Stairwell cakes

Cyber Core, Book Two, Chapter 05: Meet Adallinda

2024.04.22 06:22 Thausgt01 Cyber Core, Book Two, Chapter 05: Meet Adallinda

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Mission Log: Mission Day 0024

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Addendum 01

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Moments like this really make me hope that I can get a steady supply of more iron, tin, copper, and other materials I need to upgrade the sensor-suites throughout my structure sometime soon. I had to rely on the relatively low-resolution video-imagery, with only the wavelengths within the visual-light spectrum and the near-infrared and near-ultraviolet immediately adjacent to them, for example, in order to pick up the mild increase in body-temperature emitted by “Krunorim Kregorim” the 'house magician of the formerly-ennobled House Lignignory just after casting some sort of 'detect enemy' spell. ​
I couldn't categorize it because the only other elements in my data-set relating to 'Magical Mysteries' came from a single source: Sudryal, an Elf magician. Unfortunately, said Elf was now at least a day's travel to the northwest, and well out of range of the radio-headsets I had provided for him and the rest of his group. So, whatever data I would pick up from Mr. Kregorim, professional magician, in the near future would need to wait for cross-checking. ​
In the meantime, I created a series of dedicated personnel files for all the folks who had so conveniently introduced themselves or each other, in the clock-cycle after Kregorim's casting and the phantom sensation of something somehow touching my disembodied self. ​
For his part, Kregorim's expression rumpled into lines and bristles around his shadowed eyes. That beaky nose drifted from side to side like a weather-vane for 3.253 more seconds before “Lord Zee” coughed into his handkerchief. ​
“Well, magician?” he asked, unable to keep slight quaver from threading through his voice. “May I, my household, and our retainers safely enter this hovel?” ​
“Hmmm...?” Kregorim asked, his head tilting forward at the neck and pointing just south of the assembled group; two of the guards and both of the shade-carriers stared that way, trying to determine what held the attention of a 'magician' to that degree and edging 2.34 centimeters north as they did. “Oh, my, yes, Your Lordship. There is... something resembling a mind in the vicinity, but it harbors neither malice nor hunger. I sense no recognition of any of us as a threat.” ​
Lord Zee's scowl only eased up a bit. “Not at the moment, magician, but how quickly could it change and become a threat?” he demanded. ​
Kregorim laced his fingers together and pressed the tips of the thumbs to his lips as he straightened to his full height, muttering for 2.834 seconds. “To foretell the future with any clarity, I would require certain tools back in my wagon, Your Lordship. But from what I have determined so far, please imagine the mind as somewhat akin to a vast picture puzzle, with more pieces than grains of sand that could be fit in a bucket.” ​
If Kregorim had been hoping to reassure Lord Zee... or Packard, or the 'security detail' as a whole... he'd failed miserably. Every one of the latter group tightened grips on weapons and loosened their stances, sending wary looks in every direction. Including the foyer and the attached freight elevator housing and resource-collection point, but they also considered the surrounding landscape. ​
“Where are all of these... puzzle-pieces now, magician?” Packard rumbled out. ​
Lord Zee turned to shoot a haughty expression at him, mouth opening into a sneering shape. ​
Packard held up a hand. “Security concern, Your Lordship,” he stated, before his employer could actually speak. “You're paying me to keep you safe, remember? The magician needs to explain why this... puzzle-piece mind isn't dangerous even if it's not all in one place that I can cut in half, or one of my people can set aflame.” ​
Honestly, I was curious about that point, as well. Sure, an individual nanite or even the mass of them inside the impact-zone of any of the weapons I could detect the bandits readying, could get smashed. But the resulting dent in the swarm's overall effectiveness amounted to less than killing a perfect line of ten wasps out of a swarm of a thousand. Wasps, after all, were complex organic creatures, and required nests to reproduce. My nanites had different limitations. ​
“As I said, I sensed neither hostile intent, nor any resemblance to a desire to consume us,” Kregorim answered. “At best, I may have sensed something down around the base of the cliff-side that might eventually gather itself together into a simple mind, on the order of a forest-scavenger or the like... in a few hundred years. The odds of all those pieces assembling themselves into a coherent whole any sooner seem quite astronomical to my humble self, Sergeant Packard.” ​
About half of the tension in Packard's body relaxed, but his eyes stayed narrow. He turned in place to address his 'security team'. “Stay sharp, people,” he told the group. “Stockley, Tianna, walk us through this building. Wakeley, you and Tigah take over the perimeter-patrol when we're done. Relieve Lathai and Palmyra, send them to join us, and we'll head down the stairwell to the next floor.” ​
Lord Zee shifted from foot to foot, stifling a yawn. Packard rolled his eyes without moving his head, and shot a poisonous look at one of the remaining 'security personnel' who looked about to snicker. That one coughed and got herself under control before Packard continued. “We'll let the patrons into this top area if they want...” He turned to look over his shoulder, fixing a narrow-eyed stare at Lord Zee. “... But I would consider it a breach of contract under the 'refusal to abide by reasonable safety precautions established by security personnel' clause if they went any further into the structure without my blessing.” ​
Lord Zee's lips twisted as if he'd just bitten down onto a fresh slice of lemon, but he nodded. “You've given me no reason to question your professionalism and loyalty, Packard, so I shall abide by your strictures.” ​
“ Da- dee...! ” came a shrill voice from one of the other wagons. ​
Without missing a beat, Lord Zee added, “... And I shall do my best to ensure that the others in my House do the same.” ​
The side-door on another wagon, which had sunk a whole centimeter into the still-dewy grass and soil than the one Lord Zee had exited since getting parked, flew open. “Pippa, why are my stair-steps not already in place that I may exit this wretched contrivance?” a voice demanded from inside the wagon's shade. ​
The voice straddled a number of possible sources. The high pitch suggested a young woman, the tone implied a woman used to using that voice primarily to express displeasure, and the distinct rasp hinted that she felt practices like 'vocal warm-ups' or 'drinking tea with honey and lemon' were something only the 'lower classes' might require. ​
A fresh set of six ragged-looking people scrambled away from the others securing the neo-horses and the other wagons, setting another set of steps and handrails in place, in front of the wagon's side-door. They then braced themselves in position, five with heads down and shoulders hunched. The sixth, standing at the end of the walkway, pulled a hood off of a sweat-soaked mass of dark curls, then tugged down a wrap that had covered the face from the nose to the chin. My video-imagery let me pick up the tanned complexion on what I provisionally assessed as a Human Female face, in desperate need of soap and moisturizer along with a couple of hot meals and at least twelve hours of uninterrupted sleep. Oh, and a black mole, smaller in diameter than the eraser-end of an old-fashioned pencil, just below the right-hand corner of her mouth. ​
Two gloved hands no more than five centimeters across extended out from the wagon's interior; stained once-white lace, as far as I could tell at the moment. They gripped the top ends of the handrails while a booted foot... I hesitantly judged it a women's size four, narrow, if that much... reached out to plant itself as firmly as possible on the top step. A veritable cloud of ruffles and ribbons and other fabric-related embellishments rammed its way into the space between the hands and feet, along with the sounds of strained effort. ​
After 2.845 minutes of struggle, the young woman managed to extract herself and the dress... I was at a loss to decide between 'wedding cake' or 'wearable balustrade' as an adequate summary of her outfit... from the 'socket' of the wagon. The five attendants to the sides had managed to keep the handrails in place, despite the pressure from the dress; the sixth had extended what I would have sworn was a punch-target pad, with a vertical strap-handle on the back, to press against the noblewoman's midsection, keeping her from flying out of the wagon like a seed pinched between two fingers. The woman huffs out a sigh as she steadies herself, then nods at the bare-faced attendant before straightening to her full height of, at best, 1.46 meters with help from the boot-soles and heels. “By the Darkest Star, why must those wretches responsible for designing these conveyances be so infernally callous to the sartorial demands of the nobility?” she announced. She maintained a death-grip on one handrail while tugging at the folds of the dress with the other, apparently attempting to prepare for her descent down to the lawn. ​
“Adallinda, dearest daughter,” Lord Zee proclaimed as he turned, the shade-carriers shuffling around him to keep the fabric arch in position. “I distinctly recall instructing you to wait to show yourself until Packard and his crew had confirmed the area secure.” ​
“Da-dee, I have been a proper and perfect lady for the last four hours, but I need to pee before I ruin another dress!” she answered, before lowering her face to address the woman with the punch-pad. “Pippa, please tell me that there's a suitable oubliette somewhere in that strange building,” she almost begged. ​
Pippa blinked up at her, then turned to face Lord Zee, a look of panic on her face. ​
Tianna stepped around the visual obstruction that Lord Zee presented, raising a hand and pointing. “The young mistress will need your help in there, Pippa, but she'll find the comfort she needs behind either of the doors inside here, off to the left.” ​
“Absolutely splendid, hireling, thank you,” Adallinda shot back, then turned to address the challenge of getting herself down to ground-level. She wound up adding a few smudges to the handrails and losing a few bits of fabric to them in turn, but after a mere 6.831 seconds of effort, she alighted on the ground with an audible sigh of relief. With Pippa moving alongside her and the other five attendants trailing in her wake, she brushed past her father and the 'security forces' on her way to the foyer's double doors. She shoved them both aside, almost falling forward with the unexpected lack of resistance, but hiked up her skirts and all but raced into the nearest restroom. ​
That door served as yet another inconvenience. She visibly shifted from foot to foot as Pippa went in first, and the other attendants arranged themselves to help assist in squeezing her through the frame. Yet another indignant shriek sounded through the closing doorway as she beheld the facilities. “What manner of effrontery is this? Daddy will have the one who built this abomination flogged...! ” ​
Lord Zee turned a look of wide-eyed wonder in Tianna's direction, who shrugged in response. “It's like nothing I've ever seen before, Your Lordship,” she answered his unspoken question. “Every surface is clean and smooth stone of some sort, the lighting is flameless and steady as the sun's, and there seems to be no limit to the wash-water.” ​
Lord Zee opened his mouth and gestured in the direction of the doorway now preserving the modesty of his daughter and the ears of the 'audience'; before he could actually ask, Stockley jumped in with, “The individual seats inside are separated with panels for the privacy of the users, but they might not be wide enough to accommodate Lady Lignignory's finery.” ​
On the one hand I have to take issue with the notion that the stalls are too narrow; they meet the relevant handicap-access-standards that remain on the law-books back home, and therefore got incorporated into the genius-building construction parameters. On the other, though... that dress was definitely meant more to turn the woman wearing it into some kind of display of the House's wealth, if not taste than offer much assistance with bodily needs. Depending on the degree to which it served to defend Adellinda's “virtue” as well as show off the dressmaker's addiction to excess, it's entirely possible that she would have had to take some or all of it off completely in order to 'attend to her business'. ​
Lord Zee's scowl didn't vanish, but did turn at least mildly thoughtful. “Packard, please join me as we inspect the other room that the previous owner of this... place... was courteous enough to provide. Oh, and magician, you may join us, as well.” ​
Kregorim and Packard exchanged doubtful expressions, but Kregorim squared his shoulders to offer a bow. “I look forward to exploring this mystery alongside you, Your Lordship,” he answered. ​
Packard rolled his eyes again after Lord Zee passed him, then nodded at the remaining 'security force'. “You lot keep those big ears pointed at us, aye? I'll expect help if any trouble arises in there while you're securing the rest of this inn, or whatever it is.” ​
Tianna pointed in the general direction of the main structure. “The 'inn' part's down there, Packard,” she said, and got a nod in response. “Understood. Let the rest of the 'stock' know that they can start shepherding the others in the Lignignory House out of their wagons and in this level up here, but no further.” ​
Lord Zee had already passed through the glass doorway, pausing to marvel at the fact that they consisted of not one, but three layers of the apparently-priceless substance. Kregorim managed to chivvy him there rest of the way inside, pointing to the gaps between the glass. “Beyond my ken is this strangeness, Your Lordship, but water flows between them,” he stated. “This side, upward, and the opposite in the other.” He pressed both hands to either side of the thickness. “Flowing steadily as a stream...” ​
Lord Zee's expression took on a somewhat strained look as Kregorim continued in that vein for 1.63 minutes. “Yes, yes, magician, fascinating stuff, but I find myself suddenly that much more interested in searching that other room,” he finally said. ​
The three of them made their way through the door, but only after it had settled back in place did the remaining 'security force' let out a burst of relieved laughter. ​
“Very well, very well,” Tianna managed to say, wiping a tear from an eye. “You heard him, you lot. Search this structure, make sure there aren't any traps that might pose a threat to anyone, yourselves included. When you're done, just wait around that far door there until we swap out the people Packard said, aye?” ​
Stockley held the door for the other three, then pointed at the grey-skinned Elf still overseeing the ragged-looking folk. “Bring the rest of the family inside, one at a time, if you'd be so kind?” he said, the words somewhere between an actual question and an order. ​
“In what order, stickyfingers?” the Elf shot back. He approached the foyer to within arms' reach of Stockley and lowered his voice, “The remaining four will spend the next hour arguing over who's to go first, by age or seniority or height or Darkest Star alone knows what else.” ​
Stockley smiled back. “If you let them argue that among themselves, they'll stay out of our way until we're ready,” he pointed out. “Might take until sundown if Lord Zee doesn't settle things when he returns.” ​
“Taking out their frustrations on us, cutpurse,” the Elf answered, but his shoulders had already slumped. “All right, I can probably convince them that the Lord is still making sure that this glass hut up here is perfectly safe, and that they should wait for him to personally allow them in, but I expect at least a bit of real meat in the night's gruel for each of us for our trouble.” ​
Stockley nodded. “I think I can arrange that,” he said, before nodding at the wagons. “Best get them started and distracted among themselves so the rest of you can get yourselves settled for the night,” he advised, then headed into the foyer to join the rest of the 'security force', searching the mysteries of the interior. ​
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2024.04.21 05:23 SnarkyIguana Living here is slowly driving me insane

Rant incoming. This is going to read very “AmITheAngel” but I swear I’m a good tenant, lol. I’m quiet, considerate, and keep to myself, but for some reason the apartment gods have frowned upon me and I’m going nuts.
My neighbor to the left gave me bed bugs. My neighbor to the right has bassy music playing from 1pm to 10pm daily. My downstairs neighbors fight at all hours of the day except on the weekends when they decide to do karaoke… very poorly. The neighbor that lived downstairs before them used to get really mad that my floors creak when we walk no matter how light (they’re completely unlevel and that shitty cheap apartment vinyl “wood”) and he used to pull the fire alarm on his way to work at 7am every morning for a couple weeks before he moved out. It wasn’t uncommon for him to bang on my floor if you sneezed or coughed. God help you if you dropped something on accident.
If this weren’t bad enough, the folks living in a house next door to my building throw loud family parties in the backyard and their band plays for hours on end running into the night every time the weather’s nice. Even with the windows completely shut and being at the far end of the apartment, you can hear it. As you can imagine, this often triggers my other two loud neighbors to respond with their own loud music. It’s no exaggeration when I say I often cannot hear myself think.
The free parking is really bad so I pay extra for a reserved spot, but that doesn’t stop people parking in it any time I’ve left for even a half hour. A lady on the first floor just opens her door and lets her dogs run around the parking lot when they need to go to the bathroom and they end up shitting all over the stairwell. I’ve almost run them over multiple times on accident - they’re so small and they just run around unleashed and unattended.
The icing on the irritation cake is that even after living here for a couple years I’m still getting previous tenants mail. I invested in a “return to sender” stamp and nothing works. I’ve even received the stamped letters back in my mailbox. Feels like a sick joke at this point like some Truman Show-esque sitcom where everyone’s in on the joke but me.
The only consolation at this point is that I see some of the posts on this sub and remember I’m not the only one with grade A garbáge neighbors cause sometimes it really does feel like I’m being punished for my past lives misdeeds lmao
edit: I have no idea how I forgot this one because it is the single funniest thing I’ve ever witnessed, but there’s another big apartment building next to mine owned by a different company. One day I looked out my living room window to see smoke billowing up and I look outside and their dumpster was on fire. A literal dumpster fire. And I just remember the first cop to show up was just standing there staring at it like 🧍‍♂️
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2024.04.19 05:10 MindlessTree7268 Gawd, Derek was such an ass in season 2!

I'm rewatching right now, and I'd always known he was an ass during this period but just damn. Seriously. I'm at the part now where he just saw Meredith in the morning at the vet's house and assumed she had slept with him. And then he was just a complete ass to her all day at the hospital, behaving completely unprofessionally. Did he seriously tell her that she never takes responsibility for her actions? Like has he even looked at a mirror through this entire thing and seen how horribly he's been treating Meredith? Who's the one actually not taking responsibility for their actions here? And then calling her a whore in the stairwell.
I know people think "pick me, choose me, love me," was cringe, but I think she was an absolute boss in the way she talked to him in the stairwell. "I make no apologies for how I chose to fix what you broke. You don't get to call me a whore."
This ass starts a relationship with her, and just when they're getting serious, his wife whom he never mentioned once shows up out of nowhere and basically ambushes her. Then, he tells her he chooses Addison, as if there's no choice because "she's my wife." Not giving a damn about Meredith's feelings at all, considering that 48 hours earlier, she was falling in love and didn't even know the guy had a wife. Then he makes sure to keep himself embedded in Meredith's life while making a half-assed effort to restore the marriage with Addison, and then he's just a complete and absolute ass to Meredith when he sees that she's moving on with someone else. Like, really? You're the one who left her, dude. You shattered her heart, which she took such a long time to open up to you in the first place, and chose your wife over her. And what, you just expect her to be celibate for the rest of her life while you're screwing your wife and keeping her in an emotional affair with you so you can have your cake and eat it too? What an absolute asshole Derek was. As far as I saw, he never even apologized for his nasty treatment of her after seeing her at Finn's house either.
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2024.04.11 23:43 VastStory Random thoughts after 5+ rewatches

I love this show so much. So wacky and scandalous, while poignant and careful where it needs to be. I love the ending. I have some musings below and would love to hear others' opinions or other random thoughts they've had about the series/characters.
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  1. Nonnie exploding on Patty after kissing her in the stairwell was amazing. Acting, lighting, score. Perfect. Ditto Patty eating her birthday cake. First time I saw that scene and then cut to black with the eating sound, I was speechless. These scenes show that it's not just a dumb Netflix teen drama. The show is so heightened but careful.
  2. Patty's lashing out always made sense and was in character to me. I'm sure the inner monologues helped. I tend to fixate on inconsistencies and OOC behavior, but I'm pretty sure everyone acts and reacts consistently.
  3. Did Bob A's dad spend time with Brick? Seems like he'd be super proud of his grandson who was a star wrestler, got girls, hooked up with a MILF. Brick is more compassionate and sensitive than the grandpa would like, but I could see him being proud and attentive of Brick.
  4. I think Brick is the best person in the show. He's definitely my favorite. His character development makes a lot of sense as well, starting with his community service at the LGBTQ center. It makes sense he didn't get in to college, he wasn't very smart and his home life was a mess. It's hilarious that he'd find success as a hot guy eating influencer.
  5. Love Brick and Magnolia as friends and relationship 2.0. Their chemistry in both relationships was solid. When they were platonic, it seemed like they were good support to each other. When he'd interact with Patty, it was jarring. I thought it was so weird that they were even talking to each other and I'd have to remind myself they were actually dating.
  6. I love that Cora Lee said Bob was evolved and not just any man can step back and let a woman shine. I also think her issue of fitting into his mold, based on their shared goals, left her in a crisis and she wanted to figure something out in her own way without him. The scenes about their marriage were so great and understandable. So well written and acted.
  7. I like how the Bob's discussed sexuality. It was very nuanced that Bob B acknowledged enjoying sex with women but emotionally was exclusively gay.
  8. Dee's sponsor looks like a more symmetrical, twink Ryan Gosling. He had a good vibe of being fun, but not exaggerated and I would have loved to see him more.
  9. Dee is the worst. She immediately judged Patty after hearing Patty and Magnolia's argument about Brick and didn't know anything or anyone. She made her judgement quick. Plus what a dumb move as a journalist to immediately antagonize her subject. The rapping was probably the low point of the series for me. Glad it recovered.
  10. I've never had a problem finding my tampon string. Is this really a common issue?
  11. How did they make me sympathize with Dixie??
  12. How weird is it that all the parents and Dixie speak in a Southern accent?
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2024.04.04 03:47 reddanger95 Level 2, Keyed Descriptions

Scarlet Citadel has poorly written descriptions and boxed text. I am using the format and tips provided by Justin Alexander in his new book "So You Want to be a Game Master". There are four parts to a good key for each room: the room description (i use a couple key words and not boxed text), reactive checks (things that trigger as soon as the party steps in to the room), room elements (provides additional detail on key room features, some may not require checks), GM info (things only you as GM need to know, try to limit the number of items in this section because players should be able to find anything).
If you find things on here that are different/changed from the original text, just comment and I'll clarify. I modified a few things to better fit my story, but they should be minor enough that you can disregard or replace them. Again, any questions just comment and I'll clarify.

Other Posts:

Level 0, Keyed Descriptions
Level 1, Keyed Descriptions
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2024.04.01 23:58 Poorly-Drawn-Beagle Wrong Halloween II (Chapter I)

On the screen, a widow-peaked man in an opera cloak was rising quite dramatically from an ornate coffin, helped by a very pale woman in a clingy black dress.
“Thank you, Nocturna, my dear. Somber salutations, my fellow devotees of the macabre! My name is Mortimer Kadaver, ever your moribund master of ceremonies here at Kadaver’s Mystery Theater. And it gives me veritable chills down my spine to welcome each of you to our hellishly haunting Hallowed E’en special. That’s right, agony-amigos, ‘tis the season of the witch once more! We find ourself caught halfway between autumn’s equinox and the shadowed solstice, and in honor of Great Samhain, Lord of the Dead, frightening fêtes and masked soirees shall profligate- nowhere less than here, naturally! This dark morn we’ll be kicking things off with an old favorite: Dread Castle, starring man-of-a-thousand-faces Basil Karlo! But first, a message from our sainted sponsors, the good people at Silver Shamrock.”
The head of James Gordon, familiar behind greying hair and chunky square-lensed glasses, poked out from the crack between door and doorframe long enough for him to growl “Turn that crap off” and then disappear once more back into his office. Within, he continued to converse, fretfully.
“Barb, I just want to make sure- I’m only saying, I should be there. I know you can. I know I did. But this is important! No, I didn’t say that. Yes, I- of course. Well, who’s picking you up then? Hmph. No. I don’t like him. Well. Fine. I’ll still drop by. Nothing’s going to come up tonight, I promise I’m dropping by. Alright. Love you.”
The phone hit the receiver with meteoric force, and James Gordon slid his hands under his glasses, wearily rubbing his eyes with the heels of his palms. Nothing’s going to come up tonight, he thought to himself. He wasn’t superstitious, really, but saying things out loud like that…
One of the newer kids, Alcana or something, rapped her knuckles on the door, and Gordon bade her enter. The young woman looked unaccountably nervous.
“Uh, comish- sorry, commissioner. I, um. It’s news from Chief O’Hara. She said you’d want to know, there’s been a breakout of some kind at Arkham.”
Gordon slapped something off his desk and leaned his suddenly too-heavy head on a hand, arm propped on desk. “Oh, is it Saturday again?!” he snapped, sardonically.
***
The October sun was not yet fully up. It wasn’t any kind of hour to call on someone. However, around these parts, people were more accustomed to working night hours.
Dick Grayson, slightly nervous despite himself, knocked on the imposing front door of (stately) Wayne Manor. It’s been a long time, he thought to himself. When you come back after a long time everything’s supposed to feel smaller. Wayne Manor had seven floors. The one thing it could not possibly feel was small.
Truthfully it was too large to be properly maintained by the existing household staff of one. But it was large enough to hold quite a few secrets, which, as far as its owner was concerned, was chief among its redeeming qualities.
Redeeming. Dick Grayson mused. Why REdeeming? Was it deemed before and now needs to be deemed again? And what exactly is an act of demption?
In due time the door was answered by soldier, spy and star of stage (retired), and servant (current) Alfred Pennyworth. No doubt through some superhuman force of will, he looked exactly as he always did. Well, at present he was in fact wearing a ludicrous white nightgown and cap, which Dick opted not to comment on. Perhaps a millisecond passed in which the older man contemplated a warm hug before evidently deeming it improper, impropriety being the chief cardinal sin in Alfred’s world.
“Master Dick. A bit early for trick or treating.” Alfred observed, coming dangerously close to sounding slightly stuffy.
“Alfred. Sorry to, ah, wake you. I’m… here.”
“So I see.”
“Just for a visit. To see Ba- to see everyone.”
“I might have known it. Brought that infernal motorcycle with you, as well.”
“‘fraid so.”
The bike, which Dick sometimes privately thought of as the Wingcycle, was indeed parked and kickstood in the front courtyard. Anyone enterprising bicycle thief bold enough to approach Wayne Manor in broad daylight and smart enough to find a way around the isomorphics frankly deserved it.
“Well, you’d best come inside then, before you let all the good air out.”
Dick Grayson stepped through and into, letting the sights of the foyer wash over him again.
“Would Bruce be in, by any chance?”
“I believe he was called away on some night business. He should return soon enough.”
“Bruce? How unlikely.”
Alfred made a noncommittal noise. “You’ll be glad to know your old room is still roughly habitable by human beings, just as you left it.”
The room was empty now but otherwise just as he remembered it. Before Alfred left him alone, he called over his shoulder, “It really is good to see you again, my boy.” Dick did not suppress a smile.
***
The sun was most of the way above the horizon and, through some drizzling clouds, was struggling to illuminate Arkham Asylum.
There were jurisdictions where ‘police commissioner’ was just a desk job. What with one thing and another, mostly with not knowing who in the department was fully trustworthy, the job had always been a bit more than that for James Gordon. Occasionally that meant an extra measure of respect from those in the department. And perhaps he could go to bed some nights thinking that even on the worst days he had gone above and beyond the call of duty. But it also meant spending rather more time than he really wanted to at the Elizabeth Arkham State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.
They preferred you not to call it Arkham Asylum, probably realizing how it conjured a mental image of a nightmarish Victorian house of pain. Similarly, staff frowned on ‘inmate’ and sternly insisted on ‘patient.’ But as far as Gordon and the rest of Gotham was concerned, both terms were spot on the money, and ‘Asylum’ it remained, with all its ‘inmates.’ At least as a small comfort, the place looked a bit different this time.
“Caesar’s ghost,” Gordon heard himself swear. Most of an entire wing of the building was charred, and a sizable part of the wall had collapsed. It was already roped off, but it was heart-sinkingly plain that someone, maybe a lot of someones, had had plenty of time to make an escape.
“Most of the building wasn’t touched, inmates are still locked down. Fire department’s got the flames under control. So now we’re working with Arkham staff to search the area, pick up any inmates who might still be in the area,” someone was saying, loudly enough to be heard over the panic. It was Kitch- Stan Kitch. Blonde, youngish, usually charming, and one of few on the force Jim felt inclined to trust.
“What the hell caused all this?” Gordon snapped.
“I’m not sure, sir. Best we can put together is they were booking a new inmate named Garfield Lynns just a few hours ago-”
“Firefly. Jesus Christ.”
“Uh, yes sir. And there was some sort of explosion in the Intensive Ward, something- Intensive Treatment, I think. We don’t know what he used, or how- he had to get it into the building through a third party, no way he could have had it in a police cell the whole time-”
“Where’s Lynns now?”
Kitch hesitated. “It looks like he died in the panic, sir. We’re still working out how. He was with a guard named Bolton, Lyle Bolton. But Bolton got a pretty bad burn, sir, he’s not in any shape to talk to anyone now. I mean, he’s talking, but nothing sane.”
“Well, that’s great, isn’t it. We have Firefly playing suicide bomber and god knows how many inmates getting out on Halloween. Is that about the shape of it?”
“That’s about right, sir,” Kitch said, in the tones of one hurrying to pull of a Band-Aid.
Gordon swore again and waved Kitch away, marching through the chaos surrounding the ruined asylum. A few orderlies were being helped by firefighters or medics, hacking and wheezing and feeling frantically at the rashes spreading on their faces. The now-dissipated fumes of the fire had had something chemical about them, something that affected people badly. Elsewhere guards were trying to round up panicked inmates and calm them down.
Gordon paid minimal attention to it. There was someone he needed to consult with. An old friend. Someone never too far from the thick of things. Gordon dodged around bodies, employing the old trick of Looking As Though You’re Supposed To Be Here, ducked a yellow CAUTION rope and was inside the charred remains of the Intensive Treatment ward.
It was dark, and soaked. If someone were to walk through it they would feel very much alone. Gordon knew he was not.
“You there?”
“It was the paint, Jim. Used for marking roads. Some of the inmates mix it on Tuesdays to pay for the cost of their food and clothing. Firefly’s goons have been spiking shipments of paint with a hyper-oxidizing compound he created, with instruction to light a shipment of it ablaze if he were brought to Arkham.”
“And hello, incidentally.”
To the uninitiated it would have seemed as though a shadow had peeled itself off a nearby wall and come to life. Jim Gordon had seen it often enough that it was no longer a surprise anymore.
“Sounds like we don’t have to worry about Firefly anymore,” Gordon opined. “Poor stupid son of a bitch.”
“He managed to outsmart us. A deviant mind isn’t necessarily a stupid one.”
No. Guess you’d be exhibit A, there. Or I would. Gordon’s fingers twitched. He found himself wishing he hadn’t given up on smoking. “I was supposed to see my daughter today,” he grumbled. “We have to compare notes with Leland. They might have a list of inmates who were in this ward. We can start making guesses about who might still be out there.”
“I might have a few ideas,” Batman replied. “At least six guards were found dead. Deep tissue scanner confirms they didn’t die from the fire, or from lack of air. There were laceration wounds in the throat or stomach area. Someone with enormous strength took a bladed weapon and… slashed them. In the middle of a raging fire, someone took the time to kill them as violently as possible.”
Gordon raised an eyebrow.
“He couldn’t get that far on land. Unless he somehow managed to drive. Swimming to shore would be more difficult, but for him, it might be possible.”
“Slow down. Who are you talking about?”
“It’s Halloween, Jim. I think we’re just about due for a return from Michael Myers.”
***
“Come now, Socrates. I want to get back to the nest and a good day’s sleep.”
Gotham City had its sordid spots, as did any city. But even the unfortunates forced into the slums of the Narrows could breathe a sigh of relief knowing that they weren’t living out of the city’s cavernous sewer system. It would take a truly pitiable creature to try and make a living there. There were few creatures in the city more pitiable than Otis Flannigan.
“Oh, Socrates. Ever willful.” He set his friend on his shoulder, admired the twitching whiskers. “Here. Some cereal from my private stash. A rare delicacy, yes? No, my mistake, that’s my cyanide. Here. Mmm.”
Once upon a time he’d been a fairly insignificant ratcatcher in Gotham’s Sanitation Department, right up until he’d been caught breeding the rats he was meant to be exterminating. Just a way to drum up a little extra business, but his superiors had been less than understanding. From that point on he’d made a living training his rodent friends to sneak into homes and pilfer valuables. And cover a few annoying former coworkers in bites. That racket had worked nicely for a time, but eventually authorities had caught on. There were other rats in Gotham, flying ones. Thus, Otis found himself compelled to relocate his Mischief to the spacious darkness of the sewer system. It was something you could admire about rats. They could be comfortable anywhere, survive in the tightest, roughest spots. They were survivors.
“Now come on,” Otis said, stroking Socrates’ white belly. He would never say as much, to avoid giving the little Berkshire too much of an ego, but Socrates was his favorite. “We’ve had a long night. We ought to get some bedrest.”
Socrates cheeped at him, a trifle indignantly.
“Oh, I know, my friend. Old Miller’s Junkyard was much cozier. But Hellhound and his brutish dogs have staked that spot out for themselves. I fear we wouldn’t be safe there. Now, no more fussing. Scamper off and find the Mischief.”
‘Mischief’ was the proper term for a group of rats. It was Otis’ favorite name for his furry little family. Gently he sat Socrates down on the cement walkway and watched him scurry into the darkness, following at his own sedate pace. Otis enjoyed the sound of his footsteps reverberating for a while. It was quiet in his burrow this morning.
“Socrates,” he called. “Don’t get too far ahead, little one.”
No response. Such a willful rat. Otis continued on his way to the nest. In his years he had come to prefer the company of rats over that of humans. Rats lived a crude existence, to be sure, even a bloody one at times- he’d seen them fight each other, kill, even eat the remains of the loser. But that was honest savagery, born of nature. Rats didn’t have the kind of concealed, cultivated savagery he’d learned to expect from the human race.
It was quiet in the burrow this morning. An audible undercurrent of worry in his voice, he called out “Socrates? Where’d you go?”
Still no response. Otis felt a wrongness he couldn’t quite explain. There were no threats down here, not to him or to Socrates. Suddenly in the darkness he heard a faint, anxious squeaking.
“Socrates?” Otis quickened his pace in the direction of the sound. What he found at the end of it nearly made him retch.
Socrates was there. So were a few more of his rats. They had been butchered, chunks cut out of their flesh. But they had not been killed, at least, not first. The predator had carved out the meat and tossed them aside while they still lived. Some were still breathing shallow, resigned half-breaths, while Socrates, the most recent victim, breathed more hurriedly, more desperately.
“o god, o god, o god. I… I can help. Don’t worry, I can help!”
He could not. As he whirled around to look for something of use, Otis looked into the face of death.
The Shape stabbed through Otis’ lower jaw first, under and up and through. There was a gasp of sheer agony but no scream. Then the Shape wriggled the shard of glass around and, with great force, yanked it back out. The prey fell to the ground, clumsily, and tried to crawl away. Futile. The next stabs were in Otis’ torso, as he whimpered and shrieked and at last held up his hands in pleading. The last thing he was aware of the Shape carving chunks out of his stomach, and eyeing them curiously before giving them an experimental taste.
Michael Myers ate alone in the dark. He was free, but not whole. He wanted something better than a shard of glass for killing. And he wanted his face back. Otis Flannigan wore a gas mask, currently clipped to his belt, with large empty-looking eyes and a long snaky breathing trunk. As he ate, Michael eyed it with interest.
***
Dick Grayson snapped awake in his bed, roused by some nightmare he couldn’t remember. Damn. I’m still in jeans. And tights under that. What time is it? He couldn’t be late. The sun still looked high. And there was a tray with a silver lid containing breakfast, which was gone within seconds of discovery. God bless Alfred.
That taken care of, Dick immediately became restless and left his bedroom. The rest of the Manor was just as he remembered it, too. As long as he’d lived there, Dick had never fully memorized the layout of the place. He had grown up in trailers and trains. A house this size felt like more than he could take in. Much of it was sealed off. Too much living space for one man, certainly too much for one man to clean. But still, it was too much to take in.
A hallway opened up to a staircase, a staircase led down to a hallway, and Dick passed rooms. Conservatory, billiard room, library, and the main study, and an old grandfather clock stood in the same old corner. Not entirely conscious of doing so, Dick reached out and moved the clock’s hands to a familiar time of day. Of night, more usually.
There was an all-too familiar grinding and creaking as the wall slid away. The Cave opened up before him, welcoming as ever.
***
The Cave was much as he remembered it, as well. There were perhaps a few more trophies, albeit nothing to overshadow the giant penny or the animatronic dinosaur. As Dick vaulted over the side of the stairwell and scanned the place he spotted a case of musical instruments sticky-noted JOHNNY DUNE, MUSIC MEISTER II and a ray gun purportedly belonging to Professor Radium. Each exhibit was lovingly donated from the evidence lockers of a grateful GCPD, if ‘donated’ meant ‘they never asked for it back.’ Hell, Dick thought, if you filed a report with the police that a vigilante was hoarding crucial pieces of evidence, they’d probably make a note to warn Batman about him.
Dick found Bruce himself in his usual place, in front of a wall of computer monitors, utterly fixated. Atypically, he was reclining Roman-style on a bed of steel nails. Being accustomed to taking the initiative in conversations, Dick called out “New furniture?”
Bruce didn’t react visibly to a new presence in the Cave. More accurately, he did not need to react to something he had never been unaware of.
“It’s an old trick employed by holy men in India. Most expect the nails to penetrate the flesh, but as long as the weight is distributed evenly it’s perfectly safe.”
It figured. When normal people wanted something stimulating, they played chess. Or took a cooking class or somethign. For Bruce Wayne, you came to expect blindfolded knife throwing, escapology, bomb disposal, building up an immunity to iocaine, anything that would put extra gray in Alfred’s remaining hair.
“If you already know the trick what’s the point?”
“I knew a man in Egypt who swore by its health benefits.”
That was it. Not so much as a turned head, or a ‘hello.’ When Bruce was at work he tended to be obsessive bordering on monomaniacal. Food could be ignored, let alone conversation. Dick Grayson couldn’t recall ever having called the man ‘father’ or ‘dad,’ even though that was what he undeniably was. But sometimes he couldn’t help but feel like the adult in the relationship.
He attempted some small talk. “So. Tim not around?”
“Probably with your old club.” Amazingly, Dick thought he heard a touch of amusement there.
“Not my club. Not anymore. And not ever, actually.”
A grunt.
“What about your club, then? Keep in touch?”
Bruce’s gaze never wavered from the screen, but in time he spoke, as casually as he could ever say anything. “Busy time of year. Diana should be in Germany, undercover as a dance instructor. John messaged recently about a distress signal at an Antarctic outpost. The Halls are in Florida; two journalists named Thirteen and Gold vanished in Poho County researching a local monster.”
“And Clark?”
“Still Clark.”
Wow. We’re doing it. We’re actually talking. Go, us.
“So, guess that’s Tim. And the League. And me. Oh, forgot. I took care of that underground race Black Mask was hosting. Even brought you back a trophy. Feast your eyes.”
Dick pulled a wickedly sharp-looking hunting knife out of his pocket. The effect was spoiled somewhat by the pastel pink handle.
“The Bride tried to stick me with this. It’s, ah… got MAID OF HONOR engraved on it. Almost certain the Groom must have had a matching one with ‘Best Man’ on it. Kind of wishing I grabbed that one instead. But, you kn-”
It was around then that Dick realized Bruce’s gaze had shifted. The older man was staring intently at the knife, the look in his eyes decidedly disturbed.
“Um. Would a card have been better?”
“There’s something you need to know.” Bruce got up from the nailbed, without suffering as much as a puncture. “There was a fire at Arkham last night. At least a dozen escapes.”
“So, a pretty good night by Arkham standards.”
“Dick.” Bruce’s voice had an edge to it. Dick immediately went silent. “You need to hear this. One of the escapees is a serial killer named Michael Myers. He’s personally committed dozens of murders across multiple states. Always on Halloween.”
“I… think I remember. He escaped during a transfer, what three years ago? You and Batgirl caught him.”
“Not before he killed at least five people. I was lucky the number wasn’t higher.” He turned back to the monitors. For the first time, Dick noticed a pair of photographs that had been brought up onscreen: one a thoroughly ordinary looking man with a blank, almost confused face, and the other a close-up of a bone-pale mask with ratty black hair, empty eyeholes staring.
Bruce continued. “There was something different about Myers. Something singularly unlike the other criminals I’ve faced. Unusually strong, and fast, but more than that, he was… monstrous. He performed his first known murder at the age of six. His own sister.”
Dick felt the skin on the back of his neck crawling. It wasn’t the story. He’d heard worse, he was certain. But something about the way Bruce told it.
“For the longest time, I struggled to find an explanation for his otherness. He’d been a patient of Hugo Strange for some years, while Strange was operating under the name Terrence Wynn. Probably one of Strange’s test subjects for an experimental steroid called Venom. For a while I convinced myself that was it. A disturbed boy nursed on exotic drugs. But I looked into those eyes. I saw... in the back of my mind, I wondered if there was something else wrong with Michael Myers.”
Earlier that morning…
Dr. Leland was still shaky, clinging to a trauma blanket, normally steely composure totally shattered. She hadn’t escaped Firefly’s stunt entirely. In fact she’d been rather lucky to escape with the full use of her legs. All things considered, she’d gotten off relatively easy with some nasty first-degree welts on a hand and one side of her face. Recovery was guaranteed. Physically, at least.
“She’s not in any position to answer questions!” The EMT was understandably incensed. He admired her dedication, noting particularly the way she was not even slightly afraid of him, but he did not back down.
“It’s fine,” Leland had sighed, waving them away. “I’ll talk to him.”
They were alone now, Leland seated in the back of the ambulance, the Batman statue-still beside her. After a long, shuddering breath she finally managed “You need something?”
“Anything you can tell me about Michael Myers’ behavior in custody.”
At first Leland couldn’t think of much to tell. Myers had been quiet, unresponsive, near catatonic for his entire captivity. Pertinent details came out slowly, as she thought of them. In time she reached the subject of the masks.
“We always operated under the assumption that Myers murdered to act out a kind of power fantasy. When he was apprehended- when you apprehended him, it shattered that fantasy. The masks, we thought they were an attempt at self-reinvention. He’d spend all his free time making them, either that or exercising. Mostly he seemed to model them on local super-criminals, either fellow inmates or ones he could have been aware of through television. We weren’t sure what significance that had, at first.”
“But later?”
Leland swallowed, with difficulty. “He made one to resemble a cowl. Like… like yours. It suddenly clicked then. That was the thing that united all the others. He was trying to relate to others who had challenged you. We’d find him drawing bats too, sometimes. It was a new dimension to his pathology. He was becoming obsessed with the Batman.”
The silence hovered on the air a while.
Dick found his voice, eventually. “You said he escaped last night. And he only kills on Halloween? Halloween’s already half-over.”
“Until he’s apprehended, or a body is discovered, we have to act under the assumption that he’s arrived in Gotham and will continue to kill. Myers won’t set a trap and wait for me to spring it, like the other would. He prefers to hunt his prey. But until he finds them, he will kill anyone else whose path he crosses.”
Dick sighed. “Bruce, I’m really sorry. But I’m kind of… preoccupied, tonight. With Barbara?” He can’t have forgotten. Sure, he forgets things. Important things, sometimes. But he wouldn’t forget this.
“Fine.” Bruce turned his back.
“Fine?”
“Yes. I’m coordinating with Gordon on this one. You two should stay alert and keep an eye on each other.”
Did I hear that correctly? ‘One of the most dangerous guys I ever faced is on the loose, but you two have fun?’ ‘Go keep personal commitments?’ Holy Personality Change. Either he’s got a brain slug, or… he’s genuinely that worried.
Something on a computer screen beeped; Bruce’s attention strayed back into its event horizon. “Surveillance network’s picked something up. Body found in a terminal reservoir at the water treatment plant. I’ll have to check it out. Alfred.”
The butler had manifested seemingly out of nowhere, in his usual fashion. “Another adventure in the sewer system, then? Shall I roll out a few dozen gallons of tomato juice again?”
“Yes.” Like that, Bruce went to work armoring himself. Piece by piece, a man became something more. Over his shoulder, almost an afterthought: “Remember. Be careful.”
“Right,” Dick said, uncertainly, turning his gaze. “Um. I only brought my bike. Any chance I could borrow the car? Not the car, I mean, just a car.”
Bruce was gone by the time he looked back.
“Just take the bloody car,” Alfred muttered.
***
Around 2 PM, with plenty of light left in the day, Dick Grayson parked a modest-ish ‘78 Plymouth Volaré in a visitor spot, accidentally charmed the woman at reception, climbed the stairwell (using his usual complicated means of high jumps and backwards-giant vaults rather than simply walking on the stairs) and knocked on the door of apartment 8A.
Barbara Gordon answered.
“Hi. Actually I meant to bring flowers, I forgot that. Can you hang on maybe twenty minutes while I go start over?”
“You’re an idiot, Dick Grayson.”
“I have a hunting knife named MAID OF HONOR if you’d rather-”
“Shut up,” Barbara not-quite-laughed.
“Just feel like I should have brought a present. To mark the occasion. Maybe a cake with ‘Happy Last Preoperative Examination’ on it.”
“Alright. Let’s just get this over with.” Barbara Gordon pushed forward on the handrims of her wheelchair, trying halfheartedly to run over his foot. They were at the service elevator at the end of the hall by the time he heard her whisper, almost undetectably “Thanks.”
It was more than enough.
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2024.04.01 15:29 cartar10 Symphony OTS 23/3/24 plus brief Disney comparison

I recently got off the symphony of the seas which was my first royal Caribbean and all I can say is WOW in both good and bad ways. I’ll preface by saying this was a spring break cruise and my first one of those to. I’ve got a fair bit to say so I’ll break it down with different topics. Starting with the ship.
The ship itself was nice though not quite as much as a Disney ship and felt smaller than it is. The elevator situation was hit or miss you could go direct to destination in the middle of the day of share at 7 am and at the busiest times elevators would stop that were full which is also true of Disney. Unfortunately where the ship lacked was cleanliness. The stairwell carpets and stateroom couches were stained and you could see where paint was coming up and the ship was rusting. In addition the experience arts were almost all broken in someway. Overall the ship was incredible but the cleanliness and maintenance left much to be desired.
For me the most important part of cruising is the food and this was the biggest problem. I’ll start with the mdr where the food was frankly terrible the steak was between McDonald’s and ihop in quality and the baked cod wasn’t good either. Coming into the cruise we knew there wasn’t a show with dinner but were expecting a calm experience however once again royal did somthing tacky to disappoint. On the second formal night in the middle of dinner party music came on and the cruise director came on and told us to give it up for the culinary team who then paraded through the dining room. Now I’m fine with recognizing the crew but it shouldn’t be in formal night. The windjammer felt really small and the food was of acceptable quality though more limited in choice than Disney. As someone who isn’t the biggest fan of Disney’s quick service options el loco and storrentos were great though the former could be open longer. Thankfully the specialty was different. The first restaurant was Jamie’s for lunch and frankly it would be worth the cost just for the bread and the lasagna and brownie did not disappoint. The next one was wonderland and frankly this can’t be missed if you haven’t done it yet. The food at wonderland was interesting if not the most appetizing and our server and the hatter were great. Though if your dinning there mind your step as our waitress said many people fall down those steps. Our last speciality restaurant was chops for lunch. Our server was incredible and very talkative unlike our mdr server. The filet was great and so was the chocolate cake. Both playmakers and Johnny rockets also had great crew and we loved the campfire cookie.
Unfortunately where the cruise was majorly lacking was service. While we never felt we needed more we didn’t feel that anyone but the speciality restaurant crew made us feel special or even welcome. Our stateroom host was decent though once a day service was annoying with the trundle bed and we suspect he may be a replacement for the one that was arrested as there was a screw missing from our bathroom door knob where a camera may once have been hidden. The sport staff at abyss and flowrider were also good.
This sailing had a lot of sea days plus Falmouth Jamaica which meant we did most of the activities aboard. Probably the most common in the fleet is the flowrider which was more difficult than I expected. The abyss was quite fun thought the hours again left a lot to be desired. Outside of these there was mainly just sports which were full of unruly teenagers and table tennis whose balls and paddles were being thrown overboard and into the boardwalk by the aforementioned teenagers. Also because of the teenagers they were putting the balls and paddles away at 10 pm to prevent the situation.
That brings me to people and their behavior. You may have seen my post about the teen Snapchat group and credit where credit is due they were probably the most respectful group of teens in the ship thought he bar wasn’t that high. There were about 1000 teens aboard and from my experience and the Facebook I gathered that they were doing the following: throwing trash and table tennis equipment overboard and into the boardwalk, staying up all night running through the halls and wrestling, stealing do not disturb magnets and a little girls birthday decorations, ding dong ditching, screaming, running on deck, trampling an old lady and leaving her for other passengers to pick up, clogging toilets, and leaving an excessive amount of used condoms on the deck. In addition there was someone in the group who was in an elevator and tried to stop a group of teens sticking their hand in the door. The teen accused them of assault and they were detained on the ship and handed of the local authority in Fort Lauderdale. Overall the security said they tipicaly have 2-3 incidents a month and had about 15 on this sailing. Unfortunately the adults weren’t much better though less directly disruptive. I would go up on deck to watch us sail in just before 7 and all the lounge chairs were covered in items. There was also a few moments of guests getting angry at the crew. Plus obviously as the parents they are responsible for the behavior of their children as well. IMO royal has to crack down. They need to change the rules so if you leave any item on a chair for more than maybe 10 minutes it’s going away and you’re paying for the towel. They also need to make it know that if you can’t behave you are never welcome aboard a royal Caribbean group vessel again even if that means getting of at the next port.
One place were royal was actually better than Disney was the shows. The first show we saw was hairspray and they did a great job putting on this show and ended with the whole room standing and clapping along. The next show was hiro which had little story but was quite impressive. 1977 was unfortunately terrible and the ice conditions were to causing lots of falling and a show that was awkward to watch. It wasn’t helped by the cruise director begging for applause at the end. Next was flight and after 1977 I had low expectations. It’s fair to say I was wrong. The show was great and while the individual scenes didn’t go together well the scenes themselves were quite good. Thankfully the ice cast also has iskate where they redeemed themselves.
Also on this cruise we did the all access tour which I would not recommend. The tour starts in the galley where they effectively go over how a kitchen works then you go down to the store room where they explain how a fridge works and yap about how many tonnes of food they bring on. Then you go to the engine control room where you can’t take photos or get close to anything the latter I understand somewhat. After that it’s off to the bridge where you are only allowed on the wing and can not take photos of the equipment. The no photos rule is entirely stupid to me as all bridges and engine rooms are roughly they same, cruise lines post photos and videos of their bridges, and you don’t need a photo to know what the controls look like if you were going to take the bridge. Plus when I was on the control side of the panel my father quietly asked the security officer if he could take my photo at that angle which would show the back side of the pannel aka a flat sheet of blue metal and the tour guide quite rudely stopped what she was saying to yell at him that he couldn’t. Also the tour guide was not at all knowledgeable about the ship and got many things wrong. She didn’t fully understand how a bow thruster works. I would not waste the 2 hours on this tour if it was free.
Overall it is quite sad as many of the crew problems are directly or indirectly they fault of upper management and we will be thinking twice before sailing with royal again.
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2024.03.26 06:44 Dont_Trip98 Thoughts From a Rooftop

Would love some feedback on this! This poem was written for my creative writing class as a persona poem from a perspective other than my own. It was supposed to capture a character who reveals a secret, in a location related to this secret.
"Thoughts From a Rooftop"
The tails of my coat dance with the breeze, my feet dangling off the edge like a child in their highchair.
“I’m going to kill myself tomorrow.”
I say it out loud, just to see how it sounds,
and it sounds empty, but true.
Tonight is my rehearsal dinner, if you will.
Practicing the motions of a plan that frankly, I’ve had forever.
Well, no, not forever, But it feels that way.
When I was a boy, I dreamed of becoming the most magnificent baker.
Gallons of ganache and pastries oh, so puffed!
Would wrap my patrons around street corners.
“Can you see it?” I’d ask my mother, eyes shining brighter than the lights on my imaginary marquee.
She’d hold my doughy face in her hands, soft as a fresh souffle, and tell me all the beautiful things about my bakery.
How the lights, warm and easy, would welcome you like a mother’s open arms
How the music, live some days, would make your muffin somehow taste just a little bit better
How the colors, vibrant, yet purposeful, would play with one another running across the walls
“And the smells, Quincy” she’d say. “The smells alone could end a great war”.
I was there.
I could feel the lights.
I could hear the music.
I could see the colors.
I could even smell all the beautiful scents and fragrance.
But, that dream is dead.
It died a long time ago, laid to rest the same day as my mother.
The same day I learned what it means to hurt.
The same day I learned that some dreams are just dreams.
The same day I learned that even your most wonderful dream can be stolen by some fucking asshole who couldn’t bear to pay fourteen dollars for a cab.
Anyways,
That dream is dead, and soon I will be too.
When dreams die, as does the dreamer, so please, don’t feel sorry for me.
I’m simply tying up a loose end.
Nothing more than par for the course.
The view’s nice. I think to myself as the city winks at me.
I wonder if it has ever looked this nice.
The gravel crackles beneath my sole as I stroll back toward the stairwell.
Keys in my door, I’m stopped by a neighbor, Claire.
We talk sometimes, not because she’s particularly interesting, but because I’ve always thought she looked like my mother.
She tells me about work, how she doesn’t really know what her job actually is, how she listens to coffee shop jazz in morning traffic, and how her boss likes to hit on her on Thursdays.
But I’m not listening.
Maybe it’s all in my head, given the circumstances, but I swear she even sounds like her tonight.
A sweet aroma tugs me back to the present
“What’s that?” I ask, raising my nose to the sky like a hound.
“Oh shit, my cake!” she shrieks, eyes white as porcelain.
She calls over her shoulder: “See you tomorrow!”
running down the hall without looking back.
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2024.03.25 23:47 GIJoeVibin Oil on Troubled Waters, Chapter 5

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You could always tell when a British force was returning to base after a long mission, for the simple reason that their Warriors always sounded on the verge of death.
Sam watched, dressed in his late night off-duty uniform of an old t-shirt and older trousers, as a company’s worth of Warriors pulled in, visibly caked in dust and grime. They were the vehicles of another company in the battalion-strength British force here at Buckley, and their departure for New Mexico several days ago had left the rest of them having to take up far more work. Now they had returned, things would be back to normal. Hopefully.
Soldiers disembarked rather rapidly, rushing to offload their weapons so they could get back to comfortable seats and beds, rather than the sleeping bags and cramped confines of a Warrior. It was usually always chaos after a big mission, though at least the wind had been taken out of many of them by how exhausted they all were.
“Evening Sam!” One soldier yelled, waving. It was Sergeant Briggs, one of the NCOs in 3 Company that Sam regularly interacted with. Sam waved back, waiting as Briggs jogged up.
“Evening. How was the Hekatian hunting?"
“Huh? Oh, yeah, yeah, Hekatian remnants. Yeah, that was basically bollocks.” Briggs replied, shaking his head. “I mean, there were Hekatians, and we did deal with them. But that wasn’t why we were there. A fucking militia could have handled them."
"Really?"
"Yeah. Come on, no way I'm gonna be able to turn in my guns for like an hour, not with this lot in the way." Briggs waved at the mass of soldiers, swarming towards the large building that housed the battalion's weaponry. "Let's go to the cricket ground."
It didn't take long for the pair to reach the cricket ground, a much quieter area of the base. Calling it such was optimistic, it existed solely in lines of tape crunched between parked vehicles. Breaking the expectations of more than a few Americans on the base, cricket was not actually that popular with the young British soldiers, though it's few fans were devoted enough to demand the use of the grass parking area as a grounds. Sam didn't get the appeal himself, he was always more of a football man.
Briggs stopped beside a beaten-up armoured recovery vehicle, vital in the complex task of recovering the destroyed tanks that littered parts of the country. He then jumped up, to perch himself on the armour plate, using it as a bench of sorts. Sam joined him, the pair watching the hustle and bustle of the base even at this late hour.
"So, the whole thing was bullshit. 1 Platoon kicked them over in a few hours once they found them. Seems no one had actually bothered to look. Just a bunch of starving guys with barely functional weapons, who'd been bullying locals for food and didn't stand a chance. And Command knew it. Whole thing was basically a cover for a shopping run. We spent most of it poking around some old scientific facility, Sandia it was called. Stripped it for parts, basically."
“No shit?”
"No shit. We got down to Albuqurque, they sent 1 Platoon off into the hills, but us and 3 Platoon were told we'd be reserve, basing out of what's left of the Kirtland base. Let me tell you, they bloody fought for that place. I spent a night in a burnt out Abrams, that was fun."
"Sure, sure. But what'd you mean, strip it for parts?"
"Well, first day we had to evict civvies squatting on the airbase, and it was just us, some of our engineers, plus a bunch of American regulars. Like, not National Guard. Once we cleared it of squatters, spent the day shoving as much shit off the runway as we could, got it relatively clear, couldn't do much for the craters in it though. Then next day, they brought in a bunch of helis and landed them literally anywhere they could. Then a big prop bird, A400 I think, comes in, does the diciest landing I've ever seen in my life. Company commander turns around and tells us our job is actually to help these guys, do whatever they ask us to, whatever.
"Uh huh." A ambulance went racing down the road outside the base, it's siren blaring.
"Turns out, what they want us to do is go explore these busted labs, dig more rubble out the way. Spent the rest of the week doing exactly that, we'd crack open a room and then they'd go in, look at what was in there, and get us to cart specific equipment out. Sometimes they'd tell us to go in with full rad gear, we'd measure bugger all on our geiger counters and tell them, so they would go in with shorts and t-shirts."
"So, hold on, they were taking equipment? Like, as in we're stealing shit from the lab?"
"Well, I asked the Captain. He said he was told the Americans sold it to us, equivalent of flogging an old piano you don't use anymore, and asking the buyer to come get it out of the house and pick it up. Not stealing. I mean, it's not like anyone could have missed what we were doing, we had to have permission. There were the US army guys helping us, bunch of the helis had USAF markings. Had to be approved."
"What the hell could we have been after that was in there?"
"No clue. Tried to talk to the American guys they brought in, none of them were chatty, when we overheard them it was like they spoke in riddle. Like, they sent us to check this reactor room, right. Some nuclear test facility, reactors and shit. We come out, tell them it's clear on rads, they all nod, start going in. I eavesdrop, one of them's saying to the other that there's 'no evidence of a faded giant'. The hell does that mean? Felt like being in a Tolkien story. So, we couldn't get shit for answers out of them."
Briggs opened up one of his pockets, pulling out a little ration-pack protein bar and scarfing it down.
"Anyway, I think they just wanted the lab's computing equipment, as much as they could find that still works. Shit's gotta be cutting edge, right? Plus any data they still had. Everything we grabbed, they carted it on the plane and the helis. I don't think they really managed to fill up everything though, just not enough to salvage."
"Anything more specific?"
"Nah. Corporal Donaldson said he heard they did some advanced tech shit, so maybe we were after that, but then Donaldson thinks Hekatians crashed in Roswell so I don't believe him."
"I just don't get it. What are we gonna do with it that the Americans that they wouldn't do with it themselves? Why pay when they could just share it?"
"They couldn't get around to getting it themselves, clearly. And besides, those scientists who worked on it, I'd bet they're living with us now. So we might as well take it, since they can't use it."
Briggs shrugged as he finished his sentence, then dropped down from the vehicle, leaving Sam alone on top in the cold. He looked back up, as if struck by something he had to share before he left.
"The one thing that was real weird, though. One of the strange riddle things they said, was after they went into this big bunker under the airbase. I think they stored nukes there before the war, we had a look around as best we could but most of it had collapsed, and the place was empty. So we didn't end up carting home a nuke or anything. But anyway, as we're leaving, one of the Americans turns and says something to his friends, quiet enough none of us could hear it, but one of the Hekatians picked it up on his helmet mic. Something about a 'possible empty quiver', and they all looked real grim about it. Real strange."
Briggs turned and walked off, then stopped himself.
"Oh, and I got one of them pasta bolognese MREs, it's in my bag. So, you know the deal-"
"5 of the tutti frutti drink powders, coming your way." Sam replied.
"Hell yeah." Briggs grinned back.
Even with the return of 3 Company, Sam's platoon still found itself having to be on standby for any potential problems. And so that was how, the next day, Sam found himself wandering around the base in most of his gear, with absolutely nothing to actually do but wait.
With convenient timing for avoiding his death by boredom, a utility vehicle suddenly pulled up nearby, one of those American infantry squad vehicles that packed half a dozen men in without windows or doors. This one was only half occupied though, by base security personnel, accompanied by one familiar figure in a distinct camouflage pattern and a blue beret.
“Afternoon Sam.” Lt Dave Skinner waved to Sam, beckoning him over. Sam could see the Lt lacked most of his gear, clearly also just wandering around the base awaiting something.
“Ey Lt. What’s up?” Sam asked.
“Bored, and heard there's a protest down by the gate. These lot offered a ride, you want to come see?"
“Why not.” Sam clambered into a spare seat at the back, quickly securing himself. The vehicle rumbled off, quickly heading down the base’s roads towards the gate. Traffic was light today, a few base security vehicles moving around, and thus they were soon close to the gates. Sam could see the protest pretty well in the clear day, what looked to be more than a thousand people, clutching various placards. A few members were up on top of a van, with one using it as a podium to deliver a speech, whose contents Sam could not fully decipher.
As the vehicle pulled more into sight, the mood of the crowd seemed to change, the protestors catching sight of the distinctive blue berets of Sam and the Lt, which marked them as UN personnel. The speaker gave one last shout, which Sam could hear as ‘we won, what next?’, before turning his attention to the same thing as his crowd.
“UN go home! UN go home!” The man yelled, quickly joined in the chant by the rest of the crowd. The driver stopped, clearly wanting to now discharge the passengers who were garnering interest.
“At least they got simple slogans to remember.” Sam muttered, climbing out and putting his boots back on the road.
“Aye.” Dave replied, adjusting his uniform as he walked forwards. Their ride moved on, and the pair of British soldiers continued on towards the nearest point of interest, that being a British Jackal.
It, rather like what Sam had just been riding, was a vehicle devoid of doors, windows, or any real form of protection for its crew, although this one traded a large crew capacity for being festooned with weapons. It’s crew, who had decked themselves with football hats from home and thus evaded recognition, watched the crowd ahead with boredom as a radio blared out pop music. He recognised them as soldiers of another unit in the battalion, one he didn’t usually interact with.
“This all for us then?” Sam asked.
“Afraid so.” The man on the machine gun mount replied, glancing down. His accent, and his hat, betrayed him as a Liverpudlian.
“Oh well.”
“They're not a risk.”
“As in?”
“As in, they aren't going for the fences. If they did, well.” The man nodded towards the loitering Military Police beside the gate, before patting the gun he stood by.
“Aye.” Sam walked on, rather unnerved. Dave, who had said nothing during the exchange, carried on beside him.
“All a bit mad isn’t it.”
“It is. At least those out there are just protesting, rather than. You know. The whole KC thing.”
“I don't think we have to worry about another KC.”
“Dunno what these lot really expect, mind. We can’t go home or else the reconstruction collapses.”
“And everyone starts ripping each other apart.”
“Yeah.”
Before either of them could continue their thoughts, Sam’s phone buzzed in his pocket, causing him to pull it out. The phone identified the caller as the company commander, Danny, which was odd.
“Hello?” Sam asked, before Danny could speak.
“Where the bloody hell are you? Do you have the Lt?”
“We're at the front gates. Something wrong?”
“Probably about to be. We have a situation, armed individuals spotted near a RA project. Possible prelude to an attack. Your platoon got stood up to intervene right after you vanished, they’re loading up now, they'll pick you up.”
“Gotcha. Heads up, but the protestors are all in our way.”
“They’re still out there? Damn. Oh well.”
It took more than a few minutes, in fact, with Sam wondering if he should have just walked back to the unit instead of staying to be yelled at, but soon the Warriors were trundling down the road towards Sam and the Lt. The lead slowed somewhat, Sam running up and throwing himself onto it so he could climb up. He was sure the sight of a soldier scrambling up his own vehicle would be rather amusing to some of the protestors watching, so he did his best to get up to the turret as quickly as he could.
“We grabbed your stuff for you.” Dani said, as Sam reached the commander’s side of the turret. He glanced down into his seat, seeing it indeed had been piled with his stuff.
Sam dropped down, before beginning to pull equipment on as fast as he could, given the cramped confines of the turret and the circumstances. Helmet went on first, the beret pushed clumsily into a pocket. Rifle was pulled up, so that he had a good grasp on where it was. The rest would be best left sorted out on the way, with him kicking it down and onto the vehicle floor.
“What time do you call this, anyway?” Dani asked, playfully.
“Time these lot got out of our way.” Sam gestured at the crowd, who only seemed more energised by the sudden arrival of the UN vehicles.
“Yeah, how exactly are we gonna get out of here?”
“Very carefully. Etty, watch your driving, last thing I want is someone getting run over.” Sam contemplated the fact that at least it could be worse: they could have sent the Hekatian unit on the base out. So far, said unit had been confined to base security drills, and joining patrols conducted otherwise. If they attempted to break this protestor blockade, it would probably end poorly.
Several military police, all Americans. appeared from out of the guardhouse, all geared up with riot shields and bulletproof masks. They gripped batons in one hand, forming up into ranks while the Warriors continued onwards. There weren’t enough to form a full corridor out, not with the size of this crowd, but there were a fair number present. A loudspeaker on the base began blaring orders to let the vehicles through, and while some protestors began to move away, their place was filled by others.
“I’ve got an idea. Etty, park us up next to the MPs.” Sure enough, the driver complied, the armoured vehicle coming to a halt. Sam leaned out, quickly identifying a commander. "Hey! You reckon you can form a box around our vehicles? Don't want anyone getting in the way of us and being injured.”
“We’ll do our best, but we can only manage 2 at a time.” The man replied, gesturing his men to form a cordon around Sam’s vehicle.
“That’ll have to do, thanks man.” More MPs took position at the gates, forming a wall to block anyone that may try and slip through.
“How many you reckon are out here? One thousand, two?”
“Who knows. Just so long as no one gets hurt.”
The gates now parted, and the crowd naturally attempted to surge forwards, only to be met with a shield wall. Etty started the vehicle moving again, at little more than a crawl. Behind the front line of protestors, who were simply randomly pushing up against the shields, Sam could see a line of protestors linking arms in order to form a wall of their own.
“Smart move.” Sam nodded towards the protestor wall.
“These guys are gonna have to go in with truncheons if they want to break that in a quick fashion.” Dani replied, grimacing. As they watched, the MPs began to push forwards, successfully forcing the front line of protestors to retreat.
As they reached the gates, objects began to fly from the protest, all manner of items. Empty bottles, placards, rocks, anything that protestors had on hand and could hurl. Not a genuine threat, particularly not given the level of aim, but Sam didn’t much feel like getting hit on the head by a placard.
“All vehicles, button up.” Sam ordered, dipping his head down and pulling the hatch over. Dani followed, the vehicle now fully sealed up.
“How’s it looking out there, Sam?” Lt Skinner asked.
“Raining sticks and stones.”
“Can you catch me one? Lost my pet rock.” Trevor said.
“Go out and get it yourself.” Sam threw back, checking his gear over. He glanced at the monitors, seeing the Jackal gunner, along with his crew, had now donned gas masks. The gunner then pulled out a small grenade launcher, loading a round into it and aiming it towards the crowd, and suddenly Sam knew exactly where this was going. “Oh shit, CBRN on now.”
“What?” The question came even as well-drilled hands activated the CBRN system, and as a long canister was fired from the grenade launcher. It arced out, landing in the midst of the crowd and quickly dispensing tear gas.
“They’re firing tear gas into the crowd.”
“One way to clear a path.”
The MPs froze up, not quite sure what to do, meaning that this action by Sam’s fellow Brits had clearly not been coordinated. A path began to indeed clear, though, as another grenade was fired, civilians fleeing from the gas. Sam had been tear gassed before, during training. It wasn’t nice, especially if there weren’t proper medics around to immediately help you clear the effects.
The Warriors pressed on, drivers figuring it was best to make use of a bad situation., The MPs, though, abandoned any intent of escorting the Warriors and moved out of the way, with Sam’s guess being they didn’t want to be seen helping. As the Warriors moved forwards, some masked members of the crowd surged back towards the gap that had been cleared around the canisters. For a second, Sam was worried they were about to run someone over, but they wisely stayed to the side of the Warrior, banging on the sides. Unfortunately for them, fists and sticks weren’t particularly good against armour meant to keep out machine guns.
“Hearts and minds.” Sam muttered, as after they reached the edge of the protestors and were able to properly accelerate.
“What you say, Sarge?” Dani asked, confused.
“Nothing.”
Sam’s mood had not much improved by the time they arrived at the Reconstruction Authority project. He wasn’t quite sure what the Hekatians working for the RA were building, probably just some new housing, but things had clearly ground to a halt given this strange situation. Information was still scarce, just that armed people had been seen nearby, and there was worry of a potential attack, but no one who had arrived on station had been able to locate them.
“The British President has announced his intent to hand control of Britain's nuclear weapons to the United Nations." The radio was blaring some news story as they reached the construction site, surrounded by a wired fence and checkpoints. "In a press conference today, President Jones spoke of the need for what he called ‘complete security’ of the world’s nuclear weapons, citing the highly controversial use of nuclear weapons during the Second Hekatian War. Jones has called upon the other nuclear powers of the world to follow suit in pledging the world’s nuclear weapons directly to the UN, though so far only France has posi-"
“You’re the UN lads, right?” The security guard yelled from his temporary booth, next to the little barrier that marked the gate. That was a stupid question, who else would we be, Sam thought to himself.
“Yeah. You let us through?”
“Of course! Hold on!” The man responded, the barrier slowly raising to let the multi-ton armoured vehicle through, and letting Sam turn his attention back to the radio.
“With us is Oz Sullivan, formerly a lifelong campaigner for nuclear disarmement. Oz, what do you think of the prim-the president’s statement today?” The newsreader quickly corrected their mistake, whilst the Warrior rolled through to a clear patch of ground, parking up next to a group of hi-vis wearing Hekatians.
From Sam’s understanding, this had just been a bit of empty space, practically a park, before the war. Then, a temporary mass grave for victims of the war, it’s contents now dispersed to permanent burial sites. Sam was sure there was more than one reason they’d sent the Hekatian-staffed Reconstruction Authority to build stuff here, given the task of removing bodies had fallen to them.
“Well, I think it’s the right way forward, since as I and many of my colleagues recognised, the disarmement we campaigned for simply does not hold in an interstellar age. But we must still be smart in their use, esp-” Sam turned his attention away to watch the Lt’s Warrior pull up, the platoon commander hopping out to converse with the security staff on the site. Vehicle doors opened, the platoon spilling out to start taking various positions as needed.
“Sarge!" Dave shouted over, beckoning Sam to join him in conversation with the locals. "Get down here!"
"Aye Lt."
“I suspect the hard sells will be both India and Pakistan, as well as the Irani-" Sam could hear the radio dropping off as he got further away, approaching the Hekatian foreman the Lt was now speaking with.
“Anything new?”
“Police say they haven’t found shit, but we've at least got a cordon. Units are…here.” The Lt popped a small marker on the shared tacmap, Sam seeing a signal marking the presence of multiple police units in a loose cordon, some distance away. That made sense, start wide and tighten up.
“That’s something. What should we do next?”
“Well, I was thinki-“ The Lt was cut off by the sound of a machine gun springing to life, taking everyone by surprise. Sam dove to the ground like his comrades, looking up at the nearest building to see two separate sources of fire. The bullets, right now, seemed to be hitting away from him, and so Sam made a break for the better cover of the Warrior. Bullets raked the ground as he ran, mixing with yells and screams of pain, but Sam made it without a scratch, and could now begin evaluating his next move.
He raised his weapon, glancing out from behind the armoured bulk to get a better look at the source of the fire. It was indeed a pair of machine guns, firing from the windows of what looked like a residential building. Sam fired back, though he knew there was very little chance of hitting them.
“Permission to open fire!” Dani shouted over the radio, the urgency in her voice overpowered only by the Lt’s response a moment later.
“No! Hold your fire! Civilians in those buildings, small arms only!” More fire was going out now, the machine guns of the platoon adding their weight of fire to the UN efforts to fight back. Plasma, from the Hekatian members, splashed against walls. Sam really hoped no civilian in that building was looking out of their window right about now.
Back on the ground, the worker Hekatians were scattered left and right, many of them exposed. Sam grabbed one off the ground, lifting him up and shoving him towards the Warrior’s rear door. The worker, glad to have someone giving directions, climbed into the back, taking advantage of the protection afforded.
“Get the Hekatians into the Warriors! Now!” Sam ordered, beckoning another Hekatian into the Warrior as he did. He kept plugging away shots, doing what he could to keep the enemy from firing accurately. Suppress, suppress, suppress.
“Need a medic over here!” Someone from 2 Section yelled, Sam looking over to see Lance Corporal Hillier crouching over a bleeding Hekatian. That wasn’t good, the longer they stayed out here the more would go down. Action had to be taken, now.
"1 Section, push forwards, clear that building!" Dave ordered, taking charge before Sam had to. "2 and 3, suppressing fire, get people into cover!"
Sam could already see one obstacle, that being the fence dead ahead. He slammed his gloved fist onto the Warrior's side, adding an order of his own.
"Etty, ram that fence!"
Etty, enthused by the prospect of contributing something, followed orders and rushed the Warrior into the perimeter fence, quickly knocking it down and reversing to clear the hole. Sam followed into the gap, looking back to see that so far he had only been joined by Corporal Goose and Trevor. Still, he rushed forwards, charging the building. There was a thump of a grenade launcher against the building, someone clearly not having considered the potential consequences of firing a grenade launcher at a residential building. But it did drive the attackers to cease fire, if only for a moment, long enough for Sam to close the gap. Not that he was any happier about it.
His hands rushed to his radio, as more of 1 Section rushed forwards to join him.
“Whoever the fuck just sent off that grenade, I am going to kill you when this is over, do you understand?” Sam declared down the line, before using his hands to signal that someone should start kicking down doors. “Watch your goddamn fire, keep them suppressed.”
“Aye Sarge, we have them on the 9th floor.” Dave responded. “Good luck.”
“9th, gotcha. Someone br-” Sam cut himself off, watching as Meerox charged the door. It gave way quickly in the face of an armour-plated Hekatian throwing himself at it. "Nevermind."
Corporal Goose led the way through, stepping over the recovering form of the Hekatian now sprawled on the ground. The rest of the section poured through, fanning out to cover various corridors. They may have come under fire from just two guns, that didn’t mean more people weren’t present.
“Good one.” Sam muttered to the Hekatian, as he entered. He lowered his hand to pull Meerox up, glove meeting glove and raising him back to his feet.
“Thank you Sergeant.”
Sam patted Meerox on his back, heading on to chase the disappearing forms of the rest of the section. Rifle and machine gun fire continued to crackle behind them, reminding everyone that they really ought to get a move on.
“Lifts are down.” Corporal Goose was stood next to the lift shaft, gesturing at a warning scrolling over the little display screen.
“It’s a climb, then. Me, Meerox, we’ll go straight up to cut them off. Remainder, teams of two, clear each floor, just to be sure. Careful with civvies. Sweep each floor quick as you can, direct people out the building."
There were nods, as everyone formed themselves into impromptu assault groups. Were they doing this in any other environment, Sam would be breaking out the grenades. But for such an environment, you had to watch everything.
“Hold on.” Emma spoke up, rushing over to a nearby fire alarm. She pulled it straight down, triggering loud sirens and flashing lights to start blasting across the building. Lance Corporal Edwards gawked at her for a moment before she returned to his side in the assault team. “What? Less people in the building.”
“Alright, let’s move.” Sam ordered, Meerox taking the lead. He opened the door into the stairwell, walking straight through, and got the first signal of quite why care was needed. A bullet rang out, smacking into the armoured Hekatian, joined by a pair of screams. Meerox whipped his rifle around at a target Sam could not quite see yet, only to hold his fire, even as another bullet slammed into his armour. That could only mean one thing.
“UN, UN!” Sam shouted, poking his head around to see 4 people crouched in a nook in the stairwell. One, a man, clutched a pistol, while a woman clutched two children close. “Hold your fire!”
Meerox did not wait for the man to comply, simply taking another step forward and snatching the pistol out of the man’s hands. The Hekatian proceeded to eject the magazine, then the chambered round, before offering it back to the man. Said man looked on only in shock, obviously just having had the natural reaction any American would probably have seeing a heavily armoured Hekatian burst through a door amidst a gun battle.
He was, Sam had to admit, extremely lucky the pistol was so useless against the body armour, or Meerox would probably have put a plasma lance straight through his head there and then, family or no family. Meerox, for his part, simply dropped the pistol, and turned back to the stairs, charging up as if nothing had happened.
“Jesus. Jesus christ. I’m so sorry.” The man whimpered, his children increasingly panicking even though the imminent threat had passed.
“It’s alright mate. It’s alright. Get to the reception, SWAT will be there soon, they’ll take care of you.” Sam couldn’t be sure of that, he didn't know where SWAT was right now, but it was more likely to be true than not. Even if it was untrue, firm directions tended to reassure civilians regardless of their veracity.
He pushed on, following Meerox up the stairs, as a group of civilians rushed down. As they climbed, pairs of soldiers began to peel off, and the number of civilians coming down increased. They were hardly obeying a left-hand-side rule, and thus making it harder and harder to get past. By the fourth floor, with Goose and Trevor now disappearing to clear said floor, the flood had gotten so bad that Sam had completely stalled, civilians rushing past.
They stalled for what felt like an eternity, but was probably only a minute, before they were back to a trickle, right as a woman with a rather expensive looking modified AR-15 came rushing down the stairs.
“Halt!” Sam shouted, raising his rifle at her. Meerox did the same, many of the civilians turning their heads around to see what had happened for a brief moment, even as they carried on their rush. “Drop that goddamn weapon!”
She responded by throwing her hands up, but she was still clutching her weapon. That wasn't good. A rifle in the hands of one person was, as far as Sam was concerned, inherently a different thing to a pistol held by a parent surrounded by their kids. For all Sam knew, this woman was part of the attack, and taking the chance to get away. That, or she was really stupid for bringing her rifle to a fire alarm amidst a shooting. He suspected the latter.
“Drop it right now!” Sam repeated his order. Boots came clomping up the stairs, Smedley and Trevor. Both added their weapons to those arrayed at this woman, who had now frozen on the stairs, before Sam waved them off, to continue clearing floors. “Do you hear me?”
“I… I’m not part of it! I promise!”
“Then drop your fucking weapon so we can stop it! Now!” Any second spent here was a second longer the firing continued up there. He could tell Meerox was restless too, the Hekatian shifting his weight subtly to try and prepare in case this turned hot. Had it not been for the fact the M4 could very easily be levelled at Sam, who was not as bulletproof, and that Meerox could not necessarily close the gap in time before a shot was fired, the gun-clearing trick would probably have already been repeated.
“Police, out of the way!” More noise came from below, a fresh set of authoritative barks. Reinforcements.
“Put down your gun or else they'll arrest you!” Sam added. He wasn’t sure the cops necessarily would, but the threat seemed to convince the woman, who lowered the gun. Finally. “Right, keep moving!”
“I can help you get the shooters!” The woman said.
“No, you can’t!” Sam responded, glancing back to see a dozen SWAT storming up the staircase behind him. Some took the same route that Smedley and Trevor had, only to quickly discover said floor had been cleared.
“You Sergeant Heppell?” One of the SWAT called after Sam, who continued to climb.
“Yes! I’m going straight to the 9th floor!”
“Good! Ramirez, Biria, on me, everyone else clear floors!” The same voice announced, indeed pursuing.
“You have any info?” Sam asked, still directing his voice down. He was now approaching the 6th floor. 3 more to go.
“Two shooters, machine guns, mostly shot at Hekatians!” Nothing new or useful. Unsurprising.
“What gear do you have?”
“I have breaching explosives!” One of the other SWAT, a woman, replied. 7th floor.
“Good!”
A few more civilians trickled past, another family. Sam could see someone stood on the landing of the 9th floor, and they seemed to wave down.
“Hey! Up here!” 8th floor. 1 to go.
“UN forces coming through!” Sam replied. “SWAT in the rear!”
“Listen, man, you gotta help. These guys, they’ve blocked the doors. They’re real bad, they’re all holed up, keys aren’t getting me through.” Sam could see the man better now, as they rounded the switchback of the stairs. He was in a big jacket, what looked to be the official gear for building security from Sam’s guess, though supplemented by a baseball cap, the Mets if Sam recalled correctly. Said hat did very little to cover up some nasty facial scarring, clearly some old 3rd degree burns. His right hand was hidden in a pocket, maybe clutching a taser. What good do you think that’s gonna do?
“Alright, get the hell out of here. This is on us.” Sam replied. He felt like something was wrong, what was this man doing standing by the door at this point? Was he really delusional enough to think he, a security guard, could take on two men with machine guns with a taser?
“Good work man.” The SWAT leader added, grinning as he moved past Sam, beckoning his squad to carry on. One, the woman presumably, took out some explosives while still on the stairs, while the other just brushed past, heading up to the door. “Imagine meeting another Yankees fan out here.”
Well, that showed just how well Sam recognised baseball logos.
“Hah. Yeah.” The man half muttered, a slight grin. Then he looked towards Meerox, and Sam got a truly awful feeling in his stomach. “And you, I’ll see you in hell, you four ey-”
Sam dived out of the way well before the flash, the roar, the storm of shrapnel that tore through every inch of the corridor above. So did Meerox, the two naturally hurtling down the staircase since it was the only avenue of escape. But you couldn’t duck away from the shaking of the building, the roar of the blast, the screams. One short and clipped. The last, long and agonised.
There was a pause of silence, the shooters stopping in surprise, then a fresh hailstorm of bullets from the British forces outside. It was at this point Sam recognised he was currently pinning the female SWAT officer to the floor, with Meerox having already gotten up. He offered a hand, raising Sam up to his feet again. The cop, who Sam could tell by the nametag was Ramirez, was gasping for air, and she did not seem to have yet realised what had just happened. Sam knew she would probably prefer it that way, based on his guess as to what would be waiting for them above.
“You alright, Sergeant?” Meerox asked, tilting his head up and down to look for injury. Sam ran his hands down his face, finding plaster had coated him, but otherwise he was intact. A quick glance at his uniform confirmed the same.
“Feel like shit, ears are ringing but I think I avoided anything too bad.” Beside the pair, Ramirez sat up, and began taking deep breaths amidst coughs.
“Good, Sergeant.” Meerox looked back up the staircase, still functional as such even with the holes ripped into it. “I suppose there might still be two more of them up there.”
Before Sam could respond, Corporal Goose was rushing up the staircase had appeared from the levels below, this time leading a dozen cops.
“Jeez, thank fu-” Sam glared at Goose, cutting him off, then made a subtle head tilt towards Ramirez. It would not do much good for Goose to be all cheery about their survival, given what Sam knew would have happened to the other two cops upstairs. One of the SWAT members behind Goose budged past, rushing over to Ramirez.
“Possible two more hostiles upstairs. Watch out, one had a suicide vest. Possibly three wounded up there.” Wounded was euphemistic, even if there was still agonised screaming coming from above. The fire from outside slackened, the soldiers outside probably figuring an assault was in progress and it was best not to shoot another soldier by accident.
“Aye Sarge.” Goose looked back, pausing for a moment amidst the din. The Corporal glanced down the line of geared-up soldiers and armed police, taking a deep breath to compose himself. “Alright, you with the shield up front, you with the flashbangs, get 'em ready.”
The group charged up, quickly making their way in. By the sounds of gunshots Sam could hear, they had found their targets quickly.
He hoped they wouldn’t have too much trouble.
“Evening Sam.” Lt Skinner said, approaching Sam whilst he sat on the stretcher. He was still, as far as he knew, intact, though the ringing in the ears had not yet gone away. But the nurses and doctors at the temporary field hospital had not really bothered Sam, just letting him sit there.
“Evening Dave.” Sam replied, watching the scene ahead. Most of the activity around the building had died down now, but there were still ambulances and police cars loitering, and firefighters at work.
“Turns out Trevor wasn’t lying. Goose really did tackle that guy. Cops had bodycam footage of the full thing, Goose bloody dived on him before he could get that pistol out.”
“Huh.” Sam replied, flipping through his phone. “So I guess that tackle is the only reason we had a prisoner."
“Pretty much.” Dave paused for a moment, looking on. “Not sure I can get that mindset.”
“Pardon?”
“Going into a building with guns to shoot up a bunch of Hekatians, I mean, I get that. Well, you know, I wouldn't do it but I get where it comes from. But saying, I’m gonna go out and do this knowing I’m not coming back. Explosive vest, pistol just to shoot yourself. Like, I know we’re soldiers, we gotta accept we might not come back. But I don't think I won't come back.”
“When we were sent to America that first day, right after DC got nuked and we were sent in to help create some sort of frontline.” Sam began, looking up from his phone. “We didn’t say it on the plane, but we all thought we were certain to die there. One way or the other. When we touched down, and we were suddenly amidst it all… I dunno, for a lot of us it went away. Or we put it in the back of our heads. I managed to put it away, for a while. Then they ordered us to fall back to New York, and I was certain that was the end. And I was almost right. The moment Bainbridge took that hit while we ran for the shelter, I felt certain we were dead. And yet…”
There was silence, the two watching another ambulance arrive, this time to evacuate another wounded Hekatian.
“I don’t know what exactly drives you to go into something intending to die. But I know what it's like to expect that you are certain to do so. And I dunno, maybe there’s not that much difference.”
“You said that guy, the one who blew himself up, he had old facial burns. Cops talked to some of the residents, they confirmed he worked there. Burns were from when Boston got hit, so he was nuked, and allegedly had seen a doctor about possible cancer recently. We haven’t got back anything on the guy we captured yet, but if I had to guess he might also have been on his way out.”
“Do we know how many Hekatians they got?”
“Dozen dead so far. More to come.”
“Christ almighty.”
“Danny said he’s pulling us off the line for a while, no patrols, just rest. Let’s hope things are calm for the next while.”
“Let’s hope they’re calm for the rest of time.” Sam replied, watching another bunch of EOD traipse out of the building.

Author's Notes In Comments

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2024.03.21 15:58 MyInnerCulture An Afternoon with Anna

“Have you heard of Anna?” A boy with a grown-out bowl cut and dirty knees asks me. No, I tell him. Of course I haven’t heard of Anna. We just moved to the cul-de-sac in that sleepy little town in Vermont a few days ago. My bed isn’t even set up yet, so I’m sleeping on a mattress on the floor in our living room with my little brother, Kenny.
“Who’s Anna?” I ask.
“Who’s Anna?” another kid shrieks—a girl with wavy red hair under a baseball cap. “She’s, like, famous!”
A famous Anna? Huh. That doesn’t help me. I don’t know many celebrities because I don’t watch a lot of movies or TV. Mostly I read books, but somehow I don’t think my collection of young adult dystopian fiction will help me…or impress them. I want them to like me. I can’t believe we’ve only been in the cul-de-sac since Wednesday and there are kids in my front yard. They just came right up and started chatting like I’m not the new kid in town. Like they want to know me. I didn’t even have to lure them in. Mom wants me to make real friends here and I promised her I’d try. I hope she isn’t too busy unpacking the dishes in the kitchen to see me now, surrounded by four other kids—five if you count Kenny, but he doesn’t count because he’s just my brother, and like four years younger than me anyway. Four kids. Four new friends. But they want to know—they really want to know—if I know who this Anna is. And I don’t.
“You can’t live here if you don’t know.” Another girl, this one in a dress, her hair tied back in a huge, floppy bow, states. As if my family will actually have to move if I lack this important knowledge.
“Don’t be a jerk, Katie,” the fourth kid, a boy with spiky hair and freckles, says. “What’s your name? I’m Trevor.”
“Hi Trevor. I’m Mary.”
“And this is Brenna and Kyle. Don’t listen to them about Anna. They’re just being dumb because you’re new. They’ve never even seen her.”
“I don’t understand. Who is Anna?” I ask.
He grins, but it’s a shade darker than friendly. “She’s your neighbor. See that house back there? Behind yours, behind the cul-de-sac?”
“Yeah?”
It’s a tall Victorian, the once-white paint chipped and fading. Not at all like the cookie-cutter homes around it, the ones that all look like mine.
“That’s Anna’s house. She’s an old woman who lives in the attic.”
“She’s probably not even up there anymore,” Katie says.
“She is,” Trevor insists.
“What’s so special about that?” I ask.
“Because she’s not a normal old lady. She’s—”
“You’d better not tell her, Trevor,” Brenna says, adjusting her baseball cap. “She won’t believe you.”
“Believe you about what?” I ask. “Will someone just tell me what the big deal is about Anna?”
“She doesn’t have a face,” Trevor spits out.
I stare at him, mouth gaping. He’s joking. Brenna was right—how could I believe that? A woman with no face? Of course, they’re messing with me. I feel my cheeks burn with embarrassment and fresh anger. This, Mom. This is why I don’t play with other kids. They’re jerks. Jerks!
“That’s not funny,” I say, trying to contain myself so I don’t cry. I always cry at the wrong times—not because I’m sad, but because I’m so angry. It started in fourth-grade three years ago when a little boy named James called me Mousy Mary. Mousy because of my frizzy brown hair and freckles. Because I wasn’t pretty, like some of the other girls. I cried in front of the whole class then, and I never forgot it.
Neither did they.
“I know. It’s serious,” Trevor says. “You know why she doesn’t have a face?”
“Why?” I ask cautiously.
“Because a bunch of dogs ate it off,” Trevor says.
“This is so stupid,” I say, and I mean it. I’m already thinking of an appropriate punishment for such a stupid story and for almost making me cry. Payback, I’ve found, is far more useful than tears.
“I told you she wouldn’t believe you,” Brenna says. I want to slap the smirk right off her face, like I did to Ava Clare back in Ohio, or Jackie Blank in Missouri. They never laughed at me again. I glance over my shoulder to see if Mom is watching. This I don’t want her to see.
“Dogs ate it off? How? Why?” I demand.
“Because the town set the dogs on her after that little girl disappeared,” Trevor says. “Yeah, Anna was just a lonely old lady and sometimes kids would go visit her and keep her company. Then one day, one of the little girls went in and never came back out.”
I cock my head, slightly intrigued. Kyle pulls out a cell phone—I hope Mom is watching now, so she can see that it’s perfectly normal for kids my age to have one—and hands it to me after he finds what he is looking for.
“See? Her name was Brigit, and she was ten. Read the article. It’s old but it’s all there,” Kyle says.
I study the article on his phone. It’s a story about children who went missing in Vermont. Within the article is a picture of an old newspaper clipping from the 1940’s. A homely girl wearing a flowered dress stares up at me. On the twentieth of July, 1940, Brigit Mason, aged ten, was last seen entering the white Victorian that still looms tall and imposing over the rest of the neighborhood. Perhaps more disturbing than the mystery behind her disappearance is the paragraph that confirms Trevor’s story. The townspeople, angry and afraid of the old woman who lived in the towering Victorian, sought their own brand of justice. Though they claimed they only intended to interrogate her, she was attacked by a pair of dogs belonging to Brigit’s father. Anna Farrington, the old woman in the old Victorian, was left to die on the attic floor.
Without a face.
My head shoots up. I give Kyle back his phone.
“See? Told you!”
“Anna’s dead,” I deadpan.
“Yeah, but she’s still up there, in the attic,” Trevor says. “Didn’t you read it? They left her there to die.”
“That was eighty years ago,” I say.
“And she’s still there. Isn’t she, Kyle?” Trevor asks.
Kyle nods fiercely. “It’s true. My older brother swears. He went up to the attic, and she was sitting in a chair. He swears!”
“So, what…did your brother see her face?” I ask.
“No, duuuuuh. Because it wasn’t there.”
“Ugh, let’s just go. She’s lame,” Brenna says. Yes, I definitely want to smack her. She won’t even know what hit her. I smacked Ava Clare so hard her freckles flew right off her face. No one believed me when I told them, but I saw it. I even picked one up off the floor.
“Don’t call my sister lame!” It’s Kenny’s first contribution to our conversation. He isn’t coming to my defense. He’s coming to theirs.
“You’ve never gone up to the attic either, Brenna,” Katie says. “You only think Anna’s up there because you believe Kyle’s stupid brother. I heard he just went up there to make out with a girl. What would he know?”
“He knows more than you,” Kyle shoots back. “Why don’t you go up to the attic?”
“Wait—have any of you been to the attic?” I ask.
For the first time since traipsing up my front lawn, they are silent. Sheepish looks pass between them. It’s obvious: no one has ever seen Anna. None of them have ever even been inside that house, I bet. They are just clinging to some bizarre legend from the past, probably the only interesting thing that ever happened in their stupid little town.
“And you called me lame?” I roll my eyes. I have done so much worse for so much less. I promised Mom it would be different this time. Not at all like Ohio, or Missouri, or Nebraska. We were running out of country, and my parents were running out of excuses. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I want friends. But the other kids are always so stupid and so mean. My books are better. In dystopian novels, kids die when they’re idiots. It’s not like I’ve ever killed anyone.
Though Sasha in Missouri did call me Bloody Mary when I knocked out three of Dustin Lang’s teeth when he tried to kiss me in the bathroom at a party. He came out with blood running down his chin, spitting his teeth into his hand, but I’m the one with the nickname. I’m not the real Bloody Mary anyway. But I am honored by the comparison.
“Well, let’s go then,” Trevor says, puffing up his chest. The Marvel Avengers look like they’re going to fly right off his t-shirt. “Right now.”
“Pshh, yeah right,” Kyle says.
“I’ll go,” I say. “I’m not scared. It’s all a dumb joke anyway. You’ll see.”
“Don’t do it Mary. I’ll tell Mom,” Kenny says, tugging on my arm. His eyes are wide. What does he think I’m going to do to these kids anyway? They could still be contenders for friends. Maybe even the bratty Brenna, after a lesson or two. The mouthy ones are always quick to fall in line once someone puts them in their place.
“Good, you should tell Mom,” I say to him. “Let her know I’m going for a walk with my new friends. She’ll be so happy.”
“Are we really going to do this?” Katie asks. That bow is starting to annoy me. It’s long enough to choke her with, I bet. A person doesn’t die straight off from choking. They pass out first. Sometimes they shake like they’re having a seizure before they wake up. As long as you let go after five, maybe ten seconds, there’s usually no permanent damage, but I’ve been wanting to try for thirty. What color will Katie’s face become, and what kind of weird, jerky movements will her body make if I choke her for thirty whole seconds with that ridiculous white bow?
“Why come over here asking if I know about Anna if we aren’t going to go see her?”
“I can’t,” Kyle says. “My mom wants me home in, like, twenty minutes.”
“The house is right there. We can be in and out in ten,” I argue.
“Ha, I bet Kyle won’t last for five,” Trevor laughs, but there’s an undercurrent of nerves there. He doesn’t want to go see Anna either, but he’s tough. His hair is gelled and spiky like he thinks he’s cool, and cool kids are always the worst. Always the first to put you down. Back in Oregon, I showed the cool kids how cool they really were with a little help from Visine. A couple drops into their smoothies at lunch, and they were shitting their brains out in front of the entire cafeteria then down the hall, diarrhea streaming down their pant legs, streaking the floor. In all, seven kids ended up in the hospital—every single one of them cool.
Well, at least until I got through with them.
“Shut up, Trevor,” Kyle mumbles.
Kenny stays behind, while the rest of us walk past my new house, across the newly-mowed grass, to the chain link fence that separates my backyard from the overgrown weeds of Anna’s crumbling Victorian. It doesn’t look like anybody has lived there since Anna met her gory end. I don’t believe for a second that she’s still haunting the attic after all that time. Trevor and Kyle call each other names on the short jaunt, distracting from their apprehension and fear. I wonder, not for the first time, if someone can take a hammer and—if you hit just right—push a person’s tooth back up into their gums. I imagine it might work with a canine. You’d have to use a rubber hammer or mallet because a steel hammer would shatter the tooth first. Kyle has nice canines. Good and pointy. I don’t see any rubber mallets discarded in the tall grass, so I’ll have to check our own garage. Did Dad unpack his tools yet?
What is this house doing here anyway? Why hasn’t someone torn it down and built two cookie-cutters in its place? It doesn’t belong here, and as we approach I feel a sudden kinship with it. I don’t belong anywhere. We climb the crooked steps and cross the front porch. The front door opens. Still no rubber mallets, but plenty of broken glass. Could I carve out a cornea? I’ve never even tried. It sounds like delicate work, and I seldom have the finesse.
“Are we really doing this?” It’s Brenna. Not so tough now. The first one to balk.
“Guys, seriously, my mom…” Kyle stammers.
“You really are stupid, aren’t you?” I ask.
They all look at me. It’s one thing if they call each other names, but they don’t know me. I’m just a new neighbor, some unknown kid with mousy brown hair, a mousy little mouth, and mousy little eyes. Mousy Mary. Bloody Mary. They don’t know about Ohio or Missouri or Nebraska. Oregon, Idaho, Tennessee. To them, the sweet, stupid kids from the cul-de-sac, I am as faceless as Anna, a patsy they think they can torment and scare with a story about a woman who definitely isn’t in the attic of the rickety old Victorian behind my house. How dare I call them stupid? How dare I call bullshit on their own silly joke?
“What did you just say?” Trevor asks, his green eyes narrowing. His cornea would fit perfectly in the round locket I stole from Jill in Missouri, after I shaved off both of her eyebrows at a sleepover. Jill had been the closest thing to a true friend I ever had, which is why I spent the night at her house. But she should’ve known better than to tease me about Timmy Stratton, a boy I didn’t even like anyway.
“I said you were stupid. All of you.” I say it proudly, without shame. Screw these cul-de-sac sacks. “Get out of my way.”
I storm past them, thumping up the giant wooden staircase inside the front door. I don’t look back, but I hear them whispering. Plotting. Good, let them plot. They have no idea what is coming to them. Silly, silly cul-de-sacks.
I am at the second story landing when their footsteps follow mine. Cautious, they are. Not like my sure steps, pressing toward the attic to prove the little idiots wrong. On the second floor, I step around the holes in the floorboards, stirring ancient dust, while I throw open warped and weathered doors to bedrooms long-since lost to age. On the other side of the third door is a set of narrow wooden stairs.
I look back at my new, would-be friends. They stand huddled in a tight ball of nerves at the top of the main staircase. Katie, in that hopeful white bow, is pale. Brenna keeps her features tight, but I can practically smell her fear and boy does it stink. Kyle looks like he might pee himself but is too proud to admit it. Trevor, clever devil, is intent on my face, his lips almost curling in a smile that I match as I turn and climb the final set of steps.
It gets hotter and harder to breathe as I ascend. At the top of the stairs is another door, slightly ajar. I’m a little surprised to see light again after the dark, enclosed staircase. A beam of late afternoon sun shines through a slatted window to the right of the door. And here it is—just a dusty old attic. I step farther into the room, taking in the pitches and angles of the ceiling, the darkened eaves filled with cobwebs, spiders clinging between the beams, an old rocking chair in front of an old brick fireplace, a woman with long, gray hair.
“Wait—”
I start to scream. When I turn, I see Trevor smile—an evil gleam to rival my own—as he yanks the door at the top of the stairs shut. I hear a click, even as I scream and lunge for it. The old metal knob clangs in my hand, but the door doesn’t budge. I pound—god, how I pound—and beg and plead for the stupid cul-de-sacks to let me out. They laugh and snigger from the safety of the stairwell, on the other side of the door from…
Anna.
I stop pounding. I’m crying now. Just like I always do. I am such a baby. I always cry over silly things. And this is silly, right? There are no such things as ghosts—not even of faceless women who died some horribly gruesome death. Maybe I didn’t see what I think I saw. The form sitting in the chair is probably just a doll. Yeah. Part of the prank. Kyle’s brother and his friends probably set this all up, and Kyle, Trevor, Brenna, and Katie, the stupid cul-de-sacks, cashed in on the prank. And I walked with all my gumption and gusto right into the trap, believing that they were the stupid ones. But I am the one who fell for it.
I am still falling for it if I am still crying.
I tune out the sniggering—I’ll deal with the cul-de-sacks later—and force myself to calm down. Deep breaths. They will pay. I take comfort in visions of sweet revenge. Or maybe I’ll let it slide and keep this in my back pocket. Let them think they bested me until they least expect it. Only I’ll need something better than Visine this time. I will be fine.
“Get a grip, Mary,” I challenge myself.
When I finally have the nerve to look again, I expect the chair to be empty—or for her to be standing right behind me for a good jump-scare. Anna and her faceless mug, ready to claim me. But, no. She is there but she hasn’t moved. She isn’t even rocking. From where I stand by the locked door, I can only see her gray hair, her left shoulder and arm in a faded pink flower-print dress, and a knobby hand. The hand is good work if it is a fake. It isn’t a skeleton, but I can see the bones protruding unnaturally through the skin. She is so still, so impossibly still.
A doll. Has to be. A clever fake. Some mannequin or art school project. A paper mache masterpiece from some senior class prank put to good use. I am sure of it.
So, I gather the gumption that sent me into the room in the first place, and take a step toward her. Then another. And another. It isn’t far. Her flowered dress looks familiar, but I can’t figure out why. No one I know dresses like that—like someone from the 1940’s. The long, stringy hair is real enough. Gray. Then, just as I come up on her side, her head turns.
Anna looks at me.
They have it wrong: Trevor, Kyle, Brenna, and Katie. Kyle’s brother. The newspaper article. Anna has a face. At least, part of one. The left side, the one closest to me, is normal—well, normal for pallor, colorless flesh clinging loosely to a skull. But the right…the right has literally gone to the dogs. Shreds, like dangling crystals on a chandelier, hang from her forehead to her chin, and they tremble in the motion of turning her head to look at me.
Only she isn’t looking. Not with eyes anyway. Empty, black sockets stare not at me, but through me. I feel them wrap around my spine and drag me closer. Closer to where Anna sits in that faded flowered dress that I suddenly remember from the photo of little Brigit Mason who went into the old Victorian to visit an old woman and never came back out. The dress is Brigit’s, but the shredded remains are a face that belonged to Anna, the lonely old woman mauled and left for dead. I don’t understand how this is possible, but it is. It’s right in front of me.
I don’t scream. I can’t. I am frozen. There is cold death wrapped around me. I feel sad. So terribly, terribly sad. I cry a lot, but I never feel sad like this. It overwhelms me as the cold seeps into my pores from the woman with half a face. I cannot tear my gaze from the black pits where Anna’s eyes used to be. Then, a darkness, an empty void descends. I don’t see it, but it I sense it coming, closing in from all sides. It presses around my body like the tightest, most unwelcome hug until I can’t breathe. I am collapsing inside of myself, bones creaking, chest sinking, lungs crushing within the void’s inescapable embrace. My vision of the room, of Anna, closes in slowly. I know now I should’ve run when I had the chance. When my body still belonged to me. I am being swallowed. Consumed. And there’s nothing I can do about it. Anna is the last thing I see before the tunnel of blackness, the all-encompassing void, finally collapses, and I feel myself tripping, falling headfirst into nothingness.
I land in the room, but I’m not on my feet anymore and I’m closer to the fireplace. I don’t know how I got here. I can move again, but my body feels…different. The sadness is still with me, heavy like a weighted blanket. It’s the only thing that feels the same as it did before the void. It is…it is how Mom always says I should feel. I should feel sad for the kids that I hurt. She never understands how they all have it coming. Every last one. I never act without provocation. I never shove pencils into ears or rip out chunks of hair for no reason. I never added nuts to the allergen-free lunches in the cafeteria or started a fire in the sixth-grade science lab because my fellow classmates were wonderful people. Little shits all of them. If Mom hadn’t discovered the lily of the valleys I mixed into the batter of my birthday cake last year, I would’ve shown all those assholes what happens when I don’t want a goddamn birthday party!
I never feel sad for those kids. Just like I don’t feel sad for Brigit Mason, who probably came in here to torment a perfectly wonderful woman who just liked to be alone. The sadness that holds my rickety bones together is for Anna, the poor reclusive soul who liked to sit quietly in her attic in front of this fireplace, reading books, not bothering anyone, until stupid little brats—like those damn cul-de-sacks—thought it was funny to break into her house and disrupt her wonderfully quiet moments, and report back to the town what a crazy old hag Anna Farrington was. She wasn’t crazy. She just wanted to be alone. She just wanted peace and quiet. She just wanted—
THE LITTLE SHITS TO DIE.
The door flings open. They are all standing there, the cul-de-sacks. They had been smiling. Laughing at my terror. They aren’t laughing now. Trevor is in front since he closed the door. But I want to save him for last, so I grab him by the collar with my bony hand and yank him into the attic. He stumbles across the room, almost falling into the now-empty rocking chair. Kyle, next in line, screams—such a high-pitched, girly sound, it surprises me. I don’t take a mallet to his teeth. That would be too easy. Instead I unhinge my jaw and clamp my mouth over his lips, sucking his teeth straight from his slimy gums. He can’t believe it. I can’t believe it. I never knew I was this strong. When I let him go, there are caverns where his molars, lateral incisors, and those beautiful, pointed canines used to be. He shoves his fingers in his mouth and I laugh—a raucous, unexpected roar—since he reminds me of the abominable snowman from the Rudolph Christmas movie after he loses his teeth. Blood covers Kyle’s hands, and his eyes roll into the back of his head. He collapses at my feet before I decide if there’s anything else worth taking.
Brenna, tough Brenna. She’s too scared, too stunned by what happened to Kyle to move. Not so tough staring into my empty sockets. I decide her red hair isn’t enough. What I really need is a scalp—a full skull-cap, like the ones swimmers wear in the pool. It will be a lot of work for both of us to endure, but worth it in the end, I think. Even with these fancy new canines, tearing through the supple skin around her head is messy, the jagged line regrettable. I know it looks hideous, but one works with what they have. She flails. Of course she does. Nothing hurts worse than being scalped. Nothing that a person can survive anyway. I know before I lift my prize from the bloody bone underneath, that she’s already dead. Her eyes roll back like Kyle’s when the sheer trauma becomes too much. But, unlike Kyle, she won’t open them again.
Katie. The only one smart enough to run. The only one with the time to get out. Somehow, though I’m not sure how I do it, I seal the front door before she reaches it. Part of me is busy gnawing through Brenna’s face. Another part is aware that I cannot let Katie go. Not without leaving behind her bow for all this pretty red hair. When I catch up with her, she’s trying all the windows in the living room. Some are broken. All were nailed shut ages ago, which actually works in my favor. She picks up the splintered leg of what used to be an end table and tries to clear the jagged glass from one of the narrow panes of the rounded turret, the Victorian’s most notable feature. I wrap my hand around her wrist, and as I do, a knuckle bone breaks through my skin. I’ll have to fix that. I only wanted the bow, but Katie has nice fingers too.
She fights against the thick ribbon around her neck. I knew the bow was long enough to strangle her with when it was unraveled from her hair. I count, waiting for thirty seconds. I really want to know how the body will respond after so much time, but I make a fatal mistake. Well, fatal for Katie, at least. I can be forgiven for being overzealous when this is the most fun I’ve ever had. I pull too hard, and the ribbon is too strong. Her trachea collapses. I hear the delicious crunch as I feel it give. She, like Kyle and Brenna before her, also collapses.
After tying my red wavy hair back, I decide to wear Katie’s hands like the most pristine gloves in the becoming shade of peaches n’ cream. Then I make my way back up the main stairs, to the narrow steps where my final prize awaits. Trevor. Clever Trevor. He is ready with an old board he must’ve found while he was locked in the attic. He swings and the board cracks against my chest, tearing my flowered dress. His eyes widen—his big, green eyes—when I don’t go down. I don’t feel the hit at all, actually. Silly Trevor. He trips and I descend over his body for the delicate work of removing not just his corneas, but his whole eyeballs that will fill the sockets that have been empty for so long. My new Katie gloves are deft and efficient—an excellent choice. Trevor screams the loudest of any of them. Stays awake the longest too actually. I guess he really is a tough guy. When I’m done, and Trevor is laying before me, eyeless and whimpering, I use a splintered piece of the board he cracked against my chest to stab him in the heart. It’s the least I can do.
I leave Trevor in a bloody, lifeless heap of prepubescent spare parts, and return to Kyle on the stairs. Quiet, toothless Kyle with the brother who thought he knew a thing or two about Anna. Well, now he really will. I drag the unconscious miscreant past Brenna’s corpse and down the narrow stairs. His head thuds on each step and a trail of blood seeping from his mouth follows us to the second floor, down the main staircase. He gurgles, and I think his eyes roll open for a moment, just long enough to see Katie in the living room without her pretty bow or her precious hands.
I deposit Kyle on the porch. When Kenny brings my mom—and I’m sure he will—they will find him. Kyle, lucky or unlucky, depending on who you ask, will serve as this generation’s proof of the legend. A reminder of what happens to kids who condescend to disturb my rest. I hope his brother in particular takes responsibility for his part in poor little Kyle’s misadventure.
And if anyone else dares to make their way up to the attic, they’ll find me in my rocking chair in my pretty pink flowered dress, my long red hair pulled back with a big, white bow. I’ll turn and flash my pointy new canines, stare with my big, green eyes, and beckon with a small, delicate finger. Then I’ll do terrible things that terrible children deserve. Things that make Visine in smoothies and poisoned cake batter look like child’s play.
Like sending the new kid into an attic to meet a ghost with no face.
She has a face now. If my little brother Kenny ever comes up here to confront the legend of Anna, he’ll know what happened to his sister. Even with green eyes instead of brown, red hair instead of mousy frizz, he’ll recognize me. He’s a good kid. I hope he doesn’t come.
He has toes to die for.
​
​
submitted by MyInnerCulture to scarystories [link] [comments]

2024.03.15 17:34 Leading_Reputation22 [SELL][US]10 ml rollerballs Cocoapink, Naughty Button, Sage Goddess, Moonalisa 5mls, assorted Etsy shops

shipping: $5
Moonalisa
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Sage Goddess
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{take all three for $25}
Naughty Button
(10 ml rollerball oils):
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Cocoapink
(10 ml rollerball oils)
-Mansion: Sweet Magnolia, Pink Crepe Myrtle, soft peach nectar surrounded by sheer vanilla, the unmistakable notes of old books, stairwells and memories of what once was, sugared Tonka bean and oakmoss tempered by a drop of gentle white musk complete this haunting blend. formally Myrtles P-$10
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{take both for $15}
Lonjora J Scents
-Pink Raspberry Cosmo 10 ml: notes of pink raspberry, Florida orange, and green lime juice, followed by middle notes of juniper berries, lemon zests, and a Triple Sec accord; sitting on intoxicating notes of violet leaves, a Vodka accord, and a dash of sugar. Think Pink Drink!-$5
Patisserie Parfumerie
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Non-indie
Demeter Perfumes
-Birthday Cake 10 ml rollerball oil:
Demeter’s Birthday Cake is a delicious and aromatic blend of chocolate cake, buttercream icing and pink icing flowers-$5
submitted by Leading_Reputation22 to IndieExchange [link] [comments]

2024.03.06 22:11 Flagg1991 Houe of Whispers: Part 25

Light and sound whirled around Meagan in a disorienting tempest. She had no weight, no form, was nothing but pure energy. Her thoughts came not as words but as images and emotions. Cody lying face down in the river, the bad man thrusting into Mary-Anne Preston’s dead body, Alyssia’s naked flesh welted, bloody, and caked in dirt, Tom and Julia hacked into tiny pieces, victims of their daughter’s selfishness. Taylor Hogan uttered a cruel, hateful laugh; the girls in the group home called her names, one pulling her hair; Meagan herself lying in bed, sad and alone and wishing everyone wasn’t so mean to her.
Pictures, taunts, insults, the sting of a slap, and Cody’s eyes as his soul disincorporated, beautiful brown fading to dead gray - all flashing by, each one stoking the fire in her center until she glowed red like the heart of hellfire. She saw herself kissing Cody, bitterly remembered the happiness ripped away from her; she remembered Joey VanderMeer raping her, betraying her, letting his friends all hurt her. The fury grew, throbbed, swelled, burning hotter and brighter, blotting out everything else until nothing mattered, nothing but making them pay. Pay for raping her, pay for killing her sister, pay for putting her in a box and leaving her in darkness; pay, pay, paypaypaypaypay. She was hate, she was consumed, she was Meagan and Meagan was her, she was vengeance. The girl didn’t matter, the boy didn’t matter, even Mary-Anne didn’t matter. They were pawns, cogs, objects moved across a board.
She waited so long for this, passed so many years caught between worlds like a fly between window panes, too angry to pass, too weak to come back. She called the boy, but he wasn’t strong enough; the girl was. Her body was young, her vitality potent, she was pure, powerful, alive.
And now, after fifteen years, so was she.
Eyes long closed shot open, two dazzling beams on high; auburn hair writhed like Gorgon snakes; dead flesh rejuvenated, and a cold, still heart began to beat anew. A hate-filled scream exploded from dusty windpipes, and a soul once trapped broke free. The lights flickered, the closet door slammed open, then closed, bulbs burst, Tom clutched his daughter protectively and Julia screamed. The TV screen in the living room scrambled, then detonated like a bomb, spraying glass. The house shuddered as if in fear of her return, and streaks of lightning rent the night.
Doors slammed, windows bowed, the plaster hiding Alyssia’s second-to-final resting place cracked like the altar veil upon the death of Christ. Tom held Meagan’s head to his chest and screamed, his voice lost in the roar of second coming. Julia, white faced and wide-eyed, fell back against the wall, chest heaving, gaze darting from one impossibility to the next. Beneath the bed, Brody whimpered and piddled. A creaking moan sounded from the walls, a chorus of splitting struts and timbers, or perhaps a ghostly choir seeping through the tearing fabric separating their world from ours.
A shaft of unearthly white light poured from the closet and wind shrieked through the room, breaking the window, knocking the closet door off its hinges, shoving Julia roughly to the floor in a tangle of limbs and hair. A sizzling ball of light emerged from the closet and hovered before the terrified family, jagged tendrils feeling the air like tiny, ropy teneicles.
It seemed to vacillate, then with a shrill, banshee-like lament, it was sucked through the shattered window. Car alarms triggered spontaneously up and down the street, and the trees rustled as if in a great gale.
Head resting in her father’s lap, Meagan Harriman smiled.
Alyssia Preston’s rage was now loose in the night.
***
Dave Caswell took a long drink from the crumpled can, burped, and tossed it onto the empty passenger seat. Country music whispered from the radio in the dash, and the gentle rocking of the big rig’s cab lulled him. He shook his head, blinked his eyes, and rolled his neck. Lit by the green glow of the control panel, his face was haggard and drawn in the mirror, the pallid mask of a man who slept too little and worked too hard.
He was sailing south on I-95 from Pittsburgh with a load of electronics. He was fifteen miles north of Fredericksburg and nearly fifty from Richmond, his final stop. He’d been awake and on the road for two days, maybe three, kept alive by gas station coffee, Monster energy drinks, and handfuls of caffeine pills. A lot of guys would take meth in his shoes, but not him. He didn't do drugs or drink. He didn’t like not being in control of himself; bad things could happen when you aren’t in control.
Like -
He stopped that thought before it could form. Something happened a long time ago when he was drunk and it scared him off booze and dope forever. That’s all.
Sometimes, though, he flirted with the idea of speed. They say it pumps you up, and right now, grainy-eye and nodding, he could use a pump up. He was exhausted.
And sore.
Sitting behind the wheel of a truck might not sound labor intensive, but it was. His back hurt, his legs hurt, and his butt itched something fierce. There was a T&A truck stop just this side of Falmouth and he was seriously considering stopping, but already knew he wouldn’t. He was close to finishing this haul and once it was over, he could go home. Would he make it to Rossville tonight? It was 120 miles from Richmond to Rossville. He could be there in less than two hours.
That wasn’t far, but in his condition, he wasn’t sure he could get there without falling asleep. In an eighteen wheeler, you can’t slack for even a moment; it’s like a ship, you gotta stay alert at the helm or you’re in biiiig trouble.
Drawing a sigh, Dave turned the radio up; Blake Shelton was on with God’s Country and Dave grimaced. He was listening to a classic country station out of Maryland’s Eastern Shore but lost it somewhere around Warrenton. He didn’t like the new stuff. It was too modern and bland, pop shit about sex with the occasional mention of fried chicken or dirt roads to remind you you were listening to a country song. He liked the old stuff. Hank Sr., Waylon, Conway Twitty. There was something honest in their music. They weren’t trying to be country like the hat and boot wearing assholes on CMT, they sang about life and hardship, things everyone could relate to.
Ahead, the road stood black and unspoiled beyond the reach of the truck’s big headlights. A concrete retaining wall separated the north and south bound lanes, and cars whizzed by in the opposite direction, their lights washing over him and making him wince. Behind, his lane stood deserted save for another truck way back. 1-95 is a major artery and runs the entire length of the eastern seaboard, but you wouldn’t know that now. Once he got closer to Fredericksburg, traffic would pick up. In Richmond, it was apt to be heavy even at 11 pm.
God’s Country went off and a commercial for Big Bill’s Used Car Emporium replaced it (“Now that’s what I call a deal!”). Static hissed beneath the announcer’s boisterous pitch, and Dave changed it, settling for a station playing AC/DC. It, too, was staticky.
Whatever. Par for the course on the road; stations come and stations go.
He yawned and shifted his weight. The reflective markers in the asphalt were starting to hypnotize him and he forced his eyes away.
It was just after 8 pm by the dash clock. He’d be in Richmond by ten, out before eleven, and in his own bed no later than 1:30, 1:00 if traffic was light
AC/DC gave way to Metallica, and the static was so bad he could barely make out the vocals. A half mile later, it was all white noise interspersed with pops like knots in a fire. He touched the dial, and a shock raced up his arm. He wrenched his hand back with a startled grunt. “Shit.”
The radio’s LED face flickered and cut out, then came back, only now instead of green it was fluorescent white.
Electrical issue.
Great.
Perfect.
Just what his night needed, the possibility of the dash blowing up in his face.
“Fuckin’ shit,” he said. He leaned over the wheel and shook his head in exasperation. The siren song of the road called him back, and he calmed, forgetting the danger.
How many miles before he heard the voices? Five? Ten? He became aware of them gradually, the way a sleeping man might the brush of insect legs on his cheek. He glanced uneasily at the radio, expecting it to explode in a shower of plastic and metal at any moment, then back to the road.
The voices - a dozen, maybe more, stations overlapping - grew in volume until he could make out errant words. “Forecast”, “President”, “Mind.” He began to relax again, but bristled when he heard his name, a quick, sharp sound in the white noise.
“Dave.”
His eyes darted nervously to the radio. Words scrolled across the readout now, blinking black type.
Just a coincidence, sure, but kind of spooky nevertheless.
“Dave…”
Coincidence though it may be, the back of his neck prickled. He fixed the radio with an uncertain look, then yelled when a spark of electricity arched out of it. “Dave...Dave...DAVE…”
The voice was clearer, louder, and God help him, he almost thought he recognized it, like a face glimpsed once from afar. His heart pumped cold water into his veins and phantoms bugs crawled over his arms. Something wasn’t right here and call him what you want, but he was getting scared.
A green exit sign appeared ahead, and he changed lanes, intending to park someone and get out...at least until the heebie jeebies passed.
“DAVE!”
Every light in the cab flashed on at once, then went out. The wheel locked in his hands, and his heart rocketed into his mouth. The readout cracked, and steam rushed out in a plume. He tried to turn, but the wheel was stuck.
“Daaaavvvveee.”
The seat belt drew tight across his chest, as though someone had pulled it from behind, and something smashed his foot into the gas pedal. The truck’s engine kicked into high gear and the tires flew over the pavement. Someone screamed, and Dave realized it was him.
Mist swirled around his head and the voice tapered off to whispers again, a dozen, a hundred, a thousand. The truck was barrelling through the night, faster than it had any right to go, and the wheel grew hot in his hands. He tried to let go, but his palms stuck fast. Jesus, what was happening? WHAT WAS HAPPENING?
The seatbelt tightened even more, biting into his chest, cutting his air flow. Seering agony snaked up his arms, and the sizzle of cooking flesh found his ears. He threw back his head and moaned through clenched teeth.
“Dave.”
Crystal. Right next to him. He turned his head...and his breath hitched.
Alyssia Preston knelt in the passenger seat, facing him. Her face was bloodless white and her eyes like those of a dead fish: Lifeless, soulees, cold. Dave didn’t have time to process what he was seeing or to even be afraid before she was on him. He let out a howl, and all at once, the wheel unfroze. He jerked unthinkingly to the left, and the headlights revealed an impossible forest of concrete.
The ghost was gone now, but her mocking laugh lingered.
Crazy.
He was -
Hurtling at nearly one hundred miles per hour, the truck was a 40,000 pound missile. The front end smashed through the retaining wall, crushed a sports car under its tires, and slammed into the support column of an overpass. In the moment before impact, Dave Caswell’s eyes widened…
...then the cab snapped closed around him like a set of avenging jaws.
He was alive, impaled and twitching, for a long time afterwards.
***
The shrill, monotonous cry of the smoke alarm echoed through the house, piercing Julia’s ears and sinking deep into her brain. Cold night wind rushed in through the broken window, and the curtains danced like gleeful ghosts celebrating the long-awaited return of their mistress. Tom sat on the bed with Meagan’s head in his lap, dazed and staring into space, as though what just happened required the utmost contemplation. Brody issued a series of pathetic whimpers, and the overhead light dimmed, then brightened again.
Julia, sitting against the wall with her legs splayed in front of her in a V, tried to make sense of it, but her mind rebelled. She was a rational woman. She could buy someone being able to pick up on psychic energy from time to time, but not...this...whatever this was. She swallowed thickly, ran her fingers through her tangled red hair, and blinked rapidly, as if by doing so she could dispel the events of the past five minutes and make everything normal again. She was numb, drunk, her head stuffed with cotton and her insides chilled. Was she in shock? She tried to remember the signs and symptoms, but they wouldn’t come, nothing would except for the firm, demonic voice that spake from Meagan’s throat.
She shuddered and shot an uneasy glance at the bed. Tom stroked Meagan’s forehead, looking as lost and stricken as Julia felt. “Honey?” he asked, his voice barely a croak. “Meagan, can you hear me?”
Meagan gazed up at the ceiling, her eyes milky white and her lips moving. Julia’s stomach twisted, and the realization that her baby was in trouble burned through the fog swaddling her brain. Her maternal instincts kicked in, and on her knees, she scuttled to the bedside. “Meagan?” she asked shakily. “Baby?”
The little girl’s lips formed a litany of silent words. Her eyes didn’t blink. Julia pressed her hand to Meagan’s forehead, and it was clammy, slick with sweat.
Verging on skull-blasting panic, Julia looked her daughter up and down, not knowing what to do or how to do it. T-That thing said it would kill her if they called anyone. And if they did call an ambulance, what could they do? Ho do you fight something like this?
A priest?
Ghostbusters?
Pat.
The paranormal investigator. He’d know what to do, he had to.
But if she called him…
Frustration knotted her chest and a sob welled in her throat. She had never felt more helpless, more powerless, than she did right now, kneeling next to her daughter and unable to help her. Tears flooded her eyes and she pressed the heels of her palms to them as if to keep them from overflowing.
Scarcely audible, Meagan whispered a single word over and over again.
Julia wasn’t sure, but she thought it was “Bobby.”
***
After shutting down the grill, scraping the flattop, and turning out the light, Bobby Beauford left the kitchen and walked into the dining room.
Phyllis, a short, pudgy little woman with short brown hair and glasses, sat behind the register and counted a stack of crumpled bills. Her husband Donnie, tall and so scrawny that his black Mel’s Diner T-shirt hung from his frame, weaved aimlessly between the empty tables, stopping to wipe one here and there with a white rag so grimey it should have been tossed out a week ago. A varied and schizophrenic mix of framed posters dotted the pale blue walls - Babe Ruth, Gone With The Wind, Frank Sinatra, the Brooklyn Bridge at night - and an old school Payola jukebox sat unused in a corner. Bobby had been working here for seven years, first as a dishwasher then as a cook and finally as kitchen manager, and in all that time, it had never once moved or played.
It’s for looks, Donnie told him once in his challenging, New York gangster accent. Everything he said sounded like a threat and sometimes you couldn’t tell if he was sore at you or just making small talk.
Transplants from Staten Island (Phyliss was half Italian, Donnie, to literally everyone’s surprise, was Irish-German), they had been living in Daytona Beach for twenty years. They opened Mel’s with their daughter eight years ago. Bobby had been with them since almost the beginning. The pay was decent enough - especially with Florida’s lack of state tax - and Phyllis gave him cash every day, so he always had a little spending money in his pocket.
For groceries.
And cigarettes.
And coke,
“You almost done?” Donnie asked sharply.
“Give me a minute,” Phyliss replied defensively. She counted out sixty dollars in fives and tens and handed it to Bobby. “Here you go,” she said.
“Thanks. You want me to come in early and clean the hoods?”
Phyllis opened her mouth and closed it indecisively. Dotty and ditzy, she had trouble making up her mind and usually didn’t until the twenty-fifth hour, which drove Donnie (and everyone else) nuts. “Uh...yeah, you can come in. 5:30?”
“Alright, yeah, I’ll be here.”
“Thank you.”
Pocketing the money, Bobby crossed the dining room to the door. “Take it easy, Bob,” Donnie said.
“You too.”
Pushing through the door, he went out into the warm Florida night.
A symphony of crickets made light, summery music and a hazy moon kept watch from the inky heavens. He took a deep breath and let it out through his nose. He loved Florida, and had since his folks took him to Disneyworld when he was ten. The temperature was always nice, even in the dead of winter, and you were never more than a couple miles from a white, sandy beach. He moved here shortly after high school and never looked back. Literally, the only time he’d been back to Rossville was when Mom died. He didn’t even come back when the house sold.
He hated that house.
Behind the wheel of his ‘98 Dodge Avenger, he pulled his seatbelt on, put it in reverse, and swung left.
Mel’s occupied a suite in a largely deserted strip mall on the corner of South Clyde Morris Blvd and Herbert Street, an intersection boasting a gas station and an ice cream parlor where people sat outside on picnic tables year round. Bobby turned left onto Herbert, then right onto Clyde Morris. Ten minutes later, he pulled into the narrow parking lot fronting his building, a tall, boxy contract with stucco walls and a red terra cotta roof, He parked in front of the stairwell, got out, and went inside.
The apartment, spacious with an island separating the kitchen from the living room, was neat and tidy, the floors vacuumed, the throw pillows on the couch placed just so, and the wall-mounted flatscreen new and flashy. On his days off, Bobby bumped a couple rails of coke as soon as he woke up, and by evening, he buzzed around like a kid on sugar, cleaning this, polishing that, dusting, waxing, washing, scrubbing, fluffing. He lived alone and spent most of his time at Mel’s, so the place was never messy to begin with. In fact, it sometimes struck him as downright unlived in. He woke at 5:00 am, was at work by 5:45, and didn’t come back again sometimes until eight or nine. At most, he ate, watched an hour or two of TV, and went to bed.
Locking the door behind him, he made his way into the kitchen, opened the fridge, and grabbed a bottle of Corona from the top shelf. He twisted the cap off, tossed it into the garbage, and took a long, thirsty drink. Next, he opened the freezer and scanned the boxes crammed inside for something to make. Pot roast, meatloaf, chicken fried rice, nothing looked good. Finally, he settled on a Stouffer’s French bread pizza. You’re supposed to put these in the oven, aren’t you? He checked the back, saw that you were, and let out an indifferent, “Meh.”
He took it out of the box, ripped off the inner cellophane packaging, and sat it on a plate. He popped it in the microwave, set the timer for six because the rig was a low wattage piece of junk, and went into the living room with his beer. Dropping onto the couch, he kicked his feet up on the coffee table, snatched the remote, and turned on the TV.
The Goldbergs was on, and he hesitated before tossing the remote aside; that was the show about the eighties, and Bobby didn’t a shit about the eighties. It was either that or Dancing With the Stars, though, and he’d rather eighties nostalgic over Sean Spicer’s fat ass doing the rumba anyday.
Taking another drink, he settled in and let out a long belch. He was just getting interested in the generic sitcom storyline when the screen flickered. A second later, it turned to snow. Son of a bitching Comcast strikes again.
Hurt at being left out, the power flickered too.
And there goes FPL.
Whatever, his food should almost be done. As long as the central air stayed on, he didn’t give shit.
He sat his beer down, got up, and walked into the kitchen. No sooner had his crossed the threshold than his ears detected a strange zapping sound. He looked at the microwave and sputtered; through the glass viewing window, stalks of electricity streaked back and forth like lightning. The smell of burning ozone pinched his nose, and coming alive, he rushed over, grabbed the cord, and yanked it from the wall. The microwave’s hum died and the current faded away.
Bobby took a moment to catch his runaway heart, then drew a deep breath. So it wasn’t Comcast and FPL, it was this hunk of cast-off, tag sale crap. He bent over, and his reflection in the door grimaced back at him. “You little fu -”
The microwave exploded.
Searing heat rushed over Bobby’s face, blistering his skin, and shards of glass and plastic embedded in his flesh. He let out a strangled cry and danced back, his hands flying to his wounded visage; bright, pulsing pain ballooned in his skull and his eyes burned like embers. His feet tangled and he fell against the wall, knocking a clock from its nail; it fell to the floor and landed face up, the hour hand spinning backwards like out of control fan blades. Bobby slumped to the side and landed on his knees; blood and bits of wet, lumpy flesh oozed through his fingers, and his eyes ran down down his raw cheeks in white rivulets. He gave voice to his torment...
...and something answered.
Like throwing a switch, the kitchen came alive: The toaster dinged, cabinets slammed, ice cubes shot from the fridge’s water dispenser and pelted Bobby like hail, the TV cut back on, the volume blaring. A glass flew out of the drying rack and smashed into the side of his head, shredding his scalp. His heart pounded and terror seized him, burning off the pain. Another glass hit him, and another, then a wooden spoon.
The air shimmered with electricity and a low, guttural rumble shook the walls. The TV flew from its spot and hit the far wall, cracking the plaster and breaking. The pipes groaned, and a gyster of hot, sludgy water burst from the drain. Bobby curled up on the floor and did his best to protect himself from the onslaught. A plate smashed on the floor next to him, showering his face with jagged pieces of ceramic. A fork stuck in his leg, the toaster caught fire, the fridge trembled, then waddled out of its alcove before tipping over and crushing his legs to the knee; bones snapped with a wet crack, and Bobby screeched like a trod upon cat.
A voice, barely a whisper but somehow loud, spoke from the center of his head.
“Bobby.”
Bobby’s heart came to a halt and every muscle in his body went stiff.
He recognized it.
Alyssia Preston.
Not a night went by that he didn’t hear it in his sleep, that her screams didn’t resound through the haunted chambers of his own mind.
He didn’t mean to do it. H-He wasn’t thinking straight and when Joey told him he could have her, he just...he was drunk! He regretted it every single day, he didn’t mean to, it was Joey’s fault.
“Bobby...I’m back.”
She stood over him. He couldn’t see her but he could feel her. He pictured her as he last saw her, naked, covered in purple bruises, and afraid. She looked so young, no more than a baby. That image was burned into his memory, only now, she wasn’t lying on the ground, sobbing and trying to get away, she towered strong and proud, chin tucked to her chest, white light glowing in her eyes.
“I-I’m sorry!” Bobby cried. “Please, I-I’m so sorry!”
She knelt beside him, and he cringed. Warm pressure laid on the back of his head like a ghostly touch, and his spine tingled. “Please, I’m sorry!”
The hand went to his throat.
“No! No!”
Another joined it.
Bobby broke down, his sob cutting off when Alyssia squeezed. Every thought, every feeling, every ounce of pain poured out of her and into him, filling is heart, his soul, his head. His nerve endings quivered, and the most exquisite and excruciating agony Bobby had ever known cut through him like a thousand electrician knife blades.
He didn’t want to die…
...but when the escape of death finally came, he embraced it heartily.
submitted by Flagg1991 to Viidith22 [link] [comments]

2024.02.22 20:03 jarofgoodness My Seal Team Found Something Horrific in the Baltic Sea

I was a part of a Navy Seal team called SAC-OP Recon. If you know anyone who was a Navy Seal they'll tell you they never heard of us which is by design. They'll think you mean Spec Ops. We're above that. Spec Ops guys don't even know we exist. The team operates within special access programs, all of which are programs and projects that have the highest security clearance the US government uses.
I can't tell you any of the things I worked on and I wouldn't if I could. Let's just say that if the military or an intel group needed to see or do anything underwater that no one could know about and that also required knowledge of technologies and information that even regular seals aren't cleared to have access to, they'd send us in.
Our job was to survey the site in detail. Not like you see on National Geographic, where they do some sonar scans and sit back and write a paper about it and pat themselves on the back. They take years, sometimes decades to do what we have to do in a few days. We map out every inch of the area with high quality sonar, infrared, visible light, x-ray, backscatter microwave, and a few things I can't mention. By the time we're done, if there's a dime sitting buried in the sand on the ocean floor you can find it in our data.
Our work is quickly processed and handed over to our sister team called SAC-OP Strike. Normal Seal teams call these guys Fire Teams. They do everything from sabotage, disarming mines, to underwater combat. Yes combat. Actual underwater combat. They have special weapons designed to work underwater and I'm not talking about mere knives and spearguns.
Anyway, it was 2013 and we were sent to the Baltic Sea with orders to check out something that had recently been found on the ocean floor by some sunken treasure hunters. It's called the Baltic Sea Anomaly. The Swedish government had quietly shut the treasure hunter's study of the object down and made them sign national security oaths to keep their mouths shut and play it off like they can't find funding for further expeditions. Meanwhile they called the U.S. for assistance. They have their own divers of course, but this thing was shutting down any and all electronics that came within 200 feet of it. They were stumped.
The object itself was located about 300 feet below the surface and was just sitting there on the ocean floor. It was almost perfectly round except for a few sections that looked as if they had been cut out. It had the basic shape of that ship Han Solo flew in the Star Wars movies - the Millenium Falcon. The treasure hunters original sonar image had been published before the Swedes had the situation under control so the public was already theorizing it to be a UFO. It was not.
The object sat at the end of a long trail in the sand that stretched out on the bottom and into a ravine that appeared to be cut out of a small undersea mountain. This gave the impression to some that this was a crash landing scar on the ocean floor where the object had slid to a stop upon it's sinking. It was not.
I was looking forward to the challenge of performing a reconnaissance mission without the aid of electronics. We brought a few devices with us just in case, but were fully prepared and expecting not to be able to use them. We even had underwater flares in case our lights shut off.
Our mission was simple: determine the basic nature of the object and survey it's exterior in detail. This sounds easier than it is. Especially without cameras and electronics. To determine the nature of the object we used the null hypothesis approach. This is where you try to rule things out by attempting to disprove your hypothesis. In this case we were acting on the hypothesis that the formation was natural in origin. Was it sandstone or a build up of sediment that just happened to form a shape that coincidentally looked like a construction?
Deep down I was thinking it was probably some WWII equipment that had been scuttled or blasted off of a ship during the war. Maybe the base of a large ship mounted gun. But why would it be knocking electronics out? And how? At any rate all of us were Geologists, Marine Biologists, and Oceanographers so we knew exactly what to look for. I know that might sound odd to you. You have to understand that knowing what we are doing in all situations that we might encounter is what the military was paying for. You are not deployed in our group without these skills. If you don't want to do the schooling stay in the regular Seals.
In addition to our skill set our team only had two squads of three men each and no commanding officers. All six of us were officers of equal rank. We designed the missions ourselves and operated with extreme self discipline. If you need an officer to tell you what to do, then you aren't fit for our kind of work. The Navy learned the hard way a long time ago that a commanding officer's ego can ruin a mission in certain circumstances. And while it might be necessary to have one when the men under him need that to perform, in the case of SEC-OP missions they only get in the way and risk lives and mission failure, and we did not fail at our missions. It wasn't allowed. Teams in the old days had to keep shanking their commanding officers to ensure mission success and finally the Navy just started letting us do our thing.
My squad was going to start by taking samples of the surface material that had settled or otherwise built up on the object. We would drill through it with diamond tipped hand powered drills we had to determine what the object beneath was composed of. We'd do this with the aid of special chemistry test kits we had which were designed to work in ocean water. Remember, we couldn't use spectrometers because electronics were useless. The other team was going to examine every inch of the thing looking for signs of manufacturing. Both teams would also create a map of the object's magnetic field and variance if there was any, using only hand held compasses and underwater pencils. Yes, we were that good.
We began our dive when the sun was exactly 45 degrees above the horizon. This would provide enough light so we wouldn't need to use our flares for most of the day. We didn't bring air tanks except small ones for emergencies, and instead had hoses coming from the surface, supported by air bags every fifty feet. This would allow us to stay down as long as we needed. The Strike team was topside in the boat making sure the air pumps were working and preparing for whatever they might have to do once we came back with our assessment. They weren't expecting to have to do anything as we all assumed that this was either a piece of wartime hardware or an ancient ruin but they were prepared anyway. They always were.
On the way down, I noticed there were no fish or life of any kind in the waters around us. Usually that time of year you could find flounder, herring, Cod, and other species of fish swimming about. Maybe it was an odd coincidence but I found it noteworthy just the same.
As we approached the object a strange feeling came over us. It was an unusual feeling for us all. It was mild fear and apprehension. We had all been in much more dangerous situations that this before and we were trained not to fear. We didn't fear death, injury, or even drowning, yet all of us reported this same sensation.
We wore special dive masks that covered our entire faces so we could speak to each other. Sound travels well in the water and so as long as we were close enough we could all discuss what we needed to. We agreed to continue the mission in spite of this feeling but to make sure we kept each other aware of any increase in feelings of duress that we might experience. We soon arrived at the object and split up into our respective squads.
Up close the object was clearly not a natural formation, but we would go through our process anyway to be thorough. The object was somewhat flat on top except for a small perfectly smooth dome on the right side. To the left side there was a stairway going up to the flat top. The right angles and straight lines on the object had been dismissed as a rare but real natural phenomena that occurs due to the molecular nature of certain types of stone combined with water erosion from tides and currents. But here the stairs were sandwiched between flat stone walls on both sides which would prevent water from moving in the necessary directions to erode the stairs into the perfect steps that they were.
I chipped off a small chunk of the material on the side of the structure and put it into my test kit's receptacle, squeezed some chemicals into the enclosure, and shook it. I already knew but the resulting color of the mixture verified that the object was indeed covered with a thick layer of silt and sand that had built up, compacted, and hardened over time. It must have taken a long time to get into the state it was in because that part of the Baltic Sea didn't have a lot of turbulent water or natural silt.
I got the drill out and turned the hand crank as the bit sunk into the caked on silt and sand. It went down about four inches when it hit the underlying structure. I withdrew the drill, blew the silt out of the hole with a turkey baster type of device we use, and looked in. I recognized the material right away. It was coarse grained granite. Pink, black, and white specks together. The surface of the object wasn't just made from granite which shouldn't be found at the bottom of the sea, but it was polished granite! Perfectly flat and smooth. I cleared off some more of the compacted sand covering the area and showed it to my team: Brent, and David, both of whom were busy mapping the magnetic variance of the object. David swam over to the other squad to inform them of the discovery while Brent showed me the map they had made thus far.
It was unbelievable. They drew on a plastic sheet that had a sketch of the object on it with a special kind of grease pencil that worked under water. The lines they drew around it represented the distance from the object where the magnetic field the object emitted varied from standard north/south, and each line had a number on it indicating how many degrees off from the expected compass reading it was at that point. According to the map, the object was pulling the compass needle a full forty five degrees away from magnetic north towards itself. This effect was not present at the surface as we had checked before descending.
Just then David swam back over and told us that the other squad had found something that we needed to see. We met them behind the object where the bottom of the structure met the ocean floor. The men had discovered a small doorway. My squad volunteered to go inside. We removed our air lines and hooked up our emergency air tanks, each containing about a half hour of air.
It was dark inside the passageway and so I lit up a flare. We were in a hallway that led back towards the front of the object, but underneath it. The walls had less silt on them and we could wipe it off with our hands down to the polished granite. About halfway back the passageway ramped upward and we walked up and out of the water into a large room inside the structure.
The room was dark and cold. My flare lit the walls and ceiling revealing the same polished granite as the outside. There were engravings in the stone wall every four feet or so. The ceiling was about 12 feet from the floor. The room was a half circle in shape and had three granite tables that resembled altars a little bit, one on each side of the ramp and one behind it. The rest of the room was bare.
I tried to turn on my flashlight and as expected it did not work. David started sketching the images on the engravings which appeared to me to be depictions of human sacrifice. In the images, the rituals were taking place on the top exterior of the very structure we were inside. It was clear from the scenes depicted that this building wasn't always underwater. Either the oceans had risen since it was in use, or the land had sunken.
Brent pulled me over to one of these engravings and pointed. There in the image was some creature devouring the sacrifice. The men in the scene weren't sacrificing people to some deity, they were feeding a monster.
It was like a man in that it had two legs and feet, however at the waist it appeared to have about a dozen tentacles coming off its body but no arms. It did have a head though but it looked more like a giant mouth gaping open with a large teeth. The thing had large feathers coming off its back and the top of it's head as well. I've never seen anything like it depicted before however there are some Aztec and pre-Columbian figures that are similar in a few ways.
Brent and I quickly measured the room's dimensions and did a walkthrough, covering every square foot of the place. We found a stone door that appeared as though it was supposed to rotate on a central shaft, however we could not get it to budge. We discovered a stairwell that descended downward, but not back into the water. This went down into stone. We surmised that the structure had been built on top of an even larger rock or mountain that was now buried by the seafloor.
We descended the stone stairwell, which was not made of the same granite as the upper chamber. Instead this material looked like standard seafloor Basalt. The stairs ended about forty feet down into a small antechamber. There were some relics on the floor there, a spear and a set of ankle shackles. Both appeared completely oxidized to the point where they would probably disintegrate upon our attempting to pick them up.
The room had an opening that led into a huge cavern which was lit by an abundance of bioluminescent algae which coated much of the cave walls as well as a small river that flowed in and out of a set of pools. The water glowed a bright aqua color from this algae which made the water cloudy and opaque. There were large quartz crystals embedded in the rock along with iron pyrite and veins of gold. The view was spectacular.
We wondered aloud what had been in those shackles. We suspected it was the creature from the engravings or perhaps a sacrificial victim. There were footpaths that ran between the rock and stalagmites that formed the floor of the cavern. We split up and each proceeded down different paths giving ourselves exactly ten minutes time to meet back at the foot of the stairwell. Our air would be running out by then and we weren't going to risk trying to breathe the ancient air down there. We'd have to head back soon.
We took air, water, and sand samples as well as photographs using old fashioned, non electronic cameras loaded with a special film designed for low light. The cavern seemed to go back at least three hundred feet, with a ceiling around thirty feet high. The width I estimated in the neighborhood of fifty to sixty feet.
I could hear water pouring into water coming from the rear of the cave and so I headed back to ascertain whether or not there was some kind of waterfall back there someplace. I rounded a bend in the footpath and saw the source of the sound. A two foot diameter flow of water was pouring out of the sidewall of the cave about twenty feet up, arcing into a pool that was recessed in the floor. Behind the waterfall there were several skeletons chained up to the back wall. I started to take some photos of this when I felt something wrap around my right ankle.
Looking down I beheld a black tentacle protruding up out of the pool which had wrapped around my lower leg several turns. I instinctively pulled my leg away but it tightened its grip as I did so. I sounded a distress call from a noise making device we each carried on our wetsuit as I struck the tentacle with my fist in the hope it might release me.
It pulled back a bit which caused me to fall onto my back. I reached for my rock pick as the thing rose up out of the water. It was hideous. It used it's tentacles for support on the black rocky ground. Its head was like an octopus only the mouth was front facing. It growled, baring what reminded me of shark teeth with several rows going towards the back of its throat. It started to pull me towards it and lift me up off the ground when Brent reached me with David not far behind. He struck the tentacle that held me with his rock pick letting loose a glowing aqua colored fluid from the creature's flesh. It immediately dropped me and turned its attention to Brent.
Its saucer sized, amber eyes twitched back and forth as it examined him a moment before it lashed out with two of its tentacles. As it did, both of these appendages projected long, thin, sharp, white ribbed rods from their tips which pierced Brents torso. The creature then lifted him up and pulled him in towards its gaping and shrieking mouth.
David had arrived at my location by then and began to drag my body backwards away from the thing as it put Brent's head into its mouth and closed it in a circular fashion around his neck where its teeth cut through Brent's wetsuit and flesh. He flayed around trying to break free for a moment before the creature had bitten his head clean off. We could only watch and take a few photos from a distance as it used it's tentacles to peel back his wetsuit and munch on Brent's body like a human would when deshelling a shrimp.
I got to my feet as David announced that we needed to let the strike team handle it. The two of us headed for the stairwell as fast as we could. Before we could get there, the creature swam along the river next to us and jumped out of the water, tackling David while thrusting it's pointy rods through him just like it did to Brent.
David and the beast fell over sideways and it proceeded to feed on him. It did so with such ferocity and speed that I had no time to try to save him. All I could do was run and take advantage of the fact that it would be stalled from killing me for a minute as it feasted on David.
I glanced back as I ran and saw that the creature had put David's lifeless body down and had begun to pursue me. I guess it didn't want to lose any of that rare human meal it had discovered. I suppose it had been feeding on the algae in the water for so long that the taste of blood once again after all these years was too much for it to resist.
Just as I was reaching the opening into the small chamber where the stairwell was, the thing flung itself at me and I landed on my back. I had my rock pick in hand by then so I started to bang it's pointed tip into the meat of one of the monster's tentacles. It withdrew it but as it did, the thing wrapped its body around my upper torso and pressed it's flesh against the back of my neck where I could feel tiny bristle-like hairs stick into my spine. Like little needles they inserted deep into my nervous system where the creature hijacked my motor control.
It used this method to couple with my brain and our minds became one mind. I knew its entire history, thoughts, and experiences. I understood its deepest motivations and desires and it knew mine. It used my legs to walk as it rode me like a horse back up the stairwell, into the chamber above, and down the ramp to the open sea outside.
It hadn't been out of the cavern in over a millenia as it needed a human host to climb the stairs. I could feel its excitement as we exited the structure and proceeded to kill the three men in the other squad who had been waiting for our return.
Knowing the lethality of the strike team it opted to steal an inflatable motorized raft and sink the boat by having me chip a hole in the hull with my rock pick. The sound of my doing this alerted the seals inside to our presence and two of them entered the water to check it out as we sped off in the raft.
I got an oversized trench coat to hide the creature on my back so I could move about among the masses without causing a stir. I haven't checked in with the Navy in several weeks now and am currently sitting in a cheap hotel room in Barcelona typing this.
While I would like to be rid of this thing, I also have to admit that I feel its pleasure at the taste of human blood and meat. Our minds have become one and I am as much it as I am me. I know the military will have sent a wet team to track me down by now and I know they will probably eventually find me. I have to stay on the move. The trail of dead will soon give away my whereabouts as the method of the kills is unique and leaves its own signature.
I'm putting this story online as a last ditch effort to get a message through to my dear mother, Jane, the only person I still feel connected to and whom I miss dearly. I love you mom. I'm sorry about all of this and maybe someday if I'm lucky we can meet again.
I've already left too many bodies here, so I'm leaving Barcelona tonight before daybreak. But first I feed again. X
submitted by jarofgoodness to nosleep [link] [comments]

2024.02.18 19:01 United_Patriots Galactic Urban Adventures

Taking Place in the Nature of Orion Universe
Taran was no stranger to breaking an entering. At this point, it was basically his job.
Galactic Urban Adventures was one of the more popular channels on the net. The success still surprised Taran, given that the whole thing started as a hobby. Between classes at Cenovak State, he would take his shitbox city car, cheap camcorder, boundless curiosity, and explore. The Cradle provided plenty of opportunities.
The ecological collapse took half of the planet's producers with it. One didn’t have to travel far out of town to find overgrown orchards, littered with the long dead corpses of monitor drones. Shadowed by vine choked buildings, waiting for workers that would never return. Specters haunted the Cradle, and Taran was there to catch them on camera.
Taran didn’t expect much. He thought wandering through abandoned buildings with a shitty camera on a stick would only appeal to his specific brand of autism. So he was surprised when the channel started picking up traction, and began making actual money. Enough that he decided “Screw it, I’m going all in.”
Taran told Cenovak State to piss off, hopped in his car, and explored some more. The channel grew steadily, as the locations became more exotic, more dangerous. Abandoned farms turned into shuttered factories, defunct missile silos, old military test sites. With each risk, came greater reward. So Taran decided to take the biggest risk of them all.
The Thaffki homeworld was the first to fall to the initial Dominion advances. Even now, with them on the backfoot, it still lay well behind the front lines. Only someone out of their mind would ferry a young Gojid to a place like that. The Arxur had such a reputation.
Celic was a space taxi driver, although he disliked the term. He would take you anywhere, as long as you had the credit, and as long as it didn’t involve getting shot at. Taran’s request failed both of those criteria. But he was as persistent as he was curious, and along with a rather significant forward payment, convinced the Arxur to take him along.
Together, they made the rather inadvisable choice to burn straight into Dominion space. Luckily for them, they were too concerned with the looming Federation invasion to bother a glorified tin can with a subspace drive bolted to the back. The duo, to Taran’s excitement and Celic’s relief, touched down on the surface unmolested.
They emerged to a graveyard, long untouched by sapience, weathered by time. The central business district of the city had been struck by antimatter, leaving a plate of glass in its place. On the periphery, twisted steel tombstones, backs broken by the unrelenting power of material annihilation. Nature spilled from every nook and cranny, filling the void left by death.
The specters had come to haunt again. For Taran, it was visions of those who lived before. Closing his eyes, he could almost see them, in those final days. Unaware that their lives were measured in mere hours, if they were lucky. There was an unease to it all, as if the mere act of standing amidst was intruding on some sacred place. Celic felt much the same way, seeing impressed upon the ruins the sins of his people. A reminder of why he had to watch his back. They were only there for a day. A day was all they needed.
If Galactic Urban Adventures was on the map before, then the Thaffki episode made it the cartographer. It racked up a billion views in just the first day alone. It shot to the top of every trending page, news outlets ran it non stop. Interviews, articles, more interviews. By the end of that first week, Taran and Celic, along with GUA, became almost household names.
Celic decided to stick around, only because he found he enjoyed the attention, and Taran was happy to have him along. Some banter would do well to spice up the videos. And besides, exploring ruins could get lonely.
Now a two man act, Urban Galactic Adventures only continued to grow. A trend carried forward with the arrival of humanity. Say what you will about them, their homeworld had plenty of places to explore. Chernobyl, Fukushima, Three Mile Island. A lot of those early Earth episodes had a radiation theme to them. Luckily, enough time had passed so that skin cancer wasn’t a concern.
The later episodes certainly carried more variety. One of the more memorable ones, at least for Taran, was Doha. Not least for the fact that he nearly came down with heatstroke. Fun fact, dark brown fur does not mesh well with the desert sun. But regardless, the ghost city certainly held its own charm. Due to the climate, everything that wasn’t buried beneath the encroaching sand was preserved perfectly. The duo could ascend a dune to the 40th story of a half submerged skyscraper, and find offices that looked as if everyone had just left. That episode was definitely one of the more successful.
Miami too was certainly noteworthy. A category six hurricane made a mockery of the city's flood defenses back in 2062, leaving most of downtown submerged in waist deep water. A rare opportunity to see the early stages of nature's reclamation. Vines and creepers slowly ascending the swamped condominiums, as seabirds and fish used the flooded streets as their highways. They even managed to spot a crocodile, which Taran jokingly referred to as Celic’s cousin. He did not appreciate the comparison.
Certainly, Earth held its secrets. Many of which, Taran hoped, lay within the dark subways of New York City.
“Remind me why we’re here again?” Celic said for the camera. He stood swaying gently in his windbreaker, the skyline of downtown peeking just above the row houses behind him.
“Because,” Taran worked the bolt cutter around the chain, “New York City has an extensive network of tunnels, most of which have been left abandoned. Its prime content waiting for us down there.”
“And I presume,” The Arxur arched an eyebrow, “that the tunnels have been abandoned for a good reason?”
“Well, that's for us to find out. And there we…go!” Taran squeezed, and the cutters split the chain like putty. The steel door shifted slightly, signaling that the path forward was now open.
“How illegal is this?”
“Not much more than usual. Comeon, let's go.” With one paw holding a maglight, and the other holding the camcorder, Taran pulled open the door, and took his first step inside. Celic followed close behind.
The tunnel was musty, and a faint odor of mildew hung in the air. Taran felt his spines bristle against his windbreaker at the sudden coolness. The concrete walls were cracked in places, and where there was paint, it was heavily faded. Running down the middle atop a bed of loose gravel, a set of electric rails, long since left unpowered. Rust had found a home on much of the metal.
“Must have been decades since this place was last used.”
“No kidding.” Celic took a claw to the wall, and dragged downward. He traced a clear path, and the digit came away with a comical amount of dust.
Taran turned his attention back down the tunnel. The maglight was powerful, revealing that the tunnel took a slight curve to the west. If Taran’s navigation was correct, it would lead them directly to the center of the city, so called ‘Manhattan’. Maybe an hour or so of walking, assuming they didn’t get distracted. That, it turned out, would be difficult to avoid.
“Look, something up ahead.”
“Looks like some sort of…train car.”
The car laid alone on the track. The design was evidently old, clear even if its state of repair came anything close to passable. The ribbed metal exterior was lathered in graffiti, artwork that until now was unknown to the wider galaxy. The windows were smashed in for the most part, along with the headlights. One of the doors was left ajar, giving a slight view to the interior.
“I’m heading inside.”
“Be careful, could be boobytrapped.”
“Yeah, sure.”
The interior was about as well kempt as the exterior. Half the seats were missing their cushions, and the floor was littered with cigarette butts and general detritus. Along the upper rim of the interior, old advertisements hawked products that in all likelihood didn’t even exist anymore. One in particular caught Taran’s attention, of a human woman dressed in a vibrant pink dress, caught leaping perfectly through the air. His visual translator put the text as saying “Shen Yun 2045: China Before Communism”. Some sort of show? Interesting. Taran made sure to get the ad in focus. Maybe some of his human commenters could give some context.
“You done in there?”
“Yeah, yeah, give me a sec.”
Taran made his way back out, and the duo continued on their way. The tunnel eventually straightened out, and began a gentle downwards dip. We must be heading under the…East River now. Manhattan shouldn’t be too far away.
An odd scurrying sound caught both their ears, from the swirling darkness ahead.
“Shit, what's that?”
Taran gripped his maglight just a little tighter. “Don’t know. Maybe some local wildlife?”
His suspicions were confirmed quickly, when an odd little creature emerged from the void. It shot past them quickly, not even stopping to pay them mind. From what little Taran saw of it, the animal looked to have a coat of dark gray fur, dragging along a long, fleshy tail. He turned back to see Celic slightly off base.
“Oh, don’t tell me you were scared of that thing?”
“No no, its just…not a fan.”
“Yeah sure, big guy. And you're supposed to be the big, scary predator.”
“I heard that, asshole.”
Taran chuckled as their journey continued. They passed by another train car, a bit less dilapidated than the last, but otherwise unremarkable. The tunnel began to rise slightly, indicating they were now beyond the river. Taran had no actual plan on what to do once they got to the other side. Maybe try to find a side path, or continue on until the tunnel ended. But it already took them two hours just to get here. Who knows how long it would be until-
“Taran, look ahead.”
He turned to see that the tunnel, for some reason, was walled off. Coming closer only revealed further oddities. The concrete was spotless, practically glowing under the maglight. Almost like it was just poured yesterday. Over the tracks too, for they ran right into it. And in the center, was something even more strange. A steel door, with a single handle on the right, inset inside a heavy frame. It appeared freshly painted in a lustrous red.
“What the..” Taran rapped his claws against the metal, creating slight echoes from the other side. “Why would they just put a door in the middle of a train track? It's not even big enough for a train to fit through.”
“And it looks brand new too,” Celic ran a claw over the concrete, this time producing no dust, “like they built it yesterday…”
“There has to be some reason why it's here. Wait, is it even locked?” There appeared to be no sort of key, latch, arrestor, padlock, anything to keep the thing in place. All besides that lever. Taran tried to pull down, but besides a little give, the thing wouldn’t budge.
“Here, let me try.” Celic put both paws on the thing, and pulled with all his weight. The lever protested, but there was no beating the full strength of an Arxur. With a terrible squeal, it gave way. Some mechanism actuated, and the door went ever so slightly ajar. “Looks like we're in.”
It wasn’t going to open easily, though. Taran guessed it weighed four times the average Mazic, probably more. It took both of them pushing with all their might to even convince it to swing. But the door had a hidden defense mechanism for those daring to pass through its way: Dust. Without warning, a thick cloud of the stuff poured through the gap, catching the explorers completely off guard.
“Brahk!”
“Fuck!”
The duo stumbled around for a moment, trying to blink away the sudden particle assault. With tears in their eyes, they stood to see the navigable gap they produced in the doorframe. Just beyond, pitch black darkness.
“You good?” Taran called out, half blind.
“Fuckin dust got in my eyes, damnit, stings like shit.” Celic grabbed the water bottle from his pack, and poured half its contents right over his eyes. Taran thought it a good idea, and did the same. Once it didn’t feel like a thousand needles stabbing at their eyeballs, the duo continued on their path.
Stepping through, a quick flashlight sweep revealed a much different scene. The tunnel was an absolute mess, with boulders and debris strewn about. Along the walls, chunks were missing, and cracks had run valleys through the graffiti. It looked like an earthquake had done a quick run through. It was also warm on this side of the wall, much warmer. Not ten seconds, and Taran could already feel the windbreaker sticking to his fur.
“Brahk, who turned up the heater?”
“Fuck if I know. But this thing ain’t staying on, that’s for sure.” Celic tore the jacket off, leaving his chest bare to the world. Taran decided that it was a good idea, and did the same. With only their cargo leggings hiding their shame, they-
“Wait.” Taran turned back to the door, which still stood ajar. But there seemed to be no handle on the other side. He wanted to be sure. He picked up a particularly sturdy looking boulder, and placed it between the frame and the door. “Just so we’re not locked out.”
The state of the tunnel didn’t seem to improve much the further they went along. In fact, it was only getting worse. Eventually, they came to a dead end. A tunnel collapse had completely blocked the way.
“Maybe that’s why they blocked the tunnel off. This place seems about ready to come down.”
“Yeah, maybe,” Celic didn’t look entirely convinced, “but the divide seems so stark. Why is this side so much worse than the other? You’d think it would be more gradual.”
“Yeah, you’d think.” Taran brought the flashlight across the roof, where several ceiling panels seemed ready to drop. “But we probably shouldn’t stick around to find out. Let's head back.”
“Good idea. Not in the mood to get crushed today.”
Working their way back, Taran couldn’t help but feel disappointed. Besides the train car, and the weirdly brahked up tunnel, not much really seemed to jump out. Unless they found something exciting, it was going to be a boring episode. And that something presented itself from an errant sweep of the light.
“Look,” Taran pointed a claw off to the side, “a door.”
A door indeed, some sort of maintenance access, as far as he could tell. It hung slightly ajar, bent inwards around the edges. Taran thought it almost looked like someone blew something up on the other side.
“You want to check it out?”
“Yeah. Maybe we’ll find something more interesting in there?”
“Let’s make it quick then. Can’t help but feel something about this is off.”
The much smaller door swung easily on its bent hinges. The light revealed that it was indeed a maintenance tunnel, in rather poor condition. Half the piping on the wall was broken or otherwise bent, and all the lighting was shattered. And somehow, the dust seemed even more thick.
“Brahk, can barely see a thing.”
“Feels like I’m breathing in twenty attics here.” Taran could only imagine what kind of fun lung conditions he was going to get after this. Something brushed up against his foot.
“Huh, what's….BRAHK!”
“Whoa, what’s wrongffffFUCK!”
They stumbled backwards, nearly tripping over their thundering hearts. Taran felt his quills almost jump straight off his back. Taking deep dusty breaths, their lights settled upon the corpse lying on the floor.
It wasn’t even a question whether the human was dead or not. Even through the dust, Taran could see the pale embrace of death had taken him. That wasn’t even mentioning the eyes or the ears, from which sprouted dried rivers of blood that caked over the man's jumpsuit.
“W-what the FUCK. Fuck, we need to call someone, or something.”
“I-I’m already on it. Just give me a- wait, where’s the signal?” Even underground, they’d been getting one. But all Tarans holopad could show now was four empty bars. “Where’s the signal?!”
“Okay, okay, just…don’t panic. We just need to get to the surface. We can tell someone there.”
“Brahk, it's two hours back to the entrance. Should one of us stay here, or-”
“Maybe not two hours, look.”
Celics claw pointed down the hallway, where a beam of light could barely be seen through the dust. It seemed to originate from above, wherever above led.
“A way out?”
“Hopefully.” Celic stole another brief glance at the corpse. “Something’s going on here.”
“And it isn’t good, whatever it is. Let's move.”
They moved quickly down the hallway, revealing that the light came from the top of a stairwell. Peering up, Taran couldn’t make out any details, besides the lattice of the grated metal steps. Putting his foot on the first one caused it to sway. Along with the debris littering the floor, it told him the steps didn’t rest on a sturdy foundation.
“Careful coming up. Feels like this thing’s gonna topple over.”
But it appeared that it would hold. They ascended slowly, light growing brighter which each step upwards. Getting closer to the top, Taran still couldn’t make out any details from above. It was all just light.
Near the top, the steps suddenly gave way to a twisted jumble of metal. Taran judged that if he was careful, standing on the top would just allow his arm to reach the ledge above. Wait, why was this stairwell like this in the first place? And the corpse, the tunnel, what happened here? He couldn’t recall any news or story saying anything about something happening in New York. Maybe they were just emerging to a particularly dilapidated building?
Taran was about to find out. He clipped the camcorder and maglight to his belt, and began to climb up. It felt like every step was going to send him greeting the ground below very quickly. But before he knew it, his paw found purchase on the ledge, and he began pulling himself up. For some reason, the ground beneath his paw had a crunchy texture, almost like broken glass.
No, it was broken glass. Black glass. Taran came over the edge, and found himself staring at the stuff, which littered the ground like sand. It was warm to the touch. Standing on his feet, Taran brought up the camcorder, and prepared to take in the city around-
Where’s the city.
He was supposed to be standing in the middle of Manhattan. Skyscrapers should rise all around him, there should be millions of people going about their day. Instead, all Taran could see was glass.
WHERE’S THE CITY.
As far as the eye could see, glass. A flat desert, expanding out in all directions. In the distance, mangled skeletons resembling the burnt disinterred corpses of buildings rose, standing ominously on the horizon.
“What the…” Celic clambered out of the hole, spinning in little circleS, trying to process the landscape that now surrounded him. “Where’s the…” He didn’t even finish. Taran knew he came to the same conclusion as him. This was the city. This was New York. What was left of New York.
But it wasn’t possible. Not two hours ago, they had seen the skyline rise over the East River. Now, everything was just…gone. Replaced by a plate of glass. Taran cast his mind back to the Thaffki home world, where his eyes set upon nearly the exact same sight. Only an antimatter detonation could do…this.
But it wasn’t possible. They would’ve felt the explosion in the tunnel. Antimatter wasn’t like a Dossur sneezing, it was antimatter. A single gram of the stuff could completely level a small sized city. And standard warheads held a lot more than a gram. But there was nothing besides that red door.
“What the fuck is going on.” Celic stared at the space where a building was supposed to be.
“I-I don’t know. None of this makes any sense. The city was just here earlier. And its gone, and we should’ve felt something, and it’s just gone.”
“Okay, okay, just try and stay calm.” Celic sounded like he was having a hard time himself. “Stay calm, and figure out what we’re going to do.”
“What are we going to do. Where do we even go? Everything’s gone!”
“Stay calm, Taran! Just, think!”
“I’m trying, I really am, it just doesn’t make any brahking sense!”
“I know it doesn’t, but pointing that out isn’t going to help us.”
“Okay, okay, okay.” Taran takes several deep breaths, trying to calm his racing heart. “Uh…we…go back through the tunnel? It will get us across the river, maybe we’ll find help there? Survivors, something? I don’t know.”
Celic takes another look around, searching for something that isn’t there. “I don’t know, that might be our only option, but,” he glances over the East River, to the glass across the riverbank, “it doesn’t look like there’s much left over there.”
“Do we have another choice? We could wait here for rescue, but how do we even know rescue will come? Is there anything even left out there?”
“Maybe, but…” His eyes turn to the stairwell, “okay, maybe the tunnel is the best bet. We can figure out what to do when we get across.”
Their descent back down took on a dangerous urgency, the stairs protesting their every rapid step. They hit the concrete below running, lights swinging with each and every stride. They take care not to trip over the corpse, and soon find themselves in the collapsed tunnel. Dashing through the rubble, Taran can already feel his chest begin to burn. He could only wish he had the endurance of a human or an Arxur. But he pushed on anyway, desperate to reach something approaching safety.
They come to find the red door still propped, waiting for their passage. The air becomes cold again as they pass underneath its frame. They continue to jog, but Tarans stubby legs, along with his low endurance, finally fails him. He stumbles to a stop, doubles over, desperate to catch his breath.
“Taran, you okay?” Celic calls back, one he realizes he left his companion behind.
“No no, I’m fine, I just need a moment..”
“No, wait, here,” Celic bounded over, and before Taran could protest, picked him up, and threw him over his back. He grunted with the effort, but he began forward again no problem. Taran wanted to say he was fine, but he more appreciated the chance to catch his breath.
But even Celics endurance had its limits. By the time they reached the first train car, he was panting heavily. Taran had recovered enough to where he could walk again, but neither of them were running anytime soon. The rest of the way was a silent, stressful walk, dread looming over what now lay on the other side of the entrance.
A spill of natural light told them that they had arrived. The door was slightly ajar, hiding the outside world from them. Taran could already see the devastation that lay ahead. He braces himself, and takes a deep breath. A paw wraps around the lip of the door and pulls, eliciting a groan from the rusted metal joints. The gap widens, more light pours in, and the duo steps out into-
Wait, WHAT?
Their feet land on green grass and live earth. The sky is a deep ocean blue, where clouds tumble and twirl. Out of the fenced off clearing, century old row houses stand proudly, as the midday traffic passes by. Taran turns, and sees the skyline of Manhattan just barely peeking over the shingle tile roofs. Sirens blare in the distance, and the rumble of traffic is like a low earthquake.
WHAT?!
Taran…doesn’t know. He takes his paws to the earth, letting the soil run between his claws. It’s not a mirage, or a hallucination, it all feels so real. The air is fresh, crisp, cool. No, this can’t be right.
Taran turns to see Celic frozen in place, a long arm reaching out before him. His paw twists, feeling for the breeze, trying to see if he reality is reality.
But it is, all of it. Or it feels like it. But the tunnel, and the corpse, that was real as well. Taran picked up the rubble, he felt the corpse brush up in his leg. The heat, from the air, from the glass. The sensations, the perceptions, they all felt just as material as the ones he was experiencing now.
So what in the name of the protector is going on?!?
“Hey, you two doin alright?”
Taran and Celic both turned to see a human standing at the fence line, staring down at them with concern. “You know you ain’t supposed to be in there, right?”
Somehow, Taran managed to find his words. “Uh…yeah, we know. We’re urban explorers. Galactic Urban Adventures, have you heard of us?”
“Can’t say I have. But I have heard of the police, and they’ll be wanting to meet you if yah don’t haul your asses out of there.”
“Oh, yeah, good idea.” Taran got back up on his feet, and trudged back over to the fence. Celic followed close behind. They clambered over the chain link with ease, and landed right in front of the human. His concern had not abated.
“You sure you two are doing alright? I’m no expert on alien body language, but I’d say you two look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
Taran wasn’t sure if that was true or not.
——-
The footage finished transferring, giving Taran some sense of relief. Now, he could check to see what the camera had to say.
He pressed forward on the laptop, and the footage sped ahead. From the entrance, whipping past the subway cars, right up to the red door. He brought the speed back to normal, and waited with bated breath. His past self leaned up against the steel, and pushed with all his might. After the dust cloud had cleared, the view slipped beneath the doorway, and emerged into…the ruined tunnel.
So it wasn’t just our eyes, the camera saw it too.
He could feel Celic lean over his shoulder. “It wasn’t a hallucination, the camera saw it too. What the fuck is going on.”
It was all there, too. The collapsed wall, the maintenance tunnel, the corpse. Taran watched in silent horror as he clambered over the lip, and emerged into the erased city. It was all real.
“I-it doesn’t make any sense. It’s like we emerged into a different world, or,”
“A different reality. But that isn’t possible.”
“It’s not. But what was all that then?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s something we shouldn’t know. Maybe we should’ve never stepped through that door.”
The red door. Like some sort of…boundary. Between us, and whatever strange reality we stepped into. There was no latch on the other side. If it had closed, would we have been trapped?
“We can’t put this out. Or at least, anything from beyond that…door.”
Taran could hear Celics tail thwack in agreement. “No, people would think we edited it.”
“Should we delete it all?”
“No, no, keep it. Just in case.”
Taran closed the laptop, and got up from his chair. The hotel room, perched on the Brooklyn side of the east river, gave a fantastic view of Manhattan. He looked upon the glass forest just over the water, and wondered: Should they be there? Should any of this be here?
There was only one thing Taran thought he could know for sure. A specter was haunting them.
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2024.02.17 18:00 United_Patriots The Nature of Orion [33] - We All Have A Choice

Thank you SpacePaladin15 for the amazing universe!
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Kiris puts down his pad with disgust.
No, I don’t need this right now.
A phrase that often signaled the end of conversations with his parents. They were few and far between, but they were notable for all the wrong reasons.
I don’t need any of this right now.
A phrase that ended most days, actually.
Kiris put his work badge in the glove compartment, shoving it far in the back. Returning to the steering wheel, he stared across the parking garage. Only weathered concrete stared back.
He should head home. It’s late, and tomorrow is another early shift. Besides, what would his parents think? Getting wasted on a work night, How irresponsible. He can almost hear their nagging in the silence.
Kiris brings the engine to life. His favorite dive isn’t too far away.
——-
“Kiris, the usual?” Ceno called from the counter. The old Harchen was a friend of Kiris, almost by accident. With how often he was here, it was almost inevitable.
“The usual, yeah.”
The tender pulled one of the more potent liquors from the shelf. “Rough day?”
“Like I said, the usual.”
Taking a glance around, all the standard company was present. There was that Gojid couple in the corner, the Nevok was in his usual spot, all the vaguely recognizable Harchen. Nothing new, as usual.
The decor too. Almost fifty years out of date, Kiris reckoned. Ceno liked to call it character. Kiris found he’d grown tired of character. He found he was tired of a lot of things. Probably why the bar had become an almost nightly occurrence.
The first shot went down with ease. It came with experience. He was just about to order a second when a heavy presence landed to his left.
“I’ll have what he’s having.”
Kiris turned to see a cloak donned gray wall glaring back. Even for an Arxur, he (she?) was absolutely massive. Coming from a Harchen, where anyone higher than a standard road bollard was considered tall, that was saying something.
Kiris watched as the predator downed two shots in quick succession, before making a go for a third. That could only mean one thing.
“Rough day for you too?”
The predator turned its crimson glare onto the Harchen, in a way most others would consider intimidating. The voice was female, spoken gently from underneath the cloak's hood.
“Pardon?”
“You downed two shots of Sunside FireFruit Fireball within ten seconds of each other. You know the proof on that, right?”
Her head turned back, and she stared down at her now third glass. She downed it without further hesitation, sighed deeply once it was done. Kiris took that as a yes.
“We all have something going on, don’t we?”
She didn’t answer.
The silence continued as the shots kept coming, spare the background noise of the bar, and the news broadcast from the TV. Spare some mention of a Chief Hunter between shots four and five, Kiris didn’t catch much.
By the time number seven rolled around, coherent thought was becoming a passing memory. But there was just enough left for Kiris to call it quits. Must’ve been a bad day, he usually only went up to six.
“Yeah, I’d think that’s a good idea. I’m closing your tab.” Ceno stared down at the Harchen with some concern, but this was something he’d come to expect.
Most of the other patrons had filtered out, leaving just Kiris, and Arxur, and the odd stragglers. It would be several hours before Kiris would be sober enough to drive, and by that point, work would be wondering where he was. Maybe I won’t go in tomorrow. They won’t care. Not a lot of people did.
“I have things going on, yeah.”
Kiris turned a groggy head towards her. “What?”
She, along with him, was halfway to annihilation. Even under the hood, Kiris could see that she was struggling to keep her eyes open. He found it surprising that she was coherent at all.
“You said earlier, we all had things going on.”
“I…did…”
“You did.” She snorted. “Don’t ask me how I remember.”
“Huh…”
She turned to face Kiris, the full weight of her stare bearing down directly on the Harchen. “What do you have going on, you little snack…”
Maybe well past halfway, based on that comment. A little snack? Was she planning on eating me, literally? His train of thought, which had been running at low speed all night, was blown right off its tracks.
“Uhh….uhh…”
His malfunction brought forth laughter. “You should’ve seen the look on your little face, thought you were gonna die…Oh, you prey are so easy to fuck with.”
“...yeah…thank you?”
His little acknowledgement brought a doubled over bout of laughter, bringing tears to her eyes. She eventually recovered, and her lean over the Harchen became much more pronounced.
“I like you, what’s your name?”
“...uh…Kiris.”
“Heh, Kiris, do you know what it’s like to be a prey?”
“U-uh…no?”
A maniacal glare crossed her face.
“Would you like me to show you?”
Even through the inebriation, the implication hit Kiris over the head like a lead sledgehammer. Oh, oh, OH. She wants to do THAT. Uh, huh, okay, how do I feel about this? An Arxur, Three times my size, like, five times my weight. She could easily crush me, bite my head off, pin me to a wall, carry me around with one paw, strangle me, and, uh, huh, oh stars.
He suddenly couldn’t breathe, and felt his heart breaking records in his chest. But overriding it all was an adrenaline injected excitement.
Okay, I definitely want this. Whatever this is, I want it, right now.
“Yeah....okay, sure.”
The exact answer she was looking for. “Perfect. Do you have a place in mind?”
Kiris didn’t like the sudden responsibility. “I..uh, my place isn’t too far from here. W-we can walk.”
Not that both of them were capable of much more. “Sounds good to me. Shall we get going?”
She didn’t even wait for an answer before she half stumbled off the barstool. Kiris followed close behind, finding that he’d partially forgotten how to walk as well. Together, they began their long, difficult, self-inflicted trudge back to his apartment.
Through the haze of liquor, and the mounting excitement of whatever was to come, Kiris couldn’t help but wonder: Why did I say yes?
—-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Memory transcription subject: Shaza, Chief Hunter, Sector Commision Four, Greater Dominion Seris, Arxur Refugee
Date [standardized human time]: December 8th, 2136
Seris awoke, still wrapped around him. She watched for a while, his chest rise and fall, scales shift color ever so slightly. To lie there forever, with him at her side? That was her only true wish. It didn’t matter that the sheets were filthy, or sounds that sounded suspiciously like gunshots rang out every so often. As long as I’m with him. I don’t deserve you, Kiris.
He wakes, turning over to face her. She feels his tail shifting happily against her leg.
“Morning”, said softly.
“They don’t call it morning here.”
He snorts. “Whatever they call it here.”
“Sure, fine.”
“So,” he gently lays a paw against her face, “what's the plan for today?”
“Uh, don’t know. We don’t need anything. Guess we just…stay here and wait. Maybe work will finally come through?”
Seris had sent applications to every mercenary outfit in the arm. So far, nothing. She suspected it had something to do with him. For obvious reasons, Harchen were not known as warriors. She still had some hope, but hope couldn’t pay for food. They needed money.
“I’m sure it’ll work out. As long as we’re together.”
“Of course.” She nuzzled up against him, wishing that this moment would last forever. But they had to get up eventually. And Seris wouldn't be second in line.
“Can I take the shower first?”
“Take your time, there’s no rush.”
Seris realized that it was probably a bad idea to sleep naked in the bed. Given the general state of things, she doubted the sheets had seen anything approaching a cleaning product in months. And considering the location, and what people probably did in them, (Fuck, what we did in them), just being in proximity probably risked contracting several fun and interesting diseases.
Not that the shower was much better. Stepping in, Seris observed several interesting colonies of mildew growing in the corners. Taking care not to touch them, she turned the faucet, and learned another reason why the motel was dirt cheap. It was one of those ‘exciting’ water heaters, where one end was a tundric cold that would freeze you solid, the other being like standing next to an antimatter detonation, and the bearable between being so minuscule as to be observed only through an atomic microscope. By the time she had found that middle ground, several minutes had already passed.
The water ran over her scales in rivers, through the valleys of scars. Valleys of sin, where only pain received and pain inflicted resided. Seris hoped the water would carry the residents away, send them swirling into the dark abyss below. It was a hope, and only that.
Kiris had seen them during their first night together. He’d seen them every time after. They were never brought up. She always wondered why he never brought them up. Maybe he knew they only held bad memories, ones not worth bringing out. She silently thanked him for that.
One brief lather later, Seris stepped out. Standing in front of the mirror, she wiped away the condensation. Amidst the caked on grime and water stains, there she stood.
Me. Despite everything, it was still me. Shaza, Chief Hunter, proud servant of Betterment, and-
Seris dried herself quickly, before stepping back into the main room. Kiris sat on the bed, watching the news. “All yours.”
He jumped off, and waddled into the bathroom. The door shut, and Seris was alone.
She donned one of the few pelt sets she had, basic undergarments and a long hooded cloak. Good for keeping your face hidden from any unwanted eyes. Worked so far, at least. From the closed door, the shifting of water told her that Kiris had just hopped in. She still had several minutes to waste.
Probably a good idea to check out the window. Just to make sure.
The sleep shutters were closed, but little strips of light managed to peek through. She used a claw to shift one slightly, just enough to give her a full outside view. A car shot down the street, a few Venlil were making their way about. On the opposite curb-
Him.
He was easy to clock, even with that hood on. I’d told him to message me, so why was he here in person?
There was only one way to find out. It didn’t matter if he was with Betterment. If he was, they’d already found me, and I was good as dead. If he wasn’t, then he had what I wanted. It could be both, or something entirely unexpected.
It was a quick walk across the street, and closing the distance only confirmed my initial observation.
“Sefris, I told you to message me.”
The Chief Hunter didn’t turn to face me, and instead kept his gaze set on the motel.
“It wouldn’t be secure. Get unlucky, and it would be both our heads on the chopping block. I’m surprised you lasted this long.”
“Call it good fortune.”
“Good luck. City is absolutely crawling with Betterment. How they didn’t clock you earlier is beyond me.”
Wait, “How do you know that?”
“Because Betterment sent me to kill you.”
Somehow, it wasn’t surprising. The fact I was still alive was. A reason for hope. “You did a terrible job.”
“That was the point, yes. I got what you wanted. Intelligence.”
From underneath his cloak, he presented a small data chip, so small as to be carried away by a mild breeze. But he snatched it away before my claws could grasp it.
“What are you doing?”
“Oh, so that's what he looks like.”
Following his gaze back to the motel revealed that prey standing at the door, staring across the street with concern.
“So that's the prey you're so enamored with.”
“Enamored, don’t tell me-”
“Don’t lie to me, Shaza. I saw the report. You don’t see the same prey for two years unless there is something there.”
“You misunderstand, this was-”
“All a lie by Isif, designed to smear you. That fucking that Harchen is your way of giving service to Betterment. Like I said, I read the report. Don’t insult my intelligence by repeating the same trite you said to that officer.”
“Sefris, if you-”
“Do you realize how pathetic you sound, Shaza? Trying to deny what I can see with my own two eyes? Your little attempts to defend yourself only embarrass you further.”
“Enough! What is this, Sefris? I’d thought I could trust that you could see through his lies!”
“Lies, funny. The only one lying here is you. Isif told the truth, one that we all know, one that you and so many others refuse to recognize.”
“Oh and what would this ‘truth’ be?”
For the first time, he turned his glare to me. He only looked disappointed.
“We are all broken, Shaza. Every single one of us. Sad, pathetic little excuses for people. Souls twisted into grotesque abortions of sapience, capable only of violent expression of its deep inner rot. That is who we are.”
“So we are left with a choice. Lie, convince ourselves that we are something that we are not. That the violence serves some greater purpose, for blood, for soil, for nation, or whatever we come up with.”
“Or, we submit to the truth. That we are nothing. And only through rejection of Betterment, becoming ‘defective’, can we become something. It was what Isif did, it is what you have done, it is what I will do.”
“Your…going to defect?”
“Of course, Why would I not? I am a man of the truth. Where it shows itself, I follow. It took Isif leaving to see it. Do you?”
“What you call ‘truth’, is nothing more than-”
“What do you call yourself, when you're with him?”
“P-pardon?”
His attention returned back to the prey, who still stood watching the whole exchange.
“Your persona, Seris. That’s you to him, correct?”
“Yes, but I see no reason why that’s releva-”
“Tell me Seris, do you love him?”
“Wha..”
“I am asking you Seris, do you love him?”
“Why are you-”
“Answer the question.”
What was he getting at? Acting like Seris was anything real. Why was he engaging in such ludicrous fantasy, this-
“I do.”
Sefris nodded his tail. It was the answer he wanted. Or rather, Seris thought, the answer he already knew.
“How does he make you feel?”
“...Happy. Like I’m cared for. It all still feels so…”
“Strange.” The Chief Hunter finished for her. “Like you're not supposed to be feeling these things, but you do regardless. You’ll get used to it, I promise.”
“But at the same time, I feel like I don’t…deserve it. After what I’ve done.”
“We don’t.”
Silence, for a long moment. Sefris pulled the chip back from his pocket, and presented it to Seris.
“This chip contains everything you need for the Cradle. New passports, new identities for you and him. Enough credits to hold you over until you find work.”
“The Cradle?”
“Betterment already knows your on Skalga. They don’t know you're here. I’ll have to tell them to maintain appearances. You need to be offworld by the time that happens.”
“But why the Cradle specifically?”
“Because that’s where Isif is.”
So he had come through after all. “Where exactly?”
“Don’t know, most I’ve heard is that the Coalition have him running a listening post out of some government nature reserve. On the border of Cenovak, Creychall, and Bendara. Chances are, you’ll find him there.”
But in light of everything he just said, “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because Seris has no reason to go after a defective Chief Hunter, and you're too smart to try. The very fact I’m supposed to be killing you should be enough evidence that the Dominion has no intention of welcoming you back. You bring them his head, you’ll both share a grave.”
“No, I know that I can-“
“Don’t lie to yourself. You may pretend your little crusade will amount to something, but you know it won’t work. In fact, I don’t think you’ll even bother looking for him at all. You’ll settle down, build a new life for yourself. At some point, you’ll forget that you even cared about him in the first place. That’s when you’ll finally admit the truth.”
Why does he keeping harping on this ‘truth’, there is no truth here, only his-
“Why are you helping me?”
For the first time, Sefris looked upon Seris with something almost approaching sympathy.
“Isif made me realize we all have a choice. We can continue, or we can be better. He wanted to be better, I want to be better, I know you want to be better. Whether we deserve it or not, it's a choice we all have to make. It’s best we make the right one.”
Seris doesn’t know how to respond, but to look back at over to Kiris. He still stood there, worry weighing down on his face. Did he hear?
“I…thank you, Sefris.”
He nodded his tail in appreciation. “Get back to him, he’s worried.”
Seris took the advice as a command, and quickly crossed the street. Up close, his concern is only more evident.
“Kiris, I’m sorry, I should have told you-”
His tail tells her to calm down. “It’s okay, Seris, it's okay. What did he want?”
“He was…” She pulled something quickly off the top of her head, “someone from one of the jobs. We’re hired, and they want us on the Cradle, so-”
“Stop.” His sudden interruption throws Seris off balance.
“Stop?”
“You don’t have to lie to me, not anymore.”
“Lie to you? What are you-”
“Shaza, I know who you are. I’ve known for a long time.”
Seris freezes, absolute fear invading every fathom of her body. For a moment, she forgets how to breath.
“Keris, I can explain. Please, just let me-”
“I don’t care.” His expression is one of entire disinterest with her justifications. “You’ve always been Seris to me. That’s all that matters.”
He…doesn’t care. No, that can’t be right. He should be angry, infuriated, rightfully demanding tp never see me again. It was my fault for making him like this.
“H-how can you not care! After everything I’ve done, how can you…” her voice trails off. Saying that word seems incomprehensible.
“How can I love you?” Kiris finished for her. “Honestly, I don’t know. I just woke up one day, saw you next to me, and I just…knew. I think that makes me a terrible person. But being with you,” he nodded his tail in a defeated manner, “makes me happy. I can’t help it.”
She could see, deep down, that his love tore at him. The way his eyes wavered, his clenched paw. He hated himself for being happy. A mutual feeling, and it was all her fault.
Seris couldn’t help but kneel down, and take him in a tight embrace. “Kiris…I'm sorry.”
He squeezed back. “It's okay, you don’t have to apologize for anything. Just tell me where we’re going.”
No, this isn’t right. There’s so much to apologize for, so much he should hate me for. I don’t deserve him. I need to…no, I can’t. I can’t do that. That would hurt too much. Fuck, what do I-
“The Cradle.”
Seris knew she didn’t deserve him, nor did he deserve her. Sefris had said as much himself. But like he said, she had a choice now. Leave now, continue on as she is. Or stay with him, and maybe become something better.
She made her decision.
“The Cradle.” Kiris looked to the spot where Sefris was, now empty, before turning back. “I’ve always wanted to visit. But what are we going to do there? Will we be safe?”
Seris felt the chip jostle in her pocket. Money, new identities, another chance.
“We’ll figure something out. As long as we’re together.”
She could tell he wasn’t fully sure, but he was sure enough. His tail gave a little happy nod.
“As long as we’re together.”
I had a location on Isif. Now, it was only a matter of time until he was in my claws. And once he was, I would prove Sefris wrong, and be proudly accepted back as a Chief Hunter. Kill Kiris, finally be rid of Seris.
In and out, nothing more.
—-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why does she look so familiar?
Kiris awoke with her laying next to him, fast asleep. It was the first time he’d gotten a proper look at her face, in the creeping light of the dawn. And looking upon it, the specific arrangement of scars, he couldn't help but think: I’ve seen you somewhere.
It was an oddity amidst a fun night. For sure Kiris had enjoyed it, quite a lot actually. For the first time in a long while, amidst the excitement and the pleasure, he felt truly alive. But he couldn’t shake that overwhelming sense of Déjà vu. Where did I see you?
He suddenly flashed to a memory he didn’t even know he had: That news report playing at the dive. The one that mentioned something about a Chief Hunter. Displaying a portrait of an Arxur that now seemed oh so familiar.
No way, not a chance.
But he had to be sure. Just in case. He reached over to the nightstand, and picked up his holopad. Bringing up the internet search engine, he put in a simple query, Chief Hunter List.
The first result was an Archivepedia link, listing all of the Current Chief Hunters in alphabetical order. Alongside the name and a brief description, an official Dominion issued portrait presented itself.
Kiris began scrolling through the list, trying to find that one face. He scrolled and scrolled, side bar creeping ever closer to the bottom of the screen. Why am I doing this, there's no way that…
Brahk.
Shaza, Chief Hunter, Sector Commission Four. The portrait was like a near exact look alike. Even down to the placement of the scars. He couldn’t deny it.
I just brahked a Chief Hunter.
I just brahked a Chief Hunter.
I just brahked, a CHIEF HUNTER.
WHAT
That just about summed it up. What?
Kiris struggled to piece together just how what happened, just happened. A CHIEF HUNTER, walked into a bar on Fahl, got speh faced, slept with me, and is now next to me, in my bed, and I’m not dead, and she’s a CHIEF HUNTER.
“Kiris?”
Shaza had awoken, her glare now taking on a much more sinister aspect.
“Oh…uh, morning. Yeah, morning.”
She gave a confused look. “Is…something wrong?”
“No, nothing, just got something from my work.” He quickly flicked off the wiki page.
“Oh, okay.” Throwing off the sheets, she hopped out of the bed. “Gotta head out now.”
“Wait, wait, you're just leaving?”
“Sorry, have to.”
Before Kiris even had time to process, she was already dressed, and halfway out the door. Just before she fully stepped out,
“Wait!”
Shaza popped her head back through the doorway. “What’s wrong?”
“I..uh…I had a lot of fun last night. Did you?”
She glanced to the bed, then back to him. “Yeah, I did.”
“Would you want to make this a…thing?”
She cocked her head. “A thing?”
“Yeah, something fun we do every once in a while. Every month, maybe?”
“Umm…”
“We could keep meeting here?”
“Uh..” She didn’t look entirely convinced.
“Or not, it was a stupid idea anyways…”
“No no, I can make it work. I think…no, I can.”
“Okay then, so every month meet here? That sounds good?”
Her tail nodded. “Yeah, sounds good. I’ll look forward to it. Until then?”
“Yeah, until then, I guess…wait!”
She popped into the doorway once more. “What is it?
“I never got your name.”
Her eyes narrowed for the briefest moment.
“Seris.”
The door shut.
Kiris could hear the Chief Hunter plod slowly down the hallway, before disappearing behind the slam of the stairwell access.
Wait, what did I just do?
Kiris had just invited a Chief Hunter into his home on a monthly basis. Most normal people would consider that a poor decision. Apparently, Kiris wasn’t a normal person.
But now, he was presented with a choice. One was the normal, sensible, moral thing to do.
No, I need to report her. She’s a chief hunter, she can’t just be going around. What kind of person would I be if I just let her walk free?
Kiris picked up his pad, he went to the dial screen, he inputted the emergency number, and…and…
The other was the horrible selfish thing to do.
He placed the pad back down on the table. He made his decision.
She made me feel something. She made me feel alive.
That Arxur, responsible for the death and suffering of millions, had done that. Knowledge of her true self that Kiris found produced an irresistible allure. Kiris was feasting on a forbidden fruit, so repugnant, yet so sweet at the same time. That at any moment, she could snap, slit his throat, leave him for dead. It was all so thrilling. Even thinking about next time caused his heart to beat a little faster.
He could only think: What do I have without her?
The usual. And Kiris was tired of the usual.
She needs something from me, I need something from her. We both have what we want. This is all just a transaction. Nothing more, nothing less.
But there was another reason, small, quiet, shoved deep down. An incongruity, if you will. For Kiris couldn’t help shake the feeling that to her, this wasn’t just some transaction. That what just happened, and what was going to happen, was some sort of…outlet.
Seris, huh? I’ll humor it. Why not?
After all, he knew this little fling wouldn’t amount to anything.
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2024.02.15 18:18 the_judge_168 Trip Report - 21 days in Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Hokkaido, and Hakone

Got a ton of great info from previous trip reports so hope this is helpful to those reading. Happy to answer any questions in the comments. Trip was last month in January. Travel schedule: TokyoKyoto /OsakaTokyoHokkaidoTokyoHakoneTokyoHome
 
Background:
Late 20s / Early 30s M/F. I’ve been to Japan a few times but mostly Tokyo, the first time for my partner. We stayed with friends in the Tachikawa area while in Tokyo so this added ~2 hours extra travel time per day.
 
General thoughts on popular topics:
 
Prebooking: The things we booked before the trip: Studio Ghibli museum, Suntory Yamazaki tour, Nikka Yoichi tour, DisneySea lunch reservation. For Studio Ghibli we had many devices open and we were 115-9.8k in queue to get in. Most slots sold out within minutes if not seconds. For Yamazaki we missed the lottery period but we were able to get a first come first serve canceled tour spots. Disneysea the top restaurants were all booked out within 3 minutes. Nikka should be fine to book until a few days before. We debated restaurants but did not want the schedule / flow of travel to be interrupted to make a set reservation time so did not book any.  
Cash: We spent 95k yen in cash over 21 days. (Just cash, most of our spend was on credit card). Most places took credit card and/or IC card. Would always carry a bit of cash in case but overall you should not need much, especially while inside Tokyo. Plenty of smaller restaurants would not have a card machine visible, but would take out if you asked to pay with a card. A lot of card machines would have a tap option but it would not work so you have to insert a card. Some machines do not accept the newer 500 yen coin as well, so you may need to swap it out. If you have a lot of loose change there would sometimes be payment machines in front of registers that let you dump a bunch of coins.
We withdrew from ATMS in convenience stores as those would accept foreign debit cards. We had no fee card but it seemed to be 110 yen or 220 yen each time we withdrew. Not all stores had international ATMs, especially once you got outside of Tokyo.  
Suica / train / bus:
We both had iPhones and loaded Suica cards before the trip. Super convenient and easy to refill on your phone. You do not have to unlock the phone to use, though a few times it would not scan and you would then have to unlock. Seemed to happen when Face ID wanted the passcode to unlock. We used Suica exclusively for all trains and buses and only bought physical tickets for Shinkansen, Haneda and Sapporo airport buses. Both Haneda and Sapporo airport buses took Suica, but we wanted to be safe in case. For some buses you have to tap on and off at the front, others are flat fee. You can see if it charges you a flat fee or says trip in progress. Also for JR stations if you enter and leave it charges you a 150 yen fee. We didn't want to walk in the cold one day and found that out.
As for Google maps and trains, the info for which car was fastest transfer was pretty nice. I found timing and pricing to also be pretty accurate inside Tokyo. In Hokkaido some of the prices did not match (usually was cheaper than what Google said). Also with snow cancellations and delays, Google did not have all the info so using the JR site was more useful. We were probably unlucky but we had multiple delays on trains / buses and cancellations due to weather and random events.
Another tip I would mention (probably more relevant to traveling from Tachikawa to Tokyo) is that Google did not seem to give the option to switch from a local train to the express train that skipped more stops unless there was more than a few minutes to transfer. In a lot of cases you can save 5-15 minutes boarding an express train. If a train stops and a lot of people walk to the other side of the same platform and wait and doors don’t close, there will usually be an express train soon.
 
eSIMS:
We used Verizon TravelPass, Ubigi, Airalo and T-Mobile 2g. Verizon TravelPass was the fastest and most consistent, but we only used the days we had banked for free. Ubigi was the next best, although I found it would randomly drop / lag in more crowded areas. Airalo was definitely slower than Ubigi but maybe a bit more consistent? I used 2g a few times when my Ubigi dropped and it was fine for a few quick map checks and iMessages. Of my 10gb allotment for Ubigi, 4.7GB was used for Google Maps (seemed quite high considering I downloaded offline maps), 2.3 for Safari, 1.6GB for System Services, 122MB for Google Translate. I ran a bit low so ended up buying 1GB more to be safe.Would probably buy Ubigi again in future even at double the cost of Airalo. On a side note, once we stopped using Verizon TravelPass we did have to do the sim lock trick to use Verizon number for iMessage.
 
Convenience stores and trash:
Most convenience stores have a small bar table line to eat and if not we ate outside in front if other Japanese people were doing so. All the convenience stores have trash cans as do many of the department stores. I never felt I had any issues carrying trash / bottles.The hot section was pretty nice for mornings and if you do not mind carrying around a larger bottle of water, it is much cheaper than a small bottle. We also went to grocery stores over convenience if that was an option for pricing and selection.
 
Japanese usage:
I know the basic phrases and can read some Kanji. I found if I started a conversation in Japanese they would then respond in Japanese and I would not be able to communicate so after the first day or two I just started in English with google translate. It saved a lot of time and got points across much faster. That said, compared to previous trips for me there were many more random people who could speak English and a few who were fluent. Reading Kanji was helpful both in train stations (not having to wait for signs to switch to English) and for general signs.
 
General food and restaurant thoughts:
I listed some restaurants that we enjoyed, really bad ones and slightly different places. Almost every meal was pretty good in general. We tried to eat at restaurants that were at least 50% Japanese inside / in line. I found that the 3.5-4.2 rating was the optimal range like others mentioned, and anything above 4.2 would be more tourists. For a lot of the recommended restaurants on social media the customers were 80-100% tourists.This was especially true in Kyoto and Osaka, as all the places we had down were all tourists. We did not have any specific foods we needed to try so we would just go with what we were craving at the time. Many restaurants you check in on a tablet to join the queue and it gives you a slip. Some slips have a QR code to scan to see where you are in line. You can usually browse shops around the restaurant and go back closer to your time.
Another tip would be a lot of restaurants (especially ramen) offer a mini / half bowl. This worked well for my partner as the normal bowls would normally be too much food on days we had second breakfast / elevenses and afternoon tea. A lot of restaurants (Tonkatsu / Tempura) also have an option for unlimited rice / miso soup so if you are fat like me make sure to get your second bowl.
Lastly, fruit is ridiculously priced compared to the US. We wanted to have fruit throughout the trip but held off most of the time due to cost. My partner did bring oatmeal to have for breakfast some days, and you can get hot water at convenience stores.
 
Luggage and laundry:
We had two backpacks (Allpa 35 and North Face Recon) that we used during the side trips. We did take an empty 22l suitcase to Hokkaido for food souvenirs but for the rest of the side trips it was backpacks only. It made trips much smoother not having to worry about luggage space and transport. We packed pretty light and the only item we didn’t use were flip flops since the hotels all provided slippers.
All the hotels we stayed at offered either free or coin laundry. Should note my partner got a few rashes from the detergent which I believe is a common issue.
 
Hotels / bed bugs:
We read a few reports about bed bugs right before we left so checked each hotel but all were pretty clean. All hotels had amenities on the first floor or on request. This was nice as you were able to just get the things you needed. Some of the hotels we stayed at used a machine to check in so check in times were a bit stricter as machines would not work before check in time.
 
Flights:
ANA Premium Economy SFO to HND.
ANA Economy HND to TSA, TSA to HND
AirDo Economy HND to CTS to HND
United Economy NRT to SFO
ANA SFO to HND: The ticket gives you basic United lounge access, which is a nice perk for premium economy. Service was good and flight attendants were really nice. First meal was box with tuna croissant sandwich, grandma’s cookies and banana. Second meal was an option of tempura or hamburg steak. They provided snacks (kit kats, arare snack mix and hard candy) as well as beer, wine, plum wine and champagne. Seats were ok and was about 75% full. Business was about 50% full.
AirDo: Bag drop was with ANA, seems most of things handled with ANA. Good service and only drinks for flight. Full flights both ways.
ANA HND to TSA to HND: Chance to get a Pokemon plane where you get a pokemon gift. Good service and happy with flight. One meal included. Full flight both ways.
United NRT to SFO: Long delay due to mechanical failures and poor service throughout. Entertainment system did not work outside of showing a flight map. Food was edible though. 2/3 filled around us. Business and premium economy fully filled.
 
Hotels:
Kyoto: Royal Park Hotel Kyoto Sanjo ($84/night): big rooms, good location, clean, coin laundry
Sapporo: Sotetsu Fresa Inn Sapporo-Susukino ($46.55/night): standard rooms, good location, clean, coin laundry
Jozankei: Grand Blissen Hotel Jozankei (~$420 / night dinner and breakfast included): huge room, pretty new, nice amenities, free hotel shuttle, free laundry. We had some issues with a/c airflow so we had to open the window at night.
DisneySea area: JR East Hotel Mets Tokyo Bay Shinkiba ($85/night): bigger than normal business room, good location, can’t open window
Hakone: Hakone Gora KARAKU (~$640 / night, Breakfast included): huge room, newer, free hotel shuttle, unlimited beer / wine / liquors / snacks / coffee / tea in lounge, some issues with a/c airflow as well.
 
Day 1 Travel Day (9,325 steps, 3.87 miles)
Arrived in Haneda in the evening and used QR code for customs. Almost no wait and the whole process took less than 10 minutes. Bus to Tachikawa, with extra traffic on the road we took one hour and 45 minutes to arrive, 20 minutes behind schedule. Had food at a local restaurant and prepared for Kyoto next day. No jet lag issues as already adjusted to the time zone, and most steps were from Taipei in the morning before we left.
 
Day 2 Travel to Kyoto (22,960 steps, 10.02 miles)
Took Shinkansen from Tokyo station. We had a few issues buying tickets as we scanned in using IC cards from Tachikawa and the machine did not read phone IC cards. Ended up having to buy tickets from the counter. We did not use Google translate and said we wanted Nozomi and Green Car with seats together. We were told no green car but were able to buy Nozomi tickets. Pricing seemed a lot higher than what Japan Travel app listed but they confirmed it was correct. Looking back it is in line with Klook / Google pricing but much higher than what Japan Travel App listed for some reason. We then went back to the machine to upgrade tickets to green car and were unable to find any seats next to each other for the next 4 Nozomi trains. We ended up booking two separate seats in the car but found an older Japanese guy using one of our seats as his luggage storage. We showed him our ticket and he said it was a green car and to just sit where we want. The conductor came by and the Japanese guy talked to the conductor and the conductor gave us seats in the reserved luggage seat and said these were ok to sit together. Was a bit weird but not an issue and the train ride was smooth otherwise. With ticket issues we did not have time to get ekiben so we ate Clif Bars we brought. We did see most of Mt. Fuji around Shin Fuji station.
We arrived at Kyoto station around 1pm. We walked to Honke Daiichi-Asahi and waited about 30 minutes for our ramen. You queue in line and when you get close you go to the machine to put in your order. We thought ramen was solid, gyoza was meh. Main server spoke some English. After our meal we walked over to Higashi Hongan-ji Temple. It was pretty empty and this was our favorite temple in Kyoto with beautiful woodwork and architecture throughout. Very tranquil all over the grounds and a lot of people are going to worship. You do have to remove shoes to go inside, but they provided bags to hold them. This was the only temple we felt where we were visiting a temple and not a tourist attraction in Kyoto. Afterwards we walked towards our hotel and stopped by koé donuts. We enjoyed the more mochi style donuts and they have a lot of unique flavors. We browsed a few shops and got to our hotel around 4pm. After checking in we walked towards Gion and Yasaka shrine. After wandering a bit we ended up at the Kyoto Ebisu Shrine for their Toka Ebisu festival. It was a fun experience and interesting to see the festival and stalls on the street before the shrine.
 
Day 3 Fushimi Inari Taisha, Yamazaki, Sannenzaka Ninenzaka, Kiyomizu-dera (28,971 steps, 12.18 miles, 78 flights climbed)
Took Keihan Main Line and got to Fushimi-Inari at around 7:30am. It was pretty empty and we had time to set up a tripod and take photos at the start of the gates. It took 40 minutes for us to reach the peak and about 1 hour to go down as we stopped more. Beautiful scenery and views throughout and we thoroughly enjoyed the visit. The amount of people throughout was about the same at this hour and we would have 1-2 minutes of no one else for most of the hike. Some shops started opening on our way down but most were still closed. We were very happy that we did the full hike and glad we went early before it got busy. We were back to the main entrance at 9:03am and it was still pretty empty.
We took a train to Kyoto station and went on our way to Suntory Yamazaki Distillery. We got to Yamazaki and had a second breakfast at Daily Yamazaki at the train station. After that we made our way to the distillery to check in before our 11:20am English tour. We checked in and went through the museum and checked out the tasting menu. Tour was pretty good and it was nice to see the process. You spend a lot of time listening to their audio guide on your phone and watching a video for each section. The grounds are really beautiful and you end the tour with a tasting of Yamazaki from different casks. Afterwards we went to the tasting room and ordered. There is a total limit of only 6 drinks and 1 per each of the premium whiskies. Pricing for 15ml pours: 300 yen for 12 years, 1000 yen for the 18-21 years, and 4000 yen for the 25-30 years. We ordered Hibiki 30, Yamazaki 25 and Hakushu 25 to start. Afterwards we went back for our next three and we were allowed to get Hibiki 30 again, as well as Hibiki 21 and Hakushu 18. It was an amazing experience as even with Costco pricing I would never be able to afford most of these bottles. After the tasting we picked up a few souvenirs at the gift shop (they don’t sell any of the nicer whiskeys unfortunately) and ate at a local Udon shop (かぎ卯) before going back to Kyoto.
We went to the hotel and relaxed for an hour before stopping by Lawson for our afternoon tea meal, which we ate by the river. We walked to Kōdaiji Temple then to Sannenzaka Ninenzaka area. It was crazy packed at 4pm and we were not really able to browse or stop at any shops comfortably. We went through and got to Kiyomizu-dera in time for the sunset. Afterwards Sannenzaka was a bit less crowded so we had some mochi and went to the two Ghibli shops and Ocha-no-ko SAISAI. We ended up going to Kura sushi for dinner and won the game on our last set of 5 plates and got a wasabi tape prize.
 
Day 4 Osaka Day (26,261 steps 11.01 miles)
Took train to Osaka in the morning and shopped around Osaka station and Umeda sky. We browsed the malls, Lululemon, Pokemon center, Ghibli stores, and Samurai jeans. Had lunch at Human Beings Everbody Noodles Premium downstairs in Lucua and then took the train down towards Shinsaibashi, and stopped at Warehouse (Denim) on the way. Walked through the shopping streets and to Namba Parks. Got our Gilco man picture and decided to get Gyukatsu. Went to Gyukatsu Tomita by Namba parks and got in line. Queue got super long behind us quickly and it turned out to be 100% Korean diners except for us. It was a pretty solid meal and the line was tripled when we left. Browsed a few more stores and took the train back to Kyoto.
 
Day 5 Kyoto back to Tokyo (12,142 steps, 5.16miles)
Started at Nishiki market at 9am but was a bit too early to go as many of the shops had not opened. Afterwards we checked out and took the Shinkansen back to Tokyo. This time we bought tickets outside of the station so it was an easier process and we were able to get seats next to each other. We went for green car again and were pretty happy we did as the normal cars seemed quite packed (guess it was weekend?). Relaxed the rest of the day in Tachikawa.
 
Day 6 Ghibli Museum, Ginza (14,729 steps, 5.69 miles)
Had 10am tickets for Ghibli museum and arrived around 10am. Huge line but it moved quickly and the museum inside was busy but you were able to browse everything you wanted in peace. They give you a small film ticket featuring a random movie for short film screening and it’s a nice souvenir. I really wanted to get my favorite movie and asked a few different employees but unfortunately we were not able to exchange. I really enjoyed the visit and we spent about two and a half hours there. The gift shop has a lot of stuff not found in the other Ghibli stores as well.
Afterwards we headed to Ginza to have Shabu Shabu at Shabusen Ginza 8F shop. Wait was about 30 minutes at 1pm. We had the basic set meal and added on the A3/A5 meats. Pretty satisfied with the meal and you get free refills on your rice / noodles. Afterwards we browsed a few stores but as it was the weekend everything was very packed. Itoya was really bad in particular as you had to wait to even make it across the floor. Headed back to Tackikawa for dinner afterwards.
 
Day 7 Flight to Sapporo (20,341 steps, 8.32 miles)
Took the airport bus from Kichijoji to Haneda, paid with IC cards. At terminal 2 departures the Pokemon machine was there but broken. We flew Air Do but you check your bags in at ANA counter and most things seem to be through ANA directly. Flight was pretty smooth and we arrived at New Chitose around 12pm. We bought tickets for the airport bus and got in line. We were the first stop and when we arrived at the next terminal they could only fit a few people in line so most people had to wait for the next bus. With snowfall from the previous day as well as bus driver change midway through, we took 2 hours to get to our stop in Susukino (40 minutes late). We arrived at hotel around 2:15pm and the machines did not allow check in until 3pm. Their luggage storage was full so the front desk took our bags. We walked over to the ramen street and the places we wanted to go were already not taking customers at 2:30pm. We ended up having soup curry at SHO-RIN which was pretty good. The beers we ordered throughout Sapporo were bigger size bottles and you have the option to get Sapporo Classic which is not sold outside of Hokkaido. After checking in we headed to Shiroi Koibito Park. It started snowing pretty heavily as we got there so we had to walk through snow for about 10 minutes. As we were a bit behind schedule, the tour and factory were already closed. Due to snow it was pretty empty and all the picture areas of the park include a phone stand so you can take pictures easily. We were able to get ice cream at the cafe before the last order and there is a huge difference with the Hokkaido milk. Afterwards we looked for food options around and decided to walk over to Taoka Miyanosawa for some Abura ramen. It was full snow and wind so we were pretty frozen when we arrived but it was worth the walk. When we finished eating, the snow had stopped so we walked back to the train station. For some of the bigger intersections we discovered there was actually an option to go underground to cross and avoid snow. We had waterproof shoes which was a big benefit as the snow was up to our knees at some of the streets we had to walk. We walked around Susukino and Tanukikoji before going for a second dinner at Ramen Shingen. Wait was about 30 minutes and I really enjoyed the Miso ramen here. Checked train schedules for Otaru / Yoichi the next day and Google stated everything was canceled. After a bit more checking JR website said some trains were canceled between Sapporo and Otaru and all trains after Otaru were canceled. We fortunately were able to book two times for our Nikka Distillery tour the next day so we were flexible depending on weather / cancellations.
 
Day 8 Otaru / Yoichi / Sapporo (20,134 steps, 8.03 miles)
We got to the train station early to make sure we could catch a train. We were able to get to Otaru by 8am and got to the bus stop to get to Yoichi for our Nikka tour. About 10 minutes before our bus was supposed to arrive an employee came out and made an announcement. We asked the lady in front of us and she said that due to the snow the bus was 30 minutes to 1 hour late. Google did not show this delay so keep in mind when checking maps. We decided to just do Otaru first and to go to Yoichi in the afternoon. We walked over to Sankaku market and it was fully empty. We went to eat at Takinami Donburi Restaurant and there was no wait to sit but food took about 20 minutes to come out. I got a variety bowl and my partner chose three toppings bowl. We found the bowls to be pretty disappointing. We did enjoy trying the Otaru pilsner though. Afterwards we walked to the canal and browsed shops until we got to the music box factory. It was pretty empty throughout, though there were a few Korean tour groups. We made the obligatory stops at LeTao and Rokkatei as well as Kitaichi Hall. Kitaichi Hall was really nice inside with the lamps but the chiffon cake and ice cream both left something to be desired. We were happy to have gone to see the ambiance though especially with no wait. Afterwards we walked back to Otaru station and caught a local bus to Yoichi.
We got to Yoichi around 1pm and went to Kakizaki Shōten around lunch. This meal was much better than our breakfast and we also tried the local 41 Beer Craft Works beers. Afterwards we made our way to Nikka Distillery. It was beautiful in the snow and the tour ended up being just the two of us. While the tour is normally in Japanese, our guide made it in English with the help of the printed cards. Due to snow a few areas were unfortunately closed but it was still a great experience. It was really cool to see the worker shovel the coal into the stills. The tour is completely free and you get a free tasting at the end of two whiskeys and their apple wine. Afterwards we went to the tasting room and ordered all the cask variations of their whiskey as well as a few other drinks we had not tried before. The menu is a bit more limited compared to Yamazaki though. They do have older bottles on display but were told those were not available to try. No limit on how many drinks you want to order here. Afterwards we went to the museum and gift shop to pick up a few souvenirs. A much larger selection of whiskey available to purchase compared to Yamazaki. We explored the ground a bit more before heading for dinner at Garden House Family sushi. We enjoyed our sushi bowls here and the waitress spoke English / they have an English menu. I got a variety bowl and my partner got a chutoro bowl. No uni available so they subbed chutoro for it in my bowl. Afterwards we walked back to the bus station and it seemed that some buses were not running. A bus eventually showed up and it went all the way to Sapporo. The driver said due to snow it would be very delayed so we ended up getting off at Otaru and took the train back to Sapporo. We wanted to do Otaru beer warehouse for dinner but did not want to risk getting stranded in Otaru.
 
Day 9 Jozankei Onsen (14,401 steps, 5.88 miles)
Debated going to Nijo market but after yesterday just checked out instead and headed towards Sapporo station. We had planned to go to Rokkatei for the ice cream sandwich but did not realize they were closed that day. Ended up browsing the department stores and picked up some snacks / sweets / ice cream for second breakfast. We also tried Mister Donut finally and they offer free refills on coffee if you dine in.
Went to the bus stop to catch our hotel bus to Jozankei. As with our previous travels, the bus arrived at the hotel at 2:30pm or about 30 minutes late due to snow. We stayed at Grand Blissen Hotel Jozankei and were very happy with our stay. We paid for the view floor and the room was amazing. Very spacious room and in room onsen. Only complaint would be the A/C airflow seemed to be pretty weak and we ended up leaving the window open to sleep. Guests were mostly Japanese as well when we were there, and there were a lot of families. After relaxing for an hour we headed out to go to the Futamitsuri Bridge. Google maps stated you had to make a big circle but the front desk said there was a pathway before Jozankei Manseikaku Hotel Milione, which was accurate. It was pretty empty at the bridge and the pathway were pretty icey. We stopped by the parks before heading back. Dinner was really good and consisted of sashimi starter, scallops and cooked fish second course, a very fatty prime rib main, and black sesame creme brulee dinner. You had a drink machine for water / tea / coffee and a table to order other paid drinks. Spent the rest of the night relaxing in the onsen.
 
Day 10 Sapporo in morning, flight back to Tokyo (9,226 steps, 4.05m)
Started the day in the onsen before heading to breakfast. Breakfast was the standard meal set with an additional buffet. It was a step down compared to the night before and the salmon main fish was not grilled which was kind of strange. Most people had a bite and left the salmon which was the first time I’ve seen so many plates uneaten at a restaurant. Checked out and headed back to Sapporo. Bus took about the same time (1.5 hours) and we went to Nemuro Hanamaru at Sapporo station for lunch. The queue is pretty ridiculous but there is an option to wait for standing bar only, which we waited about 15 minutes for. The fish here was really great and we were really happy with our meal. You write down your order on a slip and hand it to the chef. They had an English menu but it seemed to be missing a lot of the nicer items so I ended up just asking the chef if they had and wrote names down on the order slip (English spellings of fish we wanted). The initial sushi chef was pretty good and she got most of our orders quickly. They switched chefs halfway through and after that service slowed considerably. We also had a few kitchen orders that never arrived so we asked to cancel and got the bill. All the off menu items were charged at the standard expensive price point (418 yen) which was a great deal.Afterwards we took the train to the airport for our flight. I believe Google maps stated the trip would be 1750 or 1990 yen but the trip ended up being only 1150 yen.This is when we went back and noticed a lot of price discrepancies from Google. We flew Air Do for the return leg as well but this time it was ANA plane.
 
Day 11 Shibuya / Harajuku / Aoyama / Roppongi / Shinjuku (24,030 steps, 10.51 miles)
Spent the day walking through shops, starting from Shibuya. There were quite a few stores that did not do tax free. After Shibuya we walked to Cat Street and Harajuku before going to Aoyama and Roppongi. We mostly stopped by denim stores and character stores. We ended up eating in Iruca Tokyo for dinner and it was probably our favorite Ramen on the trip. We waited about 40 minutes from the start of Line B cone to enter. We ordered both the special Shoyu and Shio ramens as well as the truffle rice bowl. Stopped by Shinjuku on the way home for some pancakes and dessert.
 
Day 12 Shinjuku / Nakano (15,300 steps, 6.12 miles)
Started the day in Shinjuku and browsed some department stores including Lumine and Isetan Men’s. Might be nostalgia speaking but felt the selection in general for a lot of the men’s stores seemed much more bland and generic compared to before.. Had Tempura Funabashiya Shinjuku for lunch which was consistent and solid as always.We did a little more shopping and went to Shinjuku Takano Fruits Parlor. It was a good experience and we waited about 30 minutes. When we left the line was extended down multiple floors of the stairwell. There were a lot of empty tables but not enough staff to process everything. We then went to Nakano Broadway and browsed the shops for a while.
 
Day 13 Asakusa, Tobacco Salt, Skytree, Akihabara, Kichijoji (20,652 steps, 7.99 miles)
Went to Asakusa in the morning and despite the pouring rain it was already pretty packed at 10:30am. Walked through Nakamise shopping street to Senso-Ji. After visiting the temple we took a bus to Tokyo Skytree. Before Skytree we walked over to the Tobacco & Salt Museum. This was much better than expected, especially considering the 100 yen entry fee. We spent about an hour and half before heading back to Skytree shops. I would say the Ghibli store there had the most selection out of all the ones we visited. After Skytree we headed over to Akihabara. We browsed for a few hours and played some claw games before heading to Kichijoji for dinner. We went to Satou steakhouse and had the duo cuts sampler (12k yen per person). No wait though and I enjoyed the meal. Afterwards we picked up their famous minced meat katsu on the way out.
Day 14 Sunshine City, Shin Kiba, Ginza (16,136 steps, 7.12 miles)
Started the day in Sunshine City, mostly for the gachas and to check out the different stores. The Gacha store was pretty insane in size and we found a few unique ones. We enjoyed it much more than Akihabara and felt the overall vibe was much more relaxed. Afterwards we headed to Shin-Kiba station to check into our hotel for DisneySea the next day. We stayed at JR East Hotel Mets Tokyo Bay Shinkiba ($85/night) and we were pretty happy with our stay. Slightly bigger than normal room and was pretty new. Some issues with airflow as well and you cannot open windows. Convenience store in the lobby and a few restaurants at the station next door. It’s only two stops from DisneySea so location wise was perfect for us as the trip from Tachikawa was just too far. Spent the night in the Ginza area and had drinks / dinner at Torikizoku. This location ended up having two American groups who let their kids run around and scream. While I did not notice before, it was actually the first time I realized how many restaurants we ate at did not have kids. Good choice if you are traveling with kids though.
Day 15 DisneySea (24,119 steps, 10.26 miles)
Got up early and made it to the gates by 7:50am. There was already a decent crowd waiting at the time. Unfortunately for us, they did not open the gates until 9am. Once in, we quickly walked over and got in line for Soaring. When we entered, the sign said 40 minutes and it took about 60 minutes. Wait was 120 minutes when we got out. While waiting we got the 40th anniversary pass for Indiana Jones. It should be noted there is a two hour delay before you can get another anniversary pass and one hour delay for premier pass and Stand By pass shop bookings. They also sell out which we did not realize and would have booked Raging Spirits before it sold out. We were also unable to book the Tower of Terror Capsule toys, so it was sold out before 9:20am when we got in line. That said, towards the end of the day they allowed people into some of the standby pass stores, but were strict about the Tower of Terror gacha. We ended up paying for premier passes for Tower of Terror and Journey to Center of Earth (1500 and 2000 yen per person) and we found it worth skipping lines which stayed at around 60-90 minutes all day for those rides. Food wise we tried a lot of the stands and booked The Teddy Roosevelt Lounge for lunch. The Teddy Roosevelt lounge seated us about 15 minutes after our reservation time and we were told we had 30 minutes to order and one hour to get out upon being seated as they were busy. The drinks were sugary and very light and the food was not very good. We would stick with just the casual dining / stands in future. Only other note would be that the fireworks are launched in between the parks, so while most people gathered by the water, the best view was actually outside of the park. My partner really wanted to go and was very happy with her experience. Overall as someone fully indifferent to Disney, I enjoyed the day and found the park to be quite empty outside of the lines for the popular rides. You always had a place to sit and did not have to wait in any of the bathrooms. Plenty of rides had very short waits and things like the old style sailing ship were completely empty. Our favorite ride was Soaring and we were happy we did it first.
 
Day 16 Imperial Palace, Tachikawa evening (14,740 steps, 6.53 miles)
After checking out we headed to Tsujihan Kagurazaka. We arrived at 11:02am right after opening but one full set of people had filled out seats so we ended up having to wait until 11:25am for the next round. Overall it was a solid meal and the 20 minute wait felt about right. Not something I would go out of my way for in future, but it was nice to try. Afterwards we headed to walk in the Imperial Palace. It was pretty empty but pleasant to walk through. Headed back to Tachikawa after and had a relaxing rest of the day.
 
Day 17 Hakone (13,302 steps, 5.76 miles)
We headed for Hakone in the morning and took local trains there. We debated the RomanceCar but the train timing was not right and it would have added a bit of travel time and cost. Our hotel had a shuttle from Odawara station so we took that to get to Gora. We stayed at Hakone Gora KARAKU (~$640 / night, Breakfast included). Overall it was pretty good, but felt a step down compared to our Jozankei onsen. The hotel included a lounge that provided unlimited beer, wine, water, sparkling / tonic, tea, coffee, and various snacks. The lounge removes the beer in the morning and changes out the snacks as well. They also did not provide amenities for you to grab, so you have to request it during check in. After arriving, they took our bags and gave us tea and a cake to prepare for check in. We were not able to enter our rooms until check in time so we headed over to Tamura Ginkatsu-tei for lunch. Queue was about 25 groups ahead of us so we decided to walk directly to the Hakone Open Air museum instead. We had a quick lunch at Lawson on the way. We spent around an hour and 45 minutes there, though I would have liked to stay a bit longer. We left so we could get back to the hotel to enjoy the Onsen and have some time before dinner. Room was pretty spacious and the outdoor bath was pretty nice. We paid for the mountain view / east building but did not pay for a view floor this time which was the right choice as the area is more developed. That said, if you are debating between western or Japanese style rooms in the east building, the Japanese style rooms are one floor higher and on the same floor as the lounge. We headed back to Tamura Ginkatsu-tei for dinner and arrived around 15 minutes before it opened. There were six groups on the list before us and about 6 more groups that got in line before us. The tofu cutlet was pretty unique but we would probably not return. We tried the local Hakone beers as well and the Red Ale was my favorite.
 
Day 18 Hakone / Owakudani / Tokyo (13,178 steps, 5.89 miles)
Woke up for the sunrise and then had breakfast at the hotel. Meal was pretty good and they gave you the chopsticks as a gift. Enjoyed the onsen until check out time and headed to Owakudani. The Ropeway was unfortunately down for maintenance so we ended up taking a taxi using the GO app. Cost was 2600 yen - 500 yen promo, so a pretty good price to save 35 minutes vs walking and bus (~800 yen). It was a sunny day so we had a great view of Mt. Fuji and had the customary black eggs and ice cream. We took the bus back down and had a nice walk through undeveloped areas before getting back to Gora. Took hotel shuttle back to Odawara station and had a relaxing rest of the day once we got back to the Tokyo area.
 
Day 19/20 Kichijoji / Tachikawa shopping days (15,262 steps, 5.94 miles, 7,602 steps, 3.08 miles)
Spent the weekend in Kichijoji and Tachikawa to pick up any more souvenirs we needed and to get any cravings we had out of the way. We did have Flipper’s pancakes in Kichijoji with minimal wait on a weekend so it might be a better option compared to the more central locations. Both Kichijoji and Tachikawa are good options as they have most stores with fewer crowds and less waiting.
 
Day 21 Travel Day Home (9,823 steps, 4.17 miles)
Our flight left in the afternoon and it took about 2 hours to make it to Narita. We watched the 49ers game in the morning with the DAZN stream which was 1020 yen for the rest of the season. It was the FOX broadcast with most ads going over as well. Coming from Tachikawa we ended up taking the Musashino train to Higashi-Matsudo Station to take the Narita SkyAccess. It was pretty smooth throughout and you did not have to buy any special tickets. We had a United flight home that was super delayed and did not have a working entertainment system. With zero expectations for United flights in general, the food was better than expected, service was still pretty bad. We flew normal economy and from the seat map it should have been fully empty by us. People switched seats due to this and our empty area ended up being somewhat full. They also let people move into the extended legroom economy seats which was a bit surprising but I think flight attendants gave up after our delays and some of the passengers’ behavior. We did debate upgrading but both business and premium economy were fully filled and flight is relatively short so happy we did not.
 
Overall we had a great trip and if we were doing it again we probably would have spent one more day in Kyoto / Osaka and more time in Hokkaido. We also would stay more central in Tokyo, as the hour train rides each way were pretty draining and the Chuo line train stayed full no matter the time of day.
My favorite parts of the trip were: Suntory Yamazaki Distillery, Yoichi Nikka Distillery, Fushimi Inari Shrine, Studio Ghibli museum
My partner’s favorite parts of the trip were: Onsens, Hokkaido milk, Shirito Koibito Chocolate Factory, both whiskey distilleries, Studio Ghibli museum and Disneysea.
Happy to answer questions in the comments below!
submitted by the_judge_168 to JapanTravel [link] [comments]

2024.02.10 22:39 Ok_Amoeba6618 Recently reread world war z let me know what you think of this story (sorry for any grammar issues) completely fan made

I meet David Simon in the city of Madison formerly known as Harrisonburg, Virginia. It was one of the only blue zones in the United States on the East Coast. It is perfectly situated between two mountains which makes it almost Impossible for zombies to reach. During the war, the roads and bridges leading to Harrisonburg were destroyed, ensuring the survival of everyone in the Safe zone. David is a tall skinny older man. Accompanying him is a young woman who bears a striking resemblance to him. I can only assume that it is his daughter. We sit down at the cafe and the barista comes by with three menus. After we order our drinks, I begin the interview.
Start from the beginning.
Well, I had just graduated from University of Richmond three years prior to the outbreak in those days I was just worried about keeping a roof over our head. I had a job in sales to do that very thing while I perused my master's in public health. It was just the three of us me my wife, then girlfriend, and Shoshana
he motions towards the young woman sitting adjacent to me.
She was about a year and a half when it all began. It started out kinda slow in Richmond
Richmond I am sorry I'm not familiar with geography of the state.
Yeah, Richmond was the formal capital before Hari..
he stops himself
Sorry, I mean Madison
We lived in a shitty apartment near downtown right smack in the middle of VCU. (VCU,Virginia Commonwealth University the largest college in the state prewar).
I remember when the first murders started to happen. I thought it was just crazy people well going crazy. A bunch of homeless people on drugs losing their shit and killing people. Back then, meth was the most popular drug, and it was catching on with them.
It started to hit me when that news lady broke the story about African Rabies, the dead coming back to life, ZOMBIES ,fucking crazy. Then I started to get worried.
I already had two guns, a 1911 I took with me on hikes and 22 rifle. That made me feel a little safer. I think a week went by and then everything went crazy every day I heard sirens. It was crazy especially at night.. People raiding stores shooting each other in the street multiple car crashes too, random fires well you remember how it was in the beginning you were more likely to get killed by human than a zombie.
When was the first time you saw one of them?
My girlfriend and I had this plan you see back in the day I was an avid hiker I knew there was this cabin on the Apalachin trail, it was pretty remote, we were planning to go there when things died down if things died down. I went out to get supplies from the Kroger, canned food and milk, mostly. I had most of the survival supplies I would need on the trail, even a baby carrier.
He ruffles his daughter's hair and messes up her curls. She pulls away in annoyance.
Anyway, I was in the middle of the canned food aisle most of the food was gone when I heard a woman scream no at the top of her lungs. You see most of the infected were downtown at the hospital and were confined there by the police and national guard with a few here and there leading away from downtown. But back to the screaming woman she screamed at the top of her lungs. One of them was wearing a Kroger uniform grabbed her and forced her to the ground biting her ear and the side of her face off. She was still screaming when two more stumbled towards their friend, one dug into her stomach and the other grabbed her leg. Everyone in the store was rushing towards the entrance, creating a wall of people. I saw an overweight woman get trampled by at least twenty people when she fell. The chaos of everything gave me the perfect chance to grab the rest of the canned off the self and get the fuck out of there. on my way out I stopped to look at the carnage the woman was still twitching as they dug their hands into her ribcage grabbing all the gore they could and shoving it in their mouths.
What happened when you got back to the apartment?
I told my girlfriend about it. We planned to get out of the city the following day and go to my mother's house. The county at this point was safer than the city. There were still a lot of them, but the police and national guard were handling it well.
Were you able to get out of the city?
No, after the attack at Kroger they started popping up everywhere including in my apartment. I still remember the screams coming from down the hall followed by the gunshots. Because of this we weren't able to leave we didn't know many were in the apartment building in the days following the first scream we heard a few more followed by scuffles or gunshots. Another week went by there was still craziness outside but in the apartment building, it was mostly deserted. I guess most of the VCU students got the fuck out of there like we should’ve.
What about the baby crying?
Yeah that is what I was really afraid of. Thats what really freaked me out. Shoshana was sleeping through the night mostly, but she would always wake up around 1 or 2 in the morning wanting milk. So to solve this problem, so she wouldn't crying so much one of us slept out in the living room. So as soon as she cried we would get up and feed her. We had enough milk to last a month it was the last thing I grabbed before getting out of the Kroger.
When did you finally make it out of the city?
After another week, when the news stopped, and it was just the emergency response blue screen on the TV . Last news we got about the outbreak was that a horde of a few hundred undead were circling around the VCU dorms at Monroe Park and the cathedral. The sirens had stopped, you could see the fires from downtown. Our canned food situation was dire, the diapers genie was even more dire trashed piled up in our already small apartment. It stunk to high heaven but by that point we had become nose blind to the smell. It was becoming a health hazard to even be in our apartment for the first time in the whole time of being there, there were roaches we had been killing them for the last few days. I was starting to worry about Shoshana, she was still small then. Then the power went out and the water too, that was the last straw we decided to nut up. I assembled my rifle it was an AR-7 and got my 1911. The AR-7 was a good gun all the components fit into the stock including extra ammunition.
(AR-7 the main emergency side arm of the United States airforce prewar)
We formulated a plan for how to get out of the city. We knew the main roads were trashed we couldn't pass anywhere near Monroe Park at all without the dead circling our car and killing us. The highway was the same story too many cars and the dead had a buffet’ with people trying to escape the city. Then the thought dawned on me that we couldn't take the car, or we would just be a package meal for the undead or we would get stuck in the car and starve to death. If we were going to escape it would have to be on foot. At this thought we both lost hope, we contemplated suicide but both of us couldn’t.
Why?
Look to your left neither one of us could hurt her. Believe me we got into an argument over it we of course couldn't scream at each other like most of our fights had devolved into. The dead could hear us so for the first time in our relationship we whisper fought.
Whisper fought?
Yeah, one of our couple friends used to do it instead of yelling at each other they whispered harshly instead.
Please continue
After calling each other every name in the book and almost walking out into the hallway twice we both concluded that we couldn't hurt our sweet baby girl. So, we came up with a plan we would only pack what we needed for a few days journey. Before the news shut off there was a safe zone in Harrisonburg (post war Madison) we saw that they were herding refugees from Richmond and the coast into James Madison University. So, we decided that was our destination but first we would need to make it out of the apartment. I was to be the one to see if our floor was clear, we lived on the third floor. If it was clear I was to go up each stair well and shut all the doors to the floors above and below.
Was your floor clear?
Yes, for the most part, I could hear moans and pounding from within the apartment at the end of the hall. I’m guessing that's where gunshots came from. My wife was friends with our neighbor Mia before they had a falling out, every time Mia’s boyfriend would visit, he would bring his gun, he was the type who was afraid of the city back in the day. I just hope Medina, Mias roommate, wasn't trapped in there, locked in her room starving while they pounded on her door.
What about the stairwells?
They were also cleared I figured most people got out earlier in the month I didn’t know how wrong I was you see they were all in the basement I heard them first the shuffling and the moans. At first, I thought they were coming from the first floor but upon further inspection I saw them in the basement surrounded by blood and gore caked all over the walls and floors. Lucky break for us with that many I don't know if we could've gotten out. After closing all the doors, I went back upstairs. I got Aviya and the baby together and we quickly and quietly exited the building. I got to tell you I was so afraid of Shoshana getting upset we couldn’t use the carrier my mom got her for hiking so we had to use the chest carrier she had when she was a baby and I knew it was uncomfortable for her, but she didn't cry she was as silent as a church mouse. If she had I wouldn't be here, they would've come up, broken down the doors and cut us off at the stairwell.
Why could you use the other baby carrier?
The baby carrier was a backpack for a baby, but the problem is that it didn't have enough room for any extra supplies.
When you got out of the building, were they’re a lot of them on the street level.
I saw maybe seven or eight of them, but we quickly moved out of their line of sight, they weren't a problem. They were shuffling toward the dorms at the end of West Marshal Street the street I lived on. I heard them all moaning and snarling at the dorm. That sound still haunts me and probably everyone else on the planet. I’d probably seen every Zombie movie known to man before the war, but in person that moan is so loud especially when they’re in groups.
I thought VCU campus was at Monroe Park. Were you close to it?
So, yes, that is confusing, but VCU is essentially most of downtown Richmond. They have dorms everywhere.
Why hadn't they got in?
The dorms had reinforced glass windows and a steel gate for the parking garage, nothing was getting in there.
Go on
So our plan was to get out on route 64 which led to route 33 which leads to Harrisonburg. Going all the way down Kenny Street, the street on the side of our apartment building would lead us right through a neighborhood which was adjacent to route. It was dangerous but our only way out, but we were essentially defenseless. Yes, I had guns on me but firing a shot in the city like that would have been suicide and I was not ready to serve up my wife and child like a steak dinner.
So, what did you use as a weapon?
I saw a baseball bat in the clutches of a zombie. I guess the poor bastard was still grabbing it when he turned. I managed to get him on the ground and stomp his head in, but this upset Shoshana badly. She never did like fighting, whenever my wife then girlfriend would fight, she would cry. This did exactly what you would expect. Zombies began pouring out of each house at the end of Kenny Street must've been like five or ten of them. Men women children and everything in-between. In every state in bathrobes, fully dressed, naked, and then came that awful moan one after another. This in return attracted more and more; before we knew it there were about twenty or thirty of them.
What happened then?
We booked our asses to the highway. There was gap between the houses that led exactly where we needed to go. Once then we were pretty much Scott free or that's what I want to say but we still had a two-day trek. But the two day trek turned into a week-long horror show to Harrisonburg. We passed through so many abandon towns and saw so much blood enough for ten life times. We slept in abandon houses and hotels. That was a long hard journey I thought we were going to die so many times between the zombies trapped in and under cars, their hands hanging out of windows ready to grab you and pull you in. There were also zombies trying to get into cars and don't even get me started on the people we came across desperate as shit and would kill you over can of beans. I had to kill a man who was trying take my wife. Shot him in the lung he crumpled on the road I left him for the dead the gunshot must've attracted at least ten of them. Sometimes in my dreams I'm taken back to that memory. It's so vivid I can hear him gurgling and choking on his own blood as the dead rip into him.
It was scary shit, especially with a person that doesn't understand anything you say and can give away your position at any time if she got upset.
But we survived, I guess that's all that matters in the end.
He turns and smiles at his daughter
submitted by Ok_Amoeba6618 to zombies [link] [comments]

2024.02.10 22:09 Ok_Amoeba6618 Recently reread world war z let me know what you think of my story, this completely fan made (also sorry for any grammar issues)

I meet David Simon in the city of Madison formerly known as Harrisonburg, Virginia. It was one of the only blue zones in the United States on the East Coast. It is perfectly situated between two mountains which makes it almost Impossible for zombies to reach. During the war, the roads and bridges leading to Harrisonburg were destroyed, ensuring the survival of everyone in the Safe zone. David is a tall skinny older man. Accompanying him is a young woman who bears a striking resemblance to him. I can only assume that it is his daughter. We sit down at the cafe and the barista comes by with three menus. After we order our drinks, I begin the interview.
Start from the beginning.
Well, I had just graduated from University of Richmond three years prior to the outbreak in those days I was just worried about keeping a roof over our head. I had a job in sales to do that very thing while I perused my master's in public health. It was just the three of us me my wife, then girlfriend, and Shoshana
he motions towards the young woman sitting adjacent to me.
She was about a year and a half when it all began. It started out kinda slow in Richmond
Richmond I am sorry I'm not familiar with geography of the state.
Yeah, Richmond was the formal capital before Hari..
he stops himself
Sorry, I mean Madison
We lived in a shitty apartment near downtown right smack in the middle of VCU. (VCU,Virginia Commonwealth University the largest college in the state prewar).
I remember when the first murders started to happen. I thought it was just crazy people well going crazy. A bunch of homeless people on drugs losing their shit and killing people. Back then, meth was the most popular drug, and it was catching on with them.
It started to hit me when that news lady broke the story about African Rabies, the dead coming back to life, ZOMBIES ,fucking crazy. Then I started to get worried.
I already had two guns, a 1911 I took with me on hikes and 22 rifle. That made me feel a little safer. I think a week went by and then everything went crazy every day I heard sirens. It was crazy especially at night.. People raiding stores shooting each other in the street multiple car crashes too, random fires well you remember how it was in the beginning you were more likely to get killed by human than a zombie.
When was the first time you saw one of them?
My girlfriend and I had this plan you see back in the day I was an avid hiker I knew there was this cabin on the Apalachin trail, it was pretty remote, we were planning to go there when things died down if things died down. I went out to get supplies from the Kroger, canned food and milk, mostly. I had most of the survival supplies I would need on the trail, even a baby carrier.
He ruffles his daughter's hair and messes up her curls. She pulls away in annoyance.
Anyway, I was in the middle of the canned food aisle most of the food was gone when I heard a woman scream no at the top of her lungs. You see most of the infected were downtown at the hospital and were confined there by the police and national guard with a few here and there leading away from downtown. But back to the screaming woman she screamed at the top of her lungs. One of them was wearing a Kroger uniform grabbed her and forced her to the ground biting her ear and the side of her face off. She was still screaming when two more stumbled towards their friend, one dug into her stomach and the other grabbed her leg. Everyone in the store was rushing towards the entrance, creating a wall of people. I saw an overweight woman get trampled by at least twenty people when she fell. The chaos of everything gave me the perfect chance to grab the rest of the canned off the self and get the fuck out of there. on my way out I stopped to look at the carnage the woman was still twitching as they dug their hands into her ribcage grabbing all the gore they could and shoving it in their mouths.
What happened when you got back to the apartment?
I told my girlfriend about it. We planned to get out of the city the following day and go to my mother's house. The county at this point was safer than the city. There were still a lot of them, but the police and national guard were handling it well.
Were you able to get out of the city?
No, after the attack at Kroger they started popping up everywhere including in my apartment. I still remember the screams coming from down the hall followed by the gunshots. Because of this we weren't able to leave we didn't know many were in the apartment building in the days following the first scream we heard a few more followed by scuffles or gunshots. Another week went by there was still craziness outside but in the apartment building, it was mostly deserted. I guess most of the VCU students got the fuck out of there like we should’ve.
What about the baby crying?
Yeah that is what I was really afraid of. Thats what really freaked me out. Shoshana was sleeping through the night mostly, but she would always wake up around 1 or 2 in the morning wanting milk. So to solve this problem, so she wouldn't crying so much one of us slept out in the living room. So as soon as she cried we would get up and feed her. We had enough milk to last a month it was the last thing I grabbed before getting out of the Kroger.
When did you finally make it out of the city?
After another week, when the news stopped, and it was just the emergency response blue screen on the TV . Last news we got about the outbreak was that a horde of a few hundred undead were circling around the VCU dorms at Monroe Park and the cathedral. The sirens had stopped, you could see the fires from downtown. Our canned food situation was dire, the diapers genie was even more dire trashed piled up in our already small apartment. It stunk to high heaven but by that point we had become nose blind to the smell. It was becoming a health hazard to even be in our apartment for the first time in the whole time of being there, there were roaches we had been killing them for the last few days. I was starting to worry about Shoshana, she was still small then. Then the power went out and the water too, that was the last straw we decided to nut up. I assembled my rifle it was an AR-7 and got my 1911. The AR-7 was a good gun all the components fit into the stock including extra ammunition.
(AR-7 the main emergency side arm of the United States airforce prewar)
We formulated a plan for how to get out of the city. We knew the main roads were trashed we couldn't pass anywhere near Monroe Park at all without the dead circling our car and killing us. The highway was the same story too many cars and the dead had a buffet’ with people trying to escape the city. Then the thought dawned on me that we couldn't take the car, or we would just be a package meal for the undead or we would get stuck in the car and starve to death. If we were going to escape it would have to be on foot. At this thought we both lost hope, we contemplated suicide but both of us couldn’t.
Why?
Look to your left neither one of us could hurt her. Believe me we got into an argument over it we of course couldn't scream at each other like most of our fights had devolved into. The dead could hear us so for the first time in our relationship we whisper fought.
Whisper fought?
Yeah, one of our couple friends used to do it instead of yelling at each other they whispered harshly instead.
Please continue
After calling each other every name in the book and almost walking out into the hallway twice we both concluded that we couldn't hurt our sweet baby girl. So, we came up with a plan we would only pack what we needed for a few days journey. Before the news shut off there was a safe zone in Harrisonburg (post war Madison) we saw that they were herding refugees from Richmond and the coast into James Madison University. So, we decided that was our destination but first we would need to make it out of the apartment. I was to be the one to see if our floor was clear, we lived on the third floor. If it was clear I was to go up each stair well and shut all the doors to the floors above and below.
Was your floor clear?
Yes, for the most part, I could hear moans and pounding from within the apartment at the end of the hall. I’m guessing that's where gunshots came from. My wife was friends with our neighbor Mia before they had a falling out, every time Mia’s boyfriend would visit, he would bring his gun, he was the type who was afraid of the city back in the day. I just hope Medina, Mias roommate, wasn't trapped in there, locked in her room starving while they pounded on her door.
What about the stairwells?
They were also cleared I figured most people got out earlier in the month I didn’t know how wrong I was you see they were all in the basement I heard them first the shuffling and the moans. At first, I thought they were coming from the first floor but upon further inspection I saw them in the basement surrounded by blood and gore caked all over the walls and floors. Lucky break for us with that many I don't know if we could've gotten out. After closing all the doors, I went back upstairs. I got Aviya and the baby together and we quickly and quietly exited the building. I got to tell you I was so afraid of Shoshana getting upset we couldn’t use the carrier my mom got her for hiking so we had to use the chest carrier she had when she was a baby and I knew it was uncomfortable for her, but she didn't cry she was as silent as a church mouse. If she had I wouldn't be here, they would've come up, broken down the doors and cut us off at the stairwell.
Why could you use the other baby carrier?
The baby carrier was a backpack for a baby, but the problem is that it didn't have enough room for any extra supplies.
When you got out of the building, were they’re a lot of them on the street level.
I saw maybe seven or eight of them, but we quickly moved out of their line of sight, they weren't a problem. They were shuffling toward the dorms at the end of West Marshal Street the street I lived on. I heard them all moaning and snarling at the dorm. That sound still haunts me and probably everyone else on the planet. I’d probably seen every Zombie movie known to man before the war, but in person that moan is so loud especially when they’re in groups.
I thought VCU campus was at Monroe Park. Were you close to it?
So, yes, that is confusing, but VCU is essentially most of downtown Richmond. They have dorms everywhere.
Why hadn't they got in?
The dorms had reinforced glass windows and a steel gate for the parking garage, nothing was getting in there.
Go on
So our plan was to get out on route 64 which led to route 33 which leads to Harrisonburg. Going all the way down Kenny Street, the street on the side of our apartment building would lead us right through a neighborhood which was adjacent to route. It was dangerous but our only way out, but we were essentially defenseless. Yes, I had guns on me but firing a shot in the city like that would have been suicide and I was not ready to serve up my wife and child like a steak dinner.
So, what did you use as a weapon?
I saw a baseball bat in the clutches of a zombie. I guess the poor bastard was still grabbing it when he turned. I managed to get him on the ground and stomp his head in, but this upset Shoshana badly. She never did like fighting, whenever my wife then girlfriend would fight, she would cry. This did exactly what you would expect. Zombies began pouring out of each house at the end of Kenny Street must've been like five or ten of them. Men women children and everything in-between. In every state in bathrobes, fully dressed, naked, and then came that awful moan one after another. This in return attracted more and more; before we knew it there were about twenty or thirty of them.
What happened then?
We booked our asses to the highway. There was gap between the houses that led exactly where we needed to go. Once then we were pretty much Scott free or that's what I want to say but we still had a two-day trek. But the two day trek turned into a week-long horror show to Harrisonburg. We passed through so many abandon towns and saw so much blood enough for ten life times. We slept in abandon houses and hotels. That was a long hard journey I thought we were going to die so many times between the zombies trapped in and under cars, their hands hanging out of windows ready to grab you and pull you in. There were also zombies trying to get into cars and don't even get me started on the people we came across desperate as shit and would kill you over can of beans. I had to kill a man who was trying take my wife. Shot him in the lung he crumpled on the road I left him for the dead the gunshot must've attracted at least ten of them. Sometimes in my dreams I'm taken back to that memory. It's so vivid I can hear him gurgling and choking on his own blood as the dead rip into him.
It was scary shit, especially with a person that doesn't understand anything you say and can give away your position at any time if she got upset.
But we survived, I guess that's all that matters in the end.
He turns and smiles at his daughter
submitted by Ok_Amoeba6618 to ZombieSurvivalTactics [link] [comments]

2024.02.10 20:32 Ok_Amoeba6618 I recently reread world war z and I got inspire this is completely fan made let me know if you like it

I meet David Simon in the city of Madison formerly known as Harrisonburg, Virginia. It was one only blue zone in the United States on the East Coast. It is perfectly situated between two mountains which makes it almost Impossible for zombies to reach. During the war, the roads and bridges leading to Harrisonburg were destroyed, ensuring the survival of everyone in the Safe zone. David is a tall skinny older man. Accompanying him is a young woman who bears a striking resemblance to him. I can only assume that it is his daughter. We sit down at the cafe and the barista comes by with three menus. After we order our drinks, I begin the interview.
Start from the beginning.
Well, I had just graduated from University of Richmond three years prior to the outbreak in those days I was just worried about keeping a roof over our head. I had a job in sales to do that very thing while I perused my master's in public health. It was just the three of us me my wife, then girlfriend, and Shoshana
he motions towards the young woman sitting adjacent to me.
She was about a year and a half when it all began. It started out kinda slow in Richmond
Richmond I am sorry I'm not familiar with geography of the state.
Yeah, Richmond was the formal capital before Hari..
he stops himself
Sorry, I mean Madison
We lived in a shitty apartment near downtown right smack in the middle of VCU. (VCU,Virginia Commonwealth University the largest college in the state prewar).
I remember when the first murders started to happen. I thought it was just crazy people well going crazy. A bunch of homeless people on drugs losing their shit and killing people. Back then, meth was the most popular drug, and it was catching on with them.
It started to hit me when that news lady broke the story about African Rabies, the dead coming back to life, ZOMBIES ,fucking crazy. Then I started to get worried.
I already had two guns, a 1911 I took with me on hikes and 22 rifle. That made me feel a little safer. I think a week went by and then everything went crazy every day I heard sirens. It was crazy especially at night.. People raiding stores shooting each other in the street multiple car crashes too, random fires well you remember how it was in the beginning you were more likely to get killed by human than a zombie.
When was the first time you saw one of them?
My girlfriend and I had this plan you see back in the day I was an avid hiker I knew there was this cabin on the Apalachin trail, it was pretty remote, we were planning to go there when things died down if things died down. I went out to get supplies from the Kroger, canned food and milk, mostly. I had most of the survival supplies I would need on the trail, even a baby carrier.
He ruffles his daughter's hair and messes up her curls. She pulls away in annoyance.
Anyway, I was in the middle of the canned food aisle most of the food was gone when I heard a woman scream no at the top of her lungs. You see most of the infected were downtown at the hospital and were confined there by the police and national guard with a few here and there leading away from downtown. But back to the screaming woman she screamed at the top of her lungs one of the wearing a Kroger uniform grabbed her and forced her to the ground biting her ear and the side of her face off. She was still screaming when two more stumbled towards their friend, one dug into her stomach and the other grabbed her leg. Everyone in the store was rushing towards the entrance, creating a wall of people. I saw an overweight woman get trampled by at least twenty people when she fell. The chaos of everything gave me the perfect chance to grab the rest of the canned off the self and get the fuck out of there. on my way out I stopped to look at the carnage the woman was still twitching as they dug their hands into her ribcage grabbing all the gore they could and shoving it in their mouths.
What happened when you got back to the apartment?
I told my girlfriend about it. We planned to get out of the city the following day and go to my mother's house. The county at this point was safer than the city. There were still a lot of them, but the police and national guard were handling it well.
Were you able to get out of the city?
No, after the attack at Kroger they started popping up everywhere including in my apartment. I still remember the screams coming from down the hall followed by the gunshots. Because of this we weren't able to leave we didn't know many were in the apartment building in the days following the first scream we heard a few more followed by scuffles or gunshots. Another week went by there was still craziness outside but in the apartment building, it was mostly deserted. I guess most of the VCU students got the fuck out of there like we should’ve.
What about the baby crying?
Yeah that is what I was really afraid of. Thats what really freaked me out. Shoshana was sleeping through the night mostly, but she would always wake up around 1 or 2 in the morning wanting milk. So to solve this problem, so she wouldn't crying so much one of us slept out in the living room. So as soon as she cried we would get up and feed her. We had enough milk to last a month it was the last thing I grabbed before getting out of the Kroger.
When did you finally make it out of the city?
After another week, when the news stopped, and it was just the emergency response blue screen on the TV . Last news we got about the outbreak was that a horde of a few hundred undead were circling around the VCU dorms at Monroe Park and the cathedral. The sirens had stopped, you could see the fires from downtown. Our canned food situation was dire, the diapers genie was even more dire trashed piled up in our already small apartment. It stunk to high heaven but by that point we had become nose blind to the smell. It was becoming a health hazard to even be in our apartment for the first time in the whole time of being there, there were roaches we had been killing them for the last few days. I was starting to worry about Shoshana, she was still small then. Then the power went out and the water too, that was the last straw we decided to nut up. I assembled my rifle it was an AR-7 and got my 1911. The AR-7 was a good gun all the components fit into the stock including extra ammunition.
(AR-7 the main emergency side arm of the United States airforce prewar)
We formulated a plan for how to get out of the city. We knew the main roads were trashed we couldn't pass anywhere near Monroe Park at all without the dead circling our car and killing us. The highway was the same story too many cars and the dead had a buffet’ with people trying to escape the city. Then the thought dawned on me that we couldn't take the car, or we would just be a package meal for the undead or we would get stuck in the car and starve to death. If we were going to escape it would have to be on foot. At this thought we both lost hope, we contemplated suicide but both of us couldn’t.
Why?
Look to your left neither one of us could hurt her. Believe me we got into an argument over it we of course couldn't scream at each other like most of our fights had devolved into. The dead could hear us so for the first time in our relationship we whisper fought.
Whisper fought?
Yeah, one of our couple friends used to do it instead of yelling at each other they whispered harshly instead.
Please continue
After calling each other every name in the book and almost walking out into the hallway twice we both concluded that we couldn't hurt our sweet baby girl. So, we came up with a plan we would only pack what we needed for a few days journey. Before the news shut off there was a safe zone in Harrisonburg (post war Madison) we saw that they were herding refugees from Richmond and the coast into James Madison University. So, we decided that was our destination but first we would need to make it out of the apartment. I was to be the one to see if our floor was clear, we lived on the third floor. If it was clear I was to go up each stair well and shut all the doors to the floors above and below.
Was your floor clear?
Yes, for the most part, I could hear moans and pounding from within the apartment at the end of the hall. I’m guessing that's where gunshots came from. My wife was friends with our neighbor Mia before they had a falling out, every time Mia’s boyfriend would visit, he would bring his gun, he was the type who was afraid of the city back in the day. I just hope Medina, Mias roommate, wasn't trapped in there, locked in her room starving while they pounded on her door.
What about the stairwells?
They were also cleared I figured most people got out earlier in the month I didn’t know how wrong I was you see they were all in the basement I heard them first the shuffling and the moans. At first, I thought they were coming from the first floor but upon further inspection I saw them in the basement surrounded by blood and gore caked all over the walls and floors. Lucky break for us with that many I don't know if we could've gotten out. After closing all the doors, I went back upstairs. I got Aviya and the baby together and we quickly and quietly exited the building. I got to tell you I was so afraid of Shoshana getting upset we couldn’t use the carrier my mom got her for hiking so we had to use the chest carrier she had when she was a baby and I knew it was uncomfortable for her, but she didn't cry she was as silent as a church mouse. If she had I wouldn't be here, they would've come up, broken down the doors and cut us off at the stairwell.
Why could you use the other baby carrier?
The baby carrier was a backpack for a baby, but the problem is that it didn't have enough room for any extra supplies.
When you got out of the building, were they’re a lot of them on the street level.
I saw maybe seven or eight of them, but we quickly moved out of their line of sight, they weren't a problem. They were shuffling toward the dorms at the end of West Marshal Street the street I lived on. I heard them all moaning and snarling at the dorm. That sound still haunts me and probably everyone else on the planet. I’d probably seen every Zombie movie known to man before the war, but in person that moan is so loud especially when they’re in groups.
I thought VCU campus was at Monroe Park. Were you close to it?
So, yes, that is confusing, but VCU is essentially most of downtown Richmond. They have dorms everywhere.
Why hadn't they got in?
The dorms had reinforced glass windows and a steel gate for the parking garage, nothing was getting in there.
Go on
So our plan was to get out on route 64 which led to route 33 which leads to Harrisonburg. Going all the way down Kenny Street, the street on the side of our apartment building would lead us right through a neighborhood which was adjacent to route. It was dangerous but our only way out, but we were essentially defenseless. Yes, I had guns on me but firing a shot in the city like that would have been suicide and I was not ready to serve up my wife and child like a steak dinner.
So, what did you use as a weapon?
I saw a baseball bat in the clutches of a zombie. I guess the poor bastard was still grabbing it when he turned. I managed to get him on the ground and stomp his head in, but this upset Shoshana badly. She never did like fighting, whenever my wife then girlfriend would fight, she would cry. This did exactly what you would expect. Zombies began pouring out of each house at the end of Kenny Street must've been like five or ten of them. Men women children and everything in-between. In every state in bathrobes, fully dressed, naked, and then came that awful moan one after another. This in return attracted more and more; before we knew it there were about twenty or thirty of them.
What happened then?
We booked our asses to the highway. There was gap between the houses that led exactly where we needed to go. Once then we were pretty much Scott free or that's what I want to say but we still had a two-day trek. But the two day trek turned into a week-long horror show to Harrisonburg. We passed through so many abandon towns saw so much blood enough for ten life times. We slept in abandon houses and hotels. That was a long hard journey I thought we were going to die so many times between the zombies trapped in and under cars, their hands hanging out of windows ready to grab you and pull you in. There were also zombies trying to get into cars and don't even get me started on the people we came across desperate as shit and would kill you over can of beans. I had to kill a man who was trying take my wife. Shot him in the lung he crumpled on the road I left him for the dead the gunshot must've attracted at least ten of them. Sometimes in my dreams I'm taken back to that memory. It's so vivid I can hear him gurgling and choking on his own blood as the dead rip into him.
It was scary shit, especially with a person that doesn't understand anything you say and can give away your position at any time if she got upset.
But we survived, I guess that's all that matters in the end.
He turns and smiles at his daughter
submitted by Ok_Amoeba6618 to worldwarz [link] [comments]

2024.02.10 02:25 Global_Trifle9141 I wish this game had skill based matchmaking

There’s no reason I get such idiotic teammates. I’ve had my fair share of dumb deaths, but some teammates just take the cake. Constantly getting idiots who run into a team thinking they can John wick the situation. Then there’s the teammate who stares at walls rather than where the enemy is. Sometimes they know the enemies exact position and run straight up to them (done that ngl). Then there’s the teammates who rat the entire time. You could literally just go solo. There is no reason to abandon a team just because you’re a p****. I hate these smooth brain people bro. Yesterday I had an idiotic teammate who ran into a stairwell knowing a whole 4 man team was watching the door. Then today I had a teammate who crouched in the middle of the floor with multiple paths getting to him just so he could watch one side with a wall because he thoughts that was where the enemy would come. KNOWING there’s more than one. There needs to be a duo and solo mode.
submitted by Global_Trifle9141 to ArenaBreakoutGlobal [link] [comments]

2024.02.08 18:46 comfort--creature A RPDR Serial killer?!

To preface, I often have linear, plot heavy dreams that are similar to a movie, and last nights nightmare was a fun one.
In the first “scene”, I was out of body observing a well lit, windowless room (a basement?) with pictures of drag queens pasted all over the walls. While it wasn’t exactly the same, it was very Buffalo Bill-esque.
Against one wall was an old box TV playing an episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race, illuminating the silhouette of a dumpy middle aged man with short black hair sitting cross legged in front of the screen. I couldn’t see his face as his back was to me, but I could hear him whispering softly under his breath, repeating every word in unison to the scene on the TV. Cut scene
Next thing I know I am back in body. I am in a city attending a special fan event during the day at an industrial warehouse themed night club. I’m alone and nervous because I’ve never don’t anything like that, but I’ve decided to just go for it because Trixie and Katya are there—two of my favorite queens!
While there I’m a little shy and uncomfortable but I’m having a nice time albeit being a wallflower. Trixie & Katya are in “boy drag” (aka regular street clothes) mingling about. I also spot one of my favorite podcasters who is attending, and he seems to have found an acquaintance of his—a huge Samoan guy with long jet black hair who’s dressed like a death metal head (& therefore stands out a bit).
Time passes and I’m mostly people watching and trying to work up the courage to introduce myself to the podcaster as he talked animatedly to his friend off to the side.
Suddenly out of nowhere Katya comes rushing from the directions of the stairs in the corner (the kind that go up to a VIP section, but there is also a flight heading down into what I presumed was the basement). She seems really out of it and heads directly into the bathroom, Trixie running after her a moment later. The bathroom is in the corner across from the stairs so not many people see this, but the three of us are in a prime position and when the door swings open catch a glimpse of Katya falling to her knees and puking violently into the toilet.
We all kinda look at each other in disbelief. Because Katya has been very open and vocal about her addiction struggles, we’re obviously all thinking the same thing—a relapse?!?
I’m so shocked and emboldened by this I finally make my move and approach the podcaster + acquaintance, and am like “omg did you guys see that?!”
They’re just as shocked as me and are like, “OMG we need to discuss this now!!” Not wanting to draw too much attention to a delicate situation, I follow them as we quickly make a descent into the stairwell for a more private setting.
The stairs lead us to an unlit 10x10 concrete room with no windows and nothing in it. The floor is caked in grime as if it’s never been cleaned.
I’m a few steps behind as they both move to the darker side of the room beneath the stairs (the only light is coming from the opening above). It’s so dark my eyes haven’t adjusted and since I’m farther back I don’t see what happens when suddenly there is a sharp yelp & then silence. In horror I realize they’re both gone! (A trap door!?)
In complete shock I cautiously approach the stairs without actually going underneath them (afraid the same will happen to me.) I can’t see anything at first but as my eyes slowly adjust I notice a dirty canvas tarp crumpled in the corner. I stare for a moment and notice a nearly indistinguishable mumbling emanating from the floor.
My heart starts beating out of my chest. Slowly I crouch down, and gingerly pulled one edge of the tarp back, revealing a small 1.5” vent pipe flush with the floor—where the sound is coming from. I can’t quite make it out so I slowly lower myself and put my ear to the hole. The soft din finally takes shape and I recognized it immediately—it’s an episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race. end scene
Hope you enjoyed that! Obviously it was all a set up to trap Trixie & Katya and the weirdo from the beginning is to blame (also probably drugged Katya), but his plan misfired.
My husband found it thoroughly entertaining when I woke him up in a cold sweat at 3:30am, and told me I should write it down, so I figured why not share.
submitted by comfort--creature to Dream [link] [comments]

2024.01.29 01:05 EricDubYuh Man Who Sold the World Tier List

S
Midge Ure - The best 2 and a half minutes in musical history, no kidding. BUT that outro is way too fucking long. 3 minutes? That’s more than half the song. Midge’s moaning gets old. Real ones skip after 2:48. Still, Midge’s vocals suit the song the best. He mixes a tone of suspicion and cynicism with woe and hopelessness. I imagine the staircase as something straight out of Eraserhead. Ik you guys love this song too, and you’re right to.
Silvia Pérez Cruz, Raül Fernández Miró - Really makes you feel like our favorite Middle East cowboy. I feel like I stumbled into some back water bar where the musicians can’t afford more than a guitar, but goddamn do they have passion. One of the shorter songs on the list, which makes each pause more impactful. Silvia sings the song like she really saw a ghost on the stairwell that day, and was never the same for it. Wailing outro moans are haunting. I really wish she didn’t repeat “lost control” at the end, but I like the extra “never” at 0:49. I can see Venom Snake listening to this in a corner while he contemplates war or whatever he thinks about as he vapes.
A
Nirvana - Kurt makes me feel like I’m listening to some forgotten veteran, alone with only broken dreams for company. I love the voice cracks. The electric guitar sounds like cigarette smoke. I wish that one audience member didn’t shout “whoo” at 0:22, it really takes me out of it. I don’t have much else to say except rip Kurt, studio version would have been S tier, I’m positive. Stupid fucking depression.
B
David Bowie - David Bowie has an amazing voice. So why tf did he huff helium before hopping into the studio? He sounds like a little green Martian who thinks he’s Ziggy Stardust. Bowie’s tone is eerily casual when the voice changer is off, which is a little haunting, but it doesn’t make me feel very much. Obviously I have to give him props for creating my favorite lyrics of all time, but there’s a reason everyone thinks Nirvana created this song. I hate the maracas and the fucking guiro. He does have good outro moans, I’ll give him that much. Album cover is iconic tho. Bowie IS the man who sold the world. Dress is sexy af. I love the cards scattered across his bedroom, like he called the wrong bluff, and the world is lost because of it. I imagine the staircase as a winding marble one, straight out of some pos rich guy’s mansion. Too bad the song itself didn’t live up to its potential, but that’s what covers are for baby.
Simple Minds - The distortion is rad. Emotion is mid. Pauses are good. I still don’t like the maracas or guiro. Probably gonna be controversial, but I’d say it’s a direct improvement off of Bowie, even tho it is fairly generic. Only slightly better tho (no dumbass Martian filter).
C
Trevor Something - Definitely a different take. Sounds and looks like something out of cyberpunk or Blade Runner. It’s not sad or haunting tho, and that’s what I like about the lyrics. Would make for a cool boss fight music, but other than that you can skip this one.
D
The Hics - Venom Snake probably listened to this while he was studying to be a surgeon or whatever. Instrumental is chill, but not really the same song at that point.
E
Emel - Why is it opera now? No passion. So slow. Even more unecessary moaning than usual. Took me three attempts to finish. Sucks. But that surprise guitar at 2:55? Solid. Guitar guy should get a raise. I’m reading now that she’s a big social activist and I feel bad. She’s doing what Kojima would have wanted. Respect, but this song sucks.
Mac Glocky - Venom Snake is a stay at home dad who likes Green Day and wears New Balances. The only thing he ever sold was his old PS3.
F
Lulu - Venom Snake joined the circus. “We must have died alone :D” Like, did they even read the lyrics? These guys really could not give less of a fuck about selling the world. Ass.
Alien Cake Music - Wtf is this album cover. It looks like he’s farting. Also, this song was definitely made by AI and you can’t convince me otherwise. Fuck that. Don’t give this guy the revenue.
submitted by EricDubYuh to Music [link] [comments]

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