Throat and chest hurting head congestion but no stuffy nose

https://ibb.co/mXc6Pyw
My daughter, 15F, started feeling ill Apr 28. It started with fever, body ache, and congestion/sinus pain and cough and ear ache, and deep fatigue. We treated with advil/tylenol, figuring it was just a normal cold. It was getting worse and throat was very inflamed (though not sore, apparently) with those white spots so started clarithromycin May 5 (allergic to amoxicillin). Did a course of 7 days, twice daily. May 6 we started doing peridex rinse 2x day, and saltwater baking soda rinse every 2 hours. A couple days into this routine, her throat started hurting badly but the fever and other symptoms started getting better. But throat has been steadily getting worse, along with pain in the back of the head and neck, and still a bit of a cough. The doctor prescribed another course of clarithromycin since the throat is still inflamed with white spots (picture in link is current). We are on day 3 of the second course of clarithromycin. We have had a swab come back negative for strep and a mono blood test also come back negative. The pain in throat, back of the head and neck seems to be getting worse, worst in the mornings upon waking. The tylenol and advil do help the pain.
If it's not strep or mono, what else could this be?
(Taking vit D 5000iu/day due to deficiency, and iron supplement as well, normal dose)

In hindsight, I should have known something was wrong with The Caeles Academy of Acting.
Maybe the fact that it doesn't exist to the outside world.
This place prided itself on famous alumni it didn't actually name, and a once in a lifetime opportunity to work with the best in the business.
It's what I wanted.
More than anything.
After enduring four years of high school with barely a semblance of a drama club (we met every month, and our teacher was an alcoholic), and countless failed auditions, I was ready to take my acting career seriously. I had one year.
According to my parents, I had one year to make a living from my passion.
If it didn't work out, I would be on the first plane back to Connecticut.
It's not like they didn't trust me. I think they were just scared I wouldn't be able to financially support myself. So, I got a job right out of high school and slipped a year. Drama schools are expensive, and college’s are cut-throat on who they take on. I found Caeles Academy by accident–or, I guess it found me?
After researching cheap drama classes, auditions, academy’s, literally anything to progress my career, an ad popped up.
Not exactly flashy.
Just a date, a time, and a promise that they only take the best. I ignored it, but throughout the week, I started getting more ads. Just the words, “IMPRESS US - - JOIN CAELES ACADEMY NOW.”
Followed by, “BE WITH THE BEST, AND BE THE BEST. JOIN THE S CLASS NOW.”
When I googled the academy, nothing came up.
I gave up, clicking on the ad, which sent me straight to an application form.
I filled in my details as more of a joke. But I wasn't expecting to get an email back. Again, it was a time, a date, and that exact same tagline: “Impress us.”
However, Caeles Academy was different from what I imagined.
I was expecting a university building, or at least some modern structure.
Judging from their marketing and ads, I figured they could at least afford decent premises. Though I was mistaken. When I stepped out of the Uber, I found myself staring at what looked like an abandoned office tower, a red-brick monolith in the middle of nowhere.
Which was crazy, because I swore a girl wearing a bikini had strode through the doors, with nothing but her phone, and a coffee tucked under her elbow.
According to the text sent from the academy, the auditioning rooms were on the third floor.
Tipping my head back, the checkerboard of broken windows didn't exactly instil confidence.
Neither did the clunky set of automatic doors that took a while to open.
It was a summer's day, and the heat was already baking through my dress, sweat sticky on the back of my neck.
I wanted to make a good impression, but the heels were a little over the top.
Though I had also seen a girl casually walk in wearing a two piece bikini.
“Well?”
Freddie’s voice made me jump. I forgot I was on the phone to him. I was excited the whole car-ride, already high on five coffees, and now I was silent.
If I perceived the ‘academy’ from an objective standpoint, it definitely looked like the perfect place to be brutally murdered. But my own personal opinion was it was.. okay.
“What's it like?”
I pretended not to see a rat scuttling under an old candy wrapper.
“It's… fine.”
“Just fine?”
I could hear the smirk in my friend’s tone. He couldn't wait to tell me it was a scam, and had been reminding me all week I was essentially willingly selling myself to the black market. I was stubborn, so, fine sounded better than my initial first impression.
Which was to turn around, walk away, and completely block the place from my memory.
Unfortunately, at that moment, I valued my pride over my awareness.
“It's… okay.” I said, trying to find positives. I was staring at a looming grey building with shattered windows and a resident rat living near the door. I had a hard time figuring out how the girl from earlier had just casually strode inside, barefoot too. I glanced down at the ground, immediately regretting it.
Like there weren't bits of chewing gum and grime stuck to the concrete.
“Huh.” Freddie said, his tone creeping into teasing territory. “You're really selling it.”
“It just looks like a building,” I muttered, my gaze glued to the rat, who looked a little too comfortable.
Maybe it was a pet.
I was getting progressively more infuriated the more I stared down this place. Judging from the decades old writing ingrained into the door, it used to be a dentist surgery. “What do you want me to say?” I wasn't even trying to hide the scorn from my voice. “It's a building that looks like an academy.”
“Can you send a picture?” Freddie asked, “Ooh, wait, I'll face-time you.”
“That's, uh, that’s not really necessary–”
I was cut off, suddenly, when a guy threw himself through the automatic doors, palms first. He took two stumbled steps forwards, one back, and lifted his head, half lidded eyes finding the sky, before dropping to his knees and heaving up pinkish liquid.
I could see him trying to hold it in, slamming his hands over his mouth, only for it to splurge through his fingers, showering the ground in greyish pink froth.
Like he'd downed a bottle of Pepto Bismol.
Inching towards him, I realized it was Pepto Bismol.
The stink made my own stomach churn.
“Missy?”
I found my voice. “Uh, can I call you back later?”
Before my friend could answer, I ended the call, slipping my phone in my pocket.
The guy was still heaving, coughing up globules of pink.
“Are you okay?”
The sound of my heels click-clacking on concrete made me cringe. The guy noticed, flinching away. Closer, and I could see his scraggly blonde hair.
He was handsome.
Without the bile spewing down his chin.
Early twenties, wearing a fitted white shirt now covered in streaks of bright pink. Part of me wanted to make a half-hearted joke, but getting even closer, so close I could smell his pepto-breath, I noticed he was trembling, his hands clenched into fists.
When I attempted to awkwardly pat him on the shoulder, he twisted around, so fast my morning coffee slithered its way back up my throat.
His eyes were wide, almost feral, studying me like a wild animal.
I noticed the whites of his pupils were red, like he'd burst a blood vessel.
Theatre kids were intense, though I had never met THIS kind of intense.
“Are you… going in there?” The guy’s voice was a child-like whimper I wasn't expecting.
It looked like he was slowly regaining clarity, staring down at his filthy shirt, his hands stained bright pink.
I nodded, uncertainly, offering him my water. “Yeah. Did you audition?”
He shoved it away, slapping himself in the face. “I… I don't know.”
“You… don’t know?”
Suddenly, it was like something had contorted in his expression, a switch being pulled. I wasn't expecting him to twist around so fast. The guy slowly cocked his head, his lips breaking into a grin. His eyes, however, stayed the same.
“Of course I've auditioned.” He said, with a laugh.
“It was the best experience of my life!" His mouth formed an almost mocking frown.
“Unfortunately, I didn't make the cut. Which is a real shame. I'm sure Caeles would have benefited from my talents.”
What was weird, is that his mouth was moving, but he wasn't even looking at me, frenzied eyes caught in an oblivion I couldn't see.
When he did look at me, his expression crumpled all over again.
Pepto jumped to his feet, brushing himself down.
I couldn't take his over the top smile seriously, when his eyes were screaming, hollowed out caverns silently begging me to listen.
This guy was fucking crazy.
“Wait.” Pepto whispered, when I turned to walk away.
He pulled out his phone, tapping the screen before shoving it in my face.
I HAD SO MUCH FUN AT THE CAELES ACADEMY AUDITIONS :)
When I could only stare at him in confusion, Pepto’s gaze flicked to his phone, swiping bile from his lips.
His eyes went cartoon wide, like he couldn't believe what he himself was typing.
“That… that's not what I was trying to say!” He tried retyping it, but the guy was just writing strings of emoji hearts.
I didn't know what to say. I had dealt with rejection before, but I had never gone this far. Pepto was having a full on mental breakdown, his body shuddering, teeth chattering, blinking eyes and lips parting as if to speak, but choking on his words. When he started clawing out his hair, I took the opportunity to make a quick getaway.
Before I could make it to the doors, though, Pepto jumped in front of me, waving his phone directly in my face.
“Just…” he pointed at the screen. “It won't let me…” Growing frustrated with himself, he let out a wet sounding sob, clawing his fingers through his hair.
“Fuck, it won't let me…it won't let me type! It's not letting me type!”
By now, he had tufts of hair stuck between his fingernails. I don't know why his first reaction was to immediately try ripping his hair out.
A quick glance at my own phone reminded me of my own audition that was in five minutes.
Meanwhile, I was dealing with what I was pretty sure was delusion, denial, or a mixture of both.
I was considering pushing past him, when Pepto’s phone screen hit me in the face. Again.
This time, though, there was coherent writing.
“FIND LUKE.”
“Luke?” I said. “Who's that?”
“Luke!” The guy was bouncing on the heels of his feet. “He's my…” Pepto drifted off, his eyes going vacant, as if I could physically see his brain being plucked from his skull. Pepto dropped his phone, and I grabbed it before it could hit the ground. His hands went to his curls, clawing, scratching, until he was drawing blood across his forehead.
“I… I don't know! I can't… I can't remember. Luke. He was my… he was my… I don't know, I can't… I can't–”
I stumbled back when he let out a shriek, scratching at his face.
“Fuck!” He whimpered. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!”
Pepto grabbed my shoulders, shaking me, his fingers digging into my skin.
“I don't know who he is.” He gritted out, pink froth pooling from his lips.
Pepto broke out into a sob. “I don't… I don't know who he is, but you can find him, right? You can… you can find…”
Again, he trailed off mid sentence, his hands going limp around my shoulders.
I managed to side step him, swallowing a cry.
“Yeah, I'll, um, I'll find him for you.”
Pepto backed away, suddenly, stumbling over himself.
His gaze found mine, vacant, like a baby deer.
“Find who?”
I didn't wait around to answer him, pushing through the doors and stepping inside.
The interior was unsurprisingly even worse than the exterior.
The elevator was broken, so I had to run up three flights of stairs.
I expected at least an attempt at an academy, even in the dregs of an old dentist surgery.
What I got, though, was a never ending staircase, obnoxious photos of teeth greeting me on every level.
The third floor was… less clinical.
I strode directly into a waiting room filled with college aged students, either sitting on plastic chairs, or standing around, rehearsing.
The room itself was cosy enough, a navy carpet and a TV playing a random Twitch stream.
Situated in the middle was a desk with a bored looking woman behind it.
Her smile was fake. I could understand her pain. She was stuck in a room with theatre kids all day.
“Sign here.” She prodded a sheet of paper.
I was convinced her voice was AI.
While I was scribbling my details, I took a moment to notice the stark difference from the kids entering the room, to the ones leaving. The kids entering wore wide, confident smiles and were social butterflies, chatting amongst themselves.
The kids leaving reminded me of pod people.
They left the room silent, in an orderly line with dazed smiles on their faces, like they weren't sure where they were.
I watched one guy walk directly into the wall instead of taking a left toward the exit, and a girl straight up just toppled down the stairs.
The kids waiting with me named them rejects.
I wasn't convinced until I glimpsed an empty bottle of Pepto Bismol sitting on the floor by the window.
Thinking back to Pepto, that made a lot of sense.
I was still dazedly staring at the bottle, when my name was called.
Jumping to my feet, I did my best to calm myself down, straightening my ponytail. Pepto had really screwed with my head. I could barely even remember the lines I had been rehearsing for a week straight.
I was muttering my lines to myself, when I stepped through the door.
The door that apparently turned you into a pod-person on the way out.
For a moment, I thought I was blinded by stage lights.
It was so bright.
The glow bathing me was clinical, stabbing into my eyes.
When I blinked, I found myself standing in front of three shadows sitting in front of me.
Their chairs were made of leather, far different from the plastic ones in the waiting room.
So, they did have filthy cash.
I was looking at one man, and two women.
They were… average?
I expected them to be more glitzier, but they were just regular people.
The man was in his late twenties, maybe early thirties, a stiff looking brunette wearing a suit and tie, one leg crossed over the other. His eyes were narrowed slightly, lips curved into the start of a smile. Like I amused him.
The women were polar opposites.
One of them was my Mom’s age, grey hair and floral clothing. She took a sip of water, her gaze burning into me.
Google told me not to be intimidated by their stares, but it was impossible.
These people were carving holes into my skull.
Sitting next to her, a younger girl who seemed to own the color red.
Her hair simmered, blood red, while she herself was sculpted in a dress, perfect cherry lips spread in a wide smile.
With a little too many teeth.
They studied my face like I was already theirs, drinking in every inch of me.
Freddie said I had to find a weakness in their expression and use it to my advantage.
If I could find the prick of a genuine smile, I could become their favorite.
“Hi!” I said. My caffeine intake was starting to take effect.
I didn't realize I was bouncing up and down until I caught myself.
Red’s smile stretched wider.
Maybe they liked my eagerness.
“My name is Misa.” I introduced myself, staying casual, keeping my arms by my sides. “I'm twenty one years old–”
I choked on my next words when Red spoke up. “Impress us, Misa,” Her voice was a smooth, almost seductive rasp, and I felt myself fall into it, enveloped in sugar that was too sweet, and yet I couldn't stop myself. She folded her arms across her chest, her gaze challenging me to do something different. To make her want me.
“Show us something we have never seen before.” She stood up, cat-like eyes narrowing, “Show us how desperate you are to join this prestigious class.”
I nodded, and began.
I had planned a whole monologue, practised it over and over again, forcing Freddie to judge me with a none biassed opinion.
I was three lines in, when Red started laughing.
“Stop.”
I did, my cheeks heating up, and she started clapping.
“Sweetie, oh, stop, you're adorable!” She said, her lips curving into a cruel smirk.
She leaned forward, like I was something that entertained her, jostling her heeled foot. “We don't take amateurs. I think you need to go back to school.”
This woman was definitely a psychopath.
Empty eyes sparkling with a gleam that definitely enjoyed humiliating candidates, and a twisted smile that was a little too wide. Red made me want to crawl into the ground.
She made me want to turn around, leave the room, and quit my dream. I was aware of my own fury, my embarrassment turning my cheeks crimson. I matched her.
Maybe that's what she wanted all along. To wear the color of her victims.
Taking a shaky step back, I started to nod, started to agree, my mouth choking with the words, “You're right. I'm sorry for wasting your time."
I had never received proper constructive criticism from a professional standpoint.
Which meant I really did suck.
But I didn't move. I didn't want to move, and Red continued laughing, her companions sitting in silence.
The man rolled his eyes with a loud, exaggerated sigh.
Like I was boring.
The older woman pulled out her phone.
“Misa, you are…cute.” Red said. “But you're not quite what we are looking for.”
I wasn't sure I could admit it right there, but she made me feel things.
Like I was ignited.
Like I was going to prove this crazy bitch wrong.
I found my voice, strong and confident, despite my hammering heart.
“Give me another chance.”
Red’s lips curled. “So cute, Misa. Oh, sugar bear, It would be better if you left the room. Unless you want to embarrass yourself further! In that case, be my guest!”
She turned her attention to her nails, nudging the guy.
“Dinner?” She hummed. “I'm thinking of Italian. You are quite the wine connoisseur, Nicholas. Why don't you introduce me to your favorite?”
“Hey.” I blurted.
They ignored me, getting a little too close.
I don't know why I continued, reading my lines, screaming them, so I would be heard. I read them perfectly, and tweaking the genre from drama to romance, and then to horror. I became three different characters, a high school girl struggling with cancer, a final girl, and a woman going through a divorce.
I was fucking perfect.
But they weren't listening to me, caught up in their own conversation.
I tried again.
And again.
And again.
By now, I was on my knees, my fingers ripping into my hair. I was seeing red.
“We want originality, Misa,” Red said, sucking her teeth.
Her voice crawling into my skull was enough.
She still wanted me.
The thought polluted the back of my mind, taking a strangling hold. She still wanted me. When I lifted my head, Red wasn't looking at me, her gaze on the table grains. “Show us something new.”
I got to my feet, panting, my breath in my throat.
I became a screaming, strangled mess, a woman who lost her baby.
Red’s interest was piqued. Only slightly. Through my fraying vision, she slowly turned in her chair. “Again.” She clapped her hands, “Come on, Misa! We want new! We want never been fucking done before! Are you deaf?”
I couldn't stop the sobs escaping my mouth.
They lost interest again, right in the middle of my reading.
“Why can't you look at me?” I found myself spluttering.
When the man pulled out a bottle of water, I pulled off my heel and lobbed it at his face.
“Look at me!”
He did. Slowly. His gaze found me, for perhaps the first time.
Not as an amateur, but as a potential candidate.
Around the twentieth attempt, I started to laugh. Never been done before? I could feel my fingernails already in my scalp, clawing chunks of my hair out.
Reality contorted, and I felt myself drop to my knees. I was still laughing, spluttering, sobbing. I could still hear her in my head. Never Been Done Before. I started slowly, dragging my fingernails down my face until I felt the harsh sting.
“Again.” Red said, and her voice led me to stare down at my hands, at pinkish flesh glued to my bones, fleshy mounds.
So easy to tear. I didn't even feel it.
Only the sudden, unbridled euphoria of biting into my own skin, locking in my jaw, and ripping into myself.
When I tore it from the bone, warmth filled my mouth, and I was choking, guzzling down my own flesh, mulling it in my mouth and swallowing.
I can't remember how I got so deep, and why I didn't stop.
Why I didn't fucking scream.
But it didn't matter.
Red was standing up. She was clapping, her lips spread into a grin.
Her applause filled me with stars.
So, I ripped my hair from my scalp, a hysterical giggle escaping my lips.
She loved me.
I could see her jumping up and down, clapping.
Louder, and louder.
Her applause controlled me, twisting and contorting me into hers.
I didn't even think. I wanted to impress her, and doing this was doing just that.
My fingers were delving into my right eye socket, clawing my eye out. It didn't even hurt. Not with her thundering applause that was deafening, beautiful, an orchestra in my ears.
When I was semi conscious, my eye was crushed in my hand, but my vision was still mine, almost too clear. I could see streaks of red blurred between my lashes. My hair was caught between my fingers. But I wanted to do more.
When I stumbled to my feet, Red’s smile was so beautiful.
The man, however, looked horrified.
“Someone bring in the one of the successes,” Red’s voice was a shrill giggle, “Bring him in!” she clapped her hands together, and I spat out a fleshy thing. “I want to see them together! I want to see the future in front of us!”
Footsteps coming towards me in slow, shuddery thumps. I looked up, and a shadow was dancing around me.
When I slowly rose to my feet, I half realized I’d bitten my toe off. The shadow had a face, a boy who was younger than me. I think he used to have hair, but half of it was gone, half of it was still stuck between his fists. When I found his eyes, I found twin caverns instead.
Eyes that were still physically there, and yet there was no life.
No spark.
I was staring at a dead body, a flesh puppet who had lost his strings.
When he grabbed my hands, pulling me into a waltz, I caught a smear of scarlet trickling down the back of his neck. When I followed it upwards, his head was covered, slick, dripping with red.
Like me, he matched her too.
And he was beautiful, she told me, her push, her thunderous applause, guiding me into a waltz.
His feet moved, perfecting every step, and my foggy mind couldn't understand why. He matched my every move, the two of us floating across the floor.
My feet knew the steps before my mind.
How could he dance? I thought, dizzily.
How could he dance, when smeared scarlet followed his twisting, and turning and pirouetting feet?
Because underneath that swimming clinical light, the back of the boy’s head had been carved away, a perfectly sculpted cavern where his brain should have been. I could see the severed stem, where it had cleanly plucked out.
His fingers cradled in mine were wet. Swimming in blood.
His own blood.
Spinning round and around, I imagined myself as a princess.
I saw an 18th century ballroom lit up around us. Glittering smiles and glasses of champagne, long, flowing ball gowns.
I blinked, and my head was tipped back, gliding in blood once again.
When he pulled me to his chest, I stumbled, and a name came to light.
Luke.
I had found him.
Our finishing spin left me hard to breathe.
My body was broken, ripped into, and yet somehow not.
By the time we were finished, the two of us bowing, my mind was full of fog.
Cotton candy.
“Congratulations!” Red’s smile was inhuman, stretching right off of her face.
“You're in the S class!”
I was led through a door that wasn't the one I entered from. Inside the room were a dozen or so students, kneeling on the floor. They were missing parts of themselves, like unfinished puzzle pieces.
I dropped onto my knees next to a girl without a head. I could only see her torso, but I knew she was smiling.
Looming over us, was the goddess Athena drenched in blood that was still wet.
Dripping, pooling from every crevice of her dress.
Looking closer, this statue was moving.
Something sickly crept into my mouth.
Her right eye was human, a twitching eyeball sandwiched inside the stone.
It didn't match her. It was wrong, horrifying, like a painting, a real human eye struggling to focus on us.
And then, my own gaze found the statues head, where a real human brain had been forced inside perfect white, pink, greyish mush dripping down the sculpted, slender neck.
I could see where it had been pushed, pulverised through the stone.
The statue’s singular eye found me.
Its dancing pupil jumped up and down.
Before it blinked.
Next to me, Luke was on his knees, as if in prayer.
I can't remember leaving the room.
I just remember running.
Back down the stairs, stumbling, staggering over myself.
I was screaming by the time I reached the doors.
They opened, as usual.
But I couldn't get through. I tried, but I was slamming into something I couldn't see.
Pepto was still waiting outside. The sky was dark.
When he saw me, he stumbled over, slamming his hands into the glass.
I couldn't even understand myself. I was just fucking screaming.
Pepto held up his phone.
“DID YOU FIND HIM?”
I shook my head.
“No.” I lied.
I can't tell him the truth. I don't even know what it is.
“I can't get out!”
Pepto nodded slowly, typing something and showing me his phone.
I'm getting you both out of there. I think I know how I can get inside.
It's been 3 days, and Pepto is yet to return.
I’ve tried multiple times to cry out for the H word. But it won't let me type it.
Please H me. I need to get out of this place.
Fuck. Get me OUT OF HERE.
Classes start tomorrow.

hello all
I moved to another state where there is more humidity and pollution, and now my allergies are the worst they’ve ever been. 10 mg zyrtec OTC doesn’t help me anymore. I haven’t tried Zyrtec D yet , but my symptoms now consist of nose congestion and itch, a bad, dry cough, and ear pain. these allergies also make me feel weak and sleepy.
I don’t know what to do. I haven’t used flonase yet, and I don’t know if I should head to urgent care or not because I have no medical insurance yet. I don’t know if i should stick to drinking ginger tea..
help, please

Hey all! So I wanted to give a part two since I'm not high now lol, and also I wanted to clear up some things and add in some other details I left out that I just remembered. If you haven't seen the first part of this post then I suggest going to that, otherwise you'll be very confused. Also, I forgot to add this in my first post but DON'T READ if triggered by certain topics like r*ape, SA, murder, abuse, etc. Another thing is, this post is going to be a lot darker and aside from talking about what happened, I'm also looking for advice on my mental state and how to cope. So please read with caution because I'm going to be talking about what happened with B, but also about my past before him and how what happened is affecting my past trauma.
So, I'm not going to retell the whole story but I am going to be bringing up a lot of parts from it and things I didn't realize until after the incident happened. And some of the things I didn't think of until my friend brought it up. So in my first post, I was talking about how B (26M) was REALLY into Jeffrey Dahmer. Well, in the show we watched with Evan Peters, I noticed a lot of things Jeffrey did as well as already knowing a lot about him before watching it. I noticed that B was doing a lot of things similar to him. Now, I forgot to add in this part last time, but B was really 'straight phobic.' Now I'm a bi transman but I don't hate cis / straight people. In fact, a lot of my friends are cis and in straight relationships. For some reason though, he did, to a weird extent. And even though he was being respectful in the beginning, I'm starting to get a feeling he wasn't actually gay or cared about trans people. Because it seems as though ALL of his former partners were transmen. Which isn't that weird I guess, and he did tell me he tried dating a cis man before but it didn't work. After I met him in person he was telling me that he really liked his trans partners to still have sex vaginally and he liked tits. So, I was kind of confused at that. I think what was really going on was that he isn't gay but wanted to be so he could be like Jeffrey Dahmer. I know it's a bit of a stretch, but you'll see why later. So another thing is, Jeffrey would always ask his potential victims to go back to his place for drinks and to take photos, particularly sexual ones. Jeffrey would then lace the drinks and go on to do weird things to his victims while taking their pictures. And while I was trapped at his place, B kept pushing alcohol on me, A LOT. So much so, that when I kept refusing he started getting angry. However, once I pretended to take a sip it was like his whole attitude changed. He also kept joking it was laced, like EVERYTIME he offered me some. Even though I didn't actually drink any, like I said in the first post, I still got a few drops on my lips and in my mouth. After that I started to get a headache and was a bit dizzy. Also, he had told me before that he liked to take pictures of his partners in sexual poses while they held his guns. Aside from the guns, that's EXACTLY WHAT JEFFREY WOULD DO. For some reason, I didn't piece any of this together until afterwards. I guess I was too shaken up to think clearly. I said this before as well, but when I first entered his house, it was pitch black and he had black out curtains on EVERY WINDOW in his house. His bedroom, living room, kitchen, I mean his whole house made it seem like it was night outside. Another thing that is eerily similar to Jeffrey, is that B told me before I met him in person he always liked dating someone younger. I, at the time, was nineteen and he was twenty five, about to turn twenty six. I honestly don't know what was wrong with me so have not seen the BIG RED FLAGS in the beginning, but he played it off so well I didn't even notice them until after everything happened. And it isn't like me to go for older guys, I usually try to go for someone two years older or younger than me, as I don't like have a huge age gap between me and my partner. Anyway though, Jeffrey always went for younger guys, as well as sometimes KIDS. So, that's another thing similar between them, as well as the fact that B told me he was into little brother play. Where he makes his partners act like a younger brother during sex, etc. He also told me he liked for his partners to SUCK ON BINKIES. BRUHHHH, no thanks bro, I'm good. See, if it was just one of these things that he liked / was into, then I guess it would be normal. Just a guy into a weird ass kink, but all these things combined just did not sit right with me as well as how he was acting. Now, I said in my other post that basically the ENTIRE TIME I was with him, he had a weird ass expression on his face that made me uncomfortable. I wish I could explain better, but it was like constipated / confused look, like Edward from Twilight when he does those weird facial expressions. His brows were always furrowed and he looked like he was uncomfortable / anxious the whole time. He was being super sketchy. His body language was just really off-putting and made me feel weird. And the thing he kept ranting about the most was how Jeffrey Dahmer was misunderstood and just needed someone to be there for him, and then maybe he wouldn't have killed people. The thing that scared me the most was how he said he felt the same way, that he wished he could just have someone not leave him and how he had trust issues after his former partners. Especially the one I mentioned in the last post, about how his ex partner before me snuck out in the middle of the night and got his family to come get him. His family lived across the country, so it had to have been pretty bad for his ex to call his parents and tell them to come get him. Because they drove across multiple different states to come pick him up in the middle of the night so he could sneak away. I have a major feeling that B left out a lot of their fight and why his ex actually left. Not to mention while I was with him, he watched every move I made and wouldn't let me get on my phone without him seeing what I was doing / texting to people. I have a feeling if he thought I was trying to leave him he would've done something bad. Just like Jeffrey. Jeffrey wouldn't always hurt his victims (Not at first anyway) it was always when they said they had to leave that he would get angry and force them to stay. So, idk man, I could've been killed or worse. Also, I know I said I could've been killed or worse, and some of you are probably thinking what's worse than being killed? Well, to me, a lot of things he could've done would have been worse. Especially if he was trying to be like Dahmer, then I could've gotten acid injected into my brain or been r*aped. Which is exactly what I think he was trying to do, with how much alcohol he was trying to push on me. He also kept 'petting' me and touching my thighs while he told me all the ways he'd kill me 'if he was a serial killer.' I genuinely think that something bad would've happened if I didn't have one HELL of an excuse to leave. Because honestly, my mom couldn't have given a better excuse for me to go that also sounded real and not like a lie. Because, like I said before, I had told him before I met him that my mother had health issues and was always in and out of the hospital, so it was perfect that she used that as an excuse. He got really cold and wasn't speaking to me when he heard my phone call and that I had to leave, but I think if I would've tried to leave without that excuse or by giving him an obvious lie, then I might not be here. I'm also super grateful to my best friends who let me come to their place and stay late instead of going home. Me and my best friend, basically my sister, have talked about this a lot since it happened and every time we do, we try to rationalize why someone would act like that, other than being an actual serial killer / r*pist. But we can never think of a reason besides the fact that he simply is what he seems like. A really unhinged person who could've hurt me badly. Also, this was my FIRST TRUE experience in online dating and I honestly think I'm never going to try that again. I've run into so many creeps trying to date online, AND in real life. Most people who aren't trans probably don't realize or know this, but there are a lot of men that want to do really weird and fucked up things to trans people because I guess they think we are some mutant or something, or 'the best of both worlds.' I've run into them a lot, and when I met B, I thought that was over. I thought I had met an actual good person who was educated on trans topics and was respectful of my boundaries and my body. Nope. Now I'm starting to think dating, at least where I live now, is almost impossible and I think I'm going to be alone for awhile. :') Not to mention, I'm now traumatized after what happened with B, and I already had trouble trusting men, and just people in general. Before meeting him I have already been SAed before, multiple times. I guess I'm simply asking for advice on how to move on from something like this. I was trying, and doing kind of ok, moving on from things that had happened before I met B, but now after what happened with him I feel like I'm back sliding and it's making me relive all my past traumas. I basically trust no one, when it comes to sexual things, besides my two best friends I've known since childhood. I tend to over sexualize everything, even things that aren't sexual at all, and get scared around ANYONE, even family members, who I know deep down don't see me like that. I was also abused as a kid and wasn't able to get out of it until I was eighteen, and I've only just turned twenty now, so it wasn't even until two years ago I was still being abused. I feel I've fallen into the dark again and my panic attacks have gotten worse again. I feel depressed and I didn't realize until recently that I'm suicidal again. I didn't realize it until recently, because when I was younger and suicidal, I knew I was. I've tried unaliving myself before so I didn't think about it because I don't feel that way now. It's different this time. Instead of my thoughts directly wanting me to pull out a gun and, ya know, this time it's more subtle and more of a subconscious action. Like closing my eyes for a few seconds while driving. Or intrusive thoughts about ramming head first into the car in the other lane. Or going hiking and thinking of what it would feel like to step off the cliff. I'm honestly just tired. I feel like every person I meet has some kind of ulterior motive, whatever it is. I'm working at a really nice job but it seems like every time I save up money and am doing good for my future, I have to use it on something unexpected that pops into my life. I'm living with my grandparents for now because they said they weren't going to charge me rent, and I'm super grateful for that, but even still I can't keep money and I kind of just don't see my future anymore. Both my parents were drug addicts, my mother to pain pills then xans after that, my father was mainly an alcoholic but also did meth, pills, and other things. It doesn't help because when I was younger, around my early teen years (13-16) I started smoking cigs when I was 12, then I started smoking weed, which I still do, but then it got worse and I've tried xans, snorting pills I didn't even know what they were, drinking, and I've even done shrooms and LSD. I've also had some really bad trips on LSD that made my severe panic disorder worse and after that I now disassociate a lot too and have trouble knowing if I'm in reality while having a panic attack. And after what happened with B, his house and the smell (Cigs and booze) just reminded me what it was like living with my parents in that crack house looking trailer. It's like my brain won't let me let go of the past and move on. It's like I'm constantly stuck there still. And aside from dating, it's also super hard to meet people as friends where I live. I love my two best friends, one of which has been with me since we were basically fetuses and her parents and mine were friends, so her parents were also abusive drug addicts. It's nice to have someone so close and how we can relate to what we went through. We joke that we were traumatized by our parents, but also by each other's parents as well lol. Even though I'm grateful for them, you never know what's going to happen in the future and I don't want to be solely dependent on them and be able to make new friends, but I just can't. I feel so alone, and my friend I grew up with has been moved out a lot longer than me and has had time to heal, and I don't wanna keep dumping my mental problems on her because it's unfair to her. I feel like I'm just bringing her back to our past with me. When I moved out, I completely cut ties with my father, I don't even like calling him that, as he was the first person to SA me and he is, in general, and evil person. I try to think that evil people don't exist, but then I think of him and I realize they do. My mom though, is a good person when she isn't on anything. Recently though, I blocked her and haven't talked to her in over a month because she OD again on xans and amphetamines. I kind of realized recently that she is almost as bad as my father, even though I never wanted to admit that to myself. Because when I was younger, I admitted to her that he had SAed me and she kept pressuring me to tell her what happened, like, IN DETAIL. I told her no because I didn't want to relive it and think about it, even now I have a lot of repressed memories. And because I wouldn't tell her EXACTLY what happened, she doesn't believe. I think she does, deep down, but she doesn't want it to be real. And after her OD last month, she tried telling me she didn't and that it was just her BLOOD PRESSURE. LIKE OH MY GOD BITCH, WHY DO YOU LIE? She must think I'm stupid or something. Before I blocked her, I cussed her out over text and said something like "Who do you think was the first person at the hospital? Not grandma, not your husband, ME. I've always been there for you first. Who do you think told me you had OD? The doctors when I first got there!" And she still denies it, even though when me and my friend got the hospital she was lying there naked (they had to cut her clothes off to save her) with a breathing tube stuck down her throat. I've tried helping her my whole life but apparently she doesn't want help. So now I've gotten tired of her BS and I blocked her and now my grandma is pressuring me to talking to her, luckily though, my grandpa went through something similar as a kid and understands how it is so he isn't guilt tripping me into talking with her. I'm just tired of having to put into traumatic situations. My mental health just keeps getting worse. Somehow, trauma always finds me and nowadays, it seems my only friends are my demons. It used to not be like this, but now even when I'm with my two closest friends, I still feel lonely. Like they are reminding me that when I leave my friends, I'm alone again. Anyway, I know this probably isn't the right subreddit for this, but I kind of just started ranting, sorry for that.
Also, to clear some things up, no I don't use drugs, not anymore. I've never really been an addict at all in my life, somehow. I just did drugs because I wanted to escape when I was younger, and thankfully I never got addicted to any of them. Not like you can get addicted to LSD or shrooms anyway. The only thing I've got addicted to was cigarettes, which rn, is the least of my concerns. And as for weed, I used to be a major stoner but it started making my panic attacks worse so I stopped for a few years, cold turkey, and only recently started smoking it again. So, I'm not worried about weed and if anything, it's been helping now. Especially since I don't smoke it nearly as much as I used to. So, for those worried about me being or getting on drugs, don't worry I'm fine. I have made a clear boundary for myself to never do anything besides smoking my cigs and weed. Cause I've seen how drugs affect my parents and others I've known and I've sworn to myself that I won't become them. It also sucks though because I see psychedelics as something that can help a lot of people with trauma, and the first shrooms trip I ever did changed my life for the better. Now though, after my bad LSD trip, I don't know if I can every do them again. Maybe one day, but not for the foreseeable furture. Again, sorry for going on a rant. I'll probably post this to another subreddit and see if anyone can help. I'm not looking for therapy as I don't have the money or health insurance. Just looking for someone who can relate that has been able to move past similar things and find happiness. If you've read this far, thank you. Like seriously, from the bottom of my heart. It means a lot to me that someone would read about another person's problems and life experience. I hope whoever is reading this is having a great day / night wherever you are, and are living your best life. And for those reading that are going through a similar situation right now and can't get out, I promise you aren't alone. I haven't really gotten better, so I can't say things get better, but I can say it DOES get easier. All I can say is, you aren't alone in it. There are others, like me, who know your pain. Keep living, it'll be worth it. Even though I'm not doing my best and my mental problems are still with me, that doesn't mean it's all been bad. I've made a lot of amazing memories after I moved out. Keep going.

This reddit has been a treasure trove of information and support. We have seen many stories of other families who are enduring a hard, long few months with a reflux baby. Thank you for helping us feel less crazy and like others understand.
In our experience, we found there isn't a lot of helpful information about how to help a baby going through reflux and how to know if your baby might have reflux. So, we wanted to share our experience in hopes that you will feel less alone and maybe encouraged too!
If you want the story, here it is! If not, skip to the bottom section.
Feeding has been a difficult journey since our daughter was born. She lost over 10% of her weight in 2 days (I am told that is normal for breastfed babies). So, the lactation consultants encouraged me to begin pumping after every feed to increase supply, or 12 times a day. I did this for 4 weeks. While my supply eventually came in, feeding continued to be immensely difficult. After 7 lactation appointments and multiple appointments with the pediatrician, we were greatly discouraged. By the time our daughter was 8 weeks old, she would scream every feed and feeds would take close to two hours. Even giving her a bottle of breastmilk would take more than an hour for her to finish. I was ready to throw in the towel on breastfeeding because I was devastated at how difficult it was. Our daughter would scream and cry more than 10 hours a day. It was awful. I also experienced lots of nipple pain around this time, which added to the frustration.
When our daughter was 8 weeks old, our pediatrician referred us to an Occupational Therapist thinking her suck reflex might have issues. We had a 3 hour appointment with the Occupational Therapist who assessed that she did have some issues with tongue positioning when swallowing and a shallow latch, but her assessment was that reflux was the biggest problem our daughter was facing. We began doing exercises for the latch and tongue issues. Because of the OT's assessment, our doctor prescribed Famotidine for our baby. Now, our baby is almost 12 weeks and is very happy! Breastfeeding is one of her favorite things and is a good experience for us both! She eats in under 30 minutes and most feeds are joyful. There are still hard reflux days where she is unhappy and struggles to latch, but overall it is much better!
Here are the top things we learned:

1. We learned the signs of reflux our LO was experiencing. For her reflux looked like: Clearing her throat, latching then quickly unlatching, throwing her head back, crying as if she was in pain, tons of spit up (even 30 minutes after she ate), and she needed to be burped a lot.
   
2. Our baby developed a fear of reflux which led to a fear of eating. She became defensive during nursing, despite her hunger because she was afraid of acid coming up. She also limited her eating because with reflux she would experience more acid when her stomach was full. So, this was a key reason why our LO fought eating. Knowing she was in pain definitely gave me more grace and patience, but it was so sad to discover that she was afraid to eat.
   
3. We began to choose a baby-led feeding position
   

In the hospital, I was taught the football feeding position and was told to smash her face into the boob so she would latch. Many lactation appointments confirmed this. However, for our reflux baby, this added fear because she would try to pull away but I wouldn’t understand her cue. We learned from the occupational therapist that the baby has to trust that I see her cues of struggle so she can regroup before taking in more milk. This meant, we had to do a breastfeeding position where I was not holding her head and where she could have more freedom to pull away as she needed.
For breastfeeding we did a side-by-side position. Where the baby lays on her side right next to me. This gives her the freedom to pull away as needed. Once we rebuilt trust, I was able to do a cross-cradle position. I still do not hold her head. She can pull away as needed.
We also do this with the bottle. We started with her mostly sitting up, leaned against pillows. When reflux started to bother her, she could pull away and then come back when she was ready.

1. With our LO, we developed a mantra: When it doubt, pull it out

Anytime we think LO is having trouble and might cough/choke, we started pulling off the breast or tilting the bottle to give her a break.
For our LO, choking means more frustration and fear of nursing. I was concerned she wouldn’t latch back on, but I found it is much better to give her a break then to push her.

1. Burping

Our LO needed lot of burping. Here's our signs she needed burped immediately: clearing her throat, anytime she starts wiggling a lot, anytime she is choking or coughing, etc.
We got into the habit of always burping every 10mL of the bottle or 4-5 minutes on the breast. I also burp in between sides.

1. Upright positions make a big difference for our LO

We keep her upright for 20 minutes after a feed so she doesn’t have as much burning acid come up. It’s our way of helping her keep it down.
We had to plan when we'd do tummy time and diaper changes so that our LO wasn't at risk of spit-up (or hiccups). We did it before feeds or after holding upright for a while.

1. We learned to use a pacifier or LO's hand to help her keep the reflux down

For our girl, we found the swallow reflex can be used with a "dry nipple" (finger, pacifier, etc) to get her to continually swallow. This helps the reflux stay down for her! You and I do it all the time to keep stomach nasties from coming back up.

1. Celebrate every minute of baby sleep you get

A well rested baby eats so much better. Our LO was much more patient with us during this difficult work of feeding when she had a good nap. Give yourself grace if all you can do is contact naps.

1. Our experience with Famotidine (Pepcid)

We saw some results immediately.
We saw better results after 5 days
We saw great results after 14 days.
All babies cry. This won't change that. But it's nothing like it was before. Our LO does not throw her head back and most feeds are very positive. She's still fussy in the evening, but that can be normal for all babies.
We think we notice when it wears off, right now we're on a single dose per day. The last feed before her dose, she usually struggles. But that's nothing compared to how it was.

1. Help your Dr. by eliminating all uncertainty that it truly is a reflux problem.

We have a great pediatrician! But how do you know if a patient really does need medication when there might be something less drastic that would solve the problem? It really helped our dr. that we gave her a detailed account of the symptoms and timing of our LO's problems. It also helped that we happened to need to bottle feed our LO in front of the dr and it was terrible! The dr could see for herself what it was. I also cut dairy and regulated caffeine early. This helped our dr. be confident that a reflux medication was the best next step. We haven't added dairy back in yet. Just happy things are better right now.

1. Don't be afraid to advocate for you and your baby.

No one will care about your baby as much as you do. Lactation, pediatrics, OT, every professional has a specific purpose and goal that's aligned with what they know best. But YOU are the kid-expert. Trust your gut. If you think something isn't working or your LO isn't alright, advocate. Lactation will hope for a completely breast-fed baby. Which is a wonderful thing. But what's most important is that your baby is happy and healthy no matter how that happens. Formula, pumped, or breast-fed. Many pediatricians will be concerned with the child's development. We hit our milestones, but it came a huge cost of time with 120 minute feeds each time, and very little sleep. Make sure that ALL medical professionals giving you important advice knows your LO's backstory. We made some mistakes with this... That's another post. Taking good notes helped our occupational therapist spot the problem over time.
And when you try new things, get some sort of timeline of how long to try it before there be improvement. Find out if the medication or technique should work after a week or a month. This will help you manage your expectations when you might be feeling hopeless.

1. Know your milestones

It is normal for certain weeks to be challenging. Knowing our milestones helped us understand the full picture of what our LO was experiencing, not just reflux related. And, it gave us hope that some of the misery wouldn't last forever. Haha.
Non reflux-related breastfeeding lessons

1. Pump-related

I hurt so bad from pumping and I assumed that was normal. I went through weeks of blanched nipples and very significant nipple pain only to discover I wasn't pumping correctly! Make sure to measure your nipples for your flange size. If you are working with a lactation consultant, they can help with this. Also, I learned to check the breast pump manual to learn about the settings. I have now made some adjustments to the settings. Now that I have discovered these things, my nipple pain has gone away.

1. Shame when breastfeeding isn't working

I experienced a lot of shame and guilt when breastfeeding wasn't going well. I thought I was a terrible mom and I felt embarrassed that something that should be natural and easy was a nightmare. That led me down all kinds of destructive thoughts, fearing that I wouldn't be a good mom moving forward because this area was hard. I had to learn to reframe things. I had to start to see that any volume of milk my reflux LO got was a win. I had to discipline myself to not compare myself to other moms who could breastfeed in public for less than 10 minutes while I had to make sure to feed in the car, knowing my LO would take over an hour and cry nonstop. I had to learn that if a feed wasn't going well, it isn't a failure to decide to offer a bottle to help LO fill up more quickly. Honestly, I had to learn to lay aside my expectations and do what worked. And, I had to have my identity not wrapped around breastfeeding and my child's success. Just as my LO struggled in this area, she will struggle with more things in the future. I will be a better mom if I can love her through it without feeling shame for where she is at. Having a supportive, loving husband greatly helped when I wanted to throw in the towel. I also found that talking with my counselor and having a space to remember the truth about my baby (i.e. her struggling to breastfeed is because of the reflux, not because I am a bad mom), greatly helped my mental health and my relationship with my baby.
It is the end of week 11 for us and it has changed dramatically for the better! We are on week 3 of the Famotidine. Our baby smiles all the time and is a joy to be around. I am beginning to like being a mom, which I couldn't imagine 2 weeks ago. People say things get better at week 12 and we didn't believe them. We felt hopeless. For us, it actually did get better. But, we know that isn't everyone's story. Regardless of how long you have been struggling with a reflux baby, it is incredibly hard on the whole family. And, I don't know when it will get better for you. My prayer is that it will get better for you very soon because it sucks and is awful. In the meantime, I hope this post helps in some way or at least helps you know that someone else in the world gets where you are coming from.

You guys know what an alpine coaster is? They are like a small roller coaster you find in the mountains. They are also called summer toboggans or mountain coasters and I think there’s some long German compound word they are called in parts of Europe. They are like a roller coaster, but with much smaller one or two person sleds you just sit on instead of multi-person cars you ride in, and instead of being built with like a scaffolding or a framework the tracks are just on the ground, using the elevation of the mountain. Basically it’s a coaster track on the side of a mountain where you ride a sled down.
They are pretty fun. Or at least I used to think so. They are more “personal” than roller coasters and although you get nowhere near the speed on them that you do on a good traditional roller coaster and they can’t do corkscrews or loops or anything like that the openness and simplicity of the ride gives an impression of a much greater speed. You’re just sitting there with nothing but a little plastic sled and the track between you and the ground as it goes zooming by. It’s like the difference between how fast a go-cart feels compared to how fast a sports car feels. You know the sports car goes faster but the open, simpleness of a go-cart feels a different kind of fast. There’s plenty of POV Youtube videos if you want to get the basic idea of what they are.
I used to love alpine coasters. Used to.
My family used to go to Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge and up and down the Smokey Mountains for vacations when I was a kid and they are common in that area and I’d always rode them every chance I got.
But as with so many things after I grew up and went to college they just became part of my childhood that slipped away. They aren’t exactly common once you get away from the mountains.
Until one cool spring afternoon in 2004. I was in my final year at college and I was driving back to campus in Tennessee after a short visit to my folks in North Carolina. It was only like a 4 or 5 hour drive via the most efficient route and I had no need to be back at campus early so instead of taking the freeway all the way I got off and took part of my trip through the mountains. The scenery was nicer and I admit I liked pushing my Camaro just a little faster than I should through the twisty mountain roads.
Just after lunchtime happened upon one of those little by-the-highway tourist towns deep somewhere in the Smoky Mountains near the Carolina/Tennessee border. Nothing fancy, a gas station/truck stop, a diner, a couple of places selling tourist merch nestled deep in the mountains. I pulled into the gas station. My tank was getting low and I needed to stretch my legs, maybe grab something to eat. It was still early and I only had another couple of hours. I could kill an hour or so and still make it back to campus at a decent hour.
I pulled into the gas station and was filling my tank when I happened to glance across the road and… well I’ll be damned. There it was. “The Blue Ridge Alpine Coaster.” Nestled on the side of the mountain was a building, a mockup of a red barn, where a single railed track that led up into the mountains, where it soon got lost in the greenery. Wooden hand painted standees of cartoon character bears dressed in stereotypical “Hillbilly” getup stood around, some of them holding signs showing the ride hours and ticket costs and other info. I had to admit, as silly as it was, it made me smile.I finished pumping my gas and, well, nostalgia is a helluva thing. I decided then and there I could waste a little time riding an Alpine Coaster again after all these years before getting back on the road.
I parked my car in a corner of the truck stop's parking lot, put my phone in the center console, this being the days before smart phones when people didn’t keep their phones with them 24/7 and I didn’t want my old Nokia brick phone to fall out during the ride, locked my car and walked across the mountain highway to the Alpine Coaster building.
Getting closer, the place was less inviting. The half hearted attempt at a whimsical faux-Americana kitsch was far less effective when it brushed up against the actual decaying, run down wooden building. Hell calling it a building was generous. It was a wood frame holding up a long roof that covered the area where you got on the sleds. The wood boards creaked under my footsteps.
The only real enclosed structure was a shack that held, what I assumed, was a ticket booth. A door on the side had both a single occupancy bathroom with an out of order sign on it. An old Pepsi machine buzzed and glowed next to it.
Still the place looked alive. Ahead of me a bored looking attendant was helping a mother and her young son into one of the sleds while in a bored monotone repeating the safety brief. A few people were waiting in line at the ticket booth. Up in the mountains the playful shouts of people on the ride echoed down. Fond memories of my own childhood rides flooded my mind.10 minutes and 15 dollars later I was settling into the hard plastic seat of a bright red sled sat atop a simple aluminum rail.
I couldn’t help but grin as the sled slowly climbed the track up the mountains, making click-clack ratcheting sounds that hit my nostalgia centers hard. I felt good. The air was cool and crisp and smelled of pine.Higher and higher in the mountains we went. I don’t know if this is my mind trying to make sense of it after the fact but when I remember these moments, the last good moments, I sometimes think I remember a very slight, very subtle pit of fear in my stomach. I honestly don’t know if I felt it at the time or not or it’s just how my mind tries to make sense of it looking back at.
But either way mostly I was enjoying myself. I smiled. I was a kid again. I could hear riders in front of me let out that initial yell of terrified glee you get at the first drop of any good ride.
It peaked. I glanced around. I could see for miles, rolling hills and mountains. I the sled tipped over and zoomed down the mountain and I let out the same happy yell I heard from the other passengers.The ride zoomed down the mountain, catching speed. The mountain forest floor zoomed past, only a few feet under me. Trees zoomed past. I gave out a happy whoop as the ride banked hard around a curve and then looped back under itself.Another dip, another curve. I closed my eyes, enjoying the feel of the G-forces pulling me every which way.
There was no one exact single moment where things started to go “wrong.” The ride kept going. And going. At this point the first creeping thought entered my head.
The ride… was still going.
It just started to hit me… this ride was going on for a really long time. I had taken a dozen rides on various coasters of this type before that day and they topped out at about 5 minutes or so, and that was the long ones. Longer than a traditional roller coaster but not that long. This one had been going on for what felt like 10, maybe even 15 minutes.
I looked back over my shoulder and could only see trees, moving too fast to really get a bearing on where I was at in relation to anything.
I wasn't exactly really worried yet. Okay so I had found a particularly long alpine coaster. At the time I wasn’t 100% wasn't sure they didn’t exist or anything like that. I was a little… unnerved but nothing was happening that was impossible. Yet.
I was trying to talk myself back into just enjoying the ride and stop overthinking it, and halfway succeeded, when out of nowhere I suddenly banked hard, the track jutting out almost over a sheer cliffside. I gripped the sled more tightly as I was whipped around. The ride then dipped hard and picked up speed, barreling down the side of the mountain.
I was pushed back against the seat by the force of the drop. Jesus I didn’t remember them being this rough. I was feeling slightly nauseous. And where had this elevation drop come from I wondered? I was still in the foothills and I didn’t remember seeing anything but gentle rolling hills and light drops from looking at the ride’s route earlier. How the ride had managed such a long, steep drop in this area I didn’t know. . For the first time I hoped that the ride would be over soon. I had no idea then how much I would want that same hope to be true so much more as time went on.
With a whiplash motion I was whipped forward and then back as the ride leveled out on flat ground again, but by this point I was going fast, too fast. My neck hurt from the mild whiplash and I felt sour in my throat and for a moment the contents of my stomach threatened to come back up. For the first, but hardly the last time the ride felt unsafe. Alpine Coasters are tame affairs, much slower and gentler than full on roller coasters but this thing was throwing me around like no thrill ride I had ever been on.
I looked around. I mean I wasn’t that deep into the woods. I should have been able to see a glimpse of something; the highway, the gas station, the tourist shops, the Alpine Coaster office, something, anything. But nothing. Just trees.
I forced back some panic for the first time. I closed my eyes and counted to ten. The ride zoomed along. I counted to 60. I counted to 60 again. And again. Okay this was getting uncomfortably harder and harder to explain.
Suddenly I noticed that up ahead the track seemed to just end, for one brief, terrible moment I thought the track just ended but I was wrong. Almost without warning the track dipped in an almost vertical drop. I almost screamed as I plummeted for 20, maybe 30 seconds before flattening out again.
By this point the voice in my head that was telling me something was wrong was louder and I could no longer tell myself it was wrong. This ride could not have been this long. I tried to make sense of it, wondering if somehow I had gotten diverted onto some kind of maintenance track or, hell for one brief irrational moment even entertaining the idea that I had wound up on an actual train track somehow. But that was absurd. The rail below me was not a train track, it was still just the simple, aluminum rail of an alpine coaster and there had been no diversions or junctions in the track. I was still on the ride, as insane as that was starting to feel. Had the ride somehow looped? Again after having the thought I immediately dismissed it as crazy. There’s no way I could have missed the ride building where I got on. And what kind of ride loops over and over?
The sled zoomed through the forest, oddly never seeming to lose speed despite the relatively flat grade of the track. I cursed myself for leaving my phone in the car and not wearing a watch. I don’t know exactly how long I had been on the ride at that point but it felt like I had been on the ride for a half hour, maybe more. But time is a funny thing when you’re in a situation you’ve never been in. Could have been more, could have been less, at that point.
My pride finally failed me. I started to scream for help. I screamed out that the ride was broken, to stop it, that I needed help. I did that for about ten minutes or so I think. The ride kept going. Mostly flat, level track with occasional mild dips and turns. But the simple length of the ride grew more and more unnerving and unexplainable.
I thought about just bailing out. But the ride, impossibly, was still not slowing down and chunks of mountain rock and thick tree trunks were all around me. Bailing out without risking smashing into a rock or a tree seemed impossible.
The ride kept going.
Up ahead the forest was clearing out some, I could see the forest brightening, more sunlight making it through the canopy.
I wasn’t prepared for what I saw.
The trees stopped and I had just enough time to take in a flat, open area of rock maybe 40, 50 yards at most before another sheer cliff. The tracks twisted and turned and then shot straight down. But that wasn’t the worst of it. For a moment, a very short moment, I had a clear view for miles and the landscape was, to be blunt, totally impossible. Any possibility that I had just stumbled on some incredibly long ride was blasted out of my head. Barren, volcanic looking rock stretched for miles. Jagged, black rocky outcroppings as far as the eye could see. I was in the goddamn Smoky Mountains. They don’t look like that.
I had a few moments for the terror of that view to settle in before the cart plunged into another horrifying drop. I gripped the handles of the cheap plastic sled until my knuckles turned white. The drop felt completely vertical, like I was falling at terminal velocity. I screamed. My stomach dropped and turned. I imagined the sled coming away from the track and me just plummeting screaming to my death on the rocks below. But somehow the ride still functioned. I closed my eyes tightly and just waited for whatever was going to happen. Eventually after several what felt like a full minute of steep plunging the track again leveled out, and I opened my eyes to see myself moving at breakneck speed over that black, rocky landscape.
Now that I was moving on a more or less flat horizontal track again I took a few deep breaths. I looked over the edge of the track. Nothing but that black, jagged rock, almost looking like obsidian, zooming past. I had no idea how fast the sled was moving now. Fast. Faster than a gravity powered sled should be moving. And the track was higher off the ground now. Alpine slides usually stick pretty close to the ground, but I was 20 feet or so in the air, the track suspended in the air, a simple metal tube tower like a power pylon every few yards.
Without any immediate threat and the sled moving fast but steadily and level I was able to think about my situation again, for all the good that did me. Ahead of me the track just continued to the horizon, nothing but the same rocky landscape as far as I could see. I craned my neck to look back over my shoulder and looked back behind me and it looked the same. Even the mountains were but distant specs on the horizon behind me.
This was insane. There’s not a giant seemingly endless field of black jagged rock in the goddamn Smoky Mountains. There’s no cliff faces tall and steep enough for a multi-minute vertical drop. And alpine coasters were small affairs, not major engineering projects that span miles with pylons and vertical tracks. It made no sense.
Sadly it wasn’t going to start making any more sense anytime soon.
The ride kept going.
I was on this rocky landscape for several hours. I feel comfortable saying this because I could actually notice the sun getting lower in the sky. And the sled wasn’t slowing down despite the grade of the track being flat. I was getting cramped from sitting and stretched my legs and twisted my back as best I could. Didn’t do much help. My eyes were starting to get irritated from the constant wind in them. Worst of all it was starting to get chilly. I only had on a light jacket, a windbreaker, just something to keep the breeze off me, no real insulation. I was cold, my joints were stiff, I was hungry and thirsty. My eyes watered and my throat was so dry it was sore.
But none of that was as bad as just how little sense this all made. There’s nothing like this place anywhere near the Smoky Mountains. This was like some volcanic rock landscape. The more I thought about it the less sense it made.
The ride kept going.
My mind didn’t even try to process this. Whatever I was experiencing simply couldn’t be possible. I was crazy. I was dreaming. The CIA had kidnapped me and dosed me with some new version of LSD and I was in a straightjacket in a padded room at Area 51.
The sled kept zooming along as the sky turned to dusk. Soon the bridge disappeared from my view and I continued on along the endless, rocky, featureless landscape.
I sat back against the sled, mentally and physically numb. I was exhausted. I was thirsty. I was cramping up. I was hungry. I had to pee. I held it for as long as I could, then had no choice but just wet myself. I cried until I had no more tears left. Then I just sat there.
The ride kept going.
By the time the sun dipped below the horizon my throat felt like sandpaper. I dug around in my jacket pockets hoping to find a stick of gum or piece of candy. Nothing. I checked again, having nothing else to do. Under a crumpled store receipt in the inner pocket of my jacket was a single old, forgotten cough drop. I unwrapped it from the paper and popped it in my mouth. Saliva flooded back into my mouth and I was overwhelmed by the methanol and medicine taste. It was something at least, although I knew it would be a brief and temporary fix at best.
I felt my eyes get heavy. It was getting colder. That mountain cold. That deep cold the mountains have even into the early spring when the sun goes down. That kind that just pulls the heat right out of you. I shivered. A terrible, horrible certainty came to me. I would ride until I passed out from exhaustion or the hypothermia set in. My body would tumble off the sled to fall and skip across the rocky ground like a stone skipping across a lake, my bones breaking as I tumbled until my body finally came to a stop. If I was lucky I would be killed and not have to lie for days, broken and bruised, on the ground until death took me.
The ride kept going. The ride kept going. The fucking ride kept going.
“Fuck you” I said to the ride, my voice a horse whisper. I pulled my jacket closer around me, for all the good it did. The cold wind was slowly but surely pulling my body heat away. My shivering got worse, crossing the line from a simple normal shiver into those deep, almost violent full body ones.. I wasn’t anything you could call an experienced outdoorsman, but I knew enough to know that wasn’t a good sign.
It was getting dark. There was a full moon at least so I wasn’t totally in the dark.
About then I noticed something. The landscape, what little I could see in the fading light, was changing. It was smoothing out, becoming less rocky and craggy. Up ahead an odd, shimmering light was starting to appear on the ground.
I was over it before I even realized what it was. The tracks were going over a smooth surface.
Water. It was a lake. The odd lights I had seen were the moon, reflected in ripples on the lake.
Within minutes I was out of the view of the land. After the nearly endless rocky landscape and everything else I had seen, it scared me how little I was shocked. I didn’t like how mentally numb I was getting. I leaned over. There was enough moonlight to see the water, 15 or 20 feet below the track. The pylons holding up the track went into the water, the light wasn’t good enough to even make a guess at how far they went down or how deep the water was.I leaned back in the sled. My eyes were red and bloodshot from the constant wind. I closed them. This was a mistake.I jerked awake. I don’t know if I dozed off for a split second or an hour. My weight had shifted and I caught myself as my center of gravity was in danger of sending me off the sled and into the water.
I screamed in anger. A deep primal scream. I hurt so bad. My joints felt like they were full of glass. My limbs were full of pins and needles. I glanced over at the water. For the first time on the very edges of my brain a tiny voice started to speak up, telling me that I could be all over if I just jumped. I shut the voice up, but it scared me still.
I sat there as the ride went on. It felt like hours. Eventually the lake ended in a rocky shore line. The damned ride. There was no safe place to bail out. If the ride slowed down, it was high in the air, if it moved toward the ground it sped up. Sharp rocks, big trees, nothing you could safely bail out into.
I kept having to force myself awake. I kept dozing off. Once I felt myself falling asleep and drove a vicious uppercut into my own nose to stave it off.
I seriously started to think about how much longer I could hang on. The voice came back again. This time I didn’t shut it up. I wasn’t admitting it to myself yet, but I was starting to think about the best way to land that would end it quickly if I needed to.
Something was ahead. The track seemed to dip into the ground. I was too tired, too beaten to even get scared. I was just resigned to whatever happened at this point.
With little warning the track took my sled into a tunnel in the ground. Everything went completely pitch black. After several moments even the dim moonlight was gone.
This was the worst part. The creepy forest, the immense rocky landscape, the eerie lake… those were bad. But this was just nothing. Nothing to look at, nothing to hear, nothing for reference or sense of where I was going. The walls of the tunnel felt like they were inches from me in every direction. The air felt thick, like there wasn’t enough oxygen.
With every moment I was in that tunnel I lost a little more hope. After a long, long time I made a decision. When I got out of this tunnel, I would jump. I didn’t care anymore. Hopefully there would be a spot where I could be certain the fall would instantly kill me. I was done. The ride had beaten me. I sat there, waiting for a chance to end this on my terms. That was all I had left.
Eventually up ahead, a tiny speck of light appeared. I gathered my strength, ready to end it. I sat up, getting my legs under me so I could jump as soon as we were clear. The sled burst out of the tunnel. The dim light of the full moon was enough to be momentarily blinding after the pitch black of the tunnel.. I gave my eyes a moment to adjust.
I was back in a normal looking Appalachian forest. Rolling hills, green trees. The air smelled of pine again. I heard an owl hoot off somewhere.
Slowly I lowered myself back into a setting position, in shock. At first I refused to believe it but the ride was slowing down. I held still, making sure my mind wasn’t playing tricks on me, but no, the cheap plastic sled that had been my world for what felt like an eternity was slowing down.
Up ahead, a structure was visible, peeking out from among the trees in the dim lighting as the sled moved down the track.
It was the Alpine Slide building. The crappy fake red barn where I had boarded this cursed ride so long ago. I blinked and rubbed my eyes, sure it was either my mind or the cursed ride playing tricks with me. But the building stayed there.
It grew closer and closer. The track leveled completely out. The sled slowed down more. Before I had the time to really come to terms with it I arrived back at the building.
The sled slowed to a stop, gently pumping against another sled parked on the track. I sat there for a few moments, gasping in great big gulping fear breaths, trying to assure myself the ride didn’t have one last trick of its sleeve.
I looked around. The place was empty, deserted. The overhead lights were still on and the old Pepsi machine still glowed and buzzed, but the ticket booth was dark and empty, a metal gate pulled down over the ticket window.
Suddenly it hit me that I was free and I practically leapt out of the sled and onto the platform. I immediately collapsed. My legs were jelly and my head was spinning. I tried to stand up again and doubled over, dry heaving. Have you ever been out on a boat for a day and have that weird reverse motion sickness when you’re back on solid land? It was like that times a hundred. My inner ear was literally pounding, all the motion had really done a number on it.
I laid there for a few moments and eventually forced myself to stand up on my two wobbling legs. I looked around, a horrible certainty creeping into my mind that there would be no exit, no way off the platform but to my relief an exit turnstyle, one of those full height ones, was set into the fence that surrounded the ride property.
I went through it and found myself back on the main road. The truckstop was still there, still open but far less busy. My car sat in the same corner of the parking lot I had left it.
I allowed myself one look back, just one quick one. The metal skeleton of the Alpine Slide track sat there, dark and quiet but otherwise normal.
I stumbled-ran back to my car, dug the keys out of my pocket, and collapsed inside. When the door shut I let out a primal scream, the tons of fear and confusion and anger all fusing into a single, raw emotion. I screamed again and again.
After a few moments I felt like I was emotionally at least back to a place where I could act, although I wasn’t sure yet what to do next. Not really knowing what to do I cranked the car. The A/C had been on low when I shut off the car and it came roaring back to life and cold air blowing on me almost sent me back into a full on panic attack. I fumbled with the climate controls until the air stopped blowing directly on me, then calmed down enough to turn the heat on, helping to get the chill out of my bones. There was a half full bottle of water in the center console cup holder and I grabbed it and chugged it. Nothing ever tasted as good before or sense as that few ounces of water.
That was when I noticed the clock on the radio head unit. It was 4:17 in the morning. It had been about one, one thirty or so in the afternoon when I got on the accursed ride.
Over 15 hours. I had been on the goddamn ride for over 15 hours. Over half a day.
I just sat there. Warming up. Calming down. I was exhausted. I was dehydrated. I can’t even describe how my head felt. I probably had at least a minor case of hypothermia. I thought about going into the gas station and asking for help but what would I even say, and more than anything I just wanted to get away from this place. And I just wanted to get away. I wanted to be nowhere near that damn ride.
I put the Camaro in gear and pulled into the street and in panic I immediately slammed on the brakes. I was lucky there was no traffic on the road at that moment. The feeling of accelerating to just normal surface street speeds made me sick to my stomach. I gathered myself and very slowly accelerated the car I usually treated with a very heavy foot up to 30 miles an hour. Every time I tried to accelerate at a pace faster than “Old Lady Going to Church, Uphill” I would have a panic attack. I was okay once I was up to speed, but accelerating freaked me out after being on that ride.
I drove about 30 minutes, putting some arbitrary amount of distance between myself and the coaster. Eventually I made it back to where the twisty mountain road met back up with a major road that would eventually meet back up with the highway. After a few more minutes of driving I saw the onramp for the highway. There was one of those big truckstop travel plazas and pulled in, parking right up at the door. I smelled like pee and I can only imagine how I looked, but I didn’t care.
I kept a couple of emergency 20s in the back of my wallet and spent it on the biggest bottle of water the store had, an overpriced bottle of eye drops, and a huge travel mug of coffee. The clerk looked at me as if he was expecting me to either drop dead or rob him the entire time.
Back in my car I downed the coffee. I put a few eye drops in each of my eyes and sat there as the caffeine took effect until I felt like I could make it back to my apartment. The sun was just coming up when I finally pulled out of the truck stop and got on the freeway. I slowly, very slowly, accelerated up to highway speed, put the Camaro in cruise control, and let the miles start to drift away. I turned on the radio, I needed to hear human voices. Every time my mind went back to what had just happened I turned the radio up louder, eventually drowning it out with painful levels of rock music. I wasn’t ready to think about it yet. Yes looking back I know I was just in denial. I finally made it back to the crappy little apartment I had off campus, a little two story walk up studio. I let myself in and collapsed on the cheap couch. I was asleep before I even had the time to decide whether or not to do anything else. I woke up later that afternoon. I took a shower and ate a meal and didn’t think about the ride. I washed the pee stained filthy clothes I had been wearing and didn’t think about the ride. I went back to class and didn’t think about the ride. Every time I thought about the ride I forced it out of my head. I’m sure this wasn’t the most mentally healthy thing to do but what can you say?
I didn’t forget about it, don’t be silly. This isn’t the kind of thing you forget. One day while looking up something else in the university’s library my curiosity got the better of me and I looked up the Alpine Slide. No website but a few Google Map and Yelp mentions. None of them mentioned anything weird, certainly nothing even remotely like what I experienced. Near as I can tell it closed sometimes in the winter of 2012.
Life went on. I mean, that’s what it does. The next day was a little better. And the day after that a little better. And the day after that a little better still. I met a nice girl. Graduated. Got married. Got a nice house in the suburbs. Got a dog. Had a daughter. Spent a lot of time happy and not thinking about being trapped on an endless alpine coaster.And that was my life for many, many years after that.
Until a few weeks back when as a very different person I found myself driving a boring and safe mid sized family SUV through those same mountains. My wife Carol, 5 months pregnant, sat in the passenger seat, our 6 year old daughter Emily in a booster seat in the back, and Max our mixed breed mutt next to her. It had been a nice pleasant trip, driving back from visiting her folks.
I hadn’t thought about that fucking ride in so long I barely registered that I was in the same general area until it was too late. Suddenly I realized that little mountain tourist trap town was only a few minutes down the road. I swallowed hard and gripped the steering wheel hard. Carol was looking out the window at the scenery and Emily was deep into some kid’s Youtube video on an iPad. I forced myself to keep my breath steady as we rounded the corner.The town was still there, sorta. Time had not been kind to it. The gas station was still there, at some point it had been bought out by Shell. The tourist trap shops were still there. One of them was now a vape shop. The diner was closed, the building looking like it sat unused for a long time.
But of course that’s not what I cared about. A looked over at the site where the Alpine Coaster once stood. It was gone. The kitschy fake barn was gone. The site was just a bare concrete slab with a chainlink fence around it. Faded “no trespassing” and “for sale” signs hung off the fence. A pile of old, decaying lumber that might have once long ago been part of the structure covered part of the old lot. No sign of the track remained outside of some old concrete support posts dotting the side of the mountain.
I exhaled out a breath I hadn’t even realized I had been holding in. Soon the little town disappeared in my rear view mirror.
About a half hour later we stopped for gas. I pulled up to a gas pump across from a massive motorhome. Max stuck his head out the window and started barking at a little white dog, a toy breed of some kind, in the window of the motorhome. Carol and Emily immediately headed into the store to restock on snacks while I fueled up.
I stood there, a half smile on my lips as Max barked and wagged his tail in an attempt to attract the attention of the other dog while I filled up the tank, said dog doing an admirable job of ignoring him.
Right about the time I finished fueling up and cleaning the bugs off the windshield Carol returned from inside the store, Emily in tow, arms filled with two full sized bags of Salt and Vinegar Potato Chips and what looked to be a half dozen individually wrapped pickles.
I raised an eyebrow at the collection of food but knew better than to question a pregnant woman's snack choices.
“Should we take Max for a quick walk?” Carol asked. The travel plaza had a nice little gated dog walking area off to the side.
“Yeah probably not a bad idea, he’s been cooped up in the car for a few hours.” I said. Max, upon hearing his name and the word “walk” , forgot about the other dog and upgraded from wagging his tail to wagging his entire body while making whining sounds and staring right at me.
About this time I became half aware that the big motor home next to us was pulling away. I didn’t think much of it, outside of doing a quick automatic mental check to make sure Emily was well clear of the moving vehicle, but she was safely between me and our SUV, well out of the way.
But that was when Emily looked behind me and cheerfully yelled “Daddy look a roller coaster! Can I ride the coaster?”
It’s cliche as fuck I know but my blood went cold.
I turned around slowly, certain in my knowledge that terrible old decrepit Alpine Coaster would be there, having just popped into existence to trap me again.
That.. is not what I saw. Sure enough there was a coaster there, one I hadn’t noticed earlier because it had mostly been blocked by the motor home, but there it was. It was even an Alpine Coaster.
But it was not the same coaster I had encountered those years ago. That was immediately obvious. It was a small but modern and newish looking setup with neon lights and a bunch of people. There was an actual building where you bought tickets and a little snack stand.
“Daddy! Can we go on the coaster!” Emily asked again.
My mouth made motions but no words came out. I glanced over at Carol, hoping she’d say we didn’t have time but to my horror she smiled and said “You know what? That does sound like fun. Daddy will take you while I take Max for a walk.”
My mind raced, trying to think of a way to get out of it. But Emily was already dragging me across the parking lot to the entrance.
I patted my pocket, making sure my phone was in it. Every fiber of my being was screaming to run away. I slept walked through the line and the ticket booth while Emily bounced happily.
We got into a two seat plastic sled. This one was actually a lot nicer than the one my mind wouldn’t stop thinking about. It had two nice cushioned seats, big grab handles, even a nice rollbar.
The sled started up the track. I fought back the panic. I swerved my head around, keeping the building in my view. I was terrified of losing sight of it. We made it to the top and Emily did a happy squeal as we started down the side of the mountain.
My heart raced. Any second, any second my mind told me we’d lose sight of the building and then the ride would never end. The ride sped down the mountain. My mind tortured me with thoughts of not only going through it again, but seeing Emily go through it. The ride went around a big, banking turn. Emily kept shouting happily. How long before Carol reported us missing I wondered? Could I keep Emily calm? What if it lasted even longer this time? What if this time it never ended?
And then we were back at the start of the ride. The same attendant who had helped us into the sled was helping Emily out. I stepped out. The attendant gave me a brief look but said nothing. I guess I looked a little wild eyed.
I was fine. Emily was fine. It had been a perfectly normal, fun ride.
“That was fun Daddy! Thank you!” Emily said. I forced a smile back. “It was fun.” I responded, hoping like I sounded like I meant it.
I took Emily’s hand and we walked back to the car. Max saw us coming and barked happily. Carol looked up from the pint of Ben and Jerry’s she had somehow acquired and added to her snack collection while we were gone and smiled at us.
“Did you have fun?” she asked.
“It was so fun Mommy!” Emily said.
Carol smiled down at her, but then looked at me and frowned. “Are you okay?” Carol could read my face a lot better than the attendant could. “You’re pale.”
I smiled and this time the smile felt real. “Ya know what. Yeah, I think I am okay.”
Carol looked a little puzzled, but didn’t press it. We loaded Emily back in her booster seat, stopped Max from trying desperately to eat half a discarded gas station hot dog off the ground and got him back in the car. Carol and her small collection of snack food took her place in the passenger seat and I got in the driver's seat.I smiled. I cranked the car. I put it in gear. I pulled out of the gas station and back on the road, this time accelerating just a little faster than I had in years.

Today, I lost our Alfie after 11 years with us.
Alfie was a rescue that we met 11 years ago, to this day. A small, chihuahua mix – he was often timid with others and people, but for some reason, grew very interested in us at the dog park day. We were there to actually review adopting another dog, but that dog took no interest. Instead, Alfie (then named Rugger) followed us around the dog park as my partner (now husband) and I walked around the dog park. We would look back, and there he was – checking us out and shyly walking the other direction each time we caught him. Our heart became set on him, and as he sat in the back while other more aggressive dogs with their love came forward, we were set on him and pushed our way through the crowd to get back to him.
Right away, we could tell that he was possibly abused as a stray from San Bernardino. He was cautious and hated us picking him up – his body would fall flat to the floor. Regardless, he still worked through his timidness and crawled into bed and went under the sheets on our first night and slept with this. He always felt shy and timid with strangers, never scared just not too sure, but he blossomed and showcased his love, fun and energy with us. We always got to see him for all he is and could be. I could tell that he trusted us – and I know that sounds cliché since I’m sure every pet parent feels this way, but it seems like he knew we would always have his back. He never left our side and would come with us to family gatherings just as if a child would. He was our baby and he knew it.
Last year, kidney disease popped up on our radar at stage 2 – it was a shock, but after 10 years and an unknown true age (rescue estimated 3, vet estimated 4-5), we knew that we were getting into this old age problems. Suddenly, his teeth got bad – and we were hesitant to do anesthesia. But they got worse and worse as in the case of most Chihuahua’s, and we did some blood work to see if he was stable before scheduling an appointment. Then we were told it was stage 3.
He was so uncomfortable with his mouth, we knew we had to do something – but then we started considering his medications, his back injections, his anemia, his lethargy, his qualify of life… We made a decision, then it was back and forth on some good days, til it wasn’t. We made the decision to put him down yesterday, and this AM the vet came over and put him down in the living room with him in my arms.
I am absolutely heartbroken and I cannot stop crying. I’m physically feeling pain in all parts of my body. My head hurts, my nose hurts, my eyes hurt, my throat hurts, my chest hurts… everything is just hurting from nonstop convulsing crying. The vet said he was passing already from the sounds of it and her visual examination, and not even a half dose of his sedative caused him to start going and an irregular heart beat (he pulled away yelping from the injection). But I can’t shake that I chose this and chose his death. I can’t get rid of this guilt and this horrible feeling. And then I remember everything, then I focus on missing him, then its guilt, and now its me being pissed that I didn’t get more time with him and that this feels so unfair and how dare God take him from me with conditions that led us to this point.
I don’t know what to do. I am just repeating everything in my head nonstop. I keep expecting him laying right next to me and to feel his warmth, or him asking for help onto the bed or couch. I can’t stand to look at all the things that gave him joy (being a Chihuahua from CA in Washington State, mostly blankets and space heaters). Everything is causing me grief and pain. I feel like this is excessive but I cannot stop – it’s been 7 hours but I don’t know. This feels like too much and I don’t know if I’m strong enough.
I don’t even know what I’m looking for, it just seemed like someone could take this mess and tell me something. Anything. I just miss my boy and the only thing that would make me feel better is having him back. This is just too hard. I know he may have been up to 16 years old, but this still just kills me.

I'm a 42 year old male, I met my wife when I was 18, she was 23 and we began 'dating' when I was 21, working a job I hated in the same place she worked (casino workers, if you know, you know). We hooked up at a Xmas party and started a very awkward relationship. I say awkward because we had some weird trouble having sex for the first like 6 months... it's odd when I think back on it, should have been a huge red flag but she was draped in reg flags the entire time and it didn't seem matter to me. Aside from that, when we finally did have sex she got pregnant... she was not at all ready, neither was I really, but are you ever? At any rate, I didn't have too much of say in it, she decided on an abortion and I supported her. We stayed together after that horribly shitty experience, our relationship was never really all that good, lots of petty fighting/arguing and really the only reason it continued was because we worked opposite shifts and barely saw each other which made it easier to sorta get along.
Fast forward a couple years, we decide to buy a house because financially it made sense (this is almost 20 years ago so it was still affordable at that time), she made quite a bit of money, mostly in tips (so not on paper), but she probably made 2-3 times as much as I did so she never really struggled financially (in her life I don't think) while I came out of poverty and lived paycheck to paycheck up until a few years ago (the pandemic was surprisingly good for my career). This was never really an issue for me, I've lived in debt my whole life and I've always had the optimism that I would eventually work my way out of it, it's really the only bit of confidence I have in myself, my ability to learn and become relatively good at almost anything. This was always a point of contention, my wife hated that I had debt so when we bought the house together we were asked if we wanted a joint bank account as most couples combine their finances with cohabitation, my wife scoffed and adamantly told the banker there was no way she's mixing her finances with mine, it was relatively embarrassing at the time but I was also just 25 (she was 30) so I went along with whatever, it was going to be slightly cheaper for me to pay a mortgage than rent at the time so I was in and she'd cover bills. Things were never that great when living together, things must have been good enough for me to stay but I only look back with anger now so it's hard to see anything good but I'm sure there must have been some.
Fast forward another couple years and I feel extremely pressured (by her and her family mostly, they're old fashioned country type folks) to ask her to marry me... so I do. We stay engaged for another few years, I have no desire to waste a bunch on money on a wedding but she's the one with money so we have the big wedding she wanted. I'll admit it was a pretty great party, I don't remember anything good involving her on our wedding day but I have lots of good memories with family and friends. Afterwards we went on a 'romantic' honeymoon at an all-inclusive tropical resort and this is where I'll get into a bit of what I've dealt with for years... our resort was gorgeous, room was nice, just a room but nice... first thing my wife did was complain, about everything, the bed, the fridge, the lights, the balcony... nothing was good enough for her, this would become a common theme for the next decade plus. We also did not have sex on our honeymoon, she was far too busy complaining and being angry for us to ever get in the 'mood', this would be more foreshadowing of what's to come.
Now, this might seem like I'm building up to her becoming really bad after getting married but that's not really the case... she was just as bad before, it didn't really get worse, it just became more noticeable... or maybe I just tolerated things more in the beginning. The truth is when I look back, there were so many signs, she casually put me down and basically treated me like a child from day one, something I just accepted because looking back, I was a fucking child when we got together... she was not really, five years my senior, and she very much took advantage of that dynamic. Over the years she slowly went about convincing me that the things I wanted were silly/ridiculous and that I should want what she wanted (the nice lawn, the house, kids, etc., etc.) because everyone should. I never wanted these things.
I won't get into details here because I could write a novel on the insane shit I've dealt with over the last 20 years that could prove this, but I did do a lot of research in the last few years and have come to the conclusion that she could have BPD with narcissistic traits... I'm obviously not a doctor so it's definitely not a diagnosis or anything but she ticks almost every box from the many many things I've read on the subject, so if you have a moment and you don't know what BPD is I suggest googling it. It's pretty terrible but it might give you a better idea of my life.
At any rate, I dug myself deeper and deeper, thinking that every next move would finally make her happy and bring me some kind of peace, so we had a child about a year after we were married. This is where it gets really tricky... I sincerely regret having a child with this woman, especially because she is not at all "cut out to be a mother" (her words, not mine) but her mother had been sick on and off with cancer for a few years and her older sister couldn't have children so she felt obligated to give her mom a grandchild, bad reasons all around to have a child. That being said, I love my son more than anything in the world. As much as I wish we did not bring him into this horrible world, he's still the very best thing to happen to me and I will take care of him and love him for the rest of my life no matter what.
I should mention, since I've eluded to it, I've always had self-esteem issues, goes all the way back to having acne problems in high school but my wife has methodically picked away at my confidence and self-esteem over the years, cutting me down to this very day... to the point that I feel very much worthless. I know that I'm not, I know I deserve better but another fun thing about my wife is her desperate need for sympathy... So, not only does she make me feel horrible about myself, she also manages to make me feel horrible FOR her... she's overweight, and I'm sure has low self-esteem herself but she has decided to take it out on others rather than internalize and try to make things better for herself. She would rather blame others for any of her short comings, I guess it's easier to convince yourself you can't do anything about it when it's someone else fault.
I apologize, because I feel like I'm a bit all over the place but I guess I'm just trying to set the scene for where I'm at now and give just a small glimpse of the hell I've been living in and how I got here...
The first few years of my sons life were pretty great (comparatively at least), honestly it was probably the best we've ever gotten along, probably because most of my focus (and hers) was on our son. Unfortunately, her mother passed away just after my son's first birthday, this was obviously devastating for her, not unexpected but still devastating. We're lucky in Canada because she had a full year maternity leave and was able to spend time with her mom. She took it very hard, and decided to stay off work for an additional 4-6 months (can't remember exactly). This was all fine and understandable, I supported her through all of it, financially and emotionally. Once she went back to work, this is when things took a real nose dive... she has always been a very entitled person but upon going back to work (part time I should mention) she decided everything was horrible for her so she was going to make it horrible for everyone around her. This went on for around 4-5 years (again, the time frames get fuzzy because it's been so long), it was hell. I really just plowed through for our son, I made him my main focus and I took care of everything. Without going into it too much, I sort of shifted gears with my job and focused on finding something that worked better for raising a kid, I got onto a full time day shift (unheard in the casino world) and we worked opposite shifts. It was pretty good for child care (that we couldn't afford) as one of us was always home. This made her more contentious... again, going back to the entitled thing, she felt it wasn't 'fair' for me to work a good shift, she should be the one doing that. I eventually worked my way out of casinos and into a work from home job (before COVID) and it was great, she could work whatever shift she had to and I would always be around for our son.
Fast forward again, my son's in school, she's still super angry at life and making things hellish but I do my best to make it good for our son. It's difficult to keep a smile on with him while putting up with temper tantrums and fits from my wife... yes, we had a toddler and she was the one who threw fits. For an example, I can recall one specific Xmas where my son and I were playing video games which is his biggest interest, something she absolutely hates, and she made a few comments about how we should be doing family things together for Xmas (it was Xmas eve), so my son and I got off the computer and played a board game in the living room... nice and wholesome fun I thought. My wife throws a fit, full on screaming and slamming things around, I don't even remember what for exactly, it happens so often I can't keep track anymore. Her temper tantrum ends with her storming off and slamming the door to her room. I'll never forget looking at my son right after, him tearing up a bit and asking me "what is wrong mom?" and I just said "I'm really sorry buddy, I don't know" and we hugged... I cried a lot about that that night, one of many times I would have to apologize for her and the way she acts around him. This is just one small example and a terrible Xmas memory that I'll always have, hopefully my son won't. I think the worst part of these 'tantrums' is that she can almost always justify them, only to herself really but usually by blaming me or my son for "making her so upset" or worse, blaming some inanimate object for "not working how it should".
Fast forward to now(ish)... I've basically lived in my basement for the last 5 years, my office and bedroom are there, I stay down there to avoid my wife as much as possible but it feels like a prison cell now. I've retreated from life in general over the years too, I've always been a pretty anti-social introvert, I prefer quiet one on one conversations rather than group settings. Most of my 'friends' over the last 10-15 years revolved around my job (casinos take over your life people, for real) and my wife, I slowly lost any friends that had no connection to her. This was partially due to me retreating and the fact that my wife would insert herself into any friendship that was just mine to the point that I sort shut those people out to avoid them having to deal with her. Sadly, I don't have friends anymore (didn't have many to begin with but still), my son is essentially my only friend and because I work from home by myself I rarely talk to any other adults. My wife and I talk only when necessary... I cannot make eye contact with her anymore. This is probably needless to say but we haven't had sex in over 6 and a half years and I don't cheat, I don't have the confidence, so I've just accepted that I'm celibate now.
One other area of contention that I feel I should explain since I've mentioned it already, through the pandemic there was a serious power shift, financially speaking. She essentially lost her job and is now in a lower paying part time job (more realistic pay compared to her previous job), whereas I made a couple job changes that bumped me up well ahead of her. For comparison, the salaries essentially flipped, almost exactly... to where I make 2-3 times what she makes. This has become an area of contention because this was something she was able to lord over me for the majority of our relationship, she spent money freely while I paid the mortgage and barely ate for the first 5 years we lived in the house but now, for the first time in her life she has to pay attention to her finances and watch her spending... she does not like this so it's just another thing to constantly complain about and make passive aggressive comments about the things that 'dad' can afford to do/buy but doesn't (mainly because I'm paying the mortgage and all the bills now while finally paying down some debt).
Oh, I should probably also mention that it's a regular thing for her to insult me and put me down in front of our son and on flip side of that she also uses him to garner sympathy from me ("shouldn't daddy feel bad mommy has to go to work?") it's very frustrating because I just want to protect my kid but I guess she knows that.
Again, I'll apologize for how disjointed this all is... the more I type, the more I think about shit to type... like I mentioned, I could write a novel on this, mostly because I have no real outlet, just sit in my basement talking to myself about it all... or I guess stewing in it.
So, I guess I should try to finish off with what exactly the advice is that I'm seeking... I essentially hate my wife, the word I use often is 'despise' and over the years we've had brief conversations where I've told her that "I'm done and I'm just here for the kid" and unfortunately she took this as push to work on our marriage harder and 'fix' things, far too little, too late. She makes me feel like the worse person in the world and yet I just can't bring myself to say to her face that I want a divorce... I feel sorry for her, fuck so much so that I bought a house with her, married her, and had a fucking kid with her... I'm sure that's not the case, I must have loved her at one point but I just can't see it anymore. I don't know why I can't say it to her, why I can't just end this... I'm so worried about how she'll react, what she'll do to me, to my kid... how she'll try and turn him against me. I'm just paralyzed with the fear of what could/will happen if I tell her we're getting a divorce.
I've made plans over the last few years to move out, rent an apartment for me and my kid and just continue to pay her bills until we can sell the house and split the profit. I can't afford to do this, it would cause me to go back into debt but I do not care, it would be worth it to get away from her. I have set deadline after deadline... "I'll do it after Xmas" or "after her birthday" or "before my birthday" and these days come and go and I just can't do it... I don't know what the hell is wrong with me, it's like I just don't want to hurt her, even though I'm hurting her by not ending things and she definitely doesn't give a shit about hurting me... I just don't want to face her and deal with it and how she will make the aftermath hell.. and I worry so much about my son, it would have been so much better for him if I would have divorced her years ago, he's fucking 10 now... another fear is having to explain it to him but we're setting a horrible example. One of my wife's favourite ways to use our son against me, is planting it in his head that "family is all that matters", focusing specifically on our little family, and how we have to "stick together no matter what, that's what family does". It's such an underhanded way to prep him for hating me because I'm "breaking up our family".
I would appreciate any advice on how the hell I can get over my paralyzing fear and just end this marriage or maybe you wanna come over and end it for me? I'm at a point where I'd take that... as I mentioned I've not shared most of this with anyone... so feedback would be a really new thing for me.
Oh, and please feel free to call me chicken shit, and tell me I just need to grow a pair and get this done... it's the same thing I've been saying to myself for years, not helpful but I understand the sentiment.
Shit... I'm sorry, this turned into a novel. Thank you.

Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road
With the coming of morning Rene found the earth enwreathed in a grey and sinuous fog that was so thick he felt like he was standing on the shores of an ocean of sky. Only the lapping edges of the wide pond he had located was visible beneath rolling tails of mist. He couldn’t even tell where the heavens ended and the water began—they had all joined together at the waist in one vague mass. It all had filthy, sooty smell to it too, like the inside of a baker’s oven. As through a clouded window pane he saw a red and malevolent haze glowing on faraway slopes to the southeast. Zildiz noted his bewilderment and taunted him:
“Don’t you recognized your own handiwork when you see it? An entire biome went up in smoke because of the Engine’s rampage. Not that I mind—all this is Leaper territory after all.”
“Cry me a river,” Rene scowled, dipping his boots into pond and wading into it. It was only knee height at the deepest point. What’s more, he could see the blurred outlines of small darting shapes below the surface that he hoped were fish.
He made Zildiz sit with her back against a sapling and bound her to it with the spool of webbing he’d collected.
“Don’t get any ideas,” he told her. He slipped off his boots and raggedy socks, rolling up the jumpsuit around his calves and getting back into the water.
At first he tried to get at the fishes with his bare hands. It would be just as easy as catching the milky cave species they raise in the aquaculture ponds back in Ulysses, he thought. All one had to do was slip one’s hand in with glacial patience so as not to disturb them, dipping the palm right under their bellies. Rene had gotten so good at it as a boy that he could even tickle them right in the gills and under the chin. But he soon discovered that the fish on the surface world were nothing like their subterranean cousins. For one thing, they weren’t blind, or stupid. The little rascals fled when he floundered after them, feet slipping on the mossy stones that covered the pond bed. Zildiz looked on with interest as the single worst attempt at hunting she had ever had the misfortune to witness began. This Rene-creature was as clumsy as it was slow-witted, splashing around in fruitless pursuit of its feeble prey. How had these animals ever managed to conquer the stars? Zildiz watched as Rene stubbed his toes on a sharp rock and howled, falling arse-backwards and losing his visor in the process. He then painstakingly dredged the pond bottom for it, turning it up some time later all covered in water lilies and mud. Rene angrily slung his backpack back on and cleared the gunk out of his mask before fitting it back on his face, only to begin yelling as a river crab he’d left inside tried to crawl up his nose. He tore the mask off again and doused it in the pond, finally ridding himself of the curious crustacean.
“Phew!” he sighed with relief.
“Toss it in again,” Zildiz suggested gaily, “At least that way you might catch another.”
“Shut up,” Rene glowered, face going purple with rage. He grabbed the biggest stick of driftwood he could find and began beating the surface of the water as if it owed him money.
Zildiz hid a smile at that. She was famished and events had definitely taken a turn for the worse, but at least someone else was suffering more than she was.
And while this halfwit is preoccupied, Zildiz schemed, I’ll go ahead and signal the god for help. She activated the magnetosynaptic organ behind her inner ear and tried all the usual frequencies.
Nothing but static. Either her organ had been knocked out of commission with the loss of her exomorph’s functions, or the heavy smog caused by the wildfire was getting in the way of reception.
But more than this, a greater part of the Vitalus would be preoccupied with containing the damage to its work. As a shared consciousness It had unimaginable processing power, yet It tended to deal with the world in a holistic fashion, neglecting the individual elements. This did not mean that the god could not be effectively omniscient—It merely had a wholly different perspective and hierarchy of priorities than did Its mortal servants.
For problems on the micro scale, it did however deploy Hollowores or other Inkarnids. Zildiz wasn’t vain enough to think it would send such an avatar of creation and destruction just to retrieve one lone Gallivant. No help would be forthcoming for a while. No matter; she was certain that she could outsmart the Fleet-man soon enough.
Then something happened which drastically altered her perception of him and his kind. Rene grabbed another stick and banged the two pieces together, frowning with concentration. Without a word he returned to the survival kit and combined them with the spool of webbing, twisting them together into the silk and rotating them to create something that was greater than the sum of its parts.
Grinning evilly, the Fleet man took the two sticks and the webbing strung between them and gently lowered them into the pond. He then waited, tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth as a fish approached him. When it refused to come any closer, he took one of the white cubes and crumbled it into pieces, which he sprinkled liberally into the water right above his new tool. Eventually the fish took the bait and swam in for a nibble. In a flash Rene pulled up the net and held up a wriggling, pinknosed carp with an ecstatic cry of victory. Chuckling at his own cleverness, Rene hauled his catch to the bank and dashed its brains out on the rocks. He then repeated the process until he caught three more carp with the exact same method. He gutted and descaled the carp with his clasp knife in a trice.
Zildiz was seeing the boundless cunning of these creatures firsthand. It bothered her more than she cared to admit. Granted, if her exomorph was up and running she could’ve killed him in a heartbeat, humming sword or not. But the rate at which he had adapted to his surroundings was concerning.
For comparison, say a Gallivant wished to specialize in the catching of fish. It would have had to ask the Vitalus to edit its gilt helix so that its exomorph could accept the grafting of an appendage designed solely to catch fish. This was assuming the Vitalus had calculated that the addition of this new capability would not lead to the eventual collapse of the riverine ecosystem in the next ten or twenty generations, or that the Gallivant in question could be entrusted with such a responsibility, assuming that its lineage’s previous contributions to the Great Game rendered it worthy of the sudden advantage.
Meanwhile, Rene had developed the net tool in less than the span of an hour, with absolutely zero regard for the consequences of his actions. Zildiz could only imagine what an entire nation of Renes could do if they were given time to multiply beyond Arachnea’s carrying capacity. Clearly this Fleet was a threat not to be taken lightly.
Rene finished cleaning the fish and skewered them on sharp sticks. He then found some pebbles and started banging them together to produce sparks above a pile of bark scrapings and twigs, careful placing one of the brown lumps from the kit inside. It was just as successful as his first attempts at fishing; he smacked the rocks together until he bruised his fingers, then hurled them cursing into the fog.
“Sonofa…” he swore, squatting next to Zildiz and looking at the raw fish dejectedly.
“What, you can manage all that but can’t get a fire going?” she asked, nodding at the blaze in the distance. Rene made no reply, too busy sucking on his thumb. Suddenly he unsheathed the sword and Zildiz nearly panicked, thinking that she had finally annoyed him to the point of violence. Instead, Rene picked up a chunk of quartz crystal off the ground and cut it in half, producing a shower of sparks as the edge met the mineral. Rene piled the fuel again and repeated the trick with the sword and the stone until the tinder caught and tiny streamers of smoke wafted up. Cupping his hands around the precious heart of flame, Rene blew on it lovingly and smiled as it grew into a merry, crackling cookfire.
Making sure to give Zildiz a smug look, Rene sat cross-legged next to it and began to barbeque his meal. Zildiz had built fires herself during the cold monsoon seasons as a special allowance granted by the Vitalus for extreme weather fluctuations, but those had been for warmth, not to burn food with.
The smell of the browning fish skin flooded Rene’s mouth with spit. He saw Zildiz licking her chops unconsciously, said:
“Don’t worry. You’ll get yours.”
Sure enough he held out first batch of carp for her to eat, blowing on it to cool it. Zildiz even forgot her hostility for a moment as she seized the fish with her jaws.
“I can feed myself, you know,” she told him between crunchy mouthfuls of bone and white flesh. It was delicious! An explosion of flavors that was at once both salty and slightly burnt, the meat firm yet succulent. Swallowing greedily, she pulled the fish off its stick and ate it whole, the fish’s head crackling under her molars. Rene watched her choke the thing down with a mix of amazement and alarm, then replied:
“I would consider giving you an arm free to eat with, but you’re a walking arsenal, lady. Is it good, though? My cooking?”
“Passable,” Zildiz lied with a shrug of her shoulders. Her affected disdain did not stop her from giving the rest of the carp a longing look. Rene knew she was hungry and tore the next fish in half, gorging himself and giving Zildiz the rest. Very soon all that was left of their breakfast was a pile of bones and scales that Rene kicked back into the pond. He sat back and propped his bare feet next to the fire to dry his toes.
“Uuurrpp!” Zildiz belched appreciatively.
“Bless you,” Rene commented, and settled down for a nap. He could only rest his eyes for a moment, as the woman would slit his throat as soon as he let his guard down. But the fatigue of the constant marching and fighting amassed on the edges of his consciousness. Slowly but surely, he was pulled down into the untroubled realm of sleep, free from the cares of his existence.
Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road

All right here it is finally, thank you all for your patience and let's hope chapter 5 is a little more expedient. As usual I hope you enjoy and would love to get everyone's thoughts.
4: Memory transcription subject: Zeak, Harchen orphan, citizen of the Venlil Republic. Date: standardized human time July 13th 2136.
The sky was a roaring mass of fire and pungent black smoke that choked out the light of the sun. As I ran down the street, green blood flowed like a broad shallow river. It splashed up with every step I took, sticking to my scales, the smell of it made me feel sick. As the piercing wail of the emergency sirens seemed to grow louder and louder with every step I took making my ears ring and filling my head with a thunderous pain. My heart pounded, my lungs were on fire, and my legs felt like they were made of lead.
A herd of towering blurry figures appeared out of nowhere and ran past me, some almost knocking me down. In their panic they began to look more like crazed wild animals than people. I cried for help but they couldn't hear me. I waved my paws then grabbed one of them a male Venlil, tightening my grip with all the strength I had hoping this would get his attention. He threw me off like I was trash, less than trash. I turned around and continued pleading for anyone to help me, reaching out for others. But their frantic idiot eyes looked only straight ahead and not down, never down, as the herd passed me.
I turned back around and continued to run, blood splashing up soaking me all the way to my knees. I stumbled, my legs were so tired I could barely stand, and I fell down catching myself, plunging my paws into blood as deep as my wrists. I felt myself scream but I couldn't hear it over the ringing in my ears. A scrap of paper gently floated past me, a single word written on it that echoed in my mind “Weakling.” It passed and four more took its place, “Coward”, “Liar”, “Oath breaker”, “Murderer.” I screamed in rage and slapped the pieces of paper aside, blood splashing onto my snout, but the meanings of those words remained. Getting back up I stumbled forward, and fell down again. Then with an effort born out of sheer desperation I managed to stand again lurching forward. My legs were too tired to run but I had to keep going, I had to save them. Or at least her, please Protector if you're listening please let me save at least her.
It felt like I was searching for an endless time. Lurching forward, stumbling, falling down, getting back up, lurching forward once more. Eventually I saw it and my heart fell into the pit of my stomach. My family's car was turned over on its roof, the driver's side had been caved in. It was engulfed in fire and thick black smoke that rose up into the sky. I struggled forward and when I reached it I collapsed, my knees hitting the hot pavement. The smell of burning metal and something else I didn't know assaulted my senses making my stomach turn. Every muscle in my body begged me to run away. Calling out their names l looked inside, and a wave of nausea and horror flooded through me.
I turned away and vomited, then reached up with my blood soaked paws and covered my eyes. Those words thundered in my head making me think it was going to burst open, as hot tears welled up. “WEAKLING! COWARD! LIAR! OATH BREAKER! MURDERER! MURDERER! MURDERER! MURDERER! “I'm sorry I'm sorry, I should have stayed, I should have helped. Why did I run?” I wailed, still unable to hear myself. Someone rested a delicate paw on my shoulder, and the world went quiet. As the pain in my head melted away.
My eyes snapped open and I was greeted by the gentle ringing of my alarm. In a rush of adrenaline I leaped out of bed not even bothering to wipe the sleep out of my eyes. Running out of my bedroom and down the narrow hallway towards the living room. Convincing myself It had all just been a horrible, horrible nightmare and everything was alright. Mom and Dad would be fixing breakfast, Dad softly singing a Harchen folk song while making something savory and delicious as mom sang along in harmony, preparing something special for my baby sister Naila. Oh yes and Naila, she would probably be sitting on a cushion in the sunny part of the living room. Holding her crooked tail, a birth defect which my parents said could be fixed when she was older. And making excited chirping noises at my arrival, while sunlight shone against her emerald scales. I loved my baby sister, I knew other kids resented having a younger sibling. Dismissing their responsibilities and spending less time with their family and more with their friends. I never once felt that way, the moment Naila hatched I devoted every spare minute I had to her. Finding music that would help her fall asleep, watching over her when my mom needed a break. Excitedly telling her about the day's events and what I learned at school, especially what I learned in computer science which was my favorite class.
“Mom! Dad!” I yelled bursting into the living room. “I just had the worst…” My voice trailed off as I was greeted with nothing “dream.” My heart tightened painfully in my chest, as I frantically ran through the house throwing open every door, knowing that they had to be here somewhere. They were just playing a game on me that was all, a game I would tell them I didn't appreciate. After the final door had been opened and no one was there to yell “Surprise!” My body slumped and I felt heavy as reality set back in, and the memories of what happened hit me like a hammer. I made my way back down the hall to my room, tail dragging behind me as I crawled back into bed. Wrapping myself tightly in a blanket, trying to find some comfort.
It must have been hours I lay there feeling numb all over, wishing I could get up the energy to just cry. I think I might have fallen asleep at one point. If I did it was a dreamless sleep, thank the stars for that. Eventually I did get up, sitting cross-legged on my bed, resting my chin in my paws, staring holes into the wall. I took a deep breath and side numbly looked out the window, searching for anything to distract myself with.
It was overcast, and eerily quiet. The emergency sirens had stopped blaring yesterday mere hours after everyone had gotten to the bunkers. The bodies of the dead had already been collected and their blood cleaned from the pavement. So as to not attract any predators into the neighborhood. I saw my neighbor A'shul was home, his white vehicle was sporting some new dents. I wondered, when he got into his vehicle yesterday morning and drove to the nearest bunker; did he try to help anyone? Or was he thinking only of himself? I suppose it didn't matter really. Nothing mattered.
I turned my head away and looked around my small room taking in everything, every trinket, misplaced item, my old second-hand desk, a big green crackle finished monster. Better suited for a Venlil than a young Harchen, heck I needed a stool just to use it. I had gotten it for basically nothing about a year ago, when the local extermination office was getting rid of their old furniture. All it took was a small bribe and they put it in my bedroom when no one was home. My parents, but especially my mom we're not happy when they saw it the next day. They would tell me at least once a week that It was too big for me and they were going to get rid of that eyesore. “Wouldn't you like something a little more modern dear?” My mom would ask, practically pleading for me to say yes. I used to pray that my parents would just shut up and stop bugging me about that stupid desk. I thought it was great, it made me think of private detective Bal from the exterminators show. Bal was a no nonsense Harchen who was so often pivotal in tracking down the predator or predator diseased person. My desk was very similar to his and that's why I wanted it. But at that moment, I would have given anything to hear those words again.
On the desk there was an ornate wooden box, with a fruit tree in full bloom delicately carved into its lid. There were also scuff marks where it had been dropped, and a deep crack running down the center. It was known as a blessing box, Naila's blessing box to be specific. When she hatched nearly ten months ago the whole neighborhood had been invited to come and write a blessing on a scrap of paper and put it in the box. I had written one too, not a blessing but a promise, a promise I couldn't keep. The belief was that if kept near the infant, the combined power of all those blessings would keep the hatchling safe until their first birthday. Where on that day the box would be set on fire and burned to ash. Releasing those blessings back into the world so they may protect someone else. It was an old tradition and not commonly practiced anymore, but as my dad always said “It is important to keep the old traditions alive my son. Both in song and action.” I remember asking him why? And he looked at me like he had been waiting for that question for a long time. “Because” He said, his tail moving with authority. “Someday when you lose your way, and you don't know where to turn to. You will always have something to guide you back to your center.”
Looking away from the box not wanting to look or think about the damn thing, I shifted my gaze down to my bedside table. There was a little holographic projector showing pictures of me, Mom, Dad and Naila on holiday back on Fahl, the Harchen home world to see family. I was born and raised on Venlil prime, so I didn't really know any of my extended family. There was a picture of my mom and Naila sleeping at the beach. Naila’s crooked tail coiled around mom’s arm, their scales a deep emerald in the light of the sun. The picture changed to me and Dad putting the finishing touches on a sand skyscraper taller than him. I had to sit on his shoulders to place the last bucket full of sand on top. Both of our scales were as blue as the ocean. My tail flicked sadly thinking of that day. I reached over and turned the holo protector off.
My holopad lay next to me flashing, alerting me to an urgent message. I hadn't really looked at my holopad since yesterday morning. Picking it up I tapped the flashing icon. It was an official government statement signed by Governor Tarva herself, saying that the humans Noah and Sarah were peaceful explorers, and that they only wished to be our friends. ‘No, that's impossible, they’re predators. Predators don't want peace, they want to conquer, kill and eat us,’ stunned and confused I kept reading. The rest of the message stated that the two human scientists were completely unaware there was intelligent life of any kind on Venlil prime. ‘No! Lies! Predator lies!’ I yelled inside my head. Something hot began to form in my chest as I read the last bit. Governor Tarver had shown the two predators footage of the Arxur torturing Venlil pups. It said that the humans were capable of empathy and felt deeply saddened and angered by what they saw. They vowed to do everything in their power to get their united nations into the war against the Arxur.
I scrolled all the way down and what I saw stopped me cold. Standing in her office being flanked by General Kam, stood Governor Tarva. Beside them looming over the two Venlil one bigger than the other, both of them covered in some sort of protective suit. Their faces were obscured by dark visored helmets. It said that the larger of the two Noah was male, and the smaller one was Sarah female. Sarah had her hands clasped in front of her, while Noah kept his to his side. Neither were acting threatening, and neither Tarva or Kam looked to be harmed in any way.
Something in me snapped, that hot thing inside my chest erupted and I could feel my scales turn black. I very carefully set my holopad down beside me, then I uncrossed my legs and got out of bed. I stood there in the center of my room shaking slightly, feeling terribly calm as white hot rage flooded my body, spreading to my paws and all the way out to the tip of my long tail. It never had to happen, the panic, the stampede, the death, we could have stayed home and avoided those people. ‘No… no not people,’ a bitter thought came over me. ‘They're not people at all, people stop and help, like that Venlil girl Kayleik, she was a person maybe the only one. But the rest of them were just wild animals, masquerading as sentient beings. ‘Do you really think you're any better, coward?’ Some internal voice said.
A sudden impulse took control of me and I grabbed my desks stool and hurled it against the wall. It dented the wall and bounced off still in one piece. Enraged, I leaped forward grabbing it by the legs, then turned around and slammed it into my desk. The sheet metal dented and the green crackle finish paint flew off, but the stool made of good dense wood from the string fruit tree stayed whole. “DAMN THEM! DAMN THEM! DAMN THEM! DAMN THEM!” I screamed, slamming the stool down again and again, my tail whipping wildly, striking the bed and the floor. The tip of my tail began to hurt, which only fueled my anger. Finally I heard cracking and wood began to splinter off. They didn't have to die, we could have stayed home. The muscles in my shoulders burned and my heart pounded as hot tears began to well up. I brought it down one final time narrowly avoiding the blessing box, and the stool broke in two. I hurled the pieces away from me, one slamming into the corner the other crashing through the window.
I leaned against the desk catching my breath as tears flowed freely. ‘Well that definitely showed them didn't it. Hey I got a great idea! Let's go break some more stuff, that will definitely make you feel better. Idiot!’ That internal voice said all coldness and bitterness. As I cried, the burning in my chest cooled, and I was filled with the same numbness as before. After a while my stomach growled, reminding me I hadn't eaten since yesterday. I moved sluggishly out of my bedroom and went straight to the kitchen, quickly grabbed some fruit and left to go and watch the view screen or something. The moment I entered the living room, memories came flooding back. Mom and Dad laughing, Naila sleeping peacefully, the lingering aroma of breakfast, and the warmth of our home. But now it was all gone and I was alone. For the first time in my life, I had no one to go to.
It was right then I realized I couldn't stay here anymore. This place felt like a tomb, all cold and filled with the memories of the dead. Besides, if I stayed here someone would eventually send the authorities to come and get me. Ship me off to an orphanage, foster care or maybe to my extended family back on Fahl. I balked at the idea of being forced to live with people I didn't know or trust. Memories of yesterday's stampede invaded my mind and I shuddered. I couldn't trust any of them not anymore. No, there was one person I could think of that maybe I could trust. Turning around I went back to my room, found my backpack and grabbed my holopad, the blessing box, the holo projector and my blanket stuffing it into my pack. Then I went to the kitchen and filled my pack up the rest of the way with dried fruit and vegetable snacks. With my backpack looking like it was going to burst I shouldered it and made my way to the front door. When I rested my scaly paw on the door handle I stopped and looked back at the place that was once my home. “Goodbye” I said in a shaky voice, knowing this would be the last time I would never set foot in this house. With my head low I opened the door and stepped out, into the dim light of a new unfamiliar world.
Previous First

So, I wrote up a little intro to an RP I was taking part in with a friend, and it kinda... Spiralled.
I quite like what I ended up writing, so I'm sharing it here. I think I did a good enough job offering up an interesting angle on Stormcast.
For a bit of context; Améline is a Knight-Questor, and Gorgo is a mortal she's taken on as almost like an apprentice. Gorgo heard about this 'storm-goddess' that was immortal and couldn't be beaten, and glory-hungry tried to first defeat Améline in a fighting competition. Long story short, Gorgo got knocked out so early she didn't even get to fight Améline, but she ended up getting to train under her instead. Gorgo's grown quite a bit over the training, which includes getting traumatised by fighting Chaos alongside Améline.
Gorgo also has six snakes on her head instead of hair.
The reference Améline makes to being worshipped is that, well, she's pretty much a goddamn superhero. She inspires others, and because she's a demigod born from Sigmar some of that becomes outright worship, which she doesn't know how to deal with.

Out in the field, Améline could put on her sigmarite war-plate in just a bare few minutes, a skill refined by repeated necessity. Here, in the safe confines of the fortress, she could afford to take her time, slowly easing on each piece of her gear onto her body and tightening the leather straps until her armour was securely placed. As she did so, Améline quietly whispered prayers of warding to her armour in one of the secret tongues of Azyr, taught to her by her Lord-Relictor, Herakes Who-Carries-The-Firmament-And-Laughs.
Améline smiles to herself as she remembers when Herakes had let her in on a secret; the prayers by themselves, unless charged with arcane or divine power, did nothing for her armour. They were simply tools to focus the mind before battle and calm it with rote.
"And a Retributor-Prime needs all the focus they can get." the venerable Lord-Relictor had laughed. Scant moments later, she would watch him be eviscerated by a Bloodthirster while bellowing oaths of . But Améline liked the memory of that day regardless, and was thankful that it hadn't been one of the ones taken from her by the Anvil of Apotheosis. Try as she might to put the pain of loss from her mind, Améline missed the uncomplicated camaraderie of the Blackhammers.
It had been simpler in the early days of the Realmgate Wars, she muses to herself, not for the first time. Not easier, not by any measure. But Améline's world had been the Stormcast she stood shoulder-to-shoulder with, the enemies at her front, and the survivors she had rescued. Lord-Celestant Phionas gave the Retributor-Prime her orders, and she would enact them as best she could or die trying. She was surrounded by siblings who implicitly understood her in ways others struggled.
She hadn't stood out; she'd just been another warrior in Sigmar's army.
She hadn't been been a hero that people looked up to; just another Stormcast fighting to free the Realms.
Améline hadn't been worshipped back then.
And now...
Améline hears a knock on her door, and releases a quiet breath she hadn't realised she'd been holding.
This was nostalgia talking, she reminds herself. Cherry-picked memories of a hellish period of war, further pared down by numerous Reforgings. It had likely been just as messy back then too; she'd just managed to overcome the problems that had plagued her back then. She would do so again with the present, and whatever might come in the future.
She just wished she had the Blackhammers again, she thought mournfully to herself, before slowly easing herself upright, going over to the door and opening it.
When the door is opened, Améline finds herself looking down at Gorgo. The quiet gloom of the Stormcast's thoughts pervade further; though now she knew Gorgo was on the road to recovery, she couldn't help but see the young woman's trials marked all over her body. Not just in scars, but in the way she carries herself.
When Améline had first met Gorgo, she'd been a strutting peacock of a warrior, staring proudly right into Améline's eyes as if challenging the Stormcast to refuse training her. Améline hadn't begrudged the youth's pride; instead, she took it upon herself to let Gorgo remake it into something more productive, and healthy for the warrior. Améline remembered how her snakes had flared outwards, looking like the crest of a multi-coloured tropical bird.
The product of that training now stands before her; wan, tired, her shoulders slumped by weights that couldn't be seen by eye, but pulled her down terribly nonetheless. Even her snakes lounged down over her scalp and shoulders. Gorgo still looked up at Améline's eyes with a strange kind of confidence, born of experience rather than arrogance. Whatever her agony, Gorgo wasn't broken yet.
It still sent a pang of pain through Améline's soul to see her student seem so diminished. Perhaps the life Gorgo had chosen would have inevitably led to this moment, and thanks to Améline she would survive it; but that didn't stop Améline's mind from furiously rebelling against Gorgo's misery.
Would that the battle against Chaos had ended with the Realmgate Wars.
The words 'I'm sorry' had almost left Améline's lips when Gorgo pushed a spear into Améline's hand. The Stormcast immediately recognised it; it was Gorgo's choice weapon, the one she brought to training pit and battlefield alike. It was sturdy, a product of good craftsmanship and materials, and the tip was meticulously sharpened until it could pierce flesh and armour with but a thrust. Below the tip hung a stone carved with a rune that Améline didn't understand, but had seen Gorgo hold onto tightly when she thought no one was looking.
Améline had never seen Gorgo give that spear to another person.
"To fight the Khornates." Gorgo blurted out, pre-empting Améline's question. "You're going to need every bit of help you can get."
Gorgo shifted her feet, starting to turn as if to beat a hasty retreat, but Améline stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.
There was so much that she wanted to tell Gorgo. The countless words welled up inside the Stormcast; how proud she was of Gorgo, how much she regretted failing the young warrior, how Améline wasn't worthy of training her, and just how dearly the Stormcast wished she could shelter Gorgo.
Instead of all the thoughts that swirled around her said, Améline said, almost surprising herself;
"After the Gorestorm is beaten, we're not going to train."
Gorgo flinched, and looked up at Améline with a hurt, betrayed look. Améline didn't know where her tongue was leading her, but it continued speaking for her;
"For a few weeks. Until then, I want to spend some time with you."
"You already do when we train." Gorgo mumbles, but the hurt in her eyes abates, and she starts looking curiously up at Améline.
"We're going to spend some time together at rest." Améline clarified, her voice becoming firmer as her thoughts slowly coalesced into coherency. "Theatre, dances, taverns. Whatever you want. My treat."
"Is Allassía going to be there?" Gorgo groans, and Améline's heart lightens as the young warrior's mood lifted. She might be grumbling, but by this point Améline knew when to recognise pantomime.
"If she wants to." Améline lightly replied, and was rewarded with Gorgo theatrically rolling her eyes, as if her lips hadn't just ticked upwards in a smile at the thought of spending time with her Hurakan rival.
And then, Gorgo seemed to throw away any last pretence of annoyance as she surged forwards and wrapped her arms around Améline's waist. For a moment the Stormcast wondered if Gorgo was trying to wrestle with her, before the warrior's sudden stillness revealed that she was instead hugging Améline.
"Thank you." Gorgo grunted, with a sincerity that broke Améline's heart a little. "For everything."
The words bubbled up once more from the dark recesses of Améline's mind, but this time she quieted them as she wrapped an arm around Gorgo's shoulders and hugged her back. There would be time for them.
But later.
Gorgo held on to Améline for a while longer, before just as abruply as she initiated the embrace, she broke from it. She took a step back with a laugh, put her hands on her hips, and looked up into Améline's eyes with some of her old, cocksure fire.
"Say hello to the Chained Butcher for me." Gorgo commanded, and Améline couldn't stifle her laughter before it bubbled up from her throat, hale and hearty and utterly taking her by storm. Gorgo joined in with Améline, before turning on her heel and strutting down the corridor, leaving Améline alone with the spear.

Usually my seasonal allergies to pollen, ragweed, mold etc. manifest in the usual sneezy, runny nose, itchy throat and eyes, etc.
One day I woke up and felt like I couldn’t get a full breath in. I happened to check the pollen count and it was extremely elevated, and it’s been extremely elevated ever since that day. It’s been going on for a little over a week.
I’m not congested or sneezy in my nose whatsoever, my eyes aren’t itchy. I just feel like im not inhaling all the way. It’s been making me dizzy and lightheaded. I’m also experiencing extreme fatigue to the point it interferes with my daily functioning, and headaches almost every single day. The headaches border on migraines, and it’s a full head headache if that makes sense. It hurts my entire head, it’s not concentrated to just one part of my head. I’m also experiencing almost daily nausea. I’ve been taking Zofran and Ibuprofen daily.
Could this be allergies? Or should I get this checked out?

For context, this story happened nearly 3 years ago, however a recent late-night conversation with a friend made it clear to me that the repercussions of this incident are still being felt to this day.
I (25M) met my now-ex girlfriend (25F), whom I will be assigning the fake name "Anne," when we were both 17 at our small town high school in semi-rural Georgia. Our romantic relationship began following our senior prom which we attended together. Despite our approaching high school graduations, the two of us decided that we could make our relationship work beyond high school and into college since we would both be attending different universities in the same city. We each grew up in typical southern protestant traditions and casually held onto some sort of religious beliefs. I, myself, have always identified religiously as something of a deist, meaning I believed (and still do to this day) that some sort of higher entity, force, or meaning was responsible for existence. Anne, at that time, would have self-identified as a Christian and attended church semi-regularly, however it was never a significant part of her life or attitude toward the world.
Shortly after we both began our new lives as college students in an unfamiliar city, Anne expressed that she would like to search for a new church to attend regularly as it helped create a sense of community and belonging for her which she had been missing since moving away from home. I strongly encouraged this, since I wanted her to be able to make friends and discover herself philosophically. The church that caught her attention was a non-denominational "modern" church that seemed to emphasize community at least on a surface level basis. However, out of curiosity, I took a look at the church's website and did notice a few mentions of "Pentecostal experience", which worried me since my only knowledge of Pentecostals was rumors of snake handling, especially in the more rural areas of the South. However, I chose to not be too judgmental upfront and continued to encourage her to find herself and meet new people.
Over the next few months, Anne started to spend more and more time devoted to bible studies and attending gatherings for women at the church. She specifically asked me not to accompany her on Sunday services since, as she put it, the elder members of the church would not act too kindly about unmarried woman "dragging around" some unfamiliar man who was not her husband. It became clear pretty quickly that she was becoming more than just a casual Christian and I supported this, however we did not talk much about the specifics of what she was being taught at this church.
This all came to a head when one night, Anne asked me if she could pray over me in something she called a "spiritual language." Having only ever heard vaguely of speaking in tongues, I obliged. I sat next to her on my couch and watched as she raised one hand and began quietly chanting in complete gibberish. My heart immediately sank in discomfort and fear but I was too stunned to do anything. so I just sat and watched for several minutes until she finally went quiet. All I could do or say was tell her that I appreciated her thoughtfulness and went about my day.
Pretty soon, the behaviors and acts became more and more extreme. Her "tongues" became louder and more intense and began to include violent shakes and lots (and I mean LOTS) of crying. She spoke of seeing "signs" and hearing "the voice of God" in a very literal sense. Her grades in college even began to suffer as more and more of her time was devoted to these newfound beliefs. Naturally, I became extremely worried that she was slowly slipping into some sort of paranoid delusional psychosis. At the very least, these teachings made her into a much angrier and more paranoid person. It was clear that her new beliefs were more than just a spiritual awakening but also a nose-dive into a mental health crisis.
Our relationship, at this point, was very clearly waning but my feelings toward the woman I once knew were still strong. I decided that it was time for an intervention of sorts. This resulted in me spending a whole weekend studying Pentecostal beliefs and reading Reddit stories from ex-Pentecostals about what it took to break them out of their conditioning. It was on a Monday night when I invited her over to my apartment to confront her about how the things her church were teaching her were actively harming her and even presented her with evidence of how these churches prey on mentally unwell people and how "speaking in tongues" was nothing more than an experience in her own brain chemicals. While I had hoped that hearing her new beliefs be directly confronted would help break the spell they had on her, it seemed to have no effect. Surprisingly, she did not fight back or show much anger toward my confrontation, instead resorting to the "please respect my beliefs" argument that made it so hard to push back against, since, at this time, I was still concerned about preserving our relationship.
Unfortunately, things only got worse from here. I spent some time trying to ignore the issue for the sake of the relationship, especially because I did not sense that I had many other romantic options given my shy nature and struggles to make new friends at college. However, my new "ignorance is bliss" approach to our relationship did not last long. At this point, we had been together for about 3 years and the conversation of marriage and kids started to become serious. I have always wanted kids since I come from a large family with many siblings, which Anne seemingly was excited about as well. However, after a pleasant conversation in which we fantasized about what we would name our children, she said something that sparked an anger in me that I did not often feel. She told me that if any of our future children came out to us as gay, lesbian, bi, transgender, or anything like that, that we would have to disown that child at all costs and that she could not love her child knowing that they were a "sodomite" (her words). I have always considered myself an ally of LGBTQ+ folks and wouldn't think twice about loving my children any less if they came out to me and have always felt this way. I did not say much in the moment out of pure shock and instead steered the conversation elsewhere while I quietly boiled over in anger over this comment.
Here is where the title of this post comes into play and where my role in this interaction enters a grey area. I spent several days unable to let this anger subside while imagining my own perspective children being thrown to the streets for bravely coming out to their own parents. I decided that another intervention was necessary, except this time I didn't want to be ignored. I came up with a plan that I referred to as a "scorched earth" intervention. Over the course of an evening, I began texting, calling, or messaging almost every person that Anne was close to. This included family, friends, past friends, classmates, and even some plain old acquaintances. I needed her paranoid and hateful beliefs to be confronted by more than just myself and hoped that if everyone important to her also expressed concern; that she would separate herself from this church and seek proper mental health counseling.
The responses I received from Anne's friends and family ranged significantly. Some people, including her mother whom I was close with, asked that I not try to "insert myself between Anne and God". Some friends agreed with me wholeheartedly and would reach out to Anne over text or in person to try and offer help. Some people met me with total apathy. Unsurprisingly, once Anne found out what I did, she broke things off over a brief but highly emotional phone call. She told me that I had embarrassed her and that supposedly God was telling her I wasn't the man she was supposed to marry. It did not hurt too bad since I was anticipating the end of this relationship for a while. The effects of my approach seemingly had lasting impacts on many of her relationships, however. At least one longtime friendship had ended because the friend was appalled by Anne's new paranoid beliefs. It was also unsuccessful, as Anne would never seek mental health counseling. In fact, it probably pushed her further into her church crowd - only further bolstering her new delusions.
Since much time has passed, I have started to feel uncertain whether or not I did the right thing in trying to have all of Anne's friends and family confront her about her extreme beliefs. At the time, I felt that I was justified and doing the right thing by trying to encourage a clearly delusion person to seek mental health counseling by any means necessary. Now, I am able to realize that I acted out of anger and permanently damaged how some of her oldest friends view her. I also realize that I acted immaturely and probably should not have tried to bring in every person close to Anne to fight a battle on my behalf.
Nowadays, Anne is still with that church and regularly posts on Facebook all sorts of whacky spiritual conspiracies. She is still very clearly paranoid and delusional all while putting on a facade of normalcy. I just pity her for living in a constant state of paranoia at this point. She even works full time with the church as a "worship leader," although I am not sure what exactly that means. She actually got married about a year after the relationship ended to a man she met at her church. They met, got engaged, and married all within 12 months. Thankfully, no children have been brought into this world yet from their relationship, which is surprising to me considering how urgent it seemed to her during our relationship. I do not hear much from any friends or family of hers anymore, other than one mutual friend who told me that Anne frequently refers to me as "that demon." As for myself, I finished school and have not married but was able to finally make friends and go on dates and my future is looking bright.
So, Reddit, am I the asshole for my "scorched earth" methods towards my fanatical ex-girlfriend?

It plagues my mind more often than I'd like to admit, so I want to get it off my chest.
At age ten, I had a boyfriend. We were in the same class and were pretty serious (as serious as kids can be), though we kept it mostly a secret.
One day, after lunch, our class were doing wind down activities in our groups. He and I were both in the silent reading group, so we decided to sit next to each other. I was pretty absorbed by my book, up until my BF tapped my shoulder.
I looked at him and he gestured down to his lap. Obviously I looked down to see what, at first, I thought was his thumb. I simply thought his thumbnail had fallen off, so I made a "Ouch, that looks like it hurts" type hiss.
That's when he gestured for me to come under the table. Realisation hit me, that wasn't his thumb. Honestly, I wish it hadn't, but earlier that year I had a uncle force himself upon me, so unfortunately, I kinda caught the gist of what he wanted.
I shook my head no, heart racing in my chest as I turned back to my book and simply tried to ignore him. To this day I regret not speaking up to the teacher, or to the principal... Or anyone at all. I've kept it to myself for 15-ish years. I can't help but wonder if maybe he had been SA'd and that's why he was trying to request a BJ. Or maybe he had been watching content at home that no kid should be watching. If I had said something, would things have been better or worse for him?
Anytime I saw him after the incident, I felt sick to my stomach and super anxious. Even in highschool I felt this way. Anytime he approached me, it was all I could thing about. Did he even remember?
The worst part was I had been best friends with his cousin. I began to distance myself from her because of him.
I don't know. I don't even know why it's affected me so much. Nothing actually happened.

Previous Part
Morning eventually came, banishing the eyes that seemed to peer at me through the night. It was strange how suddenly the feeling left me, making me think that someone really was watching me. The whole thing was really doing wonders for my paranoia. Despite the rough morning and sleepless night, I still found myself waiting outside Bianca’s house bright and early that morning. The air was cool but not chilly, one of those perfect days that’s cold enough you’ll never start sweating unless you really try, but warm enough that a T-shirt will get you through without too much trouble.
I only had to knock once before Bianca threw open the door.
“Where you just waiting there for me?”
I asked, cracking a smile and raising an eyebrow.
“You’ll never know” she added playfully, “Are we ready to go then?”
Bianca had made some preparations for the trip, she didn’t have a backpack ready to go but she definitely made an effort to dress the part… sort of. She was wearing an old grey combat jacket that I imagine she pulled out of Stein’s closet. The jacket was way to big for her but she made it work. Her combat boots matched the jacket, looking old and well worn. What didn’t match was the bright red yoga pants she was wearing, but I wasn’t about to complain. Besides, I had packed each of us a spare set of clothes just in case.
“Oh! So I had an idea, its a long walk, not crazy but I’d rather not just walk the whole way if we can help it. Frank and Stein used to have some bicycles when we first came here so I asked them about it and well.”
Bianca chirped, as she led me around the back of the house and pulled a tarp off two abysmal looking bicycles. The bikes were both red at one point but that was a long time ago. Now they were covered in a layer of rust and I could barely make out the branding that may have once read, “Shwinn”.
“Um… Bianca I think I might get tetanus if I sit on that thing.”
“Oh come on! Aren’t you tired of walking everywhere? Lets just give the bikes a shot, if they crumble to dust we can leave them.”
“And get me a tetanus shot.”
I added quickly
“Fine, and get you a tetanus shot.”
Bianca shot back, she feigned annoyance but she couldn’t hide the smile that crossed her face.
Laughing to ourselves, we got on the bikes and took off North, out of town and onto a dirt path leading to the woods. Bianca didn’t say much on the way out but I could tell she was having a good time. This may have been her first time out of the house for something other than supervising Frank and Stein. She tried to hide it by riding fast and staying out in front of me, but I could still catch her eyes literally glowing with happiness every now and then. I thought back to what Frank had said about her eyes glowing when she experiences strong emotion. I hoped that was the case and she wasn’t just trying really hard to influence me, which he had also said would make her eyes glow.
As we neared the end of the path, the forest’s edge came into view. we let the bikes roll to a stop then got off and let them fall over onto the dirt. I half expected them to explode into a puff of rusty brown dust the second they touched the ground but to my surprise, neither bike did. I could’ve swore I heard Bianca sniffle almost like she’d been crying. I opened my mouth to say something and then thought better of it, if she wanted to tell me what was going on she would. Well, that or she’d just manipulate me away from the question. Wait, was she doing that now? It’s hard to tell, maybe that’s how everyone around her feels. The more I thought about it the more I realized how difficult it must be for her just to have friends or form relationships with people at all. If she told them the truth they’d never know if what they were feeling around her at any given moment was real. All they’d have to go on would be her word, could they really trust that, could I? If she kept her secret she’d know that at any moment she could just change how they felt about her, manipulate them into anything she wanted. Could she resist that kind of power over them and still look someone in the eyes and say she was their friend. Not to mention how hard it would be to keep that secret over years of knowing someone.
“So Keith, were exactly are we headed? You do have some Idea where this mine you’re looking for is right?”
Bianca asked skeptically, snapping me out of my thoughts.
“Well about that…. I just know its out here in the forest somewhere. That’s pretty much all I have to go on from Frank, Stein, and that massive bartender in town.”
I told her sheepishly.
“Well that explains why you over-packed so much then. Seriously? How long do you think we we’re going to be out here, you’re packed like some kind of survivalist.”
She mocked, picking through the pack I’d made for her. After she finished rooting through the pack I made for her like some kind of giant squirrel and, chastised me yet again for not doing more research on the mine, we set off.
The forest felt imposing as we walked into the woods through a manicured patch of trees. Someone had gone to great lengths to braid a few trees over this little path before the forest turned back into its natural wild state. It gave off the feeling that civilization ended with this path and something else entirely began. As we got off the path our light faded quickly, chocked out by the limbs of massive pine trees. All this cover meant there was very little foliage on the ground which was covered in a blanket of needles. The though occurred to me that we were looking for a mine in a valley. That’s weird because what exactly would be in a valley that warranted the creation of a mine? Usually you’ll find them in mountains so what exactly was one doing out here.
“Bianca I just had a thought, Why would they build a mine out here? I mean what’s the point, is there even anything valuable out here to mine?”
“Yeah, come to think of it your right. What other reason would there be to have a mine out here?”
“Unless they were just mining from a cave but that still doesn’t answer the question of what they were…”
Bianca cut me off
“What was that first thing you said?”
“Um… mining from a cave?”
A lightbulb went off over her head as she exclaimed,
“That’s it! There’s caves under the town, I’ve heard Frank talk about them before! Maybe they didn’t have a real mine so they were just mining something out of the caves.”
“Not to burst your bubble Bianca, but that still doesn’t get us any closer to these caves or mines or whatever it is.”
I responded cautiously, trying not to sound to critical of her revelation.
“Well not exactly, Frank said they were in the East of the forest somewhere so all we have to do is head East till we run into them.”
Bianca said, full of confidence. Then something occurred to me, we had no real way of getting back to the bikes other than retracing our steps. Now that was easy enough now, if we went deeper into the woods we would get lost pretty quickly.
“One more thing Bianca, Maybe we should come up with a way to find our way out? I really don’t want to end up lost out here.”
I asked nervously, fidgeting with my hands.
“Way ahead of you on that one, I left my phone back by the bikes. Here give me yours and I’ll put my number in so you can track it and find our way back.”
She said, taking my phone, putting her number into it, and turning it to me to show she’d tracked her own phones location with it, giving us a path back to the bikes.
As we turned East and headed even deeper into the forest the terrain started to change. Instead of the pine needle coating we started to see rocks and the ground was more rugged. Here and there we’d even pass a boulder or two. I decided to break the silence of our search.
“So are you ever going to tell me how you met Frank and Stein?”
Bianca sighed before responding.
“I suppose you deserve to know if your sticking around. You probably guessed I wasn’t always living with them. Lets just say before that I was with someone who I though meant the world to me but I never meant the same to him. It was all a game to him and eventually I noticed that. Then, a little while afterwards I realized I wasn’t exactly powerless anymore and I did some things that I’m not exactly proud of to survive on my own.”
I could tell talking about this hurt her but I needed more.
“That’s not exactly telling me a whole lot Bianca.”
I pressed, maybe a little to hard.
“I found out I had powers and I used them ok! I got myself out of a situation where I was pulled so many way I didn’t know which direction was up! The second I found out I could do the same thing to people myself, I did! You’re the first person to actually seem to give a shit that wasn’t some crazy doctor that tolerates my existence or someone I just manipulated into caring! Maybe I even did that with you! I JUST DON’T KNOW ANYMORE!”
Bianca screamed at me, getting in my face with tears beginning to run down her own. Her eyes were glowing electric blue again and I knew I’d crossed a line.
“Hey I’m sorry I didn’t mean to hurt you. I… I didn’t know.”
“No.. you didn’t but I guess you should”
Bianca sniffled out, trying desperately to pull herself back together and keep up the act the everything was ok. Bianca went silent for a while as we kept walking along, crying to herself before she finally took a deep breath and said,
“You know, this is the first time someone’s asked me to come along and do something outside the house in years. I spend so much time cooped up in there just helping with experiments and looking after Rocco. It’s actually nice to get out and talk for once.”
Her voice still a lifts hoarse from screaming at me before.
“Look if you want to talk about it we’ve got nothing but time out here. I’d like to know a bit more about you anyways.”
I said taking her hand and trying to sound comforting.
“Yeah maybe I should get some of it off my chest. Here it goes I guess.”
Bianca said, taking a deep breath and tightening her grip on my hand. Her eyes still glowed faintly as she told me her story as we ventured deeper into the forest.
I’ll give you the shorter version of it here, mostly cause I’m not sure how she’d feel about me spoiling all her secrets.. She ran away from her family and her college education for a guy, his name was Brooke. Brooke was from money and had a job lined up by his family at a law firm so Bianca thought she was set for life with him. Bianca was madly in love with him at the time but as days grew into months and years, Brooke became a monster. He cheated on her and told her she wasn’t enough, that her shortcomings drove him to do it over and over again and somehow it was all her fault every time. He became abusive not long after the cheating started, flying into fits of hysteric apology afterwards only further convincing Bianca she was somehow at fault. After three years of this she eventually got up the courage to leave and never looked back. On the road she discovered her powers of manipulation, letting her play with people’s emotions and she only got better at it with time. Unfortunately her abilities got her into a very specific form of getting money out of people, prostitution. One day she tried to solicit Stein and he saw straight through her. Stein took her with him to the hotel he and Frank were staying at and they took her in on the spot. The trio traveled together ever since, Bianca becoming a kind of daughter to them.
I was in shock once she finished her story, it sounded like she’d really been through the ringer.“I don’t know what to say, that’s awful, all of it.”
“It was, I lived it. But I made it through, doesn’t matter how at the end of the day. I’ve got Frank and Stein and that’s enough, they let me into their home and I recovered in my own way, I’m still here so I’ll take what I can get right?”
Bianca stated with a cold loom of determination on her face. It was painfully obvious to me that despite the masquerade of being fine she was barley holding it together underneath. Like just talking about it with me was driving a finger into old wounds.
“At least you’ll never have to go through something like that again. With your abilities you never have to get pushed around like that.”
I said with completely no tact whatsoever. Bianca stopped suddenly as I said this and whirled around to face me. The fire I’d seen in her eyes earlier reigniting in seconds.
“Do you really think that’s all this is?! I’m no better than him, even you don’t know what you really think when you look at me! Admit ti!”
Bianca growled at me, hysterical once again.
“No, Bianca I…”
“Look I know your trying to help but just leave it, ok? I’m done talking about this”
She cut me off, pulling herself back together and signaling very clearly we were done with that particular conversation.
“Besides look over there, That hole in the rock see it? That might be what we’re looking for.”
Bianca said, gesturing to the stone wall that now jutted out of the ground beside us.
The rock wall she pointed out was chipped near the middle in a way that couldn’t have been natural. Straight lines don’t really exist in nature and this hole was cut squarely into this rock wall. As we got closer I could see that it wasn’t just an entrance either. The hole opened into the rock wall but then suddenly dropped, like whoever carved it had hit a point where the ground just fell out from under them. From where Bianca and I were looking into the hole we couldn’t quite see the bottom.
“Well we found what we were looking for, is this bringing back any memories from those dreams you had?”
Bianca asked, sounding a little short tempered still as I searched through my bag.
“What are you looking for in there?”
“Rope, I’ve got to see what’s in there and I’m hoping I brought enough to climb down there.”
I replied hurriedly, still tearing apart my bag to get to the rope I had packed underneath everything else.
“Rope? you’re not seriously going to climb down that pit are you? I can barely see down there.”
Bianca complained, sounding exasperated.
“Here, this should help you see down there.”
I said, tossing her one of the two head mounted flashlights I brought along.
“ME? I never said we were going down there!”
Bianca panicked momentarily.
“Look, you can stay up here and wait for me if you really don’t want to go down there. But I would appreciate having you to watch my back.”
I added trying to soften her up. Bianca opened her mouth like she was going to say something but stopped, instead dropping her own pack to the ground and searching through it.
“Look if I’m going down there I’m going to need something better than yoga pants on and…. You actually packed a change of clothes in here. Geez you really did think of everything.”
As Bianca took the jeans I packed and went off to find somewhere to change I finally found the rope. It was about 50 feet of strong climbing rope that I kept for an occasion just like this. Now that’s not to say I was a professional climber by any means but a 20 or 30 foot rappel I should be able to do. I was hoping that the descent wasn’t much further than that. I anchored the rope to a tree a little ways away from the hole in the rock face and tossed the rope down the hole. It hit the bottom with a satisfying thud just as Bianca got back from changing. The jeans I had packed were a little big on her but she’d manage. She looked like a mess in her ancient combat boot and jacket, all of which were too big for her. I tried to open my mouth to tell her she looked nice, I swear I really did but what came out was hyena-like laughter at her appearance.
“I…. Oh god I’m…. It’s just”
I struggled to get out, laughing all the while.
“Well I’m glad you like it at least, ok seriously come on, stop laughing.”
Bianca scolded as she began giggling herself. Soon enough we were both laughing, Bianca’s earlier storminess cleared up by the absurdity of the situation.
Here we were, a succubus and a guy with a strange mark out in the woods getting ready to rappel into a hole in the ground that apparently didn’t exist. All this was almost starting to feel… I’m not really sure how to put it, not normal but not so strange. Honestly I finally felt like I’d found some kind of purpose again out here. As weird as it all was I was starting to enjoy… this, this whole odd situation I’d found myself in. Bianca and I finally got ahold of the laughter and stood back up from our place on the ground.
“Do I really look that bad?”
She asked
“I’ve never heard you complain about your looks before. But no, with those jeans on you look like maybe, just maybe you prepared a little bit for coming out here.”
I teased, getting a little wry grin out of her.
“Come on, lets get going. Hopefully we can be in and out of there pretty quickly.”
I said, handing Bianca her pack and shouldering my own.
Rappelling in wasn’t actually all that hard, really dangerous without safety equipment sure, but neither of us had any trouble descending the maybe 20 foot drop. At the bottom I saw something that shocked me, this place wasn’t abandoned. I saw lighting set up, not on but very clearly set up recently. Bits of old mining equipment were scattered around the… cave? Mine? Im not really sure what to call it anymore. What concerned me more than anything was the light I saw at the far end of the cave (I’m settling on calling it a cave). The light came from a massive bonfire and I could just make out the shadows of several people sitting around it. I have no idea how we didn’t see the smoke on our way in. It wasn’t filling the cave but it also wasn’t coming out from anywhere I saw on the way here.
“Bianca get down!”
I whisper shouted at her, turning off my headlamp and falling flat to the ground myself. Bianca dropped to the ground as she heard me with unexpected grace. I didn’t know if those figures by the fire had seen us but I certainly wasn’t taking chances.
“Ok, I’m going to creep up and see if I can hear them talking or something. Can you just stay here and watch my back? I don’t want you getting any closer than you have to.”
I instructed Bianca who answered with a quick nod and reached into the inner pocket of her jacket. She withdrew a jeweled golden dagger from it.
“I sorry, what’s this now?”
I asked, confused and thrown off guard by the weapon. It was a really beautiful blade, the hilt was silver with several purple gems inlaid in it. The blade was golden save for the razor sharp edge which was some kind of strange blue material that was roughly the same color Blanca’s eyes glowed.
“I had a life before this you know.”
Bianca responded.
“Yeah we talked about it but you didn’t really tell me much about this part apparently. Doesn’t matter I guess just surprised you have Jeff Bezos’s butter knife in your jacket pocket.”
I whispered, pointing at the dagger in her hand.
“Well we can talk more about how I ended up with this later, not really the time now. Just be careful ok.”
I got up as she said this, realizing she was right. Now really wasn’t the time to be asking about strange daggers, I had more pressing issues.
I crouched down and started creeping towards the figures by the bonfire, careful to avoid the rusty machinery bits scattered across the ground. As I got closer I saw a passage I had missed in the dark. I dared to turn my headlamp on for just a second, trying to block out most of the light with my hand. What I saw through the dim light and shadows of my finger left me awestruck. Inside the passage a coliseum had been constructed, with seats carved into the stone. The structure itself was made up of the rusted metal pieces that littered the room, collected and smelted together to form the walls of the structure. What frightened me the most was the symbol clearly and meticulously drawn on the dirt floor, the same symbol that adorned my back, the symbol of the thunderbird. Moving on, more shaken than ever I crept closer still to the roaring bonfire. I could just about make out the words the figures were saying. When I got close enough to make out the word “tests” the fire suddenly went out with a gust of wind.The room temperature must have dropped 10 degrees immediately and I could swear I heard the sounds of heavy rain above us. But the sudden lack of light isn’t what rooted me in place, cowering on the cave floor. What did that was the two illuminated grey eyes that pierced through the darkness like lightning in a storm, eyes I would never forget, the eyes of the woman from Imalone.
This time I clearly heard the voices of the figures from around the bonfire as they all dropped to their knees.
“Shaoni! We weren’t expecting you till later, Stormcaller.”
The figures all said some variation of in unison. Their tone sounding almost as though they were begging for forgiveness. In a voice that hissed like rain on pavement the woman apparently named Shaoni spoke.
“I’ve come to oversee the start of the trials, is everything prepared?”
In one bone chilling moment her eyes locked on mine and she said the one thing I’d hoped she wouldn’t.
“You didn’t tell me we had guests.”
The moment the words left her lips I turned back to where Bianca was waiting, her now glowing eyes cutting through the darkness of the cave. Giving up any form of subtly, I bolted for the rope behind Bianca. I just wanted to be out of this cave, whatever I might learn from searching around was far outweighed by the fact that Shaoni was here. I’d seen the kind of destruction she’d left in her wake in Imalone and I had no desire to see it happen again here. I banged my ankle on several of the little bits of rusty metal on the floor as I ran, sending sparks of pain up my leg. I didn’t hear anything behind me at all which was almost more unnerving than the footsteps I expected to hear. I closed in on Bianca and saw she hadn’t moved at all, her eyes fixed on something behind me. I dared to take a quick glance back over my shoulder and saw Shaoni taking her first step away from the extinguished bonfire. Lightning crackled around her like one of those novelty plasma globes. In the flashes of light I could see her face. There was no smile or frown, no emotion at all. She simply stared straight ahead towards me and took slow calm steps, inching ever closer.
“Bianca we’ve got to go… NOW!”
I shouted, snapping her to attention. She nodded and turned on her heels, back toward the rope we’d thrown in earlier. Only, when we got to the rope and gave it a tug, it came falling back toward us.
“There’s no way. I…I anchored it to that tree, it should’ve held!”
I cried in disbelief. Bianca and I starred up at the now stormy sky through the hole we would’ve escaped from. Two men walked into view on either side of the hole, glowering down at us. I notice a marking on one of the men’s hands in a flash of lightning from the storm. I could only assume if I was able to make it out I would’ve seen a marking just like the one on my back. Just as soon as the men had appeared a shape flew in from the left with a low growl, taking both men along with it.
“Ok, new plan! There’s something else up there and I really don’t want to get involved with… whatever that was either. I didn’t see any footprints near the entrance so I’m assuming those guys we saw by the bonfire got in another way. We’re just going to have to find where that was and get out that way.”
I instructed Bianca, gesturing to the men in toe with Shaoni and trying not to sound as afraid as I was.
“Ok, I’m with you but lets get moving, I don’t want to any closer to her than I have to be.”
Bianca answered, putting her hand on my shoulder. I suddenly felt a wave of calm rush over me and for the second time I was grateful for Bianca’s ability to simply turn off my fear response.
Shaoni now stood about 50 feet from us with four men following behind her. In the light she gave off I could see the men were all dressed like normal people. I kind of figured they would be more of those canvas wrapped weirdos from Imalone but no. There stood four men in jeans and flannels standing there. Shaoni looked like she could’ve stepped right out of a painting of Pocahontas. She wore an animal hide dress with frills along the bottom and arms. Her head was adorned with a leather band containing several hawk feathers. In short she looked like she’d stepped out of a different time. But I had no time to look over the finer details of her clothing as Bianca and I rushed towards her. Once we got within striking distance I pulled Bianca to the left, towards the passage I had seen earlier. Shaoni never made a move towards us, she just simply looked at me, the ghost of a smile briefly crossing her lips. One of the men with her grabbed at Bianca though, pulling her out of my grasp momentarily. That was a mistake because she was on him immediately with the ornate dagger I’d seen before. As the man grabbed her Bianca lashed out with the dagger, sticking him in the gut with the blade. He screamed in anguish and let go of her but Bianca wasn’t done yet. She followed up by stabbing the man in the back of the neck as he bent over, grabbing at the hole in his abdomen. The other three men were so taken aback by the sudden ferocity she displayed that they didn’t come any closer. As time stood still for a second the men all looked toward Shaoni, awaiting instructions but hesitant to get any closer to Bianca. Using the brief moment of disbelief Bianca had caused, we ran down the side passage towards the coliseum.
“What was that?”
I asked, still shocked by how suddenly Bianca had acted.
“He tried to grab me, I don’t like when they try to grab me”
Bianca responded, distant and… scared? I got the sense she was still in shock at what she had done too. But I couldn’t worry about that right now, we still had to get out of here. Luckily the men didn’t seem to be following us. Wether Shaoni called them off or they stopped to care for their friend I didn’t know, and frankly I didn’t care.
Rushing through the rusty coliseum was haunting. I expected something to jump out of every shadow in the imposing structure. As we slowed to a jog in the middle of the coliseum, right where that eagle symbol was, we stopped to look around. We had come into this arena through an open arch but the only other exit I could see was a similar but barred archway. The coliseum was huge for something constructed in a cave, probably 400 feet across. I had no idea how this thing could’ve been made without anybody finding out.
“Bianca are you seeing anyway out of here? Bianca!”
I asked, then shouted as I turned to see her standing still as a statue in the middle of the Eagle symbol. She was staring at the dagger she had stabbed that man with. Blood still stained the blade and dripped from it intermittently.
“Bianca are you alright?”
I questioned as I walked over to her. She still had this look in her eyes, like she was miles away.
“Bianca? Come on talk to me. Look, you did what you had to do back there, sure it wasn’t exactly pretty but it had to be done.”
I tried to comfort her with my words but the truth is, my heart just wasn’t in it. I was a little scared of what I saw from her in those few moments. She just lashed out and attacked him, not that he didn’t deserve it but going back for more was too much. But what would’ve happened if she didn’t act? It’s not something I could really dwell on now and I’m not sure it really mattered. I just wasn’t feeling all that great about the fact we may have killed someone.
“I don’t like it when they grab me.”
Bianca finally repeated, still appearing catatonic. I leaned down to her level, putting my face right in-front of her’s and putting her head in between my hands.
“Bianca I know enough to know that whole situation may have dug up some memories for you but nows really not the time. We have to keep moving, we have to find a way out of here, and I can’t do that without you right now.”
Bianca tensed up as I spoke to her, but I could feel her relax as I finished. A single tear fell from her eye as she gave me a nod and followed behind me as I walked toward the barred off archway.
Before I made it to the archway there was a massive crash as something tore the rusty bars from their mountings and fell into the room.
“Tuck?!”
I exclaimed, recognizing his colossal figure on the floor immediately. His shirt and pants were torn to shreds though, Like he’d flexed too hard and burst out of his clothes. Bianca and I rushed over to check on him but apparently he was fine. Before we even started walking towards him he was already back up on his feet and lumbering towards us.
“Tuck what are you doing here? Actually never mind, are you ok?”
I asked, concern in my voice.
“It’s going to take more than this to stop me son. I figured you might go looking for that old mine I mentioned the other night so I came to find you. I feel real bad about ya run’in off the way ya did and I got to thinking. Maybe I could make it up to ya if I told ya about the mine. So I came out here and found some shady look’in fellas poking around and figured maybe ya needed help, looks like I was right.”
Tuck explained, dusting himself off and brushing away some of the tattered remains of his shirt. I didn’t buy his story for a second but I wasn’t going to argue with this bear of a man.
“So how did you get in anyway?”
“Used the old entrance from back when this place was still run’in, come on I’ll lead ya out.”
Tuck answered, already turning and walking back the way he came.
The walk out was long and none of us talked much so I just looked around. The further we walked down this little tunnel the more I noticed crushed equipment. The walls looked like they were made up of bits and pieces of crumbled rock that may have once been the ceiling of a much bigger tunnel here.
“There was a collapse, just like the report said only, whatever caused it wasn’t any fault of ours. It was that damn thunderbird waking up.”
Tuck piped up, answering one question and making me ask another.
“Wait you knew about her?!”
“All the miners did, some decided to follow her after she woke up and brought the walls down on us. Others wanted revenge for the brothers we lost, I’m one of the former. You see son, the reason I stayed around this town so long was because of that bird. I want a chance to return the favor.”
“But what about Robert? If you hate the thunderbird so much why’d you let him in? You had to see that tattoo on his hand.”
“I know he thinks that damned bird will “save” him or something but I don’t blame him. Everyone deals with things in their own way and it’s not my place to judge folk for it.”
Tuck lectured, as we made our way further down the passage. His words made sense to me but I didn’t understand how he could be so understanding. From what I understood the thunderbird had a part to play in the original mine’s collapse and the death of the workers there. Only for some of the survivors to revere this creature. If I were in Tuck’s shoes I don’t think I could forgive and forget.
Finally we saw light at the end of the tunnel. We emerged into the whispers of what I’m sure was a monster of a storm. But that’s not what drew my attention, what did were the boulders scattered around the hole we just came out of. It looked like they had been moved, and recently. The suspicious red stain just barley peaking out from the bottom of one of them only served to convince me further. Tuck’s story didn’t quite make sense and this entrance seemed like it should’ve been blocked up until very recently. I wasn’t about to question the guy who saved us though, so I let the issue rest.
Bianca’s idea of tracking her phone to find our way to the bikes worked like a charm. We followed the directions my phone spit at us and eventually found our way back to the bikes. Tuck’s old Ford Bronco sat behind our bikes leaving me to question if he followed us on our way here.
“Well do you kids want a ride back to town?”
Tuck asked, his voice bellowing across the forest. Seriously it was like the guy swallowed a loudspeaker at some point and just spoke through it now.
“No we’ll find our own way back.”
“Alrighty then, stay safe son.”
Tuck called back to me as he got into his truck and drove off. Bianca and I stood up our bikes and got ready to head back to town.
“Hey Keith?”
“Yeah what is it Bianca?”
“Next time you offer to bring me along somewhere can you warn me about the damn thunderbird that seems to just show up around you.”
I laughed at this, it was nice to see Bianca joking around again. After what happened in the caves she seemed like someone else, none of her usual cheeriness was there. Not that I knew if that was what she wanted me to see from her or how she actually presented herself but still. I trusted her enough at this point to assume she wasn’t using her abilities to mess with my head.
When we got back to Bianca’s house the sun was just beginning to set, washing the town in shades of purple, orange, and red. We walked the bikes around to their place behind the house and I walked Bianca back to the front door.
“Thanks for today Keith,I don’t… get out very much anymore and it was… nice… to do something other than sit around the house for once. You know, despite everything that happened it was actually fun.”
I was taken aback by her words at first. If it was me I’d immediately want nothing to do with this person who just put me in danger.
“You had fun? The thunderbird showed up again and we may have killed a guy and you had fun?”
I asked, raising and eyebrow suspiciously.
“Can we not talk about that right now? Anyways I don’t exactly have a high bar for what is and isn’t fun at this point. I’ll see you later Keith.”
Bianca said, cracking a smile and walking into her house.
I was about halfway back to my own house when I realized she never gave me my backpack back. Well, looks like I’d be seeing her again then because I need that stuff back. I wasn’t sure what to think about what I’d seen today. If the thunderbird was in those mines years ago why did she end up in Wisconsin? There was also a very real possibility some people in this town worshipped her so I’d have to keep an eye out for that. The really interesting thing to me was the Shaoni never seemed to want to hurt me in the cave today. She was terrifying as all hell sure, but I didn’t get the sense that she wanted to cause me any sort of harm. If she wanted to do that my gut told me she would’ve done it quickly and efficiently.
Thunder suddenly cracked outside, interrupting my train of thought. As I stood up to see what time it was a knock came from the front door. I froze, who exactly could it be? I doubt Bianca would come over, I don’t think she even knows where I live but maybe she came by to drop off the backpack she absconded with? The knock came again, more forcefully this time.
“I’m coming, I’m coming!”
I shouted, as I jogged to the door. My heart dropped as soon as I opened it, On the other side of the door stood Shaoni. She was dressed normally for once, wearing a long flowing white nightgown. Shaoni stepped into my house as she cooed in her usual misty voice.
“Good evening. Keith was it? We have much to discuss.”

This is going to be all over the place and I'm not exactly looking for advice, I'm just venting.
My sister, her friend and I were drinking together on this bridge right outside our apartment we lived in at the time, as the night went on they both eventually got into an argument because my sister felt like he wasn't being a genuine friend due to his lack of loyalty and communication with her. They talked things out a bit and they eventually made up. Although when we all agreed to go back inside her next move tells me it's not really about that and something much deeper.
She was never really as open as I am to talk about her feelings or our past to eachother, she would only be brief most of the time. I should mention she is older than me so she remembers more about our parents than I do. They were alcoholics, neglectful and were in an abusive relationship. Making us believe we were more poor than we really were for years to feed their addiction, that's something they will never admit to. A forgotten memory of mine was that my mom used to lock us in our room all day so she could bring people over and drink. Strangely my mom was actually the one to bring that up to me but then justified it by saying she was protecting us. If I were to bring it up today she'll completely deny she ever said that or it happened. Anyway, it brought back other memories during that time period. The times we were let out of the room we would always see people or my parents fighting, my sister was completely desensitized at this point. However my mom also told me that my dad chased her through the house and my sister was sitting in the hallway and he kicked her very hard in the chest while running after my mom and made my sister cry. I was just a baby so I don't recall this.
As we grew older my mom broke up with my dad and decided "to get better" Except we couldn't talk about anything from the past because she would go from 0-100 and get in our face or ridicule/mock us, her thought process was that she had it worse so we should be grateful. My dad on the other hand actually takes accountability, got sober because his alcoholism nearly killed him so he turned his life around, and said he was sorry to us many, many times and we kept in contact. He started a new family with my now stepmom who I get along with. My mom relapsed on and off since then but she's sober now, she gets moments of clarity here and there and expresses remorse but she'll go back to her old mindset and it's like there she is, we're back at square one.
I remember a different time that allowed me to see my sister's perspective was while we were both drinking at a park she just broke down crying to me, I couldn't really understand most of what she was saying but what I did understand was she always felt our mom favored me and she was mean to her. My mom was sick in the head like that she would try to pin us against eachother because we were very close. My mom would tell my sister I was holding her back, talk about my ugly smile etc. Then she would come to me to talk about what she didn't like about my sister. It all came out during a petty argument my sister and I had, it was then we realized what she was doing but still didn't confront my mom. She probably did that out of fear of us seeing her for what she truly is so that was her attempt at trying to keep it swept under the rug.
Now that I shared the details, I think my sister was miserable and done with life and everyone in it always disappointing her one way or another. During this time my mom was drinking again, she knew my mom would never get better even if she got sober because of her mentality, she's just too broken. So she thought the only way out was to jump, I ran back to the apartment and told my mom what happened, her first words were "Fuck sakes" in an annoyed tone like it was a minor inconvenience. That still makes me mad to this day. Thankfully my sister survived the fall, but instead of my mom changing her attitude towards my sister she kept repeatedly lecturing her that she's lucky to be alive, and gossiping to some family members saying that my sister was just being competitive? That's the thing with her she thinks everyone is competing with her and no one can be as traumatized as she is. Then would also just be on her fucking phone like it was another normal day, I'm positive she enjoyed everyone's pity she was getting on Facebook. What also hurt me was my sister sided with my mom, she was probably embarrassed because she made that decision while intoxicated but I believe it was something more than that. Not everyone who's depressed just jumps off a bridge like that, and I hate that my mom brainwashed her.
Unfortunately it wasn't too long until my sister was back in the hospital because of a heart infection. I felt at this point she just stopped trying altogether. She was so detached from everything. She passed in 2019, I promised to take care of her cat Jasper for her. And I can't even do that in peace because my mom ended up abusing Jasper multiple times, she hung him out the window and found it funny, we lived on the top floor of our apartment. Even made fun of my sister's swollen body in the hospital saying she looks like a queen ant. Seriously what is wrong with her?
Sometime in 2023 we visited our hometown to visit our family members. My dad lives on the reservation so took this opportunity to drive to town and come see me, we spent time together then we both agreed to visit the places that my sister and I went to, including the bridge. Seeing that bridge again brought back all my memories and emotions, the anger I felt towards my mom came back even stronger, but also made me depressed, because I try to detach myself from that part of my life like as if it didn't happen because it's easier that way so seeing it in front of my face was rough. I remember when I told my mom, yeah, I did see the bridge. I couldn't hold in my angry expression and had an urge to face her to say it, and of course she hasn't changed at all as she thinks it was nothing more than teenagers drinking. Sometimes this cycle of obsessively dwelling in the past makes me think I hate my mom, but then it's like who am I kidding? That's not who I am. I still love her. I just feel lost without my sister and I feel hopeless, I'm angry at everyone for moving on so quickly, I'm angry at the world, I feel like I don't have that connection with anybody else on this earth. Not my mom, not my dad, nor other family members because I'm the outcast. Dwelling in the past will be my downfall. Anyway, I should probably wrap up this post and get some sleep. I'm sleep deprived and not thinking straight right now.
If you've stuck around this far thank you for reading and keeping my sister's legacy alive. Have a good day.

37 F, UK (England), height 172cm, weight IDK I don’t/won’t weigh myself due to eating disorder but I am within a low-end healthy BMI, non drinker, trivial smoker (~1 a week), no illicit drug use, Caucasian
Current health conditions : hidradenitis suppurativa (only recently diagnosed) Hurley scale 2 if that means much; low LVEF/T wave abnormality/heart rhythm issues; osteoarthritis of lower spine (severe); post-operative arthritis of left ankle following major fracture in 2022 (it’s now mostly scaffolding in that ankle rather than bone); major depressive disorder; restrictive eating disorder.
Additional : extreme vitamin D deficiency + ferritin deficiency
Previous : breast cancer +++ grade 3 (2019); heart ischemia due to severe anorexia nervosa (2020)
Meds : Butec 20mg patch; Amitriptyline; Alprazolam; Zolpidem; Lymecycline; Ramipril (currently stopped due to incident below); Promethazine; Oramorph; Celecoxib; Colecalciferol; ferrous sulphate; probably others I can’t remember at this point
TLDR : Sepsis, extremely low BP (why?) and heart stopped during the surgery to remove source of infection, no idea what they did in theatre to start it, they mentioned some kind of medication. Concerned about what impact this will have on me going forward.
At 37, not obese or overweight, very casual smoker (less than 1 a week), Caucasian etc - i.e not hitting any of the normal criteria or profile for people to get hidradenitis suppurativa (it literally started out of nowhere in Feb this year) I was suddenly diagnosed with it. It’s been hard. Back to back antibiotics and an I&D in late Feb for one abscess that was huge.
To get to the point, my right armpit had a large mass developing and causing a lot of pain. It felt like there were loads of smaller lumps within the large lump (like a beanbag!). To put it in context, last Saturday my armpit was painful and sore but I felt fine. I went to bed that night and noticed it had started turning red and clearly inflamed. I was also in hindsight starting to feel a bit under the weather. Decided to get it checked at urgent care the next morning as I’d always been advised to with this HS condition.
On Sunday morning I still felt mostly ok, a bit unwell maybe, nothing major, but the pain in my armpit was substantial. I went to urgent care. They triaged me and then sent me immediately to A&E because my obs were apparently concerning. Pulse was approx 140, blood pressure was “low”. And they confirmed the abscess was definitely infected. I’ve been through this before several times, once ending in an operation, mostly ending in another course of antibiotics, so I wasn’t exactly keen to go to A&E (not that anybody is, but I just thought it’d be another massive precautionary thing rather than anything else)
On arrival in A&E I already felt decidedly unwell. I was shaking and dizzy. I remember checking in at reception, sitting down, then immediately being called by a nurse to get triaged again. I vaguely remember wobbling to the room with him, getting obs checked again and him calling someone - “ok - in a wheelchair?” - then asked if I thought I could walk. By that point I was pretty much gone I think. I did walk (I’m stubborn). I remember him telling me my blood pressure was extremely low. I remember going to a chair to get my bloods done and then…nope. Totally collapsed. Absolutely nothing.
Next I knew I was in a private bay somewhere in bed with loads of wires and beeping, a cannula in my arm with a drip, and a few nurses there, who told me I was in ICU and they were trying to get my blood pressure up as it was critically low. I asked what they meant by that and they said the diastolic was in the 30s when I came in. My normal BP is roughly 110/80ish.
I remember being wheeled for a chest X-Ray; and I remember them doing a heart echo and the doctor showed me what my heart was doing - basically it looked as though it was trying to violently bounce out of my chest. It was honestly going mental. My blood pressure wasn’t going above 50 diastolic (can’t remember the top bit) but it kept dipping back down to 37ish and slowly climbing back up.
They told me I wasn’t responding to fluids treatment for it - I don’t know what they meant by that but they were really packing in as much saline as they could into me. Bolus and drip. Then they wired me up for some kind of test to see if the fluids were effective on my heart or not?
I kept going in and out of consciousness
They told me they were going to do emergency surgery to remove the infection asap so I signed everything for that
Only very vaguely remember anything about going to theatre other than the anaesthetist telling me he needed to put another cannula in my wrist and I completely freaked (I have a weird phobia of anything touching my wrist veins, even writing this is making me uncomfortable, I know it’s dumb).
Next thing I know, it’s Monday morning and I’ve woken up with a nurse next to me, who told me I’d been asleep all night (op was at about 9pm, I woke up at 6.40am), and that I was still in ICU/ITU, still on saline and antibiotics, feeling like I’d been hit by a bus.
A few hours later a doctor spoke to me and told me I’d gone into septic shock from the infection in my arm, and that during the surgery my heart had stopped and they had to administer some kind of drug to start it again. That’s when they said i would need to stop the Ramipril for a bit - they were still fighting low BP on the Monday but nowhere near as dramatic.
On Tuesday I was moved from ICU to a “normal” ward and was feeling much better. Blood pressure was stabilising although it did dip quite badly again on Tuesday overnight.
On Wednesday I was basically ok (as in, I didn’t have any emergency situations going on and I was stable). I asked if I could get discharged because I wasn’t able to get any sleep at all on the ward and I felt utterly exhausted, all I wanted to do was sleep and I couldn’t get any because of all the noise and obs checking and fluid bag changes and whatever.
Discharged Wednesday night.
Been in bed at home since then, I’ve got a horrible chesty cough now and I feel totally rotten. My arm hurts from the surgery and I keep getting chest pain. I think my BP’s ok as when I stand up I’m not symptomatic (dizzy).
This is a really really long post and I’m sorry for that but I guess I just want an explanation as to what happened to me?! They said it was sepsis and “my heart didn’t like it” likely because I already have cardiac issues. But it was SO intense. I’m really struggling to come to terms with it all and how I felt pretty much fine only hours before it all went crazy and I collapsed. A doctor did come and speak to me and I think basically told me I almost died, or could have died, and during surgery it was looking pretty dicey. I got given a leaflet about the “psychological impact of being in the ICU”. (I haven’t dared read it).
It blows my mind how I can go from ok to dying to ok again; all within a week. It’s hard to even get my head around the fact I nearly died because there’s huge irony in it (I have been suicidal for the last 3 ish years, on and off, largely due to how poor my health is and the chronic pain in my spine). I had been doing really well mentally for a little while, which was huge for me, as I have spent a lot of time in psych units due to my suicidal ideation and just being really mentally unwell. It all stems from the cancer diagnosis really but my arthritis is the pain source of problems now.
Also what the hell did they do to my heart in surgery?
Any insight welcomed, I really would love some answers and closure to what happened, I don’t want this to affect the really positive trajectory that my mental health had been on, but it’s been a real struggle this week to know what the hell I’m meant to do with what happened. I’m not a hypochondriac by any means - I downplay a lot - but the chest pain since I got discharged is scary. Should I be worried?
Thanks all for any information or anything you can offer.

Author note: The Cryopod to Hell is a Reddit-exclusive story with over three years of editing and refining. As of this post, the total rewrite is 2,182,000+ words long! For more information, check out the link below:
What is the Cryopod to Hell?
Join the Cryoverse Discord server!
Here's a list of all Cryopod's chapters, along with an ePub/Mobi/PDF version!
Want to stay up to date on TCTH? Subscribe to Cryopodbot!
...................................
(Previous Part)
(Part 001)
"Hell yeah, I wanna go exploring." Jason says to Calanthra with a smile. "How do we navigate around Ripspace though? Traveling to other galaxies is going to take billions of years, right? Surely, there's a shortcut."
"Ripspace is not as it seems." Calanthra explains, gesturing grandly to the epic sight before them. "It is a connection between the past and the present; the near and far. The further away or the further back you want to travel, the higher the price you will have to pay."
Jason's smile vanishes. "Wait... you can use Ripspace to travel back in time?!"
"No." Calanthra clarifies. "Time is linear. We cannot travel through it. Some can slow it down or speed it up. A rare few can even pause it for a short while. But moving forward and backward is impossible. Countless have attempted to do so over the eons, but all have failed."
She looks at Jason meaningfully. "Many Rulers would wipe out galaxies if it might let them obtain such a power. The fact they still haven't proves it is impossible."
Jason nods slowly. "I won't lie. I have a lot of regrets. Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and save my daughter from dying."
"Everyone has regrets." Calanthra muses, looking off into the distance. "I have plenty, myself. But it's better this way. There would be pandemonium if time travel ever became possible."
She pauses before continuing with her explanation. "While we cannot go back in time, we can look back into time. Pinpointing exact moments in history is difficult, to say the least, but it is possible to use Ripspace to search for key moments in intergalactic history."
"So it's like a massive seer-stone." Jason muses aloud. "But wait, didn't you imply earlier that you used Ripspace to travel to the Milky Way from Andromeda? How does it allow you to jump between galaxies? Are other species using Ripspace for intergalactic travel?"
"You can indeed use Ripspace to travel to distant reaches of space." Calanthra explains. "But... you have to pay a certain price. Akasha's Barriers still protect every galaxy. Cosmics cannot travel between them easily. Mortals can, but the price we must pay is unimaginably steep. That is also the reason my mother perished not long after arriving in the Milky Way and giving birth to me."
The Fairy Monarch sighs softly.
"My people used the power of Ripspace to travel to several other galaxies. We were fortunate that the Creator had died, allowing us to take up residence here in secret, but the Angels, Titans, and Dragons were still a threat we could not overlook. Later, the Volgrim rose up too, and that was something that worried us for a while. Particularly when their Sentinels began to rapaciously erase the lives of innumerable Sentients."
She waves her hand. "Ultimately, very few galaxies didn't have a Ruler in power. Traveling to one that did meant flipping a coin and praying our people could avoid their gaze. Sadly, time has shown me that we were likely unsuccessful. I have lost contact with all my sisters across the cosmos."
The image of innumerable galaxies floating in the distance changes before Jason's eyes. Calanthra manipulates some unseen power, causing herself and Jason to suddenly materialize directly in front of a beautiful spiral galaxy.
"This is our Milky Way." Calanthra explains, waving her hand to conjure another, far bigger galaxy beside it. "And this is Andromeda."
"Is it just me or does Andromeda seem... brighter?" Jason asks.
"Andromeda contains far more interstellar particles, cosmic energy, and latent magical power than the Milky Way." Calanthra says. "Of course, in the ancient past, it had even more than it does now, but such is the way of entropy and Chaos."
Jason nods. "How exactly do galaxies lose power over time? Doesn't this feel self-defeating in a way?"
"Every Ruler enters the Unending War with a strategy." Calanthra says, motioning with her hands to disperse the galaxies and reveal images of ghostly creatures, some standing on two legs, some on four, and plenty that appear as mere blobs of energy. "I cannot pretend to know the thoughts of such high and mighty beings, especially as I am a mere mortal myself. Even so, I can definitively state that there are Rulers who seek to put as much galactic energy into their initial creations as possible, while others wish to adopt a more energy-efficient growth-model."
She pokes her finger against Jason's chest. "Take the angels and humans, for instance. The Creator poured the vast majority of his power into creating a galaxy full of Apex Cosmics. At their peak, the angels as a whole commanded enough power to flatten other galaxies. But what did they do instead? They fought with one another, killing themselves due to sheer boredom, if not outright ego."
"I see." Jason says, brushing Calanthra's finger away. "So the Creator dumped all the Milky Way's energy into the angels. I take it this is uncommon among Rulers?"
"Of course. It's a wasteful strategy and usually loses Rulers the War for that Eternity." Calanthra says dismissively. "The Timeless used a different strategy. She created the fairies as mere mortals that evolved over time, gaining greater and greater power through their own efforts. This meant that instead of devouring Andromeda's abundant Cosmic energy, they could slowly sap off its excess over time. For you see, the more energy a galaxy has, the more it can produce. If you ration it long enough, you can reap more of it across the duration of an Eternity."
"That makes sense." Jason concludes. "It's like a Rush build in an RTS versus an Economy build. You sacrifice long-term gains in exchange for short-term power. The problem is, with Akasha's Barriers preventing Rulers from attacking their enemies straight away, a Rush build is dumb because you're just wasting your resources and sacrificing Cosmic energy when you'll actually need it."
Calanthra blinks twice. She looks at Jason with a strange expression, then turns away for a moment, trying to understand the strange terms he's used. They mostly make sense, but some of them are a little...
She shakes her head and returns to the topic at hand. "Right. Rush strategy versus Economy. Of... course. Well, in any case, there is one advantage toward the first strategy. If you drain all the energy from your galaxy, it becomes less appealing for other Rulers to attack. Because Andromeda was so large and still filled with Cosmic power even billions of years after the Expansion Era, it stoked the hunger of the Dark Ones. Meanwhile, the Milky Way only needs to deal with the Plague, which is threatening for mortals, but manageable for Cosmics. In that respect, we've gotten off much luckier."
"I get the bigger picture now." Jason says with a nod. He turns to look back at the cosmos before him. "So, what about all this? Are we gonna go exploring, or what?"
"In order to explore the universe presented here, we would need to make sacrifices we cannot afford. I think you would find the price most disagreeable. But there is something we can explore freely..."
She waves her hand, and instantly, the brilliant and beautiful cosmic view of the universe vanishes.
In its place, Jason and Calanthra suddenly appear inside a dead, barren wasteland. Brown and grey dirt rises up in huge dunes stretching off into the distance. Fallen towers made of gold and stone lay on their sides, or stick into the ground, buried nearly up to their tops as they point diagonally toward the sky.
And speaking of the sky, it glows faintly grey, as if some weak, pale imitation of a star were trying to shine through a thin atmosphere clouded by dust and grime. The very air itself smells of sulfur and toxins, making Jason's nose curl up when he takes a breath.
"Ugh... what the hell? Where are we now?" Jason asks, as he turns and looks around at the dead world surrounding him.
"An Ancient Domain." Calanthra says softly. "A remnant of a dead universe. All life stripped away. All hope lost. Septillions of different Sentient species, gone. Their mortals, their Cosmics, reduced to dust by the Contraction."
The Wordsmith frowns. "This Ancient Domain represents a dead universe? But how can that be possible? If the Heat Death played out and all the galaxies faded to cosmic dust, then there already wouldn't be anything left. And then, if the entire universe collapsed into a singularity before exploding again, there definitely wouldn't be anything left behind resembling physical matter."
"You perceive reality through just three dimensions." Calanthra intones. "Time and space can be considered two dimensions. Cosmic Power is another dimension. I must admit I do not understand how Ancient Domains have continued to exist across countless Eternities, and I don't know how they retain a vaguely familiar form... but I can assure you that in spite of bending logic itself, they do exist and they can provide tangible benefits to those dedicated to exploring them."
"You've been exploring them, then?" Jason asks, turning away from the dead world to scrutinize Calanthra's phantasmal image.
"Me, a little. But often, I dispatch my descendants to scour these Ancient Domains for things of value. It may surprise you, but there are powerful artifacts, vengeful spirits, and all manner of other inter-dimensional horrors lurking within these so-called dead-lands."
Calanthra pauses. She shifts her posture to look at Jason deeply.
"And that is why I've brought you here, Jason. It's time for me to get down to the crux of the matter and breach the subject that I find most important."
He nods. "I'm listening."
"It's like this." Calanthra explains. "The Ancient Domains are unfathomably broad. Think of how large a universe is. Think of how many universes have existed. Think of how much space my people have yet to explore."
She pauses.
"The gains we have received have made my people stronger than you would expect. Among those gains are Yredelemnul's Eye and other leftover remnants of power that many dead ancient Rulers lost when their Existences became forfeit. While their tangible Existences may have perished, their spirits sometimes live on in these broad, unending dead universes..."
"That's why you approached me." Jason says, while crossing his arms and leaning on the ball of his heel. "You said you wanted an alliance with humanity. You... want humans to help you explore the Ancient Domains?"
"Trust is hard to come by among mortals, Cosmics, and Rulers." Calanthra says simply. "I never would have considered allying with the humans before, but you have shown me the broadness of your mind during the debate against your clone and the commander of your military. To some, you certainly appear naive, but to me I see an opportunity I would be foolish to ignore."
She continues. "The Fairies cannot reproduce efficiently. Every fairy we send into the Ancient Domain is one less fairy we have among our Empire. We already have a difficult time replenishing our numbers through the remaining Male Fairies, but do you think it is easy for us to reproduce with other species?"
Jason slowly shakes his head. "Blinker and Kar's children were all crocodiles, not fairies. From that, I can only imagine that most of the time, your mating attempts do not create more of yourselves, but instead more non-fairy children."
"That's exactly correct." Calanthra replies. "But that all changed recently when I found out one of your human males somehow spontaneously altered his genetic profile to become a fairy. There is no doubt about it; Samuel Baker harnesses all the capability to reproduce that you humans do, as well as the trueborn powers of any male fairy."
"So... are you seeking a marriage alliance with Samuel Baker?" Jason asks, scratching his head in confusion. "You could just ask him yourself, you know?"
"This is not about one man." Calanthra retorts. "Samuel Baker, if he were to join our ranks, would certainly help us stave off extinction for a while longer. But that is hardly worth all this melodrama and me taking you to the Ancient Domain in person..."
Jason's eyes widen in realization. "I see! You... you're thinking that if my magic could make one male fairy, I could surely make another, and another..."
"Yes, precisely." Calanthra says, revealing a beautiful smile. "Additionally, if humans were to assist us in scouring these Ancient Domains, we could make great gains together. There is plenty of room for another species to join ours in locating powerful artifacts and other items capable of Uplifting us."
"You want to become Cosmics still." Jason muses. "You haven't resigned yourselves to your current fate."
"Quite the opposite." Calanthra says. "The curse placed upon us is unbreakable by those beneath the realm of Ruler. As I said before, the fairies have lost this Eternity's war. However, while we cannot Ascend any longer, that does not mean the humans are subject to the same limitation. If we could groom a human into becoming the Milky Way's Ruler, we could finally break free of our shackles by virtue of having a powerful ally."
She pauses, looking meaningfully at the Wordsmith.
"If the Demons or the Volgrim were to become our Ruler, we would not enjoy such a benefit. At best, we would only maintain the status quo, and at worst, they might eradicate us out of fear of having an unsightly tumor in their midst."
"Haha." Jason laughs. "So you brought me here to show your sincerity. I get it. Well, I'm definitely not opposed to helping you. Blinker is my good friend. If she were to ask me, I'd definitely say yes to just about any request."
Jason turns away. He walks a few feet off to the side and pauses, standing to gaze out at the Ancient Domain and its endlessly rolling plains which stretches off into the infinite distance...
"Here's what I can do." Jason says. "My people are already working on laying out the options for humanity and where our fellow men and women will depart over the next few weeks. Some will travel to Maiura. Some will go to Sharmur. Some will stay on Tarus II. It's no trouble at all to put Pixiv on the list, especially as I was already planning to do that. I even have some other places I'd like to include, too..."
"Such as Camael's Cube?" Calanthra asks with a smile. "Or do you perhaps mean Chrona and Hope's Hall of Heroes?"
Jason nearly jumps out of his skin. He whirls around to look at Calanthra with shock in his eyes. "What?! How do you know about Chrona? How do you also know about where Hope has been hiding?? I don't even know that much!"
"For those who are talented in magic, it is possible to see through many lies and deceptions." Calanthra says calmly, unfazed by the alarm on Jason's face. "Your Spynet Sphere isn't so different from the many options I have at my disposal. I have many means to keep an eye on the galaxy. And while Diablo does not know exactly where or what Chrona is, he certainly knows of its general existence."
Her smile turns cold. "I would advise you not to take Unarin lightly either, Wordsmith. That ancient creature is more capable than you can imagine. He is hiding a great many secrets from the galaxy... secrets he does not know that I am aware of. If he were to learn of the true extent of my information web, I fear that he would dispatch a handful of High Psions to eliminate the fairy species tomorrow."
Calanthra's words truly rock Jason to his core. All along, he assumed the precautions he put on Chrona, precautions that fooled even Hope, would make his hidden dimension impossible to detect.
But how could he be so naive?
As the daughter of an Apex Cosmic, Calanthra must have her means, and that likely means Unarin and Diablo aren't too far behind either.
"Shit." Jason curses, lowering his head as a flicker of anger smolders in his heart. "I was too complacent. Chrona isn't secure, which means it's only a matter of time before more Cosmics learn of its existence. How long before they can find its exact location and invade it?"
"Calm yourself, child." Calanthra says soothingly. "The situation is not that dire. After all, Chrona still exists within a highly accelerated timespace. Any biological entity that wishes to travel there could suffer severe after-effects. Furthermore, the entities born inside will be too adapted to living within a higher dimension, so they won't pose much threat to the creatures of realspace."
She waves her hand. "Let's move on, Jason. I want to discuss other matters before dying of old age."
The Wordsmith cools himself off. He inhales deeply, then returns his attention to her.
"Alright. What next, then?"
"Fairies are not the only Sentients capable of entering Ancient Domains." Calanthra explains. "There are others who rarely appear inside here. That is why exploring these domains can be dangerous. The good news is that Cosmics have little need to enter these barren lands, as most of the heritages, treasures, and other such gains you might find inside are only useful to mortals. There are exceptions, but they are so rare as to be a needle found within ten million haystacks. A waste of effort better spent simply progressing one's Cosmic power the ordinary way."
"So what you're saying is, when you send fairies into an Ancient Domain, they can die as a result of crossing paths with Sentients from other galaxies." Jason concludes. "But if you had an army of humans to enter with you, your people would be a lot safer."
"Safety in numbers, yes. And you humans are... uniquely advantaged in Ancient Domain exploration." Calanthra says mysteriously. "Before that, though... do you know what the Power of Imagination is, Wordsmith?"
Jason raises an eyebrow. "Imagination? Like the mental ability to visualize stuff in your head? Yeah. It's not that complicated to understand."
"Ah, that's where you're wrong." Calanthra chides gently. "Imagination is the key to magical power. Imagination, Conception, Visualization, these are all key capabilities powerful maguses and sorcerors use to uplift their capabilities! And as it turns out, most Sentients are actually quite terrible at conceptualizing thoughts into imagery."
She gestures grandly. "Just take the Volgrim! You may think they are a powerful Sentient species, but in fact the Volgrim have terrible imaginations. They are stodgy, dull, and lack a great deal of creativity. All the gains their Technopaths make through technology are developed via brute force. They slowly improve their technological prowess by minute fractions over long periods of time, eventually resulting in a large and cohesive buildup."
"At the same time, the Psions Uplift themselves through meditation and sitting motionless for thousands of years at a time. Can a species capable of such incredible feats of drudgery also possess limitless imagination? I think not."
"Maybe the reason they're able to sit still for so long is because they live in their imagination?" Jason posits. "In which case their power of imagination should be quite formidable, right?"
"Possible, but unlikely." Calanthra says with a wave of her hand. "Never mind that. The point I'm trying to make is that humans have an extremely high affinity for magic. If your people were to ally with mine, we could teach you our ways. You could help us through your Wordsmithing and superior genetics, creating more fairies and humans alike. This would create a recursive cycle that would continually bolster both our species to greater and greater heights!"
She lowers her voice back to normal. "An alliance with humanity would have other benefits. You humans are equally adept in technology and magic both. You are versatile, capable of learning any skill provided you have time to devote to your studies. The bursts of inspiration you receive also allow you to make large jumps in capability as well, which could mean that in a relatively short period, you might even be capable of challenging the Volgrim."
Jason nods. "That does sound tempting, Calanthra. I'm willing to help you, but I won't demand my people join the fairies. It would be better if those who were the most interested did so instead."
Calanthra playfully twirls a finger through her hair. "Well. My daughters are all beautiful. Perhaps you should make mention that the fairies are... aggressively interested in copulation?"
"COUGH COUGH!" Jason wheezes, taking a step back as he asses her bold choice of words. "Yeah! Uh, I can probably- I'll let everyone know about that too. Obviously!"
Calanthra chuckles. "Such a cute boy. Well, it seems I've accomplished what I wanted. Let's return for now. You can always pay Ripspace a visit later."
"I will." Jason says, nodding seriously. "Waypoint."
Calanthra raises an eyebrow. "You think you can return here without a Ruler's power?"
"Won't know unless I try." Jason smiles back.
...
Not long after, Jason and Calanthra emerge back into Realspace. He shivers as he feels the Eye of Yredelemnul fixating on him from behind, but Calanthra quickly reactivates the Formation of Light, sending the sliver of a Ruler back to the shadows so it can no longer interact with the physical world.
"You know, Jason." Calanthra says. "You are a Candidate. You have the capability to become a Ruler someday."
"I am?" Jason asks, before thinking back to a conversation in the past. "Oh yeah, someone did mention that to me before. But... eh. I don't know. Becoming a Ruler sounds awful."
"Awful?" Calanthra asks. "How so?"
"It seems... lonely." Jason says, his voice softening. He looks at the space between the four statues, where Yredelemnul's Eye has disappeared. "Imagine all your loved ones dying, but you're stuck behind, living through the end of an Eternity, which takes trillions of years before Heat Death finally eradicates everything. Then comes the next Eternity, where you can remake your species again... but it won't be the same. Even if you remake your loved ones, it won't really be them."
Jason lowers and shakes his head. "That sort of life doesn't suit me."
"I understand why you'd think that way." Calanthra says. "In fact, you are suffering from the same affliction that plagues all Candidates who began their Existences as Biologicals. We have too many ties to the mortal world, so the majority of Biologicals who ascend to the rank of Ruler... fall to their non-biological opponents."
"As for the things which are not biological..." Calanthra says, looking at Jason with disgust. "You should already know what they are."
"Highly evolved Artificial Intelligences?" Jason guesses.
"That's right." Calanthra affirms. "There are several tiers of power a superintelligence can possess. The Volgrim have taken great care to prevent anything above a Beta Core from forming in the Milky Way, but once, a long time ago... they made a huge mess by accidentally creating the Milky Way's first Alpha Core Synthmind."
Calanthra chuckles. "The stupid fools didn't only create an Alpha Core, they gave it autonomy in the hopes it would be able to stop the wars between their factions. They built indestructible bipedal bodies for its splintered intelligences, and called them... Sentinels. Luckily, they were able to defeat the Alpha Core before it ascended further, but countless other biological species have failed at that juncture, creating an Alpha Core that ultimately devoured the full power of their galaxy for itself."
A chill trickles down Jason's spine. "You're saying the vast majority of Rulers are actually Alpha Core AIs? AIs that control entire galaxies?!"
"No, Jason." Calanthra counters. "Alpha Cores can defeat advanced civilizations. But there is one Existence higher than an Alpha Core, a tier that can only be reached once it has swallowed the power of a galaxy."
"That would be an Omega Core. a sentient artificial intelligence that has become Ruler over one or more galaxies. And in Akasha's game, more than 90% of all Rulers are estimated to be these superior lifeforms."
"It is for that reason that these highly adaptable entities are known as The Evolved."

"Hell yeah, I wanna go exploring." Jason says to Calanthra with a smile. "How do we navigate around Ripspace though? Traveling to other galaxies is going to take billions of years, right? Surely, there's a shortcut."
"Ripspace is not as it seems." Calanthra explains, gesturing grandly to the epic sight before them. "It is a connection between the past and the present; the near and far. The further away or the further back you want to travel, the higher the price you will have to pay."
Jason's smile vanishes. "Wait... you can use Ripspace to travel back in time?!"
"No." Calanthra clarifies. "Time is linear. We cannot travel through it. Some can slow it down or speed it up. A rare few can even pause it for a short while. But moving forward and backward is impossible. Countless have attempted to do so over the eons, but all have failed."
She looks at Jason meaningfully. "Many Rulers would wipe out galaxies if it might let them obtain such a power. The fact they still haven't proves it is impossible."
Jason nods slowly. "I won't lie. I have a lot of regrets. Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and save my daughter from dying."
"Everyone has regrets." Calanthra muses, looking off into the distance. "I have plenty, myself. But it's better this way. There would be pandemonium if time travel ever became possible."
She pauses before continuing with her explanation. "While we cannot go back in time, we can look back into time. Pinpointing exact moments in history is difficult, to say the least, but it is possible to use Ripspace to search for key moments in intergalactic history."
"So it's like a massive seer-stone." Jason muses aloud. "But wait, didn't you imply earlier that you used Ripspace to travel to the Milky Way from Andromeda? How does it allow you to jump between galaxies? Are other species using Ripspace for intergalactic travel?"
"You can indeed use Ripspace to travel to distant reaches of space." Calanthra explains. "But... you have to pay a certain price. Akasha's Barriers still protect every galaxy. Cosmics cannot travel between them easily. Mortals can, but the price we must pay is unimaginably steep. That is also the reason my mother perished not long after arriving in the Milky Way and giving birth to me."
The Fairy Monarch sighs softly.
"My people used the power of Ripspace to travel to several other galaxies. We were fortunate that the Creator had died, allowing us to take up residence here in secret, but the Angels, Titans, and Dragons were still a threat we could not overlook. Later, the Volgrim rose up too, and that was something that worried us for a while. Particularly when their Sentinels began to rapaciously erase the lives of innumerable Sentients."
She waves her hand. "Ultimately, very few galaxies didn't have a Ruler in power. Traveling to one that did meant flipping a coin and praying our people could avoid their gaze. Sadly, time has shown me that we were likely unsuccessful. I have lost contact with all my sisters across the cosmos."
The image of innumerable galaxies floating in the distance changes before Jason's eyes. Calanthra manipulates some unseen power, causing herself and Jason to suddenly materialize directly in front of a beautiful spiral galaxy.
"This is our Milky Way." Calanthra explains, waving her hand to conjure another, far bigger galaxy beside it. "And this is Andromeda."
"Is it just me or does Andromeda seem... brighter?" Jason asks.
"Andromeda contains far more interstellar particles, cosmic energy, and latent magical power than the Milky Way." Calanthra says. "Of course, in the ancient past, it had even more than it does now, but such is the way of entropy and Chaos."
Jason nods. "How exactly do galaxies lose power over time? Doesn't this feel self-defeating in a way?"
"Every Ruler enters the Unending War with a strategy." Calanthra says, motioning with her hands to disperse the galaxies and reveal images of ghostly creatures, some standing on two legs, some on four, and plenty that appear as mere blobs of energy. "I cannot pretend to know the thoughts of such high and mighty beings, especially as I am a mere mortal myself. Even so, I can definitively state that there are Rulers who seek to put as much galactic energy into their initial creations as possible, while others wish to adopt a more energy-efficient growth-model."
She pokes her finger against Jason's chest. "Take the angels and humans, for instance. The Creator poured the vast majority of his power into creating a galaxy full of Apex Cosmics. At their peak, the angels as a whole commanded enough power to flatten other galaxies. But what did they do instead? They fought with one another, killing themselves due to sheer boredom, if not outright ego."
"I see." Jason says, brushing Calanthra's finger away. "So the Creator dumped all the Milky Way's energy into the angels. I take it this is uncommon among Rulers?"
"Of course. It's a wasteful strategy and usually loses Rulers the War for that Eternity." Calanthra says dismissively. "The Timeless used a different strategy. She created the fairies as mere mortals that evolved over time, gaining greater and greater power through their own efforts. This meant that instead of devouring Andromeda's abundant Cosmic energy, they could slowly sap off its excess over time. For you see, the more energy a galaxy has, the more it can produce. If you ration it long enough, you can reap more of it across the duration of an Eternity."
"That makes sense." Jason concludes. "It's like a Rush build in an RTS versus an Economy build. You sacrifice long-term gains in exchange for short-term power. The problem is, with Akasha's Barriers preventing Rulers from attacking their enemies straight away, a Rush build is dumb because you're just wasting your resources and sacrificing Cosmic energy when you'll actually need it."
Calanthra blinks twice. She looks at Jason with a strange expression, then turns away for a moment, trying to understand the strange terms he's used. They mostly make sense, but some of them are a little...
She shakes her head and returns to the topic at hand. "Right. Rush strategy versus Economy. Of... course. Well, in any case, there is one advantage toward the first strategy. If you drain all the energy from your galaxy, it becomes less appealing for other Rulers to attack. Because Andromeda was so large and still filled with Cosmic power even billions of years after the Expansion Era, it stoked the hunger of the Dark Ones. Meanwhile, the Milky Way only needs to deal with the Plague, which is threatening for mortals, but manageable for Cosmics. In that respect, we've gotten off much luckier."
"I get the bigger picture now." Jason says with a nod. He turns to look back at the cosmos before him. "So, what about all this? Are we gonna go exploring, or what?"
"In order to explore the universe presented here, we would need to make sacrifices we cannot afford. I think you would find the price most disagreeable. But there is something we can explore freely..."
She waves her hand, and instantly, the brilliant and beautiful cosmic view of the universe vanishes.
In its place, Jason and Calanthra suddenly appear inside a dead, barren wasteland. Brown and grey dirt rises up in huge dunes stretching off into the distance. Fallen towers made of gold and stone lay on their sides, or stick into the ground, buried nearly up to their tops as they point diagonally toward the sky.
And speaking of the sky, it glows faintly grey, as if some weak, pale imitation of a star were trying to shine through a thin atmosphere clouded by dust and grime. The very air itself smells of sulfur and toxins, making Jason's nose curl up when he takes a breath.
"Ugh... what the hell? Where are we now?" Jason asks, as he turns and looks around at the dead world surrounding him.
"An Ancient Domain." Calanthra says softly. "A remnant of a dead universe. All life stripped away. All hope lost. Septillions of different Sentient species, gone. Their mortals, their Cosmics, reduced to dust by the Contraction."
The Wordsmith frowns. "This Ancient Domain represents a dead universe? But how can that be possible? If the Heat Death played out and all the galaxies faded to cosmic dust, then there already wouldn't be anything left. And then, if the entire universe collapsed into a singularity before exploding again, there definitely wouldn't be anything left behind resembling physical matter."
"You perceive reality through just three dimensions." Calanthra intones. "Time and space can be considered two dimensions. Cosmic Power is another dimension. I must admit I do not understand how Ancient Domains have continued to exist across countless Eternities, and I don't know how they retain a vaguely familiar form... but I can assure you that in spite of bending logic itself, they do exist and they can provide tangible benefits to those dedicated to exploring them."
"You've been exploring them, then?" Jason asks, turning away from the dead world to scrutinize Calanthra's phantasmal image.
"Me, a little. But often, I dispatch my descendants to scour these Ancient Domains for things of value. It may surprise you, but there are powerful artifacts, vengeful spirits, and all manner of other inter-dimensional horrors lurking within these so-called dead-lands."
Calanthra pauses. She shifts her posture to look at Jason deeply.
"And that is why I've brought you here, Jason. It's time for me to get down to the crux of the matter and breach the subject that I find most important."
He nods. "I'm listening."
"It's like this." Calanthra explains. "The Ancient Domains are unfathomably broad. Think of how large a universe is. Think of how many universes have existed. Think of how much space my people have yet to explore."
She pauses.
"The gains we have received have made my people stronger than you would expect. Among those gains are Yredelemnul's Eye and other leftover remnants of power that many dead ancient Rulers lost when their Existences became forfeit. While their tangible Existences may have perished, their spirits sometimes live on in these broad, unending dead universes..."
"That's why you approached me." Jason says, while crossing his arms and leaning on the ball of his heel. "You said you wanted an alliance with humanity. You... want humans to help you explore the Ancient Domains?"
"Trust is hard to come by among mortals, Cosmics, and Rulers." Calanthra says simply. "I never would have considered allying with the humans before, but you have shown me the broadness of your mind during the debate against your clone and the commander of your military. To some, you certainly appear naive, but to me I see an opportunity I would be foolish to ignore."
She continues. "The Fairies cannot reproduce efficiently. Every fairy we send into the Ancient Domain is one less fairy we have among our Empire. We already have a difficult time replenishing our numbers through the remaining Male Fairies, but do you think it is easy for us to reproduce with other species?"
Jason slowly shakes his head. "Blinker and Kar's children were all crocodiles, not fairies. From that, I can only imagine that most of the time, your mating attempts do not create more of yourselves, but instead more non-fairy children."
"That's exactly correct." Calanthra replies. "But that all changed recently when I found out one of your human males somehow spontaneously altered his genetic profile to become a fairy. There is no doubt about it; Samuel Baker harnesses all the capability to reproduce that you humans do, as well as the trueborn powers of any male fairy."
"So... are you seeking a marriage alliance with Samuel Baker?" Jason asks, scratching his head in confusion. "You could just ask him yourself, you know?"
"This is not about one man." Calanthra retorts. "Samuel Baker, if he were to join our ranks, would certainly help us stave off extinction for a while longer. But that is hardly worth all this melodrama and me taking you to the Ancient Domain in person..."
Jason's eyes widen in realization. "I see! You... you're thinking that if my magic could make one male fairy, I could surely make another, and another..."
"Yes, precisely." Calanthra says, revealing a beautiful smile. "Additionally, if humans were to assist us in scouring these Ancient Domains, we could make great gains together. There is plenty of room for another species to join ours in locating powerful artifacts and other items capable of Uplifting us."
"You want to become Cosmics still." Jason muses. "You haven't resigned yourselves to your current fate."
"Quite the opposite." Calanthra says. "The curse placed upon us is unbreakable by those beneath the realm of Ruler. As I said before, the fairies have lost this Eternity's war. However, while we cannot Ascend any longer, that does not mean the humans are subject to the same limitation. If we could groom a human into becoming the Milky Way's Ruler, we could finally break free of our shackles by virtue of having a powerful ally."
She pauses, looking meaningfully at the Wordsmith.
"If the Demons or the Volgrim were to become our Ruler, we would not enjoy such a benefit. At best, we would only maintain the status quo, and at worst, they might eradicate us out of fear of having an unsightly tumor in their midst."
"Haha." Jason laughs. "So you brought me here to show your sincerity. I get it. Well, I'm definitely not opposed to helping you. Blinker is my good friend. If she were to ask me, I'd definitely say yes to just about any request."
Jason turns away. He walks a few feet off to the side and pauses, standing to gaze out at the Ancient Domain and its endlessly rolling plains which stretches off into the infinite distance...
"Here's what I can do." Jason says. "My people are already working on laying out the options for humanity and where our fellow men and women will depart over the next few weeks. Some will travel to Maiura. Some will go to Sharmur. Some will stay on Tarus II. It's no trouble at all to put Pixiv on the list, especially as I was already planning to do that. I even have some other places I'd like to include, too..."
"Such as Camael's Cube?" Calanthra asks with a smile. "Or do you perhaps mean Chrona and Hope's Hall of Heroes?"
Jason nearly jumps out of his skin. He whirls around to look at Calanthra with shock in his eyes. "What?! How do you know about Chrona? How do you also know about where Hope has been hiding?? I don't even know that much!"
"For those who are talented in magic, it is possible to see through many lies and deceptions." Calanthra says calmly, unfazed by the alarm on Jason's face. "Your Spynet Sphere isn't so different from the many options I have at my disposal. I have many means to keep an eye on the galaxy. And while Diablo does not know exactly where or what Chrona is, he certainly knows of its general existence."
Her smile turns cold. "I would advise you not to take Unarin lightly either, Wordsmith. That ancient creature is more capable than you can imagine. He is hiding a great many secrets from the galaxy... secrets he does not know that I am aware of. If he were to learn of the true extent of my information web, I fear that he would dispatch a handful of High Psions to eliminate the fairy species tomorrow."
Calanthra's words truly rock Jason to his core. All along, he assumed the precautions he put on Chrona, precautions that fooled even Hope, would make his hidden dimension impossible to detect.
But how could he be so naive?
As the daughter of an Apex Cosmic, Calanthra must have her means, and that likely means Unarin and Diablo aren't too far behind either.
"Shit." Jason curses, lowering his head as a flicker of anger smolders in his heart. "I was too complacent. Chrona isn't secure, which means it's only a matter of time before more Cosmics learn of its existence. How long before they can find its exact location and invade it?"
"Calm yourself, child." Calanthra says soothingly. "The situation is not that dire. After all, Chrona still exists within a highly accelerated timespace. Any biological entity that wishes to travel there could suffer severe after-effects. Furthermore, the entities born inside will be too adapted to living within a higher dimension, so they won't pose much threat to the creatures of realspace."
She waves her hand. "Let's move on, Jason. I want to discuss other matters before dying of old age."
The Wordsmith cools himself off. He inhales deeply, then returns his attention to her.
"Alright. What next, then?"
"Fairies are not the only Sentients capable of entering Ancient Domains." Calanthra explains. "There are others who rarely appear inside here. That is why exploring these domains can be dangerous. The good news is that Cosmics have little need to enter these barren lands, as most of the heritages, treasures, and other such gains you might find inside are only useful to mortals. There are exceptions, but they are so rare as to be a needle found within ten million haystacks. A waste of effort better spent simply progressing one's Cosmic power the ordinary way."
"So what you're saying is, when you send fairies into an Ancient Domain, they can die as a result of crossing paths with Sentients from other galaxies." Jason concludes. "But if you had an army of humans to enter with you, your people would be a lot safer."
"Safety in numbers, yes. And you humans are... uniquely advantaged in Ancient Domain exploration." Calanthra says mysteriously. "Before that, though... do you know what the Power of Imagination is, Wordsmith?"
Jason raises an eyebrow. "Imagination? Like the mental ability to visualize stuff in your head? Yeah. It's not that complicated to understand."
"Ah, that's where you're wrong." Calanthra chides gently. "Imagination is the key to magical power. Imagination, Conception, Visualization, these are all key capabilities powerful maguses and sorcerors use to uplift their capabilities! And as it turns out, most Sentients are actually quite terrible at conceptualizing thoughts into imagery."
She gestures grandly. "Just take the Volgrim! You may think they are a powerful Sentient species, but in fact the Volgrim have terrible imaginations. They are stodgy, dull, and lack a great deal of creativity. All the gains their Technopaths make through technology are developed via brute force. They slowly improve their technological prowess by minute fractions over long periods of time, eventually resulting in a large and cohesive buildup."
"At the same time, the Psions Uplift themselves through meditation and sitting motionless for thousands of years at a time. Can a species capable of such incredible feats of drudgery also possess limitless imagination? I think not."
"Maybe the reason they're able to sit still for so long is because they live in their imagination?" Jason posits. "In which case their power of imagination should be quite formidable, right?"
"Possible, but unlikely." Calanthra says with a wave of her hand. "Never mind that. The point I'm trying to make is that humans have an extremely high affinity for magic. If your people were to ally with mine, we could teach you our ways. You could help us through your Wordsmithing and superior genetics, creating more fairies and humans alike. This would create a recursive cycle that would continually bolster both our species to greater and greater heights!"
She lowers her voice back to normal. "An alliance with humanity would have other benefits. You humans are equally adept in technology and magic both. You are versatile, capable of learning any skill provided you have time to devote to your studies. The bursts of inspiration you receive also allow you to make large jumps in capability as well, which could mean that in a relatively short period, you might even be capable of challenging the Volgrim."
Jason nods. "That does sound tempting, Calanthra. I'm willing to help you, but I won't demand my people join the fairies. It would be better if those who were the most interested did so instead."
Calanthra playfully twirls a finger through her hair. "Well. My daughters are all beautiful. Perhaps you should make mention that the fairies are... aggressively interested in copulation?"
"COUGH COUGH!" Jason wheezes, taking a step back as he asses her bold choice of words. "Yeah! Uh, I can probably- I'll let everyone know about that too. Obviously!"
Calanthra chuckles. "Such a cute boy. Well, it seems I've accomplished what I wanted. Let's return for now. You can always pay Ripspace a visit later."
"I will." Jason says, nodding seriously. "Waypoint."
Calanthra raises an eyebrow. "You think you can return here without a Ruler's power?"
"Won't know unless I try." Jason smiles back.
...
Not long after, Jason and Calanthra emerge back into Realspace. He shivers as he feels the Eye of Yredelemnul fixating on him from behind, but Calanthra quickly reactivates the Formation of Light, sending the sliver of a Ruler back to the shadows so it can no longer interact with the physical world.
"You know, Jason." Calanthra says. "You are a Candidate. You have the capability to become a Ruler someday."
"I am?" Jason asks, before thinking back to a conversation in the past. "Oh yeah, someone did mention that to me before. But... eh. I don't know. Becoming a Ruler sounds awful."
"Awful?" Calanthra asks. "How so?"
"It seems... lonely." Jason says, his voice softening. He looks at the space between the four statues, where Yredelemnul's Eye has disappeared. "Imagine all your loved ones dying, but you're stuck behind, living through the end of an Eternity, which takes trillions of years before Heat Death finally eradicates everything. Then comes the next Eternity, where you can remake your species again... but it won't be the same. Even if you remake your loved ones, it won't really be them."
Jason lowers and shakes his head. "That sort of life doesn't suit me."
"I understand why you'd think that way." Calanthra says. "In fact, you are suffering from the same affliction that plagues all Candidates who began their Existences as Biologicals. We have too many ties to the mortal world, so the majority of Biologicals who ascend to the rank of Ruler... fall to their non-biological opponents."
"As for the things which are not biological..." Calanthra says, looking at Jason with disgust. "You should already know what they are."
"Highly evolved Artificial Intelligences?" Jason guesses.
"That's right." Calanthra affirms. "There are several tiers of power a superintelligence can possess. The Volgrim have taken great care to prevent anything above a Beta Core from forming in the Milky Way, but once, a long time ago... they made a huge mess by accidentally creating the Milky Way's first Alpha Core Synthmind."
Calanthra chuckles. "The stupid fools didn't only create an Alpha Core, they gave it autonomy in the hopes it would be able to stop the wars between their factions. They built indestructible bipedal bodies for its splintered intelligences, and called them... Sentinels. Luckily, they were able to defeat the Alpha Core before it ascended further, but countless other biological species have failed at that juncture, creating an Alpha Core that ultimately devoured the full power of their galaxy for itself."
A chill trickles down Jason's spine. "You're saying the vast majority of Rulers are actually Alpha Core AIs? AIs that control entire galaxies?!"
"No, Jason." Calanthra counters. "Alpha Cores can defeat advanced civilizations. But there is one Existence higher than an Alpha Core, a tier that can only be reached once it has swallowed the power of a galaxy."
"That would be an Omega Core. a sentient artificial intelligence that has become Ruler over one or more galaxies. And in Akasha's game, more than 90% of all Rulers are estimated to be these superior lifeforms."
"It is for that reason that these highly adaptable entities are known as The Evolved."

I remember when I was a little girl I would look in the mirror and just be so disappointed, in my mind, I was ugly, stupid, and poor, and it broke me completely. I would get bullied heavily in elementary school not only because I was poor but because I was chubby, while I ate lunch kids would stand by my desk and make pig sounds at me, oinking and calling me butterball. They told me I had meth head teeth. The only thing I liked about myself was my freckles but that brief feeling of liking myself soon disappeared when one boy told me it looked like I had shit splattered on my face.
I was eleven when I began to diet, whiten my teeth, and wear makeup. My teeth naturally straightened out on their own and I shed the weight with the help of heavy restriction, not without developing an obsession over how I looked. When I was twelve, boys began to notice me, I broke my nose and in doing so had to get it straightened out so I could breathe properly, no longer did I have my father's Roman nose which I so despised. I wanted desperately to be like the girls who ignored me and to be liked by the boys who bullied me for a little baby fat.
Because of this obsession, I didn't believe people when they told me I was pretty. Compliments always felt ingenuine and I naturally assumed boys were asking me out as a joke so I turned every single one down out of fear of humiliation. Deep inside me something seethed, I wasn't satisfied with the weight I had lost and begged and cried until my mom shared her Ozempic with me. I was thirteen.
Still, I could describe in detail the way I picked apart every flaw, the way I had autopsies on past conversations, searching for a new insecurity. One day I went into my dad's toolbox and stole his roll of duck tape and wrapped it around my waist. I was amazed by how beautiful I looked, my waist was the smallest of all the girls at my school and this felt like a victory. I tailored my favourite sundress on my mom's sewing machine to fit my brand-new waist and wore it to the first day back from summer break.
Everyone turned their heads to look at me, I thought that only happened in the movies until I strolled into English class with a waist the size of a tangerine. I shoved lies through my teeth about a gym and diet plan I had done over the summer to make myself look so small, my friends listened with eager ears and wide eyes trained on my midriff. The attention was more addictive than any substance I've put into my body. My friend had told me how the boys were talking about me and how they planned to ask me out, that's when I made up my mind.
It felt like a poison I happily drank, knowing all of the risks. Every Sunday after church I walked to the Dollar General by my house and bought five rolls of duct tape, two dollars each for one week of classes, ten dollars in total. The same woman was always there and she always smiled at me, asking what I did with all of the tape, my face would split into a sickly sweet smile as I told her a new falsehood every time.
My mother would comment on how she didn't want me to go anywhere by myself because I was too pretty to do so, this was like pouring gasoline onto my forest fire. In the morning when everyone was sleeping, I wrapped one roll of duct tape around my waist so no one could hear the sound; I took it off before my showers at night, water running as pain pushed tears from my eyes and bit the inside of my cheek until I could taste iron flood my gums. I was left with cuts and tears in my skin, flesh tender with torture, still, I mummified my body every morning with duct tape. Sometimes I would do my thighs if I wore leggings or skinny jeans so people would comment on my impressive thigh gap.
After a year of doing this, my midriff looked like a piece of raw steak beaten with a meat tenderizer until it was almost torn apart entirely. I wouldn't even let people touch me in fear that they could feel through my attempt at perfection. I started skipping church. Every weekend I shut myself inside so I could breathe at full capacity while I shut my blinds and stared at my ceiling, my mind went numb with the impending doom that I would suffocate myself with that dreadful silver tape when the bell rang. My whole life I had heard that beauty is pain and that's all I thought this was, I thought that models did similar things and it was just something I had to accept to be beautiful.
Essentially, I had turned into a zombie; my breathing was shallow, and I became pale, clammy, shaking, and nauseous. I couldn't stomach meals. Every night I would wake up around midnight and cough up my guts but I hadn't eaten any food so there was nothing left in me to vomit but bile and eventually blood. I stopped talking to people, I thought it better for them just to look at my pretty long lashes and my tiny little waist than to listen to me tell them I was fine through shaky breaths. My dad was so scared for me, he kept bringing food into my bedroom and would come to collect the uneaten dish when he dropped off the next. He couldn't look at me without crying. It was just his drowsy gaze piercing into my vacant skull while we both swallowed back what we wanted to say, the words dying in our throats, never to be heard.
Everything hurt all of the time, it didn't matter anymore whether I had the duct tape on or not. I almost preferred the feeling of it on so the stinging of the cuts and the soreness of my ribs was shielded by something. One day in PE the teacher asked me to sit out so I did. I tried my best to keep my vision straight and my head up while I watched the other kids play California kickball. It was okay until there was a suffocating feeling, like something was consuming everything in my body like tiny creatures with razor-sharp teeth were cutting their way up my organs. My body began to convulse as I coughed until I fell to my hands and knees, coughing up this invisible force in my throat. The game stopped abruptly and every pair of beady eyes turned to watch me writhe in pain on the dusty gym floor while I clawed at my chest and throat, eager to tear the skin off completely.
Mr. Duke jogged over to me, crouching down to my level and putting a hand on my back. With furrowed eyebrows, he asked what was happening and with nothing more than Ozempic running through my system, I screamed at him to get away from me. That final wave came like a million little hands of wind pushing at the back of my throat until I heaved up the very last of what was left in me. Hands flew over mouths while some gagged at the sickness once inside of me. On that floor was a pile of what looked to be red coffee grounds in a little puddle of cherry wine. I was as terrified as anyone else in the gym, I screamed between heavy sobs while scuttling away from the mess I had made.
I knew that this was the end of me, that I would be taken to a hospital and everyone would know what I had done. I didn't even need to go to the hospital for everyone to know what I had done. Once I had collected myself and began talking frantically in a hushed circle of my friends while we waited for the ambulance, one boy on the hockey team caught a glimpse of shimmering silver beneath my gym strip and snuck up behind me, pulling my shirt up and revealing the secret I carried like a cross I had to bear.
My back laden with strips of duct tape like it was armour was on display to my entire class, my shame shown to what I had perceived to be the entire world. The girls didn't find this so funny but the boys came up with the name of Tape-Face. I remember rushing to the locker room with my friends following close behind, I grabbed scissors from my pencil case and began to cut it off myself, ripping it away madly along with little segments of flesh. My friends watched in horror, they just stood like it was a game of wax museum and I was the security guard there to punish whichever moved first.
In the hospital, I couldn't face my parents, not even the doctor, I kept my eyes locked on my lap. I couldn't see their stares but I could certainly feel them digging into me like a frog on a dissection table. My mom was utterly speechless and my dad spoke only through voice cracks and subtle sobs while he brought me soggy sandwiches from the cafe on the first floor.
I took another week off school because I could predict the painfully true rumours and when I finally set foot back into the school, it was worse than I anticipated. I felt hideous, like a pig that had been chugging back lard in my t-shirt, sweatpants, and perfectly average body. My friends were hesitant to eat around me and tiptoed around the incident like it had never happened which almost felt worse than bringing it up. Others were not so kind. A group of kids, guys and girls all mixed together, the kind that stole cigarettes from their parents had waited until I came back to sneak away from class and cover my locker in duct tape. Over top of the tape they scribbled on a dictionary of names they would call me in the hallway "Tape-Face" "Fraud" "Botched" "Duct tape Barbie". One of the girls sat behind me in math and had cut little squares of duct tape to stick them into my hair, I called my mom in the principal's office and cried while the secretary had to cut it out of my hair.
My dad made the decision to pull me out of school, so I started homeschooling but that didn't stop the harassment. We lived close to the school and during lunch and after school kids would throw duct tape wallets and wads of tape onto the porch. My dad's final straw was when someone dropped off a Barbie whose waist and thighs had been wrapped in duct tape in our mailbox. He had contacted not only the school but the parents of the kids several times with no avail to the torment ending anytime soon. He moved us to a new town where I could go to class without anyone knowing the pain I subjected myself to for two years.
I'm in college now and I've never told anyone this. I've cut contact with everyone from that school. One of the bullies tried to reach out and apologize, blaming her behaviour on mental illness but that felt like she had shattered a plate and said sorry, thinking that it would put the plate back together. I told her I didn't forgive her and blocked her. A boy from the hockey team also messaged me, the one who flipped my shirt up. He said he just had a daughter he couldn't imagine her going through what I went through and that he's sorry for what he did. All I had to say was that I hope she doesn't have to go through what he put me through either.
​
​