Apologies beforehand for the length and or grammar) So for background I am a (21 F). I referred to my stepmother(36F) as my mother before this. I don’t now. My father (41M) has been with SM for almost eleven years. Ever since I was 10. Earlier last year, actually around this time -may- of last year my blood Little Sister (F18) she was 17 at the time, called me bawling telling me that our aunt (SM sister), told her SM was cheating with this man. If that’s what you want to call him. Saying they had relations, had been hanging alone together, ect. I was so mad my Little Sister had to walk around the house not saying anything. /Mind you I don’t live at their house but visit often, as soon as I turned 18 I moved in with my BF(19M) and his phenomenal family./ Anyways LS was so distraught. And I was so upset to see her like that. I turned full protector mode and honestly might not have been the best idea but I was so tired of SM doing this again….
For context-when I was 13 I believe, we (SM, LS, and I) went on a trip to the beach with her work friends and while there I was in the car with SM. She stopped at the gas station and I stayed in the car. Her phone started pinging crazily and I thought it was Dad. It was not, it was an unknown number but the words I saw popping up on the screen were enough to rattle me. I started shaking and grabbed her phone and looked at the conversation. These texts coming in were the only ones in the chat. But the person on the other side was talking about basically (defiling) my SM. I immediately put the phone back where it was and tried to focus and not freak out. How was I supposed to approach this? I was hours away from my father. And my young self was obsessed with my SM. But my head was spinning. I confronted her after we were done driving and got back to the beach house. I told her what I saw and asked her why and she told me to please understand and not say anything to my Father because they were fighting at the time and told me that it was just “her friends son had gotten to his mothers phone to send those texts to my SM” I swallowed that lie and pushed everything from my mind, I regret it indefinitely to this day. Not saying anything then….. but back to the present 2023-2024
So with my information I made a group chat with both SM and my Father and laid out the facts that I had been presented with. Mainly I was pissed at my SM that my Little Sister was the one to find out and that she was in so much pain. Of course SM was mad I didn’t reach out to her individually. We had a long texting spiel which ended up in her making excuses for everything her sister said. Deny deny deny. But the damage was done. Discord was struck and it was time for everything to start. Soon enough the text messages were found, the love notes, suspicion, and the beginning of the end. :Their relationship had already been strained before this because of various marital fights, and in no way am I saying she is the bad person in all this or that he’s perfect. They’ve both messed up. But this new information was too much. Messing with my blood was too much for me: But they also are taking care of two minors (my eldest “sister” 23F, her children) I don’t refer to her as my sister. God forgive me, but she has parts of the devil inside her. But I love those children with all my heart. Another story for never. Anywho, that’s why they’re still “together” married.
Months passed and talks of separating, lawyers and fights were flying. None of that compared to what’s happened in 2024, she dropped her last cheat and now is “with” my little sisters best friends dad…. Oh but my bad that’s just speculation…. I guess going over to his house alone to “help repair walls” or at my parents house alone with just her and the kids… her telling me to my face that she found him attractive, to hiding her car in his garage behind his car and much more. But she never and I mean NEVER had time to hang with her family because she’s soo swamped with her business… Every year for Mother’s day-before this year my BF and I went all out. EVERY YEAR since I was able to work and have my own money. I mean streamers, cake, dinner, decorations inside AND outside in the yard and also presents. And never once did we get anything more than a hug and a Thankyou. And I was grateful…. Then this year she posts “To these Two beautiful daughters of mine, I am one lucky momma” and then posted a picture of MY little sister and /Cheat #2’s/ daughter. And I am the asshole in their (SM,LS) eyes because I didn’t say Happy Mother’s Day. I didn’t go over there. Nothing. To a person that never reaches out to me, expects me to text her asking about what’s going on in her life right now. When that’s all I, and only I ever did before all of this happened. It’s just getting worse and worse now but I won’t release what’s happening as of now to ensure I don’t mess up anything if courts come into this. So I’m asking AITA for telling my father, breaking up their marriage and now not considering my SM my mother because of what she posted?

I always enjoy reading trip reports so I thought I would go ahead and share a report on my Golden Week trip with my parents.
Warning, long post!
This trip was from May 2nd to 15th. Some background, I (late 20's) am a foreign resident living in Hokkaido. I have also lived in Tokyo before so I am pretty comfortable with navigating the city and transit system, and speak intermediate Japanese. I have briefly visited Kyoto and Osaka but this was my first time in Hiroshima. This was my parents' (both 60) first time in Japan, and as it was probably one of few trips they will make to Japan, we decided to try and hit a lot of major sites for the first half before spending time in Hokkaido.
Obviously Golden Week isn't the most ideal time to travel in Japan, but as a resident, this was the best time I could travel without having to take too much time off work. My parents like travelling, but this was their first time in Asia and anywhere where English isn't widely spoken. They enjoyed their time here, but I am pretty sure if I weren't living here, it wouldn't have been a destination they would have travelled to on their own. I planned most of the trip myself. Parents weren’t too interested in pop-culture (anime, music, etc) so I was able to save time by cutting out a lot of the more touristy anime spots. They were pretty down for anything else, and Dad knew he wanted to see a baseball game and visit Hiroshima, so we made sure to make those two happen.
May 2nd-Arrival in Tokyo
(Hotel Sotetsu Fresa Inn Tokyo Tamachi-Two double bed rooms)
Parents flew from Vancouver to Narita and landed shortly before 3:00pm. I flew JetStar from Hokkaido and was set to land shortly after 3:00. I figured I would have time to get my bag and get from terminal 3 to 1 to meet them before they got through customs and baggage. However, my flight was a bit delayed and landed closer to 3:30. Not a big deal, but surprisingly my parents got through customs and baggage and were waiting for me before I even got my bag. We took the train directly to Mita Station in Minato, which was only a 10 minute walk to our hotel. It was around 6:00 by the time we checked in and got settled, and the parents didn't sleep on the plane, so we decided on dinner at the hotel restaurant before grabbing some conbini snacks and heading to bed by 9:00.
May 3rd (Constitution Memorial Day)-Tokyo
Taking advantage of their jetlag, we were up and ready to go at 7:00 am, but first dropped off our suitcases to be shipped to our Kyoto hotel. We had each brought a mid-size suitcase and backpack, so we shipped our suitcases and kept two days worth of stuff in our backpacks. It was a bit of a pain to have to rearrange all the bags so soon after arriving, but I wanted to send the bags earlier, as I was worried about delays due to Golden Week. It was very easy to do at the hotel, and so worth it to not have to haul bags all over.
We grabbed a conbini breakfast before heading to Asakusa and Sensoji. There were a fair amount of people there at around 8:00, but not crowded yet. Almost all of the shops were still closed but my parents really enjoyed seeing their first temple. After grabbing a goshuin paper (I forgot my goshuincho at home, I was so cheesed) we took a walk to the Sumida river and had coffee with a beautiful view of the Skytree. After that, we made our way back through Sensoji, towards Kappabashi Street. It was after 10:00 so all of the shops in front of the temple were open and crowds were in full swing. My parents didn’t mind the crowds too much but they were really happy we arrived early and had the chance to see things with less people. Mom was on the lookout for kitchen knives, hence the stop in Kappabashi. There were only a few shops open due to the holiday, but it was fine.
We headed back to the Minato area for one of our few food reservations, the Harry Potter cafe. (Booked through the official site a few weeks in advance.) I really wanted to drag my parents to a silly themed cafe, but I knew anything like the Kirby or Pokemon cafe would be totally lost on them, so I compromised with the Harry Potter cafe. I’ve been to enough themed cafes to know that you pay a lot for the experience and atmosphere and the quality of the food is secondary. That said, the food here was my least favourite of all the themed cafes I have been to in Japan. The decorations and restaurant were cool, but unless you’re a diehard fan, I would skip this one.
After lunch, we headed to Tokyo Tower. We didn’t go up, but we took a look at the shops, saw the Children’s Day carp streamers, and stopped at the beer garden. We were leaving to go have a break at the hotel when we saw a sign for the Japantique Show and decided to stop in. (Free admission) It was cool but everything was way out of our budgets, by like, thousands of dollars. After that, we bussed back to our hotel for a rest. We stopped for dinner at a Yakiniku Like near the station, which is a great option for budget yakiniku in my opinion, before heading to Ginza to window shop and look at more things we couldn’t afford. I also had to point out the Kabukiza theatre to mom and dad, as I am a big Kabuki fan. We didn’t have time for a show this trip but I definitely recommend seeing even just a single act if it’s something you might be interested in. Headed back to the hotel and was in bed by 9:00.
May 4th (Greenery Day)-Tokyo
Another early morning, we took the train and arrived at Harajuku station around 8:00 a.m. We had breakfast at Sarutahiko Coffee, above the station. After that we wandered towards Meiji Jingu. It was already warming up (high of 29 this day) so it was nice being under all the trees. As we passed the entrance to the garden, they were just about ready to open, so we decided to wait and go in. It was still too early for most of the flowers to bloom, but it was still a really nice spot. After the garden we made our way to the main shrine, followed by the Meiji Jingu Museum. They were having an exhibit on dresses of the Meiji era, particularly focused on Empress Shoken, so I thought it would be an interesting stop. There wasn’t much information in English, and the exhibit was pretty small, but seeing the dresses was cool.
I dragged mom and dad through Takeshita Street. It was very crowded, but my parents still got a kick out of seeing the stores and fashion, although they rolled their eyes everytime I offered to buy us matching platform shoes for some reason. After a stop in Uniqlo, we headed to Shinjuku for lunch. We stopped at a random izakaya near the station that I unfortunately forgot the name of. We snapped some pictures of Godzilla and the 3D cat billboard before heading to Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden. Happy surprise that it was free admission for Greenery Day. There were a lot of people there, but it is a large park, so it wasn’t too crowded. Like the Meiji garden, most of the flowers weren’t in bloom yet, but it was still really pretty and nice to just be able to rest under the trees in the shade for a while.
After the garden, we head back towards Shibuya. We wandered around the scramble and main streets for a bit. I had a ticket to enter a pop up store at 5:15, so mom and dad had to wait outside while I got my goods. I got out with enough time for us to get to the Shibuya Sky building in time for our 6:20 entry. I would have liked to have gotten 6:00 tickets to see more of the sunset, but I was just happy to have gotten any tickets during dusk. It was still an incredible view, and it was a clear day so we could see Fuji in the distance. Mom and Dad were a bit overwhelmed by crowds at this point, so we headed back to the hotel and had dinner at a soba chain near the station, opposed to trying to find something in Shibuya. Mom and Dad were in bed before 9:00.
This was definitely the most crowded day we experienced during the trip. My parents said that while they don’t feel the need to ever go back to Shibuya or Shinjuku, they were happy that they had had the experience of seeing them, and don’t regret going, even with the crowds. I had originally planned Shibuya, then Shinjuku in the evening so we weren’t doubling back, but the garden closes late afternoon and it worked out with the evening Shibuya Sky tickets.
May 5th (Children’s Day)- Tokyo/Kyoto
(Hotel Sotetsu Fresa Inn Kyoto Kiyomizu Gojo-Connecting Twin Rooms)
Checked out of the hotel early and made our way to Tokyo Station. We had breakfast at a cafe in the basement, before dropping our backpacks in a locker and taking a walk around the Imperial Palace grounds. After we got our bags back, we grabbed some ekibens for lunch and caught the 10:30 shinkansen to Kyoto.
Because of the holiday and wanting us to be sitting on the Fuji side, these were the only shinkansen tickets I booked in advance. I booked through the JR west site, just under a month before. I had no problem using my Canadian mastercard to pay, and at that time there were still lots of seats available. It all worked out too as we had amazing weather and got a beautiful view of Fuji.
After arriving in Kyoto, we picked up my parents JR Kansai-Hiroshima passes. I am not eligible for one as a foreign resident, but they were definitely worth it for my parents, and if I planned better, we could have gotten more value out of them.
After dropping our stuff off at our hotel, we went to Kingaku-ji. The crowds weren’t as bad as I was expecting for mid afternoon during Golden Week and we thought the pavilion was very beautiful. After a vending machine ice cream we hopped on the bus to Arashiyama. The bamboo grove also was not nearly as crowded as I expected and we even had to empty spots to take pictures. Main street Arashiyama on the other hand, was very crowded, with a lot of tourists (foreign and local) having to walk on the road. We walked down to the Kimono Forest which was very cool and then head out after that.
We planned on finding a restaurant in Kyoto Station for dinner, but as we were on the train back, we were delayed due to Kyoto Station being temporarily shut down to investigate a suspicious item. It turned out to just be a forgotten backpack but I think most trains were delayed about two hours. The delay sucked, but I guess it’s to be safe than sorry. (That’s probably easier to say as someone already in Kyoto vs one of the people who would have been stuck on an inbound shinkansen.)
After catching a replacement bus that was enroute to go near our hotel, we decided to bail on dinner at the station and find something closer to us. We ended up in a small and smokey but still tasty yakitori place before calling it a night.
May 6th (Substitute Holiday)- Kyoto
Waking up early again, we caught the train to Fushimi Inari. There was a small family restaurant on the main street leading up to the shrine that had just opened. (I think this was just after 8:00 am) We stopped there for breakfast before going up to the shrine. We got pretty far before Dad’s knees started bothering him. Fortunately on the hike down we passed a shrine dedicated to back and knee health, so Mom and I bought an omamori for him.
After that we headed to Kiyomizudera. I think this temple was my parents' favourite of all the shrines and temples we went to, minus the hills. We didn’t find the streets too crowded at this point but the hills and stairs did not help my parents' feet and knees. They did really enjoy walking through the temple when we got there, and we could have spent a lot more time here, but we had a lunch plans.
I booked us a 12:30 lunch reservation at Yakinikugyusho Shin. Normally I don’t bother too much with reservations when I travel but I was worried about the Golden Week crowds and I wanted to make sure we had at least one nice meal somewhere in Kyoto. I booked this through TableCheck. We all had different beef rice bowls and they were all delicious. The restaurant had a really cool traditional atmosphere too.
After that we wandered the area for a bit before heading to the Samurai Museum. I personally thought it was a bit overpriced for what it is, but our guide was funny and had a lot of information. We did enjoy the throwing stars experience at the end as well. We weren’t too keen on the optional samurai dress up experience so we opted out of that. We headed back to the hotel for a rest before heading out for dinner at a nearby burger place called Burger Eleven, which we were pretty happy with. Headed back to the hotel to pack and have an early night.
May 7th- Kyoto/Hiroshima
(Hotel The Knot Hiroshima-Triple Room)
We checked out of the hotel early in the morning after having our suitcases shipped to our Osaka hotel. Once again, really easy and worthwhile. After that we head to Nishiki Market for breakfast of tempura and seafood. We arrived as things were starting to open and not too crowded. After pursuing all the shops we bussed to Kyoto Station to head off to Hiroshima.
I had no idea how to use my parents' JR passes at the ticket machines, and since we would need both shinkansen tickets and limited express Haruka tickets to Shin-Osaka, I just decided to go straight to the ticket office and have them do it. They had English speaking staff, so it was really easy. We were able to get reserved seats together on the next train out.
We arrived in Hiroshima at our hotel around 2:00 pm. We went to drop off our backpacks, but the hotel actually let us check in early which was great. Then we toured around Hiroshima Castle and then Shukkeien Gardens. I feel like I could have spent hours in the garden, but Mom was dealing with some pretty intense blisters, so we walked around for a bit and fed the carps before heading back to the hotel. We had a drink at the hotel’s rooftop bar before dinner. The original plan was to walk to Okonomimura for dinner, but Mom’s feet weren’t up for it. We found a nearby restaurant called Hazaya, which was a great alternative. After dinner we grabbed some snacks and called it a night.
May 8th- Hiroshima/Osaka
(Hotel WBF Namba Motomachi-Two Double Rooms)
Up early again to visit the Peace Memorial Park and Museum. Ticket sales the day of started at 8:30 and we were first in line. It seems you can enter earlier with an e-ticket, which we could have bought on the spot, but we decided to wait the 10ish minutes till the counter opened. I won’t say much about the Museum other than it was very heavy, but incredibly well done. I highly recommend it. We beat a lot of the crowd, including most of the school tours that were arriving as we were leaving. After a small breakfast at the museum cafe we walked through the park and to the dome, then grabbed our bags from the hotel and headed to Osaka. Once again, did not want to fiddle around with the JR passes and ticket machines, so we went to the ticket office. We could have been on the next train out, but waited for the one after so we had time to grab lunch at the station.
We arrived in Osaka, checked in to the hotel, and headed to the Tempozan Wheel. The view was great, but the wind was quite strong, which scared my parents who are terrified of heights. This was in the afternoon but I imagine the night view would be amazing. After a little stroll around the area, we headed to Dotonburi for dinner. Mom and Dad weren’t too keen on takoyaki, which I was surprised by. They both decided they favoured Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki. I’m more for Osaka-style but I won’t say no to either. Did a little bit of souvenir shopping before heading back to the hotel for the night.
May 9th-Osaka/Hokkaido
We set off early for Osaka Castle. Enjoyed walking around the grounds and the surrounding park. I took some of this subreddit’s advice and didn’t go inside the castle. We had gone inside the Hiroshima Castle, which is also pretty museum-like, so we weren’t upset to miss this one.
After enjoying the morning, we made our way back to the hotel to get our suitcases, then caught the bus from Namba OCAT station to KIX airport. We had time for lunch before checking in to our flight to Chitose. I don’t know about the international terminal, but the food options on the domestic side at KIX are pretty minimal. Had an easy flight to Chitose where I was reunited with my car and drove us to my house for the night.
May 10th- Sapporo
(Hotel Quintessa Hotel Susukino 63-One Queen Room and One Double)
From here out the trip was a much slower and relaxing pace. Had a lazy morning before making our way to Sapporo by car. Checked into our hotel and did a little shopping near Sapporo station. Attended a Fighters game that evening, which was a great time! ES Con Field is a beautiful brand new stadium and has a lot of great food options. I don’t follow baseball much but we still all really enjoyed the atmosphere. The Fighters won which I am sure helped a lot. I know they’re not one of the super popular teams in Japan, but if you’re a baseball fan with a free evening or afternoon in Hokkaido, I think the stadium alone is worth seeing a game here for.
May 11th- Jozankei
(Ryokan Hana Momiji-Comfort Japanese-style Room)
Checked out of our hotel just before 10 a.m.. We walked down to Shiawase-no-Pancake for a fluffy pancake breakfast, before driving an hour to Jozankei. We had a reservation at the Hana Momiji ryokan. My parents both have tattoos, but wanted to try an onsen. I looked at a few ryokan options in Jozankei before picking this one. Any room with a private onsen was out of our budget, but Hana Momiji has several private baths that guests can book, so this was the best option for us. We first arrived and parked at the ryokan before wandering around the town.
We came across a small temple that just so happened to have a small cave you could walk through that was full of Kannon statues. A bit strange but very cool. There were still carp streamers up so we enjoyed seeing them over the river. We had lunch at a small ramen shop, did a little more souvenir shopping, then headed back to the ryokan to check in. Mom and Dad enjoyed the private bath before dinner, and I used the public bath on the top floor after dinner. It was a little crowded for the shower stations but for a while I had the outdoor bath all to myself which was grand. The ryokan’s kaiseki dinner was amazing but we weren’t too hungry from lunch, and the food just kept coming. The sukiyaki was my favourite. After I visited the onsen we relaxed in our room for the rest of the night.
May 12th- Otaru (Mother’s Day)
We woke up and had the buffet breakfast at the ryokan. The buffet had a lot of options but was a bit underwhelming compared to the kaiseki dinner. We checked out at 10 a.m. and continued to Otaru. Since it was Mother’s Day, my siblings and I agreed I was to organise something nice for Mom. I decided to take us to a glass blowing workshop. This might seem random for Japan, but for some reason, Otaru is well known for glass blowing and music boxes. We had an 11 a.m. reservation at Studio J-45. The shop is more on the outskirts of the city, but it was a beautiful little store, and the staff were so friendly and helpful. There were only three staff members and one of them spoke English well enough to explain everything to my parents. My mom made a flower vase, my dad made a wind-chime, and I made a cup. It was a really fun and easy process and all of our pieces came out beautifully. I think the best way to access this place is by car, but if that's an option for you and you’re looking for a unique experience, I highly recommend this studio! One thing to keep in mind is that the pieces need to cook in the oven after, so you’ll either need to be able to pick them up another day, or have somewhere in Japan they can be shipped to (for a fee I believe). I could have shipped to my house but I wanted to make sure Mom and Dad had them before they left.
After that we headed into downtown Otaru to meet some of my friends. There was a cruise ship docked this day so it was a bit more crowded than usual. We stopped in at the music box museum and then we all went for lunch together and had some delicious gyukatsu. We strolled down the rest of main street to the canal. At this point it was late afternoon and starting to rain. Most things in Otaru close pretty early anyway so we said goodbye to my friends and drove back to my town for the night.
May 13th- Home
Didn’t do much today. I worked a half day to save some PTO. Dad wanted BBQ for lunch so we went to a yakiniku place in the next town over, and then met one of my friends at Hamasushi for dinner (our usual go-to spot).
May 14th- Sapporo
(Via Inn Prime Sapporo Odori-Triple Room)
Last full day in Japan for my parents. Worked another half day in the morning. Took a detour to Otaru on the way to Sapporo to collect our glassware. Arrived in Sapporo and checked into the hotel, then had tough time trying to find overnight parking. For our last dinner I booked a reservation in Kessel Hall at the Sapporo Beer Garden. (Booked online through their website.) Didn’t do all you can eat Ghenhis Khan (mutton), because as we were heading out my dad mentioned he doesn’t like lamb. 🤦So he had a seafood platter, mom had a sausage dish, and I ordered some lamb a la carte. Sure enough, he tried a piece of mine and made me order another plate of it. We enjoyed the beer and dessert as well, then went back to our hotel. The hotel had a public bath which I enjoyed that evening before heading to bed.
May 15th-Home
Woke up early to drive Mom and Dad to Shin-Chitose for their 10 a.m. flight to Narita. This would have given them plenty of time to get to their 4 p.m. flight to Vancouver, but just to be safe, AirCanada kindly delayed the flight till 8 p.m. so they could spend half a day in Narita.
Some closing thoughts:
Golden Week Crowds- I was really expecting the worst when it came to the crowds, especially in Kyoto, but I honestly didn’t find them to be that bad. Maybe I just got lucky but other than the day in Shinjuku and Shibuya, I never felt I was being “herded” anywhere. At Kinkakuji, we would maybe have to wait a minute to get a spot at the fence for pictures but it was never shoulder to shoulder like I was expecting. Kiyomizudera was really only crowded on the walk down, especially when cars were passing. We didn’t go to any viral restaurants, but we never had to wait more than 10ish minutes to be seated anywhere. It was probably more a case of right time, right place, but if you end up stuck with a Japan trip planned during Golden Week, I think as long as you’re patient and well planned, you can still have a really nice trip.
-Parents used Sakura mobile esims. It took us a couple tries to get the access point info input correctly but once we did, they had no problems.
-Didn’t want to deal with tracking down IC cards in Tokyo (we all have androids) so I brought two Kitaca cards from Hokkaido that they were able to use everywhere we went.
-Like I mentioned, I could have gotten more value out of the JR Kansai-Hiroshima pass had I planned better. Ex: I know you can use them on the express train from Osaka to KIX. Since our hotel was in Namba we weren’t anywhere convenient to catch it, and I was worried we would haul our luggage to Osaka station, only to not be able to find enough lockers to put our stuff in. It was just easier to leave our bags at the hotel, come back, then take the nearby limousine bus. If I did this again using these passes, I would have booked our hotel closer to Osaka station. That said, using the passes just to go from Kyoto to Hiroshima to Osaka already saved my parents about 5k yen each.
-Other than the ryokan, which I booked through their site, all our hotels were booked through Agoda.
-I mentioned Mom had blisters. She had gotten really good shoes, but it was her socks that caused all the problems with the toe seams rubbing the wrong way. Make sure if you’re investing in good shoes, you have some good socks to go with them.
-Overall I think it was a really good trip. It was tiring but fun to tour my parents around Japan. It looks like a lot very quickly, but we got through everything I had put on our itinerary, and didn’t feel rushed anywhere, other than our Kyoto lunch reservation. My parents enjoyed the peacefulness of Hiroshima the most, and we would have liked to see Miyajima if we had time, so should they come back, that is where they would probably visit again.
If you made it through this whole thing, thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed or found this helpful!

I am fresh from hosting another great birthday party for one of my kids and I feel like I've cracked the code on these birthday parties so I wanted to share my hack, which seems obvious, but isn't: make it all about the birthday kiddo and their friends. I live in a rich part of the country where people ROUTINELY spend $600-$1500 for children's birthday parties. Nobody opens presents at the party. Parents routinely put "no gifts please" on the invitation, and the whole affair often feels like it's about adults showing off for their friends and neighbors with catering and extravagant party favors and expensive bounce houses. I wouldn't dare spend that kind of money, but I feel guilty not offering a similar experience for parents who buy my child a gift and arrive with certain expectations. I let go of this guilt gradually over the years by focusing 100% on the kid experience. - For older kids, we do drop-off pajama parties from 4pm to 9pm with movies and chocolate fountains and pizza and parents aren't involved at all. It's chaos and the parties are the talk of the school. In December I had 18 kids at my house since I always let siblings come along. - We open gifts within an hour of the party starting so guests can see their gift enjoyed and people can leave when they need to. - I make the cake/cupcakes from modified $1 boxed cake mix and people rave about how great it tastes without store chemicals. The cream cheese frosting is always the biggest hit. - I make grazing boards with goldfish and Combos and pretzels and popcorn and cheese sticks I already had at home so kids can snack the whole time, but offer no catering except the occasional pizza if party occurs at meal time. - I let my kiddos play with a few of their newly opened toys AT THE PARTY with their friends in a designated spot so they can enjoy the excitement of the gifts with their friends. This is always a huge joy for the kids and raises all the parent eyebrows. Everyone is so worried they'll lose pieces. They will. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe next week. Pieces will be lost. At least this way core memories are formed. - I don't do favors. I get a pinata and they beat it to shit and they fight to the death for the candy. I like to raise and lower the pinata so they miss every second swing and really have to fight for it. I keep an extra candy bag for littles who don't want to risk their lives for a lollipop. - I design the invitation using free Canva templates and email them so I don't spend any money. Today we hosted a super fun <$200 party for our 7-year-old. Here were the costs.
$100 Rented park space (could easily do this for free if you choose not to use a covered rentable space) $10 Cake/cupcakes (from buying cake mixes on sale and homemade frosting which I learned to do well watching TikTok videos) $8 Water bottles and Capri-Suns (Sam's Club has 80 bottles of water in perfect 8 ounce servings for $8) $3 Chips and Salsa (pulling from things I already had at home) $3 20 lb Bag of ice from Sam's $20 Ice cream sundae bar with toppings $20 Pinata with candy (Mexican grocery stores have great deals on pinatas and I buy clearance candy at 90% after Christmas and Easter and Halloween) $1.25 Treat bags from Dollar Tree for pinata
So when I first started moving away from the norm in my area I worried it would disappoint parents that I wasn't going all out. Mentally, I had to refocus and continually ask myself "what would a kid do if they were throwing this party?" The result is a lot less money and plenty of fun with tons of sugar. I let the parents with sugar concerns deal with that however they like. So far they just seem happy their kiddo is preoccupied.
I bake and freeze cake layers and cupcakes a week before the party for convenience and because it makes them more moist. I also make and freeze the frosting when I have time so decorating the day before is easy and not super stressful.
Hope this helps anyone else struggling with party planning!

Ilril - half-ogre female Rank/Profession: Journeyman Jeweler. Shopkeeper. Game mechanic: 1st level Expert Sidekick Working various markets since her apprenticeship, Ilril has been using her skills as a jeweler and glassblower for the past year and a half. She came up with the idea of signing on with a ship to both learn new skills and to view various other markets while working passage. She is currently working for the crew of the Red River in Lobor in the Archipeligo in a small shop that Red River managed to purchase. River's Edge. She is also using her contacts from the various flea markets and swap meets to get in further merchandise from those contacts to act as an agent for them, as the permanent location makes it a desirable source of revenue. Skills: Jeweler, Glassmaker. Some skills in minor metalwork, mainly soft metals. Personality: Pragmatic, Artistic Goals: Make money, hone skills, eventually find a way to normalize her appearance to some extent. Appearance: Ilril is a half-ogre, and while most half-breeds look like a mix of the parents blended together, her appearance is not so blended. Her left half looks mostly-human. Her right half looks mostly-ogre. The mismatch of sizes and features gives her myriad problems on a daily basis. 3gp/year, noncombatant.
Mournmyr Barrityl - black dragonborn female Rank/Profession: Gardener, Druidic Initiate Game mechanic: 1st level Magic Sidekick, crew of the Red River Has been working in Druidic groves and landscape maintenance in the Archipeligo for several years now. Skills: Proficiency in Wisdom, Druidic Initiate, proficient in Nature & Medicine Spells: Druidcraft, Guidance. Create or Destroy Water. Personality: Focus on plants and cultivation, not well suited to farm work. Slight ADHD. Slightly introverted around people she doesn't know, extroverted when with people she does know. Fascinated by the fae and the stories about them. Goals: Eventually wants to become a druid herself. Equipment: quarterstaff, gardener's clothing, knife Appearance: whip-thin almost skin-and-bones black dragonborn female with matte-black scales and a few scars from fights in her childhood. Wears practical clothing but accessorizes it to make it more feminine or pretty. 5gp/year
Ihzu Velda - hill dwarf female Rank/Profession: Journeyman Ship's Carpenter Game mechanic: Warrior sidekick, level 3 Ihzu is a hill dwarf from the isle of the Iron Reaches, she's spent most of her life either aboard ships or at docks. She has two Misadventures in her backstory that she almost never talks about, and turns red and embarassed just talking around the Crate Of Ill Omen or Gentleman Jack's Pleasure Excursion. Skills: Defender, Proficiency in Constitution, Athletics, and Nature (foraging), carpenter's tools Personality: stoic, hard-worker, results-oriented. Disdains artistic work unless it is functional. Goals: Become a full Master as a Ship's Carpenter. Currently working under Gadget. Equipment: chainmail, light crossbow, shield, warhammer, carpenter's tools Appearance: short, squat, dwarf female without a beard though she does have sideburns and particularly thick eyebrows, usually scowling. 3gp/year
Zylkoris - ratfolk male Rank/Profession: Unranked Chandler Game Mechanic: 1st level Expert Sidekick Zylkoris has spent most of his life wandering from place to place and never lingering for long, though he did spend a couple of years learning basic chemistry and helping out a chandler in Sokal. Skills: Dexterity-proficient. Proficient in History, Performance: Art (scent-based chemistry), Stealth, Arcana, Medicine. Expertise with Tinker's tools. Proficient with engraver's kid, alchemical supplies Personality: cautious, careful, precise. Quite familiar with chemistry involved in soap and candle making, and to some extent (spent a couple years in the field) selling and using ship's equipment. Goals: Eventually make enough or save enough he can settle down in his own place. Having fun with the journey until then. Equipment: alchemy (chemistry) kit, tinker's tools, commoner's clothing, work clothing with leather apron. Appearance: thin but wiry look, black fur, pink nose, right ear has a chunk missing from a bar fight (the other guy started it!), long thin tail. 5gp/year
Chalarra Mizerym - tiefling male Rank/Profession: mercenary soldier grunt Game Mechanic: warrior sidekick, level 3 Skills: Dexterity focus, Acrobatics and Survival. Attacker type (+2 to hit). Familiar with but not proficient in watercraft. Personality: direct, fancies himself a poet but self-aware enough to know he's not a good one, pragmatic, has sworn off alcohol after misadventure last time he went on a bender. Goals: None. He isn't completely content with living day-to-day but he's never been good with strategies. Equipment: shield, falchion, shortbow, 20 arrows, leather armor Appearance: No tail - it got cut in half and then infected by some magical curse. Still sore around where the amputation took place. Reddish skin, black hair, prominent horns, carefully trimmed moustache and goatee. Criminal record: Two cases of drunk and disorderly, two cases of inebriated in public, one case of improper wagon control when he was drunk and managed to land a wagon atop a streetlamp. Neither he nor anyone else involved know how he managed that and the charge was dismissed after that. 5gp/year
Eloise - yuan ti female Rank/Profession: prostitute, exotic dancer at the Scarlet Festhall in Lobor Game Mechanic: 9th level Rogue (Soulknife) Skills: Psionic powers as a Soulknife, Deception, Insight, Performance: dance. Feat: Grappler Personality: cold and calculating behind a friendly mask, she is completely comfortable with her current line of work as the hours and pay are both excellent. She's also discovered a certain satisfaction in being as good as she is in that line of work, and every so often she manages to get pleasure out of the whole thing instead of just feigning it for the client. Goals: continuing to work until she's managed a sufficient nest egg, eventually finding someone with both money and the ability to pleasure her and retiring at that point. That's years down the road though. Criminal record: None. Nobody is going to question her about Samnael's death as everyone who knew the man knew he deserved it a hundred times over. Equipment: In addition to her psi-knives, Eloise normally has four throwing knives nearby at all times plus a collapsible baton. She also has a collection of knives, swords, and exotic weapons she's been gifted by clients over the years. Appearance: Very similar in appearance to Victoria, though her hair is longer and more well-maintained. Background: Samnael is her grandfather and Victoria's grandfather. Samnael sired a number of children and then waited for them to have children before hunting them down and killing them before devouring them. Sometimes devouring them piece-by-piece before killing them. Eloise observed her parents being killed, and the man throwing her aside so that she could mature before he came to claim her. When the two did next meet, she carved him up and buried the pieces in seven locations to make sure he wouldn't be coming back.
Francois Delacroix, Captain of the Elsinore (Hammership) Halfling (Mouseling) m, LN, MV:25, AC:14, hp:39 Level 5 Ranger (Horizon Walker) Str:8, Dex:17, Con:12, Int:13, Wis:13, Cha:12 Skills: Athletics +2, Insight +4, Investigation +4, Perception +4, Survival +4, proficiency with airships, navigator's tools. Personality: Flamboyant (if it is worth doing, it is worth doing with style), Reliable & Fair (sticks to his word, treats all the crew fairly), Storyteller (if he gets going with one of his sailor stories, facts will be stretched to make it a better story) Special Equipment: The One Hat. Most mouselings wear elaborate clothing and will decorate all their treasured possessions. Captain Delacroix takes this seriously with his uniform, but it is nowhere more obvious than with The Hat. It is literally taller than he is and decorated with ribbons and embroidery and feathers (these accounting for most of the height) from exotic creatures and ports. He has spares but The One Hat is the formal one that gets worn while doing his captain duties. It is large, elaborate, and somewhat gaudy by most people's standards. Damage it or steal it at your peril, especially around his crew as seeing the Hat coming is a signal to look busy and they appreciate the warning. Also they've been known to chip in and buy an extra ribbon or flourish to add to it from time to time. Dagger of Warning, Shortbow, Rapier, leather armor (elaborate embossed scrollwork), boots, Ring of Feather Fall, 20 arrows Languages: Common, Narsian, French (badly - there was a woman involved), Sailor's Slang, Orcish (only a few cursewords and a few other phrases - there was another woman involved) Favored Enemy: Fliers Fighting Style: Archery Feat: Sharpshooter Spells: Absorb Elements, Beast Bond (parrot "Mister Percy"), Cure Wounds, Lesser Restoration Background: Captain Delacroix has worked his way up through the ranks, first serving aboard the Tantalus on a sea route. His first airship was as Navigator's Mate aboard the C57D Altair, a patrol ship for a prominent city/state, and he's primarily worked airships since then. The Elsinore is his first captaincy, though the ship itself is owned by the Hildebrand Tea Company. Description: Captain Delacroix is a mouseling of unremarkable appearance with sun-bleached fur and bright eyes and quivering whiskers. He has a single scar, taken in battle against pirates when aboard the Altair, just under his left ear but this is normally concealed by The Hat. Other than the hat he normally wears practical (though embroidered with a few flourishes) clothing under a thick Captain's coat that has a couple of patches from rough use.
David Hennings, beholder isekai Species: Beholder, Background: Isekai David is a seven year old child who died of bone cancer and was reincarnated as a beholder. He has learned to switch out his eyestalk abilities in part of his desire to become a powerful wizard. AL:LN, AC:18, MV:5, hp:180 Str:10, Dex:14(+2), Con:18(+4), Int:17(+3), Wis:15(+2), Cha:17(+3) Skills: Perception:+12, Darkvision 120ft, Passive Perception:22 Eyestalks: 1. Prestidigitation, 2. Paralyzation (DC 16 Con) 1min, 3. Mending, 4. Anti-Magic Ray, 5. Cure Wounds, 6. Telekinetic Ray (DC 16 Str to avoid being picked up, 400 pound limit), 7. Laser Eye (1d10+1 dmg, 800ft range), 8. Stun Beam (DC 16 Wis or unconscious), 9. Disintegration Beam (DC 16 Dex 45dmg), 10. Detect/Read Magic. Anti-magic Cone: David has learned to turn off the anti-magic field, otherwise it is a cone 150ft long that suppresses all magic within that field. David is studying magic because he wants to be able to do a lot of things he can't currently manage. He also wants to be an adventurer.
Topaz, drow female engineer of the Darkness Rising (Hammership) Species: dark elf, female, late adolescent development Game mechanic: 4th level artificer (armorer) AC:13, MV:30, AL:CG, hp:19 Str:11, Dex:13, Con:8, Int:16, Wis:11, Cha:14 Skills: Arcana +5, Athletics +2, Insight +2, Investigation +5, Nature +3, Perception (D) +2. Alchemist's Supplies, Carpenter's Tools, Flute, Navigator's Tools, Smith's Tools, Thieves' Tools, Tinker's Tools, Vehicles (Water), Woodcarver's Tools. Spells: Dancing Lights, Mending, Prestidigitation. Absorb Elements, Cure Wounds, Detect Magic, Disguise Self, Faerie Fire, Feather Fall, Magic Missile, Thunderwave Topaz is an engineer first and foremost, working on ships is her first passion. She's also very fond of the male gender and demonstrates a lack of species-ism. Appearance: a short (5'0") amber-eyed drow who looks (in human terms) to be about nineteen. Mid-back length white hair with highlights that are usually dyed a shade or two different from her eyes, usually in a ponytail. Lithe build. Equipment: light crossbow, 20 bolts, mechanic overalls, dagger, spear, studded leather armor DM Note: Topaz is based on the character Kaylee from Firefly.
Gadget, ship's carpenteengineer of the Red River (Flying Fish ship) Species: warforged female Game Mechanic: 4th level artificer (artillerist) AC:15, MV:30, AL:LN, hp:27 Str:10, Dex:14, Con:12, Int:15, Wis:14, Cha:11 Skills: Arcana +4, Athletics +2, Insight +4, Investigation +4, Perception +4. proficient with Carpenter's Tools, Jeweler's Tools, Navigator's Tools, Thieves' Tools, Tinker's Tools, Vehicles (Water), Woodcarver's Tools Feat: Gunner Spells: Mage Hand, Mending. Alarm, Cure Wounds, Feather Fall, Identify, Shield, Thunderwave. Gadget is a warforged who was a dwarven woman an era ago, she retains some of that identity despite several resets. Enough remains of the warrior who faced the Elven Empire that she privately relishes the chance to shoot up vessels of the Free States as apparently they're similar in outlook. Appearance: Gadget is a warforged with a vaguely feminine styling, with her face being much more articulated than is normal for a warforged. She has also placed a "skin" made of porcelain plating on both arms and hands. Equipment: studded leather armor, light crossbow, 20 bolts, handaxe

With plenty of delays and 12 reports later, we've arrived at the final report of my one year Japan adventures. I've returned from Japan exactly a year ago and I can't believe how fast the time went by. Feels like just yesterday when I stood at the airport, flying out to Japan, excited to spend a year there. I wonder if I ever get over it!
I will probably make one more post after this, a sort of retrospective where I go over my favourite places, foods, activities, regrets and what I would have done differently, but for the main travelling part - this is the last one! It'll cover my final few travels up to north Japan, including cities like Kakunodate, Morioka, Kitakami, Hakodate and my fourth (!) visit to Sapporo. Fair warning: I will probably be very sappy and sentimental in this report since there were a few goodbyes to be had in May 2023. Without further ado, let's finish this.
Prior reports can be found here:
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12
Tokyo
My mother and I checked out of the hotel we stayed at in Ueno, leaving our suitcases there because there were still a few hours left before my mom's flight. Since it was my mother's last day in Japan, I asked her if she wanted to eat anything special as her final meal and... she picked McDonald's. Don't judge me - I asked her several times but she said she had tried a lot of food and was good with just having McDonald's. So we went over there, ate some burgers before a final round in Ueno park and then we picked up her luggage and went onto the Skyliner to Narita. My mother got herself a Starbucks coffee and we talked a bit about her trip and if she was satisfied and she loved every second of it despite having been sick for a few days in the first week - which she never mentioned to me up until this point, tch. Either way, it was time to say goodbye to my mom and I took the train back into Tokyo. Now, this was when it finally hit me that this was "it". I only had 1 1/2 months left and there was no travel companion to look forward to anymore. There were still a few friends I've made on Discord coming to Japan on their own, separate travels and I would meet up with them for karaoke but aside that - my final countdown began. It felt really, really weird.
I spent the rest of the day in Akihabara, window shopping, then having a meal at my favourite Chinese restaurant before I had to take a somewhat longer trip from Tokyo to Hino, which was 1 1/2 hours out of central Tokyo and where my Airbnb was located. I only stayed there for 2 days and one of those I spent on taking care of laundry and just relaxing a bit after travelling about with my mother for 2 weeks. The area was quite nice, although a power outage in the entire city block took out my ability to take a shower for almost the entire day so some of my plans were foiled. On the second day, I met up with one of the aforementioned Discord friends. The weather was quite bad with heavy rain so we only window shopped around Ueno and then met up with another set of friends for a big karaoke session! This would also be my last karaoke session in Japan for the time being (still one of my favourite activities to do in Japan, especially if your with a group of dorks).
Morioka
I initially planned to travel from Tokyo to Morioka, checking out a few places nearby and then go further north in one go for the sakura but it was way too early to actually go to Hokkaido for them. Since Tokyo's hotel and airbnb prices were also getting more and more expensive in this period, I had to make some Frankenstein-esque itinerary. Which is why I'd go to Morioka, visit the spots I wanted to visit and then went back to Tokyo for a week before then venturing to Hokkaido... the last weeks were kind of messy in terms of planning, to be honest.
Either way, I hopped on the shinkansen and took a trip to Morioka, without any real plans aside wanting to take sidetrips to Kakunodate and Kitakami from there. As far as Morioka itself goes, there are some pretty sakura spots throughout the city, even if a lot of petals were starting to fall already. But it made for some pretty paths at least. I missed out on checking out the Hachimangu shrine, which I somewhat regret. Morioka is famous for their three different types of noodle dishes; wanko soba, reimen and jajamen. I've only tried out jajamen because I love the "original" Chinese dish a whole lot and found a small place with a very nice owner who told me how to eat the dish and what to do after finishing the noodles. Typically, you crack a raw egg into your plate and pour hot water in, mixing the remaining miso and raw egg in for an egg soup. It's incredibly delicious and I would've loved to go for another round but the place was closed throughout the remainder of my stay :(.
Now, Kitakami was of particular interest for me because from pictures I've seen online, the sakura "tunnel" there looked incredible. Unfortunately by the time I got there, a lot of sakura had already fallen off in that area. There were still some other sakura trees around the area and a few food stalls. I was a bit disappointed to not have caught the main attraction but it was still worth for like a half day. Had some gyudon at a very small place run by an older lady before heading back.
The next day, I'd go for a bit of a longer trip to Kakunodate. Another town famous for its sakura and the old samurai and merchant districts. The weather was once again rather shabby, but the town was still really beautiful! One thing I really started to appreciate was when there would be random sakura trees in between others up in the mountains/hills, which was the case here. The trees around the river were the highlight, though, even in this weather. It must look even better when the sun is out and you're here at peak bloom! But it's also definitely a well known spot and I was surprised that it was this busy last year already, even though borders weren't open for that long yet. Something that always goes down well in somewhat cold, rainy weather is a hot bowl of soba or udon. This was a thick duck broth and tastes absolutely fantastic, one of my favourite soba meals in Japan (here's the Google maps location). Something else to note: the shinkansen ride from Morioka to Kakunodate has incredible scenery. It's sort of like a sightseeing spot in itself to be honest. There was a point where I could see sakura trees for what felt like a solid minute of riding on the train there.
But that was all for this part of northern Japan. I only spent like 3 days up here but would say it's worth checking it out if you are planning a trip up north and want to see something on your way to Hokkaido, for example. With that being over, I headed back to Tokyo for a few days - remember, it was all a bit weirdly planned out here...
Tokyo, again
Back in Tokyo, I once again found myself in Kunitachi, where my extremely nice Airbnb host picked me up from the station to take me to the place itself - and I couldn't have thanked her enough because it was still pouring rain that week. I spent the next few days just wandering around the neighbourhood, doing "regular life" stuff like laundry and recharging my travel battery. But I also took advantage of the weather when it stopped raining for a day or two and headed to Showa Kinen Park!
Showa Kinen Park is a huge park in west Tokyo, with a large variety of flowers and plants all over the park grounds. I spent four hours here and I am not sure I even saw everything properly. It's very popular in Spring for its tulips, which are plenty colourful. There's also smaller gardens within the park, some of which exhibit bonsai trees. Very much recommend checking this place out. If you don't want to walk, you can also rent bikes at the entrance area IIRC and there's also other small "buses" going around the park so that you don't have to track back if needed.
After a few days, I once again packed my stuff for the actual final journey up north. First stop - Hakodate.
Hakodate
This was my third time in Hakodate, having been there in Summer, Winter and now Spring. The train journey takes around 4 hours and I arrived at around 4pm, took a taxi (with a very chatty driver!) to my accommodation Share Hotels Hakoba (very much recommended) and then immediately went out for some good old Hakodate shio ramen at Fukufukutei. I absolutely love the shio ramen they serve in Hakodate, it just feels so light yet flavourful and the chashu at this place was amazing. I ordered a half-sized fried rice to go with my ramen and was very satisfied with my meal.
Nothing better to follow that up by walking up the slopes of Hakodate. The Motomachi area is always great and the small park in the area had a bunch of sakura trees. And just looking over the harbor of Hakodate never gets boring. Don't get baited by the "famous" slope everybody takes pictures at, the entire hillside of Hakodate is amazing and there are a lot of small shrines - explore them all if you can, it's a great side-quest.
The second day was the "big" one because I had been looking forward to seeing Fort Goryokaku in Spring. Now, if you plan on visiting this place in sakura season, the fact that Hakodate is not a typical tourist destination won't save you from having to line up and wait to get tickets up the tower. I've not seen this many people anywhere in Hakodate but it makes sense because this is a very famous spot for sakura. However, the wait is most definitely worth it. I'll let the pictures do the talking here.
Once I had my fill of taking pictures from inside the tower, I went down and checked the park itself out and I honestly think in terms of just sheer volume of sakura, this place blew out any other I've visited out the water. I took SO many pictures here, I can't really post all of them but here's a selection. Do not miss out on this if you ever plan on visiting Hokkaido in Spring. I probably spent around 1 1/2 hours in total at Goryokaku before heading back and to Hakodate Park, which also sports a lot of sakura! And since it's practically right next to Hakodateyama, you can take pictures with it in the background from here too. This cat gang was lazing about there too and garnered some attention from the locals as well. It's also a fairly quiet part of Hakodate, there weren't many people here at all which made for a very relaxing stroll. Keep in mind though that even in late April, Hakodate gets somewhat chilly in the evening so bring at least a thin jacket if you play on exploring about in the evening.
Coincidentally, a friend I've not met in years was in Hakodate at the same time and we spontaneously met up for a quick ramen dinner which was once again incredible. I honestly can not recommend shio ramen in Hakodate enough. I've been to three different places and all three have been absolutely amazing. Shio ramen is still my favourite type and I'll never get tired of it. With that meal done, my short stay in Hakodate was over and I was 100% satisfied with going there one final time. Up next was my final stay in Sapporo...
Sapporo
Ah, Sapporo. One of the first major cities I've visited during my one year in Japan and it would also be the last one (not counting Tokyo because I "lived" there, most of the time) I'd visit on the trip. I stayed there for about 1 1/2 weeks with no real, clear goal in mind. I just wanted to check out what sakura Sapporo has to offer, meet up with my American friend again and be nostalgic.
Just like with Hakodate, Sapporo was unexpectedly cold around this time. If you've stayed in places that have constant 20-25°C going for like two months already, 10°C feel cold as hell and I had to layer up over there. I met up with my friend on my first full day and we did some anime merch shopping and had some burgers at J.S Burgers (burger was alright). My friend usually had work going on weekdays, so the next day, I did my own clothes shopping for a bit, making use of the ever downward trending yen and buying myself a few essentials at Uniqlo.
My plan then was to go to the place where I had made a ton of memories and acquaintances in August 2022 - the anime bar. Now, if you've not read my August report, I'll give you a TLDR: this was pretty much the first place I mustered up the courage to go to and socialise with Japanese people, even with my pretty terrible Japanese at the time and I ended up going there every single evening, meeting towns of different folks and it was an incredibly great time. I was looking forward to go there again on my final trip to Sapporo but when I walked closer and closer to the location, I realised something was off and as I arrived, I saw that the bar had practically shutdown. All the decorations in- and outside were gone, the sign was taken off. This might sound a bit dramatic but I was very sad at that moment. I probably stood there for a few minutes in disbelief. Just 6 months earlier in September, I had been there and now this place full of memories was gone. It sucked! But life goes on and I'll at least have cherished memories of this place forever.
Of course, I had to go to my favourite ramen place in all of Japan and got a big portion of their shio toripan tsukemen and it hit the spot just like it always did. If I could only eat one restaurant's ramen for the rest of my life, it'd probably be this. Maruyama-koen around the end of April had more sakura and also plum blossoms! As per usual, plenty of food stalls selling typical festival food around.
My Airbnb was located east of Toyohira river and relatively close to Nakajima-koen, making it so that I pretty much always had a nice walk back to my accommodation and Nakajima-koen is pretty every season I've been there. Also a bit nostalgic because it was one of the first places I visited on my first trip to Sapporo. The park itself had a few sakura trees along the "main" path and also just dotted about randomly within the premises. If you're into cosplay, you may run into a bunch of cosplayers here, it is a fairly popular spot for it.
I met up with my American friend another few times, having some relatively cheap and alright meal at Yakiniku like, shopping and spending some time around Odori park. Another throwback because on my first trip, I took a picture of the TV tower from roughly the same spot. We also checked out Round One, which is a big arcade center with lots of crane games and arcades. I'm kind of 50/50 on crane games at this point, especially in these huge buildings because it's just so incredibly loud and I get sensory overload sometimes. We also went for soup curry dinner at this place. Soup curry is also one of my absolute favourite dishes and one of the main reasons I think Hokkaido has the best cuisine in Japan. Keep in mind that this restaurant has gotten pretty popular since the last time I went there but if you manage to go there, do order the fried chicken on rice which is limited to a certain amount of servings per day!
This wouldn't be the last time I met with my friend, however, since she was going to go to Tokyo in May and we'd meet there for the last time!
Again, I omit the parts of my stay in Sapporo where I just bummed around and didn't do anything special. Had a few more soup curries, had some interesting roast beef near my Airbnb, bought more clothes, more merch and saw the last sakura of the year slowly falling on my last walk through Nakajima-koen. 3 months after seeing the first sakura in Kawazu, my own personal little sakura hunt had ended and on top of that, sakura season ending lined up almost perfectly with my 1 year in Japan ending... And even though I did get 3 months of seeing sakura here and there, I think staying in one place and see the sakura start blooming and then also falling within 1-2 weeks definitely made me realise why it is such a popular season. It's both beautiful and kind of sad, that fleeting feeling!
Random side-note: met up with some people from Hello Talk again and I didn't know that Torikizoku didn't exist in Hokkaido at all at the time! The very first one opened while I stayed there this time and both of the people I met up with were curious to check it out. If you ever wanted to see what a newly built Torikizoku store looks like, here's a peek.
Took some final pictures at Susukino and Toyohira river on my last day in the city before it was time to say goodbye to Sapporo as I took a flight back to Tokyo this time, not making the same mistake of booking a huge train ride back like I did in September 2022! Had to get myself some Hokkaido ice cream at the airport and then said farewell to Sapporo.
The Tokyo Finale
With less than 3 weeks left in Japan, I kind of fought the dreadful feeling of returning home every day while also trying to make the most of my time. And to be honest, making the most of my time for me meant to just enjoy the mundane. I'll get into this in the aforementioned retrospective post but I should have definitely appreciated the "boring", normal days more than I did at the time.
Once again, I had stayed east of Sumidagawa, taking regular walks along the river every day. Also discovered really unique ramen near Akihabara one day, which I'd recommend you to check out. The chashu here is incredible and the broth has a lot of spices in them. I kind of started to put less effort into finding hidden gem restaurants as I felt like I've done that the entire year and visited Sushiro more frequently in my final weeks in Tokyo - simply because it's cheap while still being better than most sushi I can get in my home country.
As mentioned earlier, my American friend was flying out to Tokyo for a few days because one of her friends from the US was coming over to Japan for the first time. But we had another 2 days before the latter arrived and because my friend didn't have many opportunities to go to Tokyo, she always made use of her time by getting her fill of all things anime merch (I'll expose her here by saying she was hunting down a whole lot of BL) and we spent hours in Ikebukuro looking through every store under the sun. Also, Kanda matsuri took place during this time, one of the biggest festivals in Tokyo with thousands of people marching through different neighbourhoods around Kanda, Nihonbashi, Otemachi and Akihabara. I didn't actually know what to expect but the streets around Akihabara were packed. But it's really cool to see the festivities, music and dances.
My final Airbnb was up in Uguisudani, a very quiet part of Tokyo north of Ueno. If you're into trains, I imagine this station would be cool because there are like 5 or 6 different tracks around and you can see them all from the bridge. Also comes with nice sunsets. My Airbnb host's wife brought freshly made sandwiches every morning and let me tell you, those konbini sandwiches got nothing on these. They felt like whole meals! There was also a pretty good tsukemen place nearby which I visited twice.
On one of these days, I had to do the painful journey over to city hall to effectively deregister myself as a resident. Since I had come over to Japan with the sponsoring of a company, I met a couple people who had just arrived in Tokyo for their own working holiday and had to do the opposite of me that day. Felt kind of envious because I knew they were about to have a fantastic year! Also a bit sad because I would have loved if they had been there when I first came over to have some friends to spend time with but at least I got to meet one of them late 2023 anyway!
At last, after spending a few days with my friend and her friend, taking them to a few food places, battling hordes of people at the Pokemon Center in Ikeburuo and have them experience Torikizoku and Sushiro as well, it was time to bid farewell to my friend, for a long time too probably. She was the first proper friend I had made in Japan and we spent a lot of time together whenever I was in Sapporo or she visited Tokyo, so this was extra sad. She would later leave Japan in September 2023, returning to the US after she spent 2 years as a JET. It really all felt like the end of an era at the time, especially because we don't know when we'll next meet. It was a fairly emotional goodbye as we both did our best to hold back tears (she probably thinks I didn't notice :P) but I am sure we'll see each other at some point and fortunately these days, staying in contact online is easy so we check on each other regularly.
I don't have a lot of interesting things to say for my final week in Japan. It kind of all became blurry towards the end. Most of the time I was just buying merch and taking walks around areas I had previously stayed at while also eating all the food that I could because soon enough all the variety I got to enjoy while living in Tokyo would be no more.
On one of the last few days, I messaged the Airbnb host of my June 2022 accommodation and asked him if he was up to meet for a CoCo ichi meal in Machida (both of us just freaking love curry and we had met there before) and he agreed! The last time I was there was in July 2022 and I have the fondest memories of my stay in Machida still. It was the place where the feeling of "Damn, I live in Japan right now" kicked in back when I arrived. We had a nice chat over our lunch, I gave him a little gift and then also said our goodbyes. I still keep in touch with him and hope to be able to stay at his place some time again - but it has been very popular lately haha.
The last day is still pretty vivid in my mind. I got jajamen at my favourite Chinese restaurant in Ueno, then had another long walk to Asakusa, taking the route back along Sumidagawa one last time, through Asakusabashi and then decided to end my journey at one of the places I first visited when I arrived almost a year earlier: Kanda Myojin. I sat down here for about an hour, just looking at the night sky. I got kind of overwhelmed by emotions and may have shed a tear or two as well, hoping that time would stand still and I could just continue staying there but unfortunately, time doesn't stop for anyone and eventually I had to get back up and walk back to my hotel, took a final relaxing bath and then went to sleep...
But! My flight back home wasn't until 4:45pm and it was from Haneda so I checked out of my hotel, left my suitcase there to pick it up later and went on a final stroll through Akihabara, taking this picture just to have a direct comparison to the one I had taken in June 2022. The difference was night and day. Just like with Kanda Myojin being the first and last place I visited, my final meal had to be the same as my first - another plate of curry at CoCo Ichi. If you've read my reports, you'll realise I went to CoCo ichi a whole lot and I am not ashamed to admit that this chain restaurant will always have a special place in my heart! But then, it was time to get my luggage and get on the train and eventually the monorail to Haneda airport. Here's my final 7-11 "haul" as I waited for the plane to get ready and boarding to begin.
And then it was time to say goodbye to Japan for real. Even a year later I get emotional looking at these silly pictures taken from inside the plane. After travelling all across Japan, meeting dozens of fantastic people, showing friends around, eating tons of curry, the best year of my life had come to an end.
Aaaand that is it. I apologise for the lack of pictures towards the end of the report when it all became a wall of text without much to show off in picture form. Still, I hope you enjoyed this final report even if it was a bit messy. If there's anyone who actually read all of my reports - thank you very much! As I said, there's going to be a retrospective post after this too but as far as the travelling part goes, this was it. It can't be overstated enough and I will bring this up in that thread too but quitting my job to take a year off in Japan was by far the best decision I've ever made in my life and even though I have already been back to Japan for a two week holiday in November 2023, this particular year in Japan I will never, ever forget.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask and I'll do my best answering them. Thanks again for reading!

I have had 3 different roommates and all 3 have ended horribly now. I’m a senior in college. My first apartment out here I roomed with my best friend from high school. The first year was great and so we released. One month after releasing we got into an argument over her feeling like I didn’t ask her permission for my choices in the apartment. I painted a $10 bookshelf that we split when buying. We had talked when we initially bought it about me doing it and then we never got around to it, but I randomly decided to paint it and I guess she didn’t like it. I take the blame for it because that is I guess what I did. Lots of back and forth where I realized she had been holding a lot in since freshman year of high school until we just never acknowledged one another for an entire year. Traumatic. I then didn’t learn my lesson and moved in with one of my other friends. We had a lot of conversations about me not wanting to lose another friend and she said she would never let it get to that point. I agreed and we move in to an apartment together. 3 weeks into living together and we got into an argument over her feeling like I wasn’t respecting her boyfriend over me telling her he was treating her poorly and feeling uncomfortable with them having huge arguments in front of me and her response was “well its his apartment too” ummm no I didn’t sign a lease with him.(There is so much more to this I could make a movie over her but anyways) She then threatened to have him k!ll me and I very quickly realized that I needed to get tf out. I contacted the apartment complex and after paying a $300 transfer fee I moved into a different unit with a random roommate. Now I will say that this roommate comes with no drama so I guess there’s that. But she is filthy, overbearing, and downright strange. When I moved in I was told I couldn’t put anything in the living room bc “she leased her for the big living room and too much stuff will make it feel too small”. Well shit. Ok let me shove my dining table, couch, and all my decorations into my room I guess. I ended up having to buy a small storage unit until my lease is up to store all the things I couldn’t fit into my room. But weirdly enough she keeps buying more furniture to fill up the living room. She is filthy to the point the community spaces are unusable (for me at least). There is food left out, dishes left a mile high, clothes that sit in the washer until it smells like mildew, and flies and gnats are everywhere. When I first moved in she warned me about that so at least she is aware??? I used to try and just clean up after her and myself anyway to just keep a clean apartment no matter what. Eventually I just decided it wasn’t worth it when I deep cleaned the entire apartment for friends to come over and she came out to bake a cake 20 minutes later (before my friends even came over) and left a tornado behind her, undoing 4 hours of my day cleaning. A few other things that put me off: a butterfly sitting in our freezer because she found one and wanted to euthanize it, a daddy long legs sitting in the corner of the living room that I’m not allowed to kill or remove because she is working up the nerve (since july) to catch it and keep it as a pet, and the camera I don’t have access to that is pointing at the front door and my bedroom door.
I stay at my boyfriends every single night and just use my apartment to keep my things at. Luckily in July my lease is up and my boyfriend and I found our own place together.

I'm trying to make a list of all of the things to do in Denver for this summer. Does anyone know of anything I should add?
DOUBLE CHECK BEFORE YOU GO. THIS LIST MAY NOT BE UP TO DATE. MANY LOCATIONS / TIMES / COSTS WERE TAKEN DIRECTLY FROM LAST YEAR’S POST

Music Festivals

• Saturdays 05/25-08/31 Swingin Under the Stars - 7:30PM-10PM FREE All Ages Swing Dancing, Lessons, Ice Cream, Live Music Little Man Ice Cream, 2620 16th Street Denver, CO 80211
  
• 06/01-06/02 Outside Festival – 11:30AM-8:30PM $59/Day, $79 / Weekend Music Festival with Emphasis on Outdoor Activities; Performers Include: Thundercat, Lettuce, Say She She, Fleet Foxes, Andrew Bird, the Heavy Heavy, and More! Civic Center Park
  
• 06/07-06/08 Regenerate - Fr 5PM-??; Sa 3PM-?? $99/day 18+ EDM Festival, Performers Include: John Summit, Eric Prydz, Gorgon City, Ben Bohmer, Purple Disco Machine, and many more! Civic Center Park, Denver
  
• 06/08 Five Points Jazz Festival - 12PM-11PM FREE All Ages 140+ Jazz Performances Five Points, Denver
  
• 06/15 Denver Ska Fest - 1PM-11PM $60 All Ages All Things Ska; Performances Include: Goldfinger, Less Than Jake, Five Iron Frenzy, and More! DFA Sculpture Park, 1736 Speer Blvd #1848, Denver, CO 80204
  
• 06/22 Edgewater Music Festival – 2PM-10PM $10 All Ages Live Blues Music and BBQ Citizen’s Park, 5560 W 24th Ave, Edgewater, CO 80214
  
• 07/12-0714 Compost Heap Music Festival - Times TBA FREE (Suggested Donations) Underground Music of Various Genres Seventh Circle Music Collective, 2935 W 7th Ave, Denver CO
  
• 07/05 Beethoven and Brews – 4PM-8:10PM Concert $80 Beer then Classical Music then Beer then Classical Music Denver Performing Arts Complex
  
• 07/16 Sad Summer Festival – 4PM-8:10PM Concert $59 Indie Rock; Performers Include: Mayday Parade, The Main, The Wonder Years, and We the Kings Mission Ballroom
  
• 07/21-07/22 Global Dance Festival – 5PM-1AM $99/Day All Ages *EDM, Art Installations, Circus Performers, Silent Disco. Performers Include: The Chainsmokers, Duke Dumont, Fisher, Gryffin, Kaytranada, and many more Stockyard Event Center Grounds, 5004 National Western Dr, Denver, CO 80216
  
• 07/26-07/28 Underground Music Showcase - 3PM-12AM $90-125 Weekend Pass *Independent Music of Various Genres. Performers Include: Beach Fossils, Tkay Maidza, Amyl and the Sniffers, and many others Broadway // 6th Ave to Alameda, 21 S Broadway, Denver, CO 80209
  
• 07/26-07/28 Rocky Mountain Folks Festival – 10am-12AM $50 21+ * Bluegrass Festival; Camping Available* Lyons Colorado
  
• 08/09-08/11 Rocky Mountain Folks Festival– 10am-12AM $50 21+ Folk and Bluegrass Festival; Camping Available Lyons Colorado
  
• 08/23-08/25 Ghost Canyon Fest – 6PM-12AM $50 21+ Noise, Punk, and Post Punk Bands Skylark Lounge // Mutiny Information Café, Denver CO
  
• 09/14 Sunnyside Music Festival – 12PM-7:15PM FREE All Ages Local Bands, Food, Vendos Chaffe Park near 2001 W 44th Ave, Denver, CO 80211
  

Culture Festivals

• 06/07-06/09 Denver Greek Festival - F 11AM-11PM; Sa 11AM-12AM; Su 11AM-7PM $5 All Ages Celebration of Greek Heritage with Food, Music, Vendors, and Art Assumption of the Theotokos Greek Orthodox Cathedral, 4610 E Alameda Ave, Denver, CO 80246
  
• 06/16 Juneteenth Festival - 12PM-8PM FREE All Ages Celebration of Black Culture and Liberation with a Parade, Live Music, Vendors, Headline Performance from Bow Wow Five Points, Denver
  
• 06/22-06/24 Cherry Blossom Festival - 5k Sa 8AM; Parade Sa 9:30AM FREE All Ages Celebration of Japanese Heritage with Taiko Drumming, Teriyaki Chicken, Sake, Japanese Art Sakura Square, Denver
  
• 06/22-06/23 Denver Pridefest - Sa 11AM-7PM; Su 11AM-6PM FREE All Ages Celebration of LGBTQ+ Culture with 5k Run, Parade, Venors, Concerts, Drag Events Civic Center Park, 101 W 14th Ave, Denver, CO 80202 (Parade Starts at Cheeseman Park)
  
• 07/12 -07/14 Colorado Black Arts Festival - F 1PM-8PM; Sa 11AM-8PM; Su 11AM-7PM FREE All Ages * Celebration of Black Culture with Performances, Visual Art, Scavenger Hunts, Food, Parade, Vendors* City Park, 2001 Colorado Blvd, Denver, CO 80205
  
• 06/29-06/30 Mile High Global Bazaar – 12PM-6PM FREE All Ages Cultural Exhibits and Vendors from around the World Wynkoop Plaza at Union Station
  
• 07/27-07/28 Colorado Dragon Boat Festival – Races Start 8AM; Festival Sa 10AM-7PM. Su 10AM-5PM FREE All Ages *Dragon Boat Races, Food, Vendors, Performances Sloan's Lake Park W Bryon Pl, Denver, CO 80212
  
• 08/03-08/04 Taste of Ethiopia Festival – Time TBD FREE All Ages Celebration of Ethiopian Culture, Food, and Music Location TBD
  

Food / Drink Festivals

• W-Th 05/08-10/16 Civic Center Eats - 11AM-2PM Free All Ages 10-20 Food Trucks of Various Cuisines Civic Center Park, 101 W 14th Ave, Denver, CO 80202
  
• 06/15 - Summer Brewfest - 1PM-10PM Last Year: $55 Advance, $60 Day of Only Allowed Half of Time) 21+ *Unlimited Tastings of Local Beer Brews Mile High Station, 2027 West Colfax Avenue, Denver Co 80204
  
• 07/18 The Big Eat - 6PM-9PM $93 21+ 50+ Restaurants All You Can Eat, Live Music; Live Performances from Namebackwards Trio and Cereus* Denver Performing Arts Complex, 1400 Curtis St, Denver, CO 80204
  
• 08/01 Denver Burger Battle - $90 21+ 20+ Restaurants Best Burger Competition; Unlimited Drinks and Burgers* Tivoli Quad, 1000 Larimer St, Denver CO 80204?
  
• 08/24 [Denver Summer Whiskey Tasting Festival] https://www.eventbrite.com/e/2024-denver-summer-whiskey-tasting-festival-august-24-tickets-756396691867) - 2:30PM-6PM $35 21+ Tasting of 20+ Whiskey, Tasting Lessons, Live Music, Food Location TBA
  
• 09/04-09/07 Denver Food and Wine Festivals 11AM-8PM $60-$95 21+ * Food and Wine Showcase, Tastings, Seminars, Cocktail Competition* Tivoli Quad on the Auraria Campus, 1000 Larimer St, Denver
  
• 09/07 Whiskies of the World 6:45 PM-9:30PM $99 21+ Global Whiskey Tasting, Light Bites, Free Glass Four Seasons Hotel, 1111 14th St, Denver
  
• Date TBD BBQ Fest - Time TBD Last Year: $35 Under 20; $109 Adult All Ages * All You Can Eat BBQ, All You Can Drink, Cooking Demos, Live Music* Location TBD
  

Art / Crafts / Shopping Festival

• 06/07, 07/05, 08/02, 09/06 Sante Fe First Friday Art Walks - 5:30PM-9PM FREE All Ages Galleries , Vendors, Food Trucks, Music Sante Fe // 5th Ave to 11th Ave, Denver, CO 80204
  
• 06/07, 07/05, 08/02, 09/06 RiNo First Friday Art Walks - 5:30PM-9PM FREE All Ages Art,Vendors Larimer St // Broadway to Downing
  
• 06/07, 07/05, 08/02, 09/06 Lakewood First Friday Art Walks - 6PM-9PM FREE All Ages Galleries, Drinks, Music 6501 W Colfax Ave, Lakewood, CO 80214
  
• 06/06-06/09 Denver Fringe Festival - Hours Vary Prices Vary, $75 All Inclusive All Ages 60+ Shows of Performance Art, Music Plays, Comedy, Improv, Cabaret, Magic, Dance, Aerial, Immersive Experiences, & More Across 12 Venues All Across RiNo and Five Points Denver
  
• 06/01-06/02 Denver Chalk Art Festival - 10AM-8PM FREE All Ages Chalk Art on the Street 123 W. 12th Avenue, Denver, CO 80204
  
• 06/08-06/09 Highlands Art Festival - 10AM-5PM FREE All Ages Art Vendors and Food Trucks 3550 Federal Blvd, Denver, CO 80211
  
• 06/15 RINO Summer Art Market – 12PM-4PM FREE All Ages *55+ Local Artists, Live Musical Performances 1900 35th St, Denver
  
• 07/05-07/07 Cherry Creek Arts Festival - Hours Vary 9AM-8PM FREE All Ages Art Vendors Cherry Creek North, 2401 E 2nd Ave #150, Denver, CO 80206
  
• 07/27-07/28 Cheeseman Park Art Festival – 9AM-5PM FREE All Ages 150+ Artists, Live Music, Food & Drinks Cheeseman Park, 1599 East 8th Avenue, Denver CO 80218
  

Other Festivals

• 06/01-06/02 Big Gear Show – 12PM-8PM FREE Outdoor Goods Consumer Show Colorado Convention Center, 700 14th St, Denver, CO 80202
  
• 06/08-06/09 Unicorn Festival – 10AM-5PM $25 All Things Fairy and Unicorn Including the Unicorns Themselves Clement Park, 7306 W Bowles Ave, Littleton, CO 80123
  
• 07/04-07/07 Fan Expo – F 4PM-9PM; Sa 10AM-7PM; Su 10AM-5PM $29 / Day; $109 4-Day Pass All Ages Convention for Fans of Comics, Sci F, Horror, Anime, Gaming Colorado Convention Center, 700 14th St, Denver, CO 80202
  
• 07/20-07/21 Lavender Festival – 9AM-5PM $15 Adults, $13 Seniors, $9 Children All Ages Lavender Fields, Artists, Live Music, Demonstrations of Dye Garden and Blacksmith Shop Denver Botanic Gardens* Chatfield Farms, 8500 W Deer Creek Canyon Road, Littleton, CO 80128
  

Farmers Markets

Sundays

• Select Saturdays & Sundays 06/01-08/18 Urban Market at Union Station – 12PM-6PM 1701 Wynkoop, Denver, CO 80202
  
• Sundays 06/02-09/29 Arvada Farmer’s Market – 9AM-1:30PM Olde Town Square, 5702 Olde Wadsworth Blvd. Arvada, CO 80002
  
• Sundays 05/??-10/?? Parker – 8AM-1PM – 19565 Mainstreet, Parker, CO 80138
  
• Sundays 05/19-10/13 HighlandsSquare – 9AM-1PM 3600 W 32nd Ave, Denver, CO 80211
  
  • Sundays 06/23-10/13 Central Park – 8:30AM-12:30 PM Founders Green at Central Park
• Sundays 05/26-10/13 Festival Park – 9AM-2PM – 300 2nd St, Castle Rock, CO 80104
  
• Sundays 06/02-10/13 People + Produce – (Food Trucks Beer Garden Live Music) - 9AM-1PM – Bellview Station, Glendale, 6785 E Chenango Ave, Denver, CO 80237
  
• Sundays 04/05-10/27 Metro Denver Famers Market - Highlands Ranch – 10AM-2PM 9288 Dorchester St, Highlands Ranch, CO 80126
  
• Sundays 05/05-11/10 South Pearl Street – 9AM-1PM 1527 S Pearl St, Denver, CO 80210
  

Tuesdays

• Tuesdays 06/04-09/24 Evergreene – 10AM-2PM 1036 El Rancho Road, Evergreen, CO 80439

Wednesdays

• Wednesdays 06/05-08/28 Green Valley Ranch – 5PM-8PM Green Valley Ranch Town Center Park, 4890 Argonne St., Denver, CO 80249
  
  • Wednesdays 06/19-09/25 Metro Denver Farmers Market – Aspen Grove – 10AM-2PM Green Valley Ranch Town Center Park, 4890 Argonne St., Denver, CO 802497301 S Santa Fe Dr., Littleton
  • Wednesdays 05/01-10/02 Boulder County Farmer’s Market – 13:30PM-7:30PM 13th St between Arapahoe Ave & Canyon Blvd

Thursdays

• Thursdays 05/9-09/26 Real Farmers Market - Erie – 5PM-8PM – Briggs Street // Wells and Moffatt, Erie 80516

Saturdays

• Select Saturdays & Sundays 06/01-08/18 Urban Market at Union Station – 12PM-6PM 1701 Wynkoop, Denver, CO 80202
  
• 1st and 3rd Saturdays 5/11-08/31 Rebels in the Garden - 9PM-1PM Activist Group Rebel Marketplace, S Del Mar Park, Aurora, CO, USA
  
• Saturdays 05/04-10/28 Southwest Plaza – 8AM-2PM 8501 W Bowles Ave, Littleton, CO 80123
  
• Saturdays 05/11-09/28* Southland – 8AM-1PM – 6155 S Main St, Aurora, CO 80016
  
• Saturdays 06/15-09/30 Lakewood – 10AM-2PM Mile Hi Church. 9077 W Alameda Ave, Denver, CO 80226
  
• Saturdays 06/01-10/05 Golden 8AM-1PM 1019 10th St, Golden, CO 80401
  
• Saturday 05/02-10/12 Cherry Creek Fresh Market – 9AM-2PM Cherry Creek Shopping Center, 3000 E 1st Ave, Denver, CO 80206
  
• Saturdays 5/13-10/14 Real Farmer’s Market - Louisville – 9AM-1PM 824 Front Street, Louisville, CO 80027
  
• Saturdays 5/04-10/26 City Park – 8AM-1PM 2551 E Colfax Ave, Denver, CO 80206
  
  • Saturdays 05/11-10/26 University Hills – 9AM-1PM – 2500 S Colorado Blvd, Denver, CO 80222
• Saturdays 4/06-11/23 Boulder County Farmers Market - Longmont – 8AM-1PM Boulder County Fairgrounds, 9595 Nelson Rd, Longmont, CO
  

Denver.org List of Farmers Markets

Concerts

LIST OF ALMOST ALL CONCERTS AND LIVE MUSIC IN DENVER SUMMER 2024
Great List of Free / Cheap Concert Series by Day of the Week
Free Outdoor Concerts

• Sundays 06/02-08/04 City Park Jazz - 6PM-8PM FREE All Ages Jazz, Blues, Brass, and More City Park Pavilion, Denver, CO
  
  • Dates Vary 05/17-10/05Levitt Pavilion Free Concerts Series - Times Vary FREE All Ages Free Concerts, Various Genres Levitt Pavilion, 1380 W Florida Ave, Denver, CO 80223
• 06/20, 07/18, 08/15 Riverfront Park Summer Sessions - 5PM-9PM FREE All Ages Riverfront Park, Denver, CO
  
• ** 08/10** Opera on the Green - 6PM or 8 PM FREE All Ages Central Park, Denver, CO
  
  • ** Dates Vary 06/01-08.08** Concerts in Central Park - 6PM or 6:30 PM FREE All Ages Central Park, Denver, CO
• 06/19-08/21 Green Valley Ranch Sunday Concerts in the Park - 5:30PM-7:30PM FREE All Ages Green Valley Ranch Town Center Park, 5050 Argonne St, Denver, CO 80249
  
• Highlands Ranch Community Association Summer Concert Series - 6:30PM-8:00PM FREE All Ages Highland Heritage Regional Park, 9651 S Quebec, Highlands Ranch, CO 80129
  
• ** Select Saturdays 06/01-008/08** MCA Concerts and Jazz Series - 6PM FREE Founders Green, 7601 29th Ave, Denver, CO 80238
  
  • ** Select Thursdays 06/03-07/27** MCA MoJaBlu Concert Series - 6:30PM FREE Jazz Conservatory Green, Denver, CO 80238

Outside Paid Venues

• Red Rocks Event Schedule 303-319 CO-8, Morrison, CO 80465
  
• Empower Field Event Schedule 1701 Bryant St, Denver, CO 80204
  
• Fiddler’s Green Event Schedule 6350 Greenwood Plaza Blvd, Greenwood Village, CO 80111
  
  • Every Other Wednesday 06/12-07/31 [Lakewood Summer Concert Series](h https://www.lakewood.org/Government/Departments/Community-Resources/Arts-and-Culture/Arts-and-Culture-Events/Sounds-Exciting-Summer-Concert-Series) - Doors 5PM, Headliners 7:15 $10 All Ages Heritage Lakewood Belmar Park
• Denver Botanical Gardens Music at the Gardens Schedule Denver Botanic Gardens, 1007 York St, Denver, CO 80206
  
• Evenings El Pastor at the Denver Botanic Gardens Small Ensembles Hidden Throughout the Gardens Denver Botanic Gardens, 1007 York St, Denver, CO 80206
  
• Civic Center Park Concert Schedule Civic Center Park, 101 W 14th Ave, Denver, CO 80202
  
• Dick’s Sporting Goods Park Concert Schedule Dick’s Sporting Goods Park, 6000 Victory Way, Commerce City, CO 80022
  
• Arvada Center Outdoor Amphitheater & Front Porch Concerts Arvada Center for the Arts and Humanities, 6901 Wadsworth Blvd, Arvada, CO 80003
  
• Wednesdays 06/05-07/17 Shady Grove Concert Series at Four Mile Historic Park - 6:30PM $20 Four Mile Historic Park, 715 S Forest St, Denver, CO 80246
  

Paid Indoor Venues

• List of Venus in Denver

Concert Lists (by Genre, Search, Etc)

• Songkick
  
• Concertfix
  
• Concertful
  

Parks / Nature

National Parks

• Rocky Mountain National Park $15-$35; $70 Annual; $80 Interagency All Ages 415 Square Miles of Mountain Environments FREE DAYS: 08/04, 09/24, 11/11
  
• Mesa Verde National Park $15-$30; $55 Annual; $80 Interagency World Heritage Site of Pueblo Ruins FREE DAYS: 08/04, 09/24, 11/11
  
• Great Sand Dunes National Park $25; $40 Annual; $80 INteragencyFREE DAYS: 08/04, 09/24, 11/11
  
• Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park $15-$30; $55 Annual; $80 Interagency FREE DAYS: 08/04, 09/24, 11/11
  

State Parks

• Barr Lake
  
• Cheyenne Mountain
  
• Crawford
  
• Eleven Mile
  
• Jackson Lake
  
• John Martin
  
• Lake Pueblo
  
• Mancos
  
• Ridgway
  
• St. Vrain
  
• Staunton
  
• Steamboat Lake
  
• Trinidad Lake
  
  • Roxborough State Park

City Parks

• City Park Lake, Science Museum, Zoo, Golf 17th and York, Denver, CO
  
• Skyline Park * Beer Garden, Ice Skating Rink in Winter* 16th and Arapaho, Denver, CO
  
• Civic Center Park * Lots of Festivals, Art Museum, Library, Government Buildings* 101 W 14th Ave Pkwy, Denver, CO, 80203
  
• Confluence Park Aquarium, Children’s Museum, Elitch Gardens, S Platte River 2250 15th St, Denver, CO
  
• Centennial Flower Gardens Gardens, S Platte River, Elitch Gardens 1101 Little Raven St, Denver, CO
  
• Commons Park S Platte River, Sand Prairie 17th and York, Denver, CO
  
• Sloans Lake Park Lake, Festival 1700 Sheridan Blvd, Denver, CO
  
• Washington Park Lakes, Boat Rentals, Gardens, Playgrounds, Sports, Tennis Courts, Soccer Field Virginia Ave and Downing St, Denver, CO
  
• Cheeseman Park Paths, Playgrounds 1599 E 8th St, Denver, CO
  
• Bear Creek Park 2,600 Acres, Hiking, Biking, Horseback Riding, Swim Beach, Boat Rentals 15600 W Morrison Rd, Lakewood, CO
  
• Paco Sanchez Park Hilly expanse with unique playgrounds 1290 Knox Court, 3240 W 14th Ave, Denver, CO 80204
  
• Ruby Hill Bike Park 7 Acre Park for Bike Riders with Ramps and Tracks W Jewell Ave, Denver, CO 80223
  
• Smaller / More Distant City Parks include: Berkeley Lake Park, Rocky Mountain Lake Park. McDonough Park, City of Cuernavaca Park, Benedict Fountain (Triangle) Park AND MANY MORE…
  

Hikes

• Day Hikes Near Denver

Water Activities

Beaches

• Cherry Creek State Park Swim Beach Smoky Hill Trail, Aurora, CO 80015
  
• Aurora Reservoir Swimming Beach S Powhaton Rd, Aurora, CO 80016
  
• Aurora Reservoir SCUBA Beach E Reservoir Dam Rd, Aurora, CO 80016
  
• Platte River Highlands Bridge and Swimming in Confluence Park 2250 15th St, Denver, CO 80202
  
• Soda Lake Beach in Bear Creek Lake Park Near 15600 W Morrison Rd, Lakewood, CO 80228
  
• Chatfield Park Swim Beach Near Perimeter Rd, Littleton, CO 80128
  

Pools

• List of Public Denver Outdoor Pools - $50 Summer Pass
  
• List of Public Denver Indoor Pools - $50 Summer Pas
  

Splash Parks

• List of Splash Parks in the Denver Metro Area May be out of date

Water Parks

• List of Water Parks in the Denver Metro Area May be out of date
  
• 05/25-09/02 Island Kingdom Waterpark at Elitch Gardens - Varies between 9AM and 8:30PM (Closes at Dusk) $50/Day, $77/Season All Ages Water Park with Thrill Slides, Family Slides, Wave Pool, and Lazy River; Attached to Theme Park (No extra cost) 2000 Elitch Cir, Denver, CO 80204
  
• 05/25-09/07 Water World - Varies between 10AM and 7:30PM $45-$50 Adults; $30-$45 Kids All Ages Water Park with Thrill Slides, Family Slides, Wave Pool, Lazy River, and Surf Wave 8801 N Pecos St, Federal Heights, CO 80260
  
• 05/25-08/11 The Splash at Fossil Trace - 10AM-6PM Park; 10AM-5:30PM Pools $13 Day Pass, $195 Season Pass All Ages Pools and Water Slides 3151 Illinois St, Golden, CO 80401
  
• 05/25-09/02 Pirate’s Cove - 10AM-5:30PM $19Day Pass; $133Season Pass All Ages Pools and Water Slides 1225 W Belleview Ave, Littleton, CO 80120
  

Amusement

Theme Parks / Roller Coasters

• Year Round, Dates Vary Elitch Gardens - Times vary between 9AM and 9PM $35-$70/Day, $78-$150/Season All Ages Theme Park and Water Park 2000 Elitch Cir, Denver, CO 80204
  
• 05/13-09/10 Lakeside Amusement Park - Varies between 1PM and 11:30PM $25-$35 All Ages Classic Theme Park Built in 1908 4601 Sheridan Boulevard, Lakeside, CO 80212
  

Themed Festivals

• Saturdays & Sundays, 06/15-08/04 Colorado Renaissance Festival - 10:30AM-6:30PM $28 Adult, $12 Child All Ages Renaissance Themed Food, Drink, And Entertainment including Comedy, Sword Swallowing, Fire Breathing, Music, Jousting, and More 650 Perry Park Ave, Larkspur, CO 80118

Outdoor Movies

Local Projections

• Denver.org List Mostly not announced yet List of Outdoor Movie Showings in and around Denver Including: Red Rocks, Avanti, Town Center Park Auditorium, Ironton Distillery & Crafthouse, Elitch Gardens (in the Wave Pool) and many others
  
  • 07/09-08/18 MCA Outdoor Film Movie Series - Dusk Contemporary Blockbusters and Popular Films South Green, 7601 29th Ave, Denver, CO 80238

Drive Ins

• 88 Drive In - 7PM $10 Double Features Drive in Theatre, Film Schedule 5 Days in Advance 8780 Rosemary Street, Commerce City, CO 80022

Theatre / Opera / Symphony / Dance / Burlesque Shows

• Denver Center for the Performing Arts Big Performing Arts Complex with Several Auditoriums for Plays, Concerts, Symphonies, Shows, and More 1350 Curtis Street, Denver, CO 80202

• 06/04-06/16 & Juliet – Buell Theatre
  
• 07/08-07/20 Some Like It Hot- Buell Theatre
  

• Miners Alley Playhouse Local Children’s Theatre 1224 Washington Ave, Golden, CO 80401

• 04/26-06/02 The Full Monty
  
• 05/04-06/01 The Emperor’s New Clothes
  
  • 05/04-06/01 The Emperor’s New Clothes

• Adams Mystery Playhouse Full-time Murder Mystery Theatre 2406 Federal Blvd, Denver, CO 80211

• 06/01-08/10 Murder at the Forbidden Cavern (Adult Show)
  
  • 06/05-08/08 Mystery at the Campground (Kids Show)
• 08/15-09/14 Murder in the Royal Court
  

• Arvada Center for the Arts and Humanities Local Playhouse for Concerts and Plays 6901 Wadsworth Blvd, Arvada, CO 80003

• ** 08/30-10/13** Waitress

• Vintage Theatre Local Play House Specializing in Revival and Contemporary Musicals and Play 1468 Dayton St, Aurora, CO 80010

• 05/03-06/09 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee
  
• 05/31-07/17-07/30 The Hombres
  
  • 08/23-09/22 Della Doucet

• Firehouse Theatre Company at The John Hand Theatre Performance Art Group 7653 E 1st Pl, Denver, CO 80230

• 05/11-06/08 These Shining Lives
  
  • 06/29-07/28 Othello

• Curious Theatre Company Cutting Edge Theatre 1080 Acoma St, Denver, CO 80204

• 05/18-06/15 Cullud Wattah

• **06/11-08/13 Colorado Shakespeare Festival 972 Broadway, Boulder, CO, 80302

• 06/08-08/11 Macbeth
  
• 07/06-08/11 The Merry Wives of Windsor
  
• 07/28 Arden of Faversham
  

• 07/18-07/20 Colorado Burlesque Festival - 7PM Doors; 8PM Show Prices TBD 18+ Burlesque, Drag, Aerial, & Variety Performance Ophelia’s Electric Soapbox, 1215 20th St, Denver
• 06/29-08/04– Central City Opera’s 2024 Festival – Opera Shows including The Pirates of Penzance, The Girl of the Golden West, and Street Scene Central City Opera House
Theatres to Keep an Eye on
• The Source Theatre Company Local Performing Arts Theatre 721 Santa Fe Dr, Denver, CO 80204
• Lone Tree Arts Center Contemporary Center Which Hosts Plays, Concerts, and Events 10075 Commons St, Lone Tree, CO 80124
• Cherry Creek Theatre Performance Art Center 350 S Dahlia St, Denver, CO 80246
• 05/18-06/04 Control Group Productions Immersive Dance Theatre Shows 1801 Brentwood St., Lakewood, CO 80214

Museums / Exhibits / Gardens

Art

• Denver Art Museum - 10AM-5PM $22 ALL AGES Daily 10AM-5PM General Art Museum 100 W. 14th Avenue Pkwy Denver, CO 80204 - FREE DAYS: 06/11, 07/09, 07/21, 08/13, 09/07, 09/10, 10/08, 11/02, 11/12, 12/10
  
• Museum of Contemporary Art Denver - T-F 12PM-7PM; Sa-Su 10AM-5PM $12, $5 after 5PM T-Th All Ages Contemporary and Modern Art 1485 Delgany St Denver, CO 80202 - $0.01 DAYS: 06/01, 07/06, 08/03, 09/07, 10/12, 11/16, 12/07
  
• Meow Wolf - Hours Vary 12PM-10PM $45-$55 ALL AGES Psychedelic Immersive Alien Art Experience 1338 1st St, Denver, CO 80204
  
• Spectra Art Space: Nova Ita: Propagation - 11AM-9PM $20-$32 ALL AGES * Psychedelic, Immersive Local Art Experience* 1836 S Broadway Denver, CO 80210
  
• Clyfford Still Museum - 10AM-5PM $10-$15 ALL AGES Art by the Artist Clyfford Still 1250 Bannock St Denver, CO 80204 – PAY WHAT YOU WISH DAYS: 05/29, 06/01, 06/22, 08/16, 09/04, 10/03, 12/03
  
• Museo de las Americas - 12PM-5/6PM $8 ALL AGES Latin American Art 861 Santa Fe Dr, CO 80204 - FREE DAYS: 06/07, 07/05, 08/02, 09/06, 10/04, 11/01
  
• American Museum of Western Art 10AM-4:30PM $5 All Ages Art Depicting the American West from 1800s to Present 1727 Tremont Place, Denver, CO 80202
  
• Kirkland Museum of Fine and Decorative Art- T-Sa 11AM-5PM; Su12PM-5PM $10-$12 All Ages Fine and Decorative Art 1201 Bannock St Denver, CO 80204
  

History

• History Colorado Center - 10AM-5PM $15 ALL AGES General History Museum with Emphasis on Colorado History 1200 Broadway Denver, CO 80203 – FREE DAYS: 08/04, 11/02
  
• Four Mile Historic Park 10AM-4PM $6-$8 ALL AGES Celebration of Denver’s Western Heritage 715 S Forest St, Denver, CO 80246 - FREE DAYS: 06/28, 07/26, 08/23, 09/27, 10/25, 11/22
  
• Black American West Museum - 10AM-2PM $15 All Ages History of Black and African American in the Wild West 3091 California St Denver, CO 80205
  

Science / Nature

• Denver Museum of Nature and Science - 9AM-5PM $25 All Ages Nature, Science, Technology, and History; Planetarium; Laser Fantasy 2001 Colorado Blvd Denver, CO 80205 - FREE DAYS: 06/04, 06/19, 08/21, 09/10, 09/30, 10/20, 11/03, 11/18, 12/08
  
• Botanical Gardens - York St (Downtown) - 9AM-8PM $16 Gardens with Plants from All Over the World 1007 York St, Denver, CO 80206 - FREE DAYS: 06/05, 07/03, 08/28, 11/29
  
• Botanical Gardens - Chatfield Farms) - 9AM-4PM $12 Gardens and a Full Working Farm 8500 W Deer Creek Canyon Rd, Littleton, CO 80128 - FREE DAYS: 06/05, 07/03, 08/28, 11/29
  
• Plains Conservation Center M-F 6:30AM-4:30PM; Sa 8AM-4:30PM $10 All Ages Prairie Conservation Center / Activities / Educational Experiences 21901 E Hampden Ave Aurora, CO 80013
  

Animals

• Denver Zoo - 10AM-5PM $26 Adults, $19 Kids All Ages Animals, Conversation, Education 2300 Steele St, Denver, CO 80205 - FREE DAYS: 11/03, 11/09, 11/12
  
• Butterfly Pavillion - 9AM-5PM $16 Adults, $11 Kids All Ages Butterfly Garden, Insect Exhibits, Tarantula Holdings, Education 6252 W 104th Ave, Westminster, CO 80020
  
• Denver Downtown Aquarium - M-Th 10AM-8:30PM; F-S 10AM-10PM; Su 10AM-8PM $28 All Ages Aquarium / Restaurant / 4D Theatre / Mermaid Shows 700 Water Street Denver, CO 80211
  
• Wild Animal Sanctuary - 10AM-5PM $50 Adults, $30 Kids All Ages Learn About Wildlife Rescue and See Animals from Elevated Platforms - Stresses It's Not a Zoo but you can see many "zoo" animals 2999 Co Rd 53, Keenesburg, CO 80643
  

Things to Do Year Round

• WIP of Places to Eat, Drink, and Have Fun Around Downtown I'm still building this. Please let me know if you have anything to add or change!
  
• Eat Around the World in Denver Join us over at /denverfood where we're trying to make a list of restaurants that represent each of the world's countries all in the larger Denver area!
  

Other Resources

General Compilations

• Mile High on the Cheap
  
• 303 Magazine Events Calendar
  
• Colorado.com Events Schedule
  
• Denver-Co Events
  
• Vesta Events
  
• AllEvents
  
• Metro Denver
  
• Dairy Block Event Calendar 1800 Wazee St, Denver, CO 80202
  

Under the city, the Know It All is commanding his computerized slave, Brain Drain, to build him a few new mechanical servants to help him to kidnap the mayor.
"Master, I have something to show you. I've built myself a servant to do my bidding. Would you like to use him?" Brain Drain asks.
One of his drones brings in a dead Mike Luis, the seventeen-year-old, Asian teen with his rock-hard abs, and Highland Hills football team letterman jacket. The boy, with his buzz cut, looks like your average American teen from the 50s.
"Why did you bring me a dead body?" The Know It All asks.
"I am Brain Drain. He is not dead. My nano bugs have put him to sleep, so he feels as little pain as possible when we begin our work on him," Brain Drain says.
"What work do you imagine we'll be doing on this young man?" The Know It All asks his computer.
Brain Drain laughs, before removing part of Mike's brain with a laser attached to his computer console. As schematics for a machine-man hybrid appear on his console, Brain Drain straps Mike to an operating table, and begins his work.
As he watches his servant build himself a slave of his own, The Know It All is impressed.
After twenty-seven hours of surgery, The Know It All and Brain Drain have built a new monster with which to attack the city under the cover of darkness.
Their machine-man, a cyborg with spider legs, and the head and body of a human, with crab cracker arms, and one laser eye, is sent out to terrorize the city.
The cyborg, with its entirely metal, lower body, and metal arms, looks around, and demands to know why he can't feel his legs.
"Mike Luis… Is that your name?" The Know It All asks.
"It is. And who might you be?" Mike asks.
"You can call me Master from this point on," he says.
The sad look on Brain Drain's face says it all; his master has just stolen his creation.
As The Know It All looks his way, Brain Drain smiles quickly, hiding his disappointment with his master.
The Know It All tells Mike that his father was working with a superhero when a shockwave hit, and everything went crazy. "We tried to rebuild you as best as we could, but… Well, these were the only parts we had on hand, and all we wanted to do was save you. God, I'm so sorry that this happened to you…" He says crying his crocodile tears, hoping to sway Mike into joining his side.
"I want to see myself," Mike says, unable to cry with the live wires, and electrodes sticking out of his face.
After looking at himself in the mirror, Mike smashes it, and demands to know where his father is.
"He's getting a medal from the mayor. If only there was a way to get to him, and stop him once and for all..." The Know It All says. "By the way, if you're going to be a villain, you'll need a new name. How about Robo Wrecker?"
Mike smiles after hearing his new name, and is about to leave the underground hideout when Brain Drain calls out to him, and asks if he'll need any help with his mission.
"Hell yeah!" Robo Wrecker replies as a swarm of drones fly over his head with guns, and robots attached to them.

***

That night, the Red Rider is meeting with Mayor Billingsley, and Doctor Richard Luis, who stopped the explosion from a superhero named Particle Man. Red Rider is also receiving an award as he and his team defeated a mutant villain named Big Dick Dinosaur: the huge, green T-rex with its colossal penis which shoots ejaculate on command.
Red hid behind a car while Big Dick Dino frosted his team like a cake with his incredible splooge cannon. He came up with a plan to stop the dinosaur, and vibrated until he was moving fast enough to slow down time, and, once time had slowed, Red began to send car after car at the Dino's cock, and underbelly.
After crushing the Dino's junk, and stomach, Red came out of hiding. As the news cameras arrived, he pointed to the crippled Dino, and flexed for the crowd.
The mayor goes on to say that the country of Marwick is lucky to have two such heroes as Doctor Richard Luis, and the Red Rider.
Speaking at a press conference before the award ceremony, the Mayor tells the press how grateful he is for all of the new heroes who have stepped up, and begun patrolling the city in the absence of the League of Heroes.
The rest of the No Siders stand off to the side of the stage, arms crossed, watching as their leader takes all the credit for saving the city.
Red sits in a folding chair along with Doctor Luis, and the two men chat for a bit before the mayor arrives, and begins speaking to the crowd.
Mayor Billingsley talks about the value of every superhero team which is protecting the city, and all the ones who will come after them.
"What about the villains?" Robo Wrecker asks, dropping down from the sky, his spider legs digging into the ground.
The men and women who are gathered around all run in terror as Red Rider orders his team to form ranks, and to follow him.
"We'd like to, but we're on crowd control, so I guess you'll have to take care of this yourself, boss," Power Fist says.
Robo Wrecker picks a woman up with his crab claws, and snaps her in half, her blood and guts spilling onto the ground.
As Red begins to vibrate, he tosses a bolt of lightning at the cyborg.
The machine-man is struck by the lightning, and he begins to malfunction.
As drones come dropping down to the ground, they begin firing at the people in the crowd.
As they disperse, Power Fist uses the gems on her gauntlets to create energy shields around part of the city so the people can escape.
Metal Mouth is able to hack into the drone's motherboards, and shut most of them down, while Alonzo, and Old Man Gus, hide behind a group of children.
Makko bites the top off of a fire hydrant, and begins spraying water all over the remaining drones.
The battle drones all fall to pieces, and as they round up the remaining drones, Red Rider loses sight of Robo Wrecker, and of the mayor.

***

As he limps his way back to the underground with the mayor in his grasp, Robo Wrecker returns to his master, and hands him his new toy.
"Welcome, Mayor Billingsley/ I just wanted to say hello, and tell you that things are about to get really bad for you in a few minutes," The Know It All says, holding a drill.
The mayor screams in pain as his skull is pierced by the red-hot drill, and something is inserted into his skull.
The Know It All scrambles the mayor's brain, and replaces it with a mechanical brain which lights up, and glows bright pink.

***

After checking up on everyone who was taken, Red Rider, and his people, return to their hideout, and look for anything which they could use to track Robo Wrecker.
Using chips, and motherboards, from the fallen droids to track its GPS, Metal Mouth, and Alonzo, are able to track the droids to a power plant two towns over.
The group heads to the Justice Van, and piles in. The men are amazed by all the changes which Alliver was able to make to it. The Justice Van- which can now fly, and go underwater- is just incredible. It takes just fourteen minutes to reach the Luka Falls Power Plant, and, once they arrive, the No Siders see hundreds of drones guarding the facility.
Red begins vibrating at a high enough speed to stop the world, and he is able to walk in a fifth dimension, one where no one is able to move, or see him at all. Red is only able to maintain this state for twenty minutes before he begins to fade away, and get lost in the fifth dimension.
Red Rider, in his red, leather jacket, and matching pants with a black lightning bolt on the sides, and front of his jacket, runs through the storm until he reaches the power plant.
Alliver sits on Power Fist's lap, and he wonders where her uncle is.
"He's racing the speed storm. You can't see him, but he's there." Power Fist says.
Makko drinks some vodka with salt in it, and Metal Mouth looks on with a face which is frozen from rust.
Alonzo and Gus sit in the front seat of the Van, and play cards. The two of them trade cigarettes for beer as they play.
Red Rider enters the power plant, and with just eight minutes left before he fades away, finds the mayor tied up in the center of the plant. Red grabs him, and before he knows what's hit him, the mayor, and the Red Rider, are outside of the power plant, running for their lives.
Firing a flare in the air to alert his team, Red- who is weak, and bleeding from his ears, and mouth, after racing the speed storm- can barely run.
The Justice Van parks as the droids and drones begin to attack.
The mayor helps Red into the van, and the group flies away with over one hundred drones in pursuit.
Alliver tells his friends that he’s outfitted the Justice Van with many new toys, and weapons for their use.
Pressing a button on the side of the steering wheel, Alonzo sees that it's an EMP mine.
Firing the mine at one of the drones sends a shock wave all throughout the town of Luka Falls. Metal Mouth is also affected by the EMP, and is disabled for the rest of the trip home.
On the way home, Alliver and Alonzo try to repair Metal Mouth while Old Man Gus drives the van. Old Man Gus, however, is blind in one eye, and doesn’t see the building which he's about to crash into.
Power Fist, seeing that they are about to crash, uses her gem to create an energy shield around the Justice Van.
Alliver is impressed by Power Fist's magic, and he tries to hack into her gauntlet, wanting use it to create a shield around Metal Mouth, and the van, when they are in need.
As the Van crashes through a building, Mayor Billingsley demands to be let go, but Power Fist reminds him that he was just kidnapped, and needs to stay with them until they reach his office.
After crashing into the apartment building, the Justice Van refuses to start up. Alonzo tells Alliver to keep working on Metal Mouth while he tries to fix the van.
Alliver tells him that it might be smarter if he tries to fix the van as Alonzo isn't familiar with the changes which he's made.
"I'VE BEEN FIXING THIS VAN SINCE BEFORE YOUR LITTLE GREEN ASS SHOWED UP, AND I CAN FIX IT NOW!" Alonzo retorts, slamming the door, and popping open the hood of the van.
The inside of the van glows a bright, green hue, and the entire thing seems to be covered in some kind of metal-plastic.
Opening the door. Alonzo tells Alliver to fix the van while he works on Metal Mouth.
The little green man smiles, and hops out of the van.
Power Fist, in her most deadpan voice, asks Alonzo if he's fixed the van already.
"That's very funny, Wednesday Addams,” Alonzo says.
With the van fixed, the No Siders take off, leaving behind a fake card which the homeowners can call for reimbursement.
Driving out of the apartment, and back into the sky, Power Fist, who is now driving, takes the No Siders back to the mayor's office, where they hand the mayor off to his security team. He is rushed away.
After dropping off the mayor, Power Fist drives back to the junkyard, and she injects her uncle with a syringe filled with a red and black tornado.
Red begins to heal, and he fills the syringe with more of his blood, before putting it back where it was, and thanking his niece.

***

Power Fist is getting drunk with Makko, and Alonzo, when Red arrives. He asks to speak to his niece for a minute in private.
"Sure. What's up, Dunkcle?" She asks.
"I just wanted to thank you for saving me. I was at the point of death just then, but you brought me back. I just wanted to say thank you, booger head," Red says.
"You’re welcome, pig sticker. I just want you to know that I never would have let you die… unless I could be the one to kill you, that is," Power Fist laughs.
Red Rider and his niece share a few laughs as they walk around the junkyard. The two are enjoying themselves when the police show up, looking for Red Rider.
Officer Jones, and his new partner, Jesse Quick, arrest Red Rider, and tell him that the mayor has revoked his vigilante license, and is planning to disband all of the superhero teams in the city unless they join the police force.
Red is arrested for acting as a vigilante without a license, but, before he can drive off with her uncle, Power Fist asks him a question. "At what time did the mayor sign this order to suspend my uncle's vigilante license?"
"Two hours after he returned to his home. Why do you ask?" Officer Jones asks.
"Well, then you have no case against him. You see, my uncle wasn’t acting as a vigilante in the past two hours, so you have no grounds to arrest him, Officer Jones," Power Fist says.
Releasing Red Rider, Officer Jones laughs, and tells him that he doesn’t want to see him on the streets trying to save people anymore, or he'll be arrested.
Officer Quick looks around the junkyard, and she notices Makko. She stares for almost two minutes before Power Fist loudly asks her what she's looking at. "I just noticed you people seem to be living here in this junk yard, and I was wondering if that might be against the law?" Officer Quick asks, pointing at a pair of bunk beds where Makko and Metal Mouth are sitting together.
Officer Jones takes out his ticket book, and writes Red a bunch of tickets for his many violations. He also gives Red a court date to stand before a judge, telling him that, because of his former service as a hero, he'll be allowed to stand before the judge in his costume, and will most likely receive community service, and not be allowed back in the junkyard ever again.

***

Over the next two weeks, Red Rider begins working at a coffee shop called Speed Demon Deluxe Brew. All of the workers are speedsters, and each of them are able to take orders, and deliver coffee, at super speed. Red's uniform is a brownish-gray hat, and apron, as well as light brown slacks, and a white shirt with the logo of the company on it.
While he's working, the rest of the No Siders are spending their time looking for somewhere to live. Power Fist and Makko find a burned-out crack house on the wrong side of town- a part of the city called Crimeville.
The heroes of Crimeville are very overprotective of their part of the city. Superhero teams like Gang Bang and the South Side Sleuths fight each other for control over the crime-infested streets of Crimeville.
As they are walking the streets, Power Fist and Makko see a little girl being mugged by a group of older children. One of the boys is yelling at the girl in Spanish, and another, with a thick, French accent, laughs as the little girl is pushed to the ground.
Power Fist and Makko intervene, and send the boys running.
As they take off down the street, the little girl thanks Power Fist and Makko. The two then ask the girl why those boys were bothering her, and she tells them that her older brother beat up the biggest boy’s older brother, and cousin.
The girl looks up, and runs away in terror.
Looking behind herself, Power Fist sees a hovering superhero team called the Chicken Crew. The members of the Chicken Crew wear giant chicken costumes with masks, and capes.
The leader of the Chicken Crew demands to know who the hell the two new heroes in his part of the city are.
"We're not looking for trouble. We just wanted to help a little girl, that's all," Power Fist says.
Makko asks why Chicken Lord and his friends are dressed up like chickens.
"YOU DISRESPECTFUL, FISH-STINKING FUCK! YOU SPEAK ILL OF OUR COSTUMES, AND YOU SPEAK ILL OF THE CHICKEN GOD, ROY RODGERS!” Chicken Lord yells.
Power Fist tries to calm everyone down, but the Chicken Crew launches into their attack.
As they fire their eggs at Makko and Power Fist, Toilet King charges into the fight, and attacks a brown and white chicken man called King Chicken.
Power Fist throws her gauntlets at the Chicken Crew, and breaks Chica-Chica-Boom-Boom's leg, and Turkey Neck’s back.
The last man standing is Chicken Lord, and Makko swallows him whole, spitting out his costume, and cape.
Toilet King asks Power Fist what brings her to his neighborhood in the middle of the night.
"It's 4:30 PM. For some reason, the sun just doesn’t shine on this neighborhood. I don't know why," Power Fist says.
"I think a racist wizard must have done it, or something like that," Toilet King says.
Deciding to help his friends to find a place to live in Crimeville, Toilet King takes them to Wuthering Heights: a small, Latino neighborhood in the middle of Crimeville.
Wuthering Heights is a nice-enough place to stay in the morning, even though there is no sunlight in Crimeville.
Toilet King takes his friends to an abandoned lot called the greenhouse. He tells Power-Fist that if she and her friends are willing to put in the work. they can build a nice place on that lot. "It's only $5,000, and it's huge. The guy who bought it wanted to flip the land, and a group of his neighbors murdered him the night they found out what he planned to do. After that, the city took over the land, and, well, they just want to get rid of it for cheap," Toilet King says.
Power Fist and Makko head to the bank to find out how much they have to buy the abandoned lot.
With -$8 in their team bank account, the No Siders are forced to continue meeting at the junkyard.
The group is forced to wait until dark before they enter the junkyard, but without Red Rider as he is forced to wear an ankle monitor for his community service.
While meeting up at night, Power Fist reports that they are broke, and that they can't afford to move out of the junkyard. Alliver asks them why they don't just sell something of value, like water, or air molecules.
Alonzo explains to his little friend that, on Earth, gold, silver, and jewels are considered valuable.
Alliver is pleased to hear this as he has a machine which can turn air into gold and diamonds. "I believe I still have it with me. This machine is very useful as gold and diamonds are used to power my peoples’ ships, and lasers.”
Alliver creates a giant gold nugget, and hands it to Power Fist, who takes it to a jewelry store, and sells it for a fortune, taking the $500,000, and using $5,000 to buy the land, and the rest to fix up the junkyard so that they can live there.

***

While everyone is adjusting to their new lives, The Know It All is putting his plans into action, taking control of the mayor's robotic mind. He orders the mayor to begin disbanding every superhero team in the city.
Each team in the city is served with termination papers. The only team which is allowed to continue operating is the League of Heroes because of their injuries, and out of respect for their service.
Tiger Man, and Lucky Lady, are both almost completely healed, Mr. Invincible, and Castle Man, are still in critical condition, and Speed Demon was killed fighting the Golden Goons.
The mayor does as his master commands, and begins disbanding every superhero team in the city.
Arriving with the mayor's latte, and pumpkin bagel, Red Rider, whose face is concealed by a mask, hands the bagel to the mayor, who yells at him for not bringing him any cream cheese.
Enraged that this man is yelling at him after getting him fired from his team, Red dumps the man's latte over his head. Sparks begin to fly, and the mayor falls to the ground, dead.
As the mayor’s security team knocks on the door, Red grabs the mayor, and jumps out of the window behind the mayor's desk.
Hearing the sound of crashing glass, the mayor's security team comes running, but doesn’t find the mayor, or whoever took him.

***

Back in his apartment, Red has just called his niece to help him out, and to come to get the mayor. He waits ten minutes for her to arrive.
"What the hell did you do, Uncle Tomás?" Power Fist asks.
"MARCY, YOU HAVE TO BELIEVE ME! ALL I DID WAS DUMP A CUP OF COFFEE OVER HIS HEAD!” Red says.
Power Fist decides to take the mayor, and head to the team's new headquarters in Wuthering Heights.
Driving the Justice Van with Alonzo and Alliver, Power Fist discovers that Alliver and Alonzo have built a huge warehouse filled with alien teach, and sleeping pods, as well as cloaking technology.
In the morning, the police arrest Red Rider for attacking, and abducting, the mayor.
With all of the superhero teams disbanded, the police are forced to hire freelance, superpowered deputies to help them to arrest the Red Rider.
Not putting up a fight, Red lets himself be arrested, and to be taken to a superpowered prison called The Dampener.
While inside The Dampener, Red Rider joins up with a gang of mutants, and superheroes, called the Puritans. Their leader is Diamond Mine: a mutant whose skin is as hard as a pink diamond.
Red's Roommate is Chewy: a big Mexican with the power to eat anything, and spit out a fireball. Chewy introduced Red to Diamond Mine, and the two of them became fast friends.

***

Meanwhile, back in the junkyard, Alliver is cracking open Mayor Billingsley's skull. He trips a secret alarm in the mayor's head, sees a glowing light, and removes a bomb, handing it to Alonzo.
Before he can throw the bomb, it goes off in his hand, blowing both of his arms off, and a part of his jaw.
Alliver hears the explosion, and rushes to find Alonzo. He does a deep tissue scan once he finds Alonzo's body, and, after that, he decides to merge with Alonzo, something which his people can only do once in their lives as they will die as a result of the merge.
Alliver and Alonzo become fused together in a cocoon made of green slime, and hard green crystal.

***

On the streets of Bainbridge, Power Fist and Metal Mouth are patrolling the streets while Makko swims through the sewers, munching on rats, and alligators.
As he is making his way out of the sewers, a giant group of five man-sharks jump out of the water, and attack Makko.
"Hello, little brother. Did you miss us?" One of the sharks asks.
The big, blue, tiger shark picks his smaller brother up by his neck, and tosses him around.
The big blue shark pounds Makko's face into a burger with cheese, and curly fries, and, after the beating, the sharks leave Makko in a pool of his own blood.
Power Fist and Metal Mouth radio Makko to get his position, but the shark boy is unresponsive. Power Fist sends Metal Mouth back to headquarters while she goes to check on Makko.
Using the glow of her gauntlet gems to light the way, after searching a mile of underground sewer, Power Fist finds Makko's limp body. The shark lord is still breathing, and one of his twin hearts is still beating. Unlike most sharks, Makko, and other man sharks, have two to three hearts, and four lungs: two for breathing air, and two for breathing water.
Power Fist sees her friend beaten, and bloody, and she lifts him off of the ground, and carries him to the hospital.
The doctor on call is a witchdoctor named Doctor Zhivago. The man stands 6'5”, his face painted a bone white in the shape of a skull.
The big man drinks a potion, and spits it all over Makko, who begins to hyperventilate. The witchdoctor then removes a tube of salt water from his sleeve, and, after forcing Makko to transform into his shark form, pours the salt water into his gills.
The shark man begins crying blood.
Makko opens his eyes, and sees Power Fist standing over him. He strokes her face lovingly, until she catches his hand and pushes it away.
Power Fist leaves the hospital, and returns to the junkyard, where she finds the cocoon, putting up a shield around the junkyard.

***

Strap in, everyone - this one's a doozy! We'll do our best to provide ample detail and to be organized, but we're desperate for some objectivity regarding a situation that's heading towards estrangement from my mother and her husband - that would obviously be very sad for us, but particularly for our 2 year old daughter and her little sister who is now 2.5 weeks old.
Background
This past April, my wife was scheduled to have her baby sprinkle. Historically - i.e. the baby shower she had for our first daughter - her immediate family (mom and sister) were much more heavily involved with the planning vs. my family, as is probably not uncommon.
Over the past couple of years, there has been an underlying theme of conflict with my immediate family (particularly my mother) regarding the lack of a role she plays in our life. To put it briefly - she wants to be involved, she says she wants to help, but fails to back it up with actions. Last June, my mother retired from her job as an elementary school social worker - and prior to that she often said 'I'll be able to do so much more to help once I'm retired." Since that point, my wife and i have done our best to be extra-communicative about what we need or what would be helpful to give her opportunities to help out, as that was something she requested. When my wife's baby sprinkle came up as a topic, we encouraged her mother to reach out to my mother to give her the chance to be more involved than the time before.
Some more important tidbits, before we get into the situation:
-My mother and father divorced in 2000 and it was not an ugly divorce - they are both very involved parents and continued to make key decisions together and without moderation through my early adulthood. They will still talk to one another to this day, if family conflicts arise.
-My mother remarried 10 years ago to an italian man who, prior to this, my wife and i had considered a father-figure, a grandfather to our daughter, and someone we loved. He is a retired pastry chef - one with quite an impressive resume. Without going into detail, he was extremely well-known in the NYC food-scene, has received some high honors for his cakes.

• My wife was 36 weeks pregnant at the time of her sprinkle - she had been diagnosed with high blood pressure a month prior as a result of the pregnancy and was encouraged to get extra help, more bedrest, and most importantly to avoid stressful situations.
• The decision was made to have the sprinkle at our home and to invite all genders to attend - we wanted a generally more casual affair, so effectively a little party at our place to shower my wife, that our combined family was throwing for her.

-My wife is from a very humble family. I would say that i am not. I think i was raised with values, but at the same time i have had to do far more maturing in the realm of selflessness and gratitude, and i've learned a lot from her and becoming a part of her family. No one is perfect - but my wife is overly thankful, overly polite.
The Situation
Leading up to the event, my mother mentioned to my wife that her husband wanted to make the cake for the sprinkle - a significant contribution. My wife was hesitant, given that historically when he makes a cake, the occasion has a way of becoming "all about the cake" - however she reservedly agreed. What could go wrong?
On the eve of the sprinkle my wife's family arrived - both of her parents, her sister and 1 year old nephew. Her mother who does so much for us helped prepare the house (cleaning and decorating). The next morning, everyone was up by 645 or so. Two toddlers running about, last minute chores needing to get done - party was supposed to start at 12. I was out until 10 picking up ice, plasticware, etc - and as i arrived home, my mother called to say that she would be arriving a bit early at 11am, as she was bringing my grandfather who has been unwell, and needs extra time to settle into a space with his walker and oxygen tank. That was the extent of the conversation with her. From 7-1040, the morning was insanely hectic. And while I had hoped that me and my wife's parents would have found a way to ask less of her that morning, she was ultimately pushed to a point of exhaustion before the party began. I had been upstairs, and at 1040, i came down to see my wife crying.
Evidently when my mother arrived at 1040, she saw my father in law, asking that we move one of our cars out of the garage, so that my step-father could 'finish preparing the cake'. My father in law was unsure what do to - so he asked my wife, who was already overwhelmed with the hectic nature of that morning. Logistics like moving the car may seem innocuous - but in the moment, she didnt understand why we would need to move our SUV into drive way or narrow street, on a day when a dozen other cars will be showing up, or why they wouldnt have given us any sort of advanced notice to provide a working space in our garage. I saw my wife crying, and in the moment, I only considered one thing - my 9 month pregnant wife with high blood pressure wants the car in the garage on the day of her shower, she gets the car in the garage. I quickly and firmly said to my mother, "I'm sorry but no - we cannot move the car, please figure something else out" - and to our knowledge that was the end of it. It was a great party - my wife expressed thanks for the cake multiple times, commenting on how nice it was. As we cut the cake, my mother-in-law made some off-the-cuff comment like "MAKE A SPEECH". I had no plans to make a speech, nor any obligation to do so - and so i said something to the effect of "we're having a baby, lets eat some cake!" It was a great day.
The day after the party, my wife was putting our daughter to bed. Her parents were getting ready to leave - and then, I received an email from my stepfather, addressed to me and to me wife.
Dear X and Y,
I’m very happy for both of you that a newborn is on the way. I have no doubts that (baby) will be well taken care of as I can see that you both are great parents. You also have a crew of people around you that love you very much and really work hard on helping the both of you in these challenging times.
Having said that, after the party yesterday, I’m in need of sharing a few things with you both about myself:
Before I gave up my career as an executive pastry chef 15 years ago, I had the privilege and honor to work with some of the most famous renowned Michelin Star chefs and pastry chefs around the world, Jaques Torres, Mario Batali, Daniel Boulud and Ed Brown to mention a few. I received some of the highest praise and achievements while working for them and with them.
I was asked to participate in three James Beard events in New York City, twice at James Beard’s home in Greenwich Village and once on Long Island. Getting invited once is already an incredible honor, so being invited three times means I was doing something right. From 1990 to 1991, I participated in a few chocolate artistic shows at some of the most luxurious hotels in Manhattan. We had Ivana Trump as one of the judges to mention someone you might know, and a few other very old important New Yorkers whose names I cannot recall now. In1997, my cannoli were voted the best in New York City.
In my 24 years of cheffing, I received an incredibly large amount of praise and appreciation by so many people that saw and tasted my creations. Many of these people were nobodies but several of them were quite famous, like Pelé or Maradona to mention a couple that you know. I catered food for VIPs like Bloomberg and Giuliani, even if I hate the second one with a passion.
I have been reviewed by many magazines and newspapers and I can proudly say that I never, received a lousy review, EVER. My reviews were always impeccable because I dedicated my life, talent and passion to that industry and it paid off while I was fully involved in it.
So now for more than 12 years, I have dedicated my life to the woman I love and her beautiful family, challenging in some respects, as I need to fit into the life of an already established family, but rewarding in so many ways.
Now that you know a bit more about me, I hope you can understand what I feel and why I’m extremely upset.
There is no excuse or reasoning behind the refusal to move one of the two cars from the garage, so that I could have enough space to work on my creation I had for the both of you and for all the people attending the party. I have never ever felt so disrespected and unappreciated and for sure I cannot be quiet about it. Your words and actions have had a strong impact on me.
I worked on your cake for days, even while I was running a busy and successful business, to make sure it was a fantastic memory for the both of you, for your family and friends. A lot of effort was put into the planning and designing of your cake and being forced to finish my work in a dirty small corner like that was insulting to me and my career, to say the least. If it was not for the love I have for your mom and grandparents and the attachment I have to your entire family, I would have turned around & driven off right away.
Adding insult to injury, although I’m not sure if you shared your gratitude with your mother and father, your speech was cold and dismissive to put it mildly, as neither of you expressed any appreciation to me and the planning it took from both families to welcome the new baby, catering, decorating & party favors for example.
I’m disappointed and hurt, and I say this because I do love you both very much and I’m here to stay for the long run, so opening up about my feelings is better than carrying a grudge moving forward, but I ask you both to try and see my point of view. I know you have no problem expressing your feelings and disappointments; you’ve made it very clear how much you want everybody to step up, and I believe everybody has been stepping up. We all heard you loud and clear so now I hope you hear my voice too.
Before you become angry or defensive with your mom and me, know that this is 100% me writing. Nobody forced me to do this as I woke up in the middle of the night with the need to express my feelings to you.
Frankly, the responsible and caring thing for you to do now would be to simply and sincerely apologize and not lash back out in anger, as you so often do, so that we all can peacefully and respectfully move forward.
Love you both.
I panicked when reading this, and texted my mother begging her to find a way to undo the fact that this was sent. It then occurred to me that he sent it to my wife - and i knew the impact that reading this would have on her. In speaking with her parents, i contemplated deleting the email from her phone, but that didn't materialize and my wife came downstairs as her parents and I talked about it - and ultimately, she read it. She began sobbing and getting very angry - she felt her blood pressure rising significantly and effectively began hyper-ventilating. Her mother took her for a walk to calm her down - but the contents of the letter have had a damaging and lasting impact on us and our family.
A couple quick notes:

• We both expressed gratitude to everyone at the party - My wife specifically thanked him multiple times for the cake and commented on how beautiful it was
  
• Had we had more notice, i'm sure we couldve prepared the space and figured out a place to put one of the cars - the act not to do so that morning was a result of the last minute notice and overall hecticness of the morning - not intended as any sort of deliberate slight or disrespect. Had we had the chance to discuss all of this in a conversation, that wouldve become apparent
  
• We never asked for a fancy cake - we'd have been just as happy with one from carvel. W
  
• Our garage is pretty damn dirty no matter where you stand - so i struggle to see how things wouldve been too different if we had moved a car...
  

Since then - the damage has been significant. It has been almost two months. Him and my mother left the next day for their two-week vacation to Italy. When they returned, we were days away from having our 2nd daughter. We welcomed my mother to come over and talk, she brought my uncle who listened and seemed to primarily agree with our perspective, without being particularly vocal. We left that conversation saying that we're open to trying to move forward, but that an apology from him would be a key kickstarter to a resolution. Radio-silence. He is seemingly completely unwilling to take responsibility or to apologize, or to say that while his feelings may have been hurt, that his way of communicating and timing was out of line.
We live a decent distance from them - and it feels like he has brainwashed my entire family. They have essentially said, of course your friends agree with you, your friends always agree. So i'm looking for some objective opinion, because this is tearing our family apart.
Who is the asshole?

If you’d like to add an event to our calendar, submit an event here. Please check with the event organizers to see if events change due to weather. Have a great week!

Noteworthy Events

The Lion King at DPAC

• Winner of six Tony Awards®, including Best Musical, this landmark musical event brings together one of the most imaginative creative teams on Broadway.
• Wed, May 15 - Sun, June 9
• $29.50+

Music in the Gardens: Ruckus Rock Revival at Sarah P. Duke Gardens (sold out)

• Featured Artists: Blue Cactus, Kym Register and Kamara Thomas
• Music in the Gardens concerts take place on the lawn behind the Doris Duke Center.
• Lawn chairs, picnics, and blankets are encouraged. Pets are not allowed. Outside food and beverages, including beer and wine, are permitted and will also be available for purchase on-site from The Palace International.
• Wed, May 29
• 7 p.m.
• Free admission

20th Annual Beaver Queen Pageant at Duke Park

• A special mix of folly, pageantry and humor, contestants take on beaver personalities and compete for the title of Beaver Queen with their fashion, talent and personality.
• Sat, June 1
• Free admission, with donations to the Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association encouraged.

Good Moon Festival at Durham Bulls Athletic Park

• Featuring Sylvan Esso, Fleet Foxes, DEHD, Hippo Campus, Reyna Tropical, Truth Club, and more.
• Fri, May 31 - Sat, June 1
• Day passes are $72.95+

Boxyard Birthday: Celebrating 3 Years! at Boxyard RTP

• Join us for a full day of music, markets, and more alongside your favorite Boxyard businesses. We are so proud to be a part of the Durham community, and today we’re celebrating YOU!
• Sat, June 1
• 11 a.m. - 3 p.m.
• Free admission

Rescues & Rainbows Pet Adoption & PRIDE Event at The Velvet Hippo Bar & Lounge

• They'll be serving cocktails benefitting HOPE Animal Rescue and the LGBTQ Center of Durham during this afternoon pet adoption event in honor of National Foster a Pet Month and National PRIDE Month!
• Sun, June 2
• 1-3 p.m.
• Free admission

World Hunger Day Durham at Durham Central Park

• World Hunger Day Durham, NC, aims to raise awareness of food insecurity experienced in the community, as well as to highlight the amazing work being done to support residents and create a more fair and equitable food system.
• Sun, June 2
• 3-6 p.m.
• Free admission

Multi-Day Events

The Magnetic Fields – “69 Love Songs” 25th Anniversary Tour at The Carolina Theatre

• In celebration of the 25th anniversary of its release, the Magnetic Fields will continue to perform “69 Love Songs”—the 3-disc masterwork that marked a significant breakthrough for the American band—in its entirety over the course of two nights, for the first time in over two decades.
• Wed, May 29 and Thu, May 30
• 8 p.m.
• $37+

NCHSAA Softball Championships at Duke Softball Stadium

• Fri, May 31 - Sat, June 1
• $8+

Sylvan Esso 'Good Moon' After-party at PS37

• Featuring Suzi Analogue and Made of Oak. Must be 21+.
• Fri, May 31 - Sat, June 1
• 11-11:30 p.m.
• $10

Durham Amateur Golf Tournament at Hillandale Golf Course

• This event will be open to all golfers who have an established USGA handicap of ten (10.0) or less by the registration deadline.
• Sat, June 1 - Sun, June 2
• $125+

Durham Brick Convention Lego Event at Durham Convention Center

• Attractions: lots to see and do including large scale displays, activities, traders selling loose bricks, new LEGO® sets, retired LEGO® sets, minifigures & accessories plus dedicated building areas.
• Sat, June 1 - Sun, June 2
• Session I: 11:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m.
• Session II: 3 p.m. - 6 p.m.
• $15+

Historic Buildings Open House at West Point on the Eno Park

• Enjoy a look inside the historic McCown-Mangum House, Photography Museum, and Mill.
• Sat, June 1 and Sun, June 2
• 10 a.m. - 2 p.m.
• Free admission

Movies at The Carolina Theatre

• Jurassic Park & Rollercoaster
• School of Rock
• Quadrophenia
• Hundreds of Beavers

Monday, May 27

Events at The Glass Jug in Downtown Durham

• 2-10 p.m. - Board Game Night
• 7:30-9:30 p.m. - Movie Mondays: Top Gun Maverick

9 a.m.
Heron Rookery Tour at Pearl Mill Preserve
5 p.m.
Arts & Drafts at Fullsteam Brewery
6 p.m.
Mantis Falls Demo at Atomic Empire
Disc Golf Putting League at The Glass Jug in RTP
6:30 p.m.
Trivia Night at Ponysaurus Brewing Company
7 p.m.
Monday Night Skate at Durty Bull Brewing Brewing Company
Community Board Game Night at Moon Dog Meadery
OnlyUs Media Presents: The Bank at Rubies on Five Points
8:30 p.m.
Karaoke at The House

Tuesday, May 28

Events at Boxyard RTP

• 5:30-6:30 p.m. - Boxyard Run Club
• 6-8 p.m. - Bark & Bond Social

Events at Durty Bull Brewing Brewing Company

• 12-8 p.m. - Food Truck: Mike's Vegan Cookout
• 7-9 p.m. - Bull City Beer Runners Run Club

Events at The Glass Jug Beer Lab in Downtown Durham

• 5:45-6:30 p.m. - Community Zumba Classes
• 6-8 p.m. - Music Bingo

Events at The Glass Jug Beer Lab in RTP

• 6-8 p.m. - The Glass Jog Run Club
• 6-9 p.m. - Stitch & Sip

6 p.m.
Queer Death Cafe at Arcana
Bring Your Own Vinyl with Jaffar at Rubies on Five Points
Women on the Wall at Triangle Rock Club - Durham
6:30 p.m.
Trivia at Durham Food Hall
7 p.m.
Trivia at Beer Study Durham
King Trivia Tuesdays at Boxcar Bar + Arcade
Not Rocket Science Trivia at DSSOLVR Durham
Tuesday Blues Jam at The Blue Note Grill
7:30 p.m.
North Carolina Jazz Repertory Orchestra at Sharp 9 Gallery
8 p.m.
Jeremy 'Bean' Clemons Trio at Kingfisher
Julia Holter at Motorco Music Hall
8:30 p.m.
Karaoke at The House

Wednesday, May 29

Events at Boxyard RTP

• 12-2 p.m. - Hear & There: Daniel Delorenzo
• 5:30-8:30 p.m. - Game Night

Events at ZincHouse Winery & Brewery

• 7-8 p.m. - Signature Wine Tasting
• 7-8:30 p.m. - Laughs Comedy Night

3 p.m.
Durham Farmers’ Market at Durham Central Park
Color Pencil Magic at The Scrap Exchange
4 p.m.
Whiskey Wednesdays at Alley Twenty Six
4:30 p.m.
Whiskey Omakase at Dashi
5 p.m.
Free Wednesday Wine Tasting at Beer Study Durham
6 p.m.
Tarot with Joy at Arcana
6:30 p.m.
Singles Mixer & Durham Meetup at The Glass Jug Beer Lab in Downtown Durham
Trivia Night with Pickle at The Glass Jug Beer Lab in RTP
7 p.m.
My Hero Academia TCG Girl Power Prerelease at Atomic Empire
Hammered Trivia at Hi-Wire Brewing
Karaoke Night at Mavericks Smokehouse
Music Bingo at Ponysaurus Brewing Company
Music in the Gardens: Ruckus Rock Revival at Sarah P. Duke Gardens
Brett Chambers Open Mic at The Blue Note Grill
8 p.m.
Air Hockey Tournament at Boxcar Bar + Arcade
Trivia Night at Bull McCabe's
The Devine Feminine Comedy Showcase at Devine's Restaurant and Bar
Old Havana Nights featuring Brevan Hampden at Missy Lane's Assembly Room
Karaoke at Moon Dog Meadery
The Coyotes / Stan and Denghy at The Pinhook
8:30 p.m.
Yot Club at Motorco Music Hall

Thursday, May 30

Events at Durty Bull Brewing Brewing Company

• 12-8 p.m. -Food Truck: Mike's Vegan Cookout
• 7-9 p.m. - Thursday Trivia with Nick

12 p.m.
Taking Back Thursday: Mysti Mayhem at Boxyard RTP
The Magnetic Fields Record Signing at Bull City Records
1:30 p.m.
Meeting Mastery One Session to Transform Your Meetings at Frontier RTP
3 p.m.
Guided Museum Tour at 21c Museum Hotels Durham
5 p.m.
Thirsty Thursdays at Dashi
5:30 p.m.
Walking Club with Bull City Strollers at The Glass Jug Beer Lab in Downtown Durham
6 p.m.
Mycelial Meet Up and Tarot with Emily at Arcana
Vinyl Night with DJ Deckades at Gizmo Brew Works
“Tango for Two” Dance Class at JB Duke Hotel
6:15 p.m.
Pony Run at Ponysaurus Brewing Company
6:30 p.m.
Line Dance Classes at Mystic Farm and Distillery
Boulders & Brews Meetup at Triangle Rock Club - Durham
7 p.m.
Trivia Night at Beer Tooth Taproom
Bring Your Own Vinyl Night at Congress Social Bar
Summer Jazz Jam (Curated by Al Strong) at Missy Lane's Assembly Room
Community Board Game Night at Moon Dog Meadery
7:30 p.m.
Trivia Night with Big Slow Tom at Clouds Brewing Brightleaf Square
8 p.m.
Weekly Single Mingle at Boxcar Bar + Arcade
Trivia at Fullsteam Brewery
Buck Meek (of Big Thief) at Motorco Music Hall
9 p.m.
Everybody Eats at The Pinhook
9:30 p.m.
Karaoke Night at The Tavern

Friday, May 31

Events at Durty Bull Brewing Company

• 5-9 p.m. - Food Truck: La Republica Taco Truck
• 8-11 p.m. - Open Mic Stand-up Comedy

Events at The Blue Note Grill

• 6-8 p.m. - The Duke Street Dogs
• 9:15 p.m. - Electric Carnival

Events at The Glass Jug Beer Lab in RTP

• 5-8 p.m. - Food Truck Friday
• 6-9 p.m. - Tom Neuhauser Music

Events at The Pinhook

• 7 p.m. - Rusty is 40: Jenny Besetzt / Opin / Riggings
• 10:30 p.m. - Night of 1000 Divas!

10 a.m.
Tasting at Ten at Counter Culture Coffee
Plant Propagation: Cuttings at Sarah P. Duke Gardens
12 p.m.
SFC 3 Mixed Martial Arts Pro Superheavyweight Bout at Durham Armory
Co-Working Social at The Glass Jug Beer Lab in Downtown Durham
5:30 p.m.
Friday Night Live: Emily Musolino at Boxyard RTP
6 p.m.
Dyke Night Pride Kickoff Party at Arcana
The Patio Dance Parties : Clueless Fridays at Unscripted Durham
6:30 p.m.
Ravnica Remastered: Two-Headed Giant Draft at Atomic Empire
Paint & Sip Pottery at Delores Pottery
Temple Grandin presents: Animals Make Us Human at Duke University Gross Hall
An Intimate Evening w/ Grammy Award Winner, Susan Carol at Missy Lane's Assembly Room
7 p.m.
Bird Trivia at Fullsteam Brewery
7:30 p.m.
BYOS (Bring Your Own Sketch) at Mettlesome
Michael Hawkins and the Brotherhood at Sharp 9 Gallery
8 p.m.
Stereo Reveries at DSSOLVR Durham
Karaoke! at Fullsteam Brewery
Small Town Murder Podcast 2024 Tour at The Carolina Theatre
9 p.m.
An Intimate Evening w/ Grammy Award Winner, Susan Carol at Missy Lane's Assembly Room
A Metal Show: Alpha Andromeda, Celaris, Hermaeous Mora and Dunktank at Moon Dog Meadery
Gimme Gimme Disco at Motorco Music Hall
Mall Rat in a Cage Goth Dance Party at Rubies on Five Points
Planet Rave at The Fruit
Sneaky Link Fridays at The House

Saturday, June 1

Events at Atomic Empire

• 11 a.m. - TopDeck Championship Series Invitational Qualifier
• 11 a.m. - Lorcana Draft: Ursula’s Return
• 11 a.m. - Kill Team Tournament

Events at Boxyard RTP

• 9:30-10:30 a.m. - Fitness Pop-up: Yoga
• 11 a.m. - 3 p.m. - Boxyard Birthday: Celebrating 3 Years!
• 11 a.m. - 3 p.m. - Boxyard Birthday Market
• 11:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. - Saturdaze: DJ Baptiste
• 12-3 p.m. - Jewelry Crafting
• 1-2 p.m. - Cupcake Decorating
• 5-8 p.m. - Peter Lamb Presents

Events at Durty Bull Brewing Company

• 1-8 p.m. - Food Truck: Death By Taco
• 1-7 p.m. - Triangle Vintage Market
• 4-6 p.m. - Live Music: Lake Chamberlain
• 7-9 p.m. - Back Porch Films Documentary Screening

Events at Fullsteam Brewery

• 1-3 p.m. - Sip and Solder Stained Glass Workshop
• 2-3 p.m. - Durham "Bullpen" Treasure Hunt

Distillery Tours and Tastings at Liberty & Plenty

• Every Saturday, 10-10:30 a.m. and 11-11:30 a.m.

Events at Mettlesome

• 7:30-8:30 p.m. - House Party
• 8:30-9:30 p.m. - Harold Night: Grand Finale

Events at The Pinhook

• 7 p.m. - Slater / Tony Velour
• 10:30 p.m. - Crank Dat Dance Party!

Guided Walking Tours with Triangle Adventures

• 2 p.m. - Downtown Durham Walking Tour
• 4 p.m. - Durham African American History Tour
• 6 p.m. - Downtown Durham True Crime Tour

8 a.m.
Cars and Coffee at 5425 Page Rd
Durham Farmers' Market at Durham Central Park
parkrun Durham at Southern Boundaries Park
9 a.m.
Walk for the Animals at Duke East Campus
South Durham Farmers' Market at Greenwood Commons Shopping Center
Naturally Wild presents Birding for QTBIPOC at Sarah P. Duke Gardens
10 a.m.
Wellness Fair with Performance of "This is My Brain on Anxiety: The Detailed Experience of an Anxious, Black Woman" at Hayti Heritage Center
11 a.m.
5th Anniversary Block Party at Rumors Durham
11:30 a.m.
Barrels of Fun Brewery Tasting w/ Seth at Bull City Solera and Taproom
12 p.m.
Crafternoons at Gizmo Brew Works
2:30 p.m.
National Prostate Cancer Awareness Basketball Tournament and Health Fair at Community Family & Life Recreation Center at Lyon Park
4 p.m.
Reception for Constellations: Forty Years of Explorations within Sacred Geometry at Horse & Buggy Press and Friends
6 p.m.
Bardo Bloom and Tarot with Virginia at Arcana
6:30 p.m.
Collin Williams at Missy Lane's Assembly Room
7 p.m.
Triangle Gay Men's Chorus Concert at Eno River Unitarian Universalist Fellowship
Nobody's Business with Nantahala at Huron Stage Music Venue
Beaux Mondes: Swinging Speakeasy Jazz at Succotash Southern & Creole Kitchen
7:30 p.m.
Private Event: Shop Closed at Moon Dog Meadery
The Stinging Blades at The Blue Note Grill
"The Memories I'm Bound To" (Art + Live Music) at The Fruit
8 p.m.
Nolan Taylor at Motorco Music Hall
The Monti: In Too Deep at The Carolina Theatre
9 p.m.
Collin Williams at Missy Lane's Assembly Room
Blind Tigers: Live Karaoke at Rubies on Five Points

Sunday, June 2

Events at Atomic Empire

• 11:30 a.m. - Digimon TCG: Evolution Cup
• 12 p.m. - Pokemon TCG Tournament

10 a.m.
Jazz Brunch at Lula & Sadie's
10:30 a.m.
Al Strong Presents Jazz Brunch at Alley Twenty Six
12 p.m.
Sunday Dollar Bin Sale for Charity at Rumors Durham
Farmers Market at ZincHouse Winery & Brewery
12:15 p.m.
Public Tour at Duke Chapel
1 p.m.
Black Farmers' Market at Durham Tech
Rescues & Rainbows Pet Adoption & PRIDE Event at The Velvet Hippo Bar & Lounge
2 p.m.
Speed Puzzling Mini Tournament at Boxyard RTP
Soul Sunday w/ DJ Soul at Congress Social Bar
Hammered Trivia with Casey at Durty Bull Brewing Company
3 p.m.
World Hunger Day Durham at Durham Central Park
Brick Convention: LEGO® Fan Event at Durham Convention Center
6 p.m.
Omar Star's Extragalactic Birthday Bash at Arcana
6:30 p.m.
Open Mic Night at Moon Dog Meadery
7 p.m.
Desi Banks: The Purpose Chaser Tour at The Carolina Theatre
AZUL / Animal Prince / Elora Dash at The Pinhook
9 p.m.
Raggae Sundayz at The House

Running Art Exhibits

Constellations: 40 Years of Explorations within Sacred Geometry by Steven Ferlauto at Horse & Buggy Press and Friends

• Sacred Geometry is an ancient field of physics whose equations are expressed through shape. Shape is a way to explore the universal fabric of our existence.
• Sat, May 4 - Sat, June 1
• Free admission

Cameron Elyse's Divine Nine Legacy Memoir Exhibition at Hayti Heritage Center

• The Divine Nine Legacy Memoir delves deep into the history of the National Panhellenic Council (NPHC) or "Divine Nine," a collective of nine Greek Letter organizations founded on May 10th, 1930.
• These organizations were born out of the necessity to provide a voice for Black American students within the collegiate space. United by principles of service, community, brotherhood, and sisterhood, the Divine Nine work collectively to uplift society through acts of service to underserved areas across the nation.
• Fri, Apr 19 - Sat, June 1
• Free admission

It Ain’t All Black And White at DAG Truist Gallery

• It Ain’t All Black and White is a photography exhibition that encourages us to consider emotions such as serenity, apprehension, yearning, and more.
• Captured by 11 dynamic photographers dedicated to documenting the fullness and complexity of Black life, this exhibition offers each of us an opportunity to see ourselves with renewed attention.
• Thu, Apr 25 - Sun, June 2

María Magdalena Campos-Pons: Behold at Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University

• María Magdalena Campos-Pons: Behold is a monographic exhibition of a visionary voice in photography, immersive installation, painting and performance.
• Thu, Feb 15 - Sun, Jun 9
• Every week, Tue-Sat 10 a.m.-5 p.m., Sun 12-5 p.m.
• Free admission

Ley Killeya: Solitary Women at 5 Points Gallery

• 5 Points Gallery in downtown Durham invites you to appreciate Chapel Hill artist Ley Killeya's engaging exhibition featuring vibrant and thought-provoking paintings, exploring themes of identity, belonging, vulnerability, and acceptance, particularly for people from marginalized communities.
• Fri, May 17 - Sat, June 15
• Free admission

Counterpoints at Durham Bottling Co.

• Counterpoints is a curated showcase of local AAPI (Asian American Pacific Islander) artists, delving into the convergence of AAPI identity and mental health. Inspired by the intricate layers of musical counterpoint, its purpose is to weave together diverse narratives and confront the stigma surrounding mental health within our communities.
• Wed, May 1 - Sun, June 16
• Mon - Fri, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.

Message in a Bottle: The art of Christopher Philips Haile, 1947–1998 at Horse & Buggy Press and Friends

• This exhibit, curated by the artist's brother Roger Haile, includes over 60 artworks archived for the past 26 years.
• Sat, May 25 - Sat, July 13
• Free admission

HELLMIRE
Well, the name certainly fits. The heat that felt like it had been extracted straight from the Sun, the fire tornadoes, the barren and lifeless desert. Certainly something that would exist only in a place like Hell. All across the section of the planet they were on, were red-striped circles that pulsed on the map. Some were relatively small, others medium-sized.

Okay, perhaps this wasn't all bad. Uzi had played more than enough shooter games to know what those were, and the laughably small enemy outposts could be cleared by just about anyone here without breaking a sweat. Well, not more than they already were. The heat had all four of the drones practically sweating bullets, and the desert that stretched on for miles was certainly not helping.

But at least the worker hoped they could clear them all effortlessly.

The sand-filled winds slightly blew the teen's dull purple hair to the left, and stuck a few sand grains in her hair, which went unnoticed even by Uzi herself. A small smirk crossed her face, and the tingling sensation ceased, and her mind's racing slowed, if only by a little.

Andrew swiped one finger on the small screen, moving the map to one of the moderately-sized circles, marking the center of it.

“I hope you all aren't afraid of bugs.” The moment the word bugs was uttered, J noticeably tensed. Even though the murder drone was hoping the Sergeant hadn't seen it, the feeling of a pair of eyes burning into her back told the Disassembly Drone otherwise. Trying to will both the tension, and the mounting fear of what resides on this planet away but to no avail, J turned on her heel, facing the Sergeant and looking at the holomap. The circle he had marked wasn't far from here, just a couple minutes’ walk away.

J was damn thankful she had wings. Even if she wanted to walk the distance, the heat would render her immobile her before she could even get a considerable distance. The white-hot sand-filled winds themselves were already slightly distorting her vision anyway, and there was no way in Hell she was dying here. She leapt into the scalding-hot air, stretching her wings to half capacity, and was soon followed by the other three drones.

‘Guess they were just as steaming as I am.’

“If I'm gonna be honest here, I thought those were for gliding.” Andrew quipped to himself, shrugging. His eyes followed the drones as they leapt into the air and watched as they flew off. Sighing heavily, Andrew flipped off the holomap and swiped on his screen once more and threw down another beacon. After a couple seconds, another pod came crashing down, and with it, a jetpack. Soon, the Sergeant was also in the air, flying off to meet the drones.


After a minute of flying, V spotted what looked like overgrown cockroaches. Some were green, others orange, and there was one large creature that was white and red. Almost the very moment V laid eyes on the creature, its head almost demonically snapped up towards the drone.

Then it disappeared. ‘Dear Robo-Christ, it fucking disappeared.’

V opened her mouth, but the sound of a jetpack’s boosters shut it. She was once again face to face with the now-flying Helldiver. All three of the drones stopped flying, instead hovering in the air, surprise and confusion written all over their faces. V quirked an eyebrow at the jetpack, examining it as if it was some foreign object.

“What?” Andrew was first to break the silence, a Welsh edge to his voice. “Never seen a jetpack before?”

He was met with collective head shakes. Half because they had never seen a jetpack, and the other out of disappointment because they had failed to pick up the fact that he was Welsh earlier.

“Jetpacks are heavily outdated where we come from. They stopped using them centuries ago.” Uzi explained.

A dead silence.

“Centuries?” Andrew wasn't sure if he was just hearing things, or something. Centuries ago? “Okay, what year do you people come from?” He said, half-expecting them to recite the present year. “Actually, disregard that. What year is it?”

“3071?” N replied. That completely shattered the Sergeant's expectation.


“Aw, hell nah. This is some back to the future bullshit.” Andrew groaned, facepalming as he hovered down to the bugs, muttering strings of swears under his breath. He was quickly followed by the four drones, but the sound of the Sergeant's boosters alerted the bugs. It didn't do much of anything to deter the Helldiver, as he landed on one of the bugs, crushing it's head and spraying a nauseating green all over his legs and lower torso.

He was soon followed by J. But before she could touch down, she was pinned down by the very same creature that had disappeared after making eye contact with her. The startled drone's optics hollowed as she tried to wrestle herself out of its hold, to no avail. It raised one of its legs, and thrust it down, skewering her torso and using the other to tear her in half before it was subsequently shot dead by the Sergeant. J was still, lifeless. Just as she was when she was shot on the ship. Her gray intestines and various other organs hung out, strung every which way in the desert sands.

Andrew would be lying if he said he wasn't completely sick to his stomach watching that. He had seen men fall to these creatures, yes, but this… It struck a nerve in him. The way the corpse was sprawled, it made him remember another. All over the concrete, barely breathing. Barely alive.

The sound of tires screeching, the heart-wrenching and blood-curdling screams of children, the deafening sound of metal on metal.
"Lloyd..?"
Andrew nearly jumped out of his armor and skin the moment he heard that voice. It was one he hadn't heard in years. A feminine one. A soothing, Welsh feminine voice, yet rough around the edges. Just as quickly as it came, the voice disappeared, and Andrew was once again staring at J and the bug's dead bodies.

“I… I need a moment.” Uzi stammered, a vomit green covering her visor as she staggered away to a nearby dead tree, then proceeding to vomit her guts out on the spot.

Without even flinching but inwardly nauseated, Andrew patiently waited for J to reconstruct and get back up. And just as he expected, it slowly began. Slowly yet surely, the drone reconstructed herself, and just as quickly as she had fallen, she had gotten back up. Even though he had been unmoving on the outside, there was a bile building up in the Sergeant's throat that cost him all of his willpower just to hold down.

‘Mental note: Never stare at dead drones again.’

Just faintly, Andrew could still hear the shrieks of two child-like voices and still feel the harrowing feeling of floating upwards, then being thrown out of glass. The spiking pain of the shards, the white-hot sensation of landing on pavement.
Andrew shook his head ever so slightly, trying to wrest the memories away once more, but to no avail.
The planet seemed to tremor as more bugs burrowed out of the ground. They varied in size, but most were rather small. All three drones’ optics hollowed as they began to get into defensive stances. V looked to the Sergeant, half-expecting a signal. All he did was gesture towards the bugs. “Let's see how you all fare against the fodder.”

V was first to charge in, the razor-sharp claws that have tasted the oil of countless Worker Drones at the ready. Almost naïvely, one of the smaller bugs raced forward to meet her, and was instead instantly cut down the middle by one of the blades on her wings. V only cackled maniacally as green splotches and guts flew in every direction, changing her right hand in lieu of an M19 45mm assault rifle. Before she could fire off a round, J kicked another bug that looked like an armored scorpion. The claws themselves looked like they were sharper than an obsidian knife, and the armoring it bore looked like it could stop an artillery shell in it's tracks.

But looks can be deceiving, can't they?

It skidded across the sand, digging its claws into the sand and stopping itself just five feet away. J quickly followed up by a clean sword strike, making the creature roar in pain as a small gash was created, rendering the creature half-blind. Almost like they had coordinated and practiced this for years, V followed up with another claw strike, completely blinding the creature, then flying upwards and cleanly slicing off its tail and shooting it in the back of the head, spraying a sickly green all over.
The creature went limp, and V couldn't help but sadistically smile as she gazed upon her handiwork, hovering over the dead bug for a short while before floating down beside J. J, on the other hand, only stared at the corpse, her optics hollowed. A slow, dull-burning bile slowly climbed up her throat the more she looked at the thing, but she couldn't tear her gaze away. Her own eyes disobeyed her commands, and they fixed themselves upon the corpse, unwilling to look at anything else.

CORE MEMORY ESTABLISHED.

Before J could even stabilize herself, and try her hardest to shake off the growing nausea, tens of the small bugs were upon her, only to get blasted to green splotches by a still-cackling V. Before V could fill the remaining four with lead, J quickly swiped forward, cutting the back of the tiny bug that was just about to pounce on her clean off, her optics still hollowed, and her breath still shaky and shallowed. J’s optics fell to the dripping green liquid on her blade, and the once-cream colored sand now stained a ghastly green and yellowish red. J swiped downward once again, flicking the blood off of her blade before changing it back into a regular hand. Her optics flit nervously over their surroundings, spotting two burrow-looking things in the distance. It glowed a bright orange, as if something was in there that was a source of blinding light.

“Tell me, do you all have grenades by any chance?” Andrew asked, turning to N, who was also watching the burrow with a curious gaze, trying not to pay any attention to the now actively-decomposing corpse of the scorpion-bug thing. V felt a small ping in her stomach as her gaze fell to the corpse once more. Her face contorted in disgust as she watched the thing for a short while, before tearing her eyes away.

“Do small rockets work?” N asked, quirking an eyebrow.

Andrew wordlessly shook his head. Without even looking in the short, still-shaking teen’s direction, he threw a grenade in her direction, to which she caught. Almost instantaneously, the worker threw the grenade away, not even bothering to check if the Sergeant had pulled the pin or not. The grenade landed a couple feet away, and the four waited for an explosion.
“I didn’t pull the pin, now go get it. You pull the pin, and throw it in there.” He said, pointing a finger to the burrow. Uzi’s nerves frayed as she went to pick the grenade up. With it in hand, the Worker hooked a finger on the pin.
There was a moment’s hesitation before the short teen pulled the pin and threw the grenade towards the burrow. The small explosive went straight into the hole, the sounds of stone and dirt against metal faintly heard as it clacked and clicked against the sharpened and jagged stone before exploding, the flames belching out of the opening of the burrow like it was some sort of hibernating fire-breathing dragon as the glow faded away. But the resulting smell… It was appalling, for lack of any better term. The air reeked of rotten meat, and a sewer in a heatwave combined. It made all four of the drones almost double over and vomit, but Andrew remained still.


He would be lying if he said he didn’t want to do the same, but his experience as a Helldiver had hardened him to the point where he simply would not allow his body to do it. Though the nauseated group of drones could not see it, Andrew smiled. It wasn’t noticeable. No, not at all. It was small, and would be barely noticeable even if he had his helmet off. He slowly clapped, not loudly, but just enough for the drones to hear it.
“Well done. But that’s certainly ain't all of 'em….” Andrew's words blurred as the smell subsided, and reality once again hit the four like a punch from Mike Tyson in his prime. Were there any other bugs? Stronger ones, bigger ones? Were there more of those that pounced on J? Would they all survive being on this hellhole? Thousands of questions raced through the four drones’ heads, yet none dared to speak them out. Without showing any sort of emotion, V silently tried to will the countless rushing questions away to silence and oblivion in vain.

The minutes slowly trickled by into just as slow-passing hours as the five trekked across the desert, clearing nest after nest. J came to expect and estimate the strikes of the Stalkers as Andrew said they were referred to.

“I've seen men die to those things in ways you can't even begin to imagine. Stay on guard, or you'll join them someday. They'll use camo, get the jump on you. They're a tanky bunch, too. They can take a real beating.” He explained to J just a half hour ago. These things were truly nothing to scoff at, and if J was to be honest, they terrified her. Andrew caught her shaking while they were coming up on yet another nest. By now, they were all covered in green and red, and the recent gunshots from their previous nest clearing still echoed in her mind. Almost spontaneously, Andrew held up his arm, signaling a halt.
“Do not show fear.” He said, his voice monotone and almost callous. “The more you start shaking like you’re a leaf in autumn, the more bugs will be attracted to you. They love it when their enemy shows fear. They will swarm you, and leave nothing left.”

He once again began swiping on the small screen, throwing over yet another beacon at the hive. “Wait for it.”
About five seconds later, the sound of a shell firing off in the distance was barely even heard before a moderately-sized explosion rocked the landscape, the small plume rising up as if it was a nuclear missile.

“Alrighty, this is the place. You all will have your first tastes of what it's like to be a Helldiver.” That very same pride returned to his voice, a small chuckle slipping out as he swiped on the small screen again, calling down a small capsule that extended upwards a couple feet. A small metallic-silver colored drone flew upwards from a small compartment on the base of the flag post, flying around the flag before a camera slowly slid out from the bottom. It turned on, casting a small blue light as it played what the four drones could only assume to be the anthem.

It was a very soothing, almost hypnotic melody that made even V slightly sway her head along to the song, though the drone silently prayed that nobody saw her do it. Yet she had a gut feeling that the Helldiver currently saluting and quietly whisper-singing along to the anthem had seen her. The singing was whispered, yet it was just audible enough for V to hear it, being the closest to him.

“Freedom must reign over ev’ry last star… Through citizens lost in the all-righteous wars… Honor their deaths, do your part for the cause…”

Though none could see it, Andrew allowed another small smile to cross his face as the very same white-yellow-blue flag finally sprung outward, fluttering proudly in the sand-filled winds. Her gaze fell to Uzi, who had stopped tapping her foot to the melody, making direct eye contact with the murder drone, which was quickly broken.

“Steadfast support, of our regime, is how humankind will reign supreme. No questions or doubts, shall be allowed… Traitors will all be disavowed…”

Eventually, the symphony stopped, much to some of the group's dismay. Andrew took a couple more seconds to admire the flag as if it was an ancient treasure worth all of the galaxy’s gold. Another blue beacon lit up far in the distance, prompting N to look to it almost instinctively. It was about ten minutes’ fly to the location, and it looked like their ticket out of this hellhole. All of the four drones collectively breathed a sigh of complete relief, swiping off some pixelated sweat droplets from their visors. It was tiring to even spread their wings to flying extent, much less take off in the sweltering heat. Their limbs strained as the four drones once again took off, this time with much more effort, each of the four’s breaths labored, shaky, and sharp as they once again took off through the sand-caked wind, soon followed by Rex.
Without looking at the Sergeant, instead focusing on the now-brewing sandstorm right smack in the middle of the extraction zone. This was going to be one long day. With the amount of sand she was flying through, Uzi could swear her hair had changed its color to that of the sand. Some of it even flew into her mouth, which the teen quickly spluttered out. “Gahd, I didn't sign up for this..” She muttered under her breath. She was just a teenager, an eighteen-year-old being thrown through one nightmare after another, as if God himself wished to test her limits. She picked up speed, trying her damn hardest to ignore the knot in her stomach. Despite all of her effort to logically reason with herself, one half of her couldn't help but have the growing dreadful feeling that this was just the beginning. The sandstorm was coming up, and quickly. Before the five even knew it, they had charged headfirst into the gaping maw of the sandstorm. The winds tossed them around as if they all were ragdolls, threatening to knock each and every one of them out of the air.

“DOWN, DOWN!” Andrew shouted through the loudly whistling wind. Almost as if they were all waiting for the command, the four drones immediately dove downwards towards the small computer at the top of the plateau they were coming up on along with their Helldiver comrade. The ground came up quicker than any of them thought it would, whether it be from the absolutely kicking wind or the constant sand streams obstructing their vision. They landed roughly, Uzi being first to land. She landed shoulder-first, a sickening crack followed by a shout of pain shooting through the air that even the howling wind could not hide. The rest got off quite easy, with minor bruises and cuts, save for Andrew. His armor had only slightly dented, and it was practically invisible to any eye anyway.

“Mother of…” She almost swore through ground teeth as she cradled her limp arm. Trying to move the arm only reaped a spike of white-hot pain that moved throughout her body like a thunderstorm.


“Helldiver to Pelican-1, we got company. The good kind. Make sure you have a table for five.” Andrew said, which was then followed by almost inaudible speaking coming from the Helldiver’s helmet that the four drones could barely hear at all. Spotting her broken arm, Andrew calmly jogged up to the pained drone and took out a sort of syringe from a small pouch on his right breastplate. He raised his arm back, tapping the teen on the shoulder, which made her immediately turn her head towards him. “This is gonna sting, alright? It's a stim, it'll help with the wound.”

“N-no, I can-” Uzi was cut short by a stinging feeling, then a subsequent… Damn, this felt good. It felt like she was back to normal, and her arm worked fine. It even looked like it had completely regenerated, and the fatigue that came with flying through a sandstorm was completely gone. To say that she felt better than ever was a complete understatement. Uzi rolled her arm, expecting another shot of pain that never came as she staggered up through the storm. “Holy shit… What the hell was in that thing?”

“I don't know. Ministry of Truth and the scientists that made it know. All I, and you all gotta know is that it works.” Andrew shrugged, his voice stern and clear, but rushed. Like he wanted to change the topic. Uzi caught his tone, but did not speak of it, instead giving a nod. The sound of thrusters dying down pierced the air as the very same sleek black VTOL slowly descended, not even affected by the raging thunderstorm. “Oi, Scott. Who's the newbies? They ain't bots, that's for sure.” What the four drones could only assume was who the Sergeant called “Pelican-1”.

“They're with me. Hope you got an extra seat.” He gruffly replied, gesturing for the dumbfounded drones to come with him to the back. Without much of a choice, given the barren desert, and the lack of any hope of getting off of this place besides the VTOL currently on the ground, they followed.

“Ay, y'all hurry your asses up ‘fore I get sand in my seats again. Took ages to clean that out.”

“Yeah, yeah. We're going, Pelican.” Andrew replied, his voice a mix of irritation, and camaraderie, as if he was speaking with a lifelong friend. The group clamored into the surprisingly spacious back of the VTOL, the ramp closing behind them the moment they all entered. The metallic gray door to the cockpit swooshed open, and out of it was a man dressed in all-black pilot gear, the Super Earth insignia stitched onto his left breast almost perfectly. “Shotgun's vacant, anyone want?”

J shot up, keen on not sitting next to Uzi, muttering a quick “thank you” before softly nudging past the pilot, taking the seat. The pilot took a deep, audible breath, his shoulders rising and falling in quick succession. “Scott, I hope you know what you're doing.” His voice turned from lightly jabbing, but lively, to straight-to-the-point, somewhat irritated and monotone. He quickly slipped back into the cockpit as the VTOL took off, effortlessly shooting past the atmosphere and into the inky black vacuum of space.

"Yeah, I do too."


Before any of the four drones knew it, they had docked on the Super Destroyer once more. Nearby, near the galactic map, the Sergeant was deep in conversation with Pelican-1, the two hunched over on different sides of the table, pointing to planets as if they were chess pieces. To the left of the table, where Pelican was, was a series of red, some darker than others. On Andrew's side, was yellow, some lighter than others. All other planets were covered in blue, with Super Earth in the middle, along with another much smaller planet beside it. N had just come out of the barracks, wearing that bright smile the four drones came to know him for. The tear streaks were well hidden, almost completely invisible to the naked eye. V was… God only knew where she went, and J was fighting with Uzi, as per usual.

Damn, he was happy the rooms were soundproof.

“Alright, listen up!” Andrew’s raised voice cut like a sharpened blade through the air, making each of the three present drones freeze. He sounded pissed, but for the approximately five hours they had known the Welshman, he always sounded pissed in some way. The sound of distant slurping was heard as it got louder and louder. V came through the West door, some sort of iced coffee in hand, slurping through a straw.
“Oi, read the room.” Pelican said, his voice echoing through the quiet bridge. The slurping stopped almost immediately.

“As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted,” Andrew snarled, giving V a side eye that nobody saw due to to his helmet. “From here, you all are going to Mars. There, you will stay for 5-10 months, and become proper Helldivers, which you will then come back here, as I have personally arranged. I wish you all good luck.”


Those words sent cold chills down each drone’s spine, and confirmed Uzi's worst fear. This was truly just the beginning.
Author's Ramblings: Yeah, this is truly Just the beginning. TRIPLE POST INCOMING HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE-
I pity these poor drones. They don't know what's coming..
I gazed a gazeless stare, we walked a million hills, I must have died alone... A long, long time ago... Who knows? Not me. I never lost control... You're face, to face, With the man who sold the world....

The area where we were heading in Eastern Europe was known for its radioactivity. We had received reports of strange animals, things that looked like they were hatched from a mad scientist’s laboratory. I didn’t know how much of it I believed, because some of the descriptions the survivors gave sounded more like wendigo and dogmen than any real animal. I figured that, in the heat of the moment and under attack, their minds had likely twisted the true form of the animals, horrifying as they were, into something truly nightmarish.
There were three of us heading into the dark Eastern European forests: my friend Dmitri, who was originally from the country and knew the language, his girlfriend Anna and myself. Everything seemed mundane enough as we flew into the country and handed over our passports. There was no sign of the horrors waiting ahead.
The first towns we encountered looked idyllic enough as we drove through them in a rental car. Isolated farmhouses with cows and chickens dotted the landscape. Plentiful fields of wheat, potatoes and corn stretched out on all sides of us. The black earth here was fertile, I knew. As we headed deeper into the radiation zone, however, the houses and farms all started to look abandoned and dilapidated, the fields barren and dead.
“Christ on a cracker,” I muttered, more to myself than to my friends, “this place looks like it suffered through the Apocalypse.”
“It did,” Dmitri said grimly. “A nuclear apocalypse. I feel like the Biblical one is far more optimistic than the true apocalypse will be. In reality, there will be no Rapture, no victory of light over darkness. If there is ever a World War 3, every major city will be consumed by nuclear fire. It will throw buses and cars thousands of feet into the air, spilling out bodies onto the burning skies. Entire streets will collapse, trapping countless millions under the rubble.”
“That’s a cheerful thought,” Anna commented, her dark blue eyes staring out the window. I saw the reflection of white eyes skittering through the brush outside, small animals that disappeared in front of the approaching roar of the engine.
“How far is it?” I asked, feeling carsick and anxious. The winding roads here curved through countless hills. It reminded me of driving through parts of Northern California before, when I had retched out the window. Anna and Dmitri seemed unaffected, though. I cursed my stomach, which was always turning traitorous towards me.
“It’s a while, man,” Dmitri said. “This country is huge. Probably another three or four hour drive. And then we have to start walking.”
“Good thing we left before dawn,” Anna said, stifling a yawn. She had a can of some cheap Russian Red Bull knock-off, some fluorescent green crap that smelled like chemicals. But she drank it as if it were the finest French wine. I gazed out at the dark forests that passed us on both sides, wondering what kind of sights lay ahead in this land of the damned.
***
The Sun rose early over the gently rolling hills and black earth of Ukraine, sending its rusty streaks of blood across the sky. The going had been easy so far, except for the constant car sickness I felt. I took a few pills of meclizine, wishing that I could have smuggled some weed gummies through customs. But here, cannabis was illegal, and I was not eager to see the inside of an Eastern European prison, where lunatics like the Three Guys One Hammer maniacs and the Chessboard Killer lived in hellish conditions.
“Holy shit, would you look at that?” Dmitri said with awe and wonder oozing from his voice as the car braked abruptly. I looked up quickly, my stomach doing flips. But what I saw laying across the road instantly brought me back to the moment. Dmitri pointed a tattooed hand at the sight.
“Is that real?” Anna asked. I could only shake my head as we all stared at the dead bear that was laying across the cracked road, its dead eyes staring straight through us.
I noticed immediately that the bear had extra paws on its arms. Blood-stained claws jutted sharply out of its four paws, each seeming to have seven fingers. Its feet looked stunted and twisted, like the roots of a tree. An extra arm stuck out of the front of its chest, a pale, white fleshy growth emerging from its sternum. The mutated limb looked malformed and boneless, causing a sense of revulsion to rise up as I gazed on it. It flopped gently in the heavy wind that swirled down the surrounding hills.
“Well, I guess the rumors are true,” Dmitri said slowly, his eyes as wide and excited as a child. “Can you imagine what other kinds of things must be lurking in these forests? This is going to make a really awesome documentary.” Anna nodded, playing with a small, hand-held digital camera she took everywhere with her. She wanted to make a video that would finally go viral on the internet and help her gain some recognition for her work.
“I’m going to record everything, including this,” she said excitedly, brushing a lock of blonde hair behind her ear as she opened the door of the car. Dawn had risen overhead, radiating the first warm rays of a bright summer day. After a long moment, I followed her out. Dmitri stood at her side, his dark eyes wide. He ran a trembling hand over his shaved head as he looked down at the enormous bear.
Anna zoomed in with the camera, kneeling down before the still beast. Her finely-formed fingers shook with excitement as she drew within inches of the corpse. I wondered how the bear had died, as I didn’t see any signs of injuries on the creature’s body. The next moment, I saw it blink.
I backpedaled away, giving a hoarse, guttural shout of warning. Anna was busy staring at the screen of the digital camera, scanning it across the bear’s extra fingers and limbs. But the panic that swept over Dmitri’s face showed me that he, too, had seen it. He grabbed Anna’s arm, dragging her back with sudden fury. She stumbled, her legs crossing under her. She crashed into him and they fell back together. A moment later, the bear came to life, its bones cracking as it twisted its head to look at the three of us.
It swiped a mutated paw at the place where Anna’s face had been only a moment before. I heard the sharp claws slice through the air like switchblades. The bear’s head ratcheted over to glare at us. It gnashed its teeth as silver streams of saliva flew from its shaking head. With a primal roar, it leapt off the ground. I turned to run back to the safety of the car, but I nearly tripped when a pale figure streaked out of the forest right in front of me.
It looked like something conjured up in a nightmare. It was naked and bloated, its skin white with bulging, pink cheeks. It looked to have a combination of human and pig features, and yet it ran upright like a person. Its irises were blood-red, its pupils huge and excited. Its beady eyes flicked over to Anna and a low, satisfied growl erupted from its wide throat. I watched the muscles work furiously in its porcine body as it sprinted towards her.
Before either Dmitri or I could react, the pig-thing grabbed Anna around the neck, its sharp, black fingers digging deeply into her skin. She squealed like a strangled rabbit as it dragged her away into the dark Ukrainian forests. Its pink lips pulled back in an excited grimace, revealing the sharp fangs underneath. I heard its guttural growls fade away rapidly. It sprinted much faster than a person, its hooves slamming the ground over and over at a superhuman speed.
“Hey!” Dmitri called excitedly, taking a step forward. “What do you…” A giant bear paw with too many gleaming claws smacked his leg out from under him, sending him flying. I only stood there, shell-shocked and amazed, as Anna disappeared into the trees.
A single moment later, the bear rose to its full height, roaring at us. Streams of spit flew from its mouth as its rancid breath washed over us, breath that emanated a smell like roadkill and infection. I put my hands up, flinching, expecting a blow that never came. When I looked up, the bear had gone back on all fours. It ran in the path the pig-creature had gone, its white, boneless extra limb hanging limply from its chest.
“What the fuck!” Dmitri cried on the ground, rocking back and forth. I came back to life, running over to his side. I saw deep gouge marks sliced through his blue jeans. Bright streams of blood lazily dripped from the claw marks on his left leg.
“We need to get help,” I cried, shaking him. His eyes looked faraway and confused, as if he didn’t fully realize what was happening. “We need to go back and get the police.”
“The police?” he asked, laughing. “The police here won’t do anything. You think they’re going to travel out into the radioactivity zone just for a missing person?” He shook his head grimly before reaching out a hand to me. “Help me up. There’s a first aid kit in the car. We need to bandage this up. Then we’re going after Anna.”
***
We had no way to call for help. The phones this far out in Chernobyl didn’t work, and there were never any cell phone towers built in the silent land. After Dmitri had disinfected and bandaged his legs, he rummaged through the trunk, looking for weapons.
“God damn, there’s nothing good here,” he said despondently. “Some bear mace, some knives… what good is any of that going to do against these mutated monsters? We need an AK-47.” I nodded in agreement.
“Too bad we’re not in the US,” I said. “The only guns you’re going to get around here are the ones you take off the bodies of Russian soldiers.”
“Yeah, if only,” he muttered sadly, handing me a large folding knife. “We have one canister of bear mace, three knives and a tire iron. Not exactly an arsenal.” I really didn’t want to go into those dark woods, but thinking of Anna being tortured or murdered made me feel sick and weak. I shook my head, mentally torn.
“Here, take the bear mace, too. I’ll take the tire iron and a knife,” he continued, forcing the black canister into my numb fingers. “You ready for this?”
“Absolutely not,” I said. “I think we should try to find help. If we both go out there and get slaughtered, no one will ever find Anna.”
“The nearest town is two hours west of here,” he responded icily. “By the time we get help, her trail will have gone cold. It will take at least five or six hours to get any rescue out here. No, we need to do this, and we need to do it now. If you don’t want to come…”
“I’ll come,” I said grimly, my heart pounding. “Fuck it.”
***
Dmitri had a sad history. As a child living in Ukraine, he had been kidnapped by an insane neighbor and kept in a dirt pit outside for weeks, wallowing in his own piss and shit, slowly starving. He said the man would throw down a stale crust of bread or a rice cake into the mud and human waste every few days. Dmitri would pull the food out, wipe off the feces and eat it. I shuddered, remembering the horror stories he had told me. I knew he had a personal reason for making sure Anna was not subjected to the same endless suffering, even if it meant his own death.
The bear and the pig-creature had left a clear trail of broken brush and snapped twigs snaking through the forest. Side by side, we moved cautiously ahead, constantly checking our backs. But we saw no signs of movement and heard nothing. Up ahead, the trees abruptly opened up, letting golden sunlight stream down. Blinking quickly, we left the forest behind.
We walked out into a field in the middle of a valley surrounded by tall, dark hills. Grass and weeds rippled in waves as the wind swept past us.
Formed in a semi-circle in front of us, human skeletons lay endlessly dreaming. They stared up into the vast blue sky with grinning skulls and empty sockets. Some still had putrefying strips of flesh and ligaments clinging to the bones. Animals had scattered some of the bodies, but others lay complete, like corpses in a tomb. Human skulls, leg bones and arm bones lay scattered haphazardly across the field, their surfaces yellowed and cracked with age. It looked like a bone orchard.
“What are we looking at right now?” I whispered, furtively glancing around at the field of bones. An insane part of my mind wondered if they might rise from the dead and come after us. Compared to what we had already seen in this place of nightmares, it didn’t seem that far-fetched.
“Dead bodies,” Dmitri said grimly.
“Victims of the nuclear accident?” I asked. He shook his head, pointing at some of the fresher corpses nearby. Their throats looked like they had been ripped out, the bones of their necks showing deep bite marks. The one nearest us had its skeletal fingers wrapped around a glass bottle with a piece of paper rolled inside and a cork inserted into the top.
I knelt down, prying the fingers back with soft, cracking noises. I uncorked it and took out the paper. It felt thick in my hands, like some kind of hand-crafted paper from the old days. The cursive flowing across the sheet looked like it had been written in a quill pen with actual ink. In confusion, I read the letter aloud:
“Rules to survive in the Helskin Nature Preserve:
“1. The cult known as the Golden Butchers has been kidnapping women to breed them with the pig-creatures. They worship the offspring that result from these unions as gods. If a member of your group gets taken, you will find them in the living farm at the end of the forest.
“2. If you encounter Mr. Welcome, the enormous pig god with the eyes on his forehead, you must not let him touch you.
“3. The red snakes can only see while you’re moving. If you encounter them, stay still. Don’t even breathe.”
“Breeding women with pig-creatures?!” Dmitri cried, horror washing over his face. “We need to find her! But where do we even start?” I looked through the field, trying to see any sign of tracks, but it looked like hundreds of animals had gone through this field recently. Paths of tall, crushed grass crisscrossed the enormous length of it, some of them worn down to black dirt and stones. I just shook my head, having no idea.
A distant scream rolled its way down the surrounding hills. It came from our left and sounded very much like Anna. Dmitri’s eyes turned cold. Without looking back at me, he started frantically running towards the sound. It faded away within seconds.
“Wait up!” I cried, sprinting as fast as I could. His freshly-shaved head gleamed as he disappeared into the trees. Gripping the open buck knife in my hand, my knuckles white with tension and fear, I followed after him.
***
We wandered for hours through the woods, never hearing a second scream to guide our path. We both hoped that we were going in the right direction. A small deer trail winding through the brush opened up, heading up rocky hills and clear streams of water.
Sweating and nervous, we traveled for miles and miles, rarely talking. A few times, I tried to get Dmitri to slow down.
“How do you know you’re going in the right direction?” I asked. “We’ve been walking this trail for five hours and haven’t seen a thing.”
“This was the direction the scream came from,” he said weakly. “Where else would they go? They would want to travel quickly with a hostage. They would take a trail.” I didn’t point out that there may be other trails, that we had absolutely no idea where we were going.
As we reached the peak of a mountain, I pulled a small, portable Geiger counter we had taken along for the trip. The radioactivity here was high, much higher than normal background radiation. I didn’t know how far we were from the nuclear power plant at the center of all this, but at a certain point, it would become too dangerous to keep moving forward.
Dmitri was next to me, chugging a bottle of water when a shriek rang out below us. It sounded almost animalistic but had a strange, electronic distortion. Amplified to an ear-splitting cacophony, it echoed through the trees. Much quieter roars answered from the forests all around us in response, the cries of bears and other predators. These sounded much closer, however.
“Pssst,” a pile of thick ferns said to my left, shaking suddenly. In Ukrainian, the ferns continued by whispering, “Hey, you!” I jumped, swinging the knife in the direction of the brush, watching the blade shake wildly in my hand as fresh waves of adrenaline surged through my body. Dmitri was by my side, his eyes wide and wild. He glanced over at me, nodding. He had the tire iron raised like a tennis racket, ready to strike. A moment later, a little boy crawled out.
He was scarecrow thin, his face smudged with dirt and filth, his dark eyes sunken and lifeless deep inside his small head. He had black hair and a nose like a little twisted lump in the center of his face. It seemed like it had been repeatedly broken. He didn’t look older than ten, but he looked so emaciated that it was impossible to say. The rags and tatters he wore barely covered his body, and the boy was almost in his Genesis suit.
“Come out,” I said grimly. Dmitri’s eyes bulged from his head.
“Don’t kill me, please,” the boy whispered in a cracked, choked voice, his accent giving all his words a guttural tone. “Take me out of here. My Mom and Dad brought me here, they were part of the Golden Butchers, but a couple months ago, they got sick and died from all the poison in the water and food.”
“Who are you, kid?” Dmitri said, reaching down and pulling him up to his feet. I watched the boy closely, the bear mace in one hand and the knife in the other, looking for any sign of sudden violence or betrayal.
“My name is Pilip. I come from the farm,” he said, pointing vaguely towards the tallest peak in the area. “You can’t see it from here, but it’s over there.” Dmitri kneeled down until he was eye-to-eye with Pilip.
“Can you take us there?” he said. Pilip’s eyes teared up, but he slowly nodded.
“If you will take me with you when you leave, I’ll show you,” he said, crying now, “but it is a horrible place. It is the place of Mr. Welcome.”
***
Pilip guided us to the living farm, saving us a great deal of time. He navigated the forest like an experienced hiker, seeming to know the entire area from the smallest clues: a split, fallen tree, or a tree with a whorl like an eye, or a sudden curve in a babbling brook. It saved us a great deal of time wandering through the woods, where everything looked exactly the same to me.
“There,” he said, pointing through a break in the trees to the farm. The entire top of the hill was cleared of trees and brush. In its place stood a nightmare.
The farm was the closest place to Hell I have ever seen. The top of the living building peeked over the tall trees surrounding it. It had something like a bell tower on the top of it, almost like a church might have. But instead of a bell, it had an enormous, blood-shot eye.
The eye had an iris as red as a dismembered heart. Its pupil was dilated and insane. From here, the eye looked to be about the size of a church bell and had no eyelids. Strange white filaments like those of a slime mold surrounded it, trailing down into the building. I wondered if this was the optic nerve for the great, staring eye.
The rest of the building was as black as eternity, windowless and imposing. It had a brutalist architecture, all sharp angles and steep slopes. I watched the building and the eye closely. To my horror, I realized that the entire thing was alive somehow. The eye constantly spun in its place, staring out over the surrounding hills like the Eye of Sauron. The building constantly breathed.
“Welcome!” a hushed, distorted voice cried. The words seemed to come from the breathing and living walls of the farm itself. “Welcome! Wellllll-come…”
“What the fuck is this, kid?” Dmitri whispered hoarsely. “Where’s Anna?” Pilip shook his head sadly.
“She’s inside with the other breeders,” he said, the fear and terror evident on his face. “They keep them chained in cages or bound in the basement until the time for the ritual comes.”
“And when is that?” I asked. He looked up at the sky and the fading light. We had somehow wasted nearly an entire day already. Night was coming, and we hadn’t even seen Anna yet.
“At sunset,” he responded. Dmitri nearly jumped up at that.
“Sunset?! That’s almost here! We need to go now!” he cried. I almost wanted to laugh.
“What are you going to do, stab that enormous building with your knife?” I whispered. “We need a plan. Maybe we can burn it down or…” But my words were cut off by the roaring of the building. Its scream echoed over the hills. It was immediately answered by countless others, including one that came only a few dozen feet behind us. I grabbed Dmitri’s shoulder, my panicked eyes flicking in that direction.
“There’s something…” I started to say when the brush cracked under a heavy weight. Looking up, I saw something horrible stalking us from behind.
It looked like a pig, walking on all fours with a fat, bloated body, but it was the size of an SUV. Its eyes were like the eye in the building, blood-red and dilated. All over its body, hundreds of sharp teeth grew out of its skin, covering the pink flesh like tumors. The creature almost looked like a porcupine with all the sharp points of fangs projecting from its body.
For a moment, its eyes widened as we stared at each other. They instantly narrowed as the pig roared again and gave chase. It gnashed its teeth, opening and closing its mouth in a frenzy of bloodlust. In its mouth, too, the teeth grew wild. Hundreds of razor-sharp teeth of different sizes grew from its gums, tongue and lips.
“Run!” I cried, grabbing Pilip’s arm and hauling him off the ground. The boy had a natural survivor’s instincts and immediately started running by my side, away from the approaching creature.
We broke out into the massive clearing where the living farm stood. I saw that the building had only a single door in and out, a black barn door that stood wide open. I heard Dmitri’s feet pounding the ground behind me. The heavy thuds of the approaching creature drew louder by the second.
“In the barn!” I cried, not having time to think. It was the only possible place of safety here. I sprinted faster than I ever had before towards those doors as if they were entrance to paradise itself. Without slowing, I ran into the building, trying to slam one of the doors shut behind me. Dmitri grabbed the other. With the creature only seconds away, they started swinging shut. Pilip’s small body pressed against my leg as he came forward, using his meager strength to help me.
The door was extremely heavy and hard to move. The building itself looked like it was six or seven stories tall, and the doors to the barn nearly a-third of that height. With a tortured creak, they slammed shut. A single breath later, something heavy thudded against the other size, as if it had been hit by a battering ram. But the door held. Quickly, Dmitri and I grabbed a large board leaning against the wall and stuffed it into the brackets on both sides of the door, locking it from the inside.
I noticed how cool and dark it was in here, as if I had walked into a cave. I turned, taking in the interior of the living farm for the first time. At that moment, I had to repress a scream welling up in my throat.
***
Hundreds of imprisoned women both lined both sides of the barn. They were stacked one on top of another like prison cells. Wearing filthy, blood-stained rags, most of them looked silently down on us with dead, haunted eyes. I noticed the majority were in their twenties or thirties, but their eyes looked centuries old.
Along the back wall, an enormous pig lined the wall, positioned like Jesus on the cross. It stood as tall as the barn itself. Extra eyes covered its face, a dozen of them positioned all over its cheeks and forehead. From the top of its head, I saw white filaments rising up into the bell tower. Its many blood-red eyes focused on us, as still as death.
“Welcome,” it hissed. “Welcome!” Its limbs were chained to the wall. Enormous rusted links intertwined around its body, preventing Mr. Welcome from moving.
“Anna?!” Dmitri cried, looking around frantically. There was no one else here that I could see except for Mr. Welcome and all the hostages. “Anna, where are you?!”
“Don’t scream,” Pilip said in a tiny, fear-choked voice. “Please, don’t scream…”
But it was too late. As Dmitri’s last words faded, trapdoors built into the black floor of the barn sprung open. Dozens of mutated bears and pig-creatures crept out, their predatory eyes scanning us with hunger and anger.
***
“Fuck!” Dmitri cried, running back to the door at my side. Frantically, the three of us pulled the board up and dropped it to the fleshy floor with a clatter. As hisses and growls erupted all around us and the predators creeped forwards towards us in a semi-circle, the barn door flew open.
It was night now, the darkness creeping in like a descending curtain. No pig creatures awaited us on the other side, but something worse seemed to be creeping out of the forest.
I saw snakes the color of clotted blood slithering ahead. Each one was the size of a tractor-trailer, yet they made very little noise. An occasional hiss would rip its way through the air, but they hunted silently.
As I stood in the field in front of the barn, a no-man’s land of hellish proportions, the certainty of death fell over my heart like grasping skeletal hands. I looked down at the little boy sadly. He gave me a faint smile, even though his eyes were terrified.
“I think we’re fucked,” Dmitri whispered by my side. I only nodded.
***
But at that moment, I remembered the rules, and an idea came to me.
“Just stay still,” I said. “Don’t even breathe.” Pilip and Dmitri looked at me strangely, then recognition came over their eyes. Dmitri only nodded, and then we all played statue.
The predators from the barn were only thirty feet behind us by now, crouched down and hunting us like a cat with a mouse. Yet the snakes also closed in, their black, slitted eyes gleaming with a reptilian coldness. As the mutated bears and pig creatures leaned down to pounce, I closed my eyes, waiting for the inevitable.
I felt a sudden rush of air all around me. The snakes flitted forward in a blur, their massive jaws unhinging. Two fangs swiveled out like switchblades, fangs big enough to impale a police car. Drops of clear venom fell lazily from the ends.
Keeping my eyes closed, afraid to even breathe or blink, I listened as the sounds of tearing flesh and screaming animals resonated all around me. After about thirty seconds of this, everything went deathly silent.
***
I don’t know how long we stood there like statues, but eventually, someone touched my shoulder. I opened my eyes, unbelieving. Dmitri stared at me intently.
“They’re all gone,” he whispered. “All except Mr. Welcome. It’s now or never.” I nodded, and together, we moved into the farm.
The trapdoors still lay open. I could hear very faint sobbing coming from under the building. Dmitri was afraid to make a sound. Together, the three of us went down to investigate.
We found a dark basement covered in hay. Torture tools covered the walls: iron maidens, brazen bulls, crosses and an entire universe of whips, saws, grinders, pliers, razor-wire and other blood-stained tools of the trade. In the corner, we saw Anna, her hands tied to the wall. More rope bound her feet and legs. We ran forward. When Anna saw Dmitri, she collapsed into a nervous wreck.
“Oh my God, you came! Please, get me out of here, right now,” she whispered. “They’re coming. The ritual will start soon.” Without a word, we started cutting the ropes, freeing her quickly.
“We need to be as quiet as possible,” I told Anna. “We can all get out of here. Let’s go.”
***
As we ascended from the basement back to the main floor of the living farm, the repetitive, metallic voice of Mr. Welcome kept repeating the same insane mantra.
“Welcome,” it said. “Welcome!” Once the four of us were all together, however, it changed.
“Welcome, thieves,” it hissed, its voice deepening and turning into a demonic gurgle. “That is my breeder. You will have to find out what happens to thieves.” I could only imagine all those blood-stained tools in the basement, and I shuddered.
Mr. Welcome inhaled deeply, his massive, fleshy body ballooning. With a predatory roar, he ripped the chains out of the wall of the living building. Orange pus and dark, clotted blood dripped from the holes. The barn breathed faster and deeper, the broken walls vibrating and shimmering as new life and pain flowed into them.
Mr. Welcome started moving towards us like a grinding juggernaut, walking on two legs like some sort of pig god. His many lidless eyes never looked away from us. The frayed optic nerves leading to the bell tower broke with a sound like snapping rubber bands. Dmitri looked at me with great sadness in his eyes.
“Get away,” he whispered. “I’ll distract it. Just get Anna home, no matter what.” Before I could respond, he ran forwards towards the abomination, the small, useless knife raised in one hand.
Mr. Welcome saw him coming. He tried to swipe at Dmitri with a sharp, black hoove, but Dmitri ducked, running around the back of him. He gave a battle-cry and started stabbing the monster in the back of the leg, which probably hurt it about as much as a toothpick.
But it provided a distraction. This time, Mr. Welcome spun his whole body, falling back to all four legs to deal with this nuisance. He used his massive snout to smack Dmitri hard, sending him flying across the barn. He hit the wall with a bone-shattering thud.
Dmitri’s skin immediately started to blacken, as if he were being burned alive. His eyes melted out of his face as he screamed, clawing at the dying patches of necrotic tissue spreading across his body. Within a few seconds, his screams faded to agonized groans. He tried to crawl back towards us as he died.
“Run!” I screamed, grabbing Anna’s hand and forcing her to sprint by my side. Pilip was already one step ahead of us, frantically trying to reach the shelter of the forest. I heard the ground shake behind me as Mr. Welcome drew near, moving much faster than we could ever hope to go. I knew we would never make it.
“Keep going, no matter what!” I yelled at Pilip and Anna. They kept running, the animal instinct to survive now foremost in their minds. I had to suppress mine. I turned to face the creature, the evil pig god known as Mr. Welcome.
***
In hindsight, I don’t know if God or some divine power had interceded, but the bear mace was probably one of the few items that could have saved us at that moment. Mr. Welcome had many eyes, and now that he was running on all four paws, his face was within reach. As my heart palpitated wildly, I raised the bear mace and sprayed at his dozen eyes. He didn’t slow, and I had to jump to the side to keep from being trampled. The air whooshed past me as if a subway car had gone by.
But a moment later, Mr. Welcome gave a roar- and not one of anger and hunger. This was a roar of pain and uncertainty. Blinded, Mr. Welcome frantically started running in circles, knocking down huge swathes of trees. The ear-splitting racket as he pulled the forest apart crashed over the surrounding landscape. Without a moment of hesitation, I turned to follow Pilip and Anna back to the car.
We told the police about the barn and all the hostages, but they claimed they couldn’t find it, and we never heard anything more about it.
***
Looking back on the experience, I now know why Chernobyl is a restricted zone, and it isn’t just because of the radioactivity. There are some things that hide under the surface, after all- things that grow in the dark, rotted places where no eyes roam.

The area where we were heading in Eastern Europe was known for its radioactivity. We had received reports of strange animals, things that looked like they were hatched from a mad scientist’s laboratory. I didn’t know how much of it I believed, because some of the descriptions the survivors gave sounded more like wendigo and dogmen than any real animal. I figured that, in the heat of the moment and under attack, their minds had likely twisted the true form of the animals, horrifying as they were, into something truly nightmarish.
There were three of us heading into the dark Eastern European forests: my friend Dmitri, who was originally from the country and knew the language, his girlfriend Anna and myself. Everything seemed mundane enough as we flew into the country and handed over our passports. There was no sign of the horrors waiting ahead.
The first towns we encountered looked idyllic enough as we drove through them in a rental car. Isolated farmhouses with cows and chickens dotted the landscape. Plentiful fields of wheat, potatoes and corn stretched out on all sides of us. The black earth here was fertile, I knew. As we headed deeper into the radiation zone, however, the houses and farms all started to look abandoned and dilapidated, the fields barren and dead.
“Christ on a cracker,” I muttered, more to myself than to my friends, “this place looks like it suffered through the Apocalypse.”
“It did,” Dmitri said grimly. “A nuclear apocalypse. I feel like the Biblical one is far more optimistic than the true apocalypse will be. In reality, there will be no Rapture, no victory of light over darkness. If there is ever a World War 3, every major city will be consumed by nuclear fire. It will throw buses and cars thousands of feet into the air, spilling out bodies onto the burning skies. Entire streets will collapse, trapping countless millions under the rubble.”
“That’s a cheerful thought,” Anna commented, her dark blue eyes staring out the window. I saw the reflection of white eyes skittering through the brush outside, small animals that disappeared in front of the approaching roar of the engine.
“How far is it?” I asked, feeling carsick and anxious. The winding roads here curved through countless hills. It reminded me of driving through parts of Northern California before, when I had retched out the window. Anna and Dmitri seemed unaffected, though. I cursed my stomach, which was always turning traitorous towards me.
“It’s a while, man,” Dmitri said. “This country is huge. Probably another three or four hour drive. And then we have to start walking.”
“Good thing we left before dawn,” Anna said, stifling a yawn. She had a can of some cheap Russian Red Bull knock-off, some fluorescent green crap that smelled like chemicals. But she drank it as if it were the finest French wine. I gazed out at the dark forests that passed us on both sides, wondering what kind of sights lay ahead in this land of the damned.
***
The Sun rose early over the gently rolling hills and black earth of Ukraine, sending its rusty streaks of blood across the sky. The going had been easy so far, except for the constant car sickness I felt. I took a few pills of meclizine, wishing that I could have smuggled some weed gummies through customs. But here, cannabis was illegal, and I was not eager to see the inside of an Eastern European prison, where lunatics like the Three Guys One Hammer maniacs and the Chessboard Killer lived in hellish conditions.
“Holy shit, would you look at that?” Dmitri said with awe and wonder oozing from his voice as the car braked abruptly. I looked up quickly, my stomach doing flips. But what I saw laying across the road instantly brought me back to the moment. Dmitri pointed a tattooed hand at the sight.
“Is that real?” Anna asked. I could only shake my head as we all stared at the dead bear that was laying across the cracked road, its dead eyes staring straight through us.
I noticed immediately that the bear had extra paws on its arms. Blood-stained claws jutted sharply out of its four paws, each seeming to have seven fingers. Its feet looked stunted and twisted, like the roots of a tree. An extra arm stuck out of the front of its chest, a pale, white fleshy growth emerging from its sternum. The mutated limb looked malformed and boneless, causing a sense of revulsion to rise up as I gazed on it. It flopped gently in the heavy wind that swirled down the surrounding hills.
“Well, I guess the rumors are true,” Dmitri said slowly, his eyes as wide and excited as a child. “Can you imagine what other kinds of things must be lurking in these forests? This is going to make a really awesome documentary.” Anna nodded, playing with a small, hand-held digital camera she took everywhere with her. She wanted to make a video that would finally go viral on the internet and help her gain some recognition for her work.
“I’m going to record everything, including this,” she said excitedly, brushing a lock of blonde hair behind her ear as she opened the door of the car. Dawn had risen overhead, radiating the first warm rays of a bright summer day. After a long moment, I followed her out. Dmitri stood at her side, his dark eyes wide. He ran a trembling hand over his shaved head as he looked down at the enormous bear.
Anna zoomed in with the camera, kneeling down before the still beast. Her finely-formed fingers shook with excitement as she drew within inches of the corpse. I wondered how the bear had died, as I didn’t see any signs of injuries on the creature’s body. The next moment, I saw it blink.
I backpedaled away, giving a hoarse, guttural shout of warning. Anna was busy staring at the screen of the digital camera, scanning it across the bear’s extra fingers and limbs. But the panic that swept over Dmitri’s face showed me that he, too, had seen it. He grabbed Anna’s arm, dragging her back with sudden fury. She stumbled, her legs crossing under her. She crashed into him and they fell back together. A moment later, the bear came to life, its bones cracking as it twisted its head to look at the three of us.
It swiped a mutated paw at the place where Anna’s face had been only a moment before. I heard the sharp claws slice through the air like switchblades. The bear’s head ratcheted over to glare at us. It gnashed its teeth as silver streams of saliva flew from its shaking head. With a primal roar, it leapt off the ground. I turned to run back to the safety of the car, but I nearly tripped when a pale figure streaked out of the forest right in front of me.
It looked like something conjured up in a nightmare. It was naked and bloated, its skin white with bulging, pink cheeks. It looked to have a combination of human and pig features, and yet it ran upright like a person. Its irises were blood-red, its pupils huge and excited. Its beady eyes flicked over to Anna and a low, satisfied growl erupted from its wide throat. I watched the muscles work furiously in its porcine body as it sprinted towards her.
Before either Dmitri or I could react, the pig-thing grabbed Anna around the neck, its sharp, black fingers digging deeply into her skin. She squealed like a strangled rabbit as it dragged her away into the dark Ukrainian forests. Its pink lips pulled back in an excited grimace, revealing the sharp fangs underneath. I heard its guttural growls fade away rapidly. It sprinted much faster than a person, its hooves slamming the ground over and over at a superhuman speed.
“Hey!” Dmitri called excitedly, taking a step forward. “What do you…” A giant bear paw with too many gleaming claws smacked his leg out from under him, sending him flying. I only stood there, shell-shocked and amazed, as Anna disappeared into the trees.
A single moment later, the bear rose to its full height, roaring at us. Streams of spit flew from its mouth as its rancid breath washed over us, breath that emanated a smell like roadkill and infection. I put my hands up, flinching, expecting a blow that never came. When I looked up, the bear had gone back on all fours. It ran in the path the pig-creature had gone, its white, boneless extra limb hanging limply from its chest.
“What the fuck!” Dmitri cried on the ground, rocking back and forth. I came back to life, running over to his side. I saw deep gouge marks sliced through his blue jeans. Bright streams of blood lazily dripped from the claw marks on his left leg.
“We need to get help,” I cried, shaking him. His eyes looked faraway and confused, as if he didn’t fully realize what was happening. “We need to go back and get the police.”
“The police?” he asked, laughing. “The police here won’t do anything. You think they’re going to travel out into the radioactivity zone just for a missing person?” He shook his head grimly before reaching out a hand to me. “Help me up. There’s a first aid kit in the car. We need to bandage this up. Then we’re going after Anna.”
***
We had no way to call for help. The phones this far out in Chernobyl didn’t work, and there were never any cell phone towers built in the silent land. After Dmitri had disinfected and bandaged his legs, he rummaged through the trunk, looking for weapons.
“God damn, there’s nothing good here,” he said despondently. “Some bear mace, some knives… what good is any of that going to do against these mutated monsters? We need an AK-47.” I nodded in agreement.
“Too bad we’re not in the US,” I said. “The only guns you’re going to get around here are the ones you take off the bodies of Russian soldiers.”
“Yeah, if only,” he muttered sadly, handing me a large folding knife. “We have one canister of bear mace, three knives and a tire iron. Not exactly an arsenal.” I really didn’t want to go into those dark woods, but thinking of Anna being tortured or murdered made me feel sick and weak. I shook my head, mentally torn.
“Here, take the bear mace, too. I’ll take the tire iron and a knife,” he continued, forcing the black canister into my numb fingers. “You ready for this?”
“Absolutely not,” I said. “I think we should try to find help. If we both go out there and get slaughtered, no one will ever find Anna.”
“The nearest town is two hours west of here,” he responded icily. “By the time we get help, her trail will have gone cold. It will take at least five or six hours to get any rescue out here. No, we need to do this, and we need to do it now. If you don’t want to come…”
“I’ll come,” I said grimly, my heart pounding. “Fuck it.”
***
Dmitri had a sad history. As a child living in Ukraine, he had been kidnapped by an insane neighbor and kept in a dirt pit outside for weeks, wallowing in his own piss and shit, slowly starving. He said the man would throw down a stale crust of bread or a rice cake into the mud and human waste every few days. Dmitri would pull the food out, wipe off the feces and eat it. I shuddered, remembering the horror stories he had told me. I knew he had a personal reason for making sure Anna was not subjected to the same endless suffering, even if it meant his own death.
The bear and the pig-creature had left a clear trail of broken brush and snapped twigs snaking through the forest. Side by side, we moved cautiously ahead, constantly checking our backs. But we saw no signs of movement and heard nothing. Up ahead, the trees abruptly opened up, letting golden sunlight stream down. Blinking quickly, we left the forest behind.
We walked out into a field in the middle of a valley surrounded by tall, dark hills. Grass and weeds rippled in waves as the wind swept past us.
Formed in a semi-circle in front of us, human skeletons lay endlessly dreaming. They stared up into the vast blue sky with grinning skulls and empty sockets. Some still had putrefying strips of flesh and ligaments clinging to the bones. Animals had scattered some of the bodies, but others lay complete, like corpses in a tomb. Human skulls, leg bones and arm bones lay scattered haphazardly across the field, their surfaces yellowed and cracked with age. It looked like a bone orchard.
“What are we looking at right now?” I whispered, furtively glancing around at the field of bones. An insane part of my mind wondered if they might rise from the dead and come after us. Compared to what we had already seen in this place of nightmares, it didn’t seem that far-fetched.
“Dead bodies,” Dmitri said grimly.
“Victims of the nuclear accident?” I asked. He shook his head, pointing at some of the fresher corpses nearby. Their throats looked like they had been ripped out, the bones of their necks showing deep bite marks. The one nearest us had its skeletal fingers wrapped around a glass bottle with a piece of paper rolled inside and a cork inserted into the top.
I knelt down, prying the fingers back with soft, cracking noises. I uncorked it and took out the paper. It felt thick in my hands, like some kind of hand-crafted paper from the old days. The cursive flowing across the sheet looked like it had been written in a quill pen with actual ink. In confusion, I read the letter aloud:
“Rules to survive in the Helskin Nature Preserve:
“1. The cult known as the Golden Butchers has been kidnapping women to breed them with the pig-creatures. They worship the offspring that result from these unions as gods. If a member of your group gets taken, you will find them in the living farm at the end of the forest.
“2. If you encounter Mr. Welcome, the enormous pig god with the eyes on his forehead, you must not let him touch you.
“3. The red snakes can only see while you’re moving. If you encounter them, stay still. Don’t even breathe.”
“Breeding women with pig-creatures?!” Dmitri cried, horror washing over his face. “We need to find her! But where do we even start?” I looked through the field, trying to see any sign of tracks, but it looked like hundreds of animals had gone through this field recently. Paths of tall, crushed grass crisscrossed the enormous length of it, some of them worn down to black dirt and stones. I just shook my head, having no idea.
A distant scream rolled its way down the surrounding hills. It came from our left and sounded very much like Anna. Dmitri’s eyes turned cold. Without looking back at me, he started frantically running towards the sound. It faded away within seconds.
“Wait up!” I cried, sprinting as fast as I could. His freshly-shaved head gleamed as he disappeared into the trees. Gripping the open buck knife in my hand, my knuckles white with tension and fear, I followed after him.
***
We wandered for hours through the woods, never hearing a second scream to guide our path. We both hoped that we were going in the right direction. A small deer trail winding through the brush opened up, heading up rocky hills and clear streams of water.
Sweating and nervous, we traveled for miles and miles, rarely talking. A few times, I tried to get Dmitri to slow down.
“How do you know you’re going in the right direction?” I asked. “We’ve been walking this trail for five hours and haven’t seen a thing.”
“This was the direction the scream came from,” he said weakly. “Where else would they go? They would want to travel quickly with a hostage. They would take a trail.” I didn’t point out that there may be other trails, that we had absolutely no idea where we were going.
As we reached the peak of a mountain, I pulled a small, portable Geiger counter we had taken along for the trip. The radioactivity here was high, much higher than normal background radiation. I didn’t know how far we were from the nuclear power plant at the center of all this, but at a certain point, it would become too dangerous to keep moving forward.
Dmitri was next to me, chugging a bottle of water when a shriek rang out below us. It sounded almost animalistic but had a strange, electronic distortion. Amplified to an ear-splitting cacophony, it echoed through the trees. Much quieter roars answered from the forests all around us in response, the cries of bears and other predators. These sounded much closer, however.
“Pssst,” a pile of thick ferns said to my left, shaking suddenly. In Ukrainian, the ferns continued by whispering, “Hey, you!” I jumped, swinging the knife in the direction of the brush, watching the blade shake wildly in my hand as fresh waves of adrenaline surged through my body. Dmitri was by my side, his eyes wide and wild. He glanced over at me, nodding. He had the tire iron raised like a tennis racket, ready to strike. A moment later, a little boy crawled out.
He was scarecrow thin, his face smudged with dirt and filth, his dark eyes sunken and lifeless deep inside his small head. He had black hair and a nose like a little twisted lump in the center of his face. It seemed like it had been repeatedly broken. He didn’t look older than ten, but he looked so emaciated that it was impossible to say. The rags and tatters he wore barely covered his body, and the boy was almost in his Genesis suit.
“Come out,” I said grimly. Dmitri’s eyes bulged from his head.
“Don’t kill me, please,” the boy whispered in a cracked, choked voice, his accent giving all his words a guttural tone. “Take me out of here. My Mom and Dad brought me here, they were part of the Golden Butchers, but a couple months ago, they got sick and died from all the poison in the water and food.”
“Who are you, kid?” Dmitri said, reaching down and pulling him up to his feet. I watched the boy closely, the bear mace in one hand and the knife in the other, looking for any sign of sudden violence or betrayal.
“My name is Pilip. I come from the farm,” he said, pointing vaguely towards the tallest peak in the area. “You can’t see it from here, but it’s over there.” Dmitri kneeled down until he was eye-to-eye with Pilip.
“Can you take us there?” he said. Pilip’s eyes teared up, but he slowly nodded.
“If you will take me with you when you leave, I’ll show you,” he said, crying now, “but it is a horrible place. It is the place of Mr. Welcome.”
***
Pilip guided us to the living farm, saving us a great deal of time. He navigated the forest like an experienced hiker, seeming to know the entire area from the smallest clues: a split, fallen tree, or a tree with a whorl like an eye, or a sudden curve in a babbling brook. It saved us a great deal of time wandering through the woods, where everything looked exactly the same to me.
“There,” he said, pointing through a break in the trees to the farm. The entire top of the hill was cleared of trees and brush. In its place stood a nightmare.
The farm was the closest place to Hell I have ever seen. The top of the living building peeked over the tall trees surrounding it. It had something like a bell tower on the top of it, almost like a church might have. But instead of a bell, it had an enormous, blood-shot eye.
The eye had an iris as red as a dismembered heart. Its pupil was dilated and insane. From here, the eye looked to be about the size of a church bell and had no eyelids. Strange white filaments like those of a slime mold surrounded it, trailing down into the building. I wondered if this was the optic nerve for the great, staring eye.
The rest of the building was as black as eternity, windowless and imposing. It had a brutalist architecture, all sharp angles and steep slopes. I watched the building and the eye closely. To my horror, I realized that the entire thing was alive somehow. The eye constantly spun in its place, staring out over the surrounding hills like the Eye of Sauron. The building constantly breathed.
“Welcome!” a hushed, distorted voice cried. The words seemed to come from the breathing and living walls of the farm itself. “Welcome! Wellllll-come…”
“What the fuck is this, kid?” Dmitri whispered hoarsely. “Where’s Anna?” Pilip shook his head sadly.
“She’s inside with the other breeders,” he said, the fear and terror evident on his face. “They keep them chained in cages or bound in the basement until the time for the ritual comes.”
“And when is that?” I asked. He looked up at the sky and the fading light. We had somehow wasted nearly an entire day already. Night was coming, and we hadn’t even seen Anna yet.
“At sunset,” he responded. Dmitri nearly jumped up at that.
“Sunset?! That’s almost here! We need to go now!” he cried. I almost wanted to laugh.
“What are you going to do, stab that enormous building with your knife?” I whispered. “We need a plan. Maybe we can burn it down or…” But my words were cut off by the roaring of the building. Its scream echoed over the hills. It was immediately answered by countless others, including one that came only a few dozen feet behind us. I grabbed Dmitri’s shoulder, my panicked eyes flicking in that direction.
“There’s something…” I started to say when the brush cracked under a heavy weight. Looking up, I saw something horrible stalking us from behind.
It looked like a pig, walking on all fours with a fat, bloated body, but it was the size of an SUV. Its eyes were like the eye in the building, blood-red and dilated. All over its body, hundreds of sharp teeth grew out of its skin, covering the pink flesh like tumors. The creature almost looked like a porcupine with all the sharp points of fangs projecting from its body.
For a moment, its eyes widened as we stared at each other. They instantly narrowed as the pig roared again and gave chase. It gnashed its teeth, opening and closing its mouth in a frenzy of bloodlust. In its mouth, too, the teeth grew wild. Hundreds of razor-sharp teeth of different sizes grew from its gums, tongue and lips.
“Run!” I cried, grabbing Pilip’s arm and hauling him off the ground. The boy had a natural survivor’s instincts and immediately started running by my side, away from the approaching creature.
We broke out into the massive clearing where the living farm stood. I saw that the building had only a single door in and out, a black barn door that stood wide open. I heard Dmitri’s feet pounding the ground behind me. The heavy thuds of the approaching creature drew louder by the second.
“In the barn!” I cried, not having time to think. It was the only possible place of safety here. I sprinted faster than I ever had before towards those doors as if they were entrance to paradise itself. Without slowing, I ran into the building, trying to slam one of the doors shut behind me. Dmitri grabbed the other. With the creature only seconds away, they started swinging shut. Pilip’s small body pressed against my leg as he came forward, using his meager strength to help me.
The door was extremely heavy and hard to move. The building itself looked like it was six or seven stories tall, and the doors to the barn nearly a-third of that height. With a tortured creak, they slammed shut. A single breath later, something heavy thudded against the other size, as if it had been hit by a battering ram. But the door held. Quickly, Dmitri and I grabbed a large board leaning against the wall and stuffed it into the brackets on both sides of the door, locking it from the inside.
I noticed how cool and dark it was in here, as if I had walked into a cave. I turned, taking in the interior of the living farm for the first time. At that moment, I had to repress a scream welling up in my throat.
***
Hundreds of imprisoned women both lined both sides of the barn. They were stacked one on top of another like prison cells. Wearing filthy, blood-stained rags, most of them looked silently down on us with dead, haunted eyes. I noticed the majority were in their twenties or thirties, but their eyes looked centuries old.
Along the back wall, an enormous pig lined the wall, positioned like Jesus on the cross. It stood as tall as the barn itself. Extra eyes covered its face, a dozen of them positioned all over its cheeks and forehead. From the top of its head, I saw white filaments rising up into the bell tower. Its many blood-red eyes focused on us, as still as death.
“Welcome,” it hissed. “Welcome!” Its limbs were chained to the wall. Enormous rusted links intertwined around its body, preventing Mr. Welcome from moving.
“Anna?!” Dmitri cried, looking around frantically. There was no one else here that I could see except for Mr. Welcome and all the hostages. “Anna, where are you?!”
“Don’t scream,” Pilip said in a tiny, fear-choked voice. “Please, don’t scream…”
But it was too late. As Dmitri’s last words faded, trapdoors built into the black floor of the barn sprung open. Dozens of mutated bears and pig-creatures crept out, their predatory eyes scanning us with hunger and anger.
***
“Fuck!” Dmitri cried, running back to the door at my side. Frantically, the three of us pulled the board up and dropped it to the fleshy floor with a clatter. As hisses and growls erupted all around us and the predators creeped forwards towards us in a semi-circle, the barn door flew open.
It was night now, the darkness creeping in like a descending curtain. No pig creatures awaited us on the other side, but something worse seemed to be creeping out of the forest.
I saw snakes the color of clotted blood slithering ahead. Each one was the size of a tractor-trailer, yet they made very little noise. An occasional hiss would rip its way through the air, but they hunted silently.
As I stood in the field in front of the barn, a no-man’s land of hellish proportions, the certainty of death fell over my heart like grasping skeletal hands. I looked down at the little boy sadly. He gave me a faint smile, even though his eyes were terrified.
“I think we’re fucked,” Dmitri whispered by my side. I only nodded.
***
But at that moment, I remembered the rules, and an idea came to me.
“Just stay still,” I said. “Don’t even breathe.” Pilip and Dmitri looked at me strangely, then recognition came over their eyes. Dmitri only nodded, and then we all played statue.
The predators from the barn were only thirty feet behind us by now, crouched down and hunting us like a cat with a mouse. Yet the snakes also closed in, their black, slitted eyes gleaming with a reptilian coldness. As the mutated bears and pig creatures leaned down to pounce, I closed my eyes, waiting for the inevitable.
I felt a sudden rush of air all around me. The snakes flitted forward in a blur, their massive jaws unhinging. Two fangs swiveled out like switchblades, fangs big enough to impale a police car. Drops of clear venom fell lazily from the ends.
Keeping my eyes closed, afraid to even breathe or blink, I listened as the sounds of tearing flesh and screaming animals resonated all around me. After about thirty seconds of this, everything went deathly silent.
***
I don’t know how long we stood there like statues, but eventually, someone touched my shoulder. I opened my eyes, unbelieving. Dmitri stared at me intently.
“They’re all gone,” he whispered. “All except Mr. Welcome. It’s now or never.” I nodded, and together, we moved into the farm.
The trapdoors still lay open. I could hear very faint sobbing coming from under the building. Dmitri was afraid to make a sound. Together, the three of us went down to investigate.
We found a dark basement covered in hay. Torture tools covered the walls: iron maidens, brazen bulls, crosses and an entire universe of whips, saws, grinders, pliers, razor-wire and other blood-stained tools of the trade. In the corner, we saw Anna, her hands tied to the wall. More rope bound her feet and legs. We ran forward. When Anna saw Dmitri, she collapsed into a nervous wreck.
“Oh my God, you came! Please, get me out of here, right now,” she whispered. “They’re coming. The ritual will start soon.” Without a word, we started cutting the ropes, freeing her quickly.
“We need to be as quiet as possible,” I told Anna. “We can all get out of here. Let’s go.”
***
As we ascended from the basement back to the main floor of the living farm, the repetitive, metallic voice of Mr. Welcome kept repeating the same insane mantra.
“Welcome,” it said. “Welcome!” Once the four of us were all together, however, it changed.
“Welcome, thieves,” it hissed, its voice deepening and turning into a demonic gurgle. “That is my breeder. You will have to find out what happens to thieves.” I could only imagine all those blood-stained tools in the basement, and I shuddered.
Mr. Welcome inhaled deeply, his massive, fleshy body ballooning. With a predatory roar, he ripped the chains out of the wall of the living building. Orange pus and dark, clotted blood dripped from the holes. The barn breathed faster and deeper, the broken walls vibrating and shimmering as new life and pain flowed into them.
Mr. Welcome started moving towards us like a grinding juggernaut, walking on two legs like some sort of pig god. His many lidless eyes never looked away from us. The frayed optic nerves leading to the bell tower broke with a sound like snapping rubber bands. Dmitri looked at me with great sadness in his eyes.
“Get away,” he whispered. “I’ll distract it. Just get Anna home, no matter what.” Before I could respond, he ran forwards towards the abomination, the small, useless knife raised in one hand.
Mr. Welcome saw him coming. He tried to swipe at Dmitri with a sharp, black hoove, but Dmitri ducked, running around the back of him. He gave a battle-cry and started stabbing the monster in the back of the leg, which probably hurt it about as much as a toothpick.
But it provided a distraction. This time, Mr. Welcome spun his whole body, falling back to all four legs to deal with this nuisance. He used his massive snout to smack Dmitri hard, sending him flying across the barn. He hit the wall with a bone-shattering thud.
Dmitri’s skin immediately started to blacken, as if he were being burned alive. His eyes melted out of his face as he screamed, clawing at the dying patches of necrotic tissue spreading across his body. Within a few seconds, his screams faded to agonized groans. He tried to crawl back towards us as he died.
“Run!” I screamed, grabbing Anna’s hand and forcing her to sprint by my side. Pilip was already one step ahead of us, frantically trying to reach the shelter of the forest. I heard the ground shake behind me as Mr. Welcome drew near, moving much faster than we could ever hope to go. I knew we would never make it.
“Keep going, no matter what!” I yelled at Pilip and Anna. They kept running, the animal instinct to survive now foremost in their minds. I had to suppress mine. I turned to face the creature, the evil pig god known as Mr. Welcome.
***
In hindsight, I don’t know if God or some divine power had interceded, but the bear mace was probably one of the few items that could have saved us at that moment. Mr. Welcome had many eyes, and now that he was running on all four paws, his face was within reach. As my heart palpitated wildly, I raised the bear mace and sprayed at his dozen eyes. He didn’t slow, and I had to jump to the side to keep from being trampled. The air whooshed past me as if a subway car had gone by.
But a moment later, Mr. Welcome gave a roar- and not one of anger and hunger. This was a roar of pain and uncertainty. Blinded, Mr. Welcome frantically started running in circles, knocking down huge swathes of trees. The ear-splitting racket as he pulled the forest apart crashed over the surrounding landscape. Without a moment of hesitation, I turned to follow Pilip and Anna back to the car.
We told the police about the barn and all the hostages, but they claimed they couldn’t find it, and we never heard anything more about it.
***
Looking back on the experience, I now know why Chernobyl is a restricted zone, and it isn’t just because of the radioactivity. There are some things that hide under the surface, after all- things that grow in the dark, rotted places where no eyes roam.

The area where we were heading in Eastern Europe was known for its radioactivity. We had received reports of strange animals, things that looked like they were hatched from a mad scientist’s laboratory. I didn’t know how much of it I believed, because some of the descriptions the survivors gave sounded more like wendigo and dogmen than any real animal. I figured that, in the heat of the moment and under attack, their minds had likely twisted the true form of the animals, horrifying as they were, into something truly nightmarish.
There were three of us heading into the dark Eastern European forests: my friend Dmitri, who was originally from the country and knew the language, his girlfriend Anna and myself. Everything seemed mundane enough as we flew into the country and handed over our passports. There was no sign of the horrors waiting ahead.
The first towns we encountered looked idyllic enough as we drove through them in a rental car. Isolated farmhouses with cows and chickens dotted the landscape. Plentiful fields of wheat, potatoes and corn stretched out on all sides of us. The black earth here was fertile, I knew. As we headed deeper into the radiation zone, however, the houses and farms all started to look abandoned and dilapidated, the fields barren and dead.
“Christ on a cracker,” I muttered, more to myself than to my friends, “this place looks like it suffered through the Apocalypse.”
“It did,” Dmitri said grimly. “A nuclear apocalypse. I feel like the Biblical one is far more optimistic than the true apocalypse will be. In reality, there will be no Rapture, no victory of light over darkness. If there is ever a World War 3, every major city will be consumed by nuclear fire. It will throw buses and cars thousands of feet into the air, spilling out bodies onto the burning skies. Entire streets will collapse, trapping countless millions under the rubble.”
“That’s a cheerful thought,” Anna commented, her dark blue eyes staring out the window. I saw the reflection of white eyes skittering through the brush outside, small animals that disappeared in front of the approaching roar of the engine.
“How far is it?” I asked, feeling carsick and anxious. The winding roads here curved through countless hills. It reminded me of driving through parts of Northern California before, when I had retched out the window. Anna and Dmitri seemed unaffected, though. I cursed my stomach, which was always turning traitorous towards me.
“It’s a while, man,” Dmitri said. “This country is huge. Probably another three or four hour drive. And then we have to start walking.”
“Good thing we left before dawn,” Anna said, stifling a yawn. She had a can of some cheap Russian Red Bull knock-off, some fluorescent green crap that smelled like chemicals. But she drank it as if it were the finest French wine. I gazed out at the dark forests that passed us on both sides, wondering what kind of sights lay ahead in this land of the damned.
***
The Sun rose early over the gently rolling hills and black earth of Ukraine, sending its rusty streaks of blood across the sky. The going had been easy so far, except for the constant car sickness I felt. I took a few pills of meclizine, wishing that I could have smuggled some weed gummies through customs. But here, cannabis was illegal, and I was not eager to see the inside of an Eastern European prison, where lunatics like the Three Guys One Hammer maniacs and the Chessboard Killer lived in hellish conditions.
“Holy shit, would you look at that?” Dmitri said with awe and wonder oozing from his voice as the car braked abruptly. I looked up quickly, my stomach doing flips. But what I saw laying across the road instantly brought me back to the moment. Dmitri pointed a tattooed hand at the sight.
“Is that real?” Anna asked. I could only shake my head as we all stared at the dead bear that was laying across the cracked road, its dead eyes staring straight through us.
I noticed immediately that the bear had extra paws on its arms. Blood-stained claws jutted sharply out of its four paws, each seeming to have seven fingers. Its feet looked stunted and twisted, like the roots of a tree. An extra arm stuck out of the front of its chest, a pale, white fleshy growth emerging from its sternum. The mutated limb looked malformed and boneless, causing a sense of revulsion to rise up as I gazed on it. It flopped gently in the heavy wind that swirled down the surrounding hills.
“Well, I guess the rumors are true,” Dmitri said slowly, his eyes as wide and excited as a child. “Can you imagine what other kinds of things must be lurking in these forests? This is going to make a really awesome documentary.” Anna nodded, playing with a small, hand-held digital camera she took everywhere with her. She wanted to make a video that would finally go viral on the internet and help her gain some recognition for her work.
“I’m going to record everything, including this,” she said excitedly, brushing a lock of blonde hair behind her ear as she opened the door of the car. Dawn had risen overhead, radiating the first warm rays of a bright summer day. After a long moment, I followed her out. Dmitri stood at her side, his dark eyes wide. He ran a trembling hand over his shaved head as he looked down at the enormous bear.
Anna zoomed in with the camera, kneeling down before the still beast. Her finely-formed fingers shook with excitement as she drew within inches of the corpse. I wondered how the bear had died, as I didn’t see any signs of injuries on the creature’s body. The next moment, I saw it blink.
I backpedaled away, giving a hoarse, guttural shout of warning. Anna was busy staring at the screen of the digital camera, scanning it across the bear’s extra fingers and limbs. But the panic that swept over Dmitri’s face showed me that he, too, had seen it. He grabbed Anna’s arm, dragging her back with sudden fury. She stumbled, her legs crossing under her. She crashed into him and they fell back together. A moment later, the bear came to life, its bones cracking as it twisted its head to look at the three of us.
It swiped a mutated paw at the place where Anna’s face had been only a moment before. I heard the sharp claws slice through the air like switchblades. The bear’s head ratcheted over to glare at us. It gnashed its teeth as silver streams of saliva flew from its shaking head. With a primal roar, it leapt off the ground. I turned to run back to the safety of the car, but I nearly tripped when a pale figure streaked out of the forest right in front of me.
It looked like something conjured up in a nightmare. It was naked and bloated, its skin white with bulging, pink cheeks. It looked to have a combination of human and pig features, and yet it ran upright like a person. Its irises were blood-red, its pupils huge and excited. Its beady eyes flicked over to Anna and a low, satisfied growl erupted from its wide throat. I watched the muscles work furiously in its porcine body as it sprinted towards her.
Before either Dmitri or I could react, the pig-thing grabbed Anna around the neck, its sharp, black fingers digging deeply into her skin. She squealed like a strangled rabbit as it dragged her away into the dark Ukrainian forests. Its pink lips pulled back in an excited grimace, revealing the sharp fangs underneath. I heard its guttural growls fade away rapidly. It sprinted much faster than a person, its hooves slamming the ground over and over at a superhuman speed.
“Hey!” Dmitri called excitedly, taking a step forward. “What do you…” A giant bear paw with too many gleaming claws smacked his leg out from under him, sending him flying. I only stood there, shell-shocked and amazed, as Anna disappeared into the trees.
A single moment later, the bear rose to its full height, roaring at us. Streams of spit flew from its mouth as its rancid breath washed over us, breath that emanated a smell like roadkill and infection. I put my hands up, flinching, expecting a blow that never came. When I looked up, the bear had gone back on all fours. It ran in the path the pig-creature had gone, its white, boneless extra limb hanging limply from its chest.
“What the fuck!” Dmitri cried on the ground, rocking back and forth. I came back to life, running over to his side. I saw deep gouge marks sliced through his blue jeans. Bright streams of blood lazily dripped from the claw marks on his left leg.
“We need to get help,” I cried, shaking him. His eyes looked faraway and confused, as if he didn’t fully realize what was happening. “We need to go back and get the police.”
“The police?” he asked, laughing. “The police here won’t do anything. You think they’re going to travel out into the radioactivity zone just for a missing person?” He shook his head grimly before reaching out a hand to me. “Help me up. There’s a first aid kit in the car. We need to bandage this up. Then we’re going after Anna.”
***
We had no way to call for help. The phones this far out in Chernobyl didn’t work, and there were never any cell phone towers built in the silent land. After Dmitri had disinfected and bandaged his legs, he rummaged through the trunk, looking for weapons.
“God damn, there’s nothing good here,” he said despondently. “Some bear mace, some knives… what good is any of that going to do against these mutated monsters? We need an AK-47.” I nodded in agreement.
“Too bad we’re not in the US,” I said. “The only guns you’re going to get around here are the ones you take off the bodies of Russian soldiers.”
“Yeah, if only,” he muttered sadly, handing me a large folding knife. “We have one canister of bear mace, three knives and a tire iron. Not exactly an arsenal.” I really didn’t want to go into those dark woods, but thinking of Anna being tortured or murdered made me feel sick and weak. I shook my head, mentally torn.
“Here, take the bear mace, too. I’ll take the tire iron and a knife,” he continued, forcing the black canister into my numb fingers. “You ready for this?”
“Absolutely not,” I said. “I think we should try to find help. If we both go out there and get slaughtered, no one will ever find Anna.”
“The nearest town is two hours west of here,” he responded icily. “By the time we get help, her trail will have gone cold. It will take at least five or six hours to get any rescue out here. No, we need to do this, and we need to do it now. If you don’t want to come…”
“I’ll come,” I said grimly, my heart pounding. “Fuck it.”
***
Dmitri had a sad history. As a child living in Ukraine, he had been kidnapped by an insane neighbor and kept in a dirt pit outside for weeks, wallowing in his own piss and shit, slowly starving. He said the man would throw down a stale crust of bread or a rice cake into the mud and human waste every few days. Dmitri would pull the food out, wipe off the feces and eat it. I shuddered, remembering the horror stories he had told me. I knew he had a personal reason for making sure Anna was not subjected to the same endless suffering, even if it meant his own death.
The bear and the pig-creature had left a clear trail of broken brush and snapped twigs snaking through the forest. Side by side, we moved cautiously ahead, constantly checking our backs. But we saw no signs of movement and heard nothing. Up ahead, the trees abruptly opened up, letting golden sunlight stream down. Blinking quickly, we left the forest behind.
We walked out into a field in the middle of a valley surrounded by tall, dark hills. Grass and weeds rippled in waves as the wind swept past us.
Formed in a semi-circle in front of us, human skeletons lay endlessly dreaming. They stared up into the vast blue sky with grinning skulls and empty sockets. Some still had putrefying strips of flesh and ligaments clinging to the bones. Animals had scattered some of the bodies, but others lay complete, like corpses in a tomb. Human skulls, leg bones and arm bones lay scattered haphazardly across the field, their surfaces yellowed and cracked with age. It looked like a bone orchard.
“What are we looking at right now?” I whispered, furtively glancing around at the field of bones. An insane part of my mind wondered if they might rise from the dead and come after us. Compared to what we had already seen in this place of nightmares, it didn’t seem that far-fetched.
“Dead bodies,” Dmitri said grimly.
“Victims of the nuclear accident?” I asked. He shook his head, pointing at some of the fresher corpses nearby. Their throats looked like they had been ripped out, the bones of their necks showing deep bite marks. The one nearest us had its skeletal fingers wrapped around a glass bottle with a piece of paper rolled inside and a cork inserted into the top.
I knelt down, prying the fingers back with soft, cracking noises. I uncorked it and took out the paper. It felt thick in my hands, like some kind of hand-crafted paper from the old days. The cursive flowing across the sheet looked like it had been written in a quill pen with actual ink. In confusion, I read the letter aloud:
“Rules to survive in the Helskin Nature Preserve:
“1. The cult known as the Golden Butchers has been kidnapping women to breed them with the pig-creatures. They worship the offspring that result from these unions as gods. If a member of your group gets taken, you will find them in the living farm at the end of the forest.
“2. If you encounter Mr. Welcome, the enormous pig god with the eyes on his forehead, you must not let him touch you.
“3. The red snakes can only see while you’re moving. If you encounter them, stay still. Don’t even breathe.”
“Breeding women with pig-creatures?!” Dmitri cried, horror washing over his face. “We need to find her! But where do we even start?” I looked through the field, trying to see any sign of tracks, but it looked like hundreds of animals had gone through this field recently. Paths of tall, crushed grass crisscrossed the enormous length of it, some of them worn down to black dirt and stones. I just shook my head, having no idea.
A distant scream rolled its way down the surrounding hills. It came from our left and sounded very much like Anna. Dmitri’s eyes turned cold. Without looking back at me, he started frantically running towards the sound. It faded away within seconds.
“Wait up!” I cried, sprinting as fast as I could. His freshly-shaved head gleamed as he disappeared into the trees. Gripping the open buck knife in my hand, my knuckles white with tension and fear, I followed after him.
***
We wandered for hours through the woods, never hearing a second scream to guide our path. We both hoped that we were going in the right direction. A small deer trail winding through the brush opened up, heading up rocky hills and clear streams of water.
Sweating and nervous, we traveled for miles and miles, rarely talking. A few times, I tried to get Dmitri to slow down.
“How do you know you’re going in the right direction?” I asked. “We’ve been walking this trail for five hours and haven’t seen a thing.”
“This was the direction the scream came from,” he said weakly. “Where else would they go? They would want to travel quickly with a hostage. They would take a trail.” I didn’t point out that there may be other trails, that we had absolutely no idea where we were going.
As we reached the peak of a mountain, I pulled a small, portable Geiger counter we had taken along for the trip. The radioactivity here was high, much higher than normal background radiation. I didn’t know how far we were from the nuclear power plant at the center of all this, but at a certain point, it would become too dangerous to keep moving forward.
Dmitri was next to me, chugging a bottle of water when a shriek rang out below us. It sounded almost animalistic but had a strange, electronic distortion. Amplified to an ear-splitting cacophony, it echoed through the trees. Much quieter roars answered from the forests all around us in response, the cries of bears and other predators. These sounded much closer, however.
“Pssst,” a pile of thick ferns said to my left, shaking suddenly. In Ukrainian, the ferns continued by whispering, “Hey, you!” I jumped, swinging the knife in the direction of the brush, watching the blade shake wildly in my hand as fresh waves of adrenaline surged through my body. Dmitri was by my side, his eyes wide and wild. He glanced over at me, nodding. He had the tire iron raised like a tennis racket, ready to strike. A moment later, a little boy crawled out.
He was scarecrow thin, his face smudged with dirt and filth, his dark eyes sunken and lifeless deep inside his small head. He had black hair and a nose like a little twisted lump in the center of his face. It seemed like it had been repeatedly broken. He didn’t look older than ten, but he looked so emaciated that it was impossible to say. The rags and tatters he wore barely covered his body, and the boy was almost in his Genesis suit.
“Come out,” I said grimly. Dmitri’s eyes bulged from his head.
“Don’t kill me, please,” the boy whispered in a cracked, choked voice, his accent giving all his words a guttural tone. “Take me out of here. My Mom and Dad brought me here, they were part of the Golden Butchers, but a couple months ago, they got sick and died from all the poison in the water and food.”
“Who are you, kid?” Dmitri said, reaching down and pulling him up to his feet. I watched the boy closely, the bear mace in one hand and the knife in the other, looking for any sign of sudden violence or betrayal.
“My name is Pilip. I come from the farm,” he said, pointing vaguely towards the tallest peak in the area. “You can’t see it from here, but it’s over there.” Dmitri kneeled down until he was eye-to-eye with Pilip.
“Can you take us there?” he said. Pilip’s eyes teared up, but he slowly nodded.
“If you will take me with you when you leave, I’ll show you,” he said, crying now, “but it is a horrible place. It is the place of Mr. Welcome.”
***
Pilip guided us to the living farm, saving us a great deal of time. He navigated the forest like an experienced hiker, seeming to know the entire area from the smallest clues: a split, fallen tree, or a tree with a whorl like an eye, or a sudden curve in a babbling brook. It saved us a great deal of time wandering through the woods, where everything looked exactly the same to me.
“There,” he said, pointing through a break in the trees to the farm. The entire top of the hill was cleared of trees and brush. In its place stood a nightmare.
The farm was the closest place to Hell I have ever seen. The top of the living building peeked over the tall trees surrounding it. It had something like a bell tower on the top of it, almost like a church might have. But instead of a bell, it had an enormous, blood-shot eye.
The eye had an iris as red as a dismembered heart. Its pupil was dilated and insane. From here, the eye looked to be about the size of a church bell and had no eyelids. Strange white filaments like those of a slime mold surrounded it, trailing down into the building. I wondered if this was the optic nerve for the great, staring eye.
The rest of the building was as black as eternity, windowless and imposing. It had a brutalist architecture, all sharp angles and steep slopes. I watched the building and the eye closely. To my horror, I realized that the entire thing was alive somehow. The eye constantly spun in its place, staring out over the surrounding hills like the Eye of Sauron. The building constantly breathed.
“Welcome!” a hushed, distorted voice cried. The words seemed to come from the breathing and living walls of the farm itself. “Welcome! Wellllll-come…”
“What the fuck is this, kid?” Dmitri whispered hoarsely. “Where’s Anna?” Pilip shook his head sadly.
“She’s inside with the other breeders,” he said, the fear and terror evident on his face. “They keep them chained in cages or bound in the basement until the time for the ritual comes.”
“And when is that?” I asked. He looked up at the sky and the fading light. We had somehow wasted nearly an entire day already. Night was coming, and we hadn’t even seen Anna yet.
“At sunset,” he responded. Dmitri nearly jumped up at that.
“Sunset?! That’s almost here! We need to go now!” he cried. I almost wanted to laugh.
“What are you going to do, stab that enormous building with your knife?” I whispered. “We need a plan. Maybe we can burn it down or…” But my words were cut off by the roaring of the building. Its scream echoed over the hills. It was immediately answered by countless others, including one that came only a few dozen feet behind us. I grabbed Dmitri’s shoulder, my panicked eyes flicking in that direction.
“There’s something…” I started to say when the brush cracked under a heavy weight. Looking up, I saw something horrible stalking us from behind.
It looked like a pig, walking on all fours with a fat, bloated body, but it was the size of an SUV. Its eyes were like the eye in the building, blood-red and dilated. All over its body, hundreds of sharp teeth grew out of its skin, covering the pink flesh like tumors. The creature almost looked like a porcupine with all the sharp points of fangs projecting from its body.
For a moment, its eyes widened as we stared at each other. They instantly narrowed as the pig roared again and gave chase. It gnashed its teeth, opening and closing its mouth in a frenzy of bloodlust. In its mouth, too, the teeth grew wild. Hundreds of razor-sharp teeth of different sizes grew from its gums, tongue and lips.
“Run!” I cried, grabbing Pilip’s arm and hauling him off the ground. The boy had a natural survivor’s instincts and immediately started running by my side, away from the approaching creature.
We broke out into the massive clearing where the living farm stood. I saw that the building had only a single door in and out, a black barn door that stood wide open. I heard Dmitri’s feet pounding the ground behind me. The heavy thuds of the approaching creature drew louder by the second.
“In the barn!” I cried, not having time to think. It was the only possible place of safety here. I sprinted faster than I ever had before towards those doors as if they were entrance to paradise itself. Without slowing, I ran into the building, trying to slam one of the doors shut behind me. Dmitri grabbed the other. With the creature only seconds away, they started swinging shut. Pilip’s small body pressed against my leg as he came forward, using his meager strength to help me.
The door was extremely heavy and hard to move. The building itself looked like it was six or seven stories tall, and the doors to the barn nearly a-third of that height. With a tortured creak, they slammed shut. A single breath later, something heavy thudded against the other size, as if it had been hit by a battering ram. But the door held. Quickly, Dmitri and I grabbed a large board leaning against the wall and stuffed it into the brackets on both sides of the door, locking it from the inside.
I noticed how cool and dark it was in here, as if I had walked into a cave. I turned, taking in the interior of the living farm for the first time. At that moment, I had to repress a scream welling up in my throat.
***
Hundreds of imprisoned women both lined both sides of the barn. They were stacked one on top of another like prison cells. Wearing filthy, blood-stained rags, most of them looked silently down on us with dead, haunted eyes. I noticed the majority were in their twenties or thirties, but their eyes looked centuries old.
Along the back wall, an enormous pig lined the wall, positioned like Jesus on the cross. It stood as tall as the barn itself. Extra eyes covered its face, a dozen of them positioned all over its cheeks and forehead. From the top of its head, I saw white filaments rising up into the bell tower. Its many blood-red eyes focused on us, as still as death.
“Welcome,” it hissed. “Welcome!” Its limbs were chained to the wall. Enormous rusted links intertwined around its body, preventing Mr. Welcome from moving.
“Anna?!” Dmitri cried, looking around frantically. There was no one else here that I could see except for Mr. Welcome and all the hostages. “Anna, where are you?!”
“Don’t scream,” Pilip said in a tiny, fear-choked voice. “Please, don’t scream…”
But it was too late. As Dmitri’s last words faded, trapdoors built into the black floor of the barn sprung open. Dozens of mutated bears and pig-creatures crept out, their predatory eyes scanning us with hunger and anger.
***
“Fuck!” Dmitri cried, running back to the door at my side. Frantically, the three of us pulled the board up and dropped it to the fleshy floor with a clatter. As hisses and growls erupted all around us and the predators creeped forwards towards us in a semi-circle, the barn door flew open.
It was night now, the darkness creeping in like a descending curtain. No pig creatures awaited us on the other side, but something worse seemed to be creeping out of the forest.
I saw snakes the color of clotted blood slithering ahead. Each one was the size of a tractor-trailer, yet they made very little noise. An occasional hiss would rip its way through the air, but they hunted silently.
As I stood in the field in front of the barn, a no-man’s land of hellish proportions, the certainty of death fell over my heart like grasping skeletal hands. I looked down at the little boy sadly. He gave me a faint smile, even though his eyes were terrified.
“I think we’re fucked,” Dmitri whispered by my side. I only nodded.
***
But at that moment, I remembered the rules, and an idea came to me.
“Just stay still,” I said. “Don’t even breathe.” Pilip and Dmitri looked at me strangely, then recognition came over their eyes. Dmitri only nodded, and then we all played statue.
The predators from the barn were only thirty feet behind us by now, crouched down and hunting us like a cat with a mouse. Yet the snakes also closed in, their black, slitted eyes gleaming with a reptilian coldness. As the mutated bears and pig creatures leaned down to pounce, I closed my eyes, waiting for the inevitable.
I felt a sudden rush of air all around me. The snakes flitted forward in a blur, their massive jaws unhinging. Two fangs swiveled out like switchblades, fangs big enough to impale a police car. Drops of clear venom fell lazily from the ends.
Keeping my eyes closed, afraid to even breathe or blink, I listened as the sounds of tearing flesh and screaming animals resonated all around me. After about thirty seconds of this, everything went deathly silent.
***
I don’t know how long we stood there like statues, but eventually, someone touched my shoulder. I opened my eyes, unbelieving. Dmitri stared at me intently.
“They’re all gone,” he whispered. “All except Mr. Welcome. It’s now or never.” I nodded, and together, we moved into the farm.
The trapdoors still lay open. I could hear very faint sobbing coming from under the building. Dmitri was afraid to make a sound. Together, the three of us went down to investigate.
We found a dark basement covered in hay. Torture tools covered the walls: iron maidens, brazen bulls, crosses and an entire universe of whips, saws, grinders, pliers, razor-wire and other blood-stained tools of the trade. In the corner, we saw Anna, her hands tied to the wall. More rope bound her feet and legs. We ran forward. When Anna saw Dmitri, she collapsed into a nervous wreck.
“Oh my God, you came! Please, get me out of here, right now,” she whispered. “They’re coming. The ritual will start soon.” Without a word, we started cutting the ropes, freeing her quickly.
“We need to be as quiet as possible,” I told Anna. “We can all get out of here. Let’s go.”
***
As we ascended from the basement back to the main floor of the living farm, the repetitive, metallic voice of Mr. Welcome kept repeating the same insane mantra.
“Welcome,” it said. “Welcome!” Once the four of us were all together, however, it changed.
“Welcome, thieves,” it hissed, its voice deepening and turning into a demonic gurgle. “That is my breeder. You will have to find out what happens to thieves.” I could only imagine all those blood-stained tools in the basement, and I shuddered.
Mr. Welcome inhaled deeply, his massive, fleshy body ballooning. With a predatory roar, he ripped the chains out of the wall of the living building. Orange pus and dark, clotted blood dripped from the holes. The barn breathed faster and deeper, the broken walls vibrating and shimmering as new life and pain flowed into them.
Mr. Welcome started moving towards us like a grinding juggernaut, walking on two legs like some sort of pig god. His many lidless eyes never looked away from us. The frayed optic nerves leading to the bell tower broke with a sound like snapping rubber bands. Dmitri looked at me with great sadness in his eyes.
“Get away,” he whispered. “I’ll distract it. Just get Anna home, no matter what.” Before I could respond, he ran forwards towards the abomination, the small, useless knife raised in one hand.
Mr. Welcome saw him coming. He tried to swipe at Dmitri with a sharp, black hoove, but Dmitri ducked, running around the back of him. He gave a battle-cry and started stabbing the monster in the back of the leg, which probably hurt it about as much as a toothpick.
But it provided a distraction. This time, Mr. Welcome spun his whole body, falling back to all four legs to deal with this nuisance. He used his massive snout to smack Dmitri hard, sending him flying across the barn. He hit the wall with a bone-shattering thud.
Dmitri’s skin immediately started to blacken, as if he were being burned alive. His eyes melted out of his face as he screamed, clawing at the dying patches of necrotic tissue spreading across his body. Within a few seconds, his screams faded to agonized groans. He tried to crawl back towards us as he died.
“Run!” I screamed, grabbing Anna’s hand and forcing her to sprint by my side. Pilip was already one step ahead of us, frantically trying to reach the shelter of the forest. I heard the ground shake behind me as Mr. Welcome drew near, moving much faster than we could ever hope to go. I knew we would never make it.
“Keep going, no matter what!” I yelled at Pilip and Anna. They kept running, the animal instinct to survive now foremost in their minds. I had to suppress mine. I turned to face the creature, the evil pig god known as Mr. Welcome.
***
In hindsight, I don’t know if God or some divine power had interceded, but the bear mace was probably one of the few items that could have saved us at that moment. Mr. Welcome had many eyes, and now that he was running on all four paws, his face was within reach. As my heart palpitated wildly, I raised the bear mace and sprayed at his dozen eyes. He didn’t slow, and I had to jump to the side to keep from being trampled. The air whooshed past me as if a subway car had gone by.
But a moment later, Mr. Welcome gave a roar- and not one of anger and hunger. This was a roar of pain and uncertainty. Blinded, Mr. Welcome frantically started running in circles, knocking down huge swathes of trees. The ear-splitting racket as he pulled the forest apart crashed over the surrounding landscape. Without a moment of hesitation, I turned to follow Pilip and Anna back to the car.
We told the police about the barn and all the hostages, but they claimed they couldn’t find it, and we never heard anything more about it.
***
Looking back on the experience, I now know why Chernobyl is a restricted zone, and it isn’t just because of the radioactivity. There are some things that hide under the surface, after all- things that grow in the dark, rotted places where no eyes roam.