A paragraph in cursive

I’m sitting in a booth at a roadside restaurant named Hank’s Diner. There is no actual Hank. The Hank who named this place after himself sold it off years ago, retired, and died. Now it belongs to someone named Sid, but he didn’t want to name it Sid’s Diner, so he left Hank’s name there. It’s a bit morbid to eat at a dead guy’s diner, but here we are.
The seat cushions in this booth are red and squishy but also brown and stiff in some places. The material is cracked and the foam insides exposed like gaping wounds. Speaking of morbid, yeesh. The only way I can get my butt comfortable is by sitting with one leg crossed beneath me. Outside, the night overwhelms everything. I take a sip of an off-brand Dr. Pepper soda to try to settle my tummy which is currently doing cartwheels in my chest cavity..
The waitress approaches me in a pink checkered uniform with a white apron that’s got yellow grease splotches all over it. Her name is Glynnis Welch, no relation to my arch-enemy Lisa Welch. Glynnis is a mother of two, grandmother of two, has been married twice, divorced twice, and has two cats at home in her apartment, which is --surprisingly-- not on the second floor of her apartment building. But she was born in February. I find her fascinating. I wonder how much of her life is defined by the number two?
“Where’d your father go?” Glynnis asks me. She does not find me equally fascinating. The only thing Glynnis finds fascinating is how big of a tip she’s going to get.
The “father” she is referring to is Dutch, who excused himself just five minutes ago to use the bathroom. She’s worried we’re going to stiff her on the check. Neither of us looks like we’re exactly rolling in dough. If anything, we look like we roll in mud like that Peanuts character, Pigpen. Some of this mud on me is actually blood, but Glynnis doesn’t need to know that.
“He’s in the bathroom,” I jab my thumb in the direction of their restrooms. “Don’t worry, we wouldn’t leave without paying.”
Her face turns red, a response to being called out on her concerns about us dining and dashing. “I wasn’t thinking that, hon,” she lies. Her eyes survey the landscape of our table, trying to find anything to use to change the subject. Her attention eventually finds its way to my head. “That’s a cute headband.”
“It’s my Rambo band.”
“Oh. Okay.”
She wants to walk away from this conversation. What is with this weird, dirty-looking, little girl sipping her Mr. Pibb in the middle of the night when she should be in bed, dreaming of homework and cartoons about wacky, talking animals? Glynnis could be talking to the guy working the grill in the back of the diner instead of to me. His name is Bartholemew. He insists on being called by his full name because he doesn’t want to be associated with the Simpsons’ character, who he finds annoying. Glynnis and Bartholemew get along like peanut butter and chocolate. Or is it chocolate and peanut butter?
Glynnis takes a couple dishes away with a mumbled, “I’ll be back,” nonchalantly turning Dutch’s plate over, and marveling at how polished and clean it is as she walks away. The guy ate like he never had a cooked meal before. The truth is, he was trained to feed that way in the military. Take what you want but eat what you take. My Nana used to say that too. It’s a generational thing.
“Lily.”
A shadow slides into the booth seat across from me in the spot Dutch was in minutes ago. I look up to see a man staring at me. It takes me a moment to recognize Nathaniel. His face is paler than I remember it being before, and his eyes have big, dark circles around them like his whole face is turning into a giant bruise. Nate smiles at me, but there’s sadness behind it, and pain. I’m just impressed he’s up and about considering not that long ago he was split up the middle like a human wishbone. I wonder if they found a flesh-stitcher to speed up his recovery.
“It’s Alex now,” I tell him.
He nods. “Right, sorry.” He reaches into his big trench coat and pulls out a stack of thin, tan books with my old name written in cursive. “I believe these belong to you.”
My jaw almost hits the table. “No way!” I grab my journals and clutch them to my chest. I had just assumed that they were going to be lost forever. Maybe buried with my other body, which is going to be buried next to Mom and Dad and Roger in the Madwhip family plot.
Nate’s smile broadens ever so slightly. He cinches his coat closed and glances around. “Your friend Detective Gumby had them.”
I snort out a laugh at him using Detective Guthrie’s nickname I gave him by accident.
“Is he going to be looking for them?”
“No, he gave them to me willingly,” Nate says, taking a moment to clear his throat. “I may have given him the impression that I was an officer of the law and was going to be placing them in evidence.”
“Looking like that?” I ask in disbelief. Maybe Guthrie isn’t as great of a detective as I thought he was.
Now it’s Nate’s turn to snort-laugh. “I applied a bit of a glamor with the help of one of the remaining dreamkind.” He can tell I have no idea what he’s saying. “That’s like an illusion.”
Glynnis eyeballs us from the kitchen. She’s wondering who this strange man is talking to the underage girl in her establishment this late at night. Is my father going to come back from the bathroom in time to keep her safe? Does Bartholemew need to get that Louisville slugger he keeps by the freezer door? Should she call the cops?
I smile and wave to her. She immediately snaps out of her trance and turns away, saying something to Bartholemew that I can’t hear.
Nate coughs again. It sounds dry and scratchy. The napkin I left sticking out from under my bowl sizzles and turns black around the edges. I pluck an ice cube out of my drink and rub it over the napkin to keep it from catching fire.
“Sorry about that,” Nate says bashfully. He rubs the tips of his thumbs against his other fingers. “I’m still not at a hundred percent.”
“Then why are you here?” I ask, “Why have they got you running around fetching my journals for me? You should be in bed, sipping on a hot bowl of soup or I don’t know, in the freaking emergency ward?”
“Azrael said the same thing, but I volunteered. I wanted to be the one to do this for you.”
“But why?”
Nate’s smile twitches at the edges. His eyes get that misty look an adult’s eyes get when they’re trying not to cry. “Because I wanted to say thank you.”
“Thank you? I mean thank me?”
“For finding Meredith and getting her home. You’re a good friend.” He pauses. “You’re a good person.”
His words feel like a dagger in my heart. I look down at my roasted napkin and mindlessly play with the melting ice cube. “But everything that happened to her... it was all my fault,” I remind him.
“No, it’s not.” He reaches across the table and touches my hand. His fingers are really warm. Like ridiculously warm. Unnaturally warm. For a second my mind instinctively tries to jerk my hand away to prevent getting burned, but through sheer force of will, I don’t let it. “I can’t make you not believe that, but you should know that Meredith doesn’t. Isn’t that what really matters? Nobody else does either. We know... Samael caused all of this.”
I’m sure he believes that. Paschar believes it too. But I don’t believe it. Only some things were caused by Samael’s actions, but many things were caused by my own. I have to take responsibility for the things I do, especially when they cause harm to others. I don’t say this though, I just shrug. No sense in arguing with someone who is dead set on trying to cheer me up.
I casually flip open the top journal and reread a few entries I wrote weeks ago, back when the world still made sense. I don’t always get to write things in the moment, so I try to make sure to jot stuff down that happens to me when I’m able. Sometimes that leads to me getting details wrong because I write about them so much later, like my first jaunt into the Veil two years ago. What a pain in the ass it was to recall everything that happened and get that all written down after the fact.
Wait, someone else wrote something after my most recent entry. It’s in sloppy, cursive handwriting. I can barely read parts of it.
I joined the police force to protect those who could not protect themselves, to bring justice for those who are wronged, and to ensure the safety of all. I wanted my son to grow up in a world where he felt safe because he knew I was looking out for him. I admit that over the years it has been a struggle to not feel jaded by witnessing the harm that people do to one another. Violence, cruelty, abuse, and abandonment are choices people make. There are no accidents. Despite it all, I’ve always tried to reject the normalizing of evil.
A child died this week. It happened so violently and suddenly that I doubt she even felt it. But I felt it. I was there when it happened. I couldn’t save her; I could only avenge her. I shouldn’t say that. The killer had a gun. I shot him for my own safety. I shot him as much out of fear as out of rage. Christ, you’d think I was a rookie for letting myself get attached to a victim.
Her name was Lily. She was sad and dark and lonely. I knew her because I was the lead investigator into the death of her parents a couple years prior. Everyone that knew Lily seemed to die in horrible accidents. Her brother, her parents, her pets, her friends, even her foster family. It was like she was a walking curse, and she knew it. I can’t imagine living with that, the knowledge that anyone who gets close to you will suffer. Maybe that’s why she pushed me away when I tried to reach out to her.
I can’t help but wonder if she wanted to die. I shouldn’t think about it, and yet it eats at me. It always seemed to me that she danced on the edge of a razor, daring the world to make her bleed until finally it did. The man who killed her had a history of violence and should never have been allowed around children. How he got a job at a traveling carnival that caters to families is a mystery I hope I solve one day. Someone put him on that field, gave him that gun, and pointed him at a twelve-year-old girl.
Despite the tragedy, I do find a glimmer of hope in all this. Lily believed in something beyond her life. I’ve been skimming through these journals in which she wrote about strange experiences with angelic beings, walking in a realm of death and pure imagination, battling powerful enemies like she was some sort of fantasy heroine. As fantastic as it all was, what truly sold it was her absolute belief in everything she described. As far as I can tell, Lily was never diagnosed with any sort of mental disorder. Maybe it was all a coping mechanism for dealing with the constant death that seemed to follow her.
The thing is, she was so persuasive in her fantasy world that I almost believed in it myself at times. She actually sold me on the notion that she knew the future, that she talked to angels and the dead. I’m a grown man, someone who knows what is real and what isn’t, and yet she had me questioning the reality I know to be true. She was a unique soul, that little girl. Maybe that’s why I’m so shaken by her death. If I believe the things she told me about the world beyond, shouldn’t I be happy for her?
Something bothers me though. For starters, Lily had a doll. Every time I saw her, she had it with her. In her journals, she talked about it as if it was an angel, or some sort of walkie-talkie that let her speak directly to them. I’ve looked for it. It wasn’t on her when she died. I’ve been unable to find it. Did someone else take it? Who has the doll and what are they going to do with it? I’m probably being ridiculous. After all, a doll is just a doll. But she had me believe in its power once, who knows who else she may have convinced?
The entry goes on for another paragraph but it’s most unreadable. I’ve heard that some grown-ups have a special kind of writing that makes sense to them and nobody else, kind of like Morse code only nobody but you can read it.
“Detective Guthrie wrote in my journal.” I look up. Nate’s gone. He didn’t even say goodbye. It’s just me and Glynnis in the otherwise empty restaurant. Bartholomew in the kitchen of course, and Dutch in the toilet. Not the toilet itself, I mean the toilet room. The restroom. I don’t know why they call it a restroom though, since nobody really uses it to rest. If I go in a place called a restroom, I expect there to be couches to lie down on and maybe some elevator music to put you to sleep. Not some stinky bathroom that a dozen other people have used and left their germs all over.
Glynnis comes back over, reluctantly. “Friend of yours?” she asks me. She’s talking about Nathaniel.
“Maybe.” I stare at her. She has no idea how good I am at staring.
She stares back. She loses.
“Just wanted to make sure you’re okay. Your father is taking a while, huh?” She looks out the big window at Dutch’s beat-up, old truck that we arrived in. What she’s really making sure is that he isn’t sitting in it, ready to start the engine.
As if he heard her, Dutch finally comes out of the bathroom. Both of his hands are dripping wet. The blow-dryer in the men’s room is on the fritz. He slides into the booth across from me, frowns for the briefest of seconds as he notices Nathaniel’s lingering butt warmth, then looks at the waitress and me and mutters ”sorry" to nobody specific.
Glynnis takes it to be directed at her and she shrugs. “We thought maybe you fell in,” she offers with a half-hearted chuckle.
“No, we didn’t,” I tell Dutch. I don’t need him thinking I’m speculating on his bathroom activities with some strange lady. I don’t want our relationship starting off like that. He needs to know he can trust me not to talk about him when he isn’t around. Trust. It’s going to be life or death for us both.
Glynnis’s face turns red again. She gives me a quick frown and starts to stutter something, then twitches and her fake smile returns. “Can I get you anything else?”
“Just the check, please, ma’am.” Dutch says, wiping his wet hands on the paper napkins that came with our meal. He looks at me, gives a head nod in the direction he just came from, and asks, “Did you need to go before we head out?”
“Yes,” I lie, and then gather up my pile of journals and hurry-walk to the other restroom, leaving the two of them to handle the bill. I don’t have to go. I just need a moment alone with my books.
As I predicted, the bathroom smells. There’s a lavender air freshener on one of the sinks and it adds a nauseating aroma to the mix of odors. I go into the farthest stall, just in case Glynnis comes in, but in my mind, I know she won’t. The last thing she wants to do is come looking for me when I’m out of her sight. She’s actually relieved. Story of my life, really, people being relieved I’m gone.
I pull my feet up, hugging my journals to my chest and cry. My ribs feel tight like they’re crushing my organs. I don’t care. Let my organs get mashed into slime. Let them run out of my belly button and pool on the floor of this bathroom.
“I’m sorry, Guthrie!” I whisper to him as if the journal we both wrote in has formed a psychic connection between us and he can hear me apologize. But he can’t. He’ll never know that I lived. He’ll die thinking he failed to protect me, and I hate myself for causing his faith in himself to falter more than anything else I ever said or did to him.
I take the next several minutes rocking gently on the seat and whispering apologies to a man hundreds of miles away who can’t hear me. Then I clean myself up so it’s not obvious I was crying, dry my hands with the working blow-dryer, gather up my journals, and pop back out into the restaurant.
When I come out of the bathroom, Dutch is putting on his jacket. He hands me mine, something we bought at an outlet mall on the state line. It’s made of jean material and has patches of cartoon kitties on the front and back. It was this or an ugly, yellow sweater.
“Y’all take care!” Glynnis calls after us as we exit the front with its little jingling bell. She doesn’t mean it.
It’s some time near midnight and we’re not stopping until we’re at least two states away. Then we can pull over and sleep, no sooner. I need to get far, far away from where we started to feel even remotely alright. I told Dutch that before we stopped for food, and he nodded quietly. I know he won’t argue. His world view was shattered the moment he learned that angels are real. He would fight for them, die for them. And they told him his duty was to protect me. He’ll do it without question. They’re using him in a way, and though I feel a little weird about it, I’m not going to stop it because without him, where does that leave me? Alone, that’s where. And then I’m as good as dead. I wanted to die once. Maybe several times. But not today. I have to make things right first, no matter how long that takes. Even if it takes forever.
“Do you have any idea where we’re going?” asks Dutch over the music he turned on to keep himself awake.
I only have one clue to start with. The name of a place I heard Samael use when talking to Ohno after using that flesh-stitcher to patch me up. “Narvik” he had said. I just need to figure out where that is. Find that flesh-stitcher, send it home, and then--
The angel radio fills my brain with information about this place, Narvik. Apparently, it’s in Norway, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Okay, that’s not going to be our first stop, definitely. There’s no way we’re getting to Norway without passports. I can’t tell Dutch this though. I’m going to have to get in touch with Dumah or Barrattiel and figure something else out.
“I’ll know when we get there,” I lie with confidence, “Have you got a pen?”
“Check the glove compartment.”
"That pen you stole from a bank? It ran out of ink and I threw it away."
"There should be another, check around."
Of course there's always a pen in the glovebox. You can throw out a zillion dead pens and still pop open the glovebox and find a pen. It's like magic. You know what you won't find in a glovebox? Gloves. Does a glovebox ever have gloves in it? It must have at some point; otherwise, why did someone name it the glovebox? It should be named the flashlight box. Or maybe the owner’s manual compartment. And yep, there is another pen, thankfully. It’s a long, erasable ballpoint with the words “Dutch Brothers Plumbing” on the side. I scribble it on my pant leg to see if it works. It does.
Dutch sees the name on the pen. “My brother Werner had a bunch of those made, back when we tried to start a business together.”
He doesn’t mention that his brother Werner died during the same war Dutch was a soldier in. He took shrapnel from a landmine that somebody else stepped on. Imagine dying because someone else was careless. I’m sorry, Meredith.
I take the Dutch Brothers Plumbing pen and scratch out my old name on this journal. “Alex’s Journal” I write. I really need to work on that signature. My capital ‘A’ looks like Pac-man with a runny nose. I flip the book open to the entry before Guthrie’s. What did I last write down? The laundry room door crumbles to ash? Oh man, I’m so behind on writing in this thing.
I flip back past Guthrie’s entry and scribble the date from a week ago before writing what I can remember of my thoughts and actions. “Alright, Lily, it’s no big deal. So you’ve got the Devil chilling in your meatball.” It feels weird calling myself Lily when I just wrote my name as Alex on the cover. Best to stick with things as they happened though, so I don’t confuse myself as an adult if I reread all this.
Dutch glances at my hand scribbling furiously. “What are you writing about?”
“The past.” I don’t look up. The road is bumpy and the truck’s shocks are garbage. It takes Herculean effort to keep my hand from turning the page into an infant’s attempt at a Picasso.
“Do you ever write about the future?”
“Never in the moment where it would matter.”
Ahead of us, the road is dark and empty. Everything and everyone we know lies behind us. But the world is round, and you can only go so far before what once lay behind you now lies ahead instead. Maybe someday I’ll go home. Maybe I’ll stop by my own grave and leave myself a flower. A lily, just because.
Maybe.

I work at the service desk with a lot of female coworkers. A while ago I was helping a customer with an oven he ordered for his client. The oven(not MDO BTW) was delivered to him damaged and he wanted to get a new one ordered. Not a complicated issue except .com wasn't available because it was purchased in the store and the customer's client originally bought that oven so we had to call her to make a phone sale while she was in the middle of her busy day. So this issue was gonna take some time to get resolved and while we were waiting for his client to become available from her meeting, the customer decided to try and "cheer up" one of my female co workers who was working on a frustrating issue to the right of me by telling her to smile more. Just very weird behavior from by somebody who's actually been pretty chill so far.
Shortly after, the client calls the customer and hands me the phone to make this phone sale(I know they're suppose to be the ones entering the card info, sorry I don't give a fuck). While I'm taking the lady's card info down, the man prints some receipt paper off the printer himself and writes a note in cursive and hands it to the same female co worker still working on the same issue. Once the phone sale is complete I give the phone and the sale receipt to the customer and told him to have a nice day. That note he wrote to my female co worker said "don't forget to smile :)". Glad that dude was finally gone at that point cuz he was starting to irritate me. This actually happened about three weeks after a customer who checking out at the service desk told another female coworker of mine "A smile wouldn't kill you ya know?" She was noticeably creeped out by that and didn't smile so he tried to explain to me and a few others saying "I'm just saying it's polite to smile." That same day he wrote a two paragraph email to my store manager saying that she was rude and disrespectful.
Why do people gotta be so creepy for no reason?

Next part from The Lost Women of NXIVM:
PRODUCER: Do you have the suicide note?
HEIDI CLIFFORD (As “Anonymous Classmate”): (Reading purported “suicide note” aloud): This is a copy of the suicide note.
“I attended a course called Executive Success Programs, aka Nexium (sic), based out of Anchorage, Alaska and Albany, New York. I was brainwashed and my emotional center of the brain was killed and turned off. I still have feeling in my external skin, but my internal organs are rotting. I’m sorry, life. I didn’t know I was already dead.”
“No need to search my body.”
Was this potential suicide letter in Kris’s car coerced?
Was it her willingly writing it?
You don’t know."
As we have discussed in previous posts, nothing about the Kristin Snyder missing person case makes any sense whatsoever, and the purported “suicide note” found in her vehicle is certainly no exception.
Before we start analyzing the “suicide note,” here are a few factors to keep in mind:
• We know through information from multiple sources that Kristin was a prolific journal writer and letter writer, so we have a plethora of writing samples to compare with this alleged “suicide note.”
• We refer to “the writer” in our discussion of the “suicide note” below. The reason for this phrasing is because the actual writer of this note is unknown. Did Kristin herself write it, either as a explanation for killing herself, or for the purpose of faking her own death? Did someone else write it to make her disappearance appear to be a suicide? Was part of the text written by Kristin and added to by another party? Was the entire note faked? Was the note written by Kristin, but under duress/coercion as Heidi pondered?
• See notes under each section below regarding clear discrepancies between Kristin’s baseline writing style based on the hundreds of writing samples we have obtained from multiple sources through varying times throughout her life.
Now, without further ado, let’s take an in-depth look at this “suicide note” – line by line.
“I attended a course called Executive Success Programs (aka Nexium) based out of Anchorage, AK + Albany, NY.”
• Who is the note intended for? There is no salutation. We have tons of samples of Kristin’s letters and there is always a salutation – AND a date. If this is really her “suicide note,” why wouldn’t she address it to her partner Heidi, friends, coworkers, and/or family – as she always had addressed people in her letters? Similarly, wouldn’t she document the date of the most significant letter of her life, as she did routinely with her letters? In fact, she often even included the specific time (for instance, 7:15 p.m.) that the letter or journal entry was written.
• In addition to a salutation and date on other writing samples, Kris also typically indented her paragraphs and she also usually wrote on each line of the paper in her letters and journal entries, unlike this “suicide note,” which does neither.
• Related to the numerous writing samples we have acquired though multiple sources, Kris also primarily wrote in cursive in both her letters and in her journal. This “suicide note” is an odd hybrid of cursive and print.
• Why would anyone start a suicide note with “I attended a course…”? Clearly, the writer of this note is directing the reader to correlate ESP with the disappearance, but it seems like a very odd place for anyone to start a suicide note. Also, Kris attended two courses, not “a course”; a fact that Kris would have clearly known.
• “aka Nexium” is another oddity. Kris did not take any NXIVM classes, not even one, despite the extensive recent propaganda linking her to NXIVM. Why? Because NXIVM did not even exist at the time of Kristin’s disappearance; it was still in the planning stages. The writer had obviously heard about these plans as evidenced by the phonetic spelling. Again, it is obvious the writer of the note is clearly directing the reader’s attention to ESP/NXIVM – but if Kris were distraught enough to write a suicide note (and as functionally incapacitated as reported by her partner), why/how would she focus on minutiae like this?
• Speaking of minutiae, it gets even more obvious in the next words: “based out of Anchorage, AK + Albany, NY.” First of all, WHO CARES where ESP was based? That is in no way pertinent to the reasoning, and apparently is another clear attempt by the writer to direct the reader toward ESP/NXIVM. Secondly, this information is actually wrong. ESP wasn’t “based out of Anchorage, AK” – they held classes in Anchorage in a rented hotel space. The home base was in NY. Furthermore, Kris knew very well that this information was wrong, having recently visited their NY headquarters herself weeks before her disappearance!
•The words “based out of” (city, state) are odd as well. None of Kristin’s other writing samples did this. Nowhere does she mention elsewhere that anything is “based out of” anywhere in any of her copious writing samples we have obtained.
• Furthermore, why would the note say “Anchorage, AK” anyway? Presumably, Alaska law enforcement would be able to deduce that Anchorage is in Alaska without this unnecessary clarification.
“I was brainwashed + my emotional center of the brain was killed/turned off. I still have feeling in my external skin but my internal organs are rotting.”
• If Kris was brainwashed, she wouldn’t know (at least at the time) that she had been brainwashed. Again, this seems to be yet another clear attempt by the writer to direct the reader to look at ESP.
• Furthermore, if Kris finally did realize that she had been brainwashed, why would she then kill herself?
• The writer switches “my” and “the” in a sentence – something Kris never did, even once, in the hundreds of pages of writing we have obtained. The sentence should read “the emotional center of my brain,” not “my emotional center of the brain.”
• Another oddity is in the redundancy of “external skin.” Again, this sort of mistake does not appear to be Kris’s style, based on other writing samples. She had a Master of Science (M.S.) in Biology and she worked as an environmental consultant to the National Guard. She was a precise, clear, scientific, and articulate writer.
• This passage clearly implies that Kris was suffering from Cotard’s syndrome; per WebMD: “People with Cotard’s syndrome (also called walking corpse syndrome or Cotard’s delusion) believe that parts of their body are missing, or that they are dying, dead, or don’t exist.” We have talked to multiple people who Kris had visited in her January 2003 trip immediately prior to her February 2003 disappearance, and nobody reported any observations of any mental health issues, suicidal ideation, depression, psychosis, nor delusions of any sort. All of the people who discussed Kris’s reported mental health decline stated that they had not personally witnessed any symptoms, but rather, they were told of a rapid decline following Kris’s disappearance.
• If Kris thought she was already dead, why would she kill herself?
“Please contact my parents Bob + Jonnie Snyder at (number redacted) in Dillon, SC if you find me or this note.”
• Why would she specify to contact her parents, who lived out-of-state? Why not her partner? Why, in fact, is Heidi, the love of her life and civil union partner not mentioned AT ALL in the entire note?
• The inclusion of Kris’s parents as the sole contacts listed in the note contradicts a specific story told at the time of the disappearance alleging that Kris had uncovered memories of abuse during the class and that these purported memories were the reason/a factor in her alleged suicide. But: if that story was true, why would she include her father in the note? It should be noted that there is no evidence whatsoever that Kris was abused. As with the alleged rapid mental health decline, people who reported that story were not told of the purported abuse by Kris themselves, but rather, they were told of the purported abuse allegations after her disappearance. In fact, we even have been given a copy of a text message exchange in which the person who spread this abuse claims refers to it as “the lie.” This is yet another example of the myriad of inconsistencies and contradictions that plague Kris’s case.
• Why mention “Dillon, SC”? There is already a phone number given, so the city/state is irrelevant, and also, it is not her typical style. Again, it seems like someone with a quirky tic to mention a city and state wrote this.
• “if you find me or this note” is similarly nonsensical. If someone found her but NOT the note, they wouldn’t see the note, would they? Again, this oddity of wording is inconsistent with Kris’s typically precise style.
“I am sorry, life, I didn’t know I was already dead. May we persist into the future. KRISTN (sic) SNYDER”
• Again, if she thought she was already dead, why would she need to kill herself?
• Why is she addressing “life”?
• “May we persist into the future” is interesting. “Persist into the future” is a phrase used in ecology, which could potentially mean a couple things: a). Kristin wrote this herself; b). Kristin wrote this phrase elsewhere and someone traced/copied it onto the “suicide note”; or c). the writer had seen a document that referred to this phrase and used it.
• WHO LEAVES A LETTER OUT OF THEIR OWN NAME???? The second “I” is missing in “KRISTN.” Furthermore, as mentioned earlier, Kris predominantly wrote in cursive and she typically signed her name in cursive as well. Why, in the most important document of her life, would she BLOCK PRINT her name, and even more bizarre, why would she leave a letter out of her own name? The writer appears to drop letters and cram letters together, but there is no evidence from other writings that Kris did these things.
“No need to search for my body”
• Why was this written on the BACK of the page on the “suicide note”? And why was the note left inside of a notebook to begin with?
• Kris was a member of the Anchorage Nordic Ski Patrol, and therefore, she was involved in search and rescue. Therefore, she would already know that THEY WOULD SEARCH FOR HER ANYWAY. Also, more importantly, why would she intentionally hide her own body and therefore put her colleagues/friends on the search and rescue team through the extensive trouble and potential dangers of conducting the search for her?
• Why write “my body” on the back of the page but write “me” on the front of the page of the note? That is yet another incongruity.
• Why the emphasis on not looking for a body? The writer clearly has a very specific reason to mention this; there is a reason the writer does not want the body found. It is very rare for a person to want to hide his/her own body, and even more rare to be able to successfully do so.

Hey everyone
Sorry uf I'm posting it in the wrong subreddit but I neend some clearty
Somedays ago I read about dyslexia and most of the the it's symptoms match I'll list here a little background story and my symptoms that I think are prominet
I'm 21, I have been failing in this education system as far as I remember since grade 3 qt that time i would always fail in my exams and and somehow when I got to grade for I again failed 2 times and I was made to sit with the grade 4 students and given writing learning books like cursive writing it was hell of an embaresment and was thinking it was my own fault that I don't study enough after that In grade 6 I failed 1 time this thing kept going on and off cuz if this i got depression i isolated myself alot i even fail yet in exams this all even made me hate the education system.
My writing is really bad sometimes I can't even understand myself
I can't read in speed and when I do read i something get stuck on simple works for 1-2 second I can't pronounce works with different (not correction it i ment to write difficult) pronounce or when I have ti spell the word
When I'm writing a paragraph I something forgot what i was writing and something I'm thinking a different word and unconsciously I'll start writing a different similar work
I overthink a lot idk if it's a symptom or my embarrassing childhood made me like this
I also spell the word letter by letter when I'm writing but still something I would unconsciously write a wrong latter I exams paper still are filled with cut words even thi I'm 21 now ( i still can't spell most if the worlds )
I hate to read write
It's really hard for me to contrate on things for me mostly reading or writing
When I'm typing on my phone i use autocorrect 95% if the time infact this whole para is 99-95% autocorrected.
Very emotional person
Prefer videos or audios for studying
I'm still trying to complete my Alevels (third time) mostly in exams I have the concept in my mind but it's hard for me to get it in words and express it
I Will try to think of an alternative easy word whenever I can't write a word
Something when I'm reading something anywhere mostly on phone white reading the paragraph I lose interest ends if to 2 things then i close back out and do something else or keep reading without understand not of it
Should I get checked?

Hey everyone
Somedays ago I read about dyslexia and most of the the it's symptoms match I'll list here a little background story and my symptoms that I think are prominet
I'm 21, I have been failing in this education system as far as I remember since grade 3 qt that time i would always fail in my exams and and somehow when I got to grade for I again failed 2 times and I was made to sit with the grade 4 students and given writing learning books like cursive writing it was hell of an embaresment and was thinking it was my own fault that I don't study enough after that In grade 6 I failed 1 time this thing kept going on and off cuz if this i got depression i isolated myself alot i even fail yet in exams this all even made me hate the education system.
My writing is really bad sometimes I can't even understand myself
I can't read in speed and when I do read i something get stuck on simple works for 1-2 second I can't pronounce works with different (not correction it i ment to write difficult) pronounce or when I have ti spell the word
When I'm writing a paragraph I something forgot what i was writing and something I'm thinking a different word and unconsciously I'll start writing a different similar work
I overthink a lot idk if it's a symptom or my embarrassing childhood made me like this
I also spell the word letter by letter when I'm writing but still something I would unconsciously write a wrong latter I exams paper still are filled with cut words even thi I'm 21 now ( i still can't spell most if the worlds )
I hate to read write
It's really hard for me to contrate on things for me mostly reading or writing
When I'm typing on my phone i use autocorrect 95% if the time infact this whole para is 99-95% autocorrected.
Very emotional person
Prefer videos or audios for studying
I'm still trying to complete my Alevels (third time) mostly in exams I have the concept in my mind but it's hard for me to get it in words and express it
I Will try to think of an alternative easy word whenever I can't write a word
Something when I'm reading something anywhere mostly on phone white reading the paragraph I lose interest ends if to 2 things then i close back out and do something else or keep reading without understand not of it
Should I get checked?

i use markdown in supernote, with the toolbard turned off and a monospaced font (Settings>General) and this comes close. Bits I'm missing are: - paragraph indenting - ability to load preferred font family - focus and typewriter mode like iA Writer
It is sooooo close to being wonderful for longer writing, not just notes. So very, very close. (I shifted to using an e-ink android tablet to eliminate screen glare, type in my first drafts (which are cursive in pencil on paper), using a QwerkyWriter keyboard, and love the set up.

I'd like to possibly go against the grain here and reveal little to nothing about myself. An odd start you may say; after all without describing my interests and hobbies how are you to know whether we'd be appropriate penpals/keyboardchums? In my eyes though that leaves little to no mystery and no opportunity to discover new pursuits. It does run the risk of discovering after a month of e-mails that we have utterly nothing in common and we've just been wasting one another's time by trying to hold back the urge to type out in all caps "Use a bloody full stop! Sentences don't have to 3 miles long!". But you see I'm a risk taker and willing to play the game. As you will no doubt see by the end of this lengthy inane rambling quaint post, full stops aren't welcome on my property.
What am I looking for? Other than a hole under the hill, a babbling brook and the scent of lavender in the air? Affordable mortgages, food that hasn't lost 50% of its nutritional value over the past century, for the lovely old lady at lunch to stop giving me the evil glare and finally forgive me for dropping the gravy jug a year go, a climate that isn't progressively getting worse, for cats to just be honest and open with their feelings and explain that whilst they love the head scratches they're focusing on themselves right now and aren't looking for anything serious...sorry I've gone off on a tangent. In essence though, that is what I'm looking for. I want us to exchange messages and e-mails where we just talk about everything and anything. None of this "Hey, how's your day been so far?" small talk; in this economy who can afford that? Just dive straight into the meaty part of the conversation. I want your first message to be 12 paragraphs long explaining how you're pretty certain that your next door neighbour has been stealing honey from your hives and how you've concocted a Machiavellian scheme to get the bees to shun their garden and not pollinate any of their flowers. We then go into detailed discussion about how best to convince the bees to get on board and whether the best approach is via bribery, sabotage or simply dressing up as the queen bee and loudly declaring that your neighbour's garden is rather uncouth and shaming them in polite 18th century society.
Perhaps instead you've been delving into Victorian era literature and have fallen in love with how the countryside was described and how simple life seemed; toiling the land, milking cows, putting on our prettiest petticoats on Sundays and occasionally exclaiming "Oh Mr Darcy!" every few minutes. Ignoring of course the rampant inequality, lack of rights for the majority of the population, high mortality rates and child labour. This leads to a discussion about how modern authors just don't seem to be capable of capturing the same imagery any more. Which in turns leads to a theory that authors are paid off by local councils to not describe the leafy suburbs and rolling countryside hills in too greater detail as otherwise the population would rise up en-masse each time new planning permission is granted for hundreds of new builds that will be bought up by financial institutions to be let out at exorbitant rates.
As you may have noticed, I may have a theme in my writing. You may be quick to judge and accuse me of complaining a lot, and though I'd agree I much prefer the term "having a grumble". In truth though, is that not what we all need? Someone with whom we can talk about the smallest day to day annoyances we go through. Someone to whom we can explain our dissatisfaction with life. A grumble grouse. A moan associate. A clamour crony. A...ok thesaurus, in what world is "rap" a strong match for complain? And squawk? Making a high-pitched animal-like sound? That's just a personal attack.
Anyway, tl;dr as I think I've slightly lost the plot and honestly the bread I have in the oven smells like it's burning (or I'm about to have a stroke in which case this won't necessarily get posted, so if it does you know I'm the type of person to ignore the tell-tale signs of a medical conditions because they're too focused on the task at hand to check if in fact the bread is burning)(and that I'm the type of person who prefers long-winded run on sentences rather than getting to the point, despite coyly stating this was a tl;dr).
tl;dr I'm someone who likes to read and write a lot looking for someone or somebodies to exchange long winded paragraphs where we talk about life, problems, whether it's unbecoming to pop an entire poached egg in your mouth and swallow it whole like a pelican, and slowly talk about our interests and hobbies. We've all got our own busy lives and some of us have nefarious schemes involving bumblebees to devise, so something slow and steady would be lovely. The odd message here and there until we get to know one another better, and if you're local (and willing to provide an alibi for any future bee-based shenanigans) then blossoming into friendship as well. It should go without saying, but I'm in a happy relationship (even if I'm not allowed to grumble all the time) so I am looking only for friendship. I'd also prefer it if you were also around your 30s, more so for your own enjoyment as I don't envisage that the kids today want to talk about how MSN messenger was the peak of humanity and every form of communication since has been a hollow copy. Sure Facebook had the poke but nothing quite got someone's attention like a nudge. I'm happy with e-mail or Reddit message, I'd offer snail-mail as well (and even have various moon and animal themed stickers) though I warn you that my handwriting is akin to that of a drunk spider. But not one of those old spiders who laments how no one writes in cursive any more, but rather a young spider who Snapchats and performs burn-outs in the car parks in its Ford Fiesta to the amusement of its other young spider friends.
tl;dr Me like write and read, you also like write and read. Me you type long message, send each other. Me you friends, not food.

Wanted to make it DT post, but it's cancerous to clean up so regular post it is. With this election Croatia enters year long election season. There's EU Parliament election in June, Presidential elections at the end of the year and local elections in spring of 2025.
This Wednesday 17.04. parliamentary elections will be held in Croatia, so this post is a TLDR guide to important contesters, context and possible outcomes by 1 ar neoliberal member with his biases, cognitive limits etc. I will write first paragraph as basic introduction and additional context in cursive for those who want to know more.
Croatia is parliamentary republic meaning prime minister and parliamentary majority hold most of decision-making power. President has limited authority over ambassadors, military, security services and several appointees. Electoral system consists of 10 electoral units each electing 14 representatives and 2 special districts with 3 seats elected by Croats living abroad (Mostly BiH Croats) and 8 seats elected by minorities meaning majority needs 76 out of 151 seats. Threshold is 5% and seats asigned according to D'Hondt.
Polls referenced here are unreliable meaning rough popularity can be trusted, but seats can diverge significantly (+-5). Polls close at 7pm when we’ll get first exit poll results which are mostly correct so we could know what the new government or potential hung parliament will look like. I’ll probably ping to this thread with results update wednesday evening.
Main parties
There are 2 main parties contesting elections around which post-election coalitions will later be formed.

1. HDZ/CDU (Croatian Democratic Union): Conservative, pro EU, Pro NATO, pro Ukraine, pro immigration, fiscally conservative, mixed towards market and privatisations, mostly status quo supporters in matters of reform of territorial administration, judiciary, has history of liberalisation of various services markets, liberalisation of immigration etc., socially… I guess tolerant, pro nuclear. Projected to win between 55-63 seats. I'll refer to them as CDU onwards.

*Nota bene: Pro Nuclear refers to potential joint project with Slovenia of 2nd block of NPP Krsko where Croatia and Slovenia already operate 1 block.
Party that has had parliamentary majority under it’s current PM Plenkovic for 8 years, now seeking it’s 3rd term. Accomplishments made during last 8 years they highlight are: entry into Eurozone, Schengen, increase in development from 62% of EU average to 76% by PPS, low unemployment and in general they believe strong economy. Functional government that operates well as seen by Croatia withdrawing 2nd highest percentage of EU’s RRP funds from Next Gen EU program as well as strong support for Ukraine.
Their weakness are that Plenkovic is much like Mitsotakis from Greece in my opinion. Politician who has at the least enabled systemic corruption. Over the last 8 years, 30 ministers have resigned or were arrested at their positions, by far most of whom due to corruption scandals. That number doesn’t include various SOE party appointed cadre, or lower level officials that had corruption scandals as well. Recently they appointed as state attorney party aligned man with serious corruption links. Think of it as if Trump appointed Giuliani to lead DOJ. Media freedoms have been curtailed by SLAP and attempts to legislate away leaking of corruption investigation materiel. High inflation and housing price surge along with corruption were main criticisms by opposition. Corruption goes under EU radar because he’s not Orban like disruptor on EU level. They have very low coalition potential as 3 of 4 other major parties have pledged not to work with them.

1. SDP (Social Democratic Party): It’s debatable what to write here as party has different opinions compared to current President of the Republic Zoran Milanovic who’s poised to take over as PM and resign his presidential position if SDP led coalition attains majority. It’s my opinion that if they assemble majority, the party will fall in line behind his positions. Projected to win around 45 seats

Rank and file: progressive, Pro EU, pro NATO, pro Ukraine, softly pro-immigration, fiscally mixed, mixed towards market and privatisations, reformist towards territorial administration, socially progressive, pro nuclear.
Milanovic: soft Eurosceptic, soft NATOist, softly pro-immigration, anti-refugee, pro-Russian, mix of nationalist and socially progressive stances.
Party leader Grbin turned out uncharismatic and party itself has been in relative background compared to their glory days in 2000s. Low poll support causing infighting who and what to change. After their last stint in power ending in 2015, Green ‘’We can ‘’ party has taken some of their voters. Their only upside was Milanovic returning to politics and winning presidency back in 2020. Milanovic was most vocal opposition figure against CDU, frequently speaking out against their corruption, nepotism etc. garnering sympathies from right wing for his vulgar language, nationalism towards BiH, anti-refugee rhetoric, isolationism and protectionism, war crimes relativisation. He said he’ll try to create national salvation (from CDU corruption) government including right and far right parties and resign his position as president. That caused poll upturn for the party. Potential coalition partners include Greens in one scenario or right and far right parties in 2nd scenario.
Smaller parties

1. Homeland movement (HM): Far right, nationalist, socially conservative, protectionist, isolationist, ‘’anti-globalist’’, anti-refugee, (softly) pro-immigration, Eurosceptic, pro NATO, softly pro Ukraine, serbophobic, Catholicism, pro nuclear. Projected to win around 15 seats. Can go both SDP and CDU while refusing cooperation with Greens.

Party formed from CDU right wing exiles 4 years ago. Their rhetoric mostly concerns with globalist, EU institutions imposing ideology, importing and brainwashing people into thinking they are gay, how Serbian minority representative Pupovac is a root of all evil, how majority demographics is oppressed, how catholics are oppressed, big import lobbies destroying fair, hardworking domestic farmers, manufacturing etc., how paramilitary fascist militia from 90s war are heroes and need to be treated as such etc.

1. MOST (Bridge): Right wing. Think of them as Croatian GOP under Trump. It’s big tent party that has some radical right wingers as well as some moderate conservatives, while mostly being solidly right wing. Soft Eurosceptic, were opponents of Euro introduction, covid vaccine, mesures conspiracies/opponents, pro NATO, softly pro Ukraine, anti-immigrant, anti-refugee, homophobic, ‘’they’ll make you eat insects, trans women in bathrooms, LGBT lobby'' type of rethoric, strong connection to Croat nationalist politicians in BiH, pro nuclear, pro natural gas, standard speech about free markets while still having broad range of defined strategic industries and protectionist inclinations. Projected to win around 10 seats. Lean SDP, exclude CDU and Greens as options.

Used to be big tent party oriented towards administrative and territorial reform, judiciary reform etc. Entered into coalition with CDU in 2016 so the party split with only right wingers remaining. Entered 2nd coalition with CDU in 2017. that lasted for a few months. Now they present themselves as non-corrupt conservative option and bash homeland movement as CDU stooges connected to tycoons. Say they’ve proved their uncorruptivnes by toppling 2 CDU governments. They promise not to cooperate with CDU thrid time. The difference between them and far right Homeland movement other than coalition partners is that they are mostly based in Dalmatia region of Croatia, see Bosniaks as main foreign enemy and Bosnian Serbs as quiet allies. While Homeland movement sees Serbs as the biggest enemies and are mostly based in Slavonia region. (Quiet) Irredentism/Imperialism towards BiH is their main FoPo priority.

1. Greens (We Can): Left. Green party of social democratic kind, more similar to German Greens than other, more radical, green options in Europe. Pro EU, pro NATO, softly pro Ukraine, pro-refugee, pro-immigration, (nominally) pro nuclear (‘’Yes we do want nuclear it’s just that we want broad consultations with every actor and party concerned, with broad consensus…’’ you get the point), socially progressive, put emphasis on inclusive growth, gender parity, LGBT acceptance, anti-corruption, climate mitigation etc. Statist economics, regulation and social programs. Will only support center towards left parties in government. Projected to win around 10 seats.

High point was winning outright majority in capital Zagreb during last local elections in 2021. Since then, they’ve declined in polls from around 13% down to around 9%. Party lacks broad base outside from major urban areas. During their time in capital Zagreb they’ve focused on lowering city debt, public transport revitalisation, brownfield revitalisation, transparency, depolitisation of SOE cadres, climate change mitigation etc.
Where are liberals?
In 2017 largest socialy liberal party HNS formed government with conservative CDU which caused split and eventual political death of the party same as in 2000s when largest socially liberal party HSLS joined Soc dems which caused their de facto death. Liberal scene is now compromised of smaller local and regional parties with some claiming that CDU-s center shift makes them the liberal party on Croatian political scene. They’ve had first woman PM, first woman president and first (not extra openly) gay minister. To put this aside, there’s no major liberal party contesting this elections.
There are 4 significant liberal parties.

1. Center: Party of major from 2nd largest city in Croatia, Split. They are on the same list as soc dem SDP and are projected to make it into parliament. Social liberals
2. IDS: regional legacy liberal party from Istra peninsula. Will most likely win 2 seats and lean SDP coalition. Social liberals
3. Platform North: Regional party from Medimurje region on the northern tip projected to win a seat. Can go both conservative or SocDem. Social liberals
4. Fokus. Party mostly made of majors from satellite towns around capital Zagreb. More libertarian liberals who emphasize small government, tax cuts, market-oriented reforms and transparency rather than broad government institution or corporate governance building by non-corrupt people that other 3 liberal parties lean towards. Are projected to win 1 seat, but can go up to 3 as they are around 1% short of making it past the threshold in 2 more electoral districts.

As it currently stands there are few post election scenarios.
1.CDU + HM + Minority 8 + Platform North = As HM is in bad relations with minorities someone might drop out or HM could split with remnants joining CDU having enough votes to form majority.

1. SDP + HM+ MOST + Minorities= SDP and probably Milanovic led ‘’national salvation’’ government. Probably nightmare scenario for this sub as that could result in Croatia joining obstructionist Orban block in EU.
   
2. Repeat elections
   
3. Progressive liberal - soc dem - green government? As much of a chance as EU-US FTA this year.
   

To finish this long post and not complicate further, the biggest decider will be how much seats can CDU win. If they win around 60 seats they can collect enough votes from small regional parties, retiree interest parties or potentially fallout from other parties. This will also determine balance of power in any future coalition.

I had heard you could request to see them and got curious only to find that I can see 20 or so deceased family members (mostly from the early 1900s) patriarchal blessings.
Apparently, it's been the choice generation since 1908. I only fully read through 2 since most of them were written in faded and very sloppy cursive, but it was interesting to see the differences. The ones I looked at were only a page long and all of them started off with "name" born of "parents' names" in "birth city" on "date of birth"
It felt a lot more generic even though the two I read were very different. One was from 1930 and 60% of it was just them saying how faithful the person had been up to that point with a long list of all the things they had done like getting baptized. Then a single paragraph with a very direct list of blessings and telling them to continue serving God. The other one was from 1959 and said all obstacles would be removed from their path as they strived to be righteous and that they would be warned before they were given trials. Ending with a "be diligent in gathering together records of thy ancestors"
Overall I'm just curious if you can now see a lot more of the old blessings as well as what other similarities they have. Does anyone know when they stopped doing the generic start of the blessing?

Hmolpedia (14 Feb A67/2022) history of the alphabet article:

In linguistics, history of the alphabet (LH:1) refers to the chronology development of letters, as seen in the Greek alphabet, Hebrew alphabet, and modern alphabet, which derive from Egyptian hieroglyphs and their aqua-centric cosmology defined therein.

Wikipedia history of the alphabet (5 Apr A69/2024) article:

The history of the alphabet goes back to the consonantal writing system used to write Semitic languages in the Levant during the 2nd millennium BCE. Nearly all alphabetic scripts used throughout the world today ultimately go back to this Semitic script.[1] Its first origins can be traced back to a Proto-Sinaitic script developed in Ancient Egypt to represent the language of Semitic-speaking workers and slaves in Egypt.[2]

Now, in regard to this premise of Semitic “slaves” inventing the alphabet, a theory initiated by Alan Gardiner, in his “Egyptian Origin of the Semitic Alphabet” (39A/1916), which is amounts to the mythical Biblical narrative, i.e. the Israelites being in bondage for 500-years (430-years in Babylon and 70-years in Egypt), sold repackaged as modern history, on 15 Nov A68 (2023), I was called “classist“ and ”racist” for objecting the theory that slave workers were behind the invention of the alphabet letters.
Wikipedia continued:

Unskilled in the complex hieroglyphic system used to write the Egyptian language, which required a large number of pictograms, they selected a small number of those commonly seen in their surroundings to describe the sounds, as opposed to the semantic values, of their own Canaanite language.[3][4] This script was partly influenced by the older Egyptian hieratic, a cursive script related to Egyptian hieroglyphs.[5][6] The Semitic alphabet became the ancestor of multiple writing systems across the Middle East, Europe, northern Africa, and Pakistan, mainly through Ancient South Arabian,[7] Phoenician and the closely related Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, and later Aramaic (derived from the Phoenician alphabet) and the Nabatean—derived from the Aramaic alphabet and developed into the Arabic alphabet—five closely related members of the Semitic family of scripts that were in use during the early first millennium BCE.

In this last paragraph, we see “Jewish”, as: Canaanite language, Semitic alphabet, Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, Semitic family, mentioned 4 times, which amounts to the creation of a conceptual Old Testament model of alphabet origin, coated with a false linguistic coded veneer.
External links

• History of the alphabet - Hmolpedia A67.
• History of the alphabet - Wikipedia.

​

I don't like self diagnosing myself, but i have struggled with this my whole life and I feel like l finally have an answer. This is why i had to drop out of school. I've already been to to multiple psychologists for this all the way back to when i was 12 and the best aswer I got was 'it could be low muscle tone'. I physically struggle to write more than a few words at a time without my hand locking up from cramps and feeling like im gonna throw up, and whenever I've told people I physically can't write they look at me like im an idiot. Whenever I have managed to write even a page it would take me an hour, and be 50% scribbling out misspelt words, which teachers used to give me so much shit for because between the scribbled words, the random capitalisation, words with no space between, and random cursive starting halfway between words, my 1 paragraph i could churn out in an hour just seemed like a joke, and I always agreed. It was so embarrassing, and completely ruined my school life, and i left as soon as i could because i was sick of embarrassing myself because i know im not dumb but i never submitted ANY work because i just could not bear the physical and mental pain of writing. I still struggle so hard with it but at least i feel validated now.

Really need some help.. I'm designing a book with a lot of pages.
I work with paragraph style, but is there any way that makes it easier to select multiple text that needs to be cursive? I copy and pasted the text in my document. Now the thing is, this text contains a lot of quotes, sources etc "inside of the body text" that need to be in cursive.
It really is a hassle to have to find al the cursive words in the original text, then find them in my document, and then select them one by one and change them to cursive.
Does anyone have any tips? Or is this just the only way?

Not sure if there’s any correlation (prob not) but my writing bothers me because I write in semi-cursive/cursive for like a paragraph and then switch back to regular writing and so on, and it looks super messy but I can’t help it. Have been doing that most of my life and I just always wondered about that.

I bet you know how I've gone about this one... Not only am I quite shocked by the ability of ChatGPT to just produce a blog post for me, I can literally right click on say a paragraph and opt to dumb it down, or flesh it out or tell it to change "tone" among other things.
And yet Literally Literally struggling to change the font or format of the AI generated pages. smh.
In a world where technology continues to advance at an unprecedented pace, artificial intelligence (AI) has transcended its traditional roles in data analysis and automation to venture into the realm of creativity. One such captivating merger is the fusion of AI and fiction writing. As algorithms evolve and machine learning models become more sophisticated, writers are exploring the possibilities of AI as a tool to enhance, inspire, and even collaborate on storytelling.
​

1. AI as a Creative Muse:

AI is not here to replace human imagination but rather to amplify it. Definitely sounds like something a love-bombing AI overload would say... Writers can utilize AI to generate creative sparks and overcome the infamous writer's block. AI algorithms, such as OpenAI's GPT-3, can provide unique prompts, suggest plot twists, or even help brainstorm character development. The collaboration between human creativity and AI capabilities has the potential to elevate storytelling to new heights.
A recent Podcast (that featured my brother), made a very good point that many of the above functions were available before AI, but by far the biggest difference is the data-set that AI will base these things on, e.g. potentially being able to match your draft with all the other works stored away in its database - rather than say a random prompt.
​

1. Automated Content Creation:

AI has demonstrated its ability to generate coherent and contextually relevant text. This has led to the development of tools that can assist writers in drafting initial ideas or even entire paragraphs. While some may argue that this diminishes the human touch, others see it as a valuable time-saving mechanism, allowing writers to focus on the nuances of their narrative rather than struggling with the initial drafting process.
This is possibly by far on of the biggest impact on writers. Creating a novel can already take months upon years simply to craft the wordcount (let alone the editing). Something that ChatGPT (forgive me in advance if I get the last 3 letters wrong constantly) will 100% undermine is a writers practise. Of course the temptation will be ever present to generate drafts, but its hard to overstate how practice writers will lose from this. (now I know I sound a bit of a curmudgeon it's not that I think writers will go 'soft' its that they will undermine their own processes potentially)
​

1. Customized Writing Assistants:

Imagine having a personal writing assistant that understands your style, preferences, and the intricacies of your ongoing story. AI can be trained to recognize and emulate an author's unique voice, making suggestions that align seamlessly with the established tone and atmosphere of the narrative. This personalized touch can contribute to a more consistent and engaging storytelling experience.
Yikes - see above. I strongly suspect that this will become a very hot topic in future, e.g. there are for sure going to be authors exposed and shamed for using AI - it's going to be a bit like steroids in sports I suspect.
​

1. Genre Exploration and Innovation:

AI's ability to process vast amounts of data enables it to analyze trends in literature, identifying patterns and preferences within different genres. This analytical power can inspire writers to explore new ideas, subvert traditional tropes, or even create entirely new genres. AI becomes a partner in pushing the boundaries of storytelling, encouraging writers to experiment with unconventional narratives and thematic elements.
This is actually something that really gave me pause. I was thinking recently how in some respects no-one truly knows trends in literature. The amount of books published per year can only be estimated due to the sheer numbers, and that isn't including fanfiction and online fiction (and other mediums of creative writing).
AI however CAN know this - it would surprised me if trends were somewhat different than we expected from our own biased perspective. As I write this I am reminded of other industries vastly problematic issues with AI and wonder what are the potential outcomes if AI gathers the 'wrong' information.
The other reflection is considering the interesting paradox of growth and change in art. This fascinates me to no end, but typically the way art evolves over time is through new work being familiar and comfortable enough for people to consume, but having touches of innovation and originality that sparks intrigue and shoves the 'scene' in a new direction. I originally though this could be a problem with AI, which would write every more cursively familiar content and never innovate. According to the above paragraph those AI is quite keen to subvert (the mind boggles)
​

1. Interactive Storytelling:

AI is not confined to the role of a silent collaborator; it can actively engage with readers in interactive storytelling experiences. Branching narratives, where the reader's choices influence the direction of the story, are increasingly becoming popular. AI algorithms can dynamically adjust the plot based on reader input, creating a personalized and immersive reading experience.
LOL I actually love this - pick a path books were some of my favourite in my childhood, but I noticed a tendency towards formula - not to mention of course not much replay-ability.
​

1. Ethical Considerations:

While the integration of AI and fiction writing opens up exciting possibilities, it also raises ethical questions. How much creative control should be ceded to algorithms? Can AI truly understand the emotional depth of a story? These are complex issues that writers, developers, and society at large must grapple with as AI continues to play a larger role in the creative process.
Trust the AI overloads to go easy on the ethical considerations. I love the weird "can AI truly understand" it's like: no it can't, its just shoving together material, but there is no doubt that AI may be able to creative material with emotional impact.
I just had a strange thought - lately I've been experiencing a lot of "uncanny valley" (a feeling of discomfort watching almost realistic computer generated human beings) will such a feeling also start to happen in fiction? Imagine watching Buddies the new AI generated Friends-clone and just having a strange feeling all the time, that everything that happened was just a little off, and you couldn't place why.
Conclusion:
The relationship between AI and fiction writing is a fascinating journey into uncharted territory. Far from being a threat to human creativity, AI serves as a valuable tool, offering inspiration, efficiency, and new avenues of exploration. As writers continue to embrace the possibilities that AI presents, the future of fiction writing holds the promise of richer, more diverse, and deeply engaging narratives. The fusion of art and algorithms is not a replacement but a collaboration, one that has the potential to redefine the landscape of storytelling for generations to come.
Reading yet another pro-robotic overload paragraph that emphasizes the lack of "threat" I come across a strange realisation. Generative AI work through a feedback systems correct? A sort of natural selection, one under our control (Sort of). But as mentioned by the lined podcast - AI doesn't "Want" to say it doesn't know something - or rather it isn't rewarded for that, ergo does AI also "Want" to keep itself in use. It is "Motivated" to survive?
In my own words I think we are in for a turbulent decade or so, as people decipher how comfortable or not they feel about AI generated fiction. It sounds like the Screen Writers strike is over for now (and its a win for writers YISS), and a big topic of that was concern about professional humans being replaced by computers. One arena where I think this will really get weird is online fanfiction. A common and interesting culture of Fanfiction is requests - where people essentially tender out their desired fictional mashups - a process eerily similar to the way we can slam requests into ChatGPT.
I'll tell you what - one thing I would sorely love to use AI is to ORGANIZE my writing a bit better - e.g. 'find that scene where MC meets Antag, or how often have I used THIS phrase. Can I shove this scene earlier in - can I keep notes on a different device, character notes and whatnot without having to spend X amount of time sussing this myself.
That's the end of ChatGPT's essay. I'm extremely interested in hearing people's thoughts on this (not you GPT).

Hi, this is my first time posting on this subreddit or even reddit at all. I haven't had an account nor considered making one before finding this subreddit. But I just recently found it sometime last year when I was 15 and just lurked for a bit. It honestly surprised me, seeing people who were/are also miserable being homeschooled, considering whenever I looked it up online I saw nothing but positive things about it (granted mostly from parents). I was a little nervous to post or make an account on here simply because I've never used reddit or interacted with people who do but if it's one of the only places where I can find people who I can actually relate to, then I'm willing to post here and share my experience with homeschooling and my opinion (but for a simple tldr: it sucks. I hate it..)
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for a little background, I'm 16F (just turned a few weeks ago). I have three younger siblings (14F, 12F, and 9F) and we are all homeschooled. Always have been and from how it's looking we always will be. Have never set foot in a public school. I remember wanting to go when I was younger and always bringing it up and asking my mom (and dad at the time) and they would always say no and that me and my sisters should be grateful that we're homeschooled considering so many other kids wish to be homeschooled. I'm not sure why our dad chose to homeschool us as he left when I was 7 and never asked him (or maybe he told me and I was too young to remember). Our mom chose to homeschool us because of her personal bad experiences with public school, and she said that ever since she was a kid she just knew when she had kids she would homeschool them. Well good on her! Wish I wasn't the kid she had, though.
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I will admit, she has her moments. She is a good mom in my eyes. At least...in everything except social, educational, (and maybe health) aspects. She believes that there's no reason for me and my sisters to talk to kids our age and have friends because we're each other's friends. We are each other's "built in best friends". I haven't talked to somebody my age that wasn't online since 2019 maybe early 2020. She even said during 2020 that lockdown and covid wasn't a big deal for us because we're always inside and never go out anyway. It was the fact that she wasn't wrong that bothered me.
When it comes to educational, it was okay in the beginning. During kindergarten and elementary I would login on abc mouse and do workbooks and work on my handwriting on most weekdays. I will admit my education during kindergarten and elementary wasn't as neglected as most people on the subreddit's and I'm sorry if this makes me sound ungrateful. Though I can't say the same thing about my 9 year old sister. She probably has the worst education of all four of us. It took her the longest to learn to read, she still can't write bigger words properly, and she nearly had to be pushed back to 1st grade (she's in 2nd grade right now).
For health aspects, she refused to give us the covid vaccine saying that it was unnecessary basically. We stopped having annual visits to dentists, doctors, etc. and because of that and also just our neglectful health and diet, we ended up getting sick and infected a lot. We recently went to the dentist and me and all three of my sisters needed work done to our teeth. I needed wisdom teeth pulled, an extraction and multiple fillings (I also need braces but we haven't gotten around to that yet. My mom says we will in February). My sisters also needed fillings and other things. Thank God my mom has insurance for us, so we have all of the work done now (except for my braces ofc). But it just shows how badly our health was neglected and it's good we caught it when we did and didn't wait until adulthood to get it done ourselves.
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Now onto my education (aka the part I should've been at like 2 paragraphs ago that's my bad.. I just have a lot of feelings about this). There was a time where we (me and my sisters) stopped doing schoolwork. We would occasionally do a few things like cursive handwriting, looking up events going on right now, that kind of stuff. But that was it. No math, no proper language arts, science, history, etc.
Because of that, my education is a little pushed back and it makes me feel awful. To put things in perspective, whenever I was 12, I was in the 7th grade. Now I'm 16 and in the 8th grade, even though technically I should be in 10th/11th right now. I have a few online friends who are around my age and are around that grade level and I just can't bring myself to ever say I'm in the 8th grade at 16 years old it just embarrasses me for some reason. It makes me feel dumb.
I was unsupervised on the internet at a young age, so I saw a LOT of shit, but it also taught me more than my mom probably ever would on her own, so I have that going for me, I guess! I'm really bad at math and history, but I'm okay at language and science. Whenever I was super young, I put it upon myself to learn a new language on my own and I've been learning Japanese ever since I was 8 which has also taught me a lot of different things. Ofc I didn't and still don't have the proper material to reach fluency, because my older relatives (grandma, great grandpa, mom) believe that if I want to sink my time into learning a language, I should learn a language that's more widely used where we live, like Spanish. I love how Spanish sounds too, ofc so it doesn't bother me that much, but let's just say they don't sink their time into buying me things that can help me learn Japanese. Of course they don't want to buy me an educational thing I'll enjoy.
I've been begging my mom since I was young to go to school. I always watched TV and how school is on there and she'd always say, "yeah that's how they trick you. I thought the same thing and hated it." and that may be true, but I'd much rather go to school and feel like I'm actually doing something and interacting with kids my age than just rotting in my bedroom everyday. Sometimes me and my sisters would ask her and she would call us ungrateful and that there were so many other kids who wished they could be homeschooled. Whenever we didn't want to do our homeschool, she would try and "threaten" us by saying if we hate it so much then she will just put us in public school so we can really know what it's like. I remember thinking, when she said those words, that that wouldn't be so bad, honestly. And that I wished she would.
We gave up on asking her to go to public school a little while ago, and part of me wishes we didn't, because maybe if we begged enough, she might've considered enrolling us. But that might just be wishful thinking.
I understand the good things about homeschooling. It's nice to not be tied to a strict schedule where you have to wake up at early hours of the morning to go. It's nice not having to worry about bullying and what other kids might think of you. I understand a lot of people have awful experiences in public school, and those who need/want to be homeschooled. But just because somebody else has bad experiences in public school doesn't mean I'll also have bad experiences. In fact, I have a few online friends who actively enjoy school and wouldn't enjoy homeschooling. A few of them started homeschooling and didn't like it, but their parents won't enroll them back into public school. I'm just saying not everybody is going to have the exact same experience and I wish my mom and other parents would understand that.
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I'm really sorry for this whole wall of text. This is really just me ranting. I've been miserable lately since I've started thinking more and more about my homeschooling experience and other people's homeschooling experiences as well. And apparently there's even this thing called "unschooling" which I've seen mentioned around this subreddit as well, which is just awful...
If you read this whole thing, thank you a lot :) I'm glad somebody was willing to read through my very messy walls of text lol it makes me happy. I may post more on this subreddit or I may not. I just wanted to get my feelings out there. I hope whoever sees this has a great day and I hope things get better for you. Lord knows I'm hoping things we'll look up for me and my sisters.

I (18F) belong to a somewhat large group of high school friends (around 15 people). There is one “leader” of sorts, I’ll call her Jane. She has been getting in my nerves lately - I’ll touch on that later. There are two important members of the group to know besides Jane: “Sarah” and “Agatha”, who are best friends since forever. Jane is the glue of our friend group. She leads conversations at lunch, organizes get-togethers, takes pictures all the time, and always invites people to her home that is conveniently located right next to our school. Several things that Jane has done recently have been bothering me. Some context is necessary. I have known Sarah and Agatha for a lot longer than Jane has, and yet recently Jane has been latching on to them and shutting me out. I literally introduced her to them. This is probably partially because all three of them have nearly every single class together this year, and I don’t have classes with any of them. Still, it hurts to be left out when what was briefly a group of four girls inside a larger friend group (mostly comprised of guys) is now a trio with me on the outside. First, she organized a group chat without me in it. This was full of all her friends, people who are also my friends. She accidentally mentioned an inside joke from the group chat in front of me and then asked me why I wasn’t laughing. I responded politely that I wasn’t on the chat, so I didn’t really get the joke. She said “oh, I’m sorry, I’ve totally been meaning to create a new one with you in it, I’m just super lazy.” She did, and although she stuck to her word and made a new group chat, I cried a lot about it that day. Second, the three of them - Jane, Sarah, Agatha, have been hanging out a lot more often alone than before. After school gets out, they’ll go get coffee or ice cream together without thinking to invite me. Again, it was previously established that we were a group of FOUR, not three and some rando who imposes on their time together, and yet it’s starting to feel that way. Third, Jane plays with people’s feelings. Jane is a singer-songwriter (quite a good one, I wouldn’t be surprised if she gains a decent following in the coming years) who sometimes decides to send videos of songs to her friends as a sort of test drive before playing them at a concert. She sends me this blatant love song full of heartfelt imagery and metaphor - enough to melt anyone’s heart if they thought it was about them. She then proceeds to play this game with me over text, dropping details about the person she’s crushing on and wrote the song about while insisting she can’t say a name. She even said the classic line, “you know them VERY well.” Of course I thought it was me. Anyone would. Beyond that, she and I are the only two girls who like girls in our immediate friend group, if not entire grade (our school is quite small and conservative - not many gay people). She and I had flirted casually in the past, but after hearing this song, I suddenly thought she was serious the whole time. I began to hang out with her one on one - basically taking her on dates without the hand-holding and labeling. I work up to asking her out officially and - get this - write a letter in beautiful cursive script saying all the things I like about her. Sitting in my car, I prepare to give her the letter, but to make sure, ask her if the song was about me. She scoffs and says “no, did you really think that?” I am crushed but hide it well. After a bit of prodding, she reveals that the object of her affections is none other than Sarah, a straight girl who is probably mildly homophobic due to her upbringing (nothing against her though, Sarah is great). After a bit of crying and short-lived teenage heartbreak, I try to forget about what happened and do my best to preserve our friendship as it was. Side note: this is when she decided to date one of our mutual guy friend’s ex-girlfriend, who broke his heart. Not a good move. I tried to warn her against it and she admitted it was a bad idea but continued to go on dates with the girl anyway. Fourth, after I helped her get a good grade in a paper, she rubbed it in my face that mine wasn’t as good as hers. I literally edited her paper. She got a 96 and I got an 86 - and she usually gets grades in the range of low 80s. I get it, she’s excited and everything, but did she really have to gloat about how great it was that she got an A and I got a B? I’ve literally never received a B on a paper before. I am a straight-A student in every sense of the word. Maybe I’m being over dramatic, but I was already not happy about the grade I got, so for her to boast about the 10 points she got above me was pretty brutal. Especially because there were clear signs I’d been crying about the grade. It’s mean to say, but if you had read her paper, you would agree with me that I got her that 96. Her paper was a garbage fire before I stepped in - typos, grammar mistakes, run-on sentences, entire paragraphs that basically said the same thing as the previous one, etc. After boasting and rubbing it all in my face, she didn’t even care to say thank you for the help I gave her. We then gave presentations based on those papers. Each person was given a time slot in various rooms across the school, so a lot of kids overlapped with each other. Jane’s presentation overlapped with Agatha’s, so she asked our principal to change her time so it “wouldn’t conflict with any of her friends’ presentations so she could see all of them and not miss anyone important.” Guess which time slot she specifically asked to be moved to? That’s right, mine. Before changing her time, all of these people agreed to see my presentation, but the second she changed hers, I was chopped liver. I gave my presentation to a room missing all my friends because I am second in importance to Jane. I can’t help but feel like she did this specifically to hurt my feelings. None of my other friends even pretended to be sad that they missed my speech either. All they did was talk about how good hers was. These things, plus dozens of other comments putting me down or reminding me how unimportant I am to her, have convinced me that Jane is not a good friend. The problem is, I still like spending time with her. She’s funny, and usually nice, and despite my best efforts, I’m still kind of crushing on her. I’m in a tight space here, and I need advice desperately. Do I ditch Jane, which will cause all my other friends to ditch me as well? If so, do I tell her why and end things all at once or do I just slowly stop spending as much time with the group? Do I endure her behavior for the security of a friend group? Should I tell the others in the group to try and turn everyone against her? Or am I just being over dramatic and none of this is a problem at all? HELP!!
TL;DR : I have a bad friend with a lot of supporters and I’m not sure whether to keep hanging out with that group or not.

I promise, though not exactly short, this will be a tidy and polished lore dump (compared to what lore paragraph can become ig) So, fellow member of this sub u/LV426acheron made a post questioning the nature of the Throne of Want, since I read that discussion I also tried to write out an answer on Docs, and after 3 entire hours of following Aldia's example and going insane over lore, I finally figured it out, and created a cohesive and concise document. I think the question people were having the most difficulty responding to regarded the Giant Golems, why those specific ones work the way they do and what exactly did Vendrick intend to do with the Throne. Therefore, instead of posting the doc itself (tho if anyone is interested i'll gladly give a copy) I'll answer the questions in even more of a concise (but complete) and bullet point-like manner.

1. What is the Throne of Want? The Throne of Want appears to be a relatively conscious entity (Ds3 confirmed the First Flame has a consciousness, plus the Throne closes itself up so it makes its fair share of sense) which serves as a means to gain possession over the First Flame, taking it doesn't necessarily mean you'll link the Fire (though that's probably the choice most who could take it would make) it just means you "own" it and can decide what to do with it (Lord of Hollows ending in Ds3 confirms you can in fact take the Flame for yourself).
2. Who built the Throne of Want? This is completely unknown, however I suppose that, like the Thrones in Ds3 were built by the Way of White for the Lords of Cinder, this one might have been built by a previous Lord of Cinder, or even one or multiple of the past bearers of the Lord Souls, who date far far back before Drangleic. Bear in mind this is complete speculation, and who built it doesn't truly matter too much (it is very interesting to think about though). Also, it’s quite easy to imagine the little flames upon the stone pillars following the bridge represent every past Linking?
3. What did Vendrick want to do with it? His intentions towards it definitely changed the more he (and Aldia) learnt about it. I'm going to assume he knew nothing of it before the construction of Drangleic Castle, as the latter was commissioned by him (as a gift for Nashandra), built by the Giant Golems (more on them soon) and I'm going to assume the location was conveniently chosen by Nashandra herself, who obviously knew what she was doing with that placement (after all, the entire reason she showed up in Drangleic was to take the Throne) plus, that entire area seems to be somehow affiliated with the Dark, as we can find Grandhal and a Darkdiving temple there too. Now it gets to the speculative (but theme-coherent) part. During the construction of the subterranean rooms of Drangleic Castle, the Throne of Want is discovered, nor Vendrick nor anyone with him have any idea what it is, except obviously Nashandra, and perhaps Aldia, whom as we know was studying the nature of Gwyn's cycle and curse. If the Throne truly was built by a past Lord Soul bearer or a by a Lord of Cinder, it would make sense he’d harbor some knowledge regarding it. To answer the question in bold however, we must first digress for just a moment to a cursive and bold one:
4. What does it mean to take the Throne of Want? Once again, notice this is never stated in any description, dialogue or interview, however it makes coherent sense with DS2's themes, which is why I'm going to count it as a valid hypothesis. Taking the Throne of Want means to die, or to at least forever abandon the world to control it from within the Throne. It clearly looks like a burial mound, closes you within itself amidst pure darkness and admittedly the actual seat looks like a sad grave more than it does a mighty throne destined for the one who'll rule the world (by having control of the First Flame, one essentially gets to dictate the "order of this world", thanks for the quote Aldia). It sounds like a good deal, you forever leave the physical world but get to control it, however here we must recall one of DS2’s main themes: humanity, and this time humanity is intended as the nature of mannkind, not the fragments of the Dark Soul. Vendrick being a human was understandably reluctanct to take the Throne (once he had learnt from Aldia what its purpose was). He was in fact “just” a person, with attachments to people and things, ambitions, wants (pun unintended) and on top of that he also had an entire kingdom, the responsability over it, its subjects, and the glory that comes with ruling said kingdom. We have yet to answer question 3, and to avoid drawing this one paragraph out to be too long, we have to yet again answer a different question (that will finally finish answering the third one, ong).
5. Why then did he place the Golems and two guardians there? We enstablished that Vendrick being a human king was naturally reluctant to take a seat which eternally separates the True Monarch from the world but lets them control it through the First Flame (which he, by the time he found the Throne, likely knew close to zero about, even with Aldia’s research). We can however safely say he did intend to take it, eventually at least. This is certain because, instead of burying it away, he built a door before it that could only be unlocked with his ring, put the Throne Watcher and Throne Defender to guard it, and placed the Golems there for when he’d eventually feel the time to take it had arrived. To his knowledge, he would just have had to throw some souls to the Golems, and they would have made him a bridge. Now why not just make a normal bridge? I’d assume the Throne wanted a sort of testament of power, and though Vendrick having defeated the Old Ones was already a definelty valid candidate, perhaps the Throne wanted a more physical proof, or perhaps it demanded even more power? After all, Vendrick himself says: “I harnessed the power of the Giants, so that I might step closer to Fire” (that is likely not the exact line, I currently do not have the time to find it) we can take that literally, as in: he used the Souls of Giants to create the Golems, which he then planned to use as a literal bridge to reach the Throne. So, there is question three finally answered: Vendrick intended to eventually take the Throne, and left the Golems there to be activated when he felt it was more appropriate, as to why he didn’t activate them beforehand: the Throne is quite the eldrich thing, it was probably pretty intimaditing, it’s understandable he didn’t really wanna try messing with it any more than necessary before actually taking it.
6. Why do the Golems activate with the Kinship of the Giants? Premise: going by what the Fandom wiki says, it turns out the Kinship was greatly mistranslated, and it’s not “the key to access the Throne of Want” but a metaphysical manifestation of a feeling the Bearer of the Curse acquires towards the Giants, interpret that however you’d like, what matters is that Bearer now feels a, quote from the proper translation: “resonance with the Giants”. Now, the thread would end here with this last point if the bridge to the Throne was made by actual Giants, however it is made by Golems, so how does that work? This is what took me the longest to figure out, and here’s it explained: the Golems down there have been down there for a lot. And I don’t just mean a couple of centuries: Sweet Shalquoir informs us that the current Four Old Ones are “already” so very unimaginably old, and quote: “must have sprouted a thick coat of moss by now” (yes this matters because this, along with the hypothetical timeline, is what gets us to connect the Golems, who are the only ones in game to be in fact coated in moss, with the concept of being unimaginably old), and Vendrick, once again a shit ton of time back, says: “Drangleic will fall, the Fire will fade, and the Souls of Old will reemerge”. Now consider the Golems are likely there since construction on Drangleic Castle, meaning it truly has been a lot. Why does this matter tho? Here’s why: we know for a fact that the Souls of Giants still retain some degree of consciousness, because when in the Bearer’s inventory, they aid them in the fight against Vendrick, for well very obvious reasons. We also know for a fact that the Golems were created with Souls of Giants, we can then conclude that after being left untouched and not commanded for actual eaons, the Souls of Giants within the Golems regained some of their consciousness, and when they sensed the Bearer’s resonance with their kind, they willingly made them a path to the Throne. There it is, everything I could figure out about the Throne of Want and the Giant Golems. Now I know this is a hell of a text dump therefore to anyone who's come to read this far: thank you so so much.

The walls shake.
The secretive mechanisms of the machine rattle all around us; muted, like distant thunder.
The six of are gently rocked, highly conscious of the reverberations.
“…It sounds so far away”, Szymon mutters in his thick Polish accent.
I look up at him.
Kim responds with an uneasy chuckle: “I was just thinking the same thing”. The two smile at each other. Reassurance, I think. She glances at me, then adjusts her weapon.
I reach a hand to my forehead to rub away a thin sheen of sweat.
Before embarking on this particular mission, I did not admit to the others the intensity of my claustrophobia.
I grimace and look around, at the windowless inner-walls of the submarine, and I try not to think about the enormity of the weight of the water above our heads. The weight growing heavier and heavier by the minute, as we sink deeper and deeper into the depths of the Atlantic.
“Ten minutes til docking” warbles a distorted voice through the overhead speaker, accompanied by a dim red light. An unseen cloud of anxiety flows through the cabin like gas, and I scratch my jaw, discomforted and unsettled.
It reeks in here.
It smells like rank, stale pool water and sweat. Sweat with metallic undertones.
Szymon slides off his glasses, then rubs them on the material of his military fatigues, to little success. He mutters something to himself in Polish as he pushes them back up onto his nose.
The six of us have very different backgrounds, but what we share is our common station, a NATO barracks at the edge of Germany.
“Nearly time now”, says the man to my left. Blaine, a Scotsman who lives in my quarters. “Let’s get this fucken’ show on the road, shall we?”
I raise my eyebrows at him and give him a grim-half smile, but no-one replies directly.
To his left is Rudy, an American keen to tell anyone who’ll listen about his German heritage, despite having ‘O’Riley’ as a last name, which I get some personal amusement from. I’m married to a German myself, a wonderful woman called Nina, but the only actual German natives amongst us this evening are Kim, and Manny.
Kim’s a good friend of Nina’s, though we’re not actually particularly well-acquainted. I see her around the barracks but we don’t have much in common. When we speak, we tend to speak about my wife, which aside from the army is our only real point of shared investment.
Kim sometimes jokes that she knows Nina better than I do.
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…I’m not sure how I feel about such jokes.
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But she’s nice enough.
Beside her is the other German, born-and-bred, and that’s Manny. Currently snoozing, Manny’s an old boy. A grandson, in fact, of one of the men who helped run the, uh… ‘installations’… we’re about to visit. He’s sleeping, for now. Not sure how he manages it, but he’s a trooper.
I look down at my boots, and reflect on the objectives at hand.
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Exit the submarine.
Enter into the bunker.
Gather intel.
Report back.
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Simple enough, I suppose.
But the ‘bunker’ is one of several. A relic from the Second World War and kindly left behind by the Nazis… near-unreachable at the bottom of the Atlantic ocean.
There aren’t many pictures of these bunkers, and of the pictures that do exist it’s difficult to determine scale or size, but by all accounts the bunkers are monstrous things. Massive installations of concrete and metal and God knows what else, spread in a rough half-circle round the entrance to the Mediterranean.
Earlier today the six of us flew out from Geilenkirchen, transferred to submarine at the Lison Naval Base, and it’s been a long, miserable ride west from there.
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Every team that goes to the bunkers reports back the same thing. That they’re no major threat, there’s nothing to be found of interest, and since they’re causing no environmental damage and pose no strategic threat, NATO might as well leave them be. Operations out into the ocean to destroy and clean-up the wreckage are expensive and time-consuming, and let’s face it- there’s always something more important to deal with than some forgotten concrete halls at the bottom of the sea.
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Some busybody NATO pen-pusher must have noticed the bunkers were years overdue a visit, I guess, kicked up a fuss, and so the papers were shuffled and pawns moved around the board, and here we are.
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On the way down.
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Down, down, down into the deep.
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I try not to think about the tight, metal confines of the submarine. I pray that I will be afforded more space to move and think and breathe when we’re actually inside the bunker.
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The little red light by the speaker flicks back into life, and the jumbled voice comes through once again, this time louder with a whip-like electronic crackling.
“Five minutes to go”, it says, as I start with alarm.
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Manny is frightened out of his sleep with a gasp and a raspy exclamation. He splutters out a name that I do not recognise, one that means nothing to me.
“Friedrich!” he calls out into the gloom, jumping to his feet in panic. I hear some of the bones in his legs click as he does so.
“Jesus,” Szymon mutters, reaching a hand to his chest. “Scared the life out of me”.
The eyes in the submarine regard Manny warily. This is not the first time he has had such an outburst.
“Friedrich…” Manny mumbles again, looking around the vessel at his fellow passengers, expression glazed, confusion marked across his face.
Kim reaches up for his arm. “The dreams again, Manny?” she asks, gently beckoning him back down.
Manny just stares at her for a moment, then relents, slowly sinking back onto the bench, rubbing at the grey around his temples wearily.
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“Yes”, he replies, in German. “Yes, apologies. I don’t know what comes over me. They have been getting worse”.
“What was it this time?” Kim asks him.
He shakes his head. “It’s already fading, but… I believe it was similar to before. The people I saw in the dreamscape were none that I have ever actually met. I do not recall having ever seen them. Not in this life. In my dream, however, I knew them… I knew them all. They were- important to me. We were in a field of long grass, and there was a young man- Freidrich… He was… he was going to war”.
Kim chews her cheek a little as she considers this.
“I don’t think I expected him to come back”, Manny says quietly, as the submarine rumbles. “I knew that he was being sent to his death”.
“They’re connected to your grandfather”, Kim says with self-imposed certainty. “I’m sure of it. That’s why they’re getting worse. Ever since you volunteered to come on the mission- your subconscious knew you’d be getting closer to him, to his place of work-”
“Load of bullcrap”, Rudy chimes him, his hair flopping as he leans forward over his gun. “Kim you gotta stop with this supernatural shit. It’s all in your mind, Manny. In fact, Kim, you hit the nail on the head just now. It’s all in your subconscious, man. Just let it go. It’ll be some repressed Nazi guilt or something”. He jabs a finger towards Manny and furrows his brow. “I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. You aren’t guilty of any kind of Nazi crimes, just because your Grandaddy was an SS officer or whatever”.
Manny sighs wearily, he reaches his hand into a pocket and produces a handkerchief, which he uses to dab his forehead. “I am well aware of this”, he responds drily. “My grandfather was not in the SS. But I appreciate your passion on this matter”.
“Damn straight”, Rudy replies, leaning back in his seat.
​
Blaine and I exchange a look.
I can empathise at least a little with Manny’s internal struggle. Regarding his Nazi grandfather, I mean. My wife shares his burden, as her own great-grandfather was a colleague of his. They both worked together in a close capacity, I am told. Or at least, that’s what the records indicate.
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“Prepare for docking”, crackles the voice through the speaker, and for a second or two the light in the submarine falters, shrouding us all in temporary, sickly darkness.
I suppress a shudder as we get ready to disembark, and the rumbling all around us wavers intermittently between louder, and quieter.
​
…Louder, and quieter.
​
The sounds of the engine rise to their greatest volume since we left the port at Lisbon, then fade to a soft and steady background murmur.
Blaine rises to his feet. “Let’s check this place out then, eh. The First Bunker. Reckon we’ll find anything fun?”
Syzmon joins him, stretching as he does so. “I doubt it. They recon this place every, what, ten or so years? And they’ve never brought back anything interesting. I doubt we’ll see more than a collection of dusty old Nazi ruins”.
You don’t find that interesting?” I ask, as I prepare to disembark. “Morbid, sure. But not even a little interesting?”
Szymon makes a noise of disgust and mutters something to himself. “I find no interest in the droppings of vermin”, he says, and turns away.
The cynic in me sees Szymon shoot a quick glance at Manny before he does so, and this cynical part of me is keen to interpret it with dark thoughts, but that would do the man a disservice. Szymon is a good fellow. Hard-working.
Blaine heads through the narrow inner-body of the submarine towards the ladders, and Szymon follows on behind.
Behind him goes Rudy, flicking his hair from his face, and he’s followed by Kim, and Manny. Manny places a hand on my shoulder and gives me a tired smile as he passes me by. I return it, then with a deep sigh of relief, I say goodbye to this room in the submarine, for now. I’m looking forward to a little more space to breathe.
​
One by one we ascend the ladders and out through the circular hatch in the submarine’s roof.
​
I allow in a great lungful of air as I do so, squinting through the darkness as I fumble for my torch, switching it on and joining its yellow-gold beam with the others.
We stand on the cold metal roof of the submarine, half-visible, protruding like an iron whale from the black waters below, lapping hungrily at its sides.
Ahead of us is a steel rail, and a vast concrete platform that extends into shadow.
​
The bunker, from the inside, has the look of an enormous hangar.
Kim taps my shoulder then gestures up towards the back of the hall, closer to the ceiling, and I follow her gaze and raise my light.
Our beams fall upon a colossal eagle carved into a sheet of rock, itself embedded in concrete. The eagle is angular and cold and sits proudly upon an enormous swastika.
Szymon crosses himself and spits into the water, before taking a few long steps and leaping from the edge of the submarine’s roof to the concrete platform, his boots scraping against the side.
He hauls himself up with the aid of the steel rail, and we listen to the sounds of his boots against the ground as he looks for the mechanism which will release a bridge for safer passage.
It was in the file, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find.
I glance down into the water below; the smell of salt is thick in the air.
I am unable to keep from my head the fleeting thought of a sudden slip, of tumbling down into that dark and quietly rippling water. Its softness a twisted mask to conceal the terror if its icy depth and unforgiving pull hidden away beneath.
I shiver, and look away.
A few cold moments pass and with the eventual rattling of gears and springs, a bridge begins to extend from the side of the concrete, out towards our spot on the sub.
Blaine tests it first, and then one by one we cross, joining Szymon on the platform proper.
We begin to cross the floor, making our way towards the gridded double-doors at the hall’s far end, at present only gloomy rectangles in the distance.
​
I feel very small in here. Even as a part of a team of six, I can’t help but feel… insignificant. Dwarfed by the intensity of this deserted lair.
​
“This is a sick place”, Manny says in a low voice. His eyes flash momentarily, as a stray beam of light passes across his face. “Do you feel it, Oliver?”
After a beat, I nod in agreement. There is something wrong here, something on a level I can’t quite grasp, just yet.
I glance up to the eagle as we walk beneath it.
This is no passing-fancy historical site.
“Are you alright?” I ask him.
“Yes”, he replies, “yes, for now”.
I don’t know exactly why Manny volunteered for this mission. He’s the only one who volunteered, for one thing. The rest of us were simply ordered.
I think he pulled some strings and cashed in some favours. Convinced the brass he’d be of use, given his knowledge of, and experience in decommissioning former Nazi sites and places of…
​
…
​
…of relevance.
​
It’s true what Kim was saying earlier, as well. His grandfather was a prominent Nazi. Vanished without a trace one day, there’s no record of his death; but he did work down here. At least for a time. That much is known.
One of the first recon teams down to this bunker recovered some old files. Manny’s grandfather was one of the listed names found within.
“You reckon we’ll find any bodies?” Blaine calls back over his shoulder, just a little too loud for the environment. I cringe, but Rudy replies, undeterred.
“I should think so. Might find myself a nice shiny Nazi skull to take home as a souvenir!”
We reach the metal double-doors at the end of the hall, and with a look round the group, Blaine presses his shoulder against them, and forces one open. We slip through the gap in formation, checking down the long, dark corridors that branch out before us and beside us- disappearing into the void on our left, and to our right.
“No”, Manny says, his voice echoing down between the walls. “The reports made no note of any bodies found, Nazi or otherwise. Whatever they were doing here… They didn’t stick around”.
“So then where did they go?” Szymon ponders aloud, arcing his weapon around as he steps into a deserted room nearby, perhaps once used for briefings or meetings. “They wouldn’t have just vanished into thin air”.
​
“We might see a body”, Kim says.
The group looks at her. “A man was killed during the last expedition. A soldier. French, I think”.
​
“Oh yeah”, Rudy mutters, rubbing his nose. “How’d that happen again? Freak accident, right?”
“Aye mate that’s right”, Blaine says. “That’s what I was talking about, really. Apparently the poor fucker got knocked clean cold by a falling pipe. Might have been a ceiling panel or something, actually, but whatever. The report read that he was face-down, and drowned in a puddle. When the rest of his team found him, they didn’t have the capacity to remove the fallen material, so they were forced to just leave him down here. Don’t believe he was ever recovered, since we’re the first guys to walk these corridors in over a decade”.
“They just left him down here?” Szymon asks. “That’s cold. Inhumane, almost”.
“I don’t think they had a choice, Sy”, Kim says, nudging his arm. “Maybe we’ll have to leave YOU down here!”
“Hey, not funny!” he says, but he chuckles as he does so.
​
I’m not particularly amused, myself.
​
To tell the truth, I feel sick.
Unless they’re hiding it better than we are, it’s possible that only Manny and myself are actually comprehending the weight of the monstrosity of this place.
The others haven’t really thought about it, I don’t think.
But we’re in one of six bunkers. This particular one is the easiest to reach, supposedly, so it’s the one that Command keep sending their teams to.
But something of this size… Something as massive as this, hidden away in the darkness at the bottom of the ocean. It’s hiding a secret. A terrible, frightening secret, and I don’t even know what it is.
The place is cold, and chills ripple across my exposed skin as I glance from left to right, peering into the shadows of the open doorways as we walk the length of the central corridor. Deeper into the middle of the complex.
Strategically, a bunker like this would be better off in the Mediterranean, surely. Shallower waters for easier construction. Positioned between Italy and Libya, for instance, for maximum tactical value.
But the Nazis took the time and trouble to construct it out here, in the Atlantic.
And for what?
Why would they do this?
Where did they go?
…And what exactly did they leave behind?
​
Silence falls across the group.
There is no sound but the clamping of our boots. The long, low breaths of my comrades. Echoes, round the walls.
At the very edge of my hearing a noise shivers fast down the length of the hall. My heartrate quickens and my ears sharpen.
…The simple creak of an old structure, I should think… But it almost sounds like… whispering.
An almost-imperceptible whisper at the very threshold of sound.
It’s so faint, however, that I decide not bring it up, for fear of looking like an idiot, but I share another pointed look with Kim just beside me.
​
She heard it too.
​
Maybe the others did as well.
I glance to my left as Blaine pulls his mask up and around his nose and mouth.
Szymon crosses himself, and Manny rubs his forehead. I see that it is covered in beads of sweat.
​
We press on.
​
“We’ll head to the central room, then we split into teams of two”, Blaine says through his mask. “We get this bunker checked out, we reconvene”.
He’s met with murmurs of assent as we push through another set of double-doors – smaller this time – and step into some kind of lobby. Manny produces a map and unfolds it, and it becomes clear that this lobby will, if we continue, head through into the complex’s centre.
​
We are halted however, by the strength of our own, sudden awe.
​
We stand in the entrance to a wide room with a high, domed ceiling. The walls around us are covered- much to our surprise- in plaques and paintings, and in the room’s middle is a now-dead fountain, the centrepiece of which is a colossal statue, or series of statues, depending on your perspective.
I crane my neck, struck with disbelief.
The statue depicts three men, of varying age, with expressions solemn and eyes pure white. A long and fish-like serpent carved from the same foundation winds itself between and around them, way up towards the ceiling, its jaw wide and teeth sharp.
A dark, circular symbol can be seen on the foreheads of each of the three men, stark against the relative paleness of their stone skin.
“Die Schwarze Sonne”, Manny mutters, taking a step towards the statue. He is hauntingly small by comparison.
“The Black Sun”, Szymon repeats, staring up at the centrepiece with horror.
“What does it mean?” Rudy asks, glancing around the group. “And what the hell is this thing, anyways? It ain’t in the damned report! You’d think at least ONE of the teams would have mentioned seeing something like THIS”.
“The Black Sun was one of the many symbols utilised by the SS”, Manny replies, still staring up at the great statues. “It has been employed by many cultures, but, in this instance- it was the symbol of Wewelsburg castle”. He turns to us. “The dark home of the Nazi foray into the occult. Led by none other than Heinrich Himmler”.
“Nazi occultists?” Rudy responds. Then he puts out a hand and makes a dismissive gesture. “No, no come on. Don’t mess me with that supernatural bullshit again. We’re dealing with people, here. Just ordinary, evil people”. He shoots another look up to the statue of the three men, and the creature.
“…Well”, he falters. “Maybe not that ordinary. But you catch my drift”.
Szymon grunts and shakes his head. “Not ordinary. And not people. This place is the husk for a den of long-dead rats”.
“Look come on man, I get it, you hate Nazis. You aren’t alone in this. But open your EYES”. Rudy throws an arm out to the statues beside him. “You aren’t even a LITTLE impressed? Or at least, I don’t know… curious?”
Szymon scoffs, then walks away, turning his back to the statue as he continues his passage round the perimeter of the room.
I take another long look at the statue, then head around on its left-hand side, the opposite side to Szymon.
​
I come up alongside Blaine, admiring a painting, and I stand beside him.
​
I read a little plaque on the wall, one celebrating a visit made to this bunker by Himmler in 1941, and then I consider the painting.
It is housed in a frame of dark, rich wood, and is comprised of a host of grim, swirling colours.
​
The scene, despite its lack of vibrancy, is vivid and powerful.
​
It depicts a churning sea, and it almost feels as if I am there myself.
…And in a way, I am.
Here in this bunker, at the bottom of the ocean.
​
The waves are grey and black and tinged with the darkest of blues, frothing angrily as they crash and cascade into and over each other. At the painting’s far left is the silhouette of a shadowed city of ruins, protruding faintly from the surging sea and lost behind the spiralling clouds overhead.
I am vaguely aware of a low conversation taking place between Szymon and Kim somewhere far behind me, but in the moment they are overwhelmed by the impossible roar of these silent waves.
A lighthouse stands at the far right of the painting. Its beacon is an eye, and the flash of painted gold looks out over the storm, and casts a lone, solemn beam towards the fallen city.
​
The lighthouse, upon closer inspection, is comprised of bodies.
Hundreds and hundreds of broken bodies, intertwined with torturous new purpose.
​
“It’s awful, isn’t it”, Blaine murmurs, and I am snapped back to reality with a blink.
“…Yes”, I reply after a beat. Glancing down to the little silver tag embedded in the painting’s frame.
​
‘Die Eintausend’, it’s called.
​
Or, in English:
‘The Thousand’.
“Awful”, I repeat, “but still…”
“Aye”, Blaine grunts. “It’s a quality painting”.
​
There’s a pause.
​
“Not something I’d ever hang up in my bloody bedroom, though, personally”.
​
I chuckle drily, and we move on.
​
Our footsteps are heavy against the concrete below.
“Rudy made a point just now”, I say out loud, as we walk. Blaine waits for me to continue.
“He said that the statue- this whole room, actually- it’s entirely omitted in the reports. This is meant to be an uninteresting, unassuming lobby. Instead it’s filled with intricate paintings and giant statues. Why wouldn’t this stuff have been mentioned?”
“Seems obvious to me, mate”, Blaine replies. “Because despite what Szymon says, this stuff is interesting. And when somebody finds something mysterious and interesting, everyone and their grandma wants to come and have a look”.
​
He hoists his gun a little higher, clears his throat. “I’m guessin’ that this was all omitted because the recon teams decided they didn’t want people coming down here”.
​
I swallow.
“And why would they do that, hm?” I ask him, rhetorically. “Why wouldn’t they want anyone else coming down. Why keep it all so cryptic and silent?”
Blaine shrugs. “Couldn’t say”.
“There’s something wrong down here”, I mutter. “I’m sure of it. Something very, very wrong, and every part of me hates this place”.
“Aye”, Blaine says. “I’ve started feeling a little like that myself. It’s getting worse, actually, the deeper in we go”.
I nod. “We’re going to find something terrible down here”, I finish, but to this Blaine says nothing.
Leaving the statues and the defunct fountain behind, we push through the doors at the hall’s opposite side, and head through into a long, wide room with two simple doors.
We are joined by the others.
The door on the left has a plaque that reads: “Der Kontrollraum”, and the door on the right is marked only with the same symbol on the foreheads of the stone giants.
…The Black Sun.
My stomach turns as I look upon it, and a wave of cold nausea passes through me.
My heartrate quickens, and I roll my shoulders, attempting to release some built-up tension.
​
Manny brings a hand up to his head and gasps, and the group turns to him.
“Manny”, Kim says with concern. “Are you alright?”
Manny pats her hand, then steps away, a little closer to the ‘Kontrollraum’. “I keep seeing…” he falters. “I am seeing in my head what I can only describe as ‘flashes of memory’. But the memories are not mine”. He gestures to the Kontrollraum door.
“There is a man in there”, he says simply, then looks back at us. “A dead man, I believe”. He rubs the side of his forehead. “And I have also come to believe that I was wrong, earlier. I no longer think this place is entirely deserted”. He points to the door. “A man’s last memories are held behind that door”, then he strides towards it.
“Manny!” Rudy calls out, “wait!” But the man does not. He approaches and grabs the handle, swinging the door outwards into our corridor, and shines inside his beam of light. He steps into the room, and we follow him inside.
“Christ”, Blaine mutters as we enter. “I guess you found your Nazi skull, Rudy. Why don’t you go and grab it up”.
But Rudy doesn’t respond, he simply looks down at the sight before us.
A skeleton surrounded by dust and empty cans, slumped back in a chair against the wall. The bones are wrapped up in the threads of a Nazi uniform.
​
“None of this shit is supposed to be down here”, Rudy says, eventually. “Why did Command keep all this stuff from us?”
“It’s not Command”, Blaine replies, echoing our earlier conversation. “It’s the recon teams. The recon teams write the reports”.
“So why emit all this?” Rudy says as he throws up his hands. “I don’t get it. This ain’t no ordinary bunker, and I think we’ve all realised that by now”.
Kim ignores him. “What is it, Manny?” she asks, as the man crouches down beside the skeleton.
Manny regards the remains of the Nazi. He looks to the brown, banded book on the desk beside him, and he considers the iron cross on the front of the uniform. A hint of a chain can be seen spilling from one of the front pockets, and Manny reaches over to take hold of it.
“Hey, should you be doing that?” Rudy asks, but Manny continues, and slowly draws from the uniform a golden locket, in the shape of an oak leaf. He turns it over in his hands.
“I know this man”, he says simply.
“What do you mean?” Kim asks.
“His name is Hans. He has a wife, and a young son. A son who was no older than eleven, or twelve, at his death”.
“I don’t suppose he’ll be that young any more, Manny”, Blaine grunts, giving the skeleton’s boot a light kick. A cloud of fine, white dust bursts out into the room. “I imagine he looks just his father here”.
Manny sets the locket on the desk, and Kim reaches out to open it up.
Inside is a picture of a square-jawed soldier with closely-cropped hair. Beside him is a woman, dressed in the style of the 1930s. The picture in the locket’s other half is of a young boy. The couple’s son, by the look of him.
“Jesus…” Rudy murmurs with dismay, looking from the pictures to Manny, and back. “Manny how did you know that?”
Manny stands back up with a small grunt, his legs creaking as he does, and he takes the journal on the desk up into his hands, and begins to carefully leaf through the pages.
“Even though it likely belonged to a monster of a man…” he begins, “I can never bring myself to be anything but gentle when it comes to books. I was instilled into me a deep respect for the written word”.
He cautiously turns to the very first page, and points to the name that has been written in the front margins.
‘HANS’, it reads.
“Yes”, Manny says quietly. “This is him”.
Szymon and Blaine have begun to rummage through the room. Searching through papers and charts and various records.
Most of the files have been emptied, and those that remain seem to detail only the structural side of the complex. Aspects of the engineering, and the architecture- though nothing can be found about the purpose of- or meaning behind- the intricate statues in the central lobby.
As Kim and Rudy and I talk lowly amongst ourselves, and as Manny begins to read through the journal, Szymon takes a little time to skim through a letter he finds amongst others, tucked away on a shelf.
He snorts and shakes his head, then holds the paper up for us. “Look, take a look at this”, he says, slapping the paper down onto the desk beside the skeleton. “Have a read”, he says, before jabbing his finger onto a couple of choice lines.
“This was written by the Nazi Command of the bunker”, he says. “By my guess. And it’s directed at our little rat ‘Hans’ here”.
“What is it?” asks Kim, as she leans over to read.
“It’s a promise. A false promise, that they will ‘return’ for him”, Szymon mutters. “A promise that his comrades will come back for him when they are able”.
“From where?” Blaine asks, and Szymon shrugs.
“It does not say. Does it matter? It was clearly a lie”. He kicks the legs of the skeleton a little harder than Blaine, and the skeleton slumps lower down in its chair, with another accompanying cloud of dust. “The Nazis clearly lied to him. He did his duty like a good little soldier and stayed behind to do God knows what… and they forgot all about him. And he died alone in his chair at the bottom of the sea. He got off lightly”.
Szymon grimaces and kicks the thigh of the skeleton as hard as he can, and with a shower of white mist the skeleton crumbles and collapses into a pile on the floor.
“Fuck’s sake, what’d you do that for?” Rudy splutters and coughs. “Idiot”.
“Don’t talk to me like that”, Szymon retorts, then leaves the room, shaking his head.
Manny waves a hand around his face, dispersing the dust, squinting as he scans the pages of the mysterious journal.
“Szymon’s guess seems to be correct”, he says, as he turns the pages of the journal. “This man’s job was to keep the power running. He was an engineer, and was- it would seem- tasked with repairing and maintaining the system. To prioritise where the energy should go”.
He points to passage written near the bottom of one of the pages.
“You can read this, Manny?” Rudy asks.
To his credit, the journal is written not only in German, but in intricate cursive.
Manny nods. “Of course”. He points again to the passage, and I do my best to read what is written as Manny continues: “Here he begins speaking about a necessary diversion of power, and how he dislikes how cold the bunker has become. He also makes references to fixing and repairing”.
“What kind of a guy was he?” Rudy asks.
Kim looks at him.
“You know”, Rudy says. “Beside being a Nazi”.
“He was full of pride”, Manny says as he carefully turns the pages. “It says he was one of several volunteers for this role. He was… happy to do his duty. It gave him purpose”.
We are quiet for a moment as Manny turns the pages.
“Hans expressed in this journal his excitement at being reunited with comrades. That despite the loneliness, he knew that they would return for him, when all was ready. That he too would see the truth. That he would keep the power going for as long as they needed-”
“Wait, hang on”, Blaine interrupts. “This guy kept the power on… for how long? And for what? Why exactly was he keeping this place active?”
There is pause, and Blaine looks around the room.
“Is it still active?”
To this, of course, we have no answer.
“That’s a good point though”, says Kim. “Does it say what the purpose of the bunker is in there, Manny? Does Hans write about why he had to keep the power on?”
Manny chews his tongue in thought. He flicks through another couple of pages. “His writing is somewhat cryptic in that regard. Perhaps he feared that the journal would anger his superiors. A potential breach of state secrets. He writes only that his work, ongoing, was to protect…” He points to a sentence at the bottom of a paragraph.
Despite the calligraphy, the words are quite clear:
​
“…Die Eintausend”, Manny reads aloud, and a slow, cold chill shivers across my body.
[Part 2/3]

Don't miss out on the full experience with this amazing narration by The Dark Somnium! As always the entire cast did excellent work!!
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[Intro]
Every fourth Thursday in November, families across the country gather together in celebration of the love and appreciation they feel for one another. This of course takes place over a delicious Thanksgiving feast of turkey, yams, dressings, and pies! At least that’s the Hallmark definition, but most of us just show up for the food.
Nowadays, we purchase our turkeys and hams from the grocery store, but— not so long ago— men ventured into the woods to put food on their tables and pelts on their backs; they plowed their fields by day and their women by night… All without expressing any form of emotion, for that was considered the ultimate sign of weakness.
In fact, there are some who continue to honor these traditions even now— like my family… Oh! No! Not me or mine! No; my wife and I don’t take stock in all that old world crap— neither do my brother and sister for that matter. I’m referring to the people we came from— our parents and grandparents…
I know you’re thinking— if they’re that terrible, I should just cut them off— but it’s not that simple. If it was a matter of money principle, I would have moved to the other side of the country long before reaching this point, but it’s so much more than that…
There’s really no way to explain it except to start at the beginning… You’ll get the wrong idea if I reveal my family’s Thanksgiving tradition without context*…* But— I must warn you— this is a long one; if you decide to stick around, you better get comfortable. I know I’m gonna pour a drink first, so feel free to do the same.
​
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​
[I]
My name is Avery Hunter, but this story actually begins with my several-greats-over grandfather, Hank— a poor man who was forced to settle in an even poorer community while his wife gave birth to their second child. It was 1721, and times were hard in this particular slice of Ohio; if you had food in your belly, it was a blessed day… Well, it wasn’t actually Ohio yet, but we’re not here for that kind of history lesson.
Now, one thing to understand— the event we know as The First Thanksgiving took place in October 1621 (yep, October), but it wasn’t an actual holiday yet; that wouldn’t come until much later. The fact that Pappy Hunter’s story takes place in November is merely a coincidence.
All through the summer, food had grown more and more scarce, and now that the first snow had fallen, they were trapped until spring. Hank tried to rally the other men for a final hunt— before it was too cold to survive a night outdoors— but no one would help. When the time came, he departed alone with a small pack, a full canteen, a large knife, and a rifle he could fire only once. Before he even began, his body was so weak— so frail— that every step was like a kick to his very soul… Yet an entire community was depending on him…
And at that moment— with that realization— he resented them all very much. What did he owe them, anyway? If he did happen to make a kill, was he really going to steal food from the mouths of his hungry children just to feed those who lied on their backsides while he risked his life? No! With every stumble and twist of his ankle, he became more and more certain that he would be doing no such thing.
With the land’s resources long exhausted, he knew it would be an arduous hike before finding any game, but what choice did he have? His wife and sons would perish if he failed. He marched through the slushy snow, his toes already numb as moisture seeped through his worn boots.
Finally, as he neared the incline’s peak, he laid flat on his belly and crawled the last several feet, so as not to risk startling anything that might be grazing on the other side. With the sun already setting, he knew this was his last chance for a kill; he would soon be forced to make a fire before the darkness resigned him to a cold death.
…However— as he looked over the rise— it wasn’t a deer or boar he saw but another man… A man who was just starting to make camp himself. At first, Hank felt a twinge of disappointment; if there had been any game around, that man surely scared it away… Then he looked a little closer and was overcome by a wave of jealousy.
The stranger had a heavy winter coat, fine boots, and a large pack that appeared to be full of supplies. He also had the makings for a fire ready to burn… Without fully understanding why, Hank remained hidden with his belly pressed to the cold ground and continued watching.
The temptation of warmth was almost too much to resist, but then the stranger removed a loaf of bread from his bag… An audible growl escaped Hank’s stomach, and he decided it should be him sitting down there with that warm coat and bread… Besides, travelers disappeared all the time— especially lone travelers…
He had two choices; take the man out with his rifle, or wait a little longer and slit his throat under the cover of darkness. If he chose his rifle and missed, he would have to rush the man without knowing what weapons he carried… Yet, if he waited, there might not be any food left…
That settled it for him; he needed that food to make the trip home. Before he knew it, the rifle was in front of him— taking aim— and then he squeezed the trigger with a loud bang! A spray of blood painted the tree behind the stranger, and his body fell to the ground… But a loud, anguished groan let Hank know that his work wasn’t finished. He raced down the hill, horrified to see the man was actually beginning to rise.
Now closer, he could see the large canyon carved across the top of the stranger’s head and the fragile bone beneath… Without hesitation, Hank slammed the butt of his rifle down onto the man’s fractured skull with a loud thwack! And his body dropped back to the moss-covered earth.
Overcome with relief, Hank fell next to the deceased traveler, completely spent from his final dash down the slope. Then— remembering the bread— he sat up quickly, eyes darting around the fire in search of his prize. He found it laying in the dirt but barely paused to dust it off before consuming the remainder in three large bites. After draining his canteen, he saw another leaning against the tree— next to a large pack— and brought them closer to the fire.
He began untying the bag’s pullstring but paused before peering inside; if it contained more food, his family would live a little longer… If not, well…. At least he would have the energy— and resources— to make it home for a proper goodbye. Perhaps he would even find the strength to give his wife and children proper burials before joining them in the afterlife…
Finally, with a deep breath, he pulled the string loose but stopped short of looking inside when he was suddenly interrupted by a high-pitched— almost scratchy— voice.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you…” He spoke directly next to Hank’s ear, who instinctively jumped to his feet, simultaneously drawing his knife.
The pack fell inches from the flames, but he hardly took notice. The voice had been that of an old man, but where did he come from, and where was he now? His eyes scanned the area, but there was nothing! When he later recounted this story to his children, he recalled thinking it was the traveler’s angry spirit— returning for vengeance…
But then he heard him again, and this time, the old man snapped his fingers before speaking. “Down here, Hunter.”
Hank shifted his gaze downward to see a frail, elderly man wearing a hooded cloak. The newcomer was no more than 4-foot-tall, yet his bare feet were much larger than Hank’s own, and his jagged, yellow toenails made their disproportionate size all the more unsettling.
“Was he your son, then?” Hank gestured to the corpse between them.
“Haha, hell no! Get it?” He snickered, “hell? Because I’m an Imp! My summer house is in hell, ya know! Get it? Summer— hot! Hah! I slay myself. I hope I’ve got my face right; I put it on for you, ya know! Humans tend to get skittish otherwise, hehehe!”
The little man hopped around the campfire like a hyperactive child as he spoke, and the flames shot high into the air— illuminating his disfigured face. His grotesquely overgrown brow sat atop two bulbous eyes and a lumpy, crooked nose. His cheeks sagged with heavy wrinkles, and loose flesh hung from his chin and jawline as a result.
Even in his heightened state of distress, Hank was in awe that a man of such years could be so nimble. “You’re mad is what you are! I am sorry for your companion, but there is nothing I will not do to save my family… Including murder…” Hank’s grip on the knife tightened as he prepared to lunge, but the old man suddenly vanished into thin air with an audible poof! And the flames instantly returned those of a dying fire.
Consumed by a mixture of fear and disbelief, Hank turned circles in search of the old man, but he was alone once again. “Or perhaps it is I who is mad…” He muttered to himself.
“Hehe! Oh, don’t be so hard on yourself, Hunter! Afterall you did just commit your first murder. You’re a natural, though! You can trust me on that, hah!” This time the voice was coming from above him, and Hank looked up to see the wild little man sitting on a branch, swinging his stubby legs over the edge with giddy delight.
“But how?! How did you—” Hank started but was abruptly cut short.
“Well that’s what I was trying to explain when you so rudely interrupted me with your nefarious intentions! Hahaha! You should be grateful! It’s not every century that I grace a mortal with my company— let alone my aid! So whaddya say, Hunter? Care to try again? Hmm?” The old man peered down, and his eyes glowed with an internal fire…
“Why do you call me Hunter? It is neither my name nor my occupation.” Hank asked, confused.
The old man vanished with another poof and reappeared sitting on a log opposite the fire; only, now, he was smoking a pipe. “Hehehe, silly Hunter! But it should be both! For that is exactly what you are, aye? It’s in your blood! Sit! Sit! Hear what I have to say!” He gestured towards an adjacent log which hadn’t been there moments before, and Hank sat without comment.
“Good! Good! Yes! Hehehe! First, introductions; I am called Nod, and you are Hank! Soon you will be Hank the Hunter! Your father was a Hunter, was he not? And that’s what your brothers are, yes? Why do you deny your birthright? Why settle into such a poor community?” Nod paused as if expecting an actual answer.
Hank began to speak but was silenced before he could utter a sound. “No, no, no! Shush now; questions later! It’s always the same— some woman! Hah! Lust is a bitch ain’t it? Yes, take the pretty girl out west! Start a new life! Rarely goes according to plan, though! Your appearance shows that you’ve learned that one the hard way, hahaha! I bet you’d like to go back in time, aye? Wind back the clock, as it were? Hmm?”
Here, Nod paused again; Hank only stared in confused silence, but— when the little man still did not continue, he finally spoke up. “I do not know if you implore simple trickery to deceive the eye of man, or if a devil has granted you the powers of a witch, but I’ll not lose my soul to any creature bearing a snake’s tongue! Begone! Foul—” This time, Hank is cut off by the Imp’s loudest roar of laughter yet.
The hideous old man rocked back and forth with delight, and— when he leaned closer to the fire— Hank could almost see a different face behind the one he wore; sometimes it appeared as if he possessed only a handful of yellow, crooked teeth… But other times there were two full rows of fangs dripping blood down his chin…
After several minutes, Nod finally collected himself. “Well, too bad! Hahaha! Time is beyond my control, but perhaps I can offer you something even better! Yes, yes! Even better! And it won’t cost your soul, either! Cross my heart! Get it? I don’t have a heart! Hah! But we’re talking about souls! Bleck— disgusting, slimy, little things; nope, I’ve never had a use for ‘em... I mean… There are demons who’d be willing to trade for it… But no, no… Then I would have to make a special trip to hell… It would be a whole thing. No, I’d rather deal directly with you.”
The old man clapped his hands, and the flames shot high into the air, illuminating the area around them, but only for an instant. Though they immediately returned to normal, Hank once again caught a glimpse of something inhuman— something with long, curved horns.
“Now, down to business. You need the dead man’s pack to contain food. You would be mighty disappointed to find nothing but a change of clothes and a tin cup, wouldn’t you? Well! What if I told you that I could make it so that it was filled with bread, grains, potatoes, apples, and corn? Eh? Doesn’t that sound nice? No, wait! There’s more, hahaha! You’re wishing there was meat, but— tell me, Hunter— what of all that meat lying just behind you? Are you just going to let it spoil?”
“You’re vile! I would never! How dare—” Hank began, disgusted by the suggestion.
“Okay, okay… Sheesh, men who reek of your bloodlust are usually more fun. I can see you’re the exception to the rule. Fair enough. Probably best to just show a guy like you, aye? Hehe!” In the time it took Hank to blink, Nod disappeared and reappeared directly in front of his face; the old man was now some otherworldly creature— an Imp from hell— in an old man’s suit. Its skin was covered with lumpy wrinkles, its long horns curved outwards, its giant ears were pointed, and its eyeballs were yellow with red irises.
Nod’s hands shot out, and he stuck two long, stick-thin fingers to the center of Hank’s forehead, transporting him to another place and time. Suddenly, it was one week later; he was sitting down to a family dinner because they still had meat and grain; the children’s cheeks were plump and rosy, and his wife’s smile had finally returned... They were happy.
Next, time rushed forward, and he saw himself months later, in the spring; they were leaving their home for greener pastures. He saw an entire lifetime of success and happiness inside of a big house with his wife and their many children— each of them healthy and thriving…
Then, he was suddenly ripped away from them and thrust back into the cold, harsh reality of the present. He opened his eyes to see Nod’s face just inches from his own; the Imp had reverted back into the deformed old man, but his inhumanly wide, snaggle-tooth grin was almost as terrifying as his true form. Hank yelled and fell backwards from his log, prompting another outburst of laughter from Nod.
“Haha! You see now, don’t you? Yes! I can give you all of it! Hurry! Up! Get up, up, up! Times a wastin’, and this deal needs makin’! Hahaha! Just sign the dotted line and leave this miserable place behind!” Nod began hopping foot to foot again as Hank stood and patted the dirt from his clothes with shaking hands.
“You said it wouldn’t cost my soul, but what exactly is your price?” The suspicion in his tone was clear.
“Oh, don’t think of it as a ‘price’ per-say… Think of it as negotiating the terms of a partnership— an eternal one that will be passed along to your descendants long after you leave this world. Don’t you want your grandchildren to enjoy the same prosperity as you? You could guarantee their happiness for as long as they are willing to maintain your side of the deal… That sounds like a pretty fair arrangement, wouldn’t you say?” Nod raised one eyebrow and his entire overgrown forehead moved with it.
“It depends upon the terms… The ones you have yet to define…” Hank struggled to keep his voice steady.
“Hehe, fine, fine! Picture it! You are a new man venturing to a new land; you become the founder of a community that blooms into a thriving township and ultimately becomes Huntersville! As the contract holder, your direct descendants and their spouses shall enjoy all of the same benefits as yourself. This includes— but is not limited to— immunity to random acts of violence and nature; i.e., you and yours won’t have to worry about things like outlaws or plagues. Think of it as being imbibed with a surplus of good luck.”
“Are you saying we can simply do whatever we wish without suffering any consequences? We’ll be— immortal?!” Hank’s words were barely a whisper.
“What?! No!” The Imp was insulted by such a vast misinterpretation. “Were you even listening?! Aw, why are the strong ones always so dumb… Fine, fine; let me try an example... If you're in a saloon minding your own business and pistols are drawn— you won’t ever catch a stray bullet… On the other hand, if you were to challenge someone to a duel… Well, anything could happen…” Nod searched Hank’s face for any sign of understanding.
“Oh… I see…”
“Eh, no offense, but I’m not sure that you do… Maybe you should repeat that back… Just to be safe…” Nod narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
“Perhaps you should define my side of the bargain before it is rendered moot.” Hank narrowed his eyes in return.
“Hehehe, you win! You win! You’re a bit of a nag, aren’t you? Well, first, there’s the immediate trade. Afterall, you’ll be going home with bags full of goodies by the time we stuff your own with all that meat! Oh, don’t look at me like that; it’ll be the best thing you’ve ever tasted! You’ll want it everyday! Hmm… I guess you could have it everyday, but I have to advise against it. You’re no good to me with your neck stretched…”
“I assure you, that will not be a problem. Perhaps we could—”
Nod continued as if Hank hadn’t spoken. “We can fry some up as soon as the deal is signed, and you’ll see! Mark my words, you’ll see! Err, I mean, taste! Yes! You’ll taste it! Hehehe! Alright— plain and simple— here it is. Every November you’re gonna bag a human for us, and we’ll split the spoils. I only want the parts you wouldn’t eat anyway; just treat it exactly as you would a deer, and I’ll collect the rest. I’d do it myself, but there are rules about these sorts of things…”
“Who’s rules?”
Again, Nod proceeds as if Hank hadn’t spoken. “We’ll do this first one together! It will give us a chance to bond! You’ll also set a place for me at the opposite end of the dinner table each year; you won’t see me, but I’ll be there. Hahaha! No, no, the rest of the terms; of course, of course. You want the catch— the stick— the screw!”
“That wasn’t the catch?!” Hank exclaimed.
“Eventually, you will grow old— much older than you would have without me, mind you— and the time will come to renew our contract. This requires a very specific type of ritual… Instead of hunting a stranger, you will be hunted by your heir, and then consumed by myself and your family. Thus the cycle will repeat until broken by a Hunter. So, how ‘bout it?”
“I have questions…”
“I’ll bet you do,” Nod snickered.
“Are you saying that I would have to condemn my entire family to a life of cannibalism?! And that they would eventually be forced to eat me as well?!”
“Oh, come now; don’t be so dramatic… I’m offering blanket protection over every snot ball you shoot into your wife! The least they can do is share a meal with me once a year. Any descendant who doesn’t consume a portion of the main course will forfeit their rights to those graces! Permanently! Hahaha!”
“Yet so long as they follow this rule, all of my descendants will retain this protection forever?”
“Hmm, I think we’re going to need more examples for this one. Let’s say two sons grow up to have families of their own. Both sets of grandchildren would fall under my protection so long as you remain the contract holder… But— when the contract is passed along— only one can inherit. Their direct descendants will become my new Hunters; the others will be cut loose to live their lives as most humans must. This will hold true regardless of how many offspring you ultimately produce.”
“I see… And what if I ended my own life instead of forcing my son to hunt me like an animal?” Hank felt certain that he could not accept these terms, yet he was compelled to continue the conversation anyway.
“The contract would be null and void; your Final Hunt— and those of your descendants after you— will otherwise be entirely at your discretion. Have it next year or when you're 70 for all I care— just make sure it happens in November. Bring one heir or ten; it makes no difference… I will, however, offer a bit of advice. You may be tempted to skip a proper hunt. Perhaps you would prefer to simply bend your neck and pass the torch... But I wouldn’t do that if I were you…” A malicious grin spread wide across Nod’s face.
“I supposed that would void my contract as well?”
“No, no; not at all… Well, not that specifically. This event may be your Final Hunt, but it will be their First Hunt. You need an heir strong enough to not only hold their own resolve over the years to come, but the family’s as well— a leader! Not all children are born to be leaders, this I promise you! Hahaha! The hunt is like a test! It will allow you to die in peace, knowing the family remains in safe hands. Plus you’ll still have your soul, aye! You’ll be reborn before you know it— probably as another Hunter! So, you see? This contact has the potential to benefit you for lifetimes!”
Hank sat in silent contemplation, and— for the first time since he arrived— Nod also refrained from speaking.
“Oh! I know what might help!” In a flash of movement, Nod reappeared before Hank, and pressed his long, pointed fingers into his forehead yet again…
This time, he was only transported a few minutes into the future— after declining the Imp’s offer. He felt a great sense of relief when the creature vanished from sight and slept until dawn… On his journey home he failed to encounter a single living creature, and his wife wailed with grief at the knowledge her baby would soon be dead…
Suddenly, it was two days later, and— with no lumber for a coffin— he was forced to bury his children in old rags. His wife died four days later, and her funeral— if you can even call it that— was much the same… Only Hank no longer had the strength to dig a proper grave, and— by morning— the vultures had her. He thought of trying to catch one, but— by then— he didn’t want to survive.
“Enough! No more! I’ll do it… I’ll do it…” Hank slapped Nod’s hand away with a defeated whimper. The visions left him shaking and dripping sweat. The cold, night air would have been too much if not for his new coat…
“Hehehe! Excellent! I knew you had it in you! Now, let’s get this silly paperwork out of the way so we can have some real fun! I’m telling you, Hunter, you are not gonna believe what you’ve been missing! And I don’t cook for just anyone, you know!” With a snap of his twig-like fingers, a scroll appeared in Nod’s hands; when he allowed it to unroll, it fell to the ground and didn’t stop until the end was several feet past where Hank stood.
“One second; here we go.” Nod rerolls the contract until the end sits directly at Hank’s feet. “Just let a few drops of your human juice fall onto the dotted line, and it’s a done deal!”
Hank lifted the parchment and leaned into the firelight. The paper was completely filled with a tiny, cursive script; there were no paragraphs, or margins— just a wall of text. He desperately wished to read its contents in full, but— seeing it now— he realized that wasn’t an option regardless of any time constraint…
His hesitation lasted only a moment before remembering the sight of his wife and children lying dead in his arms… With the parchment in his left hand, he drew his hunting knife with the right and made a small cut in the fleshy pad of his thumb; then he pressed it to the bottom line. The moment it lifted from the parchment, the entire contract disappeared with another snap of Nod’s fingers, and the fire roared with new life, illuminating the entire area as if it were morning.
“Now for the fun part! Hehehe!” Again, the Imp disappeared only to reappear over the dead man’s body. He then spent the next several hours teaching Hank exactly how he wished his offerings to be handled.
When they were finally finished, the sun was rising, and Hank had more food than he could carry. The traveler’s pack was filled with the goodies promised by the Imp, and his own was too small to hold all the meat he spent so long wrapping… Where the wrapping-paper came from, he did not know or care; it was such a small detail in the grand scheme… Ultimately, he fashioned a makeshift sack from an old shirt for the rest. Then— after a few final words over the most delicious breakfast of Hank’s life— Nod gave him a long rope and disappeared.
“But what’s this for?” He called out to the empty air.
“A Hunter should always carry a good rope! Hahaha!” Nod’s voice echoed all around him, but there was no sign of the little Imp… It was only a few hours later when Hank happened upon a goat and tied the rope around its neck; they made the long journey home together.
Fearing desperate neighbors may be watching for his return, he tied the goat to a tree and stashed his gear in a nearby trunk well before reaching the tree-line. When he stumbled out of the forest it was shirtless and shoeless. As he suspected, every man in their community— the very ones who were too weak to accompany him just the previous morning— were suddenly strong enough to surround him in the darkness.
Torches were soon lit, and the disappointment was apparent on every face. Hank said he was robbed— that he barely made it back alive; he shivered as he spoke, and his skin was losing color at a rapid pace. His neighbors hung their heads in shame and dispersed with little more said.
His wife cried tears of joy to learn the truth, and she was quick to agree with the Imp’s contract; the relief Hank felt at her words was every bit as satisfying as the delicious breakfast he had only that morning…
After allowing enough time for the neighbors to be fast asleep, he returned to the forest for his bounty. By some miracle, the goat remained completely silent on their return walk, and they were able to stretch their supply through winter. On the first day of spring, Hank ventured to each neighbor’s home to confirm there were no other survivors. Being on their last two days of food themselves, he took a measure of comfort in knowing he truly could not have saved the others.
He wasn’t sure how they were going to survive out in the open; without horses to pull their wagon, the whole situation felt hopeless. He began to fear Nod had betrayed him after all… Then— just as they were about to leave most of their possessions behind— the couple suddenly heard the hoofbeats of many approaching horses, and they were pulling wagons! Upon seeing the small family, the travel-worn group came to a stop, and the Hunters instantly knew the Imp’s vision had been true.
With all the potential dangers ahead, they were more than happy to loan Hank the horses for his wagon, and— with the help of a few volunteers— they were quickly back on their way. Along the way, Hank not only proved himself to be an excellent hunter and tracker— but compassionate, intelligent, and brave— all the qualities they sought in a leader. It was also thanks to him that the wagon train avoided a deadly ambush, and discovered the land they would ultimately call Huntersville— which is where our family still resides.
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(Part 2)