My name is Quentin Lorreno. I’m somewhat of a middleman in the criminal underworld. I mediate the crime families, I arrange diplomatic marriages, I keep things civil.
But above all I buy and sell cursed artifacts.
These dissonant pieces of the world can be as anything as a shrunken head that gives you bad vibes to things as dangerous as paintings that squeeze the life out of you once you look at them.
What my clients want with them, I don’t know. I don’t ask, and I don’t tell- for the most part.
So let’s talk about UFOs.
In recent times sightings have increased and I’m sure you, dear reader, have heard the commotion of the media and all the talk about them.
Whistleblowers, leaks, court cases- all the like.
Information about alien spacecraft, intelligent aliens coming to visit- hell, even asteroids carrying data from other worlds, other systems. But let me tell you one thing: the people you call ‘higher-ups’ and the ‘elites’ barely know a thing about UFOs, much less alien life.
But I know pieces of alien starcraft are highly desired. And the fact that recovered debris and a ship itself can fetch prices so high you’ll find yourself doubting your very eyes.
The artifact was in the center of the man’s shop. A simple trader in the wet market, haggling with customers and overcharging tourists for the smallest things. “Excuse me,” I said, politely.
He turned to me and smiled, revealing a single gold tooth. “Ah, come my friend,” he cheered, beckoning me inside. I followed; so did my assistant- and expert, Aster. “What do you desire?” he paused, and added, “friend.”
I observed the small artifact in the center of his shop. It was round, and inscribed with symbols I neither understood nor truly comprehended.
“I want this,” I indicated. Despite the freezing rain of the wet market, the small spherical thing felt hot to the touch, and I drew back. “And where’d you find this?”
“Down river, sir,” he explained, vaguely gesturing to the roaring stream past the market. “My friend, the fishman found his nets. All fish in there, dead.”
I turned to my assistant. “Aster, can you verify?” She nodded, slipped a leather glove off her hands and reached out into the ether.
She was a Canary- that’s what we in the artifact business call those with heightened senses, those with powers of the interesting kind. She began to shiver and I laid out a hand on her shoulder as her eyes started to roll back- I feared for her every time she reached out.
“Yeah, it’s legitimate all right- not of this world.” She closed her eyes, sighing. “And he’s telling the truth.”
I nodded to the shopkeeper. “How much for the er, magic sphere?”
He thought, not entirely sure what to make of it. “Five hundred dollars?”
I could get a better deal. “Three hundred.”
“Four-fifty.”
That was acceptable. “Deal!” And I slid out my wallet and handed over cash. He seemed happy, and handed me the still-hot sphere. I nodded to him, and the two of us headed back out into the rain.
The moment the water hit the sphere it hissed and smoke trawled out. “Agh!” I yelped, the metal suddenly turning boiling-hot. It fell, and steam poured from the ground.
Aster, gloves on held it. “How much do you think we can sell this one for?”
There were a few clients I had in mind. World governments, for one, charged more than they really needed to for alien artifacts. A representative from the U.S Department of Defense was a client I could easily phone.
So I thought. “A few thousand,” I assured. “Worth the trip here.”
Me, Aster, and my bodyguard (where had he gone?) had traveled to the market to seek out old artifacts. Aster, with her ability, would sense if these artifacts were objects of the interesting kind, and we’d buy them from the clueless merchants.
Then we’d turn right back around and sell them to shady rich people for a more than decent profit.
It was an easy game, save for the fact that self-proclaimed artifact bounty hunters were after us and the fact that handling cursed artifacts without proper precaution could just as easily wipe us (and bystanders.) off the map.
A clean cut man with dirtied hair and ripped clothes raced up to me. “Hey boss,” it was Matt, and with someone in tow, gripped tightly by the collar. “This guy says he knows you.”
I looked at the fiery redheaded man with odd, dark tinted glasses beside him. “I don’t.” I looked at the man more carefully. “Nope, and Matt- release him.”
Matt did so and the guy fell to the floor. He picked himself up and extended a hand. “My name is Quincy Kieni,” he pointed to the sphere Aster was holding, “and uh, that sphere belongs to me.” I looked at him in confusion. He scratched his chin. “Okay, not really- but I was about to buy that.”
I shook my head. “Well you can’t have it.”
He sighed and started to wave his hands rather eccentrically. “Well, I’ll pay you double!” He began to rant now, “You don’t understand how important that is. You tourists don’t realize that-”
“Okay,” I cut him off. “What’s so good about this?”
“You’re not going to believe me,” he continued, “but it’s an alien artifact. Debris from a crashed ship east of here. Now, I’ll pay double-”
Aster laughed at his words. “Yeah, we kinda already know that.” He stopped and saw the gloves. “We’re in the artifact underworld, you?”
He nodded- then tried to seize the sphere. Matt caught him again. “Okay, fine,” he hissed. “Can I at least propose a deal?”
This was getting tedious. “What deal?”
He cleared his throat dramatically. “For the past week-” he coughed, cutting himself off. Matt gave me a look, “I’ve heard rumors of a fallen meteorite east of here messing with phones, electronics, et cetera-et cetera.” I wondered where his rumors came from. “Also according to some Company scanners I stole- anyway.”
“Whoa!” I snapped. “You stole Company scanners? Not cool!” The Company were the people after us- those who stole artifacts for themselves in order to keep the world ‘safe’.
And getting in their way mostly led to death. “That’s not the important part,” he mused. “Look, I know they’re doing recovery somewhere nearby-” he pointed to the sphere. “I can put together a spell or something and track down the rest of the ship.”
I saw what he wanted then. “You want to work together.”
He nodded shyly. “I’ll locate the spaceship. We get in and out.” He gestured to his little messenger bag. “I got a list of spells in there. Invisibility, Bloomshape, Sanctified…”
Joining forces with the strange little magician would definitely put more Company men on our trail. However, recovering more artifacts for ourselves could net me enough money from my contact at the DoD to essentially bribe our way out of any Company trouble.
I sighed heavily. “Okay, you got a deal.” Matt released him, and for the second time he fell, splashing mud all over us.
Quincy Kieni, as it turned out, was not good at magic at all. The first three attempts to cast a location spell on the artifact ended in a series of sparks, fires, and explosions, each time worse than the last.
“Not to worry,” he seethed, “seventh times the charm!” At least he was right about that one.
Black smoky lines erupted from the sphere and pointed us east, cutting across hills and roads.
So we began the journey walking and splashing in the rain, the short fiery magician leading us forwards, whistling a tune to himself so annoyingly I considered cutting off the deal.
Matt walked beside him, making sure he didn’t pull any tricks. I and Aster walked behind, eyeing our surroundings for safety.
At a certain point Aster began to shiver. Not from the rain but- “We’re getting close,” she noted. “It’s not all debris-” she reached out into the ether and froze, “-Company Men- and- something else.”
I asked her if she could tell what it was. She couldn’t. The journey continued, and the boisterous Quincy started to the quiet, now muttering the tune underneath his breath.
And over a hill and through the brush we saw it. A river, cutting through rocky hills in a small unassuming valley.
And there it was, large and looming. A great metal disc, pulsing with energy and symbols that glowed against the rain. Smoke churned out as water reacted with the metal- just as the sphere had done.
All around the crashed ship were people. Explorers sent from the Company, bagging artifacts, taking photographs and even loading off large pieces of the ship itself into trucks coming and going.
They marched with urgency as the rushing waters eroded the ship, more and more parts of it being washed away.
“Well,” Quincy murmured, “this is a larger operation than I thought they’d send.”
I squinted. “Look-” I pointed to something like a chair being brought out. A dead body, short, gray, and clearly non-human lay dead on it, “a gray.”
It’s dead, large eyes, black as night looked eerily at us, sending a chill down my spine. “That’ll fetch a price,” Matt noted. This was true- corpses, though we never had the chance to recover one, sold at astronomically high prices, pun intended.
Quincy seemed to disagree. “But think of the blood in that thing,” he mused. “So many different applications to science. Cancer, the Flu, Covid…”
“For a magician,” Aster joked, “you seem to care a lot about science.”
I silenced them. “And we better get in there before they take all of that loot away.” I turned to our newfound magician. “So do your thing. Invisibility?”
He reached into his bag and whipped out a phone, opening an app and observing a photograph of a spellbook. “Well, see,” he nervously began, “I don’t exactly know that one.” I looked at him rather angrily. “But I can make them think we’re one of them?”
I sighed. “That’ll do.” That in fact, as we would find out soon enough, wouldn’t do.
The man read out the words and waved his hands eccentrically, and gold lines surrounded us like snakes, swirling around us. “Done.” And then he started to race down the rocky hill.
“Matt, keep an eye on him.” He nodded and went after the magician.
Aster and I followed, entering the camp and nodding to the clueless agents. We went into a tent, found a couple of powerful devices and pocketed them into our bag- one enchanted to fit in an unknown number of items.
We made sure not to take anything that looked particularly dangerous. Or important enough.
“The grey-” I remembered, “do you think we can?”
We observed the men transporting the body onto a truck. “Too well guarded.”
A woman came up to us, a look of annoyance in her face. “You two!” she snapped. “Stop idling about and get to work!”
The spell held, though the lines seemed to waver. “Yes, ma’am,” I replied. “Where to?”
She gestured. “We need more people inside the ship.”
I nodded and we headed off, the lines now starting to vibrate. This was not good. Her eyes were on us, and we quickly entered the alien ship before she saw through our deception.
The inside was definitely larger than the outside. It had seemed relatively small on the outside, enough to carry maybe a crew of four, or five.
But the inside was ginormous. It was a maze of halls crawling with Company Agents scanning and scraping samples of highly reactive metal.
Aster tugged at me, and we found a room deeper in. “Something’s here,” she whispered.
“Hey!” a voice shouted. “That area hasn’t been deconned.”
“We’ll uh, handle it,” I lied. The agent handed us a mask and we put it on, entering the room and closing the door behind us.
“Woah,” Aster gasped, shining a flashlight onto the room. It was some sort of… morgue. Dead alien bodies, oddly humanoid and gray, now decaying sat on tables across the room, some cut up, some still preserved, pristine and glimmering in an unknown yellow liquid.
I felt an odd sense of fear- and being watched by something hidden inside the room, watching with deep, bulbous black eyes.
The door opened behind us, and a woman with stark blue hair walked in. “Woah is right,” she agreed, spraying a bottle of something into the air. “What designation are you from?” She looked at us intently, and the spell started to drift. “Do you even have clearance to be in this deep?”
I looked at Aster in confusion, then back at her. “We, uh, got sent here by the woman in charge.”
The lines surrounding us started to vanish. “I need to see ID Tags-” she squinted as us- “now!” That was the moment the spell broke. Her brow furrowed and- “Intruder!” she shouted, “we’ve got artifact-”
Aster reached out and scrambled her mind. She fell, dazed. I heard the rumblings of people approaching. “Damn it!”
We backed into the morgue, the dead almost staring at us, wondering what would happen next. I shoved a table onto the door, and the agents of the other side started to knock.
“What-” the door started to open, “now-”
A uniformed man entered the room, saw us and started firing, bullets hitting the wall beneath us. They began to enter shooting as we hid behind a counter, firing back.
That was when the first man screamed.
Something leaped from the shadows slashing the man and pouncing off, leaving him bloodied and terrified. He fired around and screamed as it leaped back, falling to the floor, dead.
I dared a peek- claw marks, stab wounds. “We’ve got a live gray!” a second agent yelled. Radio chatter. “Non-lethals- the boss wants it alive!”
This was good news for us. A tranq dart would at least keep us alive- though spending time in a prison was not so good. On the other hand, more agents were coming down the halls, ready to seize the alien.
That’s when I had the plan. “Aster- this just might work, but-” I told her the plan.
She nodded and began to reach into the ether. Across us, the agents fired at shadows in darkness- there were two of them, fighting back. Agents started to be lifted into the air, carried by an unknown psychic and tossed aimlessly.
Then one of the Greys darted at us, and stopped. It bared claws and teeth sharp as knives and I grew scared for a moment.
But the plan had worked. Aster reached into its mind and- “A deal!” she whispered, harsh. She turned to me. “Let’s go!”
Temporarily, at least- they were on our side.
There were three, I realized, and we began to fight our way out. The agents started to retreat, overpowered by the surprise. The Greys led the way, and I headed out.
The hall ahead of us was clear, and in the midst of the confusion we quickly exited the craft. Outside was another mess though, and Quincy and Matt were shot and hid, spells cast, bullets deflected.
A Grey snarled and leaped at them. “Matt, Quincy!” I shouted. “Let’s get outta here!”
We were being surrounded. “The truck!” Matt shouted back, starting to back towards a truck loaded with artifacts. “I hotwired the truck!”
We ran, avoiding all we could. A bullet just barely grazed me and I yelped as I reached the truck. The others followed suit, climbing inside and I started it up- and so did the three extraterrestrials.
“Go, go!” Quincy shouted. “Should’ve-” the window shattered and a bullet hole emerged in the leather behind me, “made a Plan B.”
I hit the gas and charged forwards, knocking a tent over and spilling it’s contents. There was an explosion behind us, and suddenly, we were out of the hills and into fresh road.
Distracted by whatever chaos we had sown, they didn’t give chase. And it was smooth sailing from then; we headed into a little campground a little to the west, and stopped.
We got out, and cheered. The three aliens looked at oddly and seemed to nod, understanding. One had been shot and lay dying, leaking odd yellow from it. The two spoke words in a chittering sort of way to the third as it died.
It passed, breath leaving our world. The two stared at us with bulbous eyes and leaped into the trees, leaving us with the corpse of the third.
“So,” Quincy started, “that went rather well.”
“Are you insane?” Matt snapped. “We almost died.”
I shook my head. “But we got some great loot here,” reminding the two. “And we got…” I stared at the corpse, “that. It’ll pay off some of our debts and fetch a good profit for us all.”
“Ah, his share?” Aster inquired. “That spell was barely effective.”
The magician seemed nervous at that. “Well, I was actually thinking of another prize.” Oh dear. What more was he going to ask for? “You all seem like experienced people,” he pointed out. “What if I join you?”
“No!” we all shouted. He ended up joining us anyway. We did need a magician, and a rather useless one was better than none at all.
The alien artifacts- especially the corpse fetched a high price on the market. We, soon, were overflowing in cash. Sure, we didn’t know what our clients- much less the government was going to do with it.
But at the end of the day that didn’t matter. Our job was done, and we lived to see another day. Such was life in the world of the artifact underground- it’s really the small things that matter- the knowledge that you, at least, would live to see another day.
And that, by me, was okay.

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To start I would like to say that I am an avid RVer and have travelled coast to coast in the USA with my wife, children, and dog(Australian Shepherd). We have been DEEP in the woods and have heard strange noises, stayed in cities riddled with crime, and never had I felt out of control, or uneasy... Until, Whites City, NM.
If you are unfamiliar with the area, there is almost NOTHING but desert in the surrounding areas. Roswell, NM is only about 1.5hrs north of Whites City. The area has many boogeymen in the surrounding folklore, things from Skinwalkers, Kidnappers, Aliens, and more. Whites City(which sits just outside the entrance to Carlsbad Caverns) has a population of 85 according to a quick google search.
At first, upon setting up camp, things felt, "off"... For lack of a better word. But with nothing to point at as a reason why, I kept my mouth shut so as not to spook my wife or kids for no reason. But the entire time it felt as if we were being watched, and every turn I made I expected to find something, only to find nothing. Until I walked my dog later that night...
My dog, a 2yr old Australian Shepherd, is very friendly and aloof. Up to this point he had never shown any signs of aggression, and only exhibited sweet behaviors.
It had just gotten dark, and due to a long day of traveling he needed a walk bad! At new places I always keep him leashed, and as we started around the abandoned city I thought I saw a shadow figure moving next to the restaurant building across the street. I focused my vision, nothing.. Hmm.. Keep walking!
Then out of nowhere my dog jumped to attention and started ferociously barking and growing into the dark shadow near where I saw the movement. I had never heard anything close to that come from him before, or since! But there was NOTHING there.. Yet still, he was frothing and snarling and growling!
I drug the dog back to the camper, confused. But still I kept quiet about it, and decided to shrug it off. I kept close eye on my family that night.
We left that next day, and my wife remarked, "So glad we are leaving this place! It gives me the heebie jeebeies!". I ask why, she says, "idk 🤷‍♀️ Just creepy here."
So I look up reviews of the camp sight, and another camper said they felt the same way as us, and that upon returning to his camp spot after a long day outexploring, he saw a dozen cloaked and hooded people holding candles doing some weird ritual nearby the campsite!!!
I then took a DEEP dive on the internet and couldn't find anything else with regards to Whites City. But.. there was also an old stone castle type structure on the hill above the campsite. I intended on going to check it out, but I got spooked after what happened with my dog, and the other camp review I had read.
So... IDK what, or who, is lurking around Whites City, NM. But I am not interested in going back anytime soon. (The caverns were neat though!) But the whole place had some serious TX chainsaw type vibes, where maybe the reason there aren't more stories are because those who would tell them don't make it out, and perhaps more people are involved(all 85 of them).
Haha, well that's the conspiracy theory I had, but still, creepy none the less! The feeling of being watched was so strange, and was hard to shake!

Ned remembered the moment when all the smiles died…
…when Prince Rhaegar Targaryen urged his horse past his own wife, the Dornish princess Elia Martell...
...to lay the queen of beauty’s laurel in Lyanna’s lap.
https://preview.redd.it/95pwuazoe85b1.jpg?width=551&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e87e1d95f172a847411dcfa70440ffe6270a4c4c
He could see it still: a crown of winter roses, blue as frost.
Ned Stark reached out his hand to grasp the flowery crown, but beneath the pale blue petals the thorns lay hidden.
https://preview.redd.it/trpwm2gxg85b1.png?width=962&format=png&auto=webp&s=aada9b3bc346f2eb376580e1a6cf296c2f0c2276
The phenomenon illustrates the power of unconscious inferences and implicit assumptions in perception.
This is the final part of a series exploring the hidden motives and actions of the main players during Robert's Rebellion, named LBJ in reference to the influence of Lyndon B. Johnson and the Vietnam War on GRRM's views and writings on war. LBJ also indicates considerations over whether Lyanna + Bobby B = Jon Snow. Previous installments include:

• Rhaegar Had To Be A Warrior
• Why Did Rhaegar Crown Lyanna?
  • Ice, Ice Baby?
  • Political Suicide?
  • Was She 'A Very Kinky Girl'?
• The Forging of Lightbringer: Blue Flowers & Narrow Visors
• Rhaegar Mistakenly Crowned Lyanna
• I am not fond of fishsticks, but when fish is served, I eat it.
• All is fair in love and war...
• Kingsguard Loyalty
• Southron Ambitions & Lies
• The Return of the Prince: Éowyn at the Trident
• Mirror on the Wall: King Robert vs. Queen Cersei
• The Horned Demon of the Trident

This series presented a case that, like LBJ's administration lied to the public about the Vietnam War, including by exaggerating reports of an attack on U.S. ships to coerce Congress into granting broad authority to escalate the war, the winners of Robert's Rebellion implemented a falsified propaganda campaign in service to their personal and political ambitions. They capitalized on Rhaegar's mistake at Harrenhal to form a believable lie that the crown prince abducted Lyanna, when in fact both she and Rhaegar were taken by rebel allies, with Rhaegar being tortured for the crime of crowning Robert's betrothed queen of love and beauty despite the presence of his pregnant, Dornish wife. The Kingsguard at the tower of joy betrayed the Targaryens, and they granted Robert access to the tower and Lyanna after his loss at Ashford, meaning Robert may be Jon's father. And yet either of Lyanna's guards, Arthur Dayne or Oswell Whent, may have had an affair with the she-wolf, and so not even Lyanna herself was necessarily certain of Jon Snow's paternity.
This part will show how Ned's thoughts and actions are consistent with this scenario.

Ned's Dangerous Secrets

Lord Eddard Stark is defined by his love for his family and his sense of honor and justice. He prizes loyalty and abhors the killing of innocent children, but these values are often challenged by the harsh realities of the world he lives in, leading Ned to dishonor himself in ways that haunt him. Ned Stark thus epitomizes the concept of the human heart in conflict with itself.
Our first glimpse of Lord Stark's internal conflict is in Bran's first chapter. Reading between the lines, it's apparent that Ned beheaded an innocent man, as Gared was not truly a deserter but had been chased south by a hungry, pregnant direwolf. Bran doesn't reveal what Gared said to defend himself, but it's easy to imagine he explained about the direwolf, which to Ned would come off as a lie or a slight against his house, given that direwolves hadn't been spotted south of the Wall in 200 years. Lord Stark also failed to heed the omen of the antler in the direwolf's throat; besides superstitiously signaling the danger of House Baratheon, it served as a sharp lesson that sometimes absurd, seemingly unbelievable things do happen, and so it's important to do due diligence before doling out harsh penalties. The Starks are conditioned to judge deserters harshly, however, which is why Arya murders Dareon the singer, even though his desertion was justifiable given that he had been placed at the Wall on a false accusation of rape. Neither Arya nor Ned conduct proper investigations, and so despite their good intentions, they both perpetuate injustice. Likewise, Ned staunchly supported Robert during the rebellion, and though he had very good reasons to do so, he failed to question the underlying assumptions and so unwittingly participated in perpetuating injustice.
Ned continues to dishonor himself at the Trident with his daughters, when he places loyalty to King Robert over truth and justice. Despite Ned’s desire to protect innocents, he cowed to Robert’s judgement, permitting Mycah's death and executing Lady himself, though he knew they were blameless. It’s thus easy to see how Bran’s vision of the Trident involves not only Robert’s black mountain of a shadow, but also his father’s shadows, represented by an ashen hound and a man armored in gold, indicating the dark and light sides at war within Lord Eddard Stark; some lights cast more than one shadow.

He looked south, and saw the great blue-green rush of the Trident. He saw his father pleading with the king, his face etched with grief. He saw Sansa crying herself to sleep at night, and he saw Arya watching in silence and holding her secrets hard in her heart. There were shadows all around them. One shadow was dark as ash, with the terrible face of a hound. Another was armored like the sun, golden and beautiful. Over them both loomed a giant in armor made of stone, but when he opened his visor, there was nothing inside but darkness and thick black blood.

- A Game of Thrones Bran III
Ned’s personal demons are rooted in Robert’s Rebellion. When Robert tries to convince Ned to support the assassination of Daenerys and her unborn child, the second time, Ned protests that the purpose of the rebellion was to put an end to the murder of children.

“Whereas Daenerys is a fourteen-year-old girl.” Ned knew he was pushing this well past the point of wisdom, yet he could not keep silent. “Robert, I ask you, what did we rise against Aerys Targaryen for, if not to put an end to the murder of children?”
“To put an end to Targaryens!” the king growled.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard VIII
This may reference the Defiance of Duskendale, a tax dispute which escalated to King Aerys’s abduction and imprisonment, significantly contributing to his mental decline. Once Aerys was freed by Ser Barristan, he ordered the Darklyns and Hollards wiped out, except for young Dontos at Barristan’s request, and there were children among those slain. This act sent a signal to other nobles, putting them on notice that a whole family and their goodkin, down to innocent children, would be mortally liable for the misdeeds of a few.
So when Rhaegar blundered at Harrenhal, whataboutism dictates that the whole Targaryen dynasty was thus liable. This human tendency towards scapegoating and revenge is reflected in the people of Duskendale blaming Denys Darklyn’s Myrish wife Lady Serala for influencing his actions, leading them to mutilate and burn her alive. The grisly fates of those linked to the Defiance would incline Robert and his allies to ensure the abduction and imprisonment of Lyanna and Rhaegar was conducted with utmost secrecy, to protect their own families from the dragon’s retribution.
The reference to child murder may also relate to suspicions surrounding the untimely deaths of Aerys’s offspring, and it could reference the deaths of Brandon’s companions, depending on their ages. If the latter, it underscores Ned’s diminished resentment towards Aerys for executing his father and brother. It’s possible Ned felt that his wolf-blooded brother overreacted by riding to King’s Landing to threaten the life of the crown prince.

“It has a name, does it?” Her father sighed. “Ah, Arya. You have a wildness in you, child. ‘The wolf blood,’ my father used to call it. Lyanna had a touch of it, and my brother Brandon more than a touch. It brought them both to an early grave.“

- A Game of Thrones Arya II
After Brandon and Lord Rickard were executed and Aerys demanded the heads of Robert and Ned, Ned could then justify rebelling against the throne not only to preserve his own life, but also to prevent the Mad King from extending his vengeance to wipe out both House Stark and Baratheon, down to innocent children. Ned's sense of honor is able to override his sense of loyalty in response to direct threats to innocents and his family, yet he lacks the moral and cognitive flexibility to defy kings who abuse their power to indirectly harm their subjects.
So for instance, Ned justly speaks out against and attempts to resign over Robert's assassination plans, despite the real danger of a Dothraki invasion. Yet Ned does not show the same zeal for preventing the indirect threat of the crown failing to pay its debts, even though this failure would induce lenders to fund wars against the Seven Kingdoms. The ethics of economics are perhaps more complex than murder, and so it's easy for Ned to be talked into allowing the expensive Hand's Tourney to go forward, rather than educating himself well enough to recognize that the crown's debts have the potential to harm the populace far more than any dragonspawn could.

He did not have to like it, though. And come spring, when the time came to repay all that gold, he would like it even less. Tycho Nestoris had impressed him as cultured and courteous, but the Iron Bank of Braavos had a fearsome reputation when collecting debts. Each of the Nine Free Cities had its bank, and some had more than one, fighting over every coin like dogs over a bone, but the Iron Bank was richer and more powerful than all the rest combined. When princes defaulted on their debts to lesser banks, ruined bankers sold their wives and children into slavery and opened their own veins. When princes failed to repay the Iron Bank, new princes sprang up from nowhere and took their thrones.
As poor plump Tommen may be about to learn. No doubt the Lannisters had good reason for refusing to honor King Robert's debts, but it was folly all the same. If Stannis was not too stiff-necked to accept their terms, the Braavosi would give him all the gold and silver he required, coin enough to buy a dozen sellsword companies, to bribe a hundred lords, to keep his men paid, fed, clothed, and armed. Unless Stannis is lying dead beneath the walls of Winterfell, he may just have won the Iron Throne. He wondered if Melisandre had seen that in her fires.

- A Dance with Dragons Jon IX
Consider Ned’s unwillingness to defy Robert when he points out the atrocities committed by the Targaryens.

“Nonetheless,” Ned said, “the murder of children … it would be vile … unspeakable …”
“Unspeakable?” the king roared. “What Aerys did to your brother Brandon was unspeakable. The way your lord father died, that was unspeakable. And Rhaegar … how many times do you think he raped your sister? How many hundreds of times?” His voice had grown so loud that his horse whinnied nervously beneath him. The king jerked the reins hard, quieting the animal, and pointed an angry finger at Ned. “I will kill every Targaryen I can get my hands on, until they are as dead as their dragons, and then I will piss on their graves.”
Ned knew better than to defy him when the wrath was on him. If the years had not quenched Robert’s thirst for revenge, no words of his would help. “You can’t get your hands on this one, can you?” he said quietly.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard II
Ned does not hold the Targaryens collectively responsible for the deaths of his loved ones, insofar as he’s unwilling to use the Mad King’s unjust actions as an excuse to perpetuate the murder of Targaryen children. Ned is appalled that Robert condones the killing of children and he casts Robert’s hatred towards the dragons as irrational.

Ned did not feign surprise; Robert’s hatred of the Targaryens was a madness in him. He remembered the angry words they had exchanged when Tywin Lannister had presented Robert with the corpses of Rhaegar’s wife and children as a token of fealty. Ned had named that murder; Robert called it war. When he had protested that the young prince and princess were no more than babes, his new-made king had replied, “I see no babes. Only dragonspawn.” Not even Jon Arryn had been able to calm that storm. Eddard Stark had ridden out that very day in a cold rage, to fight the last battles of the war alone in the south. It had taken another death to reconcile them; Lyanna’s death, and the grief they had shared over her passing.
This time, Ned resolved to keep his temper. “Your Grace, the girl is scarcely more than a child. You are no Tywin Lannister, to slaughter innocents.” It was said that Rhaegar’s little girl had cried as they dragged her from beneath her bed to face the swords. The boy had been no more than a babe in arms, yet Lord Tywin’s soldiers had torn him from his mother’s breast and dashed his head against a wall.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard II
When Robert reveals continuing trauma over his defeat of Rhaegar, his vengeance unsatisfied, Ned is oddly silent.

In my dreams, I kill him every night,” Robert admitted. “A thousand deaths will still be less than he deserves.”
There was nothing Ned could say to that. After a quiet, he said, “We should return, Your Grace. Your wife will be waiting.”

- A Game of Thrones Eddard I
Ned is disturbed by the notion that Robert would still hate Rhaegar.

Suddenly, uncomfortably, he found himself recalling Rhaegar Targaryen. Fifteen years dead, yet Robert hates him as much as ever. It was a disturbing notion …

- A Game of Thrones Eddard VIII
Ned’s feelings towards Rhaegar are neutral at worst, whereas he often acknowledges and excuses Robert’s faults, such as his uncontrollable rage and lust. If Ned believes Rhaegar is Jon’s father and that Lyanna willingly left with him, his charitable feelings towards Rhaegar might make sense. But then Ned should also realize Robert’s hatred of Targaryens is rational based on the official narrative involving kidnapping, rape, and murder committed by the dragons. If Ned instead suspects Robert is Jon’s father, it reconciles both his neutral feelings towards Rhaegar and incredulity over Robert’s hatred, as he knows Rhaegar’s only ‘crime’ was crowning Lyanna.
Ned is adept at suppressing bitter memories, so the absence of direct thoughts on Robert’s complicity in Lyanna’s abduction shouldn’t be construed as proof that it didn’t happen; Ned doesn’t think about Rhaegar’s complicity either. It’s noteworthy that we see Ned bury thoughts about the circumstances of Jon’s birth in the barrowlands, which are burial grounds:

“Would that we could,” Ned said, “but we have duties now, my liege … to the realm, to our children, I to my lady wife and you to your queen. We are not the boys we were.”
“You were never the boy you were,” Robert grumbled. “More’s the pity. And yet there was that one time … what was her name, that common girl of yours? Becca? No, she was one of mine, gods love her, black hair and these sweet big eyes, you could drown in them. Yours was … Aleena? No. You told me once. Was it Merryl? You know the one I mean, your bastard’s mother?”
“Her name was Wylla,” Ned replied with cool courtesy, “and I would sooner not speak of her.”
“Wylla. Yes.” The king grinned. “She must have been a rare wench if she could make Lord Eddard Stark forget his honor, even for an hour. You never told me what she looked like …”
Ned’s mouth tightened in anger. “Nor will I. Leave it be, Robert, for the love you say you bear me. I dishonored myself and I dishonored Catelyn, in the sight of gods and men.”
“Gods have mercy, you scarcely knew Catelyn.”
“I had taken her to wife. She was carrying my child.”
“You are too hard on yourself, Ned. You always were. Damn it, no woman wants Baelor the Blessed in her bed.” He slapped a hand on his knee. “Well, I’ll not press you if you feel so strong about it, though I swear, at times you’re so prickly you ought to take the hedgehog as your sigil.”
The rising sun sent fingers of light through the pale white mists of dawn. A wide plain spread out beneath them, bare and brown, its flatness here and there relieved by long, low hummocks. Ned pointed them out to his king. “The barrows of the First Men.”

- A Game of Thrones Eddard II
No one objected to Doran locking Arianne in a tower, nor were people too concerned when Baelor locked his sisters in the Maidenvault. Westerosi men treat women as property, and so Ned could forgive Robert for imprisoning his sister, especially as they were betrothed.

A storm of rose petals blew across a blood-streaked sky, as blue as the eyes of death.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard X
Robert Baratheon is a blue-eyed, death-dealing Storm Lord; this passage shows that Ned is at least subconsciously aware of Robert’s culpability in Lyanna’s presence at the tower of joy. It's also widely misconstrued as depicting blue rose petals, when it's actually fairly clear that the sky is blue and the rose petals are red, streaking the sky like blood...
Robert’s genuine grief over Lyanna’s death may permit Ned to absolve Robert of blame; this grief is the reason Ned gives for their reconciliation, after the deaths of Elia's children drove a wedge between them. Interestingly, Robert’s own death scene parallels Lyanna’s death: a bed of blood, squeezing hands and a weak smile, protecting Robert’s bastards, promise me Ned…

Robert took his hand, fingers squeezing hard. “You are … such a bad liar, Ned Stark,” he said through his pain. “The realm … the realm knows … what a wretched king I’ve been. Bad as Aerys, the gods spare me.”
“No,” Ned told his dying friend, “not so bad as Aerys, Your Grace. Not near so bad as Aerys.”
Robert managed a weak red smile. “At the least, they will say … this last thing … this I did right. You won’t fail me. You’ll rule now. You’ll hate it, worse than I did … but you’ll do well. Are you done with the scribbling?”
“Yes, Your Grace.” Ned offered Robert the paper. The king scrawled his signature blindly, leaving a smear of blood across the letter. “The seal should be witnessed.”
“Serve the boar at my funeral feast,” Robert rasped. “Apple in its mouth, skin seared crisp. Eat the bastard. Don’t care if you choke on him. Promise me, Ned.”
“I promise.” Promise me, Ned, Lyanna’s voice echoed.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard XIII
vs.

“She should be on a hill somewhere, under a fruit tree, with the sun and clouds above her and the rain to wash her clean.”
“I was with her when she died,” Ned reminded the king. “She wanted to come home, to rest beside Brandon and Father.” He could hear her still at times. Promise me, she had cried, in a room that smelled of blood and roses. Promise me, Ned. The fever had taken her strength and her voice had been faint as a whisper, but when he gave her his word, the fear had gone out of his sister’s eyes. Ned remembered the way she had smiled then, how tightly her fingers had clutched his as she gave up her hold on life, the rose petals spilling from her palm, dead and black. After that he remembered nothing. They had found him still holding her body, silent with grief. The little crannogman, Howland Reed, had taken her hand from his. Ned could recall none of it. “I bring her flowers when I can,” he said. “Lyanna was … fond of flowers.”

- A Game of Thrones Eddard I
Once Ned realized that the rebels lied about Lyanna and Rhaegar's disappearance, outing the truth was unthinkable. Too many had already fought and died based on a malicious lie, and the truth would thrust the realm further into rebellion. Ned had a duty to protect what family remained to him, including both his newborn son Robb and Jon Snow, the son of his beloved sister. Yet notice how Ned stopped visiting Robert and never sent envoys to King’s Landing to leverage advantages for the North, despite his favor with the king. It’s as if Ned was avoiding Robert. So perhaps ‘promise me Ned’ was about keeping Jon’s parentage a secret, as Robert might stupidly try to legitimize his son by his beloved Lyanna, raising dangerous questions.

And when you have it, what then? Some secrets are safer kept hidden. Some secrets are too dangerous to share, even with those you love and trust. Ned slid the dagger that Catelyn had brought him out of the sheath on his belt. The Imp’s knife. Why would the dwarf want Bran dead? To silence him, surely. Another secret, or only a different strand of the same web?

- A Game of Thrones Eddard VIII
Ned cannot tell Catelyn the truth of Jon’s parentage because she’s a political climber and may support his legitimization for her own children’s sake. If Jon is the heir to the throne, Arya or Sansa could be married to him. Robb’s claim to Winterfell would not longer be under threat, and he could leverage diplomatic advantages as Jon’s ally. The Tully creed of "Family, Duty, Honor" has imbued Catelyn with fatal blindspots when it comes to advancing her children's interests.
Jon is hidden when Robert comes to visit, consistent with preventing the king from making a connection between Jon's birth and Lyanna's death.

“I glimpsed him once at Winterfell,” the queen said, “though the Starks did their best to hide him. He looks very like his father.”

- A Feast for Crows Cersei IV
Jon takes after his mother Lyanna, and he more closely resembles Robert than Rhaegar, with his dark brown hair and almost black eyes. Varys tells Tyrion he knows of eight bastards fathered by Robert, all black of hair; he says nothing of their eye color, and Varys is manipulative, so it would be unwise to take him at his word. If Maggy the Frog’s prophecy is correct, only about half of Robert’s children are accounted for; others may not resemble Robert so closely. Having a subset of children who resemble you does not guarantee they all will, and it’s not uncommon in real life for people to have a legitimate child who looks different from their siblings. Arya is an example of this, as all her full-blooded siblings take after Catelyn while she’s the only one who looks like Ned.
Ned’s research into couplings between Lannisters and Baratheons show black-haired offspring, and so he assumes the gold will always yield to the coal. There’s no evidence that he also assumes the cold will yield to the coal, that Baratheon seed is dominant over Stark genes. Ned misconstrues how genetics works, and we shouldn’t assume Martin doesn’t understand this. In the real world, it’s possible to have a history of a certain genetic outcome which is broken once enough new blood enters a lineage. In fact, fair-haired Laenor and Laena Velaryon, whose grandmother was Jocelyn Baratheon, demonstrate that Baratheon genetic traits can be diluted.

The seed is strong, Jon Arryn had cried on his deathbed, and so it was. All those bastards, all with hair as black as night. Grand Maester Malleon recorded the last mating between stag and lion, some ninety years ago, when Tya Lannister wed Gowen Baratheon, third son of the reigning lord. Their only issue, an unnamed boy described in Malleon’s tome as a large and lusty lad born with a full head of black hair, died in infancy. Thirty years before that a male Lannister had taken a Baratheon maid to wife. She had given him three daughters and a son, each black-haired. No matter how far back Ned searched in the brittle yellowed pages, always he found the gold yielding before the coal.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard XII
Some think Ned hid Jon’s lineage because Robert would kill Jon if he suspected he was Targaryen, despite Ned’s surprise at Robert’s commitment to murdering Targaryen heirs and despite Ned insisting Robert wouldn’t harm his loved ones.

Ned shook his head, refusing to believe. “Robert would never harm me or any of mine. We were closer than brothers. He loves me. If I refuse him, he will roar and curse and bluster, and in a week we will laugh about it together. I know the man!”
“You knew the man,” she said. “The king is a stranger to you.” Catelyn remembered the direwolf dead in the snow, the broken antler lodged deep in her throat. She had to make him see. “Pride is everything to a king, my lord. Robert came all this way to see you, to bring you these great honors, you cannot throw them back in his face.”

- A Game of Thrones Catelyn II
Ned’s concern for Jon’s life didn’t prevent him from allowing Jon to take a dangerous vocation at the Wall. Sending Jon to the Wall makes even more sense if his potential claim to the throne would cause a political upheaval. This may be true whether he’s Robert or Rhaegar’s son, though it’s more important to keep this secret if he’s the son of Robert, as it has greater potential to damage Ned’s allies. The fact that Ned was willing to lie to Jon about what the Night’s Watch really is, sending him to a bleak, cold penal colony, is in line with Ned being an unwilling liar whose honor falls short when it threatens to undermine his king.

The thought of Jon filled Ned with a sense of shame, and a sorrow too deep for words. If only he could see the boy again, sit and talk with him … pain shot through his broken leg, beneath the filthy grey plaster of his cast. He winced, his fingers opening and closing helplessly. “Is this your own scheme,” he gasped out at Varys, “or are you in league with Littlefinger?”

- A Game of Thrones Eddard XV
Ned recalls Lyanna’s misgivings about Robert’s nature and the promises he made to her after visiting Robert’s bastard by a girl so young he was afraid to ask her age (a girl who incidentally resembles Sansa in age and hair color).

“Robert will never keep to one bed,” Lyanna had told him at Winterfell, on the night long ago when their father had promised her hand to the young Lord of Storm’s End. “I hear he has gotten a child on some girl in the Vale.” Ned had held the babe in his arms; he could scarcely deny her, nor would he lie to his sister, but he had assured her that what Robert did before their betrothal was of no matter, that he was a good man and true who would love her with all his heart. Lyanna had only smiled. “Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature.”
The girl had been so young Ned had not dared to ask her age. No doubt she’d been a virgin; the better brothels could always find a virgin, if the purse was fat enough. She had light red hair and a powdering of freckles across the bridge of her nose, and when she slipped free a breast to give her nipple to the babe, he saw that her bosom was freckled as well. “I named her Barra,” she said as the child nursed. “She looks so like him, does she not, milord? She has his nose, and his hair …”
“She does.” Eddard Stark had touched the baby’s fine, dark hair. It flowed through his fingers like black silk. Robert’s firstborn had had the same fine hair, he seemed to recall.
“Tell him that when you see him, milord, as it … as it please you. Tell him how beautiful she is.”
“I will,” Ned had promised her. That was his curse. Robert would swear undying love and forget them before evenfall, but Ned Stark kept his vows. He thought of the promises he’d made Lyanna as she lay dying, and the price he’d paid to keep them.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard IX
The king buys and lies to virgin whores and he fathers bastards like it’s a competition, but Ned could excuse Robert fathering a bastard on his sister because they were betrothed, after all, and the gods fill men with lust.

She had smiled then, a smile so tremulous and sweet that it cut the heart out of him. Riding through the rainy night, Ned saw Jon Snow’s face in front of him, so like a younger version of his own. If the gods frowned so on bastards, he thought dully, why did they fill men with such lusts? “Lord Baelish, what do you know of Robert’s bastards?”

- A Game of Thrones Eddard IX
Ned thinks about Jon Snow in relation to Robert’s bastards and lusts, then contrasts Robert to Rhaegar who wasn’t the type to visit brothels. Ned thinks that he hadn’t thought of Rhaegar in years; if Jon was Rhaegar’s, wouldn’t Ned think about him more often? This also establishes Ned as not particularly self-aware, as he does in fact think about Rhaegar on page before this.

There was no answer Ned Stark could give to that but a frown. For the first time in years, he found himself remembering Rhaegar Targaryen. He wondered if Rhaegar had frequented brothels; somehow he thought not.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard IX
Ned’s friendship with Robert conditioned him to excuse male adultery, and so if R+L=J, he could excuse Rhaegar’s unfaithfulness to his wife. While Ned may hold himself to a higher standard in his own marriage, he can forgive a man for acting on his natural urges.
Ned does not extend his charitable take on adultery to Cersei, whose crime is not so different from what Lyanna is alleged to have done. Lyanna did not commit incest as Cersei did nor did she forsake her own marriage vows, yet if Ned believes Rhaegar is Jon’s father, he’s accepted that his sister broke her betrothal and disregarded the crown prince’s marriage vows, leaving two young children without their father, and bore a bastard. If Jon is a Targaryen, his lineage may legally permit him to commit incest, which Cersei would see as hypocritical.
Ned’s reaction to Cersei’s infidelity is partly informed by the importance of inheritance and legitimacy in their feudal society. Noble Westerosi women are conditioned to place their duty to their families ahead of their own lusts, a standard which is not imposed on men as seriously. It’s much easier to confirm a child’s mother than it is to establish paternity, which is why women are held to more strict sexual standards. Ned’s frigid sexual relations with Catelyn may even convince him that women are less driven by lust than men. Even so, Ned’s reaction to Cersei’s infidelity was primarily motivated by bias against House Lannister and loyalty to Robert. Consider that Ned hates Jaime, who killed a man who murdered Ned’s family, because vows involving loyalty to one’s king are very important to him.

His sword helped taint the throne you sit on, Ned thought, but he did not permit the words to pass his lips. “He swore a vow to protect his king’s life with his own. Then he opened that king’s throat with a sword.”
“Seven hells, someone had to kill Aerys!” Robert said, reining his mount to a sudden halt beside an ancient barrow. “If Jaime hadn’t done it, it would have been left for you or me.”

- A Game of Thrones Eddard II
Ned is inflexible about his sense of honor when applied to the Lannisters, whom he views as child murderers and oathbreakers, yet Ned bends his ethics for his family and king. For instance, he hates Tywin for his role in the murders of Rhaegar’s children, yet remains loyal to Robert who also condones the murder of children.
Ned took Theon hostage to keep Balon in check, and would have executed him in service to his king. He essentially held a child mortally liable for his father’s actions, which is the same justification Ned uses for rising against Aerys. So would Ned have followed through with executing Theon, despite defying Robert over the assassination of Dany and her unborn child?

Even inside fur-lined gloves, Theon’s hands had begun to throb with pain. It was often his hands that hurt the worst, especially his missing fingers. Had there truly been a time when women yearned for his touch? I made myself the Prince of Winterfell, he thought, and from that came all of this. He had thought that men would sing of him for a hundred years and tell tales of his daring. But if anyone spoke of him now, it was as Theon Turncloak, and the tales they told were of his treachery. This was never my home. I was a hostage here. Lord Stark had not treated him cruelly, but the long steel shadow of his greatsword had always been between them. He was kind to me, but never warm. He knew that one day he might need to put me to death.

- A Dance with Dragons The Prince of Winterfell
Ned also lies for his family, making his indictment of the Lannisters somewhat hypocritical. He claims his wife abducted Tyrion on his orders, when he had in fact ordered her to go home and prepare the north for war. He does not hold Catelyn responsible for the deaths of his men, which Jaime ordered in retaliation for Tyrion’s abduction, no more than he held Robert and his own allies responsible for the indirect consequences of abducting Lyanna and lying about it, including her death and the deaths of his father, brother, and countrymen.

“Pycelle swears it will heal clean,” Robert frowned. “I take it you know what Catelyn has done?”
“I do.” Ned took a small swallow of wine. “My lady wife is blameless, Your Grace. All she did she did at my command.”

- A Game of Thrones Eddard X
If Ned’s mind had not been clouded by the milk of the poppy, he may have had the foresight to understand the danger he placed his own family in by informing Cersei of the discovery of her children’s illegitimacy. He gave them a chance to flee out of concern for the lives of innocents, but sadly, Ned's sense of justice is unable to account for the indirect consequences of actions (except when applied retroactively to people he dislikes) and his mercy backfired. The meeting between Cersei and Ned in the godswood reveals that he would bend his ethics for his own children’s sake.

Ned thought, If it came to that, the life of some child I did not know, against Robb and Sansa and Arya and Bran and Rickon, what would I do? Even more so, what would Catelyn do, if it were Jon’s life, against the children of her body? He did not know. He prayed he never would.

- A Game of Thrones Eddard XII
Ned is thus the type of man who would willingly dishonor himself, lying or even allowing innocents to be killed, for the sake of protecting his own. Even Ned’s final act was a lie, choosing to dishonor himself to protect Sansa.

Her father raised his voice still higher, straining to be heard. “I betrayed the faith of my king and the trust of my friend, Robert,” he shouted. “I swore to defend and protect his children, yet before his blood was cold, I plotted to depose and murder his son and seize the throne for myself. Let the High Septon and Baelor the Beloved and the Seven bear witness to the truth of what I say: Joffrey Baratheon is the one true heir to the Iron Throne, and by the grace of all the gods, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm.”

- A Game of Thrones Arya V
Lord Eddard Stark embodies a simple truth, that the road to hell is paved with the best intentions. He is as grey as the direwolf on his sigil, a man who chose lesser evils out of a genuine desire to do good, who nonetheless perpetuated injustice. Let Ned serve as a lesson to readers, the lesson he should have taken from the dead direwolf in the snow: the man who passes the sentence might swing the sword, but apply due diligence first, and reserve harsh judgement unless guilt is certain. This lesson should be balanced against the understanding that failure to act can be just as harmful as decisive action, as was the case when the quiet wolf allowed the expensive Hand's Tourney to go forth despite the crown's massive debts. Ultimately, even the best among us will be tested with impossible moral dilemmas, and so it's important to have the capacity to show ourselves and others flexibility and forgiveness.

The damning conclusion? That the United States government had escalated the war all the while knowing that it was on the losing side of the equation. The report also confirmed that JFK’s administration had helped to overthrow and assassinate Ngo Dinh Diem, the leader of the South Vietnamese government, which America supported. If our own government had no faith in our allies and our capabilities, then why the hell, readers of the Times and the Post wondered, were we still sending our men to be killed in Vietnam?
Support for the war at home was eroding daily; the protests were increasing, with voices calling, louder and louder, for an end to the conflict. Rebellion was brewing even from within the “silent majority.” Most of the POW/MIA wives had been in this camp for years. They had been trained to be strong government and military supporters, but they were now completely disgusted with Washington politics. Their suspicions about the war and those leading it were confirmed. McNamara was now right up there with Cora Weiss as a target of their ire. They knew to be wary of antiwar figures, but McNamara? Wasn’t he supposed to be on their side?
The Nixon administration was not implicated in the Pentagon Papers, though the president was incensed to see classified government reports leaked to the public. Instead of seeing the papers as a potential help, separating his administration’s policy on Vietnam from those of JFK and LBJ, “the leak of the Pentagon Papers brought forth a profound paranoia in Richard Nixon… The ultimate manifestation of this drive was the White House Special Investigations Unit, informally referred to as the Plumbers, whose first assignment was to raid the offices of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist. Later, members of the group would carry out one final mission, the Watergate break-in, which ultimately cost Nixon the very thing he had sought to defend: his presidency.”

- The League of Wives: The Untold Story of the Women Who Took On the U.S. Government to Bring Their Husbands Home Heath Hardage Lee
Look here to see this series in its full audio/visual glory with greater detail.

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Lots of thanks to u/Killsode-slugcat for helping me work through this chapter with editing.
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Memory transcription subject: Tevri, Venlil Romanticist
Date [standardized human time]: August 11, 2137
With eyes still closed, I stretched my legs and arms, paws pushing up against the inside of my sleeping bag. A sigh of contentment escaped my mouth.
I let the world in—light falling down in shafts that struck my still-waking eyes. No trees were around to provide cover from the rising sun that hung low in the east. The sounds of life surrounded me, occasionally being broken up by particularly strong gusts as well as a hint of something else.
My head turned to that hint, who still slept somewhat soundly off to my side. Last night Jack had set up his own sleeping bag less than an arm’s length from my own, citing our lack of a fire as the reason to gather closer to each other.
He tossed and turned, occasionally, muttering incoherently. At least he’s found some rest. After carrying me for over half of yesterday, he had certainly earned it.
It was actually quite surprising how well he had managed it all. His slim build compared to other humans that I had seen was betrayed by a hidden strength and incredible endurance. I suppose millions of years of evolution tends to allow such a thing.
Some part of me still felt bitter about what he had done the night prior to our last, but it was clear to me that his apology was sincere. I gave a quiet snort. He probably wouldn’t have carried you on your shoulders if he wasn’t at least somewhat sorry.
The covers of my too-big bag were thrown off and I sat up, holding my knocked knees with my paws.
Rocky rolling hills with low-grown shoots of grass lightly waved towards me. The nearby mountain range looked down upon us with its well-kept snow despite the summer season. Even three days of standing beneath them didn’t eliminate their wondrously looming presence.
I reached over to my nearby pack and grabbed my pen and journal. I clung to every thought that passed its way through my mind, marking them down the old fashioned way. There was something special about writing my feelings down on something physical rather than some pad or computer. It felt real in comparison to the alternative.
It was incredible to me how one of, if not the most dangerous planet to be found within known space was simultaneously one of the most fantastically beautiful worlds I ever had the pleasure of setting foot on. What a travesty it would have been had the federation actually managed to glass the biosphere. Ironically it had been the Arxur that prevented such a disastrous outcome. Those same savages had…
“Gah!”
Jack shot upright from where he had lain. He heaved harsh breaths, chest rising and falling as though he had just sprinted up the incline of a hill. I looked on with alarm, but didn’t think to disrupt the startled man. His eyes stared down at the dirt in front of him as he hung his hands between his legs.
“You okay?” I asked. He whipped to look at me like he had forgotten I was there. Slowly, he turned back to face the dirt. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” He took a curt sniff and ran his hands across his face as he took a deep sigh.
He was lying.
The restless sleep, the violent rise into consciousness, the obvious distress within those wild eyes—all signs of nightmares. It had been years now since I last worried about such things, but I knew all too well how difficult they were to deal with.
A thought, as intrusive as it was unwelcome, pushed its way through the crowded thoughts of my mind, forcing my heart to skip a beat. What would be enough to scare a predator—human—to scare a human within their dreams? Instantly, I shoved it back from wherever it had come. He needs you right now, just like how you needed her.
I gently crawled over to the distraught man and set a paw on an arm while he leaned forward. At my touch, he turned his head towards me, staring with those forward-facing eyes. “Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked.
A slight snarl of a smile crossed his face, but no answer came. Jack stood up and stretched his arms outward, leaning back and forth.
“C’mon, let's pack up and head out. S’always good to start out early.” He extended a hand down to me where I sat still. How could he just brush something so terrifying off so easily? My tail flicked absently I guess they always have been a rather resilient species. Why should they be any different mentally? I relented to his proposal, grabbing his hand and allowing him to pull me upright.
Breakfast—much like last night’s meal—consisted of dry pre-prepped rations. Without surrounding trees from which drywood could be scavenged, we were left fireless. The ‘breakfast bars’ as Jack called them were a sufficient substitute for warm food. Every meal with the human increased my interest in the cuisine of his species. I hadn’t imagined it would all be so wonderfully varied and delicious.
The bar itself was chewy, made of oats, filled with dried fruits and sweetened by sugar. Each bite gave a satisfying crunch as my taste buds reveled in the impeccably delightful taste.
After hydrating and filling ourselves with calories, we set off once more on the trail.
This time, I was actually able to walk properly, though less than an hour after we departed, I was left wishing that Jack could scare me sleepless again—that way I could guilt him into carrying me.
While we continued, I walked without thinking much about the placement of my paws. I worried for my human friend. His mind was clearly plagued by something terrible, but the answer of what continued to evade me. The only lead I had were my own experiences, and in chasing that lead, my mind wandered back to the past.
As I was dragged from our home without protest, Devra lambasted our parents. Velnik cowered to the side as he watched the ordeal, helpless with widened eyes. Dad practically had to peel my sister away from mom as I was shoved into our vehicle. The echo of her shouts faded away.
It was the first time my parents admitted me for predator disease screenings.
An iron grip held my hand and led me forward through the stark featureless halls of the facility. A glance over my shoulder revealed my parents walking along. They dared not to risk a look in my direction. Tears welled at the edge of my eyes as the echoes of distant screams shocked my ears and flooded my brain with fear-chemicals.
My tail wrapped around my body and my ears bent towards the ground. Why did they want to throw me in here with the monsters? All I did was explore.
The facility worker threw me in a chair within a purely white room other than the single large black wall. From the ceiling hung a projector that faced one of the three white surfaces. After the worker left, my eyes floated through the room, narrowing at a sight that practically screamed of its existence. Dark lines were scrawled into the furthest corner of the sterile chamber.
I didn’t have the time to think about its implications when the screen clicked on and the lights dimmed, enhancing the image before me.
The metal chair fell backward with me in it, creating a resounding clang that bounded back and forth across the walls.
My hands slipped and slid across the slick floor, carrying my body backwards. This scramble led the wall to smash against my back. Without a thought, my claws joined the countless other marks of those who had come before me.
A towering, onyx-shaded visage of the malevolent beast prowled beyond the edge of my vision, obscured by tears of terror that practically blinded me. The blood-orange eyes glowed greedily and its mouth was stuck in a perpetual snarl. Viscera of a horrifically familiar color dribbled down its chin from where the meat was in the Arxur’s razor-sharp teeth.
With a click, the sanguine show moved forward to yet another horrific display. Another click. Another. One more. Click. Click. Click. Silence.
My eyes were as raw as my bloodied paws. Their scraping and scrabbling joined me with the other souls who had faced this same experience. When the lights flicked on and the worker came back to collect me, I curled up trying and failing to back away. She stood me up, patting me down before pulling me from the room. Everything was a collective white blur, compressed into a single moment of unfocused voices until I heard the vehicle’s door slam.
The ride home was silent as I leaned my head against the padded surface of my seat. Shallow breaths rose and fell from my chest while Mom and Dad stared ahead. They hadn’t looked at me once since we left the facility—or even talked to me—since we left the facility.
Among the many questions I had, one clung to the surface of my mind before being swallowed by its sea of screams. Why?
When at last we arrived at home, I barely even noticed. Only when the door to the passenger cabin flung open did I somewhat rise from my stupor. A sudden surprise wrapped around me and pulled me from the car, dragging away from my supposed guardians.
In an instant, I was rushed to my room and placed upon the familiar comfort of my bed before being coated by two layers of warmth; one was the plush cloth of a blanket and the other the fluffy warmth of my sister’s fur. “It’s ok, Tev. You’re home. You’re safe.” My empty eyes had no tears left to give, so Devra lent me hers.
You’re home. You’re safe.
“Tev? Tevri?”
My repeated name yanked me from the memory. Ugh, I’ve got to stop wandering off like that.
“You in there sheep?”
With a grumble, I responded. “I told you to stop calling me that.”
Jack uttered a mischievous chuckle. “C’mon, let's get over this next hill then break for lunch. Sure seems you could use a rest.” Despite it going unnoticed moments prior, I now felt my heart pumping hard and each breath heaved just as harshly. A short break will probably do me some good.
Together, we crested the hilltop and sat down both our packs and ourselves. I greedily lapped up water from my bottle while the man beside me calmly took several swigs from his own canteen. The food he grabbed was a pair of packaged items that he called ‘pasta salad.’
The small noodles were coated in a layer of creamy sauce and mixed with a variety of colorful vegetables that I didn’t recognize, but just like everything else cooked up by these humans, it was delicious. The sweet, creamy sauce contrasted nicely with the savory taste of the noodles and the soft texture of the pasta paired with the lovely crunch of the vegetables made for a wonderful meal.
As I munched on my food, the wind lazily played with my tail. My heart drummed onward, steadying into an agreeable rhythm before finally, my breathing leveled out.
A field of purple flowers greeted us, climbing and falling with the rolling land. Down below us was the river we had loosely followed, bordered by nondescript bunches of shrubbery. Rapid white waters splashed up and against rocks, breaking the flow and sending up spray.
When together we finished our food, we sat there, enjoying the world around us. “So, Tevri,” as Jack spoke, I met his forward eyes, “we’ve been out here for two days now and I still know next to nothing about you. Why don’t you tell me a bit more ‘bout yourself.”
The sudden question caught me by surprise, but I tried my best to answer anyway. “There isn’t much to tell. I write stories and poetry about the nature of worlds I’ve visited.”
“Well, you must be one hell of a writer to throw around money like you do.”
At the compliment, I felt a rush of warmth to my face. “I—”
Jack’s calm demeanor became one of surprise in an instant. “Is your face ‘sposed to do that?” A pair of my paws clapped to my face, trying and failing to hide the spreading orange.
“Y-yes!” I squeaked. “It’s p-perfectly fine.”
“Huh, right.” He didn’t sound convinced in the slightest. “Well, uh, what about your family? You’ve met mine already, why don’t you tell me about yours?”
Just as the orange began to fade away, a shroud of mist met my eyes and my voice sunk with my ears. “I’d rather not.” The whiplash of jumping from a sense of contentment, to embarrassment, to sad longing was jarring to say the least.
“Ah.” He held his silence for a moment, allowing the blowing breeze and the distant rush of water to fill the space between.
“I’m sorry.”
“S-sorry? Sorry for what?”
Jack gave a huff. “You know it's funny really. You Venlil, us Humans. I never really saw it before, but even just a few days around you, it’s shown me just how similar our people really are.”
Again, wind and water.
“If it means anything, I’ve felt your loss.”
What?! How does he know? How could he possibly know?
He must have picked up my confusion before he responded. “After the battle of Earth I got used to hearing that answer of yours.”
Oh.
Jack rose, swinging his pack around his shoulders. “C’mon sheep, sun’s not getting any higher. Let's get going.”
“YOU—!” The dour mood was immediately washed away by my guide’s hearty laughter. Again with the emotional whiplash.
It was amazing how easily he managed to do that. Try as I might, I couldn’t stay mad at him. As I shook my head, I followed my guide’s motions and grabbed my bag to join him.
For a while we walked quietly, but once again, Jack tried to strike up a conversation. “So, you mentioned you’ve visited other worlds. What were they like?”
I gave the human equivalent of a shrug with my tail. “Some were better than others, but for the most part, they were quite beautiful.”
“You have any favorites?”
My ears perked up. “Oh yes! The sky cities of Nishtal were incredible. Dwelling among the clouds, it was a rather uplifting experience.” Jack groaned with a smile still on his face.
“That might be one of the worst puns I’ve ever heard.” In response, I simply chuckled.
“Nishtal, huh?” The smile on his face faded. “That’s the world of feathered sacks-of-shit, right?”
“What? The Krakotl? Don’t be dense now, they aren’t all that bad.”
Jack scoffed. “That’s easy for you to say. They didn’t try to wipe the Venlil from existence.”
“If they succeeded during the battle of earth, they very well could have. Not that it matters anymore. Nishtal’s skies are clouded by the ash of their once-lush swamps and their cities have been plucked from the skies. Their world died.”
Jack gave a gruff grunt. “What goes around comes around I guess.”
I was genuinely shocked at what I heard. The anger that began to bubble within me was not the same lighthearted stuff from earlier. “How can you say something like that?”
“They brought it upon themselves,” he barked.
“That bastard Kalsim was the one who brought destruction to his people and you know it. Billions of Krakotl were killed or captured by betterment. Can you honestly tell me, or even yourself, that any species deserves such a fate?”
Silence.
“No. No I guess I can’t” Mentally, I gave a sigh of relief.
With my tail, I gave him a gentle flick. “The Krakotl are functionally endangered now, you know? They may have killed a billion humans, but for each life taken, tens of their own were paid.”
My voice began to choke. “I had—have—friends among the Krakotl. If you think that the mourning you humans experienced was harsh, I just want you to think; how would you feel if less than a percent of your people survived death or capture”
These words of mine were followed by an air of silence. I wasn’t sure what it was exactly, but something I had said clearly struck a chord with the man. Unlike me, Jack seemed to ground himself in reality, but for the first time since I met him, his distant unfocused eyes made it clear enough that his mind was elsewhere.
The remainder of the day flew by beneath this same blanket of silence.
We passed from the wide grassy knolls into a sparse forest that was more brush than tree. The trail led beneath their branches and through the tall shrubbery, rarely veering one way or the other.
When we eventually stopped to make camp for the evening, the sun was still slightly above the horizon. The campsite was similar to the one we had stopped at on our first day. An old steel fire-pit was set in the middle and a steel food container lay to the side.
Even as we set up, the cold quiet remained.
Progress was slow. Jack usually did the majority of the work, but tonight, his movements were taken with less purpose than I was used to. More than once, his hands fumbled, dropping something only for him to robotically reach down and pick it up again.
Once he did finally unpack his belongings, he left to find wood for the fire. At least this time, I found myself less frightened than when he had last done so. The deafening silence of my thoughts was more disconcerting than the idea of any hunters prowling nearby.
Whatever I had said, it didn’t just strike a chord. No, this had shaken him. Not even those nightmares of his had affected him this deeply.
In much the same way that I hadn’t wanted to talk about my own family, it was clear that whatever this was, he had no desire to elaborate further. I did find it odd however that only after mentioning the near-annihilation of the Krakotl did he seem to change. Perhaps it had to do with whoever he had lost? If this was the case, then I couldn’t fully blame him for his hatred towards the Krakotl. Grief is a powerful accelerant for the fires of rage.
On the other paw, my poor heart broke for the poor avians. So many lost. So few left. When the news had arrived back on Venlil prime, I devoted every moment possible to comforting my grieving friends; to Dualo, Oqui, Icatl and Haiula.
For some though, the grief of their new reality was too strong. Several of my dear friends had been unable to overcome that grief. My ears fell and my head bowed. If nobody else would remember them, I would ensure I never forgot them. They deserved that much.
Despite the clouds looming over my mind, my ears perked up at the sound of footfalls and I turned to see a bundle beneath Jack’s arms. Minutes later, a brilliant blaze burned before us.
It felt good to have a fire again. The protective warmth felt like a familiar embrace. From my pack, I grabbed the same blanket my guide had lent me the day before and wrapped it across my body.
While I found myself shrouded in comfort, Jack prepared our food above the pit. It was yet another warm meal of packaged food. The smell of spice wafted up to the tips of my taste buds as he stirred it about with a metal ladle.
The clink of utensils against our metal bowls rose above the crackling flames. Their sun still peeked out from behind the trees, though soon enough, it fell and with it, came the night’s chill.
Countless stars that you simply didn’t get to see on Venlil Prime appeared in the night sky. A glance told me that I wasn’t the only one impressed by their appearance. My wide field of vision managed to capture nearly the entire sky. I wonder, which of those stars is home?
A gust of wind blew by sending shivers down my spine. The effect of the Wendigo’s story hadn’t been completely lost on me, but the terror it inspired had at least died down to a manageable amount. Staying near to Jack certainly helped.
Speaking of him, I’d had enough of this silence.
“Hey Jack, how would you like to hear a campfire story?” I asked, tossing aside the quiet that had covered.
“Hmph. A promise is a promise. Didn’t really have a fire last night to tell a story ‘round did we. Guess it’s only fair to give you a chance.”
My tail gave a flick of excitement at his agreeance. “I must warn you, this is a bit less of a story and more of a poem. It’s one of the last few that I wrote before my travels across the Federation ended. It isn’t quite as long of a tale as that Wendigo story you told me, but it means a lot to me.
Jack gave a thoughtful nod. “Very well, I call this poem ‘The Wandrer’s Curse.’”
“Across the stars we wandrers go, not caring much for threat or foes, The skies we see are not our own, But from them wonder’s always shown.
From Nishtal’s clear and crystal skies, To Fahl where golden deserts lie, And ‘cross the cradle’s fruitful lands, Our own horizons do expand.
It is amidst these very sights, That we the wandrers oft delight, For friends we seek and friends we find, Across the worlds of species kind.
Thru mountains, oceans and the woods, Where those long past once walked and stood, The wandrers seek to find the past; A simpler time, no clouds o’er cast.
Despite the friends which we have made, The clouds above us cast their shade, Upon the surface of our minds, And seek our hearts with chains to bind.
It is our lot to flee from pain, Brought on by smashing, lashing rains. Til weary broken and undone, We fall with legs which fail to run.
But such is life—that beautiful thing, That brings one joy and suff’ring. So with this final cloudless verse, Remember thee, the wandrer’s curse.”
At the end of my poem, the crackling fire picked up where my words left off. My eyes raised to the heavens once more and I realized just how wonderful this life was. There was something truly sublime about existing right here during this exact moment; under the stars, surrounded by trees the whistling, beside a warm fire that staved off the cold.
Sharing it with Jack made it that much better.
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https://pix4free.org/assets/library/2020-12-13/originals/alaska022.jpg (Cover Image)
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I’m doing the main mission where you raid the bandit camp, owned by the guy that killed your family or something like that, anyways i did the hideout as per usual, until I got to the very end, the ai said something and then got executed, but as soon as I press the proceed button on the execution menu it just brings me back to that dialogue with the bandit, I’ve tried at it for about 10 mins and it just keeps repeating over and over again. I have no idea what has caused this and I need help.

Hey all! Kenny from The Father's Group here! It's that time of year again and man.... y'all in for a treat! Join us next weekend on June 17th and 18th for the 3rd Annual Juneteenth Central Oregon celebration. This year's theme is Discovering our Roots!
https://www.juneteenthcentralor.com
We've had some amazing partners contribute to helping us bring this festival to fruition this year! We've also launched the first ever "Journey to Juneteenth Scavenger hunt" that takes you all over Bend to find clues and that will end on the first day of the Festival! As stated on the following link, the first leg of the scavenger hunt is located at Open Space Event Studios. Here's also another hint: head down to Old Mill... Check the Flags, check the kiosks... it's ON!
https://www.juneteenthcentralor.com/journey-to-juneteenth
We've got a RIDICULOUS Menu set up for you this year courtesy of Dave "Supadave" Chisholm. Jamaican Jerk BBQ Ribs and the Big Messy? Come on!!!
https://www.juneteenthcentralor.com/menu
We have great entertainment and panels planned for the Barry Washington Jr Entertainment Stage:
https://www.juneteenthcentralor.com/entertainment
This year and moving forward, we have named our Educational Plaza after Deshaun Adderley and the programming, exhibits, and participation are HUGE this year. From the Black History Tent, the N Word Exhibit, games and crafts for kids, Living History actors courtesy of High Desert Museum and Oregon Black Pioneers, stories with Dr Dalton Miller Jones, and much more, the Deshaun Adderley Educational Plaza is going to be FIRE!
Given that the theme this year is Discovering Our Roots, we have taken a big leap in helping Black Central Oregonians do just that. There is a dynamite service called African Ancestry that we have opened it up for Black Central Oregonians to go through and get detailed, micro focused analytics on their DNA and quite possibly connect back to their TRIBE of origin, not just region or country. More info here:
https://www.juneteenthcentralor.com/african-ancestry
And lastly, we have a music video that is footage shot by us last year, edited by myself and the music is actually a song that was written and will be performed by DayDay (the President of our board), Supadave (Lerdamercy) and Sean Alan on vocals. You can check THAT out as a taste of what's to come: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIKyfUzJwWI
Hit me up here if you have any questions. So. Freakin. Exhausted. Excited!!!

I went to a Dave and Busters in Southern California yesterday, and I took pictures of some arcade games in action. Unfortunately, three young girls playing “Spin-N-Win” mistakenly thought I was directly taking pictures of them, so they talked to the manager and accused me of taking pictures of them. The manager and a security guard confronted me, and I told the manager that I wasn’t trying to take pictures of the girls. The manager didn’t believe me, and he and the security guard escorted me out of the building. I told the manager I was sorry for making the girls feel uncomfortable, even though it wasn’t my intention. The manager was friendly and said that it was ok, as long as I didn’t do it again. I emailed Dave and Busters corporate and let them know about this incident. I’m waiting to hear back from them about whether I can return to that location in the future or not.
I wasn’t trying to take pictures of specific people or invade anyone’s privacy, I was taking pictures of the arcade games for my social media (many people do this). I don’t feel I did anything wrong, I believe this was all a big misunderstanding.
What are your thoughts?

I am new here, but am looking at ways to save money. Particularly now because I will need to be more frugal in September and October. I was wondering what tips some of you might have when it comes to eating out or making food for yourself to treat yourself to save money? I cringe at the amount of money I spend sometimes when buying lunch or dinner. I order takeout about once a week.
I started buying small bottles of creamer once in a while to make my own iced coffee drink instead of paying $5 or $6 for one drink at Dunkin. I am willing to put the time in by making something special for myself at home rather than spending $20+ on takeout.
Another big money sink for me is going to Dave & Buster's. I stopped going as often because of how expensive it is. Instead I will go to my local bowling alley and take advantage of the deals they have. I don't know how to phraae the question in a way that it would be helpful for me, but I am interested in seeing what you all have to say about it.

How do I make the games interesting? Bowling, skee ball, pitching machine, wack a goblin - I don't want it to just be dex rolls.

I had it working for a little bit but it stopped working. Now it will appear in MCM and none of its features work. I've tried moving it around my load order in Mo2, I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling, and I've tried updating to the newest version but nothing seems to work.
Here's my mod list if it helps
# This file was automatically generated by Mod Organizer.
+Buffout 4
-Workshop Framework Script Override
+Pip-Boy CC Fix
+Rusty Face Fix - Latest Version
+Addres Library
+F4z Ro D'oh
+Text Input Menu
+Rename Anything 2.6.12
+SUP F4SE Plugin
+Sprint Stuttering Fix
+settlement limits slashed
+Workshop Framework
+Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch
+High FPS Physics Fix
+RobCo Patcher
+Mod Configuration Menu 1.39
+Armor and Weapon Keywords Community Resource (AWKCR)
+Armorsmith Extended
+Faster Terminal Displays (20x) Creation Kit Version
+NPC Level Scaling
+SettlementMenuManagerMainFile
+F4MS
+NISTRON EEE Vol1 1.14
+extended dialogue interface
+Theatre of the Wasteland 1.1
+Videos of the Wasteland 2.6
+Fallout 4 High Heels System
+Alysraza Tattoos (LooksMenu - CBBE - SHB - EN - FR)
+DNX Body Tattoos (LooksMenu Overlays)
+GTM Overlay Vol.2 Female CBBE
+GTM Overlay Vol.1 Female CBBE Ligth and Dark
+RutahTattooPack_FO4
+LooksMenu Body Tattoos (CBBE)(EVB or Vanilla)
+Tobe face texture pack
+eye refection
+The K Makeup
+The Eyes of Beauty Fallout Kaleidoscope Edition - All-in-One
+Extended Face Sculpting Main File - AIO Installer
+WX Hair Colors - Nuka World Compatible
+WX Hair Colors
-Uniform Eyes - Regular Version
+Collection of textures and presets
+Sporty Underwear
+8K Realistic Skin Textures - CBBE - Fusion Girl - ABeauty - Unique Player Compatible-
+CBBE Head Rear Fix Remake
+Skeletal Adjustments for CBBE
+Caliente's Beautiful Bodies Enhancer -CBBE-
+Brown Face bug fix script update
+HiPoly Faces REDUX - Seamless Kit (CBBE-TWB)
+BodySlide and Outfit Studio -
+ASE 2.0.2 No Bunker Hill or Hangman's Alley
+Looks Menu Customization Compendium Fix INI
+LooksMenu
+Looks Menu Customization Compendium
+Tactical Reload Framework
+Pip-Boy Flashlight
+Shield Framework
+SKKDynamicTimescale_009
+SKKDyanmicTimescale_MCM_006
+SKKCombatStalkers_26.1
+SKK Combat Stalkers - MCM Settings Menu
+SKKFastStartNewGame_020
+SKKFastMinutemen_004
+SKKFastBOS_001
+Quieter Settlements
+See-Through-Scopes
+Nuka World Add-On (with TS Far Harbor Compatibility)
+True Storms Wasteland Edition v1.4
+Darker Nights 1.11p6
+Place (Fallout4 1.10.163 - latest release)
+CRP-Addon-ConcordExteriorSettlement_0.9
+ConcordRestorationProject_0.9
+New Equipment Overhaul (NEO)
+Legendary Effect Overhaul (LEO)
+Equipment and Crafting Overhaul (ECO) - Redux
+Companion Infinite Ammo and Unbreakable Power Armour - SINGLE
+Fixed Colonial Lampposts V1.01 - Homemaker Req
+Clean Shacks Compatibility
+Improved Map with Visible Roads
+Power Armor to the People
+Legendary Modification
+Cheat Terminal
+Ammo Counter Framework
+Bullet Counted Reload - v.2.00
+KS Hairdos Physics
+Commonwealth Cuts 2.5.1
+CC's Improved Hair Colors - 3.0
+512 Standalone Hair Colors (1 ESP)
+Ponytail Hairstyles by Azar v2_5a - BA2 version
+Militarized Minutemen
+We Are The Minutemen
+Militarized Minutemen - Uniforms Patches and Insignias Addon v2.3 (.BA2 Archive Version)
+Military Grade FC
+Enhanced Blood Textures
+More Blood and Bits -
+Better Settlers
+Manufacturing Extended expanded
+Manufacturing Extended - Far Harbor Addon
+ANiceOakTree's Hairstyles
+Sleek Styles - A Hairstyle Pack
+Lots More Female Hairstyles v. 1.33
+Homemaker - Expanded Settlements
+Settlement Objects Expansion Pack
+Wasteland Imports 1.52
+DOOM II SSG
+Doom_Gal_CBBE
+America Rising - A Tale of the Enclave 1-1-2 - The Oil Rig Update
+America Rising - A Tale of the Enclave
+Leveled List Scripts - Hotfix
+Shield Integration Pack
+Random Encounter Framework
+More Glow
+BlueLaserCartridge
+BlueLaserBeam 0.2
+Automatron Unlocked
+AutomatronSecuritron20170701
+WET
+MOON
+X-01 Tesla Upgrade Kit
+Clean Wasteland Workshop
+Plutonium and Quantum Spell Patch ESL
+Quantum Creatures - EN Plugin
+Quantum Creatures - Resources
+Plutonium Creatures V 1.10
+Clean Settlement Homemaker Greenhouses
+Manufacturing Extended
+20 Leagues Under the Sea - Vault 120
+Enclave X-02 Power Armor 0.401
+Suit Up
+Enclave X-02 Chem Station Recipe - ESPFE
+X-02 Factions Al-In-One
+X-02 Factions Get Free
+Hellfire X-03 Power Armor 0.21
+Hellfire X-03 Chem Station Recipe - ESPFE
+X-03 Factions All-In-One
+X-03 Factions Get Free
+Enclave Officer Uniform
+Enclave Officers Uniform (CBBE Edition)
+Enclave Settlement Kit
+Enclave Gear Pack
+Enclave Remnants
+Enclave X-02 Power Armor Patch
+Enclave Officers Uniform Patch
+Synth Power Armor
+Bastion - Soviet Power Armor
+Red Shift PA
+Classic Advanced Power Armor
+Liberty Power Armor Version 2.3
+Clean Settlement Greenhouses
+Clean Barns Painted
+TES-51 Power Armor Update 1.2
+T 65 Power Armor
+T 65 Power Armor - East Brotherhood of Steel Paint
+T51c Power Armor
+Tumbajamba Raider Power Armor
+Raider Power Armor Crafting
+Vault Tec PA
+MW JOKR
+MW Strela-P
+Honey Badger - Main
+BOCW Nail Gun - Ammo Crafting
+BOCW Nail Gun
+T-49 - Armor of the Storyteller 1.1
+Leveled Lists Integration
+Murdering Chainsaw
+BlasTech E-11 Version 1.5
+Radvolver 1.2
+Gamma Knife and Bayonet
+Dual 44 1.1 - ESL
+Dual Radvolvers
+More Nuka Cola and Vim
+Nuka-Cola Flavors for the Commonwealth
+NukaNukeArtillery
+Kirby
+Nuka Cola Refigerated Display Case
+ptrs41_v1.142_BA2 archive
+Tactical Combat Swimwear (Extended Version)
+M1 Garand
+M1911A1
+The Lightsaber 3.7
+Service Rifle
+Mauser
+Mauser Family Redux
+BFV PPK with TR
+The Sturmgewehr 44
+CollectionBigGunsW
+AtomicPowerStation
+Nick Valentine Reborn - Compatibility Fix
+Valentine REBORN - HD Retexture - V2 - Red Eyes
+Master Sword and Sacred Grove 2K Textures
+Settlement in the Sacred Grove
+American Flag - T45 Armor
+win1897_v2.0_Scripted
+Tomb Raider CBBE
+Wrap Up Outfit
+AF2011A1 - NPC Leveled List
+AF2011A1
+Chilling Tales for Dark Nights (OWR-Boston)
+MtnDew stimpack texture 1.2
+Mountain Dew RadAway
+Commonwealth Stormtroopers 2.0
+Institute Portal Gun Version 1.51
+Workshop Synth Production
+Tunnel Snake Jacket Converted to CBBE
+Prey Armor Converted to CBBE
+Nuka-Cola Machine Retexture 2K 1.1 (fix)
+Nuka-Cola Bottlecap Replacer
+Nuka Recipe Book 2K Retextures 1.0 - ESP
+Nuka-Cola Workshop Armors Converted to CBBE
+Graphic T-shirts Converted to CBBE
+Detective Outfit Converted to CBBE
+Chinese Stealth Suit Converted to CBBE
+Captain Cosmos Outfit Converted to CBBE
+Riverside Settlement ESL flagged ESP
+OSIPR
-Metrocop
+S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Inspired Bottles
+Stalker's Vodka
+Catwoman CBBE
+COCO Ahegao TShirt
+Ahegao Face Mask
+Generic Radium Rifle
+Advanced Plasma Pistol - Standard
+Weapon Wall Racks 1.1
+Weapon Rack Extended 1.3 - Nuka World
+Blue's Minutemen Flag Pack (Standalone)
+Vending Machines
+Pristine Workshop Assets SMM Patch
+Pristine Workshop Assets
+Slocum Joes Vendor Mats
+Slocum's Joe Auto Diner - Main
+Slocum's Joe Manufacturing
+UniversityPointSettlementSPE
+Universal Disassembler
+Simpson's Gun
+Robocop auto 9
+MW PP19 Bizon
+Type_81_PrecisionTacos
+Type 11
+- Automatic Assault Rifle - Powerful Audio Overhaul
+WWI French Army Items
+The Hello Kitty Hand Axe of DOOM
+Laser Garand Final I hope lol
+Killable Children 1.2.7.1 - All Dlc
+vtaw jumpsuit bodyslide
+Vtaw Maxy Dress Main
+Vtaw Sonya Bodyslides
+Vtaw Sonya Main
+Vtaw Widowmaker Bodyslide
+Vtaw Widowmaker
+Dark Disciple Cowl
+JetPack CTD fix for
+BNPA And NAVI Power Armor 1.03
+Enclave Operators CBBE
+Enclave Operator
+Gunner Operator 2.0 - Bodyslide (CBBE and Uni-Boob)
+Gunner Operator 2.0
+Private Military Company - CBBE Uniboob Bodyslide
+Atlas Summit Redux
+Captain Zao Uses Type 52 Pistol
+Chinese Compact Pistol
+WD_CAK_ANIMS
+Chinese Assault Rifle Stand Alone
+Right Handed Handmade Rifle
+Treasure Island - Version ENG
+Fallout - 76 - C.A.M.P
+FalloutShock Apartment
+Rapture - Main File
+The Bounty Office
+WW2SOVHair - ESL FLAGGED
+WW2HEERHair - ESL FLAGGED
+Communist Army's outfit
+MP412 REX
+MP-40 with 4k Textures
+SVT-40
+Nuka-World Plus 1.1
+SSEX for SKE users
+Settlement Keywords Expanded v1.60
+NanoSuit
+Grease Gun SMG
+The Train - Version 4
+Plunger Gun
+M1928A1_Thompson
+FG-42
+Classic Combat Shotgun
+TR patch
+Classic Firing Sound
+Level List Inject
+Hotfix 4
+Intervention
+Heavy Helmet Maska-1SCH
+ToughGirlAttire
+Submersible Power Armor Redux Version 1.2
+Submersible PA Version 1.7
+Cre Plugsuits
+M203 - 2K
+PEACEKEEPER
+AK74M - Assault Rifle
+AKM - Assault Rifle
+Proton Axe With Inversal
+Remington 1858 NMA 1.2
+DC-15A 1.3
+StarWarWeapons
+MoreSettlementAttacks.rar
+Mechanist Omega - An Antagonist Quest Mod
+M60-M60E3 FO4
+M24 Stielhandgranate
+Russian Recon Pack
+MakarovPM
+Lewis Gun 1.0.1 - ESL
+Luger - Main File
+Auto Revolver
+Webley 1913 - Main file
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+AnotherOne SKS Type 56
+AnotherOne PPS-43 - Update
+AnotherOne PPS-43 - Ammo Counter Framework support
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+Private Contract
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+LKs Fallout Ladies . Cait (HiPoly) Replacer
+Shino Clothes
+Kel-Tec Sub 2000
+Accuracy International AX50
+Girly Animation
+Motoko Kusanagi outfit
+B.Y.O.P
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+Piercing collection
+Bodyslide Vtaw Wardrobe 2
+VtawWardrobe2
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+Vtaw Kasuga Main
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+Vtaw 2022 Xmas Update 1.1
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+Vtaw Xmas 2021 Main
+Vtaw Miranda Bodyslides
+Vtaw Miranda Main
+Vtaw Kitana Bodyslides
+Vtaw Kitana Main
+Vtaw Jade Bodyslides
+Vtaw Jade Main
+lePiercings Bodyslide visibility mod
+lePiercings CBBE
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*Unmanaged: ESPExplorerFO4

Hello everyone,
After my last week's post a Wholesome rickshaw ride, a lot of you requested me to write about another experience I've had in the city, this particular one is about a big fancy convoy I saw in Bandra last week.
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El gran convoy de Decepticons
I had just finished my weekly football game at Andrew’s, and I wanted to get myself some coffee. It was going to be a long night for me; I wanted to have a head start on the next week’s workload. I decided to walk, I always like to walk down the tiny streets of Bandra while the rest of Mumbai was busy doing their best impression of NYC or Singapore. This tiny part of Bandra was happy being a small village somewhere in the forgotten parts of Portugal with its narrow lanes, Quaint houses crowned with Terracotta tiles, giving them a rustic look. These houses were only separated from the street by a tiny compound wall and an old rusty gate, both of which have seen many layers of paint fade off, a mark of their unrewarding duty of guarding many generations, watching familiar faces move on to new horizons. That was their curse, They were destined to be there for as long as they could stand the test of time. The gate was armed only with a humble latch, a metal bar with a lever which was out of kilter with rest of the structure but fixed itself into a hole in the wall. The compound walls were draped in shrubbery, occasionally a branch of Bougainvillea or Jasmine would spill out over the rounded edges of the wall. However, the overwhelming beauty of the sight was just a masquerade, as underneath those pretty colours were exposed pieces of glass that would pierce through your skin if you were considering leaping over the wall into the compound. The ancient art of deceit is unparalled I thought to myself.
This little island stretching from Hill road till Linking road, is protected by high-rise buildings towering over it like Titans boasting their armors of concrete that are coated in glass, shiny lights & glamour. They are tasked with warding off any evils that may intend on harming the innocence of this Promised Land. Man, I love walking through these streets, each time I explore a new detail. Being a Sunday evening, a lot of windows were occupied and I’d frequently lock eyes with an empty stare from a dimly lit balcony or a laughing Pedro uncle leaning over the balcony, looking down on to the street whilst speaking to his friend in the ‘Gelf’. I felt like I was being watched, but I didn’t feel paranoid at all. I looked certainly out of place in my sporting gear as compared to the shirt sleeves, night gowns or stained Banyans of my onlookers. I felt like I was the boy representing the little town, marching back from a big show-down at the colosseum. I was not in a hurry to get my coffee and I was certainly counting my steps. Every once in a while I’d cross a kitchen window slightly ajar where I’d hear a cacophony of stainless steel utensils being handled with diligent urgency. I’d be greeted with a violent hiss coming from a pressure cooker that would fill my breath with the rustic smell of dal with a dash of turmeric or the earthy and crusty aroma of curry leaves dancing in hot oil, you could tell there’s Fish curry for dinner.
I stumbled upon a familiar sight. I had seen this house before, which meant I was almost arriving at my destination. I remembered because I read the time stamp on the house the first time I saw it, ‘1935’ it read, It was painted in a lighter caramel coat which you couldn’t discern without really squinting your eyes because it was masked by the hue of orange street lights in the dark. Lucky for me I’ve seen it many times in the day so I knew. The house had a large courtyard which was completely barren, but it was the only property which had trees inside it, the Villa itself had lots of windows. Every time you’d try to count the number of windows, you’d find yourself missing out on one and then repeat this fruitless activity from the start.
I reached the main road, and the subtlety of the sights I was enjoying started fading away. Down the entire stretch of the main road, there were shops, stores, street hawkers, and small cafes planted at regular intervals. It was time to put on my earphones. I walked past groups of people loudly talking to each other, some were pointing at one of the storefronts, some Hawkers arguing with their customers, “Aaj subeh hi fresh maal aya hain madam, Seedha export wala container se utha ke laya hain”. I played Bob Dylan on my phone to drown out the noise a little. I walked past a group of smartly dressed women preparing to walk into a café. One of them shouted, “What? This is a café? I thought we were really going to crack nuts, dude!” which caused everyone around her to laugh. I thought it was funny too but I was careful not to smile or give an impression that I was eaves-dropping. I get nervous around attractive women, I really do. Besides, I’m sure she wouldn’t enjoy Bob Dylan so there was no point in sticking my neck out.
My destination was right across the street, It was almost routine for me to visit Starbucks post a football game. Buying over-priced coffee is the easiest way to fit amongst the rich and the fancy types. Once you step inside and you have practiced everything you want to say to the Barista verbatim you blend right in. They know you’re one of them, I can’t even imagine being one of the folks who hold up the line not knowing what they want to order, or ask silly questions like what does Tall mean? Or Grande mean? Or Venti mean? They all mean the same dummy but the cup sizes differ, I hope they never change the menu, I’m worried I’ll blow my cover.
I entered the coffee shop which triggered the air curtain fixed above the carefully wiped glass door, The entire store was filled with the violent shriek of the mechanical whirring of the device, I drew some curious gazes that looked up from their books or laptops to enquire who had walked in as I got completely draped by the cold air gushing down on me, I do it all the time too, I always look up to see who has walked in. What if it’s a famous person or a runaway bride or a widowed man with his toddler? I stayed back for a bit, fanning my shirt, subtly announcing that I had come back from some heavy sporting activity and that this is not even an event for me but merely a routine. I was not startled by the attention I drew because I was well-versed with my routine once I stepped up to order. It all went so smooth, I narrated my order word for word with careful and timely pauses so that the Barista and the person behind me carefully registered everything I wanted in my drink. I imagined the person behind me thinking “wow, he knows his coffee”. By the time I was done with the payments they called out my carefully crafted order and my name in a fancy accent signaling that the coffee was ready to be served, “ A grande white mocha, with almond milk and hazelnut, no whipped cream, for AK” Man, I love capitalism. It’s so efficient , they even drew a tiny heart next to my name and now everyone knows that I’m very specific about my coffee. I walked out, barely holding back a smirk. I was preparing to cross the streets when the entire street got illuminated by a blanket of white light, I looked to enquire its source and the lights almost burned a hole in my corneas. The source of the light was a Mercedes G-Wagon, my dream car, Despite the blinding white light I could figure out the make of the car because I’ve obsessed over every little detail of the car. Then something unusual happened, the white lights dimmed and you could see the iconic three pointed star nested into the center of the chrome grille tucked away behind a caging of carbon fibre that give it an lustrous but muscular look, suddenly the white lights were replaced by Red & Blue flashing lights. I watched the mammoth vehicle close in to me a wide open jaw, It was a convoy! Who on earth is this rich that they have a car that I might not be able to afford even if I liquidated my entire property as a patrol car? This is ridiculous, I thought to myself. I waited eagerly to spot the vehicle that was being guarded, I finally caught a glimpse of it. A couple of more expensive patrol cars down the road, I saw a dark, phantom-like silhouette gliding towards me very rapidly. A dark entity carved out of obsidian, It seemed to have a sophisticated shape and yet I could discern almost nothing, It looked like a Lovecraftian beast being brought to life. Once it was close enough I met the piercing gaze of its headlights that spellbound me. They were rectangular in shape which made it look like a Cyborg, and they were glowing a shade of turquoise which I had never seen before. It felt like the march of the Decepticons upon the streets of Bandra. As this alluring figure evaded past me I caught a glimpse of a little detail, the spirit of ecstacy. I immediately knew this was the most expensive car in the world. The Rolls Royce Cullinan. As soon as the convoy moved past me, I looked around. Everything and everyone around me came to a stand-still to catch a glimpse of the Decepticons. I guess the car is so elegant that it comes with the in-built feature of halting space time. I immediately unlocked my phone to check the how much this majestic beauty would cost. So I typed in
Rolls…..
Royce….
Cullinan…..
Price in Mumbai……
On-road because I wanted to be practical ofcourse.
I almost dropped my phone when I saw the number that flashed before my eyes, I scoffed at the ridiculousness of it all. What could you possibly offer me for a price like that? So I did the next practical thing, I opened up the Sales brochure. They have seats crafted out of Carbon-fibre that are padded with hand-stitched leather, The seats have a massage feature that will ensure you always have a relaxed butt. This is unfair, I thought to myself while crossing the road. No one person should have access to this much luxury that they can get their butt massaged at all times. I bet the owner of that car has piles….. piles of money am I right? I laughed at my own silly joke and thought to myself that the attractive woman I saw outside of the café would have enjoyed this joke too. I hailed an Auto from there, sat down in this modest steam punk vehicle and started imagining what it would be like to be sitting inside that car. The auto drove past the same little streets I previously had walked across and then suddenly came to a halt. I looked up and I saw some Traffic officials holding up traffic. Before I could even try to rationalize what all this commotion was about there they were again, THE DECEPTICONS! I scoffed, All that wealth and money spent and I reached here before you in just a modest 23Rs/km ride whereas your car cost you a small town’s entire year’s GDP. The convoy was held up in traffic which means my ride was going to be held up too. Great! I thought to myself. The Cullinan had now pulled up right in front of me. When my auto driver commented, “Ye Ambani ji k.i Gaadi hain” What? The richest person in the country? Right in front of my eyes? Can he see me? I couldn’t see him because the windows were tinted pitch black to maintain privacy. I was in half a mind to run up to the car and beg for money to maintain the status quo, “Sir, please mera start-up fund karado, subeh se kuch nahi khaya.” Like a silly person I waved towards the car. Did he recognize me from before? He probably wasn’t even looking outside the window, he must be looking at some dapper presentation made by a IIM-A graduate on how India’s economy will shape up in the next 5-years. What if he did see me? Is he seeing me now? Can he see the Starbucks cup in my hand? Does he know I’m having a grande white mocha with almond milk and hazelnut, no whipped cream, for AK?

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Hey, I’m going to share my “resume” with y’all. Could anyone please be brutally honest and tell me what colleges (of the ones I show) you think I might be accepted, waitlisted, or rejected from. I’m EXTREMELY nervous! Thank you!
Colleges: (for reference I want to major in economics) -Texas A&M -UT Austin -UT Dallas -UCLA -USC -Emory -University of Michigan -Brown -Cornell -UNC Chapel Hill
Background: -Slightly below average household income family, white, mother is an immigrant. -Non-native English speaker (first language was Serbian). -I am fully fluent in Serbian and English and can speak at a conversational level (probably B1-2) in Mandarin, Spanish, and Arabic. I also know basic phrases and communication in Tigrinyan and German
Academics/Awards: -GPA: 4.45 Weighted (Out of 5) but not top 6% for UT because I’m at an extremely competitive public school -SAT: 1560 -AP Classes as of Junior year: 10, but taking 6 more senior year -National Merit Finalist -Academic All American (AAA) from the National Speech and Debate Association (750+ NSDA points) -#2 Speaker at UIL state in debate in the most competitive event (out of like 250+ competitors at state and hundreds more in districts and hundreds more that didn’t even go to districts) -Winner of 8+ Debate tournaments -4 Bids to the Tournament of Champions (on average even prestigious teams get maybe one throughout their entire career)
Extracurriculars: -Member of Speech and Debate team (3 years and going onwards) -Debate captain (2 years and going onwards) -100+ volunteering hours at local food shelter -Job at local restaurant (1.5 years) -Job at tutoring facility (1.5 years) -Co-owner of finance club -Owner of entrepreneurship club -Owner of language/world cultures club -Member of Mock Trial (3 years) -Member of Cross Country/Track team (1 year) -Owner of DECA club (first one ever at my school) I placed decently for it being my first year. -Member of National Honor Society -Participated in a prestigious collegiate debate camp that was ~3 weeks. I got 2nd place. -Created a debate camp that taught around 30 different students for 2 weeks. -Taught and created curriculum for a debate tutoring service that had around 50 students for ~6 months. -Created an online affiliate marketing business (as a freshman), generated $1000 in 2 months, and built a computer with that money. I then taught a rough estimate of around 10 other people to do the same, with probably around an accumulation of $4,000 spread evenly amongst them. -Have 3 social media accounts with around 50,000 followers each, each teaching biology (health), sat tips, and economics/entrepreneurship respectively -Created a power washing business that generated ~$5,000. Helped power wash and clean local businesses as well -Created an online website creation business. Created a website for over 25 companies, and generated ~$1,000. -Created a non-profit that sends money to mental health institutions (using portions of money from different businesses of mine.)
Passion Project: -As an aspiring economics major that wants to go to law school, I did research (that was published) on the effects of environmental laws on different companies. I interviewed around 5 different heads of companies, and reported it to local news reporters and politicians in my area. I am currently in the process of getting a bill into congress, to try and ease the effects of enviro-law on small businesses, while simultaneously being eco friendly.