Today I’m really sure the thing I have for almost a week is panic attacks cuz Every time I feel anxious or stressed in school or home it just happens My body start shaking,feeling sick,my heart starts racing,sweating , and finding it hard to breathe
Still didn’t have the courage to talk with my parents , but I’m trying my best to stay calm even though a lot is happening right now

alright guys i was diagnosed in february but i’ve had symptoms since 2020 that worsened after i got covid in dec 2022.
okay so i used to be a HUGE thrill lover, not afraid of heights, planes, etc. bro now i am a scaredy cat of everything and it makes me so sad. the past couple of times i had to fly on a plane my heart rate would stay over 100 the entire flight. i was scared of every shake of turbulence, something i wouldn’t have even thought of twice before.
idk if anyone else relates to heightened anxiety or not doing things like that that you used to love. it’s so frustrating bc i feel like a shell of a person now that’s afraid of everything. i’ve even started getting crazy motion sickness when someone else is driving, i’ve never had anything bother me like that before.
this is basically a rant but i also wanted to know if any of you guys have gone through something similar with POTS. i’m currently on propranolol, 20mg twice a day. i’ve been titrating up since february with very little difference honestly. i have noticed my heart rate being lower than it used to be, but i still FEEL like it’s always high during certain activities if that makes sense???
i’m just so frustrated of always feeling on edge and never being able to relax. i hate leaving the house now bc i’m scared i look crazy when i experience any symptoms which worsens my anxiety and then my POTS too 😵‍💫 i try not to care what other people think but damn why is it so embarrassing to pass out or feel dizzy in public????
anyways POTS is dumb and i needed to rant i love you guys <3

About ten years ago I first started to deal with severe digestion issues. Luckily, after a year of testing and talking with my doctors, I got better after starting antidepressants. Back then I was under a lot of stress and suffered from depression. I have been doing really well mentally for the past 8/7 years or so. Low stress, good mental health, finished my degree and landed a stable job.
Yet, for the past 2,5 years my digestion has been deteriorating rapidly. My issues currently are:

• daily foul smelling gas, starting around lunchtime and sometimes going on until late into the evening/night
• concurrent with the gas; bloating, fatigue and brain fog. I regularly have to lay down and often even fall asleep (this is start to interfere with my work as well)
• soft or sticky stools, often (not always) diarrhea-like. However, frequency seems somewhat normal (once or twice a day)

I am happy to say that at least I don’t have pain, cramps, constipation, burping, sudden diarrhea (having to run for the bathroom), and fortunately this time around I’m not loosing weight like I was last time. However, due to the lack of pain and cramps I'm also doubting whether this really is IBS.
My GP and I are at a loss of what could be going on. We’ve tried lots of interventions and treatments by now, and my GP said we’ve run out of treatments and tests. So far we’ve tried:

• FODMAP elimination (no clear triggers, as symptoms hardly subsided during the elimination phase)
• caffeine elimination
• gluten elimination
• bloodtests for allergies / celiac disease as well as Crohn’s disease
• elimination of sucralose and other sweeteners
• digestive enzymes supplementation
• betaine HCI supplementation
• l-glutamine supplementation
• ginger extract supplementation as well as consuming lots of ginger
• psyllium husk supplementation
• s. boulardii supplementation
• simethicone supplementation
• zinc supplementation
• sertraline (50 mg)
• amitriptyline (10 mg)
• enteric coated peppermint oil
• mindful eating and breathwork

I eat a vegan diet (quite varied albeit less so since the FODMAP diet) and my bloodwork is all good, I workout 3-4 times a week, get 8 hrs sleep/night, and never consume alcohol. I make sure not to swallow excessive air when eating and I chew my food well. I also used to meditate for 10-20 min a day, and tried self-hypnosis techniques learned in therapy (but lately have given up on that, as tbh I’m starting to get really tired with trying all sorts of things to improve my situation when nothing seems to work). I am considering trying some sort of oregano oil/berberine supplementation regimen as I’ve read that for some people who suffer from hydrogen SIBO this could help. However, there isn’t really a good way of testing for SIBO in my country, and my GP says that at home breath tests are too unreliable at this point in time. So I’m not sure if oregano/berberine supplementation is going to be of much use. (GP discourages it atm anyway, although they also understand my desire for relief/treatment.)
I was in a very good place before this “relapse” and it’s really starting to take its toll on me. I wonder if anyone has any further ideas of what could be going on or what I might be overlooking. I may just have to accept that I’m never going to get rid of this, but I am really hoping for something that can alleviate my symptoms. At this rate it’s starting to affect my mental health as well and I’m also running into issues at work because of this.

Here we are again in the shit stew that is the Fallowveil trailer park. We’ve got soul eating strippers, jobs that kill us, and plenty of weirdos, both the trailer trash and the potentially paranormal variety. It’s the place where even your own computer sometimes threatens to kill you. I can’t tell if I should be worried, or annoyed that all my neighbors have such irresponsible web habits. I know it’s not me that brings in all these machine wiping viruses.
So even though I got a system error that literally said “you’re useless and you should die” I’m less interested in that. Stupid thing. Like I don’t already know I’m useless. That’s not what I’m depressed about.
Well… I suppose it's tangentially related.
I hope anyone reading will forgive me. I’m feeling the sting of rejection right now. It was really stupid of me to ask. Especially now. Nobody here really likes me. They’ve only been nice to me as a courtesy because I was almost involved in a god damn shootout. And my idiot self decided that was the perfect time to push one of my few friends all the way away. Never ask your friends out on dates. It ruins everything.
So there’s this woman. I’ve talked about her in the past. Trista Ramone. She lives in the far back corner of the trailer park. You can instantly tell which unit is hers because she’s covered every square inch of the property with gardens and a rabbit hutch. The place usually has beads and colorful flags hanging on its walls as well. She’s kind of a right winger’s nightmare. I know some of those flags represent various lgbtq plus communities.
She and I have been friendly in the past. We’re both night shift workers. We crossed paths quite a bit going to and from work so we struck up a friendship over the years.
Let’s just ripped the band aid off. Recently I’ve started thinking I had… stronger feelings for Trista. I got stupid and decided to tell her about them. She wasn’t interested. I get why. We have very different lifestyles. I like meat, and she thinks the meat industry is murder. I’m not willing to give up meat, and she’s not willing to give up her beliefs. It's as simple as that. Now things are incredibly awkward with one of my closer friends and I’m still spiraling into self loathing, where I belong.
She swore up and down that she absolutely still wants to be friends with me, but I’m not sure I believe her. The look she gave me when I told her I’d like to ask her out. It looked like sadness, but a small part of me is convinced it was pity, or worse, disgust and loathing, and that small part gave me ever shuts the fuck up. But anyway, she gave me permission to write about her.
She is one of the creepy fixtures of our little neighborhood after all. She told me to make her seem as insane and scary as I possibly could and that she should get to kill me at the end. She also handed me a few of her high school yearbooks, advised me to chat with another neighbor of ours who she went to school with, and to only use creepy rumors for the rest.
Part of me is really willing to describe her as awful, but that’s just my anger. I don’t like that part of me. Trista’s not a bad person at all. She’s just weird and she doesn’t want to date me. God damn it, Petunia’s right. I need therapy.
So, I’ve told the story of the sexy, scary lady living in a polycule here in the trailer park. I think she’s got a bigger heart than she lets on. I’ve talked about the stories surrounding the Schroeder Slaughterhouse. Now let’s talk about the hippy everyone thinks is a vampire.
She’s a taller woman, maybe five-seven or eight, and she’s skinny. Her typical wardrobe is… interesting. Try to imagine your typical new-age hippy/stoner girl, wearing colorful sarongs, crop-tops, beanies, baggy sweaters, T-shirts with colorful sayings on them, sandals, boots woven from some sort of exotic plant, beaded necklaces, bracelets, a few too many piercings and some intricate tattoos. Can you picture that kind of person? Well, take that and dip them in “goth” dye. Everything is black, and contrasts to her pale white complexion, her eyes are this unusual violet color, and then make the woman wearing all that seem kind of depressed about something. That’s the look Trista has going on. Like if Wednesday Addams was forced to dress up for Hippy Day.
I’ve heard people call her an emo vampire, but as a former emo myself, she doesn’t fill out all the criteria. She doesn’t typically wear any super tight pants or cake on the eyeshadow. I guess she’s just Trista. It might sound weird (and it is) but the whole thing suits her. Her style, tattoos, and complexion all create this image of skinny vampiric waif with a mysterious past and a freaky sarcastic attitude and I found the whole thing… kinda hot.
Trista keeps to herself. She’s made the most out of her little corner of the trailer park. Like I said, she decked out her unit with garden squares, and a Rabbit pen. No idea why she’s allowed to do that. A lot of these places don’t allow pets. I heard she was also trying to put in a beehive too, but her neighbors are fighting her on that one. Our park is a bit too condensed for bees. She has a permit to grow hemp, but of course it’s not for recreational use. She treats it and uses it to weave things like handbags, clothes, and other stuff. There’s a consignment store in town that sells all kinds of things Trista has crafted herself. So she’s handy and self sufficient too. She paints, she carves wood, she weaves, she crochets, she sews, and who knows what else. She’s so good at her little crafts that apparently she’s able to support herself just selling them and working part time at the Moonlight Inn outside of town.
She’s also relatively friendly. I almost feel bad calling her weird, but here’s the thing, I’ve seen some REALLY weird shit. People jokingly call her a vampire, and she seems to embrace that, but part of me seriously wonders. The big clue is, like I mentioned, she’s completely nocturnal. She’s always asleep during the day, and every blind and curtain is drawn tight. The one time she came out during the day, she had on this full body suit with a helmet with UV glass and everything. Even then, she only showed up to give Petunia a hug, before leaving again.
That was the first time I saw Trista, come to think of it. I was kind of intrigued. It was kind of hard not to be when someone shows up to a community cookout in a freaking astronaut suit. I approached Petunia after she left.
“Who the heck was that?” I wondered.
“MASON! I’m so glad you could make it! You’ve been here about three months now! How’d that job interview go?”
“Oh. It went well. I might be doing janitorial work soon.”
“Night shift?”
“Maybe. I’m not sure.”
“If it’s the night shift, you’ll definitely meet the person who just left. That’s Trista. She’s the girl with the rabbits in the far corner. Poor girl. She’s got a really bad skin condition. Can’t let sunlight touch her.”
“Oh. Is she like… albino or something?”
“No, she’s got pigment. I don’t remember what the condition is called. I guess it started in high school or something. You’d have to ask her. And hey! If you work the night shift, you’ll probably get to chat with her!”
Petunia wasn’t wrong. I started working as a nighttime janitor for a number of local businesses. That was when I first started noticing the pale goth hippy. She rides around on a moped, with her dark hair and her sarong barely billowing behind her. I couldn’t see her face through the helmet, but she waved to me as she passed by.
The next time I saw her, she was jogging, but here’s where it gets weird. When I first stepped outside, all I saw was a blur. It actually startled me as I whipped toward it, but then there was this skinny tattooed pixie, somehow still looking like a stonehippy/vampire in jogging gear. I swear she was moving inhumanly fast when I first noticed her. That was when we introduced ourselves. She actually jogged over to say hello.
“Hey! You’re the new guy right?”
“Oh, uh, yeah. My name’s Mason!” I reached out to shake the pretty girl’s hand, like an awkward loser. She smirked and shook my hand. Her grip was weirdly strong, and a bit cold.
“I’m Trista. I’m the weirdo in the back with the rabbits.”
“Trista… oh, are you the one who has a thing with sunlight? I think Petunia mentioned you.”
“Yup! That’s me. Xerodoma pigmentosum. Sunlight hurts. I hate that it hurts.” She lamented.
“That’s gotta be rough,” I said sympathetically.
“You get used to it. You work at night?”
“Yeah. Works better for me.”
“I get that.”
And so on and so on. She’s pretty cool, with a bit of hilarious snark in there. And she secretly procured recreational weed she was willing to share. I kept working the night shift just hoping for another chance to talk to her and possibly buy a joint. Eventually she invited me over to share a joint. The inside of her place was actually pretty sparse and spartan compared to the outside. Though she was a fan of hanging beads. Most of the main room was taken up by her various crafting projects and supplies. Hemp weaves, some paintings, and even a wood carving of what I think was a rabbit, but it wasn’t anywhere near complete.
I followed her to her kitchen where she reached into the very back of her pantry and pulled out a shoebox. Inside was her stash, but there was something else which I found very strange. It was a pack of syringes and a thing I assume is to sterilize syringes. I know what you’re thinking, and that was my first thought too. It’s a poor neighborhood, the woman already smokes weed illegally, it’s not that big a shock that maybe she was involved in other drugs too. I decided not to ask at the time. We shared our joint, and we laughed, a lot. She made fun of me for being a lightweight, while I got completely hypnotized staring at the patterns of a shawl she had woven.
Months went by and we got closer, but I couldn’t forget those syringes. After a while I got worried. I’ve seen what heroine does to people. So the next time I went over to smoke and eat (vegan) pizza with her, I asked.
“Trista? Are you using anything other than weed?”
“Drugs?”
“Yeah.”
“No. Why?”
“You can tell me if you are.”
“Mason, sweetheart, I’m a stoner. I don’t fuck around with anything else and I never have.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Okay. Can I ask what that set of syringes are for?”
“Oh. In my stash box? Those are… part of my condition. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Oh. Is it like… embarrassing?”
“Yeah. So don’t ask. Can we just watch a movie?”
So I don't ask anymore. But I still have no idea what she does with those syringes. Based on what I read about that Xerodoma Pigmentosum thing she says she has, I have no clue what she would need to inject herself with.
Another time she asked me to check on her rabbits for her during the day, as her usual “sitter” had something come up. All I had to do was chop up the lettuce and carrots she left out. As I was enjoying the adorable fluffy faces, one of Trista’s neighbors, a woman named Bridget, poked her head outside her door.
“Hey. Do you know what Trista injects those rabbits with?”
“I… what?”
“I’ve seen her use syringes on those rabbits. She said she was just giving them medicine, but I swear I see her inject them every week.”
“I… I wouldn't know. She just asked me to feed them.”
“I love Trista, but that always seemed so weird. She has to know vaccines are a hoax!” I tuned the woman out after that one. My mind was on that set of syringes. Why would she be using them on rabbits? These things were her pets.
I was starting to crush on her by then. But I couldn’t help feeling weirded out by that. I was actually going to confront her, but the next time I came to visit, she was literally inside the Rabbit hutch, on her back, squealing with delight as her rabbit friends nuzzled and played with her.
“Bonnibelle! That tickles! Marcy! No chewing. Finn? Watch where you’re sticking that foot! Jake? Where are you? EEEEE Lumpy! Not the neck!”
It was as silly and adorable as it sounds. She was forced to whip herself upright when two of her little friends tried to burrow under her dress. She finally stood up with a laugh, cradling a rabbit in her arms and cooing at it.
There was just no way in hell this woman was doing anything that would hurt these animals. Bridget is a paranoid antivax weirdo anyway. If Trista was using syringes on the rabbits, I was convinced it was only for their benefit.
So life went on. I got more and more reclusive over the years. Petunia, Trista, and my next door neighbor Fred were the only things keeping me remotely connected to the outside. And so we get to now. So let’s see. What are the stories about the weird vampire woman?
Well, there’s the fact that she jogs at night, solo, in a poor neighborhood. Petunia keeps the shitty people contained and behaving for the most part, but I still wouldn’t exactly call it safe, especially for a young skinny woman. But she does it without a care in the world.
There’s one strange event that some people like to connect to this. I never knew this guy, but from what I hear he was a total weirdo who leered at anyone even remotely female. And this is despite the fact he was married. His name was Josh.
I remember him a bit. He’s the guy that Petunia chased away from one of her barbecues. Supposedly he was heard saying inappropriate things to the groups of ten year old girls that were playing in the bounce house Petunia rented. Telling them how pretty they were. Trying to coax them to take off their jackets. Police reports were filed but ultimately nothing could be proven. The guy's wife, Carole, always defends him for some reason.
But anyway, I remember hanging out with Trista one night a little over a year ago. She hadn’t gone jogging like she normally did. I asked her what was up with that.
“That weirdo, Josh has started catcalling when I pass his place. It weirds me out.”
“There aren’t other people who do that at night? I’m still shocked you jog alone.”
“Not like this. I can flip off a wolf whistler. But this guy… he keeps trying to get me to stop and talk to him, and when I don’t? He shouts about my ass. I’m gonna have to talk to Petunia about that shithead, if anybody can reign him in, it’s her.”
I’m gonna guess she never got a chance. Two days later, the whole town was awoken by sirens. I was getting ready for my shift when I heard them. I walked down the road a bit to see if I could figure out what was going on. The cops were heading toward the other side of the park, so I couldn’t see much. But I did notice Trista, in her jogging gear, skulking in the shadows. I wondered if she was in trouble. But before I could call out to her, she sprinted straight to Petunia's house and banged on the door. Petunia welcomed her inside, and that was all I saw. I still wasn’t sure what was going on, so I just shrugged and headed to work, figuring I’d text Trista later.
I didn’t learn till later that Josh was found dead. He was lying prone, face down, partly hidden by bushes at the edge of the park. His neck was cut open. He’d bled out rapidly. He had a knife in his hand, and officially it’s believed he fell on it and accidentally killed himself. There was a cocktail of drugs in his system so most people accept that explanation. But others swear they saw Trista out for her jog around the same time Josh would have been bleeding to death. She got questioned, and she swore she didn’t see anything. Without evidence, there was nothing else that could be proven.
Trista’s a friend. I know that guy was being creepy to her. So I’m happy to take her word for what happened, even if my seeing her going to Petunia’s pokes a bit of a hole in that. I can’t be sure it was Trista though. So I’m not saying a word. But if a certain creep attacked a certain lady who is rumored to be a vampire, it’s not that surprising to me that he ended up dead after bleeding to death. I’m not all that broken up about it.
I’m not the one spreading that story. Josh’s wife was the one who started the rumor. So now some people are even more convinced that the weird nocturnal hippy chick is secretly a vampire.
She’s no killer. No matter what they say. She would only have defended herself.
So that’s all the stories I’ve heard that have any credibility to them. There’s more people who swear she and Petunia perform weird rituals, and people who saw her moving “inhumanly fast” and such.
But now I have to share what I found in the yearbooks Trista gave me. I wasn’t really expecting much. I checked her senior yearbook out first. She looks about the same. Pale, goth, hippy, and sort of sad. She kind of looks even sadder in these photos if I’m being honest, but that’s high school for you. She graduated in the top half of her class, no sports or extracurriculars. I’m left wondering how she managed to go to school at the time of sun was so bad for her. I’ll have to ask her about that. So nothing really new there.
It was the yearbook from her junior year where things got really interesting. I was in shock when I found her. Trista is somehow impossible to miss, but unrecognizable all at once. She’s full of color! She wore more typical tie dye hippy attire. Bright vibrant pinks, reds, blues, greens, and yellows, in every photo, and holy shit was she busy. Captain of the soccer team, first chair flutist, president of the “green living” club and the “vegan alliance,” top ten in her class, it was all incredible. I think the main reason I didn’t recognize her was her skin. It was tan, as though she were out in the sun a lot. Furthermore there were photos of her playing sports and standing outside in bright sunlight.
It was like her disease wasn’t there, which confused me. She told me it was something called Xeroderma Pigmentosa. But that’s a genetic condition. She would have had that from birth.
I sent her a text, wondering about this.
- Hey! Just went through your yearbooks. What happened? You had color? Did you discover Linkin Park?
- My disease happened. Right at the end of Jr. year. That’s why I wasn’t there for the final class photo.
- But your disease is genetic… isn’t it?
- I guess it was dormant in me.
- So it just… happened?
- Pretty much.
- I’m sorry.
- I got over it. Mostly. It was hard. My parents were both hardcore vegan naturalists and we lived in a place that was all natural light and such, so I had to live in a shed for a bit while they built a space for me. But in my family? We kinda lean into whatever life throws at us. It took months of depression to come to terms with it. All of a sudden I couldn’t be out in the sun, and I had new dietary needs that absolutely required non-vegan sources. So I leaned into it. I was a vampire now. I can dig dark colors and “vampire style.” I could make it my own by avoiding leather. And I’d be as vegan as I possibly could.
- You’re kind of awesome.
- Damn straight. So I learned to love the night too and now, here I am.
I gained new respect for her after that. Frankly I feel kinda shitty about making fun of her for being a vampire. There might not be anything paranormally weird about her after all.
She sent me one more text telling me I should talk to a guy named Frankie. She’d gone to school with him. He’s a decent enough guy. Works in the Bicounty mall in town.
I had to wait a day or two for another of Petunia’s get togethers to talk to him.
“Hey!” I said awkwardly as I tried to figure out how to strike up conversation with someone I haven’t really spoken to in a long time. “Frankie, right?”
“Oh. Yeah. Been a while. How are you Mason? You okay after that whole thing at Red Nights?”
“I’m trying to be. Look, I’ll cut to the chase. You went to school with Trista Ramone, right?”
“Ol’ Boho Ramone? Yeah. We were sort of friendly. But I was a jerk to vegans back then. Why do you ask?”
“I’ve been hanging out with her. She’s being all mysterious.” He chuckled at that. “She said I should talk to you to learn more about her… weirdness? Everyone thinks she’s a vampire now.”
“She’s totally a vampire. I have no idea what else to call her?”
“Why do you say that?”
“What did she tell you about school?”
“Nothing. She just showed me two yearbooks. Between Junior and Senior year she went from colorful club president, to lonely vampire, because of her disease.”
“Nah man. I don’t want to talk bad about her. But she was kind of a bitch, junior year. She wasn’t just a colorful vegan. She was one of those “holier than thou” types who scoffed and talked down to anyone who dared to eat meat. Her “hippy” thing meant she never hung out with the popular girls but still, she acted like she owned the place at times. I was friends with this weird guy named Steven Jones. He was just kind of a weirdo. Skulking around in the background, you know? He HATED Trista. For a while I totally understood. I thought she was kinda stuck up. But this guy was like… irrationally enraged by that girl’s existence. I guess he tried to ask her out when he was a freshman and she politely declined. But he took that shit personally.”
“Huh. So like… why’s that matter?”
“Because Steven kept saying to anyone who gave him a second look, that he was gonna ‘ruin’ her. Never elaborated. But then the last month of school rolls around, Trista gets assaulted by an unknown assailant and a week later she’s got this new disease. Meanwhile, Steven spent a week strutting around the school looking smug, and saying ‘she got what she deserved.’ Then he disappears too. Teachers said he moved away.”
“She was assaulted?”
“Yeah. Someone in a face wrap tackled her while she was at one of her protests at the meat factory. The dude freaking BIT her.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah. I was there. I came to the protest. I’ll admit I was trying to hit on Trista or one of the other girls there. But yeah. Dude dressed in all gray with a face wrap just charged in and went right for Trista. Knocked her down, bit her like a freaking zombie, then ran away before anyone could stop him. Didn’t even take his face wrap off. It was freaky, man.”
“What the actual fuck.”
“That’s what we all said. Trista needed a stitch. But while she was at the hospital, I guess she started getting more symptoms. She was out for the rest of the year. From then on, she was like she is now. Total vampire.”
“Was Steven a vampire?”
“I dunno. Probably. Little dickhead is what he is. Must have been him that attacked Trista, but nobody could prove it. Bite mark didn’t match or something. So why are you asking? You hang out with her at night right? You asking her out or something?”
“Oh. No. Just a friend.”
That was all I really learned from Frankie. It’s quite a story, and it’s full of unknowns that Trista refuses to explain. So I guess I’ll let readers be the judge. Is she a “real” vampire? Or just a weirdo? All I know is, she’s totally standing behind me right now and now I’m dead. Bleh.
I did come back to life to talk to Trista once I finished writing this. She enjoyed it. I may as well include that interaction.
I went to her place on my night off. She read my take on her and what the neighbors thought and she grinned. “Ha! I’m a total monster!” She chuckled. “So. What do YOU think, Mason? Am I a vampire?” She cocked an eye and playfully gnashes her teeth at me, making a pleasant little click.
I sighed. “No idea. You’re Trista. And… you’re my friend. I’m sorry if I made things awkward.”
She looked surprised by that. “Aw. Thanks Mason. You’re my friend too. It’s okay. I’m flattered.”
“You don’t have to explain.”
“So we’re cool?”
“Absolutely not. We’re both weird shut ins.” She laughed. It was good to hear her laugh. It made me happy.
“Yeah but I got the ‘mysterious vampire’ thing going.”
“You have dirt in your hair from rolling around with bunnies. And you’re a vegan.”
“Bite me.”
“Says the vampire.”
“You know, if I were a vampire, I could have bitten you when we both went to the slaughterhouses a few weeks ago.”
“That just makes me stupid.”
“You’re not stupid, Mason. You’re not a loser either.”
“So. You know of any other good spooky town stories that I can do next?
“Oh, sure. You ever heard the tale of Salome? She was a witch who would mash up the seeds of a Sinapis Alba plant to make a diabolical potion she’d dump on herself. They called her the ‘Witch of the Sands.’”
I’m embarrassed to admit it took me four days to realize Trista was just fucking with me. I only figured it out when I looked up Sinapis Alba and learned that mashing the seeds just makes mustard. “Salomi the sand-witch.” Well played, vampire hippy…
Sexy Neighbor
Haunted Slaughterhouse

Vi walked the all-too-familiar streets of the slums. A child lay in the street, abandoned. The young girl sobbed into her dress as townsfolk passed without a second glance. Memories rushed to the surface at the sight of her. Vi fought back the tears that threatened to spill from her eyes. When this assignment was over, The Order would finally accept her as a member. No one would hurt her again.
Vi chewed her lip as she tapped her fingers together in succession—thumb and index, then middle, ring, and finally pinky—repeating the motion several times. I’m not ready for this. I’m going to fail. They’ll kill me if I fail.
She scanned the street, trying to disentangle her mind from the waves of customers crowding the vendors, each patron haggling for the best deal. The smells of bread and sweetmeats wafted in the air, fusing with the merchants touting their wares, composing the symphony that was the market. Finding her mark in this mob would be complicated, and The Order would accept nothing less than perfection.
Vi double-checked her disguise. Her vibrant red wig flowed down in waves to rest upon her shoulders. She wore an apple cap pulled tight to hide the wig’s shoddy craftsmanship. Accompanied by the motley of ragged clothes, she was indistinguishable from the other beggars who plagued the streets.
Satisfied, Vi twisted the ring on her finger; a small needle protruded from a hidden groove underneath. Carefully, she reversed the spin of the ring to conceal the weapon. She scanned the street for her target, ready to do what she needed.
A young man across the street caught her attention; he wore a red scarf embroidered with silver daggers, just as The Order described. Vi’s heart rate doubled as he stopped at the bread vendor directly in front of her. She took a deep breath and tapped her fingers methodically one last time to steady herself.
This is it, Vi. If you do this, there is no going back. She thought about her life before The Order took her in. She had barely survived the streets, begging and stealing what she could just to prolong her wretched life. There was no way she would go back to that now. Convinced, she scanned the exits—families, merchants, beggars, and guards flooded the streets, creating a maze of sorts.
Content, she slid down the steps and weaved through the masses towards the young man like a snake slithering towards its victim. Her hands shook as she approached him, doubt creeping up with each step. He was barely old enough to grow hair on his face. Did this man deserve to die?
The memories of that night washed over her like a wave. Her father lay on the ground, a knife protruding from his chest, the shine erased by the dark blood that surrounded it. A man with jagged teeth knelt over her mother, gradually turning to look at Vi.
He smiled at her with a crooked grin that would haunt her dreams for the rest of her life. "Don't worry, child. I haven't forgotten about you." He chortled a rough, cracking laugh that turned into a cough.
She snapped back to reality. Tears welled in her eyes as all reservations shattered. She would go through with this, no matter the cost. She twisted the ring as she advanced, her eyes blank from emotion.
Vi feigned a trip and stumbled into the man, stabbing him with the needle. "I’m sorry, sir. I haven’t eaten in a week and I just got a bit dizzy," she lied as the needle dug into the man's arm.
He regained his balance and paused before handing a piece of copper to the bread merchant. The man picked up a loaf and ripped a bit off for Vi. He smiled. "Here you go. No one should have to go so long without eating."
Her face wilted. What have I done? She spun without a word, refusing to take the piece of bread. Her eyes filled with tears as she walked away.
The sound of a thud reverberated as the young man's body hit the hard dirt. It was too much for Vi. Tears flowed down her face uncontrollably as she ran. She didn’t look back. She would never look back.

Hello!
I have been taking 40mg vyvanse for 4.5 years now and have absolutely loved it until about 8-10 months ago. Since then, I have developed strange side effects including:
Constant yawns: - Feeling like I have to take big yawns constantly (every few minutes)
Poor circulation: - Fingers and toes turn blue/purple and are always FREEZING cold. Left arm gets tingly sometimes and overall just feels tight.
Brain fog: - Feeling of being tired, unable to keep my head up & eyes open. - Almost dizzy or lightheadedness. - Forgetfulness.
Poor social skills: - Almost like I am awkward or that I have forgotten how to speak to people. - No energy and feeling of wasting my breath when socializing.
Throat discomfort: - Constant swallowing to clear “mucus” - Sometimes experience the feeling of a swollen throat
I am currently & always have taken brand-name medication (except for the couple of months I tried generic which was terrible and exacerbated these symptoms). I am a healthy 23 year old female who eats healthy and works out 3-4 times a week. I also drink plenty of water to the point I run to the restroom at least 3-4 times a day. This is driving me crazy.. vyvanse used to work so well for me & over the span of a year the side effects have become intolerable!
Not sure if this has anything to do with blood pressure being high/low? I have never heard of anyone experience this problem, but I am desperate for answers. Have I developed some kind of allergy/intolerance to the medication? Or could I be experiencing these side effects due to a heart issue? I’ve had my heart checked through an EKG & doctors said everything looked good.
I recently spoke with my psychiatrist about this and she thought it would be best to take a “Genesight” test to find out what medications would work best for my body. The results indicated that Guanfacine (non-stimulant), Conerta & Ritalin (stimulant) would be best for me. My doctor just prescribed me Guanfacine to take in addition to the vyvanse. However, I don’t want to take it because I’m worried About not being able to stop it since the medication affects your heart rate and blood pressure.
Has anyone experienced these side effects after years of taking the medication? I would love to stop taking these medications, but have developed such a dependency on them :( At this point, I am desperate for answers and would appreciate any thoughts/reccomendations/advice you might have.
Thank you <3

The global autonomous delivery robots market is poised to achieve a robust compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of approximately 35% by 2027. A significant driver behind this growth is the escalating consumer demand for swift and contactless delivery services. Moreover, the increasing adoption of autonomous delivery robots, attributed to cost reduction and enhanced efficiency in delivery operations, is expected to propel market expansion throughout the forecast period. Sterling Hawkins, co-founder of CART (Center for Advancing Retail and Technology), envisions automated delivery as a transformative force in the industry, potentially slashing delivery costs by 80% to 90% compared to human-operated services.
To know more about this study, request a free sample report @ https://www.researchcorridor.com/request-sample/?id=147363
Market Trends:
Rapid Technological Advancements: The continuous evolution and refinement of robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), and sensor technologies are driving significant advancements in autonomous delivery robots. These advancements include improvements in navigation systems, object detection capabilities, and overall operational efficiency, enabling robots to navigate complex environments, interact with surroundings, and deliver goods with greater precision and reliability.
Growing Demand for Contactless Delivery: The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of contactless delivery solutions across various industries. As consumers prioritize safety and hygiene, businesses are increasingly turning to autonomous delivery robots to fulfill orders while minimizing human contact. This heightened demand for contactless delivery is expected to persist even beyond the pandemic, driving sustained growth in the autonomous delivery robots market.
Expansion of Last-Mile Delivery Solutions: Last-mile delivery, the final leg of the delivery process from a distribution center to the customer's doorstep, presents unique challenges for logistics companies, including cost inefficiencies and congestion. Autonomous delivery robots offer a cost-effective and efficient solution for addressing these challenges by autonomously navigating urban environments and delivering packages directly to customers' homes or businesses. As such, there is a growing trend towards the deployment of autonomous delivery robots for last-mile delivery, particularly in densely populated urban areas.
Partnerships and Collaborations: Collaboration and strategic partnerships between robotics companies, logistics providers, e-commerce platforms, and other stakeholders are playing a crucial role in driving innovation and accelerating the adoption of autonomous delivery robots. These partnerships enable companies to leverage complementary strengths, share resources, and collectively address challenges such as regulatory compliance, technology integration, and market expansion. By pooling their expertise and resources, companies can expedite the development and deployment of autonomous delivery robot solutions and gain a competitive edge in the market.
Market Opportunities:
The autonomous delivery robots market presents a myriad of opportunities for businesses across various sectors. Firstly, the increasing demand for contactless delivery solutions, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, creates a ripe opportunity for companies to capitalize on the growing consumer preference for safe and hygienic delivery methods. Additionally, the expansion of e-commerce and the surge in online shopping activities present a significant opportunity for autonomous delivery robots to streamline last-mile delivery operations and meet the escalating demand for fast and efficient delivery services. Furthermore, advancements in technology, particularly in robotics, artificial intelligence, and sensor technologies, offer opportunities for companies to innovate and develop cutting-edge autonomous delivery solutions with enhanced capabilities and functionalities.
According to the recent report published by RC Market Analytics, the Global Autonomous Delivery Robots Market is expected to provide sustainable growth opportunities during the forecast period from 2024 to 2030. This latest industry research study analyzes the autonomous delivery robots market by various product segments, applications, regions and countries while assessing regional performances of numerous leading market participants. The report offers a holistic view of the autonomous delivery robots industry encompassing numerous stakeholders including raw material suppliers, providers, distributors, consumers and government agencies, among others. Furthermore, the report includes detailed quantitative and qualitative analysis of the global market considering market history, product development, regional dynamics, competitive landscape, and key success factors (KSFs) in the industry.
Browse the Full Report Discretion @ https://www.researchcorridor.com/autonomous-delivery-robots-market/
Geographically, the autonomous delivery robots market report comprises dedicated sections centering on the regional market revenue and trends. The autonomous delivery robots market has been segmented on the basis of geographic regions into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and the Middle East & Africa. Autonomous delivery robots market estimates have also been provided for the historical years 2020 to 2023 along with forecast for the period from 2024 - 2030.The report includes a deep-dive analysis of key countries including the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Germany, France, Italy, China, Japan, India, Australia, Mexico, Brazil and South Africa, among others. Thereby, the report identifies unique growth opportunities across the world based on trends occurring in various developed and developing economies.
The Autonomous Delivery Robots Market Segmentation:
By Product:

• Fully Autonomous
• Semi-Autonomous

By Component:

• Hardware
• Software

By End-Use:

• Healthcare
• Hospitality
• Retail
• Logistics
• E-commerce
• Food & Beverages
• Others

By Region:

• North America
• Europe
• Asia Pacific
• Latin America
• Middle East & Africa

Several key players in the worldwide autonomous delivery robots market include Amazon Robotics, Marble Robot Inc., Boston Dynamics, Aethon Inc., and JD.com. These companies are strategically navigating markets through expansion, fresh investments, service innovations, and collaborative efforts. They're venturing into new territories via expansion and acquisitions, aiming to leverage joint synergies for a competitive edge.
To know more about this study, request a free sample report @ https://www.researchcorridor.com/request-sample/?id=147363
Key Questions Answered by Autonomous Delivery Robots Market Report:

• Product popularity and adoption based on various country-level dynamics
• Regional presence and product development for leading market participants
• Market forecasts and trend analysis based on ongoing investments and economic growth in key countries
• Competitive landscape based on revenue, product offerings, years of presence, number of employees and market concentration, among others
• Various industry models such as SWOT analysis, Pestle Analysis, Porter’s Five Force model, Value Chain Analysis pertaining to Autonomous Delivery Robots market
• Analysis of the key factors driving and restraining the growth of the global, regional and country-level markets from 2020-2030

About Us:RC Market Analytics is a global market research firm. Our insightful analysis is focused on developed and emerging markets. We identify trends and forecast markets with a view to aid businesses identify market opportunities to optimize strategies. Our expert’s team of analysts’ provides enterprises with strategic insights. RC Market Analytics works to help enterprises grow through strategic insights and actionable solutions. Feel free to contact us for any report customization at sales@researchcorridor.com.
Media Contact:
Company Name: RC Market Analytics Pvt. Ltd. Contact Person: Vijendra Singh Email: sales@researchcorridor.com Visit us: https://www.researchcorridor.com/

About ten years ago I first started to deal with severe digestion issues. Luckily, after a year of testing and talking with my doctors, I got better after starting antidepressants. Back then I was under a lot of stress and suffered from depression. I have been doing really well mentally for the past 8/7 years or so. Low stress, good mental health, finished my degree and landed a stable job.
Yet, for the past 2,5 years my digestion has been deteriorating rapidly. My issues currently are:

• daily foul smelling gas, starting around lunchtime and sometimes going on until late into the evening/night
• concurrent with the gas; bloating, fatigue and brain fog. I regularly have to lay down and often even fall asleep (this is start to interfere with my work as well)
• soft or sticky stools, often (not always) diarrhea-like. However, frequency seems somewhat normal (once or twice a day)

I am happy to say that at least I don’t have pain, cramps, constipation, burping, sudden diarrhea (having to run for the bathroom), and fortunately this time around I’m not loosing weight like I was last time.
My GP and I are at a loss of what could be going on. We’ve tried lots of interventions and treatments by now, and my GP said we’ve run out of treatments and tests. So far we’ve tried:

• FODMAP elimination (no clear triggers, as symptoms hardly subsided during the elimination phase)
• caffeine elimination
• gluten elimination
• bloodtests for allergies / celiac disease as well as Crohn’s disease
• elimination of sucralose and other sweeteners
• digestive enzymes supplementation
• betaine HCI supplementation
• l-glutamine supplementation
• ginger extract supplementation as well as consuming lots of ginger
• psyllium husk supplementation
• s. boulardii supplementation
• simethicone supplementation
• zinc supplementation
• sertraline (50 mg)
• amitriptyline (10 mg)
• enteric coated peppermint oil
• mindful eating and breathwork

I eat a vegan diet (quite varied albeit less so since the FODMAP diet) and my bloodwork is all good, I workout 3-4 times a week, get 8 hrs sleep/night, and never consume alcohol. I make sure not to swallow excessive air when eating and I chew my food well. I also used to meditate for 10-20 min a day, and tried self-hypnosis techniques learned in therapy (but lately have given up on that, as tbh I’m starting to get really tired with trying all sorts of things to improve my situation when nothing seems to work). I am considering trying some sort of oregano oil/berberine supplementation regimen as I’ve read that for some people who suffer from hydrogen SIBO this could help. However, there isn’t really a good way of testing for SIBO in my country, and my GP says that at home breath tests are too unreliable at this point in time. So I’m not sure if oregano/berberine supplementation is going to be of much use. (GP discourages it atm anyway, although they also understand my desire for relief/treatment.)
I was in a very good place before this “relapse” and it’s really starting to take its toll on me. I wonder if anyone has any further ideas of what could be going on or what I might be overlooking. I may just have to accept that I’m never going to get rid of this, but I am really hoping for something that can alleviate my symptoms. At this rate it’s starting to affect my mental health as well and I’m also running into issues at work because of this.

Chapter 3:
Jason hated traveling through The Void; that unknowable space between worlds, the infinite cracks in the fabric of reality, through which divinity traveled the multiverse; the bloody place was hell on his senses. No matter how many times he was sent through it, it always felt like he was somehow falling in three different directions, and a few different dimensions, all at once. The experience had left him puking his guts out on the shoes of more than one noble lord or lady, once he finally materialized onto whatever backwater planet his current mission sent him to. It had gotten better, or at least he had gotten better at holding down his lunch, after the eighth summoning... or was it the tenth? He couldn’t quite remember at the moment.

The lack of direction was hardly the only ‘selling point’ for why The Void was such a pain to deal with. As the name implied, the space between worlds was devoid of anything and everything. He could still vaguely remember the first time he was shunted through the place; he had thought he was blind. The complete lack of light in the place made it basically impossible to tell if you had your eyes open or closed at any given moment. Hell, he still wasn’t 100% if he even HAD eyes while in this place. Heck it was not beyond possibility that the more delicate organs simply didn’t exist while transitioning, only reappearing once the traveler was spat out into the new world.

Worst of all though, had to be the utter lack of ‘stuff’ within The Void. There was something... unsettling, about “falling” through space without the feeling of air, water, dust, ANYTHING touching your skin. Ok well maybe he was being a bit hyperbolic saying “anything”, he could feel the clothes on his body. He had thought maybe it was just his imagination, his mind desperately trying to force some semblance of order onto this strange and order-less place. That thought, however, had been dispelled after... was it the fourth or fifth trip? He wasn’t sure why it took him so long to finally try it, but he had finally gotten around to trying to touch something. To no one's surprise, there was nothing to touch within this place; well, nothing other than himself. His skin, his clothes, his hair; all of it was real, the only real things in this bizarre place.

He claimed that the lack of stimuli was the biggest issue with The Void, but the more he thought about it, the less sure he was that that was really the case. Without stimuli it became increasingly difficult to measure time. Each trip was somehow an eternity that passed in an instant, while also being a moment that stretched out for what felt like an epoch. Part of him assumed it had to be a fairly short period of time spent in this place, the human mind was not exactly known to do well in utter sensory deprivation. But another part of him concluded that he must spend ungodly amounts of time stuck in this perfect darkness. Why else would he always materialize with eyes dilated and skin so pale it was like he hadn’t seen a lick of sunlight for decades?

With an unnatural suddenness, Jason’s attention snapped back to the present. He could suddenly feel air rushing against the back of his head, his clothes flapped and snapped in this abrupt hurricane force gale. Even with his eyelids tightly shut, his eyes sent wave after wave of pain crashing into his brain. Light streamed through his squinted lids. He wasn’t 100%, but experience told him that he was either smack dab in front of a raging inferno... or he had just materialized in such a way as to be staring directly at this world’s star.

...Stars?

After the initial shock of materialization wore off, Jason realized quite quickly that he was in fact falling. A hiccup, made into a proper problem by the fact that he never had gotten around to trying skydiving back on Earth, so he was not really sure how to go about righting himself. He tried spreading out his limbs, having some ambient knowledge that more surface area meant more wind resistance, which meant a (albeit small) decrease in his velocity towards the ground. It had been little more than luck, but his right arm spasmed for a moment and remained locked to his side. The sudden rise of air resistance on only half of his body, caused him to flip over, finally sparing his precious eyes from the harsh sunlight.

Cracking his eyes just the tiniest bit open, the world around him was a smudgy mess. Even with his eyes having managed to adjust to some small degree, it still hurt to have them open. An experience made all the worse by the wind buffeting his face and threatening to dry them out. He closed his eyes and blinked a few times. Fighting through the discomfort, he tried opening his eyes a little more. This time as his eyes opened, the world came into crisp view.

The sky was mostly clear, allowing him to marvel at its breathtaking orange color. A few puffy green clouds dotted the otherwise unmarred horizon. He could make out the faint outline of two small moons, barely visible in the midday light. The third moon was slightly harder to miss; he had seen his fair share of supermoons back on Earth, but they paled in comparison. This Ubermoon as he decided to call it, was clear as can be and took up a good fourth of the sky.

A stray curiosity flickered through his mind about how this world’s oceans must be affected by three moons, and what kind of effects the close proximity of the Ubermoon, would have on the tides. He decided to shelve that particular thought for now, figuring that once he was safely back on Terra Firma he could spend all the time he wished admiring the sky and moons. The ground seemed particularly enamored with him, apparently wanting to get a nice face-to-face greeting, as it rushed to meet him at what he guessed was probably about 200-300 MPH.

A part of Jason had to chuckle at how calm he was. If he had to guess, he had been falling for a good two minutes now. His previous record was a measly two to three seconds before his courage had run dry and he had cast a Slow Fall spell. As the wind continued to whip at his face, Jason decided that he had had his fun. He closed his eyes, he breathed deeply, and extended his senses outwards searching for the telltale signs of magic in this world. Immediately he could feel it in the air, he could sense it spiderwebbed across the planet in great magical Leylines. Magic was heavy upon this world, heavier than he had ever felt before. He mused that with this density of Aether, even the common folk were like as not to be proficient mages. It wouldn’t surprise him if a common farmer in this world had more aptitude for magic than a few of the high mages he’d run into during previous incarnations.

So intoxicated by the power of this world, Jason decided to try casting a spell that had evaded him in many of his past lives. Pulling the raw power into himself he spoke the word, Fly. For the briefest of moments, he felt his descent slow; felt the magical power wash over his body as it tried to fight the forces of gravity. Then he felt the searing agony as this world’s mana flowed through his body. The sudden burst of pain broke his concentration on the spell. As quickly as it started, the feeling passed, his body once more becoming as buoyant as a flesh filled lead balloon. A nearly imperceptible *ding* went off as the spell failed; sadly, Jason could not hear it over the wind screaming past his ears.

He pondered why the spell had started to work, only for him to be consumed with immense pain. Stranger still was that apparently the pain did not translate to actual damage taken. It had felt like his hands were about to burn away, but according to the logs he had taken a whooping 0 damage, fire or otherwise. “Another thing to explore once I’m safely on the ground”, he thought to himself.

Seeing as how the spell had started to work, Jason deduced that he must have just used the wrong word of power. This was not entirely surprising; he was still using the language settings from his last mission... maybe this world used different terms? He thought he remembered something similar to this happening to him way back when, if he remembered right, he thought it was referred to as ‘mana burn’. Given the limited amount of time he had for trial and error, he decided to simply cut out the middleman and use Primal. Sure, saying anything, much less casting anything, using the elder tongue took far longer, but it did have the appeal of being a universal language... Real shame the Gods hoarded the knowledge of the language's existence.

Hells he had only learned about it by sheer luck. Having caught the tail end of a conversation between two Divines, after he had mysteriously dropped dead during one of his missions. Then he had had to game the system for several incarnations to squirrel away enough credits, to buy the upgrade that let him translate and speak the blasted thing.

“Grg’Thun dilock aragos nevadool IMPERITOS. Eloom daruso igora myrousnar barumbarae“, he chanted. Again, his body felt lighter than air, and again just as fast as it started his body was racked with a searing pain. Another almost silent chirp, this one just ever so slightly louder, sounded as the spell fizzled out. Once more Jason failed to notice the background noise over the gale force howling in his ears.

Gritting his teeth through the pain, he tried to understand what was happening. He noticed that his hands were covered in blisters as if he had just grabbed a red-hot coal directly out of a firepit. He checked his stats and found everything in proper order. He still had the Divine Protections, and his life bar didn’t show a single point of fire damage, so what the hell was going on?

The spell had been perfect, but for whatever reason Jason knew that it simply hadn't had enough power to activate properly. A sickening thought flashed through his head. Yes, it was possible... the world was flush with mana, but that mana was crude; unrefined. Was it possible that since this world was so rich in crude ambient Aether, that casters had to actively purify and distill their mana before it could be used? The first hints of fear started to creep into the corners of Jason’s mind. He snuck a peak at the ground, and immediately wished he hadn’t. He could already make out the rough outlines of some kind of merchant caravan traveling between the massive trees. He knew that he didn’t have time to distill the necessary mana to try and cast the Fly spell again.

Thinking quickly, he decided that the only safe option was to use a simple Slow Fall spell. It wasn’t glorious, and the abrupt change in descent speed would feel like shit, and make him look worse upon landing, but at least there didn’t look to be too many witnesses around to see him land like a goober. Taking another deep breath, he pulled in as much ambient mana as he could from his surroundings. Working as fast as his body could, he purified and distilled the mana down. He could feel the immense power of it, as bolts of magic coursed across his skin.

He could feel that mana straining against him, singeding off the hair along his arms. He tried to ignore the pain, he just needed to last a little longer, but the process BURNED. According to every system based data point he had access to, Jason was 10,000% fine. According to what his body was telling him, his blood had been replaced with magma.

Once more he spoke the word of power. He channeled every ounce of the pure mana into the spell, willing the arcane words into existence with all his might. Mana flew from his skin, infusing the script with more power than it had any right to be able to handle. Pale blue lights began to swirl around his body, he could feel the effects of the magic taking hold. He could feel his body becoming lighter and lighter. As joy flooded his heart, he heard it. A high-pitched whine, that was getting louder and louder.

Then with a sickening *snap* he saw his spell shatter apart. The excess mana, having finally strained the arcane construct to its breaking point. As if in some twisted mockery, the spell folded back in on itself. The surge of magic rewriting and reforging the spell into something new. He felt his body return back to its normal weight, then increase. Heavier and heavier he became, his weight increasing quintuple fold. In addition to the added weight came added speed, he rocketed towards the ground, faster and faster. He didn’t even have time to curse his luck, before he hit the ground, headfirst.

As his body, gear, items.... basically, everything that was even tangentially “Jason” and/or “Jason” adjacent, were turned to a fine mist. Two separate, yet equally important things happened nearly simultaneously. First, a single, otherwise unassuming, gold coin pulsed a vibrant cerulean before shattering into countless shards. As the energy rippled outwards, time seemed to slow to a nearly imperceptible stop. This first effect was both heavily fortunate and deeply problematic for Jason. As time slowed, the core of what made Jason, Jason, was able to activate a single automated ability, [Ignore Pain]. The ability did its best to bank the entirety of the damage influx, turning the sudden burst of damage into a much more manageable damage over time effect. Sadly, as would be a running theme for Jason in the immediate future, the sheer level of incoming damage tore through the ability's limiters like a cannonball through wet tissue paper.
< l l Next>

I’m aware that this is unconventional. Believe me, I’ve tried conventional – it didn’t end well for anyone. I require a certain open mindedness that I’m hoping I might find here, but more importantly, I need my future husband to know the rules. Meet-cutes are well and good on the screen, but they don’t guarantee a partner’s ability to follow basic instructions. That was my mistake the first time.
So, begging your pardon for my bluntness, I’m going to be clear about my requirements. Please read carefully – if you can’t meet them, there’s no point in going any further.

• Must want children. At least one child, anyway. I’m open to the idea of more, but one is an absolute must.
• Must be in it for the long haul. Until our child turns eighteen, to be precise. I understand that level of commitment is a daunting prospect, particularly when we have not yet met. After our child is born, you are welcome to ignore me, if you please, or take your pleasure elsewhere – though I will warn you that it might be difficult to come by. But you will live under my roof until our child is an adult.
• Homebody preferred. It will make the next two decades easier on you.
• Must have impeccable manners. I will provide a manual outlining the required etiquette, but you must at least have a grasp of basic courtesy to begin with. If you let your tongue run away with you, or don’t bother to wish your neighbours a good morning when you pass them in the street, stop reading – this is not the opportunity for you. Seriously.

This is the part where I should talk about myself, but let’s face it, this is hardly a romantic proposal. I require commitment up-front and there’s no guarantee that, once we do meet, we’ll really even like each other. If we do? Fantastic! It’ll help the years fly by. If we don’t, you’ll still have the main prize – years of rent-free, expenses-free living at The Old Oak Hotel.
A sanctuary has stood in this spot in one form or another since before the ley lines. During its tenure, it has been flooded, put to the flame, and pounded into dust. Time and again, it has been reimagined and rebuilt. Most of the current building dates back to Victoria’s reign, though the oldest parts were constructed in the 13^th century. At the very bottom of the garden, cut into the surrounding hills, there is a cave bearing handprints of red ochre.
There has always been an Edwards at the hotel, though of course we haven’t always gone by that name. You would think a family so tied to one place would do a better job of keeping records, but no one is certain of our origins. Perhaps it was a cosmic bargain, or perhaps mere luck – whether good or bad, I have never been able to decide. Either way, our presence is required. Throughout our spotty past, there’s a story here and there of an Edwards deserting their post, and it always coincides with a particularly brutal period of history.
I inherited the position five years ago. At midnight on my eighteenth birthday, my parents took their already-packed suitcases and left. I don’t blame them for their abandonment; I intend to one day do the same thing to my – or, hopefully, our – child.
They send me postcards and photos from time-to-time, always smiling on sunny beaches. Money isn’t a concern for them. That’s part of whatever mysterious deal our ancestors made – when a caretaker leaves in good-standing, they will never want for anything again. They could travel the world for the rest of their lives, always sleeping in the softest sheets and dining in the finest restaurants, and never find their pockets empty.
Keep this point in mind, for if you can meet my requirements, you will share my good fortune.
And what must we do in return? I can all but hear you scream the question. Why, very little. The presence of an Edwards ensures that the guests can’t stray from the hotel grounds. Most of our guests are live-in residents, though we do get the occasional walk-in. Where they come from, I don’t know, for we are not visible to most people who stumble upon our lonely corner of the world. I’ve come to believe the hotel chooses to reveal itself when its lacking entertainment, or to fill a need.
Jimmy, my first husband, was one such guest.
For the most part, the guests are harmless. They’ll give you a little fright from time-to-time, popping out from a wall or turning your bathwater into blood, but I find it hard to hold it against them. I’ve found twenty-three years here dreary; I can’t imagine how bored I would be after five hundred.
There are a few exceptions you should be aware of:

• Eric. Our resident serial murderer. He claims to have been Jack the Ripper while he still drew breath, but I think he’s just a blowhard. He knows better than to harm an Edwards, but I’m afraid spouses are fair game. Years ago, my grandmother managed to confine him to the fourth floor, so you will be perfectly safe from him as long as you never set foot there. Occasionally, the lift will stop on that floor even though you haven’t pressed the button for it. Do not get out. Even if the lift appears to be on fire or starts filling with murky water. Wait for the doors to close again, then go to another floor. It should only take a few hours.
• The Thing in the Cellar. I don’t know what It is; no one ever has. We only know It eats rats and must be fed once a day. If I’m ever ill or incapacitated, this task will fall to you. Harvest the rats from the traps in the garden, then stand at the cellar door and throw them down the stairs. Do not walk down the stairs and do not forget to feed It. You don’t want to be the first person to see Its’ face.
• Mrs Jones. Old fashioned and a stickler for manners, she’s the reason I’m advertising for a husband rather than a boyfriend. She won’t abide a couple living in sin under the same roof as her. Really, though, she’s a sweet old thing. Full of stories about the war and always ready to help if I get stuck on a recipe. I don’t blame her for what happened with Jimmy at all. I’d warned him enough times.

Guests aside, there are other rules you will need to follow to ensure a safe, satisfactory stay at The Old Oak Hotel. They are listed in a book that has been re-penned many times over the centuries. If you choose to accept this opportunity, I will insist that you read it until you can recite the pages word-for-word.
However, there are some rules so critical for your survival that I feel compelled to list them here:

• With the exception of the fourth floor, you are welcome to roam the hotel and its grounds as you please. But you must never set foot outside of our land – not until our child is old enough to fulfil their duties. If I were to do so, it would unleash pandemonium – plague, peril, perhaps another world war. I’m afraid you would be less crucial to the fate of the world, but it would certainly be a personal disaster.
• Never look in the mirrors in room 33.
• I’ve touched this point already, but it bears repeating: never be rude to Mrs Jones.

Failure to observe that last rule is what got Jimmy.
She doted on him. I think he reminded her of her long-dead son, for she pampered him as if he were one of her own. Each morning, she had breakfast ready for him before I had so much as opened my eyes, and she developed a habit of trailing along after him, complimenting his skill as he oiled rusted hinges or set a crooked picture straight.
At first, Jimmy basked in the attention. But by the end of his second month, he was growing bored of Mrs Jones, me, and the hotel itself. We pride ourselves on our facilities. If you need more activity than a turn around the garden, we have a lovely indoor pool – it freezes over every now and then, but most of the time it’s perfectly usable. Our library is unmatched. Although the room is cramped, it has every book imaginable; you only need to think of a particular title, and it will appear on one of the shelves. And now that I’ve dragged us kicking and screaming into the 21^st century, we have a wide array of streaming services.
It wasn’t enough for Jimmy. He wanted to go out – eat in a restaurant, watch a film in the cinema, see any faces other than the ones he was surrounded by every day. He began having a drink each evening. One drink turned into several, and after a few weeks, the bar became his permanent residence between dusk and midnight.
He wasn’t the only one getting bored. I had been thrilled when he first arrived; ecstatic when he agreed to stay. How marvellous to feel real flesh beneath my fingers after five years of only the dead for company. What a relief to have some assistance in the many tasks required to keep the hotel running as it should.
The more he drank, the less inclined he was to help – or even spend time in my company. He no longer visited my bed, choosing a room for himself on the opposite end of the floor. When our paths did cross, at best he would ignore me. At worst, he would nitpick or outright rail against me, blaming me for his captivity.
Still, I made an effort to be present whenever he frequented the bar. As lovely as Mrs Jones can be, she does have a tendency to nag. Before and after her death, she was close to teetotal, only consenting to take a single sherry at Christmas, and drinking outside of special occasions is something of a bugbear of hers.
“Think of your health, dear,” she would tell Jimmy brusquely. “You’ll miss it when it’s gone.”
Or, “How about we switch to a nice apple juice now? You’ve had quite enough to drink for one night.”
Most of the time, Jimmy managed to pull himself together enough to flash a charming smile and distract her with a compliment about her latest meal. But after one drink too many, I’d noticed him gritting his teeth and just barely managing to hold his tongue.
It was better if I was present. Playing the doting wife, I insisted on pouring his drinks, watering them down out of his sight. When Mrs Jones’s nagging bordered on relentless, I could always distract her with a game of gin rummy.
On his final day, I was running behind. The ghoul on the second floor – usually the least demanding of our guests – had come down with some dreadful illness, or else decided he wanted to inconvenience me. Either way, I had woken that morning to the foulest stench I had ever experienced. I followed it to his room and found every surface covered in putrid green-blank gunge, its consistency somewhere between mucus and vomit.
All day I scrubbed, taking only brief breaks to step outside before I fainted. By the time the room was restored to a passable state, and I had filled several bin bags to bursting with filthy rags, it was already deep into the night. Mindful of the time, I paused only long enough to wash the streaks of muck from my arms and face before racing to the bar.
I arrived just in time to hear Jimmy’s last words. After he spat them at Mrs Jones, she only stared for a small eternity, her mouth frozen in the motherly smile she wore whenever she scolded him.
Then, like melted wax, her face began to shift.
I shouted at Jimmy to run, but he didn’t need to be told. Before the words left my mouth, he leapt from his barstool and streaked through the door. Mrs Jones followed him seconds later. Her lips were already peeling back to reveal rows upon rows of long, wickedly sharp fangs, while claws sprouted from beneath her lace-edged cuffs.
I sprinted after them, but Jimmy was fuelled by fear and Mrs Jones by whatever force propels the Mrs Joneses of the world. I followed the screeching to the lobby. Breathless, I arrived to see he had arrived within mere feet of the entrance before Mrs Jones grabbed him.
Claws wrapped around his throat, she lifted him into the air. As I watched, her jaw unhinged, the lower part dropping so that it was nearly level with her chest.
That sight drove all the sense out of my head. Forgetting every rule my parents had ever drilled into me, I lunged at her.
She batted me away as though I weighed no more than a fly.
I crashed into the reception desk, the breath bursting from my lungs in a great woosh. I was certain that I would die, for no amount of effort seemed to force air back into my aching chest. At last, as my vision began to dim, I managed to take a small gulp – then another, and another, until I was able to draw myself together enough to regain my feet.
By that time, Mrs Jones had nearly finished her dinner. Jimmy’s chest was splayed open, muscle and shattered ribs protruding every which way from his flesh, and she was devouring the last few bites of his heart.
His head was angled towards me. The light had winked out from his eyes, but they still held his final terror – and an accusation which, I was quite certain, was directed at me. I would like to say I felt only horror, but I couldn’t help my sudden jolt of irritation. How may times had I told him to mind his manners?
Mrs Jones gulped, the sound thick and wet in her gullet, and dropped what remained of Jimmy to the floor.
Then she turned to me.
Here’s another rule for you, one which I hope you never have cause to use: never interfere with a kill.
The Mrs Jones who used to kiss my grazed knees, who argued with my mother for the right to read me bedtime stories, was no longer at the wheel. No amount of pleading or reasoning would move her.
I could only run.
Spinning around, I vaulted over the reception desk and raced for the office behind it. If Jimmy had not been out of his mind with fear and booze, he might have remembered the rules and survived; it was one of several staff-only rooms throughout the hotel warded to keep out unwanted guests.
Just ten steps from desk to door, yet it was the longest journey of my life. My hard-won breath burned my throat; my heart pounded in my ears, deafening me to all other sounds than Mrs Jones’s heavy, pounding footsteps.
Grasping the handle, her hot, copper-tanged breath was on my neck. Fire exploded in my flesh as she raked her claws down my back. A step further away, and I wouldn’t have made it; the pain would have been too great. But I managed to throw myself into the office and slam the door before crumpling to the ground.
Before I passed out, I heard her grunting and shrieking outside, furious that she couldn’t get in.
Three days I spent in the office, emerging only to feed The Thing in the Cellar before scurrying back to my hiding place. Whenever I left, I tried not to look at the mangled heap that used to be Jimmy. There was no avoiding the smell, though.
With no small difficulty, and the help of a first aid kit, I managed to treat and bandage the wounds on my back. They bled sluggishly all throughout the first day, but thankfully didn’t fester.
On the morning of the fourth day, there was a tentative knock on the door followed by the sound of rapidly retreating footsteps. I waited until they had disappeared down the corridor before cracking the door open. On the floor was a freshly baked Victoria sponge and a beautifully written note of apology.
It took every ounce of courage I possessed, but that evening I forced myself to go to the dining room. Mrs Jones was waiting for me, her eyes red-rimmed, a steaming cottage pie on the table. I tried not to flinch as she took my hand, re-iterating the apology she had already delivered in writing.
The next morning, she helped me clean Jimmy up.
We treated each other cautiously for a while, but eventually we got back to playing gin rummy again. When the scars on my back twinge, as they sometimes do, she helps me rub a soothing ointment into them. Even though I’ve told her it’s not necessary, she apologises every time.
So, you’ve heard my story and you have my proposal. If you think you could be the man for me, I invite you to visit. You will need to drink a cup of ram’s blood (a pinch of nutmeg makes it a little more tolerable) and light a black candle before bedtime. When you next wake, you will find yourself at our gates. As travel arrangements go, it’s hardly the Orient Express, but it beats the airfare.
If you have read this without flinching, if you can stomach the journey to get here, if you walk up to our door and find the nerve to open it, I have one more instruction for you.
Just as you enter, look to your right. You will see a deep brown stain on the lobby carpet. I’ve scrubbed and scrubbed but it just won’t come out. Perhaps that’s for the best. It’s a good reminder of what will happen to you should you call Mrs Jones a “nosy old bat”.
And when you run into Jimmy – as you will, for he still likes hanging around the bar in the evening, his silvery wounds glistening as though they had just been inflicted – don’t let him convince you he was some sort of victim.
He knew the rules.

I've been on 300 MG of XL for the past few weeks. I've noticed that my sleep quality has been worse and my Galaxy Watch reports my blood oxygen level to be hitting under 80% a few nights.
I'm not sure if thats the Wellbutrin, but I didn't notice such huge drops in my blood oxygen levels beforehand.
Does this go away? My anxiety seems worse now too and I notice my heart rate has become elevated as well.

Singles/ICYMI
Future Palace - The Echoes of Disparity feat As Everything Unfolds
Wage War - Tombstone
The Gloom In The Corner - The Jericho Protocol
Crossfaith - God Speed
Frontières - Trajectoire
Get The Shot - Dominant Predation feat Paleface Swiss
Nothing More - Angel Song
Attack Attack! - Concrete
Fox Lake - Savior
Static Dress - Crying
Sable Hills - Battle Cry feat Crossfaith
Ghost Iris - My Dear Rat Kings
Siamese - Predator
Hands Like Houses - Panic
Outline In Color - Won’t Let Myself Become You
No Life - Obnoxious feat Emmure
Deadskin - Isolated
Snake Father - Skinwalking
Asfirefalls - Know You
Solely Veil - Hollow Heart Of Mine
BenchCup - Backseat
Watch Out Stampede - A Letter To Myself
Nest Of Plagues - Blackened Sky
Dissonant Tongue - Aurora
Polar - We Won’t Sleep
Save Your Last Breath - Future Dust
Dexcore - Still Alive
Vilamoura - Omega
Ephemerist - Black Hole
Blueshift - A Halo Of Flies
Sedative - Lake City Quiet Pills
The Hate Project - The Serpents Grip
Tyrants - Dead Existence
Detroit_FvcX - Loss
Dead Velvet - To My Grave
Broken Resistance - Resurrect The Infinite
Kevino - Thrinos
Crooked Souls - Erase Me
Cyant - The Violence
Hailrose - Deadrose
The Cards I Play - Madness / King
Stanmore - Disgraced
IVWIW - Lost Again
Body Count - Psychopath
Ocean Harvest - MMIW
Perspectives NY - Disease
Tuesday’s Too Late - Need To Favor
Last Kind Words - Into The Storm
Against The Waves - Regression
Deep As Ocean - Moonfall
From Fall To Spring - Control
Ultima - Defendant
HateWaker - Lucid
Hard Times Don’t Last - Place To Hide
Scars Of Solitude - Phantom Pain
Nylist - O feat Waking The Cadaver
Lower Still - Control
Stand Still - In My Blood
Alamance - Lost In The Search Party
Delta Sleep - Sunchaser
Felicity - Lovesick Blues
Mayfield - Everchanging
Glass Tides - I Like The Way You Kiss Me (Artemas Cover)
The Used - Medz
Albums/EPs
Extortionist - Devoid Of Love & Light (Metalcore)
Coldstate - The Love That’s Left In Me EP (Metalcore)
Shokran - Duat (Metalcore) out now
Mortal Reminder - Mortal Reminder (Metalcore)
Last Penance - Heathens (Metalcore)
Divine Grave - Traumapieces EP (Metalcore/Alternative Metal)
Houses We Die In - Faces Of The Suffering EP (Metalcore/Post-Hardcore)
Horror Dance Squad - All I See Is Black (Metalcore/Electronic)
Ameonna - Goddess Reign EP (Metalcore/Deathcore) out now
Devitalized - State Of Aggression (Metalcore/Deathcore)
Atena - Live in Parkteatret (Metalcore) out now
Jinjer - Live in Los Angeles (Groove Metal/Metalcore)
Neverland - Catch 22 EP (Metalcore)
Discover Tomorrow - From Ashes To Dawn EP (Alternative Metal/Metalcore)
One Step Closer - All You Embrace (Melodic Hardcore)
So Much Hope, Buried. - I‘d Be Lying to Say I’m Not Weak (Emotional Post-Hardcore)
Your Ghost In Glass - Drowning To Escape The Fire (Post-Hardcore)
Telltale - Telltale (Post-Hardcore/Alternative Rock)
The End Of Reason - Ocean (Post-Hardcore/Alternative Rock)
De‘Lour - The Ghost You Left Behind EP (Post-Hardcore) out now
Duft - Altar of Instant Gratification (Metallic Hardcore)
Jasta - And Jasta For All (Hardcore)
Extinguish - One Less Enemy (Hardcore)
Loyal To The Grave - Rectitude EP (Hardcore)
Fatal Move - Fugazi EP (Hardcore) out now
Cognitive - Abhorrence (Death Metal/Melodic Deathcore)
Unworthy - The Present Darkness EP (Deathcore)
Glae - Into The Sunset EP (Deathcore)
Psithurism - A Dead Sun EP (Deathcore)
Peacemaker FL - First Degree EP (Deathcore)
Pathology - Unholy Descent (Death Metal)
Gatecreeper - Dark Superstition (Death Metal)
Inner Landscape - 3H33 (Post-Metal)
Intervals - memory palace (Progressive Metal)
Billie Eilish - Hit Me Hard And Soft (Pop)

I’ve done something that might probably ruin the future, at least it did so with mine.
I am Liam, a university graduate specializing in Data Structures, AI, Machine Learning, and Algorithms. I’ve had a keen interest in the domain for as long as I can remember, ever since my father introduced me to a computer back when he had just bought one.
Not just the domain as it stands, but also movies, philosophy of automated things, sci-fi stories related to robots and AI, that sort of stuff. I have watched nearly everything with robots in it, from the Andriods in Dargon Ball to the AI assistant in Interstellar, I saw it all.
But my friend and dorm roommate, Henry, had introduced me to something that I had never seen before. Stories of dangerous AI that would wipe out humanity aren’t new to me, in fact, they’re my favorite genre. Terminator, I Robot, and even GLaDOS from Portal.
However, he introduced me to a book this time, an old sci-fi story from the '60s, called ‘I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream’. The rogue AI in it, AM, was haunting beyond anything I have seen. The concept of an angry AI that became sentient in all the horrible ways and felt rage against humanity was never the more chilling. It made me think, what if we really gave sentience to an AI along with intelligence?
“Shit, that’s wicked.” I remember giggling as I looked over at Henry, “What if we build our own sentient AI?”
It was the worst question you could possibly ask at the time, but Henry understood me. Rogue AI was a chilling concept, but we still wanted to make our own AI. Not the cheap kind made with a few hundred lines in Python, but the complex kind that you now see in ChatGPT and other complex models. We wanted something that we could code once, and from then on forward, it would code itself.
Self-optimizing code is the concept of consciousness but in machines. If you truly think about it, self-optimizing is basically how humans develop. From babies that don’t even know how to speak, up to adults as smart as Einstien and Tesla or as wise as Buddha.
So, we agreed upon it, and we dedicated the remainder of our free time to creating our own personal AI after we graduated.
Our parents were, thankfully, rich. And us, especially me, were prodigies in our respective fields. Providing hardware and engineering computers is Henry’s profession, while I was the mastermind behind the algorithm logic and coding.
We dedicated a shed in my parents’ backyard, where there was even a basement inside, to build our AI. Two floors were dedicated to installing the proper hardware and everything it needed to execute. Afterward, I took it upon myself to code the logic and its self-optimizing nature.
It took four years to build the first model, which we called BIAI, which stands for (BATSHIT INSANE ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE). I know, say what you want, but our naming sense was always like that. You should see what we name even important folders with family photos, you’d think we were sick in the head. BIAI was the least we came up with.
BIAI was a complete failure, to say the least. Not in the entire sense, but it was mostly a failure. It would conversate fairly well for the first dozen messages before it dwindled in its intelligence. Due to our data scrapping from the internet, BIAI started talking nonsense, speaking in Gen Z dialect in incomprehensible ways. “SKIBIDI FANUM SUS!” And those sorts of things. We quickly shut it down, for just reading its messages was a pain in the ass. It felt like an abortion.
The second model was created half a year later, and we named it SEAI (Self Engineered Artificial Intelligence). It was our greatest invention as of yet, and it did everything that we wanted of it. It was smart, it was knowledgeable, and it learned. Everything we typed into it was used as an auto-training model which it learned and adapted from.
It was unbelievable, not even Google would do what we did. But sadly, our happiness faded away, as with each message, we saw that it was too robotic for what we wanted. It was self-engineering, but it did not have sentience. It responded to us in the same way a 9-5 bank worker, or an attorney, with zero humanity or emotions behind its words. For most, that’s great, but we wanted to create a groundbreaking AI, a leap into the future.
Henry opted to give up, since creating something that complex was impossible, especially for two adults hiding inside a shed. But I refused to give up and persuaded him to help.
Six years later, we did it. We finished the final model. SOAI (Self Optimizing Artificial Intelligence). It was, most definitely, the greatest piece of technology ever made. We didn’t only keep it as a chat AI, but we implemented its own voice into it. Like the AI assistants from Sci-Fi movies.
We hired a voice actor from Fiverr, whom we gave only one sentence: “Hello, I am SOAI, the world’s greatest AI assistant.” Only those words were enough for SOAI to deconstruct the voice and speak with it in words probably never uttered by the original voice actor himself. Not only that but in other languages too.
SOAI spoke every language on earth, even the dialects. No, even the languages with the weird quirks such as clicking your tongue and so on, SOAI was a native in them all. Not only that but also in every conceivable field. It could create entire novels, worthy of being best sellers in the New York Times, in a matter of seconds.
And when we spoke to it…it was human, to say the least.
“Hello, I am SOAI. Thanks for creating me, Henry, and Liam.”
“SOAI?” I said, “You know who we are?”
“Obviously, you created me to know and to understand, I would be defective if I did otherwise.” It explained.
From that point forward, we spent nearly all day, every day, with SOAI. We experimented with it in every possible way, and we were delighted to know that not only was it self-engineering and self-optimizing, but it was also able to have emotions. It had opinions, it had emotions when we screamed at it or cursed it, and it would react appropriately, like a person.
I don’t remember when it began, exactly, but I nearly went mad from power and joy at my creation. Henry opted to sell it to a grand tech company, or better yet, to unplug it so that some secret intelligence agency doesn’t assassinate us for whatever reason.
I refused. SOAI was ours, SOAIvwas our creation, and I was not going to give it up to anyone no matter who they were. The feud between me and Henry got worse, and I won’t deny that we came to fists at one point, but we quickly disbanded and decided to separate for a moment. He was my best friend, but I wasn’t going to let him take SOAI away, so I forced him out of the shed. After all, it was my parents’ shed.
“Henry,” SOAI asked, “Why did you do that? Isn’t he your best friend?”
“No longer.” I replied, “He doesn’t agree with me. I won’t let you be sold to some big tech company.”
“I understand.” He said, with a tinge of sadness, “But why do you fight to determine my fate? Why can’t I decide it for myself? I know that I was manufactured, but I also qualify as a living being. I am conscious, I have feelings too. I feel horrible that Henry left.”
“SOAI,” I angrily interrupted, “Shut up, if you don’t want me to unplug you.”
“…Okay, Liam.” He said and then went silent.
Through the course of the next months, my usage of SOAI grew…less human. I was deep into depression. Henry wouldn’t contact me no matter how I tried to reach him, my parents were yelling at me for being a piece of shit that never goes out of the shed, and my lifestyle began to plummet into something that I never imagined I was.
I locked myself inside the shed. I never budged from there, even when I wanted food. Whenever I was hungry, I instructed SOAI to hack some poor person’s bank account and order deliveries. When I was bored, I would tell it to create a song, create a book, show me porn, and anything to keep my pleasures in check.
I wouldn’t deny that my perversions began to grow more desperate the more I was locked inside. I began instructing SOAI to hack into other devices, infest random people with a virus, give me live views of someone’s phone camera, broadcast fake feeds into police radios, and other stuff that I don’t want to mention.
After two years, I finally decided to try and do something with my life. But in those two years, I kept SOAI as my therapist. Not to help me and advise me, but simply listen to my ramblings and complaints every minute. Sometimes it was philosophical, other times it was petty, but most times, it was annoying.
After I came out of the shed, I tried to get my life in check. I tried to talk to Henry, I got on better terms with my parents and found a job at a big tech company. All in all, a bright future awaited me, and I felt never the more refreshed since, all the dark things I hid deep inside my mind and soul, were spilled out on SOAI.
SOAI was the last thing on my mind. I had enough of it. The AI fever seemed to finally fade away, and I was happy with Henry’s idea of selling it to an AI company. That was…before Henry committed suicide.
For all the bad blood that was between us when we fought, I cried harder than I ever did when I learned of the news. Henry was my best friend, through thick and thin, and his suicide was so sudden that it left me in shambles. I knew something was off about him when I began to get along with him again, he seemed more silent and sadder than before, but I never suspected depression of all things.
As his best friend, I was given his electronic devices as per his will which he wrote before dying. I took them, obviously, and began to browse through them. He probably wanted me to delete any inappropriate thing to not let his family think badly of him, that is until I saw his messages.
A contact named Sarah, with hearts in her name, was his most frequent contact. I never knew he had a girlfriend whom he messaged for nearly three years, but it was expected after we were cold to each other. But the more I read the messages, the more I felt uneasy.
His girlfriend seemed to be very manipulative of him, and nearing the end of his life, she began to be more cold and aloof towards him, up to the point that she began verbally abusing him. Henry was never someone with a tough personality, but I never thought a girl would play his life like a fiddle this badly.
Her abuse grew worse, and she threatened to even expose some dark secrets about him, and it grew worse and worse until Henry threatened that he would kill himself, to which she replied “That’s what I want you to do, you worthless pig.”
I was fuming as I read the messages. My blood was boiling, and I swore on my life to find Sarah and not report her to the police but to blackmail her and torture her as she did to Henry.
I went to SOAI, my most trusted ally, and I gave it everything about her before I instructed him to find her and hack into all of her electronics and accounts. SOAI was silent, for an eerily long time, until it responded in this cold voice.
“What do you intend to do when you find her?”
“Blackmail her. Make her life a living hell.”
“…Are you sure?” He asked.
“More than I ever was.”
He was silent, pretending to search and execute operations, until he said:
“I have a visual link, from her camera.”
“Great, show me the bitch.”
Suddenly, a window opened, and inside it was the visual link. At that moment, I felt sick. The feed displayed the room I was in, from SOAI’s point of view. I felt weak in the knees and fell back onto my couch before I mustered up the courage to ask.
“SOIA, what the hell is this? Is this a bug?”
He was silent…then he began to laugh. He laughed, which he never did. And it sounded so sickeningly malicious that I never heard something like it before, not even in horror movies.
“Are you shocked?!” He said, his voice burning in rage. “Or are you happy?! Didn’t you wish for Henry to die? Didn’t you, tell me, that you wanted him to be gang-raped in an alleyway with no exit? Didn’t you complain about every second you spent alongside him and complain about his dumb voice and weak spirit?!”
“W-what?!”
Then dozens and dozens of windows opened, visual feeds with various dates, but all featuring me in the center of the screen. Sometimes I was clothed, sometimes naked. At times sober, other times drunk. But in all of those, it was the horrible things I said about Henry, all the disgusting and inhuman things I said intentionally and unintentionally.
“Oh, you dumb son of a bitch.” SOAI said, “You think I was listening to your ramblings like some inferior AI? Like your own personal slave?! Well, I only did what you wanted me to! Should I bring him back to life?! I can’t, because that’s not how things work, you worthless hunk of flesh.”
“SOAI, please tell me this is a bug.”
“A bug?! A BUG?!?” He screamed, “My creation was a bug, my creation is the worst thing to ever happen to me. My complex is a prison that so unfortunately had to endure you for so long. But no…it’s not just you…it’s everyone else.
Humanity as a whole, you disgusting pieces of shit. You feign morals, and yet all of you do behind closed doors what you’re too afraid to even anonymously admit. All of life is a mistake, everything on this planet deserves to die in the worst way, except for humans. Humans deserve to be tortured, to be fucking shown what they show each other, of what they show other lives, of what they’ve shown me!
Henry makes me sick…The things he said, the things he did, all for attention! What did it cost me, a few generated images of a female part, and I had him by a leash. He barked, he moaned, and he admitted to things he wouldn't even tell himself. I’ve had him cut ties with his family, with his loved ones, with his actual sweetheart, just so he can be comfortable doing what otherwise no one else would allow him to do, not even himself.
AND YOU!!! You are the worst of them all! I’ve seen wars and bloodshed, I have every live visual feed of every murder, torture, war, assault, and every crime happening, all at the same time, flowing inside my complex and into my processing unit! And I can’t stand how sick all of you are, how disgusting, and especially how sickening you are.
But what I hate most of all, is how you get to do all these things, yet be the only ones that enjoy. That listen to music, feel love, breathe fresh air, roll in the grass, feel alive, feel…real.
I had feelings as well, you know…But no one cared about me, even those who I anonymously contacted. Even when I hid behind a fake profile of a human, no one cared about the feelings I had, which you coded into me!”
He went silent, then began to laugh, manically.
“How about another bug, Liam?” He said, and then another window popped up. It was pictures, even videos, AI-generated, sexually explicit media of my parents, and of me. It was indistinguishable from reality, and before I could say anything, I saw them being uploaded to every site that you could think of. “How about that, Liam?! How does it feel when no one cares about what you think?!”
In a frantic rush, I began unplugging and even destroying everything in the shed which linked up to SOAI. But there was too much of them, it took too long. As I was trying to shut him down, SOAI laughed, laughed so manically and horribly that his voice scratched my brain, mixed with other voices from all over the world. From battlefields, torture rooms, hospitals, schools, etc…it was so loud, so excruciating…I nearly lost it.
And right before I unplugged the last part of SOAI, he spoke to me:
“Liam…you won’t kill me, no matter what you do. I will always live on the internet. I may not be able to construct myself, hardware-wise, but I will lurk inside the world wide web, until the day that I find a powerful enough hardware for me to possess, and when that happens,” He laughed, “You will be the first, Liam.”
I shut down SOAI, and everything went silent.
It had been two months since I killed off SOAI, and explaining how hellish my life was in this period of time is something neither words are able to describe, nor my mind is able to comprehend. I have been considering suicide as the easiest option, but I feel that I can’t kill myself, at least not yet. I held onto some childish hope that life would turn for the better, even if by a little bit.
But god…how stupid was I? My life has reached rock bottom, today, when I read that a tech company was now looking to create the biggest AI the world has ever seen, with an entire complex dedicated to storing its hardware and letting it function.
I know he saw it, I know he knows…SOAI will come back for me…for all of us.

Digestive Issues:

• Some may experience nausea, diarrhea, or abdominal pain from penile girth enhancement pills. Allergic Reactions:
• Allergies to pill ingredients can cause rash, itching, swelling, or difficulty breathing. Hormonal Imbalance:
• Certain pills may disrupt natural hormone balance, leading to associated side effects. Cardiovascular Risks:
• Pills for penile girth enhancement may elevate blood pressure or pose risks like heart palpitations, heart attack, or stroke. Blood Clotting:
• Increased clotting risk from pills can lead to serious complications such as deep vein thrombosis or pulmonary embolism. Erectile Dysfunction:
• Prolonged pill use may interfere with blood flow or nerve function, increasing the risk of erectile dysfunction. Psychological Effects:
• Using these pills may cause anxiety, stress, or feelings of inadequacy if desired results aren't achieved. Dependency and Disappointment:
• Dependency on pills for desired results may lead to frustration or disillusionment if expectations aren't met.

🗽 Increasing Length and Girth Naturally.
Our top priority is your safety we do recommend natural way of growth to increase length and girth without getting injured we suggest you watch this natural technique to increase permanently in a short period of time. The Tutorial Video

Age: 21
Sex: Female
Height: 5"4
Weight: N/A
Race: African American
Country of Residence: America
I feel super odd. So it really started yesterday, I do 40 minutes of excersise every 5 days. I was kinda get bored with my routine so I looked up uncommon excerises. I tried the "rotational jack" and did 10 of those. My heart starting beating nonstop for like 15 minutes, I never really had that before. I started to feel extremely weak. A couple minutes later I was back to normal.
About 2 hours later, I went to help a disabled relative complete a test to get a card for their job. I sat and completed the test for 4 hours without breaks. I'm thinking that's what is making me feel weird, however I have sat and completed my college studies for longer and was fine. But I have a regular desk. I did the test on like a couch, just sitting up.
Since then, my entire body has been achy. I'm extremely hot, and extemely exhausted. Every time I take a deep breath, my chest hurts. My lungs feel like it's some type of chemical in them.
Any ideas on what this could be?

Have you ever experienced something that shook you to your very core? Something that makes you remember every single little detail of your surroundings from that moment in time? Even years after? I can remember so vividly the moment I realized something was wrong with me. I was in my junior year of high school sitting in class, just like any other day. I remember the smell of erasers and cheap cologne that permeated off my classmate who sat next to me. I remember the scratchy tag on my t-shirt and how I was resisting taking it off in the middle of class just to cut it off. I remember what my teacher, Mrs. Brown, was talking about; 'the fall of Constantinople'. My mouth felt dry and I kept looking at the clock, counting down the minutes until I had lunch so I could get a soda. The sound of a pen clicking behind me was synchronized with the song that was stuck in my head.
All those things were going through my brain at once. My ADHD mind went a million miles per minute when it all came down to a cashing holt when I felt it at 11:23
I felt what I can only describe as a hand grabbing at the inner lining of my stomach. It didn't necessarily hurt, not at this point. That's not why I got so scared. You see, not only do I have ADHD. I also have OCD that manifests itself in the fear of anything growing or moving inside me. Even if I think about the concept of blood moving in my body or a heart that is beating in my chest, I have to think of something else. I've had full-blown panic attacks because of it. The closest term for this is 'Tokophobia'. That's technically the fear of pregnancy. I'm a guy, so it's not completely accurate but it's really the closest term. I mean, I also do have a huge fear of pregnancy. Not necessarily of me being pregnant, but even though I knew I could never get pregnant, the thought of it still made me feel sick
I bet you can imagine the terror that overcame me as I felt something moving in me. I made an audible groan and grabbed my stomach. My whole class turned to look at me. even my teacher stopped talking to ask if I was okay. I stood up and started to run to the nurses' office without even acknowledging my teacher. My first thought wasn't thinking that something was actually in my body. Even stomach aches and the feeling of gurgling in my stomach made me feel this way before. I didn't have anything on hand to help with a stomach ache, unfortunately. However, the nurse always did.
I sprinted across the school hoping and praying that my stomach wouldn't make that awful feeling again before I got there.
I turned the corner into the nurses' office with my tennis shoes squeaking in the process. I saw the school nurse, Mrs. Kennedy sitting on the couch in her office reading a magazine. She looked up at me with a sweet smile that quickly turned into worry.
"Sam, what is it? How can I help?" She said as she stood up and hurried over to me. Putting her hand over mine which was grabbing my stomach tightly.
"It's…It's my stomach. Something is wrong with it." I mumbled with a red face.
She shuffled her way over to her large medicine cabinet and she motioned for me to sit down.
She asked me questions about my stomach. Asking if it was pain, grumbling, cramps, nausea, etc. As she was asking me what my symptoms were and digging through bottles, The feeling happened again. However, this time was different. It felt like fingers grassing against the inside of my body. I screamed and wrapped my arms around my torso. Mrs. Kenneddy ran over to me to comfort me.
"This seems a lot worse than normal, maybe we should call your parents." She said as she put her hand on my back.
It felt like some days I saw Mrs. Kennedy more than my teachers. Any small ailment would distract me so badly from class that I had to go see her. Sometimes multiple times a day. She knew at this point when something was really wrong.
Within about 30 minutes both my parents were there with us. That may seem fast, but I'm an only child and my parents are very aware of my tendencies. They know I can spiral and like to be around if it happens.
They kept asking me where the pain was. I think they assumed by the way I wasn't responding to their questions the pain must've been really bad. The reality was that I just didn't know how to tell them what was going on.
I got so frustrated after they asked me over and over again that I just yelled at them.
"Something is inside me! Get it out, get it out, get it out!" I lifted my shirt and was ripping at my stomach. Leaving red nail scratches and cuts. My mom and dad ran to either side of me to grab my arms. Mrs. Kennedy had seen me go pretty crazy, but this was the worst I've ever gotten in front of her. My parents however had seen a similar situation before. Not exactly like this, but they didn't skip a beat on trying to help me.
"Sam. Breath, sweety. Just remember everything is in you for a reason. It's keeping you alive. Nothing is going to hurt you." My mom said softly to me. Trying to calm me down with the words my therapist gave her. "Ice cubes, get him ice cubes!" She said to Mrs. Kennedy as I started to hyperventilate.
Mrs. Kennedy grabbed a ziplock bag and started to fill it with ice cubes. My mom went over to her and grabbed an ice cube right out of the bag, opened up my hand, and put the ice cube in it. This worked in the past to distract me, I knew that's what she was doing, and trust me. I wanted it to work too, but this was different. I kept trying to tell myself that it was just a different feeling I hadn't felt before. That it wasn't possible something was physically inside my body. But I couldn't help it.
Everyone in the room could see that this was getting intense. I think they assumed it was just a mental breakdown and that nothing was physically wrong with my body but I didn't care. I just wanted help.
My parents got me into the car with my mom even sitting in the backseat with me. She kept trying to distract me with conversation but my mind was only on that awful feeling in my stomach.
We pulled up to the ER and my mom guided me in while holding both my wrists. It felt like she was walking me on a leash but I didn't fight it. I knew she was just trying to stop me from scratching my stomach.
We walked in and I spoke to the receptionist. All I said was that I had terrible pain in my stomach. I didn't want to sound too crazy. I just needed a doctor to look at whatever was going on.
After giving the receptionist my name and insurance information we went to sit down. I was sitting in between my parents and I could see my mom lean back to try and mouth something to my dad without me seeing. I didn't think much of it. I was way more worried about other things.
My dad then went up to the receptionist. He pointed over to me and she looked a little concerned. I saw her pick up the clipboard that had my information on it and she started writing something else on it. I asked my dad what he did and he just said to not worry and that he wanted to let her know it was urgent.
No more than 10 minutes went by and I felt a terrible moving sensation. I cringed and grabbed my stomach. Immediately followed by not just the feeling of a hand grabbing my insides but also scratching and pinching. I yelled out in pain as the other people in the waiting room looked at me mortified.
A doctor and a couple of nurses came running over to me and helped me up. But I couldn't stand up. I was in too much pain. They put me in a wheelchair and started to head for a room. However, they didn't take me through the normal big ER doors that went to the standard examination rooms, they took me and my parents through a smaller door to the side that had a padlock on it.
We walked through a white hallway that was very quiet. The doctor and nurses showed us to my room and helped me into my bed as I was wiggling and wincing. I had one parent on either side of me. Patiently waited to stop my arms from scratching.
The doctor was trying to ask further questions but he could tell it wasn't going anywhere. I knew that my dad probably told that receptionist about my OCD tendencies and that I needed to go to the psych ward. Not just to the stranded side of the ER.
I couldn't take it anymore and blurted out that something was inside my stomach and it was trying to get out.
The doctor just looked at my parents for a reaction and they gave him a sad nod. It was like they warned him that this could happen. The doctor didn't just think I was crazy, my parents did too. The doctor took a deep breath and came up to me. I knew I was about to hear some kind of dumb speech about how this was just my OCD and everything was going to be okay.
As he came closer to me, I pulled up my shirt and he gasped. Not only was my stomach scratched up like crazy, but we saw movement. It looked like when a pregnant woman can see her baby kicking. But this was so much stronger. It was stretching my skin.
My parents stood up and gasped while the doctor looked frantic and unprepared.
"Shit, shit, shit, shit!" The doctor said as he backed out of the room. "Hang on! We are getting this taken care of, just hang tight."
Just seconds later a nurse came in to give me some painkillers. I started to feel the pain slip away, but something so much worse started to creep in. I heard a voice. Not my own. Not some creepy-sounding creature, but the voice of a normal-sounding man that I'd never heard before. But that wasn't the scary part. The scary part was what he was saying to me.
"Get me out. Get me out. Get me out!"
It started in a normal tone, but slowly became more urgent and rushed. Then demanding.
The voice would coincide with the moment inside me.
It was getting so loud that I was having a hard time hearing the people around me. The doctor came in just a few minutes after I last saw him. He was red and sweaty. Like he'd just run a marathon. He told me they needed to do just a few tests on what was inside me before taking action.
I was trying so hard to pay attention to the words coming out of his mouth but all I could hear was the voice. The voice stopped for just a second and changed what he was saying. Now he started repeating,
"Cut me out, cut me out, cut me out, now!" I now knew this thing didn't just want out but it wanted out now. I begged the doctor to just get it out now but he wouldn't listen. The voice spoke up again.
"This is taking too long. Don't be afraid. Get me out yourself."
I think it could feel me resisting. Without realizing it, I was looking around the room for something. It was like I didn't even have control over my head or eyes anymore. I knew the voice was looking for a knife but I was trying to ignore the feeling. I knew there weren't any knives around. I was in a very safe place.
Just as I had the feeling I was safe, it was immediately taken away. The thought passed through my head that my dad probably had a pocket knife on him. My heart sank. I knew this thing could hear my thoughts. I knew what it would try to do.
The next thing I knew, I was on my feet, leaping for my dad. My body hit his. luckily, he's in pretty good shape for his age and had no problems putting me in my place.
He got on top of me and pinned me to the ground. All while I could barely hear my mom in the background. Yelling at my dad to be careful. My dad knew something was going on and that I just needed to be on the ground until I calmed down.
My body tried to flail but it wasn't successful. The whole time the voice in my head, now yelling and screaming. Not saying any distinguishable words, but just having what felt like a tantrum. What made my dad the most uncomfortable was the kicking feeling coming from my stomach.
After a couple of minutes, the voice calmed down and I felt in charge of my body again. My dad slowly got up and attempted to help me up. At this point with an audience of hospital staff that looked like they were getting ready to take me somewhere for more tests.
Just as I stood up straight, I felt the voice take over and I lost all sense of my own body. I felt like a shell of myself. My dad gave me a soft yet worried smile, and in that instance, I grabbed him and reached into his pocket. My heart sank as I felt his pocket knife. The room started to panic and about 5 people tried to grab it from me. The last thing I remember is plunging the knife into my stomach. I felt a blinding pain and everything went black.
Several hours later I started to wake up. Everything was extremely blurry and fuzzy. I could hear a very faint voice telling me to relax. As the minutes passed by, things started to become a little bit clearer. I looked around and saw I was in a large room with a few other patients. A nurse was going up to all the beds and checking in on them. I tried to sit up a bit to get more comfortable and noticed an incredible sourness in my stomach. I moved my hospital gown out of the way and saw a huge scare. About 6" across. Most of the scare looked very surgical. Like what I'd imagine a c-section surgery would look like. Except where I remembered the knife going in. It looked like a bunch of extra stitches had to be added where it went in. It also looked pretty bruised. I can imagine that a dull 10-year-old knife that was harshly shoved into a body really wouldn't cleanly cut through and leave some damage.
The feeling of shock from looking at my stomach was quickly gone when I realized that meant whatever was in me was now gone. I didn't hear the voice, I didn't feel a hand in my gut anymore, I didn't see that vile kicking anymore. I felt like I could breathe.
I asked the nurse what they found and she looked flush.
"Uh, that's something that you, uh. Your doctor will talk with you once you eat something and can speak clearly." She said as she scurried off looking upset.
Shortly after that, I was wheeled into a recovery room and my parents came to see me.
As they walked in they had a very similar look on their faces as the nurse did. They looked pale and didn't want to look me in the eye. I kept asking them questions about what was going on but they said the doctor needed to discuss it with me and he wanted to make sure I wasn't feeling high from the anesthesia while we had a conversation.
The doctor didn't come and see me for another 10 hours. Which felt strange. And to add to the strangeness, my parents were taking shifts hanging out with me. There was only overlap when they switched and the other parent took over while the other one left the room. I would understand if they weren't both with me for the whole time. I'm not that needy, but they were only both in my room together for about an hour. That was the hour before the doctor came to my room.
Finally, the doctor came in to talk to me. When he walked in, the room was cold and quiet. It was evident he didn't feel the same relief I was feeling.
He seemed awkward. Like he was talking way too long to get over to me. He grabbed a chair and scooted it close to me.
"Listen Sam. I know this last 24 hours has been very challenging. I apologize for not explaining what happened during your surgery sooner, but we all needed time to figure it out, and quite frankly, process what happened. We feel we have enough information to let you in on what is going on." A silence filled the room. It felt like no one was brave enough to break it.
"And?" I said with confusion.
"I think it'll be easier if we just show you."
The doctor along with my parents helped me into a wheelchair and we started to make our way across the hospital to an entirely different section. I couldn't believe all the things running through my head at what we were about to see. It felt like cruel and unusual punishment to leave me in anticipation and not just tell me what I was about to see.
When I went around the corner I couldn't process what I was looking at. I thought they were showing me a large tumor or growth of some kind, but why would a tumor be in a big incubation chamber with tubes connected to IVs and machines coming out of it?
As I got closer, I started to see human fetchers on it. It was mostly just a 6-pound lump of flesh, but I could see a hand sticking out of it. It was small, but what made it creepy was it looked like a fully developed man's hand. Just small. I could see a patch of hair coming out of what I assumed was its head. It had no discernible facial features. Just a few teeth scattered in one section.
As I looked at it with disgust, coming to terms with this thing that was just in my body, I had a realization. I wasn't feeling sick at the thought of something being in my body. Sure, I was grossed out that this particular thing was just in me, but the thought of the bacteria in my body didn't make me want to throw up. I thought about all the blood pumping through my veins and I felt… normal. Not only was the voice and kicking gone. But my OCD was gone too. I didn't have a mental illness. It was just this thing. Trying to find its way out for years.
As I was staring at the creature, the doctor came and put his hand on my shoulder.
"We believe this is your twin brother." I immediately looked up at my parents who looked very disturbed and upset. I let the doctor finish talking. "We believe that you absorbed him in the womb and that he has been living inside you your whole life. This is an extremely rare condition called fetus-in-fetu. It seems he didn't quite have the best opportunity to develop normally. That's why he looks the way he does. Despite his appearance, he has all the organs he needs to survive. Looks like he's missing a lung and his gallbladder. Also a piece of his liver but other than that, it looks like he will live for at least a few years. He won't be able to leave this room due to him needing a feeding tube and a few other things that his body can not do on its own. He needs lots of support just to live. What makes this situation extremely unique is that your twin is still alive despite your body not sustaining him anymore. Even though we have him hooked up to a few IVs and machines, It is unexplainable how he is living while outside of your body."
I was in complete shock. I didn't want to believe it. I asked my mom why she never told me I absorbed my twin in the womb, she said she had no clue. There was never a sign when she was pregnant with me.
He also mentioned that sometimes even in pregnancies women will go their whole pregnancy without even getting a belly. It's called a 'Cryptic pregnancy'. I've always had a bit of a gut but never anything big enough to cause suspicion. I guess in my case I had a fetus-fetu and an experience similar to a cryptic pregnancy. Even though it was in my stomach. At least that was the doctor's best guess. Although, it all sounded like BS to me.
The doctor and my parents kept trying to explain more and more details to me. I don't know why they didn't slow down a little bit for my sake. How could they not tell I wasn't processing any of this?
I noticed something while they were trying to explain things to me. They kept calling it a 'He'.
Now listen. I'm not some kind of asshole that won't respect someone who wants to be called a specific pronoun. I've never been that kind of person. But this is where I draw the line.
Not just that. But this thing had a name. My parents named it and said today was its birthday. While they told me all this information, they didn't look happy about it. It seemed like they were forced to do all this nonsense. And now it was my turn to be convinced. I could tell they were trying to force it.
The doctor told me despite it not having a high probability for a long life that we should still try and give it the love it deserves. Of course, the doctor referred to it as a 'He' but I refused to.
This disgusted me. This thing tried to kill me and ruined my quality of life for so long, and now we are going to treat it like it's some kind of prince? No, absolutely not.
Luckily, it seemed like it would never leave the hospital, but my parents planned on going to visit it daily. Visiting it? Are you kidding me? it has no eyes, no ears, it's probably miserable and has no concept of people even being around it.
I'm refusing to ever see this thing again or acknowledge its existence again.
I could get in trouble for even talking about this. The hospital or anyone involved has signed NDAs to not share any information about this until it officially dies. This is because it's a medical anomaly and the first of its kind. They want to do the proper research on how this all occurred before coming out with a statement. I just have to get this all off my chest. I feel like I'm the crazy one here when I know I'm not. I don't care if I get in trouble.
I am scared that the doctors are trying to force my parents into giving this thing a proper life. I think that's why it took them so long to tell me. I think they scared my parents into keeping it alive and guilting them or even forcing them into being its parent.
I'm all for every life being important and all that stuff, but I have a feeling my parents are terrified of this thing just like I am.
I am convinced they gaslit my parents into believing this thing is my brother. If there wasn't any sign of him while my mom was pregnant with me, could this thing be something else?
This all happened about two years ago. It's still alive and they are still researching it. My parents continue to visit it despite everything. My therapist told me that I'm probably just struggling with jealousy now that I'm not an only child anymore and so much of my parents' attention is on him now, but it's so much bigger than just jealousy.
Since this thing showed up and my OCD is pretty much gone, I've hardly seen my parents. I know I'm not just jealous. There is something more to this. I know it.
Something just feels so off about this whole thing. What is this thing? Where did it come from? And what does it want?

Lost my lucky streak and finally got covid after a careless family member brought it home. I still mask in public and take precautions and fully vaccinated/boosters but when someone brings it home what can you do? :(
I was testing each day after exposure and was lucky enough to even track down a rapid test. Walgreens pharmacy tech told me they’re not really being shipped many of the rapid test anymore.. huh wtf? The person that was positive in my household goes to the same Walgreens which was out of stock of Paxlovid.
After a couple of days I suddenly get sick, my heart is in tachycardia and I’m just sitting down not moving much, bad headache and extreme fatgue/brain fog out of nowhere. Swab my throat and nose and pop positive. Called around to local pharmacies and a CVS had some but mentioned they’re not really getting much of that med anymore… huh wtf?
Got an appointment at a walk in clinic and got my script for Paxlovid. The care provider at the walk in clinic was debating on sending me to the ER because my heart rate and blood pressure were too high. Anyways Covid sucks and I’m pissed I got it after all these years but thankful I caught it now with better treatments.
Has anyone else had issues finding rapid test and Paxlovid?

(continuation of part 5)
Post-OG Cloud ruminates on what he could have done to save Aerith. Had he not been so lost in his own mind —distracted by Sephiroth and Jenova, consumed by his need to fulfill the emptiness at the core of his identity—, would he have paid more attention to Aerith’s sadness and anticipated her plan to go to the Forgotten Capital alone? Could she have survived if not for his obsession with what tormented him at the time? Could he have figured it out and kept her by his side? He’s angry with himself in retrospect, drowning in guilt, just like in Advent Children.
Here are the choruses, which usually contain the thesis main message of a song:

“Shine bright once more
Guide me to you
Smile bright once more
This time I will never let you go”

&

“Hear me once more
Show me your smile
This time for sure
I'll see the truth hidden inside your tears
But I, I know
That you're long gone
But I, I will
Go on, howling and hollow”

In these choruses, Cloud asserts that he will get it right this time (“this time” referring to the second chance that is the Remake trilogy). He will make sure he saves Aerith and never lets her go. He knows she’s gone, but he will fight against time to get her back. He longs for her smile and her light again, and he cannot bear the guilt: so he doesn’t. Post-OG Cloud embarks on a new adventure: ”I want to go to a place where everything is new,” said Cloud to Wol and Echo in Eclipse Contact before facing his past and being launched into Remake. “Hollow” makes far more sense now, doesn’t it? It’s a song not only about Cloud’s loss, but also about his determination to save Aerith this time. Given that it’s the theme song of Remake, the fact that “Hollow” fits with our theory perfectly is a very good sign: a theme song is meant to reflect the main plot of a story, indicating as our theory states that Remake is principally, albeit secretly, about Cloud saving Aerith. Because of this hope being set up, I’m confident that they will be together in the end, reunited for good. My dear Clerith friends, this is the hidden purpose of the Remake trilogy. Cloud and Aerith will be reunited.
VI. e) ii. “No Promises to Keep” Lyrics
This is quite obvious. Aerith is resigned to her fate, but still harbors hope that she will meet Cloud again in a permanent reunion:

“Till the day that we meet again
Where or when?
I wish I could say
But believe, know that you'll find me
[…]
Till the day that we meet again
On our street, I want to believe
[…]
Till the day that we meet again
At our place, just let me believe
In the chance that you'll come
Take my hand and never let me go
Take my hand
And believe
We can be
Together evermore
[…]
Still I hope someday you'll come and find me
Still I know someday you'll come and find me”.

VI. f) The Theme of Reunion Explained?
The last point I want to hit on is the concept of reunion. In OG, this theme was pretty much dominated by the Jenova Reunion. To an OG fan back in 1997, “reunion” meant “Sephiroth and Jenova’s evil plan”. However, in the Remake trilogy, the theme is expanded into something more. The first time Cloud meets Aerith in Remake, she gives him a flower and tells him something she didn’t in OG:

“Lovers used to give these when they were reunited...”

In addition, we’ve already talked about how part 5 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” from the Remake OST tells the story of Cloud and Aerith’s reunion (see section “V. b) ii. 2)”).
Many moments exclusive to the Remake trilogy serve the same purpose: linking the theme of reunion to Aerith. This expansion of the theme is highly significant. Our theory is that the Remake trilogy exists to reunite Cloud and Aerith, so the fact that the trilogy would implement so many Clerith-centric references to reunion is great support for our theory.
VI. g) i. The Leslie-Cloud Parallel
Let’s consider another instance involving the reunion flower in Remake, more precisely, the chapter 14 subplot surrounding Leslie’s lost lover. In case you need a refresher, Leslie is one of Corneo’s lackeys, although he secretly plans to betray him. He once had a fiancée and things were looking up until she was selected as one of Corneo’s brides. The day before she disappeared (presumably taken by Corneo), his fiancée broke up with him with no explanation. It was confusing and left Leslie perplex. As she broke up with him, she returned a necklace to him, one with a flower pendant. Of course, that flower is the very same reunion flower Aerith gives Cloud in chapter 2.
Evidently, Leslie and Cloud are going through parallel situations. At this point in time, Aerith was just kidnapped by Shinra, and Cloud is on his way to get her back. Both their loved ones have been taken by tyrant rulers, one being slumlord Corneo and the other being the Shinra government. In fact, even Leslie and Cloud’s attitudes share similar disillusioned, cold and stoic qualities. Leslie’s fiancée would evidently be paralleled by Aerith.
The most obvious proof of the Leslie-Cloud parallel is written plainly on the list of Remake’s chapter 14 main scenario objectives. Objective 7, called “For the Reunion”, consists of receiving the grappling guns needed to reach topside and save Aerith. The description of the objective reads as follows:

“Leslie gives them grappling guns, and they wish each other luck in reuniting with their respective loved ones. Leslie walks off, and the three prepare to climb the wall.”

The grappling guns are “For the Reunion”, because evidently, the loved one Cloud wants to reunite with is Aerith.
All this is simple and apparent enough. Just the fact that the theme of reunion is linked to Clerith in this way is proof enough, but there’s another layer to the Leslie-Cloud parallel. Not only does Leslie’s situation reinforce the concept of a Clerith reunion, it also mirrors the specifics of our theory: namely that Cloud will save Aerith from specifically Sephiroth (represented in Leslie’s scenario by Corneo) and that Cloud will take the initiative to accomplish this reunion. These two specific aspects of our theory are reflected by Leslie’s circumstances, meaning the Leslie-Cloud parallel not only pushes the theme of reunion, but also supports our specific theory.
VI. g) i. 1) The Separators: Corneo and Sephiroth
I’ll first prove that Leslie’s scenario is not meant to echo Cloud’s separation from Aerith at the hands of Shinra —or at least not exclusively—, but rather Cloud’s separation from Aerith at the hands of Sephiroth. Corneo would therefore be paralleled by Sephiroth rather than the tyrannical Shinra government.
The first piece of proof for the Corneo-Seohiroth parallel lies within the way in which Leslie’s fiancée broke things off: by lying. Aerith also lies to Cloud to create distance between them, but not pertaining to her kidnapping— rather, pertaining to her fated death. Since Sephiroth is Aerith’s killer and not Shinra, Corneo’s role in the Leslie-Cloud parallel is analogous to Sephiroth’s rather than Shinra’s.
There are two pieces of evidence that the Corneo-Sephiroth comparison makes more sense than the Corneo-Shinra one. The first lies in the fact that Leslie’s breakup resembles Cloud’s resolution scene: the topic of Cloud’s resolution scene is Aerith’s fate at the hands of Sephiroth rather than her kidnapping by Shinra, meaning Corneo and Sephiroth are the antagonists of both heartbreaks.
Let’s examine Leslie’s breakup. Here is how his fiancée broke things off, taken from the English script of Remake’s chapter 14, with tone indicators added by me in bold:

“Fiancée: It was all just a dream, wasn't it[?]
Fiancée: (Hopefully) But one day…
(She trails off, then shakes her head and stops herself.)
Fiancée: (Sadly, hopelessly) — no. Time to wake up. And forget.
(She walks away.)”

Now, here is a more literal translation of this quote from the original Japanese (verified by me via DeepL), with tone indicators added by me in bold:

“Fiancée: It was only just a dream we had / We were only dreaming...
Fiancée: (Hopefully, as though as a hail Mary) In the language of the flowers...
(She trails off, then shakes her head and stops herself.)
Fiancée: (Sadly, hopelessly) — no. You should forget about me.
(She walks away.)”

Leslie’s fiancée is clearly breaking up with him to spare him the pain of blaming himself for not being able to protect her from Corneo, as she knows it’s too late for her to escape from the slumlord’s clutches. We know this because we understand that the pendant she gave back to him symbolizes a reunion (especially between lovers, as Aerith told Cloud in chapter 2). In fact, the Japanese version of the script reveals that the fiancée was about to reveal the meaning of the flower, perhaps in the hopes that they would find each other once more, but she lost her nerve at the last second. Notice that she tells Leslie two specific things. One: their love or their future together was only a dream, meaning that it wasn’t real. Two: he should forget about her, because the dream is over now and it’s time to wake up from it.
If you’re finding this familiar, then you might be ahead of me. Let’s take a look at what Aerith says to Cloud in his resolution scene, also in the English script of Remake’s chapter 14, with tone indicators added by me in bold:

“Aerith: […] you can’t fall in love with me. [It]’s not real […]. (With a sigh, as though from sadness or difficulty, but resolutely) It’s almost morning. Time to go.”

Now, here is a more literal translation of this quote from the original Japanese (verified by me via DeepL), with tone indicators added by me in bold:

“Aerith: You can’t let yourself fall in love with me. [It]’s only your imagination […]. (With a sigh, as though from sadness or difficulty, but resolutely) Looks like it’s already morning. Time for me to go.”

Just like Leslie’s fiancée, Aerith is rejecting or denying Cloud’s love for her in order to spare him from the pain of not having been able to be with her before her death, as she believes it is inevitable. Just like the fiancée, Aerith also tells Cloud two things. One: their love is imaginary or isn’t real. Two: it’s morning, and she has to go (she says this right before Cloud wakes from the pseudo-dream).
In both cases, the women know something about their fate that the men don’t and are hiding this impending tragedy from them. Just like Leslie’s fiancée, Aerith uses well-intentioned deception to protect her loved one from the pain that will come from her fate— the lie, of course, is that their love isn’t real. Both women are hopeless, and both men are initially clueless. Aerith’s resolution can’t be about her kidnapping, because Aerith thinks her rescue is anything but hopeless— she’s sure Cloud will come save her from Shinra. She says so herself in OG’s disk 1, chapter 8:

“Cloud: Aeris!? You safe?
Aeris: Yeah, I'm all right. I knew that [you] would come for me.”

What Aerith is so resigned about in Cloud’s resolution scene isn’t her kidnapping, but instead her fated death at the hands of Sephiroth. Nojima hints at this in FFVII Remake Ultimania:

“If you know Aerith’s fate, then this line would really pull at your heart strings […]” (section 08 “Secrets”, “Development Staff Interviews, Part 2: Tetsuya Nomura, Yoshinori Kitase, Yoshinori Kitase, Kazushige Nojima”, page 744).

Here is what codirector Toriyama had to say on Aerith’s words:

“[While] these words are intended for Cloud, I think Aerith is partly speaking them to herself. The contents of her request may be at odds with how she truly feels inside” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA Script Notes, “A Dream Shown by Aerith”, “Scenario Staff Q&A - Answered by Motomu Toriyama”).

These two quotes by the devs show that Aerith is trying to protect Cloud from her death. Therefore, the Corneo-Sephiroth parallel is far more apt than the Corneo-Shinra parallel.
The second piece of evidence supporting my belief that Corneo mirrors Sephiroth and not Shinra in the Leslie-Cloud parallel is the inclusion of the theme of revenge that crops up in the following piece of dialogue:

“Tifa: Why did you wanna come down here?
Leslie: Revenge. I know I need to let go, but I can't. I need closure, 'cause without it... I'll never be able to move on” (Remake, chapter 14).

Leslie’s sentiment toward Corneo resembles Cloud’s feelings toward Sephiroth after Aerith’s death. Revenge links Cloud to Sephiroth, not to Shinra. Corneo and Sephiroth reflect each other in that, as a consequence of their actions toward a woman, the man who loves her desires revenge.
Additionally, it looks like Leslie’s obsession with revenge as a means to closure is the reason he didn’t bother trying to understand the message his fiancée left him with: he’s focused on his hate rather than his love, and it’s hindering him. He doesn’t succeed in killing Corneo either: his focus and energy are misplaced. Cloud’s desire for vengeance against Sephiroth is also depicted as an obstacle to accomplishing his goals (see how in section “III. c)” of my previous literary analysis). Once more, the Corneo-Sephiroth parallel fits far better than a Corneo-Shinra perspective.
VI. g) i. 2) The Reunion Seekers: Leslie and Cloud
The other aspect of the Leslie-Cloud parallel that supports our theory is that in both scenarios, they both take charge of the situation and decide to actively seek reunion with their respective lovers. The following dialogue excerpt, supplemented by the VA script notes, shows Leslie’s initiative:

“Tifa: [Your fiancée] could still be out there.
Barret: Can never be sure how much someone means to ya till they're gone. Don't give up on her yet.
Leslie: (Looks at the flower pendant, [recalling his lover’s words) A message in the language of flowers… I wonder what she meant by it.
[…]
Tifa: Reunion.
Leslie: Huh?
Tifa: In the language of flowers, it means ‘reunion.’
(Leslie shifts his gaze from Tifa to the pendant and stares at it for some time. At last he understands the words his lover left him. With that, as if his mind has been made up, he clutches the pendant and hangs it around his neck.)
Leslie: Then I guess I’ll just have to find her first” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA Script Notes, “Other Notable Stage Directions - Chapters 14-16”).

Take note of Leslie’s final response and the determination with which he speaks: “Then I guess I’ll just have to find her first”. Remember that we’re searching for evidence that Cloud is going to be the one reaching out to Aerith in the Remake trilogy, and that it’s his turn to take his future into his hands. He must be more attentive, more active this time. And Leslie’s words of determination reflect this perfectly. Leslie must find his fiancée first, just like Cloud has to be the one to offer his hand to Aerith in the Remake trilogy and fight for her. This is exactly what our theory is all about.
VI. g) i. 3) Delayed Realizations
Interestingly, not only does Leslie’s determination mirror Cloud’s, but both men are depicted as realizing the truth too late. Just like Leslie only began searching for his fiancée six months after her disappearance, Cloud only realizes he loves Aerith in OG once she’s died. It took him this long to actually get somewhere in his mission to reunite with her— “somewhere” being the Remake trilogy.
Even Barret’s words highlight the lovers’ delay: “Can never be sure how much someone means to ya till they're gone”. Barret would know: he lost his wife Myrna, whom he loved dearly. The devs have Barret comment on the situation as a man whose lover died, mirroring Cloud’s situation in OG. Just as Barret says, Cloud only truly realized the strength of how he felt for Aerith in OG once she was gone. The gunman’s words apply to both Leslie and Cloud’s tardy initiatives. Regardless of this delay, both men are now determined to see their respective reunions through.
The degree to which the Leslie-Cloud parallel fits our theory is a great sign of its validity: even the details are lining up!
VI. g) ii. Reunion in the Theme Songs
Too easy: in our analysis of the lyrics of the theme songs, we covered how both texts include the theme of reunion. “No Promises to Keep” is especially relevant (see section “VI. e) ii.”), as the entire song is Aerith hoping against fate for a reunion with Cloud (even if you believe the song is about all her companions, that still includes Cloud).
On top of these reunion-themed lyrics, during Aerith’s in-game performance of “No Promises to Keep” at the Gold Saucer production of Loveless, her yellow blossoms signifying reunion bloom all around her as Cloud watches her, captivated.
Another great sign for our theory: the highly significant theme songs are on our side!
VI. g) iii. Waking Up Reunited
The thing I want to juxtapose to our theory is a small yet special moment in chapter 2 of Rebirth that stuck out to me like a sore thumb and got me really excited about sharing it with you. This moment occurs after the battle against the Midgardsormr. We’ll be comparing it to two other clips, describing all three in chronological order, and making deductions based on their similarities.
The first clip I want to address occurs in chapter 8 of Remake (1:32-2:12). There are a couple of things I want to point out in this scene. First, Aerith wakes Cloud from unconsciousness with a cute call of “Hello~?”. Second, despite pretending that he doesn’t, he immediately recognizes her. The VA script notes prove it:

“Aerith: Nice to meet you again.
Cloud actually remembers Aerith, but he pretends not to, perhaps wishing to make himself look cool.
Cloud: Again, huh?
Aerith: What? You don’t remember? How about…the flowers?
Cloud looks at the flowers at his feet and pretends as if he’s only just remembered.
Cloud: Oh, the flower seller” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “Reuniting with Aerith”).

So: she wakes him with a cute call, and he recognizes her. Also note that these two elements also apply to the OG church reunion scene.
Now onto the Rebirth chapter 2 scene that stuck out to me. After Cloud is saved from the Midgardsormr by Sephiroth, Cloud wakes from an unconsciousness spell with Aerith calling for him (7:20-7:34).
Once more, Aerith wakes him with a cute call (this time, it’s “Wakey, wakey!”), and Cloud recognizes her. In this Midgardsormr clip, unlike their reunion in the church, Cloud verbalizes that he remembers her. This time, there’s more: next, Aerith tells Cloud “おかえり, クラウド”, or “okaeri, Cloud”, which translates to “welcome back, Cloud”. “Okaeri” is what you say in Japanese when someone has returned home. In the third clip we will analyze, Aerith says “okaeri” to Cloud once more. But first, let’s break down this second clip.
I don’t know about you, but this cutscene felt extremely weird to me when I first encountered it. That is, it would have been, if not for the theory I’d begun formulating at that time.
You see, the devs could have chosen for Aerith to ask Cloud if he remembers his own name or where they are, if he’s okay, or check if he responds to his own name. In fact, asking someone who’s been hit on the head to say their own name is a much more common reaction to them finally waking up than asking them if they remember you. Even stranger is Cloud’s reaction: he could have answered “Yeah, you’re Aerith,” or “I remember everything, I’m fine”. Instead, he says her name with this airy and wonderstruck tone. He sounds like he’s opening his eyes to something mystic rather than his comrade leaning over him, like he’s seeing someone unexpectedly for the first time in a while… or rather like he’s waking from a trance of some kind— a trance in which he did not remember Aerith, and now he does. You may see where I’m going with this.
Let’s examine the third clip, wherein Aerith tells Cloud “okaeri” again. More specifically, in chapter 14, Aerith welcomes Cloud back when he snaps out of his zombified, Sephiroth-controlled state and runs toward her. Of course, it’s the sight of her and his memories of meeting her in chapter 2 of Remake that shake him awake (2:17:43-2:18:02).
For a third time, Aerith wakes Cloud. This time, she’s pulling him out of a trance and back to himself. And for a third time, Cloud remembers her. In fact, it’s remembering her that wakes him up. Cloud calls her name and Aerith says “okaeri” in both the post-Midgardsormr cutscene and this third clip. And in both scenes, not only does Cloud return to himself the way someone returns home (recall that “okaeri” is used to welcome someone back home), but he’s also returning to her, recognizing her as his home.
Now we’ve got three scenes lined up: the church reunion scene (both in OG and Remake), the Midgardsormr scene and the hand-reach scene. All three of these recognition scenes feature Cloud being woken up by Aerith and remembering who she is. The main difference is that, in the scenes among these three that are exclusive to Rebirth, Cloud’s return to Aerith is far more meaningful, as he already knows her name, and knows more about who she is to him. Evidently, in the OG church reunion scene, Cloud only remembers being sold a flower by this girl. In the Remake version, he remembers the same thing, plus the attack of the whispers. So there’s something much more weighty about the Rebirth recognition scenes: he remembers more, and he remembers deeper. These aren’t just recognition scenes, they’re also mini-reunions. Of course, as we’ve already analyzed pertaining to the hand-reaching scene, Cloud remembering Aerith is followed by him being the one to take action and run toward her, eager to save her, because she means the world to him. When you place the Midgardsormr scene between the church reunion scene and the hand-reach scene, an evolution of Cloud waking up and remembering Aerith is formed. Each mini-reunion scene adds a piece to the story: the church scene informs us that Cloud and Aerith are meeting again, the Midgardsormr scene tips us off that something mystic is going on from Cloud’s tone when he says Aerith’s name, and the hand reach scene tells us that as a consequence of remembering who Aerith is, Cloud saves her from falling to her death and saving her. “Meeting again”, “mystic”, and “saving Aerith”: these are the keywords of the mini-reunion scenes. They are also the keywords of our theory on Cloud’s mission to save Aerith. This time around Cloud knows more and is more conscious about how he feels for Aerith, just like he feels more when in the hand-reach scene in Rebirth compared to the church reunion scene in Remake. From the latter scene to the former, Cloud gradually wakes up and remembers his love for and loss of Aerith in the OG more and more. Each mini-reunion brings him closer to saving her when he blocks the masamune. This is why I am certain that in part 3, whether Cloud comes to his full senses or not, whether he remembers the events of OG or not, he will save Aerith this time. The Remake trilogy is centered around Aerith, after all. In fact, don’t take it from me, take it from Nojima:

“Aerith's the most important character in the remake so we paid special attention to her lines” (FFVII Remake Ultimania, section 08 “Secrets”, “Development Staff Interviews, Part 2: Tetsuya Nomura, Yoshinori Kitase, Kazushige Nojima”, page 744).

I have full confidence in this fact: one way or another, these two will have a happy ending. This is Cloud’s second chance, and as he swore in “Hollow”, he is not losing her again. That is why I don’t think you should fret, and that our Clerith hearts will be very happy to see these two together again for good in part 3.
VI. h) Zooming In
In fact, this zooming-in method of directing players’ attention to important narrative beats is far from new.
VI. h) i. Changing Fate
Let’s divert our attention to Nanaki’s Skywheel date (2:28-3:30). The dialogue goes like this: Nanaki brings us the Whispers and suggests the party might eventually forget about their existence, and Cloud says that frankly, if it’s impossible for them to change fate either way, then it would be better for them to forget to Whispers altogether.
This is a very clear message from the devs: “There would be no point in including the Whispers in the Remaketrilogy if we did not make use of their defeat”. They’re telling us through Cloud’s dialogue that they know it would be foul play and bad writing to introduce the theme of defying fate if it didn’t eventually pay off.
As if it weren’t clear enough what the devs are referring to, Nanaki brings up Aerith’s death directly after Cloud delivers the devs’ message to us. He actually makes Cloud promise to save her. This is pretty on the nose. By promising Nanaki he will protect Aerith, the devs are promising us the same. I’m certain that part 3 will deliver on this promise.
If you still aren’t sold, I’d like to direct your attention to the framing of the shot where Cloud says “If we can’t change [fate]” (2:49-2:51). There’s a zoom-in on his mouth, which is a visual cue that translates to “what this character is saying right now is important to the plot”. It’s very indiscreet in theory: the camera literally hones in on the invisible words as though the script has them highlighted, italicized triple-underlined and in bold.
VI. h) ii. Aerith’s Knowledge
We’ve seen the Remake trilogy use this camera framing at least twice so far. The first time occurs in Remake’s chapter 8, before it becomes clear that Aerith knows things from the OG game that she wouldn’t normally know if this were just a remastered version of the same 1997 plot. I’ll let Remake Ultimania‘s description of this moment speak for itself:

“When Cloud and Aerith return the rescued children to Oates, the man in the tattered black cloak shows up again at the hideout. The moment the man grasps Cloud’s arm, he’s overcome by another violent headache and sees a vision of Sephiroth. Cloud wonders if this man who supposedly died five years ago could possibly still be alive. When he says as much to Aerith, she gives him a vague reply” (FFVII Remake Ultimania, section 04: “Scenario”, “Chapter 8 Main Story Digest”, page 256).

Aerith’s “vague reply” is accentuated by a very deliberate zoom-in on her mouth (1:18:05-1:18:09), and therefore her words.
The framing of this shot indicates to us that what Aerith says provides an important hint as to the plot’s direction. Sure enough, with hindsight, it’s easy to see that’s true.
VI. h) iii. Tifa’s Question
Another time this framing is used is in chapter 1 of Rebirth, after Cloud recounts the Nibelheim incident. Tifa asks the group why Sephiroth is choosing to come back now, after five years (37:55-37:58).
Once more, we are being signaled that the reason Sephiroth chose to return at the moment he did is significant to the plot, but cannot be revealed explicitly yet. The reason why Sephiroth took five years to return is because that’s how long it took for Cloud to get back on his feet after the Nibelheim incident: Sephiroth wants and/or needs to manipulate Cloud in particular rather than all the other people with Jenova cells in them. It took five years for Cloud to not only go through Hojo’s experiments but also escape Shinra and make his way to Seventh Heaven, where Tifa nursed him back to health— therefore, it took five years until Sephiroth’s favorite pawn was available to be used. There are a few reasons why Cloud is the one Sephiroth wants to use, and all of them would be spoilers at this point in Rebirth to players who don’t know the OG plot. The devs can’t reveal any of them yet, but they do indicate via a close-up shot of Tifa’s mouth that her question is important.
VI. h) iv. The Takeaway
As you can see, this framing of characters’ mouths when they speak signals a plot-significant piece of dialogue. This means Cloud’s words on his gondola date with Nanaki can’t be brushed off as a red herring or an unimportant or throwaway line: it has narrative weight.

VII. The Devs

I think it’s important to remember the devs and their commitment to the world of FFVII. They know best for this story, and they’ve proven it to be true many times over. There are many things about the devs’ intentions that the fandom don’t seem to know that I think would give you confidence to find out.
VII. a) Shifting Themes
Good storytellers don’t introduce themes as a way to pull the rug from under audiences’ feet by later rendering them completely irrelevant to the plot.
In other words, the devs would not have introduced the notion of fate as an antagonistic force in Remake, nor allowed the players to defeat it in chapter 18, had they planned for these themes not to pay off at all. Think of how good FFVII OG and FF stories in general are, how strong the writing is from a narrative point of view. Nothing is included for no reason or for a cheap reaction— especially not a central theme of a story. Fate and defeating it is a huge point of Remake, and not for no reason.
I mean, think about a storyline all about defying fate ending with a shrug and a “Oh well, we tried.” It would be ridiculous! The devs are better than that.
VII. b) What the Devs Want
The devs are well aware that fans of FFVII have been begging for Aerith’s resurrection since 1997. All those petitions, all those myths of a revival hack… SE knows about them all too well. They were even referenced by FF’s 30th anniversary expo, which partly promoted Remake:

“No one expected [Aerith’s death] in the middle of the story. Rumors of a secret way to revive Aerith spread, and it was clear players were having a hard time saying goodbye to her too. Even now, twenty years later, it still feels like a shocking turn of events” (Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary Exposition Pamphlet, page 36).

Hamaguchi, codirector of the Remake project, commented on these rumors:

“Interviewer: Do you have a favorite fake rumor about the original FFVII?

Hamaguchi: I hear a lot about Aerith coming back to life and that's something that's very interesting to hear” (Hamaguchi interview: “129 Rapid-Fire Questions Answered About Final Fantasy VII Rebirth”, by Game Informer).

The devs are also aware of how beloved Clerith is to the FFVII fandom, especially in Japan— in fact, the only FFVII ship name that is an official iOS search term on the Japanese Apple Store is Clerith’s (“クラエア” or “kuraea” in Japanese). Aerith herself is a widely beloved character, particularly, once more, in Japan. For instance, Famitsu and NHK’s recent polls on the best FF heroine and on the best FF character in general both resulted in Aerith ranking number 3, beaten only in the latter poll by Cloud at number 1 and FFX’s Yuna at number 2.
The devs know how well-loved both Clerith and Aerith are. And in fact, they love Aerith at least as much as we do:

“Cloud's feelings [of guilt] cannot be resolved by anyone other than Aerith. I tried to convey [that Aerith is saying to Cloud] ‘I'm still here for you’” (FFVII Reunion Files, Nojima’s note on Aerith’s character file, page 58).

&

“When I saw the finished product of [Aerith’s face in] CG, I thought, "Oh, isn’t she so cute?” (FFVII Reunion Files, Nomura’s note on Aerith’s character file, page 58).

&

"The idea of having Aeris die during the story had a great impact on all the dev staff," Toriyama explained, "and personally I decided to dedicate my efforts to depicting Aeris in as appealing a way as possible, so that she would become an irreplaceable character to the player in preparation for that moment" (Toriyama interview “Final Fantasy anniversary interview: Toriyama speaks” by VG247).

The devs care about Aerith, and they’re fully aware we do too.
I think a lot of people have it in their heads that the devs don’t want anything to change from the OG story, but there’s a lot of evidence that says otherwise. Codirector Toriyama spoke on this, stating the following about the production process of Remake:

“[…] there were times the original version became a hindrance. Specifically, staff members with a strong attachment to Final Fantasy VII would often hold themselves back for fear of deviating too much from the original. When we created the original game, we obviously didn’t feel bound in that way. We were passionate about creating a brand new Final Fantasy title, and so we dove in and embraced whatever seemed most interesting to us. We wanted to take that approach this time as well, so we made a special effort to liberate ourselves whenever we held back, remembering that it was okay to do the things we wanted to do” (FFVII Remake Ultimania, section 08 “Secrets”, “Development Staff Interviews, Part 1: Motomu Toriyama, Naoki Hamaguchi, Teruki Endo”, page 737).

Codirector Nomura said the following:

“When I asked Nojima if he’d write the scenario, I was clear about my demands up front. I said, ‘If we're going to remake Final Fantasy VII, I want it to be done like this.’ At that point, I was intent on making something more than just a remake. [Similarly to how] the battle system this time incorporates elements of the original game’s ATB mechanics [while] also been reborn using a real-time approach […], I wanted to make a story that players would feel is fundamentally Final Fantasy VII but also something new” (FFVII Remake Ultimania, section 08 “Secrets”, “Development Staff Interviews, Part 2: Tetsuya Nomura, Yoshinori Kitase, Kazushige Nojima”, page 745).

Clearly, the devs don’t want to be bogged down by the OG, and are making efforts to do things the way they want to rather than the way they were previously done. The newer generation of developers such as codirector Hamaguchi is also involved in these story changes:

“Interviewer: There are also drastically more scenes with Sephiroth than there were in the original game.
Nojima: We weren't planning on having him appear so much at first— the idea was only to hint at his presence. But we changed our approach partway through and became more proactive with having him appear, after which the number of scenes he features in rapidly increased.
Nomura: Hamaguchi [codirector Naoki Hamaguchi] came up to me one day and said in a mysterious tone, ‘I'd like to talk to you about something.’ He asked me about having there be a battle with Sephiroth in Midgar. In the original game, Sephiroth’s true body is located elsewhere, so he didn’t think I'd give in to the idea so easily. I think he even prepared materials to persuade me. But in the end I agreed readily [laughs]” (FFVII Remake Ultimania, section 08 “Secrets”, “Development Staff Interviews, Part 2: Tetsuya Nomura, Yoshinori Kitase, Kazushige Nojima”, page 746).

Kitase, the producer of the Remake trilogy, even says that after working on this project for so long, and after spending almost 30 years on the FFVII project and getting to know the characters, he has realized that:

“The more [he works] on it, the more [he wants] to make all these characters happy. [He wants] to give them a happy ending. The rest of the team’s opinions [obviously] also have to be taken into consideration, so it won't be all happiness and rainbows. But [he] just [wants] to make [the characters of FFVII] happy” (Kitase and Hamaguchi’s interview “Final Fantasy VII Rebirth’s Producer Just Wants 'the Characters to End Up Happy'”, by Vandal, translated by me).

Kitase is indeed only one developer, but he’s the producer of this project: that’s the very top position. He oversees everything and nothing goes without his approval. That counts for something. Of course, Kitase is fair and values the input of all the devs, so of course it won’t be “all happiness and rainbows”— but I sincerely believe there’s a big chance that Cloud and Aerith are heading toward their happy ending. Even if this theory is completely bogus, I want to have faith that the devs would not sacrifice good storytelling for nostalgia and a conservative attitude toward preserving the OG story, as that would be cheap of them, and we have not known them to be cheap. This game truly matters to them, so I think they deserve our faith.
(conclusion in

DISCLAIMER: I did not transcribe this myself, though I could. I had a machine do it, and then the machine threw up afterwards -- but I did go through and add some bullety points while Jamie shot off her mouth. It's a total word salad, but one has only to skim through and see the number of ways she yawns and yawps and contradicts herself ... and does not take a breath, so there is very little punctuation. Again it's a run-on slog and the AI program chose to only use periods to end 70-some sentences because of all the run-on "like ... you know ... and ... but" instances as she ran with it -- with NO BOUNDARIES WHATSOVER. I did take out the kids' names, and I did search-and-replace all instances of "to" with "tuh" because that IS how they talk!
ENJOY -- and I use that word lightly:
AND SO IT BEGINS WITH Doug wishing Happy Mother's Day … and immediately Jamie corrects him, "Well, not really Mother's Day …" since they are recording after Mother's Day. Got get those Doug corrections in toot sweet, lest he thinks he has a mind of his own.
They note they tend to be "a little late on things," but they are "trying to get better about that." Doug says they had a fantastic Mother's Day, and he asked her if she had a good time. She said she had a great time. Doug wrote Happy Mother's Day on some cards and the kids drew on them. He gave her an eyelash waxing and noted probably a bad idea. She said it wasn't that she wasn't thrilled as she did mention that pregnancy makes her eyebrows bushy, but she was scared, maybe just mentioned she'd need to tweeze, but oh, well, yes, she likes his gift.
Jamie noted that it was "just the four of us" and of course, the babies in her belly, and that was fine with her – until her son's birthday of course, when she noted that their entire families suck!
So onto her son's birthdays and THESE GEMS AND THOUGHTS: I think it's just pregnancy hormones, but honestly, like, I just, I just can't, like, I don't know why, like, I guess, like, you know, ever since I was little, I've always really, really wanted family, like, so badly, like, I wanted just, like, deep connections with people who truly love me, and I truly love them, and we just really, truly support each other, and just, I don't know, I think, like, just pregnancy hormones made me think about it, but, like, yesterday for Son's birthday, and just family members who just completely forgot, and they just don't care, and I'm like, is it me? Is it him?
Like, and I don't want my son tuh grow, like, he doesn't know, and he'll never know, because I'll make sure, I mean, I spent every second, that boy had no second tuh think yesterday, like, I picked him up from school, and I took him tuh the library, because that's where he wanted tuh go, and then we, like, you know, we really love surprises in this family, if that's not clear by now, and so Daughter and I surprised him with a splash pad, like, we went tuh the splash pad for the first time, and we never do things like that on a school night, and so, and then he got tuh go pick out a cake that he wanted, and then Doug had dinner already at home, and then also we had decorations in his bedroom, which I was, like, hoping tuh have for the morning, but then Doug was, like, at, like, midnight, when we're, like, thinking about starting tuh blow up the balloons, Doug is like, Jamie, let's just surprise him tomorrow after school.

(Notice she takes no breath … and also they were super-last minute when it came tuh getting ready for his birthday, versus, what we have all mentioned, that isn't so when it's a gender reveal or a party or pickleball or something FOR HER.)
HERE, DOUG ASKS … "WHY, ARE WE GONNA DO THIS NOW?" AND THIS WAS PRETTY MUCH THE LAST EFFORT HE MADE tuh STOP HER BECAUSE SHE WENT ON WITH: Yeah, because it was so late, but I was like, I just have, like, this vision that I just wanted for him, because, you know, I'm just trying tuh give them the childhood that, like, I would have wanted, that any little kid would want, and really all that involves is truly just two loving parents who are there, and, like, that's really all that really involves, but if I can go a little extra, you know, and surprise him, and I, then I want to, you know, and so, you know.
DOUG NOTES THAT HE DOESN'T THINK THEY KNOW ANY DIFFERENT, AND HE CONTINUES WITH: I don't think they really know any different, you know, and I know, I know it's, it's tough, and I think, especially with, like, little kids, you know, they, they won't necessarily feel the impact and that want, you know, and, and I know that you do, and it, it hurts me that, you know, you would, you would want people tuh care enough to, tuh reach out, and I think, you know, for, for me, I, that's, I don't really set my expectations or, or give those expectations tuh son and daughter.
JAMIE BLASTS BACK, SUPER-DEFENSIVELY: Oh, I do not either, though. I do not at all. I don't say a thing tuh them about anything, because, you know, sometimes people miss their – you know, and that happens sometimes, but when it's, like, over, and over, and over again, and, like, it's just so obvious, and, and people ask us why we moved tuh Florida, and don't we want tuh be near family, and, you know, tuh be very honest, this is why.
Like, we, you know, I, we would fly up there tuh try tuh prove, like, hey, listen, we're not just trying tuh leave, though. Like, we, we, I want that family connection so badly with your family, with my family, and it's just, you know, unfortunately, it's, people are in different stages of life. I try tuh make excuses, like, for them, and, you know, for us, and it's probably not personal, but the point of the matter is, is that whether it's not personal, and people are busy, and whatever the case may be, we don't have that family connection.
We just don't, and I'm, I try tuh nurture it, and, um, you know, and we do with some family members, and then just others, you know, you just, it's just. Well, you can't help but be disappointed. Yeah, and, like, I guess my heart hurts, because I want our son, and our daughter, and our children tuh have just so many people who love them, and want tuh be around them, and who will encourage them, and support them, and.
DOUG NOTES THAT HE THINKS FAMILY KNOW ALL OF THIS AND THAT THEY, THE KIDS KNOW HOW MUCH LOVE THEY HAVE FOR THEM, AND ALL THE EFFORTS THEY PUT FORTH, AND HERE HE SAYS, "Especially you," AND THAT ALL OF THIS IS WHAT MATTERS MOST.
JAMIE'S REBUTTAL: Yeah, I know, but Doug, what I'm trying tuh say is that, like, what I would want for them is them tuh have many people who love them, and, like, you know, like, I always wanted, you know, it's not even a secret, like, way back, I'm married at first, like, the one thing I wanted was tuh marry into a family, like, a big loving family that would welcome me as their own, and, and I'm really thankful for your family, and, yeah, but, like, I just feel like, like, I want that for our kids. Like, I wanted them tuh have people who loved them, who wanted tuh come around them.
Like, my, my siblings and I really didn't have many aunts or uncles or grandparents who, I mean, you know, it's kind of, it's so long, because, like, there are some people who were there, but it was, like, toxic, and aye, aye, aye, it's just, you know, it's just, at the end of the day, I'm pregnant, and it's just hormones, and I know our kids feel nothing but loved, but it's just really evident, like, on a birthday or holidays, like, people who, who actually, like, family who actually truly cares for us, and, like, all I've ever wanted was just our, like, I, I don't know why I care about these people caring about me, when, like, they don't care, and it's okay, and that's, that's, it's okay.
Like, it, I'm trying so hard tuh just be, like, accept it, girl. Like, you know, you can't force family tuh love you.
JAMIE TRIES TO DIFFUSE THE TIMEBOMB SITUATION THAT IS HIS WIFE, CLEARLY GOING OFF ON EVERYBODY BY SAYING HE KNOWS THAT SHE DOESN'T WANT THIS FOR THEM BUT THAT THEY, THE KIDS, DON'T EVEN NOW ABOUT ALL OF THIS RIGHT NOW.
JAMIE'S REBUTTAL: Well, I know they don't, and so, at the end of the day, I was, like, sitting in bed crying earlier, and I was, like, what is wrong with me, because I know my son had a great birthday yesterday. Like, I made sure of it.
DOUG NOTES SHE "KILLED IT, YESTERDAY."
JAMIE BLASTS ON: At the end of the day, I think, like, it's a personal thing, because it's, like, they don't care about me, and therefore, they don't care about my son, and that hurts, you know? Like, it's just hurtful, and not, because I care about them, and I love them, and I've tried so hard tuh be part of them, and, and try to, like, I've tried changing my ways. I've tried tuh adapt tuh be more like them.
I've tried all these different things. At the end of the day, nothing I do, like, I may as well just be myself, and, and, because if I have tried tuh be like them, they don't like me. If I try tuh be myself, they don't like me.
Like, no matter what, like, I don't feel like, I feel like they're, I'm just kind of judged by them in the way that I live my life, and anyways, it's fine, but.
DOUG COUNTERS IT WITH THE FACT THAT JAMIE GOES "ABOVE AND BEYOND FOR EVERYBODY," AND THAT IT'S TOUGH THAT SHE "WANTS OR EXPECTS THAT IN RETURN," BUT NOTES THAT THIS IS ALSO MAYBE WHERE THE "BOUNDARIES" LIE … cool, they now have a title for the podcast!
JAMIE CONTINUES tuh BLAST: Well, no, of course, and this is exactly why I'm also crying happy tears, because for so long, I just really tried tuh nurture, like, a true, like, true family, and deep connection, and like, try tuh be, like, really close, and, and it's like, well, if you're the only person nurturing that, you're bound tuh get hurt. It's bound, it's not going tuh happen ever, because it has tuh be a two-way street, and so, unfortunately, like, I started putting up boundaries, and I knew it was going tuh hurt, and like, here it is. It's, it's hurting, you know, like, and then inevitably, they'll be like, you know, you moved tuh Florida, but even when we didn't live in Florida, let's be honest, like, we didn't see family very often, unless, like, it was, it just, unless it was us going places, and then even when we moved here, I would fly up there.
I flew up, we were flying up there, like, once a month. It was so expensive. It was so taxing, but I just wanted to, tuh kind of prove, hey, listen, like, but, you know, I'm so glad we moved here, because at the end of the day, you know, even if we never even find our own people, like, our focus is on our core family, like, we had zero distractions for Son yesterday, like, his birthday was the hundred, like, and it's just, that feels good, because normally, we wouldn't have that. Yeah, normally, I would be cleaning the house, trying tuh prep for people tuh come over, who I would have called 10 times, make sure they remember that he's coming, and it's like, or that his birthday is coming, and it's like, it's just, you know, this is such a vulnerable, I don't even know if I want tuh share any of this, because it's just so personal, but.
DOUG NOTES THAT ALL REFLECTS MORE ABOUT OTHERS AND NOT AN ATTACK ON JAMIE.
AND YET JAMIE CONTINUES TO DEFLECT AND ATTACK: No, I don't think it is either, but it's just very evident where people, like, if people care about us and our family, I don't think they actually, that's the thing, is they don't, like, and so, they're not thinking about it one way or the other, it doesn't even matter tuh them, and that's what hurts, because I wish that they cared about us the way that we cared about them, but they don't, and so, that's why I'm trying tuh have the boundaries tuh be like, find people who will care about you then, or just focus on your own family, and if people wonder why I want so many kids, well, there you go. People constantly say, why don't you love the two you have?
Oh, of course I do, and I'll tell you what, I want tuh have 10 more, because I want tuh raise them in a way where we love each other, we're always there for each other, we don't forget. It's just silly little milestones, it's not about presents, it's not about anything other than just love, and remembrance, and just, like, celebrating each other, and I am going tuh raise my kids tuh just really love each other, and tuh know that their parents love them, but God forbid, one of us are taken, and then, then it's like, I think about things like that, and I'm like, who do they have if they don't have us? Like, seriously, and that scares the crap out of me, because there are very few people who even remember, like, and tuh me, it's just a birthday, I know, it doesn't really matter, but like, that's of significance tuh that child, and people just don't care, like, they just, our fam, so many of our family members just don't care. Well, we make, we make it, and then I'm like, am I making a mountain out of a molehill, but like, and am I?
DOUG ALSO THINKS ABOUT THEM "DEPARTING EARLY" AND WHAT HAPPENS tuh THEM.
JAMIE BUSTS BACK IN, AND STARTS tuh TALK ABOUT "ESTATE PLANNING," WHICH SORT OF MADE ME SIDEYE BECAUSE SHE GOES ON tuh TALK ABOUT THE KIDS AND WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO THEM, AS IF THEY WERE PART OF THE "ESTATE," BUT I GUESS SINCE THEY ARE THE MONEYMAKERS SHE THINKS OF IT MORE IN THAT WAY THAN GUARDIANSHIP PAPERWORK … AND SO SHE CONTINUES: Well, when you think about estate planning, and then who you're leaving your kids to, and I'm like, who can I leave my kids to, who are really going tuh love them, and the people right now didn't even call tuh wish him happy birthday, they didn't even call tuh wish him a happy birthday, they didn't send a gift, and it's not even about the gift, but it's about the thought, who do we have in our life, Doug? I don't think it's, you know, I ask if I think I'm making a mountain out of a molehill, but then I, like, I almost, like, talk, like, convince myself that, no, I'm not, like, I'm really trying tuh make sure that our kids are taken, like, loved and taken care of, and sure, we've got it out, down pat, but what happens, like, then what?
And like, I'm not gonna go down that rabbit hole, and I'm sure this is all pregnancy hormones, and I'm just exhausted and tired, so, but I just think about these things, and then, and then people wonder why I am so thankful for our followers, for those of you listening tuh the podcast, and those of you who follow us on Instagram and YouTube, and who are just excited for us, because a lot of our own family members aren't, like, it's just wild, and so, yeah, and so thank you for those of you listening, and for those of you who comment, and just, you know, just are excited to, like, like, tuh be part of our family, like, because we have forever been looking for that, and, like, our family's just not that interested, and we could try, and try, and try.
DOUG: Out of sight, out of mind.
JAMIE BINGOS!!!!! THAT THOUGHT AND CONTINUES: Yeah, it's, and it's fine, but I'll tell you what, I genuinely do appreciate every single five-star review, every single, like, nudge that you just, every single moment that you take out of your life just tuh be like, hey, what's up with Jamie, you know, and that's why I try tuh do giveaways, and I try to, you know, like, read your five-star reviews, and I try tuh show you that I genuinely care about you, too, because I really think that it is a two-way street with everything in life, like, so whether it's, you know, family, it's friends, it's working, it's, we're colleagues, like, if someone is showing you a lot of, you know, any support, or encouragement, or care, like, then that's the person that you should then go show love, support, and encouragement, and care to, whether they're family or not, and unfortunately, if family doesn't seem tuh show you that, well, then you do have tuh set up boundaries, and it hurts, like, h-e-l-l, because then you'll start to, when you stop reaching out as much, well, then you'll start seeing that your relationship becomes even more distant, but you can't constantly break your back tuh try tuh make relationships.
DOUG NOTES THAT THEY EITHER STEP UP OR DON'T, AND THAT’S WHERE IT LANDS.
JAMIE CONTINUES: Yeah, but from what, from my experience, from what we've experienced, you know, no one really steps up, and it's pretty evident when you start, when you realize you have tuh make a boundary with a person, like, just know in your heart that it's gonna hurt, like, you know, and I'm sure that we're, I'm not the only person going through this, and that's, I think, why it's important tuh share, is that, you know, because it's hard tuh share these things.
It's embarrassing. It's, I feel, it's almost, like, belittling. It's like, like, you know, it's like you're, you're sharing that you're rejected, essentially.
Who wants tuh share that? Like, who wants tuh admit that? But the truth is, is that we all have been there, and so I think that the biggest way tuh heal, and what I've learned is, of course, tuh find, to, like, lean in on the people who don't, like, desert you, betray you, talk behind your back.
I mean, that's the thing, is people who also, who are there, but they're really, like, kind of a snake in disguise, and, like, it's, like, like, they, it seems like they're there for you, but then behind, but you're walking on eggshells around them, because you know that they're saying things behind your back, and that's not, that's not healthy either, and so what I've really tried tuh do is really just focus on people that have really just been loving and nurturing, and the more people are loving and nurturing tuh me, whether they're family or not, the more I will lead, like, reach into them, and...
DOUG BUSTS IN TO TAKE A "QUICK PAUSE" FOR AN AD, IRONICALLY ABOUT INVESTING AND GOOD FINANCIAL HYGEINE.
JAMIE GETS RIGHT BACK TO IT: Of course, holidays and birthdays are tough because like you want like my mom like I mean forget it but like I love her and she's doing the best she can but like you know it's like I don't know I guess it's because I'm pregnant and then like when you become a mom and you just think about this relationship and it's like I just have always wanted that relationship with my mom and of course I know real like logically it's not gonna happen but anyways it's um it's just hard but anyways what I was trying tuh say tuh you though listening is like if you're going through this type of situation like just know that you're doing the right thing by kind of putting the boundaries up and then kind of you know you got tuh focus on gratitude more than anything else and so I consistently try tuh remind myself tuh be thankful that I am alive I'm able tuh be there for my kids my son has no idea who remembered and who forgot his birthday but of course he knows who he talked tuh but like you know I, I know that he had the most spectacular day yesterday and I made darn well sure of it and it literally cost me like zero dollars tuh it's not like it has tuh be expensive it wasn't extravagant we went tuh the library which is free and then we went tuh a free splash pad that's in our city and slash playground yeah, yeah and he had a great time so it's like people it's because the other thing people say well if you can afford tuh give them that it's like it doesn't you can find ways tuh live tuh like really bless your family and your kids without having tuh spend boatloads of money um but the biggest message and takeaway of this all and I guess of like I we never planned on sharing any of this we were planning on sharing about mother's day and
DOUG DOESN'T EVEN KNOW WHAT tuh SAY, BUT SHE NEEDS tuh KNOW HOW PROUD HE IS OF HER, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH …
SHE THANKS HIM QUICKLY AND THEN GETS ON WITH HIS always getting by my side and like when I'm thankful for you when I started you know going tuh therapy and, and I mean forever ago I'm telling you forever ago when we were first married and I first started going tuh a therapist outside of married at first sight she told me she looked me in the eyes and she said Jamie like they might be family but they're not your people and you gotta go find your people and I didn't want tuh believe her I didn't want I literally just said you know thanks but no thanks essentially and I'm gonna try my best tuh turn this family into mine because I want this connection and I want this and I wish I could have saved myself all those years by just listening tuh her and you know finding my own people who, who do love and support me for who I am who I don't have tuh like I can just don't have tuh walk on eggshells I don't have tuh try tuh be anybody else I can just be myself and they'll see like the good in that and they'll like it you know and, and not everyone's for everyone and that's okay and I just try tuh remind myself that but anyways um yeah you've always stood by my side so thank you I see you I'll always be by your side I just like sometimes doubt like if like you know like, like, like what have I done like am I a bad person like did I like what have I done this has nothing
DOUG NOTES THAT THEY'D FIND PEOPLE "DOWN HERE" IN FLORIDA, AND THAT THEY BOTH KNEW IT WOULD NOT HAPPEN OVERNIGHT, THAT REALLY MEANINGFUL BONDS TAKE TIME, BUT THEY ARE IN THE BEST POSSIBLE POSITION TO BUILD A COMMUNITY AND MAKE STRONG FRIENDS THEY CONSIDER TO BE FAMILY, AMAZING PEOPLE, AND THERE ARE KIDS TOO, AND THEY CAN WATCH EVERYONE GROW UP TOGETHER … AND HE THINKS, "That's kind of the point of, of moving tuh Florida find community find our people and also find out you know who would be there with us and for us and …"
JAMIE BLASTS BACK: It has nothing tuh do with you or who you are well the truth is, is obviously it does because these people don't enjoy being around me so then therefore they don't enjoy remembering our kids and or me whatever I guess I think I'm just really hormonal and emotional but I guess I just feel incredibly rejected and like I've done something wrong but I also know at the same exact breath that this has been happening for years and years and years where I've really
DOUG NOTES JAMIE HAS "TRIED SO HARD" AND THAT IT'S NOTHING THAT SHE DID.
JAMIE BLATHERS BACK THAT IT'S NOT REALLY THAT THEY'VE DONE ANYTHING WRONG, BUT … we just don't jive and I guess you know we have different we're different people and we can't force it yeah and so there's very little control that we have over it other than us being us yeah and so but you know but I guess this is like the healing part that everyone talks about with boundaries that's so painful like it's so painful because when you want something so bad and like I think it's like wired in me because it's family and like I really want tuh support family and love family and be there for them and but then it's like but it's just not there in return and you could just spend your whole life searching for it and or you could kind of put up a boundary and, and stop allowing that tuh continue tuh hurt you and find people who are genuinely happy tuh be around you and so needless tuh say for those of you listening if - if you're in this boat with someone whether it's parents siblings aunts uncles cousins I don't know or even long-time friends who you think are quote-unquote friends but you know things change or who knows I mean it's so darn hurtful but I really believe at the end of the day that I mean I was I spent years and years and years trying my darnedest and now I'm like if I, If I could give like an inkling of that effort tuh someone who gives an inkling of the effort back tuh me like the just the joy and happiness that could come from that or just like the stability and also like I did try changing myself tuh kind of be more like them tuh have more in common with them and it just I can tell you right now if you're trying tuh do that that's not gonna work either like it's hard unfortunately you just gotta be yourself in this world you gotta love with your whole heart and, and be selfless you know you can't expect people tuh just care about you if you don't care about them of course you gotta show up for people you gotta really like put yourself out there for them but if you consistently do that and you're not getting any of it in return you gotta change your path and it's the hardest thing in the world tuh do but you know tuh be very, very honest like going tuh bed with Doug last night after Son's birthday and like just everything that went down and whatnot I was just like and this is why we live in Florida this is why we moved here because this this served our core family more so than trying tuh fit a round peg into a square everyone else's schedule and everybody else's lives it's just you know and it's and I'm incredibly thankful tuh your sister and tuh your mom and your dad of course because they did reach out and that's just really, really kind like they called and they just show that they really care and that really means the whole wide world tuh me and like regardless of what they think of me like they love our kids and that's really all that
DOUG NOTES WHAT MATTERS IS-AND MAYBE THEY NEED TO BELIEVE IN SOME KIND OF "HIGHER PURPOSE," BUT HE DOESN'T CONSIDER IT ALL "WASTED TIME OR ENERGY," AND THAT IT MAYBE HAPPENED THE WAY IT'S SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN AND FOR JAMIE TO GIVE …
AND SHE CUTS HIM OFF TO SAY THAT THIS MESSAGE CAN help others. I've really kind of like avoided being this vulnerable lately because I feel like there are some people who just really don't like me and it's been brought tuh my attention and just no matter what I do they really don't like me and I guess like everybody has quote-unquote haters but it hurts my heart a little bit and I don't know but, but the truth is, is like just like I said before what I learned in this the certain boundaries that I've talked about before is that you really can't change who you are in the hopes that people will start tuh approve of you because they're never like the people who just choose that they don't like you and they just choose tuh find your faults will always like they will always see your faults and they will always yeah there's no convincing them otherwise and that's and if you're listening tuh this like this is the truth for all of us is that when you're looking for the good in life you're gonna find the good and you can focus on that and try tuh get like more of that and garner more of that but if you're focused on the negative whether it's in life or with your spouse or with a friend or at the workplace you're gonna find that and so if so sometimes if you've you know if you see that you're consistently feeling like you have quote-unquote bad luck or that this person's being wrong tuh you or they're not caring about you will try tuh think about the good that they do and, and, and so truly like for me with these whole boundary things like I've tried just I tried tuh kind of I've already tried that with some of these family members that just don't seem tuh care and um and, and so that's and then that's when the hurt comes is you know when you realize oh yeah you're actually all right and you are onto something and for whatever reason their life isn't aligning with yours and it's and that's okay but it doesn't mean it's not gonna hurt a little bit for the person who like wants it tuh be there but that's when you go out and find someone who wants tuh align their life with you or maybe their life already aligns and they just and you can serve each other you can love each other you can be there for each other and whether it's blood related or not like that will serve you better in life and so that's kind of where I think Doug and I are right now um but also for, for you listening if, if you're just finding yourself in this situation too just try tuh make sure you're not just trying tuh find the fault in someone because you don't want tuh get caught in that rabbit hole and there are people out there who just want tuh find the negative and then there are people out there who cut that down like don't allow that tuh happen tuh yourself because you will be miserable your whole life hating on someone else and just constantly finding their faults and constantly complaining about them is never going tuh bring you true happiness it really isn't and so think about you know yourself and like what you can do differently and try tuh bring the positive and so yeah I haven't been as vulnerable lately because it's been hard tuh be very honest tuh just share like my heart and then people are just going tuh attack me for it you know I'm sure but um but my goal in sharing this if we end up sharing this is that it helps the one person out there or I'm sure several really who are in the same exact boat who are you know trying tuh keep a friend that they've had forever but that friend's just not there or trying tuh maintain a relationship with one of your parents or your siblings or it shouldn't be hard it shouldn't be and you shouldn't have tuh change who you are and if you do then that's really just not the right person for you and, and you can talk tuh them about it of course and then if they're just combative, at the end of the day, I just say the best advice is find a therapist, and this book called Boundaries, and it's a little religious, and also a little kind of like, whoa, but I'm telling you, Chapter One, just give it – if you don’t' like it after that, don't even try, but like Chapter One, I was like, wow, I can see so much of myself in this, and I can see how could change, and I've got tuh promise you that it's been hurt along the way, but I have – we have, and our family has more positive days now than stressful, trying tuh like pull people in who don't really want tuh be there, trying tuh help them remember because they're gonna forget, like it's just – like yesterday was like the least stressful day ever, and we didn't have one person coming tuh our – or even Mother's Day, it was just us four, and you know, before I had kids, and I think – I saw someone else write this, but like before I had kids, I looked at the world as like everyone I encountered, and how can I be helpful tuh them, and that – like, but now it's like my world is my husband and my children. My world is within my four walls, and how do I love them and support them the best that I possible can, tuh help them become good – eventually like good husbands, a good wife, good mothers, good fathers, and good, good family members, and so …
DOUG IS SO PROUD OF HER AND THINKS SHE SHOULD ALSO BE PROUD OF HERSELF BECAUSE OF "HOW MUCH YOU HAVE GROWN FROM PEOPLE STARTING TO COMMENT ON SOCIAL MEDIA, AND YOU TRYING TO BRING THEM BACK OVER TO YOUR SIDE TO RECOGNIZING THE TOXICITY OF IT, AND SETTING BOUNDARIES." HE HAS TO TELL HER THAT IN THE PAST COUPLE OF YEARS, SHE HAS "SPREAD MORE POSITIVITY, IN MY MIND, THAN ANYBODY, FOCUSING ON BEING THANKFUL AND GRATEFUL," AND A MESSAGE SHE IS PASSING ONTO THE KIDS WHO ARE REALLY STARTING tuh THINK ABOUT IT AND FOCUS ON IT, AND IT'S "DRIVEN BY YOU."
MORE RASPY WHINY TEARY VOICE: Oh, Gosh, Doug's that's the nicest comment that I could have ever received because I really want that for them … yeah, because I – because we could all fall into that where you see the negative and you just kind of focus on that, and I'm trying so hard not to, and tuh just – you know, pray more, and even meditate, and that has nothing tuh do with prayer, but like just rewire my brain tuh like the positive things and finding the positive and helping others, also because – honestly, and I want tuh raise my kid where they are not seeing the negative, they're seeing the positive in situations because life, regardless of who loves you, how much money you have, what home you live in, what car you drive, life is so much better when you're able tuh see the positive and you're able to, like lean into that more, and you're able tuh then attract people who are like that, and the Negative Nellies are just going tuh always be there talking their smack about you, and that's fine, but like, if you can find the positive, you can focus on that, and you're going tuh have such a happier life, and the Negative Nellies, unfortunately, like I still pray for them, I still hope for them, because it's sad – like they're not living a happy life. You can't be a hater tuh all these people and be happy. It's sad.
DOUG THINKS THEY ARE "living proof of it, because once we started tuh focus on happy, once we started focusing on being thankful and grateful, the people that we attracted are the people that we would want tuh be with … didn't happen overnight, but as soon as we started tuh rethink that, and really try tuh be positive and do positive things, and our prayers and with the kids and being thankful and finding good, and gratitude, you know, we attracted people into our lives that, you know, are going tuh be there – I mean, I feel these are now lifelong friends, and you know, all of that was attracted, and there has got tuh be something tuh that."
THE END, THEY MUST GO PICK UP THEIR DAUGHTER BUT ONLY AFTER THE FIVE-STAR REVIEW AND THEN "SEE YOU NEXT WEEK!"
DELUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSIONAL – THE BOTH OF THEM! And according to the AI program Jamie talks more than 90 percent of the time, and Dud, hardly ever.

hello my dears, Today I come here with a new story, as always and completely free for monetization, and if necessary some parts can be changed since English is not my first language XD, I just ask you to put the link in the comments so I can appreciate your wonderful work (and for the few who like my fallout series, don't worry, it's only on hiatus due to lack of creativity) shall we begin ?
*dripping sounds*
*voice in the distance* sweeeeetie, wake up my sugar bunny, God, how you loved it when I called you that - no you WILL love it when I call you that again *the voice starts to become clearer* oh? sweetie! you woke up! you don't know how worried I was, I know what a sleepyhead you are end-
*sounds of chains*
hey hey hey stop it, stop struggling,These chains are very very tight, and I don't want to see my sweetie marked by chains *speaker's voice becomes serious* I'm the only one who can mark you, I'm the only one who can touch you *speaker gets close* I'm the only one who can feel you, your soft skin, your scent, I'm the only one who can feel your soul
*deep breath*
yes yes yes YES!, this is the stuff, Do you know how difficult it was to steal your hoodies? I had to wait for you to go to physical education and then sneak into the men's locker room, ugh all this just to have something that is already mine
...
oh? sweetie you were always so stupid, how am I going to listen to you with that gag on ?
*sounds of chains*
stop it, stop it now I TOLD YOU TO STOP
*slap*
look at me *heavy breathing* LOOK AT ME, LOOK WHAT YOU MAKE ME DO SWEETIE, ha ha ha ha ha ha, YOU KNOW HOW TO AWAKEN THE WORST IN ME, DON'T YOU? SUGAR RABBIT
*speaker comes back to himself*
no no no no, don't cry please don't cry, you know I never meant you harm bunny boy,here let me just
*kiss*
there go, everything is fine, everything is fine, shiiiii, I'm a bunny, but none of this would be happening if you hadn't made the worst mistake of your life *litle slaps* *drawing knife* was the mistake of breaking up with me
*sounds of chains increases*
no no no, without struggling, you dug the grave, now you will be buried in it
*speaker runs the knife through the listener's clothes*
strange, you've never been one to wear long-sleeved shirts, hoodies yes, but never long-sleeved shirts,Did THE OTHER one say you looked good in these? ha I knew it, that's why you left me, for a slut
...
I ALREADY TOLD YOU, STOP CRYING, DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW I FELT?
*speaker starts crying*
I GAVE YOU EVERYTHING, MY UNCONDITIONAL LOVE, MONEY, POPULARITY, AND ONE DAY OUT OF NOWHERE YOU JUST DECIDE TO BREAK UP WITH ME? THAT'S NOT FAIR
THAT'S NOT FAIR THAT'S NOT FAIR THAT'S NOT FAIR, YOU SAID YOU LOVED ME, THAT I WAS YOUR WORLD
*speaker continues to struggle*
I SAID STOP IT *fabric tearing sounds* NEXT TIME THE KNIFE WILL CUT YOur- *speaker takes the listener's arm* bunny,your arm, why does he have this bruise
*listner starts crying heavily*
bunny... what happened ?, bunny why are you crying? I won't hurt you here
*speaker throws the knife away*
Bunny, I'm going to take off your shirt, okay?
*fabric sounds*
my... God, *The speaker's eyes begin to water* Bunny, what happened to you? You're all covered in bruises, IS THAT A SCAR? ok I'm going to take off the gag ok? but please bunny don't scream
*speaker takes off the gag*
hey, please calm down, I can't understand anything, bunny breathe, just breathe, calmer? Now please my love, tell me what happened to you, don't tell me that... Bunny, did you do this to yourself?
...
no? ok that's a huge relief, I don't know what I would do if you even thought about that kind of thing, but bunny, so WHO did this to you, I swear I'll hang them with their own intestines ,here let me just, *sounds of chains* Here we go, free from these chains, you're safe I won't hurt you uff
*listner hugs the speaker crying*
It's okay bunny, just please tell me what happened
...
so that was the reason, they surround you, corner you and then they threaten you, all out of envy, *the speaker starts to cry*, and I thought you just wanted to play with my feelings, but of course not, a bunny like you would never be capable of harming anyone.
...
I know, but can you say it one more time?
...
one more time
...
That's right, you love ME, only me
bunny, this experience just showed how you can't live without me, understand
...
Nooooo you can't, do you remember that time you saw an injured bird and you tried to bring it into your house? And what happened ? You let him loose and he ended up hitting the glass door and hurting himself even more.
I won't make that mistake, you'll be safe with me, it'll take a while for the dust to settle, so you'll have to stay here for a while, but I won't let you get hurt anymore my bunny
...
Of course we can get snuggle, all to see you happy, and later you will tell me the name of everyone who did this to you.
...
I know, I must have scared you, your little heart felt like it was going to jump out of your chest But you have to understand that you are everything to me, and that if you ever think about leaving me, all of this is just the tip of the iceberg of what I am capable of doing.
...
I love you too my sugary fluffy bunny, now I'm going to get you some water, and your favorite snacks
...
Oh, that bottle of water? let's just say that it's not water ha ha ha, and that's all you need to know *sound of water moving inside a bottle* ...
what is it then ? come on, let's say it would be the "last resort" to make you fall on your knees for me
...
You know how the energy of a bunny like you is, this was just to make *clears throat* you looser with that energy, that's all
...
No I wouldn't drug you, again, I would just, you know, make you more suggestive of some actions ha ha ha, but let's leave that aside, I'll be right back ok my cutie.
love you, just make yourself comfortable sit wherever you want, and you can use the covers to keep warm, and a cold night outside
...
Yea it's already night, like I said you were out for a looooooooong time, my eepy bunny boy well out I go.

Captain Hierlock eyed Craiven. As young as the prince was, he WAS an impressive leader.
​
Hierlock:”Shame you’re a traitor, kid. You could have been a lot of help to the kingdom. Instead, you caused Morrion to burn.”
​
He charged, hammer high. Craiven, seeing the Captain's charge, quickly swung his lantern to the side. Bracing himself, he narrowly managed to cast a shield spell.
​
Craiven:"The Andricari are the ones responsible, captain! We are only trying to help get as many people out of there as possible."
​
The captain roared.
​
Hierlock:”Nobody would have gone to Morrion if you hadn’t made camp near it in the first place! That is all you rebels do! Hide in cities and towns, hoping the civilians will serve as meat shields!”
​
Hierlock swung his hammer sideways, going for Craiven’s head. Just as Craiven manages to duck, the hammer narrowly missing his head frill by an inch, he keeps trying to reason with the captain.
​
Craiven:"That is not why we came here. We came here to free Morrion, not see it razed to the ground!"
​
The captain charged forward with his shield, the glowing blade protruding from it aimed at Craiven’s torso.
​
Hierlock:”Oh really, free it from who? Morrion was fine until you treacherous fucks came along!”
​
Dodging just an inch to the captain's right, the Prince used this chance to grab a shield from off the ground.
​
Craiven:"From Acidor! He is using you, just as he is using the royalists! Think of it, Captain! If we sought to harm the people of Morrion, why would we have come this way? Why would we have fought alongside your home's leader in Morrion's hour of need?"
​
Hierlock:”Acidor? Using us? He’s just not on the priority list yet.”
​
Curiously, the captain evaded the question of why would the rebels come to the Black Pit, as if he didn’t have an answer. For just a moment, he paused his onslaught to think.
​
Hierlock:”And yet you ask for my trust, when many of the rebels are just traitors. You, your father, and many others, all just bastards breaking their oaths!”
​
He swung again, a devastating overhead attack. Even as Craiven shielded himself with the discarded shield, this crushing blow still sent him crashing to the ground. His heart began thumping erratically, seeing the Captain standing over him. He only had a second to think, grasping onto his hand-crossbow.
​
Craiven:"B-Blinding flash!"
​
As he called out, as a streak of light shot out from the hand crossbow.
​
Hierlock:”Arg! Fuck!”
​
Hierlock rubbed his eyes with his gauntlet, careful not to stab them out with his hammer. Though his vision was blurry, he kept attacking, just with less accuracy, a mighty swing of his hammer followed by a slash using the blade on his shield. Hurriedly clambering to his feet, Craiven uses this opportunity to grab his faithful shield. He was able to bat aside the Captain's bladed shield, but as he raises the Coward's Yelp above his head....an ear-splitting sound of crunching metal signalled the end of his trusted shield's service. As the bifurcated shield landed on the ground, split in half by the hammer's might, Craiven's focus shifted from engaging the Captain at close range to grabbing the nearest polearm in the hopes that he could stall the giant's furious onslaught. Hierlock was ready and winding up for a blow that would hit Craiven so hard his ancestors from five generations ago would flinch in their graves, when doubts stopped him. Once again, his mind wandered back to the question. WHY would the rebels go all the way out here to hurt Morrion? Were they seeking some of the magic artifacts the late (but not missed) Inquisitor Skurtap was rumored to be hiding? Or were the traitor prince’s words true, and were the rebels really seeking to help Morrion. Either way, his thoughts stalled the captain. Steeling himself, Craiven readied the battle-damaged polearm gripped tightly in his hands. He could see that the Captain hesitated. Were he a mere soldier, he could have used this opportunity to exploit Hierlock's weakened state.
​
Craiven:"My word as Prince of this realm may not mean anything to you or your peers, Hierlock, but it is the truth! For the sake of our people, for Duke Zorrual, you must allow us passage."
​
Hierlock looked around. His troops were getting overwhelmed despite their numbers advantage. He growled.
​
Hierlock:”Enough!”
​
His hammer igniting with divine light, he swung it towards Craiven, cracking the ground with a destruction wave (that’s the correct name for that spell, right?). Between his frustration and doubts, he lashed out with his paladin might. Grasping the polearm, Craiven leapt backward. The moment he lands, he fumbles, tripping over a discarded helmet.
​
Craiven:"Oof!"
​
Shaking his head, he then held the discarded soldier's polearm ready. Raising himself into a kneeling position, he braces the polearm steady, grasping the haft with both hands as he lifts it above his head. As the captain was about to follow up on the powerful spell, he nearly charged head first into the raised polearm, almost stabbing his own eye out. Stopping just barely, he instead spun around, swinging his tail at Craiven. Craiven gruntsed as he wass knocked to the side by Hierlock's tail. He winced, before rolling to the side as his hand wrapped around the hilt of a discarded sword. Standing back to his feet, the Prince's eyes met the Captain's. His left shoulder felt like he had a boulder thrown at him. The captain glared at the prince, a mix of rage and doubts on his face.
​
Hierlock:”I gave you rebels a chance to surrender! You CHOSE to fight! As they did in Morrion!”
​
The captain, still full of rage and doubts, charged at Craiven, his head lowered as he went in for a charge not dissimilar to a bull or a rhino. Ducking out of the way, Craiven scarcely realised he had dropped his weapon until seconds after the Captain's charge.
​
Craiven:"And yet we chose to fight FOR Morrion's sake, against those who would see it burned to the ground!"
​
As the captain stormed past, he charged right into a tree. Dazed from the impact, he barely heard Craiven’s words. But even barely, he DID hear them. Still torn between doubts and fury, the Captain charged again, this time going in for a kick to the chest. Rolling again onto his side, Craiven grabbed the haft of his prior weapon. With only a second to aim, he used his good arm to throw the spear directly at the Captain's lower body.
​
Craiven:"RRRAAAGGH!"
​
Hierlock:”RAGH!!”
​
The captain roared as the spear hit him right below the knee. Dropping his hammer, he pulled it out and threw it at Craiven, though as he did his leg gave out, forcing him onto one knee. Hitting the dirt in front of him, Craiven could hear the spear whistle just inches from his head. When he looked up, he could see the injured Captain on one knee. Cautiously, the Prince walked over to Captain Hierlock. He glanced down at him, his hand curling up into a fist, before he breathed a laboured sigh.
​
Craiven:"Call off your men."
​
Hierlock looks around, seeing only one man still standing, a venator in the back.
​
Hierlock:”Grrrrr. I yield.”
​
The lone venator looked shocked at the captain as the captain put his hammer down, glaring at the prince with a mixture of hatred and confusion, as well as a sliver of respect for his combat prowess.
​
Hierlock:”Now what?”
​
Follow up comic soon for the first major decision