admit when you feel sad and angry, lonely, hopeless or even helpless – it's all relatable. Don't hide it. Be quirky, be dorky, be witchy, be opinionated, be yourself. Don't pretend.
I'm looking for someone to share romance with. Not great gestures, but small, meaningful ones. Poems for each other, expressing our feelings; cards with heartfelt messages that we put our perfume/cologne on, and a symbol that means something to us only, the print of your lips with lipstick, the way I sign and seal my letters for you.
Just as important to me is agreeing on living a healthy life, staying in shape both for ourselves and for each other, regularly working out and eating healthy. I am drug and disease-free and expect the same of you. I do drink as I love a good beer or glass of wine, rum or whiskey, but I've never really been drinking much and especially during the past year have further reduced it. One vice I have is that I enjoy a couple of cigars a year, but I can definitely accommodate you in this regard.
Another important point is aligned life goals: many childfree people seem to be adventurous, but that is a trait I don't associate with myself at all. I value safety more than adventure. I want to build a home together with my partner, a safespace for the both of us, where we always feel loved and protected, a place that we create together, make it cozy together so we just love to get back home there wherever we might have been, a home we decorate together for Halloween (my favourite holiday) or Christmas or Springtime, as we live in tune with the seasons, seeing them change around us, enjoying nature on a walk or the rain outside, reading in our cozy home. I value stability and harmony.
Appearance-wise, I am into ladies on the smaller side (albeit not regarding height), so I'm looking for someone petite/slim/skinny/healthy-fit. Likewise, I am not really muscular and don't have visible abs; like I said, I'm a runner, so if you're more into the gym-type, I'm not a good fit.
The natural progression for me would be to move from text to voice calls, videochat and then meeting up, all of that rather sooner than later. Not that there’s a need to rush anything, but having my heart broken because I already developed feelings due to a longer timeframe and then everything unexpectedly turning to shit is not something I want to have to live through again. I’d rather see earlier if we’re compatible or not; as someone who catches feelings fast I need to protect myself, I unfortunately had to learn that
Caveats/Possible red flags

• I don't like travelling as it stresses me out; I don't mind being somewhere else for a week or two, but the organisation part of it drains my energy very quickly and dealing with stuff that doesn't work out is overwhelming to me. Smaller trips are ok, but I'm not the right person to travel the world with.
• I am not the most awake person in the morning (i.e. I identify as nightowl)
• I need space for my own projects/time to recharge after social interaction.
• While I feel like I am in tune with my inner child and working on/with it through therapy, I realise this is something that could be a turn-off for people.
• I have been diagnosed with depressive episodes in the past and am taking anti-depressants right now. I realise that I am a work in progress, maybe more so than in times past, but I manage and the fact that I'm putting myself out here is based on me being ready to get to know someone new.
• I want to create a home together here, as I'm firmly rooted where I was born; I realise this is a lot to ask, but I have seen many people here being open to moving, so I want to at least try reaching out to them.

If you're interested, feel free to message me and include some pictures of yourself and I will reply with my own. Have a nice day (:

I want to preface that this is a serious question, we aren't perverts and are open to advice and opinions on this subject. We have no nefarious intent and just want insight.
Me and my girlfriend plan to open a physical local business selling Japanese collectables in the semi-near future, primarily anime figures and merchandise imported from Japan but with a wide variety beyond that. While I figure out all the logistics and investment required to begin such a journey though, there are some questions I've been unable to get any direct answers for online, one of which may come off as a bit suspect:
Am I allowed to sell adult merchandise? And even if I am allowed to, is it a poor business decision?
And by that, I don't just mean lewd or questionably designed figures. While we don't directly seek it out, due to the nature of Japan and how we wholesale source a massive variety of series and subjects, we end up with adult items on occasion. This can range from nude cards, figures, tapestries, posters, manga, etc. to as direct as Japanese adult videos and video games (both animated and live action). At the moment whenever we've ended up with such goods, it's just gone into a box of "unsellables" which grows ever more suspicious as the months go by. We're online sellers on eBay and Mercari at the moment, both of which have clear restrictions on such items.
I personally have no issue selling such items when there is clearly a demand for them, and both me and my girlfriend actually find the adult stuff to be rather funny and/or interesting (depending on the specific item, being Japan some of it goes way too far). But my question is can I sell it, and if yes, should I? Is there a required license for such things? Do Japanese adult items have different restrictions than domestic adult items?
If we do end up deciding to carry and sell such items when we have a personal store, it would be in a separated "adult only" area behind a curtain. We know of a locally owned 2nd hand shop that does this. It wouldn't be something like Spencers where there's just a mighty wall of sex toys starting down at you when all you wanted was to buy a funny mug or something. And to be clear, it would make a very small fraction of our merchandise.
Two worries I had with selling such item are: Will it hurt our stores reputation on a notable scale? And: Will it attract undesirable types of customers?
And just to note for anyone worried, we would NOT sell Japanese merchandise featuring obviously underaged characters. If we were to end up with such things by happenstance, it would go straight to the shredder. Our moral bar may be set low here but there are some things still far under it.
Any answers and advice is greatly appreciated. Cheers.

Always wanted to post this but the official AITA thread was always too intimidating so here I am. I'll try not to ramble too much but buckle up as this spans several years.
I met my BFF on an online video game when I was 14. Back then, people were rather harsh to girl gamers but he always stood up for me which caused us to grow closer. Let's call this friend B and he was a year older than me.
B and I grew to be close friends as we grew. He helped me through some really bad mental spots and I did my best for him in return despite our distance. When I was about 17, B got engaged to his GF. His GF never really liked me and made him limit his time gaming with me. This resulted in me realizing my feelings for him. I decided to tell him said feelings as we never really hid things from each other. I told him that I didn't expect him to like me back since he was engaged and that I just wanted to get it off my chest. He thanked me for not hiding it and we carried on like nothing happened. Eventually, B's engagement fell apart but we still remained as friends and nothing more. I was content with this.
At some point, I decided to move in with my ex gf and drove 20 hours with my brother to do so. I quickly regreted this as it was hell on earth. My ex would always threaten to commit unalive whenever I hinted at breaking up.
I vented to B about this one night, admitting I was at my wits end. He knew I had been trying to break up with her for a while. Suddenly, B confessed that he loved me. I was taken aback as it had been almost 4 years since my confession and we never discussed it since. I asked if he was serious and if he meant it as a friend and he said no. He meant romantically. I was over the moon. My heart felt so light. This gave me the push to finally break up with my gf and to have the police on speed dial if something happened. Thankfully, she just cried and left and her grandparents came to get her stuff.
We were 6 months into our lease at this point so my brother and I had to plan what to do next. I asked if he wanted to move to the state B lived in since neither of us wanted to turn tail and run home. He agreed. Its important to note that B and I were not dating at this point. We were being flirty but that's about it. Once we decided to move to B's state I asked him about being official and he said once we moved in together. Again, I was excited.
6 months later and we made the drive to our new apartment with B. Things were great for the first month and B was being affectionate and sweet. I was happy.
Here's where shit hits the fan:
I learned that another online friend of mine had become homeless. Let's call her S. I had only know S for a few years at this point but I was both a bleeding heart and a people pleaser so I asked them if they wanted to move in with us and share my room. She agreed. Prior to her moving in, I had her join us for some online gaming so everyone could get to know each other prior to moving in. B and S really got along but B is really good about getting along with people so I wasn't surprised. They even began to play games without me which was fine as I trusted B.
When I got home from picking up S from the airport, I saw B sleeping on the couch. I was confused and he had left her a hand written note saying stuff about how it had been a long day so he was giving up his bed for her for tonight. I thought it was sweet and left it alone.
I'll take this time to mention that we didn't have a room for S. I offered to share my room or give her the master closet. I know that sounds bad but it was big enough to fit a twin size bed in there and some. We were all early 20s and S really wanted somewhere to live so it was all we could do. Before moving in, S had actually AGREED to the closet idea so she could have her own space.
Not long after S moved in, I noticed a lot of B's attention focused on her. I was a bit hurt but said nothing. Not long later, they began sharing a room as S claimed she never agreed to the closet deal. Being the people pleaser I was, I let it go. I was in denial. B wouldn't hurt me and he still gave kisses goodbye when he left. I thought it was all fine.
That was until B's cat batted an empty box of condoms out into the hallway from B's room.
B and I never had sex. We had never even discussed it. He was a bit religious so I never brought it up. This broke me. My head finally put 2 and 2 together. I broke down. I went into B's room and destroyed 10 years worth of crafts I made for him and left the pieces on the floor. My brother did his best to console me until they got home. I demanded to know what was going on and B admitted to lying about loving me. My heart broke. I sobbed, begging to know why and he said it was to get me to break up with my ex faster. I loved this man for so long and he hurt me like this? I was inconsolable. Living there was hell after that. Little issues turned into big fights with S backing up B and my brother backing me up. Eventually, my brother forfeited his half of the deposit so we could get off the lease and move. We couldn't move far but I had to get away from him. My friends were gone.
A few months after we moved out, B contacted me, apologizing for what he did and how he acted after we found out. This contact was in the form of a hand written note inside a sketch book I had left that he dropped off at my work. He wanted to hang out and I said fine. "Offer to buy me food and I'll be there." Money was tight at the time so I wanted compensation.
Every time after that, they would buy me something to eat when we hung out. I could never get the disgust out of my mouth from being around them. Oh, and S never apologized for what she did. She knew we were dating or at least that I THOUGHT we were dating but she still went for him and never told me what was going on.
Right before the pandemic closed the world down, I moved back home. I had totaled my car and just couldn't afford to live there anymore. Once home, B asked to play games online like the good ole days. I tried but I was at my breaking point as a people pleaser and just didn't care anymore. After a couple of sessions, I told him that I couldn't do this anymore as my trust was completely gone. I told him while I accepted his apology, I didn't forgive him. He said ok. I left the voice chat and unfriended him. I haven't heard from him since.
Its been 4 years since then and it still hurts. He had been with me through my entire teenage and young adult years. What I find interesting is that when I tell this story to people, they call me a jerk. A lot of B's friends cut contact with me after it all happened too. They say he was really remorseful and that I should have given him a second chance. This incident caused me to lose all of my friends at the time, making 2020 even harder to get through. Was I wrong to drop my BFF over a lie?

Huge content warning: The cat was a baby, and didn’t die naturally or kindly. Traumatised pre teens, teens, and adults mentioned. There is no good side. It’s horrible. I doubt anyone wants to read this, I’m mostly just needing to scream into the void
My mom is on here so if you see this hi mom. I hope I got the facts right.
I honestly just don’t know who to even vent to about this. The majority of my family was witness, minus my father who was at work, and understandably nobody really wants to talk to each other about it yet, and I’m not very good at emotion in general so.
I (17F) came home from school to this horror show. Bit of background. We got a new kitten we found abandoned at our church, who we named Weasley. She’s a small ginger kitten who we think was unable to hear. She was the most adorable thing I ever saw and even though we only had her 2 weeks, she had the whole family completely in love.
So tbh I was half asleep when the bus dropped me off so I didn’t process it fully in the moment. I came home to my sister who we will call Luna (12f) crying like I’d never heard before and considering she’s fairly emotional that’s saying something. One of my dogs, one that had a reputation for being an ass, was locked up and considering the kitten was Luna’s and she was so upset I could hear it from the living room, I got a bad feeling.
I went to Luna and sat on the bed and held her awkwardly (I’m on the spectrum and for me crying people are a bit nerve wracking. However it’s Luna so emotional constipation be damned) until she explained and it was so much worse than I assumed. I thought the cat got a bit roughed up and my mom (45F) was MIA because she took her to the vet. Nope.
Apparently grandma was taking laundry to the room where the cat is kept (Luna’s room) and my dogs got in. 3/4 were uninvolved, the other however is responsible for the particularly violent death of my few month old kitten, which my sister witnessed but was no match for a big dog, and my grandmother froze in fear.
My mother managed to get the dog away after some time which nobody can agree on how long.
My mother, too shocked to realise how bad the damage was just kinda held the cat for a bit, until my little sister pointed out while crying that the poor thing was obviously dead because its insides were outside a bit
Mom stuck Luna with grandma and took the kitten and put her in a box, which will be buried and given a proper funeral soon. I’m working on a makeshift gravestone.
That’s when I got home and was caught up after holding Luna for a while. I ended up calling my best friend because I didn’t know how to console Luna. So my best friend came to help with the emotional turmoil
I think today was the first time i heard my mother cry and be so utterly sad. It was awful but oddly bittersweet because I knew she felt the same as me and Luna do. Knowing my mom understands is always very comforting.
Thanks for letting me vent, Reddit.

DC Next Proudly Presents:

THE NEW TITANS

In Shadow of Kestrel
Issue Nine: War Dove
Written by AdamantAce, GemlinTheGremlin & PatrollinTheMojave
Edited by Deadislandman1 and Voidkiller826
 
Next Issue > Coming Next Month
 
 
“Raven!”
Slade’s gruff voice pierced through the deafening, wave-like roars in Raven’s head, but the rage was too much to bear. Her hands sizzled as hellfire danced in her palms, her body readying for another attack. She locked eyes with a reptilian soldier, dismounting his simian steed and charging on foot, but as she lunged forwards to strike him, she watched a man fly into her path. Slade Wilson caught the young Titan’s hand and pushed, throwing Raven backwards.
“Come on, kid, snap out of it!” But as Slade’s words fell on deaf ears, he felt the familiar sting of a fist to his jaw, a crack echoing in his ears. He recoiled from the attack but powered through his injury and stood his ground. Sinking his heels into the ground, he locked eyes with the girl before him. Her face seemed contorted and uncanny, as if all of the rage she was feeling was pouring out of her. She groaned angrily as she thrusted her head downwards, her forehead making contact with Slade’s teeth, before pulling her head back up again in preparation for another attack.
Before she could make one, however, one of the lizardmen had almost reached the warring duo’s sides, and as he lunged forward with his long spear, he made contact with Raven’s side. A small rip formed in the side of Raven’s outfit, which seemed to only anger her further. However, it did seem to distract her enough; Mar’i fired off a single Starbolt which struck only the ground - a warning shot.
“Raven! Please!” the half-Tamaranean cried out. But the Raven she knew was buried under unfathomable amounts of fury; she ignored her teammate’s call and instead flew forwards and swung out at the reptiloid. The strike glowed with red flame, sending the creature skidding across the floor, barely conscious. Slade spotted a flash of something else on her face, as if she was finally able to fight back against the endless rage - pain, perhaps, or anguish. But in an instant, it was gone.
That flicker of something other than white-hot anger was enough for Slade.
He clutched his side as his still open wound began to ache, the bandages feeling wet with fresh blood. His jaw felt crooked, and as he gritted his teeth, it felt as though they sat differently atop each other. And yet, he clutched his staff tightly in one hand, and with the other he beckoned to Raven.
“Kid, you’re fighting it, I know you are!” Slade felt his mouth filling with blood rather than saliva.
Within a moment, Raven’s attention was locked on the white-haired man once again. She fired bolt after bolt of black and red flame, but Slade was still dextrous despite his pain. He dodged and dived, weaving through the fire, until he finally managed to make contact with his opponent. He drove his staff into her chest and pushed his weight against the weapon, forcing her backwards. She rose into the air, a black mist pouring from her arms and over her face, a large ghostly corvid taking her place. He felt the deathly cold shadow of the bird’s wing fall over him, his feet leaving the ground as she scooped him into the air.
He looked down at the ground far beneath him. A fall from this height would kill anyone, he thought, let alone someone beaten half to death.
Then, as a verdant bolt of energy struck it in the side, Raven’s Soul Self shrieked and the shadows retreated inwards. Slade felt himself falling through the air for a second, then two, before he felt his back collide with something soft and cushioned. As he looked up, he met the gaze of Conner, who soared to the ground in an instant, placing the snow-haired man on the ground and giving a swift nod.
Raven let out a pained, frustrated yell as she returned to the ground, aided by a grappling line expertly positioned by Tim, and in response, Conner jetted off towards the sound of her cries. Slade’s feet faltered beneath him, and he stumbled to keep his balance. His breathing was laboured and his vision was becoming fuzzy. It felt as though, he realised, all the blood loss and violence he had suffered over the past few hours were finally catching up to him. Was this what dying felt like?
“Slade!” shouted a voice, followed by the dulled drumming of hurried footsteps. Slade pulled his hand across his face to wipe away the mental haze and drops of blood. It was Don, sprinting towards him. When Slade felt Don clasp him by shoulders, he realized just how slowed he was by his injuries. “Plan?,” Slade coughed out.
“You’ve seen what she can do. I only see one way out of these without one of the kids getting hurt. I’d do it myself, but I’m out of practice and this is too important to leave to chance.” Don looked around anxiously, his face betraying that he had a lot on his mind. “I’m giving you the powers of a god.” Slade opened his mouth to ask a question, a million came to mind. He glanced across the battlefield. Through a blurry film, he saw Raven’s Soul Self bat Conner away with its wing. He careened into the trunk of a thick tree, uprooting it with a deep crunch. “Are you sure?,” Slade asked, breathless.
“I’m not losing another Titan.” Don squeezed his eyes shut. His grip on Slade tightened as pale, almost blinding light enveloped them. It felt warm. No, better than that: it felt peaceful. With his enhanced senses, Slade could hear his erratic heartbeat slow. Fleeting visions bubbled up in his mind, opening up his awareness beyond the wildest dreams of Project Veritas. He felt rivers of magical energy flowing through the air and earth. Each of them spiralled towards a depression. Towards Raven, he knew instinctively. Iridescent blue light spread outward from his shoulders. It washed over his body armor, bleaching the jet black panels until his entire body shone with radiance. The pain from wounds old and new faded, replaced by serenity - and power. Don opened his eyes again and sighed gently; a concoction and joy, relief, and quiet mourning.
“There,” Don remarked. Slade felt lighter, less angry, less burdened. He looked down at the iridescent light enveloping his body. Magical energy buzzed against the surface of his skin. “The powers of the Dove - officially yours.”
Slade sucked in a nervous breath. “Don…” Even rejuvenated, he was still lost for words.
“They’re yours now,” Don smiled weakly. “Now go earn them. There’s a Titan in dire need of our help.”
Conner floated out of the dense jungle, rubbing his forehead. “Is Slade glowing or do I have a concussion?”
Slade looked over at Raven. She seemed less erratic, her movements driven by her brain rather than her gut. Tim’s staff batted fiercely against her, each strike buffeting her back more and more, but it was clear to Slade that Raven was not any weaker physically - her mind, however, was another story.
Slade began marching towards her, the ache in his side dulled. “Raven. You’re strong. Fight this rage inside of you.” Raven glared at him, a spark of something in her eyes, as she swooped in towards him at top speed. As she neared him, however, Slade readied his staff, stretching it out in front of him. As the tip of the weapon struck Raven, a beam of white energy coursed through her, as if she had been struck by lightning, and her body was flung backwards across the dirt.
Slade danced a hand over his rifle, but something felt different. He pulled it into his hands and inspected it swiftly; nothing seemed out of order. Raven rose slowly from her supine position, snarling softly to herself. Her movements had slowed, the expression on her face becoming closer to horror than rage. She was doing it.
“You’re nearly there, kid,” Slade soothed, his words suddenly like butter. He watched Raven’s shoulders start to relax. “That’s it. Just fight this, Raven. You’re almost there.”
Despite her tremendous progress, Raven’s blistering fury won out once more, and she charged a large bolt of hellfire in her hands. Slade fiddled with his rifle and crossed his fingers. There was a standstill between the two. Slade analysed his rifle again; there was something different about the barrel, as if it had been swapped out for another similar model. The stock felt lighter, too, as if the weight had been–
Raven roared at him, swiping wildly with glowing fists, and in an instant Slade instinctively pulled the trigger.
What fired from the gun was not a silvery bullet, but a familiar glowing bolt of white light, cloud-like in appearance. As it struck Raven, she sucked in a deep breath, the energy engulfing her. Her face softened and her posture relaxed. Then she swung out for the man’s weakened side, his bandages poking through the aura of light. And yet, as he stayed steadfast, not even attempting to dodge the attack. Sparks flew from the point of contact. Slade just readied another shot and fired.
Her body swayed with the blow. Slade closed the gap between them and focused on the new warmth he felt, concentrating it into his staff as best he could. Then, as he held it out in front of him at arm’s length, he swiped at Raven and struck her in the side of the shoulder. Each blow seemed to be more effective than the last, but as Raven’s movements continued to slow, Slade held fire.
“You’re doing it, Raven,” Slade encouraged. He watched as the other Titans surrounded Raven, each of them ready for any further attacks. Everyone watched with bated breath as their teammate and friend thrashed and recoiled from the hit. Her breathing was rapid, although it felt closer to panic than unabashed fury. She clasped her hands over her head, groaning. Then, suddenly, she stopped.
Her face had softened completely, her jaw slack, and tears filled her vision. She looked up at Slade with a comfort in her eyes. The aura emanating from him was pervasive and contagious, and although she had felt lost in a sea of impossibly vast emotions, its warmth and comfort cut through. The anger was still there somewhat, the last remaining dregs still working its way out of her system, but the comfort, the peace that Slade was providing was the anchor for her to stabilise herself. She had only ever seen this kind of power when Don…
Raven’s eyes widened as she realised what that meant. She collapsed to her knees, suddenly feeling the bone-deep fatigue her rage had suppressed. Her teammates rushed in around her. Mar’i dropped to a knee by her side and put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s OK. You’re safe. Everyone’s OK.”
“Don I’m—” She wiped away a stream of tears, stumbling her way out of the emotional vortex she’d been sucked into. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened. I’ve lost control before, but never like this.”
Don looked older. Creases ran across his forehead and around his eyes. His smile hadn’t changed. “Raven, my brother and I got those powers when I was a kid. We didn’t ask for them. We weren’t ready for them. We didn’t know how to use them, let alone control them.” He laughed dryly, recalling Hank. “I don’t regret anything. Giving my powers to Slade is the best thing I’ve done with them in years. I know Hank would feel the same way.”
In the moment of silence that followed, Raven rose to her feet and pulled her cloak tightly around herself. She was still shaking. Tim’s eyes drifted from her to Slade. “Something’s gnawing at me. Kestrel’s powers are weakened in Skartaris. Don’s…” He coughed, “Slade’s powers are amplified. If this place is what affected you—”
Mar’i’s face flashed with recognition, “—your powers must be tied to the Lords of Order and Chaos!”
Tim furrowed his brow. “Maybe.” He hardly had time to consider further when a thundering crack tore open the sky. Two bolts of swirling energy - one red and one blue - met above them, forming a swirling portal at their vertex. The Titans readied their weapons, expecting the worst.
“It’s them.” Slade murmured, still put off by his uncanny awareness. Terataya and T’Charr descended from the sky, one wreathed in mist, the other, magma. The two elementals stopped a few feet above the ground, hovering.
Terataya was the first to speak. Even at a whisper, her voice reverberated through the air. “I don’t usually care for surprises, Don, but this was a pleasant one.” A thin smile appeared on her face.
“Slade Wilson.” Terataya’s neck turned at an unnatural angle to face him. “You wield the powers of Order with great skill. Who understands the dangers of unchecked War better than a soldier. Become my champion. Protect the balance.”
Slade took a step back, then glanced at Don.
“She’s right.” Don said, with only a hint of hesitation. “It took me years to use the powers like you used them today. You’re a natural.”
Slade looked at his hands, still gently pulsing with pale blue light. “Thanks.” He allowed himself a weak smile. “But no thanks.”
“What.” T’Charr’s voice boomed.
“It doesn’t take Zatanna to realize an old soldier like me makes a piss-poor Avatar of Peace. I fight for a living, and I’m not deluded enough to think that makes me good at anything but fighting. If you want someone who understands the need for balance, Don just sacrificed everything special about him for it.”
Don raised an eyebrow. “None taken.”
“His actions today were noble, but they do not make up for years spent squandering the gift.”
“Squandering? The Titans wouldn’t exist today if he hadn’t pulled them together. Everything they’ve done. Everything they’ve achieved for your balance wouldn’t have happened without him, including stopping that monster you made.”
“Watch your tone, mortal.” T’Charr threatened.
“There may be a vein of truth to his words, lover.” Terataya said. “But *if we were to restore Don Hall’s power, we would need assurances. His indecision led down this path.”*
Rocks ground against each other as T’Charr landed beside Don. “You would have weeks, not years, to select a counterpart and return to your duties.”
Don’s response was instantaneous. “I’ve made a decision.”
“You’ve decided if you’ll take up the mantle of Dove again?”
Don nodded. “And who should be the new Hawk.”
Terataya giggled. “Full of surprises today. T’Charr?”
“We should discuss this.” He said. “In private.”
The three of them vanished, leaving the Titans and Slade alone on a battlefield riddled with bits of dino meat and ape fur.
 
○○ Ⓣ ○○
 
“You don’t think they’re gonna come back in like, 200 years, right?” Conner asked. He sat beside the depowered Slade Wilson, who was downing aspirin to make up for the sudden deficit in peace energy.
“I don’t know.” Tim said. “But we should give them more than fifteen minutes.”
As if on cue, the skies opened again. Again, the chromatic energy lit the sky and again a portal opened its swirling maw. This time, however, it wasn’t two elemental Lords to descend. Raven squinted to make the figures out.
“Oh my god.” Conner said, having a far easier time with his super-vision.
“What? Who is it?” Tim asked.
“Donna!” Mar’i shouted. She shot off the ground towards her. Her black combat armor was replaced with a crimson and white bodysuit studded with stars that seemed to twinkle as the light shifted around her. The sword at her side was gone too, replaced with a coiled loop of rope suffused with the same brilliant energy. The two collided into an embrace, spinning through the air as they held each other tightly.
Don was the first to land, restored with the powers of Dove. He looked stronger than ever, and maybe more importantly, happier. Even Tim’s typical thoughtful brooding has been pierced by an unimpeachable joy.
“I don’t understand,.” Raven said. “S-She’s alive. How is this possible?”
“I knew there was only one person who could be trusted with the powers of War, with Hank’s abilities.” He scratched the back of his neck, a bit guilty. “And she’d been staring me in the face for years. It took some doing, but eventually T’Charr and Terataya saw that too.”
Donna landed beside him, Mar’i only a step behind. By now Conner had stepped forward. He tried not to choke over his words. “I’m sorry. If I’d—”
Donna didn’t let him get the words out before pulling him into a grapple-turned-hug that quickly grew as the rest of the team piled in. Slade flicked another aspirin into his mouth.
“Danyah!” A voice called out from over the ridge. It was Travis, mounted atop a fanged reptilian creature in the vague shape of a horse and flanked on either side by his gold-armored honor guard. He broke into a gallop, stopping just short of the Titans. “When I saw the skies, I feared the worst. Is it really you? Has sorcery brought you back to us?”
“It’s me, Travis. A Lord of Chaos brought me back.”
“Not to interrupt,.” Slade said, still nursing his wounds. “But did either of you ask them to bring us back to Chicago?”
“I…” Don grimaced. “Donna, how do we get home?”
“How did you get here? Surely you could return the way you came.” Travis said.
“No, we can’t.” Tim said, pressing a few buttons on his wrist’s holographic display. “Whatever magic pervades Skartaris is also causing some extreme time dilation. I can’t guarantee we’d return to the 21st century, or even to Earth.”
“I spent a decade in Skartaris and returned to Earth nearly two centuries later. It’s the influence of Chaos. We’d need a Skartaran mage of overwhelming power to stabilize our return.” She spat the word mage with disgust. Travis’s expression seemed to confirm the reputation of Skartaran spellcasters.
Before their anxiety could spiral, the sky above began to churn. Moments later, the ground shook as a violent bolt of lightning cleaved the air, striking with such ferocity that all but Conner and Donna were flung backward. Mar'i skidded across the damp undergrowth, her senses overwhelmed by the acrid scent of ozone. Her mind was racing; their victory was hard fought, and she doubted they had much left in the tank for another confrontation. She dug her hands into the ground and pushed herself up as she choked from the smell. The Warlord Morgan and his military guards snapped to attention, forming a protective ring around the crater that now marred the earth.
From the smoking pit, a figure rose, unfolding from a crouch like something out of Terminator. Adorned in a red and white jumpsuit that accentuated his lithe build, the young man's appearance was marked by a red cowl and goggles, with sandy brown hair rebelliously spilling out.
Conner squinted through the dissipating smoke, murmuring under his breath, “A speedster?” The Flashes had had a variety of different sidekicks and other allies over the years, but none of them recognised this one
With a nonchalant flair that seemed at odds with the charged atmosphere, the newcomer greeted them. “Hey, everyone chillax. I'm here to get you guys back home.”
Donna, ever the leader, stepped forward and spoke with a commanding curiosity, now emboldened with the war aura of Hawk. “And who are you exactly? Why should we trust you with such a claim?”
Flashing a cheeky grin, he tilted his head and responded, “Well, I’m a speedster for one. Name’s Impulse. If I run fast enough, then I can… well, I guess bend time.”
Behind Donna, the group exchanged sceptical glances. Raven's face remained shadowed by recovery, Mar'i and Conner braced for action, and Tim discretely checked his gadgets, no doubt for something that he could use on a speedster should the need arise.
“Yeah, we figured that much,” Don cut through the tension, his voice calm yet insistent. “Who sent you?”
Impulse chuckled, his demeanour remaining unfazed by their scrutiny. “Look, the details aren't the fun part. Trust me, I can get us back.”
As a silence thick with doubt and scepticism settled over the group, Impulse seemed to realise his casual assurances weren't sufficient. With a theatrical sigh, he reached up and removed his mask, revealing a face familiar to both Mar'i and Raven.
“Brody!?” Mar'i exclaimed, her surprise echoing through the clearing as she stared at the boy who had once hobbled through their college classes with his leg in a cast.
The young man’s grin widened, his eyes sparkling with mischief and a hint of pride. “Actually, it’s Bart.”
 
○○ Ⓣ ○○
 
When Slade emerged from the shower, his skin was glistening with moisture, the water tracing the contours of his scars. He wrapped a stark white towel around his waist, and crossed the plush carpet to sit on the edge of the hotel room bed. He released a slow, deep breath; it was a good job the speedster kid arrived when he did. The notion of being stranded in an alien land or, worse, a different time had gnawed at him with a ferocity that was hard to admit. Without Bart’s intervention, every one of Slade’s meticulously crafted plans would have been utterly dashed.
Facing him, a wall-mounted mirror caught his rugged reflection. Drawn to his own image, Slade studied the scars that mapped his trials, the slick white hair that crowned his head, and the deep lines etched into his face. A familiar discomfort nagged at him, focusing his attention on his right eye. Unable to alleviate the irritation through the skin, Slade exhaled heavily and carefully removed the eye altogether. The movement, fluid and practised, spoke of years of adaptation.
He placed the prosthetic gently on the bed beside him and as he massaged the socket, a decades-old habit, his mind wandered. He wasn't accustomed to keeping the prosthetic in for extended periods. Showering with it had been an uncomfortable experiment in necessity - he didn't like it, but understood the importance of maintaining the facade. The Slade he would have people believe he was would have never lost an eye, because that Slade had led a life far from by the darker paths Slade had truthfully trodden.
His thoughts wandered to his brief time wielding the potent powers of Dove, and Slade felt a twinge of regret at their loss. The clarity and strength those powers had provided were intoxicating, yet he recognised that he had a more important goal, one he couldn’t compromise. His current role demanded not the accumulation of power but the perfection of his deceit, ensuring that all believed he was not the Slade Wilson they knew, but a Reawakened, more innocent doppelganger.
Now, with the glass eye resting beside him, Slade stared at his unmasked visage. Maintaining the myth of the noble Slade was critical. The ruthless mercenary, the World’s Deadliest Killer - those identities had to remain buried. The Titans had believed him enough to entrust him with divine powers, their faith a testament to his performance, but the game was far from over; in fact, it was entering its most critical phase.
 
 
Next: Return to normality in The New Titans #10
 

Throwaway account TW SA/CSA
My husband (32M) and I (31F) have been together 6 years, married for 4.5. To preface this, my husband is not a bad man and has apologized for a lot of things he didn't understand back when this stuff happened and has been very respectful since then. Having said that:
About 3 years ago I went through an extreme emotional trauma that devastated me. I found out my already deceased grandfather was a rapist and pedophile in his lifetime and that he raped my cousin as a child and tried to rape my aunt when she was a kid. He also attempted to rape a woman at work and we have court documents proving that but it was the '60s. As I mentioned, it devastated me emotionally and absolutely broke me to the core. I went through an identity crisis and had to take sex off the table indefinitely with my husband because it was physically, mentally, and emotionally painful to do it. Given the nature of my cousin's account, I'm especially unable to perform oral sex because just thinking about it makes me want to puke. The problem is my husband and I got married with somewhat of a language barrier so he didn't really understand the damage this all did to me or what I was asking of him. We had sex many times that year because I felt so guilty and couldn't say no. Afterwards he'd fall asleep satisfied and I'd go in the shower and cry alone, sometimes even puke from the sick feeling I had.
As mentioned, we have had good talks since then and he's apologized and been very respectful, we don't really have sex but I know it's a problem for him. We've had sex once since the new year and I know he is struggling, so am I, but even after all this time it feels like he's stabbing me with a knife when he penetrates; that time this year I should have stopped it but I just felt so guilty cuz we hadn't had sex for at least 6 months before then that I went through with it, which was absolutely a mistake. He brought up before he left for work today that he needs sex (he wasn't rude or anything, just honest) and I told him we would talk later. I've been to therapy a bit but my therapist is a crisis counselor so I don't feel she's been very helpful in this regard, and it's just too exhausting to explain everything that has happened to another therapist who may or may not work out. What I've written here is the watered down version.
Due to all the trauma I genuinely feel like my core has been ripped from my gut. I've been working to strengthen my gut and rebuild the inner strength but it's a tedious process that takes a long time to heal and build.
I want to engage in sex acts with my husband but I can't do penetration or oral. I've suggested before to do everything but those and he agrees, but then he won't even deep kiss me unless it's gonna lead to penetrative sex. I want to grind and touch, mutual masturbation, receive oral, etc without the penetration to get comfortable again but it truly feels like he doesn't know how to do that (and I feel guilty asking for oral when I can't perform that for him). We met on Tinder and have always had sex as part of our relationship so it feels like he doesn't understand there is a lot in between no sex and yes sex. I don't know how I can discuss this with him. I can tell when he's horny and subtly trying to initiate and I freeze up once I realize what's going on. We cuddle and kiss all the time but it doesn't go further than that.
Right now I feel like I need to be in control of our sex life, but he prefers to be in control and that was always our dynamic which I previously enjoyed. How can I broach the topic of shifting that dynamic, and also how do I make that happen once it is discussed assuming he agrees? I need to be able to do what I want how I want and not have him react by groping or going too rough, or controlling me to the point I feel used. I need to be the one to escalate from a to b to c and so on. I feel he has some impulse control issues so he has a hard time when we're actually in the middle of things, which is part of the reason I don't try to initiate and don't accept his attempts.
Aside from this issue, I feel like we're in a really good place in our marriage. We've worked through a lot and grown together, and I feel hopeful for our future. I really want to fix this so I'm hoping someone here has some advice or ideas I can try. I don't want to be in a sexless marriage the rest of my life and neither does my husband. Thanks in advance for reading.

Remember SM...remember when they did the coolest thing by giving a bunch of older characters new designs. Like we got Red and Blue, Colress and Grimsley, HECK even Annabel! A character who was only in the BF in emerald, (a game Game Freak wants you to forget about...).
So why not do this again?

Here is my top 5 characters I want to cameo in the gen 10 games

5. Drasna

Very underrated E4 Member...
I want to know if Zinnia is her kid or not, if not kid, like maybe...niece?
It would cool if she and her family were a sect of draconids that specialize in the sinnoh legendary dragon pokemon, and she was interested in the legendary dragon pokemon of Gen 10...since we know every generation has to have a legendary dragon pokemon.

4. Nemona

Love or hate her, Nemona is one of the most popular characters of Gen 9. I would argue before Kieran and Carmine, it was her by a long mile. Still might be.
I would love to see her again, because she might have finally taken Geeta's place as La Primera, and it would be really funny if she is just a superboss like Cynthia. Go into a house, and then BOOM...Nemona!
"Hi I'm Nemona! I'm La Primera of Paldea. Things have been stressful...but fun! Battling all of the new trainers in the paldea league-wait you look like a trainer...a strong one. ME. YOU. BATTLE. YES?!"
Show slight growth as she talks about how becoming La Primera opened her eyes to the responsibilities that Geeta had, and how she wishes to do her do best to honor her example.
Just please...KEEP her the same, ON sight persona. PLEASE.

3. Drayton

I feel out of the entire blueberry league, including Lacey, Drayton has to be coming back again...like I feel they set him far too well to replace Drayden as gym leader.
Like Drayden's other grandchild, he is a prodigy but unlike Iris he is a SLACKER.
Which feel like could be translate well if bro is just on vacation to the another region and they could further his character saying he finally graduted blueberry but still doesn't want to come home.
Could be a fun six sages type quest/glitterai where you follow him around and get more of his story.
I'm going to assume it's because Drayden is getting up there in age, and he feels he won't be able to set an example as the heir. And perhaps this story has a dark ending with Drayton being called by someone (assuming it's Iris) that Drayden has passed.
Bro then leaves but thanks the player for following him around by giving him Draco Meteor, which would be really cool since Iris and Drayden did that in BW1, so it kinda leaves something to the imagination....hm.

2. Hau

Now, I feel if any character that needs a chance in the spotlight again...I think it should be Hau.
Like he forever plagued by being "the smiley rival" because SM didn't have that many facial expressions for anyone that wasn't the aether family (minus Mohn). Like Drayton, he is a prodigy, but unlike Drayton...he is a bit more upfront with his insecurities.
In SM, there are moments in the story when Hau gets visibly upset he isn't strong: like when Lily gets kidnapped, or when Gladion accused of holding back, or when he still can't beat the player in their final battle.
USUM gave his character more focus, giving a lot more urge to battle and win, while still keeping his level headed persona. He even got to be the champion fight for the game, that is arguably the hardest in the franchise. Good on him.
When he returns...he should be the kahuna of Melemele Island*. There is no excuse why he couldn't be. They SHOULD make my bro a BADASS gigachad like that guy from* Moana.
Like make everyone think Hau is the coolest dude ever.

1. Bianca and Cheren

Now, I know picking two for one is kinda unfair...BUT COME ON.
These two were the first rivals that actually felt like characters instead of just being tropes.
Blue was literally just cocky anime rival, Silver was the edgy criminal rival, May and Brendan were the rivals that have a crush on the protag,
Wally and Barry were close but the story of the games don't really have time to dwell on them... unlike Cheren and Bianca.
Like they these two were a perfect example of pokemon fans at the time of BW1's release date, ambitious yet kinda clueless about what to do with their ambition.
So what if, after nearly 12-13 years, we finally see them in the games and learn what they have been up to.
Like I want to see if Bianca has become professor and if Cheren finally has a beard to cover up that baby face he has lmao.
IF RED AND BLUE CAN COME BACK...why can't them?

Hodadenon: The Last One Left and the Chestnut Tree
Long ago a boy and his uncle lived together in an elm bark lodge.
The boy’s name was Hodadenon, which means “The Last One Left.”
All of the rest of his family had disappeared over the years and it was thought they had been killed by those who were ‘otgont’, possessed of wicked powers.
Each morning the uncle would feed Hodadenon and then go out of the lodge to hunt, leaving the boy by himself. Each evening he would return, again feed the boy, and then go to sleep.
One day Hodadenon was playing by himself in the lodge.
He began to think. “Enh,” he said, “why is it that I never see my uncle eat?”
Then he took a bone awl and made a small hole in the deerskin he used as a blanket each night.
“Tonight,” said Hodadenon, “I shall see what happens after we go to bed.”
That evening as always the uncle returned. He fed the boy and told him to go to sleep. Hodadenon lay down on one side of the fire and on the other side the uncle lay down on his couch, which was made of saplings and covered with many animal skins.
Pulling the deerskin over his head, Hodadenon pretended to sleep, but he could still see his uncle through the small hole he had made.
After a time, the uncle stood up and went over to the fire.
“Hodadenon,” said the uncle in a soft voice, but the boy did not answer.
Three times more the uncle called his name, but Hodadenon still pretended to sleep. Coming closer to the fire, the uncle blew very hard into it.
Sparks flew out, landing on the boy’s legs.
“Hodadenon,” said the uncle, “be careful. You are going to be burned.”
But even though some of the sparks fell on his bare skin and burned him Hodadenon did not move.
“Nyoh,” said the uncle, “the boy is indeed asleep.”
He went over to his couch and removed the skins.
He lifted off the top of the couch and took out a box made of birch bark.
All of this Hodadenon watched through the hole in his blanket.
Opening the box made of birch bark, the uncle took out a small pot.
It was so small that it fit easily in the palm of his hand.
From inside the pot he took out another object which the boy could not clearly see though it looked to be smaller than an acorn.
Using a little knife, the uncle scraped tiny shavings from the thing into the pot.
Then, putting the tiny pot over the fire, he blew on it and sang this song:
Grow, pot, grow in size
Grow, pot, grow in size
And as Hodadenon watched, the pot grew in size as the uncle sang his song and blew on it. Finally the pot was as large as a normal cooking pot and the odour of something delicious came from it.
Before long the food was ready and the uncle ate it all.
When he was through, he blew once more on the pot and sang this song:
Shrink, pot, shrink in size
Shrink, pot, shrink in size
And once again the pot became small enough to hold in the palm of his hand.
Replacing the thing he had scraped in the tiny pot, Hodadenon’s uncle replaced the pot in the birch bark box and again hid everything in the secret compartment under his couch. Then he went to sleep.
The next morning, as always, the uncle went out hunting and left the boy alone in the lodge. For a time Hodadenon played around the lodge.
He shot his small bow and arrow at a target and did other things, but the song his uncle sang to the pot kept going through his head.
Finally he could stand it no longer.
“My uncle will be back soon from his hunting,” he said. “He will be very hungry. I should prepare a meal for him.”
Hodadenon went over to his uncle’s couch, pulled off the skins and opened the compartment.
Taking out the box of birch bark, he opened it and found the tiny pot.
Within it was half of a small dry nut.
“So this is my uncle’s food,” said Hodadenon, “but it is almost gone.
If I want to make enough for him to eat, I must use it all.
I am sure he can get more.” So Hodadenon took a knife and scraped all that was left of the nut into the tiny pot.
Then, placing the pot over the fire, he blew on it and sang:
Grow, pot, grow in size
Grow, pot, grow in size
Sure enough, just as it had done for his uncle, the pot became larger.
Now it was the size of a normal cooking pot and it was boiling and boiling.
But Hodadenon was not satisfied, “surely my uncle will be more hungry than this when he comes home.
I must make more.”
Then he blew on the pot and again sang:
Grow, pot, grow in size
Grow, pot, grow in size
Now the pot was so large and bubbling so fast that Hodadenon had to stretch to stir the contents, which smelled very good indeed.
“Neh,” said Hodadenon, “this isn’t enough. What if my uncle wishes to share this good food with me.
After all, he will be grateful that I prepared it.
I must make more.”
So, once more, he blew on the kettle and sang the song.
Again the pot grew and now it was so large that Hodadenon had to stand on top of his uncle’s couch and use a canoe paddle to stir the contents, but he was so excited that he did not want to stop.
“This is almost enough for us,” he said, “but what if we should have visitors?
We should have enough to offer them as well.”
So, for a fourth time, Hodadenon blew on the pot and sang the magic song.
The pot grew so big that Hodadenon had to get out of the lodge because it filled the whole place from side to side! It was so big that the only way the boy could stir it was by taking a long pole up to the roof and reaching down to stir it through the smoke hole!
When Hodadenon’s uncle came back from hunting, the first thing he saw was the pudding bubbling out of the door of the lodge.
He heard someone singing above him and looked up.
There was Hodadenon, swinging his legs in the smoke hole, still stirring the pudding and singing happily:
What a good cook I am
What a good cook I am
We all will eat well now
What a good cook I am
“Nephew,” called the old man, “come down from there.
What you have done has killed me.”
Then Hodadenon’s uncle blew on the pot through the door of the lodge and sang the song to make it grow small.
When it was down to the size it had been at the beginning, he entered the lodge, lay down on his couch and began to weep.
Hodadenon, who had come down from the smoke hole, walked over to where the old man lay.
“Uncle,” said Hodadenon, “what is wrong?”
“Hodadenon,” said the uncle, “you have used up all of the only food I can eat.
Now I will starve to death.
This is why I never allowed you to see me eat.
I knew that you would do this.”
“Uncle,” said the boy, “things can’t be that bad.
Just go and get another of those little nuts.”
“Neh,” said the uncle, “that is the kind of food called a chestnut.
Long ago, though it was very dangerous, I obtained that one.
All these years I have eaten it and it would have lasted for many more.
Now I am too old to get another one.”
“Wah-ah,” said Hodadenon, “this is my doing.
I shall go and bring back many chestnuts.”
“It is not possible,” said the old man.
“The way is long and guarded by many terrible creatures.
Others of your family have gone there but none have ever returned.”
Yet Hodadenon would not give up. Finally the uncle agreed to tell him the way.
“Go straight to the north, the uncle said. “There you will find a narrow path.
At its first turn it is guarded by two great rattle snakes, slaves to the evil ones who own the chestnut trees.
No one can get past them.”
“But what if I do, Uncle?” asked Hodadenon.
If anyone by good luck passes the great snakes, he will next encounter two huge hears.
They guard a passageway between the rocks.
They too are slaves of the evil ones.
They will tear apart anyone who tries to pass.
“Further on down the path are two giant Panthers which leap upon anyone who attempts to get by them. Hodadeno, it cannot be done.”
“Is that all, Uncle?” Hodadenon said.
“Is it not enough?” said the old man.
“Neh, that is only the beginning. Next is the place where the chestnut trees grow.
There live the seven sisters who own the trees.
All of them are strong in ‘otgont’ power.
If anyone comes to steal the chestnuts, they run from their long lodge and beat the person to death with their clubs.
No one can hope to go undetected, for a flayed human skin hangs in the top of a tree looking down on the chestnut grove and it sings a warning when anyone comes close.”
“Nyah-weh, Uncle,” said Hodadenon, “I thank you for your good advice.
Now I must he on my way. I shall return with the food you need if all goes well.”
Taking two sticks, he tied them together and placed them standing near the fire.
“Watch these sticks, Uncle,” said the boy. “If all is well with me they will not move, but if I am killed they will break apart.”
Now Hodadenon set out on his way.
He went straight to the north and found a narrow path.
“This must be the road my uncle told me of,” said Hodadenon. “It looks easy enough to travel.”
The boy continued along and soon the path began to twist and wind.
Ahead, it turned sharply to the left. Hodadenon stopped, crept off the path, went through the trees, and peered out cautiously.
There on either side of the path, were two great rattlesnakes, coiled and ready to strike.
“Uncle,” said Hodadenon, “you know this road well.” He went and caught two chipmunks. Holding one in each hand he again began to walk the path.
When he came to the two rattlesnakes he threw a chipmunk into the mouth of each before they could strike him.
“Tca,” he said, “you seem to be in need of food.
Now I have given you that which you should hunt for yourselves.
Hawenio, our Creator, did not make any of his beings to be slaves. Go from this place.”
As soon as he finished speaking, the two rattlesnakes uncoiled and crawled off in different directions, leaving the road unguarded as Hodadenon went along his way.
Meanwhile, back at the lodge, the two tied sticks which had been quivering now stood still as Hodadenon’s uncle watched them intently.
Now the path entered a rocky place.
Again Hodadenon left the trail to scout ahead.
There, where the way dipped between two big boulders, were a pair of giant bears, crouched and ready to tear apart anybody who tried to go by.
“Uncle,” said Hodadenon, “you have travelled this road before.”
He climbed a tree where he heard the buzzing of many bees, pulled out two combs of honey and went back onto the path.
When he came to the bears, he hurled the combs of honey into their mouths before they could grab him.
“Hunh,” the boy said, “it looks to me as if you were hungry.
Now I have given you that which you like best of all.
The one who gave us breath, Hawenio, did not make us to be the slaves of anyone.
Go from this place.”
At his words, the two bears turned and went away,each in a different direction as Hodadenon continued down the trail.
Meanwhile, back at the uncle’s lodge, the two tied sticks stopped quivering and Hodadenon’s uncle breathed a sigh of relief.
Now the path entered a deep forest and wound between large trees.
Leaving the trail, Hodadenon crept along till he could see the place where two huge panthers, eyes glowing like green flames, hid behind a pair of giant pines on either side of the path.
“Uncle,” Hodadenon said, “you remember your travels well.”
Taking his bow and arrows, he killed two deer.
Carrying them over his shoulders, he went down the trail once more.
Before the panthers could leap upon him, he threw each of them a deer.
“Ee-yah,” he said, “I see that you were in need of food.
Now I have given you that which you are supposed to hunt.
Know that the one who gave us strength to walk around, Hawenio, did not intend that any living creature should serve another as a slave.
Go from this place.”
In two different directions away into the trees slunk the panthers and the boy continued along his way.
Meanwhile, back at the lodge, the two sticks which had been shaking as if struck by a strong wind once more stood still as Hodadenon’s uncle watched them.
The path in front of Hodadenon was very straight and wide. It looked to have been travelled by many feet.
The boy listened very carefully and soon he began to hear a very faint song coming from the treetops.
Crawling forward through the brush, he peered up and saw the one who was singing.
It was the skin of a woman tied in the top of a tree.
This was her song:
Gi-nu, gi-nu, gi-nu
I am the one who sees all,
I see you
The song was very soft.
Hodadenon could barely hear it, but he knew it would grow loud indeed if she caught a glimpse of him.
Below her was a grove of trees.
They were covered with a fruit which had burrs all over it.
These, Hodadenon knew, must be the chestnuts.
Beyond the skin woman and the trees was a great pile of human bones and just to the other side of them was the long lodge of the seven witches.
“Tcu,” said Hodadenon, “now I shall need some help.”
Going to a basswood tree, he peeled a long strip of bark.
With a burned stick and the juice of berries, he decorated the piece of bark until it looked just like a long wampum belt.
Slinging it over his shoulder, he knelt down and tapped four times on the earth.
“My friend,” he said, “I am in need of help.”
Up out of the ground poked the nose and then the head of a female mole.
“Nyoh, Hodadenon! How can I help you?” asked the mole.
“Grandmother,” said the boy, “if I make myself very small, will you carry me under the earth with you?”
“That’s too easy,” said the mole. “Let’s go!”
Then Hodadenon began to rub himself with his hands.
As he did so he grew smaller and smaller until he was small enough to travel with the mole under the earth.
Down into the ground they went, coming up beneath the very tree where the Skin Woman was swaying back and forth.
Once again Hodadenon rubbed himself with his hands until he was back to normal.
Then he called up to Skin Woman.
“Sister,” he called, “I have seen you first.
Do not tell the others I am here and I will give you this fine belt of wampum.”
“Wah-ah!” said Skin Woman, “I did not see you, Hodadenon.
Give me the belt and I will not warn them you are here.”
Hodadenon tossed the belt up to Skin Woman.
She put it on and immediately it wrapped itself so tightly about her she could not speak. Under the tree, Hodadenon quickly filled his pouch with chestnuts.
Then, making himself small once more, he called for his friend, Mole, to take him back under the earth.
Up in the tree, Skin Woman finally got her breath. She began to sing:
Gi-nu, gi-nu, gi-nu
Someone has bribed me
I cannot say who
Out from the long lodge ran the seven witches.
Each of them carried a long club.
They ran to the place where Skin Woman hung, but they saw no one.
“Someone has been here,” said one of the witches.
“Some of our chestnuts are gone,” said another.
“Skin Woman,” said a third witch, “you are our slave.
Speak and tell us who has been here.”
But Skin Woman did not answer the question.
All she did was swing back and forth in the wind, singing this song:
Gi-nu, gi-nu, gi-nu
I’ve been given a wampum belt
Shining and new
“You are a fool,” said another of the witches.
“That is only the bark from a tree.”
“It must have been The Last One Left.” said the fifth witch, “the boy whose uncle stole from us long ago.”
“If he comes back,” said the sixth witch, “we will catch him and kill him.”
“Nyoh,” said the last witch, “now we must punish our slave.”
She took her club and struck Skin Woman a heavy blow.
Each of the others did the same.
Then the seven witches went back into the long lodge, leaving the Skin Woman covered with bruises, but still singing softly of her fine new belt of wampum.
Meanwhile, back in the lodge of Hodadenon’s uncle, the two sticks had fallen over on the floor.
Picking them up and standing them upright once more, the old man watched them with great concern.
From his hiding place in the earth, Hodadenon had listened to all that was said by the seven sisters. “It is not right,” he said “that those terrible creatures should go on like this.
Friend Mole, we must go back there.”
The mole dove deeper into the earth.
She carried Hodadenon under the long lodge and came up beneath the couch where the sisters slept.
There, tied to a string of sinew, were seven hearts.
Quick as a spark leaping from the fire, Hodadenon grabbed the string of hearts and ran from the lodge.
Seeing him, the seven witches grabbed their clubs and gave chase.
Now back in the lodge of Hodadenon’s uncle the two sticks fell over once more.
The old man was so disheartened that he did not stand them up again.
He lay there staring at them, certain that his nephew would now never return alive.
From the top of her tree, Skin Woman sang as the seven witches chased Hodadenon:
Gi-nu, gi-nu, gi-nu
Hodadenon has your hearts
This will be the end of you
Now the first witch had almost caught up with the boy and raised her club to strike him.
As she did so, Hodadenon squeezed one of the hearts on the sinew string and the witch fell dead.
Now the second witch was about to strike.
Again Hodadenon squeezed a heart and the second witch died also.
In the end, he had squeezed all seven of the hearts and all seven of the evil sisters had fallen dead.
Climbing to the top of the tree, Hodadenon cut loose the cords which held Skin Woman.
He brought her down and placed her on top of the pile of human bones.
Then he began to push against a great dead hickory tree which was near the pile.
“Get yourselves up, my relatives!” he shouted. “A tree is about to fall on you!”
Immediately Skin Woman and all of the people whose bones were piled there leaped up and came back to life.
Skin Woman was, indeed, the sister of Hodadenon.
Long ago the evil witches had caught her and the others of his family whose bones lay in that pile.
There before him were his parents, his brothers, and all his relations.
All were very happy to be alive and thanked the boy again and again.
Taking the chestnuts from the ground, Hodadenon passed them out to all his relatives.
“Plant these all over,” he said. “Food will be shared with everyone from now on.”
Finally, his pouch filled with chestnuts, Hodadenon went back to the lodge of his uncle.
The old man lay there on his couch, thin as a skeleton, his eyes fixed on the two tied sticks.
“Uncle,” said Hodadenon, “I have returned.”
The old man jumped up and embraced the nephew.
To this day he still sits in that lodge, making chestnut pudding in his pot.
And from that time on, the chestnuts, like all the other good things given to us by Hawenio, our Creator, no longer belong to just one family, no matter how powerful they are, but are shared by all.

I've just come out of an 8+ year long friendship with a person with BPD and wow, this subreddit has been clarifying. For context said person has been homeless on and off for 3 years - he got kicked out of his family home, moved in with his boyfriend, got kicked out after a year or so, moved back home, then in October he got kicked out again which is when I took him in and let him sleep on my couch. I didn't even think twice about it, he had nowhere else to go and we'd been good friends for so long.
I will spare the details but we had an argument about a month ago. I definitely snapped, after 6 months of him bumming around not helping with the housework, not looking for work, blaming every little problem on him being homeless, and rotting on the couch getting stoned, I was done giving him leeway.
The jist of it is, I needed a break from living with him and his two flying monkeys, so I went to stay at my mam's for a night. But! I left the toilet clogged (genuinely just forgot, I had been dealing with it the night before and needed to go out to buy things to fix it, then some petty fight happened between me and him which was what made me decide to go stay with my mam for a night. My bad, but I told him I would fix it once I got home and that he could use the ensuite in my flatmates' room until then. Not ideal, but shit happens (literally!).) He lost his shit, saying this was "typical" (it wasn't, this had never happened before) and so I was just at the end of my rope. I told him to get a grip and that this has never been an issue before in the 6 months I'd been kindly sharing my bathroom with him. This was on Saturday afternoon.
That was too much for him, and then within 3 days he'd left and took his monkeys with him. I left them to clear out, my landlord texted me telling me they were gonna be out by the end of the week so I just let them do that while I stayed at my mam's. He bombarded me with vicious texts, I realised things could get unsafe so I went back on Monday to collect my cat and checked her into a cat hotel. When I did that I found a note pinned to my bedroom wall detailing all the ways in which I'm a shitty cat owner and friend. Apparently he's been running his mouth about me on twitter, has a pinned tweet in which he's namedropping me and badmouthing me, and has posted a private discord message I sent him that was taken out of context.
He has everyone fooled. My exflatmate's gf had an Xbox we all used for Youtube in the living room, I left my account logged in and one night she deleted all of my subscriptions, watch history, etc. Real petty shit.
I'm glad to be rid of all of them. I know the love I deserve, I have incredible friends and family and a wonderful partner. If anything this has given me more motivation to work on my own mental health recovery - I have cPTSD (ontop of auDHD, fun and games /s) and have made incredible strides over the past year, I still have my moments but I realised that I don't want to be like him. At all. So truly, this is the best thing that could've happened.
Thanks for giving me a space to share this 🫶
edit - phrasing

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Hi, i’m not sure where to start.. but first of all i’m mentally ill and i’m trying to work on myself for years. I have clinical depression, social anxiety and bipolar disorder which makes me even more “easy” to hurt. My bf has untreated adhd and anger issues. He deal with this on his own by smoking canabis since he was 13. Problem is that he is stoned since he wakes up till he goes to sleep and he is so angry when he’s not. He can’t even try to solve things or communicate without smoking. It really piss me of when i’m trying to communicate with him about some problem and he gets mad and “needs to calm down to think” by going to smoke. He’s also smoking at work which i’m not okay with. This is not the reason why i’m writing this but i just want you to get into this situation as much as i can. We are together for a year. 4 months ago i’ve made a choice to change my job so we can live together and spend more time together. Now we are coworkers (we worked at a same place just in diff shifts which made it hard for us cuz i woke him up when i came back from work). It was hard for me to change a shift cuz of my social anxiety. I also lost my best friend cause he hated him and said that he will hurt me. Now to the problem - when we were together for like 6 months my girl friend tried his loyalty by trying to flirt with him - and he failed in whole another level. Just for you to know we did it cause i didn’t trust him cuz of some things that i knew.. like.. he is exhibicionist i guess.. in past he sent a lot of dic pics to random people cuz that feeling that someone could see it turned him on.. i never thought it was a real problem cause he never really had a gf before me so i thought that that’s the reason why he was doing stuff like this. Buut I found out by accident that he is STILL doing this stuff! And he is paying for it?… he is paying online cam sites like omegle to show his D to people. I found it really weird. We r having s*x normally so that’s not a problem. As i said we ate living together but he is doing this stuff when i go to visit my parents? They live 15 min away. Also i’ve found out when i was at my lowest - my cat (10) tragically died in my arms and i was for a week at my patent’s cuz it was our cat and they were also destroyed by what happend to our cat. My cat died before Valentine’s and i was waiting for my psychiatrist to change andress in my sick note so i couldn’t leave to go to see him. He got mad and sent me a lot of angry ugly voice mails and went to go show his D on cam sites and do stuff…. lately when i tried to talk to him about this he just told me that he thought that it was over and that he can’t hurt methat he wasnt really thinking. He did this whole year of our relationship and this was his “sorry.” He told me that he is sorry and that he loves me. I stayed calm and tried to understand why is he doing this and stayed hurt inside. Lately i had a break down cuz of that (which makes sense i guess). He’s been so jealous lately that i talk to my coworkers (30+ with wifes) and that im too kind to people and that im smilin at people???.. i seriously don’t know what to do … i tried to do my best to fix this relationship but i’m at my limit. He cheated on me our whole relationship i gave him EVERYTHING and he is mad that i’m smiling at people? What the heck. What’s wrong with him? Please help me

I was raised by a father who was bipolar type 2, had borderline personality disorder, severe depression with constant suicidal ideation, the most severe anger issues I have ever seen in a human being in my life (imagine if logan roy from succession got hooked on amphetamines, about like that), and he committed suicide when I was 19. I was not allowed to feel in my home, if I was upset about anything at all, then that meant that I was "whining" and needed to shut up and be more grateful, even when I was "whining" that he took so many pills that he forgot me having to stop his suicide attempt, and I got angry when I mention that event and he went "what are you talking about?", I thought he was gaslighting me at first, but I later realized the combo of drugs he was on and his own severe mental instability had actually blocked that memory out from his stupid fucking head, but I was wrong for getting upset because "it's not my fault I don't remember". Not even the point, the point is I was raised that expressing emotions of any kind was a direct affront to my father that would not be taken lightly by him, and I VERY MUCH internalized that. It took me 18 months after his death to be able to shed a single tear about the situation, and even then it was tears of anger, and I had to force myself to cry, it was like my head was a hot air balloon of a whole lifetime of emotions and pain I had locked away and wanted to let it out but I couldn't, then when I did let it out, it hurt so much, that I wanted to numb it all away again, and that's when the drinking got really bad. I am 9 months sober after almost dying from anemia caused by a severe long term gastric bleed caused by my drinking (they consider the life threatening range for your hemoglobin level anything below about 7-8, yea, mine was 3.4 when i got to the hospital, it took 7 bags of blood just to bring me up to barely stable), and it left me with some liver scaring, I was so desperate to not feel all the pain that I drowned it, and now I'm finally having to come up for air, and oh boy. I feel like I have no idea who I am. Where does the me that my parents molded me into end and the me that is my true self begin. Will I ever be able to enjoy my interests without the deep seeded shame I have for stuff like watching anime that I have from my dad quite literally calling me a pussy for liking anime. I got a hunter x hunter charm necklace thing and I've been wearing it and I like it, but I still am so incredibly self conscious about it because of the time I tried to wear a necklace in like 5th grade and my dad said it made me look "faggy", which is absolutely fucking insane because my dad was genuinely not homophobic, my aunt was gay and she was frankly the only one of his siblings he actually liked, he didn't have a bigoted bone in his body, but what he meant is "girls won't go for you if you wear that", but fuck you, I was in 5th grade and (very much due to the emotional repression) I wouldn't get truly interested in dating until, let me check, NOW. I had a long term girlfriend through high school and college who was my first love, but we only started dating because she asked me out, I have never made the first move on a girl a single time in my life, I've quite literally never flirted. My whole life, I have been so scared of relationships because the only one I saw was my parents godless nightmare of a marriage where they were "staying together for me" even when I was in high school ACTIVELY ASKING THEM TO GET DIVORCED, because they were such fucking nightmares. I have always thought that whatever good feelings of love and fulfillment I would get from a relationship would never outweigh the pain that would come along with the fights, and only now that I'm finally starting to break through the layers of repressed emotions and that I've dried out off of the booze am I finally starting to feel different. The thing that is so hard is, I've just pushed all my feelings and all my pain down so deep for my entire life, that now the emotions are all coming at once, and good God I just can't handle it sometimes. I also got diagnosed as bipolar type 2 today, just like dear old dad, still sending gifts up from hell, just in time for my birthday too. The pain, the feeling that I have missed out on so much of my life by being to afraid of getting hurt to allow myself to have anything good. I feel like I've missed out on so much of life because of that bastard, and now I'm 25, I barely recognize myself when I look in the mirror, and I am trying to basically rebuild myself from the ground up after I almost died and got sober, and I am basically by myself dealing with it (very long story, but basically because of his death, our family business went under and my mom and I had to move to her hometown, in with my aunt and uncle, and I have no friends here and I am not close with my family and they are a bunch of judgmental Bible thumpers who basically think I'm a degenerate for drinking and a snowflake for my mental health issues), and I just feel so deeply intensely alone. I was so numbed for my entire life, that I didn't even actually know you could feel emotions this intense, the way that the sorrow just feels like a bottomless hole in your chest, and all I want is to feel like someone cares about me and that I matter. My mom is here with me, and she is doing her best, but if you can't tell from the post, she isn't exactly blameless in the cause of the issue, so that is kind of a double edged sword. I try and keep in touch with my friends from my hometown, but they're busy with their lives and they don't always have the time, plus I always feel like I'm putting them out when I need their help (there's that trauma again). I'm in therapy and I just went up to twice a week, but that still only helps so much. I even want to start dating again, but I'm stuck in a small town in the middle of nowhere in south Alabama, where the dating pool isn't exactly huge, and gets widdled down a LOT more when you take into account that I'm an agnostic democrat. God, every day I ask myself, why isn't he still here, so I can let out all of this pent up emotion and pain onto the person who actually deserves it, but even then I know it wouldn't make me feel better. So as I'm finally starting to be able to even have emotions again, I'm reminded why I wanted to numb them all away. I just feel alone, and like I don't even know who I am, and that who I am might not be the person I wanted to be, and there's a healthy dose of self hatred mixed in, and all I want is for someone to hold me and tell me it will be OK, because I know it will, but God damn it why does it just have to be so damn hard sometimes. Why did he have to die without me ever getting to tell him how he hurt me to his face. How could he rob me of that. He got to die with the last thing I said to him being that I loved him, and I have to take to my grave that the last thing that I ever said to my father was a lie.
Edit: TLDR: Abusive dad caused me to be so emotionally repressed that when he died I became an alcoholic to numb the pain and now that I'm sober and chipping away at the emotional repression, I feel an entire lifetimes worth of emotions hitting me all at once and it is incredibly overwhelming and has left me feeling like I don't know who I am and that I am all alone just picking up the scraps of my life, while not even knowing what the life I'm picking up even looks like. I just wish he was still alive so I could tell him all the things I didn't get a chance too while he was alive. All the awful, hurtful, painful, gut wrenching things I would say to him.