Tattoo quotes on moving on in life

Do your thoughts clean up when youre on the move?
For example walking around town i always have more clarity in thought (and verbally) compared to when im sitting at home.
Biggest example is when im on a train. Looking at moving scenery is like im constantly stimulated and finally my thoughts become coherent and i can think about life matters as opposed to being in a jumbled mess of the now.
Does anyone relate?

Around Thanksgiving last year, my 22 year old daughter Izzy started complaining about her back hurting. We just assumed she pulled a muscle or had a pinched nerve. After a couple weeks, the pain seemed to be getting worse. She went to urgent care on a Friday and they confirmed she probably had a pinched nerve. They gave her some meds. That following Monday (Dec. 18) she was in a lot of pain, so I rushed her to the hospital. It was her back and her left arm now bothering her. They blew her off and said that she was fine. I insisted that she get an MRI or cat scan done. Finally at my request they did a cat scan on her back and said they didn't see anything wrong. They said it's probably a pinched nerve, gave her more meds and sent us home.
The week of Christmas everything changed. She woke up each night covered in sweat. On the 28th, her heart was beating fast, she was extremely pale, and had two knots appear on the left side of her neck and one under her left underarm. I brought her to a different hospital.
When we got to the ER, they immediately took her to a room. Her vitals were extremely high (170 heart rate) from the pain she was in. They were considering that she could have meningitis or mono. They wanted to get tests ran right away. They admitted her, and did a spinal tap and MRI. 2 days later (Saturday) the doc said they found a large tumor on her spine. Can't say if it's cancer yet, she would need a biopsy first. They informed us that she would be moved that day to their sister hospital that specializes in cancer.
When we arrived, she was put on the neurology ward in a regular room. They immediately put her on a lot of meds. She was on so many pain drugs, (Oxy, Dilaudid, muscle relaxers, Morphine, Xanax, etc.) that I kept asking, "Is this end of life? Can she overdose from all these drugs?" They would respond with, "no, it's just to keep her comfortable and we're trying to get her heart rate down." On New years day they gave her Ativan. She responded horribly to it. It was a rough day. She was hallucinating and freaking out all day and night. The next day she told them to NEVER give her that again. They told her when we first arrived that anything she didn't want to take, they would respect and not put it in her charts to receive. They would put it under allergies. We assumed they would do so as they said they would.
They finally did the biopsy on Wednesday the 3rd. When she came back from surgery, she wouldn't wake up. She slept all day Wednesday and most of Thursday. I was really concerned.They kept adding more pain meds to her chart. I again was scared she would forget to breathe. That night she wasn't breathing properly and her vitals were going down. She had to be rushed to NeuroICU. They got her stable and explained it was from all the different drugs. They explained that it's trial and error. They're trying to figure out what works for her and they decided to put her on a drip line of Dilaudid. They still gave her other drugs but Dilaudid seemed to help her pain somewhat. They also said she had a spot on her lungs what looked like pneumonia starting.
All week she was constantly telling us that she was losing feeling in her legs and her left arm. By Saturday of that week she was paralyzed. They finally took her for an MRI and saw that the tumor had spread up and down her spine and to her ovaries, and it was stealing her blood supply. She would need emergency surgery asap. They of course came to explain what was happening and the surgeon informed me that Ativan would be used during surgery. I immediately told him no, and that she is allergic to it and it was supposed to be on her allergy list. I explained to him what happened when she received it before. On Sunday they rushed her into surgery and cut the blood supply to the tumor. It was too dangerous to try and remove any of the tumor. They didn't know if the paralysis was permanent, but they were hopeful that the surgery would work. It didn't we would later find out.
When she returned from surgery, she was out of control. She was violent and cursing at me. In 22 years I had never heard her curse, but she was fluent! She was hallucinating bad and kept freaking out. It was scary to watch. They decided to give her some meds to make her to sleep, to help her heal. For 2 straight days my baby screamed blood curdling screams, she would cry out "mommy, mommy" while she slept. She screamed so much and so loud that anyone in ear shot were questioning what was going on. It was heartbreaking to witness. I thought she was having a bad reaction to the anesthesia. I later found out that they were giving her Ativan anyway. They NEVER put it in her chart as an allergy the week before, and the doctor disregarded what I said about not giving her that. They had other options they could have used but he still chose to do what he wanted. I only found out because the nurse mentioned that she would be right back with her Ativan. The nurse had no knowledge that my daughter refused that medication previously. I informed her not to give that drug to her. She went and spoke with the attending physician who changed it to haldol and ketemine. That was Monday night. By Wednesday she finally calmed down from screaming, so they decided to try and wake her up.
When she woke up she could no longer speak properly, use her left arm, or move her legs. Her fingers and toes were turning black. They said it was from a certain med she was on. That it's normal. A lay person could see something was horribly wrong.
Everyday we would see up to 30 doctors. I say we, because I never left her side. One would say one thing while another would say something else. It was confusing and scary. We still didn't have a diagnosis. We just knew she had cancer. They suspected stage 4 but couldn't say until pathology came back. It was traumatic and a nightmare. It went from a diagnosis of a pinched nerve to stage 4 cancer in a matter of a week. WTF?
We finally got the diagnosis on Tuesday the 9th.. Stage 4 anaplastic large cell lymphoma. Very rare and aggressive. They said they were starting chemo immediately. They gave her the first dose that Wednesday night. We had hope. It was a rollercoaster of terror, but the doctors kept saying that she could beat this. I googled everything I could and prayed for a miracle. It's always been my girl and I, so I was desperate for her to live through this. She wasn't just my daughter, she was literally my everything.
By week 2, she needed blood on a daily basis. She couldn't eat or drink. She couldn't relieve herself. She couldn't move. She couldn't speak clearly to explain her needs or wants. Her breathing was shallow. Her vitals were not normal. They would go down and then jump extremely high. She was so out of it, that they had to come to me concerning everything. Her oxygen was dropping significantly and they had to keep changing out the masks and oxygen levels to help her breathe. They kept changing her meds and she had multiple complications from that. They couldn't find any good spots on her arms to put her IVs anymore, and her legs were so swollen that they couldn't locate a useable spot anywhere. They put it on her right side of the neck. During all this she had multiple medical emergencies. One example is they said that spot on her lungs wasn't pneumonia but they now suspected a small blood clot. That medicine she was given would hopefully help, the only problem was that medication was causing problems for her back surgery. A few days later we found out it was blood and it was completely filled up in her chest. She was drowning in her own blood. They couldn't do surgery right away because she would bleed out since her platelets were so low even while receiving blood transfusions. That blood was somehow going into her lungs. I was floored. Everyday I would ask about it and I was told it was getting better, nothing to worry about. In fact the doctor said that very morning it had cleared up significantly. Imagine my shock when the critical team comes rushing in that evening to do ultrasounds on her and tells me they suspect it's why her breathing was going downhill.
On Monday she was transferred to a MICU room on a different floor. This floor felt uneasy to me. There was death all around and you could see it. They said that this floor was where her main doctors were, so that she would get the best care. Now they introduce fentanyl to her med regimen. They explained it that it would help with her pain. She would be allowed so much every hour if needed.
The next day they decided to do the surgery to put a tube in her chest to drain the blood. She now had an extremely dangerous back surgery, staples running up her entire back with tubes, a huge scar under her arm from the biopsy with tubes, and now a huge tube coming out her chest. Her fingers and toes at this point were in a stage of necropsy. But they couldn't do anything about it. They would just have to fall off in time. It was devastating. My daughter was a trooper through out this whole time. She never complained or was negative. She was just scared when she understood what was going on. Honestly I've never seen so much courage in my life.
When it came to her pain meds she was only on fentanyl and Dilaudid drip. She would only receive it when she asked. That was her rule. She was scared she would overdose or become hooked on it and didn't want that monster on her back. She would be in so much pain but would just sit through it. Her vitals were better, but when the pain would become to much to bare, her heart rate would go into the 150 to 170 range. As soon as she got some meds it would go down to the teens to low twenty's.
On Thursday night she had a new nurse. He would administer pain meds even when she didn't request it. I saw him give her shot when she was sleeping. I walked in on him. I asked him if she requested it as I saw she was asleep and he said no. He stated he was trying to keep her comfortable. I asked him not to unless she asks. He didn't listen.Throughout the night as we slept, he would give her meds that she didn't even need. He gave her haldol. She only received that for two days after her back surgery. No one had given her that since. He would give her a shot of fentanyl behind it. I later found this out while talking with her doctors and from her records.
That Friday morning she started having these weird episodes, what later looked like seizures to me. Her vitals would drop and she would go into a deep stare. They blamed the meds. It was constant apologies for her being over medicated again. Even the doctor didn't understand why he gave her so much.She had 4 separate episodes before they (at my constant request) sent her to get a MRI done.
She had a blood clot in her brain. Again they said nothing to worry about. But after experiencing what we went through already, I was highly concerned. As I should have been. They kept apologizing and said they would change her medication up again. I told them it wasn't the medicine it was the nurse. I couldn't understand why he would give her two doses of haldol when she didn't need it. The nurse said my daughter was anxious and thought it would help. My daughter was sleeping so how could she have been anxious. I went off. Something in my spirit was telling me to get her out of there. But how could I when she was hooked up to all these tubes. She was suffering and I couldn't help her. The only thing I could do was use my voice to try and protect her and be her advocate. The next day Jan. 20th, I woke up after a couple hours of sleep, and I knew something was wrong. She was awake and trying to talk. Her vitals were back at a steady 170 with high blood pressure and a low oxygen number so I knew she was in pain. I could feel it in every bone of my body something was different that day. I felt my baby didn't have long as I thought cancer was winning. I called all of our family to come see her. I can't explain it. At one point I pulled one of her doctors out of her room and begged him to tell me what was happening. Shoot it to me straight. He kept saying she's always been critical but she would pull through. He had so much hope.
They gave her some meds to help bring her vitals down and it started to work again. Her vitals started going from 160 to 150. At this point she was having a brain scan done in her room to see what the episodes were exactly. She was awake but could no longer move from her neck down. Which had just started the 2 days before. She had a blood infection and they had to move the pic line from the right side of her neck to the left side but we're unsuccessful because she had obstructions there (2 huge tumors) They had to put the new line back on the right side in the back of the neck. I don't know what happened since I wasn't allowed in the room. I do know my daughter said after they finished, she wasn't able to feel anything but her face. She never turned her head again.
During that day she kept having flem and spit from the congestion she had due to the chest infection and surgery. I would sit there and suck it out for her. No problem, I had been doing it for days with no complaints on my end. The doctors were coming in and out constantly all day to check her brain test and at one point the doctor seeing me and my nephew take shifts suctioning her out said he wanted to try a new medicine she had never received. My daughters nurse interrupted him and said that she didn't think that it was a good idea. They went back and forth for a few minutes and I stepped in and said, it was fine, I would sit there and suction out forever if I had to. Something felt different in this exchange as well. In all of 24 days of being in the hospital, I never saw a nurse challenge a doctor. I immediately went to the computer, where the nurse had typed in the order for this drug, and googled it. The first thing that popped up, was not to give this drug to someone with high blood pressure or high heart rate. It causes a person's heart rate to shoot up high quickly. It was too late. They already administered it to her. Since her heart rate was already high it caused her to go into cardiac arrest. I just stood there in shock screaming is she in cardiac arrest? To which the doctor finally responded "I'm sorry, yes"
They ushered me and my nephew out of the room so they could work on her. After about 30 minutes they called my phone and told me she flatlined but they got her heart beating again. I went flying back in that room screaming at them. I refused to leave the room. She was now on life support, but there was no hope for her to ever wake up again. After consulting with my family and her doctors, and looking at where her vitals were, I decided to pull the plug. She passed within seconds. I feel like the doctor should have listened to the nurse, but his ego would not allow him to. I feel like he's somehow responsible, but at the same time I saw what was happening to her on a daily basis and what cancer was doing to her body. I also witnessed a lot of negligence too on their part. I've been going back and forth since January 20th, about contacting an attorney and seeing if I have a case. I requested an autopsy to be performed, because I wanted to know what all was wrong with her. They informed me they normally don't do that because of the cancer. I argued with them and said I wanted one anyway. I wanted to know what happened. I was trying to understand this whole situation. 25 days prior it was just supposed to be a pinched nerve, but it wasn't. They explained I would have to pay for the autopsy, and I was okay with that. The next day after she passed away, I received the phone call to give my permission for an autopsy. They said it would take a couple days and would let me know when it was finished so the funeral home could pick up her body.
I've been calling for months about the autopsy report with no luck. Here we are in May, I go to the hospital to get the autopsy results and it's all of five pages. It's not even an autopsy report. It doesn't even state her cause of death. It's just bullshit paperwork. All it mentions is the necropsy to her fingers and toes and her basic info like height and weight. I'm so angry right now. I have her medical records, and I noticed on the 19th of January they finally put she was allergic to Ativan. There's a lot wrong with this situation. I even asked for a CD of all her images, from pathology. What I received only two images come up. Everything else is blocked from opening. I know my daughter took multiple MRIs, ultrasounds,and CAT scans in those three and a half weeks. There's no way it's only two images.
I counted all the times the nurse gave my daughter pain meds that Thursday night and it was double what any other nurse had given her at any other time plus with other drugs she didn't need at that time. I found out that haldol and fentanyl is something they give to patients that's in end of life care. Which I was constantly told my daughter was not. Her death certificate states she passed from lymphoma related cardiac arrest. I'm just so confused on what to do. I feel like I'm letting my daughter down if I don't look into this further.
I'm sorry this a novel. I couldn't just ask a simple question with out the back story for you to understand. It was so much more believe me, this was the short version!
Do I have a case or should I just move on and accept my daughter died from cancer related complications? Thank you....

I (late 30s M) have moved since 10 years to a very international city where people come and go, and have made a few friends in the process that, over the years, have helped me in so many ways. I can literally count only four now, and I feel socially isolated.
However, since I am not single and not that young anymore (5-ish yrs) it has become extremely difficult to make friends, and keep those I have.
Two of them (unrelated) seem increasingly distracted and uninterested about what I instead valued: they show up at birthdays but that’s it. I volunteered to help them move, I am consistently nice and genuinely interested about their life, I always reach out first.
We used to go out a lot, invite to each other’s parties, check up on each other before the weekends, etc.
One of them was, in the words of my partner, “unacceptable” in the way he handled attending an event today, where we vaguely said we would meet — we didn’t and he did zero effort despite the WhatsApp geolocations etc. — while posting stories with total random people.
I have a very negative attitude and would want to retaliate by stopping to talk or sending some disappointed message like I would have done some ten years ago, just making it official I don’t feel that I deserve being treated this way, let alone embarrassed in front of my loved ones or being stood up. But I think it would be pathetic and I should just silently stop being present, answering to memes and empty connections that do not fix anything.
Sometimes friendships are over and I guess this is one of those cases. I just keep blaming my incompetence at adulting/caring about others, and my awkwardness as this is a pattern in two of four people I would trust with my home keys in this foreign place.
I don’t know what makes sense, what would you do?

Before the conception of the universe we now know, there was a single species, alone among the stars, the planets, the moons, isolated in their ways - or so they thought. From nothing, they became something: biological beings built with the construction of a sense for purpose and longing. For millions of years their kind thrived, the only living beings in relative perimeter with the cognitive function high enough to talk, build technology and abuse that technology, power-mongering creatures born with the gift and curse of consciousness. As they evolved through the ages, their greed also grew as they saw possibilities of what their world could be. After centuries of impressive technological advancement, it all came to a swift end when technology began to construct existence and evolution turned into the anarchy of mind-rotting individualists ready to reach for the universe. They knew no other than what they were and when their inevitable downfall came after many years of near self-destruction, nobody was there to save them.
The planet they lived on, earth, crumbled in animosity and war after tension grew too high, falling off the pit of existence. The most intelligent of their kind, specially gifted scientists deemed smart enough to continue the human race, were able to escape the planet before its decimation. They were tasked with the voluminous challenge of settling down on the planet TS-19, that had tested successfully for compatibility, a century before. There had previously been many attempts at colonization on other planets, but all had failed due to human greed and corruption. Now there was nobody there to spurt the weakness of the previous failures. The team of fifty scientists managed to settle down on TS-19, taking five decades longer than they had originally estimated, although not mattering much due to the incubation chambers they had developed on earth before. Settling down on the planet, almost 1.5 billion light years away, the scientists discovered a rich and conditioned atmosphere where civilization would be able to thrive.
For the first time in ages, a sense of hope was restored as the future looked brighter than it ever had on earth. The scientists discovered not only the inspiring potential for life but a profound new energy source, found in the rich soil of the planet, which had previously gone undetected in their research. The newfound energy source, named soldane, a purple clay like substance, was discovered to dramatically increase cognitive ability, improving the function of the mind by over 300%, allowing for abilities and ideas that were previously unable to be conceptualized and thought to be unattainable. The fumes of the soldane alone were enough to initiate this function partly and explained the purple tint of the planet, which was accompanied by a fluorescent glow beaming from the oceans which covered almost seventy percent of TS-19.
The scientists, in awe of the world they had discovered that was seven times larger than earth, which we now know today as concord, examined the soldane closely, discovering when consuming it, that it gave a new perception of reality than what they had known it before, changing the way they thought, the speed at which they thought at, as their neurotransmitters rapidly sped up, connections and impulses within the mind moving close to light speed. With this also came the ability to live for hundreds of thousands of years without even showing a wrinkle and instead of abusing this and trying to prevent another possible collapse in existence, the scientists decided to give life another chance, genetically modifying preserved embryos they had taken from earth and injecting them with small amounts of liquified soldane to start their breeding program. Although risky, the results were successful in creating Generation 0, the first generation of concordions. This new species, genetically enhanced and smarter than humans in every way, thrived as their advanced intelligence grew to heights above the scientists who had enabled their life. Their skin, a shade of light purple and their eyes, entirely black, were the future of all endless possibilities and everything that could come after.
The scientists who had come a long way from their original plan, raised the new species as pets to experiment on. Not learning the consequences of containment and violation from earth, the scientists met a miserable fate when after only a few months of development, the oppressed beings lashed out from their cages, ripping the scientists to shreds with their bare hands. And so forth, the new species was born, concordians, they called themselves, idealistic in their nature and relentless in their will to build a new world. From the ashes of civilization, ruins that bore no sign of reformation, the entire planet was built up slowly, soldane being utilized to create the perfect paradise, as the concordians matured into experienced and extremely sophisticated individuals, fascinated by the idea of life.

Boomers are the "me!" generation. They didn't have to live thru hard times, and their whole life was economic growth. Because of this they cannot tolerate any kind of inconvenience. I worked in retail for 18 years fixing computers and boomers were the fucking worst. From "I've never had a password for my email!" to "My computer hasn't worked since you hung my tv on the wall!". Then there is the pity party "I'm on a fixed income!" Ya, who isn't pal. As they get more irate, just laugh at them, maybe they'll blow a gasket. Ya, I'm a boomer. Never used to be, but then they moved the goal posts and changed the dates.

Hello! Looking for my forever person! Someone who shares my feelings and desire to want to be in a relationship. I'm a 6' 1'' American. I am very kind and understanding to others. I tend to be a good empathizer and listener when it comes to other people having issues and helping them overcome issues. I really strive to make people happy. I am very fun loving and deeply enjoy showing people a good time! Work related stuff I sort of feel like sharing is that I have my associates degree in I.T. as well as a Bachelor's in Cyber Security and currently work an office job that has pretty good pay. This was especially true when I got promoted a couple of times in the past two years. I've been rewarded many time and recognized for good work frequently.
The reason for my preference towards Indians is because at my previous university in Northern Virginia I was able to join it's Indian Student Association when they had a booth at a club rush event I stumbled upon one night before my statistics class. They said they took anyone so I joined wanting to see and enjoy a new culture. I really enjoyed doing stuff there and made great friends and almost got an internship thanks to one of my friends I made there...... then I got news that I would be moving again with my parents which made me sad, that is a story for anyone who wants to hear it another time.
For hobbies I enjoy playing PC games, (such as Helldivers 2, Paladins, Cyberpunk 2077, RTS games, etc.. and always willing to try new games) board games, cooking, and trying new foods (especially Indian food since I love spicy foods). One thing to note with my eating, I am not vegetarian, though I do not mind vegetarians and am willing to do that sort of thing around family if need be, though I have mushroom and peanut allergies. I have been learning Hindi on Duolingo. In my free time I like to take pictures and am highly interested in photography. I do not smoke/or vape and I drink socially and mix cocktails. I like walking, hiking, window shopping, traveling and snuggling. While I have no issues with someone who is Hindu and such, however unless your family is okay with someone who is Catholic like me I would prefer if someone is either Christian or Catholic. Just to avoid potential family disagreements and drama.
As for what I know about Indian culture, I only saw a couple of Bollywood films Bhool Bhulaiyaa and Jab We Met. I am really interested in watching more Bollywood films and learning trivia about the actresses and actors. I am aware of Salman Khan’s crazy antics for example. Another Bollywood film I would want to watch is RRR and Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani. I would love to watch it with someone and learn more about it. I do get to see some stuff about it on twitter from some accounts I follow but I don’t really understand it much. Many of the actors and actresses I hear come up are Rajinikanth, Sri Devi, Deepika Padukone, Ranveer Singh, and Keerthi Suresh. Again I am willing to learn more about all the interesting details about Bollywood and such. I am familiar with some parts of Indian history like the Kargil War, the recent farmers protest and the horrific Goan Inquisition. I would like to start out slow as a casual acquaintance and test the waters with someone. I’m not comfortable rushing headfirst into a relationship and I understand that neither would you, so being friends first is a must. I really want to get to know someone so that we can both be compatible. I am somewhat open to long distance relationships so whether you are from India, UK, etc don't be discouraged to hmu. But I would prefer someone already in the U.S. Lastly I don't want someone who'll waste my time. I don't like being led on and dumped out out the blue. Please be serious and committed.
I can talk on reddit though I like talking off reddit. Contact me anytime if you are feeling the same way about finding a life long partner and feel free to ask me any questions. :)

A/N: yeah I changed up the Alliance admiral's name a teeny tiny bit because it really bugged the shit out of me. Not a lot, it's still basically the same name, but now I can't get sued for using it. That change has been a long time coming, really.
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It was said that no plan ever survived contact with the enemy. That, at least in the case of Marcus Wayne’s infiltration of Neldia, was proven entirely true.
His ship, the Peacemaker, had undergone an extensive refit before its jump to Neldia to both modify its sensor signature and repair its failing Aegis barrier. The first objective succeeded. The second did not.
One day later, leaving the derelict Ultimate Vigil behind in deep space, the United Human Alliance courier ship Winged Deliverance logged a real space entry at the edge of the Neldia system. Its crew, having spent their waking hours plagued by hallucinations and enduring horrible nightmares as they slept, found this shift very welcome. The worst, though they could hardly believe it, was still yet to come.
“The Neldian fleet is mustering for war,” rumbled the man who had once held the title and security codes of an Alliance sector admiral. Now, he was a traitor to his homeland. “Security will be high.”
“No need to worry, Admiral,” said Marcus Wayne. “Your code will get us through.” It would not.
It took two hours for the Peacemaker, disguised as the Winged Deliverance, to be challenged by the Neldian Armada. “Transmit clearance code,” said an automated voice. Marcus took out a data disc with the admiral's clearance code on it.
“Hold,” said Terris. She was clad in black, her active camouflage offline to save battery, and she had been sitting at the passive sensor console for the past three hours. “Look at this.” A news broadcast popped up in front of Marcus Wayne and his officers. Sector Admiral Sheparda Dama, or at least he was once a sector admiral, had been tried and convicted of high treason.
“It was a secret trial,” Dama said, still in shock at the revelation. “I had no knowledge of this.”
“Well, that tracks, but what do we do now? What code gets us through?”
“Transmit clearance code,” the voice said again, “or adjust course.”
Dama thought for a moment. “Change course,” he said. “We’re not getting through.”
They did. A great sense of defeat took hold in the hearts of the crew. They would never reach the Neldian hypercom. Sheparda Dama, who would have gladly given his life in defense of humankind, would never get the chance to be the man who broke their chains.
The Peacemaker was halfway out of the Neldia system before Terris spoke again. “Hold it,” she said. “I have an idea.”
That was why she had been placed where she was. Clad in an airtight stealth suit. Inside a hollowed-out asteroid. On a ballistic journey to the heart of Neldian space. It was the most insane idea that Marcus Wayne had ever seen.
But, sometimes, insanity was a symptom of genius.
Terris flew past the Neldian Armada undetected. Many asteroids entered the inner system this way, flung by outer-system prospecting ships to the foundries and shipyards in Neldian orbit, and they were thrown and caught so frequently that only the most cursory of inspections was put upon each one. Terris passed the Alliance fleet entirely undetected.
Terris’ chameleon suit could mimic the sensor return of the precious metals it was buried in, at least enough to fool a probing scan, and the cuts made by Protectoral engineers had been so precise that Terris had fit inside there with barely a centimeter of space to spare. She was effectively entombed inside sixty meters of solid rock.
Interstellar espionage was not a job for the claustrophobic.
Finally, after days of waiting, the signal came. She was in range. A mental command triggered a series of shaped charges in the rock above her, if such directions existed in microgravity, and forty pea-sized explosives blasted a circular tunnel all the way to the asteroid surface. If just one of them had failed, that rock might have been her tomb.
Terris tried not to think about that as she began climbing her way out. A brief burst from her suit’s EVA thrusters was enough to start her on her way, and the tunnel out was wide enough for her to use her arms and legs to speed things up. Finally, after too long a wait, Terris saw the Neldian sun for the very first time.
There was fire in the distance. Comm chatter on every band. Warships burning hard for the outer system. The Coalition fleet was here.
She zoomed in, far more than she had ever had to before, and she could pick out the faintest flashes of blue as warships exploded in the black. A brief crawl around the asteroid, which also helped to warm up her muscles after days of inactivity, let her discern an attack force engaging the Alliance fleet. After a moment’s hesitation, weighing the risks, Terris activated her passive sensor suite to try and decrypt Alliance military chatter.
Instantly, her sensors were flooded with noise from the defensive bastions. The fleet base at the L5 point was loudest, its comm operators screaming indecipherably at fellow Alliance elements fighting in the black. Neldian orbit, where the hypercom station was, seemed to be the centerpiece of all the communications traffic. The hypercom, unsurprisingly, was being used as a relay for comm traffic all across the system. Terris made a note to hack its server banks for intelligence, and perhaps leave a timed virus or two to shut down the system after she was gone.
Her suit bleeped, alerting her that she was in optimum position to make the leap to the hypercom. She zoomed in on it, a red and spiked thing just like everything else the Alliance made, and calculated the right trajectory to land right on its metal surface.
Trying to jump from a moving asteroid out past Neldia’s rings and hit a hypercom station barely three hundred meters in diameter was like shooting a rifle from a jumbo jet in hopes of hitting a mosquito down on Earth. A nearly impossible shot, even with Coalition computers to help make the jump, and anyone lucky enough to make it would have been better served bankrupting their local casino at the slot machines.
Terris gave a command to her suit, activating a set of ion thrusters to boost her off the asteroid and adjust her course mid-flight. She’d never believed in luck.
She coasted silent and graceful past the particle guns in high orbit, like a majestic swan flying on a summer wind. Their sensor arrays were directed out, past her, to the far distant parts of space where a trillion tons of steel were locked in deadly battle. Terris really did wish she could smile at the moment. She was about to have unrestricted access to the biggest communications relay in the star system, able to send out viruses and receive vital intelligence that could cripple the Alliance fleet if placed in the right hands. Terris, confident as ever, knew they would be.
She would make the Neldian Armada burn, and they had no idea she was even coming.
She reached the hypercom station in just under a day, agonizingly slow for a woman like her, hovering just above its surface to avoid triggering pressure sensors. After that, it was simple enough to get inside. Terris found it almost trivial to bypass the airlock sensor grid and trigger the outer bulkhead to open unnoticed, its report to the command room destroyed before it ever arrived. Entering the station itself was easy after that.
Here, there was gravity. She could not hover like she had on the outside of the station. But here, there were no pressure sensors. She really had no need to hover.
The corridor she found herself in was large enough, though nothing like the expansive halls of a dreadnought, and a patrol of marines in powered suits trundled towards her obliviously. Terris had made the right call not to wear a Phantom powered suit. She ducked into an alcove, the chameleon suit concealing her from even their impressive sensor batteries, and they passed by with no clue at all.
Terris made it to the server banks with ease. Most of the hypercom’s security measures took the form of warships in orbit, clustered tightly around the planet to prevent exactly this scenario from happening, but those warships were off waging war. The station defenses were hopeless now that she was actually inside.
The data was encrypted, and she could neither access it nor copy it without potentially fatal consequences, but she wasn’t there to steal data. A brief, milliseconds-long connection to the primary server was all it took to riddle the entire system with custom-tailored computer viruses. The viruses were self-replicating, rather like an electronic version of the biological ones on Earth. They worked similarly, too, meant to latch onto outgoing communications signals and remain inert for a certain amount of time before activating and wreaking havoc across cyberspace.
Terris planned to leave the station in approximately thirty minutes. Shortly after that, the fireworks would begin. It was going to be beautiful.
She heard footsteps. A maintenance worker, no doubt. It was time for her to go. She disconnected from the server, taking pains to hide her involvement, and snuck out of the server room like a ghost in the night.
Next was the transmission array. This room was better-guarded, its door being flanked by marines, but Terris slipped inside by trailing behind an officer as he entered on some unknown pretext. After that, her daring and sleight of hand made sure Admiral Dama’s pre-recorded propaganda transmission was uploaded to the hypercom transmitter. It came with a set of instructions bearing the Admiralty’s seal, changed to be anonymous, to ensure as many people as possible heard his message.
In just under one standard hour, the United Human Alliance would be shaken to its very core. Terris had just made sure of it.
It took longer than she had expected for the door to open again and give her a chance to slip out. Terris had spent that time quite productively, downloading as many incoming and outgoing messages as she could to the internal hard drive just by her spinal cord. Even if they were encrypted, they’d be useful intelligence once Coalition codebreakers took a crack at them.
After that, it was trivial to slip past marine patrols and escape to the hull of the hypercom station. Terris found her ride, an Alliance warship by the name of Brightest Thunder, holding orbit just near the hypercom station. Admiral Dama, even if he was no longer an admiral, still had connections.
She charged her ion thrusters by tapping into the station reactor, an act which did not go unnoticed, but by then it was too late to respond. She had completed her incursion. The damage had been done. Perhaps if the Alliance acted swiftly and accurately, they could undo it, but Terris was a careful woman. She had covered her tracks well.
Waving one final goodbye to the crew of the hypercom station, Terris triggered her thrust pack and shot off into the ink.
“You must be my passenger.” A man in an Alliance captain’s uniform was waiting for her in the Brightest Thunder’s airlock. He wore a helmet and gloves, hermetically sealed to his airtight outfit, so he felt no effects from the vacuum of space. “I was sent by Sector Admiral Sheparda Dama,” he announced after a period of silence, “To transport you and whatever you may have safely to the Coalition fleet.” Nothing. Apart from the dull thudding of the ship’s railgun batteries, firing missiles at range to ward off a strike force of Coalition ships, the airlock was quiet as a ghost.
“You cannot expect me to endanger my life and the lives of my crew without at least some identification that you are who you claim to be!” Silence. Captain Senar Trevy had been standing in that airlock for three and a half hours, while his ship was tasked with screening Neldia and her eighteen billion inhabitants from harm, and he was just now wondering if he had been talking to a ghost.
“I am,” came a voice. Cold. Sterile. Inhuman. Exactly the kind Trevy expected from the secret spies of his former admiral.
“So you are.” Captain Trevy thought for a moment. He cycled the airlock. If his guest held hostile intent, one steel bulkhead would make no difference. “I’ve been stocking the crew with handpicked men and women since I received word of the operation,” he explained as they walked through the ship’s corridors. The crewmen he passed thought him insane. “I can’t vouch for them all, but the ship as a whole will obey me.” No response. Sometimes, Captain Trevy thought himself insane as well.
“This is my personal quarters,” he told the specter, stepping inside and sealing the door behind him. “I must warn you, for your own safety, it would be best not to leave it. The crew are mostly still Alliance loyalists.” He looked around, paying no heed to the decorated furniture or artificial sky, and finally shrugged and sighed. “Are you even here, still?”
Terris decloaked. She stood between him and the door, winged and cloaked in black like a demon of ancient myth. “I am.”
“You’re a black angel.” Senar Trevy, to his credit, kept his composure well. “A spy for the Ierad Republic.” He questioned her purpose here. They both knew it.
“You weren’t told?”
“I was told an alien would be coming aboard, but…” Trevy shrugged again, as if to say ‘what am I supposed to do?’ “The admiral vouched for you. That much is enough for me.” He also knew he had no choice in the matter. From what he knew about black angels, his ship had been lost the moment she boarded.
“I could have impersonated him,” said Terris, voice a perfect replica of Captain Trevy’s own. Even his own mother could not have told the difference. “And I’m trained to lie.” She was testing him, gauging his reaction to assess his personality. She was good at that.
“I could have you screened for deception,” Trevy countered, pointing up at a pearl-sized camera in the ceiling. Terris made a note that it was disabled. “And I could have had the technology officers vet your transmission.”
“I’m trained to lie well.” Terris sat down on Captain Trevy’s bed, a spartan thing compared to the sleeping quarters of most officers. There were no chairs in the room, so her options were few. She took off her helmet and tried to at least appear relaxed. In reality, she was anything but. “It comes with the job, really.”
“Fair,” Trevy chuckled, feigning calm. “I suppose the question now becomes whether or not you can trust me.”
“It’s a safe gamble.” Terris made a mental calculation. It would take her between thirty and fifty seconds to kill Captain Trevy, take the bridge, and vent the ship. That was a very safe gamble. “Besides, that’s what a peace treaty is.” Trevy looked confused. “A leap of faith. You trust your enemy to back their word, and you trust them to trust you as well. If we can’t get along here, can’t put aside our differences to work toward a common goal, then the Alliance will be right. And I hate it when they’re right.”
“I’m speaking to you now because I know they are wrong.” That came as no surprise to either of them. “You know, I was once a foreman of a labor crew in the munitions factories. The most productive unit in my sector.” That one did come as a surprise. “As a foreman, you get leeway to make certain decisions regarding the… well, I suppose they are slaves, under your command. Food intake and the like.” Captain Trevy looked pained when he brought up such memories. Terris wasn’t convinced that was how he really felt. “They use it to weed out any potential xeno sympathizers from the populace. Of course, at the time, I wasn’t so empathetic.”
“So you were a slave driver, and you beat your slaves to make them work. I hope every one of those shells was sabotaged.” Terris’ voice dripped with disdain. She had almost forgotten the Alliance captain was her enemy.
“No, I showed mercy,” Trevy defended himself. “I was generous.” This made Terris reconsider. Perhaps Senar Trevy could be an ally, if not a friend. “I won’t say I was a good man, but I wasn’t cruel. I was practical. Strong, healthy, well-treated workers are more productive than the beaten sacks of flesh in the other factories. My crew’s output was unmatched.”
“And?” Terris cocked her head inquisitively. For a high-ranking officer in the space navy of a genocidal regime, Senar Trevy really did not seem so bad. To be fair, however, she had set the bar pretty low.
“I was investigated for anti-human activity.” Terris could have predicted that. She almost did, too. “They sent me to the fleet, and my labor crew was reacquainted with the energy whips and pain beams.” There was no carrot for an Alliance labor slave. Only the stick. “Their productivity fell thirty percent in the first two weeks alone.” He sounded almost mournful as he said that. He was not lamenting the loss in productivity.
“You see,” said Trevy, “Hatred is not natural. It has to be caused, sustained, nurtured from the day a man is born until the day he dies.” With that, at least, Terris agreed. “And, as you’re about to see, a nation built around cruelty or prejudice cannot sustain itself. It will have to apply pressure to maintain its flawed status quo, like it did with me, and the pressure will build and build until it cannot build anymore.” He tapped a few buttons on the data disc in his hand. It began projecting an image of the battle for Neldia. He placed it on the bed next to Terris. “Now it’s breaking.”
“I wonder if they’ll find themselves in need of more shells.” Terris knew it wasn’t just shells. Every time a slave driver prioritized hatred over hard work, put cruelty over their quota, or even just bowed their head and obeyed the traditional dogma, they hurt the Alliance. Across nine worlds, with billions of slaves not working as they could have, things started to add up. “You know, for a superior species, your fleet is really getting its ass kicked right now. Might want to work on that.”
Captain Trevy nodded. His data disc beeped. He was needed on the bridge. “Agreed,” he said. “I hope this war ends soon, and to our mutual benefit. I’d hate to face you on the battlefield.” He picked up the data disc and turned to leave.
“Oh, forgot to mention, there’s a virus embedded in the transmissions you’ve received. Self-replicating. Nasty piece of work.” Terris shifted a bit in her seat. “Almost forgot about that.”
“Well, better to know now than when it’s activated,” Trevy smiled. “I’ll have Technology Officer Galdir investigate it.” With that, he left. His duty to the Alliance was nonexistent, but the men and women under his command still needed him. He had waited too long in the stateroom.
Terris, with nothing better to do, got to work on cracking the encryption in the transmissions she had copied. She failed. A transmission from deep in unknown space, sent from a dreadnought at the head of a task force known only as the Deep Expedition Fleet, was the only message she could read. Its contents, while troubling, mattered little at the moment. What was far more crucial, however, was the message Terris could not decipher. The military battle plan of Janus Ora’s personal armada.
The battle plan that, when analyzed on a Republic starship, would reveal its terrible secret too late.
The Coalition fleet was walking into a trap.
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In my 30s, I got very close to my dream career — not the exact job, but a job a lot of people use as a stepping stone to my dream job.
I loved that job, but unfortunately, the stress of the work brought into focus a number of problems I had been trying to ignore — mainly, alcoholism and trauma around some things that had happened in my childhood.
When I got laid off from that almost-dream job at 37, I had a bit of a breakdown, and then realized I need to get a handle on my problems. I decelerated to a related but less stressful/ prestigious career path and focused on getting sober and getting a handle on my emotions.
I'm now 41, feel strong in my sobriety, have done a ton of therapy, and now feel confident in both my support system and my ability to cope with life. I was recently laid off from my less stressful job, and part of me feels like the time is finally right to take another crack at my dream job, which I still miss and think about all the time. It's the only career I've ever wanted.
But another part of me feels like that's absurd — that I'm way too old to be trying to start something up, not quite from scratch, but close to it (I still have my body of work in my industry, but a lot of my old contacts and connections have moved on to other industries, fell out of touch when I was sobering up, or maybe don't have the greatest impressions of me due to my drinking and personal issues at the peak of my career). It also feels like it might be a really bad idea to take career risks in this current economy, and I should just find something stable and be thankful for the steady paycheck.
Have any of you dropped the career ball in a kind of competitive field and then picked it back up at a later date? How did it work out? Do you think it was the right move, or do you have regrets?
(I don't have any kids, I rent, and I am a single earner with some savings, if that factors into your considerations)

This is probably a stupid question, I just have been overthinking this entire situation. I really want an unbiased point of view. We are in our mid 20’s. I’m finally in a point in my life after paying off all of my debt. Now I can save money so I can go to college and pursue a career that I am excited for. I will say I don’t make a ton of money already. So I do have to run my body ragged picking up so many shifts to save money. Plus I’ve been neglecting buying groceries to save money faster. My friend and I have been friends since high school. We kind of all bonded over being poor and helping each other in a supportive aspect trying to better ourselves in adulthood. I have moved away from my hometown/hometown area and am loving it for the most part.
Now I am supposed to visit my friends towards the end of the month. My one friend kind of forgets what it’s like to be poor. He moved in with his partner pretty early on. So because of that he hasn’t been paying much of bills since then. I love my friends and want the best for them. So now I have to visit less. Like maybe once or twice a year. Compared to an average of three. I just don’t know how to explain that I am not doing this to be disrespectful but am doing this because I have to prioritize myself and not just keep living paycheck to paycheck.
I have become better at communication but I have found it’s super hard when telling my loved ones things they say that hurt me. It takes a lot but I have been pretty successful this year with creating boundaries. So now earlier this year I broke the news to both of them. I have found a career I actually want to pursue. I have to save to go to college and also save up in general cause I need an emergency fund. Plus I don’t have health insurance and haven’t had it in years. So I want to see a doctor and make sure I am mainly healthy. Plus I wear glasses and want a dentist checkup. My job doesn’t offer it so I will have to pay out of pocket even if I just do it for a year. So I let them now that I can’t visit as often.
I will say my one friend whom I need to explain this to didn’t take the news well. I completely understand that. Who wants to see someone they love less? I just feel like since then I’ve been just avoided. I understand he also has been having a hard year. I definitely love him and want him to be successful and be mentally well.
I just don’t know what to do. Neither of my friends have been responding and I feel like it’s my fault. I know people are busy and am trying to not take it personally. How do I explain to my friend this? Also like to add my car is old and the car I got at 16 and it will be a decade this year since I’ve had it. Plus it’s a 2 hour drive one way.
Also to add he visits me once a year and visit for 24 hours. They (him and his partner) come to an event in my city and then come over after. Then sleep here and we hang out together the next day and then they leave around 6-8pm. I do try and visit Saturday-Tuesday/Wednesday. So we have a lot of fun. Plus my friends live close ish together. Probably a little over an hour apart. Compared to me driving to see them.

Please don't judge me or be harsh or trolling. I can't handle it at this point in time right now.... I am just moments close to ending everything because I just can't handle it anymore. please if you judge me just keep it to yourself please..
I am on ssi and ssd getting 158 on the first and 805 on the 3rd. the ssd is after both my parents passed they put me on my dads disability drawing off what he earned working but I was originally on ssi to begin with.
I get about 963 a month total to live on. Right now I am in major debt with credit cards since covid broke out. I had to use them to live on.
I moved in with my aunt who is living in apartments based on income but they are not section 8 but they accept section 8. When i moved in, i was told by the manager i didn't need to put my income since i was a cotenant. that was 10 yrs ago. come to find out. i had to put my income now i am being sued by the housing authority for 10k, i owe two more years. my aunt and i pay 220 a month to them. they don't care what happened they just want their money.
i owe one credit card company 4.5k, another 1.8k another 600 and another 700. when i applied for them, it was 3 plus years ago. i put that i made around 700k a year when i applied to them but i was on ssdi at the time making around 11k a year. i went on the websites 3 months ago fixed the right info.
I live in a small town where nothing is available for the next 20 plus miles and have no transport. my aunt won't take me anywhere. her son who si in his late 30's lives with us and works. my aunt is on disability. I get food stamps right now worth a 130 a month which goes to my aunt even though its for me. i pay her 450 a month rent incl internet lights and 130 in food. if i don't give her the food stamps then i have to pay her another 130 a month i can't afford since all my stuff is going to her and credit cards. i legit have nothing left each month right now with having to buy myself instant mashed potatoes, oatmeal top ramen soup, noodles and spaghetti sauce. i live on that through the month.
when she buys food with the food stamps it feeds her son, me and her. but it is only enough to last a week, then for the next 3 weeks i am starving barely eating because i can't afford much when i do buy stuff that i can put in my bedroom to eat on.
past week now, there has been no food, her son has been taking his mom and him out to eat all week not bringing anything home for me. im so hungry. the nearest food bank is 4 miles away one way, but i have no way to get there my aunt won't take me they don't deliver and when i tried getting medicaid transport to take me they said they don't schedule rides except to and from the dr's.
I have no other family, I have no friends. I have no vehicle. been trying to get a minivan so I could live in it. I am sometimes bed ridden due to my bad joints/back/knees/feet/right leg nerve damage. I also struggle from morbid obesity I am around 500 lbs and funny thing is, with how little i eat. i should be losing weight but its the complete opposite.
I will be 47 yrs old when I am out of debt with the credit card companies, I tried filing bankruptcy no one will touch me being under 10k in debt with the credit card companies. i contacted legal aid, the attorney who called me back said he can't help me because its under 10k. but told me how to file but chances of me filing and getting it are slim to none esp without legal help he said.
im thinking of ending my life next month when my aunt and her son leave for a week. I just can't keep living like this. if i had a minivan I could stay in it, do door dash for extra money, I could get around trying to find an aparment based on income. I bene accepted a few times to low income places but had no way to get there and now with all the debt I wouldn't be able to afford having my own place with the credit card debt.
if i stop paying the cards, and the debt collectors come after me, they could take me to court and if they do, they could show the judge i said i made 700k a year and i didn't make that much and was on disability at the time and making only 11k a year. i found out while looking into bankruptcy that it is fraud and i could face prison time.
i just don't know what to do anymore. i really don't know what to do anymore other than ending things next month to get out of this situation i put myself in with my aunt, debt, etc. I just can't do it anymore esp without a vehicle. esp since I am bed ridden half of the day here and there due to my bad joints and weight that i have carried around for 30 yrs destroying my joints and causing nerve damage to my right leg. I can't just get up and go on the streets and live on the streets not with how badly im in pain every day esp just walking to the corner store. just a simple walk to the corner store and back and i am bed rested for an entire day barely able to move.
i can't do it anymore...

Please don't judge me or be harsh or trolling. I can't handle it at this point in time right now.... I am just moments close to ending everything because I just can't handle it anymore. please if you judge me just keep it to yourself please..
I am on ssi and ssd getting 158 on the first and 805 on the 3rd. the ssd is after both my parents passed they put me on my dads disability drawing off what he earned working but I was originally on ssi to begin with.
I get about 963 a month total to live on. Right now I am in major debt with credit cards since covid broke out. I had to use them to live on.
I moved in with my aunt who is living in apartments based on income but they are not section 8 but they accept section 8. When i moved in, i was told by the manager i didn't need to put my income since i was a cotenant. that was 10 yrs ago. come to find out. i had to put my income now i am being sued by the housing authority for 10k, i owe two more years. my aunt and i pay 220 a month to them. they don't care what happened they just want their money.
i owe one credit card company 4.5k, another 1.8k another 600 and another 700. when i applied for them, it was 3 plus years ago. i put that i made around 700k a year when i applied to them but i was on ssdi at the time making around 11k a year. i went on the websites 3 months ago fixed the right info.
I live in a small town where nothing is available for the next 20 plus miles and have no transport. my aunt won't take me anywhere. her son who si in his late 30's lives with us and works. my aunt is on disability. I get food stamps right now worth a 130 a month which goes to my aunt even though its for me. i pay her 450 a month rent incl internet lights and 130 in food. if i don't give her the food stamps then i have to pay her another 130 a month i can't afford since all my stuff is going to her and credit cards. i legit have nothing left each month right now with having to buy myself instant mashed potatoes, oatmeal top ramen soup, noodles and spaghetti sauce. i live on that through the month.
when she buys food with the food stamps it feeds her son, me and her. but it is only enough to last a week, then for the next 3 weeks i am starving barely eating because i can't afford much when i do buy stuff that i can put in my bedroom to eat on.
past week now, there has been no food, her son has been taking his mom and him out to eat all week not bringing anything home for me. im so hungry. the nearest food bank is 4 miles away one way, but i have no way to get there my aunt won't take me they don't deliver and when i tried getting medicaid transport to take me they said they don't schedule rides except to and from the dr's.
I have no other family, I have no friends. I have no vehicle. been trying to get a minivan so I could live in it. I am sometimes bed ridden due to my bad joints/back/knees/feet/right leg nerve damage. I also struggle from morbid obesity I am around 500 lbs and funny thing is, with how little i eat. i should be losing weight but its the complete opposite.
I will be 47 yrs old when I am out of debt with the credit card companies, I tried filing bankruptcy no one will touch me being under 10k in debt with the credit card companies. i contacted legal aid, the attorney who called me back said he can't help me because its under 10k. but told me how to file but chances of me filing and getting it are slim to none esp without legal help he said.
im thinking of ending my life next month when my aunt and her son leave for a week. I just can't keep living like this. if i had a minivan I could stay in it, do door dash for extra money, I could get around trying to find an aparment based on income. I bene accepted a few times to low income places but had no way to get there and now with all the debt I wouldn't be able to afford having my own place with the credit card debt.
if i stop paying the cards, and the debt collectors come after me, they could take me to court and if they do, they could show the judge i said i made 700k a year and i didn't make that much and was on disability at the time and making only 11k a year. i found out while looking into bankruptcy that it is fraud and i could face prison time.
i just don't know what to do anymore. i really don't know what to do anymore other than ending things next month to get out of this situation i put myself in with my aunt, debt, etc. I just can't do it anymore esp without a vehicle. esp since I am bed ridden half of the day here and there due to my bad joints and weight that i have carried around for 30 yrs destroying my joints and causing nerve damage to my right leg. I can't just get up and go on the streets and live on the streets not with how badly im in pain every day esp just walking to the corner store. just a simple walk to the corner store and back and i am bed rested for an entire day barely able to move.
i can't do it anymore...

My mum turned to drugs before I was born. When she had children she stopped taking drugs but slowly turned back to her old habits when my sisters and I were little. My dad was an alcoholic so he didn’t play any part in looking after us. He would drink in the pub as soon as it opened and wouldn’t leave until it closed at night. I would still see him, but it was usually when he would come over to the house that we lived in at the time and fight with my mum. My mum had a boyfriend who was physically and emotionally abusive towards all of us. He was also a drug user, so they would often leave us alone to go out and buy drugs. I can remember him abusing all of us. I have memories of him buying us pet rabbits. Shortly after getting them, he got angry about something and threw them down the stairs, so they passed away. I also remember him running out of the house naked and hiding in the garden from the police. He would hit us and also shout at us for getting scared. We were badly neglected to the point that social services got involved. They tried to help my mum but had no choice but to take us into foster care. We were in foster care for six months until my grandparents won the custody battle, and we got to live with them. During the six months that we lived in care, my mum did not attempt to better herself so that we could go back home to her. Instead, she chose drugs. In 2013, we went to live with my grandparents and have been there ever since. We cut off all contact with my mum, her boyfriend and my dad. They didn’t make any effort to get in touch at all. My dad would send us letters in the post occasionally, but he would also call the home phone when he was drunk and shout abuse at us on the phone. We started a new primary school and everything was going well until I was watching a film at home with both of my sisters. My older sister is eighteen months older than me and my younger sister is two years younger than me. My younger sister wasn’t involved as much in the situation. In the film, a couple were trying for a baby. In one of the scenes, they were rolling around on a bed kissing each other. We hadn’t seen anything like it before, and we were curious about what they were doing and why they were doing it. We made up a game where we would act out what they were doing in the film. My older sister and I would kiss each other. I can remember her touching me inappropriately once and also getting me to touch her back. The kissing turned into acting out having sex by “humping” each other because it felt good. It was innocent curiosity, we would choose who was going to play the “boy” and who was going to play the “girl” and would make up different storylines. I was around 8–11 years old when this happened. Most of the time we had our clothes on, but sometimes we didn’t. I didn’t understand sex at all when this was happening. I can remember hitting puberty at a young age and when I got my period I thought I was dying because I didn’t know what it was. I can’t remember any of this happening regularly. I think it just happened occasionally , but I know it happened a handful of times with both my siblings as well. I don’t think I truly understood that this behavior was wrong at the time, because I had lots of raging hormones, and I was just a traumatized child. I recently told my family about what happened and they’ve been so helpful. I’m slowly starting to rebuild a bond with my sister and I’ve realized that I can’t blame her for what happened because it wasn’t her fault. I’ve also struggled with severe OCD and anxiety for as long as I can remember. When I was little, I would have repetitive rituals that I would perform. I would be terrified of leaving my room in case anything bad happened so I went to the toilet at the end of my bed. I thought that bad things would happen to me if I didn’t do things a certain way and spent a lot of my time worrying. I left primary school and started secondary school, but I struggled to keep friends and always found myself feeling left out. I can remember my dad coming to visit on birthdays and Christmas, but when we went into lockdown because of coronavirus, I found out that he had cancer. We went to visit him and say goodbye. When we did this, I saw my mum for the first time in years. On Christmas Eve 2020, a few minutes from midnight she phoned to say that my dad had passed away. I miss him a lot, but he brought my mum back into my life. I slowly started seeing my mum more often and things were going well until she got me drunk one night and took me out to buy drugs with her. I can remember sitting on the sofa with her and her encouraging me to smoke crack cocaine. I was so drunk that I did it. The next day, when I woke up, I knew that she hadn’t changed. I had £2000 savings in my account which she knew about so she would “borrow” the money for gas, electricity and food. I knew it was all for drugs and I didn’t always get the money back. She mostly just smokes weed now, but she slips up sometimes. My mental health is slowly improving but everything that I’ve just written down bothers me a lot. I can’t change the past no matter how much I want to so I just need to move forward and be more positive.

Nate 2/7/2014 3:40 PM RVA – It’s not often a story weaves around the country like an insidious spider following Widespread Panic from outdoor arena to 400 seat club. But when it happens, it’s almost too much to believe. Let’s preface this story by saying, as far as actual accusations, we only have one official source saying the hippy-frat bro in question, Eric Lannon, has done anything wrong (or even really exists). But on closer inspection (and after a number of Google searches) it’s easy to see a pattern emerge–including pink Vineyard Vines plastic sunglasses, flip-flops in November, and Romney events–which tracks Lannon’s 1% style jack-assery up and down the east coast. Lannon came to light via a University of Richmond Police statement warning students about him loitering on campus and taking advantage of any rube he could get close to. Lannon, police warn, has a “history of theft and swindling. He manipulates his victims into providing shelter, food, money, and transportation under false pretenses.”
I have gotten a few emails over the last two days about this guy. Apparently a TON of people know about him or have been used by him. So I finally read the article about him and he’s kind of a genius. I highly suggest you read it, because it’s pretty interesting. What we do know is this guy is just a swindler to the highest degree. But I don’t think it’s even illegal, is it? People are voluntarily giving him all the shit he needs to survive.
Link – A man identified on Wednesday as Eric Lannon is said to have a history of theft and swindling, according to campus police. He has reportedly slept in at least four University of Richmond student apartments or houses and has received money, food, alcohol and clothing from numerous students. “He seemed like a nice guy,” said one of the junior Richmond College students whose house Lannon stayed at Tuesday. Lannon is believed to be from Richmond, according to various sources. He has been spotted on Richmond’s campus several times during the past three weeks, students report. All students quoted have asked to remain anonymous in the interest of safety. A campus crime alert released Wednesday afternoon cautioned community members not to interact with this person, and to contact URPD immediately if he is seen on campus. Lannon was not in police custody as of Wednesday night. Lannon is known to manipulate his victims into providing shelter, food, money and transportation under false pretenses, according to the police report. At least 25 Richmond students have confirmed that they have interacted with him in the past three weeks.
Obviously this Lannon dude is a huge douche. Like Grade A, 100% piece of shit of a human. I knew a girl in college who did the EXACT same thing. To hide her privacy, lets call her “Celeste”. She would bounce frat house to frat house, person to person, using and sweet talking people to allow her to live there and eat their food and use their shit. When people would cut her off, she’d treat them like total shit and move on to someone else. Easily my least favorite person I’ve ever come in contact with. But to people like her and Lannon, it’s all in the game.
Editors Note: I really wanted to use that sentence so I could include the video.
But yea, apparently he’s just a complete asshole so that’s your little Friday afternoon PSA since a bunch of people end up getting their shit stolen by him.
EDIT: Stoolie Hatcher just sent me a link to another Lannon story. Good lord this guy is the worst. Link.

https://chipstero7.wordpress.com/2023/05/24/is-baphomet-an-esoteric-representation-of-jesus-christ/
Quote from my article that discusses this (20% of 100%):
Baphomet is a symbol that has generated intrigue and controversy throughout history. It’s associated with occultism, mystery traditions, and the Knights Templar. While its origins and meanings are subject to interpretation, some individuals have proposed intriguing parallels between Baphomet and Christ. A notable parallel lie in their association with duality. Baphomet’s depicted as androgynous in nature and represents the equilibration of opposites and the integration of masculine and feminine energies. Christ is likewise depicted (especially in paintings) as androgynous and in ancient text is sometimes described as a merging of the male and the female. Drawing from the insights of the 15th-century book ‘Book of the Holy Treaty’, historian Leah De Vun describes the text as saying that Christ and Mary were originally a unified entity — an alchemical hermaphrodite. Describing the text — De Vun characterizes Christ as the “ultimate hermaphrodite, a unity of contrary parts, the human and the divine, the male and the female”. This idea of Christ as a hermaphrodite finds support in the writings of early Christian theologian Hippolytus, who, like the Ophites, considered Christ to be of dual genders.¹ Artistic representations of Christ, such as the painting “The Lamentation around the remains of Christ”, underscore this idea, showing Christ with female breasts akin to Baphomet. Some propose that the name “Jesus Christ” could represent the merging of two distinct entities or names into one. This idea is bolstered by the identification of “Jesus” as an ancient name for Isis, referred to as “Esus” in hieroglyphic inscriptions,² and “Christ” as a name historically associated with Osiris (see the book ‘Christ in Egypt: The Horus-Jesus Connection’). Within this framework, Isis and Osiris serve as possible precursors for the Biblical figures Mary and Christ.
This union or merging of Mary and Christ into a hermaphrodite like Baphomet represent twin souls becoming one and the accomplishment of the Philosopher’s Stone. The Philosopher’s Stone represents the alchemical process of inner transformation, leading to the ultimate goal of Divine Union. Divine Union refers to a spiritual state of unity and connection with the divine or higher consciousness. In essence, it refers to the coming together of twin souls, similar to how Christ merges with Mary or how Osiris merges with Isis. According to Manly Palmer Hall, in his book ‘Initiates of the Flame’, the “marriage of the Sun and Moon” represents the accomplishment of the Philosopher’s Stone. For the ancient Egyptians, the Moon represented Isis and the Sun represented Osiris and their union created Horus who was the fusion of both his parents and a divine hermaphrodite. In his book ‘Gods Wear Spandex’, Chris Knowles says: “The Chemical Wedding referred to the work of the alchemists, who sought to marry the masculine and feminine properties of creation and produce the Royal Hermaphrodite, which some historians have linked to Harpocrates (Younger Horus)”. In the ancient mysteries, the ultimate aim of the philosophers was not to transform lead chemically into gold, but transform man and woman into the divine hermaphrodite, merging the opposites; the male and the female. This is ultimately what Baphomet represents. It represents the idea that true spiritual enlightenment and wholeness come from embracing and integrating both the masculine and feminine aspects of creation. This union of opposites is seen as a path to spiritual balance and ultimate transcendence. This integration of the male and female is also represented by Rebis, which is a 15th-century figure used to symbolize the Magnum Opus or Great Work.
The connections between Christ and Baphomet are not widely recognized or agreed upon, but esoteric interpretations have been proposed. For example, in his book ‘Baphomet of Éliphas Lévi’, Abraxas Aletheia argues that Baphomet is an esoteric symbol of Christ, saying: “Contrary to popular belief, Baphomet is an image of an esoteric Jesus Christ created from a composite of alchemical, Kabbalistic and Christian symbols”. One such connection symbolically between Baphomet and Christ can be found in Baphomet’s caducous which matches the Christogram which is a monogram or combination of letters that forms an abbreviation for Christ’s name. One of Baphomet’s most recognizable symbols is the pentagram emblazoned on its forehead. The pentagram is commonly associated with Christ. In Christian tradition, the pentagram is seen as a symbolic connection to the five wounds of Christ. In certain esoteric traditions, the pentagram has been linked to the planet Venus, called the Morning Star or the Evening Star, depending on its appearance in the sky. This is of relevance, because Christ describes himself as the bright Morning Star in the Book of Revelation (22:16). One of the earliest connections between Baphomet and Christ can be found in the mythology surrounding the Knights Templar, a medieval Christian military order. Some have suggested that the Baphomet head that the Knights Templars venerated was the head of Christ. In her book ‘The Templars: The Secret History Revealed’, Barbara Frale says: “The last point raised in the indictment against the Templars concerned the secret veneration of an idol in the shape of a bearded head. There is clear evidence of the existence of image of Christ in the religious life of the order, as well as a mysterious cult devoted to the Sacred Blood”. Frale’s essentially suggesting that the Baphomet head was that of Christ. This same idea was the subject of the book ‘The Head of God: The Lost Treasure of the Templars’, by Keith Laidler.

Hello community. I am recovering from a recent break up with someone I met on a dating app 2 years ago. I had observed the guy to be especially stingy and selfish during the dates which was off-putting and wasn't attracted to him at all when we went out on 3 dates, after which, he sent me a text saying he doesn't think we are headed in a romantic direction and wondered if I'd like to stay friends. Since we were both new to the city and wanted to explore it further, I thought it isn't a bad idea to stay friends.
After being friends for a year, he asked me out after I told him about a bad online dating experience. It stood out to me that he chose a moment of my vulnerability to ask me out on a date again, saying he was attracted to me after watching me dance. I didn't reciprocate as I wasn't feeling right about it and didn't want to ruin the friendship that was developing with him. His relationship history was also a factor that kept me guarded. He had been with a woman on again off again over 10 years. He said she was an avoidant and he felt the relationship was over when he tried to move cities for her and she asked him not to and broke up with him. The other reason I didn't feel confident in him was as he seemed to have many surface-level friends from his coworking space but no close friends who really know him. His best friend and partner moved to the city a few months ago but even there something didn't seem to add up. He never seemed to accommodate to their needs (e.g. their dietary restrictions and hence never hosted them for dinner), and criticized them for being not as social and outgoing as he would like them to be.
After two months into our relationship, wherein he had made a few more attempts to 'proxy date', we had an argument over me wanting to move out of the city, where he made it about himself and how I am not considering how important he is to my life. He called the very next day and over 2 hours on the phone, apologized for his tone and his outburst and said it was only because I am so dear to him that he felt badly about me wanting to move. Something shifted in me after that call and I decided to date him.
The first month was magical- he told me he loved me and that I was the woman he wants to spend the rest of his life with. He introduced me to his parents over a call and I introduced him to mine, although typically, I'd have waited for a few years before doing that on my side as culturally it'd mean more to introduce him to my parents. We also talked about moving in to his place. He would proudly show me off in front of his friends from his coworking space but only focus on superficial details (job, appearance) and not the qualities for which he decided to be with me.
A month later, things started to shift. He said he didn't want to move in with me because he doesn't feel ready. When I pressed for an explanation, he said it's because we had an argument and he is no longer sure of me the way he was before. He also said that moving in wasn't a 'commitment' from his side and was merely an idea we'd been discussing. This is where my alarm bells went off. I clearly remembered him offering to put me on his lease as I wasn't comfortable to just move in without any formal paperwork. This led to our first major conflict within 2 months of being together. When we tried to resolve the conflict, he sat next to me and talked to me in a low, cold, impersonal tone, like he was in control, while I was distressed and wearing out with a conversation that seemed to be going nowhere for hours. Ultimately I broke down and gave away a vulnerable detail from my past relationship. He then asked what would reassure me in the relationship with him and I said any indication that he isn't pulling away from his overall commitment to the relationship. He then laughed and said okay, we have reached a resolution! His laugh was so unfitting to the cold/distant way he was behaving for the past few hours, it scared me a little. I wanted to leave his apartment but somehow thought maybe I am overthinking and that I should give him a chance. Every time we'd have an argument, he somehow focused on my reaction (crying, raising my voice), than what we were actually fighting about (him pulling away from commitments), leaving me feeling blamed and confused.
I noticed on more than one occasion that he couldn't provide care. When I was feeling low and called him requesting him to come over, he'd say "I am watching xyz show" or first say he'd come over and call up a few hours later and say "I am tired and if you're feeling better now then maybe I won't come today". I started to feel uncared for and lonely in the relationship.
As time passed, I noticed that he tried in very subtle ways to adopt his best friends as my friends. He kept saying "I don't want you to think they are my friends, I want them to be your friends too. You are new to the country and this will help you". Again my instincts warned me there was something off here, even though his friends appeared sweet and friendly and had been in his life for 10+ years. There were days when our previous argument about moving in resurfaced and we were having a bad day, but once we'd reconciled, he would compel me to socialize with his friends even if I said I needed some downtime/ time alone. When I got through a good university and told him about the news, he had a lukewarm reaction. He then went to these friends and took some advice after which, he showed up at my place with what sounded like very rehearsed lines of supporting my academic pursuits (without moving cities or taking any risks in the relationship- he suggested a long distance relationship).
In the past month I noticed being on eggshells around him, being confused about my thoughts and memories and blamed myself for the conflicts we were having. I raised these with him and broke up with him saying my emotional needs aren't being met. He didn't take any responsibility for his part. He often also brought up my anxiety issues/ trauma during arguments packaging it as concern for my wellbeing. His reaction during our fights/disagreements, he said "I can't cycle through arguments- I don't want to be that kind of a couple", "I can't change who I am, if I am not meeting your needs there's nothing we can do". After we broke up, I got a message from his best friend's partner who said she understands we are going through a difficult time and that she is here to support me if I needed a friend for a walk/ talk. I fell for it thinking she genuinely came across as a caring person. When I did meet her for a walk, she seemed to shut me down if I tried to talk about the breakup or my reasons for it and said focused on how much he cared for me and wants to remain friends with me.
I spoke to him after the walk saying somehow meeting his friend's partner felt uncomfortable. He admitted she had just gone over to his place before seeing me (she never mentioned it when she met me). It seemed to be a way for him to retain contact with me and reinforce his side of things in the breakup. He also kept insisting we stay friends as I meant a lot to him. I told him I was uncomfortable with the idea as I am hurting.
I shared all this with a trusted friend who said I may have been in a relationship with a narcissist. Would be great to get any insights from you if this seems to be the case. I am seeking help to recover from this as I often find myself still questioning and blaming myself.

Hi all, great to find this subreddit! I'm planning to backpack across the island in early June and I'm looking for any suggestions on the route, campsites, etc. for that time of year.
Info about me: I've been to/hiked 48 national parks—Isle Royale, Voyageurs, and Glacier are my last remaining parks in the contiguous states, so I'm trying to hit them now since I was laid off recently. I'm in my early 40s, in good shape, daily mileage is not a concern (I've done 20+ mile mountain traversals as day hikes), and have lived in the northeast my whole life so cold isn't an issue.
While I don't want to "rush" my time there, I tend to seek efficiency with my time, am a fast hiker, and try to not linger longer than necessary, since I'm on the move to another park immediately afterward. I'm planning on taking the seaplane to save time on both ends.
So, my questions:

1. How many days/nights should I plan for, given the above? (Was thinking 3 nights…is that enough?)
2. Given the number of days, what would be the best route to take and which campsites would make the most sense to hit good mileage each day?
3. Any unique gear needs? I'm well equipped overall, but I know every park has its own quirks to accommodate.
   1. I generally hike in trail runners, but would I be better off getting some waterproof boots for this one? I don't need ankle support thanks to decades of soccer, so this would be more a matter utility/protection.
   2. Sawyer Squeeze is my usual water treatment (I'd bring tablets as well). Guessing that would suffice?
   3. What about food storage? I don't tend to cook much on the trail (takes too much time/cleanup), so mostly dried stuff, nutrition bars, etc. I'm more accustomed to having to keep my stuff protected from raccoons and bears, but I'd guess I'd need less extreme measures for what's on the island, so if there are better suggestions than bulky bear containers I'd need to store a good distance away, I'm all for whatever y'all use!
4. Anything you wouldn't bring?
5. How's the parking safety for the seaplane lot? As mentioned, I'll have my car loaded up for living on the road and going to a number of parks, so leaving it for several days in an unfamiliar place always makes me a little nervous.

Anything else to consider? Sorry for so much text, but I'm pretty thorough with my planning to minimize issues on the road/trail (which has worked out great so far haha).
Thanks!

I am a 30 year old female and have lived in London my entire life, I want to move away from the chaotic life to a peaceful and calmer place. I am a freelance consultant so I have flexibility with where I can work.
I want to move to a place near a beach with a warmer climate and slower pace of life. I have been looking into Spain, Turkey, Portugal and Italy. For context, I will be moving on my own so safety is important for me.
Does anyone have any places they would recommend from these countries?

This is an incredibly long story, so I apologize in advance, but I strongly appreciate any advice.
I (18F) met a boy (17M) at a competition a few months ago. We both ended up winning first place for our respective category, qualifying us for Nationals. I figured he was really sweet, so after the ceremony I ran up to him and asked for his Instagram, to which he said yes. We message back and forth casually until Nationals, nothing serious although he did seem a bit forward at times. I'm frankly a very delusional person, so my friends and I would joke about how I should figure out a strategy to bag him during the few short days we had the competition.
Because I have previous bad experiences with romance and boys in general, and I also have a complicated relationship with how racism is tied into the dating market (I'm Black, and he is Korean-White) so I was pretty apprehensive going into this whole ordeal. I figured that I would show up to the comp, and he'd just ignore me or something. I'm walking through the hotel with my friend and I hadn't realized I passed by him. All I heard was a, "Hi, [my name]!" really loudly from behind me. Turned around, it was him, so a little surprised, I said hi back and moved on. He ended up catching up to me, and we had a mildly flirtatious conversation catching up on each other's lives.
For two days after that, we were inseparable, practically attached at the hip. We had so many conversations, both casual and very serious/deep. I didn't feel fully comfortable with him until we went into my hotel room alone and he didn't try anything, no inappropriate touching or language, and all around incredibly respectful. I began to feel very safe around him. He would carry my things, hold my extra plates of food, be generally very touchy and intimate, we played games and joked together a lot, etc. He was also so intelligent and interesting in general, and would always look for ways for us to be alone or at least separated from everyone else.
On the afternoon of the second day, he suddenly switched up on me. Mind you, at this point, he follows me on all my Instagram accounts, has my number, etc and isn't being dry at all over text but a total a-hole in person. That night, I called him and he told me he wouldn't hang out with me the next day, without giving any real reason, and shut me out. I confront him, asking him what's wrong and why he's upset with me, and he gets extremely defensive and loud, swearing that nothing's wrong and everything is fine and that he's not mad at me. Had his homeboy confront him too and ask him what's up between us, and he denies everything. He is still being horrible the rest of the comp, and ends up leaving without saying goodbye.
I tried to text him and he was super dry. I confront him again and gently ask him to talk to me and tell me what's wrong and he initially apologizes for being mean but then denies ever being mean in the first place. He leaves me on seen for several days, to which I text him one last time, the gist of which was "I have feelings for you, I need you to communicate with me." He completely ignored the confession and instead basically told me to stop asking him to communicate since there's nothing to communicate about.
Frankly, I really like this guy. He made me feel seen and beautiful, even though I didn't really get into details. He hasn't blocked me or unfollowed me. He still views all my stories but hasn't done anything. Not sure what happened, but I don't know what to do. Do I wait for him? Do I move on?
TLDR: Met a boy who made my life feel like a dream only for him to switch up on me very quickly. I confessed my feelings and he ignored it. What do I do?

Hi guys, would really appreciate some insight/advice/support please. I will say my partner and I weren’t married but were cohabiting in a long term relationship with marriage plans.
Was dumped out of the blue last autumn after four years with the man who told all my friends and family he was going to propose to me and we were in the middle of buying property (although we lived together in a rented apartment) and was about to start a family - he brought up conversations about what names to choose.
We were so happy, never argued and had an amazing relationship (or so I thought)……he left me saying something was ‘missing’ he felt pressured for marriage (despite HIM being the one bringing all the future plans up) and then bizarrely said he wanted to find a wife and a mother?? The man I adored turned into a stranger overnight and I still to this day have no idea why or how this happened? The only big red flag with him is he had never had proper long term relationships before me so maybe that’s where the ‘missing’ bit stems from. This all happened during a life period where he was extremely stressed with his job, was constantly saying he wanted to give up his medical career (he is a surgeon) and we both had poorly parents.
He’s never reached out, blocked my phone and completely blanks me at work.
I always (stupidly) thought he might reflect on what he’s thrown away and open up to talking.
Found out my replacement is someone 17 years younger than my ex (he’s 45, she’s 28). What the hell?! Please can I get peoples thoughts on this? He’s practically moved her into the apartment and apparently it’s all sunshine and rainbows for him. This girl has apparently told her friends she ‘wouldn’t date him as he was far too old but he’s rich and she likes being wined and dined by rich men. Shes apparently the town bicycle and as one person described her ‘a psycho bunny boiler’ and is apparently plastering photos of their dates to fancy restaurants all over social media - I obviously don’t follow her and haven’t seen these, nor do I want to. Bizarrely it seems he’s been taking her to all the exact places we did.
Even more strangely, apparently she keeps flipping her profile from Private to public with all these photos - it might be me being paranoid but it sounds like she almost wants me to see them?
I really thought at some point we would be able to work this out and he had just had a huge ‘future freak out’. I’m terrified this ‘girl’ is going to get her claws in and do all the things we had planned and I’m going to have to see it all play out in front of me. I don’t know what to do to remedy any of this or whether he will ever even consider coming back? I really believe in our relationship and have been exploring some of the MLC techniques and advice to firstly, make myself feel better and secondly to look at implementing things I can do to potentially help the situation.
The work interactions are interesting and I’m not really sure how to navigate them going forward. He was initially cordially saying hello but recently has been diving into the nearest doorway or swiftly exiting a room if he sees me there. It’s cowardly but also strikes me that he clearly isn’t yet ‘indifferent’
How to proceed?

I have some quotes on a astrology from a certain source, can you please explain to me the meaning behind and if you agree with any of it from you experience?
"Mathematicians too are born under a specific constellation, and poets are never born under that same constellation." - What does constellation mean in this case and would you say it's true?
"The study which Brown carried out on some fifty thousand men revealed that the influence of Mars is very strong in the lives of army officers."
"If a child is being born at six o'clock in the morning, at that time the sun is rising; and at that time, some stars are rising and other stars are setting, some constellations are ascending and other constellations are descending - the child is being born into a certain arrangement of stars in space". What does "some constellations are ascending and other are descending mean and can you give me an example (I'm familiar with some concepts of astrology).
"The constellations are in certain positions; this determines some of your sympathies and your antipathies in your life." - What does "the constellations are in certain positions" mean here?
Thanks for your help!

Don't get me wrong, the AI is pretty good when it works and does neat looking stuff. But it is not good enough for a game where it can take a split-second to die and up to an hour to clear a level.
1) Team AI not reacting to commands I have to issue commands twice WAY too often - sometimes I have to shuffle in a "Fall in". Extra annoying when they have to do something quick and it ruins immersion even when it doesn't get you killed. I feel I have to look every time if they have actually followed through on a command.
2) Team AI wandering off (pathing) Sometimes when I tell a team to stack up, one guy stands still and the other guy wanders off somewhere.
3) Team AI moving when you aim at them That looked quite cool in the promo video but is actually annoying in practice, especially when you are using a shield and need to have your pistol out most of the time.
4) Team AI stacking on doorways without looking into them On some stacks they just look at the door frame and not down the hallway.
5) Team AI getting injured even fighting from the most advantageous positions You can have a split stack looking down a hallway and still they manage to get shot by an unaware suspect wandering in.
6) Team AI collecting evidence Very neat... unless they get shot or run into your line of fire... and then execute you.
7) Team AI shooting hostages Human shield? Get ready to order that casket. Civilians running into the line of fire? No problem, AP goes right through them.
8) Team AI standing behind you without returning fire This is especially a problem when playing with the shield when you take an entire clip to the face and desperately return ineffective fire with the pistol. Meanwhile you have 4 pacifists standing right behind you.
9) Team AI looking under obviously empty tables Just a little niggle but it's not helping immersion either. And it makes me think of Life of Brian when the Romans search the apartment... again, not helping immersion.
10) Team selection permanently switching when swiping over a stacked door Absolutely not a fan of that, at least make it contextual just while looking at the specific door. I think in SWAT 4 they said something like "Red's got it" if you had selected the wrong team and the selection never changed on its own.