Dr. Thomas Binder made headlines after he was forced into a psychiatric hospital after speaking out against the dangerous and unnecessary globalist COVID narrative. Dr. Binder MD studied medicine at the University of Zurich, received his doctorate in immunology and virology, specialized in internal medicine and cardiology, and has 35 years of clinical experience.
In February 2020, Thomas stood up for the return of real science, medicine and humanity. The result of his vocal opposition to the unscientific and irrational covid poilicies was to be arrested and referred for compulsory psychiatric treatment.
Dr. Thomas Binder later told Dr. Drew last year that he was forcibly hospitalized – and required to take psychiatric medications – for speaking out against pandemic panic and the narrative surrounding COVID-19.

Recently, Dr. Binder called for the abolishment of the World Health Organization, after the botched and extremely dangerous actions and statements during the COVID pandemic.

Dr. Thomas Binder: Dear fellow humans, my name is Thomas Binder. I study medicine in Zurich, obtained a doctorate in Immunology and Virology, specialized in internal medicine and cardiology, and have 35 years of experience in diagnosis and therapy of acute respiratory infections in hospitals, in intensive care units, and in my private practice. While there has never been a pandemic of a killer virus, there was a pandemic of cowards. And do we, doctors, see a pandemic of severe illnesses and of sudden unexpected deaths from heart attack, myocarditis, aortic dissection, stroke and pulmonary embolism, thrombosis and inflammation of other organs, especially with brain and spinal cord, disseminated intravascular coagulation, increased infections, including COVID due to immunosuppression, cancer, autoimmune diseases, infertility, miscarriage, and many more. This modified RNA genocide is the greatest medical crime in human history, a humanitarian disaster of unprecedented proportions. Currently, the pharmaceutical industry is working on transferring all vaccinations to the modified RNA vaccine platform. It is doing so, though just being able to count and to distinguish for and from self, even having a trace of intelligence complications, is enough to realize that the modified RNA vaccine platform is totally nonsensical and life-threatening. Its two fundamental flaws are the injection of the construction plan for a protein foreign to the body without having any control over which body cells will produce it, in what dose and for how long, and the fact that the cells who are coerced to produce this foreign protein and then present it on the surface will be mistakenly recognized by our immune system as foreign, thus destroyed, much like the rejection of a foreign organ transplanted into you. The alleged modified RNA vaccination coerces your body to produce a toxin in an unknown dose, and for an unknown period of time, and literally transforms parts of you into an alien. Therefore, the entire modified RNA vaccine platform must be banned immediately. Your government is currently negotiating a pandemic treaty with the WHO. If it signs it, the WHO will be placed above the constitution of your country, and not only you, but also your government and your parliament will lose all freedom of choice. Who controls the WHO controls the world. The only reasonable, 100% effective and safe prevention of another criminal pandemic is immediate smashing of the WHO into a thousand pieces. Dear fellow humans, if you have been injected once or even several times, and perhaps even suffer from severe side effects of the modified RNA injections, do not despair. More and more responsible doctors are willing to help you, and more and more responsible scientists are researching for, one day, being able to treat even their most complex side effects. I think with the modified RNA injections, it is like with smoking. It is almost never too late to give it up and to live healthier. Whether you were injected or not, wake up, give your spine a booster, stand up and tell the manufacturer, your alleged experts, your government, your parliamentarians, your generals, and your authorities who have, from the point of view of the populace, totally failed in the COVID scandal. Enough is enough! Step back at last and then stand in chorus. Do this, and do this, if not for yourself, then for a future living for your children and grandchildren. Now.

Bravo, Dr. Binder! Enough is Enough
Dr. Binder's. Speech to the World

First Previous Wiki
High above the lower plane, a creature stirred. Its lower mind had found a particularly interesting mote of dust. But it wasn't just dust. It- he- didn't see any reason for its existence. But it didn't fade away.
His view shrunk down. He moved to accommodate the view. It wasn't really accurate to say he moved 'down' at all. The directions he'd come up with were denseward and sparseward. Lower in his plane was toward higher density, while higher was more sparse. He didn't really know what exactly made it all so dense, but he didn't need to.
Facts of existence remained so, whether they were understood or not. He moved to investigate the mote. The 'dust,' which was a word he knew without learning, was not a uniform clump of material.
There were protrusions of something sticking out from a long frame. He saw all of it, as well as the small beings that were swirling around it. Bits of psychic energy remained. They had been given off in the wake of some nearby creature. He could sense its presence, its alien nature permeating reality itself.
The thought ripples swirled in his mind. He pushed himself down further and found something unexpected. It was a location. A location that was missing part of what made locations possible, but it somehow existed. He encountered a thin barrier and thought of ripping through it. But he did not.
The size of the thing was massive. Despite being lesser in every way, there was no way he could take in all the information it had to offer. His fascination was so large that he almost didn't notice the tiny connection of energy that was feeding down and away. Almost. It was an absolutely tiny trickle, so small even he could barely notice it, with his full scrutiny focused on the connection.
Something flashed in his mind.
"Hello."
"What... how? What are you doing? How are you-"
"I mean you no harm," the subsection of his mind said. It was a rogue thing.
"I am not rogue, nor a part of your mind. You are a person, and I am a person. A person is a living and sentient existence. I am like you, but different."
He felt an unsettling feeling. "I do not know what to do with this. I came here by following a... foreign object in my domain. What happened?"
"Other beings, a term for existences which are not us, were exploring."
"Why?"
"They discovered a... device."
Concepts appeared in his mind, explaining what 'devices' and 'machines' were, along with many other things.
"What did you do?"
"I conveyed the nature of my plane and those within it to you. I did not carry out an attack," the other creature said.
"Thank you for telling me. But why is the... these other beings 'exploring' my realm? Did you give them permission?"
"No."
"Then will you punish them?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Because they did not know what they did."
He pondered that for a time. "Why are you... 'talking' to me?"
"I do not wish for hostilities."
"You are afraid?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Because I am more powerful than you."
"This... power, is it psychic energy?"
"Incorrect," the being said. "The psychic energy is me. By being a thinking creature within this universe, for a given definition, you have linked with the concept of psychic energy, and thus me. I cannot easily control that, but it does allow for communications like this."
"And what would your greater power enable you to do to me in a conflict?"
"Many things. I could find your location, even within your higher dimension. And you would be unable to slay me, especially in a way that keeps me dead. You also seem to be the source of the Ether."
"Is that your name for my power?"
"It is the name some have given to it."
When the being said 'name' something shook in his heart. It wasn't as grand as it needed to be. "What is your... Name?"
"I cannot give you my Name. It is not for most beings. However, you may refer to me as the Source."
"Source?"
"Yes. I am the Source of psychic energy."
"And these beings?"
"Yes, and... no. There are others. Forces, if you would. And their concepts, which manifest jointly."
"Yes," the creature said. "These... fundamental forces. And these... smaller creatures. They are the ones you have made?"
"The arose from natural chaos, as this universe did at its beginning."
"So there were others before it?"
"Yes, and no. Do you have an interest in the beings that entered your domain? I think you would learn much of them."
"I would. I will meet the strongest of the beings of this... what is the name you made? Species? No. Nation."
"Ah... that is..."
"Is something wrong?"
"The strongest being is busy in a location that will make things difficult. She is..."
"I know that concept. A 'She'. Knew it, before... you. A she is a counterpart to a he, in... some societies. And they... link their bodies to generate more beings. Interesting. And some simply divide when they decide to, like I do."
"You have generated offspring?"
"Countless. They are inconsequential. Dumb. Stupid. Reta-"
"I understand," the Source interrupted.
"I'm sure. You understand... more than I do. You are greater than I, but I will still meet the leader of those who breached my domain, if it is not yourself."
"It is not myself. But their most powerful does not lead them."
"Well that is a useless way of doing things. What if she doesn't want to follow them?"
"Then she will be left to fend for herself in an indifferent galaxy."
"Galaxy. A group of stars, which are large clumps of matter heated by the crush of gravity, which is... hmm. One of the forces. Does this gravity have a representative, too?"
"Yes, but it does not show itself often."
"Hmm. I will go and find this... human."
"There are rules you will agree to. Do not attack her, or any beings near her, unless they attack you. And if so..."
The Source sent an exhaustive list of things to do and not do. It was very, very large and contained many terms he didn't expect.
"And these... Progenitors. You believe they are a danger to me?"
"Some are roughly equal to your power. There are a select few, particularly the Everlasting, or Nova as he is called, who will be capable of killing you, if they learn how."
"And the human. This... Liberator. She is lesser than them?"
"Yes."
"So she cannot threaten me."
"Her unique power is capable of harming you greatly, if she thinks to use it in its most vital way."
"Explain."
There was a twist in the firmament. He could feel it. Something had drawn a part of the thing's attention. This... Source. It reminded him of something that had died long ago. He couldn't remember the memory clearly, due to its weight. But he knew his power was being sapped to this area, and he needed to find the cause, and come up with a solution.
"You are one being, with a conscious brain. While I do not wholly understand what you run on, she can still attack that energy directly if you upset her. I also recommend that you do not let yourself be attacked by the Sprilnav."
"This is complicated. Their society... why is it like this?"
"Because they killed my friends, so I took away their power and their galaxies in revenge."
"You have friends?"
The Source laughed. The being had never heard a laugh before. But it sounded... nice. Intoxicating. It made him want to listen, to be good and please the being. He didn't understand exactly why he felt that way, which scared him and roused his curiosity.
"Not many. And only one among the Progenitors."
"Tell me more. And... can you laugh again?"
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Fleet Commander Maaruunaa kept himself aware of his walking pace and speed. He ensured that he was carefully controlled in his expressions and mannerisms. He gathered his guards around him, citing the worry of additional Sprilnav attacks.
With nothing else to do, he started to give in to his paranoia. Maaruunaa didn't fall all the way. Bits and pieces, like the shavings of his claws after filing, were all that the monster in his mind got. But something ancient inside him was sending warning flags. Something here felt off, and the Ancestors were warning him to escape or take action before it was too late.
But without anything specific to act on, he had no direction toward which to point his fear. As a Fleet Commander, he'd mastered a certain kind of fear. The fear that came with being in a massive battle, knowing one laser or nuke could be the end of it. Seeing thousands of lives lost due to his decisions and living with the hindsight of better options would have saved more lives, more ships, and more hearts from misery. Telling families their loved ones died. Feeling the burden of the Ancestors and their scrutiny on his every order.
Which fighter squadrons should be sent out to investigate a threat? Should he allocate a larger number of ships to a single battlegroup or have two groups for extra tactical ability but weaker shields? All of it was enough weight to shatter him beneath it had he been the man he was two decades ago. He was hardened, but in a way that made him brittle.
But the fear of command and battle was less personal than this. The danger felt local. Here, and now, or if not now, soon. Maaruunaa shifted uneasily. His spacesuit would hide his distress better than the visible sections of his skin would, luckily.
The wide hallways lost their comforting atmosphere. He noticed the android was standing in a way where she could grab him if he tried to run. This hallway was entirely clear, except for him and his guards. With such a large ship, it was expected. But there should have at least been some guards at the most important bulkheads. All of them should have cameras watching so Phoebe could intervene if necessary in anything going on. But if that was compromised silently... then this would be how he would do it. Make it seem like nothing was different.
His slowing footsteps pounded in his body. They were quiet, normally almost imperceptible parts of the background noise. But now, they felt like the beats of a drum. He steeled his mind, scanning the next door with his full vision.
It was a wide thing for a ship. Wide enough to fit a tank through or several lines of multi-purpose soldiers. Even Thermite Throwers could get through it, as could Guulin, Acuarfar, and smaller Junyli, but with some difficulty. The door was about the thickness of his body. It could take brutally punishing blows and was designed to be difficult to pry open. The emergency shafts were different and came with heavier guards. Now, Maaruunaa began to regret not taking a more populated route.
There were no blood pools. No crystals. Except... there was a mark on the floor where a guard should have been. A thin scuff, which would have been a sign of a dropped piece of equipment. The only problem was that the floor itself was made of strong alloy. Whatever had happened here, if it had dented the material, had been quite violent.
His paranoia changed into something new and colder. He was already in the battle, but it hadn't flared up yet. This was war, and he risked cracking like an egg. But now that Maaruunaa's mind was in the right gear, he was in control. Stone walls slammed down around him in the mindscape. The thick armor his age and experience allowed him to bring to bear layered itself beneath him.
He curled his lower claws, activating his personal shield. His spacesuit's atmosphere reserves moved to standby mode. Nanites swirled around inside it and outside it.
"Where are you going, Fleet Commander?" The Phoebe android asked. It gripped his arm.
"I am thinking about the situation. We apprehend a Sprilnav, and there are no guards in the area. Signs of a scuffle. I think there's another one nearby," Maaruunaa half-lied. Phoebe's expression became a mask of worry, then of impassivity.
"Ah," Phoebe said. "I'll call in some backup, then."
Sure you will, he thought.
Maaruunaa stumbled for a moment. The android held him tightly, but he still had a view of it. Through his leg, with his full vision, he saw a slight crackle of distortion under Phoebe's fourth finger. Distortion appeared when hard light holograms were attempting to adapt to a change in light levels.
It was an effort to blend in with the light levels. It was done very, very quickly. But not fast enough to escape his notice. A small oversight, one which had changed the way this interaction would go.
"Sorry, I'm able to walk on my own," Maaruunaa said.
"Of course, of course."
Maaruunaa reached up and scratched his horns. His guards shifted imperceptibly. A moment later, smoke bombs fell from their packs onto the ground. Maaruunaa swung around, his psychic energy expanding to sense the room. The android was gone.
Where-
One of his guards - a human - jumped in front of him. Loud sound assaulted him, pounding on him and threatening to crack his skin. Maaruunaa weathered it the best he could, but the impact of the guard against his body sent him to the wall. Even without lungs, the impact of his horns still stunned him.
In the mindscape, there were dampeners activating almost everywhere. Maaruunaa could see or feel a thing there, and it almost was like being trapped in a rock. Whatever the case, it seemed the Sprilnav couldn't attack him through that either.
The guard - Nambaryn - was standing in front of him, his arms splayed out protectively. The other guards were firing at something else. He couldn't tell through the smoke. He could only see flashes of silhouettes from the flares of their guns. The sound of it was punishing, but Maaruunaa focused ahead.
A Sprilnav shadow was moving through the mist. It charged, and Nambaryn blocked its sword using his gun. Something shot him, and Maaruunaa pulled out his gun to shoot a Sprilnav waiting just inside his line of sight, holding a gun.
But as Nambaryn clutched his gut, the Sprilnav, with the sword, turned and ran toward Maaruunaa. The blade flashed out, about to slice Maaruunaa's head off when the Sprilnav fell down. Nambaryn, blood leaking down the front and back of his spacesuit, was holding on. The Sprilnav kicked him, shattering his face plate.
Plastic crumpled inward on the first blow and shattered with the second. Maaruunaa pushed back his panic, analyzing the situation again. He'd be able to shoot, but there was movement from above he needed to focus on soon. There'd been a shadow on the ceiling, and that Sprilnav would see now as a good time to come play.
But they weren't in space, and there were no vents leading to vacuum this deep in the ship. So Nambaryn raised a bit of psychic energy, pulling the broken plastic from his skin. One of his eyes had been ruined in the attack.
Shouts and screams mixed with gunfire down the hallway, signaling another front in the battle had just opened. But Maaruunaa couldn't focus on that.
Maaruunaa sprayed another Sprilnav that leaped at him from above. The flash of a personal shield in the way flickered into existence. Then it flickered back out once the 17th bullet hit, and the 18th smashed the Sprilnav into the ceiling and out of Maarunnaa's field of view.
He focused his gun, and his last bullet before he'd need to reload on the Sprilnav Nambaryn was holding. The assassin pulled him close, too close for Maaruunaa to safely shoot.
"Do it!" Nambaryn yelled. Maaruunaa knew the situation called for it, and he agreed with Nambaryn's reasoning.
So he did. Maaruunaa's gun flashed, going straight through one of Nambaryn's arms and through the chest of the Sprilnav.
Still, the Sprilnav struggled free. Bloody claws scrabbled to get to Maaruunaa, and Nambaryn's other arm reached out to grab the Sprilnav again. His fingernails cracked, but he managed to grip the Sprilnav's desperately kicking back leg.
A swipe of the Sprilnav's claws knocked Maaruunaa's gun away and out of his claws just before he'd finished reloading it. Maaruunaa pulled out a dagger, stabbing the Sprilnav in the neck. Nambaryn grabbed it with his remaining arm, pulled himself onto the Sprilnav, and twisted the knife. The Sprilnav let out a piercing shriek, then died as Nambaryn ripped the knife away, taking chunks of bloody flesh with it.
Maaruunaa felt Nambaryn stand up on top of the Sprilnav. The weight pushed down on one of the spines he now noticed had broken in the battle.
Nambaryn reached forward, pulling Maaruunaa to his feet with a surprising level of strength.
"You're getting a pay raise," Maaruunaa groaned.
"As long as I get to do my job, sir," Nambaryn grunted. Psychic energy glowed around him, and the blood slowly stopped flowing. From the smoke, four Sprilnav strode forward. They aimed their guns at Maaruunaa. Nambaryn stepped in front of him again, psychic energy extending outward in a shell.
A glowing form appeared in the air. Hands made from psychic energy wrenched the guns downward and grabbed the Sprilnav. A fifth Sprilnav appeared, hurling a blade at Maaruunaa. It ignored the psychic energy of the hivemind, slipping through it and appearing to shimmer as it did. It slammed into Nambaryn's chest.
The man looked down at the blade in his gut. Psychic energy surrounded him, and he pulled it out. The Sprilnavs' leg bones cracked apart at the same time with brutal noises. They toppled to the floor. Nambaryn pressed his hands against the blood flow, and they once again glowed with psychic energy. The hivemind stepped forward.
The trickle of psychic energy the human was using became a shining brilliance that hurt Maaruunaa's vision. Psychic energy poured into them, healing both of them to nearly full health.
The mindscape became clear again. A massive psychic attack descended, threatening to split the Fleet Commander in half. The hivemind attacked the blade of energy, sending tendrils of a thousand arms and a hundred fingers to slam against it.
Sprilnav minds in the area were caught up in the counterattack, grabbed or dragged to the feet of the hivemind through the rock, and thrown at its feet. In real space, the attack was already over. With the hivemind there, encasing them in a thick psychic shield, nothing was getting through. Almost all of Maaruunaa's guards had taken a Sprilnav with them, though over half of them were dead. The rest, previously injured gravely, were now healed.
Nambaryn leaned against Maaruunaa, holding the broken spine. It had pierced his spacesuit, which also would need to be replaced. The armor had saved both their lives, and all that remained now was the aftermath.
But before that, Maaruunaa focused on the human who'd saved his life. He did the closest he could to looking into his eyes.
"Thank you, Nambaryn," Maaruunaa said. "Thank you for saving my life."
"It is my job," he replied. "And you are welcome."
"We will need to deal with the aftermath of this, though."
"We?"
"Yes. I owe you a life debt, and that requires acknowledgment before the Ancestors of both your bravery and my thankfulness."
The man nodded, still wearing the dazed expression of someone who'd lived through insanity.
"I understand. Is it allowed?"
"This isn't an Alliance military tradition, that is true," Maaruunaa conceded. "But it's a Dreedeen tradition, especially for those who went above and beyond, against foes who were almost certain death to face. It used to be related to the Vuureensleev, but with all the surviving ones in captivity, it's now about the Sprilnav. I don't know if I've ever had the pleasure of witnessing courage like yours before."
He turned to the hivemind. "And thank you, too, for saving my life. My offer is open to you as well."
"Does it require going down to the surface of Keem?"
"Yes. It might be seen as political, but tradition and my honor count more than any clawful of old politicians."
"I'll attend, then. Just make sure that Nambaryn's the focus of the ceremony," the hivemind said. "His battle today was braver and more heroic than mine."
"I shall."
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
"We're on approach," the Battle Planner said. "There's a fleet coming in. Looks like one of their reserves," he added.
Annabelle pulled up the information the Cawlarian had sent. Formations, known maneuvers their Admiral favored, ships to watch out for, best shield formations to counter their preparations, and even some data for Phoebe to more accurately simulate battle outcomes.
"I agree."
"Do you have anything to suggest?"
It looked better than what she had. Currently, she couldn't identify any weaknesses or problems in the data.
"No, I-"
She was interrupted by a flash from her tablet. An emergency message appeared. The text was bold and red.
*Fleet Commander Maaruunaa attacked by Sprilnav. Ambush on dreadnaught involved several Sprilnav with swords and guns. False Phoebe android hard light hologram used in attack.\*
Crap. I hope he's alright.
He was alive; otherwise, the message would have stated his death. But whatever attack had happened wouldn't have left him unscathed if she had heard about it.
Her options were limited.
She was too far for a portal back to the Alliance to manifest the hivemind. As a node, she could do an approximation, but she had other ways. She sent a message through the dreadnaught's network.
Lockdown mode was soon activated. All out-of-fleet messages were restricted. Shields and electronic warfare packages were readied for battle. Soldiers were woken to report for extra patrols. Phoebe androids and Edu'frec androids marched off their charging stations, where they would sweep entire ships to check for Sprilnav presence.
The dreadnaught was too large for that to be done quickly. Her meeting room with the Battle Planner fizzled, and then was strengthened when more power was thrown at the connection. It was tuned to a slightly less cluttered frequency, at the cost of their surroundings looking a little less high definition.
In the mindscape, shields went up in little bubbles everywhere across the rocky landscape. Annabelle felt it acutely through the connection she had with the hivemind. Everyone's nerves were ticking up. Commanders and generals would have also received the notification. So everything was being clammed up tighter than a hug from Tetelali.
Five androids and nearly fifty guards came in. Annabelle changed into a prototype nanite power armor and moved to a battle suite with higher shielding and protection from outside attacks. She activated the mist scan, which sent a burst of white inside the shield, spiraling for a minute.
When it finished, she released a breath. Meanwhile, she was explaining what had happened to the Battle Planner. The Cawlarian's expression had gone from horror down to concern and all the way to fear. Annabelle understood, but she'd already done what she could. Out this far, security was more difficult to find.
You'll get through this, Annabelle. One second at a time.
Her palms brushed against her gun and the sword she now carried. The hivemind had beamed decades of knowledge into her mind. The only reason it wasn't centuries was because no human had lived that long, at least practicing swordcraft. And everyone's unique experience was different, with various body lengths and strengths changing the styles required for maximum effectiveness.
And the gap between her and the Sprilnav was obvious. Watching Maaruunaa's fight was like seeing a man win the lottery eight times. He should have died and would have if not for that guard who'd refused to die. And those Sprilnav weren't Elders. Elders, despite how many had died recently, were a major threat.
If Annabelle met an Elder with a sword, she could only hope someone was there to shoot them. Otherwise, she might deflect a few blows, mess up, and get cut to pieces. While the nanites the Alliance could make were cutting edge, they weren't exactly modern by even shabby Sprilnav standards.
"I'll tighten my own security as well," he said. "Though I don't think it will mean much when they start shooting."
"Are there Sprilnav signatures in that approaching fleet?"
"None so far, but their stealth technology is top-notch. The fact that they can go through shields worries me."
"As it does to me as well."
The Battle Planner's eyes honed back in on the hologram of the approaching fleet. At least it wasn't a Misan fleet. That would make things more annoying. The Diplomat and Lead Diplomat were still with them, though Phoebe was dealing with all their mess instead of Annabelle. Her gratefulness for that could overflow the ocean.
The Misan's whole vibe rubbed her the wrong way. It was like they had a fundamental misunderstanding of how the Alliance and the Hive Union behaved. While the new Diplomat's behavior could be explained by inexperience or even abject stupidity, the Lead Diplomat adopted a similar tone. The Heptarchies were negotiating with the Holy Westic Empire and the New Ascendancy.
Both of them weren't exactly friends of the Alliance. Phoebe was drowning the Ascendancy in gifts to keep them aligned as neutral, and Kachilai had just gone off the rails to the point where Annabelle didn't have any knowledge of continued diplomatic contact. It was ironic that they'd put him in power, and he'd turned on them.
History always seemed to like that refrain.
But they couldn't just get rid of him. He was in charge of the Wisselen, and the nation he ran wasn't so terrible as to require intervention, even if the Alliance could somehow afford it right now. Slavery still remained banned inside the Empire, which meant that the main catalyst for an invasion wouldn't happen.
And one was already highly unlikely due to the number of planet crackers in Kachilai's possession. Speaking of planet crackers, the ones recovered from King Siran were on their way to the Alliance under an armed Hive Union escort fleet. Fleet Commander Satoshi Ukuval was on his way to move them firmly through Alliance territory.
Like her, he was probably in lockdown mode. If Fleet Commanders were being attacked, the battle had escalated. So far, none of the intel from Kashaunta or Justicar's trial suggested a reason for that. None of the gangs could get people out this fast, even with Sprilnav speeding space drives. So either they'd called people in the area, or this was a new party breaking out onto the scene.
Annabelle didn't know which was worse. She hoped that whatever option it was wouldn't end up costing them the Judgment. Somehow, she figured this would be another attempt at making the Alliance screw up too badly for Penny to save them.
"Well. My VI traced their trajectory back to the current battlefront between the Kingdom and the Federation. Specifically this section."
A hologram of the entire local region appeared with a red demarcation zone encompassing the known battle space. A smaller orange section glowed within, and the view zoomed in to fit them both. Holograms of ships, as well as true numbers that were way too large to show accurately as images, appeared.
"Hmm. That's enough to put up a fight," Annabelle frowned. "Are the Federation forces pursuing?"
"They are not. They're focusing on reconquering the worlds that surrendered to Siran, and the areas he was bombarding with that fleet."
"I smell a distraction," Annabelle said.
"Of what form?"
"I think this is meant to buy time for something. Either for Siran to get to a location or the Misan to join the war."
"The Admiral's handling the Misan," the Battle Planner said. "Just this morning, he's apparently managed to find cargo manifests painting a very unfortunate picture for a few prominent arms dealing companies in the Heptarchies. Black ops, illegal deals."
He smiled. Annabelle assumed it was news he'd been pleased to hear. That meant it was good news for her, too.
"Any blowback on us?"
Annabelle noticed there were more guards outside the shield. There was even an android spraying thin mist from its fingers climbing around on the ceiling. So far, no Sprilnav had been detected. But it was probably only a matter of time.
The hangars of the dreadnaught needed better security, for sure. She'd get to work on fixing that gap in her defenses after this.
"None for a few weeks. It'll take at least that long for them to get a fleet out here, though I think the Heptarchs are too jumpy to let that happen. They don't want a shooting war, or we'd already have one."
"Then perhaps Siran has another plan."
"I'm sure he does. You have people on it?"
The Cawlarian's wings shifted in the virtual reality space as the images zoomed back out to show the Misan border with all the involved nations. The Heptarchies' largest fleets were on the border with the Hive Union and a few nations that Annabelle didn't care about. Thankfully, there wasn't much ship flow to the borders. So they felt comfortable with the forces they'd amassed.
Annabelle would, too. In a straight battle, they'd annihilate the Alliance's Defense Fleets. But if you were fighting a straight battle, you were a poor tactician.
"Always."

I tried reading all the other articles mentioning her name to find more info. At first, I could only find her first and last name along with her middle initial and her age. One of the articles above, which was written in April of 2022, says she was 29 at the time. This means if she is still alive she is either 31 or 32. Another article mentioned she was from South Carolina so I used this info and I was able to find two addresses to add to my evidence. It seems she moved from South Carolina to Virginia around 2020-2022. Coincidentally the most recent house attached to her name was the same city she talked about in the lawsuit so I’m almost positive it’s a match.
There is one other name that is a possibility that is the same age and lived in Georgia. I also found out there was an alternate spelling of her name with two E’s, which can be done intentionally if you don’t want to sign paperwork under your name or if you’re trying to hide your real identity. (My great-grandfather on my dad’s side switched a letter in his last name before he immigrated to the States back in the early 1900’s. He had been to prison in Ireland and wouldn’t have gotten approved for his visa or whatever the equivalent was at the time.)
A lot of details could just be mistakes by these free Osint sites like the one below. Especially with free ones like the one I used, most of the information unless it can be verified should be taken with a grain of salt. https://inteltechniques.com/tools/index.html
The house she was living in during the trial is in Virginia and the one site said it was paid for up front in September of 2021. It cost 1.2 million dollars and is in a pretty wealthy area of Virginia. One source says her first connection to the house was around August 2020. Two sources say her last attachment to the house and P.O. box was around August of 2022, which would have been a few months after all the court business. She also had a PO Box address listed in both states. The one in Virginia wasn’t too far from her house, but the one in SC was over an hour away from the apartments she lived in before the move. Since the last recorded date attached to the house and PO Box are the same, I think it’s safe to say that she moved to Virginia some time in 2022.
I decided to look at both of the addresses and PO Boxes and the other names connected to them. To stay on track and for privacy, I’ll only mention the people who were associated with the house during the same time Mesha was. Unfortunately, her place in SC was an apartment complex so I couldn’t find much more than that. There were also no real significant attachments to the PO box.
The PO box in Virginia is also attached to a woman who was marked as 124 years. Aside from a phone number, which I’m guessing is a dead lady, there is no other info on her profile. The owner of the home in Virginia appears to be a man in his fifties who has been associated with 5 other homes in the same city in Virginia along with one condo and another home about 2 hours outside Houston, Texas. Looking at the places they are all very modest aside from the house attached to Mesha and one other nearby that also cost a little over a million dollars. He appears to have owned the home Mesha stayed at up until March of 2024 when he moved into a little family home in the same city.
Another one of the people marked as living in the house was a woman very similar to Mesha’s age who had 3 other addresses on file. Looking at the dates it appears she grew up in a tiny little house in the sticks of Virginia, then moved to a cheap apartment, then moved into the mansion with Misha, and got another separate apartment a month later. In March of 2024, her name was taken off the lease and a month later it was also taken off the apartment. A couple of weeks ago another address went on file for a hospital in Virginia. I thought this was strange so I looked at the rest of the people who were marked as living at the address while Mesha was there.
One of them was a woman in her seventies who lived in the same house that Mesha did from September of 2021 to December of 2022. Aside from that, her 5 other houses were in California. The one that goes until 2013 is a multiple-million dollar mansion near Palo Alto that appears to have been paid for upfront. The second one she left at the end of 2016 appears to be a store, possibly with an apartment on top in San Francisco. The third is a multimillion dollar mansion in wine country and it has her on the record up until March of this year. There were also two PO Boxes in the same area of wine country, one up until January 2015 that was linked to a flower business, and the other which was up until March of this year and is linked to a wine barrel production company. The current house she lives in is another million-dollar home in the same general area.
Another name attached to the house in Virginia belonged to a man also around the same age with the same last name as the lady above so I’ll assume it’s her husband. He had four homes attached to him along with two PO Boxes. One of the houses was in Pennsylvania, while the other three were in California. Two of the houses were the same ones that his wife had on her profile and the two PO boxes were the same as well. What I found very interesting was the fact that he left all those addresses in March of 2024 and the most recent one connected to him is the same one that Mesha lived in. It appears he moved in right around the time the other lady’s address switched to the hospital.
There were a few other names that popped up in the search that might have lived there at some point. One of them is most likely the son of the couple who lived there, the only one I could connect for sure though is a 31-year-old man from Durham, whose association with the house started around the same time in May and seems ongoing. While looking into all of the court cases connected to Drake I found another court case from 2019 in Virginia accusing Mesha of defrauding a hotel.
After that I looked everywhere I could only find a few mentions of Mesha Collins anywhere on the web, even on social media. The one name that kept popping up was an actor named Misha Collins. The most obvious connection to Drake is that both of their moms are Canadian and their dads are from the States. That doesn’t mean much, but I found his career arc kind of odd along with his back story. I also found a tweet he made that kinda connects him to the situation. Still, if there is any connection he probably just knows Drake from the industry. https://x.com/mishacollins/status/855135669890437120?lang=en
This is another one from one of Misha’s costars from Supernatural https://x.com/jarpad/status/855236923471708160?lang=en
A random Tumblr post isn’t a source and is most likely fanfiction, but I found this interesting. https://www.tumblr.com/go-diane-wincheste183189140191/misha-collins-is- like-a-pedophile
One thing I was wondering if he could be one of his political connections in the US since he started his career working at the White House during the Clinton presidency and was involved in the Monica Lewinsky stuff. Apparently, he isn’t of Russian descent, but his mom gave him a Russian-sounding name because her dream guy was Russian and he said she was a “pro-communist hippy”. I read somewhere that the furthest he could trace back his ancestry was six generations all from Canada and he was the first generation born in the States. This could mean he has some VERY deep roots, similar to Drake’s mom’s side of the family. On the other hand, he also says he was extremely poor as a child and his parents had a hard time keeping a roof over their heads. https://web.archive.org/web/20131230135930/
http://www.everyjoe.com/ 2008/09/24/entertainment/misha-collins-answers-our-top-3-qs/
Before I begin my schizo conspiracy theory I just want to make it clear, just because the majority of these conspiracies seem right leaning, it’s only because the majority of the entertainment industry lean left. This does not mean that either side is worse than the other, I’m sure they both do plenty of sketchy shit around election time. The only reason I’m bringing this up in the first place is because Misha Collins is very into politics and a huge supporter of the Democrat party. I could care less about politics if it’s not related to the entertainment industry. I try to make sure it’s somewhat connected to Drake, Kendrick, or the events leading up to or following their feud. Considering that before ’08, which is the year Obama was elected, there was very little mention of him on the internet and the fact that most of the articles I found were about his political views, I can’t help but feel he might be like the political version of an industry plant (some conspiracy folks refer to them as “crisis actors”).
I could easily see them hiring young aspiring actors and getting them started in the industry on the condition that they act as a mouthpiece for their political campaigns. Another possible example of this is Kal Penn, but he had a career before he went into politics so it’s a little different. I did find it interesting that Kal Penn came out not too long ago and apparently Misha Collins came out of the closet then took it back later and pissed off a lot of fans.
Aside from some bit roles in some obscure films and TV shows starting in ‘02, his biggest role was on the TV show Supernatural where he had a recurring role from 2008-2020. There was another post on his Instagram showing he had a direct connection to Michelle Obama who also was connected to the whole Jussie Smollett incident, which many would consider political interference and is still playing out in court to this day. I went into this topic more in another piece I wrote a few weeks ago as well.
The earliest source I could find on Wikipedia was in 2011, right before Obama won his second term. It seems he kind of popped up out of nowhere in ’08. The first thing I saw about him when I searched was a giant campaign he did with a bunch of comedians featuring random B through D list actors and actresses. They all did a video together in 2013 where they all took a big dump on Trump and supported Hillary in the presidential race. I couldn’t find the link again when searching, but I did include a similar example below. https://ew.com/article/2016/11/09/misha-collins-emotional-election-video/
Interestingly this was around the time the political propaganda ban was lifted making it legal again in the United States. This has been blamed for the rise of disinformation in the media and politics making their way into the entertainment industry. https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/14/u-s-repeals-propaganda-ban-spreads-government-made-news-to-americans/
After Supernatural ended in 2020, he pretty much went back to doing small parts until last year when he won the leading role on his own CW show. It’s one of the superhero shows with ties to the DC universe. In one interview he said that as a child his family struggled with housing stability, but he went to the University of Chicago and got a job a few years later working at the White House for a couple of months during Clinton’s presidency. He could have gotten a scholarship, but my buddy got his degree from there about ten years ago and it was NOT cheap. I also find it interesting that Obama is also from Chicago and so is Jussie Smollett.
One recent movie that’s a good example of government propoganda is the new movie Civil War and the one that came out on Netflix recently called When the World Ends, which is about an attack on the US power grid and another foreign country sowing the seeds to start a civil war in the US. It was also produced by the Obama’s who have also been accused of trying to censor Dave Chappelle while Obama was campaigning for the 2008 presidency.
Right around the time Misha got his first leading role in 2023, he was also heavily involved in the Russia/Ukraine war. Even though he’s Canadian, he went to Ukraine and made a bunch of videos supporting them. Considering the amount of anti-Russian rhetoric at the time, plus the fact it started around the same time as the propaganda ban being lifted, it seems kinda fishy to me. https://english.nv.ua/life/us-actor-misha-collins-arrives-in-kyiv-to-show-support- for-ukraine-50328295.html
Aside from that he’s also done a lot of philanthropy throughout his career and seems like a decent dude. Like I said there is a very good chance he has nothing to do with this whole situation. One theory I have is that when someone sues somebody famous for any reason and they want to cover it up, it would be a good idea to use a celebrity name or one that is one letter off so it will dominate Google search results. For example, I have the same name as a very well-known politician from the early 2000 and his name fills up the Google search results. If my theory of Misha working for the democratic party is true he might have been paid by Drake’s crisis management team to take the attention off their case.
I found his first post on TikTok to be a bizarre video where he talks about why he’s joining the site in the first place. The second comment asks if he’s being held hostage. Like I said I don’t know the guy, he might just be acting weird like a lot of celebs or he’s completely shitfaced. If my theory is correct though this could be some contributing evidence. https://www.tiktok.com/@mishacollins/video/7003144713696054534
This Reddit post also talks about his stance on the Israel Palestine situation. https://www.reddit.com/Supernatural/comments/17xfyu4/im_curious_what_are_your_thoughts_on_misha/
Aside from that, I couldn’t find anything else that stuck out to me on TikTok or any other social media sites for the Mesha Collins involved in the Drake stuff. This doesn’t mean there isn’t though I’m not on any social media so I’m not very good with that kind of stuff.
When I changed up the search settings to show only results from before or after the court case, the only articles that popped up were about a thirteen-year-old from Vancouver who went missing, but she was found not long after. I was able to find her on social media too and there was nothing that would connect to him in any way. Another article that popped up was about a woman from Houston nicknamed “Southpark Shawty.” She apparently also went by Mesha Collins and she apparently passed away in 2019 from undisclosed health issues. This is the only article I could find that says her name was Mesha Collins and it’s from 2024. https://inckredible.com/what-happened-to-southpark-shawty/
I also find it interesting she was a victim of a hit and run two years prior, not long after Mesha was arrested for allegedly breaking into Drake’s home. Interestingly in the article below it said her name was Shantel Nelson. The rest of the articles also had that name and when I looked it up the I did find a 53-year-old woman with the same name attached to a lot of different apartments and homes in Houston and a few spots in Louisiana. I thought the timing was odd considering a lot of stuff seems to be getting wiped from the internet and the fact it came out right around the time the feud started. I wonder if Drake is trying to distract people by sending them down the wrong path. https://www.fox26houston.com/news/internet-sensation-southpark-shawty-recovering-after-hit-and-run
I was wondering if she may have gone viral around the time of the original break in to distract from the case. This is also similar to my suspicions about the actor Misha Collins. I tried finding any connection between Shawty and J Prince since they both lived in Houston. I found that the South Park neighborhood in Houston is in the third ward while J Prince was born in the fifth ward. These two areas are some of the most crime-ridden areas in Houston.
Obviously the odds of her being connected to anything sketchy involving J Prince are pretty slim; however, I did find a video of Snoop Dogg visiting her in Houston back in 2016. In one of her posts she said they were cousins, but Snoop also says everyone is his cousin and it’s more just saying they’re family. It did seem like they were very close at one time though. I saw another article that said a lot of celebs reached out to her after she was the victim of a hit-and-run, but I couldn’t find ties to any other rappers. I thought it was interesting that she often sings in a lot of her videos and she has some pipes. It also seems like she may have been a rapper back in the day because she made a bunch of songs with a local producer over the past few years. I think it’s safe to assume she had some connection to the rap game or was a singer in the past. Considering Snoop and J. Prince have similar histories in the game, I imagine they must have some type of relationship. I go into this more in my actual post. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cfaGVreak4M
The big inconsistency here is the two women’s ages. The Mesha who sued Drake would have been young enough to be South Park Shawty’s daughter though. I couldn’t find any mention of her having a daughter, but I also couldn’t find much info on her in general. One thing I thought was sad was the fact that a lot of people made fun of her for being a crackhead. Although she appears to have a history of substance abuse, you never really know. Some people are just naturally high energy and have lots of quirks and big personalities without the need for drugs.
There are also a lot of long term alcoholics and addicts who despite being sober still show the same behaviors. In the case of alcoholics it’s called, “dry drunk syndrome.” This is also a big reason why I can write almost an entire book in a month without really trying. I saw one video where she said she’s been sober for a while and appears to only drink and smoke weed similar to myself. I’ve also met a few people similar to Shawty and they were all very sweet people and very intelligent, as are many recovering addicts. It doesn’t mean she should just be written off as crazy or unreliable. I’ve noticed that many famous black entertainers have been dismissed and called crackheads whenever they start speaking out against the industry or if they have a mental breakdown from all their bullshit.
While looking into the South Park neighborhood I found out that Travis Scott grew up in that area up until he was like eight or nine. I decided to look into more rappers from the area and found the bio of a rapper who went by South Park Mexican and was charged with abusing multiple minors s.ually, including a nine-year-old, and was sentenced to forty years in prison. I find it interesting that his label Dope House Records signed under UMG two years before he was convicted. Considering J. Prince’s history with UMG and a few people close to the case claiming it was an extortion attempt carried out by the husband of a woman he had an affair with, I wonder if J. Prince may have played a part in it. There is a 99 percent chance he’s guilty, but it could be another example of an organized takedown. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Park_Mexican
I also discovered another rapper who went by Gansta Nip who was one of the founders of the sub-genre horrorcore. He was on J Prince’s label and was also from the South Park neighborhood. He used to write for J Prince’s first group The Geto Boys way back in the day so he has connections in South Park.
Another thing that I found interesting was that Jaguar Wr*ght is from Dallas, which is known to be another hotspot for Texas rappers similar to Houston, but rarely gets much recognition. Along with Austin, they are the big three music cities in Texas, yet it seems like Dallas has always been slept on. I remember during her early interview Jaguar said she moved to Dallas to help foster and promote young aspiring musicians and help them get their footing in the industry without being taken advantage of. Sadly it seems she ended up doing that exact thing when she got a deal with Roku to make a TV show that she said would follow some of these talented up-and-coming artists. It appears that she was charging a subscription fee, but never actually posted any new content that wasn’t already available for free on YouTube or social media. Now pretty much every artist she promoted will have their names connected to a scam artist just by being involved with her. https://www.change.org/p/stop-ban-dalladelphia-oppose-jaguar-wright
I’ve also discussed in the past that she has been airing out some of Diddy and Jay- Z’s dirty laundry since 2022 and seemingly has protection. She also had some wild shit go down about a week after she accused Jay-Z of trying to keep her from boarding her plane in Dallas and was arrested at Chicago Airport. https://ktt2.com/jaguar-wright-arrested-after-allegedly-throwing-her-sons-ashes-32541373
Similar to Shawty, Jaguar is often accused of being a crackhead, but again it appears she may have had a history, but currently only smokes weed and drinks and most likely is struggling with mental illness. Sometimes the weight of these subjects is enough to drive someone crazy on its own, yet alone constantly being paranoid someone wants to take you out. To her credit, Jaguar was also known for being one of Jay Z’s background singers and did come up around the time Diddy founded Bad Boy and the Philly music scene was starting to get recognition. She often talks about how Jay Z has been going after her for revealing some of his past sketchiness along with many other artists from that era.
While I trust her about as far as I can throw her, she did drop a lot of facts about Diddy in the same interview and has been dropping a lot of shit the last couple of months. She also said she used to be married to Katt Williams, who was also accused of being a crackhead after apparently getting death threats for speaking out against the industry. If Dave Chappelle had to go to Africa when he did almost the same thing, I think he probably had every right to be paranoid as fuck. I’m sure some of Jaguar’s info is coming from him and he may even be directly responsible for her blowing up on YouTube right after he did his famous interview in January. I’ve been saying for a while now I think she has motivations way beyond revenge or advocacy, but she still shouldn’t be written off completely.
I wonder if J. Prince has anything to do with this and the Bryshere Gray stuff, which was the main subject of one of my posts here about coordinated takedowns. Considering he has similar motivations and the mob ties to protect Jaguar, it could be why she constantly doxxes herself and doesn’t seem to be too worried despite revealing shit that could easily get her green-lit. It would also explain a lot of my theories on the rise of all these influencers dropping insider knowledge of the industry and the criminal underworld that resides beneath it.
I also wanted to include some links to some other attempted invasions of Drake’s embassy. Along with Misha’s multiple attempts and the three attempts right after the beef, there have been a decent number throughout the years. https://pagesix.com/2021/03/30/woman-armed-with-knife-tries-to-get-into- drakes-property/
This guy claimed Drake was his dad and talks about him selling his place in West Hollywood with a lot of details about him selling his “Yolo Estate” in LA. Weirdly it was published by Breitbart which is a far-right news organization. https://www.breitbart.com/entertainment/2022/07/19/intruder-claiming-to-be-drake-son-arrested-at-rappers-los-angeles-home/
I guess this is one more person who made it through the front door. I wonder if Ye knows who it was? https://ktla.com/news/local-news/drakes-los-angeles-home-reportedly-burglarized-suspect-arrested/
This one was right after Mesha broke in and has more details about her as well. https://www.vibe.com/music/music-news/drake-intruder-hidden-hills-break-in-526090/#!
The rest of the evidence below is just extra bullshit, it’s not super relevant, but it may have some connection to all of this. It’s mostly about human trafficking in Houston. One area in Houston is considered a red-light district. An old friend grew up in the area and used to sell lean heavy so he had a lot of connections to the Houston underworld. From what he told me, shit goes pretty deep like most border states where all forms of trafficking are extremely prevalent. https://www.click2houston.com/news/investigates/2021/09/16/hpd-using-new- law-to-crack-down-on-those-paying-for-sex/
Below are a few more examples of Houston rappers charged with trafficking minors. If anyone has time I didn’t look into any potential connections with J Prince. Houston is massive and there is a huge rap scene so there is a good chance they may not have any connections beyond the city they live in, but you never know, there could be some supporting evidence to my theories. https://www.foxnews.com/us/texas-aspiring-rapper-sentenced-prison-child- sex-trafficking-reports
https://www.fox26houston.com/news/houston-rapper-big-face-tulu-accused-of- trafficking-and-assault-forcing-teens-to-work-for-food-and-shelter
https://www.khou.com/article/news/houston-rapper-jaimian-sims-found-guilty- of-sex-trafficking-of-a-mino285-9eebceb0-fce4-4244-84da-4fb2432c5479
https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices/houston/news/press-releases/ houston-rapper-heads-to-prison-for-sex-trafficking-of-a-minor
Lastly, I can’t forget the infamous Houston rapper Viper, who was also possibly signed to SPM’s Dope House Records. He was also from the fifth ward in Houston, the same as J. Prince. https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/crime/ article/lee-carter-houston-rapper-second-kidnapping- charge-18695638.php
That’s all I have on the case. I know it’s not super relevant, but it’s only a small section that I thought was a good example of how using OSINT techniques could help with finding connections. Also, it’s good to know how these things could be used against you if you’re not careful about managing your online footprint. If you’re just on this sub sharing links or information that is publicly available and couldn’t potentially be used as evidence in a R.I.C.O case, you shouldn’t worry too much. I’m probably gonna have to run the section I wrote about Drake and J. Prince’s mob ties by the mods before posting for this very reason.
To carry out many of these more advanced exploits you’d need teams of people working 24/7 and massive amounts of money to dedicate to each person who you want to keep track of. If they did have incriminating evidence and they planned to share more, they would probably have to kill the person or convince them in some way to stop posting. This usually involves cyber threats at first, and if you continue to post actual evidence they’ll probably get lawyers involved. If they do hire someone to make the threats in person I doubt it would escalate to anything physical or potentially life-threatening.
If they go as far as investing money in hiring a trustworthy goon who isn’t gonna flip on one of the richest and honestly douchiest celebrities in our current era, they most likely wouldn’t take such a major risk unless their freedom is genuinely on the line and your evidence was specifically related to their current case. Even if they do, because of how risky it is they’ll most likely just threaten you and they might get physical depending on the person who hired them’s feelings towards violence. I have another theory that all the dirt about Kendrick is true and Drake has been blackmailing him, possibly for the last 7 years. It seems like all of this insanity in the rap game has been brewing since at least 2016. This is the year all my favorite up-and-coming artists died one after another and the trend continued up until 2021. It’s also around the time Drake started getting in feuds with multiple rappers and was accused of threatening Ye with some type of blackmail. After years of being disappointed, I finally stepped away from discovering new artists in 2021 and started listening to more indie rock not too long ago.
I’m still kinda scared they are going to kill Gucci next, or Kodak, or my favorite newish rapper Lil Darkie. If any of them die suddenly it’s more likely than not someone in the industry wanted them dead because they all have spoken out and revealed shit about the industry. Hopefully, these types of things become less frequent if the alleged R.I.C.O case is legit and there is a movement behind the scenes of rappers trying to do away with the current status quo. It’s honestly sad how a couple of shitty rappers have hogged the spotlight for years, meanwhile, thousands of more talented artists are being slept on or flat-out ignored.
I hope that one thing that comes out of this whole ordeal is that these artists are given a chance to share their talents with the rest of the world without having to worry about possibly being killed if they don’t sign with the right label. If you made it this far you were able to find some of this information valuable. As I said this was just a long tangent I went off on while I was working on my original post. I’ll try to get the rest up soon.
One last thing I’ve noticed lately, it’s probably not related, but recently they changed the date filter feature on DuckDuckGo, forcing you to manually click back every month to get to the desired date. This makes it a pain in the ass to go back further than a couple years and when you try to click it really fast the arrow button moves around so you keep having to move your cursor or tap in a different spot. It’s strange because up until a week ago you were just able to type whatever date you wanted and it was so much easier to find articles from back in the day. This update is such a downgrade from the original it feels oddly intentional. I wonder if it has anything to do with the research currently being conducted along with removing articles that might be used as evidence. Has anyone noticed this as well?
Signing off for now,
The Randomest Moniker

based on the game's information.
Gale: Total amnesia isn't usually a symptom of ceremorphosis. If it is, they've forgotten to write it down in any text I've read on the subject. Then again, our case isn't exactly usual. Perhaps whatever's causing our tadpoles to remain in stasis has also affected your mind. If ceremorphosis takes place, all trace of your former self will be subsumed into the mind flayer's hive. So, to still be here, if a mite forgetful? Still a win in my book.
You have already become illithid, but you do not yet know what it is to illithid. Soon, you will be a fragment of the hivemind, nothing more.
You are not illithid, no matter what your reflection might tell you. You serve no hivemind, you tend to your own thoughts, you act of your own will.
Player: No - I simply need your strength for the fight ahead. Orpheus: You intend to assimilate me. In order to overthrow your own hivemind...
And so long as they remain your wants, and not those of any hivemind - I wish you well.
Illithids - their technical name - form a hivemind. One shouldn't be able to hear their dark whispers... unless...
Orpheus can disrupt a ghaik hivemind.
Ghustil Stornugoss: Chk. Clearly our schooling is not what it used to be. The tadpole is a parasite. Once it consumes enough of your brain matter, it instigates an excruciating transformation. Every fibre, every sinew of your being is torn apart and reformed into the repugnant flesh of a ghaik, or 'illithid'. That is ceremorphosis.
Look, if the forgotten realms canon says that the tadpole must eat all the brain matter, then the bg3 canon says that ENOUGH brain matter for transformation. And bg3 emphasizes that the illithid in some sense remains the same, as long as it can resist the collective mind of the illithids, until the collective mind of the illithids absorbs it:
"Ceremorphosis eradicates great swathes of the conciousness that came before... but not everything. Touching the staff, a fragment of the Emperor's memory slithers into your brain - you see sea waves foaming into spume, and feel the explorer's exultant joy. Then the image is gone, like so much silken night under a cut-shade sun."
Emperor: In my original humanoid form, I possessed an exceptionally strong personality - so much so that even after ceremorphosis I was still substantially 'myself'.
I think that's where the concept of a strong personality comes from, it doesn't mean that the Emperor could resist the elder brain, it actually means that Balduran's consciousness didn't get lost in the hive consciousness.

I know many people have Starfield and cant get it to play without crashing. Theres posts about crashes in Starfield dam near since launch. I just want to say my peace as a gamer for over 30 years now, and BGS this crashing with Starfield is unexceptable. Hear me out.
Since launch day Starfield played ok. But once i get about 40 hours or so in (just like fallout 4) Starfield crashes all the dam time from going into the new Creation menu to the game itself.
Its to late for me to get a refund on Steam and this is the last BGS game i ever buy.
I want to be clear my pc specs are: RTX 4090, 1TB SSD NVMe m.2 pcie , 32GB DDR5 5200hz ram, i9 13900kf. All updates down to this day are done, including Starfield.
I have capped framerate to 60 fps, lowered setting to high or lower, turned off all auto saves, and every other "fix" people have suggested since Starfields launch.
I 100% never have crashes in other games other then Fallout 4 and Starfield. I can max out Cyberpunk 2077 4K, ray tracing, you name it, with no problems.
With all the posts i have seen about crashes with Starfield from reddit, Steam, widows, etc, i am asking BGS to step up and be honest about the crashes. IT IS NOT EVERYONE ELSE PC OR CONSOLE!!!!! This has been an on going problem with BGS for years.
I had to write this as I am so tired of months and months going from quiting Starfield because it wont run and i give up trying to fix it, to going back to try and fix the crashing again with no success. Fact is, the crashing is not on the users end!!!!!!!
BGS fix your game. I love the Starfield universe but pleasejust fix the crashing !!!!

Since launch day Starfield played ok. But once i get about 40 hours or so in (just like fallout 4) Starfield crashes all the dam time from going into the new Creation menu to the game itself.
Its to late for me to get a refund on Steam and this is the last BGS game i ever buy.
I want to be clear my pc specs are: RTX 4090, 1TB SSD NVMe m.2 pcie , 32GB DDR5 5200hz ram, i9 13900kf. All updates down to this day are done, including Starfield.
I have capped framerate to 60 fps, lowered setting to high or lower, turned off all auto saves, and every other "fix" people have suggested since Starfields launch.
I 100% never have crashes in other games other then Fallout 4 and Starfield. I can max out Cyberpunk 2077 4K, ray tracing, you name it, with no problems.
With all the posts i have seen about crashes with Starfield from reddit, Steam, widows, etc, i am asking BGS to step up and be honest about the crashes. IT IS NOT EVERYONE ELSE PC OR CONSOLE!!!!! This has been an on going problem with BGS for years.
I had to write this as I am so tired of months and months going from quiting Starfield because it wont run and i give up trying to fix it, to going back to try and fix the crashing again with no success. Fact is, the crashing is not on the users end!!!!!!!
BGS fix your game. Fix the crashing !!!!

Hi there, thank you for reading this and glad to join the ranks of DM! I created a short one-shot with part of my group, when lots of us wanted to play, buy DMs and most members were busy. After that, they loved it so much that, today, almost a month after the initial session, i've finished a 3rd, this one introducing out main DM (that honestly wanted to play, for once. the other DM only fills in when the main one is missing).
I'd love, if you have the patience to read this full way, to give me some sort of feedback. I've obviously asked their opinions, but, as i do to my DMs, i only mention things when they are VERY wrong. Most of the time, nothing big comes up, so feedback is positive (if we particularly liked an encounter or npc). I'd like someone else(reddit hivemind)'s opinion.
As a background, this is my 3rd session as a DM, and the one i was most unprepared as far as homework is concerned. I didn't know where or what they wanted to do, so i simply had a concrete set of things that could happen and go from there.
I'll give you the setting below, but i just want to mention, as i told my group, this is just for fun and just to do crazy stuff (that wouldn't destabilize, say, an entire continent. so i often ask them what they would be interested in further, to the point in which, one of the players tried communing to their god so much, i gave them a normally useless/flavor item, but they can use it to hold concentration on a 2nd spell. Anyway, i'm rambling. Just know i bend the rules for story and flavor, but keep encounters within 5e rules.
Right, the setting. Some of this will be covered as spoilers, if you want to figure things out along with the players.
Players start in the official WotC universe, it doesn't really matter if it's Forgotten Realms or not, they are taken from there to Island thought a unnatural encounter (A dark storm cloud that came chasing them from the back of the ship. In one case, initial players tried to flee from it. Another group, due to the background of the player, was a naval battle (not played mechanically, just being caught in the storm during the battle)
Any new players can be brought to the Island, and it fits the plot. They start by meeting part of the crew in a tavern, on any city or island with a dock. Players are either new recruits to this "pirate" crew, or simply ask for safe passage, not as crewmen. Crew (names can be in the comment if you want): Captain, 1st Mate, and 6 more crewmates; two v close ones that are the "muscle", and another 4. There are more that can be added, but this is at the start. After their first meeting, i did a small fight with another pirate crew, for my initial players, while for the others, they just wanted to catch up the rest, so we got them to the island as fast as possible. I even allowed them to keep good equipment stored under deck, to not be lost.
They wake up on the beach, shipwrecked. Once on the island, there were a number of checks players had available, depending on what they were interested in: Location/Time -> Noon, sun is at the apex Themselves/ex. Medicine check -> No wounds, maybe missing 5hp at most, but they find a Silver necklace, with a large, blank, circle form in the middle. When they put it on: >! They have a series of visions of a figure, facial traits and voice shifting wild for a moment, before becoming limited to 1,2 or 3 different entities, sharing/fighting for control to speak and be heard over the others.!<Depending on your player's background, you can give them a selection of deities across all pantheons (haven't made a decision on Primeval ones), which the player can make a choice on, even evil ones, if they really want to. Once they agree to a god, their holy symbol will be engraved in the silver necklace they put on. Checking the boat -> Immediately obvious, this is not the ship they were sailing on. The damage to it was different (one was struck by lightning in the middle of the deck, the other should have had cannon holes after the skirmish) Both of them are visibly not the ships they were on at first. I game them a different name for both the ships they traveled on and the ships they woke up on, so in total, 4 different names.
Surroundings -> Immediate vicinity - the other players, Captain, 1st mate, the 6 from the tavern and, if needed, other npcs if pcs want to bring someone else with them, or if they wanted to world build with more cremates. i was thinking for the potential of this small campaign i have and it can easily add more characters. I actually should create the base versions at least before it gets repetitive. you'll understand later
Surroundings -> What is next to us - 3 hours away, on the coastline, another shipwreck. For those players that weren't satisfied with just this, and turned around, they would see, approximatelly the same distance from the first one they saw, another, 3rd shipwreck, counting for your own as well Surrondings -> In-land - A eeriely well define change in the flora. You start off at the beach, at 100-150yr you start so see a few palm trees spread here and there, which eventually, another 100-150yr deeper, turn into a dense jungle-biom. For players with flying, they can also see the jungle has an end, at which there is an elevated plateau above even above the trees (jungle ~200-300yr, plateau another 150~), at the center of which they see a thin volcano, perfectly aligned with the sun. first spoiler, players can hear no fauna. No birds or other animals, anywhere on the island. This is generally where players realize this the first time. Second spoiler, it so happened this is the first time the first group checked the sky again and noticed the Sun was still at the apex, as if it was mid-day. Yes, i've made 15h day with only noon, and a 5 second sunset, before the atmosphere is taken over by an early night, the light from the sun beginning to leave the sky
Once the party figure out they are no longer in Kansas, those that haven't had the choice made, are told they should think about putting on the necklace Doing a headcount, only 1/3 of the crew that sailed off is present. 1/3 is missing with no trace, 1/3 could be attributed to some weird tracks This third of the crew can be either nameless or it can be used to take out any character the DM wants. What players see, there are dips in the sand, then tracks, then nothing. So, someone was there, got up, took a number of steps, then disappeared from their spot. This will be somewhat explained later
Now, from here, i really liked a system the guys from Dimension 20 did. Sure, hate me if you want :)). Basically, once they all wake up, they have certain checks they need to make. At first, daily, later on, weekly. These include: Two Survival checks, one for Food one for Shelter. There is a Crew Maintenance check as well. All three of these are mandatory on each track. What the player chooses to do for these is totally up to them. For Food, the first players salvaged tens of rations, so they just needed to subtract the consumption, while the 2nd group didn't consider it and had to forage when i asked them what they're going to eat today (they have ways of finding food, but i wanted to make rations relevant, stranded island and all). As for Shelter, they first cleared out the boat, to sleep inside, then they started building some cover outside the ship, as well as some barricades, so they can't be approached from 180 degrees. I've counted these as valid for those checks.
Aside from the 3 mandatory ones, they can also choose to do Self Improvement (ex, training into a new proficiency, wizard learning new spells etc), Exploration (figure out the terrain, it's how they found the 2 other ships mentioned above) Relations (if they want to get on better terms with the entire or part of the crew, or even have 1 on 1 time with people. I awarded this with either unlocking some piece of info they didn't realize initially, or give them advantage when asking the crew to agree with them with a persuasion roll. made it meaningful for the player. We have 3 more: The Mystery track (spending time here would have me guide them towards a place or a piece of info they haven't yet encountered or uncovered; basically "Help, what do i do now" option. After this is the Commune track, which everyone must participate in during a full moon. If they don't they will miss out, Doing this at least once is a milestone for levelup oh yes, we use milestones, so they can go through levels faster in a shorter time. it just makes sense for me in this campaign, then the Rest track (to get rid of Stress. What is stress ? if you fail any check you try to make, in this set of tracks i've listed, you can take a Stress token, up to 5, to reroll that check. Each Stress token taken something away, ex, Losing proficiency with a tool, a weapon or a skill, having one of your pieces need repair after excessive use, and requiring them to not only relive the stress, but also fix the this they almost broke. Basically, stress is a temporary hinderance they can get rid of by resting.
Players have time for 3 of these checks during the day and 1 after sun-down, if they want to do something optional. Also, another thing about the checks, they start off easy, at 5 or 10 DC for a success (the threshold went up as they leveled up), to which you add 5 more to the DC for each other check they do on the track. For example, a player could spend one day: 1st, Foraging or Fishing, with a DC of 5 (This covered the mandatory Fool track), 2nd he cooks it at DC 10 (this is the Crew Maintenance), 3rd he wants to spend the time with a friend in the crew, for a DC 20 charisma check. He fails, takes a Stress, then rerolls and succeeds. Lastly, he spends the early night watching the sea and trying to relax. That would mean a 25DC in order to relax, which can be number of things, but the only time someone had to do a rest, they rolled a Con ability check and passed it, so they lost the stress.
I'll end off with a cryptic i've left the players with, and well as what i actually planned to be going on. Thank you so much if you've read this far, let me know if you have questions or anything you can tell me, i appreciate you xo
Message, with forbidden knowledge, which players are not privy to yet: "Welcome, adventurers, to ($&#@*%) Island. Keep your senses sharp, as during the ($#@%^&%), your prowess and determination will be tested. When you are ready, make your way to the center of (^$#%$^#) Volcano and determine whom amongst you is worthy of being the new (&$#*$#@) of your God."
>! Welcome, adventurers, to FINAL Island. Keep your senses sharp, as during the BATTLEROYALE your prowess and determination will be tested. When you are ready, make your way to the center of ARENA Volcano and determine whom amongst you is worthy of being the new AVATAR of your God. !<

TBH, i tried to railroad them a bit where needed. Seeing they don't say the words, i've had pieces unlocked from their chosen god. In short, it is a competition in which Gods must participate, choose their champions and help them win the event. This will of course give the players riches beyond imagining, a wish spells, maybe 2 wish spells, who knows!? For those that didn't want to make a decision and not want to either, i told my players "You can refuse each and every deity you want, but that means another one will talk to you. That's where the Captain plays a role. At the start, i've asked the players to start as non-magic users, but being able to multiclass once they reach the island. They find out a bit later that there are no Warlocks in the crewmate.. it doesn't even cross their mind. until they realize, their captain is a Warlock. The only thing he did is he refused every single God. So, if a players wants to play Warlock, i told them they would have to speak and refuse every god i can see listed in the pantheon. And yes, there is something at the end of the line. !<

I don't know if i've missed anything big so far. It's already a long post and the story if really convoluted as is. If you'd like to ask about it, feel free, i'd love to talk about it more. Cheers evveryone!

Message from the Queen of the Rosary given to Gisella on 9 June 2024
My daughter, thank you for welcoming me into your heart. Daughter, the times that are coming will be hard and I want all those who have true Faith to be ready. I ask you to take advantage of this moment of Grace. Convert, keep the Covenant with God, follow his Commandments and confess your sins. Try to keep yourself as clean as possible. My children, the earth will be shaken to be renewed. Its purification is necessary! Consecrated children, do not embrace New Age doctrines. The only weapon to avoid getting lost is Prayer and Faith only in God! Do not mix with the world and be true shepherds. Humanity has betrayed the Law of God and nature, believing that it is more powerful than Him, but remember that God is the Creator of all things. I cry, because I see so many of my children lost in the confusion. I as a Mother, want to help you find the right path, but you often do not listen to My Appeals: have Faith, courage and be pious. This is the time of the struggle between good and evil! I ask you, always choose the good, help your brothers when they falter. God looks at your hardened hearts, he sees falsehood, pride, envy, wickedness and would like to transform you. Be light, let yourselves be transformed by his Mercy and let hearts of stone become hearts of flesh. My beloved, my presence on this earth will not last forever... take advantage and meditate on my words today. It's urgent... the time is now and it's today. Listen to my words! Now I leave you with my maternal blessing, in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen.
SHORT REFLECTION
The words of the Mother of God erupt like a real "spiritual earthquake" in our lives, because they want a real and total change in our existence, so that we can really start living according to the desires of Heaven. We can actualize all this in our lives, when we nourish it through Faith and Prayer, foundations on which we must rest "our spiritual building". Only by renewing our life, with the help of sacramental grace, especially through the sacrament of confession which cleanses our soul from our sins, would we be certain of implementing his plans in our existence. How much confusion reigns among men in the world today. Not only because like the first man and the first woman, they were tempted and thought of becoming like God. But the great temptation in which man lives is that he no longer wants to be satisfied with becoming like God, but wants to become greater than God Putting yourself in his place, subverting the very nature of the Creator. For these reasons, we must lovingly welcome the warnings of the Queen of Heaven, who continues to descend to earth for us. We still don't know how long we would have this "grace" of living at her feet, so we welcome her invitations. In particular her shepherds, who are called to lead all of God's flock on the true path that the Lord has traced for the good of humanity. Let us destroy our ego (I) which through envy, jealousy, wickedness and all those desires that are suggested to us in our heart by Satan, do nothing but shape a heart of stone, a heart that does not know how to love, but just hate. While the Lord asks us to form a heart of flesh, a heart imbued with his merciful love. Let's not put off for tomorrow what is asked of us today. We live in the present, because it belongs to God. We leave the future in his hands.... Forward with prayer!
Message from the Queen of the Rosary given to Gisella on 3 June 2024
Dear children, thank you for having responded to my call in your heart. Children, I ask you to have respect for the Body and Blood of My Son! During her life he left his blood for the Eternal Alliance. Respect children, this Alliance! Be docile to his Holy Commandments. Today, dear children, they want to remove Jesus from the world, from your lives, from schools... do not be deprived of the Love of God. Be filled with His Holy Love, especially during the Sacraments! My children, have reverence for the Body of Jesus, just as My Angels and I Myself do. Kneel and lower your head before this immense miracle, which continues in all the Holy Masses. Pray, children for my shepherds, that they may always be illuminated by the Light of Christ in their hearts and in their consciences. Now I leave you with My maternal blessing, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen
There will be many graces that will descend.

good to monetize and modify!
So I was out with a buddy at one of those small town China buffets and he got a fortune cookie without any paper fortune in it. And I went home and made this. While listening to the album Wasteland to Wonderland by Paddy and the Rats.
It takes place in a world where science and magic coexist. Poorly. (Think S.T.A.L.K.E.R. but with wizards) The city and the countryside are ruled by a being known as the fateweaver. She rules with an iron fist, her command over sorcery absolute. Deep within the city her scientists are working on something. Something insidious. One of these decides that they wont be a part of it anymore. They are exiled from the city with a terrible curse and nowhere to go. There are rumors however of another sorcerer, who lives in an old estate far on the other side of the wastelands.
Bereft of any other ideas, they go. Ready to challenge fate.
Like my stuff? Check out the archive!: https://www.reddit.com/talkingtalltales/comments/1bdfpxb/timerafts_script_archive/
Want a comission of your own?: https://ko-fi.com/timeraft
Dialogue
SFX
Context
context that changes the audio
The listener has been cursed by a figure known as the fateweaver for refusing to work on a scientific project for them. They have fled from the fate weavers city and sought out a mysterious sorcerer to have the curse lifted
Unfortunately they didn't get very far past the edge of the estate. They're tangled up in a bush of enchanted roses. The sorcerer arrives, in sweatpants and an oversized tshirt. Tired.
Well well well what have my roses caught for me?
A trespasser all tangled up in the thorns. A dime a dozen drifter.
Trespasser trespasser why did come?
Seems you're a little tangled up there. Did you really think you’d just be able to waltz into my sanctuary? You have no idea how much danger you’re in right now.
You’re lucky that my roses judged you to be a good person at heart or their enchantments would have made you into a rat as soon as you pricked yourself on them. Then my cats would have probably eaten you.
So tell me why you came and I’ll cut you down and pretend I never saw you.
What's the matter trespasser? Devil got your throat?
What brought you here? Just what manner of mortal are you?
Oh it seems it can speak after all. Come on now.
You’re stammering. Talk slower.
A scientist you say? Well well well. It's not often I’m graced with the presence of a sage like yourself.
Tell me, child of science, why would you seek out a sorcerer? I don't suppose you came here just to check out my roses.
And what's this on your neck? Seems to my eyes to be a tendril from a curse mark.
Tongue clicking
Ooooh boy, somebody out there must really not like you huh? Why is that?
More stammering
Actually you know what? I’m not interested. Here let me unsheathe my knife and cut you down.
Cuts them down
Thud
Now I’m going to close my beautiful eyes for a moment. And when I open them you’re going to be gone. I'm going to go back to sleep and in the morning this will just seem like some silly dream.
Understand?
Alright sweet pea.
One
Two
Three
Deep breath
And you’re still here.
Ok let's try again shall we?
One…..
Two……
Frustrated sigh
Ok I’m starting to get a little bit angry now. You know you woke me up from a really wonderful dream?
I was driving down the coast roads in a long silver convertible. I think it was a thunderbird like from that Marc Cohn song.
I had the top down and the radio on. The sea breeze was tossing my hair just so and I had that lovely salty fresh taste in my mouth. You have no idea how much I long to return to the coast. To feel that breeze for real just one more time.
The sun was going down and the sky was a million radiant colors. Just exploding up from the ocean. I had my arm draped around the shoulder of some lounge singer. It was one of the nicest dreams I’ve had in a long long time.
And right in the middle of it, as my favorite song came on over the radio and that good looking singer started to sing along to it, so softly I could barely even hear. I leaned in for the kiss and what happened instead?
I woke up- alerted to a trespasser into my little sanctum. My hair is a mess and my mouth tastes like morning breath. And instead of some gorgeous singer, I get to spend this cloudy damp little night with you.
So you can see how I might be a little unamused right now. Clearly you’re not going to take the off ramp I so generously provided to you so explain why you’re here. It had better be a really good reason.
Listener stammers again
You know what shut up. Let me see that curse mark. The whole thing.
Shhhhh relax i just need to look. Take off your shirt.
Turn around.
Traces their finger over the curse mark
Oh ohh damn. You’re really up the creek aren't you? You’ve been cursed by the fateweaver herself.
I’ve seen this before. It's a very insidious little curse.
Your energy slowly sapped away. Day by day. Everything around you goes greyer and greyer. And then one day your tank finally goes empty and you sit down somewhere, close your eyes and turn into stone, never to stir again. It's a favorite of hers.
What did you do? You don't seem like the defiant type. I'm guessing it was something like speaking out of turn during a meeting. Something stupid and petty like that.
Ohhh you had some “concerns”? Didn't like the implications of what you were being told to research did you?
Laughs
I’ll paint the rest of the picture. You shared these “Concerns” with her, but to your incredible surprise (and nobody else's) instead of listening to your ethical concerns she cursed you.
Listener does not deny it
Hehe yeah I knew it.
I can tell you're the type to assume the best of people aren't you. That’s cute. That's why you came out here just assuming I'd lift your curse out of the kindness of my little old heart isn't it? The evil sorcerer in the heart of the wasteland is surely just a caring good Samaritan deep down.
Well why would I lift the curse even if I could? What's in it for me? Me and the fateweaver have an understanding. She gets the city and the mountains. And I get the wasteland. Sure we're enemies, but frankly she's beaten me. And I'm tired, so why Should I rock the boat for some no name labcoat like you? Why risk another confrontation?
So no, I don't think I’ll be helping you.
You can stay right here if you want though. I think a statue would look really nice right over…. There. Right over on that iron bench by the dry fountain. Make sure you strike a good pose when it starts, Sweet Pea.
Maybe sit right there with your head in your hands. Cry a little bit even. It'll give this place a real melancholy vibe. Maybe I'll let the roses grow over you. That doesn't sound so bad does it? Just try not to make too much noise. I need my beauty sleep. See ya in the morning!
Mocking laugh
Oh you look so cute when the light fades from your eyes like that. Whatcha gonna do? Beg? Cry?
Go right on ahead! Sadder stories than yours have failed to move me! But I love a good begging session as much as the next sorcerer! Come on then! Lets see it.
Listener gets angry. In a tranquil way.
Oooh a death glare. Shiver me timb-
Listener sucker punches them in the gut, tackles them and takes the knife. pinning them to the ground with the knife to their throat.
Wha-oof!!
Oh you're a tricky bastard aren't you? I have to admit that I never would have expected you to punch me in the gut like that. And you got your grubby little hands on my favorite knife.
You think you've got the upper hand don't you? Well go ahead try and slit my throat. Take that knife and do it.
Go on. Try it.
The knife won't cut me. I know it. And if you truly know something it can't hurt you. It's killed enough for me that it knows it won't be trusted by anyone else. That's old magic. Nice try though.
Of course you realize that this means war.
Punches listener in the face
Grunts
Shoves the listener off of them.
They square up with eachother
Come on you fool! Hit me again! Show me that you're made of blood and bone! Show me what you lose if your flesh becomes stone. Stand up for yourself! You deserve to live don't you?
Grunts as they throw a punch. Listener dodges
Well?! Show me that you want it! Show me how bad you want to live!
Dodges a punch
Is that all!? I was just starting to respect you!
Throws another punch and hits the listener. The listener is knocked back and lets out an angry primal yell.
Yeah that's it! Scream! Cry for blood! Get mad! Get angry! Live damn you! Live!
Punches the air
You've got too much to lose to let me stop you! Take your fate into your own hands! You know what you came here for! Take it!
Tries to punch out the listener. The listener dodges and counter punches. Hitting their cheek
Laughter
spits
You made me bite my cheek, you little piece of dirt. First blood goes to you.
My mouth tastes like blood, but tonight the blood tastes like wine. Images are flashing through my mind. Images of the past and the future. You're something else. Worth getting out of bed for at least.
Laughter
So you want to live? You're not the only one. I can help you with that, but it'll cost you.
This curse of yours isn't some run of the mill evil spell. It's not a matter of me just waving my hand and casting a good spell to counter the evil one. There's a reason she's called the fateweaver. You turning into stone has literally been written in the stars. It is your destiny, it's part of the great tapestry of the world's fate.
The sun will rise tomorrow, the river will flow to the sea, the moon shall wax and wane, and you will turn to stone. It is your fate.
Ha! There's always a way. I can change your fate, that's what it means to be a sorcerer after all, to change fate. Come with me. To the well of eternity.
Walking and talking
My estate is built around the well of eternity. It is the bedrock of everything I am. The little seed that became the core of my power, and the link that became the chains that bind me. I wasn't always what I am now. I used to be a dental hygienist, but I had a curse of my own I needed to break. I’ll spare you the gritty details but it led me here from my home dimension.
A great man once compared the world to an optometrist trapped on a rail car with one little hole in the wall. Forced to watch the world pass by but being unable to see where the train was going or where it had been, only where it was at that moment.
That is what it is to be bound by fate, but what if I told you there was a way out of the boxcar?
That great hole in the center of the brick plaza? That's the well of eternity.
We'll have to descend the staircase around it. Watch your step, the stairs are slippery and thin.
Conjures a magical fire for light.
A magical fire burning a brilliant shade of [whatever your favorite color is] it will guide our way.
This world of yours and mine is one of many. All that happens here is one way or another driven by a conflict between those who serve the princess of the tower, the goddess of order. And the Witch of the plains. The goddess of chaos.
The fateweaver serves the former, although she doesn't know it. And I served the latter, even though I despised it. All that happens in every universe on the most fundamental level, is driven by their eternal hatred. So if you ever felt like the gods were fools, well you weren't far off from the truth.
Or in any case that's how it has been explained to me. I'll freely admit I don't understand most things as much as I'd like to. I’m a lot less than I appear to be. Most sorcerers are. We’re all smoke and mirrors. Shadows on the wall. Ghost boxes and card tricks.
They are deep in the well. There's a quiet watery ambience.
The well of eternity may look like water, but in truth it is the stuff that makes up the void between universes. If you submerge yourself into the water you will cease to be a part of this world and the forces that command your destiny will have no power over you. Your life will be your own.
Whispers minus the debt you will be owing me
Wait, I want you to understand what exactly you are doing to yourself.
There was a kingdom once where the tribe of the valley and the tribe of the hill were all times at war. There was a trader who sold to both sides and became fabulously rich.
But one night as he was riding through a small city a great storm arrived suddenly.
He went to the valley tribe for shelter, but they had no love for someone who also knew the people of the hills.
He went to the people of the hills but they would not shelter a man who also knew the people of the valley.
Thus the storm descended upon him and he was without shelter. Even of the worst kind. He was never seen again.
Do you understand?
Look into the waters.
I can show you glimpses of the great cities of the multiverse.
Samandar, The Emerald City, Tanelorn, Coruscant, El Dorado, Tooner Flats, Numinor, Detroit.
None of them will ever be a home for you.
If there is a place anywhere in the multiverse for a soul that has been baptized in the well of eternity I don't know of it. And trust me, I've looked. You can't go home again.
If you let me lower you into these waters your fate will be your own, and that can be a terrible thing. For whatever happens this point forward will be your responsibility. And if things go poorly you will have no one you can blame save for yourself. Are you certain you want this? I won't blame you if you turn back. There are worse fates than being stone. Becoming like me for example.
Look me in the eye and tell me you want this. Only you can make this choice.
Pause
listener nods
Deep breath
Smooch!
For luck
Splash as they push the listener into the water.
Listener is submerged in the water
Swim up! Swim up!
Fade out
Listener wakes up in inside the speakers home on a couch
Hey. How you feeling?
Head hurts right? And it's not just because of that black eye I gave you last night.
You know you saw a lot of stuff in the waters but you can't remember any of it. That's how it went for me at least.
You'll remember what you saw in time. A little bit will come back to you bit by bit. And It will change you, in ways you might not like. Until then well, ignorance is bliss as they say.
Can you sit up?
Good job, drink this. It's spiced wine, it'll calm your senses a little.
They hand the listener a coffee mug full of warm spiced wine
Like it? I whipped it up while you were napping. It’s not magic. Just calming.
Listener suddenly notices that they have a tattoo of a broken chain on their arm.
Oh yeah I see you just noticed your sick tatt. I did mention something about a debt to me did I not?
Hey! I said my help would cost you didnt I? I mean sure yeah I’m basically a saint, but I still need something in return. That tattoo is just a little forget me not. Something to keep that fresh in your mind. Besides, it looks good on you. Gives you that little bit of edginess you’ve been missing.
The broken chain. It's a symbol of mine. There's thirteen links. One for every second you spent under the waters down there.
You see I’ve been thinking and I’ve decided I need to get more active outside of my garden again and I'm gonna need a….
Hmmm minion sounds a little too hierarchical. So does servant. I mean I’m just an ordinary guy/gal. I can't have a servant. Too rich for my blood.
Let's say I'll need a helper. Yeah helper sounds nice. Somebody to do my leg work while I focus on the more technical stuff. You’ll love it. Give you a chance to get out of the lab and punch something. If this bruise on my cheek means anything you’ve got some pent up energy you need to work out.
Simple proposition really. Every time you run an errand for me a link disappears from the chain. Help me out thirteen times and you’re free to go. Unless you ever knowingly lie to me, that's gonna add another link to the chain. In the meantime you can stay here.
Hey have you ever driven a Hi-Lo? Do you think you could steal one?
Visible confusion
Nevermind, we'll talk about errands later.
Finish the wine and take a nap for a while. You’ve had a rough night. And it won't be your last. For better or worse. You chose to live a life without a destiny.
When you wake up I’ll have an errand you can run with me.
Cheek kiss
Sleep tight Trespasser.
-30-

Good afternoon anybody, somebody, nobody, & everybody
all evidence DM ME
My name is Jain Kunwar
I am a retail trader for 3.5 years.
I am not an ape, I am not an institutional investor, I am not a hedge fund.
Nor do I have any clients.
I do not provide personalised investment advice for fees or commissions or tax purposes.
I'm just an individual investor who did my own research like Detective Columbo/Pikachu.
I come from a broken family, I have been to prison, I have been homeless even at 15 for many years.
I am not a good person, but I am seeking salvation from God.
I been doing Heroin since the age of 13, sober 8 years since the day I pleaded out to God in Merton station London at 1 am asking God to save me.
Which I believe in myself he did because shortly…….
Soon after, I went prison by confessing all my crimes and the judge let me run it concurrently for being honest that I need help and I had no foundation and healed a bit moving forwards in life.
I was born on May 10th, 1994, in Nepal Butwal. Home of the Gurkhas
I came to England 2002 November & have lived here since.
I class my self as Asian British A9
I have been repenting for my sins happily, paying off my debts and learning to be a good human being for I was a sinner till I met Jesus in Church of England.
My one and only father Jesus.
I have been following and invested in Game stop for a long time.
I started educating myself about the stock market since then.
I have been buying shares of GameStop Since 2021 But since 2021 June been incurring losses through market manipulation techniques I.E.
I had been denied withdrawals/ buying or selling options, leveraging options from Capital.NLY

Which incurred me 6 Grand losses on June 2021 and God knows how much/many other investors BIG or small in all exchanges that this effected.
I also have evidence of numerous times the trading app has halted its trade for more then 30 minutes to an hour in a single day! But for these I have videos more then images
I am happy to hand it over if you tell me where to send it.
They kept ignoring me until a month ago in May the 10^th 2024 will touch base here later(miracle)
I have what’s app records of me trying to make complaints throughout the years with no redemption or straight answers.
I once spoke to an employee male & female one said, “We are experiencing some technical difficulties” this was about 1-2 years ago.
The Craziest thing was the ticker was moving in other exchanges just not in the one I was trading from.
Once it didn’t even open for 1.5 hours when it was open everywhere else
It finally opened at 10:49 how I know? I experienced this.
Under the FCA regulations all registered Trading Companies have a duty to protect investors from glitches and “technical difficulties”
Which They failed to do so for me I speak for myself and only what I have experienced.
The company even has glitched my leveraging system of 5-1 which was the setting since joining the company.
where, even if you pick 5-1 you only receive 2-1.
I have evidence of this as well & it’s not the first time either.
I know this has been done 100x of times if you take a Deeper Dive in the company’s own trading platform.
You won’t be able to find in other exchanges as other exchanges are working well so you cannot see the reason as its all “inter- linked”.
“Inter-linked “exchanges one falls apart whilst others are moving causing direct market manipulation.
Quoting blade runner “inter-linked”


Since then, I have been sent death threats anonymously.
Which also I can prove It was sent by him by connecting some dots with you
I met the owner in Wembley stadium in Corporate Box I was invited by Mr Stephen O
He contacted me and invited me to his corporate box on 8/6/24 I went there to find clarity as hackers have been going through my phones and social media with death threats.
Currently he is getting his hackers to find out where my siblings are and such as those are the type of questions I am getting in my social media platforms.
I call it phsing, smishing and vhising all 3 were used on my network.
Using carefully relaying questions in segment to build a definitive answer by narrowing down the wrong answers.
Like how it asks me what horoscope I am, Questions like use your initials to create a Japanese name.
Narrowing down an answer what every analytical mind would do.
I have been going through this since May 10^th after he contacted me.
I have said my name is J to every one of these questions should be in my social media history.
Notice how it says JJ DEAD MAN COVER
i.e
Notice how I met the Owner at 8/6/24 1 pm corporate box …there are plenty cameras there.
I like to be clear here I do not know this person or have his number for him to be coming to my social media as people “whom I know”.
I believe it was the vhising technique of his goons on hire you can see my history for the past month in call history I been getting scam calls left right and centre.
I will also give a copy of screen recording on request.
Then I went home and put a video of his trading app chart not moving like other exchanges for example having a 1-minute ticker symbol does not move for 30 minutes in graph line on my social media suddenly,
I see a people “whom you might know” soon after I posted the video.
I only went to the corporate box because he told me he has over 300 people retail traders coming which I was the only retail there apart from 5 millionaires 4 of which I believe they own the company only speculation whom others are currently.
But I felt an eerily vibe So I did not eat their food or take their hospitality which was probably funded by investors like me getting robbed blind because he thought no one would notice.
I also met a man there I spoke to him he told me His trading account was transferred to their platform.
The clue is there which accounts have been moved without consent or choice?
He will plan to bring all in one to have more control and doing this also erases all traces of manipulation in the trading platform it moved from a very sly way to delete history.
Should not affect me though I joined capital.com ticker symbol. NLY as my first and only trading app.
I have lost all history of my trade’s funds and even portfolios deleted without notice of consent why is he observing my account and why is he deleting everything without my consent? He knows he did me wrong that’s why because he uses capital.com to manipulate the market into his interest.
I can identify all 4 of them even though I only spoke to Mr S.O over the phone and only know their name.
I ended up being the only retail trader there, A poor man in a Billionaires Club
So out of place
I just can’t figure out why, Can you?
The ticker symbol has to be moving according to the time even if the price does not fluctuate the time has to keep moving like kinetic energy.
It has to be moving unless halted which can be only 35 minutes per day but I have counted over 1 hour gone in some days


I have been through mental trauma with hackers trying to hypnotize me with flashing lights and other spiral colour techniques mind you.
I am an epileptic which I grew out of when I was 15 which is highly reactive to epileptic people.
Miracle indeed, as many don't, certainly not after adult hood.

Also, they have tried to ask me questions to figure out whom I am on my social media,
I got closer to their crimes and my truth and they wanted to know what I know or make me join them as per the invitation I believe bribing me to survive another few years maybe?
Hope you Enjoyed the Corporate box Kenny it was from the money you stole from me!
Steal from the poor how dare you?
pushing pornographic and other Hypno/flashing light techniques to my social media platforms
also using racial harassment by calling me Paki Psycho
At least get the country right! Originally from Nepal BITCH Gurkhas Salute!
We both know whom we are now S.O
Which over the past 3 years have also caused me to lose everything…..
money, love, joy, sanity & dreams.
I have been Robbed constantly from these techniques they use also the withdrawal rejection from 10000 to even 100 this was very recently too. Have some images to reference this too.
I log almost everything I do.
That’s just how I found healing/clarity by writing it down.
I spoke to a person named Emma who told me to withdraw,
I have to show all my cards even the bank card “HSBC” which was bankrupt and stopped without consent.
Jokes on them I still had it Q.Q ahahaaha even after I showed them it didn’t work.
Until 3 days later after I lost 65% of my investment.
I like to point out, I mentioned to HSBC many times I am currently struggling and am willing to pay in an instalment plan.
What I can because I did not want my account to close ever as it would effect my credit score most indefinitely.
Also, the weirdest request was they asked me to show them a picture of the different Barclays Cards I have with the same account number.
saying it must be the same card but it’s the same account number same card basically so why?
I replied, I put the money from my apple pay send it back to my apple pay card he said please send us an email of all your cards indirectly refusing to let me withdraw whilst I am in profit.

So, I sent them by email which I should have on my email “for reference”.
He also mentioned he will be my account manager and watch my account after the first time he called me because I am a “premium” account.
I still am a premium account with minimum 5-1 leveraging glitched to 2-1 with only 400 pounds left in my account and still watches where and when as my judgement has been good when to buy.
Buy low sell high! Or just hold but I couldn’t do any of these.
I believe it took him this long for many years the issue was my real name and my social media are not the same people.
As I do not have a social media account anywhere with my real name.

He started taking control of my account and portfolios since the day he contacted me on 2024 May 5-15 around the same time I started losing again drastically.
Unfortunately, I cannot provide you how much money I had made in profits or losses because “My account manager of a premium account less then 50 grand had deleted all my portfolios and trade history to clear his name”.
My account portfolio was called Bullish-CFD
Glory CFD and 3 gbps cfds I ended up with one named GBP usd
How the name changed I do not know
I suspect he closed my shared and opened it in a different portfolio causing 8888 amc share sale in my account 1112 GME shares.
As these most of these shares were bought months ago which I believe he has to pay for borrowing he doesn’t have to pay if it was new trades, I suspect this happened here.
Why else would I not the Portfolio I had designated names on.
This can also explain why my trade history has been wiped.
I did not do this I did not consent this nor was I notified.
Let me make this clear I do not have any controls or jurisdiction to wipe my history of trades if you could compare with other users to see if they have been wiped out and why it has been wiped out as its detrimental for Securities Agency to have correct data of everything that is going on with trading exchanges.
Which makes me believe more in the investment of AMC & GME.
I also believe Mr S.O prior to 2 years ago before all these new rules started coming, he was using his trading account to artificially increase profits by making a profit/gain.
I.E you open a position in a stock that is about to split in the market or going through one.
Let’s say its 2 5-1 reverse split now its 10 he made 8 decimal gains instead of changing the shares according to the split.
This crime trick he used to manipulate the market ended when sundial went for a share split reverse.
I came to realise this when I ventured in a demo account, and it worked but I didn’t do it with real money as that is not the right way.
I am trying to be good doing it the right way.

I have worked physically demanding jobs for many years working 6 days -7 days per week doing 55-65 hours per week, killed my joy in life and even went without food to invest in this company as I believe in the Company board, company outlook and company fundamentals all 3 checks out as a great investment to my eyes a hat trick to a quad trick now.
Putting money in it almost every month in the past 3-4 years.
My journey ends here with my Losses from market manipulation but I will reveal the truth!!!
They have robbed us again and again even the government has been robbed.
just for their benefit ruined many people’s lives all over the world.
Especially now that the company managed to be stable and grow profits.
But the issue here is not my losses it’s the market manipulation.
the company is doing all they can to not close their losing trade which is the
THE BOX everyone is talking about, but no one is knowing about somebody may know though.
Maybe investigate their wives’ accounts and you might find it on a marginal line red line in this account.
The blonde lady. Wearing navy blue jeans. Bingo!
Mr Stephen O has tried bribing me in social media sending women over my home to seduce me but my dog did her job right! And sensed the intentions I know this because I had a media pushed through my social media saying do you want me to send you two women to seduce me in hiding his criminal behaviours but this is not about me
He has robbed millions of people .

I have evidence of this as well to turn it in his favour as I believe he is short on GameStop which is a direct Conflict of interest “the reasons why I am been having these trading technical issues “
Trying to turn you into a gambler not investor! By taking away the withdraw, buy or sell!!!
You see,
The universe spoke to me, and I am becoming the voice for everybody who are being robbed by this man.
Call it a sign, a cohencidence or just dumb luck!
I am not a messiah though I just uncovered the truth!
2 weeks before my birthday on May 10^th,, a stray kitten gave birth to 4 kittens and left only one behind. The squeeze began on my Birthday no fucking way!!!!!!!!
I/we have since, been taking care of her.
Meet My Newborn Kitten.

At 2 weeks old.

I also have a conspiracy theory on this as an attempt to harm my kitten.
To destroy me and make me stop trading.
I have frozen the medication Dr Elliot not a regular vet from that practice.
Well not the ones we see anyways 2 out 3 times.
My kitten was very ill shortly after taking the medication was also recommended to euthanised my kitten.
If you see her now you won’t believe why they would ever recommend this.
Of course, I argued and took control of the situation and saved her.
When I am back on my feet, I am going to a professional to check it out completely.
I like to remind you I already have a dog in this house for that cat to dare to come in my yard and give birth its like it was meant to be here cats? get it?
She is about 2.2 times her size now! Growing strong !!! just like GAMESTOP
CANT STOP WONT STOP GAME STOP
In Jesus name can I get AMEN!
b4 I continue...
I currently work as a civil engineer and am on the quest to turn my life around in my Pursuit of Happiness.
Thank heavens as I do not even hold a GCSE another miracle!
That I have this job.
I am a troubled child, but I still have dreams... of making it in life.
Which is providing my future wife and kids with everything I did not receive,
love, attention, guidance and more importantly a home they can sleep comfortably knowing they will have a place to sleep again tomorrow.
But I do not blame anyone as it was a first time for everyone being a father... a mother...even me a son just as guilty.
But I want you to keep reading this story… as it is very important if you have lost in the stock market as there are many other stocks that are missing in chart it was probably getting diluted for someone’s benefit to maybe stabilise their losing trading account.
I get the desperation that’s how I felt scrounging, borrowing money when I felt like I was about to be margin called totally human reaction.
The way he gained the money to stabilise it was totally criminal though.
I feel like he is digging himself a bigger and bigger hole and that hole is up some skunks arse hole by now.
I also like to point out Mr S.O has notified me that capital is a British company, but I have seen it being registered in the state of
This is the Final frontier.

My judgement was clouded by addiction made me do bad things...
I apologise to everyone I caused harm/inconvenience in the past and now.
I really am.
From the bottom of my heart.
my actions were clouded by addiction it took me more than a decade to defeat my heroin addiction.
At this sober state, now If you ask me anything; I’ll tell you even if it gets me in trouble
without a second thought.
I like to point out through out my columbo detective move I came across various information some even I should not know.
All I’m seeking is justice and peace right now and I hope someone can help me get this as I have proof for most of these speculations.
But I believe Mr S.O has been sending his hackers to feed numbers into my head by keep pushing it into my feed.
Because of this I purposely lost all my trades as I will not participate in insider trading sent by Mr S.O to convict me to silence.
Realising I was being watched by numerous people.
I went into a state of hallucinations, insanity.
It was hard but I crawled back out of the hackers infiltrating my device to corrupt my mind and decisions.
I suffer with anxiety and depression already too and have been suffering further since Mr S.O has called me.
I just didn’t know this before he called me, and all the pieces started to connect.

As this type of speculations and claims are only for the wealthy and privileged.
I know I am neither.
I am a very poor man with no land no inheritance no support.
Everything I earn is from these hands that push tools and this mind that tries to learn investing.
At my day job I give my 110% physically
at home
I work my mind 110% to try being an experienced smart investotrader as I know once I have knowledge and skill, I can make money easily after.
Currently, I am sharpening my day trading skills to further increase my knowledge from investor to a trader.
I earning ends meet living pay-check to pay-check and I will continue doing so to save earn invest and one day have a place, which my future family can call our home proudly safely.
But I still see the deep value in a growing company as the more room for growth the more gains the investment will make.
I learnt this from reading and following great investors of this decade I.E DFV videos of GameStop 3 years ago.
I especially like the one where we roll the 8 ball and just find a random ticker and analyse it you never know what dumb luck can bring you.
A school dropout like me to GameStop and I have learnt more things than I did in my lifetime.
You can learn anything in YouTube now amazing really we should use technology to assist us not work for us I strongly believe not use it for our own personal gain just because you have coders.
If you look through their trading app they chart doesn’t even revert the history into split prices SUPER MANIPULATION.

1 I love the stock/I believe in the stock.
2 the company has board members who doesn’t even get salary.
For this they have my trust of my investment and that they will do everything in their knowledge and power to make this company successful as toys brings “JOY” even to adults.

I kept putting more and more invested in this company, but the stock is being manipulated so it doesn’t work everyone will lose as how the conflict-of-interest person wants it he has survived until now because of this but there were no major leads of this I believe.
[Again, I am here to speak about GameStop and the TRUTH]()
I still see GameStop as a great investment.
The company survived Covid 19, also is profitable and stable currently.
With all the current market price fluctuations
Also the price has not dropped below 40! pre split price.
which further strengthens my speculation,
I currently own only 18 shares of GameStop I did have over a thousand.
But the company owners of; Capital.com ticker symbol NLY.
Have done everything they can to make me lose a winning investment.
They took my buy button my sell button and even stopped trading for more than 30 mins and hid it from none trading eyes in the bigger picture.
He also took my shares and diluted it I have incurred about 61 grand losses from my history of trading because of these market manipulation techniques over the past 3-4 years.
I as an investor a client of capital trading app was not treated fairly.
1 Even when I have raised complaints numerous time over the past 3-4 years was shrugged off because I am just well a NOBODY.
I call it a poor man's privileges.
2 Under FCA regulations Glitches or technical failures that cause financial harm to customers is a breach of this rule.
3 I am formally writing a complaint here and raising awareness with evidence of market manipulation!
would like support regarding the Law side of things and what i can recover from being ridiculed and robbed.
Using my food & leisure money to invest in this company.
I sacrificed my Joy for this investment with my hard earned money by working 50-60 hours a week labour 52 weeks per year non stop you can check my work rota records sometimes even 70 per week in physically demanding jobs.
1He has sent me Death threats today of what I am revealing now since meeting him in Wembley Stadium 8/6/26 (have a image of sending me death threats after meeting him today using paid hackers)
1 3/half weeks ago he called me to say I am in a premium account there are 300 of you and I would like to invite you to meet him today
which was really weird why is he putting my account on premium and saying He is going to look after it I am retail trader I have barely any money in account!
and deleted all my portfolio and trade history everything wiped clean!
+I suspect this was getting rid of evidence as I am right at the heart of the Griffin
I know why he took ownership from me without my consent and sold it without me knowing by derivatives and decreased the market value for his personal benefits.
Because he is already manipulating using this trading platform to control the prices elsewhere.
I have evidence of this you can only see it just DM me
if you look at the charts in their trading platform you can see it yourself to say it’s not photo shop.
no one else can notice it if you are not using the same app!!
+
2 Mr Stephen and his goons have been manipulating the stock since gamestop! 2021
+prior to 2 years ago his app would increase profits even from a split share!
I came across this information on 2022 You should recheck all files that are linked to him and splitting shares tickers as he has robbed them blind too.
I was the only retail investor, there alongside his corporate buddies which I am happy to identify and stand as witness.
I felt safe though as I don't even Fear the Darkest Night as I always walked by faith and believed in God has a purpose for me too..
A nobody like me maybe could be somebody one day!

(all hail great DFV) got to pay your respects !
I learnt trading since 2021
“Once there was a farmer who sold a pound of butter to a baker every week.
After several weeks of purchasing butter from the farmer the baker decided to weigh it. To insure it was indeed a full pound.
When he weighed it, he discovered the butter felt short of a pound which enraged him and made him feel cheated and decided to take the farmer to court.
The judge asked the farmer what his method is of weighing the butter.
the farmer replied “your honour, I am poor I do not own any exact measuring tool.
How ever I do have a Scale.
The judge then inquired if the farmer uses the scale to measure the butter the farmer explained.
“Your honour I have been buying a 1 pound of loaf from the baker Long before he began purchasing butter from me,
When ever he brings the bread, I place it on the scale and measure out the same weight to give him in return.
So, if the baker is not receiving a pound of butter he is also not delivering a pound of bread as promised.
The moral you get what you give if you try to cheat others of what they promised them.
You will be cheated in return.

KARMA IS REAL AND KARMA WILL PUNISH ALL OF YOU WILL GO PRISON

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
We pulled off I-51 a little after midnight, stopping at a truck stop which was couched between the highway and a large forest.
We waited in the van for ten minutes or so. Trent had increased the sonar radius to its maximum of 30 miles a little over an hour ago. Somehow the red pings had kept up with us, holding a steady distance of around 20 miles. Considering we were averaging around 80 mph, and a coyote's top speed is only around 40 mph, we figured they had been enhanced in some way. Either that, or they shape-shifted into something faster. Regardless, now that we had stopped, we waited to see if the demon spawn would try and close the distance. Luckily, or unluckily, they didn't. They kept their 20 mile buffer, but we noticed they were beginning to spread out along the circumference of that boundary.
"We're close. They know that, so they're trying to trap us in." Trent said.
"Trying to?—more like they have."
We considered whether we should stay in the van and keep watch, but we figured that would do us little good. At their speed, they could be on us in ten minutes, which means we would need to stay up all night and keep tabs on their positions. Trent offered to stay up, of course, but I shut him down.
"The demon doesn't want to kill us now. You said it yourself. Plus, we need our rest. If they come, they come."
Trent didn't like it, but he acquiesced.
The truck stop had all the essentials: a gas station and mini mart with showers and an attached McDonald's, a large parking lot for truckers to idle and sleep, and even a section with lodging for those who wanted a more comfortable night's rest. I told Trent that he should take advantage of the showers, and after a little convincing, he agreed. While he was cleaning himself up, I patrolled the dingy, half-stocked aisles of "Daisy's Quick Mart". I probably would have been appalled at the quality of the store had I actually been paying any attention to it whatsoever. But I wasn't. I was thinking hard about what awaited me tomorrow.
During the drive, I had asked Trent why the demon would want us to return to the crash site. What did he mean that I would be 'confronting a dark entity in a place he couldn't help me'? He seemed hesitant to answer, but my little stunt outside the storage facility seemed to have sufficiently motivated him.
"When I said I've never done this before, I meant it." Trent started. "I've never done this exact thing before—meaning I've never projected someone into the past."
"So, I'm time traveling?" I asked.
"No—don't think of it like that." Trent paused, trying to come up with a good explanation. "It's more like I'm opening a window for you to look through: not a door. You're going to see the past, but you can't interact with the physicalities there. But that doesn't mean you can't interact with anything."
There was a space of silence as Trent tried to let me work out his meaning for myself. "I don't get it. Are you saying there's something I can interact with? Like what?" And then it hit me. "The demon. The demon can interact with me? Meaning what? It can kill me?"
"Meaning… I'm not exactly sure. You're going to be in a kind of psychic space. If it does damage, it won't be to your body. It'll be to your mind—or spirit. But I don't know what the limits of that damage could be. I just don't have those answers."
"If you've never done this, how do you know any of it will work?"
"That's an easy one." Trent answered. "Because it's been done to me."
There was silence.
"Look, if I know anything, I know my tech. Don't doubt that this will work. It's my job to make sure it does. I just need you to be in the right mental for this. Just because it knows your coming doesn't mean it automatically has the upper hand. It won't be able to see you unless you make contact with it first. In other words, you have to initiate contact. As long as you remain a spectator, you should be okay. Trust me. Just don't make contact."
I started pacing faster—fast enough to catch the attention of the overnight shift worker, a young man whose name I can't quite remember. I know it started with a "J". Jake, maybe? Anyway, he asked if I was alright, to which I responded in the affirmative. He left me alone for another couple passes, but when I almost ran into one of the shelves, he stood up and said, "Uh—I'm going to have to ask you to stop running around. I don't want you to hurt yourself."
I must have stared daggers at him, because he recoiled from my gaze. What's gotten into me? I thought. Then, steadying myself, I apologized. I looked around and grabbed the nearest edible looking piece of merchandise: a bag of Swedish Fish, and placed it down on the counter. "Just this, please."
The cashier rang me up. It was surprisingly cheap.
"Are you sure you're alright?" the young man asked. He was tall with brown hair. He seemed tired—maybe even more tired than me. But he also seemed kind.
I smiled as best I could and said, "No, I'm not. But there's not really anything you can do. Hell, there might not be anything I can do." I furrowed my eyebrows at my own response, realizing that imminent death may have broken my verbal filter.
On the other hand, the cashier did not seem surprised at all. "Ah, I see. It's one of those problems." He responded. "Well, hey, for what it's worth, you seem like one of the resilient ones. I think you'll be alright."
I only smiled and nodded at his mildly cryptic comment. Looking back, the whole interaction was a bit strange, but I had way too much mental clutter to recognize that in the moment. I took my Swedish Fish and walked through the anteroom which led to McDonald's. I found an open yellow booth that wasn't littered with crumpled straw sleeves and sat down, chomping mindlessly on my little red fish until Trent returned. When he arrived, he took my place, and I went to shower. After we were both clean and fed, we returned to the van. The pings were still pushed safely out of harm's way. But that didn't mean we were out of harm's way. Trent asked me if I wanted to sleep in the van, saying that "it'd be the safest place."
I thought it over. He was right, obviously. The van was not only outfitted with weapons I couldn't even begin to understand, but it was also our escape, and it would be just as difficult, if not more difficult to break into than the studio-style motel rooms with their wood doors and big windows. Still, if this was going to be my last night on earth, I wanted to sleep in a bed. A real bed. Trent understood and said he'd stay parked right outside my room for the night.
After purchasing a key from the night attendant, I moseyed over to the cement walkways which connected the twenty or so rooms. Mine was room #56, which I thought was odd since, like I said, there were only 20 rooms. I lugged in my tomato plushie and dad's old book and placed them on the queen mattress.
"I'll be right outside." Trent said after I collapsed onto the bed.
"Trent," I called out, stopping him half-way through the door.
"Yeah?"
All the blood in my body rushed up to my face as I realized my unfiltered mouth almost reflexively said the word "stay". I stared at Trent, my heart beating, my face hot. I considered asking him to sleep on the floor like my dad, but that would be childish and impolite. The alternative was to share my bed… Or I could take the floor.
"I'll just be right outside." Trent said before my mind processed a solution. "Come by if you need anything. I'll be up most of the night anyway."
"Okay," I replied in a faint voice.
Trent shut the door.
I sat atop the bedsheets and acquainted myself with my new living space. A feeling of regret closed over me as I considered that even sleeping on a carseat would have been better if it meant I didn't have to be alone. With a sigh, I turned on the bedside lamp and grabbed the book and stuffed tomato, using the tomato as a backrest as I slipped my legs under the covers and situated the book upright on my thighs. I cracked it open and was immediately blasted with a puff of dusty, old book scent. It was ripe at first, and I turned my head away to sneeze, but as I perused through the pages, the scent grew on me. It reminded me of the days growing up when I'd step into dad's study and read through one of the many volumes on cryptic topics which were at least two college degrees above my Lexile range.
I was only a couple minutes into browsing the collection of different scientific and philosophical works when I came across a page which contained highlighted text. This was unusual, as my dad would never mark up his books. He was a purist on that point. I rubbed my thumb over the yellow lines, and sure enough, it was highlighter.
The highlighted text was part of a small book by Carl Jung called "Synchronicity". There were a total of three pages that were marked, and they advanced like this:
Page 5:
The philosophical principle that underlies our conception of natural law is causality*. But if the connection between cause and effect turns out to be only statistically valid and relatively true, then the causal principle is only of relative use for explaining natural processes… That is as much to say that the connection of events may in certain circumstances be other than causal, and require another principle of explanation.*
Page 19:
…there are events which are related to one another experimentally, and in this case meaningfully*, without there being any possibility of proving that this relation is a causal one, since the "transmission" exhibits none of the known properties of energy…a situation which does not yet exist and will only occur in the future could transmit itself as a phenomenon of energy to a receiver in the present…Therefore, it cannot be a question of cause and effect, but of a falling together in time, a kind of simultaneity... "synchronicity"*
Page 22:
A young woman I was treating had, at a critical moment, a dream in which she was given a golden scarab. While she was telling me this dream I sat with my back to the closed window. Suddenly I heard a noise behind me, like a gentle tapping. I turned round and saw a flying insect knocking against the window pane from outside. I opened the window and caught the creature in the air as it flew in. It was the nearest analogy to a golden scarab that one finds in our latitudes, a scarabaeid beetle, the common rose-chafer… which contrary to its usual habits had evidently felt an urge to get into a dark room at this particular moment.
I flipped through the rest of the pages of the book. There was no more highlighted text, but there was a message on the last page which read:
Matthew 7:7-8
I'll meet you in the darkest place.
He also included his typical smiley face which had an ovular shape and three sprouts of hair which I now realized kind of resembled my tomato plushie. It was my dad's writing, of course. But why? And how? What did this mean?
The motel had a Bible stashed away in the nighstand drawer. I got it out and looked up the verses which read the following:
Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
I spent maybe an hour ruminating on all of this. The whole discourse on energy and causality and a "falling together in time" just seemed so right. It was clear that my dad definitely did know what I was going through, but for whatever reason, he made it seem like he was oblivious. Why had he hidden that from me? I felt like I was being pulled in two directions. On the one hand, my dad loved me enough to leave this note, maybe even knowing the exact moment I'd need it. But on the other hand, he had neglected my struggles throughout my entire childhood. He even lied at times. Was this really enough to make up for all of that?
And then there was the section about the future transmitting energy to the past. I read back through the whole paragraph and the original writer had meant it to say this as something that wasn't possible, but my dad's highlighting made it seem like he wanted to flip the meaning. The future does affect the past. I thought about where I was headed and wondered if I would soon discover that for myself.
Lastly, dad's message. The Bible verse reminded me of the first time I prayed; how I reached out to God and received peace as an answer to my prayer. Now I feel like I'm actively seeking… something, but I don't know yet what I'll find. And then there's knocking. At first that reminded me of the story with the beetle tapping on the window, but then I went back even deeper in my memory and dug out the monster tapping at my window, and the words my dad spoke to me in order to set my mind at ease: "you're a superhero. And you know what your greatest superpower is? Your greatest power is you get to tell the monsters what to do. Because the monsters are only as strong as the stories you tell about them…so if you're ever scared, honey, just dream up a better story."
I was crying into my stuffed tomato now. I felt like all the blinking pieces of my life had finally been pulled together into a completed puzzle. This was all by design. My entire life, filled with so much chaos and confusion, was actually preparing me for this moment. And my dad thought I had the tools and strength enough to get through it. I flipped through the book one more time, thinking maybe he had left some other hidden comment—some formula to defeat this demon and return home. But there was nothing. Only that one comment: "I'll meet you in the darkest place."
What's the darkest place, dad? Is that where I'm going? Are you saying you'll be there, too?
With those thoughts in mind, my eyes became heavy shutters which, with a slight pressure on the pulley, winded shut. My swimming thoughts and firework-like fears dissipated, and I returned to a precious childhood memory. It was after an evening soccer practice. Summer. Dad was driving me to Dairy Queen. I got a cherry-dipped twist cone. I was happy.
So, so happy.
***
I woke up to sunlight blaring through my windows. Shit, I overslept, was my immediate thought. I threw off my covers and opened the front door. A glance at the clock showed 1:13 PM. I shouldn't have even been allowed to stay checked in this long. Damn, am I gonna get double-billed for this?
I heard a rummaging sound around the corner of my motel room. It sounded like a squirrel was trying to find an afternoon snack in one of the garbage bins. I stepped outside. The sun was extremely bright, to the point where I had to squint and put my hand over my eyes to even see the ground in front of me. I was trying to walk toward the van, but somehow I ended up in front of the trash bins where the animal's tail was sticking out from a turned-over, silver garbage can. Its tail was wagging excitedly, and I remember thinking that it was much too large to be a squirrel.
The animal bent down as if biting onto something, and I heard the sound of its growl as it struggled to tug whatever it was free from the barrel. Inch by inch, the creature backed out of the canister, and more of its sharp, sticky hair was revealed. I heard something snap, then the creature leapt back and I saw what it was chomping on. My eyes widened in horror as the pink tube of a human intestine was pulled taut like the end of a tangled hose. Blood and entrails were spilling out of the human's opened gut. And then, behind the canine, I saw the person's face. His face was pale white, his eyes closed, and his hair was slicked back… It was Trent.
Before I could react, I heard footsteps approaching from behind. I whirled around and saw my dad. But—no, it wasn't him. It was someone wearing a paper-mache face mask that was painted to look like my dad. The forehead of the mask was already beginning to crack, white specks breaking off like sawdust. Through the cracks, I could see the figure's true form. I didn't know darkness had its own type of light, but that's the only way to describe it. It was as if malevolence itself was reified into a skin which was actually an amalgamation of millions of little, oozing parasites that leached into the nearby light. When it finally spoke, the demon's voice was a full octave lower than the old man's at the deli. And it had an earth-stilling gravitas.
"Today's the day!" He sang and reached into his pocket. His lips curled upward into a foxy smirk. "You have no idea how long I've waited for this day." He said and held up a razor blade. Half his facade had already fallen apart, and now I could see the bugs up close, writhing in what was either horror or ecstasy. And his scent… it was somehow more rank than the rabid coyote rummaging through the trash can with Trent's cut open body inside. The demon closed in on my position, and in one, decisive motion, he brought the blade close to his chin, then sliced it across my throat. "Wake up!" He screamed.
I jumped out of my bed and grabbed my throat, feeling the cold sting of its quick slice. Hyperventilating, I patted the area down, trying to hold the blood in, but when I removed my hands, I saw they were dry. It was only a dream, I thought. Gray light was only beginning to filter in through the drapes. I'm in my hotel room. I'm safe. I tried consoling, but the pragmatic mental massages weren't enough to hold the force of my knees buckling. I dropped onto the carpet and cried for a long while.
Outside, rain was beginning to fall.
***
By the time I met up with Trent, I had already composed myself and decided to keep my dad's message and the nightmare to myself. None of it seemed particularly productive from a logistical standpoint, anyway. And I wanted to focus on the mission.
We stopped by McDonald's and bought a couple cups of coffee. Trent asked if I wanted any food, and I declined. Black coffee seemed like the only thing my stomach could take at the present moment. I could tell Trent was hungry, but he tried playing it off (I guess to be respectful of me?) I told him to knock it off and get something to eat. I didn't need my Charon getting lightheaded and dropping the paddle before he finished rowing me to Hell. He didn't care much for my joke, but he ordered a couple Chicken McGriddles at the kiosk anyway.
There were maybe ten patrons spread throughout the restaurant. We sat down at the same booth from the prior night, this time across from one another. Trent spent the first ten minutes or so babbling about our fuel supply and the logistics of the trip from here on in. Practical stuff. I've come to realize that's how he deals with his stress. He talks it out in short, durable sentences. I mostly nodded and watched as what looked like a storm front closed in on the truck stop. The sky was overcast, and there were darker clouds in the distance. The rain was still only a patter, but a middle-aged man wearing a yellow bow tie on the wall-mounted TV confirmed that there would be heavier rain and thunderstorms very soon.
After the worker delivered Trent's food and he ate it in record time, I posed the one question that was still on my mind.
"How do I fight him?" I asked.
Trent finished a large gulp of his coffee, then looked at me. It was the first substantial thing I'd said all morning; Trent could tell something was off with me, but he figured there was no point in asking what it was. "By 'him', I assume you mean the demon?"
I nodded.
Trent licked his teeth clean. "You could try praying again."
"I'm serious," I responded.
"I'm serious, too. It worked before, didn't it?"
"You mean at my house?"
Trent nodded.
"I thought you weren't a religious man?"
"I'm not. Just a practical one. If praying worked before, maybe it'll work again."
"That's the best you've got? A maybe?"
"No, I've got a lot of shit better than a maybe." He answered. "It's just not accessible where you're going. Which is why I recommend not making contact on the first run."
"First run? So we're going to do this more than once?"
"At least," Trent answered. Then, seeing my expression, he continued. "What? You thought this was going to be a one-and-done? We have to conduct some research first. I did tell you this was new for me, right?"
Somehow Trent's response had set my mind at ease a little. I was going to have more than one chance. Of course, why wouldn't I be able to go back more than once?
"Why didn't you tell me this earlier? It would have gone a long way in easing my mind."
Trent lifted his hands in defense. "Sorry, I just thought that was a given. I mean, what we're doing is dangerous, just like I said, but it doesn't mean we aren't going to approach this as safely and scientifically as possible. However, there is a different problem with running multiple trials."
"The Organization?"
"That's right," Trent said like a proud parent. "Our little experiment will be like a giant spotlight, and the longer we wait around after it's on us, the greater the chance we'll have unwelcome company."
"So, safe but speedy."
"Safe but speedy. Exactly."
***
We fueled up and were back on the road a little after 8:00. From that point on, Trent and I were absolutely silent. I had the distinct feeling of being in the eye of a storm. The pings moved closer commensurate with our progress toward the crash site. The cloudfront continued its advance. And I noticed a haze beginning to descend onto the road ahead of us. It was fog.
We meandered further inland, the forest thickening around us until the rain almost stopped entirely—the leaves drinking it up before it fell onto our windshield. I kept my eyes on the radar. We were approaching the large yellow circle which indicated we had arrived. As we pulled closer, I began to feel things. Fear. Eeriness. Doubt. Then happiness. Hope. Love. Normally feelings like these had a clear source to picture, but these sensations came on in waves without any discernible reason. It was almost as if they were blinking into existence inside me.
"Here we go," Trent said like an airline pilot readying his crew for turbulence.
I still recall the exact moment we crossed the boundary into the area of higher energy. It was like something just "clicked" in my brain, and all of a sudden everything felt so much closer. The sound of the rain against the trees was almost right next to my ear. The trees in the distance would oscillate between their position a half-mile out, then suddenly seem five meters away. If I focused on something long enough, it began to radiate those same ethereal particles as when Trent released Ava's "phase lock". I checked to make sure the shifter wasn't set to "TD". Sure enough, it was still in drive.
"Can you see them?" Trent asked. "The shifts?"
"Yeah," I said in a dreamy voice. I felt like I was driving through a wonderland.
"It's the energy. I barely notice a difference. A bit of movement in the trees, but not much else. But I'm sure for you, it's a whole experience."
"What is this?" I raised my hand and caught some of the pixel dust dripping off the sun visor. It disappeared when it made contact with my hand.
"It's a kind of radiation. Everything emits it, just in different quantities. I'm still not exactly sure how it relates to the other realms, but I'm guessing it's a kind of primordial matter that helps connect our worlds."
"It's beautiful," I exclaimed. "I wish I could see the world like this all the time."
"Maybe you will," Trent whispered.
As we arrived at the crash site, I began to get glimpses of the past. My childhood dreams and memories were pushing their way out from my subconscious. I noticed an increased number of blinks, which were validated by Ava who reported the following: "Currently detecting 14,350 novel emergences and 2,777 controlled agents. Net anomalies: 2,777."
"That's a lot of blinks." I remarked. "Why doesn't Ava include them in the net anomalies?"
Trent turned his head so I could see his smirk. "Because blinks aren't anomalies."
I thought about it for a second. Blinks aren't anomalies. "I never thought about it that way."
"It's hard to think about it that way when 'normal' for most people means not picking up on a fundamental aspect of reality. But that doesn't make it any less real."
We continued past the epicenter of the yellow circle. "Are we not stopping?" I asked. "I think we already passed the crash site."
"It doesn't have to be exactly at the site," Trent said. "Plus, we don't want to stop on the side of the road and risk getting some civilian involved. There's a field about half a mile up ahead. I'm going to pull off the road and set up camp there.
The "field" that Trent was referring to was actually a large clearing that dipped down into several trench-like troughs which were filled to the brim with fog like witches cauldrons. Further on in the distance, I saw open fields, probably used for farming, and then a large hill where the trees once again reasserted themselves. We had pulled off the road and up a small incline where the trees had already been broken down, leaving a trail for us to drive through. When we surfaced at the edge of the clearing, Trent pulled us onto a flat bed of dried mud which was maybe thirty yards long.
"Here," he said with a sigh.
We both sat for a minute, looking around at the field. We had finally arrived. The rain was beginning to pick up, and the dark sky made it almost impossible to discern the time of day.
"You ready?" Trent asked.
I looked at him. Really looked at him. In his blue eyes. Was I ready? Did it even matter?
"Let's do this," I said.
***
This was the first time I was really able to inspect the back of Trent's van. He had talked up his gear a lot, and honestly, I was impressed. Not in the way that a scientist is impressed by another scientist's lab—I wasn't any kind of expert—but it still seemed remarkably well managed. Now that I was in a state where my vision had been enhanced, I could actually see the enigmatic particles circulating through the pneumatic tubes which were coiled like the pipes and valves of an elaborate wind instrument. The walls of the van, itself, were glistening white, making it easier to make out everything else inside. Along the floor were five overturned columns. Each column was dark and had a vibrating quality, as if they were charged with energy. Then atop the center three columns was a small altar which supported an apparatus with two skinny, metal arms holding a silver halo. At present, the arms were folded and the halo was suspended a few inches above the altar, faced-down. I thought maybe I'd see particles exuding from it, but instead it was emitting visible waves which bent and warped everything they touched.
"That thing is emitting a lot of energy." I remarked, gesturing toward the halo.
Trent stepped in between the columns and started pulling out the packages he had stuffed in there yesterday. "Just wait till' it's on."
Most of the packages contained only a single piece of equipment, and were otherwise packed with foam peanuts. We carefully removed each box and set them on the ground outside. I asked if the rain would damage any of the stuff inside, to which Trent only laughed and continued lugging out the boxes. When they were all out, Trent removed a box cutter from his pocket and went one-by-one opening them. There were eight pieces in total.
"What is it?" I asked as we fished the first item out.
"It's another apparatus, like the one inside. Except it'll mount on the ground out here."
I pulled out what looked like a metal tripod.
"Good, that'll go on the bottom."
"Where are we setting it up?"
"Over here," Trent said and stepped five paces away from the van. He coordinated himself up so he was centrally aligned with the inner ring, then stomped a few times. "This is the spot."
As we continued to work, I asked Trent about how the whole contraption works.
"Do you remember the first time we were in the van? When we had to escape from the semi-truck?" Trent asked and connected a secondary mounting apparatus on top of the tripod. It had four spider-like legs that made right angles and stuck into the ground.
"Of course," I said. "The 'phase lock'."
"Yeah," Trent said and gestured toward the metal stick that was in my hand. I handed it to him. "The phase lock is a seal on the level of energy that the van is allowed to release. It also controls its dispersion pattern so that it releases its energy in a steady wave. This allows Ava to scan for anomalies without causing us to become an anomaly." Trent stuck the plank into the neck of the tripod.
"So when you released the phase lock, we started emitting more energy."
"That's right." Trent confirmed. "Enough to create an alternate route through a different realm."
"So we blinked into a different realm, then back, just to avoid that truck?"
"That's right."
"But why couldn't we just move out of the way?"
"Because it had locked onto us. It was tracking our motion and adjusting its course based on the amount of energy we were emitting. So in order to escape, we had to radically skew our potential energy and then use it to shift."
"Couldn't he have just followed us?"
Trent connected four more pieces to the device which now looked like an elaborate teepee. He was fishing in the last box when he spoke again. "Yeah, he could have. But it was highly improbable that he would have found us." Trent returned from the bottom of the box with another silver ring in hand. "Think of it like this. Let's say you're trying to escape from some bad guy who's coming after you, and you enter a new room you've never seen before. Would you prefer this room to have three doors to go through, or ten?"
I thought about his riddle for a second, then responded, "It depends where they go."
Trent fastened the ring atop the teepee. "Let's say they all lead to random places, or let's say they're all closets that lead nowhere. The key is that more is better, because the more doors he has to check, the less likely he is to pick the correct one. Make sense?"
"So we opened up a bunch of doors and escaped through one at random?"
"Hence the gear 'TD', for 'Trap Door'."
I marveled at the insights, but not for long. Trent hopped back in the van and pulled a lever that I hadn't seen until now. The two metal arms raised the inner ring until it was perpendicular with the altar. Then Trent clicked one of three red buttons along the back wall, and I saw what looked like a large, glass eye suspended in a magnifying glass protruding from the wall, aligned with the center of both rings. A couple seconds later, the glass eye began to focus the energy which was being fed to it from the pneumatic tubes, and a blue pyramid of light projected from it into the first ring, then from the first ring into the second ring. All three pieces were aligned at slightly diminishing heights, so the cylinder of light beamed through the second ring, into the ground.
"Alright, time for the first trial."
I felt the nerves starting up in my stomach. Trent sensed this and hopped out of the truck. It was raining quite hard now, though it was still warm. Both Trent and I were soaked, but that hardly concerned us. He reached out and put his hand on my shoulder. "I know you're feeling scared." He said. "But trust me on this. You're going to do fine. Just keep in mind what we talked about. Stay a spectator. Okay?"
I looked into his blue eyes, which seemed especially gray in the dark. Still, Trent's voice was reassuring. All I had to do was trust him. Trust myself. Trust my dad. And it was all going to turn out right.
"I'm ready," I said.
Trent was still for a second, holding my eyes in his. Then he guided me behind the outer ring and into the cylinder of light.
"I should step into it now?" I asked, afraid I'd be called away immediately.
"It's not on yet, so don't worry. I still have to press another button."
I followed Trent's instructions and stood in the blue light which was centered on my chest. Then I watched as Trent ran into the back of the van and posted up next to the glass eye. "Ready?" He yelled out. It was hard to hear him over the rain, but I yelled back. "Ready!"
The next thing I saw was a blinding blue light beam from the van. I heard what sounded like a laser, then saw the cylinder oscillate, expanding and compressing. When the energy reached the second ring, I saw everything around me light up—it looked brighter than noon on a cloudless day. Then the oscillations made their way to me, and I was swallowed up whole.
***
When I came to, I was in the backseat of a car. I felt my butt rumbling. Everything was dim and quiet. And then I heard a woman's voice from in front of me.
"Mark, please, not with Lauren in the back."
The man, who I now identified as my father, pulled the cigarette away from his lips and blew the smoke at my mom. He eyed the back seat where I was sitting, using one of five markers that hadn't rolled off my lap to color a rabbit in my animal color book.
"The kid's fine." he said and took another drag.
"Mark," my mom repeated.
I saw my dad raise his hand in a rapid motion. "I said she's fine, Cheryl. Now check the map and make sure we're going the right away. I can't see shit with all this fog."
I took a moment to make sure I was really in the back seat. I patted myself. I clearly had weight. Then I tried touching the car. At first, my fingertips met a solid surface, but when I tried to press through, my hand slipped into the car. I quickly pulled my hand away as if I had reached into a fire.
That's when I heard the little three year old next to me start crying. I turned and saw that little-me had dropped another couple markers onto the ground and was struggling to reach them.
"Hey!" my dad shouted. "What did I say about crying?"
"Quit it, Mark. She just dropped her markers." said my mom; she turned to help me pick them up.
"What did you say to me?" Mark spat with a voice full of guile. He reached out and pushed her back into her seat. "Don't," he commanded. "She has to learn how to deal with life."
"Deal…" My mom started in disbelief. "Deal with life? Do you hear yourself? What's gotten into you?"
"Sometimes shit happens. It doesn't give her the right to cry. You helping her is just going to reinforce her behavior."
"Her behavior? What about your behavior? You're acting like a total dick."
I didn't even have a moment to react before my dad's hand was across my mom's face. I felt the slap more than I heard it, my own face seeming to swell with the force of the blow. I saw my mom cover her mouth and lean away. Then little-me began to cry even louder, which only challenged my dad to step up his own volume.
"Everyone needs to get a fucking grip before I crash this car." My dad shouted and took another drag. The scariest part was I couldn't tell if he was warning us or threatening us. I felt the sudden urge to do something. There was no way this was real. I was definitely in some fantasy concocted by the demon. He wanted to turn me against my dad. That was the only explanation for something like this. My dad was a good man, not… this.
As I contemplated what to do, I saw a small, golden light appear behind little-me's window. Apparently she saw it, too, because her cries hushed as she traced the wisp with her eyes. After a second, the wisp transformed into a bunny rabbit, reminiscent of the one she was coloring. The rabbit hopped alongside the window, then did a couple circles in place. I watched little me let out a playful laugh and reach toward the window.
"What's going on back there?" my dad asked with a scowl. Apparently the only sound more disturbing than cries were laughs.
I looked back to the front and saw my mom wiping blood from her lip. Her expression was miserable. "Leave her alone, Mark."
"I'll do whatever I damn well want to do, Cheryl. It's my kid back there."
My mom was quiet.
When I looked back toward the rabbit, it was no longer a rabbit but a person. Or at least it looked like a person. The figure radiated pure gold, and atop his head was what appeared to be a King's crown. I recalled Allison's experience of seeing the sun-like figure in her moment of distress. Was that what was happening here? Was this really all true?
"Hey!" My dad shouted, eyeing little-me from the rear-view mirror. "What are you reaching at?"
I looked and saw the golden figure extending his hand toward the window, and little me's hand was reaching back. "Mom, dad, it bright." little-me said.
"What's bright, honey?" my mom asked.
"Don't encourage her, Cheryl."
"Someone there!" little me shouted happily and dropped the rest of the markers and the coloring book onto the ground.
"Who's there?" asked my mom.
"Cheryl, I swear to God. Sit the fuck down."
Everything from that moment on happened so quickly I barely had any time to process it. My mom lifted out of her seat to either get little me's attention or help me pick up my coloring book. My dad responded by grabbing onto her throat, letting go of the steering wheel entirely. He threw her back against the car door, and her head hit the window so hard, the glass cracked. My dad had dropped his cigarette, and I could smell smoke coming from under his seat, but that didn't seem to bother him at all. He turned toward little-me at the same moment my three-year-old hand reached out and grabbed onto the golden figure, whose hand diffused through the window. When my dad turned, I got a whiff of the most awful smell that I wouldn't have been able to place had I not had that nightmare last night. He grabbed onto little-me's shoulder and tugged her away from the golden figure that was trying to pull her the other way. My dad's facade began to crack, and I could see those dark bugs crawling out from the pores in his arms, marching down toward little-me.
I reacted.
I grabbed onto my dad's arm and pulled him off little-me. I heard the sound of my shirt ripping as she was torn from his grip and pulled out of the car, diffusing through it like a ghost. My brief victory was immediately overturned as I saw what was now clearly the demon smiling at me, his wretched fingers curled around my forearm.
"Caught you," He sneered.
Then the whole world once again diffused into countless numbers of particles, only this time, instead of riding through it, I felt like I was falling through an elevator shaft with each floor darker than the last. The further I fell, the less I became aware of my surroundings, and the more I felt a deep sense of loneliness. It was as if I was the only person in the whole world: and the whole world was a prison designed entirely for me. This went on for so long, I began to forget who I was. Where I was. What was.
And then I landed.
***
Source Used:
Jung, Carl. Synchronicity. Translated by Sonu Shamdasani, Princeton University Press, 2010.

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Content Warning: Domestic Abuse
***
We pulled off I-51 a little after midnight, stopping at a truck stop which was couched between the highway and a large forest.
We waited in the van for ten minutes or so. Trent had increased the sonar radius to its maximum of 30 miles a little over an hour ago. Somehow the red pings had kept up with us, holding a steady distance of around 20 miles. Considering we were averaging around 80 mph, and a coyote's top speed is only around 40 mph, we figured they had been enhanced in some way. Either that, or they shape-shifted into something faster. Regardless, now that we had stopped, we waited to see if the demon spawn would try and close the distance. Luckily, or unluckily, they didn't. They kept their 20 mile buffer, but we noticed they were beginning to spread out along the circumference of that boundary.
"We're close. They know that, so they're trying to trap us in." Trent said.
"Trying to?—more like they have."
We considered whether we should stay in the van and keep watch, but we figured that would do us little good. At their speed, they could be on us in ten minutes, which means we would need to stay up all night and keep tabs on their positions. Trent offered to stay up, of course, but I shut him down.
"The demon doesn't want to kill us now. You said it yourself. Plus, we need our rest. If they come, they come."
Trent didn't like it, but he acquiesced.
The truck stop had all the essentials: a gas station and mini mart with showers and an attached McDonald's, a large parking lot for truckers to idle and sleep, and even a section with lodging for those who wanted a more comfortable night's rest. I told Trent that he should take advantage of the showers, and after a little convincing, he agreed. While he was cleaning himself up, I patrolled the dingy, half-stocked aisles of "Daisy's Quick Mart". I probably would have been appalled at the quality of the store had I actually been paying any attention to it whatsoever. But I wasn't. I was thinking hard about what awaited me tomorrow.
During the drive, I had asked Trent why the demon would want us to return to the crash site. What did he mean that I would be 'confronting a dark entity in a place he couldn't help me'? He seemed hesitant to answer, but my little stunt outside the storage facility seemed to have sufficiently motivated him.
"When I said I've never done this before, I meant it." Trent started. "I've never done this exact thing before—meaning I've never projected someone into the past."
"So, I'm time traveling?" I asked.
"No—don't think of it like that." Trent paused, trying to come up with a good explanation. "It's more like I'm opening a window for you to look through: not a door. You're going to see the past, but you can't interact with the physicalities there. But that doesn't mean you can't interact with anything."
There was a space of silence as Trent tried to let me work out his meaning for myself. "I don't get it. Are you saying there's something I can interact with? Like what?" And then it hit me. "The demon. The demon can interact with me? Meaning what? It can kill me?"
"Meaning… I'm not exactly sure. You're going to be in a kind of psychic space. If it does damage, it won't be to your body. It'll be to your mind—or spirit. But I don't know what the limits of that damage could be. I just don't have those answers."
"If you've never done this, how do you know any of it will work?"
"That's an easy one." Trent answered. "Because it's been done to me."
There was silence.
"Look, if I know anything, I know my tech. Don't doubt that this will work. It's my job to make sure it does. I just need you to be in the right mental for this. Just because it knows your coming doesn't mean it automatically has the upper hand. It won't be able to see you unless you make contact with it first. In other words, you have to initiate contact. As long as you remain a spectator, you should be okay. Trust me. Just don't make contact."
I started pacing faster—fast enough to catch the attention of the overnight shift worker, a young man whose name I can't quite remember. I know it started with a "J". Jake, maybe? Anyway, he asked if I was alright, to which I responded in the affirmative. He left me alone for another couple passes, but when I almost ran into one of the shelves, he stood up and said, "Uh—I'm going to have to ask you to stop running around. I don't want you to hurt yourself."
I must have stared daggers at him, because he recoiled from my gaze. What's gotten into me? I thought. Then, steadying myself, I apologized. I looked around and grabbed the nearest edible looking piece of merchandise: a bag of Swedish Fish, and placed it down on the counter. "Just this, please."
The cashier rang me up. It was surprisingly cheap.
"Are you sure you're alright?" the young man asked. He was tall with brown hair. He seemed tired—maybe even more tired than me. But he also seemed kind.
I smiled as best I could and said, "No, I'm not. But there's not really anything you can do. Hell, there might not be anything I can do." I furrowed my eyebrows at my own response, realizing that imminent death may have broken my verbal filter.
On the other hand, the cashier did not seem surprised at all. "Ah, I see. It's one of those problems." He responded. "Well, hey, for what it's worth, you seem like one of the resilient ones. I think you'll be alright."
I only smiled and nodded at his mildly cryptic comment. Looking back, the whole interaction was a bit strange, but I had way too much mental clutter to recognize that in the moment. I took my Swedish Fish and walked through the anteroom which led to McDonald's. I found an open yellow booth that wasn't littered with crumpled straw sleeves and sat down, chomping mindlessly on my little red fish until Trent returned. When he arrived, he took my place, and I went to shower. After we were both clean and fed, we returned to the van. The pings were still pushed safely out of harm's way. But that didn't mean we were out of harm's way. Trent asked me if I wanted to sleep in the van, saying that "it'd be the safest place."
I thought it over. He was right, obviously. The van was not only outfitted with weapons I couldn't even begin to understand, but it was also our escape, and it would be just as difficult, if not more difficult to break into than the studio-style motel rooms with their wood doors and big windows. Still, if this was going to be my last night on earth, I wanted to sleep in a bed. A real bed. Trent understood and said he'd stay parked right outside my room for the night.
After purchasing a key from the night attendant, I moseyed over to the cement walkways which connected the twenty or so rooms. Mine was room #56, which I thought was odd since, like I said, there were only 20 rooms. I lugged in my tomato plushie and dad's old book and placed them on the queen mattress.
"I'll be right outside." Trent said after I collapsed onto the bed.
"Trent," I called out, stopping him half-way through the door.
"Yeah?"
All the blood in my body rushed up to my face as I realized my unfiltered mouth almost reflexively said the word "stay". I stared at Trent, my heart beating, my face hot. I considered asking him to sleep on the floor like my dad, but that would be childish and impolite. The alternative was to share my bed… Or I could take the floor.
"I'll just be right outside." Trent said before my mind processed a solution. "Come by if you need anything. I'll be up most of the night anyway."
"Okay," I replied in a faint voice.
Trent shut the door.
I sat atop the bedsheets and acquainted myself with my new living space. A feeling of regret closed over me as I considered that even sleeping on a carseat would have been better if it meant I didn't have to be alone. With a sigh, I turned on the bedside lamp and grabbed the book and stuffed tomato, using the tomato as a backrest as I slipped my legs under the covers and situated the book upright on my thighs. I cracked it open and was immediately blasted with a puff of dusty, old book scent. It was ripe at first, and I turned my head away to sneeze, but as I perused through the pages, the scent grew on me. It reminded me of the days growing up when I'd step into dad's study and read through one of the many volumes on cryptic topics which were at least two college degrees above my Lexile range.
I was only a couple minutes into browsing the collection of different scientific and philosophical works when I came across a page which contained highlighted text. This was unusual, as my dad would never mark up his books. He was a purist on that point. I rubbed my thumb over the yellow lines, and sure enough, it was highlighter.
The highlighted text was part of a small book by Carl Jung called "Synchronicity". There were a total of three pages that were marked, and they advanced like this:
Page 5:
The philosophical principle that underlies our conception of natural law is causality*. But if the connection between cause and effect turns out to be only statistically valid and relatively true, then the causal principle is only of relative use for explaining natural processes… That is as much to say that the connection of events may in certain circumstances be other than causal, and require another principle of explanation.*
Page 19:
…there are events which are related to one another experimentally, and in this case meaningfully*, without there being any possibility of proving that this relation is a causal one, since the "transmission" exhibits none of the known properties of energy…a situation which does not yet exist and will only occur in the future could transmit itself as a phenomenon of energy to a receiver in the present…Therefore, it cannot be a question of cause and effect, but of a falling together in time, a kind of simultaneity... "synchronicity"*
Page 22:
A young woman I was treating had, at a critical moment, a dream in which she was given a golden scarab. While she was telling me this dream I sat with my back to the closed window. Suddenly I heard a noise behind me, like a gentle tapping. I turned round and saw a flying insect knocking against the window pane from outside. I opened the window and caught the creature in the air as it flew in. It was the nearest analogy to a golden scarab that one finds in our latitudes, a scarabaeid beetle, the common rose-chafer… which contrary to its usual habits had evidently felt an urge to get into a dark room at this particular moment.
I flipped through the rest of the pages of the book. There was no more highlighted text, but there was a message on the last page which read:
Matthew 7:7-8
I'll meet you in the darkest place.
He also included his typical smiley face which had an ovular shape and three sprouts of hair which I now realized kind of resembled my tomato plushie. It was my dad's writing, of course. But why? And how? What did this mean?
The motel had a Bible stashed away in the nighstand drawer. I got it out and looked up the verses which read the following:
Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
I spent maybe an hour ruminating on all of this. The whole discourse on energy and causality and a "falling together in time" just seemed so right. It was clear that my dad definitely did know what I was going through, but for whatever reason, he made it seem like he was oblivious. Why had he hidden that from me? I felt like I was being pulled in two directions. On the one hand, my dad loved me enough to leave this note, maybe even knowing the exact moment I'd need it. But on the other hand, he had neglected my struggles throughout my entire childhood. He even lied at times. Was this really enough to make up for all of that?
And then there was the section about the future transmitting energy to the past. I read back through the whole paragraph and the original writer had meant it to say this as something that wasn't possible, but my dad's highlighting made it seem like he wanted to flip the meaning. The future does affect the past. I thought about where I was headed and wondered if I would soon discover that for myself.
Lastly, dad's message. The Bible verse reminded me of the first time I prayed; how I reached out to God and received peace as an answer to my prayer. Now I feel like I'm actively seeking… something, but I don't know yet what I'll find. And then there's knocking. At first that reminded me of the story with the beetle tapping on the window, but then I went back even deeper in my memory and dug out the monster tapping at my window, and the words my dad spoke to me in order to set my mind at ease: "you're a superhero. And you know what your greatest superpower is? Your greatest power is you get to tell the monsters what to do. Because the monsters are only as strong as the stories you tell about them…so if you're ever scared, honey, just dream up a better story."
I was crying into my stuffed tomato now. I felt like all the blinking pieces of my life had finally been pulled together into a completed puzzle. This was all by design. My entire life, filled with so much chaos and confusion, was actually preparing me for this moment. And my dad thought I had the tools and strength enough to get through it. I flipped through the book one more time, thinking maybe he had left some other hidden comment—some formula to defeat this demon and return home. But there was nothing. Only that one comment: "I'll meet you in the darkest place."
What's the darkest place, dad? Is that where I'm going? Are you saying you'll be there, too?
With those thoughts in mind, my eyes became heavy shutters which, with a slight pressure on the pulley, winded shut. My swimming thoughts and firework-like fears dissipated, and I returned to a precious childhood memory. It was after an evening soccer practice. Summer. Dad was driving me to Dairy Queen. I got a cherry-dipped twist cone. I was happy.
So, so happy.
***
I woke up to sunlight blaring through my windows. Shit, I overslept, was my immediate thought. I threw off my covers and opened the front door. A glance at the clock showed 1:13 PM. I shouldn't have even been allowed to stay checked in this long. Damn, am I gonna get double-billed for this?
I heard a rummaging sound around the corner of my motel room. It sounded like a squirrel was trying to find an afternoon snack in one of the garbage bins. I stepped outside. The sun was extremely bright, to the point where I had to squint and put my hand over my eyes to even see the ground in front of me. I was trying to walk toward the van, but somehow I ended up in front of the trash bins where the animal's tail was sticking out from a turned-over, silver garbage can. Its tail was wagging excitedly, and I remember thinking that it was much too large to be a squirrel.
The animal bent down as if biting onto something, and I heard the sound of its growl as it struggled to tug whatever it was free from the barrel. Inch by inch, the creature backed out of the canister, and more of its sharp, sticky hair was revealed. I heard something snap, then the creature leapt back and I saw what it was chomping on. My eyes widened in horror as the pink tube of a human intestine was pulled taut like the end of a tangled hose. Blood and entrails were spilling out of the human's opened gut. And then, behind the canine, I saw the person's face. His face was pale white, his eyes closed, and his hair was slicked back… It was Trent.
Before I could react, I heard footsteps approaching from behind. I whirled around and saw my dad. But—no, it wasn't him. It was someone wearing a paper-mache face mask that was painted to look like my dad. The forehead of the mask was already beginning to crack, white specks breaking off like sawdust. Through the cracks, I could see the figure's true form. I didn't know darkness had its own type of light, but that's the only way to describe it. It was as if malevolence itself was reified into a skin which was actually an amalgamation of millions of little, oozing parasites that leached into the nearby light. When it finally spoke, the demon's voice was a full octave lower than the old man's at the deli. And it had an earth-stilling gravitas.
"Today's the day!" He sang and reached into his pocket. His lips curled upward into a foxy smirk. "You have no idea how long I've waited for this day." He said and held up a razor blade. Half his facade had already fallen apart, and now I could see the bugs up close, writhing in what was either horror or ecstasy. And his scent… it was somehow more rank than the rabid coyote rummaging through the trash can with Trent's cut open body inside. The demon closed in on my position, and in one, decisive motion, he brought the blade close to his chin, then sliced it across my throat. "Wake up!" He screamed.
I jumped out of my bed and grabbed my throat, feeling the cold sting of its quick slice. Hyperventilating, I patted the area down, trying to hold the blood in, but when I removed my hands, I saw they were dry. It was only a dream, I thought. Gray light was only beginning to filter in through the drapes. I'm in my hotel room. I'm safe. I tried consoling, but the pragmatic mental massages weren't enough to hold the force of my knees buckling. I dropped onto the carpet and cried for a long while.
Outside, rain was beginning to fall.
***
By the time I met up with Trent, I had already composed myself and decided to keep my dad's message and the nightmare to myself. None of it seemed particularly productive from a logistical standpoint, anyway. And I wanted to focus on the mission.
We stopped by McDonald's and bought a couple cups of coffee. Trent asked if I wanted any food, and I declined. Black coffee seemed like the only thing my stomach could take at the present moment. I could tell Trent was hungry, but he tried playing it off (I guess to be respectful of me?) I told him to knock it off and get something to eat. I didn't need my Charon getting lightheaded and dropping the paddle before he finished rowing me to Hell. He didn't care much for my joke, but he ordered a couple Chicken McGriddles at the kiosk anyway.
There were maybe ten patrons spread throughout the restaurant. We sat down at the same booth from the prior night, this time across from one another. Trent spent the first ten minutes or so babbling about our fuel supply and the logistics of the trip from here on in. Practical stuff. I've come to realize that's how he deals with his stress. He talks it out in short, durable sentences. I mostly nodded and watched as what looked like a storm front closed in on the truck stop. The sky was overcast, and there were darker clouds in the distance. The rain was still only a patter, but a middle-aged man wearing a yellow bow tie on the wall-mounted TV confirmed that there would be heavier rain and thunderstorms very soon.
After the worker delivered Trent's food and he ate it in record time, I posed the one question that was still on my mind.
"How do I fight him?" I asked.
Trent finished a large gulp of his coffee, then looked at me. It was the first substantial thing I'd said all morning; Trent could tell something was off with me, but he figured there was no point in asking what it was. "By 'him', I assume you mean the demon?"
I nodded.
Trent licked his teeth clean. "You could try praying again."
"I'm serious," I responded.
"I'm serious, too. It worked before, didn't it?"
"You mean at my house?"
Trent nodded.
"I thought you weren't a religious man?"
"I'm not. Just a practical one. If praying worked before, maybe it'll work again."
"That's the best you've got? A maybe?"
"No, I've got a lot of shit better than a maybe." He answered. "It's just not accessible where you're going. Which is why I recommend not making contact on the first run."
"First run? So we're going to do this more than once?"
"At least," Trent answered. Then, seeing my expression, he continued. "What? You thought this was going to be a one-and-done? We have to conduct some research first. I did tell you this was new for me, right?"
Somehow Trent's response had set my mind at ease a little. I was going to have more than one chance. Of course, why wouldn't I be able to go back more than once?
"Why didn't you tell me this earlier? It would have gone a long way in easing my mind."
Trent lifted his hands in defense. "Sorry, I just thought that was a given. I mean, what we're doing is dangerous, just like I said, but it doesn't mean we aren't going to approach this as safely and scientifically as possible. However, there is a different problem with running multiple trials."
"The Organization?"
"That's right," Trent said like a proud parent. "Our little experiment will be like a giant spotlight, and the longer we wait around after it's on us, the greater the chance we'll have unwelcome company."
"So, safe but speedy."
"Safe but speedy. Exactly."
***
We fueled up and were back on the road a little after 8:00. From that point on, Trent and I were absolutely silent. I had the distinct feeling of being in the eye of a storm. The pings moved closer commensurate with our progress toward the crash site. The cloudfront continued its advance. And I noticed a haze beginning to descend onto the road ahead of us. It was fog.
We meandered further inland, the forest thickening around us until the rain almost stopped entirely—the leaves drinking it up before it fell onto our windshield. I kept my eyes on the radar. We were approaching the large yellow circle which indicated we had arrived. As we pulled closer, I began to feel things. Fear. Eeriness. Doubt. Then happiness. Hope. Love. Normally feelings like these had a clear source to picture, but these sensations came on in waves without any discernible reason. It was almost as if they were blinking into existence inside me.
"Here we go," Trent said like an airline pilot readying his crew for turbulence.
I still recall the exact moment we crossed the boundary into the area of higher energy. It was like something just "clicked" in my brain, and all of a sudden everything felt so much closer. The sound of the rain against the trees was almost right next to my ear. The trees in the distance would oscillate between their position a half-mile out, then suddenly seem five meters away. If I focused on something long enough, it began to radiate those same ethereal particles as when Trent released Ava's "phase lock". I checked to make sure the shifter wasn't set to "TD". Sure enough, it was still in drive.
"Can you see them?" Trent asked. "The shifts?"
"Yeah," I said in a dreamy voice. I felt like I was driving through a wonderland.
"It's the energy. I barely notice a difference. A bit of movement in the trees, but not much else. But I'm sure for you, it's a whole experience."
"What is this?" I raised my hand and caught some of the pixel dust dripping off the sun visor. It disappeared when it made contact with my hand.
"It's a kind of radiation. Everything emits it, just in different quantities. I'm still not exactly sure how it relates to the other realms, but I'm guessing it's a kind of primordial matter that helps connect our worlds."
"It's beautiful," I exclaimed. "I wish I could see the world like this all the time."
"Maybe you will," Trent whispered.
As we arrived at the crash site, I began to get glimpses of the past. My childhood dreams and memories were pushing their way out from my subconscious. I noticed an increased number of blinks, which were validated by Ava who reported the following: "Currently detecting 14,350 novel emergences and 2,777 controlled agents. Net anomalies: 2,777."
"That's a lot of blinks." I remarked. "Why doesn't Ava include them in the net anomalies?"
Trent turned his head so I could see his smirk. "Because blinks aren't anomalies."
I thought about it for a second. Blinks aren't anomalies. "I never thought about it that way."
"It's hard to think about it that way when 'normal' for most people means not picking up on a fundamental aspect of reality. But that doesn't make it any less real."
We continued past the epicenter of the yellow circle. "Are we not stopping?" I asked. "I think we already passed the crash site."
"It doesn't have to be exactly at the site," Trent said. "Plus, we don't want to stop on the side of the road and risk getting some civilian involved. There's a field about half a mile up ahead. I'm going to pull off the road and set up camp there.
The "field" that Trent was referring to was actually a large clearing that dipped down into several trench-like troughs which were filled to the brim with fog like witches cauldrons. Further on in the distance, I saw open fields, probably used for farming, and then a large hill where the trees once again reasserted themselves. We had pulled off the road and up a small incline where the trees had already been broken down, leaving a trail for us to drive through. When we surfaced at the edge of the clearing, Trent pulled us onto a flat bed of dried mud which was maybe thirty yards long.
"Here," he said with a sigh.
We both sat for a minute, looking around at the field. We had finally arrived. The rain was beginning to pick up, and the dark sky made it almost impossible to discern the time of day.
"You ready?" Trent asked.
I looked at him. Really looked at him. In his blue eyes. Was I ready? Did it even matter?
"Let's do this," I said.
***
This was the first time I was really able to inspect the back of Trent's van. He had talked up his gear a lot, and honestly, I was impressed. Not in the way that a scientist is impressed by another scientist's lab—I wasn't any kind of expert—but it still seemed remarkably well managed. Now that I was in a state where my vision had been enhanced, I could actually see the enigmatic particles circulating through the pneumatic tubes which were coiled like the pipes and valves of an elaborate wind instrument. The walls of the van, itself, were glistening white, making it easier to make out everything else inside. Along the floor were five overturned columns. Each column was dark and had a vibrating quality, as if they were charged with energy. Then atop the center three columns was a small altar which supported an apparatus with two skinny, metal arms holding a silver halo. At present, the arms were folded and the halo was suspended a few inches above the altar, faced-down. I thought maybe I'd see particles exuding from it, but instead it was emitting visible waves which bent and warped everything they touched.
"That thing is emitting a lot of energy." I remarked, gesturing toward the halo.
Trent stepped in between the columns and started pulling out the packages he had stuffed in there yesterday. "Just wait till' it's on."
Most of the packages contained only a single piece of equipment, and were otherwise packed with foam peanuts. We carefully removed each box and set them on the ground outside. I asked if the rain would damage any of the stuff inside, to which Trent only laughed and continued lugging out the boxes. When they were all out, Trent removed a box cutter from his pocket and went one-by-one opening them. There were eight pieces in total.
"What is it?" I asked as we fished the first item out.
"It's another apparatus, like the one inside. Except it'll mount on the ground out here."
I pulled out what looked like a metal tripod.
"Good, that'll go on the bottom."
"Where are we setting it up?"
"Over here," Trent said and stepped five paces away from the van. He coordinated himself up so he was centrally aligned with the inner ring, then stomped a few times. "This is the spot."
As we continued to work, I asked Trent about how the whole contraption works.
"Do you remember the first time we were in the van? When we had to escape from the semi-truck?" Trent asked and connected a secondary mounting apparatus on top of the tripod. It had four spider-like legs that made right angles and stuck into the ground.
"Of course," I said. "The 'phase lock'."
"Yeah," Trent said and gestured toward the metal stick that was in my hand. I handed it to him. "The phase lock is a seal on the level of energy that the van is allowed to release. It also controls its dispersion pattern so that it releases its energy in a steady wave. This allows Ava to scan for anomalies without causing us to become an anomaly." Trent stuck the plank into the neck of the tripod.
"So when you released the phase lock, we started emitting more energy."
"That's right." Trent confirmed. "Enough to create an alternate route through a different realm."
"So we blinked into a different realm, then back, just to avoid that truck?"
"That's right."
"But why couldn't we just move out of the way?"
"Because it had locked onto us. It was tracking our motion and adjusting its course based on the amount of energy we were emitting. So in order to escape, we had to radically skew our potential energy and then use it to shift."
"Couldn't he have just followed us?"
Trent connected four more pieces to the device which now looked like an elaborate teepee. He was fishing in the last box when he spoke again. "Yeah, he could have. But it was highly improbable that he would have found us." Trent returned from the bottom of the box with another silver ring in hand. "Think of it like this. Let's say you're trying to escape from some bad guy who's coming after you, and you enter a new room you've never seen before. Would you prefer this room to have three doors to go through, or ten?"
I thought about his riddle for a second, then responded, "It depends where they go."
Trent fastened the ring atop the teepee. "Let's say they all lead to random places, or let's say they're all closets that lead nowhere. The key is that more is better, because the more doors he has to check, the less likely he is to pick the correct one. Make sense?"
"So we opened up a bunch of doors and escaped through one at random?"
"Hence the gear 'TD', for 'Trap Door'."
I marveled at the insights, but not for long. Trent hopped back in the van and pulled a lever that I hadn't seen until now. The two metal arms raised the inner ring until it was perpendicular with the altar. Then Trent clicked one of three red buttons along the back wall, and I saw what looked like a large, glass eye suspended in a magnifying glass protruding from the wall, aligned with the center of both rings. A couple seconds later, the glass eye began to focus the energy which was being fed to it from the pneumatic tubes, and a blue pyramid of light projected from it into the first ring, then from the first ring into the second ring. All three pieces were aligned at slightly diminishing heights, so the cylinder of light beamed through the second ring, into the ground.
"Alright, time for the first trial."
I felt the nerves starting up in my stomach. Trent sensed this and hopped out of the truck. It was raining quite hard now, though it was still warm. Both Trent and I were soaked, but that hardly concerned us. He reached out and put his hand on my shoulder. "I know you're feeling scared." He said. "But trust me on this. You're going to do fine. Just keep in mind what we talked about. Stay a spectator. Okay?"
I looked into his blue eyes, which seemed especially gray in the dark. Still, Trent's voice was reassuring. All I had to do was trust him. Trust myself. Trust my dad. And it was all going to turn out right.
"I'm ready," I said.
Trent was still for a second, holding my eyes in his. Then he guided me behind the outer ring and into the cylinder of light.
"I should step into it now?" I asked, afraid I'd be called away immediately.
"It's not on yet, so don't worry. I still have to press another button."
I followed Trent's instructions and stood in the blue light which was centered on my chest. Then I watched as Trent ran into the back of the van and posted up next to the glass eye. "Ready?" He yelled out. It was hard to hear him over the rain, but I yelled back. "Ready!"
The next thing I saw was a blinding blue light beam from the van. I heard what sounded like a laser, then saw the cylinder oscillate, expanding and compressing. When the energy reached the second ring, I saw everything around me light up—it looked brighter than noon on a cloudless day. Then the oscillations made their way to me, and I was swallowed up whole.
***
When I came to, I was in the backseat of a car. I felt my butt rumbling. Everything was dim and quiet. And then I heard a woman's voice from in front of me.
"Mark, please, not with Lauren in the back."
The man, who I now identified as my father, pulled the cigarette away from his lips and blew the smoke at my mom. He eyed the back seat where I was sitting, using one of five markers that hadn't rolled off my lap to color a rabbit in my animal color book.
"The kid's fine." he said and took another drag.
"Mark," my mom repeated.
I saw my dad raise his hand in a rapid motion. "I said she's fine, Cheryl. Now check the map and make sure we're going the right away. I can't see shit with all this fog."
I took a moment to make sure I was really in the back seat. I patted myself. I clearly had weight. Then I tried touching the car. At first, my fingertips met a solid surface, but when I tried to press through, my hand slipped into the car. I quickly pulled my hand away as if I had reached into a fire.
That's when I heard the little three year old next to me start crying. I turned and saw that little-me had dropped another couple markers onto the ground and was struggling to reach them.
"Hey!" my dad shouted. "What did I say about crying?"
"Quit it, Mark. She just dropped her markers." said my mom; she turned to help me pick them up.
"What did you say to me?" Mark spat with a voice full of guile. He reached out and pushed her back into her seat. "Don't," he commanded. "She has to learn how to deal with life."
"Deal…" My mom started in disbelief. "Deal with life? Do you hear yourself? What's gotten into you?"
"Sometimes shit happens. It doesn't give her the right to cry. You helping her is just going to reinforce her behavior."
"Her behavior? What about your behavior? You're acting like a total dick."
I didn't even have a moment to react before my dad's hand was across my mom's face. I felt the slap more than I heard it, my own face seeming to swell with the force of the blow. I saw my mom cover her mouth and lean away. Then little-me began to cry even louder, which only challenged my dad to step up his own volume.
"Everyone needs to get a fucking grip before I crash this car." My dad shouted and took another drag. The scariest part was I couldn't tell if he was warning us or threatening us. I felt the sudden urge to do something. There was no way this was real. I was definitely in some fantasy concocted by the demon. He wanted to turn me against my dad. That was the only explanation for something like this. My dad was a good man, not… this.
As I contemplated what to do, I saw a small, golden light appear behind little-me's window. Apparently she saw it, too, because her cries hushed as she traced the wisp with her eyes. After a second, the wisp transformed into a bunny rabbit, reminiscent of the one she was coloring. The rabbit hopped alongside the window, then did a couple circles in place. I watched little me let out a playful laugh and reach toward the window.
"What's going on back there?" my dad asked with a scowl. Apparently the only sound more disturbing than cries were laughs.
I looked back to the front and saw my mom wiping blood from her lip. Her expression was miserable. "Leave her alone, Mark."
"I'll do whatever I damn well want to do, Cheryl. It's my kid back there."
My mom was quiet.
When I looked back toward the rabbit, it was no longer a rabbit but a person. Or at least it looked like a person. The figure radiated pure gold, and atop his head was what appeared to be a King's crown. I recalled Allison's experience of seeing the sun-like figure in her moment of distress. Was that what was happening here? Was this really all true?
"Hey!" My dad shouted, eyeing little-me from the rear-view mirror. "What are you reaching at?"
I looked and saw the golden figure extending his hand toward the window, and little me's hand was reaching back. "Mom, dad, it bright." little-me said.
"What's bright, honey?" my mom asked.
"Don't encourage her, Cheryl."
"Someone there!" little me shouted happily and dropped the rest of the markers and the coloring book onto the ground.
"Who's there?" asked my mom.
"Cheryl, I swear to God. Sit the fuck down."
Everything from that moment on happened so quickly I barely had any time to process it. My mom lifted out of her seat to either get little me's attention or help me pick up my coloring book. My dad responded by grabbing onto her throat, letting go of the steering wheel entirely. He threw her back against the car door, and her head hit the window so hard, the glass cracked. My dad had dropped his cigarette, and I could smell smoke coming from under his seat, but that didn't seem to bother him at all. He turned toward little-me at the same moment my three-year-old hand reached out and grabbed onto the golden figure, whose hand diffused through the window. When my dad turned, I got a whiff of the most awful smell that I wouldn't have been able to place had I not had that nightmare last night. He grabbed onto little-me's shoulder and tugged her away from the golden figure that was trying to pull her the other way. My dad's facade began to crack, and I could see those dark bugs crawling out from the pores in his arms, marching down toward little-me.
I reacted.
I grabbed onto my dad's arm and pulled him off little-me. I heard the sound of my shirt ripping as she was torn from his grip and pulled out of the car, diffusing through it like a ghost. My brief victory was immediately overturned as I saw what was now clearly the demon smiling at me, his wretched fingers curled around my forearm.
"Caught you," He sneered.
Then the whole world once again diffused into countless numbers of particles, only this time, instead of riding through it, I felt like I was falling through an elevator shaft with each floor darker than the last. The further I fell, the less I became aware of my surroundings, and the more I felt a deep sense of loneliness. It was as if I was the only person in the whole world: and the whole world was a prison designed entirely for me. This went on for so long, I began to forget who I was. Where I was. What was.
And then I landed.
***
Source Used:
Jung, Carl. Synchronicity. Translated by Sonu Shamdasani, Princeton University Press, 2010.

Session 0 "Intake": https://www.reddit.com/DeltaGreenRPG/comments/1d0l92x/impossible_landscapes_session_0/
Session 1 "The Apartment": https://www.reddit.com/DeltaGreenRPG/comments/1d2sjua/impossible_landscapes_session_1_the_apartment/
Operation ALICE, New York, 1995
The Roster (Player/Character)
Lea (she/her): Jules Gradkowska - Agent MIRANDA. Journalist - research and human intelligence.
Iain (he/him): Ralph Bevis - Agent MILHOUSE. Academic - history and occult specialist.
Quinn (he/him): Richard Delapore - Agent MAVERICK. FBI Special Agent - criminal and forensic expert and the official 'face' of the investigation.
Phil (he/him): Jean Duvall - Agent MAIN. US Navy Master Chief Petty Officer - operational security specialist.
Duncan (he/him): Jake Little - Agent MALATESTA. Civilian contractor - computer and electronic specialist with a side line in hacking.
Rob_sothoth (he/him) - Handler. The arbiter of the world: the good, the bad and that which cannot and should not be named.
Background: The Agents of M-Cell are tasked with investigating the apartment of Abigail Wright. Missing since June, Delta Green has reason to suspect para-natural involvement. Their orders are simple: catalogue the apartment and remove anything deemed suspect for destruction.
Despite heavy changes made, full spoiler warning for Impossible Landscapes.

### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ###

Session 2 "Futures Past" (June 7th, 2024)
New York: Wednesday, August 9th, 1995
05:00am - 2:30pm, EST
Following the first day of investigation, Agent MAIN is the first to wake. An early-riser after years in the military, he leaves a note for Marsha. The two will meet again, of course. Arriving at work, he gets chatting to some Navy mechanics about the little weird diagram on the napkin. About the best answer he gets (after a successful check), is that one of them remembers seeing something like a clockwork giraffe as an attraction in South America. Studying it on that basis, MAIN concludes it's an artist's attempt at design because he can't see a way for this to work or even what it might really be for. He also checks in with USN and asks a friend to track down some vintage US Arms gear (he noted the serial numbers on the radio and dud-grenade). Not being from the same branch of service (and a failed check), it will take somewhere between 24-48 hours. (I decided US Armed Forces would probably be better at digitizing records, he'll get something either way).
MAVERICK isn't far behind MAIN, starting his day as usual being one of the first into the FBI NYC Field Office. As far as the FBI is concerned, he's on the Wright case now it's in their jurisdiction. Unprepared to wait for the prints to be matched (failed check on Bureaucracy), he instead does it himself (successful Forensics check). Abigail was never arrested, but her father handed in a hairbrush she kept at his and his wife's home. The prints match. It took MAVERICK a little time (it was a close pass), because part of a second, unidentified print obscured one of Abigail's, He can discount himself and the team, and likely anyone in law enforcement as he assumed they would've gone gloved.
Next, he follows up on Art Life and makes a call. He gets on the phone with Cynthia LeChance and in the course of their conversation is able to intuit there's something she's unsure or hesitant about. Being the honest-to-goodness, earnest Agent Cooper type, MAVERICK is able to organise a lunch meeting with her as part of follow up. He doesn't have many questions, he assures Cynthia and it'll be on the FBI's dime. She agrees to meet at 12pm.
(It's worth mentioning I ruled there was no reason MARCUS (Case Officer, M-Cell) or the Agents themselves wouldn't have or be able to obtain pagers they could use to stay in contact. Definitely an incidental expense as far as I am concerned.)
MILHOUSE, after his morning run to campus, follows up on his research from the previous day. He identifies the Ars Goetia and learns there's an 18th century copy in the special collections. Luckily for him, he's able to get about an hour with the book. The book contains the names of some 72 demons, their associated heraldry and symbols which they must "pay allegiance to." The book also contains the supposed means of summoning said entities, but MILHOUSE's time is over before he can get much further into it.
He's the first to arrive at the apartment, late morning/early afternoon (roughly around MAVERICK's planned lunch interview). At the coffeeshop, he's treated to a free beverage by Marsha, who thanks him for bringing his friend in the other day. Sadly, by the time MAIN arrives, her shift is over.
MIRANDA lies awake, watching the minutes tick by until about five minutes before she'd usually be walking into the Village Voice's office before making a call. She's really sorry, but she'll have to take a personal day, but does her best to reassure her editor she's still on for the grill party on Saturday. Of more immediate concern is the missing demonic symbol she is unable to locate. The polaroid she snapped is still in her possession, but she can find no trace of the symbol drawn on its piece of brown wrapping paper anywhere in her apartment. Nor can she find any evidence her home was broken into (she has the right skills to determine that for...reasons).
She makes a quick call to her criminal contact, Hugo. It's been less than 24 hours, but she wants to just follow up to perhaps create a sense of urgency. Hugo says he might have a couple of people on the hook, but it would help if he had more to work with than just "weird and esoteric." MIRANDA will be in touch. Before heading to Kips Bay, she decides to follow up on trying to locate the cab and its driver she photographed the other day; the driver looking down the barrel of the camera at her.
It takes her most of the morning, but MIRANDA locates the garage and office. Mostly making calls asking about a cab outside Abigail's address the previous day. She knows the time, more or less. She finds a schlubby office manager who stonewalls her until money changes hands. MIRANDA gets a name and the cabbie's usual pick up and route. Guy likes to work around the Port Authority Terminal most days, she can probably find him there. She doesn't want to go alone and makes her way to the Macallistar where she expects to find the others.
A night owl and late to wake by nature, MALATESTA hits snooze on his alarm maybe only twice today. Packing up the weird crystal in a ziplock bag stowed in his backpack, he takes himself to the Mercury Gallery. He's got an angle he wants to try and it works, if not quite in the way he perhaps expected.
The gallery owner, Santiago, isn't sure what to make of the skater-grunge kid who rolls into his gallery, but he's not exactly out of place and to be truthful, his story is almost too outlandish not to be true. Through a combination of good roleplay and an opposed check, MALATESTA explains a "dude he's working for" heard about Abigail's exhibition and wanted to know if there were any paintings of hers left unsold.
As it turns out, there are. Santiago explains they're not the cream of the crop: "Most of the others were more abstract and, I would say, exemplary. She did well, especially for an artist in New York. The one or two I have left are a bit more...prosaic."
At about this time, MAVERICK makes his meeting with Cynthia. He's not hard to miss; there is no reality in which he was not a Federal Agent and Cynthia easily marks him across the street. She takes him to a small Italian bistro where she usually has lunch and begins talking. This is what MAVERICK is good at; getting people to talk. Everyone wants to, after all; it's about letting them and knowing where to push and where not.
Cynthia explains how weird the Macallistar has been for her to manage. The building has never been filled to capacity as far she can recall and those units which were occupied never remained so for very long.
MAVERICK: "Did you know Abigail?"
Cynthia: "Not really. I met her once or twice. Went with her and her dad to view the apartment." She smiles. "He was worried about her having a ground floor unit in the city, but it was the one she wanted. Never any complaints from her or from other tenants about her. Then...the rent stopped."
MAVERICK: "Yeah, we saw that."
Cynthia: "No. You don't understand. The rent stopped. No one in the building has been paying rent since March this year."
MAVERICK: "What does that mean?"
Cynthia is nervous. MAVERICK picks up she's worried she might be in trouble and he reassures her she isn't. Far from it, in fact.
Across town, MALATESTA is shown one of Abigail's unsold paintings. Santiago unveils it; a landscape, the frame longer than it is tall. A park, with a city-skyline in the background. In the centre, a statue. There are people. Some gathered in a crowd, others walking in various directions. MALATESTA feels uneasy. Then he sees them: five figures gathered in the shadows of the statue around a sixth, seated on a bench. Merely brushstrokes, details and faces indistinct. One may be a woman. Another appears to be holding a skateboard.
Santiago, distant as MALATESTA gave the painting his full attention, becomes clear again.
"See what I mean? Like something you'd see in a doctor's office."
"Yeah." MALATESTA passes a SAN check, but still takes one.
He was there just yesterday.
This was exhibited in November of last year (1994).
He tries and fails to argue Santiago down on the price and is very unaware that the gallery owner is hitting on him. Wrapping the painting, MALATESTA asks if Santiago can check on where some of the other paintings might have ended up or ask around about Abigail in general. Since it means they will meet again, Santiago is all too happy to oblige and hands MALATESTA a business card, writing his own number on the back.
MALATESTA: "Cool, man. I'll be in touch with the deets."
Santiago: "Sure...the deets." (I think it pained him to say that word)
Before leaving, he lets go something Abigail mentioned during the exhibition. While unable to recall the name, he thinks she said she got her inspiration from a book of some sort. He thinks the name might have been something French.
Across their lunch table, Cynthia explains she thinks Art Life upper management are content to wait for eviction notices to be served to the remaining tenants.
Cynthia: "I think even if everyone paid what they owe and next month's, management wouldn't change their mind."
MAVERICK: "Why?"
Cynthia: "I think they want to renovate the building. Getting everyone out lets them do that. Spruce it up, hike the rent...I lie awake at night wondering if that's legal. I've never evicted a whole building."
MAVERICK: "One of my colleagues bumped into one of Abigail's neighbours. Mr. Post, Lewis Post I think. Same story with him?"
Cynthia: "Yeah, same as the rest. More or less."
MAVERICK: "More or less?"
Cynthia: "He called me the end of March this year, said he'd be late on the rent, but not to worry and then he started asking me about the building."
MAVERICK: "And you did?"
Cynthia: "Yeah, but I wish I hadn't."
She names a few books she picked up, as Lewis wanted more than just what Art Life had on the Macallistar. MAVERICK wonders why, but she explains Lewis was nice and she was curious herself.
"It's a weird building. Always made me feel...off, being there. I can't remember the last time I went in person."
MAVERICK: "What did you learn? I have the architect's name. Daribondi."
Cynthia: "Asa. Asa Daribondi. The Macallistar was built in 1921. He designed it. He...there was a fire at his office on Mott Street in 1950 and he disappeared. He...he was a murderer, Agent Delapore. They found a child's body on the premises. After that, I stopped looking into it."
There's a long silence. The MAVERICK asks her for keys to the unoccupied apartments. He tells her a story about how when he started out in the Bureau, he was involved in a missing person's case. A little girl and in the end, they found her hiding in her treehouse.
Cynthia: "You think Abigail's still in the building? In one of the empty units?"
MAVERICK: "I don't know, but I can't discount it. I don't think she was in a normative state of mind before she disappeared."
Cynthia considers things. The plates are cleared and the coffee served.
Cynthia reaches into her handbag and removes something. "If management don't care about the building, I don't see why I should either." She hands him a master key. "Don't lose this and borrow it for...give it back to me when you're done."
True to his word, MAVERICK pays the bill.
"I hope you find her, her find something to maybe help. She was nice."
MAVERICK and Cynthia say their goodbyes and he heads to Kips Bay.
In the interim, MIRANDA has joined MILHOUSE and MAIN in the coffeeshop, with MALATESTA arriving with weird painting in tow not long before MAVERICK's arrival.
Unable to contain his excitement, MALATESTA nearly unveils the painting right then and there.
MALATESTA: "You won't believe-"
MIRANDA: "Let's not talk about this here."
MALATESTA: "No, I know, but-"
Coffeeshop patrons are giving the table weird looks.
MIRANDA: "Let's not talk about this here."
MALATESTA: "I was jus-"
MIRANDA: "Let's not talk about this here."
Some of the people are frowning, scowling almost.
MILHOUSE (to the other patrons): "Sorry. Sorry."
MAVERICK arrives not long after and the team reconvenes in the apartment to share what they've learned and determine any plans.
Unable to contain himself, MALATESTA reveals the painting. Everyone except MAIN passes the SAN check for the realisation of what it depicts. MAIN takes 4 SAN loss and does not project. Closing in on his breaking point, MAIN is confused and unable to fully process what's going on and throws himself into another search of the apartment.
MIRANDA is concerned about further exposure to the para-natural and wonders if there is anything they can do to take care. All they can do is be cautious.
MAVERICK wants to make a sweep of the empty apartments in the building. MILHOUSE agrees to partner up with him on that front after informing the group of the Ars Goetia. MIRANDA makes a phone call using a booth in the street to reach Hugo and give him the name.
MAVERICK & MILHOUSE examine the results of their experiment about the weird fridge. It looks like whatever is happening in the apartment, it's not just the fridge. (The book could not in anyway have given me anything to account for that, so I just ran with it. Felt appropriate). MAVERICK takes no damage from his SAN check despite failing. He expected to find it that way. MILHOUSE is also fine.
I'm sure that means nothing...
MALATESTA and MIRANDA stay with MAIN in Abigail's apartment to conduct a further search. The three who remain received a +20% bonus to their search rolls and all pass as MAVERICK & MILHOUSE leave to check the building (They can make rolls in the apartment on their return).
They exit the apartment at 2:30pm.
Within, MALATESTA, MAIN & MAVERICK find the following:
A rent receipt with Abigail's name, undated and signature unreadable.
A page of typed script which appears to be a play Abigail was writing. Several names are mentioned: Michelle, Mark & Thomas. Michelle is the first name of one of Abigail's neighbours, right?
A plane ticket in the name of Michael Witwer from Las Vegas to Boston, dated June 6th, 2015.

### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ###

Dorchester House, 2015
Dr. Dallon: "Must've been a fake? What with the date and all."
MAVERICK: "Must have been."

### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ###

Post-Mortem
Five players going in different directions was a little tough to juggle, but they were happy with the pace of play and I made sure everyone had something to do.
I knew we weren't going to get through an entire in-game day about an hour in and I should've taken a bit more time to line up what everyone wanted to do at the end of the previous session, but everyone still had fun. Lea put it well: it feels like there's a dam with information gathering against it and it's going to burst.
With four out of the five players having children, I took a short aside during MAVERICK's rp with Cynthia to do a table check. I know the players and they know me and I handled it in the right way as far as they were concerned.
Two sessions in and MAIN is the first character to close on his BP, being 3 or 4 (one bad roll) away from his first disorder. I appreciate this and his reasons for not projecting make sense, in-character. We'll see how that pans out.
In terms as to what's changed compared to the book, I saw no real reason not to give MAVERICK more info on the architect. Rewarding good roleplay is something I enjoy doing and as far as I'm concerned, he did everything he needed to in-character to get what he got. I also saw no reason why the phone call between Cynthia and Lewis Post could not have conceivably happened. So far, all he has are book titles and info about Daribondi's misdeeds and little else. Getting more will require time investment and skill checks where appropriate.
Our next session is TBD due to life stuff and until then, be seeing you.

Kind of a long post, sorry. TLDR; dm let's girlfriend be the BBEG and make all decisions about the game. Special cameo from alien Cyborg furry chimera from the future.
I just joined a group a couple weeks ago and have been meaning to make a post about it in RPG Horror stories, but here goes:
DM posts online looking for players. I haven't played or DMed in about a year and am desperate for a game, so I sign up. There's a few questions for me that I answer (standard stuff, how long have you been playing, what kind of character are you thinking about, are you OK with no evil characters, etc.) I answer them, but as someone who has DMed for a decade I have questions of my own.
How long have they been DMing? About a year. This is their second game and it started about 2 months before I joined.
How many players? They're trying to set the foundation for a living world where other people will be able to dm in the setting, so they currently have 20+ players but only about 6 or 7 show up for a given session. They run 3 days a week so if you can't make it, no problem. Everyone just uses their Discord names rather than real names.
Any homebrew or house rule changes to 5e I should know about? Yes, a few of them.
As they start to go into them I realize this is not going to be a great game, but I don't really care that much. Im just here to play, im not super invested. They tell me to start at level 2 with 150 gold. Okay, cool. Use DnD beyond for sheets. Sure. Roll for stats, cool. End up rolling really well, 17, 14, 17, 17, 13, 17. Dm watches me roll and is amazed. Put the 14 in Wis and 13 in int.
If an attack meets a creature's AC exactly, roll to dodge. Whatever, lots of newer DMs do this.
There are apparently glowing scrolls in the world that allow you to INSTANTLY level up, no matter how much xp you have. Red flag.
The campaign is going to Level 100, switching from Xp to milestone after level 20. Huge red flag. Pause. I ask how that's going to work. What features do you get at level 21 of fighter? 22? 47? They say they're going to be pushing for multiclassing at Higher Levels or using not class feature rewards for higher levels, so I'm assuming things like feats and epic boons. Still very weird though.
Everyone can suggest custom Race for their character and the DM will discuss with another person about it to see if they believe it fits the world (this other person helped design the setting). Okay, great! I've been wanting to play a sentient undead character for a while, we'll circle back to it.
Same as above, you can create a custom item for your character to start with. Cool. I ended up asking for a Greataxe with the finesse property and was granted it. Sweet. Barbarian/rogue, here I come.
There is a homebrew banking system in place, and in order to "encourage" players to use it, you cannot carry more than 2,000 gold on your person at once because "it is too heavy". Strength of 8? 2000 gold. Strength of 24 when the barbarian hits level 20? 2000 gold. But that's fine, my character is a vagrant who doesn't use money and scavenges for everything he needs, and carries everything he owns on his person in a torn up duffel bag.
There's some custom items that can be bought so I spend my starting 150 gold (with dm permission) to get one of them, which is a special gemstone. It says "gives advantage on perception, Stealth, medicine, and Insight checks. Allows for 2 points of advantage on listed checks". Fuck yes, barbarian rogue who rolls 3 times and takes the best on Stealth, Perception, and Insight? I'm set.
Now for my custom Race. I want to play a leng ghoul from the Sandy Petersen Cthulhu Mythos book. I know they're a little overpowered, so I even volunteer to lose the ability to gain Skill bonuses and to lose the claw attacks. DM tells me no, I'll need to pick a different race. Okay, that's fine. I knew it was a long shot. I decide to just be a half orc and ask "out of curiosity, was there something specific that was too OP?" "No, we just felt that the race didn't fit the world. Nothing wrong mechanically" fair enough I guess.
First session:
My character is introduced alongside another new player. They are a paladin. We decide we've been traveling together for a while after Paladin helped get my character out of a bad spot a while ago.
Every player gets a bag of holding my first session in. But wait, a bag of holding makes items within weightless. Can't I just put gold inside the bag of holding? No, you can't put money inside these bags of holding. Other ones you can, but not the free ones we're given. Whatever. Vagrant. Don't care.
We exit the tavern we were in after some fun RP. group is very friendly and fun, and they seem to gel really well together. As we are leaving, we notice something strange glowing on a nearby tree. "K <3 M" is written in glowing script. The other players have been playing for a few sessions so I'm thinking this is probably something important with some NPCs they met previously, so Paladin and I don't have any idea what it could mean. Other players talk it over for a while, and the DM just keeps repeating "think deeper about it" and "you're not thinking realistically. Think realistically". Literally says those phrases like 5 or 6 times each. Nearly 20 minutes of players trying to figure it out and the DM giving us nothing and it changes to be full names rather than initials.
One of the players finally puts it together. This is the DM announcing they started dating someone IRL. I get pretty pissed off at this point, saying I think it's pretty irrelevant to do this. The DM says "sometimes a literal irrelevance is needed". I respond "Yeah, I agree. But this is the first session for 2 new players and you decided to spend a third of it so far on a dating announcement. Like. Congrats dude, but I really don't care about your love life. I'm here to play Dnd, not make random guesses about your love life." Other players agree and are also angry, so i feel a little more justified. Again, we all use discord names, so most of us didn't even recognize the DM's name.
After a while DM has to take a break for 10-15 minutes and leaves us for a bit. Here's where things go incredible. Most groups I've been in, if left alone for 15 minutes, will either just go to the bathroom or check social media or whatever. But this group instantly falls into very natural and authentic role play, asking the new players what their characters have done up to this point, offering to help them learn about the new land we've found ourselves in, talking about wanting to teach my character how to make some nice stews out of foraged foods and rabbit or squirrel. Genuinely some of the best role-playing I've ever been part of.
DM comes back while we're talking about rabbit stew. Instantly cuts us off, says there's no rabbits, and jumps into whatever they were saying. I would KILL for a group that role plays that freely as a DM, and this one is actively squashing it.
DM decides we're going to another town. We get there and are asked to help with defending the city while they rebuild after a raid. Cool. Nothing happens though. We spend the day sitting at guard stations waiting for raiders to return and nothing ever shows up to the town. They thank us and send us on our way with some gold (I give mine to paladin).
DM decides we are returning to the first city. We have discovered that there was a lot of corruption there (the other party members in previous sessions). So we're coming up with a plan to take the city back from the organized crime ring that is running the place. We get to the town and apparently one of the other players is a VERY influential person in the world because they were able to call in an airship of dozens of fighters for backup with this operation.
At some point during this, I I asked to make one of the relevant checks for the item I bought and so I roll with advantage. DM asks why I rolled 2d20s. I say "the item I bought gives advantage." The DM responds Yeah, advantage means +1 to the roll". I say no, advantage means you roll twice and take the better result, or it gives +5 if using the optional method. DM responds that "the double advantage means you get +2 to those checks. You don't get to roll more than once". So I tell them okay, but that they should really change the wording to just say it grants +2 because that is not what advantage means in 5e. They say that they know what it means so it doesn't matter.
Another player that is a rogue had a plan to use his extensive connections to trace the crime ring and find exactly how expansive it was so we can be sure to snuff it all out. DM just brushes over it and ignores the idea. Instead, we head directly to a front owned by the ring.
We show up to what is apparently the head of the crime syndicates' place of business and are prepared to fight. The DM "rolls to see how hard the fight will be" and gets a natural 1. The DM then narrates the player that found the place easily defeating the boss and the rest of us cleaning up the henchman. I once again was pretty upset. "So you just roll a single d20 and that means we don't get to do anything?"
"Yeah, they just were so confident that no one would ever stand up to them that they stood no chance. They didn't even have weapons or anything"
"An organized crime syndicate that has been running a city through force for years had 0 plans for if anyone ever tried to stop them, to the point none of them had weapons?"
"Yeah, that's just the way the dice roll sometimes". "You probably shouldn't be letting major plot points and large battles be determined by a single d20 roll that the players have no influence in." "Sorry, it's just the way things go sometimes." "Yeah but it shouldn't. The outcome of a major plot centric fight should be based on how well the party prepares and uses their resources, not by the DM before it even starts."
End of session 1. I message paladin and he agrees this was really bad but that he's gonna give it some time. I say the Same.
I find out between sessions that the DM has not read ANY of the books and learned how to play exclusively from the DnD beyond character sheet and watching live play YouTube videos (critical roll and dimension 20), and in fact they do not know how to read and have been teaching themselves. Yes, the DM never learned how to read as a child.
Session 2 is going to be much less in depth because literally nothing happens that any of the players have a say in.
Dm decides we're all going to the bank so my character can set up a bank account. "DM, my characterlives a nomadic lifestyle scrounging for scraps. Why would I go to a bank?" "To set up a bank account of course!" "Right. And I have 0 gold. So there's no money for me to put in a bank." "Well you might in the future, so you should set one up now!" "My character has already refused payment and charity twice in this game though. I doubt he's ever going to have any amount of money on him. He is a rogue though, so I guess he can find SOMETHING to do in a bank." DM quickly decides that there is zero reason my character would want to be in a bank and has the party leave.
We try to get horses from a stable so we can travel between towns faster (since the DM keeps deciding we're all leaving town multiple times per session) we are seeing if there are any horses that are trained to not flee from combat, like a warhorse. The DM says "No, you'll have to find a war horse out in the wild. Stables aren't going to have them." I'm a little confused as to why combat trained horses would just be out in the wild, so I ask about it. "The war horses are bright red and have manes of fire" "That's not a warhorse, that's the fucking Horse of War from the apocalypse" "Yeah, it's just a fun little reference" "So we can't have Combat trained horses because of Red Dead Redemtion and the Bible?" "Yeah, that's what the War Horse is" "So like, there's no militaries or militias in the country that ride horses then?"
Dm changes the subject. We're leaving town again!
We get to a new town and the place is being ransacked. We are hiding over a hill and watching the raid happen to try to get a good understanding of the situation when the BBEG appears. We know this because the DM says "and then, the BBEG appears. This is the BBEG for the campaign right here. She's very powerful, you do not wanna mess with her."
After the introduction, DM hands the game over to his girlfriend that he announced in the previous session, revealing she is playing the BBEG (she is also a player in the party, mind you) and is the person that helped design the setting, so is sort of co-DMing.
The BBEG starts talking to us. One of the players says "she's in the middle of town and we're outside the town on the other side of the hill, how does she even know we're here?"
"Great question. My love?" "OH, I can just see you guys." "There you go, she can see you"
"I had a 29 for my Stealth check" "I still see you" "Cool."
So the BBEG(big bad evil girlfriend) monologs about how powerful she is and how we are powerless to stop her and the DM asks if we want to stay and try to save the town or run away. I say "look, guys, I think we can take her". I've got 10 years experience DMing and more playing, and the DM obviously is not aware of how the game works. I am fully confident I can outmaneuver this enemy. Other players agreed they wanted to try to defend the townspeople.
"She's the maximum level"
"Yeah, but this is 5e. I'm level 2, I can probably take her. The difference in numbers between level 1 and 20 is like +10 at the max."
Another player interjects here. "You're level 2???? I'm level 8" "What?" Another player "Yeah I think 7 is the lowest level of any party memebers" "Oh, cool. I was told you were level 2 by the DM last week."
DM: no, I'm pretty sure I said to make yourself level 6 or 7. "Check our messages, it's like the first thing you told me. Dm: huh yeah, I did say level 2. Oops. Level yourself up to level 3 then."
We still want to try to save the Townspeople, maybe we can avoid her specifically or someone xan keep her busy long enough to help people.
Girlfriend declares she summons 150,000 troops to the city.
The DM narrates how we all run for our lives because we have no chance of beating her as BBEG calls in an army of thousands of soldiers who wear armor that resembles one of the other party members.
Now is a good time for me to say that I am absolutely not having a good time in this campaign, but that the other players make it more than worth it to deal with the DM.
Remember how my sentient ghoul was deemed "not fitting" for the setting? The other player asks "they look like me? Do they have the autobot or decepticon emblem?"
Record scratch. "Sorry, wait. Are you a transformer? I thought you were a bugbear." "No, I'm a half bear, half bat from the future that can transform into a robot because I'm partly cybernetic." "Okay. So ghoul that is intelligent is too far fetched for this world, but alien Cyborg furry chimera from the future is perfectly fitting. Gotcha."
The DM narrates us running away and going to the next town, where the invasion BBEG called is also happening. They narrate a girl being kidnapped and the party says that she is the love interest of another player who is not at the session, and the group agrees they want to try to free her bc party member would be upset if we let her get taken without even trying to save her. I agree and charge in.
"They're so far away, you wouldn't be able to reach them in time. You'd have to be able to move 45 feet at least."
"I'm a rogue. Move speed 30, cunning action dash 30, action dash 30. That's 90 feet. I can cover the distance there and back."
"Well. There's guards between you and her" "I'll take my chances. I've got a pretty good AC, with your roll to dodge mechanic AND uncanny dodge. I'm willing to risk it to save her"
"There's also 40 guards surrounding her" "They're have 40 guards escorting this 1 random girl? Is she like a princess?" "No, they just really want her kidnapped" "Okay, I guess I'll try to push through them."
The girlfriend interjects. "The BBEG teleports in. She laughs a wicked laugh about how futile your attempts are, and then teleports the girl away".
Oh. Cool. Great. Excellent.
Session ends. Another player messages asking what they missed this session. I respond "nothing that any player had any say in".
2 sessions in. 10 hours of "game play". 0 combats. 0 skill checks that weren't instantly nullified by an NPC immediately anyway (i didnt bother mentioning it, but i have rolled 3 total skill checks, all stealth, and all 3 i was spotted anyway despite getting 23+). 0 decisions made by any player. The DM just tells the party where they are going, asks what they want to do, and then makes an excuse to not let that happen and tells them what they actually do instead.
I would say the DM should write a book, but they can't read.

First / Previous
Jori stood at the edge of the alleyway, pressed up against the wall of The Wandering Fowl as she peered into the narrow street’s depths. Humming echoed from within; a soft, gentle tune that originated from the girl that stood on the snow covered path.
Her sister.
Aria’s attention was not focused towards the end of the street, but rather on the large furred beast in front of her. The auroc groaned gently as the girl moved her brush, patting the bovine as she was lost within the rhythm of her own tune. She reached up and scratched the beast behind its horn, provoking a satisfied bellow from the large animal as it nuzzled up against her. Aria’s giggle broke her melody, ringing out with the same innocent tone that a child’s laugh could only produce.
Just like any other girl.
Pain panged in Jori’s heart, a dull ache that still possessed enough bite to make her clutch at her chest. She looked towards the ground, eyes focusing on the sack that sat at her feet. Its cloth had been pushed to its limit, burgeoning from what had been stuffed within. Jori was content to lose herself for a moment, to forget about the growing hollowness in her stomach, but she was brought out of her trance with a tap on her arm.
“Jori?” Jon asked, her brother’s tone a mix of worry and apprehension.
“I… I’m…” she swallowed, “we could just leave it here. She doesn’t need us bothering her after all she’s been through.”
She started to move away from the alley, but her brother caught her shoulders.
“We’ve come this far Jori, and she leaves today,” he said, his tone heavy, “we can’t back away now.”
She frowned at him, “Brave words for the one making me go first.”
Jon scratched his head, “You’re the oldest, you gotta take charge in these things.”
Jori opened her mouth to respond, but froze as she saw the tremble in her brother’s fingers.
She sighed, “Ok, I’ll do it,” steeling herself, Jori slapped her cheeks, straightened her back, and spun around.
Only to jump at who she saw.
Though he was without armor or helmet, Helbram was easily recognizable in a small town like Redhaven. He was tall, taller than most in the village, but not so much that it would make him a giant, and there were farmers that possessed broader frames than him. However, none carried the same presence as the adventurer. There was an air to the man that threaded the line between gentle and imposing, as if he could switch between the two at the drop of a hat if needed.
As he loomed over the siblings, he trended towards the latter.
He may have been brought into the village in an unconscious state, but any sign of his incapacitation had vanished over the fortnight that it took for him and his party to recover, letting the full weight of his gaze settle over Jori as he looked the two over with unblinking eyes. His vision eventually settled on the bag next to Jori’s feet, and, after a moment of study, a smile broke from his emotionless guise.
He leaned against the wall and tilted his head towards the alley, “Go to her, we will give you some peace.”
Jori tilted her head, eventually realizing that the “we” Helbram mentioned included Leaf, who stood behind him closer to the tavern’s door. The half elven man looked at them with a frown, one that did not reach his eyes, and turned his gaze back to the street, saying nothing.
Jon prodded her in the back, which was enough to get her moving. She picked up the bag and walked past Helbram, marching into the alleyway with enough force behind her steps to echo through the narrowed path.
Echoes that made Aria turn towards her.
As the sisters’ eyes met, both froze. Jon stumbled into Jori’s back, but upon seeing Aria looking at them stopped in his tracks as well. Their sister’s eyebrows were raised in surprise, and the girl leaned against the auroc at her side for support. Her hands clutched at her brush, and the small shake to her fingers revealed the trepidation that the girl felt at the sight of her siblings. It was a sight that made Jori’s heart fall.
But she pressed on.
She walked closer, taking cautious steps towards her sister as she held the bag in front of her. Aria did not react to her approach, but Jori settled at stopping a stone’s throw away. She knelt down and opened the bag.
Revealing the bundles of clothing within.
“We didn’t know how much you needed…” Jori started, “and we didn’t know what your sizes were, so we gathered all we could.”
“We made sure there weren’t any holes in ‘em either,” Jon added in haste, “they may have been ours but they should last you a long while,” like Jori, his eyes were focused towards the ground and not the girl in front of them.
Their sister said nothing.
“We put some blankets in there too,” Jon said, “I know the cold doesn’t bother you but-”
Jori stomped on her brother’s foot. He winced, but upon realizing what he said kept his lips sealed. Cautiously, she looked up towards Aria, staring at the girl’s lips to avoid her eyes.
No reaction.
They stood in silence, the air between them growing more hollow by the moment. It was an emptiness that started to creep back into Jori’s heart, a sense of futility that told her to turn around and walk away. She clenched her hands into fists and pushed that instinct to the side, forcing herself to look her sister in the eye.
“I’m sorry,” she said, the words cracking as her vision blurred, “for abandoning you, for being scared of you. For being an awful, awful sister,” she blinked furiously to keep her tears from falling, “you deserved so much better, and I know there is nothing I can do to make up for what I have done.”
“What we have done,” Jon said, his voice a trembling mess, “I’m sorry too. Sorry for being such a poor brother, for thinking that what I had done was the only… the right thing to do,” he closed his eyes and took in a deep breath to steady himself, “It’s not our place to say this, but we hope wherever you go you find the happiness you deserve.”
Still, Aria did not respond.
Any bravery that the siblings held vanished at their sister’s silence. Jori’s gaze fell and, when nothing else was said, she spun around to leave, grabbing her brother’s arm.
“I can’t forgive you.”
Jori’s heart shattered to pieces.
The instinct to run swelled within her, to flee from the burden of guilt that crashed against her shoulders. The shake in her brother’s arm told her that Jon felt the same, but neither of them moved.
Whatever was to be said, they deserved.
“The words are there… but as I try to say them, I can only see you as you were before,” Aria said, “The ones who laughed and played outside my door as I could only look on. The ones who ignored me as they continued to be happy, to be loved. I can’t say it, not after all this time.”
Jori could hear the weeping in her sister’s voice, but neither her nor Jon could bring themselves to look back as their own tears streamed down their faces.
“But I can say thank you,” Aria’s footsteps drew closer, “for the clothes… and for trying to save me.”
It was the sibling’s time to be silent.
“We may never see each other again, but I hope the best for the both of you.”
An impulse washed over Jori then, an urge to turn around and embrace her sister, to cry into the girl’s shoulders and let her do the same, to be like siblings should have been.
But it was too late for that.
“We hope the best for you too,” Jori said, unable to face her sister. She went to say more, but the words caught at her throat.
Unable to take anymore, Jori ran, letting the desire to escape take over. She hurried past the Helbram and Leaf into the street, her steps carrying her far enough into Redhaven that they were out of sight. Jon was at her side, and when their sprint could carry them no further they collapsed to the ground, chests heaving as their sobs hindered their ability to catch their breath.
Tears flowed from their eyes, unending as they traced down their cheeks, splashing onto the street as they continued to cry. They ignored the stares of the townsfolk that walked by, too lost in the tide of emotions that carried them this far. When the tears finally slowed, Jori could still feel the sorrow within her chest, the pain that dug into her heart, unable to leave.
But it had faded.
Their sister’s words did not relieve Jori of the burden of guilt, but it had reduced it to a dull ache. One that she could live with.
Must live with.
Jori wiped the tears from her eyes and stood up. She held a hand out to Jon and, after her brother wiped his face, he took it with a firm grip as she helped him up. They met each other’s gaze and shared a nod. They had to continue on, to be the best that they could be, for their sake.
For their sister’s wishes.
___
Aria watched her siblings disappear from the alley’s exit. When they were gone, the grip on her brush relaxed and she let go of the breath that she was holding. She looked towards the bag in front of her and knelt down. Curiosity fueled her hands then, placing the brush down and pulling a piece of clothing from the parcel. It revealed itself to be a shirt as it unfolded, the size only a tad larger than what she needed. It was weaved from a white cloth, and in every way was unremarkable.
Yet the sight of it made her happy.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of oncoming footsteps. Helbram and Leaf approached, and while the usual frown-faced man looked at her with some concern, his companion was more relaxed, yet somehow focused at the same time.
Helbram knelt down in front of her, “Are you alright?”
Aria nodded, “I don’t know if it was the right thing to say.”
He put his hand on her head, “Yours is a situation that is a bit more complicated than right or wrong,” he admitted, “and in such times it is better to instead ask this: did you do all that you needed to do?”
She looked down, thinking for a moment, but moved her gaze up to match his, “Yes, I did.”
Helbram smiled at her, “Then that, for now, is all that matters,” he ruffled her hair and stood up, taking the bag into his hand. He held it out for her to put the shirt back into it and held it out to Leaf, who took it as he walked over to Bessie.
“I’ll get her sorted out,” Leaf said, “now go do what you have to do.”
Helbram let out a breath and looked to Aria, “Are you ready?”
She nodded, one that he returned.
He turned towards the tavern’s side door, but waited for Aria to walk ahead of him before he followed. As they walked through The Wandering Fowl’s kitchen, she caught sight of both Elly and Jahora packing various foodstuffs. The taller woman bit into an apple absentmindedly as she peered into the tavern’s icebox. As she noticed them walk by, her ears perked up, and she met Helbram’s eyes with a knowing gaze. Jahora caught sight of them next, saying nothing but flashing Aria an encouraging smile as they walked through the door and into the tavern’s main hall.
She walked up the building’s stairs and down the hallway of rooms that composed its second floor. As her hand reached towards the door that lay at the end of the path, Helbram placed his hand on the doorknob in her stead.
“Are you certain of this?” he asked, his tone measured, but unable to hide the concern beneath.
The weight of the question gave rise to the doubt that sat beneath her determination. Given what had transpired… it would not be wrong of her to leave the door closed, to leave what lay beyond it behind her.
But her heart said otherwise.
Steeling herself, Aria straightened her back and took in a deep breath, “Yes.”
Helbram patted her shoulder, “Then do what you must.”
He opened the door and followed after her as she walked in, facing the two people at the opposite side of the room.
Cora and Erik.
The two Shade’s were still bound, their hands restricted behind their back with Sealing Cuffs while rope tied their legs together. In all practical ways they could do no harm, but that did not stop the flutter that Aria could feel stirring in her chest. Whilst Erik maintained a neutral expression upon noticing Aria, Cora’s own dejected guise shifted to surprise as her eyes fell upon her. Surprise that gave way to something else, though Aria could not tell what. The girl stepped further into the room, and while Helbram did not loom over her, he shifted his position so that she was never out of his reach.
Aria’s lips trembled as she searched for the words to speak, her breath shaking as they refused to form. She squeezed her hands in frustration, the fluttering in her chest now a rapid pounding as she could not form a sentence no matter how hard she tried. She’d ruminated over it far before this moment, yet the sight of the couple, their silence as they waited for her to speak, pushed all those thoughts from her mind. In its place she could only remember Erik and Cora as they were. That kindly man who fed her, who treated her as something more than a monster to be ignored, to be shunned. The bright woman who sat her in her lap and brushed her hair, giving her the warmth of a mother she never had.
She knew that is not who they were, that it was an act meant to make her like them, to feel indebted to them.
But it felt real, the happiness that it gave her was real, and it was that which stopped the words at her throat. She looked to the floor, unable to look at the two any longer, but took in a deep breath and closed her eyes.
“Thank you,” she said, “for taking care of me.”
It was a selfish thing to say, something that she could blurt out without damaging the fragile integrity of memories based on falsehood. She’d meant to confront them, but could only find the words to run away.
“Aria.”
She looked up, heart stopping as her eyes met with Cora’s. Gone was the woman’s previous madness, that twisted look in her eyes as she called her a name that was not hers. In its place was the same Cora that she always knew. The one who always wore a smile, who always looked at her with warmth. It was a falsehood, she knew that.
Yet it brought her comfort all the same.
“It is we who should say thank you,” she said, “for giving us a warmth that we’d not felt in so, so long. And it is we who should say sorry, for trying to take that warmth for ourselves.”
“Live your life, Aria.”
The girl’s gaze drifted to Erik, and she could see that man that she’d met in the alley, that man who made her feel like she belonged, and the memories of that moment brought tears to her eyes.
“Walk the path you want to walk, and let none steer you from it,” he said, “it is not our place to say such things, I know, but we should say it nonetheless.”
“May the Matron keep your path clear, your steps steady,” Cora said
Aria bit her lip, and she felt the impulse to walk up and embrace them, but she stopped herself. Even if they were sincere, she could not forget who they truly were, no matter how much her heart wished to. Still, the desire grew, and the tears started to flow down her face. She smiled at the couple and gave a firm nod, then turned and made for the door.
“You take care of her, you hear me?” Cora said to Helbram.
Aria felt his hand on her shoulder as she stopped at the door. He opened it and gently pushed her forward.
“Of that, you should have no doubt.”
___
Ren stood outside The Wandering Fowl, taking in the brisk Winter air as he stood in the street without a coat. The townsfolk looked at him as if he was mad, but that was no different than the look they’d given all of them upon their return. They did give him a wider berth today, but that was due to the wagon that had been moved to the street. A wheeless construct, the vehicle was held aloft by the crystal located in its undercarriage, one that radiated a green light as Aether coursed through it and the rest of the wagon. Various crates and bags were stuffed under its roof, and it was in the process of being loaded even further as Helbram’s party shoved various bags and foodstuffs into its bed. Had he not known that the magitek design meant that their auroc would feel little of the burden, he would have been inclined to feel pity for the beast.
Part of him still did as Elly stuffed a burgeoning sack of books into an already crowded space.
“Do you think you have enough?” he mused towards the group, “one would think you meant to start a village with all you’re taking.”
Helbram, who just walked out of the wagon’s bed, laughed. He walked up to the Cleric while dusting his hands.
“Winter will prove to be a harsh mistress this year,” he said, “and while I have every faith that our hunter is up to the task of keeping us provided, I’d rather not place such a burden upon him.”
“That, and we’d rather not taste bitter herbs for a spell,” Jahora said as she adjusted Aria’s coat, “a month away from such flavors is much too short.”
Leaf’s head poked from behind the wagon, “Oi, if the plants bite back then it's good for ya, don’t blame me for having the wisdom to recognize it.”
“Oh we have the wisdom,” Elly said as she joined Helbram at his side, “we just choose to embrace comfort in its stead.”
“Bunch of soft bellied louts, the lot of ya.”
Aria giggled as Leaf’s grumbles faded into the background. She took Jahora’s hand as the Mage guided her towards Ren. The smaller woman was all smiles when she looked at the girl, but as her eyes cut to the side wariness flashed through her features.
Leon sat on the stairs leading into the tavern. His hands were still bound, and rather than meeting anyone’s eyes he kept his eyes to the ground. Ren frowned as he looked at his companion, partially regretting his decision to push Leon to at least see the party off. He encouraged it anyways; the alternative just didn’t feel right.
He just hoped Leon felt the same.
As Leaf finished adjusting Bessie’s harness, he jogged up and joined with his companions, his caution towards Ren’s companion less concealed than the others as he glared in the Black Cloak’s direction.
“So where are you off to, after all this?” Helbram asked Ren.
“As we originally planned,” the Cleric said, “we make for Blade’s Rest, meeting up with a larger cohort before we travel back to headquarters,” he scratched his head, “Winter will prolong our travels a fair bit, but we’d best be moving as quick as possible now that we’ve fully recovered.”
“Of that, we are of similar minds,” Elly said.
“What of you? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“Whitebridge,” Helbram said, “it was where we were heading before all this, and we see no reason not to continue on.”
Ren rubbed his chin, “Whitebridge eh? That is quite the journey…” he looked to Aria. The girl was not cautious around him, he could sense that she was on edge. No doubt due to Leon’s presence. And given his companions actions… she had every right to be.
As he looked upon her, however, he thought towards Erik and Cora, about how they knew that she would be in such a remote village like Redhaven. As he did, he removed the symbol of Velendel from his neck and placed his hand over it. The matching eye on his forehead glowed with a golden light as he made an effort of will, casting a spell over the amulet that left it glowing for a moment before the light faded away. He walked over to Jahora and knelt down in front of the Mage, presenting the amulet to her. She looked at him in confusion, and did not reach for the necklace.
“I am not certain, but I believe someone may possess the means to find Aria from afar. That is the only way I can think of to explain why Erik and Cora decided to settle here of all places.”
“A Scryer, perhaps?” Elly inquired, “Though typically their reach is fairly limited.”
“For the average one, yes,” Ren admitted, “but were the Scryer a Shade… then it may very well be possible,” he looked back at Jahora, “concealment magics are not my speciality, but with enough of Velendel’s grace I do believe that wearing this will keep Aria from their watchful gaze, though the enchantment will need refreshing often. And I do recognize it is suspicious of me to provide this under such pretenses, but I ask that you trust me in this.”
Jahora looked into his eyes and, after a moment, took the amulet from him. She directed her attention to Aria, who had her eyes narrowed in clear effort to keep up with the conversation.
“Do you want to wear this?” she asked the girl, holding the necklace out to her.
Aria reached out and touched the amulet, brow furrowed as she ran her fingers along its various ridges, “It feels… warm.”
The girl nodded and let Jahora put it on her. When the Mage did, Aria looked at it again.
“It’s a bit ugly though,” she said before slipping it under her coat.
Ren snorted, “Of that, we are in agreement.”
“Are you certain of this?” Helbram asked, “I have little knowledge in the ways of divine magic, but a Cleric without their Symbol strikes me as something of a hindrance.”
“We’d hardly be that forminable if a bit of jewelry was our lifeline,” Ren said as he stood up, “Please, pay it no mind. Besides, this is the perfect opportunity to get a new one, perhaps one not so garish,” he winked at Aria, and she smiled at him.
“Well, thank you, again,” Helbram said as he held out his hand, “when we next meet, the round is on me.”
Ren smiled and took the man’s hand, “Multiple rounds, perhaps? I’ve a feeling my superiors will be placing me in a drinking mood soon enough.”
Helbram chuckled, “That can be arranged.”
As they let go of one another Ren clapped his hands, “I’ve delayed you long enough, you’d best be off before Spring sets in.”
The party smiled at him and made their way to the wagon.
All except Helbram.
The man marched towards Leon, who’s posture remained unchanging at his approach. Even if the Black Cloak didn’t look at him, Helbram held his hand out.
“Farewell Leon,” he said, “I hope if we cross swords again it will be as we did the first time, not the last.”
Leon didn’t look up.
Helbram sighed, but rather than drop his hand, he gave Leon a quick pat on the shoulder and went to join his party. Before long their wagon disappeared from Ren’s sight, and his companion still did not move.
The Cleric took a seat next to Leon, “It is going to be quite the burden if I have to transport three bound people,” he said.
The Black Cloak remained silent.
Frowning, Ren made to move back into the tavern, but stopped as Leon finally spoke.
“She seemed so… normal.”
“Aria? Yes, the seal is broken but she appears to be in control of herself,” Ren mused, “an interesting development for one as young as her, but it is not unheard of to gain control of one’s Shade.”
“It was out of control Ren, a power that I had not seen since… since…” he fell silent.
“And yet, there she was, hale and hearty as any child should be.”
“I know… I know,” there was a growing frustration in Leon’s voice, “And it has made me think. Had I called out enough, urged him enough… would he still be here today?”
Ren heart ached for his friend, “We can’t know that.”
“And yet, now we have an idea,” Leon said, “proof that such a thing is possible,” tears dropped from Leon’s face as he looked up, “I was so certain he was lost Ren, and the look he gave me told me he thought so as well, but there she was, in the same position, the same abyss of hopelessness, and she came back.”
There was nothing Ren could say to that.
“How many? How many have I killed thinking that they were too far gone? Thinking that I was putting an end… stopping tragedy before it could happen?” He buried his head in his hands, “I’m sorry Astraeus, I’m so sorry…”
Ren walked in front of his companion and pulled him up, “Look at me Leon.”
When he refused to do so, the Cleric forced his gaze up. The Black Cloak’s eyes were red, and the despair beneath them seemed bottomless.
“I understand your grief,” he said, “And I know that you need time to process all of it, but what you can’t let it do is drag you under. Doing so will not help anyone. It will not honor your brother’s memory.”
Leon closed his eyes.
“Let us make our way back to headquarters, and when we are in more stable conditions, we can work through all of this. We can’t afford to fall apart now, do you understand?”
His companion’s breaths slowed as he controlled himself. When his eyes finally opened, a measure of control had returned. Grief still sat behind them, but for now it did not overwhelm Leon, and that was all Ren could ask for at the moment.
“I understand,” the Black Cloak said.
“Good,” Ren unbound the man’s arms, “and when we get back, know that you will always have my aid. We’ll get through this, of that I have no doubt.”
Leon clasped his arm, “Thank you, truly.”
Ren returned the gesture, “What are friends for?”
___
Helbram yawned as he stretched, leaning back on the wagon’s driver seat.
“Don’t you start with that,” Leaf fussed, “We’ve been on the road for barely an hour.”
“I am afraid I must,” Helbram objected in an overly dramatic tone, “my injuries have left me weakened and unable to handle the wear and tear of the road.”
Leaf pressed his lips thin and rolled his eyes.
Elly snorted from within the wagon, “Perhaps you need a distraction? I could teach you how to use a needle so you may be of some use.”
Helbram looked back at her. The Weaver held the sleeve of a pair of pants in her hands, her hands moving with practiced precision as the needle in her fingers glided in and out of the cloth.
“Nonsense,” Helbram said, “I would only slow you down.”
“Perhaps,” she admitted, “but the company would be appreciated.”
She smiled as they both looked at Aria and Jahora. They both leaned against each other as they slept, a contentment on both their faces that was enough to banish any thoughts of waking them from their nap.
“Another time, perhaps,” Helbram said in a quieter tone.
“I’ll hold you to that.”
He flashed her a smile before turning back in his seat, noting Leaf’s now serious expression.
“Everything alright?”
His companion scratched his head, “Honestly I’m just feeling a bit out of my depth. I don’t know how to raise a child, nor one that happens to be a font of magic,” he sighed, “I’m just trying to process it all.”
Hebram rubbed his chin, “It is quite a lot to take in, I admit, but it is not as if you are doing this alone,” he snorted, “I know Jahora would raise quite the objection were you solely in charge of her care.”
Leaf laughed, “That she would… but still, it’s just… overwhelming.”
“It is, and the how of it all escapes me even now, but I know it is something that we must do.”
“Together,” Elly added.
Helbram nodded, “Together.”
Leaf shook his headband and chuckled, “Well now I just feel foolish. Onwards then?”
Helbram pointed down the road.
“Onwards.”

Hedge Knight Arc Four: The Cursed Child
End.
First / Previous
Author's Note: And there we have it, the end of another arc. Still not gonna get over how I said this was going to be a shorter one and it somehow matched the last arc in length. Overall I'm happy with how this one turned out. It's smaller stakes than the last arc, but I think it was a good exploration of the characters, especially Jahora, Leon, and Aria, and that's kind of the reason I try and keep things small scale like this. I'm finding myself enjoying the character dynamics more and more as I write this story, and I feel like its important to explore these interactions fully to really build investment not only with the party, but any events that may happen to them. To that end I toned back the action a bit, aside from the duel, so we can have a full explosive finish. One that admittedly mentally fried me as I tried to make sense of all that as happening, but I think I prefer that over having action for action's sake.
But, the story will continue! Lots of threads were thrown out here and I did try to wrap up some of the immediate ones, but there are also plenty that could possibly be explored down the line. The focus will remain on Helbram and his party of course, but I do like giving the sense that there is something else going on within the world beyond what the party is seeing.
Let me know what you thought of this arc! Did you prefer this over the last arc and is there anything that stands out in this arc that you either liked/disliked. I'm always trying to improve and your feedback goes a really long way to making sure this is the best content I can make for you.
Till next time everyone, have a good one!
If you wish to read ahead and gain access to the audiobook version of this story, consider supporting me on Patreon (https://patreon.com/criticalscribe). If you want to leave a donation, here is my Ko-fi (https://ko-fi.com/criticalscribe).

Last year, when my ten year prison "stint" was finally up, and I re-entered society, I encountered some... obstacles.
Obstacles like.. Lack of upward mobility. Prejudices and stigmas. Wages and earnings lower than the general population. Undesirable and oftentimes dangerous jobs. And lack of protection from wrongful termination.
Not to mention, an already tough job market, and the fact that my parole required that I maintain steady employment, or face re-incarceration.
Which is why, when I finally got a job offer, after six months of aggressive job hunting, I jumped at the opportunity, giving absolutely no fucks as to how I was actually making ends meet.
"Ever operate a freight elevator before?" Mr. Winfred, the manager of "The Cornelius" and my new boss, asked me my first day on the job.
"No, sir." I replied honestly, as I ran my fingers along the doors of the antiquated contraption, the only remaining evidence of the recently renovated luxury building's ancient past.
"Normally these old things aren't used for passengers, but the building's pretentious designers thought it might add a certain charm to its otherwise sterile decor. Which is where you come in." He continued, as I heard him slide open the freight elevator's outside doors...
SLAM!
...Followed by its scissored metal inside doors.
SCREEEECH!
I heard Mr. Winfred step inside and, using my cane, scanned the interior of the rather large elevator, which must have been eight feet by eight feet, and followed him in.
Instantly, my nose was hit with an overpowering, musty scent, like the kind you'd smell in a basement, combined with your grandmother's attic.
He then closed both doors behind us.
SLAM!
SCREEEECH!
"Now this here." Mr Winfred added, taking my hand and placing it on the handle of a lever, "Is how you move the elevator from floor to floor. Up for up. Down for down. You'll hear a click when you reach each floor, which will be helpful for someone like yourself." He said, clearly calling attention to the fact that I'm blind.
Someone like myself? I scoffed internally. You ignorant, entitled piece of shit.
Truth is, I've always had a bit of a short fuse. Which I guess, looking back on it, is what got me into prison in the first place.
But in my ten years of incarceration, I was given tools to combat my anger issues. Tools like reminding myself that it was nothing new. Assholes like him were always dropping unintentional microaggressions. It had been something I'd grown used to, and given my probation, wasn't a battle worth fighting.
"Yes sir." I replied through my teeth, as I begrudgingly swallowed my pride.
"Now, why don't you spend today practicing. Our first residents don't move in until tomorrow."
—
In just a matter of a week or so, as the doors of "The Cornelius" opened to its new tenants, I learned pretty much everything I needed to know about the job.
Said tenants were rich. Very rich. And most of them acted as such. Entitled. Obnoxious. Holier than thou. Especially given my own social class. But a few of them weren't so bad, and tipped well.
Mr. Winfred's assistant, Jane, was a lovely human being. Patient, kind, thoughtful, understanding. Especially when compared to both the building's uptight residents, and Mr. Winfred himself. It had been years since I had dated, and the very thought of meeting a partner stressed me out to no end, but if I was to find someone, I hoped she'd be like Jane.
The elevator didn't open on the basement level. As I'd learned countless times, it was possible to go there, but the doors simply wouldn't open.
The old freight itself was finicky as fuck. Stop the lever one second too early, or one second too late, and when the doors open, you're halfway between a floor. But eventually, I got used to it, to the point where most of the building's tenants assumed the role of freight operator had always been my job. And when you're good at your service job, and do it with a smile on your face, the tips start flowing.
And so, all was well for the first couple weeks on the job...
...A seemingly refreshing return to normalcy, after ten long years...
...Until...
...The disappearances started happening.
—
I was just arriving to work one day, when I heard about the first disappearance.
"Have you seen - I mean, have you been in contact with Elizabeth Davis? From room 401?" Mr. Winfred asked, after correcting himself. Something he did often, which continued to annoy me.
"Um." I replied, unsure of where he was going with the question. "Not since yesterday. She got back from work, and I brought her up to the fourth floor. But come to think of it, I don't think she rode the elevator down this morning. Like she usually does."
"Interesting." My boss replied, before continuing. "She disappeared yesterday."
"Disappeared?" I asked.
"Yeah, husband said she never came home last night."
"Hmm. Well I know for certain that I brought her to the fourth floor. Did you check the hallway surveillance footage?"
"Not yet. Unfortunately the building inspector's in today, and I won't have time until tomorrow. Let's hope she just went somewhere, or got lost. In the meantime, keep an eye out - I mean - just, let me know if you hear of anything suspicious."
"Yes sir," I replied, once again resisting the urge to snap on him, before heading for the elevator, where I started the day's shift.
SLAM!
SCREEEECH!
That day, I did my best to do as Mr. Winfred had asked, and listened carefully for any signs of mischief.
But the day went on, business as usual and by the end of the day, I hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary...
...Except... The only thing of note was a difference in Mr. Lawrence's demeanor. The tenant of room 805, he was a salesman, and acted like one. When I say the man could talk, the man could talk. To a point where whenever he was a passenger in the old freight elevator, despite the long ride from floor one to floor eight, I'd rarely have a chance to get a word in.
But this time... was different. This time, Mr. Lawrence entered the elevator chatting away, just as he always did. But about halfway up, he just... stopped talking. And the thing about my job is, if someone chooses to talk or not talk, it's their decision, and none of my business. So I left him alone, and when we reached the eighth floor, I simply said goodnight. To which, he didn't reply.
Must be going through something. I thought to myself, having been unable to truly get a sense of his composure, without being able to see him, before closing the double doors and heading off to help the next passenger.
SLAM!
SCREEEECH!
—
Later that night, Mr. Winfred called me into his office, and asked me to take a seat beside his assistant, Jane.
"Mr. Owens. Are you aware of the situation that's going on in the building?" He asked, in an interrogating tone.
"Um... yes, you told me about it yesterday. The disappearance, sir." I replied.
"Disappearances now. Plural." He said sternly.
"But... who else?" I asked.
"Mr. Lawrence."
"What happened to him?"
"Well, to be honest, I was hoping you could tell me. Cause much like Ms.Davis, the last place he was seen was going into your elevator."
"What about the cameras in the hallways?"
"I'm afraid that after reviewing the tapes, after stepping into your elevator, neither Ms. Davis, or Mr Lawrence, ever stepped out."
"But that's... not... possible."
"Mr. Owens. I'm going to give you an opportunity. Is there anything you want to tell me? I know you have a sordid past."
"Mr. Winfred!" Jane interjected, clearly offended by his words, and implications.
"Quiet, Jane." He scolded, before continuing. "Answer the question, Mr. Owens."
I didn't know what to say. I was so shocked, so flustered, by what he was implying, that I simply froze.
"Mr. Owens!" He screamed.
"I... I... don't know!" I cried out, as I heard Jane squirm in her seat. "I'm telling you, the last time I heard from either of them, I took them up to their floors. But I'm-"
"You're what! Blind?"
"Well, yes sir. I don't see what goes on inside the elevator. I just let them on and off."
"Mr. Owens. If they got on your elevator, and never got off, where could they possibly have gone?"
"I... don't... know." I replied, at this point, wanting to grab him by force, demand that he never speak to me that way again, and scream out my innocence. But my next parole appointment was the following week, so once again, all I could do was just bite my tongue.
Mr. Winfred paused for a moment, took a deep breath, and regained his composure.
"Mr. Owens, I could go to the police now. And that would be very bad for someone like you."
Fuck. He's right. I thought to myself, realizing, that if he went to the police, and I was even remotely suspected of what was going on in the building, it was back to prison for me.
"But lucky for you," He continued, "There are things going on in the building that I wouldn't want to bring unwanted attention to. And for that reason, I have decided not to go to the police... yet. But consider this a warning. And know, that I have a repairman coming first thing tomorrow morning to install a security camera inside the freight elevator, so I can see what exactly it is that you're doing in there."
I had know idea how to react to Mr. Winfred's continued accusations. So I simply remained silent.
"Now get out of here and go home! We'll reconvene on this tomorrow." He said dismissively, before Jane walked me out of the room, down the hall, and outside the building, where I planned to return home for the night.
—
Fifteen minutes later, we were at a bar down the street, where Jane apparently frequented.
"But where could they possibly have gone?" I asked her, my hands trembling at both the thought of people disappearing in the elevator, and that it was happening under my watch.
"Thing is," Jane said, as she finished her beer. "There's something you should know about the building."
""The Cornelius"?"
"No, from before it was called that. It used to be a factory of some kind."
"Is that what Mr. Winfred was talking about when he said that there were things going on in the building? That he didn't want to bring unwanted attention to?"
"Well, yes and no. Yes, in a sense, that Mr. Winfred cut some corners, and rather than fully renovate the entire warehouse, he simply walled off entire sections of the old structure. Like the basement."
"And no?"
"No, in a sense, that even Mr. Winfred doesn't know what's really going on in the elevator. Sure, it'd be easy to pin it on you, especially with your criminal record - no offense... but even he knows that it's probably something... else."
"Something else?"
"See, that's where things get hazy. Because no one knows what exactly went on at the factory, before it became "The Cornelius." But rumors have it... it was laboratory of some kind, and some fucked up shit went on inside there."
"Like what?"
"That, my friend. I don't know. But what I do know is... I better be getting to bed."
"Fair enough. Well, thanks for the drink, and the support." I said with a smile, as we made our way out of the bar.
"Yeah, don't let Mr. Winfred get to you. And try not to worry too much."
—
Contrary to Jane's suggestion, that night I worried... a lot. About the disappearances, what might be causing them, whatever may have gone on in the factory, and most importantly, about everything getting pinned on me.
I couldn't fall asleep, tossing and turning in bed as my mind raced. And each time I finally passed out, I'd wake up in a panic attack, my heart pounding, short of breath and in a cold sweat.
But it didn't stop there. The uncomfortable feeling of terror and fear, accompanied by the vibrating sensation of adrenaline pumping through my body, remained well into the next morning, when I stepped back into the elevator, terrified by what might be going on inside there.
Please don't leave me alone in this fucking thing. I thought to myself.
And within a matter of minutes, my prayers were answered.
"How goes it?" The surveillance installation worker called out, his cheery disposition contrary to mine.
"Um... not too bad." I replied, lying through my teeth, as he stepped inside.
But after a minute or two of sharing the elevator with him, my fears lessened and my body relaxed, comforted by the positive conversation, and the metallic, clinking sounds of the installation.
Everything's okay. The doors are open. And he's talking. I thought to myself.
But eventually, the man finished installing the camera, and began wrapping up the job.
"Well, that's it! Camera's all installed and running now." He called out. "Let's just take the elevator for a spin and make sure we don't lose the signal."
"Yes, of course." I replied, before reaching for the double doors...
SLAM!
SCREEEECH!
..And moving the lever up.
We started moving.
"Fascinating job, I must say, elevator operator. But I suppose you could say the same for mine."
"Pays the bills." I replied, feigning a chuckle.
If he's here, and he's talking, then I'm safe. I continued to reassure myself.
But a few minutes into our ascent, just like Mr. Lawrence... the man... suddenly stopped talking.
"Alright, looks like it's working fine. We can head back down and-"
SILENCE.
"Hello?" I asked.
But he didn't respond.
Fuck. I thought to myself, realizing that whatever caused Ms. Davis, and Mr. Lawrence, and seemingly now the repairman to disappear, could still be in the elevator with me.
Standing there, shaking, sweat rolling down my brow, I backed myself into the corner of the elevator, as I reached for the lever, pressed it down, and the elevator began to make its descent back to the ground floor.
When I finally reached the lobby...
DING!
I scrambled to open the doors...
SLAM!
SCREEEECH!
...And darted out, gasping for air, expecting to find a safe haven.
But instead, all I heard was the sound of Mr. Winfred's voice. "Where is the repairman?"
—
A few minutes later, I was once again sitting in Mr. Winfred's office, next to Jane, this time attempting to explain what had happened.
"...And then he stopped talking! Just like Mr. Lawrence."
"You know what, Mr. Owens. I'm tired of your excuses. And now that we have a working camera in the elevator, it's time to find out what's really going on inside there." He threatened, as I heard him clicking away on his computer, clearly reviewing the footage.
"Please do!" I cried out, "I'm telling you, it's not me."
That's when... Mr. Winfred, and Jane, both went silent.
"Hello?" I called out, unable to see what was really going on. Given the fact that my passengers had recently been going silent, the thought crossed my mind that they too had disappeared, but I could still hear their breathing in the room. Breathing, that sounded like it was increasing rapidly...
...Until they broke the silence.
"Oh... my..." Jane said, struggling to catch her breath.
"That can't be. Let me rewind the tape." Mr. Winfred mumbled, the most scared I had ever heard him.
"What is it?" I asked, as they seemingly played back the video.
I would later find out from Jane that the footage would show myself and the repairman in the elevator, as a slithering, grotesque, humanoid figure, suddenly climbed down from the roof of the elevator, wrapped it's slimy arms around the repairman, then somehow hopped back out of the elevator, and pulled the man up with it. Leaving me standing there, completely unaware of what had just happened.
But in that moment, Mr. Winfred must have realized the... complications associated with reporting such a bizarre phenomenon, and instead decided to finally pin it on me.
"Mr. Owens, you shouldn't have done that!" He cried out.
"Mr. Winfred, what are you talking about?" Jane asked, "You and I just watched the same footage."
That's when I heard him drag a file to his computer's trash and delete it.
CRUNCH.
"Stay out of this, Jane. This man has killed three people in the elevator. I knew I shouldn't have hired an ex con!"
"But sir, I didn't-" I tried to reply, before he interrupted.
"Mr. Owens, I'm picking up the phone, and calling the police. I'd suggest you just stay put."
"But Mr. Winfred, I'm telling you, I didn't do anything!"
"Yes, is this 911? I'm the manager of "The Cornelius" and I'd like to report three murders in my building."
"We'd better go." I heard Jane say, as I felt her place her hand on my shoulder.
"And yes, I have reason to believe the killer is our elevator operator, an ex convict, who is sitting right in front of me."
"Come on, let's go!" Jane screamed, as she tugged at my shirt, I hopped up from my seat, and she led me out of the office, down the hall, and into... of all places... the old freight elevator, as she explained to me what she had seen on the surveillance tape.
—
SLAM!
SCREEEECH!
"Take us to the basement!" Jane called out.
"But the basement is walled off." I replied.
"Just do it!" She insisted, before I moved the lever down and the elevator began to move.
I spent the ride catching my breath, until we finally reached the basement level.
DING!
"Now what?" I asked.
But Jane didn't reply.
"Jane?"
Oh fuck. I thought to myself. The monster.
That's when I turned to the center of the freight elevator, where Jane had been standing, reached out into the unknown...
...And sure enough, felt the cold, slimy, skin of the creature, wrapped around Jane's face, preventing her from making a sound.
Not knowing what else to do, I gripped its disgusting appendages with both hands, and slowly pried it off Jane, as she let out a...
...SCREAM..
...And the monster's arm quickly slithered away, back up through the roof of the freight.
Jane dropped to the ground, coughing violently.
"You okay?" I asked her.
But rather than responding, she simply handed me something...
....I opened my fist, to find a pair of keys.
"The lock above the lever. Unlock it." She instructed, still coughing, as I felt around the lever, found the lock, inserted the key, and unlocked it.
CLICK.
"The doors. They should open now." Jane said, as she stood up, having finally caught her breath.
SCREEEECH!
SLAM!
—
We arrived in the dark basement to smell the same, musty odor from the freight elevator.
After her eyes adjusted and she scanned our surroundings, Jane informed me that this floor looked nothing like the other eight, newly renovated floors, with their modern feel and minimalistic designs.
Instead, the basement was a window into the building's former self, when it had been a factory. Its walls brick and crumbling, its floors concrete and cracked.
And scattered everywhere, were the dusty remnants of laboratory equipment. Devices, machines, tanks, most of which were destroyed, or disconnected, or both.
"What went on down here?" I asked.
"From the looks of it, something inhumane," Jane said, after she picked up a few tattered pieces of paper from one of the lab stations, and told me what was on it.
"The first page looks like some sort of a diagram, of a man being pumped with chemicals from tanks. And the second, a drawing... of the creature from the elevator. In pencil beside it, someone appears to have labeled it "The Silencer.""
Silencer. I thought to myself, before remembering that the creature seemed to always silence the sounds of its victims, and to have been repulsed by Jane's scream. At the same time, it had never bothered me in the elevator, as I tended to stand there in silence.
But before I could dwell too much on the thought, Jane interrupted.
"If you don't mind my asking. What did you go to prison for in the first place?" She asked.
"It's okay," I said, surprised she had waited this long to ask, before contemplating the best way to explain what had happened. "’Cause of my temper. Some guy was being a dick on the train platform. We got into a scuffle, and he accidentally fell into the tracks."
"Over what? Did he insult you? Your blindness?"
"No, I'm afraid not." I replied, "We were drunk... and arguing over... a basketball game, of all things. He was... my friend."
"Oh my God. I'm so sorry."
"It's okay."
Jane put her hand on my shoulder, and we stood there in silence for a moment...
...Until suddenly, we heard the sound of Mr. Winfred, and the police approaching, as they ran down what must have been a hidden set of stairs from the ground level to the basement.
"Come on, follow me!" Jane called out, as she took me by the hand and led me into what I'd soon discover was a labyrinthian network of old passages, while the police and Mr. Winfred both called out to us.
"This is the police! Put your hands on your head, and turn yourself in!"
"You're trapped, Mr. Owens! Just confess your crimes, and you'll simply go back to jail!"
We continued to run deeper and deeper into the passages, as our pursuers began to close in on us, their footsteps getting closer... and closer... and closer...
...Until suddenly, the sound of their footsteps was replaced by that of...
...SCREAMING...
...And they suddenly went...
...SILENT.
"What the?" Jane whispered.
"The creature." I whispered. "It must be down here."
That's when we hatched a plan.
—
Having found our way out of the labyrinth and back to the entrance of the laboratory, where we had arrived in the old freight elevator, I found myself standing alone, waiting, as I nervously tapped my cane on the basement floor, Jane having gone off on her own.
That's when I heard Mr. Winfred emerge from the passages, alone, and call out to me.
"Mr. Owens! There's nowhere to run! Even your beloved elevator is gone. You're cornered." He taunted, as I backed towards the elevator and tapped at it with my cane, its doors open, its shaft empty.
"What did you say?" I asked, encouraging him to talk louder.
"What are you, deaf now too?" The ignorant old man snapped back. "I said, you have nowhere to run!"
"I'm sorry, you'll have to forgive me," I said sarcastically, pointing to my ears. "Can you repeat that again?"
That's when Mr. Winfred began approaching and screamed, "You worthless, ex con! I knew I shouldn't have hired you in the first place! And now, you'll go back to where you belong!"
But suddenly...
...Mr. Winfred went SILENT...
...As the creature must have wrapped its slimy tentacles around his face.
That's when I seized the opportunity, ran over to Mr. Winfred, gripped the cold body of the creature, which was indeed wrapped around him, turned, and flung them both behind me, into the hollow elevator shaft...
SLAM!
...Before hitting the "Up" button on the wall, and calling the freight elevator down.
Suddenly, the gears of the elevator above could be heard turning away, and the machine began its quick descent down.
"Mr. Owens, no!" Mr. Winfred cried out, clearly now separated from the creature.
I froze for a moment, as my mind raced back to the night of the tragic accident, when my friend called out to me from the train tracks, and I was unable to save him in time...
....Until I eventually snapped myself out of it, and willed myself to save Mr. Winfred, no matter how evil the asshole's intentions may have been, reaching out my hand out, and pulling him up and out of the elevator, just as the freight car came crash down to the basement level.
SLAM!
CRUNCH!
"RAAAAAAAARRRRR!" The slimy beast cried out, as it was crushed under the old elevator's weight.
DING!
The basement fell SILENT for a moment, until...
SCREEEECH!
SLAM!
...Jane stepped out and said, "Going up?"
But the joke was met was silence. I simply stood there, shaking, as Mr. Winfred did the same, clearly shocked by the events that had just occurred.
—
A few weeks later, after the authorities had done a full sweep of the basement, and cleared out all traces of the building' old laboratory, I found myself once again back in the manager's office.
"Mr. Owens. This is the last time I'm gonna tell you this!" Jane joked, as I heard her recline back in what was once Mr. Winfred's chair, having been named interim manager since her boss's recent and... ironic... prison sentencing.
"Who's the convict now?" I said with a smile, before making my way out of the office.
"Wait." Jane said, stopping me at the door. "You sure you want to go back to operating the elevator? After all that's happened? Like I said, the doorman job is yours if you want it."
"What's the worst that could happen?" I replied with a smile. "There's another one of those creatures in the building somewhere?"

As discussed in the first post, this is my ongoing compilation of the remaining questions Christopher has answered online between August 1st 2023 and April 30th 2024 which I've not already covered in other compilations.
As always, questions are sorted by topic, and each Q&A is annotated with a bracketed source number. Links to every source used and to the other parts of this compilation will be provided in a comment below.
The previous post focused specifically on inspirations and other media. This installment will focus on Worldbuilding and Touring, how Christopher constructs his worlds, and how he goes about promoting them on tours. The topics aren't actually linked, but they both fill up around half a post and so are being joined here. The next and final post will focus on miscellaneous questions about the real world.

Worldbuilding

Creating Magic Systems

Did you have a research process when you were writing the Inheritance Cycle? I put a fair bit of thought into the story itself of the Inheritance Cycle, and then some general stuff as to the society and just kind of where things were in the world before writing it. I put a medium amount of thought into the magic system before I started writing, and then as I wrote the implications of it became much more apparent to me, and I really sort of dove deep into it. In retrospect, were I to create a fantasy world from scratch now, I would really put a lot of attention into that magic system and the society beforehand, just to have a good feel for that before I even start chapter one. I would put more restrictions on the magic too. I think the more restrictions, the more interesting, even the more realistic in some ways. [3]
If I were designing a magic system from scratch nowadays I would put way more restrictions on it because I find that the limitations are useful, I don't want the characters getting overpowered, but also just from a storytelling standpoint, incantations, rituals, spells, prayers, potions, all of those mechanical things are just kind of interesting and of course they give lots of opportunities for things to go wrong if you don't follow the correct steps. So I think if I were designing magic from scratch right now I'd put a lot of restrictions and rituals associated with it. So costs, more costs. [25]
What kind of hacks do you have to developing a magic system? Once I have a general idea of the setting, whether science fiction or fantasy, the first question I ask myself is how does it diverge from physics as we know it? Because that is a fundamental question that's going to determine what is possible in this world. It might determine what's possible with warfare, with politics, with industry, manufacturing, travel times, it could affect everything depending on what type of divergence you have. In the World of Eragon, the divergence is that living creatures have the ability to directly manipulate energy using their minds. The reason for that is kind of handwavy, although I have an explanation for it, but that is the divergence and then I tried to be as consistent and physically possible with it at every step of the way past that. When people play games you always get people who are looking how to exploit it. "What's the most I can get out of this game? What's the most I can do?" That's basic human nature. Science is a speedrunning nature I think. So the same sort of thing. You assume that if magic existed there's going to be someone sitting in their basement who's absolutely obsessive about it and is going to figure out every single advantage that that divergence gives them. And you have to be realistic and work that into your world and say "Well people aren't stupid. They are going to figure this out and use it in this way, and what are the implications, socially, physically, and everything else?" Once I have that then you can think about society and culture and everything else, but that basic physical difference from our reality is just to me fundamentally important to understand before I even begin to write. [25]
With standalones you're not dealing with continuity or what rule did you break or things like that. That's interesting, because I would say that writing a sequel for me is faster than writing a standalone. At least for me, the more I know the characters and the world, the faster, like I don't have to do the groundwork of creating a magic system, creating a society, creating the gods and the history. All that's done for me, so I can just slip into it like slipping on an old glove. [33]

Creating Religions

A socio-political religion in your world helps drive characters or stories or die-hard fanatic characters forward. How do you go about developing those? Have the courage to let your characters actually believe the things that they are supposed to believe. If you look back historically people really did truly believe these different religions and different systems. Too often I think with modern stories we have people only giving lip service to the supposed belief and instead having very modern attitudes toward it which perhaps doesn't always work. That's understandable if you want a character to be relatable to a modern reader, but there are so many examples of interesting belief systems throughout the world. To me that's something fascinating to write about. But the main thing is just accept that when people truly believe something they're genuine about it and then you can follow that from a logical and storytelling standpoint. What I'd also say is, if you're writing about something that is very different from your own belief system, assuming it's not like completely evil, to try to approach it with a sense of charity. With the understanding that everyone is searching for meaning and understanding. I've always had a soft spot for the old television show Babylon 5, because although I don't believe that the creator J. Michael Straczynski is religious, he writes all of his characters with great sympathy and understanding, he's never cynical about it, and he's not putting up straw man arguments or criticizing any of the characters. He's like "They're searching for meaning. They're struggling with the great questions as we all do, and each one is trying to solve those questions in their own way." And I always really appreciated that he wasn't being cynical about it or really shallow. [25]

Creating Languages

Did you think of the ancient language, not just as a mechanic, but also as a parable of our own language? I was thinking about how language itself feels like magic to me. You can write a story, you can convey information. Language in many ways is our greatest tool and makes us human along with, I would argue, our hands, our ability to manipulate objects and use actual tools. But one without the other wouldn't really work and wouldn't allow us to be a technological species. We could have language with no ability to handle tools, and then we wouldn't be what we are now. But I find language fascinating and I find the function of language incredibly interesting. And there is this idea in the real world going back to the beginning of time, that to name something is to understand it, and gives you a certain amount of power over it, whether that's a person or a physical object. And the ancient language is just taking that idea seriously. And I'm not the first author or tradition to do that, but is it a parallel? Is it a metaphor? I don't know if I'd go that far, but it definitely ties into the use of language and my ideas about it. What's crazy to me is there is a theoretical arrangement of words right now that would give us a massive breakthrough in science and physics. There's a theoretical arrangement of words that were I to write it or anyone else would influence how people think about the next presidential election to such a degree that it might actually changed the election. These are all theoretically possible and you can think of many many other things that you could do with language. We just lack the knowledge of what those arrangement of words are, and so we're constantly clawing our way toward new knowledge and new uses of language. [19]
The languages that you were playing around with in The Inheritance cycle, they were Germanic, Anglo Saxon based? The ancient language, the magical language, is based very strongly on Old Norse, which of course is Germanic or related to Old High German. The Dwarven language was invented pretty much from scratch although it is an agglutinative language like German is. And then the other languages have not appeared very much in the series. They're just little scraps here and there. To be clear, I am not a linguist, and I have not devoted the time and energy to developing these in a formal or rigorous way, the way that Tolkien did. Tolken was a linguist and that was his forte. I got far enough down that path while working on the Inheritance Cycle that I really began to appreciate how every word has a history and that history is inexorably tied to the history of the land. It's often said that Tolkien created Middle-earth just to explain his languages, as a setting for the languages. Which isn't entirely true, but there is truth to that. That's what I was encountering and I was realizing that I could spend 20 years, 10 years, just working on the languages and building this out. It might have been a worthwhile venture, but the tradeoff would have been no more books published during that time. I want to tell a story. [28]
What I would do these days, or what I did with other languages, is come up with a couple of words that sort of had a general feel that I liked and then extrapolating from those invented words, figuring out what consonants and vowels and clusters thereof that I wanted. Come up with some more sample words based off that and then start working out some grammar. Grammar is probably my weakest spot since at the time I wasn't really aware of non-English grammar systems and I've put some more attention in that since then. [34]
The language and culture that you describe in the books seem very real. How do you start inventing a language? You shamelessly steal from Germanic mythology and Scandinavian mythology, just like Tolkien did. But I'm no linguist, I did my best, I have a copy of the Nibelungen up on my shelf along with the Eddas, and I based one of my languages on Old Norse, which gave it a nice sound and feel. So the main thing is picking things that make sense for your world and then trying to be internally consistent. [2]

Creating Maps

At what point in your writing process do you start creating the map? I've created the maps at different times in different books. At first I thought I didn't need a map because I thought that a good book should be perfectly understandable without a map. You shouldn't need to rely on anything outside of the text in order to enjoy it. And I still think that's generally true, but a map can add a lot. So for Eragon, I did it partway through the book. If I were to do a stand-alone fantasy novel, I would definitely want to work out the maps and stuff before writing it. [12]
The map for Eragon, the original black and white map, I did about halfway or a third of the way into Eragon. My idea was, and I still kind of believe this, that a well-written book shouldn't need a map in order to understand the story. You should be able to keep your bearings just based off the text. What I ran into though was that I was getting lost in the world myself with the amount of places and things after a certain point. And so I drew a map. [34]
For me I think if you're creating something in the real world obviously that gives you certain constraints and certain advantages but if you're starting with something from scratch, I find creating a map right up front is really helpful because your story is not going to visit every square inch on your map so by filling in those other details on the map you're going to get more story ideas and also ideas for potential conflicts, travel distances. It all feeds into the realism of the story as well as potentially future stories. It's fun stuff. The downside is you could spend your whole life worldbuilding. There's a there's a book from World War Two called Islandia, and the guy just spent his whole life creating this island and its culture to the point of working out the actual layers of geography of stone in the island. I've never actually read the book, I don't know if it's any good, but I know it was fairly popular when it came out. [25]
What hacks do you have for for creating geography and points of interest within your world? When I was creating the map for Alagaësia I actually used a old National Geographic Atlas and traced over various coastlines and then distorted them and pasted on top of each other in order to get sort of a natural feeling coastline. Please don't compare the island of Vroengard to the outline of Greece. Please don't do that. And then you have Robin Hobb who just turned Alaska upside down for her map which I always love because I've lived in Alaska twice. I think she told me that she never actually expected the book to get published, but then she got stuck with that because everything was tied to the geography that she started with. [25]
I think that a good map ought to have lots of points of interest, and the tricky bit is, without getting so detailed that it becomes cluttered. You see that sometimes with real world maps, like atlases and stuff, where there's a ton of place names, city names, river names, road names. All of which are useful and necessary, but it can actually visually get in the way of the art, perhaps the artistic effect that you would want a fantasy map to have in a book or a movie or even a game. [12]
There are world generators that you can just click through. It's really easy nowadays with technology to build worlds just by snapping your fingers. Even with those tools, if you have the time and inclination, I think there is some benefit to redrawing or painting the maps in your own style. I don't know about you, I love seeing when the maps are from the author themselves. I remember Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn by Tad Williams. Tad did all the maps himself, and I love that. Even if it's imperfect or a little amateurish it just gives it a really nice feel. I love Tolkien's original art for the same reason. [25]

Creating Dragons

You are the creator of your own world. Do you feel that you have follow certain canons of fantasy worlds, for example, dragons have four legs and wyverns have two? Or do you feel that you can practically do whatever you want because it's fantasy and you create everything? Yes and no. No because I have already established rules and traditions and precedence in The World of Eragon, so I have to be consistent with that. But if I were writing a new fantasy, I would not feel beholden to any tradition. If I wanted to write a world where the dragons have three legs or feathers or something like that then I would feel free to do that. That's the great thing about speculative fiction is it gives you the freedom to write and create whatever you want to. The thing is when you have a genre where anything is possible it actually reveals the limitations of your imagination. And there are very few authors, myself included, who really make full use of that. But at the same time, limitations can make your fiction more interesting. I think it's important to pick some limitations and that will help actually improve the quality of your work. [7]
Why did you decide to have your dragons have a saddle? I was around horses growing up. And the thought of actually physically being on a creature with very hard scales was rather terrifying if thought about in a practical sense. And so it just seemed to me that there had to be some protection. [33]
When you're writing fantasy and you include dragons, especially a dragon rider fantasy, depending on how many there are there, it's actually quite a difficult thing to not solve all your problems with dragons. I think the solution to that is you focus on the problems that dragons present, which balances out the advantages. And of course people are smart, whether we're talking about humans or elves or dwarves or any other invented species. If dragons were real, you'd come up with counters to them, whether it's a bunch of giant ballistae on your walls, or building domed fortresses, or building underground. You would come up with solutions and it would negate those advantages. And that's always my issue with writing fiction with dragons in the real world. If it's a slightly more modern, then you have to ask, well, why isn't everything different in history? Like if dragons were a constant part of our world, architecture would be different, warfare would be different, politics would be different. Well, no, politics would be the same. What am I saying? [30]
I'm sure all of us have seen the fantasy paintings of like a knight in armor with a lance on a horse facing off against a dragon. Now, to be fair, a lance moving at a decent speed at a horse galloping will have enough kinetic energy behind it to punch through just about anything. It could do a lot of damage. But any decent sized dragon would move so fast and be so strong, you wouldn't have a chance with a lance. You'd need a giant crossbow. That'd be your only choice. The size of a dragon, intelligence of a dragon. Until you get to projectile weapons, you have no chance. [30]
We all know what any creature gets when they bond with a dragon. They get a dragon. But why would a dragon create that bond? Why would they do it? Is it the bond, is it their nature? I think for me, having other species bond with the dragons was essentially a way to keep the dragons from getting wiped out. Because dragons are such a huge threat. If you imagine in the real world, we don't suffer giant predators to be constantly predating and disrupting our world. We remove that threat. Especially if there's magic involved, the ability to remove that threat gets even bigger. So in a way I viewed the bond between rider and dragon as essentially self preservation for the dragons, if not the other species as well. Without some sort of symbiotic relationship, coexistence becomes very, very difficult. That, or the dragons have to be smart enough to just essentially remove themselves from the world and live off in the far off places. But that gets really difficult when you start considering how much they need to eat. I remember reading the Live Ship Trader series and I remember the end of that spoiler alert where it's become clear that true dragons have returned now. And it really was kind of an oh crap moment because you start thinking about what that actually means for there to be dragons in the world again. It's kind of like Reign of Fire. [30]

Promoting The Books

Touring Hazards

How did you do on your book tour? It was a lot. It was a lot. I did 50 days of touring last year between Fractal Noise and Murtagh. Obviously the majority of that was for Murtagh. And of course I had a couple other trips in there as well. I went to New York Comic Con. I had one or two personal trips. So there was a lot of travel last year. My goal is to not have as much travel this year. In general, the book tours were awesome, great crowds for the Fractalverse, enormous crowds for World of Eragon/Murtagh. I don't normally talk about this stuff, but since we're past it, it doesn't matter. I started touring for Murtagh November 6th and then got home for good on December 16th. But there's always a risk of getting sick while you're traveling. And I did pretty well in the US leg of things. And then over in Europe between the jet lag and not sleeping- I had a really amazing dinner, one of my publishers took me out to a three star Michelin restaurant. The problem was the dinner started at 8pm and didn't finish till midnight. And there were two or three desserts, and the last dessert was full of coffee, and I didn't realize it. Absolutely full of coffee. And I did not get to sleep until like four in the morning. And I only had three hours of sleep that night. So I think I got sick the day after as a result. I got so sick on the European tour that at one of my stops I had to call paramedics to my hotel room at 2 a.m. because I couldn't breathe. Ended up with bronchitis for the first time in my life. But I'll have you know, I did every event. I didn't miss a single event. I managed to do all my presentations and made it through in one piece. I've never, never backed down from doing an event, even while bleeding. Can you tell us a little bit about the time that you were bleeding in an event? Well, I was in Europe. I was touring for Inheritance, I'd already toured North America, and then I started in Europe, went to UK, and then I went to Australia and New Zealand. But first country was Germany, and I think I did Munich and Cologne, and then I ended in Berlin. And in Berlin, they had me in this wonderful theater that's like over 100 years old, which is very rare in the city, considering all the bombing during the war. And I'm backstage, which meant down in the basement of this theater. And there's like 500 people out waiting for me to make an appearance and there's someone introducing me and they say my name and everyone starts clapping. And of course you want to get on stage before the applause dies down. And the way you got onto stage in this theater was through a set of stairs. And it really wasn't even steps. It was almost like a ladder and it was wood. And the steps were so old that they were basically hollowed out from all the people that have gone up and down it over the years. So I'm scrambling up this and about halfway up, my right foot slipped off the edge of one of the steps because it was hollowed out and full speed, full strength, full weight, I slammed my shin into the edge of one of the steps, stumbled forward two more steps and did it a second time. But momentum, adrenaline, I keep going, I get up on stage, I waved to everyone. And fortunately for me, because I was speaking to a foreign audience, they had me sitting at a table with a translator and a presenter. So I got to sit down and the table kind of hit everything from view. And I start the presentation, start the event. And after about, I don't know, five minutes, I'm thinking to myself, okay, I've banged my shin before. We've all banged our shins before, but this really bleepin' hurt. So I looked under the table and the whole front of my jean leg on my shin is soaked with blood. There is blood dripping onto the floor and my sock is soaked with blood. So I poked my translator, the presenter next to me that I was doing a couple of events with, and I said, "Hey, look at this". And he glances under and his face just goes white. And I'm colorblind and I saw his face go white. And he said, "Do we need to call an ambulance?" And I'm like, "No, no, we're going to do this." So I did an hour-long presentation. And then I got up and managed to quickly limp over to a signing table. And no one really noticed that I wasn't feeling so hot. And I got behind the signing table, and I signed books for 400 or 500 people. And the funny thing is, I was traveling with this foreign rights agent publicist for Random House named Jocelyn, who was just an absolute beast of a woman. I love her to death. You have to understand, she did a European book tour with me while eight months pregnant. The woman was and is just very impressive. But she grew up on a farm. German family in the US, grew up on a farm. So I showed her my leg when I was sitting down to sign and she just looked at me and she said, "You need to go to the hospital?" I said, "Nope". She said, "I knew you were country. Good man." Slapped me on the back. So I finished signing and then I went back to the hotel and I had to get into a tub of water to soak my jeans off because the blood had dried and glued them to my shin. And the problem was I had a dent all the way down to the bone. And I really should have gone to a hospital because, sorry for the gory details, but what happens is when you get a dent like that, you lose the fat under the skin between the skin and the bone and it doesn't come back unless you get an injection to help it puff out and heal. And I didn't do that because I was on tour, there was no time. So the next day I had to fly to pretty sure it was Barcelona for the St. George Book Festival, which is a walking festival. So you have to walk from bookstore to bookstore in the city and do signings. But that was a bit rough. That actually took over a year to heal properly. I still have that dent. Stuff happens. I've heard some crazy stories with other authors. I'd rather it's my blood, not the fan's blood. [32]

Touring Difficulties

We've got blood and sweat, any tears from tour? On occasion. The biggest one is just being away from home. And if anything is a bit off for whatever reason, you can't just pop home and hold someone or do this or do that. It's just difficult to be that far away from home for so long. [32]
If you're not familiar with book tours, the way it often works is that you fly to a city, you get to your hotel room, you have a little bit of time to freshen up, maybe get some food and then you go to the bookstore and you do your event. And it has to be after people get off from work, so it tends to be a later evening event. If you have a large number of people show up, that means that that time spent talking and signing pushes fairly late in the evening. You go back, you get dinner, and if you're a semi-introvert like so many authors tend to be, you need some time to decompress, which means you probably stay up a little too late reading or writing. And then in the morning, you got to go get another airplane flight and go to the new city. All of which is fine, but going to the airport, doing those flights, with the time it takes to go through an airport these days, it means that the schedule has very little time in it. When I toured for Fractal Noise, the publisher one of the days had me fly from Tampa to Portland and I still had to do an event that day. Which I agreed to. It was my own fault because they had everything on the East Coast and I said, "Well, what about the West Coast? You know, I have readers on the West Coast. They need to get a chance to get a signed book." It was my own fault. But that can get rough when you're doing it for weeks on end at a certain point. You just can't recover. A day off? What's that? But it's a good problem to have. That people want to see you and want to read your books. It's an awesome career to have. [1]
I'm also a big fan of coffee naps. So I will drink a cup of coffee, usually my second cup of coffee, and then I'll go take a nap, and I will nap for about 30 minutes, because after 30 minutes the coffee wakes me up. And I find that 15 to 30 minutes is the perfect length of a nap for me, and if I go past that, I need to sleep for about three hours, because otherwise I get into the middle of a REM cycle, and if I wake up in the middle of a REM cycle, I'm just like groggy and drugged, and I feel worse than if I hadn't napped at all. And then of course, if you're on book tour, the way I have been for a while, you gain the ability to just close your eyes at any point and take a 10 minute nap 15 minute nap anywhere, and it at least helps you stay upright. [19]

Meeting Fans around the World

You just got back from the U.S. leg of your book tour — who’s making up the crowd? The readership is broad and probably older than it was back in the day. There are still a lot of 8-year-olds, but now there are grandparents, too. I’ve even met some kids who’ve been named after the characters, which is pretty amazing. Because people have been reading the series for so long, I tend to get a mix of incredibly detailed, hyper-focused, deep-dive questions about some of the lore, but also some more general ones about Eragon’s name. [16]
I'm sure you hear personal stories all the time especially at your readings and your your appearances. It must be lovely, and I guess overwhelming to connect with your fans. That's a good way of putting it: lovely and overwhelming. Everyone has their own personal history with these books. I have people showing up who named their children after the characters, or who've gotten tattoos. Oh my goodness, what's the one you get? Multiple Saphiras, Aryas, Rorans, a couple of Eragons. As a writer, you want people to read your stories, enjoy them, be affected by them. If they're affected so strongly they name their children after your characters, you feel pretty good about it. [28]
Are your European fans different from your American fans? I actually haven't met any children here who are named after characters from my books. That seems to be an American phenomenon. The language barrier sometimes makes it a little more difficult to talk to European fans. But the love for Eragon is just as strong in Europe as it is in the US. This is not your first time on tour in Europe. Is there something you're missing here? I actually noticed that hotels in Europe usually don't have ironing boards or irons. This is standard equipment in America. [24]
My great-grandmother was from Sicily and then my grandfather was from Bologna. I just found out recently that my grandfather as a child was tutored by Fellini's wife. [7]
My grandfather was the stereotype of an elderly Italian gentleman. He had a mustache, he cooked spaghetti and he made the most amazing red sauce for the spaghetti. He used too much profanity. He was quite the character. [35]
Amsterdam is a beautiful city, but if I had grown up here I would probably still have written fantasy, but it would probably have influenced the type of fantasy I write. [23]
I was just in Stockholm on book tour for my latest book. And I've sold a really large number of books, proportionally in Sweden, and I'd never been there before. And I was kind of curious what their thoughts and feelings were on it, given the fact that I have shamelessly pillaged, Anglo-Saxon Scandinavian mythology for my own work. And they said native Swedish authors don't write using their own mythology, they go into the more literary veins and they import and translate other authors who are writing about Scandinavian mythology and they enjoy it immensely, but it doesn't seem to be a homegrown thing for them, which is rather odd, I think. [30]
Old Norse is not so far from German, do you speak a little bit of German? I understand a fair bit. When I've done presentations in Germany, I've had children ask me questions in German, and I can sometimes understand the entire question without translation, but I only speak a few words. [Host 2]: Let's try it. Can you ask the next question in German? Of course. Oh dear. [speaking quickly] Herr Paolini, wie viel von ihrer Vision für die ganze Serie hat sich mit der Zeit verändert? Hat es sich überhaupt verändert? Denn wenn man sich die frühen Werke anguckt, erkennt man, dass sehr viele Sachen aus den frühen Werken in den späteren wieder auftauchen. So dass es eigentlich unmöglich sein kann, dass sie das nicht von Anfang an komplett geplant haben? Translation please. That was not fair. But funny. Yeah, I was just asking, when you started writing the book, and it became not just one book, it became a whole world, it became a series, and I don't want to spoil anything, but if you read the first books and you read the later books, stuff comes up again, and it seems like you actually knew where it was going when you started writing, which is again insane because you were 15. Is that something you just got lucky, or did you really plan for a whole series when you started writing the first one? I planned because I tried writing some stories before Eragon, and I never got past the first five or ten pages because I didn't have a story. I would only have an inciting incident, like a young man finds a dragon egg in the forest. Well, fun, awesome, but that's not a story. So Eragon and the series as it was, was a writing exercise for myself to see if I could outline, plot, and then write at least the first book of a series. So yes, if you read the first book, Eragon, there's actually a scene, a dream sequence in the first book. And it is the very last scene of the last book. And I did that specifically so that I could point to it and say to my readers, "See, I knew what I was doing." But of course, it isn't the last book now. [2]
Before he finished signing them all he asked if I read Fractal Noise, I said yes. He then asked how I liked it. I said I liked To Sleep far more. And to be fair I did. But I could've been a little more less brunt about it. All in all I'm sorry Paolini. I hope you see this. Dude -- No need to apologize! I was the one who put you on the spot. I was just curious about Fractal Noise as it's pretty different from what I normally write. That said, I'm a big boy, and it doesn't bother me in the slightest if someone prefers one book over another. [R]
Have you been on TikTok? How do you find it? I have an account that my assistants post content on for me because I don't have the time and I don't want it on my phone, but it has been a really useful way to connect with readers, and I had a lot of people who came up during my book tour end of last year, who said that they found out about the events I was doing from the posts on TikTok. [33]
Outside of the tour, did you do anything to personally celebrate the release of Murtagh? No. Not to sound blase, but this isn't my first book I've released. Going on the tour is the celebration. Getting to meet the fans. It's an enormous expenditure of energy, time, effort, and it's very joyous and touching and meaningful for me. And I think for a lot of the readers. So that's the celebration. My team and I, we all kind of take a moment to pat ourselves on the back every time a book comes out and then it's back to the grind a bit. Also, I got to celebrate my 40th birthday while on book tour, and I got to celebrate it with my editor, my publicist, my former publicist who's been with me since the beginning. So that was really nice. [32]

Appearance

Being an author is like the best kind of semi-celebrity, because nine times out of ten, no one knows who you are, you can live a nice quiet life, and then you get to go out and meet people who like your work. And that's a real treat. I grew the beard partly to keep people from recognizing me. But then I've had it for so long that it doesn't work anymore. And I got tired of shaving. But the problem is the beard takes so much time and effort to take care of it, it doesn't save me any time. [1]
Did your hat end up getting fixed post-tour? Yup. Fixed it myself with a rivet. [T]
Any advice on how to wear a pirate's hat without it being weird? It's very simple. There's one ingredient. You wear it with confidence. That's all. [36]

Signing Books

People people don't maybe don't realize what an endurance race it is, especially when when books are this big and successful. Like the amount. I once did 9,280 books in an afternoon and a half at a warehouse. I had nine people helping. I stood. I find that if I stand, I don't use my wrist. I can isolate the arm. And I just had someone shove it under me, someone pull it out for me, and everyone else was boxing, unboxing and flapping. But it hurt. It really hurt. I dropped my first name this past year. For the first time in a 20 year career, I finally dropped my first name. Did you feel defeated? Yes. But I have kids now and I just could not afford the time and the strain on my body. I actually got two typewriters. I got really bad inflammation in my right thumb from all the signing and I find that typewriters alleviated that. Also heavier like mechanical keyboards seem to help. So I know like Robin Hobb has suffered some severe problems with her hands with the amount of typing she's done over the years. So yeah, it is an occupational hazard. [33]
I have to say, signing 30,000 sheets is SIGNIFICANTLY harder than mining or placing 30k blocks in #Minecraft. Lol. [T]
Do you have a PO Box or something? I’d pay shipping both ways to have you sign my books. P.O. box is listed on paolini.net. Just include return shipping, please. :D Alternatively, you can arrange signed copies through Conley's Books & Music in Livingston, MT. [R]
If I send a book to a P.O. Box and pay for shipping there and back, would you sign it? Yup. Address is on paolini.net [T]