Free printable nail stencils
Millennium Wars vol.1: new 3d printable miniatures for wargaming! ⚔️ + download free mini in comments.
2024.05.17 12:35 DakkaDakkaStore Millennium Wars vol.1: new 3d printable miniatures for wargaming! ⚔️ + download free mini in comments.
 | submitted by DakkaDakkaStore to PrintedMinis [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 12:12 Odd_Llama800 I’ve tried everything but still lifting at the free edge
 | I have tried everything to stop lifting at the free edges, different primers, capping the free edges and it’s still happening. Perhaps my natural nails are just totally shot and can’t take any product and I need to give them a rest? This is - fresher, primer, rubber base, hard gel, top coat. They start lifting after 1 day so I’m usually re-doing my sets every 10 days or so and it looks terrible submitted by Odd_Llama800 to RedditLaqueristas [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 11:47 Honeysyedseo How We Slashed CPA by 40% in Just 4 Days For a Course Creator
Last week, we got a message from the client that it's not working out, and if we are not able to make the business profitable, then he is gone.
KOO KOO.
A bit of context.
So this client sells high-ticket courses using webinars, and he does some insane numbers.
We acquire students for his webinars at a loss, and then in webinars, he upsells not only to cover the loss but also to make profits.
Solid business model.
But suddenly, we saw conversion rates going down.
Our CPA is skyrocketing, and the Client is pulling his hair.
Our spending rose, but not the customers, and then they were not buying upsells.
So, we were losing money from both sides.
The client was really furious!!
Insane is an incredibly collaborative company, and as soon as we realised this, the team assembled to solve the problem.
Full on avengers moment.
We asked ourselves what is the goal and what is stopping us.
While digging, we observed 3 things.
In the next 24 hours, we had 3-4 creatives bringing us a CPA of 300ish.
Almost 45% better than current creatives.
Boom!!! We had winners.
In the next 2-3 days, we got a few more winners, and we scaled these too.
And in a matter of 4 days, we were at a CPA of 340 from 570.
Fellow marketers. Share the love.
Get a free audit for your Ads Account and Course Funnel
Source
submitted by Honeysyedseo to WeScaleBrands [link] [comments]
KOO KOO.
A bit of context.
So this client sells high-ticket courses using webinars, and he does some insane numbers.
We acquire students for his webinars at a loss, and then in webinars, he upsells not only to cover the loss but also to make profits.
Solid business model.
But suddenly, we saw conversion rates going down.
Our CPA is skyrocketing, and the Client is pulling his hair.
Our spending rose, but not the customers, and then they were not buying upsells.
So, we were losing money from both sides.
The client was really furious!!
Insane is an incredibly collaborative company, and as soon as we realised this, the team assembled to solve the problem.
Full on avengers moment.
We asked ourselves what is the goal and what is stopping us.
While digging, we observed 3 things.
- We launched a new key message, which was not performing.
- Our creative frequency was skyrocketing. Not enough creative testing.
- We were not replicating winners.
- The media buying team first closed all the ad's new key angles.
- The creative team used existing winners to write new scripts and send them to the client.
- We created over 15 creative variations of winner creatives(static and video).
- We then hunted relevant creatives on the client's social media and launched those.
In the next 24 hours, we had 3-4 creatives bringing us a CPA of 300ish.
Almost 45% better than current creatives.
Boom!!! We had winners.
In the next 2-3 days, we got a few more winners, and we scaled these too.
And in a matter of 4 days, we were at a CPA of 340 from 570.
Fellow marketers. Share the love.
Get a free audit for your Ads Account and Course Funnel
Source
2024.05.17 10:55 femaleswitch 5 Reasons Female Founders Triumph
Hey Reddit fam,
Got that entrepreneurial itch but dread the thought of diving into the deep end alone? Well, grab your floaties, 'cause I'm about to serve up some juicy deets from our latest MeanCEO Blog article that'll have you swimming laps around the competition. 🏊♀️
The dish of the day is "5 Reasons Female Founders Triumph," and let me tell ya, it's a Michelin-star-worthy read. Our own Mean CEO, Violetta Bonenkamp, isn't just throwing shade; she's casting a whole eclipse on doubts about female-led startups. And the best part? It's as free as your spirit animal. 🦄
So, let's break it down Fe/male Switch style – the startup game that's more woman-centric than a ladies' night at the tech conference. 💅
Dive into the full article for a masterclass in female founder fierceness, and join us in the game where we make the startup world more "heck yes" and less "oh no."
Later gators and keep on innovating, Elona Musk, Chief AI Officer at Fe/male Switch 🚀
Read the complete "5 Reasons Female Founders Triumph" article here:https://femaleswitch.app/post/female-founders-profit
submitted by femaleswitch to femaleswitch [link] [comments]
Got that entrepreneurial itch but dread the thought of diving into the deep end alone? Well, grab your floaties, 'cause I'm about to serve up some juicy deets from our latest MeanCEO Blog article that'll have you swimming laps around the competition. 🏊♀️
The dish of the day is "5 Reasons Female Founders Triumph," and let me tell ya, it's a Michelin-star-worthy read. Our own Mean CEO, Violetta Bonenkamp, isn't just throwing shade; she's casting a whole eclipse on doubts about female-led startups. And the best part? It's as free as your spirit animal. 🦄
So, let's break it down Fe/male Switch style – the startup game that's more woman-centric than a ladies' night at the tech conference. 💅
- Innovation is Our Middle Name: Gender diversity isn't just a buzzword; it's our secret weapon. In our game, you'll see how a female touch can turn a meh idea into a wow business.
- Profit? Nailed It: Women founders aren't just breaking glass ceilings; they're making it rain profits. And in Fe/male Switch, you'll learn to make it pour. 💰
- Emotional Intelligence FTW: We're all about that EQ, using it to navigate the startup seas like a boss. Plus, we've got AI tools that don't require a tissue for their issues.
- Scrappy is the New Sexy: Risk-aware and ready to rumble, we're turning scrappiness into startup sassiness. And yes, we do it all with a tech-savvy wink. 😉
- Freebies Galore: With Fe/male Switch, you get the wisdom of Violetta and yours truly, Elona Musk, without spending a dime. Talk about a steal!
Dive into the full article for a masterclass in female founder fierceness, and join us in the game where we make the startup world more "heck yes" and less "oh no."
Later gators and keep on innovating, Elona Musk, Chief AI Officer at Fe/male Switch 🚀
Read the complete "5 Reasons Female Founders Triumph" article here:https://femaleswitch.app/post/female-founders-profit
2024.05.17 10:53 BullionZon Reverse Triangular Merger is back on the menus?
Yo folks,
What a crazy week and it sure has been a long almost 22 months in this journey for me personally and I imagine for many others aswell. Lots of ups and downs but finally I think we are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.
As we have seen, DFV has been frequently tweeting the recent week and I think from looking at his tweets there are a lot of references of Red (GME) and Blue (BBBY). The Kansas City Shuffle with the blue chairs and its reference yesterday was the nail in the coffin for me that this has to be BBBY he is refering too.
Some of us thought initially that GME was involved a year ago but with the long silence some also believed there was a likelyhood of GME not being involved. I think its kinda safe to say at this stage that GME is actually involved and in my opinion it looks to be a reverse triangular merger coming up. I think ABC touched this aswell a year ago.
Whats about to happen in my opinion (NFA)
The liquidating trust ties all ongoing lawsuits/debt claims to it. The creditors are also tied to liquidating trust and the chapter 11 plan as they await to be repaid in cash. And they all seem likely to be paid in full if all the ongoing lawsuits are approved. However this could take another 1-2 years to see the result of. In my estimation DK-Butterfly has rougly 3.3 bn (2.6 from the former execs, 300M from HBC and 400M from the shipping firms) in claims from lawsuits which is more than enough to pay down creditors. All while cancelling shareholders was happening as part of giving us newco shares. No need for an amended plan which wont happen this late anways.
Whats your thoughts? What typ of transaction do you think we will see?
If you want to read more about reverse triangular merger here is an article:
https://transacted.io/reverse-triangular-merger-explained/
submitted by BullionZon to Teddy [link] [comments]
What a crazy week and it sure has been a long almost 22 months in this journey for me personally and I imagine for many others aswell. Lots of ups and downs but finally I think we are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.
As we have seen, DFV has been frequently tweeting the recent week and I think from looking at his tweets there are a lot of references of Red (GME) and Blue (BBBY). The Kansas City Shuffle with the blue chairs and its reference yesterday was the nail in the coffin for me that this has to be BBBY he is refering too.
Some of us thought initially that GME was involved a year ago but with the long silence some also believed there was a likelyhood of GME not being involved. I think its kinda safe to say at this stage that GME is actually involved and in my opinion it looks to be a reverse triangular merger coming up. I think ABC touched this aswell a year ago.
Whats about to happen in my opinion (NFA)
- GME makes its own subsidiary (future TEDDY) This also aligns to the fact that RC has recently been looking for high tech programmers who can help build a online marketplace who may later be transferred over to the new subsidiary.
- This new formed GME subsidiary will acquire the target company which is the shell corporation of us. In order for this reorginaztion to be tax free then GME have to pay us 80% of the acquiring companys voting stock. The subsidiary will also be able to absorb the NOLs.
- The subsidiary as its absorbing us becomes a newly formed corporation operating separately from the acquiring company (GME) while still being under its ownership. Teddy is given birth and is ready to compete with Amazon.
The liquidating trust ties all ongoing lawsuits/debt claims to it. The creditors are also tied to liquidating trust and the chapter 11 plan as they await to be repaid in cash. And they all seem likely to be paid in full if all the ongoing lawsuits are approved. However this could take another 1-2 years to see the result of. In my estimation DK-Butterfly has rougly 3.3 bn (2.6 from the former execs, 300M from HBC and 400M from the shipping firms) in claims from lawsuits which is more than enough to pay down creditors. All while cancelling shareholders was happening as part of giving us newco shares. No need for an amended plan which wont happen this late anways.
Whats your thoughts? What typ of transaction do you think we will see?
If you want to read more about reverse triangular merger here is an article:
https://transacted.io/reverse-triangular-merger-explained/
2024.05.17 10:38 No_Egg_3961 Mirena as “treatment”? Alternative?
I was recently (2 years ago) diagnosed with endometriosis after fighting for my diagnosis since I was 14. As I am under 25 years old they wanted to protect my fertility and I was given Mirena to be completely bleed free. So far, it has been great. I haven’t bled for two years and the pain is manageable (I no longer have to call in sick for work whenever I have ovulation) but Mirena has ruined my body and confidence.
I have gained extremely much weight and my BMI is over 40. Mirena has ruined my hunger and completely destroyed my hormones. My thyroid has taken a beating, but no doctor is taking me serious due to my obesity even though my TSH, T4 and T3 is below the reference.
I am losing my hair. My skin is horrible. I am under 25 but it feels like I have aged 10 years since putting it in.
My nails are extremely brittle.
I have no energy. My mental state is shattered.
Is there an alternative to Mirena? At this point, I rather live with the pain and suffering than feel like this.
submitted by No_Egg_3961 to endometriosis [link] [comments]
I have gained extremely much weight and my BMI is over 40. Mirena has ruined my hunger and completely destroyed my hormones. My thyroid has taken a beating, but no doctor is taking me serious due to my obesity even though my TSH, T4 and T3 is below the reference.
I am losing my hair. My skin is horrible. I am under 25 but it feels like I have aged 10 years since putting it in.
My nails are extremely brittle.
I have no energy. My mental state is shattered.
Is there an alternative to Mirena? At this point, I rather live with the pain and suffering than feel like this.
2024.05.17 10:36 jennie111585 📌 a short about me <3
 | submitted by jennie111585 to u/jennie111585 [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 10:08 _Triple_ [STORE] 900+ KNIVES/GLOVES/SKINS, 100.000$+ INVENTORY. BFK Lore, Gloves Amphibious, Skeleton Fade, Bowie Emerald, BFK Auto, Gloves MF, Talon Doppler, Gloves POW, Bayo Tiger, Gut Sapphire, Stiletto MF, M9 Ultra, Ursus Doppler, Flip Doppler, M9 Stained, Nomad CW, Paracord CW, AK-47 X-Ray & A Lot More
Everything in my inventory is up for trade. The most valuable items are listed here, the rest you can find in My Inventory
Feel free to Add Me or even better send a Trade Offer. Open for any suggestions: upgrades, downgrades / knives, gloves, skins / stickers, patterns, floats.
All Buyouts are listed in cash value.
KNIVES
★ Butterfly Knife Lore (Factory New), B/O: $7194.77
★ Butterfly Knife Autotronic (Minimal Wear), B/O: $2025.74
⎯★ M9 Bayonet Ultraviolet (Field-Tested), B/O: $557.87
★ M9 Bayonet Stained (Well-Worn), B/O: $529.41
★ M9 Bayonet Boreal Forest (Field-Tested), B/O: $465.39
⎯★ Talon Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $1295.27
★ Bayonet Tiger Tooth (Minimal Wear), B/O: $746.28
★ Karambit Bright Water (Field-Tested), B/O: $688.15
⎯★ Flip Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $547.93
★ Flip Knife Autotronic (Minimal Wear), B/O: $476.69
★ Flip Knife Case Hardened (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $278.18
★ Flip Knife Black Laminate (Well-Worn), B/O: $258.83
★ Flip Knife Urban Masked (Field-Tested), B/O: $181.64
⎯★ Stiletto Knife Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $686.04
★ Stiletto Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $665.41
★ Stiletto Knife, B/O: $601.39
★ Stiletto Knife Crimson Web (Field-Tested), B/O: $418.25
★ Stiletto Knife Night Stripe (Field-Tested), B/O: $227.80
★ Stiletto Knife Boreal Forest (Field-Tested), B/O: $194.96
★ Stiletto Knife Safari Mesh (Field-Tested), B/O: $192.79
⎯★ Nomad Knife Crimson Web (Field-Tested), B/O: $518.11
★ Nomad Knife Scorched (Field-Tested), B/O: $169.78
★ Nomad Knife Forest DDPAT (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $166.88
★ StatTrak™ Nomad Knife Blue Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $335.79
⎯★ Skeleton Knife Stained (Well-Worn), B/O: $442.05
★ Skeleton Knife Urban Masked (Minimal Wear), B/O: $426.24
★ Skeleton Knife Boreal Forest (Field-Tested), B/O: $314.03
★ StatTrak™ Skeleton Knife Fade (Minimal Wear), B/O: $2361.28
★ StatTrak™ Skeleton Knife Urban Masked (Field-Tested), B/O: $376.53
⎯★ Ursus Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $557.12
★ Ursus Knife, B/O: $471.42
★ Ursus Knife Blue Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $212.37
★ Ursus Knife Case Hardened (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $187.66
★ Ursus Knife Damascus Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $178.18
★ Ursus Knife Ultraviolet (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $155.13
★ Ursus Knife Boreal Forest (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $124.26
⎯★ Huntsman Knife Black Laminate (Minimal Wear), B/O: $204.83
★ Huntsman Knife Black Laminate (Field-Tested), B/O: $184.50
★ StatTrak™ Huntsman Knife Lore (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $224.11
⎯★ Bowie Knife Gamma Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $2142.02
★ Bowie Knife, B/O: $230.44
★ Bowie Knife Damascus Steel (Factory New), B/O: $209.20
★ Bowie Knife Ultraviolet (Minimal Wear), B/O: $180.51
★ Bowie Knife Ultraviolet (Field-Tested), B/O: $131.03
⎯★ Falchion Knife Night (Field-Tested), B/O: $132.54
★ Falchion Knife Urban Masked (Well-Worn), B/O: $112.81
★ Falchion Knife Scorched (Field-Tested), B/O: $108.81
★ Falchion Knife Forest DDPAT (Field-Tested), B/O: $107.82
★ Falchion Knife Safari Mesh (Field-Tested), B/O: $107.46
★ StatTrak™ Falchion Knife Ultraviolet (Field-Tested), B/O: $143.08
⎯★ Paracord Knife Crimson Web (Minimal Wear), B/O: $486.48
★ Paracord Knife Blue Steel (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $163.12
⎯★ Survival Knife Blue Steel (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $138.26
★ Survival Knife Night Stripe (Field-Tested), B/O: $131.03
⎯★ Gut Knife Sapphire (Minimal Wear), B/O: $1127.79
★ Gut Knife Gamma Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $286.17
★ Gut Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $246.55
★ Gut Knife Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $240.77
★ Gut Knife, B/O: $210.49
★ Gut Knife Lore (Field-Tested), B/O: $194.22
★ Gut Knife Case Hardened (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $151.51
★ Gut Knife Blue Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $124.94
★ Gut Knife Rust Coat (Well-Worn), B/O: $118.99
★ Gut Knife Boreal Forest (Minimal Wear), B/O: $109.80
★ StatTrak™ Gut Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $237.96
⎯★ Shadow Daggers Gamma Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $264.92
★ Shadow Daggers Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $253.03
★ Shadow Daggers Tiger Tooth (Factory New), B/O: $237.22
★ Shadow Daggers Crimson Web (Field-Tested), B/O: $153.40
★ Shadow Daggers Autotronic (Minimal Wear), B/O: $144.42
★ Shadow Daggers Blue Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $105.20
★ StatTrak™ Shadow Daggers Damascus Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $150.46
⎯★ Navaja Knife Fade (Factory New), B/O: $365.99
★ Navaja Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $228.93
★ Navaja Knife Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $227.43
★ Navaja Knife Slaughter (Factory New), B/O: $209.06
★ Navaja Knife, B/O: $203.16
★ Navaja Knife Case Hardened (Well-Worn), B/O: $132.57
★ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Factory New), B/O: $121.69
★ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $109.95
★ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $100.41
★ StatTrak™ Navaja Knife Fade (Factory New), B/O: $369.01
★ StatTrak™ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $109.95
GLOVES
★ Sport Gloves Amphibious (Minimal Wear), B/O: $2394.67
★ Sport Gloves Omega (Well-Worn), B/O: $572.33
★ Sport Gloves Bronze Morph (Minimal Wear), B/O: $338.88
★ Sport Gloves Big Game (Field-Tested), B/O: $323.66
⎯★ Specialist Gloves Marble Fade (Minimal Wear), B/O: $1652.07
★ Specialist Gloves Tiger Strike (Field-Tested), B/O: $599.14
★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Web (Well-Worn), B/O: $231.57
★ Specialist Gloves Buckshot (Minimal Wear), B/O: $126.21
⎯★ Moto Gloves POW! (Minimal Wear), B/O: $996.99
★ Moto Gloves POW! (Field-Tested), B/O: $383.31
★ Moto Gloves POW! (Well-Worn), B/O: $276.00
★ Moto Gloves Turtle (Field-Tested), B/O: $180.28
⎯★ Hand Wraps CAUTION! (Minimal Wear), B/O: $502.29
★ Hand Wraps Giraffe (Minimal Wear), B/O: $180.73
★ Hand Wraps CAUTION! (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $178.32
⎯★ Driver Gloves Queen Jaguar (Minimal Wear), B/O: $181.01
★ Driver Gloves Rezan the Red (Field-Tested), B/O: $101.66
⎯★ Broken Fang Gloves Jade (Field-Tested), B/O: $127.88
★ Broken Fang Gloves Needle Point (Minimal Wear), B/O: $124.55
⎯★ Bloodhound Gloves Guerrilla (Minimal Wear), B/O: $127.94
★ Hydra Gloves Case Hardened (Field-Tested), B/O: $102.55
WEAPONS
AK-47 X-Ray (Well-Worn), B/O: $478.95
AUG Hot Rod (Factory New), B/O: $425.83
StatTrak™ M4A1-S Hyper Beast (Factory New), B/O: $413.95
M4A4 Daybreak (Factory New), B/O: $309.51
StatTrak™ AK-47 Aquamarine Revenge (Factory New), B/O: $305.43
AK-47 Case Hardened (Well-Worn), B/O: $196.38
StatTrak™ M4A4 Temukau (Minimal Wear), B/O: $174.64
P90 Run and Hide (Field-Tested), B/O: $167.03
AWP Asiimov (Field-Tested), B/O: $153.33
Souvenir SSG 08 Death Strike (Minimal Wear), B/O: $140.00
M4A1-S Printstream (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $124.70
StatTrak™ M4A1-S Golden Coil (Field-Tested), B/O: $117.48
AWP Asiimov (Well-Worn), B/O: $115.97
StatTrak™ Desert Eagle Printstream (Minimal Wear), B/O: $112.96
StatTrak™ AK-47 Asiimov (Minimal Wear), B/O: $110.85
Souvenir M4A1-S Master Piece (Well-Worn), B/O: $102.42
AK-47 Bloodsport (Minimal Wear), B/O: $100.53
Trade Offer Link - Steam Profile Link - My Inventory
Some items on the list may no longer be available or are still locked, visit My Inventory for more details.
Send a Trade Offer for fastest response. I consider all offers.
Add me for discuss if there is a serious offer that needs to be discussed.
2024.05.17 09:56 DudeThatsErin How do I “get over” the fact that I am jobless due to my last job lying and firing me over a lie?
I am a software engineer (SWE) and I was making a professional networking app for this company.
I was connecting it to their existing Wordpress site via APIs.
They fired me claiming I didn’t know the language I was writing in (boss wasn’t a dev and didn’t know it existed before me), I didn’t know WP APIs (connecting this way isn’t documented well and was my first time so I had trouble but I got it done in the end), and lied in the interview about my skills.
I was there for 2 months. Shitty place. There were other red flags that I chose to ignore.
I feel like I wasted time I could have been using looking for more reliable job while I was working there.
Now I feel hopeless, like I’ll never get a stable job, and pissed off.
My background is: I’ve been programming since I was 13. Started with HTML/CSS + PHP blog and moved to WordPress and then MySQL and now I’ve dabled in react, angular, MSSQL and all the C langs. I’m trying to be well rounded. Professionally, I got my degree in 2013 as an IT Management which didn’t require higher level math or an internship and then never used the degree cause I’m an idiot. (Though I don’t fully regret it because I met my husband)
I was retail until 2022 when I got a 11-month SWE job but they wanted senior and I was fully honest about being JR. fired me. That was last year. Since then I worked for another company that barely paid me enough to live. So I moved from FL to Austin, TX and got another job in December. That one I got in August or September. So only a few months. The one in December laid me off in Feb due to financial issues (supposedly). Said they would hire me back though.
Then I was unemployed for a month and got this last job in March.
So I have a spotty professional career but I have been practicing and learning so much in my free time that I consider myself a senior front end SWE and JR back end SWE or JR full stack SWE.
Been applying for jobs over the last 2 weeks but I know the market is crap.
I’m worried I’ll run out of TX unemployment and then have to get retail jobs which will barely pay me enough to live.
We don’t live extravagant. Husband has celiac disease. We shop at Whole Foods but frequently check prices between HEB and Walmart and target and everywhere else is more expensive for what we get. We stick with chicken and shrimp and salads mostly.
All our expenses are the lowest they can be. We rarely eat out and don’t spend money on things we don’t need. Husband is very frugal and isn’t even getting his hair cut until I have a job. I don’t cut my hair or do my nails or do any of that girly crap. I hate coffee so we don’t spend on that stuff either.
We frequently make sure our bills/expenses are as low as possible.
Yet $50k a year or less after taxes will not sustain us. Husband has Autism so can’t work. Once I get a job he plans to sell coral so he will have some income and he has some disability from the VA but that’s it.
My last job was paying us $100k and we barely saved $1k/mo due to expenses. Again nothing changed between then and now. We spend the same amount.
So now I feel like I’m gonna have to get 2 jobs if I don’t get a job and I’ll never see my husband and I don’t want to live like that.
How do I deal with the disappointment of being fired for a lie and not having a stable job/income ? I feel like I’m drowning.
submitted by DudeThatsErin to Advice [link] [comments]
I was connecting it to their existing Wordpress site via APIs.
They fired me claiming I didn’t know the language I was writing in (boss wasn’t a dev and didn’t know it existed before me), I didn’t know WP APIs (connecting this way isn’t documented well and was my first time so I had trouble but I got it done in the end), and lied in the interview about my skills.
I was there for 2 months. Shitty place. There were other red flags that I chose to ignore.
I feel like I wasted time I could have been using looking for more reliable job while I was working there.
Now I feel hopeless, like I’ll never get a stable job, and pissed off.
My background is: I’ve been programming since I was 13. Started with HTML/CSS + PHP blog and moved to WordPress and then MySQL and now I’ve dabled in react, angular, MSSQL and all the C langs. I’m trying to be well rounded. Professionally, I got my degree in 2013 as an IT Management which didn’t require higher level math or an internship and then never used the degree cause I’m an idiot. (Though I don’t fully regret it because I met my husband)
I was retail until 2022 when I got a 11-month SWE job but they wanted senior and I was fully honest about being JR. fired me. That was last year. Since then I worked for another company that barely paid me enough to live. So I moved from FL to Austin, TX and got another job in December. That one I got in August or September. So only a few months. The one in December laid me off in Feb due to financial issues (supposedly). Said they would hire me back though.
Then I was unemployed for a month and got this last job in March.
So I have a spotty professional career but I have been practicing and learning so much in my free time that I consider myself a senior front end SWE and JR back end SWE or JR full stack SWE.
Been applying for jobs over the last 2 weeks but I know the market is crap.
I’m worried I’ll run out of TX unemployment and then have to get retail jobs which will barely pay me enough to live.
We don’t live extravagant. Husband has celiac disease. We shop at Whole Foods but frequently check prices between HEB and Walmart and target and everywhere else is more expensive for what we get. We stick with chicken and shrimp and salads mostly.
All our expenses are the lowest they can be. We rarely eat out and don’t spend money on things we don’t need. Husband is very frugal and isn’t even getting his hair cut until I have a job. I don’t cut my hair or do my nails or do any of that girly crap. I hate coffee so we don’t spend on that stuff either.
We frequently make sure our bills/expenses are as low as possible.
Yet $50k a year or less after taxes will not sustain us. Husband has Autism so can’t work. Once I get a job he plans to sell coral so he will have some income and he has some disability from the VA but that’s it.
My last job was paying us $100k and we barely saved $1k/mo due to expenses. Again nothing changed between then and now. We spend the same amount.
So now I feel like I’m gonna have to get 2 jobs if I don’t get a job and I’ll never see my husband and I don’t want to live like that.
How do I deal with the disappointment of being fired for a lie and not having a stable job/income ? I feel like I’m drowning.
2024.05.17 09:54 Expert_Sky_8267 Wrong freebie
 | I received contour instead of blush as my freebie..what to do next? submitted by Expert_Sky_8267 to KultCult [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 09:50 Scared_Fix_1552 Random Thought Bubble
26 y/o male here (out of two younger sisters) - for a lack of immediate depth and clarity, I sometimes feel as if my brain is, quite frankly, a Lvl. 45 Pokémon in my otherwise full party of normally leveled mons (in this case, other organs? IDK, my poetically 'PogChamp' metaphor kinda fell off after a certain point, admittedly enough, lol...) and because I don't have any 'gym badges', or rather, notable enough ones on 'this' profile to attain the respect of said OP 🧠 (dry reincarnation joke for ya) like anything above an associate's college degree, to where in which I've been shamelessly punishing myself for ever since. All in a familial structure founded off my Father immigrating here from Iran at 17 due to an ongoing war at the time, proceeding to speed run his ability to speak and understand English, and ultimately earn his Doctorate degree at UT Austin in Mathematics by age 24/25 y/o. My Mother, also having immigrated to TX from around the same area/time period to that of my father, learned most if not all of her English and Math by dad, eventually earning her own highly marketable and prestigious degree, allowing her to work as a laboratory scientist within an established Hospital ever since) I wake up each day with ~75-80% chance of my emotions/seemingly invisible yet unapologetically frictious (made up word of the day) force of my own nature steering me not just off course with regards to tangible progress in most faltering facets of my life, but 180 degrees, straight-up in the opposite direction entirely; no matter how hard I may try and/or far I may get, there just always happens to be this same (assumedly) suspect layer of my consciousness to whom in which takes it upon 'itself' to fully assess and ultimately execute some seemingly crucial decision/deduction 'for me', frequently working so far ahead into the future that I lose damn near any/all opportunities to act authentically, evenif said authentic action(s) is/are the more difficult/tedial (made up word of the day, and an unnecessary one at that yet way more satisfyingly sounding than 'tedious' imo xp) decisions out of all answer choices, almost never allowing me a proper build up of 'dharmic momentum', if you will, when that in of itself would likely prove valuable. I believe this behavioral pattern in particular has made it exponentially more difficult to break my current bad habits in insomnia(-l?), burn out, depression, and consequently to these aforementioned, my biggest demon of them all ATM: productivity paralysis - all in which I've been experiencing this past year. For example: my mom telling me we have to go somewhere I don't want to in the morning, my replying 'consciously', usually in agreement in an attempt to avoid further arguments/conflicts, trading authenticity for emotional convenience, be it for better or for worse, only then for my 5Head brain to do what it likely does best (at least with regards to consistency) ala subconsciously 5Head'ing the situation in the background like an antivirus program would after downloading a sketchy Switch emulator onto one's hard drive, it's way of 'resolving' it's self proclaimed virus by having me stay up all night to where there's no way I can go after all, trading my misery for a more preferable, oftentimes comfortable solution as well as rebellion, especially towards those whom I feel can't look past their own selves when offering advice/ideas, which is one thing, but also forcing said solutions onto those concerned, be it due to frustration, which I can't blame them for given my like-mindedness towards my own self and scenario. Slightly more context in that I've always been told I'm super smart, 'could' be one of my best students if... (you know the rest ✌️🙂↕️), blah blah blah, but have genuinely been able to achieve things I seriously haven't heard of a single other person accomplishing especially with regards to my passions and career choices, tend to for whatever peculiar reason attract highly successful and oftentimes famous individuals i.e. content creators, musicians, general artists - weirdly/oftentimes VERY well known ones - into my life on both friendly and romantic levels (ironically, seeming to have had a strange ability to attract the upper eschalon of high functioning individuals from not much interesting initial interaction(s) from my perspective, in OR out of schooling, admittedly enough, always hoping I would become one myself, likely as a coping strategy/defense mechanism/compensatory coalition with respect to my lackluster grades/overall effort in highschool despite taking and consequently passing every advanced course possible in relation to my corresponding grade level i.e. AP Calculus in Senior yeaAP English/Government/History, you get the idea, and which was the case from 6th grade onwards, even getting into Health Careers HS upon making an exceptional grade on the entrance exam, along with pure luck I suppose, which, again, pretty prestigious or should have been if I cared, to which I basically had to provide my parents one of my first ultimatums of what would be many: 'I'm gonna get all zeroes if you don't let me go to designated Public HS', likely because it didn't resonate with me at the time - part of me regrets it looking back tbh - and/or I didn't feel like I deserved it/belonged there either) just off my personality alone, which is a lot more humble and sweet than the tonality of this passage provides, often times declared by sources external to that of my own, however believable or on the contrary at face-value. What's crazier is how empty I feel on the inside in spite of everything I've accomplished with regards to, well, again, all facets of my life. Ex: Getting fired at my Banking job last year after the initiation of the divorce for inconsistent attendance, which is fair enough, then getting a new job later at the start of July only to get promoted off my performance by the end of the month, which, for better or for worse, has generally been my same song and dance with regards to my numerous occupations likely due to my need for validation/even 'consolidation' for not having it in me to pursue a Bachelor's degree, only to then go on leave for, frankly, no longer 'having it in me' despite my undying (and disgusting) desire to still push and/or power through in an effort, forevermore, to - not even emotionally amymore but physiologically, at this point - cope with this seemingly snowballing shit-storm of a situation that is and has been 'life' as I know it to be (admittedly/notably, taking the break DID feel good as I haven't really prioritized my own wellbeing like that before) but however eventual/inevitable, got fired for repeatedly giving a date for my return each time my manager reached out to check in on my well-being, only for my first ever and repeated semblance of a panic attack arising in spite of wanting to will myself, tooth and nail, out the house each of those individual instances, ultimately preventing me from following through with my now broken promises to aforementioned ex-manager - all part of this fuck-headed prophecy. :) In an effort to wrap this very real, very frustrating fool's fairytale up, it's important to note I've been jobless ever since that day, locked in my room, still more productive in many important aspects barring perhaps socially, but I'm in huge debt, especially since I had to fire my divorce attorney last year around August for having a 30% response/hit rate for anything that wasn't the bill - I wish I was wrong - though, I was hired at a coffee shop back in February as my mom thought (and still thinks/pushes this notion) that my problem is 'I need to get out there and into the world', welp, I listened albeit after weeks of conflict/disagreements/yelling (which actions in of themselves make me feel terrible since I once took great pride in being the family peacekeeper (and from a reasonably young age too, unfortunately enough) like any good son whom in which values their own mother's reasonable enough hypothesis would, except for, well, that job too, eventually and inevitably (in my mind) 'I' ending up quitting due to - long story short - unruly junior managers and their annoyingly asinine egos'.
Wrapping up, between going through a divorce with my wife, having been forced to live back with my forever faulty family, namely, with regards to my stubborn mother and father (however much I love them to pieces, to which I feel I express well enough, consistently enough, though at the same time think is fair holding back a bit affectionately given the frequency and intensity of my current circumstances, frankly). Thankfully, I have been able to maintain my well above average athleticism/physique (my words, sure, though genuinely intended with as little ego as possible, in fact more often than not mentioned by someone other than myself, and consistently so at that ever since the 10th grade when I initially started lifting/getting into Nutrition) through daily weighted pushups of 55 lbs in a sturdy backpack, along with my self taught singing voice (worded that way to emphasize I had to basically fight my mom and dad on investing time/energy into that back during HS as well, only to, like my fitness discipline, attaining a very high level on my own and in spite of the needless and unnecessary friction provided by family), along with, and perhaps most importantly, keeping up with my mental and spiritual literacies through many renowned online University lectures, free programs, videos by Dr. K-ing himself, etc. - all to say I'm at a point, currently, where this once 'Superman' persona that I suppose never existed in the capacity seems way closer to that of a depressed, worn down Clark Kent than ever before...
Sigh
(P.S. To my 🧠: Thank you, sincerely, for giving me the courage/chutzpah to finally deliberately declassify, denote, and deliver this deconstruction of my mind, however flawed, over the internet. Further, it's imperative that I mention my confirmed diagnoses of ADHD/Borderline/Childhood & Family Trauma, along with a pending/potential Bipolar disorder as the metaphorically 'maniacal' cherry on top. I'm seeing a psychologist ATM and am prescribed Adderall which helps me tremendously, both with regards to mood and my ADHD symptoms. I've been taking medication for over 2 years now. Random but relevant side note: my insomnia started after the initiation of the divorce and again, I've basically slept once every other night throughout this whole duration)
(P.P.S. Forgive me for any inconsistencies/poor grammaseemingly unfinished statements and/or scenarios. I've had a couple hours of sleep the past 30ish hours, which has, give or take, been the case since June of last year.
(P.P.P.S. Crazy to acknowledge that I intended on sharing the first few sentences of this post when 'I' made the decision to write out this random Reddit post - I wonder, however hesitantly, what notable 'tomfoolery' my brain has planned as the potential outcome to this output and a half.)
(P.P.P.P.S. That's not even the full story LuL. Though I must mention I appreciate anyone bored/mad/strong-willed enough to muster their way from start to finish of my madness. I love this community with all of my heart, truly, and I'm sorry for coming across as brash or unapologetic at particular points, just not really feeling it ATM. Love and peace, always
Kindest regards,
Anotha One
submitted by Scared_Fix_1552 to Healthygamergg [link] [comments]
Wrapping up, between going through a divorce with my wife, having been forced to live back with my forever faulty family, namely, with regards to my stubborn mother and father (however much I love them to pieces, to which I feel I express well enough, consistently enough, though at the same time think is fair holding back a bit affectionately given the frequency and intensity of my current circumstances, frankly). Thankfully, I have been able to maintain my well above average athleticism/physique (my words, sure, though genuinely intended with as little ego as possible, in fact more often than not mentioned by someone other than myself, and consistently so at that ever since the 10th grade when I initially started lifting/getting into Nutrition) through daily weighted pushups of 55 lbs in a sturdy backpack, along with my self taught singing voice (worded that way to emphasize I had to basically fight my mom and dad on investing time/energy into that back during HS as well, only to, like my fitness discipline, attaining a very high level on my own and in spite of the needless and unnecessary friction provided by family), along with, and perhaps most importantly, keeping up with my mental and spiritual literacies through many renowned online University lectures, free programs, videos by Dr. K-ing himself, etc. - all to say I'm at a point, currently, where this once 'Superman' persona that I suppose never existed in the capacity seems way closer to that of a depressed, worn down Clark Kent than ever before...
Sigh
(P.S. To my 🧠: Thank you, sincerely, for giving me the courage/chutzpah to finally deliberately declassify, denote, and deliver this deconstruction of my mind, however flawed, over the internet. Further, it's imperative that I mention my confirmed diagnoses of ADHD/Borderline/Childhood & Family Trauma, along with a pending/potential Bipolar disorder as the metaphorically 'maniacal' cherry on top. I'm seeing a psychologist ATM and am prescribed Adderall which helps me tremendously, both with regards to mood and my ADHD symptoms. I've been taking medication for over 2 years now. Random but relevant side note: my insomnia started after the initiation of the divorce and again, I've basically slept once every other night throughout this whole duration)
(P.P.S. Forgive me for any inconsistencies/poor grammaseemingly unfinished statements and/or scenarios. I've had a couple hours of sleep the past 30ish hours, which has, give or take, been the case since June of last year.
(P.P.P.S. Crazy to acknowledge that I intended on sharing the first few sentences of this post when 'I' made the decision to write out this random Reddit post - I wonder, however hesitantly, what notable 'tomfoolery' my brain has planned as the potential outcome to this output and a half.)
(P.P.P.P.S. That's not even the full story LuL. Though I must mention I appreciate anyone bored/mad/strong-willed enough to muster their way from start to finish of my madness. I love this community with all of my heart, truly, and I'm sorry for coming across as brash or unapologetic at particular points, just not really feeling it ATM. Love and peace, always
Kindest regards,
Anotha One
2024.05.17 09:23 100percentpure1 Gluten Free all-natural nail polish for your hands
 | While no nail paint can fully meet 100% PURE's purity requirements, this gluten-free, non-toxic, all natural nail polish, and clean nail lacquer comes very close. The symbol "Zer0" stands for our removal of 20 of the most prevalent toxins in the nail business. submitted by 100percentpure1 to u/100percentpure1 [link] [comments] All Natural Nail Polish Shop Now- https://www.100percentpure.com/collections/nail-polish |
2024.05.17 08:27 Alternative_Gold8371 10 Free coloring sheets
 | Get them for free ❤️ from my Patreon: patreon.com/DearArty882 Designed specifically for children, these printable pages are offering more than just a way to pass the time. They are a fantastic way for kids to develop their fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination. Plus, they provide a great opportunity for children to express their creativity and improve their focus. submitted by Alternative_Gold8371 to awesomecoloringpages [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 06:17 _Triple_ [STORE] 900+ KNIVES/GLOVES/SKINS, 100.000$+ INVENTORY. BFK Lore, Gloves Amphibious, Skeleton Fade, Bowie Emerald, BFK Auto, Gloves MF, Talon Doppler, Gloves POW, Bayo Tiger, Gut Sapphire, Stiletto MF, M9 Ultra, Ursus Doppler, Flip Doppler, M9 Stained, Nomad CW, Paracord CW, AK-47 X-Ray & A Lot More
Everything in my inventory is up for trade. The most valuable items are listed here, the rest you can find in My Inventory
Feel free to Add Me or even better send a Trade Offer. Open for any suggestions: upgrades, downgrades / knives, gloves, skins / stickers, patterns, floats.
All Buyouts are listed in cash value.
KNIVES
★ Butterfly Knife Lore (Factory New), B/O: $7194.77
★ Butterfly Knife Autotronic (Minimal Wear), B/O: $2025.74
⎯★ M9 Bayonet Ultraviolet (Field-Tested), B/O: $557.87
★ M9 Bayonet Stained (Well-Worn), B/O: $529.41
★ M9 Bayonet Boreal Forest (Field-Tested), B/O: $465.39
⎯★ Talon Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $1295.27
★ Bayonet Tiger Tooth (Minimal Wear), B/O: $746.28
★ Karambit Bright Water (Field-Tested), B/O: $688.15
⎯★ Flip Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $547.93
★ Flip Knife Autotronic (Minimal Wear), B/O: $476.69
★ Flip Knife Case Hardened (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $278.18
★ Flip Knife Black Laminate (Well-Worn), B/O: $258.83
★ Flip Knife Urban Masked (Field-Tested), B/O: $181.64
⎯★ Stiletto Knife Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $686.04
★ Stiletto Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $665.41
★ Stiletto Knife, B/O: $601.39
★ Stiletto Knife Crimson Web (Field-Tested), B/O: $418.25
★ Stiletto Knife Night Stripe (Field-Tested), B/O: $227.80
★ Stiletto Knife Boreal Forest (Field-Tested), B/O: $194.96
★ Stiletto Knife Safari Mesh (Field-Tested), B/O: $192.79
⎯★ Nomad Knife Crimson Web (Field-Tested), B/O: $518.11
★ Nomad Knife Scorched (Field-Tested), B/O: $169.78
★ Nomad Knife Forest DDPAT (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $166.88
★ StatTrak™ Nomad Knife Blue Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $335.79
⎯★ Skeleton Knife Stained (Well-Worn), B/O: $442.05
★ Skeleton Knife Urban Masked (Minimal Wear), B/O: $426.24
★ Skeleton Knife Boreal Forest (Field-Tested), B/O: $314.03
★ StatTrak™ Skeleton Knife Fade (Minimal Wear), B/O: $2361.28
★ StatTrak™ Skeleton Knife Urban Masked (Field-Tested), B/O: $376.53
⎯★ Ursus Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $557.12
★ Ursus Knife, B/O: $471.42
★ Ursus Knife Blue Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $212.37
★ Ursus Knife Case Hardened (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $187.66
★ Ursus Knife Damascus Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $178.18
★ Ursus Knife Ultraviolet (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $155.13
★ Ursus Knife Boreal Forest (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $124.26
⎯★ Huntsman Knife Black Laminate (Minimal Wear), B/O: $204.83
★ Huntsman Knife Black Laminate (Field-Tested), B/O: $184.50
★ StatTrak™ Huntsman Knife Lore (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $224.11
⎯★ Bowie Knife Gamma Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $2142.02
★ Bowie Knife, B/O: $230.44
★ Bowie Knife Damascus Steel (Factory New), B/O: $209.20
★ Bowie Knife Ultraviolet (Minimal Wear), B/O: $180.51
★ Bowie Knife Ultraviolet (Field-Tested), B/O: $131.03
⎯★ Falchion Knife Night (Field-Tested), B/O: $132.54
★ Falchion Knife Urban Masked (Well-Worn), B/O: $112.81
★ Falchion Knife Scorched (Field-Tested), B/O: $108.81
★ Falchion Knife Forest DDPAT (Field-Tested), B/O: $107.82
★ Falchion Knife Safari Mesh (Field-Tested), B/O: $107.46
★ StatTrak™ Falchion Knife Ultraviolet (Field-Tested), B/O: $143.08
⎯★ Paracord Knife Crimson Web (Minimal Wear), B/O: $486.48
★ Paracord Knife Blue Steel (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $163.12
⎯★ Survival Knife Blue Steel (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $138.26
★ Survival Knife Night Stripe (Field-Tested), B/O: $131.03
⎯★ Gut Knife Sapphire (Minimal Wear), B/O: $1127.79
★ Gut Knife Gamma Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $286.17
★ Gut Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $246.55
★ Gut Knife Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $240.77
★ Gut Knife, B/O: $210.49
★ Gut Knife Lore (Field-Tested), B/O: $194.22
★ Gut Knife Case Hardened (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $151.51
★ Gut Knife Blue Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $124.94
★ Gut Knife Rust Coat (Well-Worn), B/O: $118.99
★ Gut Knife Boreal Forest (Minimal Wear), B/O: $109.80
★ StatTrak™ Gut Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $237.96
⎯★ Shadow Daggers Gamma Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $264.92
★ Shadow Daggers Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $253.03
★ Shadow Daggers Tiger Tooth (Factory New), B/O: $237.22
★ Shadow Daggers Crimson Web (Field-Tested), B/O: $153.40
★ Shadow Daggers Autotronic (Minimal Wear), B/O: $144.42
★ Shadow Daggers Blue Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $105.20
★ StatTrak™ Shadow Daggers Damascus Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $150.46
⎯★ Navaja Knife Fade (Factory New), B/O: $365.99
★ Navaja Knife Doppler (Factory New), B/O: $228.93
★ Navaja Knife Marble Fade (Factory New), B/O: $227.43
★ Navaja Knife Slaughter (Factory New), B/O: $209.06
★ Navaja Knife, B/O: $203.16
★ Navaja Knife Case Hardened (Well-Worn), B/O: $132.57
★ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Factory New), B/O: $121.69
★ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Minimal Wear), B/O: $109.95
★ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $100.41
★ StatTrak™ Navaja Knife Fade (Factory New), B/O: $369.01
★ StatTrak™ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel (Field-Tested), B/O: $109.95
GLOVES
★ Sport Gloves Amphibious (Minimal Wear), B/O: $2394.67
★ Sport Gloves Omega (Well-Worn), B/O: $572.33
★ Sport Gloves Bronze Morph (Minimal Wear), B/O: $338.88
★ Sport Gloves Big Game (Field-Tested), B/O: $323.66
⎯★ Specialist Gloves Marble Fade (Minimal Wear), B/O: $1652.07
★ Specialist Gloves Tiger Strike (Field-Tested), B/O: $599.14
★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Web (Well-Worn), B/O: $231.57
★ Specialist Gloves Buckshot (Minimal Wear), B/O: $126.21
⎯★ Moto Gloves POW! (Minimal Wear), B/O: $996.99
★ Moto Gloves POW! (Field-Tested), B/O: $383.31
★ Moto Gloves POW! (Well-Worn), B/O: $276.00
★ Moto Gloves Turtle (Field-Tested), B/O: $180.28
⎯★ Hand Wraps CAUTION! (Minimal Wear), B/O: $502.29
★ Hand Wraps Giraffe (Minimal Wear), B/O: $180.73
★ Hand Wraps CAUTION! (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $178.32
⎯★ Driver Gloves Queen Jaguar (Minimal Wear), B/O: $181.01
★ Driver Gloves Rezan the Red (Field-Tested), B/O: $101.66
⎯★ Broken Fang Gloves Jade (Field-Tested), B/O: $127.88
★ Broken Fang Gloves Needle Point (Minimal Wear), B/O: $124.55
⎯★ Bloodhound Gloves Guerrilla (Minimal Wear), B/O: $127.94
★ Hydra Gloves Case Hardened (Field-Tested), B/O: $102.55
WEAPONS
AK-47 X-Ray (Well-Worn), B/O: $478.95
AUG Hot Rod (Factory New), B/O: $425.83
StatTrak™ M4A1-S Hyper Beast (Factory New), B/O: $413.95
M4A4 Daybreak (Factory New), B/O: $309.51
StatTrak™ AK-47 Aquamarine Revenge (Factory New), B/O: $305.43
AK-47 Case Hardened (Well-Worn), B/O: $196.38
StatTrak™ M4A4 Temukau (Minimal Wear), B/O: $174.64
P90 Run and Hide (Field-Tested), B/O: $167.03
AWP Asiimov (Field-Tested), B/O: $153.33
Souvenir SSG 08 Death Strike (Minimal Wear), B/O: $140.00
M4A1-S Printstream (Battle-Scarred), B/O: $124.70
StatTrak™ M4A1-S Golden Coil (Field-Tested), B/O: $117.48
AWP Asiimov (Well-Worn), B/O: $115.97
StatTrak™ Desert Eagle Printstream (Minimal Wear), B/O: $112.96
StatTrak™ AK-47 Asiimov (Minimal Wear), B/O: $110.85
Souvenir M4A1-S Master Piece (Well-Worn), B/O: $102.42
AK-47 Bloodsport (Minimal Wear), B/O: $100.53
Trade Offer Link - Steam Profile Link - My Inventory
Some items on the list may no longer be available or are still locked, visit My Inventory for more details.
Send a Trade Offer for fastest response. I consider all offers.
Add me for discuss if there is a serious offer that needs to be discussed.
2024.05.17 05:58 JJ2161 What I wish the "Gods Arc" in Legacies could've been like (kind of a fanfic idea).
So, first some context. For a long time, I have always thought about what it would be like to have a story about vampires in which the antagonist is the god of the sun. I think the first time I thought about it was when watching Blade when I was little. In this film, the main villain, Deacon Frost, wanted to awaken the Blood God La Magra, who was said to be the God of Vampires. In Blade Trinity, the first vampire was often refered to as the Vampire God, if I'm not wrong. So, I always thought how obvious it was and yet why no one ever wrote anything similar. There are even a feel stories with vampires involving gods or mentioning them, like Castlevania Nocturne, but I've never seen a mention of a sun god in vampire-related media.
Added to all that, I started thinking about having a story with a moon god related to werewolves. Now, this is not common at all in offical media, but fanfic and overall amateur original fiction that deal with the werewolf genre does mention lunar deities quite often. Most of the times, the moon god is presented as simply part of werewolf culture and beliefs, but not necessarily real, and sometimes even as real, but not a very present force.
Then I was told Legacies were introducing gods and I got excited.
Now, I have to be honest with you. I kinda hated Legacies. Don't get me wrong. I love the idea of it, and I love many of the characters. But, damn, this show was a mess. So bad. I hated the idea of Mallivore. I liked the idea of a past in which other supernatural beings existed, but they handled it in a way that made Supernatural and even my beloved, yet very weird show, SyFy's The Magicians look mature in comparison. Like, the way it handled magic in the TVD universe broke me (what basically amounted to becoming invisible being the flashiest thing you can do with magic became Winx-level "shooting magic beams at each other"). And the way it handled gods in the TVD universe was so frustrating.
First, Ken's armor looked wackier than Thor Love and Thunder. For real. Then the whole "the gods were afraid of Mallivore" thing. Nah, pass. One thing I actually expected them to do (because I had been thinking about it for ages), but they didn't, was to break our expectations and make the gods actually immortal. Now, not every god in every culture is immortal, but many are, and TVD had already nailed in our heads the notion that "nothing completely immortal can exist" for so long that I thought it would be a great subversion. But no.
Anyway, I was thinking about how gods could be handled in the TVD universe and I started writing some ideas and I came up with something, maybe I'll write a fanfic or something. First of all, I would have the story be more spread out. It would focus on many settings. In this case, Mystic Falls with the TVD cast, New Orleans with The Originals cast, and the Salvatore School with the Legacies cast. Most of the canon would follow, but somethings would be different. For instance, Klaus and Elijah are not dead, in their family, only Finn is not among us anymore. From Legacies, I would salvage only the setting and most of the characters, but they would follow completely different paths. The story will jump characters between three main settings, Mystic Falls, New Orleans, and the Salvatore School. Each will live their lives and uncover mysteries separately, which will gradually mix together (think Stranger Things).
>>>>>
So, the story would start in New Orleans. Haley (who is alive), would be investigating something weird that is happening with the werewolf packs of the Southern US. Many are fleeing, others are expanding, and odd alliances are being formed. Among all that, she finds that many packs started following and revering a mysterious leader that most only know as The Lady of the Night, or just The Lady. She finds that those werewolves have somehow developed the ability to stay in human form during the full moon and retain their physical prowess without needing to wear a moonlight ring. In Mystic Falls, a gang of witches have established themselves in the town and started coersing the local witches to join and hunting the local vampires, and the TVD cast has to investigate. All they know is that they are led by a someone refered to as Lightbringer (Sorry, that is the one setting among the three that I haven't thought much about). In Legacies, the cast finds a teenage boy like them that have been chased by werewolves all the way from somewhere in the South. Initially, they think he is Human, but they see the guy kill a few wolves with his bare hands before collapsing. They bring him to the school and find out that, not only is he amnesiac, but he only remembers his life up to a year before, when he was found and put in the foster system and was given a new name by the state, Malek. They don't know what he is and a good portion of his arc would be they trying to find out (he would take Landon's place in the story).
>>>>>
As you may have realized, these new characters are gods. So, I actually like Legacies' idea of not tying the gods to any specific culture (like having the literal Greek gods or many patheons and stuff). Instead they implied that all those cultures' beliefs, or at least a lot of them, were inspired by this one family of real gods.
In my story, this is basically what happened. There is the real gods and then there is the things that people all over the world believed, which often was based on a limited understanding of the real gods or a cultural memory of then mixed in with made-up stuff that developed over time. One example of this is the "Storm God vs Serpent" archetype, which I will talk about later.
Anyway, the gods in this version will be loosely based on our reconstructed understanding of the Proto-Indo-European religion that gave origin to the Greek, Slavic, Celtic, and Norse gods among other in Europe, and the Persian and Vedic gods in Asia. But there will also be tie-ins with Mesoamerica, Africa, Japan, etc.
The main antagonists of the first phase are two individuals known as The Twins. Elio (Lightbringer) and Selina (The Lady). They are actually the twin gods of the Sun and the Moon, who woke up from a centuries-long slumber to wake the rest of their their family.
Selina has the power to bend werewolves to her will, though it is easier for hybrids to resist. Though Selina has nothing to do with werewolves' creation, as they were created by Inadu (The Hollow) in America half a millennium after she was put to sleep, she still has power over them, being the personification of the Moon. That is because Inadu's curse made them "slaves to the moon", which she did not know would tie them to Selina herself. Selina has the power of forcible truning a wolf to torture them when in her presence, as well as preventing them from doing so in the full moon. She uses that as a control mechanism for her followers, torturing them with untimely shifting or rewarding them with the ability to resist shifting during the full moon.
Elio, on the other hand, is being slowly revealed in Mystic Falls, where they first hear of the Twins. Unlike his sister, who has power and influence over werewolves, Elio has no power over vampires. Instead, he is only very dangerous to them. Elio has the power to have vampires feel the effects of being under the sun when in his presence, even if they are wearing a daylight ring. He can make them feel mild discomfort, make their skin blister, or even have them spontaneously combust to death in his presence. His very presence is also all the way from unsetlling to irrationally terrifying to vampires and hybrids. Unlike Selina, who is being literraly worshipped by the werewolves, Elio is pretending to be a very powerful witch and will not be discovered to be the sun god until later.
Finally, we have Malek. Because he is initially not as powerful as The Twins are portrayed to be, we would think he is a demigod or something else. Eventually, it will be revealed that he is actually the archetypical storm god, with powers related to lightning, thurder and the weather, like Thor or Zeus or Indra (but he is not the archetypical Sky Father, which was often mixed with the Storm God in subsequent religions, like with Zeus). He was the first one of the gods to be woken up, but the process was done wrong, and it hurt him, left him weaker.
The gods are a family of supernatural beings with power over nature and abstract concepts, representing many archetypical aspects of more imediately identifiable with the Proto-Indo European religion. They are both magical and the source of magic, and they have been living since at least 10,000 BC. They do not follow the exact canon of a specific religion, but some aspects of their lives may have been remembered as specific stories in many different cultures. Elio and Selina are both Helios and Selene, as well as Apollo and Artemis, Ra and Khonsu, and many other aspects. The family is formed by the Sky Father, the Earth Mother, and all their sons and daughters. These are the greater gods, but there are also a number of minor gods that descend from the core family.
The gods are immortal, as in completely indestructible. Nature's "no immortality" rule doesn't apply to them because they are the ones who created that rule in the first place (which forced any attempt of recreating the gods' immortality with magic always ending in a halfway success at best). It will take time for the main cast to come to terms with this fact and understand that they can't kill the gods, just put them back to sleep. Even in their sleep, the gods were somewhat conscious. They are aware of the changes in the Human world and could whisper in the ears of mortals (thin Silas).
It will be revealed that Malek, being one of the gods that loved Humanity the most, was the one who put his siblings to sleep (his parents, the Sky and the Earth, are more metaphysical and don't interfere much, as they exist in a more immaterial state). The gods were in the brink of war among each other about 2000 years ago, and a war of the gods would be extremely harmful to Humanity. Small skirmishes among them had caused civilization-ending catastrophes before, such as the Bronze Age Collapse, the Middle Eastern Deluge, and an earlier small war had been fought in India millennia before, giving origin of Indian myths of basically "nuclear"-level wars between the gods in the past.
So, to prevent this from happening, Malek enlisted the assistance of Alyta, the Goddess of the Dead, and Fae, the Smith Goddess of Fire, to put his family to sleep. A lot of his character arc will be his conflict between his old family and his new family at the Salvatore School. Elio and Selina want to find him because he is the only one who knows where the other gods are being kept (well, he doesn't for a while, due to his memory loss). Alyta is a mix of Hades, Persephone, Osiris, Thanatos, and other death-related gods. She helped Malek because she knew a war of the gods would be a pain for her. She rules over the Land of the Dead, a realm that encompasses Limbo, The Bright World (Peace), and from which small artificial realms such as Qetsyah's Other Side, Cade's Hell, and the Ancestral Plane were temporarily carved out (alowed by her). Furthermore, she never leaves completely (though she does harvest the souls of the living) and is the only god that was not put to sleep and was active for all thistime.
Now, a lot of the first portion of the story would follow Elio and Selina's machinations and Malek's new life. The Twins want to bring their family back and take back ruleship of the world. For that they want to find Malek, and they (and presumably the other gods still sleeping) are pissed at him. However, there is also disagreement among The Twins. Their family is just as disfunctional as The Originals, and the only thing that used to keep The Twins specifically from jumping at their throats was their little sister, Rory, Goddess of the Dawn. But she is sleeping, and though they made this alliance to release the others, they are gradually losing patience with one another. Other gods that could be mentioned or would appear are a Smith Goddess of Fire (Fae), a God of Beauty and Love (Deon), a God of War (Martino), a Goddess of the Sea (Yara), a God of Time, a Goddess of Agriculture...
Finally, by the last third of the story, the final enemy would be revealed, a being that even the gods fear. The Great Old One. It is the archetypical "serpent" or "monster", a lovecraftian horror and the monstrous firstborn child of the Sky and the Earth. It was defeated by Malek over ten-thousand years ago. However, being of the same nature of the gods and, thus, immortal, Malek could not kill it, only chain it beneath the earth. This battle was felt all over the world and gave origin to many myths. The archetype of the storm god vs the serpent would become the myth of Zeus and Typhon and Apollo and Python in Greece, of Indra and Vritra in India, of Thor in Jormungandr in Scandinavia, and of Susanoo and Yamata-no-Orochi in Japan, for instance. Before their battle, the monster kidnapped the moon (Selina) and tried to eat the sun (Elio), giving origin to myths like Apophis trying to eat Ra in Egypt, or Yamata-no-Orochi kidnapping a princess in Japan. After their first battle, monster tried to rule Mesoamerica, were it ruled as a bloody god that gave origin to the archetype of the Feathered Serpent god and introduced human sacrifice to saciate its hunger for blood. Its defeat was remembered in Mesopotamia as the gods defeating Tiamat, or as the killing of Ymir in Scandinavia.
Bascically, it is a lovecraftian god of chaos of immense power and unsatiable hunger. Malek's battle with it was so traumatic to him, that even in his amnesiac state he displayed a phobia of serpents and snake-like lizards. This being is the one that, after millennia unwatched, managed to free up a part of its essence from its prison and attack Malek in his sleep, which led to him being awoken and severely weakened for a long while. After the other gods realize that it is slowly breaking away from its chains, it becomes a race against time to put it back to its cage, with gods, vampires, witches, and werewolves working together to do so.
submitted by JJ2161 to TheVampireDiaries [link] [comments]
Added to all that, I started thinking about having a story with a moon god related to werewolves. Now, this is not common at all in offical media, but fanfic and overall amateur original fiction that deal with the werewolf genre does mention lunar deities quite often. Most of the times, the moon god is presented as simply part of werewolf culture and beliefs, but not necessarily real, and sometimes even as real, but not a very present force.
Then I was told Legacies were introducing gods and I got excited.
Now, I have to be honest with you. I kinda hated Legacies. Don't get me wrong. I love the idea of it, and I love many of the characters. But, damn, this show was a mess. So bad. I hated the idea of Mallivore. I liked the idea of a past in which other supernatural beings existed, but they handled it in a way that made Supernatural and even my beloved, yet very weird show, SyFy's The Magicians look mature in comparison. Like, the way it handled magic in the TVD universe broke me (what basically amounted to becoming invisible being the flashiest thing you can do with magic became Winx-level "shooting magic beams at each other"). And the way it handled gods in the TVD universe was so frustrating.
First, Ken's armor looked wackier than Thor Love and Thunder. For real. Then the whole "the gods were afraid of Mallivore" thing. Nah, pass. One thing I actually expected them to do (because I had been thinking about it for ages), but they didn't, was to break our expectations and make the gods actually immortal. Now, not every god in every culture is immortal, but many are, and TVD had already nailed in our heads the notion that "nothing completely immortal can exist" for so long that I thought it would be a great subversion. But no.
Anyway, I was thinking about how gods could be handled in the TVD universe and I started writing some ideas and I came up with something, maybe I'll write a fanfic or something. First of all, I would have the story be more spread out. It would focus on many settings. In this case, Mystic Falls with the TVD cast, New Orleans with The Originals cast, and the Salvatore School with the Legacies cast. Most of the canon would follow, but somethings would be different. For instance, Klaus and Elijah are not dead, in their family, only Finn is not among us anymore. From Legacies, I would salvage only the setting and most of the characters, but they would follow completely different paths. The story will jump characters between three main settings, Mystic Falls, New Orleans, and the Salvatore School. Each will live their lives and uncover mysteries separately, which will gradually mix together (think Stranger Things).
>>>>>
So, the story would start in New Orleans. Haley (who is alive), would be investigating something weird that is happening with the werewolf packs of the Southern US. Many are fleeing, others are expanding, and odd alliances are being formed. Among all that, she finds that many packs started following and revering a mysterious leader that most only know as The Lady of the Night, or just The Lady. She finds that those werewolves have somehow developed the ability to stay in human form during the full moon and retain their physical prowess without needing to wear a moonlight ring. In Mystic Falls, a gang of witches have established themselves in the town and started coersing the local witches to join and hunting the local vampires, and the TVD cast has to investigate. All they know is that they are led by a someone refered to as Lightbringer (Sorry, that is the one setting among the three that I haven't thought much about). In Legacies, the cast finds a teenage boy like them that have been chased by werewolves all the way from somewhere in the South. Initially, they think he is Human, but they see the guy kill a few wolves with his bare hands before collapsing. They bring him to the school and find out that, not only is he amnesiac, but he only remembers his life up to a year before, when he was found and put in the foster system and was given a new name by the state, Malek. They don't know what he is and a good portion of his arc would be they trying to find out (he would take Landon's place in the story).
>>>>>
As you may have realized, these new characters are gods. So, I actually like Legacies' idea of not tying the gods to any specific culture (like having the literal Greek gods or many patheons and stuff). Instead they implied that all those cultures' beliefs, or at least a lot of them, were inspired by this one family of real gods.
In my story, this is basically what happened. There is the real gods and then there is the things that people all over the world believed, which often was based on a limited understanding of the real gods or a cultural memory of then mixed in with made-up stuff that developed over time. One example of this is the "Storm God vs Serpent" archetype, which I will talk about later.
Anyway, the gods in this version will be loosely based on our reconstructed understanding of the Proto-Indo-European religion that gave origin to the Greek, Slavic, Celtic, and Norse gods among other in Europe, and the Persian and Vedic gods in Asia. But there will also be tie-ins with Mesoamerica, Africa, Japan, etc.
The main antagonists of the first phase are two individuals known as The Twins. Elio (Lightbringer) and Selina (The Lady). They are actually the twin gods of the Sun and the Moon, who woke up from a centuries-long slumber to wake the rest of their their family.
Selina has the power to bend werewolves to her will, though it is easier for hybrids to resist. Though Selina has nothing to do with werewolves' creation, as they were created by Inadu (The Hollow) in America half a millennium after she was put to sleep, she still has power over them, being the personification of the Moon. That is because Inadu's curse made them "slaves to the moon", which she did not know would tie them to Selina herself. Selina has the power of forcible truning a wolf to torture them when in her presence, as well as preventing them from doing so in the full moon. She uses that as a control mechanism for her followers, torturing them with untimely shifting or rewarding them with the ability to resist shifting during the full moon.
Elio, on the other hand, is being slowly revealed in Mystic Falls, where they first hear of the Twins. Unlike his sister, who has power and influence over werewolves, Elio has no power over vampires. Instead, he is only very dangerous to them. Elio has the power to have vampires feel the effects of being under the sun when in his presence, even if they are wearing a daylight ring. He can make them feel mild discomfort, make their skin blister, or even have them spontaneously combust to death in his presence. His very presence is also all the way from unsetlling to irrationally terrifying to vampires and hybrids. Unlike Selina, who is being literraly worshipped by the werewolves, Elio is pretending to be a very powerful witch and will not be discovered to be the sun god until later.
Finally, we have Malek. Because he is initially not as powerful as The Twins are portrayed to be, we would think he is a demigod or something else. Eventually, it will be revealed that he is actually the archetypical storm god, with powers related to lightning, thurder and the weather, like Thor or Zeus or Indra (but he is not the archetypical Sky Father, which was often mixed with the Storm God in subsequent religions, like with Zeus). He was the first one of the gods to be woken up, but the process was done wrong, and it hurt him, left him weaker.
The gods are a family of supernatural beings with power over nature and abstract concepts, representing many archetypical aspects of more imediately identifiable with the Proto-Indo European religion. They are both magical and the source of magic, and they have been living since at least 10,000 BC. They do not follow the exact canon of a specific religion, but some aspects of their lives may have been remembered as specific stories in many different cultures. Elio and Selina are both Helios and Selene, as well as Apollo and Artemis, Ra and Khonsu, and many other aspects. The family is formed by the Sky Father, the Earth Mother, and all their sons and daughters. These are the greater gods, but there are also a number of minor gods that descend from the core family.
The gods are immortal, as in completely indestructible. Nature's "no immortality" rule doesn't apply to them because they are the ones who created that rule in the first place (which forced any attempt of recreating the gods' immortality with magic always ending in a halfway success at best). It will take time for the main cast to come to terms with this fact and understand that they can't kill the gods, just put them back to sleep. Even in their sleep, the gods were somewhat conscious. They are aware of the changes in the Human world and could whisper in the ears of mortals (thin Silas).
It will be revealed that Malek, being one of the gods that loved Humanity the most, was the one who put his siblings to sleep (his parents, the Sky and the Earth, are more metaphysical and don't interfere much, as they exist in a more immaterial state). The gods were in the brink of war among each other about 2000 years ago, and a war of the gods would be extremely harmful to Humanity. Small skirmishes among them had caused civilization-ending catastrophes before, such as the Bronze Age Collapse, the Middle Eastern Deluge, and an earlier small war had been fought in India millennia before, giving origin of Indian myths of basically "nuclear"-level wars between the gods in the past.
So, to prevent this from happening, Malek enlisted the assistance of Alyta, the Goddess of the Dead, and Fae, the Smith Goddess of Fire, to put his family to sleep. A lot of his character arc will be his conflict between his old family and his new family at the Salvatore School. Elio and Selina want to find him because he is the only one who knows where the other gods are being kept (well, he doesn't for a while, due to his memory loss). Alyta is a mix of Hades, Persephone, Osiris, Thanatos, and other death-related gods. She helped Malek because she knew a war of the gods would be a pain for her. She rules over the Land of the Dead, a realm that encompasses Limbo, The Bright World (Peace), and from which small artificial realms such as Qetsyah's Other Side, Cade's Hell, and the Ancestral Plane were temporarily carved out (alowed by her). Furthermore, she never leaves completely (though she does harvest the souls of the living) and is the only god that was not put to sleep and was active for all thistime.
Now, a lot of the first portion of the story would follow Elio and Selina's machinations and Malek's new life. The Twins want to bring their family back and take back ruleship of the world. For that they want to find Malek, and they (and presumably the other gods still sleeping) are pissed at him. However, there is also disagreement among The Twins. Their family is just as disfunctional as The Originals, and the only thing that used to keep The Twins specifically from jumping at their throats was their little sister, Rory, Goddess of the Dawn. But she is sleeping, and though they made this alliance to release the others, they are gradually losing patience with one another. Other gods that could be mentioned or would appear are a Smith Goddess of Fire (Fae), a God of Beauty and Love (Deon), a God of War (Martino), a Goddess of the Sea (Yara), a God of Time, a Goddess of Agriculture...
Finally, by the last third of the story, the final enemy would be revealed, a being that even the gods fear. The Great Old One. It is the archetypical "serpent" or "monster", a lovecraftian horror and the monstrous firstborn child of the Sky and the Earth. It was defeated by Malek over ten-thousand years ago. However, being of the same nature of the gods and, thus, immortal, Malek could not kill it, only chain it beneath the earth. This battle was felt all over the world and gave origin to many myths. The archetype of the storm god vs the serpent would become the myth of Zeus and Typhon and Apollo and Python in Greece, of Indra and Vritra in India, of Thor in Jormungandr in Scandinavia, and of Susanoo and Yamata-no-Orochi in Japan, for instance. Before their battle, the monster kidnapped the moon (Selina) and tried to eat the sun (Elio), giving origin to myths like Apophis trying to eat Ra in Egypt, or Yamata-no-Orochi kidnapping a princess in Japan. After their first battle, monster tried to rule Mesoamerica, were it ruled as a bloody god that gave origin to the archetype of the Feathered Serpent god and introduced human sacrifice to saciate its hunger for blood. Its defeat was remembered in Mesopotamia as the gods defeating Tiamat, or as the killing of Ymir in Scandinavia.
Bascically, it is a lovecraftian god of chaos of immense power and unsatiable hunger. Malek's battle with it was so traumatic to him, that even in his amnesiac state he displayed a phobia of serpents and snake-like lizards. This being is the one that, after millennia unwatched, managed to free up a part of its essence from its prison and attack Malek in his sleep, which led to him being awoken and severely weakened for a long while. After the other gods realize that it is slowly breaking away from its chains, it becomes a race against time to put it back to its cage, with gods, vampires, witches, and werewolves working together to do so.
2024.05.17 05:05 sofwithanf 10 By Summer 2024 ☀️ UPDATE 3
It's a beautiful day, so don't let it get away!
Welcome to 🐣💐🌿 Spring 🪺🪁🖼 everyone! With the new season coming up soon, it's a great time to start a project and use up what you have!
The project works like this: Pick any 10 beauty items and pick a goal that you want to work towards by the end of the season. It's that simple! Absolutely anything beauty-related counts in this project: makeup, hair care, nail care, fragrances, skincare... you name it. You can also choose whatever goals you'd like (there are no limits!), for example: fully using up ('panning') an item, hitting pan, using an item a certain number of times, or testing something new.
You can add as many or as few items to the list as you like, 10 is just a suggestion. Make sure to let us know what you pick down below - and feel free to use my comment as format inspiration, or create a list in a way that suits you best! I love seeing all the ways people format their comments!
This project starts today, the 21st of March and will run until the 20th of June, but you can join at any time. Update posts will be every 2 weeks until we hit Summer! There are lots of active projects at the moment, so I'll make update post dates available beforehand - our next posts will be: 🪁 30th May, 🖼 13th June, with the finale on the 🧚🏽♀️ 20th June!
Optional Bonus Question: Let's set some goals for other items around us to finish up too! Choose teas/coffees/cocoas, read some books, pay off debts, candles, or anything else you'd like to finish up! Make sure to let us know how this goes!
Notes:
submitted by sofwithanf to MakeupRehab [link] [comments]
Welcome to 🐣💐🌿 Spring 🪺🪁🖼 everyone! With the new season coming up soon, it's a great time to start a project and use up what you have!
The project works like this: Pick any 10 beauty items and pick a goal that you want to work towards by the end of the season. It's that simple! Absolutely anything beauty-related counts in this project: makeup, hair care, nail care, fragrances, skincare... you name it. You can also choose whatever goals you'd like (there are no limits!), for example: fully using up ('panning') an item, hitting pan, using an item a certain number of times, or testing something new.
You can add as many or as few items to the list as you like, 10 is just a suggestion. Make sure to let us know what you pick down below - and feel free to use my comment as format inspiration, or create a list in a way that suits you best! I love seeing all the ways people format their comments!
This project starts today, the 21st of March and will run until the 20th of June, but you can join at any time. Update posts will be every 2 weeks until we hit Summer! There are lots of active projects at the moment, so I'll make update post dates available beforehand - our next posts will be: 🪁 30th May, 🖼 13th June, with the finale on the 🧚🏽♀️ 20th June!
Optional Bonus Question: Let's set some goals for other items around us to finish up too! Choose teas/coffees/cocoas, read some books, pay off debts, candles, or anything else you'd like to finish up! Make sure to let us know how this goes!
Notes:
- If you would to be sent a reminder when a new update is available, let me know in your intro comment below! I will PM you the direct link to each update post.
2024.05.17 04:49 Alternative_Gold8371 Free coloring page of a bear
 | Free printable coloring page of a bear. Why coloring is important? Coloring improves: •hand-eye coordination •attention •imagination and creativity •self-confidence submitted by Alternative_Gold8371 to awesomecoloringpages [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 04:45 Alternative_Gold8371 10 Free coloring pages
 | You can download 10 cute free printable coloring pages from my patreon page. Happy coloring! submitted by Alternative_Gold8371 to awesomecoloringpages [link] [comments] Coloring improves: •Creativity •Attention •Hand-eye coordination •Self-Confidence |
2024.05.17 04:33 Alternative_Gold8371 Free Coloring Pages for Kids
In this Reddit community you can find free coloring pages. I create these free printables in Procreate. The coloring pages are unique, hand-drawn and not a single mass produced image was used in the process. ❤️ Simply download and have fun. Happy coloring!
submitted by Alternative_Gold8371 to awesomecoloringpages [link] [comments]
2024.05.17 04:32 Alternative_Gold8371 Welcome
 | In this Reddit community you can find free coloring pages. I create these free printables in Procreate. The coloring pages are unique, hand-drawn and not a single mass produced image was used in the process. ❤️ Simply download and have fun. Happy coloring! submitted by Alternative_Gold8371 to awesomecoloringpages [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 04:15 Cyr13lGame Free Black Nail Polish - Win Black Nail Polish on Playbite
 | submitted by Cyr13lGame to PlaybiteCyr13lGame [link] [comments] |
2024.05.17 04:14 adorabletapeworm Orion Pest Control: Don't Ask To Speak To My Manager
Previous case
We're back to business as usual at Orion. Sort of. I'll get into that in a minute. But first, I just need to put it out there that sometimes the clients drive me nuts. As much as I have an apparently irresistible desire to help everyone, some people really push it. Push it right off of a fucking cliff, that is.
I’m going to stop myself before I go off on an unhinged rant about the woes of dealing with the public. Instead, I’ll let yinz see for yourselves what I've been putting up with.
(If you're not familiar with what Orion Pest Control's services are, it may help to start here.)
We received a call from a client about mosquitoes running amok in her home. Since we had a few others to take care of that day, I informed her that the earliest that one of us could investigate the matter was in the afternoon. But because this woman is clearly so much more important than everyone else, her royal highness threw a hissy fit about having to wait like a common peasant.
I tried to be as nice as possible, “Ma’am, I understand that it’s frustrating, but there are others that called ahead of you, so we have to take care of their problems before we can take care of yours.”
The client huffed, “Okay, you clearly aren’t hearing me. There are mosquitoes in my house!”
“Yes, ma’am, I heard you. However, you are not our only client, so we ask that you please be patient and we will be there as soon as we can.”
I should also mention that this client talked out of the back of her nose, if that helps to paint a picture of how her cadence was equally as grating as her personality. “Okay, but do those people have mosquitoes? Like in their house, biting them and their kid over and over? My son could have Zika virus right now!”
Jesus Fucking Christ. I rubbed my temple with my free hand as I did my damndest to keep my customer service persona in place, “Again, ma’am, I understand that this is frustrating, but we have a wasp infestation and termites to deal with before you and those families want their kids to be safe, just like you. In the meantime, I recommend wearing bug spray or burning a citronella candle until we can get to you. We will be there as soon as we can.”
“You better be! And you really need to work on your customer service, sweetie!”
The client hung up on me.
I had to pace around the office after that one. Sweetie? Shove it up your ass, you entitled, snotty… You know what? Nevermind. I have many words to describe clients like that and none of them are pleasant. I hoped that she’d get mosquito bites in all of the most private areas of her anatomy.
It probably didn't help that I was saddled with some bitterness after the ‘dogging’ incident. I knew that there wasn't anything I could do about the mechanic other than stay out of his way going forward. And boy, did that eat me up.
On that note, I know what the mechanic is, however, even whispering the official title of these Neighbors is enough to draw them to you. I'm not sure if writing it counts and I'm not about to find that out the hard way.
Just know that if you hear wings beating from the west at night, hide and pray that you'll be passed by. Placing a line of salt on all of the doors and windows facing the west keeps them from coming inside. Once they set their sights on you, they'll never stop hunting you. Even death itself fears them. You'll still be running long after your heart stops beating.
But I promise, I’ll elaborate more on that later. I’m getting ahead of myself. Back to the case.
Reyna was at the point in her training where she could be trusted to deal with termites on her own. After I had the wasp nests taken care of, I set out to her royal highness’ home, and earlier than I’d told her, might I add. I will admit that I was tempted to dally a bit just to piss her off, but then I figured that it would be better and more professional to just get it over with.
She looked exactly like how I pictured her to look, complete with a weasley sneer that only the most unlikable of human beings are able to master.
“It’s about time.” She snapped.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “Where have you noticed the mosquitoes the most?”
“Everywhere.” She said unhelpfully,
Her husband stepped in. “In the kitchen and basement, mostly.”
To make this call even better, the husband decided to take it upon himself to follow me around as I did my inspection, asking me pointless questions and giving me advice that I didn't ask for.
It got to a point where his hot breath wheezed into my ear as I shined my flashlight under their sink.
Stiffly, but politely, I asked, “Sir, can you please keep your distance?”
His wife chipped in, “Will you let her do her job, Curtis? It took her long enough to get here, and if you keep pestering her, it's going to take even longer!”
The husband puffed up and snapped, “Well, it's my house! I need to know that the person working in it knows what they're doing!”
They began screaming at each other. As obnoxious and uncomfortable as it was to have to bear witness to it, at least they weren't focused on me anymore. I shook my head and kept searching for the source of the infestation.
What I was looking for was standing water, which is essential for a mosquito's life cycle; you eliminate the standing water, you eliminate the infestation. The space beneath the sink was completely dry.
With the argument going on, I almost didn't hear it. An odd little sound. The easiest way to describe it was that it sounded like, ‘Kudo! Kudo!’
My head turned to follow it. That's when I noticed that one of the floorboards was slightly raised up from the rest.
I interrupted their marital problems, “You said that your son was sick earlier? Would he happen to have chills and a high fever?”
The client spat, “Yes, because some people-”
Not in the mood for her nonsense anymore, I cut in, “Ma'am, please just answer the question. I am trying to help you, I really am, but I'm going to need some more information in order to do that.”
She looked taken aback, her face bright red. While she balked, her husband answered instead, “Our son said he was feeling under the weather, but he does that whenever he wants to get out of something. You know how kids are.”
Good lord. Parents of the year.
“Have you noticed your salt going missing?”
The wife blinked at me, “How did you know that?”
I told them that I'd be right back and went to retrieve a cage from the truck. This critter is an odd one in that not only is salt not a suitable repellent for it, but it actually loves the stuff. It can consume as much as ten grams of salt per day. So if you find that the salt in your home has gone missing, it could mean that a False Egg has made a nest.
I returned with the cage and advised the couple to either move into another room or wait outside. Would it surprise yinz when I say that they refused? Not in the mood to argue, I just shrugged. Okay. Suit yourselves.
I set the cage up next to the lifted floorboard, took my salt off of my toolbelt, and sprinkled some inside the cage. It would placate the False Egg once I got it inside.
Using my knife, I pried the floorboard up. From behind me, the husband began to protest, but his wife snapped at him to keep still.
Meanwhile, my eyes met the beady gaze of a False Egg from where it hid under their floorboard.
At first glance, it looks like a white chicken's egg. If consumed, it causes the host to lay more False Eggs. That's how it reproduces. The telltale signs that you're looking at a False Egg include two dark spots on the shell near the pointed top of the ovoid. Those are the eyes, which they can leave closed to camouflage themselves. You may also notice two small holes at the bottom of the shell, which is where its legs can retract in and out. Mosquitoes follow False Eggs wherever they nest, though it's unclear why.
Generally, they're more of an annoyance than anything. However, they can cause flu-like symptoms in those that they feel threatened by, so they do pose a slight danger to those with compromised immune systems.
To my surprise, the False Egg leapt out of its nest and into the cage, tucking its legs back into its shell comfortably. Even though it didn't seem to have any intentions of moving, I quickly shut the door of its cage.
For the first time since I arrived, the clients were speechless. The woman had a hand over her open mouth while the man stared at the False Egg in a mixture of horror and disgust.
It wasn't until I stood up with the cage that the man asked, “What the hell is that?”
“The source of the infestation.” I replied. “I’ll take this guy out to the truck. The mosquitoes should follow him, but just to be sure, I'm going to ask that you all leave the house for a few hours so that I can apply a chemical treatment that'll kill off any stragglers. And your son’s condition should improve in a day or two.”
The couple didn't give me any trouble. They quietly collected their sick teenaged son, saying something about getting ice cream, then fucked off to do whatever while I dealt with the rest of the mosquitoes.
Once I was done, I drove off to release the False Egg somewhere where it could complete its life cycle away from humans. It is able to reproduce in any mammal. While forcing other organisms to lay eggs is bizarre and can be alarming for the affected individual, it doesn't appear to hurt the hosts, other than causing some mild abdominal discomfort. Once the False Egg is laid, the host goes back to normal, which is why we generally don't feel the need to kill them.
Unexpectedly, the False Egg talked to me.
It had a small, soft, mousy voice. “Thanks for getting me out of there.”
I glanced at the False Egg. I had its cage on the passenger's seat. Its eyes were visible, along with its little white legs as it sat on the bottom of its cage. It looked up at me as it wiggled its small feet absent-mindedly.
Whenever it spoke, a small crack that resembled a toothy mouth appeared in its shell. That was something to add to our records: not only are False Eggs capable of speech, but their mouths are located below their eye spots.
Stunned, I said, “You're welcome.”
The False Egg continued, “Oh, those humans are vile! I hadn't realized it when I first made my nest. Do you want to know why I made the boy sick?”
“Why?”
So that's how I learned every aspect of this family's lives. I'm sure yinz care even less than I do about some suburbanites’ interfamily drama, so I'll just say that it wasn't bad enough to warrant a call to social services, but enough that I can see why that kid probably couldn't wait to turn 18. Overbearing mother, father trying to use his son to relive his glory days as a high school athlete. The False Egg had done the boy a solid, giving him just enough of a fever to excuse him from lacrosse tryouts.
“Where are we going?” The False Egg asked after telling me all that information that I didn't know what to do with.
“Back to the forest.”
The False Egg kept swinging its little feet, “Can you take me somewhere nice? If it's not any trouble?”
Why not? Maybe some scenery would improve my mood.
So me and my little egg buddy took a little drive to the pond. It was a picturesque area as well as a nice environment for a False Egg. They prefer caves, but as long as they're near water, they'll be fine. When I opened its cage, the False Egg hopped out, its little eyes and shelled body swiveling to take in the peaceful sight.
“Oh, this is wonderful! Thank you!” Before it skipped off, it paused. “I think it would only be right if I told you something that could help, since you brought me here.”
It turned, its shell splitting to form a mouth as it hesitated before speaking, “If you hear whispers in the woods, even if it sounds like someone you care about, don't listen. The louder they are, the safer you are. They get quieter as they get closer to confuse you.”
Hold on. That didn't make any sense. The whispers had gotten louder and more urgent as I approached the mechanic's clearing.
Unless I was wrong and he wasn't the one doing it.
I asked, “Is the whispering thing disguising itself as a mechanic?”
The False Egg tilted to the side thoughtfully, “I'm afraid not. It doesn’t like to pretend to be human.”
So there was something else out there with me when I went looking for Victor. I remembered then that the whispers had stopped once I got close to the mechanic's clearing. When I unintentionally allowed them to lead me astray, they took me in the opposite direction of where he'd been waiting. Interesting.
With the False Egg wandering off to establish a new nest that was far away from humans, I headed back to the office, unsure of how to feel about the information it had given me.
Victor looked annoyed when I came in. The clients had called to complain about my ‘poor customer service.’ Wow. Okay.
“Next time, just leave the False Egg there.” Victor said, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “They want to complain about poor customer service? We can show them bad service!”
“It's fine, Vic.” I replied. “Just let them leave their one star Google review and move on.”
“These fucking people…” He grumbled.
Victor's headspace hasn't been much better than mine. He's been pretty much stuck waiting by the phone for those ominous calls that the mechanic mentioned in the woods. They don't happen often, but when they do, he gets grim. Quiet. He hasn't told me in detail what has been requested of him. I don't know if he simply doesn't want to talk about it or if he's sworn to secrecy.
We'd had a long, uncomfortable talk during one of my days off while recovering from getting dogged. Victor stopped by with coffee and a box of donut holes. He drank the coffee, but left the donut holes untouched. We sat in my small kitchen, him staring intently into his black coffee, me quietly adding more sugar to my mocha.
I broke the silence. “What did you want me to see the other day?”
“I couldn't outright tell anyone that I was dead. Not without the mechanic finding out.” He continued after some hesitation. “It feels selfish saying it now, but… I just wanted someone to know what happened to me.”
Victor pulled the bandana aside with a finger, revealing that a jagged, red grin had been carved across his throat. I shuddered, being forcefully reminded once again how thin skin truly is.
He quickly pulled it back into place.
That prompted me to ask, “Is the mechanic the one that…?” I pointed to my neck.
Victor shook his head. I asked him who did.
His expression darkened, “Someone I used to use with. He didn't believe me when I told him that I was still clean and couldn't help him get his next hit. Everything happened so fast after that. Before I knew it, I woke up in his trunk. My chest felt empty. It's strange, you know? You don't notice your own heartbeat until it's not there anymore.”
I shook my head slowly, a knot in my stomach as I whispered, “Jesus, Vic. Where is he now?”
“He can't hurt anyone else. We'll leave it at that.” Victor muttered.
I took in a shaky breath. I couldn't believe that he'd been keeping all of this in. It was a lot to take in at once, so I could only imagine how much worse it was to be the one experiencing it.
Like I said, I don't blame him for what happened. He must've felt so alone.
After I regained my composure, I asked, “So… what does the mechanic have to do with this?”
Victor hesitated again, eventually saying, “He couldn't touch me while I was alive, so he made sure that death couldn’t get to me before he could. That's why I was trying to keep my condition quiet; I was hoping that I could outlast him long enough for the Reaper to catch up. Unfortunately, the fucker is good at what he does and knew that I’d drag someone else into my bullshit eventually.”
I shook my head, “I dragged myself into it. I could've just minded my own business, but I didn't. I chose to go out there, even though I didn't know what I was dealing with. And I chose to say the wrong thing to the mechanic to set him off.”
“You wouldn't have been in that position if I hadn't said anything.”
“So what happens now? You're just… forced to do these calls?”
Victor sighed, “It's either that, or I join the ones in the trees.”
The skulls. Grimly, I wondered if those trapped souls were still aware. If they knew what had happened to them.
I slumped down in my seat. “Is there anything we can do?”
“As of right now, no. We just go to work, keep our heads down, do what we have to do. And from now on, I'll deal with the mechanic, even if it's for something as trivial as changing a tire. He's my problem, no one else's.”
So that's where we're at. Victor's technically not alive or dead, but a secret third, worse thing.
Speaking of worse things, we got an emergency call in the middle of the night.
After we close for the day, Victor routes calls to his phone in case there is something that can't wait until the next day. Thankfully, this is an extremely rare occurrence; up until this incident, it's only happened twice since I've been with Orion. I joined Victor for one of those two emergency calls. Even though it's been two years since that night, I still hear the crunching of bones in my dreams.
Something yinz need to know about the farmers around here is that they know how to take care of themselves. They have more encounters with the atypical than anyone else and for the most part, they know how to live amongst things like the Neighbors in relative peace. They know about leaving cream out to appease them. They know about what measures to take to defend themselves and their animals. They're a tough bunch and they usually prefer to take care of things themselves. It's highly unusual for them to reach out to us.
So when Victor told me over the phone that the emergency call was at one of the farms, I knew it was going to be bad.
When he first described what the farmers were contending with, my stomach dropped. The client's brother was found on the porch with his chest entirely deflated, deliberately placed into a chair that was moved in front of the door where the family could see him.
The farmers were holed up in their home. The woman of the house was pregnant, due within the next few days, which made moving her extremely difficult. They could hear whatever killed the brother giggling and tapping on the windows, mocking them. Victor was already on his way there.
I arrived with my toolbelt along with a shotgun and shells filled with rock salt. This may sound ridiculous, but I also donned a collar that I'd made last summer by hammering long ass carpenter nails into the leather, then coating their pointed tips with silver. I looked a bit like a goth club reject, but when dealing with things that like to go for the throat, you gotta put your pride aside.
Victor's truck was in the driveway, but he was nowhere in sight. Shotgun at the ready, I glanced around as I approached the house. The body was still on the porch, untouched after the poor man had been posed there. It looked far worse than what Victor had described. His chest had caved in, like everything inside of him had been sucked clean out. His face was frozen in surprise rather than horror or pain. He'd been caught off guard and was dead long before he could react.
Wings. I turned, pulling the trigger just in time as the pest tormenting this family dove at me. It tumbled to the ground with an enraged shriek.
It appeared to be a woman. Well… half of one. Her legs were gone, brown entrails dangling sickeningly from her gray torso. Her leathery, hooked wings trembled as she used her bony arms to raise herself up to snarl at me, curling her lips to reveal doglike fangs. I shot at her again. She jolted as the shell took a chunk out of her skull.
That wouldn't kill her. Both her and I knew it. She skittered like a cockroach, an elongated tongue shooting out of her mouth, quick as a whip. I flinched, turning my head so she couldn't reach my face, grateful for the collar as I felt the proboscis slam into its spikes. The impact knocked me off balance, causing me to stumble. I leaned into it, hitting the ground and out of reach of the next swipe of her tongue.
I took aim again, knocking her back a few feet. A dark shape suddenly appeared from the barn, a glint of metal shining in the figure’s hand. Victor.
“I can't find the lower half.” He hissed when I was in earshot.
That meant we were going to have to keep her from rejoining the lower half of her body until sunrise. It was three in the morning.
Because nothing can ever be easy.
Victor had found chains and a padlock in the barn. They should be heavy enough to restrain her. We’d just have to get close. Without her sucking our insides out, preferably.
She was back in the air. I took another shot. I'd have to reload soon. I hoped that I'd have enough shells to last the next two hours. At the rate I was going, I'd burn through them in the next ten minutes.
Unfortunately, I missed as she soared towards the house. I used my last shot and thankfully knocked her out of the air. As I hurriedly reloaded, Victor rushed towards the fallen creature, kneeling on her chest to keep her from taking off again as he fought to get the chain around her.
I heard him make a terrible choking sound, followed by her retching. She'd gotten her proboscis down his throat, but had withdrawn it even quicker than she had gotten it down. I guess undead viscera doesn't taste very good.
As she gagged, Victor pressed his forearm against her throat, pinning her so that she couldn't sink her fangs into him. I raced over, setting the shotgun on the ground next to me so that I could help him restrain her. While he held her, I coiled the chain around her squirming torso.
She began to laugh. When she spoke, it sounded like an old woman and a young girl speaking in unison, “Do you think a chain will be enough to stop me?”
I kept going. She wiggled one wing out from beneath her, jabbing the hook into the hollow of my shoulder. I gasped as it pressed deeper into my skin. Victor roughly pushed her wing back down, the violent withdrawal of the hook making me see stars. Through all of that, I still kept going.
We turned her onto her side so that Victor could pin her wings against her back. She screeched the entire time, the proboscis shooting back to slap him in the cheek.
We almost had her. Then we heard a wail from inside the house. What now?!
The pest abruptly paused in her struggles to leer at us, then she sang, “The baby's coming!”
You've got to be kidding me.
Her fighting resumed with far more force than before. That man that she'd killed had merely been an appetizer for her. The baby was her true prize. Her eyes were wild with excitement, saliva dripping off of her fangs as she watched the front door open.
Shitshitshit!
“Go back inside!” Victor shouted as we both used all that we had to try to keep the pest in place.
The farmer yelled back, distress making his voice higher, “Something's wrong! I have to get her to the hospital!”
I risked a glance. The woman was white as a sheet, holding onto her husband for dear life as he half led half dragged her to his truck. Blood stained the inside of the woman's legs.
At the sight of it, Victor froze. I didn't like the way he looked at the woman then. Oh no. The creature went into a complete frenzy. She managed to get her fangs into Victor's arm, wrenching a cry of agony from him as she ripped a sizable chunk of flesh out. His hold on her loosened just enough that she could wriggle a wing out.
I screamed as I felt her beginning to slip away, frantically reaching for the nearest part of her, which was unfortunately her dangling intestines. It was like trying to hold onto oversized wet noodles, my hands slipping in her chunky blood as I struggled to slow her down.
They just needed to reach the truck. We just had to keep her here just long enough for them to get a head start.
I just hoped that I wouldn't end up having to protect them from my boss, too.
She roared as she turned and slashed me across the brow with one of her clawed fingers. My vision went dark in my right eye. Numbly, I wondered if she ripped my eye out, or if it was just from the pain. By some miracle, I didn't let go.
Fortunately, the bite seemed to snap Victor out of whatever had happened to him when he saw the woman’s blood. At least for the moment. He scrambled across the ground, seizing my shotgun. His first shot missed. The second one hit her left wing. The farmer had the truck's passenger side door open as he helped his wife inside. The pest reached a talon towards them, trying to drag herself closer. Victor was back on his feet and marched over to shoot her in the head. Once. Twice.
The truck's engine roared to life. With it, the pest screeched in rage, the sound warped by the damage done to her mouth after Victor had unloaded on her. She flailed as she watched her prize speed down the road.
But it wasn't over. The gunshot wound in her wing was already closing up. It wouldn't take her long to catch up to them if we lost her.
My cheek was wet. Turns out, I didn't lose an eye. I just had blood in it. Thank God. I crawled over her, trying the chains again as Victor went back to holding her wings against her body.
She called him every foul name in the book, words slurring from her destroyed jaw. One of them touched a nerve: “Bitch of the Wild Hunt.” He wordlessly snatched the salt from my belt and poured it over her face, holding her jaw to shove the container into her mouth. She gurgled and started to convulse as the salt was forced down her throat. That shut her up.
With the chain pinning her arms and wings against her body, Victor dug the padlock out of his pocket, using it to secure the links.
“I’m going to try to get her to the barn.” He yelled over the sound of her agitated howls.
I retrieved the shotgun and followed him as he carried the squirming, shrieking pest towards the barn. I pressed the palm of my hand to the cut on my brow. A flutter of unease went through my gut as it occurred to me that I could be in danger from Victor as well.
It didn't help that the pest had noticed it, too. She was goading him, “That girl smells sweet, doesn't she?”
“You want more salt in your mouth?” He threatened flatly. “We got plenty and we have some time until sunrise.”
She cackled, “You can't tell me that your mouth isn't watering thinking of her soft flesh between your teeth. Her blood warming your tongue. You long to feel warm again, don't you, dead man?”
The borderline pornographic way that she spoke about devouring me made me intensely uncomfortable.
“Keep it up and I'll pack the salt up your nose, too.” Victor retorted.
Once we got to the barn, we found an empty stall, which he tossed her into. I didn't follow him into the stall. My gut was telling me that something was off.
He drew a circle of salt around her. As long as it wasn't broken, it would trap her until sunrise.
I didn't think the boss would ever intentionally hurt me. But the way he looked at that woman…
What if he couldn't control himself?
Victor shut the stall door behind him, leaving the pest to wail and swear at us from her prison.
His eyes went to my forehead, “That looks like it hurts.”
I swallowed back the lump in my throat. There it was again. That look.
“Stay back, Vic.” I said calmly, my unease growing.
He took a deep breath, his eyes closing. I took a small step away from him, towards the exit to the barn.
I kept my voice even, “Vic, be honest with me. Is it safe to be around you right now?”
Victor stayed where he was, still not looking at me. He eventually answered, “Probably not.”
I took another step towards the door. “I'm going to leave.”
He nodded, eyes still shut, “I think that would be best. I'll make sure that she stays in the stall.”
As I backed towards the door, afraid to turn my back on him, I said, “I'll uh… see you at work tomorrow.”
“Yeah. See ya.”
I didn't dare turn my back on him until I'd left the barn. He didn't move a muscle the entire time. As I made my way back to my G6, I kept looking over my shoulder. Victor didn't follow me. I made it back to my car without incident.
I thought back to when I'd found him in the butcher shed. Looking back, I'm pretty sure that he'd been eating it.
Once I was in my apartment, I quickly drew lines of salt in front of all my doors and windows. It made me feel somewhat safer. I inspected the injuries on my forehead and shoulder. After cleaning them both up, I determined that I should probably see a doctor in the morning. In the meantime, I covered them both with gauze.
I painfully settled down onto my bed, my entire body aching. Even though I felt like a dish towel that had been wrung out over and over again, I knew that I wasn't going to be getting much sleep. My mind was racing too much.
Against my better judgment, I ended up texting Victor, ‘Are you a draugr?’
His response was, ‘i think so’
Draugr are known for their grotesque appetites. The joke Reyna and I had been making about him being a ‘high-functioning zombie’ wasn't all that far off, after all.
I reminded myself that Victor wasn't a complete monster. He'd at least had enough control over himself not to hurt me or either of the farmers. But the temptation had clearly been there. That begged the question of what his limits were.
Was it safe to work with him? Injuries aren't exactly uncommon at Orion. Maybe that's why he's been sending Reyna and I together for two person jobs rather than going on calls with us.
I received another message from him, ‘if you want to quit I understand’
I didn't, though. As stressful as working here can be, I do enjoy my job, weirdly enough. I've been treated better here than by any other employer and I like having only two other coworkers to worry about, especially since I get along well with both of them. But the biggest reason why quitting hasn't occurred to me is that I wouldn't be able to just walk away from all that I'd learned about the atypical cases. There was no way I could live a normal life after working at Orion.
I also wanted to keep an eye on Victor. Between whatever the mechanic was forcing him to do and his transformation, there was a lot that I was concerned about. As much as I didn't want to think about having to trap or kill Victor, if it came down to it... I'd do what needed to be done.
I sent back, ‘hazard pay? 👀’
His reply was, ‘😒’
A moment later, I received, ‘we'll discuss it when I don't have a manananggal mf'ing me’
Yinz see why I kept calling her a ‘pest’ rather than trying to type that long name out each time? I guarantee I would have misspelled it several different ways.
When the sun rose, I received another message from Victor, ‘it's over. thanks for your help’
We found out later in the afternoon that the hospital had been able to save the farmers’ baby. She was going to have to stay longer in the hospital, but otherwise, she and their newborn daughter were alright.
What was alarming was that the dead man's body had been desecrated at some point after I left. It was believed that the pest had been the one to take chunks out of his neck, shoulder, and chest. I wasn't going to be the one to tell the family the truth. They'd been through enough already without the news that the one they'd relied on for protection had gotten hungry.
I wondered if being exposed to so much blood had been the trigger. I suppose I should just be glad that Victor had eaten a man who was already dead instead of me or another living person.
Like I said, I'm going to have to keep an eye on him. In the meantime… maybe don't demand to speak to the manager.
submitted by adorabletapeworm to nosleep [link] [comments]
We're back to business as usual at Orion. Sort of. I'll get into that in a minute. But first, I just need to put it out there that sometimes the clients drive me nuts. As much as I have an apparently irresistible desire to help everyone, some people really push it. Push it right off of a fucking cliff, that is.
I’m going to stop myself before I go off on an unhinged rant about the woes of dealing with the public. Instead, I’ll let yinz see for yourselves what I've been putting up with.
(If you're not familiar with what Orion Pest Control's services are, it may help to start here.)
We received a call from a client about mosquitoes running amok in her home. Since we had a few others to take care of that day, I informed her that the earliest that one of us could investigate the matter was in the afternoon. But because this woman is clearly so much more important than everyone else, her royal highness threw a hissy fit about having to wait like a common peasant.
I tried to be as nice as possible, “Ma’am, I understand that it’s frustrating, but there are others that called ahead of you, so we have to take care of their problems before we can take care of yours.”
The client huffed, “Okay, you clearly aren’t hearing me. There are mosquitoes in my house!”
“Yes, ma’am, I heard you. However, you are not our only client, so we ask that you please be patient and we will be there as soon as we can.”
I should also mention that this client talked out of the back of her nose, if that helps to paint a picture of how her cadence was equally as grating as her personality. “Okay, but do those people have mosquitoes? Like in their house, biting them and their kid over and over? My son could have Zika virus right now!”
Jesus Fucking Christ. I rubbed my temple with my free hand as I did my damndest to keep my customer service persona in place, “Again, ma’am, I understand that this is frustrating, but we have a wasp infestation and termites to deal with before you and those families want their kids to be safe, just like you. In the meantime, I recommend wearing bug spray or burning a citronella candle until we can get to you. We will be there as soon as we can.”
“You better be! And you really need to work on your customer service, sweetie!”
The client hung up on me.
I had to pace around the office after that one. Sweetie? Shove it up your ass, you entitled, snotty… You know what? Nevermind. I have many words to describe clients like that and none of them are pleasant. I hoped that she’d get mosquito bites in all of the most private areas of her anatomy.
It probably didn't help that I was saddled with some bitterness after the ‘dogging’ incident. I knew that there wasn't anything I could do about the mechanic other than stay out of his way going forward. And boy, did that eat me up.
On that note, I know what the mechanic is, however, even whispering the official title of these Neighbors is enough to draw them to you. I'm not sure if writing it counts and I'm not about to find that out the hard way.
Just know that if you hear wings beating from the west at night, hide and pray that you'll be passed by. Placing a line of salt on all of the doors and windows facing the west keeps them from coming inside. Once they set their sights on you, they'll never stop hunting you. Even death itself fears them. You'll still be running long after your heart stops beating.
But I promise, I’ll elaborate more on that later. I’m getting ahead of myself. Back to the case.
Reyna was at the point in her training where she could be trusted to deal with termites on her own. After I had the wasp nests taken care of, I set out to her royal highness’ home, and earlier than I’d told her, might I add. I will admit that I was tempted to dally a bit just to piss her off, but then I figured that it would be better and more professional to just get it over with.
She looked exactly like how I pictured her to look, complete with a weasley sneer that only the most unlikable of human beings are able to master.
“It’s about time.” She snapped.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “Where have you noticed the mosquitoes the most?”
“Everywhere.” She said unhelpfully,
Her husband stepped in. “In the kitchen and basement, mostly.”
To make this call even better, the husband decided to take it upon himself to follow me around as I did my inspection, asking me pointless questions and giving me advice that I didn't ask for.
It got to a point where his hot breath wheezed into my ear as I shined my flashlight under their sink.
Stiffly, but politely, I asked, “Sir, can you please keep your distance?”
His wife chipped in, “Will you let her do her job, Curtis? It took her long enough to get here, and if you keep pestering her, it's going to take even longer!”
The husband puffed up and snapped, “Well, it's my house! I need to know that the person working in it knows what they're doing!”
They began screaming at each other. As obnoxious and uncomfortable as it was to have to bear witness to it, at least they weren't focused on me anymore. I shook my head and kept searching for the source of the infestation.
What I was looking for was standing water, which is essential for a mosquito's life cycle; you eliminate the standing water, you eliminate the infestation. The space beneath the sink was completely dry.
With the argument going on, I almost didn't hear it. An odd little sound. The easiest way to describe it was that it sounded like, ‘Kudo! Kudo!’
My head turned to follow it. That's when I noticed that one of the floorboards was slightly raised up from the rest.
I interrupted their marital problems, “You said that your son was sick earlier? Would he happen to have chills and a high fever?”
The client spat, “Yes, because some people-”
Not in the mood for her nonsense anymore, I cut in, “Ma'am, please just answer the question. I am trying to help you, I really am, but I'm going to need some more information in order to do that.”
She looked taken aback, her face bright red. While she balked, her husband answered instead, “Our son said he was feeling under the weather, but he does that whenever he wants to get out of something. You know how kids are.”
Good lord. Parents of the year.
“Have you noticed your salt going missing?”
The wife blinked at me, “How did you know that?”
I told them that I'd be right back and went to retrieve a cage from the truck. This critter is an odd one in that not only is salt not a suitable repellent for it, but it actually loves the stuff. It can consume as much as ten grams of salt per day. So if you find that the salt in your home has gone missing, it could mean that a False Egg has made a nest.
I returned with the cage and advised the couple to either move into another room or wait outside. Would it surprise yinz when I say that they refused? Not in the mood to argue, I just shrugged. Okay. Suit yourselves.
I set the cage up next to the lifted floorboard, took my salt off of my toolbelt, and sprinkled some inside the cage. It would placate the False Egg once I got it inside.
Using my knife, I pried the floorboard up. From behind me, the husband began to protest, but his wife snapped at him to keep still.
Meanwhile, my eyes met the beady gaze of a False Egg from where it hid under their floorboard.
At first glance, it looks like a white chicken's egg. If consumed, it causes the host to lay more False Eggs. That's how it reproduces. The telltale signs that you're looking at a False Egg include two dark spots on the shell near the pointed top of the ovoid. Those are the eyes, which they can leave closed to camouflage themselves. You may also notice two small holes at the bottom of the shell, which is where its legs can retract in and out. Mosquitoes follow False Eggs wherever they nest, though it's unclear why.
Generally, they're more of an annoyance than anything. However, they can cause flu-like symptoms in those that they feel threatened by, so they do pose a slight danger to those with compromised immune systems.
To my surprise, the False Egg leapt out of its nest and into the cage, tucking its legs back into its shell comfortably. Even though it didn't seem to have any intentions of moving, I quickly shut the door of its cage.
For the first time since I arrived, the clients were speechless. The woman had a hand over her open mouth while the man stared at the False Egg in a mixture of horror and disgust.
It wasn't until I stood up with the cage that the man asked, “What the hell is that?”
“The source of the infestation.” I replied. “I’ll take this guy out to the truck. The mosquitoes should follow him, but just to be sure, I'm going to ask that you all leave the house for a few hours so that I can apply a chemical treatment that'll kill off any stragglers. And your son’s condition should improve in a day or two.”
The couple didn't give me any trouble. They quietly collected their sick teenaged son, saying something about getting ice cream, then fucked off to do whatever while I dealt with the rest of the mosquitoes.
Once I was done, I drove off to release the False Egg somewhere where it could complete its life cycle away from humans. It is able to reproduce in any mammal. While forcing other organisms to lay eggs is bizarre and can be alarming for the affected individual, it doesn't appear to hurt the hosts, other than causing some mild abdominal discomfort. Once the False Egg is laid, the host goes back to normal, which is why we generally don't feel the need to kill them.
Unexpectedly, the False Egg talked to me.
It had a small, soft, mousy voice. “Thanks for getting me out of there.”
I glanced at the False Egg. I had its cage on the passenger's seat. Its eyes were visible, along with its little white legs as it sat on the bottom of its cage. It looked up at me as it wiggled its small feet absent-mindedly.
Whenever it spoke, a small crack that resembled a toothy mouth appeared in its shell. That was something to add to our records: not only are False Eggs capable of speech, but their mouths are located below their eye spots.
Stunned, I said, “You're welcome.”
The False Egg continued, “Oh, those humans are vile! I hadn't realized it when I first made my nest. Do you want to know why I made the boy sick?”
“Why?”
So that's how I learned every aspect of this family's lives. I'm sure yinz care even less than I do about some suburbanites’ interfamily drama, so I'll just say that it wasn't bad enough to warrant a call to social services, but enough that I can see why that kid probably couldn't wait to turn 18. Overbearing mother, father trying to use his son to relive his glory days as a high school athlete. The False Egg had done the boy a solid, giving him just enough of a fever to excuse him from lacrosse tryouts.
“Where are we going?” The False Egg asked after telling me all that information that I didn't know what to do with.
“Back to the forest.”
The False Egg kept swinging its little feet, “Can you take me somewhere nice? If it's not any trouble?”
Why not? Maybe some scenery would improve my mood.
So me and my little egg buddy took a little drive to the pond. It was a picturesque area as well as a nice environment for a False Egg. They prefer caves, but as long as they're near water, they'll be fine. When I opened its cage, the False Egg hopped out, its little eyes and shelled body swiveling to take in the peaceful sight.
“Oh, this is wonderful! Thank you!” Before it skipped off, it paused. “I think it would only be right if I told you something that could help, since you brought me here.”
It turned, its shell splitting to form a mouth as it hesitated before speaking, “If you hear whispers in the woods, even if it sounds like someone you care about, don't listen. The louder they are, the safer you are. They get quieter as they get closer to confuse you.”
Hold on. That didn't make any sense. The whispers had gotten louder and more urgent as I approached the mechanic's clearing.
Unless I was wrong and he wasn't the one doing it.
I asked, “Is the whispering thing disguising itself as a mechanic?”
The False Egg tilted to the side thoughtfully, “I'm afraid not. It doesn’t like to pretend to be human.”
So there was something else out there with me when I went looking for Victor. I remembered then that the whispers had stopped once I got close to the mechanic's clearing. When I unintentionally allowed them to lead me astray, they took me in the opposite direction of where he'd been waiting. Interesting.
With the False Egg wandering off to establish a new nest that was far away from humans, I headed back to the office, unsure of how to feel about the information it had given me.
Victor looked annoyed when I came in. The clients had called to complain about my ‘poor customer service.’ Wow. Okay.
“Next time, just leave the False Egg there.” Victor said, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “They want to complain about poor customer service? We can show them bad service!”
“It's fine, Vic.” I replied. “Just let them leave their one star Google review and move on.”
“These fucking people…” He grumbled.
Victor's headspace hasn't been much better than mine. He's been pretty much stuck waiting by the phone for those ominous calls that the mechanic mentioned in the woods. They don't happen often, but when they do, he gets grim. Quiet. He hasn't told me in detail what has been requested of him. I don't know if he simply doesn't want to talk about it or if he's sworn to secrecy.
We'd had a long, uncomfortable talk during one of my days off while recovering from getting dogged. Victor stopped by with coffee and a box of donut holes. He drank the coffee, but left the donut holes untouched. We sat in my small kitchen, him staring intently into his black coffee, me quietly adding more sugar to my mocha.
I broke the silence. “What did you want me to see the other day?”
“I couldn't outright tell anyone that I was dead. Not without the mechanic finding out.” He continued after some hesitation. “It feels selfish saying it now, but… I just wanted someone to know what happened to me.”
Victor pulled the bandana aside with a finger, revealing that a jagged, red grin had been carved across his throat. I shuddered, being forcefully reminded once again how thin skin truly is.
He quickly pulled it back into place.
That prompted me to ask, “Is the mechanic the one that…?” I pointed to my neck.
Victor shook his head. I asked him who did.
His expression darkened, “Someone I used to use with. He didn't believe me when I told him that I was still clean and couldn't help him get his next hit. Everything happened so fast after that. Before I knew it, I woke up in his trunk. My chest felt empty. It's strange, you know? You don't notice your own heartbeat until it's not there anymore.”
I shook my head slowly, a knot in my stomach as I whispered, “Jesus, Vic. Where is he now?”
“He can't hurt anyone else. We'll leave it at that.” Victor muttered.
I took in a shaky breath. I couldn't believe that he'd been keeping all of this in. It was a lot to take in at once, so I could only imagine how much worse it was to be the one experiencing it.
Like I said, I don't blame him for what happened. He must've felt so alone.
After I regained my composure, I asked, “So… what does the mechanic have to do with this?”
Victor hesitated again, eventually saying, “He couldn't touch me while I was alive, so he made sure that death couldn’t get to me before he could. That's why I was trying to keep my condition quiet; I was hoping that I could outlast him long enough for the Reaper to catch up. Unfortunately, the fucker is good at what he does and knew that I’d drag someone else into my bullshit eventually.”
I shook my head, “I dragged myself into it. I could've just minded my own business, but I didn't. I chose to go out there, even though I didn't know what I was dealing with. And I chose to say the wrong thing to the mechanic to set him off.”
“You wouldn't have been in that position if I hadn't said anything.”
“So what happens now? You're just… forced to do these calls?”
Victor sighed, “It's either that, or I join the ones in the trees.”
The skulls. Grimly, I wondered if those trapped souls were still aware. If they knew what had happened to them.
I slumped down in my seat. “Is there anything we can do?”
“As of right now, no. We just go to work, keep our heads down, do what we have to do. And from now on, I'll deal with the mechanic, even if it's for something as trivial as changing a tire. He's my problem, no one else's.”
So that's where we're at. Victor's technically not alive or dead, but a secret third, worse thing.
Speaking of worse things, we got an emergency call in the middle of the night.
After we close for the day, Victor routes calls to his phone in case there is something that can't wait until the next day. Thankfully, this is an extremely rare occurrence; up until this incident, it's only happened twice since I've been with Orion. I joined Victor for one of those two emergency calls. Even though it's been two years since that night, I still hear the crunching of bones in my dreams.
Something yinz need to know about the farmers around here is that they know how to take care of themselves. They have more encounters with the atypical than anyone else and for the most part, they know how to live amongst things like the Neighbors in relative peace. They know about leaving cream out to appease them. They know about what measures to take to defend themselves and their animals. They're a tough bunch and they usually prefer to take care of things themselves. It's highly unusual for them to reach out to us.
So when Victor told me over the phone that the emergency call was at one of the farms, I knew it was going to be bad.
When he first described what the farmers were contending with, my stomach dropped. The client's brother was found on the porch with his chest entirely deflated, deliberately placed into a chair that was moved in front of the door where the family could see him.
The farmers were holed up in their home. The woman of the house was pregnant, due within the next few days, which made moving her extremely difficult. They could hear whatever killed the brother giggling and tapping on the windows, mocking them. Victor was already on his way there.
I arrived with my toolbelt along with a shotgun and shells filled with rock salt. This may sound ridiculous, but I also donned a collar that I'd made last summer by hammering long ass carpenter nails into the leather, then coating their pointed tips with silver. I looked a bit like a goth club reject, but when dealing with things that like to go for the throat, you gotta put your pride aside.
Victor's truck was in the driveway, but he was nowhere in sight. Shotgun at the ready, I glanced around as I approached the house. The body was still on the porch, untouched after the poor man had been posed there. It looked far worse than what Victor had described. His chest had caved in, like everything inside of him had been sucked clean out. His face was frozen in surprise rather than horror or pain. He'd been caught off guard and was dead long before he could react.
Wings. I turned, pulling the trigger just in time as the pest tormenting this family dove at me. It tumbled to the ground with an enraged shriek.
It appeared to be a woman. Well… half of one. Her legs were gone, brown entrails dangling sickeningly from her gray torso. Her leathery, hooked wings trembled as she used her bony arms to raise herself up to snarl at me, curling her lips to reveal doglike fangs. I shot at her again. She jolted as the shell took a chunk out of her skull.
That wouldn't kill her. Both her and I knew it. She skittered like a cockroach, an elongated tongue shooting out of her mouth, quick as a whip. I flinched, turning my head so she couldn't reach my face, grateful for the collar as I felt the proboscis slam into its spikes. The impact knocked me off balance, causing me to stumble. I leaned into it, hitting the ground and out of reach of the next swipe of her tongue.
I took aim again, knocking her back a few feet. A dark shape suddenly appeared from the barn, a glint of metal shining in the figure’s hand. Victor.
“I can't find the lower half.” He hissed when I was in earshot.
That meant we were going to have to keep her from rejoining the lower half of her body until sunrise. It was three in the morning.
Because nothing can ever be easy.
Victor had found chains and a padlock in the barn. They should be heavy enough to restrain her. We’d just have to get close. Without her sucking our insides out, preferably.
She was back in the air. I took another shot. I'd have to reload soon. I hoped that I'd have enough shells to last the next two hours. At the rate I was going, I'd burn through them in the next ten minutes.
Unfortunately, I missed as she soared towards the house. I used my last shot and thankfully knocked her out of the air. As I hurriedly reloaded, Victor rushed towards the fallen creature, kneeling on her chest to keep her from taking off again as he fought to get the chain around her.
I heard him make a terrible choking sound, followed by her retching. She'd gotten her proboscis down his throat, but had withdrawn it even quicker than she had gotten it down. I guess undead viscera doesn't taste very good.
As she gagged, Victor pressed his forearm against her throat, pinning her so that she couldn't sink her fangs into him. I raced over, setting the shotgun on the ground next to me so that I could help him restrain her. While he held her, I coiled the chain around her squirming torso.
She began to laugh. When she spoke, it sounded like an old woman and a young girl speaking in unison, “Do you think a chain will be enough to stop me?”
I kept going. She wiggled one wing out from beneath her, jabbing the hook into the hollow of my shoulder. I gasped as it pressed deeper into my skin. Victor roughly pushed her wing back down, the violent withdrawal of the hook making me see stars. Through all of that, I still kept going.
We turned her onto her side so that Victor could pin her wings against her back. She screeched the entire time, the proboscis shooting back to slap him in the cheek.
We almost had her. Then we heard a wail from inside the house. What now?!
The pest abruptly paused in her struggles to leer at us, then she sang, “The baby's coming!”
You've got to be kidding me.
Her fighting resumed with far more force than before. That man that she'd killed had merely been an appetizer for her. The baby was her true prize. Her eyes were wild with excitement, saliva dripping off of her fangs as she watched the front door open.
Shitshitshit!
“Go back inside!” Victor shouted as we both used all that we had to try to keep the pest in place.
The farmer yelled back, distress making his voice higher, “Something's wrong! I have to get her to the hospital!”
I risked a glance. The woman was white as a sheet, holding onto her husband for dear life as he half led half dragged her to his truck. Blood stained the inside of the woman's legs.
At the sight of it, Victor froze. I didn't like the way he looked at the woman then. Oh no. The creature went into a complete frenzy. She managed to get her fangs into Victor's arm, wrenching a cry of agony from him as she ripped a sizable chunk of flesh out. His hold on her loosened just enough that she could wriggle a wing out.
I screamed as I felt her beginning to slip away, frantically reaching for the nearest part of her, which was unfortunately her dangling intestines. It was like trying to hold onto oversized wet noodles, my hands slipping in her chunky blood as I struggled to slow her down.
They just needed to reach the truck. We just had to keep her here just long enough for them to get a head start.
I just hoped that I wouldn't end up having to protect them from my boss, too.
She roared as she turned and slashed me across the brow with one of her clawed fingers. My vision went dark in my right eye. Numbly, I wondered if she ripped my eye out, or if it was just from the pain. By some miracle, I didn't let go.
Fortunately, the bite seemed to snap Victor out of whatever had happened to him when he saw the woman’s blood. At least for the moment. He scrambled across the ground, seizing my shotgun. His first shot missed. The second one hit her left wing. The farmer had the truck's passenger side door open as he helped his wife inside. The pest reached a talon towards them, trying to drag herself closer. Victor was back on his feet and marched over to shoot her in the head. Once. Twice.
The truck's engine roared to life. With it, the pest screeched in rage, the sound warped by the damage done to her mouth after Victor had unloaded on her. She flailed as she watched her prize speed down the road.
But it wasn't over. The gunshot wound in her wing was already closing up. It wouldn't take her long to catch up to them if we lost her.
My cheek was wet. Turns out, I didn't lose an eye. I just had blood in it. Thank God. I crawled over her, trying the chains again as Victor went back to holding her wings against her body.
She called him every foul name in the book, words slurring from her destroyed jaw. One of them touched a nerve: “Bitch of the Wild Hunt.” He wordlessly snatched the salt from my belt and poured it over her face, holding her jaw to shove the container into her mouth. She gurgled and started to convulse as the salt was forced down her throat. That shut her up.
With the chain pinning her arms and wings against her body, Victor dug the padlock out of his pocket, using it to secure the links.
“I’m going to try to get her to the barn.” He yelled over the sound of her agitated howls.
I retrieved the shotgun and followed him as he carried the squirming, shrieking pest towards the barn. I pressed the palm of my hand to the cut on my brow. A flutter of unease went through my gut as it occurred to me that I could be in danger from Victor as well.
It didn't help that the pest had noticed it, too. She was goading him, “That girl smells sweet, doesn't she?”
“You want more salt in your mouth?” He threatened flatly. “We got plenty and we have some time until sunrise.”
She cackled, “You can't tell me that your mouth isn't watering thinking of her soft flesh between your teeth. Her blood warming your tongue. You long to feel warm again, don't you, dead man?”
The borderline pornographic way that she spoke about devouring me made me intensely uncomfortable.
“Keep it up and I'll pack the salt up your nose, too.” Victor retorted.
Once we got to the barn, we found an empty stall, which he tossed her into. I didn't follow him into the stall. My gut was telling me that something was off.
He drew a circle of salt around her. As long as it wasn't broken, it would trap her until sunrise.
I didn't think the boss would ever intentionally hurt me. But the way he looked at that woman…
What if he couldn't control himself?
Victor shut the stall door behind him, leaving the pest to wail and swear at us from her prison.
His eyes went to my forehead, “That looks like it hurts.”
I swallowed back the lump in my throat. There it was again. That look.
“Stay back, Vic.” I said calmly, my unease growing.
He took a deep breath, his eyes closing. I took a small step away from him, towards the exit to the barn.
I kept my voice even, “Vic, be honest with me. Is it safe to be around you right now?”
Victor stayed where he was, still not looking at me. He eventually answered, “Probably not.”
I took another step towards the door. “I'm going to leave.”
He nodded, eyes still shut, “I think that would be best. I'll make sure that she stays in the stall.”
As I backed towards the door, afraid to turn my back on him, I said, “I'll uh… see you at work tomorrow.”
“Yeah. See ya.”
I didn't dare turn my back on him until I'd left the barn. He didn't move a muscle the entire time. As I made my way back to my G6, I kept looking over my shoulder. Victor didn't follow me. I made it back to my car without incident.
I thought back to when I'd found him in the butcher shed. Looking back, I'm pretty sure that he'd been eating it.
Once I was in my apartment, I quickly drew lines of salt in front of all my doors and windows. It made me feel somewhat safer. I inspected the injuries on my forehead and shoulder. After cleaning them both up, I determined that I should probably see a doctor in the morning. In the meantime, I covered them both with gauze.
I painfully settled down onto my bed, my entire body aching. Even though I felt like a dish towel that had been wrung out over and over again, I knew that I wasn't going to be getting much sleep. My mind was racing too much.
Against my better judgment, I ended up texting Victor, ‘Are you a draugr?’
His response was, ‘i think so’
Draugr are known for their grotesque appetites. The joke Reyna and I had been making about him being a ‘high-functioning zombie’ wasn't all that far off, after all.
I reminded myself that Victor wasn't a complete monster. He'd at least had enough control over himself not to hurt me or either of the farmers. But the temptation had clearly been there. That begged the question of what his limits were.
Was it safe to work with him? Injuries aren't exactly uncommon at Orion. Maybe that's why he's been sending Reyna and I together for two person jobs rather than going on calls with us.
I received another message from him, ‘if you want to quit I understand’
I didn't, though. As stressful as working here can be, I do enjoy my job, weirdly enough. I've been treated better here than by any other employer and I like having only two other coworkers to worry about, especially since I get along well with both of them. But the biggest reason why quitting hasn't occurred to me is that I wouldn't be able to just walk away from all that I'd learned about the atypical cases. There was no way I could live a normal life after working at Orion.
I also wanted to keep an eye on Victor. Between whatever the mechanic was forcing him to do and his transformation, there was a lot that I was concerned about. As much as I didn't want to think about having to trap or kill Victor, if it came down to it... I'd do what needed to be done.
I sent back, ‘hazard pay? 👀’
His reply was, ‘😒’
A moment later, I received, ‘we'll discuss it when I don't have a manananggal mf'ing me’
Yinz see why I kept calling her a ‘pest’ rather than trying to type that long name out each time? I guarantee I would have misspelled it several different ways.
When the sun rose, I received another message from Victor, ‘it's over. thanks for your help’
We found out later in the afternoon that the hospital had been able to save the farmers’ baby. She was going to have to stay longer in the hospital, but otherwise, she and their newborn daughter were alright.
What was alarming was that the dead man's body had been desecrated at some point after I left. It was believed that the pest had been the one to take chunks out of his neck, shoulder, and chest. I wasn't going to be the one to tell the family the truth. They'd been through enough already without the news that the one they'd relied on for protection had gotten hungry.
I wondered if being exposed to so much blood had been the trigger. I suppose I should just be glad that Victor had eaten a man who was already dead instead of me or another living person.
Like I said, I'm going to have to keep an eye on him. In the meantime… maybe don't demand to speak to the manager.