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2008.03.27 06:37 Texas
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2019.05.22 03:53 dreetea Boramiyu (보라미유)
Boramiyu (보라미유) is a South Korean solo singer who debuted under Shofar Entertainment (쇼파르엔터테인먼트) (formerly Shofar Music (쇼파르뮤직)) on November 21, 2018. She is known for her various covers on YouTube, performing on I Can See Your Voice / ICSYV (너의 목소리가 보여) 5 (as Jang Boram (장보람)), and releasing several singles, mini albums, and OST's for K-dramas such as: Once Upon a Small Town (어쩌다 전원일기), Now, We Are Breaking Up (지금, 헤어지는 중입니다), Do Do Sol Sol La La Sol (도도솔솔라라솔), Into the Ring (출사표), 제3의 매력.
2023.05.28 08:33 -Bonjour-- More Madeir
From my travel report (2014):
The second trip to Madeira we made to escape the winter. The weather was like a moody diva in winter. It changes not only from day to day, but also within a few hours. So you can never plan anything for the next day, because you should not think, today it is so nice and sunny and warm, it will be the same tomorrow. But if you are unlucky, the next morning it will be completely cloudy, only to possibly be sunny again in the afternoon.
It is always a pleasure to stroll in FUNCHAL's old town. Here times an ice cream to eat, there a coffee possibly with Nata to take. But this should be done when there are no cruise ships in the harbor. Then you see fortunately more locals than tourists in the streets.
For football fans: Christiano Ronaldo, who comes from Madeira, now has his own museum in Funchal - eagerly visited by his - mostly young - supporters...
Funchal is spreading out more and more - the slopes all around are already built on, and in the hotel zone construction continues eagerly. Although it is obvious that in the newly built apartment houses still very many apartments are empty.
The first two weeks we booked apartment at about 350 m altitude with a beautiful view of Funchal. The disadvantage was that it became - especially in the evening - but quite cool. Fortunately we had not only an electric heater but also a fireplace in the apartment.
From up here you can see how Funchal has grown in recent years. It is a huge sea of houses, which goes up to all the adjacent hills.
For the second part of our stay we had chosen an apartment house at Praia do Formosa with direct view to the sea and also to Cabo Girao.
One of the most beautiful and varied gardens of Madeira is located only about 9 km east of Funchal: the Palheiro or Blandy's Gardens. In 1801, the property was purchased by Count Carvalhal. A hunting lodge was built and the count had exotic trees imported from all over the world. The count's descendants squandered the fortune, and so in 1885 the estate became the property of the Blandy family of wine merchants. The villa above the garden is still inhabited by the Blandy family and is not accessible.
The gardens are famous not only for the variety of (often exotic) plants but also for their location on a 500 m high hill with a magnificent view of the bay of Funchal. The Count's hunting lodge was renovated in 1997 and is now the exclusive hotel "Quinta Velha do Palheiro".
The gardens are divided into the main garden, the sunken garden, the valley of hell (Inferno) with mighty fern trees, the rose garden, the ladies garden and the tea house area. There are also ponds with water lilies and beautiful flower beds.
Some of the numerous trees are 100 years old. The garden has been constantly developed. Hibiscus, bougainvilleas, jacaranda, African tulip trees, coral trees and orchid trees grow here. The Blandy family imported proteas from South Africa and had a rose garden planted and a small baroque chapel built. The gardens are also famous for their numerous camellias and magnolias.
The orchid garden, created by an Austrian, apparently has more than 5000 plants and is located below the botanical garden. At the moment the orchid garden is closed, because in the big fire of 2016 in Funchal not only many houses were destroyed, but also great damage was done to the orchid garden.
Carnival is also celebrated in Madeira and by chance we saw a children's parade. It was interesting to see with which eagerness the children were partly "there". Therefore, there will probably be no problem with carnivalistic offspring in Funchal.
The town of RIBEIRA BRAVA is located at the mouth of a wide - sometimes wild (brava) river (ribeira). From Funchal there is a highway to get there. In Ribeira Brava there is a wide pebble beach, and on the other side of the promenade there are cafes and restaurants. In the historic center there are small stores, and here is also the pink town hall from the late 18th century
The Igreja de Sao Bento was built as early as 1440, but was given a new look during the Baroque period. The spire with the white-blue tile pattern and the sphere symbol of the Portuguese explorers is striking.
We still drove to Punta do Sol. This place lies between two high rocky capes. In the old core there are only a few houses and the church, behind it already begin the terraced banana fields. There is a pebble beach and on the promenade you can have a drink in small cafes. Except for us, there were hardly any tourists in the village. But here we drank the best poncha on the island. Poncha (made of honey, lemon juice and sugar cane brandy) is a kind of national drink on Madeira.
The village of Camara de Lobos - situated between two rocky cliffs - is only 9 km away from Funchal. Camara de Lobos is still a typical fishing village with the many colorful boats (xavelhas) that you can admire in the small harbor. A small church was built at the harbor early on, this was remodeled in 1420 and the current Capella Nossa Senhora de Conceicao was built.
There is still fishing and some boat building in Camara de Lobos. However, these are no longer particularly lucrative, so tourism is now a larger source of income. The fishermen in this area mainly catch the black scabbardfish (Espada), which is offered in many restaurants - also in Funchal.
There is a promenade path from the Lido in Funchal to Camara de Lobos since 2011. The path - always with a view of Cabo Girao - is partly concreted and partly laid out on wooden walkways. If you walk in the direction of Camara de Lobos, you can see the approaching waves of the Atlantic Ocean on the left and the partly high cliffs on the right. Not far behind Praia de Formosa there are some beach bars or restaurants where you can have a drink or eat quite well.
Cabo Girao near Camara de Lobos is one of the highest cliffs in the world. More than 500 m the land here falls almost vertically into the sea. Since our last visit, things had changed here, there was now a large parking lot. Then the cafes and souvenir stores were also new for us. And surprising for us was also the glass viewing platform, which exists since the end of 2012. Here you can see that wine and vegetables are grown on the small rocky outcrops. The farmers can reach their fields on the coastal fringe with a cable car. Before the cable car was built, these fields were only accessible by boat.
From Funchal it was not far to CANICO. The original village became in the course of time one of the most important tourist places on Madeira. Large hotel complexes, apartment buildings and villas were built. However, we turned off before we reached the town in order to get to Ponta do Garajau. There on a rock cliff is the 14 m high Christo Rei statue, which was erected in 1927. From here you have a beautiful view of Funchal. Since 2007, there is a cable car nearby that goes 200 m down to the pebble beach.
CURRAL DAS FREIRAS is a small village nestled between huge almost vertical mountain slopes in the heart of Madeira. There is only one road that leads serpentine to the 633 m high valley. Originally the valley was inhabited by nomads and shepherds. Towards the end of the 15th century, the land became the property of the nuns of the Santa Clara convent.
The name Curral das Freiras means "pen of the nuns". In the 16th and 17th centuries, the island was repeatedly attacked by pirates, and the nuns retreated here to the protection of the mountains, which are up to 700 meters high. Here people still live from what they grow themselves on their fertile fields. One of the specialties of the village is chestnuts. They are used to make liqueur, cakes, bread and soups, which are also sold to tourists. On November 1 of each year, the Chestnut Festival is held here.
Not many tourists come to SANTA CRUZ, although this place is certainly worth a visit. There is quite a pretty old town with the church of San Salvador built in 1533 as well as like a large modern market hall just behind the long gray pebble beach lined with date palms.
Just north of Santa Cruz is Madeira Island's airport, renamed "Cristiano Ronaldo" Airport in 2007. Opened in 1964 and reconstructed in 2000, this airport is one of the most dangerous in the world. The 2777 m long runway is built on the rocky coast above the water and looks like a bridge with large concrete supports. A large parking lot has been built below this runway.
Before the landing approach, the mountain massif must be overcome so that the narrow runway can be approached. Unfortunately, there have been numerous accidents, but this is still one of the busiest airports in Portugal.
From Santa Cruz we drove to MACHICO, one of the larger towns of Madeira. Machico profited from sugar cane cultivation in the 15th century and is now a modern town, which is divided into two halves by the Ribeira da Machico. On the eastern bank of the river is the historic fishing quarter with the main square surrounded by tall laurel trees.
The town church of Nossa Senhora da Conceicao in the center was built in the 15th century and partially rebuilt in the 18th century. Opposite stands the town hall built in the early 20th century There are several fish restaurants here.
In the surroundings of the small village FAIAL there is still a lot of agriculture, e.g. wine and fruit growing. The village is dominated by the 600 m high Eagle Rock. Only a few tourists come here, because there is hardly anything worth seeing.
Most people come to Santana to see the famous "Casas de colmo". In total there are still about a hundred of these thatched historic wooden houses. They are very scattered throughout the municipality.
On the way back to Funchal we passed through Ribera fria. Here you can take a short hike up to the Miradouro dos Balcoes, from where you have a beautiful view of the mountains.
The peninsula PONTA DE SAO LOURENCO is 9 km long and 2 km wide. In 1982 it was declared a nature reserve, mainly to ensure the preservation of the fauna with the great variety of birds and the great occurrence of the native flora. The eastern tip of Madeira is barren and windy. One can no longer imagine that everything here was lushly forested.
Then, in spring, a carpet of flowers enlivens the bare hilltops. But also in other seasons the turquoise sea and the rocks in different shades - ocher, rust, gray and green-black - bring color to the area.
The south coast can be easily approached by boats, which is almost impossible on the drastically shaped north coast with its strong winds. There is a paved access road to the parking lot above Baia de Abra. Here you can also take the public bus.
From there there is a popular rocky hiking trail. This hike is absolutely not a walk. There are some climbs, often wooden stairs. You have no shade and are exposed to gusts of wind. To avoid being blown down somewhere, I ducked down and waited out the sometimes strong gusts - really quite extreme.
At the narrowest point with a land bridge only a few meters wide, the rock drops almost 100 m vertically - fortunately the place is secured with a fence.
The hike takes - depending on your condition - 2 to 3 hours. It also depends on whether you only walk to the plateau of Casa Sardinha - administration of the national park - or if you want to make the ascent to Pico Furado. Below the Casa there are some tables for picnics. From there there is also an entrance for swimming, which can certainly be pleasant in the summer.
On the way there are always beautiful views of the sea and the rock formations - e.g. the so-called rock gate. On the south side you can see the cages of a fish farm in the sea. In front of Sao Lourenco there are two small islands, on one of them stands the oldest (from 1870) lighthouse of Madeira.
From the cape we drove to CANICAL, the easternmost municipality of Madeira. This place is still characterized by fishing and boat building. Fishing boats are still built here and there is a large repair yard.
Over the 1000 m high Encumeada Pass we drove northeast to Sao Vicente. Unfortunately the old coastal road to Seixal and Porto Moniz was closed and we had to drive through many tunnels. A few years ago it was a special experience to drive on the narrow and winding ER 101 directly at the coast - on one side the high cliffs and on the other side the sea. But apparently the road has become too dangerous in the meantime because of constant falling rocks.
We got to Porto Moniz , and unfortunately the weather got worse, more and more clouds came up. The sea raged with huge waves to the shore. Porto Moniz is a nice little town located on the northwestern tip of Madeira, a region with high mountains and views of the endless Atlantic Ocean.
From Porto Moniz you can go hiking, for example on the coastal trail "Levada da Ribeira da Janela", one of the best hiking trails in Madeira.
Porto Moniz is known for its volcanic pools. Daytrippers mostly come for these pools filled with sea water.These pools owe their formation to a lava tongue that flowed into the sea here thousands of years ago, creating caves due to the force of wind and waves. The black basalt lava pools form swimming pools and are the attraction of Porto Moniz, because you can swim (swim) in them very well - at least in good weather...
There are two different lava pools in Porto Moniz: the completely natural pools and the western pools, which have been transformed into natural outdoor pools - there are no sharp rocks here. The surrounding rocks of the outdoor pool were built as a terrace , and here you can sunbathe. The pools are open every day - even in winter. But when we were there, there was no one in the water....
The natural pools are not safe because of the black sharp basalt rocks. It is very interesting to watch the waves as they crash against the rocks. The water is sometimes whirled into the air in such a way that it looks like a geyser.
The PICO DE ARIEIRO is the most visited mountain of Madeira, because it is the only one that has been opened up with a road, but it is only the third highest. The road was probably built primarily for the observatory and not necessarily for the tourists. Already the approach through pristine landscape with rugged rock and sparse vegetation is an experience.
If the weather is good, you have a breathtaking view all around. Equally beautiful, however, is the sight of white cushions of clouds hanging between the high mountains. In winter there can be ice and snow on the peaks. Since it had snowed on Madeira about 2 weeks before our trip there, we could still see the sparse remnants on the shaded layers.
From Pico de Arieiro you can hike up to Pico Ruivo (1861 m) if the weather is good. At the beginning, the path is quite wide and in places secured by railings. Some then walk at least to the first viewpoint - the rocky peak Niho de Mata with beautiful views. The entire hike up to Pico Ruivo is clearly difficult, even if there are partially secured stairways since the 1960s. Some of the paths are steep up to 700 m, the rock steps are high, the paths are sometimes narrow and beaten, and it also goes through unlit tunnels. So you should have a good condition and be free from giddiness and sure-footed.
submitted by -Bonjour-- to ThornTree [link] [comments]
The second trip to Madeira we made to escape the winter. The weather was like a moody diva in winter. It changes not only from day to day, but also within a few hours. So you can never plan anything for the next day, because you should not think, today it is so nice and sunny and warm, it will be the same tomorrow. But if you are unlucky, the next morning it will be completely cloudy, only to possibly be sunny again in the afternoon.
It is always a pleasure to stroll in FUNCHAL's old town. Here times an ice cream to eat, there a coffee possibly with Nata to take. But this should be done when there are no cruise ships in the harbor. Then you see fortunately more locals than tourists in the streets.
For football fans: Christiano Ronaldo, who comes from Madeira, now has his own museum in Funchal - eagerly visited by his - mostly young - supporters...
Funchal is spreading out more and more - the slopes all around are already built on, and in the hotel zone construction continues eagerly. Although it is obvious that in the newly built apartment houses still very many apartments are empty.
The first two weeks we booked apartment at about 350 m altitude with a beautiful view of Funchal. The disadvantage was that it became - especially in the evening - but quite cool. Fortunately we had not only an electric heater but also a fireplace in the apartment.
From up here you can see how Funchal has grown in recent years. It is a huge sea of houses, which goes up to all the adjacent hills.
For the second part of our stay we had chosen an apartment house at Praia do Formosa with direct view to the sea and also to Cabo Girao.
One of the most beautiful and varied gardens of Madeira is located only about 9 km east of Funchal: the Palheiro or Blandy's Gardens. In 1801, the property was purchased by Count Carvalhal. A hunting lodge was built and the count had exotic trees imported from all over the world. The count's descendants squandered the fortune, and so in 1885 the estate became the property of the Blandy family of wine merchants. The villa above the garden is still inhabited by the Blandy family and is not accessible.
The gardens are famous not only for the variety of (often exotic) plants but also for their location on a 500 m high hill with a magnificent view of the bay of Funchal. The Count's hunting lodge was renovated in 1997 and is now the exclusive hotel "Quinta Velha do Palheiro".
The gardens are divided into the main garden, the sunken garden, the valley of hell (Inferno) with mighty fern trees, the rose garden, the ladies garden and the tea house area. There are also ponds with water lilies and beautiful flower beds.
Some of the numerous trees are 100 years old. The garden has been constantly developed. Hibiscus, bougainvilleas, jacaranda, African tulip trees, coral trees and orchid trees grow here. The Blandy family imported proteas from South Africa and had a rose garden planted and a small baroque chapel built. The gardens are also famous for their numerous camellias and magnolias.
The orchid garden, created by an Austrian, apparently has more than 5000 plants and is located below the botanical garden. At the moment the orchid garden is closed, because in the big fire of 2016 in Funchal not only many houses were destroyed, but also great damage was done to the orchid garden.
Carnival is also celebrated in Madeira and by chance we saw a children's parade. It was interesting to see with which eagerness the children were partly "there". Therefore, there will probably be no problem with carnivalistic offspring in Funchal.
The town of RIBEIRA BRAVA is located at the mouth of a wide - sometimes wild (brava) river (ribeira). From Funchal there is a highway to get there. In Ribeira Brava there is a wide pebble beach, and on the other side of the promenade there are cafes and restaurants. In the historic center there are small stores, and here is also the pink town hall from the late 18th century
The Igreja de Sao Bento was built as early as 1440, but was given a new look during the Baroque period. The spire with the white-blue tile pattern and the sphere symbol of the Portuguese explorers is striking.
We still drove to Punta do Sol. This place lies between two high rocky capes. In the old core there are only a few houses and the church, behind it already begin the terraced banana fields. There is a pebble beach and on the promenade you can have a drink in small cafes. Except for us, there were hardly any tourists in the village. But here we drank the best poncha on the island. Poncha (made of honey, lemon juice and sugar cane brandy) is a kind of national drink on Madeira.
The village of Camara de Lobos - situated between two rocky cliffs - is only 9 km away from Funchal. Camara de Lobos is still a typical fishing village with the many colorful boats (xavelhas) that you can admire in the small harbor. A small church was built at the harbor early on, this was remodeled in 1420 and the current Capella Nossa Senhora de Conceicao was built.
There is still fishing and some boat building in Camara de Lobos. However, these are no longer particularly lucrative, so tourism is now a larger source of income. The fishermen in this area mainly catch the black scabbardfish (Espada), which is offered in many restaurants - also in Funchal.
There is a promenade path from the Lido in Funchal to Camara de Lobos since 2011. The path - always with a view of Cabo Girao - is partly concreted and partly laid out on wooden walkways. If you walk in the direction of Camara de Lobos, you can see the approaching waves of the Atlantic Ocean on the left and the partly high cliffs on the right. Not far behind Praia de Formosa there are some beach bars or restaurants where you can have a drink or eat quite well.
Cabo Girao near Camara de Lobos is one of the highest cliffs in the world. More than 500 m the land here falls almost vertically into the sea. Since our last visit, things had changed here, there was now a large parking lot. Then the cafes and souvenir stores were also new for us. And surprising for us was also the glass viewing platform, which exists since the end of 2012. Here you can see that wine and vegetables are grown on the small rocky outcrops. The farmers can reach their fields on the coastal fringe with a cable car. Before the cable car was built, these fields were only accessible by boat.
From Funchal it was not far to CANICO. The original village became in the course of time one of the most important tourist places on Madeira. Large hotel complexes, apartment buildings and villas were built. However, we turned off before we reached the town in order to get to Ponta do Garajau. There on a rock cliff is the 14 m high Christo Rei statue, which was erected in 1927. From here you have a beautiful view of Funchal. Since 2007, there is a cable car nearby that goes 200 m down to the pebble beach.
CURRAL DAS FREIRAS is a small village nestled between huge almost vertical mountain slopes in the heart of Madeira. There is only one road that leads serpentine to the 633 m high valley. Originally the valley was inhabited by nomads and shepherds. Towards the end of the 15th century, the land became the property of the nuns of the Santa Clara convent.
The name Curral das Freiras means "pen of the nuns". In the 16th and 17th centuries, the island was repeatedly attacked by pirates, and the nuns retreated here to the protection of the mountains, which are up to 700 meters high. Here people still live from what they grow themselves on their fertile fields. One of the specialties of the village is chestnuts. They are used to make liqueur, cakes, bread and soups, which are also sold to tourists. On November 1 of each year, the Chestnut Festival is held here.
Not many tourists come to SANTA CRUZ, although this place is certainly worth a visit. There is quite a pretty old town with the church of San Salvador built in 1533 as well as like a large modern market hall just behind the long gray pebble beach lined with date palms.
Just north of Santa Cruz is Madeira Island's airport, renamed "Cristiano Ronaldo" Airport in 2007. Opened in 1964 and reconstructed in 2000, this airport is one of the most dangerous in the world. The 2777 m long runway is built on the rocky coast above the water and looks like a bridge with large concrete supports. A large parking lot has been built below this runway.
Before the landing approach, the mountain massif must be overcome so that the narrow runway can be approached. Unfortunately, there have been numerous accidents, but this is still one of the busiest airports in Portugal.
From Santa Cruz we drove to MACHICO, one of the larger towns of Madeira. Machico profited from sugar cane cultivation in the 15th century and is now a modern town, which is divided into two halves by the Ribeira da Machico. On the eastern bank of the river is the historic fishing quarter with the main square surrounded by tall laurel trees.
The town church of Nossa Senhora da Conceicao in the center was built in the 15th century and partially rebuilt in the 18th century. Opposite stands the town hall built in the early 20th century There are several fish restaurants here.
In the surroundings of the small village FAIAL there is still a lot of agriculture, e.g. wine and fruit growing. The village is dominated by the 600 m high Eagle Rock. Only a few tourists come here, because there is hardly anything worth seeing.
Most people come to Santana to see the famous "Casas de colmo". In total there are still about a hundred of these thatched historic wooden houses. They are very scattered throughout the municipality.
On the way back to Funchal we passed through Ribera fria. Here you can take a short hike up to the Miradouro dos Balcoes, from where you have a beautiful view of the mountains.
The peninsula PONTA DE SAO LOURENCO is 9 km long and 2 km wide. In 1982 it was declared a nature reserve, mainly to ensure the preservation of the fauna with the great variety of birds and the great occurrence of the native flora. The eastern tip of Madeira is barren and windy. One can no longer imagine that everything here was lushly forested.
Then, in spring, a carpet of flowers enlivens the bare hilltops. But also in other seasons the turquoise sea and the rocks in different shades - ocher, rust, gray and green-black - bring color to the area.
The south coast can be easily approached by boats, which is almost impossible on the drastically shaped north coast with its strong winds. There is a paved access road to the parking lot above Baia de Abra. Here you can also take the public bus.
From there there is a popular rocky hiking trail. This hike is absolutely not a walk. There are some climbs, often wooden stairs. You have no shade and are exposed to gusts of wind. To avoid being blown down somewhere, I ducked down and waited out the sometimes strong gusts - really quite extreme.
At the narrowest point with a land bridge only a few meters wide, the rock drops almost 100 m vertically - fortunately the place is secured with a fence.
The hike takes - depending on your condition - 2 to 3 hours. It also depends on whether you only walk to the plateau of Casa Sardinha - administration of the national park - or if you want to make the ascent to Pico Furado. Below the Casa there are some tables for picnics. From there there is also an entrance for swimming, which can certainly be pleasant in the summer.
On the way there are always beautiful views of the sea and the rock formations - e.g. the so-called rock gate. On the south side you can see the cages of a fish farm in the sea. In front of Sao Lourenco there are two small islands, on one of them stands the oldest (from 1870) lighthouse of Madeira.
From the cape we drove to CANICAL, the easternmost municipality of Madeira. This place is still characterized by fishing and boat building. Fishing boats are still built here and there is a large repair yard.
Over the 1000 m high Encumeada Pass we drove northeast to Sao Vicente. Unfortunately the old coastal road to Seixal and Porto Moniz was closed and we had to drive through many tunnels. A few years ago it was a special experience to drive on the narrow and winding ER 101 directly at the coast - on one side the high cliffs and on the other side the sea. But apparently the road has become too dangerous in the meantime because of constant falling rocks.
We got to Porto Moniz , and unfortunately the weather got worse, more and more clouds came up. The sea raged with huge waves to the shore. Porto Moniz is a nice little town located on the northwestern tip of Madeira, a region with high mountains and views of the endless Atlantic Ocean.
From Porto Moniz you can go hiking, for example on the coastal trail "Levada da Ribeira da Janela", one of the best hiking trails in Madeira.
Porto Moniz is known for its volcanic pools. Daytrippers mostly come for these pools filled with sea water.These pools owe their formation to a lava tongue that flowed into the sea here thousands of years ago, creating caves due to the force of wind and waves. The black basalt lava pools form swimming pools and are the attraction of Porto Moniz, because you can swim (swim) in them very well - at least in good weather...
There are two different lava pools in Porto Moniz: the completely natural pools and the western pools, which have been transformed into natural outdoor pools - there are no sharp rocks here. The surrounding rocks of the outdoor pool were built as a terrace , and here you can sunbathe. The pools are open every day - even in winter. But when we were there, there was no one in the water....
The natural pools are not safe because of the black sharp basalt rocks. It is very interesting to watch the waves as they crash against the rocks. The water is sometimes whirled into the air in such a way that it looks like a geyser.
The PICO DE ARIEIRO is the most visited mountain of Madeira, because it is the only one that has been opened up with a road, but it is only the third highest. The road was probably built primarily for the observatory and not necessarily for the tourists. Already the approach through pristine landscape with rugged rock and sparse vegetation is an experience.
If the weather is good, you have a breathtaking view all around. Equally beautiful, however, is the sight of white cushions of clouds hanging between the high mountains. In winter there can be ice and snow on the peaks. Since it had snowed on Madeira about 2 weeks before our trip there, we could still see the sparse remnants on the shaded layers.
From Pico de Arieiro you can hike up to Pico Ruivo (1861 m) if the weather is good. At the beginning, the path is quite wide and in places secured by railings. Some then walk at least to the first viewpoint - the rocky peak Niho de Mata with beautiful views. The entire hike up to Pico Ruivo is clearly difficult, even if there are partially secured stairways since the 1960s. Some of the paths are steep up to 700 m, the rock steps are high, the paths are sometimes narrow and beaten, and it also goes through unlit tunnels. So you should have a good condition and be free from giddiness and sure-footed.
2023.05.28 08:21 Consistent-Dog-8972 Fascinating private tour of Edinburgh
 | Edinburgh's newly opened restaurants are taking Edinburgh's food scene to the next level. Now boasting Michelin-star restaurant Heron by the same owners as Leith's Timberyard and Tom Kitchin's The Kitchin; vegan restaurant Treen; and KORA in Stockbridge - Edinburgh now has something for every dining occasion! submitted by Consistent-Dog-8972 to u/Consistent-Dog-8972 [link] [comments] https://preview.redd.it/3ohs9tlgmi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3d92833c33f18b1fe880b4069ca39d9d9c7785e5 Explore Scotland's historic Stirling Castle and beautiful National Trossachs Park during this four day tour from Edinburgh. Greyfriars Graveyard Greyfriars graveyard has long been revered as one of Britain's most haunted places, housing hundreds of ghostly figures such as George "Bluidy" MacKenzie who persecuted Covenanters back in 1600s. Many visitors report feeling physically attacked here and reporting bruises, bites, scratches or even blackout due to unknown forces attacking. https://preview.redd.it/jw925cahmi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=78c21d6446ae6e33d5966165386c273e638c40bf Greyfriars Bobby was a loyal dog that guarded his master's tomb for 14 years at this historic cemetery, inspiring JK Rowling to write part of her Harry Potter series here at The Elephant House. To experience its mysterious atmosphere for yourself, check out tours that include this haunted site in their itinerary. Niddry Street Vaults South Bridge may appear like any other street in Edinburgh from the outside, but beneath it lies an intricate network of underground vaults once used by Edinburgh's poorest residents as squatters, but now host an adrenalin-pumping paranormal tour that will give you chills! On this adult-only journey you will visit The Watcher's hunting grounds, an authentic witches coven and even witness medieval torture exhibits! https://preview.redd.it/pyg44jthmi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=87f9268523e2cb4f675c6e2e18d6cc1f3d7c0d62 Your tour begins above ground, as you learn about Edinburgh's criminals that roamed its streets, before you are led underground for an eerie walk by torchlight on Blair Street underground vaults - where body snatchers would hide helpless people before selling them to Burke and Hare for dissection in medical school dissection labs. There will also be tales of evil poltergeists and Covenanters Prison horrors such as tales of cold breezes, ghostly voices and even having hair pulled! Guests have reported feeling cold breezes while hearing ghostly voices as they experienced ghostly voices or felt their hair being pulled! The Stone Circle The Stone Circle is one of Scotland's most remarkable prehistoric structures, an ellipse-shaped layout comprising fourteen low boulders surrounding a massive burial cairn. https://preview.redd.it/f06p9saimi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e411499ddee3324e0c2f9dc36dbd9c96b05afd82 Stonehenge may have the more impressive stones, but Woodhenge boasts one distinct feature - a tree in the center softening harsh edges of monoblock paving. Furthermore, its aim to become a living monument can be seen through how its construction was conducted, with grass and moss growing amongst the stones as part of the design. Tour of this haunted location will lead you through Edinburgh's Old Town and Greyfriars Kirkyard, Niddry Wynd, Burke and Hare's stories and tales from persecuted witches as well as fun narration by tour guides who don't go overboard on scariness (this tour can also be enjoyed by families!). Highly recommended tour. https://preview.redd.it/v851smximi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=faf3a65ffce06f3fde81ea4d8e7e4818e30d26c5 Rosslyn Chapel A Roman Catholic Chapel dating back to 15th-century Scotland, Roslin Chapel stands on a small rocky peak overlooking Roslin Glen and was begun as such by William Sinclair, Earl of Caithness. But this building has earned its fame through the many captivating myths, legends and mysteries surrounding it. Built as an offering to honor Sinclair family members who had passed on quickly before us and ensure their place in heaven. https://preview.redd.it/qmm2x9ejmi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=97cabe7f0bd3efae5f58865fecc46a6e7768ddf5 Surviving Scottish Reformation and falling into disuse when Cromwell's soldiers attacked Rosslyn Castle, housing their horses within it, it eventually reopened during the 18th century. https://preview.redd.it/hie2kuujmi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d878d9fde4bd4d769910e77c616a7402cd64de2a Visitors of this medieval masterpiece will be in awe at all the beautiful features inside it, such as its Apprentice Pillar -- believed to have been constructed so skillfully by an apprentice stonemason that his master killed him out of jealousy - as well as its use as the backdrop for one of Dan Brown's best-selling novels, The Da Vinci Code. |
2023.05.28 08:11 TheBeeOfBygone 22M/US. A Path To True Friendship
So,what brings me here and why is this going be a long post? Well, I'm on a journey of sorts to rewrite some of, maybe, my wrong way of thinking and and life living and this is a post for hope and olive branch to make some wrongs right so to speak.
So, about me. I'm 22, gay, live alone, financially independent,wanting of nothing in that aspect of life. I consider myself a nice, soft spoken with the ability to stand up for himself but don't have the energy to do so; person who tries to think happy thoughts and help those less fortunate. I really have nothing to complain about, but yet, here I am 22 with not one friend in the world. First, I'm not blaming the world or others of my intolerance of human connections and my war on friendship,which I have raged for the last 5 years of my life. I have waged so hard, I stopped vocally talking to anyone in the world. It's been almost two years since I vocally talked to another human. You ask.. how is that possible? I have developed communication of nods and eye speech so to say to avoid happening to use my vocal cords. I even work from home to avoid contact with humans. I know this is very weird. I told myself 4-5 years ago I could learn so much about others by just listening and not talking. Now, to this day, I still, think that is holds some truth but maybe I'm missing something by not letting others hear my voice? Maybe their is something that can be relayed by sound and not silence; like how sarcasm over text can't be depicted correctly.
So, why am i like this why? First, I have had nothing happen to me violently or trauma that changed me. I, honestly, not sure why I started shutting everyone out. I decided one day that friendship was fake and its been so long since I had anything like that, so maybe I don't know what I'm missing or even if I am? Now, 22, maybe I'm thinking their is something to "go to war" for someone with so to speak; I mean someone to play games with and pick on each other. My brother left my life a few years ago and we used to talk baseball every day and we don't speak anymore so is it that? I mean we never were very similar and I can't even say if I liked him.
I think my biggest issue and why I'm here. I don't know if I like something or don't. It seems i just do stuff like a robot and not because i enjoy it. I don't know how to know who I like being around or what game I like playing or if I like a movie. I know this sounds off but I don't know what it should feel like to have a friend, a word I'm scared to say. How do you know if you enjoy someone's company or not? How do you know if someone is your friend or not or they just blowing smoke up your x-mas chimney? So, I figured Reddit might hold some answers or maybe, someone feels like me. I guess I'm just lost. I think some of it is I don't like myself at all and don't like being compliments. I'm more of make the other person feel good type.
So, know these are posts to make a friend but I wanted to be open about how I feel and maybe someone will read this and not be afraid in their post to admit their imperfections and maybe more people will find friends on here and not be scared to know others don't know what their doing in making friends. Anyways, that's the back story. Now, on to a little about me and what I'm looking for in a friendship.
Well hobbies wise, I'm into video games, I'm mostly into sim, strategy, and Rpgs. I play on PS5 (moved from PC a few months ago). I play more slower pace games as I think my reflexes are too slow for shooters, so only game I play competitively is Rocket League (I'm bad at that too).I'm also into sports (big 3; MLB, NBA NFL); I'm a bit of a sports nut. I also like to cook and love to learn new recipes. Other than that, I spend my time listening to asmr (monk chanting is my fave), daydreaming I am somewhere else (mostly Mars) I love anything about space. I spendway too much time wishing I was somewhere else so I probably need to ground myself. I like to read but never do. I'm in the beginning stages of learning about camping, survival (and stealth camping seems so fun).
So, what type of friend am I looking for? I'm going to list some a few things I want. I'm not listing them to be picky or be mean but I think if I got any chance of finding a long-term life long friend (which is what I'm looking for), I will hopefully find someone who into lots of stuff I am to make the best possible chance. First, I need the person to understand the things I listed by me above and be understanding and respectful about it. I won't become friends quick and not sure how long it would take to use the word friend. I can't become instant friends; that thought scares me to be honest. I move slow and like others very slow. That doesn't mean I won't respect you. You will always get that but a friend connection I can't say how long or it will ever happen. This is all new so not sure how it will go. So, anyone who wants to voice chat right away or want personal details about my life, i won't give them that; it will take a long time.
Others things I want in a person- I need someone from the Usa as I am and makes it easier time zones wise. I am CST (MidSouth) US so if you were too, that be great. It be cool if we could meet one day way down the line. I'm looking for someone who wants to and can talk regularly chat via here, text. I don't want someone who talks once a week, as I need someone not pushy but can drive the friendship until i get used to having someone to talk to. That doesn't mean you will have to lead the conversation all the time but maybe be more talkative. I'm quiet with new and more of a listener so I can come off as dry but don't intend to be. I thought about ages and I'm open to all but I'm 22 so someone my age would be cool but I'm an old soul so open to everyone I suppose. You do need to know this is platonic and I will not tolerate any weird stuff; only sfw here. I don't want any part of stuff that is not. You will get the same respect from me.
It will also be nice if you were a sports/gaming fan. It help with that start but we can be into different stuff but games seem to bring others together, so maybe it can with me and, hopefully, my future friend.
So,yeah this is A lot. If you made it this far, you either were intrigued really bored, or love the pain of listening to some random on Reddit making himself a fool. Whatever the reason, if you feel the urge,send me a instant chat message and say hi, drop a recipe, or just tell me I'm crazy asf and don't deserve a friend. Whatever it is, I will reply quick.
submitted by TheBeeOfBygone to Needafriend [link] [comments]
So, about me. I'm 22, gay, live alone, financially independent,wanting of nothing in that aspect of life. I consider myself a nice, soft spoken with the ability to stand up for himself but don't have the energy to do so; person who tries to think happy thoughts and help those less fortunate. I really have nothing to complain about, but yet, here I am 22 with not one friend in the world. First, I'm not blaming the world or others of my intolerance of human connections and my war on friendship,which I have raged for the last 5 years of my life. I have waged so hard, I stopped vocally talking to anyone in the world. It's been almost two years since I vocally talked to another human. You ask.. how is that possible? I have developed communication of nods and eye speech so to say to avoid happening to use my vocal cords. I even work from home to avoid contact with humans. I know this is very weird. I told myself 4-5 years ago I could learn so much about others by just listening and not talking. Now, to this day, I still, think that is holds some truth but maybe I'm missing something by not letting others hear my voice? Maybe their is something that can be relayed by sound and not silence; like how sarcasm over text can't be depicted correctly.
So, why am i like this why? First, I have had nothing happen to me violently or trauma that changed me. I, honestly, not sure why I started shutting everyone out. I decided one day that friendship was fake and its been so long since I had anything like that, so maybe I don't know what I'm missing or even if I am? Now, 22, maybe I'm thinking their is something to "go to war" for someone with so to speak; I mean someone to play games with and pick on each other. My brother left my life a few years ago and we used to talk baseball every day and we don't speak anymore so is it that? I mean we never were very similar and I can't even say if I liked him.
I think my biggest issue and why I'm here. I don't know if I like something or don't. It seems i just do stuff like a robot and not because i enjoy it. I don't know how to know who I like being around or what game I like playing or if I like a movie. I know this sounds off but I don't know what it should feel like to have a friend, a word I'm scared to say. How do you know if you enjoy someone's company or not? How do you know if someone is your friend or not or they just blowing smoke up your x-mas chimney? So, I figured Reddit might hold some answers or maybe, someone feels like me. I guess I'm just lost. I think some of it is I don't like myself at all and don't like being compliments. I'm more of make the other person feel good type.
So, know these are posts to make a friend but I wanted to be open about how I feel and maybe someone will read this and not be afraid in their post to admit their imperfections and maybe more people will find friends on here and not be scared to know others don't know what their doing in making friends. Anyways, that's the back story. Now, on to a little about me and what I'm looking for in a friendship.
Well hobbies wise, I'm into video games, I'm mostly into sim, strategy, and Rpgs. I play on PS5 (moved from PC a few months ago). I play more slower pace games as I think my reflexes are too slow for shooters, so only game I play competitively is Rocket League (I'm bad at that too).I'm also into sports (big 3; MLB, NBA NFL); I'm a bit of a sports nut. I also like to cook and love to learn new recipes. Other than that, I spend my time listening to asmr (monk chanting is my fave), daydreaming I am somewhere else (mostly Mars) I love anything about space. I spendway too much time wishing I was somewhere else so I probably need to ground myself. I like to read but never do. I'm in the beginning stages of learning about camping, survival (and stealth camping seems so fun).
So, what type of friend am I looking for? I'm going to list some a few things I want. I'm not listing them to be picky or be mean but I think if I got any chance of finding a long-term life long friend (which is what I'm looking for), I will hopefully find someone who into lots of stuff I am to make the best possible chance. First, I need the person to understand the things I listed by me above and be understanding and respectful about it. I won't become friends quick and not sure how long it would take to use the word friend. I can't become instant friends; that thought scares me to be honest. I move slow and like others very slow. That doesn't mean I won't respect you. You will always get that but a friend connection I can't say how long or it will ever happen. This is all new so not sure how it will go. So, anyone who wants to voice chat right away or want personal details about my life, i won't give them that; it will take a long time.
Others things I want in a person- I need someone from the Usa as I am and makes it easier time zones wise. I am CST (MidSouth) US so if you were too, that be great. It be cool if we could meet one day way down the line. I'm looking for someone who wants to and can talk regularly chat via here, text. I don't want someone who talks once a week, as I need someone not pushy but can drive the friendship until i get used to having someone to talk to. That doesn't mean you will have to lead the conversation all the time but maybe be more talkative. I'm quiet with new and more of a listener so I can come off as dry but don't intend to be. I thought about ages and I'm open to all but I'm 22 so someone my age would be cool but I'm an old soul so open to everyone I suppose. You do need to know this is platonic and I will not tolerate any weird stuff; only sfw here. I don't want any part of stuff that is not. You will get the same respect from me.
It will also be nice if you were a sports/gaming fan. It help with that start but we can be into different stuff but games seem to bring others together, so maybe it can with me and, hopefully, my future friend.
So,yeah this is A lot. If you made it this far, you either were intrigued really bored, or love the pain of listening to some random on Reddit making himself a fool. Whatever the reason, if you feel the urge,send me a instant chat message and say hi, drop a recipe, or just tell me I'm crazy asf and don't deserve a friend. Whatever it is, I will reply quick.
2023.05.28 07:33 autotldr Ukraine war: Kyiv hit by new massive Russian drone attack, Vitaliy Klitschko says
This is the best tl;dr I could make, original reduced by 66%. (I'm a bot)
Summary Source FAQ Feedback Top keywords: Kyiv#1 Ukraine#2 drone#3 attack#4 Russia#5
Post found in /ukraine and /worldnews.
NOTICE: This thread is for discussing the submission topic. Please do not discuss the concept of the autotldr bot here.
submitted by autotldr to autotldr [link] [comments]
Russia has carried out a new massive overnight drone attack on Ukraine's capital Kyiv, killing at least one person, local officials have said.
Kyiv's mayor Vitaliy Klitschko said a man died when drone wreckage fell near a petrol station.
In Kyiv alone, more than 40 drones were downed, officials said.
In a post on social media, Mr Klitschko urged Kyiv residents to "Stay in shelters", warning of waves of drone attacks and a "Difficult" night ahead. He said at least two high-rising buildings in different districts of the capital were on fire after being hit by falling drone fragments.
The latest attack comes as city residents mark the annual Kyiv Day - a popular holiday in peaceful times.
In the meantime, Russian forces have been preparing their defences in the seized regions of south-eastern Ukraine.
Post found in /ukraine and /worldnews.
NOTICE: This thread is for discussing the submission topic. Please do not discuss the concept of the autotldr bot here.
2023.05.28 07:29 Maleegee [EVENT] The Career of Giangiacomo "il Grande"
5 December 1518
Musical Accompaniment
Born in 1440 to Antonio Trivulzio and Francesca Visconti, minor Guelph nobles in Milan, Gian Giacomo Trivulzio was raised alongside Galeazzo Maria Sforza, and would spend much of his early life in his service.
His military career started in 1465, when at the age of 25 he accompanied Sforza's army to France, where they would fight on the side of King Louis XI against the League of Public Weal. This taste of blood was evidently rather satisfactory for Trivulzio, as he would spend the remainder of his life in military service.
Sforza and Montefeltro Service
In the 1460s, he fought in the service of the Sforzas against the famous Bartolomeo Colleoni - one of the greatest military minds of the 15th Century. Soon after, he moves to the service of Federico da Montefeltro, and fights in the infamous Battle of Riccardina, where the forces of Colleoni, Ercole d'Este, and Alessandro Sforza, as well as some Florentine families, faced off against an alliance of the Medicis, King Ferdinand I of Naples, and Federico da Montefeltro.It is in this period that he marries his first wife, Margherita Colleoni - a distant relative of the famous Condottiero.
Condottiero
In 1478, he entered the service of the Medicis against the expansionist Pope Sixtus IV, defending the city of Florence in the wake of the Pazzi Conspiracy, until the Ottoman capture of Otranto forced a peace settlement.In 1480, he purchased the castle of Mesocco. By 1496 the surrounding countryside will have joined the Three Leagues in Switzerland, by his permission.
Rossi War and Ludovico Sforza
In 1482, he enters the service of Ludovico Sforza, against the Rossi family of Parma, in rebellion against the Sforzas of Milan. As tensions built up between Ludovico Sforza - then Regent of Milan - and the other nobles of Milan, it was Trivulzio - then only a lieutenant to Costanza Sforza - who was entrusted with taking Parma. Trivulzio proved himself incredibly capable in the art of siege and harrying, devastating the lands loyal to the Rossi, and capturing alpine fortresses with great vigor. Making excellent headway, it was only the intervention of the Republic of Venice that stopped Trivulzio. His soldiers were transferred to the command of the Duke of Urbino - an old employer, Federico da Montefeltro. Eventually, Trivulzio would work his way to being the primary commander of Ludovico's forces in Milan, winning the war for the Milanese, defeating the Venetian army at Martinengo, and becoming Governor of Parma for the Sforzas.His first wife died in 1485. She had given him one surviving son - Gian Niccolò Trivulzio, and a score of daughters.
Neapolitan Service
In 1488, he moves to Naples, and enters the service of Alfonso d'Aragon, Duke of Calabria. He would marry Beatrice d'Avalos, and would be appointed Commander of the army of Naples. It is in this period that Charles VIII invades Italy, after being invited into Milan by Ludovico Sforza.Charles' War for Naples First Italian War (1494-1498)
Musical AccompanimentIn 1494, Trivulzio negotiated the surrender of Naples to Charles VIII, who, impressed by the man, hires him into French service, with the written permission of Ferdinand I of Naples. In 1495 he fought in the Battle of Fornovo in the service of the King of France, marching back to France with the army. He is appointed Marshal of France for his actions in the battle.
Second Italian War (1498-1503)
In 1498 Trivulzio was placed in charge of a large army by the new King Louis XII. He marched on Milan, and chased Ludovico Sforza, now Duke of Milan, to Innsbruck, where he bid the assistance of Maximilian of Austria.In October 1499, Trivulzio entered Milan, and was appointed Governor.
In 1501, Trivulzio was again placed in charge of a French army - this time, he was intended to be in command of small contingents of French troops to hold river crossings. Instead, he found himself in the midst of the French Army in their victory at Gorgonzola. The French - employing great numbers of Swiss mercenaries, defeated an Imperial army marching alongside Ludovico Sforza.
In 1502, Trivulzio commanded the French army at (the later named First Battle of) San Martino, buying valuable time for the French to bring reinforcements across the alpine passes after the Fall of Savoy and save Milan from the Imperial incursions. Later in the year he would lead the French at Marzaglia, being bested by Cesare Borgia, and withdrawing to Reggio.
In 1503, Trivulzio commanded the French army at Monterosi, squaring off against the Spanish Army, with the Fate of the Eternal City at stake. Routing the Spanish, he drove south to the banks of the Garigliano River, before being finally stopped, not by the Spanish, but by his own supply lines.
War of the Second Italic League Third Italian War (1506-1509)
In 1506 Trivulzio commanded the French Army putting Modena to siege, taking it in early 1507. Having kicked a hornet's nest, Trivulzio was forced to withdraw from Modena, though stood up a valiant defence against a Venetian-Ferrarese army at Lodi.With Milan in rebellion (in part to Trivulzio's poor governance), he withdrew from Milan, and met with the main French army in Novara.
In 1508 Trivulzio spearheaded the counterattack into Milan, which was then in Austrian hands. Crossing the Ticino, he met the main army under Georg von Frundsberg at Borgarello. Bloodying the Austrians, he forces them to withdraw, and is joined by Rohan-Gie and Trémoille, to defeat the Austrians and Venetians at the absolutely gargantuan Battle of Gaggiano. With the Austrians and Venetians defeated, Trivulzio set about restoring order to Milan. It is said that he attempted to put a stop to the worst of the sacking, but it is rather suspicious that most of the sacking hit the worst of the Ghibelline sections of the Duchy...
In 1509 Trivulzio oversaw the capture of Montferrat, and its subsequent integration into the Duchy of Milan.
Borgia War (1511-1512)
In 1511, following Cesare's attempt at seizing Rome and subsequent flight to Romagna, Trivulzio leads a Milanese army to the Romagna, where they put down Cesare Borgia alongside a Papal coalition by 1512. It was in this war that his son, Gian Niccolò passed - camp fever had taken him during a siege.Francis' War for Naples Fourth Italian War (1512-1515)
Musical AccompanimentWith the betrayal of the Spanish, and the commencement of Francis' War for Naples, Trivulzio commanded a rear force in the siege of Pescara. With the fall of that city in 1513, he lead a supporting force to Francis, proving to be a mentor and moderating voice to the rapacious young Duc de Valois.
Lombard War Fifth Italian War (1515-1516)
By 1515, the French army in Naples was exhausted, and saw fit to retire north, as the Emperor had made a pact with the Venetians, and invaded Milan. Trivulzio fought a rearguard action against the Spanish, allowing the Duc de Valois to pursue a stunning victory against the Austrians and Venetians at Lodi, and yet again routing Maximilian and the Venetians from the Duchy of Milan.Trivulzio's final actions came in 1516, where he took over the command of the army from the gravely wounded Duc de Nemours, and proceeded to assist in the seizure of Venetian Lombardy, and the subsequent Second Battle of San Martino.
Retirement
Tired and contented, Trivulzio passes in his bed in the Castello Sforzecco on the 5th of December, 1518. He was 78 years of age. He is succeeded by his grandson, Gian Francesco Trivulzio.It is said that Giangiacomo requested to be buried with a sword on his chest, instead of a cross. When asked why, he answered, "To scare the devils when they come for me."
2023.05.28 07:27 Ok-Upstairs-9887 Some songs I think in a nutshell
Into The New World - An amazing debut song, a fan favorite as well Gee - A BIG hit OH! - Love the cheerleading outfits, catchy song too Run Devil Run - Simple choreo but a good song with 2 high notes by King Taeyeon Hoot - A catchy song but can’t explain why Mr. Taxi - Once again a fan of the outfits, Taeyeon’s high note- The Great Escape - Has a j-pop vibe but still feels like something SoShi would release, it also has an unfair line distribution- The Boys - A song with 3 versions in languages Paparazzi - A Japanese song with an amazing MV Flower Power - A catchy song where Sunny ACTUALLY gets lines I GOT A BOY - A mix of hybrid genres which is really catchy Karma Butterfly - I feel like this song has a retro vibe to it Galaxy Supernova – I feel like this song has another retroey vibe and I like it Mr.Mr. - When SoShi does what they do best - having good stable vocals Catch Me If You Can - A good synchronized choreo with 3 dance breaks by 3 different members, OG with Jessica in Japanese and in Korean w/o her Lion Heart - What I said about Mr.Mr. but w/o Sica this time and the small rap part You Think - One of the catchiest, has an amazing rap part and the meaning behind the song is amazing when you need it All Night - 2 members each have a part together also a catchy song Holiday - A very summer like song FOREVER 1 - A good comeback song after 5 years with a fair line distribution
Girls’ Generation - A catchy song that’s the same name as the group Show! Show! Show! - A really catchy song You-Aholic - “Psycho sexy super magic” Motorcycle - A song where Seohyun’s voice fits PERFECTLY! But Fany’s an honorable mention Soul - A good b-side for Mr.Mr., Taeyeon’s 4-5 high notes, Tiffany’s high note n rap- Show Girls - A song that was OG in japanese and with Jessica Sign - A very slow but calm song Fan - When you look at the meaning behind it, it’s really saying how much far SoShi has came Sweet Talk - A more (retroey?) song with a bit of that summer vibe Villain - “Call me the villain cause I’m busy killin’ it” You Better Run - A good continuation of Run Devil Run
submitted by Ok-Upstairs-9887 to SNSD [link] [comments]
Girls’ Generation - A catchy song that’s the same name as the group Show! Show! Show! - A really catchy song You-Aholic - “Psycho sexy super magic” Motorcycle - A song where Seohyun’s voice fits PERFECTLY! But Fany’s an honorable mention Soul - A good b-side for Mr.Mr., Taeyeon’s 4-5 high notes, Tiffany’s high note n rap- Show Girls - A song that was OG in japanese and with Jessica Sign - A very slow but calm song Fan - When you look at the meaning behind it, it’s really saying how much far SoShi has came Sweet Talk - A more (retroey?) song with a bit of that summer vibe Villain - “Call me the villain cause I’m busy killin’ it” You Better Run - A good continuation of Run Devil Run
2023.05.28 07:20 travel-notes-oliver Tower Bridge Bike Tour
 | Contrasting with most other large bridges, this one features a long and stunning wall right up against the water's edge. Check out Hopper's Hands as a tribute to bridge iron workers; and Fort Point which serves as an abandoned military base directly underneath its south end. submitted by travel-notes-oliver to u/travel-notes-oliver [link] [comments] https://preview.redd.it/kjmpp84mbi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2bf90384d902fdd1200909f6a4a4aea2bfa34ad4 Explore "Old Sacramento" while witnessing men and women race over Tower Bridge, before heading back toward West Sacramento via River Road, Gregory Avenue and Village Parkway. HighlightsAt Glasgow's postcard-perfect bridges on this comprehensive sightseeing tour by bicycle. Your journey begins by pedaling along a flat path towards the ferry landing where there are bike racks (free during winter, $3 for valet bike parking the rest of year). https://preview.redd.it/7v245bjmbi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b1356b947f02db9fccafc9c3e0c526cf3711dc02 On this two-hour guided bike tour of central London's landmarks, learn the history behind iconic structures like Tower Bridge, Nelson's Column and St Paul's Cathedral. No matter if you choose an electric bike or regular bicycle, the ride is smooth. Your guide is eager to share fun facts about each site you see; in several instances they have even stopped to help people with flat tires or assisted a woman who crashed and broke her arm; it is this attention to detail that sets this tour apart. https://preview.redd.it/84avin0nbi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ce47b73b2c5a0d7b11d3523cad70838ff73fe95f DistancesThe Tower Bridge is an eye-catching red wall set against the skyline of London that appears as though it were an arch, though in reality it looks more like a bridge from end to end. Furthermore, there's even an eye-catching sight: an adorable small hoodoo sitting atop it for extra charm.Biking enthusiasts will find riding across the bridge and down into Sausalito enthralling; here you'll find many charming shops. However, young children and those less adept on bikes might prefer other forms of transportation instead. https://preview.redd.it/nonktkhnbi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2cc6787bd05c3eb7b0879a8bd6b0ada7f4963fd4 If you are crossing the Golden Gate Bridge on a guided tour, your guide will introduce a safer bike route with stunning views of the bridge that avoids steep hills in Fort Baker and leads straight onto an ideal bike path - much preferable than Alexander Avenue route which was dangerous and traffic-intense. RoutesAs a way of exploring your city on two wheels, there are various bike routes you can take to navigate around it. Google Maps offers bicycle navigation instructions while Strava provides another tool to plan out bike routes. https://preview.redd.it/5nnc0lynbi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2e41683ee12e19077a5d4943cd657b64048cdde5 One of the most scenic bike routes is crossing Tower Bridge on your way to Yerba Buena Island. This offers amazing vistas of both the bay and bridge. Another alternative would be cycling along Oakland's new Judge John Sutter Regional Shoreline park which provides safe multimodal access to its shoreline as well as stunning views of San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge's eastern span. After starting at Gabriel's Wharf, follow the Thames eastbound until reaching Southwark district - once home to bear-baiting pits, whore houses, playhouses, murky taverns and more. At Southwark you will also encounter bear-baiting pits, whore houses and playhouses - before continuing onto Tower of London where its unique architecture and history await you before cycling towards Butler's Wharf and Shadwell Basin. https://preview.redd.it/ysuzo5oobi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2a637aac76aa60957f90d8f4ee18e97d9d46fab6 SafetyParticipants on a Tower Bridge Bike Tour must be capable of riding their own bicycle; tag-along bikes, child seats or strollers are not permitted for safety reasons.For a shorter ride, start from Alexander Avenue's south vista point and ride directly downhill towards Sausalito - this route will cut out hill climbing by less than two miles! However, riding with traffic on narrow roads does mean sacrificing spectacular views of Golden Gate Bridge (passing underneath and then riding alongside it) and Fort Baker. https://preview.redd.it/19enh13pbi2b1.jpg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9d0681abcc3bbc80486774bb739156e89ebf14c2 Aquatic Park Municipal Pier, an historic narrow comma-shaped pier, provides some extra distance and beautiful views back towards San Francisco, Alcatraz and bay bridges. Additionally, this pier marks the start of a scenic pathway into Sausalito that leads to Warming Hut with refreshments, snacks and bathrooms available there. |
2023.05.28 06:34 bimbo_wannabe_ [I Accidentally Joined The Mafia In South Brooklyn] Chapter 5: The Dead Are Especially Nosy Down Here
![[I Accidentally Joined The Mafia In South Brooklyn] Chapter 5: The Dead Are Especially Nosy Down Here](https://preview.redd.it/zkaxtarwkj2b1.jpg?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=8b33a651493fb05e79994bff658fc34e98166e4e "[I Accidentally Joined The Mafia In South Brooklyn] Chapter 5: The Dead Are Especially Nosy Down Here") | Previous Part: https://www.reddit.com/redditserials/comments/13sxdo9/i_accidentally_joined_the_mafia_in_south_brooklyn/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button submitted by bimbo_wannabe_ to redditserials [link] [comments] These last few parts have taken a lot longer for me to write than I thought. A lot of shit has gone down in the last two months, and a lot of it, frankly, is kind of a blur. But I figure, if you've stuck with me this long, then you deserve to know how it all ended up so I'm going to try my best to remember every detail of what happened. Me? I've spent every free hour I've had, just lying in bed. I've got a lot of healed wounds that still hurt me pretty damned badly. Blood loss from multiple gunshot wounds and then drowning in the East River, dying and then being brought back while still human, incidentally, takes a lot out of a guy. But… I'm getting way ahead of myself. Where were we, again? Oh yeah, that's right. The funeral without caskets, inside of a Ukrainian restaurant just off the boardwalk in Brighton Beach. That's where I left off at. ()()() Antoni's corpse and I had spoken together for a while longer, about Beccs and their baby, actually, sitting there in the floor in front of the three empty bathroom stalls. The next moment, as usual, he was… just gone. It took a while to slow the bleeding, and it took even longer to try and clean myself up with just hand soap and paper towels and the water from the sink. Nobody came into the bathroom again, and as I left, I saw why. There was a sign on the door that read 'Out of Order' with something printed below it in Cyrillic that I imagined probably said the same thing as the English. My new winter coat had been left on the floor in front of the door and the Emergency Exit at the end of the hall had its alarm disabled and had been left propped open with a brick. I took that as a clear message that they didn't want me rejoining the party, so I exited into the alley and sat on a milk crate chain-smoking until 2 PM when the funeral ended. The weather app on my phone said it was 10 degrees outside, but oddly enough the cold air felt soothing on my bruised face. My eyes were nearly swollen shut, and every now and again I had to pull some of the toilet paper out that I'd stuffed in my pocket to wipe another trickle of blood from my nose when I sniffed a little too hard and moved the clots loose. At 1:57, I started to hear people exiting the restaurant, so I moved onto the sidewalk to wait for Becca. The people leaving the funeral only glanced at me for a second and then looked away with a bored expression, like I wasn't even there. Finally, only Becca and Toni's immediate family were still inside. Tatiana gave Becca a hug, Igor, a gentle handshake, and Antoni Sr. bent down, cupped his hands around Becca's face and pressed a chaste kiss to her forehead. I could see that his right hand was bandaged and he was holding it straighter than his left. Good. I hoped the fucker had broken it when he'd punched me in the jaw. As Becca exited, I could tell she was angry even before she stomped over to me and shoved me three times in quick succession. Like Jimmy, Becca was a lot stronger than she looked, but now I knew why. I couldn't do much but ball up and take the hits. "Where the fuck did you go? You just took off and left me there by myself. 'He wouldn't have left without saying goodbye if he had a choice.' You knew, you cocksucker, you knew, you knew he was dead!" "Yeah, I knew! Antoni was in the news. But we gotta get the fuck out of here, Beccs, you're making a scene, another one, and I gotta get outta this neighborhood before something worse happens to me." The high color of anger in her cheeks dropped away immediately into a pallid white. She'd been so pissed she'd never once registered the state of my face. "Jesus Christ, Tony, what the fuck happened to you?" "Your little Polish sausage's Daddy Dearest just beat the fuck out of me in the men's bathroom, that's what the fuck happened." "Why would he do that?" Becca asked, but I didn't answer. She looked back to Skovorodka, following my gaze. Antoni Sr. was still standing there, just inside the front door, watching me with narrowed eyes, his hands folded neatly behind his back like a soldier at ease. It reminded me a lot of how Antoni used to stand while we were waiting for the train together. "Fuck," she muttered, then "Shit," and grabbed me by the arm. "Come on." "Why would he do that?" She asked me again as we climbed the stairs to the train platform. "Antoni was Mob, Becca, Bratva. His whole goddamned family is. Him and his brothers and his father and his fucking Russian uncle, and I'd say your Mama Tatiana probably isn't in the dark about what her brother and her hubby and his sons do to make a living, either. I don't know why the Zabrowskas were on the Avenue, but suffice to say it was probably for nefarious reasons, and Jimmy found out about it and took care of business. "Only I don't think he realized exactly who he was taking out at the time he did it, or else he never would have put the body in the River for somebody to find. And then the other three showed up to avenge their brother, only two of 'em never made it past Bianchi any farther than Antoni did." "The fuck are you trying to say?" Her tone says she already understands just fine and doesn't want to. "I'm saying your dear sweet Mamma killed your boyfriend, Becca. She removed all the identifying marks from his body, ate what she wanted, then pulled all his teeth out and chewed off his hands and his feet. They dumped the body in the East River and they found him about 5 days ago, floating off of Battery Park." "Oh God. That's why. I asked Tatiana where Antoni was going to be buried and she told me in the public cemetery on Hart Island. They're not claiming the body because they don't wanna go to the cops. For the last week I been cussing him for everything he was worth, and he's been laying in the fucking morgue." She pressed her hand to her mouth, and I saw her bloodshot eyes filling with tears again. "Please don't cry, Becca, cause I'm gonna start crying again and I've cried enough for today." She sniffed back her tears and swallowed hard. "But I don't understand, Tony, what the fuck does that have to do with you?" "They knew, Beccs, they knew how the Zabrowskas died, who killed them, and they knew I helped Moretti get rid of the bodies afterwards. That's why Antoni's father went after me. The uh… the fucking Pakhan thought Jimmy sent me there to rub it in their faces that they weren't going to be able to bury any of their boys." "How the fuck would they know that?" She barked at me. "Somebody's feeding them information and not some asshole on the street, somebody from inside the Camorra." "Who would do that?" I saw her eyes darting about wildly as she tried to think of the answer to her own question. "I don't know, uh, the driver that brought Moretti, he didn't look like he was too fond of Bianchi, maybe he's a fucking option." "Frankie? I mean, him and Ma have never gotten along. He's never liked her and the feeling's mutual but… that doesn't make any sense, Frankie's always been loyal to the Camorra. Rossi always said he practically muttered the Omerta in his fucking sleep, that he was a soldato down to the bones." "I have no idea, Becca, but it gets worse," I said quietly. If it didn't hurt so goddamned bad, I would've squeezed my eyes shut. "How the fuck could it possibly get worse, Tony?" "First you gotta promise you're not gonna hit me again." Her hand balled into a fist, and I couldn't help but flinch. "I'm gonna knock you the fuck out right now if you don't stop wasting my time, Cipriani." "I sold her out, Becca. Bianchi. I told them where she lives and how to find her tonight." "You what!?" "I had to! He was gonna cut my fucking fingers off, and I don't know if he was going to take all four or just three but I wasn't about to fucking find out. I kind of need those fingers seeing as I'm a fucking southpaw!" I held my left hand out to her, curled my fingers inward, but the third finger just… stayed straight. "Ah, fuck, I didn't even notice that." "Jesus Christ, the tendon's been cut," she whispered, and when she pressed her hand to her mouth again she looked less like she was swallowing back tears and more like she was trying to swallow back vomit. I couldn't really blame her. I felt pretty nauseous myself. "You know, I'm, I'm not worried about Ma," she said, finally. "It wouldn't be the first time somebody's tried to take her out. She's harder to kill than they think." "Would, uh, would cutting her head off work? Cause if so I think they're already pretty aware of how to get the job done. They… they know Bianchi's not human, Becca." Her face got paler, if that was even possible, and her eyes were the size of saucers. "This is a goddamn nuclear disaster. Jesus fuck." We stood the last few minutes waiting for the train in silence. As the doors slid shut and we sat down, Becca began laughing wildly. "So you're in hysterics for real, huh?" I asked. "You're gonna have to forgive me, I'm a little slow on the uptake today, but I just got it, Polish sausage… only, he wasn't little, you know, he was hung like a fucking horse, and it's a goddamn tragedy for women everywhere that the man isn't on this earth anymore. And he knew how to use it, too. Best sex I ever had in my life… only sex I ever had in my life, but that's not the fucking point." A short, barking sob tore out of her. I groaned. "You know, that is way, way more information than I ever wanted to know about you and Antoni's sex life. You couldn't, uh, you couldn't let that one pass by, huh?" "I never pass up the opportunity to make a good dick joke. And he had Good Dick." I laughed and regretted it as it tightened muscles in my stomach that were still a little angry about being used as Antoni Sr's personal punching bag. "Touché, Miss Rebecca, touché." "The two-faced bastard, I gotta give the motherfucker that much, you know, it's a uniquely personal way to say Fuck You to the Underboss, getting his teenaged daughter pregnant. I am so, so goddamned tired of being a pawn in other people's games. He's lucky he's already dead or I'd kill the bitch myself," she whispered. "It wasn't a game, Becca, what happened between you and Antoni," I whispered back. I knew because Antoni's corpse had told me as much. "Don't ask me how I know, cause I don't wanna talk about it, but it wasn't a game. You didn't know about him and he didn't know about you and it was a big, fucked up coincidence. You loved him, and he really, truly loved you... he worshiped the ground you walked on." Actually, he had said he worshiped the boots she walked in, but I figured it was a translation issue. "It was a regular old Romeo and Juliet: Brooklyn Edition." She squeezed her eyes shut, snorted and at the same time choked on another sob. "Yeah, but Romeo and Juliet ended in a double suicide, not a murder and a single mother." Her tiny hand went to her mouth again, and she wasn't able to hold back the tears this time. "I miss him, Tony, I miss him so fucking much." "You know, Beccs, I miss him, too." I miss him when he was alive, not looking like a walking nightmare, and talking my goddamned ear off half the time, but I wasn't about to tell her that. "He was the first friend I made down here." "It's fucking stupid. I still remember every single thing he said to me those first few times I met him." "Odd as it is, I do too, Beccs. He was that kind of guy, I guess, he didn't have to work hard to make an impression on people. It was, uh, three days after I moved in, I think. I was in the basement, getting ready to do my laundry that morning, fighting with the stuck knob on that machine down at the end? And he walks in with his clothes basket balanced on his hip and reaches past me and just… turned the fucking thing, like it wasn't even stuck to begin with. 'It has an attitude, but it likes me,' he says, and I say, 'I can see that.' "And he, he told me his name. 'Zabrowska,' he says, 'Antoni.' And I laughed and said, 'Nice to meet you, Toni, I'm Tony.' 'Really?' he says, and I say 'Yeah. Really. Antonio Alessio Gioele Cipriani, the third, if you please.'" "Goddamn, that name is painfully Italian. No wonder you tell everybody 'Just call me Tony,'" Becca snorted. "Thank you, Miss Rebecca, I can assure you I didn't pick it myself. But, 'Ah,' Toni says and kind of taps his hand in the center of his chest, 'Junior.' And I laughed again and said 'Our parents were goddamned creative when it came to the baby naming, right?' And he laughed, too, and shook my hand. "And uh, a few days after that he showed up outside of my apartment and asked me if I wanted to go watch a game with him and his brothers at the sports bar down the street. It was Poland vs Korea. I still don't know shit about soccer, I've always been more of an American football kind of guy, but I did learn quite a few Polish swear words that day. Apparently they'd all bet money on the home team winning that game." "I bet you did. Poland kept catching red cards that whole game. I bet on Korea, of course, and altogether I won 8 grand from four extremely pissed off Polish dudes when we stomped their ass all over the pitch. I had no idea how seriously the four of them took soccer. Antoni wouldn't even talk to me for three days. Probably didn't help I made an ass of myself laughing at all of them. Course, I woulda bet more if I'd known they were good for it. Dry cleaners, my ass," Becca spat. "Well, in Antoni's defense, he probably did work at a dry cleaners like he told us, just like you work at a bodega, and Jimmy and me work at a restaurant, and Pops works at a hardware store. We all got day jobs. You know, I hate to bust your balls, Becca, but did it… never occur to you to ask Antoni if the tattoos meant something?" "No," she said weakly. "I mean, I knew they were prison tats but Jesus Christ, half the people I know have been to prison. You've been to prison, half of my cousins have been to prison, hell, Pops has been to prison. You weren't here then, but all of 2016 to 2020 I was wearing a 'Free Rossi' t-shirt everyday, a lot of people in this neighborhood did. Ma got him off on the Murder 1 charges but numbers are numbers, and she couldn't get him out of the Tax Evasion. But I figured, if Antoni didn't wanna talk about it, then it was none of my business what had happened before we met each other." She'd minded her own business a little too hard this time. "What did you and Antoni talk about, Becca?" "Everything! And anything, and nothing, all at the same time. He'd complain about living with his brothers, about Misiu always leaving hair all over the bathroom, and how Ciech always left sugar all over the kitchen counter after he made his coffee. And I'd complain about having to pick up all the empty bottles of makgeolli after my Dad in the morning. I'd help him wash all the dishes his dirty ass brothers would leave piled in the sink, and fold everybody's clothes. "We got along well, me and Antoni, we were actually very compatible, we were both neat freaks when it came to our housekeeping. We even folded our towels the same way. And he'd bitch about how Igor could never balance the register correctly at the end of the day, and I'd bitch about how my Dad never checked our invoices correctly, and I was always having to cuss out the distribution reps for shorting us on our deliveries myself. "And we'd watch TV together. He always made fun of me for the lame ass old Chuck Lorre sitcoms I loved to watch, and I'd make fun of him for all the stupid cop dramas he watched, every Law and Order known to man, and Blue Bloods and shit. We just… talked to each other, like we were two regular people, just living our lives. It was simple and it was easy, and it was enough, it was goddamned enough for me. Our relationship was the one normal thing I had going in my fucked up life." She cracked at the end, sobbing brokenly. She turned her head to the side, pressed her face into my bicep as she wrapped both arms around mine. Tears filled my eyes, as well, and now I was wiping snot out of my nose as well as blood. I felt goddamned sorry for the kid, and I felt like she had a right to cry, but I had to distract her, for my own sake. "So tell me, when was the first time you talked to Antoni? Was that the same day he asked you out?" "No, there was some time between the two. He'd been there about a week, I guess, after they moved in. They got there back in like April. I'd fucked with him the first day, you know, asked him where the hell the accent came from, and he said Poland, and I told him welcome to America cause I felt like being a dick. And he said that he'd already been in country five years and I laughed at him and told him, goddamn, I couldn't tell cause he still sounded like he was fresh off the boat. And he got this look on his face, like he was trying to decide if he needed to be offended or not, so I told him I was just fucking with him, that he was doing better than my Mom, God rest her, cause it was seven years after she got here from Seoul before she even learned a word of English and my Dad was the one that had to teach her." "Makes sense. I moved in in June, Toni mentioned he'd only been in the building about two months hisself." She nodded, I could feel the movement in the sleeve of my coat where her cheek was pressed to my arm. "Him and his brothers started coming in every day after that and you know, I kind of had my eye on him from the first time I talked to him. He was goddamn gorgeous, quite literally the walking definition of 'tall, dark, and handsome.' He had those incredibly blue eyes, and that fucking accent, man, shit put me in knots everytime he came in. I learned them all pretty quick, and Antoni was easy. He got the same thing everyday, box of Newport 100s and a pack of Russian Cream Backwoods with a large slushy. You know I gotta keep the cups behind the counter because motherfuckers'll fill it up and walk out when I get busy. I saw him when he came in, and went over to the ATM, so I had his shit sitting on the counter waiting for him." Becca had a talent for memorizing all of the regular's orders, it wasn't unusual to see a long line of cigarettes, blunts, medicine, sometimes even crack pipes and Chore Boys, and anything else she kept behind the counter, set up neatly next to the register. She also had a talent for running both registers at the same time when the line got overly long and she was there alone. Sometimes I had no idea how she kept up with it all, but that was just Becca. "And this drunk asshole came in, right after, he didn't even belong in the neighborhood, he stayed in Bed-Stuy, but he was with his cousin, and his cousin I knew and he was shooting me apologetic looks so I was already on guard. I was in a bad goddamn mood that day, anyway. And the drunk bitch, he walked over to the bathroom and tried to open it." "Key's behind the counter," I said, and she nodded. "And the key costs five dollars cause people make a fucking mess in the bathroom and I ain't cleaning that shit everyday for free. Well, drunk fuck got pissed and started talking a bunch of shit and threw his five dollars down on the counter, and you know, I can't stand that. You don't throw money at me, I ain't a goddamned stripper, you can put that shit in my hand or you can get the fuck out my store. And, I said 'Naw, son, for you it's gonna cost ten, five dollar Drunk Dick surcharge for being an asshole and cutting my line.' And the motherfucker… he called me a fucking stupid little bitch, and he told me people like me needed to be sent back to my own country." I made a sound of disapproval, already seeing where this was headed. "I hate that stupid shit. Where the fuck am I getting sent back to? The fucking hospital in Manhattan where I was born? Everybody in the store just kind of stopped and stood there, and dude's cousin? He just shook his head at me and walked right out the store and left him there." "He wasn't gonna get involved, huh?" I asked. "Fuck no. He wasn't stupid. I… uh, I was seeing red by that point so I balled up his money and I threw it across the store and told him to get the fuck out. I don't even remember half the shit I said to him, but I was yelling and he was yelling back and all of a sudden Antoni was… just there. I never even noticed him walking up. He was a big motherfucker, but goddamn he was quick and quiet when he wanted to be." Becca laced her fingers through the fingers of my right hand and I gave them a squeeze as she readjusted her head against my shoulder. I turned mine to press a kiss to her hair. She was short enough that I didn't have to worry about bumping my nose. As I turned back, I noticed that there was a puddle of water on the seat across from us, and a pit formed in my stomach immediately. My face felt cold as the blood drained from it. The puddle of water made me more than just a little nervous to see it. I had new enemies stacking up quick, and the last thing I needed was a pissed off, jealous ghost because his grieving fiancée was getting a little handsy with me. But… Antoni never showed himself, so I could only assume he approved of my offering her comfort in her time of need. Either that or he was waiting till I was alone to express his displeasure. "'Is there a problem here?' was all he asked and the drunk bitch turned around and he got even more pissed. He goes 'Man, fuck you, white boy. Mind your own goddamned business.' And Antoni kind of got in his face, and goes, 'I have made it my business. She told you to leave. Either remove yourself or I will remove you.' "And the liquor must've given him a bigger set of balls than he actually had, cause he took a swing at him. And Antoni, he just kind of… leaned back a little to avoid the swing and then leaned back in and… he knocked that bitch out cold with one punch. And then he picked him up, literally picked him up, and threw his ass out on the sidewalk, and kind of dusted his hands off afterwards." "Well, if he's anything like his father then he could throw a hell of a right cross." Becca laughed weakly. "Yeah, his Dad boxes, they all did, you know, from when they were young. Antoni told me he got in his Dad's face once when he was about 16, and Old Papa Zabrowska coldcocked him in the kitchen, and when he woke up on the couch, his Dad dragged him out back in the alley and beat him bloody. Told him if his little grown ass thought he was a man, then he was grown enough to get his ass stomped like a man." That made me feel a little better, to be honest. At least I wasn't the only one I knew who had caught an ass kicking from Antoni Sr. "I bet he didn't talk shit to his Pops again after that, huh?" "I asked him that exact question, he said 'Oh no, no, never again. I learned my lesson.' Toni and his brothers, though, were always getting in fights, even when I knew them. He told me it was hard on their Mama, back in Kraków, having four hormonal, teenaged boys with just shy of a year between each of them, you know cause… us fucking Roman Catholics ain't too fond of any method of contraception." "I didn't know you was Catholic, too, B." "Of course. Rossi is a devout Catholic, and that's how he raised me, and Nia, she's an Angel, you know, a Fallen One, that's what they call themselves, but she's even got real wings. A little more leathery and less feathery, but… same thing. She goes to Mass daily, turns out demons are actually very religious. Both of my parents were atheists, and that's how they raised me, but after some of the shit I've seen, you know, it ain't too unbelievable that there's a Big Guy upstairs." She sniffed again, wiped at her nose and I offered her a bit of toilet paper from my pocket. "That's how it all got started, the War in Heaven. God created Adam, the first living human body, and he told all the spirits in Heaven to kneel to him. And at least half of them weren't too fond of that idea, and the Morning Star stepped up as representative and said they wouldn't kneel to anyone but God. And they, uh, they lost the War, and He banished them all to Earth, to wander without bodies of their own while the other side got to come to Earth one at a time, to live their lives. "But… then there was the first murder, Abel. Cain beat him to death with a rock, and the blood on the ground, the first human blood ever shed in violence, it called to God, but He wasn't the only one it called to. The blood, it gave him a way inside of a body. Lucifer. He was the First One. He's still here, you know, I've met him. He has a particular fondness for Nia, he calls her Young One, cause according to him 1607 wasn't all that long ago." "I guess it isn't when you're that old." "But, back to what I was saying about Toni, all of them were packed into one place together like fucking sardines, the four boys sharing one bedroom in a two bedroom apartment, and all having vastly different personalities. Tatiana is little, like me, and I don't imagine she could do much to break them up when they got to fighting about everything from who ate all the leftovers to who got the top bunks on the beds." "Probably not," I answered. "I mean, I could practically smell the testosterone in their fucking apartment whenever I walked in, and it was probably even worse back then. And apparently, that had been their Dad's method of keeping them from tearing up his wife's house all the time. Whenever a problem inevitably developed, he'd just take them down to the gym and throw them in the ring without any gloves and tell them to fucking handle it, and whoever was still standing at the end was the one that won the argument. "Uh, but, uh, when Toni hit the guy, all, all I could do was stand there with my mouth hanging open like a fucking fish. I mean, I was in love, right that fucking second, standing there. The hormones were running on overdrive, my head was practically spinning with how fast all the blood rushed south, you know? Everybody was still standing there and Antoni tried to get back in line and I said, 'Uh-uh. Take your shit and go on.' And he goes," Beccs began laughing again, laughed so hard there were tears in her eyes once more. "He goes, 'Am I in trouble?''' I had to wrap my left arm tight around my stomach because I couldn't stop myself from laughing either. The makeshift bandage on my left hand that I'd wound out of paper towel had soaked through, I was going to have to change it soon. "He didn't say that, Becca." "Yes the fuck, he did. And I went, 'No, you dumbass, it's on the house, and in case I gotta translate, that means it's free. Small price to pay for a security detail.' And he just kind of blinked at me for a second, before he nodded his head and grabbed his things off the counter, went and filled his slushy up." "You probably scared the piss out of him for that second, he probably thought he'd been found out. That's what they call it, what he was, Obshchak, Security Group." "He stopped before he left, and told me thank you. And I said 'No, dziękuję', thank you. And then I winked at him and said 'Miłej nocy, piękna.'" She straightened up as the train began to slow for our stop. "And what did that mean?" "Have a good night, gorgeous." She said with a watery grin. "Smooth, B, real smooth. Nothing quite like hitting on a man in his native language. " "I mean, you know us, Tony, we got Southern Hospitality down here. As long as you're not an asshole, I do everything I can to make sure everyone feels welcome when they come inside. That's why there's a sign on the door that says 'DMZ.' They might have beef on the streets but don't nobody take that shit inside my store. And that means asking the Mexicans down the street if they need a bolsa, and making sure I ordered Farid's miswaks so he didn't have to walk all the way down to the Pakistani store, and sometimes it means learning a little bit of Polish so I could flirt with the new guy downstairs the next time he came in." We exited the train, made the switch, and stood on the platform waiting for the next to take us back to Avenue U. As I glanced to the side, I could see a puddle forming on the platform next to me, drip by drip. It was already freezing around the edges. As it turned out, I wasn't the only nosy fuck around here. "And apparently the flirting was well received by our dearly departed half-Russian friend." "Apparently, cause about a week later I was having a busy fucking Friday night and my Dad had already gone home, and I was trying to shut her down but motherfuckers kept coming inside right up until 11. I made DeAndre from downstairs stand at the door and tell people we were closed and that he was the last customer for the night and after I rung him up I told him to flip the sign on the door and I'd lock it when I finished my cigarette count… only, I forgot to ever lock it, and DeDe's traitorous ass, he fucking set me up. He knew I had a thing for Antoni, and when he saw him coming down off the platform and rushing down the sidewalk, he let him in and told him he was the last customer for the night and to flip the sign on the door." She closed her eyes for a moment. "It took me… exactly 16 minutes to notice he was there. I know, cause after I was done pissing myself when I figured out I wasn't alone, the Polish smart-ass showed me his watch. He'd set a timer when he realized I wasn't paying any attention to him, and then just stood there, waiting to see how long it would take. I had my earphones in, and it took four songs," she held up her hand and ticked them off with her fingers. "'Savage Like', 'Money, Sex, Drugs', 'Proud' and 'Only.' "I turned around and screamed like a little bitch when I saw him. And then I got pissed, cause I was embarrassed, I'd been singing along to all the songs cause I thought I was alone in the store. I started screaming at him. 'What the fuck, you can't read? The sign says Closed.' And he goes 'No, it didn't. It still said Open. I turned it myself.' I hadn't counted down my register yet, so I just went ahead and grabbed his shit and rung him up, cussing DeDe the whole time and I asked him how long he'd been standing there, and he showed me his watch. And he says, 'You shouldn't wear those, it's dangerous,' talking about my headphones, and I said, 'What are you, my fucking father?' And he got kind of a funny look on his face." I released a weak snicker, holding my stomach tight again. I couldn't resist fucking with them both a little bit. "He kinda had a point, Becca. Although, I can tell you he was probably less concerned about being your father and more concerned about becoming your Daddy." "Oh, so now you got the dirty jokes," Becca said flatly. "What can I say, B, you're a bad influence on me." "Eh," she said after a moment, "You wouldn't be the first. You know, months later he told me that he'd stood there that long because he didn't think he'd have the nerve to ask what he wanted to ask the next time if he left, which, you know, what the fuck? What am I, scary?" I couldn't help but laugh again. "Yes, Becca, you are, you're fucking terrifying half the time. You might be a short fuck but dynamite comes in small packages, you know? He was probably afraid you'd tell him to suck your dick and ban him from the store for a month like every other poor motherfucker I've seen ask you out, and he probably didn't want to go through your particular brand of ridicule in front of an audience, on top of that, with all the other customers laughing him out of the store." "It ain't my fault I'm this size," she said after a moment, shooting me a perturbed look. "No shit, Sherlock. It's genetics." "It ain't even that. It's the blood. I mean, my parents were both tall, you know, for Koreans, anyway, my Mom was 5'6. I probably would've been too if I'd had the chance, but, you know, the blood it… stops things. Why do you think Jimmy looks the way he does? I mean, Pops believes in 'aging gracefully,' as he says, but old Giacomino is a vain fuck, and he's got more of a taste for 'the Stuff' than Rocco ever had. He turned 65 this year, he's only two years younger than Pops, he was already 34 years old when he met Nia for the first time. He tells people he's got a good plastic surgeon, when they ask. And the same thing happened to me. My body wanted to stay 8 years old, forever. "Rossi had to get hormones, fucking estrogen and progesterone and HGH, off the black market to force my body to start puberty and to fucking grow. It's not like we could go to a doctor and explain why I needed the prescription. I mean, these tits aren't even mine. Ma bought 'em for my sixteenth birthday so I wouldn't feel so goddamned self-conscious. Nia's not exactly flat-chested, as you know, neither was my Mom, and it kind of gave me a fucking complex when I was growing up." "I mean, is she? I haven't really noticed," I replied, evasively. "Yes, you have, you lying fuck. There isn't a straight or bisexual man, or a lesbian or bisexual woman for that matter, that comes within fifty feet of Appolonia Bianchi that doesn't notice all of her unnatural charms. It made for some interesting 'family' trips during the summer when we'd leave the city, lemme tell you. I asked Pops once, you know, if he ever got jealous when she'd show up with some random dick she'd run across, cause I used to think it was pretty shitty of her. "I said she could've at least kept things on the downlow and not throw it in Rocco's face every few days. But he told me no, he loved her, he understood her nature very well and he'd accepted what she was years before I was even born, and that she loved him too, and more importantly, respected him. She always introduced the men to him because that was what he'd asked of her. That it was the one aspect of control he had in the situation, giving his 'permission' for her little liaisons. That it made him feel better to let them know they might be getting a piece, but she'd be ending every night lying in his bed, regardless of what they did." I nodded. "I guess I can kind of see his point." "But, the blood, that's how I ended up pregnant. I mean, I'm not a dumbass, I know how babies are made, but I wasn't worried about using condoms with Antoni, neither of us wanted to. I told him if he gave me anything I'd cut his dick off, and he knew I was serious, too, and he considered it a proportional response. I didn't even think I could get pregnant. "I stopped the birth control when I was 16 because it was making me gain weight and my cheer coach bitched me out in front of fucking everybody, and Rossi's guy said I needed to keep taking it to keep my hormone levels even. So I told Antoni I didnt want to get into my medical history, but suffice to say I was probably fucking sterile anyway, so he didn't have to worry about it, and he told me he wasn't worried about it at all. But apparently my fucking parts work better than I thought." "Or maybe he had some damned determined swimmers, who knows." "I don't know why I was even concerned about not using condoms anyway. Technically we were all excommunicated as of 2014. Pope said the mafiosi lifestyle isn't compatible with the Catholic one. You know, I wonder how Antoni would feel about all this, I wonder if he'd be pissed, think I lied to him about not being able to get pregnant." "You're just gonna have to take my word for it, B, but he's not angry in the least, he's pretty fucking proud of hisself." I'd say his chest was stuck out but he didn't have much of a chest left these days, so I just kept that part to myself. "Pretty sure he said he wasn't worried about it because he was hoping you were wrong about being sterile." Beccs gave me a strange look but the train arrived at just that moment. The people exiting did quite a bit of staring, unlike the people leaving the funeral, but I just tucked my arm around Becca and shouldered my way past them and found us a seat. The drops of water followed us into the train. "What's with the present tense, Tony? Is that some kind of cliche 'he's lookin' down on you' bullshit?" I snorted and wiped the bubble of blood from my nose, staring at the puddle of water that was starting to form in the seat next to us. I could feel the cold emanating from Antoni all along my left side. Oddly enough, it was easing the intense ache in my nearly severed ring finger. "He ain't looking down on us, B, I can tell you that much." "So it's a Hell joke?" "No, not really. But then again, I'm pretty sure we're all in Hell right this second, Miss Rebecca, so yes, yes it is." |
2023.05.28 06:25 IceQueenWeiss Selling epic games account + coupon 25% expire june 15
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2023.05.28 06:16 casapulapula Trying To Build Peace One BRICS at a Time. ANTIWAR DOT COM
Excerpt: "In the early days of the war in Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was open to negotiating a peace. The United States was not. State Department spokesman Ned Price explained, oddly, that the midst of a war is not the time for diplomacy. “This is not real diplomacy,” he said, “Those are not the conditions for real diplomacy.”
A month later, the State Department was still rejecting a negotiated end to the war, even if the negotiated settlement met Ukraine’s goals, because “this is a war that is in many ways bigger than Russia, it’s bigger than Ukraine.”
That same month, then-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett was talking to both Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin, attempting to mediate negotiations that he said had “a good chance of reaching a ceasefire.” But, once again, according to Bennet, the United States “blocked it.”
In April 2022, promising negotiations in Istanbul produced a “tentatively agreed” upon settlement. A negotiated end to the war seemed to be within reach. But, once again, the United States and United Kingdom put a stop to it. Then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson rushed to Kiev to gain control of Zelensky, telling him that Putin “should be pressured, not negotiated with.” He added that, even if Ukraine was ready to sign some agreements with Russia, the West was not. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and Numan Kurtulmus, the deputy chairman of Erdogan’s ruling party, have both said that “Zelensky was going to sign,” but “the United States…want[s] this war to continue.”
The U.S. has consistently prevented peace talks while pouring weapons into Ukraine and pushing for war, leading a frustrated Brazilian President Lula da Silva to complain, “The United States needs to stop encouraging war and start talking about peace.”
With the fall of Bakhmut, the massive loss of Ukrainian life and artillery and the Russian missile strikes on Ukrainian Patriot and other air defenses as well as Ukrainian ammunition storage sites, it is conceivable that those denied diplomatic solutions could have offered a result more favorable to Ukraine than the one that is shaping up on the battle field. Ukrainians may come to wish that Zelensky had listened to saner counsel.
But the United States is no longer the only power offering counsel. Other poles are emerging from this war larger. And those poles are pushing for peace.
BRICS is an international organization made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and growing, that does not seek to confront the United States but to balance its hegemony and foster a multipolar world. Brazil has suggested that BRICS could help negotiate an end to the war.
Lula has insisted that negotiations are “the only viable way out of the crisis” in Ukraine and has proposed a joint effort, or a “peace club,” that could include BRICS members China, India, Brazil and possibly Indonesia. Indonesia has been a leader in the nonaligned world. They have declared their interest in joining BRICS and were recently welcomed as a guest at the BRICS Foreign Ministers’ Meeting.
India’s Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has also offered “to contribute in any way towards peace efforts.”
[ ... ]
South Africa’s membership in BRICS makes it perhaps the only important international organization in which an African country has an equal voice. The insertion of Africa into the negotiating arena is an important announcement of Africa as an independent pole in the newly forming multipolar world.
The U.S. pole has not only declined to push for peace negotiations in favor of continuing to feed the war with the constant flow of weapons, but it has forcefully blocked other countries from encouraging them. But the United States may no longer be the world’s only pole. A new multipolar world, led by the BRICS nations, is attempting to compensate for the American refusal of peace talks and to take the lead in trying to start negotiations toward a peaceful resolution of the horrible war in Ukraine.
https://original.antiwar.com/ted_snide2023/05/25/trying-to-build-peace-one-brics-at-a-time/
submitted by casapulapula to WayOfTheBern [link] [comments]
A month later, the State Department was still rejecting a negotiated end to the war, even if the negotiated settlement met Ukraine’s goals, because “this is a war that is in many ways bigger than Russia, it’s bigger than Ukraine.”
That same month, then-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett was talking to both Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin, attempting to mediate negotiations that he said had “a good chance of reaching a ceasefire.” But, once again, according to Bennet, the United States “blocked it.”
In April 2022, promising negotiations in Istanbul produced a “tentatively agreed” upon settlement. A negotiated end to the war seemed to be within reach. But, once again, the United States and United Kingdom put a stop to it. Then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson rushed to Kiev to gain control of Zelensky, telling him that Putin “should be pressured, not negotiated with.” He added that, even if Ukraine was ready to sign some agreements with Russia, the West was not. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and Numan Kurtulmus, the deputy chairman of Erdogan’s ruling party, have both said that “Zelensky was going to sign,” but “the United States…want[s] this war to continue.”
The U.S. has consistently prevented peace talks while pouring weapons into Ukraine and pushing for war, leading a frustrated Brazilian President Lula da Silva to complain, “The United States needs to stop encouraging war and start talking about peace.”
With the fall of Bakhmut, the massive loss of Ukrainian life and artillery and the Russian missile strikes on Ukrainian Patriot and other air defenses as well as Ukrainian ammunition storage sites, it is conceivable that those denied diplomatic solutions could have offered a result more favorable to Ukraine than the one that is shaping up on the battle field. Ukrainians may come to wish that Zelensky had listened to saner counsel.
But the United States is no longer the only power offering counsel. Other poles are emerging from this war larger. And those poles are pushing for peace.
BRICS is an international organization made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and growing, that does not seek to confront the United States but to balance its hegemony and foster a multipolar world. Brazil has suggested that BRICS could help negotiate an end to the war.
Lula has insisted that negotiations are “the only viable way out of the crisis” in Ukraine and has proposed a joint effort, or a “peace club,” that could include BRICS members China, India, Brazil and possibly Indonesia. Indonesia has been a leader in the nonaligned world. They have declared their interest in joining BRICS and were recently welcomed as a guest at the BRICS Foreign Ministers’ Meeting.
India’s Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has also offered “to contribute in any way towards peace efforts.”
[ ... ]
South Africa’s membership in BRICS makes it perhaps the only important international organization in which an African country has an equal voice. The insertion of Africa into the negotiating arena is an important announcement of Africa as an independent pole in the newly forming multipolar world.
The U.S. pole has not only declined to push for peace negotiations in favor of continuing to feed the war with the constant flow of weapons, but it has forcefully blocked other countries from encouraging them. But the United States may no longer be the world’s only pole. A new multipolar world, led by the BRICS nations, is attempting to compensate for the American refusal of peace talks and to take the lead in trying to start negotiations toward a peaceful resolution of the horrible war in Ukraine.
https://original.antiwar.com/ted_snide2023/05/25/trying-to-build-peace-one-brics-at-a-time/
2023.05.28 05:46 -IForgotMyUsername-- [Request][Steam] Spongebob Squarepants: The Cosmic Shake [Attempt 3]
Steam account:
https://steamcommunity.com/id/AustralianPyscho/
Game:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1282150/SpongeBob\_SquarePants\_The\_Cosmic\_Shake/
I have been a big fan of Spongebob since I was a young child and would love to get this game, especially after having played the first game. The first game, 'Spongebob Squarepants: Battle For Bikini Bottom' was released in 2003 (which is actually my birth year so that's cool) and a 'Rehydrated' remake was released in 2020 and put on Steam. I have fond memories of playing the original on Plastation 2 and the remake made me feel nostalgic. I 100% completed this remake, which was very fun. The worlds are really cool, especially Dutchman's Graveyard which had a vibe that reminded me of waterparks and theme parks in Australia like Dream World, Sea World and White Water World. Yes, there's a place called White Water World. I always thought it sounded like a very weird name, but whatever it exists.
I have always loved games like Hello Kitty: Roller Rescue, the Spyro games and the Skylanders games (Especially Swapforce). I do not know what you call these games but I like these kinds of games you play using a controller. On my Steam account you should be able to see a lot of games with controller compatibility. I always find it more comfortable and fun to use a controller, rather than a keyboard and mouse.
The Cosmic Shake allows you to play as more characters which I will definitely love. There's also 30 costumes, new skills, new worlds and the voice actors from the original game came back for it. I love when voice actors get together for another game a long time after the original. The game is also low-spec, so my cheap computer will be able to run it.
I really want this game and it would be great to get the game soon.
submitted by -IForgotMyUsername-- to GiftofGames [link] [comments]
https://steamcommunity.com/id/AustralianPyscho/
Game:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1282150/SpongeBob\_SquarePants\_The\_Cosmic\_Shake/
I have been a big fan of Spongebob since I was a young child and would love to get this game, especially after having played the first game. The first game, 'Spongebob Squarepants: Battle For Bikini Bottom' was released in 2003 (which is actually my birth year so that's cool) and a 'Rehydrated' remake was released in 2020 and put on Steam. I have fond memories of playing the original on Plastation 2 and the remake made me feel nostalgic. I 100% completed this remake, which was very fun. The worlds are really cool, especially Dutchman's Graveyard which had a vibe that reminded me of waterparks and theme parks in Australia like Dream World, Sea World and White Water World. Yes, there's a place called White Water World. I always thought it sounded like a very weird name, but whatever it exists.
I have always loved games like Hello Kitty: Roller Rescue, the Spyro games and the Skylanders games (Especially Swapforce). I do not know what you call these games but I like these kinds of games you play using a controller. On my Steam account you should be able to see a lot of games with controller compatibility. I always find it more comfortable and fun to use a controller, rather than a keyboard and mouse.
The Cosmic Shake allows you to play as more characters which I will definitely love. There's also 30 costumes, new skills, new worlds and the voice actors from the original game came back for it. I love when voice actors get together for another game a long time after the original. The game is also low-spec, so my cheap computer will be able to run it.
I really want this game and it would be great to get the game soon.
2023.05.28 05:33 jacobh1999 Where do I go?
 | Mid to end of June I have some time off. Looking for some cool trails and places to explore roughly between the red lines on the map. Will be leaving from southern Wisconsin and eventually getting to DC and Philly area at then end of the trip. I have a lifted 4runner and am prepared to camp wherever or in the vehicle. submitted by jacobh1999 to overlanding [link] [comments] |
2023.05.28 05:24 OpportunityProof4908 South Carolina will be allocating 500 million dollars of its budget for a overhaul of the Myrtle Beach And its committee Direct from the governors office of South Carolina reported by local news
South Carolina set forward a path to invest hundreds of millions into its Growing popular tourist destination. The budget will be used to build a new peer and walk way to stretch along the beach, as well as ecological restoration of natural Waccamaw National Wildlife Refugee. 6.7 million dollars in restoration will include designating parts of Myrtle beach and the Surrounding mangroves and Intercostal as the Pawsley State Park preserving its natural beauty for future generations. the bill also includes a Tax break for residents of the community who would have to live with a higher tourism population, and 167 Million in low interest small business Loans. To quote the Governor on this historic legislation “This was a fantastic addition to the wonderful state parks of our amazing state … we are incredibly lucky to have such diversity in our ecology and we must preserve that” going on to say that “ It’s the beach and it’s community that’s made Myrtle Beach so successful, anyone can have an amazing beach but an amazing community of hard working People behind it now that is harder to find and we lucked out here in South Carolina”.So far estimates belive this investment could bring in as many as 2.3 million tourists after restorations are competed in 1998.
submitted by OpportunityProof4908 to PSUS_governors [link] [comments]
2023.05.28 05:15 IceJD Recommended Emoji Analysis - By Emoji - 55.0.0
Bold is new/changed info in V55.0
submitted by IceJD to disneyemojiblitz [link] [comments]
- Emojis are in the order they appear in the collection screen. The post was getting too long, so when adjacent emojis have the same recommendations they are combined
- Designations are reported based on what is in the config (except the more detailed blitz descriptions)
- See a version of this info sorted by power type
By Emojis
Mickey Mouse- All Levels: Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Add time
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- All Levels: Drop items, Create lightning, Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create suns
- All Levels: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears & Create suns
- All Levels: Transforms & Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- Add time
- Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Add time
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Bombbles
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus)
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Add time & Create lightning
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Levels 4 and 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Transforms & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Add time
- All Levels: Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Create suns & Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms & Create lightning
- Level 2: Create suns
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create stars & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Clears
- Transforms
- Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create lightning & suns
- Levels 4 and 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears, Generate score, & Create lightning
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create suns
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create lightning & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create stars
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create lightning & suns
- All Levels: Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Transforms
- All Levels
- Clears
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Clears & Adds Time
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Drop items
- Create lightning
- Create suns
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Transforms & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Create suns & stars
- Levels 1 and 2: Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create suns
- Level 3: Create lightning & suns
- Level 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create lightning & suns
- All Levels: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Transforms
- All Levels: Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Generate score & Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Generate coins
- Levels 1 thru 2: Create lightning
- Levels 3 thru 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Transforms, Blitz (triggers), Coins
- All Levels: Create lightning & suns
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Bombbles
- All Levels: Add time & Blitz (triggers)
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Adds time
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Levels 2 and 3: Create suns
- Levels 4 and 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Drops item & Create lightning
- Levels 3 and 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Clears & Drops item
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms & Drop items
- All Levels: Create suns & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Drop items & Create lightning
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears, Generate coins, & Add time
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Create suns
- Create lightning
- Rearrange emojis
- Levels 4 and 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create suns
- Levels 2 thru 4: Create suns & stars
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Clears
- Create lightning
- Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Clears
- Create suns
- Create stars
- Levels 1 thru 4: Create lightning
- All Levels
- Generate coins
- Create lightning
- Create suns
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Bombbles
- All Levels: Create lightning & suns
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Creates suns
- Level 5: Creates stars
- All Levels: Clears & Creates lightning
- Levels 2 thru 5: Creates suns
- All Levels: Rearranges & Score Bonus
- All Levels: Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Clears & Add time
- All Levels: Rearranges & Generate coins
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Add time
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Levels 1 and 2: Create lightning
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears, Drop items, & Generate coins
- All Levels: Create suns & Add time
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create suns & Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears & Add time
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Drop items & Create lightning
- Levels 1 thru 4: Create suns
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms & Create suns
- All Levels: Clears & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2 and 3: Create suns
- Levels 4 and 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms & Drop Items
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Levels 4 and 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Drop items & Create stars
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2 thru 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create suns
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Levels 2 thru 4: Create lightning & stars
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Blitz (triggers)
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Rearranges & Create lightning
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Create stars & Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus)
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears & Add time
- All Levels: Drop items & Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create suns & Drop items
- Levels 1 and 2: Create lightning
- Levels 4 and 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Generate coins & Blitz (triggers)
- All Levels: Create lightning, sun, and stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Transforms & Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- All Levels: Clears & Add time
- All Levels: Clears & Transforms
- All Levels: Generate score & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Create suns
- Levels 1 thru 3: Create Lightning
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drops Items
- All Levels: Clears, Transform, & Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- All Levels: Clears & Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Add time
- All Levels: Transforms & Bombbles
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Adds Time
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears, Create suns, & Bombbles
- All Levels: Clears & Add time
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels:
- Clears
- Drop items
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Generate coins
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Levels 2 thru 4: Create lightning & suns
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Drop items & Create suns
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels:
- Create lightning
- Create suns
- Generate score
- All Levels: Create lightning & Create suns
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Drop items
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create lightning & suns
- All Levels: Create lightning
- Level 1: Create suns
- Level 2: Create stars
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2 thru 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels
- Drop items
- Create stars
- Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms & Bombbles
- All Levels: Transforms & Bombbles
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Transforms
- Drop items
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Blitz (triggers) & Create stars
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create lightning & suns
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Add time & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Generate coins
- All Levels: Transforms & Drop items
- All Levels: Blitz (triggers), Create lightning, & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Level 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Random
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Drop items & Clears
- Level 1: Create suns & stars
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create lightning, suns, &stars
- All Levels
- Clears
- Generate score
- Add time
- Generate coins
- Level 1: Create suns
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Level 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- Levels 1 and 2: Create lightning
- Levels 3 and 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels
- Create suns
- Create stars
- Add time
- Generate coins
- Generate score
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Create suns & Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Clears
- Drop items
- Create suns
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Generate coins & Clears
- All Levels
- Add time
- Clears
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- Drop items
- All Levels: Add time & Drop items
- All Levels: Generate coins & Create stars
- All Levels: Create suns
- Levels 1 thru 3: Create lightning
- Levels 4 and 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- Levels 1 and 2: Create lightning
- Level 3: Create lightning & suns
- Level 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Create suns & Generate coins
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Levels 2 and 3: Create lightning
- Levels 4 and 5: Create suns
- All Levels
- Drops items
- Create lightning
- Create suns
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create suns
- Level 3: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Create lightning & Generate coins
- All Levels: Create lightning & Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Drop items
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Clears & Add time
- All Levels: Transforms & Create suns
- Levels 4 and 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Create suns
- Levels 1 thru 3: Create lightning
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create suns
- Level 3: Create lightning & suns
- Level 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create lightning & suns
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels
- Clears
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Transforms & Generate score
- All Levels: Create lightning
- Level 2 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Add time & Drop items
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Level 4: Create lightning & stars
- Level 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Blitz (triggers)
- Create suns
- Create stars
- Levels 1 thru 4: Create lightning
- All Levels: Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Blitz (triggers) & Create suns
- All Levels
- Create lightning
Drop items(does not actually drop items despite coding)
- Levels 2 thru 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Blitz (triggers) & Clears
- All Levels: Create lightning & stars
- Levels 2 thru 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drops items
- All Levels: Transforms & Adds time
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Transforms & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Bombbles
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Levels 2 and 3: Create lightning & suns
- Level 4: Create lightning, suns, & stars
- Level 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Transforms & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Create lightning & Drop items
- Levels 2 thru 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create suns & Create stars
- All Levels
- Add time
- Create stars (code error; really sun L1-L3 and star L4-L5; D.R. - I'd code it "right" in DEBWizard)
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Level 4: Create suns & stars
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels:
- Clears
- Create lightning
- Create suns
- Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Blitz (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Generate coins
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Level 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Clears & Generate score
- All Level: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Transforms
- All Levels: Generate coins & Create lightning
- Levels 2 and 3: Create suns
- Levels 4 and 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Transforms
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2: Create lightning & suns
- Level 3: Create suns
- Level 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- Levels 1 thru 3: Create lightning
- Level 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears & Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Drop items & Create suns
- Levels 1 and 2: Create lightning
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Create suns
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drops item
- Level 1: Create lightning
- Level 2 thru 4: Create suns
- Level 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- Clears & Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Generate coins
- All Levels: Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels
- Generate coins
- Create lightning
- Create suns
- Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Rearranges
- All Levels: Clears & Blitz (triggers)
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create suns & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels:
- Drop Items
- Create lightning
- Create suns
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Generate coins
- All Levels: Transforms
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears
- Level 1: Create suns
- Levels 2 thru 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning
- All Levels: Clears
- All Levels: Clears & Drop items
- All Levels: Create suns
- Level 2 thru 4: Create lightning
- Level 5: Create lightning & stars
- All Levels:
- Clears
- Drop items
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- All Levels: Generates coins & Adds time
- Levels 1 and 2: Create lightning
- Levels 3 and 4: Create lightning & suns
- Level 5: Create suns
- All Levels: Transform & Bombbles
- All Levels: Clears & Transforms
- All Levels: Transforms & Bombbles
- All Levels:
- Create lightning, suns, & stars
- Overcharges
- All Levels:
- Clears
- Generate coins
- Blitz (triggers)
- Bombbles
- All Levels: Create lightning
- Levels 1 thru 4: Create suns
- Levels 3 thru 5: Create stars
- All Levels: Clears & Create lightning, suns, and stars
- All Levels: Clears & Overcharges
- All Levels:
- Clears
- Transforms
- Drops items
- Adds time
- All Levels: Transforms & Blitz (TBD Subtype)
2023.05.28 05:14 IceJD Recommended Emoji Analysis - By Power Type - 55.0.0
Bold is new/changed info in V55.0
By Power Type
The power type occurs at ALL levels.....unless specific levels are noted!
submitted by IceJD to disneyemojiblitz [link] [comments]
- Emojis are in the order they appear in the collection screen. The post was getting too long, so when adjacent emojis have the same recommendations they are combined
- Designations are reported based on what is in the config (except the more detailed blitz descriptions)
- See a version of this info sorted by emoji
By Power Type
The power type occurs at ALL levels.....unless specific levels are noted!
Add time
Aladdin, Angel Chip, Briar Rose, Bruno, Captain Lightyear, Captain Pan, Celia, Cogsworth, Dr. Lily Houghton, Ebenezer Scrooge McDuck, Electrical Parade Minnie, Enchantress, Flash, Frozone, Grandmother Willow, Jack, Mary Sanderson, Pacha, Pink Dress Cinderella, Platinum Grogu, Pretty Flower, Prison Dog, Tiny Tim, Tod, Wedding Cinderella, White Rabbit, Winter Belle, Witch Minnie, Young MimBlitz
Alma Madrigal (triggers), Almost There Tiana (triggers), Angel (blitz meter fill bonus), Baby Simba (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz), Barley (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz), Captain Lightyear (triggers), Chernabog (triggers); Cave of Wonders (triggers); Headphones Dug (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz), Holiday Tinker Bell (triggers), Jedi Anakin (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz), Mama Coco (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz), Pixel Ralph (triggers), Platinum Mickey (triggers), Platinum Nemo (TBD), Queen Elinor (blitz meter fill bonus), Rainbow Mickey (triggers), Te Fiti (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz), The Emperor (triggers), Vacation Genie (triggers), Wedding Ariel (blitz meter fill bonus), Willow (blitz meter fill bonus; extends blitz)Bombbles
Abby Park, Ariel (live-action), Diamond Elsa, March Hare, K-2SO, King Triton (live-action), Pine Cone Pluto, Platinum Mickey, Spring Flute Mickey, The Witch, Topaz Tinker BellClear emoji (A-G)
22, 8-Bit Mickey, Abby Park, Abominable Snowman, Alberto, Alice, Alien, Alien Pluto, Alpha, Amethyst Ursula, Anakin Skywalker, Anastasia, Anastasia Romanov, Angel, Angel Chip, Anger, Anna, Aqua, Archimedes, Ariel (cartoon), Ashoka Tano, Astronaut Mickey, Baby Dory, Baby Moana, Bagheera, Bailey, Bambi, Bao, Barbossa, Barney, Baymax, BB-8, Belle, Bert, Bianca, Billy Butcherson, Birthday Baby Pluto, Blue Fairy, Bo Peep, Bo-Katan, Bob Cratchit Kermit, Bob Cratchit Mickey, Boba Fett, Bolt, Briar Rose, Bronx, Bruce, Bullseye, Bunny, Bunny Tigger, Buzz Lightyear, C-3PO, Cad Bane, Calhoun, Cassian Andor, Captain Goofy, Captain Hook, Captain Pan, Carl, Chernabog, Cheshire Cat, Chewbacca, Chip (BatB), Christmas Clarabelle Cow, Christmas Sally, Constance, Crab Donald, Cri-Kee, Cruella de Vil, Crush, Cruz Ramirez, Daisy Duck, Dale, Dante, Darla, Darth Maul, Darth Vader, Dash, Davy Jones, Death Trooper, Deep Sea Mickey, Demona, Destiny, Disguised Jasmine, Disguised Miguel, Disgust, Donald Duck, Doorknob, Dopey, Dory, Dr. Finkelstein, Dragon Maleficent, Drizella, Duke Caboom, Dumbo, Ebenezer Scrooge McDuck, Edna, Eeyore, Elastigirl, Elephant Abu, Elizabeth Swann, Elsa, Elsa the Snow Queen, Emperor Palpatine, Ernesto, Esmeralda, EVE, Fauna, Fear, Fennec Shand, Figaro, Finn, Finnick, Flik, Flit, Floral Miss Bunny, Flotsam, Flounder, Flynn Rider, Frank, Forky, Fozzie Bear, Gadget, Gardener Mickey, Gaston, General Grievous, Ghost of Jacob Marley, Giselle, Gizmoduck, Goliath, Gonzo, Grand Inquisitor, Grand Moff Tarkin, Grand Pabbie, Grumpy, GusClear emoji (H-O)
Hades, Hamm, Han Solo, Hank, Héctor, Hei Hei, Heimlich, Hercules, Hiro, Hitchhiker Ghost Phineas, Hondo, Honey Bee Pooh, House Alice, Hugo, Iago, Ian, Imperial Stormtooper, Indiana Jones, Isabela, Jabba the Hutt, Jack Skellington, Jack-Jack, Jackson Storm, Jafar, Jasmine, Jedi Anakin, Jedi Master Luke, Jessie, Joe, Jose, Judy Hopps, Jumba, K-2SO, Kaa, Kakamora Chief, Kermit the Frog, Kevin, King of Hearts, King Louie, King Triton (cartoon), King Triton (live-action), Kristoff, Kronk, Kuzco, Kylo Ren, Lady Kluck, Lando Calrissian, Launchpad McQuack, Lightning McQueen, Li Shang, Lilo, Little John, Little Oysters, Lotso, Louis, Luisa, Luke Skywalker, Lumière, Madam Mim, Madame Leota, Madame Medusa, Magic Carpet, Mal, Maleficent, Man-Eating Wreath, March Hare, Marion Ravenwood, Marshmallow, Mary Poppins, Mary Sanderson, Mater, Maui, Max, Maximus, Meeko, Meg, Meilin Lee, Merida, Merryweather, Mike, Miss Piggy, Miss Piggy Emily Cratchit, Moana, Moff Gideon, Monterey Jack, Mother Gothel, Mowgli, Mr. Incredible, Mr. Toad, Mrs. Nesbit, Mufasa, Mulan, Mushu, Nala, Namaari, Nana, Nick Wilde, Oogie Boogie, Oswald the Lucky RabbitClear emoji (P-Z)
Pacha, Pancake Goofy, Patch, Pegasus, Penny Proud, Pepita, Percy, Perdita, Peridot Maleficent, Peter Pan, Phil, Piglet, Ping, Pine Cone Pluto, Pinocchio, Pirate Peg-Leg Pete, Pixel Ralph, Platinum Grogu, Platinum Mickey, Platinum Simba, Platinum Woody, Pluto, Powerline, Pretty Flower, Prince Ali, Prince Charming, Prince Phillip, Princess Atta, Princess Aurora, Princess Leia, Prison Dog, Professor Ratigan, Pua, Pumbaa, Pumpkin Mickey, Quasimodo, Queen Elinor, Rabbit, Rainbow Stitch, Rainbow Unicorn, Rajah, Ralph, Rancor, Rapunzel, Rasputin, Raya, Red Panda Mei, Red Panda Ming Lee, Remy, Retro Minnie, Rex, Rey, Robin Hood, Rose, Rose (DeWitt), Rose Gold Minnie, Royal Magician Donald, Roz, Russell, Sadness, Santa Jack, Scar, Scrat, Scrooge McDuck, Scrump, Seashell Daisy, Shan Yu, Shaved Ice Stitch, Shenzi, Shere Khan, Sid, Simba, Sir Hiss, Sleepy, Slightly, Smee, Snake Jafar, Sora, Sorcerer's Apprentice Mickey, Sox, Spirit Mufasa, Spring Flute Mickey, Steamboat Willie Mickey, Stinky Pete, Stitch, Sulley, Sven, Swedish Chef, Te Ka, The Beast, The Book, The Bride, The Child, The Evil Queen, The Fire Spirit, The Mandalorian, The Manticore, The Mayor, The Prince, The Queen of Hearts, Thumper, Tia Dalma, Tiara Rapunzel, Tigger, Timon, Timothy Mouse, Tramp, Tuk Tuk, Ursula, Vacation Genie, Vacation Goofy, Vampire Mickey, Vanellope, Vanessa, Violet, Watermelon Minnie, Waternoose, WALL-E, Webby, Wedding Cinderella, Wedding Giselle, Wedding Maximus, Wendy, Willow, Winnie the Pooh, Winter Belle, Winter Cruella, Winter Snow White, Winter Pete, Witch Minnie, Woody, Yen Sid, Yesss, Yoda, Young Anna, Young Merida, Young Mim, Young Winifred, Yzma Kitty, Yzma, Zero, ZurgCreate lightning (A to L)
Abu, Aladdin, Alberto, Alpha (1, 2, 3, 4), Amethyst Ursula, Anton Ego, April Shower Bambi, Aquamarine Jasmine (1, 2, 3, 4), Arthur, Baby Rapunzel (1, 2, 3, 4), Bailey (1, 2), Baloo, Bing Bong, Bo-Katan, Boo, Bookworm Belle (1, 2, 3, 4), Boushh Disguise Leia (1, 2, 3, 4), Caballero Donald (1, 2), Cara Dune, Carl (1, 3, 5), Cave of Wonders, Chip (RR), Copper, Darth Maul (2, 3, 4, 5), Deep Sea Mickey (1, 2), Devil Dale, Doc, Doorknob (1, 3, 5), Dr. Finkelstein, Duke Caboom, Ebenezer Scrooge McDuck, Electrical Parade Elliott, Emperor Palpatine, Fairy Minnie, Fix-It Felix, Jr. (2, 3, 4, 5), Flash, Flora, Flower Piglet (1, 2, 3), Gardener Mickey, Garnet Minnie, Gauzey the Hatbox Bear, Genie Jafar, Ghost of Christmas Future Pete (1, 2, 3), Gingerbread Mickey (1, 2, 3), Governor Ratcliffe, Grandmother Willow (1, 2, 4), Han Solo, Holiday Mickey (2, 3, 4, 5), Holiday Minnie, Holiday Pluto, Holiday Tinker Bell (1, 2, 3, 4), Hondo (1, 2, 3, 4), Ice Cream Mickey, Jedi Anakin, John Darling, Jyn Erso, King Candy (1, 2, 4), Kronk, Lightning McQueen, Lucifer (1, 2),Create lightning (M to Z)
Madame Pigota, Magic Carpet (1, 2), Magic Mirror, Magica de Spell (1, 2, 4), Maid Marian (1, 2), Mater, Mickey Mouse, Mirabel (1,2), Nala (1, 2), Ping (1), Platinum Mirabel, Platinum Woody, Prince Naveen, Poe Dameron, Powerline, Pumpkin Mickey (1, 2), Rainbow Mickey (2, 3, 4, 5), Rainbow Stitch, Ray (2, 3, 4, 5), Ron, Royal Magician Donald (1, 2), Santa Goofy (1, 2, 3, 4), Santa Jack, Sapphire Joy, Scrat (1, 2, 3, 4), Seashell Daisy (2, 3), Sea Creature Goofy, Sisu, Stinky Pete (1), Suga Mama, Tamatoa, Te Fiti (1, 2, 4), The Book, The Fairy Godmother, The Mayor, Tinker Bell, Tod (1), Vacation Goofy (1, 2, 3, 4), Vampire Mickey (2, 3, 4, 5), Vanessa, Waternoose, Wedding Maximus (1, 2), Winifred Sanderson, Witch Minnie (2, 4), Yoda (1, 2), Young Anna (1, 2, 3), Young Winifred, Zazu, Zeus, ZurgCreate stars (A to L)
Abu, Aladdin, Amethyst Ursula, Anton Ego (3, 4, 5), April Shower Bambi, Arthur (5), Baby Rapunzel (2, 3, 4, 5), Bailey (4, 5), Baloo (4, 5), Bing Bong (3, 4, 5), Blue Fairy, Bob Cratchit Mickey (3, 4, 5), Bookworm Belle (2, 3, 4, 5), Boushh Disguise Leia (5), Caballero Donald (4, 5), Cara Dune (2, 3, 4, 5), Copper (5), Darth Maul (5), Darth Vader, Deep Sea Mickey (3, 4, 5), Devil Dale, Doc (2, 3, 4, 5), Dragon Maleficent, Ebenezer Scrooge McDuck, Electrical Parade Elliott (5), Electrical Parade Minnie (4, 5), Emily Cratchit Minnie, Enchantress, Fairy Minnie (3), Fix-It Felix, Jr. (2, 3, 4, 5), Flora, Flower Piglet (5), Gardener Mickey, Garnet Minnie (5), Gauzey the Hatbox Bear (5), Genie Jafar (5), Ghost of Christmas Future Pete (4, 5), Gingerbread Mickey (3, 4, 5), Governor Ratcliffe, Grandmother Willow (4, 5), Han Solo, Holiday Cinderella, Holiday Minnie (2, 3, 4, 5), Holiday Tinker Bell, Hondo, Honey Cake Pooh, Ice Cream Mickey, Indiana Jones, Jedi Anakin, Jiminy Cricket, Jyn Erso (2, 3, 4, 5), King of Hearts, Kronk, Lucifer (5), Luke Skywalker (2, 3, 4, 5)Create stars (M to Z)
Magic Mirror, Maid Marian, Mirabel (3,4), Miss Piggy, Pancake Goofy, Pepita, Peppermint Minnie (4, 5), Ping (4, 5), Platinum Mirabel (3, 4, 5), Platinum Woody, Poe Dameron (4, 5), Prince Naveen, Pumpkin Mickey (5), Queen Anna, Rainbow Mickey, Rainbow Stitch, Rainbow Unicorn, Ray, Ron (2, 3, 4, 5), Santa Goofy (5), Sapphire Joy, Scrat (4, 5), Scrump, Sea Creature Goofy (2, 3, 4, 5), Sisu (2, 3, 4, 5), Snake Jafar, Stinky Pete (5), Suga Mama (5), Tamatoa (4, 5), The Fairy Godmother, Tinker Bell, Tod (4, 5), Vacation Goofy (2, 3, 4, 5), Vampire Mickey, Waternoose (3, 4, 5), Wedding Ariel, Wedding Maximus (4, 5), Wendy, Wicket (5), Winifred Sanderson, Witch Minnie (5), Yoda (4, 5), Young Anna (5)Create suns (A to M)
Abu, Aladdin, Alpha (4, 5), Amethyst Ursula, Anton Ego, April Shower Bambi (2, 3, 4, 5), Aquamarine Jasmine (3, 4, 5), Arthur, Baby Chick Eeyore, Baby Rapunzel, Baby Simba, Bailey (2, 3, 4, 5), Baloo, Bing Bong (2), Bo-Katan (2, 3, 4, 5), Bob Cratchit Mickey, Boba Fett (5), Bookworm Belle, Boushh Disguise Leia (2, 3, 4), Caballero Donald, Cara Dune, Carl (2, 3, 4, 5), Chip (RR) (2, 3, 4, 5), Cinderella, Copper (3, 4, 5), Darth Maul, Deep Sea Mickey (2, 3, 4, 5), Devil Dale, Doc, Doorknob (2, 3, 4, 5), Dr. Lily Houghton (2, 3, 4, 5), Ebenezer Scrooge McDuck, Electrical Parade Elliott (2, 3, 4, 5), Electrical Parade Minnie (1, 2, 3), Enchantress, Fairy Minnie (2, 3), Fix-It Felix, Jr., Flora, Flower Piglet (3, 4), Gardener Mickey, Garnet Minnie, Gauzey the Hatbox Bear, Genie Jafar (3, 4, 5), Ghost of Christmas Future Pete, Gingerbread Mickey, Governor Ratcliffe, Grandmother Willow (2, 3, 5), Holiday Mickey (2, 3, 4, 5), Holiday Minnie (1, 3, 4, 5), Holiday Tinker Bell, Hondo, Ice Cream Mickey, Iridessa, Jack, Jedi Anakin, Jolly Holiday Mary Poppins, Joy, Jyn Erso, King Candy (2, 3, 4, 5), Kronk, Lilo, Lucifer, Luke Skywalker (1, 2, 3, 4), Madame Pigota, Magic Carpet (2, 3, 4, 5), Magic Mirror, Magica de Spell (2, 3, 4, 5), Magical Enchantress, Maid Marian, Mama Coco, Mirabel (5), Mother Gothel,Create suns (N to Z)
Nala (2, 3), Olaf, Peppermint Minnie, Ping (2, 3), Platinum Mirabel (1, 2, 3, 4), Platinum Woody, Poe Dameron, Prince Naveen, Pumpkin Mickey (3, 4), Rabbit, Rainbow Mickey (2, 3, 4, 5), Rainbow Stitch, Ray (2, 3, 4, 5), Ron, Royal Magician Donald (3, 4, 5), Santa Goofy (2, 3, 4, 5), Sapphire Joy, Scrat (2, 3, 4, 5), Sea Creature Goofy, Seashell Daisy (4, 5), Smee, Snow White, Spring Flute Mickey, Stinky Pete (2, 3, 4), Suga Mama (2, 3, 4, 5), Tamatoa (2, 3, 4, 5), Te Fiti (2, 3, 4, 5), The Book, The Emperor, The Fairy Godmother, Tinker Bell, Tod (2, 3), Vacation Goofy, Vampire Mickey, Waternoose (3, 4, 5), Wedding Maximus (2, 3, 4, 5), Wicket, Winifred Sanderson, Witch Minnie, Yoda (2, 3, 4), Young Anna, Zazu, Zurg (3, 4, 5)Drop items
22, Amethyst Ursula, Anton Ego, Baby Moana, Baby Rapunzel, Bao, Billy Butcherson, Bob Cratchit Mickey, Bookworm Belle, Caballero Donald, Cad Bane, Chip (RR), Copper, Devil Dale, Doc, Ebenezer Scrooge McDuck, Electrical Parade Elliott, Fennec Shand, Grandmother Willow, Gus, Holiday Cinderella, Holiday Mickey, Jedi Anakin, Jedi Master Luke, Jolly Holiday Mary Poppins, Lucifer, Luisa, Magic Mirror, Mufasa, Namaari, Patch, Pink Dress Cinderella, Platinum Grogu, Rancor, Red Carpet Genie, Reflection Mulan, Rose (DeWitt), Scrat, Sid, Silvermist, Sea Creature Goofy, Stinky Pete, Suga Mama (All - however, she doesn't actually drop items), Tiny Tim, Vampire Mickey, Watermelon Minnie, Young Merida, ZazuGenerate coins
Aladdin, Alma Madrigal, Almost There Tiana, Aquamarine Jasmine, Baby Chick Eeyore, Bernard, Bing Bong (3, 4, 5), Boushh Disguise Leia, Captain Jack Sparrow, Cara Dune, Cave of Wonders, Constance, Cri-Kee, Dug, Elizabeth Swann, Emily Cratchit Minnie, Enchantress, Ernesto, Fashion Minnie, Finnick, Flora, Ghost of Jacob Marley, Giselle, Gizmoduck, Governor Ratcliffe, Hamm, Holiday Cinderella, Jabba the Hutt, Little John, Magica de Spell, Minnie Mouse, Mirabel, Oogie Boogie, Platinum Mickey, Prince Ali, Prince John, Prison Dog, Robin Hood, Rose (DeWitt), Sarah Sanderson, Scrooge McDuck, Sultan, Tamatoa, The Prince, Witch Minnie, ZeusGenerate score
Baby Dory, Bruce, Deep Sea Mickey, Enchantress, Forky, Frozone, Gaston, Iridessa, Lady, Madame Pigota, Marie, Max, Mrs. Potts, Prince Eric, Princess Aurora, Queen Anna, Rainy Day Donald, Salacious Crumb, Sebastian, The Child, The Mayor, Tiara Rapunzel, Winter Aurora, Witch MinnieOvercharge
Platinum Simba, Sapphire JoyRandom emoji
FigmentRearrange emoji
Alebrije Dante, Clawhauser, Genie Jafar, Goofy, Gramma Tala, Imelda, Jaq, Kit, Little Oysters, Mermaid Minnie, Nana, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Pearl, Poe Dameron, R2-D2, Rafiki, Salacious Crumb, Sarah Sanderson, Shere Khan, Syndrome, The Mad Hatter, Yzma KittyTransform emoji
Adult Simba, Alebrije Dante, Alma Madrigal, Antonio, Ariel (live-action), Baby Pegasus, Baby Rajah, Bernard, Bing Bong, Binx, Blueberry Muffin Donald, Bruno, Clawhauser, Darkwing Duck, Diamond Elsa, Dr. Facilier, Electrical Parade Tinker Bell, Elsa the Snow Queen, Fashion Minnie, Fancy Beast, First Order Stormtrooper, Flower Minnie, Hatbox Ghost, Headphones Dug, Honey Cake Pooh, House Alice, Human Sisu, Ian, John Darling, Joy, King Candy, Kuzco, Lady Tremaine, Luca, Madam Mim, Magic Mirror, Magical Enchantress, Merlin, Miguel, Nemo, Panchito, Pascal, Pearl, Peppermint Minnie, Peridot Maleficent, Pink Dress Cinderella, Platinum Grogu, Platinum Nemo, Pocahontas, Princess Aurora, Pumpkin Minnie, Queen Amidala, Queen Elinor, R2-D2, Rainy Day Donald, Randall, Red Carpet Genie, Reflection Mulan, Sally, Silvermist, Soft Serve Donald, Sketch Figment, Sugar Bowl, The Book, The Caterpillar, The Genie, The Witch, Tiana, Topaz Tinker Bell, Winter Pete, Yzma2023.05.28 05:10 KirkHammettJigsaw Booking the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship From Wrestle Kingdom 17 Part II Can We Give Paddy Murphy The World Title?
 | submitted by KirkHammettJigsaw to FantasyBookingElite [link] [comments] https://preview.redd.it/ndcz4fl54j2b1.png?width=1200&format=png&auto=webp&s=0ff5ce6a845e102560bcc9556569da910350c092 After regaining his IWGP World Heavyweight Championship, Kazuchika Okada has the unfortunate responsibility of carrying the championship into the single most grueling tournament in all of professional wrestling: the G1 Climax. New Japan has decided to revert to the old format: twenty competitors, two blocks, nine matches per wrestler, and no semi-finals. Thirty minutes per block match, and the finals have no time limit. The highest scoring competitor from each block advances to the finals, and the winner of the finals goes on to compete for the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestle Kingdom. Now, if you’re wondering why I’m not doing the most recent G1 Climax formatting, there are two reasons. The first is that NJPW has announced the schedule, and it seems to line up more with a traditional G1 format. The second reason is that I REALLY DON’T WANNA FUCKING WRITE A FOUR BLOCK G1. With all that out of the way, let’s talk about who’s in the blocks! A BLOCK
B BLOCK
G1 CLIMAX 33A Block: Night One Block A is a stacked block, and Night One’s main event could potentially end up being the match of the tournament, because Kazuchika Okada is taking on none other than Bryan Danielson! The two of them put on a show, and end up going the distance! This means that they’re both middle of the road with a point each, and Shingo, Finlay, Tama and Cobb each nab two points. Night Three After beating KENTA on Night One, Tama Tonga goes for revenge on another Bullet Club member in David Finlay. However, Finlay manages to take advantage of his aggression and cheat to win, taking the top spot with four points. Okada and Bryan each improve to three points, defeating EVIL and Narita, respectively. KENTA defeats Cobb to get on the board. EVIL, Narita and Yano all have zero. Shingo gets a win, and he’s tied with Finlay for first. Night Five Ren Narita gets his first two points, toppling Yano, while Okada and Bryan both hit five, and Shingo and Finlay both hit six. Yano and EVIL are still scoreless, and Jeff Cobb is very frustrated with the fact that he has gone 1-2 so far, as have KENTA and Tama Tonga. Night Seven EVIL manages to get on the board with a win over Tama Tonga, due to BC interference. Yano gets on the board too, beating Jeff Cobb, and Mr. Athletic tears up the ringside area in response! Bryan gets through Shingo, and Okada gets through Finlay, so the men that drew on Night One are both tied for the lead now. Ren Narita defeats KENTA, a sign of the changing of the guard in puro. Night Nine Bryan defeats EVIL to take the top spot in the block with nine points, and Shingo is close behind, beating Finlay to keep the BC leader at six and improving to eight himself. Jeff Cobb finally breaks his string of bad luck, beating Okada, keeping the champion at seven! Tama also beats Narita, and KENTA runs through Yano. Night Eleven Yano tricks Tonga and defeats him, making it to four points. Cobb builds on his momentum from last week, taking a huge win over Takagi, and Bryan expands his lead by beating David Finlay! Okada defeats KENTA, and EVIL gets passed Narita. Bryan sits alone at eleven points, Okada isn’t far behind with nine, and Shingo is in third with eight. Cobb and Finlay have six each, and the rest of the field sits at four. Night Thirteen EVIL defeats Yano, and Cobb, after a shaky start, hits eight points with a win over David Finlay, who’s on a skid after a great start. Shingo breaks double digits, beating Tama Tonga, and Okada gets past Narita to do the same, hitting eleven. However, KENTA, who has history with Danielson, manages to upset The American Dragon! We’ve got a tie for first place between Okada and Bryan, with Shingo right on their tails! Night Fifteen It’s the penultimate night of A Block action, and with the race being super tight, a win is super important. Jeff Cobb defeats EVIL, hitting ten points. A great run for the Hawaiian, but Bryan Danielson hits thirteen with a win over Tama Tonga, so Cobb is mathematically eliminated. Okada also hits thirteen with a victory over Toru Yano, and Shingo Takagi gets through Ren Narita to remain in the fight! Also, David Finlay hits eight points after beating KENTA. Okada and Bryan are tied for first, thirteen points each, and Shingo has a cool twelve. Night Seventeen It’s the final night of A Block. KENTA beats EVIL, Cobb beats Tama Tonga, and Ren Narita beats David Finlay, all nice consolation victories. Bryan Danielson faces Toru Yano, and seems poised to run through him…BUT YANO MANAGES TO CLAIM ANOTHER SOUL IN THE BLACKPOOL COMBAT CLUB, BECAUSE HE OVERWHELMS DANIELSON WITH HIS SHENANIGANS AND BEATS HIM! BRYAN IS OUT! It all comes down to Okada vs. Shingo, Okada hoping to get one step closer to choosing his own Wrestle Kingdom opponent. The match hits 29 minutes, a draw would mean a Rainmaker win…BUT SHINGO MANAGES TO HIT HIM WITH A MADE IN JAPAN! COVER! ONE…TWO…THREE! SHINGO TAKAGI HAS MADE THE G1 FINALS! B Block: Night Two We kick things off in style, with Orange Cassidy showing off his skills to the Japanese crowd, defeating Yota Tsuji. Will Ospreay kicks off his campaign by beating Shota Umino, and Zack Sabre Jr. does the same, beating one of his former rivals in Tomohiro Ishii. Taichi gets past recent IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Minoru Suzuki, and in the main event, Tetsuya Naito just barely manages to get a win over The Ace, Hiroshi Tanahashi. Night Four Tanahashi gets on the board with a victory over Shooter Shota, while ZSJ beats OC in an absolute banger. Ospreay also picks up a win, over Ishii, and Yota Tsuji pulls up a huge upset, beating Minoru Suzuki! In the main event, Naito can’t get past Taichi, and the man with the golden voice is tied for first, with ZSJ and Ospreay. Night Six Shota Umino knocks Taichi back down to Earth, while Will Ospreay defeats Minoru Suzuki, keeping him at zero points. Orange Cassidy beats Tomohiro Ishii, and Hiroshi Tanahashi is able to get past Yota Tsuji. In the main event, ZSJ and Naito have a close match, but in the end, The Front Man forces Naito to pass out. ZSJ and Ospreay are alone at the top now. Night Eight Umino manages to beat Orange Cassidy, and Taichi hits six points with a win over Yota. Ishii beats Suzuki to get on the board, and Suzuki STILL has no points, the only one that doesn’t have any! Tanahashi beats Sabre with a High Fly Flow, and Naito hands Ospreay his first loss, so we have a four way tie for first! Night Ten Ishii beats Tanahashi, and that could be a costly loss for The Ace. Shota Umino hands Minoru Suzuki YET ANOTHER LOSS, and ZSJ makes quick work of Yota Tsuji. Tetsuya Naito gains ground in this tightly-contested block by getting past Cassidy in one of the most fun matches of the tournament, and Will Ospreay beats Taichi to keep his lead. Ospreay and ZSJ sit alone at eight points, while Shota Umino, Tetsuya Naito, Hiroshi Tanahashi, and Taichi are all in second place with six. Tomohiro Ishii has four, Yota Tsuji has two, and Minoru Suzuki is STILL at zero, somehow. Perhaps the World Title reign took a lot out of him. Night Twelve Naito gets a big win over Shota to stay in the thick of things, while Tanahashi keeps Suzuki scoreless and improves to eight points. Yota gets past Ishii, doubling his total, while Orange Cassidy makes Taichi’s chances at winning this block very slim, beating him in a fun match. In the main event, Will Ospreay knocks Zack Sabre Jr. out with a Hidden Blade to take sole ownership of the top spot! Night Fourteen Zack Sabre Jr. bounces back with a big win over Shooter, and Tetsuya Naito stays alive, defeating the already very worn-down Minoru Suzuki, still winless. Will Ospreay gets past Yota Tsuji, maintaining the top spot, and Taichi has an absolute banger with Ishii, with Taichi coming out on top. Finally, Orange Cassidy upsets The Ace, beating Tanahashi with three consecutive Orange Punches! Night Sixteen In a battle of the young guns with rhyming first names, Yota beats Shota. Both have six points. Orange Cassidy gets past Minoru Suzuki, getting his win back after their match during Suzuki’s title reign, which seems so far back now. ZSJ beats his old tag partner, Taichi, but Tetsuya Naito falls to Tomohiro Ishii! In the main event, between Tanahashi and Ospreay, Ospreay nearly gets the job done, but Tana pulls it out of the fire and beats him with a High Fly Flow! The standings going into the final night of B Block action are as follows: Will Ospreay and Zack Sabre Jr. are both at twelve. Tetsuya Naito, Hiroshi Tanahashi and Orange Cassidy are all at ten. Taichi sits at eight, and Shota Umino, Tomohiro Ishii and Yota Tsuji have six each. Way behind is Minoru Suzuki, still sitting a big ol’ goose egg. Zero. Night Eighteen We head into a final night with endless possibilities, and with so many potential winners, almost every match matters. Up first, a match that doesn’t matter! Shota Umino defeats Tomohiro Ishii, ending his G1 Climax run with a solid eight points. Taichi gets by Hiroshi Tanahashi, eliminating Tana. Both end with ten. Tetsuya Naito faces Yota Tsuji, and after defeating him, improves to twelve points. He’s currently locked in a three-way tie with Zack Sabre Jr. and Will Ospreay, each man having a win and a loss against the other two. Zack Sabre Jr. faces his old stablemate, Minoru Suzuki…AND SUZUKI BEATS HIM! AFTER A WINLESS EIGHT MATCHES, MINORU SUZUKI PREVAILS ON HIS FINAL NIGHT, AND NOW, IT’S ALL UP TO WILL OSPREAY! If Ospreay wins, he wins the block, but if he loses, he enters a very complicated tie with Orange, Naito and Sabre. In a rematch from the first Forbidden Door, Ospreay and OC outperform their first match…BUT THE RESULT IS THE SAME! THE COMMONWEALTH KINGPIN HAS WON THE B BLOCK! It’s going to be Will Ospreay vs. Shingo Takagi in the G1 Climax Finals! NJPW G1 Climax 33: Finals - August 13th, 2023 Shingo Takagi vs. Will Ospreay - G1 Climax Finals This is it. The winner of this match goes on to the main event of Wrestle Kingdom 18. This isn’t the first time that the three men involved with the Wrestle Kingdom main event have been Kazuchika Okada, Will Ospreay and Shingo Takagi, but this time, there’s no two night event. Only one man can get that main event slot. Will it be The Commonwealth Kingpin? Will it be The Last Dragon? Two former champions, two insane G1 runs, two very worthy competitors. Let’s get this started. This match is absolutely insane, because like, look at the two guys that are in it. Shingo uses his size advantage to batter Will from pillar to post, and Will has to tap into the agility that we see a little bit less of these days. He knocks Shingo out of the ring with a Hidden Blade, but when he goes for a Suicide Dive, he just bounces right off of Takagi! He picks Ospreay up and hits him with a brutal Uranage. This is a very, very good match, but unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and this one does when Takagi has Ospreay badly hurt. He waits for the former Aerial Assassin to get to his feet, before charging forward with a Pumping Bomber! But Ospreay reverses with a standing Spanish Fly! Rolls through! Hooks the arms! LIFTS SHINGO UP! STORMBREAKER! HE MAKES THE COVER! ONE…TWO…THREE! WILL OSPREAY IS GOING TO WRESTLE KINGDOM! NJPW Burning Spirit: Night Four - September 6th, 2023 Jeff Cobb vs. Kazuchika Okada (c) - IWGP World Heavyweight Championship Jeff Cobb managed to defeat Kazuchika Okada in the G1, so he has earned this shot at the greatest prize in the sport. Cobb recreates his game plan from the match, using his size to bully the champion, but Okada targets the leg a lot more than he did in the G1 Climax, slowing the Hawaiian right down. There’s a close call for The Rainmaker at one point, with him having to elbow his way out of an attempt at the Tour of the Islands, but the leg work pays off, especially when Cobb almost goes out when locked in the Red Ink. Cobb can barely stand when Kazu knocks him out with The Rainmaker…before clocking him with a Hidden Blade, a message to Cobb’s stablemate, Will Ospreay. Kazuchika Okada def. Jeff Cobb in 19:13 to retain the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship NJPW Royal Quest: Night One - October 7th, 2023 Shingo Takagi vs. Kazuchika Okada (c) - IWGP World Heavyweight Championship It’s the main event of Night One of Royal Quest, and G1 finalist Shingo Takagi did manage to beat Okada in the G1, so he’s got a chance to rectify his loss in the Finals. Shingo puts Okada through hell during this match, fighting like a man possessed, but Okada is just too good right now. He manages to roll through a Made In Japan, and counters an attempt at a Pumping Bomber with perhaps his most perfectly-timed Dropkick ever. Despite The Last Dragon’s best efforts, the result was a foregone conclusion from the moment the bell rang. Tonight, Kazuchika Okada was unbeatable, and he put Shingo down with a Rainmaker. Tonight was Kazuchika Okada’s no-hitter, his flu game, his Ernie Nevers forty-bomb. Can he recreate this perfect form on January 4th? Kazuchika Okada def. Shingo Takagi in 24:51 to retain the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship NJPW Royal Quest: Night Two - October 8th, 2023 Tetsuya Naito vs. Will Ospreay (c) - G1 Climax Briefcase The Ungovernable One had himself a very, very good G1 Climax run, coming just two points short of winning his block. However, he did get a win over the eventual block winner, and tournament winner for that matter, so tonight, the leader of United Empire has to put his January 4th contract on the line against the most popular man in the company. However, Ospreay is the most popular man in the building tonight, as he’s in his home country of England (gross)! The Commonwealth Kingpin is able to feed off of the energy in the building tonight, and the crowd reaches a fever pitch when Ospreay throws his elbow pad into the crowd, hits Naito with a front-facing Hidden Blade, and picks him up for the Stormbreaker! Ospreay plants the leader of LIJ and pins him! He can celebrate with his rotten-toothed, ugly, little-brained countrymen tonight! (PJ, Misery and OWD are three of the good ones don’t worry about it) Will Ospreay def. Tetsuya Naito in 29:00 to retain the G1 Climax Briefcase NJPW Battle Autumn: Night Ten - October 29th, 2023 Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Will Ospreay (c) - G1 Climax Briefcase There was one man other than Tetsuya Naito that managed to get a win over Will Ospreay during the G1 Climax, and that man was The Ace himself, none other than Hiroshi Tanahashi. Perhaps the most loved man in the company, Tanahashi also had a solid tournament, and he looks to turn back the clock tonight and secure himself a spot in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom. Unfortunately for The Ace, Will Ospreay is already in Wrestle Kingdom form, and he doesn’t fall to the High Fly Flow like he did on Night Sixteen. Instead, he gets his knees up and quickly hits a brutal Hidden Blade to pick up the win! It’s official! The main event of Wrestle Kingdom 18 is set in stone, and the competitors have two months to prepare themselves. Will Ospreay def. Hiroshi Tanahashi in 20:19 to retain the G1 Climax Briefcase NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 18 - Press Conference Run Leading up to the biggest show of the year, The Ojiisan of Them All, NJPW of course does a run of promotional press conferences. Throughout those press conferences, Kazuchika Okada does admit that Will Ospreay will be a formidable opponent, but sort of brushes him off as well. He talks about how this Wrestle Kingdom isn’t a forum for Will Ospreay to complete his arc, it’s just happening to serve as a reminder that Kazuchika Okada is the best to ever do it. It’s going to be yet another coronation for him. Will Ospreay had his Wrestle Kingdom main event against him, and he failed to defeat The Rainmaker. He failed to defeat Kenny Omega. He failed to defeat Bryan Danielson. Some things never change, and this is one of them. The result is set in stone. It’s as sure as the wind, the tides…and the rain. Will Ospreay, of course, has a very different point of view. He says that all of his losses hurt, but they always shape him into a better wrestler, and now he’s the best he has ever been. Kazuchika Okada is not the main character here, he’s not the story. All eyes are on Will Ospreay, and what he’s going to do. The eyes of the world are watching Wrestle Kingdom not to see Kazuchika Okada, but to see the climax of the tale of Will Ospreay. “Every good story has an antagonist. I’m David, and you’re Goliath. On January 4th, it’s my job to size you up, take aim, and put my best shot clean through your fuckin’ head. I may be The Commonwealth Kingpin, but I’ve still got a little bit of Assassin in me. I don’t miss, baby.” NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 18 - January 4th, 2024 Will Ospreay vs. Kazuchika Okada (c) - IWGP World Heavyweight Championship After a tremendous show, we have finally reached the main event of the evening. Will Ospreay, The Commonwealth Kingpin, walking in as the challenger against his former stablemate, his white whale, the IWGP World Heavyweight Champion, Kazuchika Okada. The bell rings, and there’s a moment of calm. The two competitors stare at each other before locking up. Okada grabs a Headlock immediately, but Ospreay backs him into the ropes. He backs away immediately, a clean break. They lock up again, and this time, Okada backs Will into the ropes, and does his patented mocking pats on the chest. Ospreay isn’t having it, though, and he slaps the champion! Okada laughs, nodding his head, and he returns to the middle of the ring. They each put one hand out, and Okada immediately ducks under the challenger’s arm, grabbing a Wristlock. He wrenches on the arm a little bit, and Will plays it safe, doing a forward roll to alleviate the pressure. Ospreay goes behind and grabs a Hammerlock, forcing Kazuchika to cartwheel out of it. The champion throws Ospreay with an Arm Drag, and Will rushes at him! Okada tries to trip him, but Ospreay jumps over and runs the ropes. Okada GOES FOR A DROPKICK! Ospreay stops dead in his tracks, the champ crashes into the mat! Ospreay tries to capitalize WITH A RUNNING SHOOTING STAR PRESS! OKADA ROLLS AWAY! Both men grab their mid-sections after failed attacks and restart once again. It looks like they’re going to lock up one more time, but the challenger fakes the collar-and-elbow and instead goes behind Okada, hitting a textbook Neckbreaker! He rolls through, clutching The Rainmaker’s neck in a sort of Guillotine position, only to throw him through the middle ropes to the outside! Ospreay runs the ropes! DIVES OUT! TOPE CON HILO! OKADA GOES DOWN, AND OSPREAY IMMEDIATELY PICKS HIM UP, LOOKING TO LAUNCH HIM INTO THE BARRICADE! Okada, still loopy, reverses, and heaves Will over the barricade! Backs up! RUSHES FORWARD! DIVING DROPKICK OVER THE BARRICADE! Okada soaks in the cheers as a result of that tremendous sequence, and returns to the ring. Ospreay staggers back to the ring as well, BUT GETS BLINDSIDED BY A TOPE CON HILO FROM OKADA! IT’S RARE THAT HE BUSTS THAT OUT! It’s been all Okada for the past couple of minutes, and he follows Will out, just to throw him back inside. Kazu smells blood in the water, and he decides to lock in RED INK! IT’S TIGHT, AND THE PAIN WAKES OSPREAY UP! HE’S GRABBING HANDFULS OF THE CANVAS, AND MANAGES TO DRAG HIMSELF ALMOST ALL THE WAY TO THE ROPES, BUT OKADA RELEASES THE HOLD AND DRAGS HIM BACK TO THE CENTRE! THIS TIME, HE APPLIES THE MONEY CLIP! EVERYBODY HATES THIS MOVE, AND WILL OSPREAY MUST BE HATING IT MORE THAN ANYBODY RIGHT NOW! However, The Commonwealth Kingpin begins fighting to his feet! Kicks to the shins! Breaks free! To the body! To the head! KAWADA KICKS, OKADA IS ROCKED! A ROLLING THUNDER KICK KNOCKS HIM DOWN! COVER! ONE…TWO…AND A KICKOUT! Ospreay picks his opponent up, before going for a Spin Kick! Okada ducks it and rolls away to create distance, before going for a Lariat! Ospreay ducks that and does a roll of his own! He charges at Okada, running up his shoulders like a ramp and flipping off, before going for an Enzuigiri! It’s ducked, and Okada goes for an Ankle Lock! Ospreay rolls, sending Okada rolling too, and Ospreay goes for a takedown, but he eats a knee! Okada looks for a Discus Elbow! Ducked, and Ospreay hits a BIG Superkick! SPRINGBOARD! OSCUTTER! OKADA CATCHES HIM, AND HE’S LOOKING FOR A RAINMAKER! RIPCORD! ANOTHER SUPERKICK TO ESCAPE! GOES FOR THE OSCUTTER AGAIN! THIS TIME IT WORKS! COVER! ONE…TWO…TH-KICKOUT! Ospreay doesn’t really know what to do at this point, so he falls back on his roots. The former Aerial Assassin climbs to the top rope! JUMPS OFF! 630 SPLASH! NO, OKADA MOVES AT THE LAST SECOND, SO OSPREAY ROLLS THROUGH, NARROWLY AVOIDING CATASTROPHE! Okada lunges at him AND SENDS HIM FLYING WITH A SHOTGUN DROPKICK! Picks him up! GERMAN SUPLEX! OSPREAY FLIPS THROUGH! DUCKS A LARIAT! SPRINGBOARD MOONSAULT! BUT THE RAINMAKER CATCHES HIM AND PLANTS HIM WITH A SPINNING TOMBSTONE PILEDRIVER! COVER! ONE…TWO…NO! OKADA ISN’T FINISHED, HE PICKS OSPREAY UP AGAIN! RAINMAKER! RIPCORD! CONNECTS! THAT’S IT! COVER! ONE…TWO…THRE-NOOOOOOOOO!!! WILL OSPREAY JUST KICKED OUT OF THE RAINMAKER! Kazuchika Okada is shocked, not to mention angry, and he starts to stomp on his adversary! Kicks right at the downed Ospreay’s skull! Okada lifts him to his feet, and Will can barely stand. The champion just begins slapping him! But that does nothing but wake Ospreay up! He starts slapping back! This is a battle of slaps, and Ospreay THROWS A SPINNING BACKFIST! It lands flush! Okada is wobbling! OSPREAY RUNS TO THE TOP ROPE! TOP ROPE OSCUTTER! HE EATS A DROPKICK TO THE BACK OF THE HEAD! OKADA PICKS HIM UP, AND HE GOES FOR A DISCUS RAINMAKER! BUT OSPREAY, ON PURE INSTINCT, REVERSES WITH A SPANISH FLY! LIFTS HIM TO HIS KNEES AND RUNS THE ROPES! HIDDEN BLADE, THAT SOUNDED LIKE A GUNSHOT! PICKS HIM UP! HOOKS THE ARMS! LIFTS HIM ABOVE HIS SHOULDERS! STORMBREAKER! HE MANAGED TO HIT IT! COVER! ONE…TWO…THREE!!! WILL OSPREAY HAS DONE IT! IN THE MAIN EVENT OF WRESTLE KINGDOM 18, HE HAS ONCE AGAIN BECOME THE IWGP WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION! HE TRULY IS THE KINGPIN! Will Ospreay def. Kazuchika Okada in 31:27 to win the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship |
2023.05.28 05:00 Kazevenikov Cryptid Chronicle - Chapter 30
A special thanks to u/bluefishcake for the wonderful original story and sandbox to play in.
A special thanks to my editors LordHenry7898, RandomTinkerer, Swimming_Good_8507, CatsInTrenchcoats, and KLiCKonthat.
And a big thanks to the authors and their stories that inspired me to tell my own in this universe. RandomTinkerer (City Slickers and Hayseeds), Punnynfunny (Denied Operations), CompassWithHat (Top Lasgun), CarCU131 (The Cook), and Rhion-618 (Just One Drop)
Hy’shq’e Ay Si’am (Thank you noble friends)
Chapter 30: A Promise Kept
Kalai stepped off the shuttle to the Vaida’s headquarters and into a running tackle-hug from Sitry. “Oh Kalai, I could kill you right now! You got to see the Great Barrier Reef in person, you bitch!” Sitry’s cheerful voice was muffled from where she was still buried in her chest. Kalai staggered backwards a pace or two, happy to be back from her whirlwind adventure around Earth with her father.
Naranjo and Papa Rhaxiid were there on the platform to welcome her back too, but their welcomes were more sedate.
“Not to mention you got out of work for half our damn trip. Ugh, it’s so not fair!” Naranjo huffed as Kalai gave him a sisterly hug.
Papa Rhaxiid reached up and chucked her chin before turning to lead the way back inside from the forested platform. “Welcome back, sweet-sprout, we’ve missed you. Come on, we’ll get you settled again and off to work. There’s quite a bit you need to catch up on if you want your credits.”
The chuckles from the twins behind her were full of sibling malice, but she knew how to shut the pair of them up. “Papa Rhaxiid? I’ve got the paper on Biodiversity in the Reef you asked for, along with the dissection report and stomach content analysis of the tuna we caught. I want to put the finishing touches on it and do a final proofread first before I send them to you.” The man turned and gave her a warm smile as they entered the building.
“Good, why don’t you go take your things back up and say hello to Andy? I’ll give you an hour and a half to get freshened up, then I want you to report to Aquarium 12 with Dr. Sor’ansa. You can put your snorkeling practice to work there.” Papa Rhaxiid walked the three of them to the residential elevator. “I’m heading back to my office. Andy’s been requested by Maetro Pae’ella to work the kitchens for something called ‘Bison burgers'. Apparently it’s a type of indigenous bovine that the eastern Bands raise. That and something from Europe called ‘French Fries’.”
Kalai couldn’t help but get excited as she and her siblings piled into the elevator back to their little shared apartment. Sure the food she’d had all over the place was good, but so far nothing had been able to compare to Andy and his Salishian cooking.
“Nerd, I can’t believe you cheated and did work on your vacation." Naranjo broke the silence of the elevator after a little bit and stuck his tongue out at her.
“Spit to windward, you vain little weed. Don’t hate me because I’m awesome.” Kalai’s riposte caused Naranjo to fold his arms and huff. Sitry simply ambushed her with an ear flick.
The elevator door opened to their floor before Kalai couldn’t bear the silence from Sitry any longer. “So, did you bag him yet, you lucky bitch?”
“No she hasn’t!” Naranjo’s singsong mockery of his sister interrupted Sitry’s response. “Papa hasn’t let Sitry even NEAR Andy without one of them around!”
“Rub it in, you snitch, besides, he did kiss me first,” Sitry preened happily as she playfully shoved Kalai’s shoulder.
Kalai pretended to stumble and almost caught Sitry’s foot, but she was just a hair too slow. “Yeah, and then you gave him a black eye, you clod.”
“Will you let it go? It was an accident!”
“It’s not even the only one he got either." Naranjo’s interjection stopped her right in front of their door.
“Wait, what? Who hurt him this time?” Kalai let her bag thunk to the floor as she turned to look accusingly between Sitry and Narny.
Sitry folded her arms and her ears twitched back as she shot a dark look at their door. “He ‘fell down’ yesterday while out at one of the Hatcheries we gave to the Hwatcoms. Mrs. Toloui nearly had a fit! She said she could smell another human on him and that he was covered in blood!”
Narny nodded primly as Kalai tried to process what they were telling her. “WHAT? Did she call out the militia? Track down whoever hurt him?”
“No, and he refused treatment and insisted that no one did it to him! When papa tried to talk to him, Andy said some stupid human macho shit about pain healing and birds liking scars. I don’t know, sometimes humans… they’re frickin’ insane!”
The door shot open and there stood Andy. His left eye was an angry puffy yellow and blue mess, and there were three points on his lips where a dark cinnabar line marked a crack. Kalai and her siblings stood in wide eyed shock at his sudden appearance and the only sound was the music emanating from the common room behind him.
Andy looked up and down at the three without saying a word. He cocked an eyebrow and snagged Kalai’s bag before any of them could react and cleared the doorway for them.
Kalai sputtered at the impropriety but Naranjo and Sitry just shrugged and walked in after Andy. “Femboys, am I right?” Narny whispered to Kalai as he passed. Kalai followed behind and was greeted by the white fluff-ball, Puck, who hopped up and down, whining for attention. She bent down and started scratching his ears and back. While Puck rubbed up against her hands, Andy settled back down at the table where his omnipad was hooked up to a keypad. Her heart started to sink a bit and Kalai shot Sitry a jealous look before the music came to a sudden halt and Andy interrupted the beginnings of her pity party.
“Ok, Kem’ira, I got the pics now and I’m telling you to declare yourself to the farmers first! I guarantee if you tell them you’re with the new DNR and you’re there to kill all the Scotch Broom in their pasture lands, they’ll stop trying to shoot you for trespassing!”
Kalai’s mood jumped up a bit. It’s not that he doesn’t care to see me, he’s in a meeting!
“No, no I’m not coming out to talk this over with them, I’ve got my own work to do! Either you start talking to folks like I showed you how, or ask the militia to give you one of their armored catsuits to wear under your uniform… Uh-huh, good luck." Andy hung up on the call and leaned back as Puck scampered over and hopped up in his lap.
Andy rubbed his temples before shaking his head. He seemed to relax a bit and Puck slid off to follow Sitry to the kitchen. Andy looked over and gave Kalai a happy smile that made her flush. “Welcome back! So how was the land down under? That tuna was fan-frickin’-tastic, if you aren’t sick of seafood I’ll do something fancy with it tomorrow to celebrate your coming back. Can’t tonight though, I got volun-told to be head chef tonight and I… Oh damnit! I’m late! Come to dinner, burgers and fries Indian style tonight. Gotta run!” With that, Andy went dashing out the door with Puck barking and scrambling along after him.
Kalai felt her heart sink back down again, as he left. “Andy I-” She started but he was gone.
“Yeah, it’s been like that for the whole week. The only time we get to hang out is dinner.” Sitry commiserated as she took Kalai’s bag into their room. “On the other hand, we might get to catch up during the family meal tonight.”
The dinner was delicious, though a bit weird. It tasted alright, but there was a certain aftertaste on the sandwich that just didn’t sit right with Kalai. She just couldn’t put her finger on it. The french fries more than made up for it though, and Mama Sakalbi had to hold a science trivia contest to see who got the last little handful.
Kalai and Narny were already silently plotting with each other for their revenge against their sister who had won and refused to share the last few matchsticks when Andy finally joined their table. He was sweaty and he smelled of woodsmoke and french fries. Kalai jumped up and offered him a seat next to her with a nervous smile. He took it gratefully and seemed to sag a bit as he gulped down a glass of water.
“Andy, I think you may be finding your calling as a culinary ambassador,” Mama Aftasia beamed. “A toast to the chef!”
Andy gave a shy smile and looked down as Kalai and the rest of the family gave a hearty ‘Here, here!”
“It’s a simple enough recipe; it’s just using bison instead of cow, that’s all, and I don’t know anyone who’d turn down hand cut fresh fries. It’s kind of hard to screw up.”
“Young man, you are speaking to a woman who found a way to take cold water and dried wumpa flakes and wind up with a Class-4 fire. Cooking has always seemed like ‘blight mysticism’ to me, and these foods? These flavors? Nothing short of a Greenwood miracle in my opinion." Mama Aftasia continued her praise of Andy, which only caused him to shrink even lower in his seat.
“To be honest, I like your salmon better,” Kalai said, and the whole table went silent. Kalai held her ground though, and was rewarded with a tired but genuine laugh from Andy that brought him back out of his shell.
“You know, I do too. My Clan were fisherpeople, not buffalo chasers.” Andy gave Kalai a cheeky grin, which she returned happily, her heart glowing. Mama Aftasia and Mama Sakalbi both blinked in bemusement at Andy’s statement while Sitry just giggled.
“Speaking of which, Andy, I received a call from Elder Alex Hwatcom.” Papa Rhaxiid’s change of subject instantly perked Andy up, and he stared silently, waiting. “He extended an invitation to our family to attend his family gathering this Friday-”
“Alex said that? He used those words?” Andy shook his head in shock as he interrupted Papa Rhaxiid. The table went quiet and everyone held their breath as they looked between the two men.
Papa Rhaxiid adopted as good an impression of the human Elder as he could. “I’d like to extend an invitation for you and your family to be guests at our family gathering this saturday up at the White… something… lodge-”
“The White Ram Lodge?” Andy sat forward, interjecting again as the color drained from his face.
“Yes, that’s the one! I asked if we could bring anything since the last time they hosted us they put on that wonderful spread. He said if we could bring a few salmon for the family, that would be wonderful.”
Andy leaned back and took another sip of ice water before holding the glass to his blackened eye. “Alex Hwatcom… just invited you… to a gathering… and he told you to ‘bring a few salmon’? Do you realize what a huge honor this is?”
Rhaxiid looked from his wives to his children with mild concern. “Um, I thought it was only dinner, but your reaction tells me there’s more significance to this than I originally thought. I was thinking about our stocks of adult Sockeye, but then I remembered in his story how important King Salmon are. Of course, I’d like to defer to you for the choice since you know these animals and the cultural expectations with this invitation better than we do.”
Andy was silent for a moment before he put the glass down. “I’d recommend a ‘hard no’ to all your clone stock!” Now it was the Vaidas’ turn to be shocked, as each of Kalai’s Erbian family’s jaws dropped in synch. Before anyone could say anything, Andy continued, “You need to bring wild-caught. Farm-raised salmon wouldn’t… well we can tell, and you can taste the difference between them. We need to go fishing!” Kalai leaned towards Andy slightly as he lowered his head and started mumbling to himself. She was just able to make out what he was saying to himself as Mama Sakalbi and Mama Aftasia began whispering to each other. “...need to get the Gillnetter out of storage, check what’s running and select the mesh. I’m gonna need a deckhand too.”
Kalai reached a hand out but stopped short of touching him. “Andy?”
He popped up and spoke for the whole table to hear. “I need a shuttle to the mainland and a waiver against the fishing ban. I’ve got to get my boat and the drum ready for sea ” Rhaxiid and Aftasia sputtered in confusion, but Mama Sakalbi had a shadow fall over her, and her ears pulled back.
“Do you mean to say you want to go out on the water? Risk the ecological balance for… dinner?”
Andy looked Sakalbi dead in the eye and gave her a firm nod. “Why don’t you come out and see how we did this before you got here. Think of it as a chance to see the way we’ve fished for the last hundred or so years, and then I can explain the way we used to fish before that.”
The offer snapped Rhaxiid out of his confusion and he brightened. “A learning experience? Wonderful, we’ll make a day of it!” His hands shot out to grab both his wives’ and Kalai could feel the vibrations in the floor from where he was excitedly tapping his feet.
“If you don’t mind hard, smelly work. Uncle Willy always called it ‘the worst desk in the prettiest office.' It’ll be a bit cramped, but I’ve got room on the boat for a few guests and observers; four I think would be ok. She’s a working boat, not a pleasure cruiser,” Andy explained. That sent the whole lot of them excitedly talking among themselves.
Kalai was about to lean in to talk to Mama Aftasia, but Andy caught her attention first. “I don’t suppose you’d want to go back out on the water, given you just got back from pleasure-boating-”
Kalai’s heart nearly jumped out of her chest. “I wouldn’t miss it for my own colony planet!”
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Kalai stood on the pier, bundled in her thermal sailor’s coat. It was still dark and the wind blew from the north in a cold little morning breeze. Kalai took a deep breath and reveled in the smell of the fresh sea air. The soft chattering of Mama Sakalbi’s teeth broke the silence. “It’s a bit chillier than it said it was going to be.”
“The water always does that. It’s never as warm as the lubbers say it’ll be,” Papa spoke as he handed her back her thermos of hot chocolate.
Papa stood next to Kalai and nudged her with his elbow. Even in the dark, Kalai could see him smile up at her and jerk his head at the shivering Erbian. He was also wearing a thermal sailor’s coat, and his hands were stuffed in his pockets to keep them warm, just like Kalai’s. “Landswoman,” he whispered to her and the two of them shared a knowing smile. It was strange, but welcome when she'd told Papa about her upcoming day fishing with Andy, and he’d politely requested to join them. Papa Rhaxiid had graciously given his spot up to accommodate her birth father. Narny was all for it until Andy had explained what they were going to do, but then surrendered his challenge to the fourth guest space, not wanting to go anywhere NEAR anything that could see him come face to face with a Lion’s Mane Jelly. Sitry had done a happy little dance when she found out, but only yesterday had come down with Thistle Fever, and was bundled off to bed by her parents. It left Kalai, Mama Sakalbi, and Papa to accompany Andy on his fishing trip.
The water brushed against the shore behind them quietly. In the gloom, Kalai could just barely make out the outline of the nearest island mountain, but only because the stars had disappeared behind it. It was almost four in the morning, but Kalai had managed a catnap on the shuttle to the empty little lot that had been the boat launch. Aside from the water, the world was silent. Even the breeze made almost no noise and a sense of peace surrounded them. Everything was so calm, Kalai felt like she didn’t have a care in the world.
In the distance, a low rumbling sound of a motor rose from being almost imperceptible to a rolling drum of thunder. From around the point, two green floating lights sped through the darkness, and a spotlight turned on. The beam of light moved jerkily until it came to rest on the pier where they were standing and Kalai started waving her arms. Sakalbi’s omnipad rang, and Andy’s voice shouted over the speaker and the background noise for them to shine a light on the edge of the pier to help him park the boat.
Kalai and Papa moved closer and turned their omnipad flashlights on and waved them as the boat swung gracefully around and glided in alongside them. Kalai caught the rope that flew over the railing of the boat and she heard more than saw Andy moving around on the deck as she tied off on one of the mooring cleats. Several lights clicked on and the deck was bathed in light enough for Kalai to get a clear view of the boat they’d be spending the day on.
Andy hadn’t lied. Kalai saw that this little vessel was a working boat with no frills at all. When he’d told her they’d be going fishing, she’d envisioned something like the charter boat papa had taken her on out of Nantucket. Sporty, fast with a nod to comfort and function. This was not that at all. A giant wheel as wide as Kalai’s outstretched arms that looked like a sideways spool of thread was secured to the deck amidships and dominated the deckspace. Wrapped around it was a fluorescent green tangle with a line of oblong white and yellow corks and rope. There was a covered hatchway sitting behind the drum in front of the raised step to the enclosed cabin. Two large windows let the light out to two children’s bunks, a little table with a booth seat and a raised captain’s chair in front of the helm and engine controls. Andy shut down the engine and that peaceful stillness returned.
“Oway there!” Kalai called, “ship oway! Request permission to come aboard.” Kalai gave the traditional greeting of a Shil’vati sailor.
“Permission granted! Anyone need a stepstool?” Andy finally stepped into the light and Kalai got a look at him. He was wearing a hooded sweatshirt and the same bright orange coveralls she’d seen the fishmongers wearing on their date.
“I wouldn’t mind a hand, Mr. Shelokset.” Papa He’osforos braced a foot on the railing of the boat and Andy pulled him up.
“Just call me Andy, Doc, and welcome aboard. Jackie should be along any minute now with the day’s groceries, and the cabin’s out of the cold. You can get yourself set wherever you find comfortable.” Papa nodded and disappeared around the other side of the wheel moving towards the bow.
Kalai helped Mama Sakalbi into the boat next, and she quickly ducked into the cabin that took up the entire stern section save for a little ledge that ran along the outside. Andy gripped Kalai’s hand and she smiled as he pulled her deftly aboard. The boat rocked a little on its mooring, and Kalai almost fell into Andy, who wordlessly put his arms around her waist to catch her as she lost her balance. She flailed for a moment before she steadied herself against him.
“Gotcha,” Andy smiled, and Kalai could see him flush almost as much as she could feel herself doing as their noses almost touched. Those big dark brown eyes surrounded by white orbs drew her in and she felt she could lose herself in them. Kalai started as Andy danced her around him and moved her towards the cabin door.
“It might be a little cramped for you in there, but the Mary Jean wasn’t built for pleasure boating, she’s a working girl. Sit tight, I gotta check a few things in the back.” Andy patted the railing affectionately before he hopped up and scooted along the outside of the cabin towards the stern. Kalai couldn’t help the little longing groan that came out as he left her there on the little tiny quarterdeck. Her heart was hammering in her chest as half formed fantasies danced at the edges of her mind.
“I saw that, little minnow.” Papa’s voice was soft, but his tone and the sudden broken silence nearly gave her a heart attack.
Kalai could only stammer as her father stared at her with a cocked eyebrow. A thump from the cabin window behind saw an amused Mama Sakalbi daintily sipping at her thermos with her ears twitched forward in interest, staring out at her. “Papa I… he-”
Papa moved carefully around the covered hatchway to stand next to her, leaning back against the cabin window and heaved a sigh. “I must say I’m surprised. This lovely man’s got good clean lines and is very well cared for. It speaks well of his Skipper.”
It took a full minute for Kalai’s brain to process that he was talking about the boat and not Andy. “And the way Andy brought him in smooth in near complete darkness? It gives me confidence in his abilities.”
Kalai breathed a silent sigh of relief and exasperation. Although she was happy to be spending more time with her father, bringing him on what she’d hoped would be a sailing date wasn’t exactly what she’d had in mind for ‘family time’. He wants me to find a nice young man and spend time with him on a boat, but the first chance I get Papa decides to clam-jam me.
From up on shore, the sound and lights of a large human vehicle screeching to a halt heralded the last of their party to arrive. Kalai heard the clomping footsteps coming down the pier and moved to the railing to lend a hand.
“Ahoy Mary Jean! Raggedy Andy, you there?” Kalai stared with wide eyed surprise to see a human female, loaded down with plastic bags and sporting two human weapons on her shoulder. The two of them locked eyes, and while Kalai didn’t understand everything the girl shouted in surprise, she had caught and understood the phrase, “What the fuck?”
“Easy now, they’re my guests, and the one inside is the boss!” Andy appeared on the pier instantly before either Kalai or the woman could react further.
“Ya didn’t tell me we were having pur-” The woman glared at Kalai and her father. She had switched to Vatikre thankfully, but her tone was hostile as she dropped everything but her weapons. “I mean, hwun’eetums, aboard. A gal could get the wrong idea pretty quick in the dark when there’s no warning.”
“Knock it off Jackie. Let’s get the grub aboard and shove off.” Andy picked up some of the bags and took the guns as Kalai offered a helping hand over the railing. “Oh, Kalai, this is Jackie. Jackie? Kalai. That’s her dad over there, Doc He’osforos. He saw and treated Kay Tee a few years back.” Andy jerked his head towards the direction of Kalai’s father as she held out a hand to the human girl. On a quick inspection, she appeared to be about the same age as her and Andy. She had a round face and was about as dark complected as Andy was. She was shorter, only a few inches taller than Papa, but when Jackie grabbed Kalai’s hand to hop up onto the rail, she could feel the strength and the compact muscle hidden by the baggy sweatshirt and pants.
“Wait a minute, did you say Mini-Me over there saw Kay Tee? You’re fuckin’ with me!” Jackie stumbled a bit as she hopped down onto the deck with a loud thunk and advanced on Papa who shrank away at her advance. “You saw li’l Kay Tee? Where the fuck is he? Is he alright? Is he still fighting the good fight?”
“Last I saw, yes, he was ‘fighting the good fight.’” Papa looked over at Andy with a slightly worried expression. Andy smacked the girl in the back of the head, causing her to flinch and she opened the door to the cabin for Andy to go inside.
Jackie rubbed the back of her head and laughed. “Well that’s a little bit of alright, innit? Maybe today’s gonna be a good day after all!”
“Jackie, get suited up and get on the bow. I need a good pair of eyes on the roller horns,” Kalai heard Andy shout from the cabin, followed by a whole lot of thumping and banging from cabinets being opened and closed.
“You got it, ol’ man. We going to your place or mine?” Jackie sidestepped in and opened a tiny little closet and pulled out a set of rain gear that was identical to what Andy was wearing. Kalai collected herself and stood in the doorway next to her father as they both leaned in.
“Mine; Chuck said the Yaw’much are running from the South. We’ll do a set nor’west of Lummi in the Rosario and see if we can get some Fraser Kings,” Andy replied as he turned the engine back on and the vessel roared to life.
“Chuck? Isn’t that one of your cousins? I didn’t know he could keep track of the movements of Salmon, may I ask how he does it?” Mama Sakalbi perked up as she pulled a set of earplugs out of a pocket and inserted them.
Andy prevaricated a bit, looking from Jackie back to Sakalbi then to Kalai and Papa. “I’d rather not answer that-”
“Breakin’ the law, breakin’ the law! Breakin’ the law, breakin’ the law!”
Jackie began singing a human song, and Andy threw her the dirtiest of looks as she finished getting into the orange coveralls. Mama Sakalbi sputtered as Andy shrugged apologetically.
“Make a hole!” Jackie called, and she and Andy came back out as Kalai and Papa made room for them. Andy hopped back onto the dock to cast off while Papa ducked into the cabin.
“Can I help?” Kalai offered as Andy shoved the vessel off and leapt the gap over the black water below.
“You want to be useful? Come forward! I could use an extra set of eyes!” Jackie called back, and Kalai felt a slap on her shoulder from the boisterous human woman.
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Andy stood at the helm, watching Jackie and Kalai as he leaned to get a better view of them past the Net drum. The bow was lifting up again, and the gentle little swells became like speed bumps, jostling them up and down in a predictable bouncing rhythm.
“Are you sure you couldn’t slow down, Andy? It’s a bit rough, don’t you think?” Sakalbi was hanging on to the table and her thermos with a worried expression on her face.
“I could, but we’ll miss the morning set. We want to bomb out the buoy right when the tide changes. If we’re lucky, then we’ll get around seventy or eighty by slack tide this afternoon and call it a day.”
“How do you know where to fish?” Dr. He’osforos was making a good show of standing and maintaining his balance with his hand on the booth.
“Well, there’s two ways you know. The first is you fish the spots your family’s fished since time began. Every family has about two or three different secret spots that we know there’s fish in, and we’re pretty defensive about their locations. The second is by smell. Right now it’s the tail end of the King season, and you can smell them in the water.” Andy turned and saw the incredulity etched on the faces of the two aliens.
“No, I’m serious! King Salmon slime is really pungent, and you can smell them when they’re close to the surface. We get to the fishing spot and take a deep whiff. If we smell them, we’ll set the nets.” Andy laughed at the disbelief on their faces as the GPS on his omnipad beeped and he turned to sail around the last buoy and head for the fishing ground.
“I’ve never noticed that in any of the Kings we’ve raised-”
Andy suppressed a laugh as they caught a larger swell as they left the lee of Lummi Island. Andy reveled in the feeling of weightlessness as the deck rose up and fell out from underneath their feet, leaving everyone suspended for a moment in midair before falling back down. A massive spray of water rose and washed over the deck, drenching Kalai and Jackie, who were still forward. “Cloned and farmed Kings don’t have that same smell. Wild ones smell and taste different, I’m telling you!” Andy pulled back slightly on the throttle as they climbed the next swell. “Brace!” he called as they climbed and fell once again.
There was a look of fear on Sakalbi’s face as she gripped the table for dear life, but to Andy’s surprise, the Doctor looked completely unfazed, and was handling the rise and fall of the deck like an old salt. “You look like you’ve done this before, Doc.”
“I’ve done a stint or two at sea before,” he spoke, in the same tone Andy would have used when trying not to sound too confident, and Andy smiled.
“Kalai keeps talking about loving the sea and sailing. Did you teach her to sail?”
“Yes, me and her mothers. When they were home, we would take the family yacht out in the Vaascon Straits and sail around the Occidiens. Kalai practically spent all her early childhood on a sailboat.”
“And almost every waking moment on one in Junior Academy. I swear you couldn’t dig her out with a trowel when she wanted to go sailing,” Sakalbi managed to add in a word as the boat slowed, and the dramatic rise and fall of the deck slowed with it.
“What about you, Mr. Shelokset, did your father teach you to sail too?”
“I was too young before he passed. My Great Uncle Willy taught me after I came home, and Grandma took me out to the family fishing sites when she wasn’t busy with the Council. For the first two or three years after they let us come home, fishing was the only way to feed our families, but the Militia and the Cambrians would try and sink our boats or arrest us whenever we tried to go out.”
“And that’s why you’re so good at maneuvering your vessel in the dark with no instruments?” Mrs. Vaida had folded her arms, and her voice twinged with that imperious tone she’d had when they’d first met.
Andy huffed a dry laugh. “I did what I had to for me and my people and to survive, Ma’am. I don’t like breaking the law or dodging lasers and gunfire, but there’s a lot of poor families that need to eat.”
The GPS beeped, and Andy gave Mrs. Vaida a slightly defiant look to counter her furrowed brow. “We’re here,” he said as he threw the engine in neutral and opened the cabin door.
Andy walked out and took a deep breath, but all he could smell was the net and the exhaust from the engine. “HEY JACKIE! WE SMELL MONEY?” Andy yelled out as he took stock of the sky. The first signs of sunrise were chasing all but the morning stars away and a light fog was rolling in from the north.
“FUCK YEAH I CAN SMELL ‘EM, ANDY! LET’S BOMB OUT AND GET BREAKFAST GOING!” Jackie looked slightly manic as she smiled brightly. Kalai, on the other hand, looked wet and miserable as she shivered, arms wrapped around herself. Andy gave his cousin a disgusted look as he pieced together what had happened. Every deckhand learned when to duck behind the raised bow and the roller horns that guided the nets so as not to get a faceful of spray when cutting through a swell. It was also a classic hazing trick for Senior Deckhands to let Junior Deckhands learn this the hard way.
Andy moved forward to stand in front of the two of them. Kalai was trying to squeeze her coat dry, but Andy knew it wouldn’t do much good until the sun came out. Jackie at least had the sense to look a little remorseful. “Kalai, why don’t you go sit in the cabin and get out of that wet coat. It’s cold enough out here even for us-”
“No way, Andy. Junior deckhand Kally here wants to impress you and get her dainty soft hands dirty! She’s been bragging about being a sailorwoman and wants to learn to fish ‘your way!” Jackie gave Kalai’s shoulder a wet slap as the poor alien woman went blue. Out of cold or embarrassment, Andy couldn’t tell.
All Andy could do was shake his head and huff. “Ok then! Secure the buoy and sling on my mark. I’ll get us in position!” Andy couldn’t help but chuckle as he heard Jackie start ordering Kalai about. Andy went back into the cabin and looked in the closet/bathroom to see if there was anything hanging up that he could give Kalai. There was only the one rain slicker and a few of Andy’s old sweaters from when he was a lot smaller. Well, looks like I’ll just be cold today. He quickly stripped out of his sweatshirt and grabbed the slicker before throwing a switch on the main control. Dr. He’osforos and Mrs. Vaida threw him quizzical looks as he went back outside wearing less than when he came in. He was down to a sleeveless shirt and his coveralls, and the morning breeze cut right through him and he braced his jaw to keep it from chattering.
“We’re ready to go- Andy, why are you practically naked from the waist up?” Kalai was staring wide eyed at him as he approached her and Jackie was on the bow. Jackie had everything ready; the buoy line was strung through the horns and ready to toss out. A giant orange and blue beach ball sized float hung at the end of the line to mark the end and make it easier to pick up later.
“Trade me your coat for these. If Jackie’s putting you to work, you’ll need these to keep warm.”
“I’m alright, I can-”
“I’m the Skipper of this boat, and I’m ordering you to take off that wet coat and put these on; and Jackie?” Andy gave his cousin a long and piercing look. “Give her the elbow gloves, not the halfsies.”
The scoff and the muttered Salishian profanities meant he’d read the next prank she’d had in mind right. She was planning on giving her the cloth gloves with only the palms and fingers coated in rubber. While perfectly fine for fishing, Andy knew they tended to get soaked through very quickly and did nothing to keep jellyfish stingers and fish slime off your hands. Kalai sputtered for a moment before she complied gratefully and she accepted the dry clothes and rain slicker.
Andy saw Jackie give him a strange look before looking back at Kalai, but he paid it no mind. He walked back to the controls on the drum and switched off the hydraulics, placing the mechanism in neutral. “SLING IT!” Andy called as he took the small jerry rigged steering wheel and threw the boat in reverse. Kalai jumped as the line started unspooling the net into the water at a rapid pace.
Andy set an ‘S’ bend in the quarter mile long net, zigzagging backwards until they came to the end of the line. Andy stopped the boat as Jackie tied off the other large buoy and tossed it over the side, unstringing the cork-line from the roller horns in the process. He pulled hard over and put a bit of distance from the net before shutting the engine down. The line of white and yellow corks marking the net bobbed lazily with the swells as silence settled over the water again. The waves rocked the boat gently as Andy found his sea legs again.
“Alright, I’ll get breakfast going. Jackie, Kalai? Post the watch for seals,” Andy called as he walked back into the cabin to fire up the tiny little gas stove.
Sakalbi, having found the confidence to stand at last, poked her head out of the cabin and stood on by the hatch to the fish hold. “Seals? Why would you need to watch for seals?”
Andy grit his teeth and looked over from where he was cracking open and scrambling eggs. “They’re the spawn of Satan and we hate their guts!” Andy bit out. Jackie came back and pulled the two shotguns and a pair of binoculars from the closet. Andy reached over to a side cabinet and pulled out a box of shells for them. Both his boss and the Doctor’s eyes got wide.
“Seals are the enemy of our blood. Were it not for the invasion, our unending war against these vermin would continue to this day!” Jackie growled as she loaded one for herself and rested the other on Andy’s seat at the helm.
The look of growing horror on Sakalbi’s face towards their facetious declarations caused Andy to chuckle a bit, before launching into an explanation. “We’re not fans of the species because they’ll wait until a fish gets caught in the net and then they’ll steal it, costing us a fish AND ripping a big hole in our nets that we then have to take time to repair. We use the shotguns and buckshot to give them a nice welt and convince them not to hang around, because they’ll wait up on the surface and watch the buoys, just like us. A single seal can and will take between five and ten fish. The worst is when they start getting full, they’ll just bite out the bellies of a salmon in the net. We can’t really do anything with that fish once it’s ‘seal-bit’. So yes, as fishermen, we hate them.”
“Learned opportunism in apex predators as a response to human activity… I think I’ll go see this behavior for myself!” Sakalbi practically rushed out the door towards the bow where Jackie was sitting on the roller horns explaining to Kalai how to spot the bastards, leaving Andy alone in the cabin with the Doctor while he cooked breakfast for them all.
Dr. He’osforos sat down heavily in the booth and pulled out his omnipad. “I’ve had a word with my friend in the Interior. She’s pulled the warrant for your brother, and I’ve withdrawn the charges I filed.”
Andy froze and turned around slowly. The only sound was the sizzle and pop of the eggs and chorizo that he’d added to them in the skillet. “You mean… it’s done? He can come home?” A wave of light headed euphoria swept over Andy and he swayed with the gentle rocking of the boat. “I will pay you back, Doc-”
The doctor held up his hand and stopped Andy. “We’ll call it even, but there’s something… I was able to get my hands on this,” Andy watched as the doctor swiped something towards his omnipad and it dinged. “What is it if I may-”
“Are you really asking an Indian to tell you a story? Because it’s going to be a long one if you are.” “I’m Sevastutavan, young man; we invented long stories.”
Andy froze and stared at the screen of his omnipad. The Vatikre was heavily accented, and Andy had a bit of trouble with the unfamiliar accent, but centered in the frame in a hospital room, sitting in a wheelchair, was a Salishian boy. Andy blinked in surprise as he stared at the screen. “Is that-”
“I am Ikw’is’hi’ehlah, and this bearer is… of the Orca Clan Sheloksets. I drove our Haida enemies onto the rocks and took many heads when they attacked our winter village on Orcas Island. I signed the Treaty with the Great White Father and I fought against the slavers of the south-”
Andy wanted to grab the omnipad but the smell of overcooking eggs brought his attention back to breakfast and Andy stirred and scrapped the food quickly, trying to save it.
“I asked her for any materials she could give me on your brother. Pictures, recordings, anything. This is what she gave me. It's the last known recording of your brother during an interrogation conducted by a Navy Commissar prior to his escape. It seems he made friends with a Pod of Deaths Head Commandos. Quite a bit of the recording has been redacted, but… there are portions of it where he talks about his family and his history. I thought you might like to have it.”
Andy hurriedly pulled out paper plates and a slice of bread for everyone and scooped a heaping portion of the chorizo eggs onto them. He handed the doctor his before leaning out the cabin door. “Slop’s on, come and get it!”
Andy sat down after moving the shotgun out of the way and started the video over again as the three women came back to grab their plates and lost himself watching his brother start telling his story.
“What’s that?” Andy heard Kalai ask over his shoulder, and he paused the video.
“That’s my brother! That’s Kay Tee!”
“Holy shit, what?” Jackie nearly shoved Kalai into Andy as she jammed her bread slice down her gullet and crowded in to see the screen.
Andy started the video over a second time and they watched in silence. “God, that brings back memories. Back when mom was still alive and before we broke up the warband. I can’t believe that slippery little punk ghosted a pod of Commandos for two fucking years! Holy shit, that’s badass!”
Before Andy could say anything, Sakalbi started coughing and brought the binoculars up. “Uh, Andy? Jackie? What do we do about sharks?”
Jackie looked at Andy in confusion. “Sharks? There’s nothing but Dogs around here.”
“Well those are shark fins and they’re charging the net!” Sakalbi pointed and Andy looked up to see dorsal fins charging the center of the net.
Andy looked at Jackie and spoke the same words in tandem, “Oh shit!”
First:
https://www.reddit.com/Sexyspacebabes/comments/yz0u3h/the_cryptid_chronicle_chapter_1/
Previous:
https://www.reddit.com/Sexyspacebabes/comments/13nh0oe/cryptid_chronicle_chapter_29/
Next:
To be posted 6/4/23
submitted by Kazevenikov to Sexyspacebabes [link] [comments]
A special thanks to my editors LordHenry7898, RandomTinkerer, Swimming_Good_8507, CatsInTrenchcoats, and KLiCKonthat.
And a big thanks to the authors and their stories that inspired me to tell my own in this universe. RandomTinkerer (City Slickers and Hayseeds), Punnynfunny (Denied Operations), CompassWithHat (Top Lasgun), CarCU131 (The Cook), and Rhion-618 (Just One Drop)
Hy’shq’e Ay Si’am (Thank you noble friends)
Chapter 30: A Promise Kept
Kalai stepped off the shuttle to the Vaida’s headquarters and into a running tackle-hug from Sitry. “Oh Kalai, I could kill you right now! You got to see the Great Barrier Reef in person, you bitch!” Sitry’s cheerful voice was muffled from where she was still buried in her chest. Kalai staggered backwards a pace or two, happy to be back from her whirlwind adventure around Earth with her father.
Naranjo and Papa Rhaxiid were there on the platform to welcome her back too, but their welcomes were more sedate.
“Not to mention you got out of work for half our damn trip. Ugh, it’s so not fair!” Naranjo huffed as Kalai gave him a sisterly hug.
Papa Rhaxiid reached up and chucked her chin before turning to lead the way back inside from the forested platform. “Welcome back, sweet-sprout, we’ve missed you. Come on, we’ll get you settled again and off to work. There’s quite a bit you need to catch up on if you want your credits.”
The chuckles from the twins behind her were full of sibling malice, but she knew how to shut the pair of them up. “Papa Rhaxiid? I’ve got the paper on Biodiversity in the Reef you asked for, along with the dissection report and stomach content analysis of the tuna we caught. I want to put the finishing touches on it and do a final proofread first before I send them to you.” The man turned and gave her a warm smile as they entered the building.
“Good, why don’t you go take your things back up and say hello to Andy? I’ll give you an hour and a half to get freshened up, then I want you to report to Aquarium 12 with Dr. Sor’ansa. You can put your snorkeling practice to work there.” Papa Rhaxiid walked the three of them to the residential elevator. “I’m heading back to my office. Andy’s been requested by Maetro Pae’ella to work the kitchens for something called ‘Bison burgers'. Apparently it’s a type of indigenous bovine that the eastern Bands raise. That and something from Europe called ‘French Fries’.”
Kalai couldn’t help but get excited as she and her siblings piled into the elevator back to their little shared apartment. Sure the food she’d had all over the place was good, but so far nothing had been able to compare to Andy and his Salishian cooking.
“Nerd, I can’t believe you cheated and did work on your vacation." Naranjo broke the silence of the elevator after a little bit and stuck his tongue out at her.
“Spit to windward, you vain little weed. Don’t hate me because I’m awesome.” Kalai’s riposte caused Naranjo to fold his arms and huff. Sitry simply ambushed her with an ear flick.
The elevator door opened to their floor before Kalai couldn’t bear the silence from Sitry any longer. “So, did you bag him yet, you lucky bitch?”
“No she hasn’t!” Naranjo’s singsong mockery of his sister interrupted Sitry’s response. “Papa hasn’t let Sitry even NEAR Andy without one of them around!”
“Rub it in, you snitch, besides, he did kiss me first,” Sitry preened happily as she playfully shoved Kalai’s shoulder.
Kalai pretended to stumble and almost caught Sitry’s foot, but she was just a hair too slow. “Yeah, and then you gave him a black eye, you clod.”
“Will you let it go? It was an accident!”
“It’s not even the only one he got either." Naranjo’s interjection stopped her right in front of their door.
“Wait, what? Who hurt him this time?” Kalai let her bag thunk to the floor as she turned to look accusingly between Sitry and Narny.
Sitry folded her arms and her ears twitched back as she shot a dark look at their door. “He ‘fell down’ yesterday while out at one of the Hatcheries we gave to the Hwatcoms. Mrs. Toloui nearly had a fit! She said she could smell another human on him and that he was covered in blood!”
Narny nodded primly as Kalai tried to process what they were telling her. “WHAT? Did she call out the militia? Track down whoever hurt him?”
“No, and he refused treatment and insisted that no one did it to him! When papa tried to talk to him, Andy said some stupid human macho shit about pain healing and birds liking scars. I don’t know, sometimes humans… they’re frickin’ insane!”
The door shot open and there stood Andy. His left eye was an angry puffy yellow and blue mess, and there were three points on his lips where a dark cinnabar line marked a crack. Kalai and her siblings stood in wide eyed shock at his sudden appearance and the only sound was the music emanating from the common room behind him.
Andy looked up and down at the three without saying a word. He cocked an eyebrow and snagged Kalai’s bag before any of them could react and cleared the doorway for them.
Kalai sputtered at the impropriety but Naranjo and Sitry just shrugged and walked in after Andy. “Femboys, am I right?” Narny whispered to Kalai as he passed. Kalai followed behind and was greeted by the white fluff-ball, Puck, who hopped up and down, whining for attention. She bent down and started scratching his ears and back. While Puck rubbed up against her hands, Andy settled back down at the table where his omnipad was hooked up to a keypad. Her heart started to sink a bit and Kalai shot Sitry a jealous look before the music came to a sudden halt and Andy interrupted the beginnings of her pity party.
“Ok, Kem’ira, I got the pics now and I’m telling you to declare yourself to the farmers first! I guarantee if you tell them you’re with the new DNR and you’re there to kill all the Scotch Broom in their pasture lands, they’ll stop trying to shoot you for trespassing!”
Kalai’s mood jumped up a bit. It’s not that he doesn’t care to see me, he’s in a meeting!
“No, no I’m not coming out to talk this over with them, I’ve got my own work to do! Either you start talking to folks like I showed you how, or ask the militia to give you one of their armored catsuits to wear under your uniform… Uh-huh, good luck." Andy hung up on the call and leaned back as Puck scampered over and hopped up in his lap.
Andy rubbed his temples before shaking his head. He seemed to relax a bit and Puck slid off to follow Sitry to the kitchen. Andy looked over and gave Kalai a happy smile that made her flush. “Welcome back! So how was the land down under? That tuna was fan-frickin’-tastic, if you aren’t sick of seafood I’ll do something fancy with it tomorrow to celebrate your coming back. Can’t tonight though, I got volun-told to be head chef tonight and I… Oh damnit! I’m late! Come to dinner, burgers and fries Indian style tonight. Gotta run!” With that, Andy went dashing out the door with Puck barking and scrambling along after him.
Kalai felt her heart sink back down again, as he left. “Andy I-” She started but he was gone.
“Yeah, it’s been like that for the whole week. The only time we get to hang out is dinner.” Sitry commiserated as she took Kalai’s bag into their room. “On the other hand, we might get to catch up during the family meal tonight.”
Kalai and Narny were already silently plotting with each other for their revenge against their sister who had won and refused to share the last few matchsticks when Andy finally joined their table. He was sweaty and he smelled of woodsmoke and french fries. Kalai jumped up and offered him a seat next to her with a nervous smile. He took it gratefully and seemed to sag a bit as he gulped down a glass of water.
“Andy, I think you may be finding your calling as a culinary ambassador,” Mama Aftasia beamed. “A toast to the chef!”
Andy gave a shy smile and looked down as Kalai and the rest of the family gave a hearty ‘Here, here!”
“It’s a simple enough recipe; it’s just using bison instead of cow, that’s all, and I don’t know anyone who’d turn down hand cut fresh fries. It’s kind of hard to screw up.”
“Young man, you are speaking to a woman who found a way to take cold water and dried wumpa flakes and wind up with a Class-4 fire. Cooking has always seemed like ‘blight mysticism’ to me, and these foods? These flavors? Nothing short of a Greenwood miracle in my opinion." Mama Aftasia continued her praise of Andy, which only caused him to shrink even lower in his seat.
“To be honest, I like your salmon better,” Kalai said, and the whole table went silent. Kalai held her ground though, and was rewarded with a tired but genuine laugh from Andy that brought him back out of his shell.
“You know, I do too. My Clan were fisherpeople, not buffalo chasers.” Andy gave Kalai a cheeky grin, which she returned happily, her heart glowing. Mama Aftasia and Mama Sakalbi both blinked in bemusement at Andy’s statement while Sitry just giggled.
“Speaking of which, Andy, I received a call from Elder Alex Hwatcom.” Papa Rhaxiid’s change of subject instantly perked Andy up, and he stared silently, waiting. “He extended an invitation to our family to attend his family gathering this Friday-”
“Alex said that? He used those words?” Andy shook his head in shock as he interrupted Papa Rhaxiid. The table went quiet and everyone held their breath as they looked between the two men.
Papa Rhaxiid adopted as good an impression of the human Elder as he could. “I’d like to extend an invitation for you and your family to be guests at our family gathering this saturday up at the White… something… lodge-”
“The White Ram Lodge?” Andy sat forward, interjecting again as the color drained from his face.
“Yes, that’s the one! I asked if we could bring anything since the last time they hosted us they put on that wonderful spread. He said if we could bring a few salmon for the family, that would be wonderful.”
Andy leaned back and took another sip of ice water before holding the glass to his blackened eye. “Alex Hwatcom… just invited you… to a gathering… and he told you to ‘bring a few salmon’? Do you realize what a huge honor this is?”
Rhaxiid looked from his wives to his children with mild concern. “Um, I thought it was only dinner, but your reaction tells me there’s more significance to this than I originally thought. I was thinking about our stocks of adult Sockeye, but then I remembered in his story how important King Salmon are. Of course, I’d like to defer to you for the choice since you know these animals and the cultural expectations with this invitation better than we do.”
Andy was silent for a moment before he put the glass down. “I’d recommend a ‘hard no’ to all your clone stock!” Now it was the Vaidas’ turn to be shocked, as each of Kalai’s Erbian family’s jaws dropped in synch. Before anyone could say anything, Andy continued, “You need to bring wild-caught. Farm-raised salmon wouldn’t… well we can tell, and you can taste the difference between them. We need to go fishing!” Kalai leaned towards Andy slightly as he lowered his head and started mumbling to himself. She was just able to make out what he was saying to himself as Mama Sakalbi and Mama Aftasia began whispering to each other. “...need to get the Gillnetter out of storage, check what’s running and select the mesh. I’m gonna need a deckhand too.”
Kalai reached a hand out but stopped short of touching him. “Andy?”
He popped up and spoke for the whole table to hear. “I need a shuttle to the mainland and a waiver against the fishing ban. I’ve got to get my boat and the drum ready for sea ” Rhaxiid and Aftasia sputtered in confusion, but Mama Sakalbi had a shadow fall over her, and her ears pulled back.
“Do you mean to say you want to go out on the water? Risk the ecological balance for… dinner?”
Andy looked Sakalbi dead in the eye and gave her a firm nod. “Why don’t you come out and see how we did this before you got here. Think of it as a chance to see the way we’ve fished for the last hundred or so years, and then I can explain the way we used to fish before that.”
The offer snapped Rhaxiid out of his confusion and he brightened. “A learning experience? Wonderful, we’ll make a day of it!” His hands shot out to grab both his wives’ and Kalai could feel the vibrations in the floor from where he was excitedly tapping his feet.
“If you don’t mind hard, smelly work. Uncle Willy always called it ‘the worst desk in the prettiest office.' It’ll be a bit cramped, but I’ve got room on the boat for a few guests and observers; four I think would be ok. She’s a working boat, not a pleasure cruiser,” Andy explained. That sent the whole lot of them excitedly talking among themselves.
Kalai was about to lean in to talk to Mama Aftasia, but Andy caught her attention first. “I don’t suppose you’d want to go back out on the water, given you just got back from pleasure-boating-”
Kalai’s heart nearly jumped out of her chest. “I wouldn’t miss it for my own colony planet!”
--------------------
Kalai stood on the pier, bundled in her thermal sailor’s coat. It was still dark and the wind blew from the north in a cold little morning breeze. Kalai took a deep breath and reveled in the smell of the fresh sea air. The soft chattering of Mama Sakalbi’s teeth broke the silence. “It’s a bit chillier than it said it was going to be.”
“The water always does that. It’s never as warm as the lubbers say it’ll be,” Papa spoke as he handed her back her thermos of hot chocolate.
Papa stood next to Kalai and nudged her with his elbow. Even in the dark, Kalai could see him smile up at her and jerk his head at the shivering Erbian. He was also wearing a thermal sailor’s coat, and his hands were stuffed in his pockets to keep them warm, just like Kalai’s. “Landswoman,” he whispered to her and the two of them shared a knowing smile. It was strange, but welcome when she'd told Papa about her upcoming day fishing with Andy, and he’d politely requested to join them. Papa Rhaxiid had graciously given his spot up to accommodate her birth father. Narny was all for it until Andy had explained what they were going to do, but then surrendered his challenge to the fourth guest space, not wanting to go anywhere NEAR anything that could see him come face to face with a Lion’s Mane Jelly. Sitry had done a happy little dance when she found out, but only yesterday had come down with Thistle Fever, and was bundled off to bed by her parents. It left Kalai, Mama Sakalbi, and Papa to accompany Andy on his fishing trip.
The water brushed against the shore behind them quietly. In the gloom, Kalai could just barely make out the outline of the nearest island mountain, but only because the stars had disappeared behind it. It was almost four in the morning, but Kalai had managed a catnap on the shuttle to the empty little lot that had been the boat launch. Aside from the water, the world was silent. Even the breeze made almost no noise and a sense of peace surrounded them. Everything was so calm, Kalai felt like she didn’t have a care in the world.
In the distance, a low rumbling sound of a motor rose from being almost imperceptible to a rolling drum of thunder. From around the point, two green floating lights sped through the darkness, and a spotlight turned on. The beam of light moved jerkily until it came to rest on the pier where they were standing and Kalai started waving her arms. Sakalbi’s omnipad rang, and Andy’s voice shouted over the speaker and the background noise for them to shine a light on the edge of the pier to help him park the boat.
Kalai and Papa moved closer and turned their omnipad flashlights on and waved them as the boat swung gracefully around and glided in alongside them. Kalai caught the rope that flew over the railing of the boat and she heard more than saw Andy moving around on the deck as she tied off on one of the mooring cleats. Several lights clicked on and the deck was bathed in light enough for Kalai to get a clear view of the boat they’d be spending the day on.
Andy hadn’t lied. Kalai saw that this little vessel was a working boat with no frills at all. When he’d told her they’d be going fishing, she’d envisioned something like the charter boat papa had taken her on out of Nantucket. Sporty, fast with a nod to comfort and function. This was not that at all. A giant wheel as wide as Kalai’s outstretched arms that looked like a sideways spool of thread was secured to the deck amidships and dominated the deckspace. Wrapped around it was a fluorescent green tangle with a line of oblong white and yellow corks and rope. There was a covered hatchway sitting behind the drum in front of the raised step to the enclosed cabin. Two large windows let the light out to two children’s bunks, a little table with a booth seat and a raised captain’s chair in front of the helm and engine controls. Andy shut down the engine and that peaceful stillness returned.
“Oway there!” Kalai called, “ship oway! Request permission to come aboard.” Kalai gave the traditional greeting of a Shil’vati sailor.
“Permission granted! Anyone need a stepstool?” Andy finally stepped into the light and Kalai got a look at him. He was wearing a hooded sweatshirt and the same bright orange coveralls she’d seen the fishmongers wearing on their date.
“I wouldn’t mind a hand, Mr. Shelokset.” Papa He’osforos braced a foot on the railing of the boat and Andy pulled him up.
“Just call me Andy, Doc, and welcome aboard. Jackie should be along any minute now with the day’s groceries, and the cabin’s out of the cold. You can get yourself set wherever you find comfortable.” Papa nodded and disappeared around the other side of the wheel moving towards the bow.
Kalai helped Mama Sakalbi into the boat next, and she quickly ducked into the cabin that took up the entire stern section save for a little ledge that ran along the outside. Andy gripped Kalai’s hand and she smiled as he pulled her deftly aboard. The boat rocked a little on its mooring, and Kalai almost fell into Andy, who wordlessly put his arms around her waist to catch her as she lost her balance. She flailed for a moment before she steadied herself against him.
“Gotcha,” Andy smiled, and Kalai could see him flush almost as much as she could feel herself doing as their noses almost touched. Those big dark brown eyes surrounded by white orbs drew her in and she felt she could lose herself in them. Kalai started as Andy danced her around him and moved her towards the cabin door.
“It might be a little cramped for you in there, but the Mary Jean wasn’t built for pleasure boating, she’s a working girl. Sit tight, I gotta check a few things in the back.” Andy patted the railing affectionately before he hopped up and scooted along the outside of the cabin towards the stern. Kalai couldn’t help the little longing groan that came out as he left her there on the little tiny quarterdeck. Her heart was hammering in her chest as half formed fantasies danced at the edges of her mind.
“I saw that, little minnow.” Papa’s voice was soft, but his tone and the sudden broken silence nearly gave her a heart attack.
Kalai could only stammer as her father stared at her with a cocked eyebrow. A thump from the cabin window behind saw an amused Mama Sakalbi daintily sipping at her thermos with her ears twitched forward in interest, staring out at her. “Papa I… he-”
Papa moved carefully around the covered hatchway to stand next to her, leaning back against the cabin window and heaved a sigh. “I must say I’m surprised. This lovely man’s got good clean lines and is very well cared for. It speaks well of his Skipper.”
It took a full minute for Kalai’s brain to process that he was talking about the boat and not Andy. “And the way Andy brought him in smooth in near complete darkness? It gives me confidence in his abilities.”
Kalai breathed a silent sigh of relief and exasperation. Although she was happy to be spending more time with her father, bringing him on what she’d hoped would be a sailing date wasn’t exactly what she’d had in mind for ‘family time’. He wants me to find a nice young man and spend time with him on a boat, but the first chance I get Papa decides to clam-jam me.
From up on shore, the sound and lights of a large human vehicle screeching to a halt heralded the last of their party to arrive. Kalai heard the clomping footsteps coming down the pier and moved to the railing to lend a hand.
“Ahoy Mary Jean! Raggedy Andy, you there?” Kalai stared with wide eyed surprise to see a human female, loaded down with plastic bags and sporting two human weapons on her shoulder. The two of them locked eyes, and while Kalai didn’t understand everything the girl shouted in surprise, she had caught and understood the phrase, “What the fuck?”
“Easy now, they’re my guests, and the one inside is the boss!” Andy appeared on the pier instantly before either Kalai or the woman could react further.
“Ya didn’t tell me we were having pur-” The woman glared at Kalai and her father. She had switched to Vatikre thankfully, but her tone was hostile as she dropped everything but her weapons. “I mean, hwun’eetums, aboard. A gal could get the wrong idea pretty quick in the dark when there’s no warning.”
“Knock it off Jackie. Let’s get the grub aboard and shove off.” Andy picked up some of the bags and took the guns as Kalai offered a helping hand over the railing. “Oh, Kalai, this is Jackie. Jackie? Kalai. That’s her dad over there, Doc He’osforos. He saw and treated Kay Tee a few years back.” Andy jerked his head towards the direction of Kalai’s father as she held out a hand to the human girl. On a quick inspection, she appeared to be about the same age as her and Andy. She had a round face and was about as dark complected as Andy was. She was shorter, only a few inches taller than Papa, but when Jackie grabbed Kalai’s hand to hop up onto the rail, she could feel the strength and the compact muscle hidden by the baggy sweatshirt and pants.
“Wait a minute, did you say Mini-Me over there saw Kay Tee? You’re fuckin’ with me!” Jackie stumbled a bit as she hopped down onto the deck with a loud thunk and advanced on Papa who shrank away at her advance. “You saw li’l Kay Tee? Where the fuck is he? Is he alright? Is he still fighting the good fight?”
“Last I saw, yes, he was ‘fighting the good fight.’” Papa looked over at Andy with a slightly worried expression. Andy smacked the girl in the back of the head, causing her to flinch and she opened the door to the cabin for Andy to go inside.
Jackie rubbed the back of her head and laughed. “Well that’s a little bit of alright, innit? Maybe today’s gonna be a good day after all!”
“Jackie, get suited up and get on the bow. I need a good pair of eyes on the roller horns,” Kalai heard Andy shout from the cabin, followed by a whole lot of thumping and banging from cabinets being opened and closed.
“You got it, ol’ man. We going to your place or mine?” Jackie sidestepped in and opened a tiny little closet and pulled out a set of rain gear that was identical to what Andy was wearing. Kalai collected herself and stood in the doorway next to her father as they both leaned in.
“Mine; Chuck said the Yaw’much are running from the South. We’ll do a set nor’west of Lummi in the Rosario and see if we can get some Fraser Kings,” Andy replied as he turned the engine back on and the vessel roared to life.
“Chuck? Isn’t that one of your cousins? I didn’t know he could keep track of the movements of Salmon, may I ask how he does it?” Mama Sakalbi perked up as she pulled a set of earplugs out of a pocket and inserted them.
Andy prevaricated a bit, looking from Jackie back to Sakalbi then to Kalai and Papa. “I’d rather not answer that-”
“Breakin’ the law, breakin’ the law! Breakin’ the law, breakin’ the law!”
Jackie began singing a human song, and Andy threw her the dirtiest of looks as she finished getting into the orange coveralls. Mama Sakalbi sputtered as Andy shrugged apologetically.
“Make a hole!” Jackie called, and she and Andy came back out as Kalai and Papa made room for them. Andy hopped back onto the dock to cast off while Papa ducked into the cabin.
“Can I help?” Kalai offered as Andy shoved the vessel off and leapt the gap over the black water below.
“You want to be useful? Come forward! I could use an extra set of eyes!” Jackie called back, and Kalai felt a slap on her shoulder from the boisterous human woman.
------------------
Andy stood at the helm, watching Jackie and Kalai as he leaned to get a better view of them past the Net drum. The bow was lifting up again, and the gentle little swells became like speed bumps, jostling them up and down in a predictable bouncing rhythm.
“Are you sure you couldn’t slow down, Andy? It’s a bit rough, don’t you think?” Sakalbi was hanging on to the table and her thermos with a worried expression on her face.
“I could, but we’ll miss the morning set. We want to bomb out the buoy right when the tide changes. If we’re lucky, then we’ll get around seventy or eighty by slack tide this afternoon and call it a day.”
“How do you know where to fish?” Dr. He’osforos was making a good show of standing and maintaining his balance with his hand on the booth.
“Well, there’s two ways you know. The first is you fish the spots your family’s fished since time began. Every family has about two or three different secret spots that we know there’s fish in, and we’re pretty defensive about their locations. The second is by smell. Right now it’s the tail end of the King season, and you can smell them in the water.” Andy turned and saw the incredulity etched on the faces of the two aliens.
“No, I’m serious! King Salmon slime is really pungent, and you can smell them when they’re close to the surface. We get to the fishing spot and take a deep whiff. If we smell them, we’ll set the nets.” Andy laughed at the disbelief on their faces as the GPS on his omnipad beeped and he turned to sail around the last buoy and head for the fishing ground.
“I’ve never noticed that in any of the Kings we’ve raised-”
Andy suppressed a laugh as they caught a larger swell as they left the lee of Lummi Island. Andy reveled in the feeling of weightlessness as the deck rose up and fell out from underneath their feet, leaving everyone suspended for a moment in midair before falling back down. A massive spray of water rose and washed over the deck, drenching Kalai and Jackie, who were still forward. “Cloned and farmed Kings don’t have that same smell. Wild ones smell and taste different, I’m telling you!” Andy pulled back slightly on the throttle as they climbed the next swell. “Brace!” he called as they climbed and fell once again.
There was a look of fear on Sakalbi’s face as she gripped the table for dear life, but to Andy’s surprise, the Doctor looked completely unfazed, and was handling the rise and fall of the deck like an old salt. “You look like you’ve done this before, Doc.”
“I’ve done a stint or two at sea before,” he spoke, in the same tone Andy would have used when trying not to sound too confident, and Andy smiled.
“Kalai keeps talking about loving the sea and sailing. Did you teach her to sail?”
“Yes, me and her mothers. When they were home, we would take the family yacht out in the Vaascon Straits and sail around the Occidiens. Kalai practically spent all her early childhood on a sailboat.”
“And almost every waking moment on one in Junior Academy. I swear you couldn’t dig her out with a trowel when she wanted to go sailing,” Sakalbi managed to add in a word as the boat slowed, and the dramatic rise and fall of the deck slowed with it.
“What about you, Mr. Shelokset, did your father teach you to sail too?”
“I was too young before he passed. My Great Uncle Willy taught me after I came home, and Grandma took me out to the family fishing sites when she wasn’t busy with the Council. For the first two or three years after they let us come home, fishing was the only way to feed our families, but the Militia and the Cambrians would try and sink our boats or arrest us whenever we tried to go out.”
“And that’s why you’re so good at maneuvering your vessel in the dark with no instruments?” Mrs. Vaida had folded her arms, and her voice twinged with that imperious tone she’d had when they’d first met.
Andy huffed a dry laugh. “I did what I had to for me and my people and to survive, Ma’am. I don’t like breaking the law or dodging lasers and gunfire, but there’s a lot of poor families that need to eat.”
The GPS beeped, and Andy gave Mrs. Vaida a slightly defiant look to counter her furrowed brow. “We’re here,” he said as he threw the engine in neutral and opened the cabin door.
Andy walked out and took a deep breath, but all he could smell was the net and the exhaust from the engine. “HEY JACKIE! WE SMELL MONEY?” Andy yelled out as he took stock of the sky. The first signs of sunrise were chasing all but the morning stars away and a light fog was rolling in from the north.
“FUCK YEAH I CAN SMELL ‘EM, ANDY! LET’S BOMB OUT AND GET BREAKFAST GOING!” Jackie looked slightly manic as she smiled brightly. Kalai, on the other hand, looked wet and miserable as she shivered, arms wrapped around herself. Andy gave his cousin a disgusted look as he pieced together what had happened. Every deckhand learned when to duck behind the raised bow and the roller horns that guided the nets so as not to get a faceful of spray when cutting through a swell. It was also a classic hazing trick for Senior Deckhands to let Junior Deckhands learn this the hard way.
Andy moved forward to stand in front of the two of them. Kalai was trying to squeeze her coat dry, but Andy knew it wouldn’t do much good until the sun came out. Jackie at least had the sense to look a little remorseful. “Kalai, why don’t you go sit in the cabin and get out of that wet coat. It’s cold enough out here even for us-”
“No way, Andy. Junior deckhand Kally here wants to impress you and get her dainty soft hands dirty! She’s been bragging about being a sailorwoman and wants to learn to fish ‘your way!” Jackie gave Kalai’s shoulder a wet slap as the poor alien woman went blue. Out of cold or embarrassment, Andy couldn’t tell.
All Andy could do was shake his head and huff. “Ok then! Secure the buoy and sling on my mark. I’ll get us in position!” Andy couldn’t help but chuckle as he heard Jackie start ordering Kalai about. Andy went back into the cabin and looked in the closet/bathroom to see if there was anything hanging up that he could give Kalai. There was only the one rain slicker and a few of Andy’s old sweaters from when he was a lot smaller. Well, looks like I’ll just be cold today. He quickly stripped out of his sweatshirt and grabbed the slicker before throwing a switch on the main control. Dr. He’osforos and Mrs. Vaida threw him quizzical looks as he went back outside wearing less than when he came in. He was down to a sleeveless shirt and his coveralls, and the morning breeze cut right through him and he braced his jaw to keep it from chattering.
“We’re ready to go- Andy, why are you practically naked from the waist up?” Kalai was staring wide eyed at him as he approached her and Jackie was on the bow. Jackie had everything ready; the buoy line was strung through the horns and ready to toss out. A giant orange and blue beach ball sized float hung at the end of the line to mark the end and make it easier to pick up later.
“Trade me your coat for these. If Jackie’s putting you to work, you’ll need these to keep warm.”
“I’m alright, I can-”
“I’m the Skipper of this boat, and I’m ordering you to take off that wet coat and put these on; and Jackie?” Andy gave his cousin a long and piercing look. “Give her the elbow gloves, not the halfsies.”
The scoff and the muttered Salishian profanities meant he’d read the next prank she’d had in mind right. She was planning on giving her the cloth gloves with only the palms and fingers coated in rubber. While perfectly fine for fishing, Andy knew they tended to get soaked through very quickly and did nothing to keep jellyfish stingers and fish slime off your hands. Kalai sputtered for a moment before she complied gratefully and she accepted the dry clothes and rain slicker.
Andy saw Jackie give him a strange look before looking back at Kalai, but he paid it no mind. He walked back to the controls on the drum and switched off the hydraulics, placing the mechanism in neutral. “SLING IT!” Andy called as he took the small jerry rigged steering wheel and threw the boat in reverse. Kalai jumped as the line started unspooling the net into the water at a rapid pace.
Andy set an ‘S’ bend in the quarter mile long net, zigzagging backwards until they came to the end of the line. Andy stopped the boat as Jackie tied off the other large buoy and tossed it over the side, unstringing the cork-line from the roller horns in the process. He pulled hard over and put a bit of distance from the net before shutting the engine down. The line of white and yellow corks marking the net bobbed lazily with the swells as silence settled over the water again. The waves rocked the boat gently as Andy found his sea legs again.
“Alright, I’ll get breakfast going. Jackie, Kalai? Post the watch for seals,” Andy called as he walked back into the cabin to fire up the tiny little gas stove.
Sakalbi, having found the confidence to stand at last, poked her head out of the cabin and stood on by the hatch to the fish hold. “Seals? Why would you need to watch for seals?”
Andy grit his teeth and looked over from where he was cracking open and scrambling eggs. “They’re the spawn of Satan and we hate their guts!” Andy bit out. Jackie came back and pulled the two shotguns and a pair of binoculars from the closet. Andy reached over to a side cabinet and pulled out a box of shells for them. Both his boss and the Doctor’s eyes got wide.
“Seals are the enemy of our blood. Were it not for the invasion, our unending war against these vermin would continue to this day!” Jackie growled as she loaded one for herself and rested the other on Andy’s seat at the helm.
The look of growing horror on Sakalbi’s face towards their facetious declarations caused Andy to chuckle a bit, before launching into an explanation. “We’re not fans of the species because they’ll wait until a fish gets caught in the net and then they’ll steal it, costing us a fish AND ripping a big hole in our nets that we then have to take time to repair. We use the shotguns and buckshot to give them a nice welt and convince them not to hang around, because they’ll wait up on the surface and watch the buoys, just like us. A single seal can and will take between five and ten fish. The worst is when they start getting full, they’ll just bite out the bellies of a salmon in the net. We can’t really do anything with that fish once it’s ‘seal-bit’. So yes, as fishermen, we hate them.”
“Learned opportunism in apex predators as a response to human activity… I think I’ll go see this behavior for myself!” Sakalbi practically rushed out the door towards the bow where Jackie was sitting on the roller horns explaining to Kalai how to spot the bastards, leaving Andy alone in the cabin with the Doctor while he cooked breakfast for them all.
Dr. He’osforos sat down heavily in the booth and pulled out his omnipad. “I’ve had a word with my friend in the Interior. She’s pulled the warrant for your brother, and I’ve withdrawn the charges I filed.”
Andy froze and turned around slowly. The only sound was the sizzle and pop of the eggs and chorizo that he’d added to them in the skillet. “You mean… it’s done? He can come home?” A wave of light headed euphoria swept over Andy and he swayed with the gentle rocking of the boat. “I will pay you back, Doc-”
The doctor held up his hand and stopped Andy. “We’ll call it even, but there’s something… I was able to get my hands on this,” Andy watched as the doctor swiped something towards his omnipad and it dinged. “What is it if I may-”
“Are you really asking an Indian to tell you a story? Because it’s going to be a long one if you are.” “I’m Sevastutavan, young man; we invented long stories.”
Andy froze and stared at the screen of his omnipad. The Vatikre was heavily accented, and Andy had a bit of trouble with the unfamiliar accent, but centered in the frame in a hospital room, sitting in a wheelchair, was a Salishian boy. Andy blinked in surprise as he stared at the screen. “Is that-”
“I am Ikw’is’hi’ehlah, and this bearer is… of the Orca Clan Sheloksets. I drove our Haida enemies onto the rocks and took many heads when they attacked our winter village on Orcas Island. I signed the Treaty with the Great White Father and I fought against the slavers of the south-”
Andy wanted to grab the omnipad but the smell of overcooking eggs brought his attention back to breakfast and Andy stirred and scrapped the food quickly, trying to save it.
“I asked her for any materials she could give me on your brother. Pictures, recordings, anything. This is what she gave me. It's the last known recording of your brother during an interrogation conducted by a Navy Commissar prior to his escape. It seems he made friends with a Pod of Deaths Head Commandos. Quite a bit of the recording has been redacted, but… there are portions of it where he talks about his family and his history. I thought you might like to have it.”
Andy hurriedly pulled out paper plates and a slice of bread for everyone and scooped a heaping portion of the chorizo eggs onto them. He handed the doctor his before leaning out the cabin door. “Slop’s on, come and get it!”
Andy sat down after moving the shotgun out of the way and started the video over again as the three women came back to grab their plates and lost himself watching his brother start telling his story.
“What’s that?” Andy heard Kalai ask over his shoulder, and he paused the video.
“That’s my brother! That’s Kay Tee!”
“Holy shit, what?” Jackie nearly shoved Kalai into Andy as she jammed her bread slice down her gullet and crowded in to see the screen.
Andy started the video over a second time and they watched in silence. “God, that brings back memories. Back when mom was still alive and before we broke up the warband. I can’t believe that slippery little punk ghosted a pod of Commandos for two fucking years! Holy shit, that’s badass!”
Before Andy could say anything, Sakalbi started coughing and brought the binoculars up. “Uh, Andy? Jackie? What do we do about sharks?”
Jackie looked at Andy in confusion. “Sharks? There’s nothing but Dogs around here.”
“Well those are shark fins and they’re charging the net!” Sakalbi pointed and Andy looked up to see dorsal fins charging the center of the net.
Andy looked at Jackie and spoke the same words in tandem, “Oh shit!”
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To be posted 6/4/23
2023.05.28 04:51 Junior_Button5882 11 Terrifying-But-True Horror Stories Reported in the News - From fatal exorcisms to unexplained deaths and devil worship—these are some real-life nightmares.
A terrifying movie or book or show gets your blood pumping in the moment of consumption, sure—we covered our eyes in Squid Game with the rest of the world. But for the most part, you rest easy afterward knowing that what you've witnessed is fiction, deliberately spun up to creep you out. When the real world gets eerier than anything Stephen King could dream up, that's when you have every right to get a little scared of the dark.
Once in a while, a story of a dreadful disappearance, demonic possession, or devil worship will land in the local paper instead of a pulpy old paperback. We've rounded up the most unnerving real-life tales below. In honor of spooky season, here are eleven we can't stop thinking about.
But in November of 2014, the haunting took a darker turn. Robert Steven Laursen Jr., 37, of Rhinelander, Wisconsin was on a regular recreational paranormal visit with friends when true horror struck. Per VICE:
Laursen recovered from his injuries, but has never spoken publicly about what occurred that day. For Martha Linn, the owner of the home, the incident was very upsetting. "It's publicity, but it's not exactly the kind of publicity you desire to have. I don't want people thinking that when they come to the Villisca Axe Murder House something's going to happen that's going to make them do something like that.” The house remains open for tourist visits and overnight stays today.
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Per KPRC2 Houston News:
At that point, Elsa ceased to sing the English rendition of “Let It Go” altogether, speaking only Spanish when pressed. The family then double-bagged the bizarre doll and placed it at the bottom of their garbage which was taken out on garbage day. They went on a trip shortly after, but when they returned, Elsa too had come back, and was waiting in the backyard of their home.
This time, the family mailed Elsa to a family friend in Minnesota, who taped the haunted doll to the front bumper of his truck. It doesn’t seem to have made its way back to Houston yet, as per Madonia’s latest February Facebook update on the creepy doll.
As the BBC reported:
As The Independent reported:
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The BBC reported:
📷Witches prepare themselves for a journey by broomstick to the Black Mountain, circa 1650. From a 17th century Dutch copperplate by Adrianus Hubertus.Hulton Archive
As Fox reported:
The Washington Post notes on the magic:
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Soon after, she was arrested for abuse of seven of her former students, as the Tampa Bay Times reported:
NBC reported:
They had nothing. That February, LAPD released elevator surveillance footage of Lam before her disappearance. The footage shows Lam behaving strangely in the elevator, appearing to talk with invisible people, peering around the corner of the door, crouching in the corner, and opening and closing the door. But what exactly is going on in this video raises more questions than answers. Theories range from psychotic episodes, to demonic possession, to unknown assailants just out of the camera's view:
This content is imported from youTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.Watch on📷
Around that time, hotel guests started reported weird things happening with the Cecil Hotel water supply. As CNN reports:
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One of the more chilling sections of the report includes a segment about the possessed 9-year-old:
For a year, no one knew exactly what happened to the family, or what would drive the parents to do something so unthinkable. In January, police released more chilling details in the case. According to accounts from family members and an investigation by police, the parents were driven by a belief that the apocalypse was coming and an obsession with a convicted killer. As the Washington Post reported:
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Seven years later, in 1981, he allegedly committed a murder in France—shooting and eating a fellow University student, Renée Hartevelt. Issei creepily documented the entire experience with photographs and he was captured by authorities once again while attempting to dump the rest of her body in the Bois de Boulogne lake. He was deported back to Japan and committed to a mental institution. For reason unknown, his psychologists in Japan declared that he was sane. Furthermore, a legal technicality involving the French government refusing to turn over the documents from his case meant that his murder charges were dropped completely. He checked himself out of the mental hospital and has reportedly been walking the streets as a free man ever since. Issei has even become a controversial celebrity, writing over 20 books. According to Japan Today, he most recently fantasized about an unnamed TV actress, saying:
"I'll catch a glimpse of her thigh and think, 'That sure looks tasty.' But I don't feel like I actually want to eat it. As I accomplished the act of cannibalism once, there's no meaning to maintaining the desire for it anymore. In my book, I wrote that it [human flesh] was tasty, but that was not really true; I'd much rather eat Matsuzaka (Kobe) beef. But because I'd desired to consume human flesh for so long, I'd managed to convince myself that it would necessarily be delicious."
Issei Sagawa was also referenced in the Rolling Stones song "Too Much Blood," with the lyrics reading: "And when he ate her he took her bones/To the Bois de Boulogne." He is currently 73 years old and continues to live in Kawaski City, Japan. To this day, no one knows why France did not allow Japan to give him a trial.
📷MATT MILLER
submitted by Junior_Button5882 to cryptid_world [link] [comments]
Once in a while, a story of a dreadful disappearance, demonic possession, or devil worship will land in the local paper instead of a pulpy old paperback. We've rounded up the most unnerving real-life tales below. In honor of spooky season, here are eleven we can't stop thinking about.
The Axe Murder House
The Villisca Axe Murder House in Villisca, Iowa is a well-known tourist attraction for ghost hunters and horror lovers alike. The site of a gruesome unsolved 1912 murder, in which six children and two adults had their skulls completely crushed by the axe of an unknown perpetrator, was purchased in 1994, restored to its 1912 condition, and converted into a tourist destination. It costs $428 a night to stay at the old haunted home, where visitors always report strange paranormal experiences, such as visions of a man with an axe roaming the halls or the faint screams of children.But in November of 2014, the haunting took a darker turn. Robert Steven Laursen Jr., 37, of Rhinelander, Wisconsin was on a regular recreational paranormal visit with friends when true horror struck. Per VICE:
His companions found him stabbed in the chest—an apparently self-inflicted wound—called 9-1-1, and Laursen was brought to a nearby hospital before being helicoptered to Creighton University Medical Center in Omaha.The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office said Laursen suffered the self-inflicted injury at about 12:45 a.m., which is around the same time the 1912 axe murders in the house began.
Laursen recovered from his injuries, but has never spoken publicly about what occurred that day. For Martha Linn, the owner of the home, the incident was very upsetting. "It's publicity, but it's not exactly the kind of publicity you desire to have. I don't want people thinking that when they come to the Villisca Axe Murder House something's going to happen that's going to make them do something like that.” The house remains open for tourist visits and overnight stays today.
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The Haunted Doll
When you think of haunted dolls, it’s likely the creepy old Victorian-looking porcelain kind that springs to mind. None of which you probably have laying around. Still, don’t get too comfortable around any kids toys too soon, though: a Disney’s Frozen Elsa doll that was gifted for Christmas 2013 in the Houston area made headlines earlier this year when it seemingly became haunted.Per KPRC2 Houston News:
The doll recited phrases from the movie Frozen and sang “Let It Go” when a button on its necklace was pressed.The family decided to throw the creepy doll out in December of 2019. Weeks later, they found it inside a bench in their living room. “The kids insisted they didn’t put it there, and I believed them because they wouldn’t have dug through the garbage outside,” Madonia told KPRC2 Houston News.
“For two years it did that in English,” mother Emily Madonia said. “In 2015, it started doing it alternating between Spanish and English. There wasn’t a button that changed these, it was just random."
The family has owned the doll for more than six years and never changed its batteries. The mother says the doll would randomly begin to speak and sing even with its switch turned off.
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📷JOIN NOWAt that point, Elsa ceased to sing the English rendition of “Let It Go” altogether, speaking only Spanish when pressed. The family then double-bagged the bizarre doll and placed it at the bottom of their garbage which was taken out on garbage day. They went on a trip shortly after, but when they returned, Elsa too had come back, and was waiting in the backyard of their home.
This time, the family mailed Elsa to a family friend in Minnesota, who taped the haunted doll to the front bumper of his truck. It doesn’t seem to have made its way back to Houston yet, as per Madonia’s latest February Facebook update on the creepy doll.
A Deadly Exorcism
In August 2016 in North London, 26-year-old Kennedy Ife began acting strange and aggressive following a pain in his throat. He reportedly bit his father, threatened to cut off his own penis, and complained of a python or snake inside of him before his family restrained him to a bed with cable ties and excessive force.As the BBC reported:
“The family then set about attempting to ‘cure’ Kennedy through restraint and prayer over the next three days, the court was told.”His brother, Colin Ife, told police:
“It’s clear that thing was in him, what we believed was a demon because it was not natural. It was clearly trying to kill him,” he said.Kennedy Ife had been bound to his bed for three days without medical attention when his brother called emergency services, explaining that Kennedy Ife was complaining of dehydration. He appeared to have developed breathing issues, and was pronounced dead at 10:17 a.m.
“We had to restrain him for himself. It was clear if we didn’t restrain him, he could have tried to harm people in our family.”
As The Independent reported:
While police were at the house Colin Ife allegedly carried out an “attempted resurrection” by chanting and praying for Mr. Ife.All seven of Kennedy Ife’s family members were accused of manslaughter, false imprisonment, and causing or allowing the death of a vulnerable adult. A post-mortem examination revealed over 60 wounds including a possible bite on Kennedy Ife’s body, and his father, Kenneth Ife, along with four of his brothers, sustained injuries as well.
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The BBC reported:
Kenneth Ife told jurors he ordered his sons to take shifts and use "overwhelming force" but denied that an "association with cults, occults and secret societies" played any part in the death.After a four day jury deliberation, all seven family members were cleared of charges on March 14, 2019.
📷Witches prepare themselves for a journey by broomstick to the Black Mountain, circa 1650. From a 17th century Dutch copperplate by Adrianus Hubertus.Hulton Archive
Dead Animals in the Walls
When the Bretzuis family decided to insulate their home in Auburn, Pennsylvania in 2015, they discovered that it had already been—with scores of dead animal carcasses.As Fox reported:
The dead animals were wrapped in newspapers from the 1930s and 40s and were among half-used spices, and other items.The expert attributed the rotting animals in their walls to Pow-wow or Dutch magic, a ritual originating in the culture of the Pennsylvania Dutch to treat ailments and gain physical and spiritual protection. The Pennsylvania Dutch were a group of German-speaking settlers to Pennsylvania in the 1600 and 1700’s, and are often of Lutheran, Mennonite, or Amish faiths.
After removing the items they sent hundreds of artifacts and carcasses to an expert in Kutztown.
The Washington Post notes on the magic:
Many of the spells deal with the care of livestock, finding water, or the treatment of minor ailments, reflecting the conditions and concerns of early American settlers.One notable ritual in their tradition is this hex to create loyalty in a dog:
But powwow also has within it a tradition of darker spells, and even of such things as conjuring demons.
To attach a dog to a person, provided nothing else was used before to effect it: Try to draw some of your blood, and let the dog eat it along with his food, and he will stay with you.The mold found on the rotting carcasses in the Bretzuis home has caused illness among the family members, and they say that the odor hasn’t gone away.
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Florida Devil Worshipping
Friends noticed that Danielle Harkins, a 35-year-old schoolteacher near St. Petersburg, Florida, started acting strangely in June of 2012, developing an interest in demonic rituals.Soon after, she was arrested for abuse of seven of her former students, as the Tampa Bay Times reported:
Danielle Harkins told the kids they needed to rid their bodies of demons as the group gathered before dusk Saturday around a small fire near the St. Petersburg Pier. They should cut their skin to let the evil spirits out, police said she told the children. Then, they needed to burn the wounds to ensure that those spirits would not return.The police were notified because a friend of one of the students who participated in the ritual raised alarms. However none of the students themselves told their parents about the event or would comment following the arrest of Harkins for aggravated battery and child abuse.
When Harkins held a lighter to one teen's hand, wind blew the flame out, police said. That prompted her to douse his hand in perfume before setting it on fire. The boy suffered second-degree burns, police said.
Another teen was cut on the neck with a broken bottle, police said. Harkins used a flame to heat a small key, which she then used to cauterize the wound.
NBC reported:
Investigators said they've spoken to Harkins, but she didn't spell out what type of religion would require such drastic measures.
"She hasn't informed us exactly what she was trying to accomplish with this," Puetz [of the St. Petersburg Police Department] said.
The Death of Elisa Lam
Elisa Lam was last seen on January 31, 2013 in the lobby of the Cecil Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. She was vacationing through the West Coast, documenting the trip on her blog, and checking in with her parents every day. On January 31 those calls stopped. Lam had vanished. Soon the police were involved and her parents arrived to help with the search.They had nothing. That February, LAPD released elevator surveillance footage of Lam before her disappearance. The footage shows Lam behaving strangely in the elevator, appearing to talk with invisible people, peering around the corner of the door, crouching in the corner, and opening and closing the door. But what exactly is going on in this video raises more questions than answers. Theories range from psychotic episodes, to demonic possession, to unknown assailants just out of the camera's view:
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Around that time, hotel guests started reported weird things happening with the Cecil Hotel water supply. As CNN reports:
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"The shower was awful," said Sabina Baugh, who spent eight days there during the investigation. "When you turned the tap on, the water was coming black first for two seconds and then it was going back to normal."The tap water "tasted horrible," Baugh said. "It had a very funny, sweety, disgusting taste. It's a very strange taste. I can barely describe it."But for a week, they never complained. "We never thought anything of it," she said. "We thought it was just the way it was here."On the morning of February 19, a hotel employee climbed to the roof and used a ladder to investigate the hotel's water storage tanks. That's where authorities found the decomposing, naked body of Lam, whose personal items were found nearby. After an autopsy, her death was labeled accidental. NBC Los Angeles reported at the time about the strange circumstances in the hotel's past:
The tank has a metal latch that can be opened, but authorities said access to the roof is secured with an alarm and lock.The single-room-occupancy hotel has an unusual history. "Night Stalker" Richard Ramirez, who was found guilty of 14 slayings in the 1980s, lived on the 14th floor for several months in 1985. And international serial killer Jack Unterweger is suspected of murdering three prostitutes during the time he lived there in 1991. He killed himself in jail in 1994.In 1962, a female occupant jumped out of one the hotel's windows, killing herself and a pedestrian on whom she landed.In February 2021, a Netflix doc called Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel explored Elisa's tragic case and the history of the "cursed" Cecil Hotel.
An Exorcism in Indianapolis
Last year, the Indianapolis Star published a lengthy report on a family terrorized by three children allegedly possessed by demons. The account of Latoya Ammons and her family tells disturbing stories of children climbing up the walls, getting thrown across rooms, and children threatening doctors in deep unnatural voices. It would seem like something straight out of a movie–a work of fantasy, except all of these accounts were more or less corroborated with "nearly 800 pages of official records obtained by the Indianapolis Star and recounted in more than a dozen interviews with police, DCS personnel, psychologists, family members and a Catholic priest."One of the more chilling sections of the report includes a segment about the possessed 9-year-old:
According to Washington's original DCS report—an account corroborated by Walker, the nurse—the 9-year-old had a "weird grin" and walked backward up a wall to the ceiling. He then flipped over Campbell, landing on his feet. He never let go of his grandmother's hand.Another segment of the piece reads:
The 12-year-old would later tell mental health professionals that she sometimes felt as if she were being choked and held down so she couldn't speak or move. She said she heard a voice say she'd never see her family again and wouldn't live another 20 minutes.This content is imported from youTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.Watch on📷Advertisement - Continue Reading Below
Utah Murder-Suicide
In September of 2014, a Utah teen returned to his home to find his parents and three siblings dead. "In a notebook, a 'to-do list' had been scribbled on the pages ... The list looked as if the parents were readying to go on vacation—items such as 'feed the pets' and 'find someone to watch after the house' were written," The Salt Lake Tribune reported. It appeared to be murder-suicide, but there was no suicide note, no prior indication that they would do this, no explanation. Police could not figure out why two parents would kill themselves and three of their four children.For a year, no one knew exactly what happened to the family, or what would drive the parents to do something so unthinkable. In January, police released more chilling details in the case. According to accounts from family members and an investigation by police, the parents were driven by a belief that the apocalypse was coming and an obsession with a convicted killer. As the Washington Post reported:
Friends and family told police that the parents were worried about the "evil in the world" and wanted to escape a "pending apocalypse." But most assumed they just wanted to move somewhere "off the grid." Investigators also found letters written by Kristi Strack to one of the state's most infamous convicted killers, Dan Lafferty, who was convicted in the 1984 fatal stabbing of his sister-in-law and her 1-year-old daughter. According to trial testimony, he killed the victims at the order of his brother, Ron Lafferty, who claimed to have had a revelation from God. The story became a book called "Under the Banner of Heaven."Police said Kristi Strack became friends with Dan Lafferty, and she and her husband even visited him in prison.
The Phone Stalker
In 2007, ABC news documented a series of cell phone calls to families with terrifyingly specific death threats. The unidentified callers knew exactly what families were doing and what they were wearing.The families say the calls come in at all hours of the night, threatening to kill their children, their pets and grandparents. Voice mails arrive, playing recordings of their private conversations, including one with a local police detective.The caller knows, the families said, what they're wearing and what they're doing. And after months of investigating, police seem powerless to stop them.This went on with the Kuykenall family for months, who reported a caller with a scratchy voice threatening to slit their throats.
When the Fircrest, Wash., police tried to find the culprit, the calls were traced back to the Kuykendalls' own phones -- even when they were turned off.It got worse. The Kuykendalls and two other Fircrest families told ABC News that they believe the callers are using their cell phones to spy on them. They say the hackers know their every move: where they are, what they're doing and what they're wearing. The callers have recorded private conversations, the families and police said, including a meeting with a local detective.
"The Watcher"
After moving into their $1.3 million dream home, a New Jersey family started receiving creepy death threats from someone who identified themselves as "The Watcher." As CBS News reported earlier this year:Advertisement - Continue Reading Below
Since moving in, the owners said they have received numerous letters from the mysterious person. "The Watcher" claimed the home "has been the subject of my family for decades," and "I have been put in charge of watching and waiting for its second coming," Castro reported.The new owners have several children, and other letters asked, "Have they found out what's in the walls yet?" and "I am pleased to know your names now, and the name of the young blood you have brought to me."The family was forced to flee from their home and later filed a lawsuit against the previous owners.
Issei the Cannibal
In 1974, 24-year-old Wako University student Issei Sagawa allegedly followed a German woman to her home in Tokyo, Japan, broke into her apartment while she was sleeping, and attempted to cut a piece of flesh off her body to consume. When she awoke, she reportedly fought him and he was later captured by the police. According to a 2012 Vice documentary that covered Issei's bizarre story, he was mistakenly charged with attempted rape and his wealthy father paid the victim a settlement outside of court to have the charges dropped.Seven years later, in 1981, he allegedly committed a murder in France—shooting and eating a fellow University student, Renée Hartevelt. Issei creepily documented the entire experience with photographs and he was captured by authorities once again while attempting to dump the rest of her body in the Bois de Boulogne lake. He was deported back to Japan and committed to a mental institution. For reason unknown, his psychologists in Japan declared that he was sane. Furthermore, a legal technicality involving the French government refusing to turn over the documents from his case meant that his murder charges were dropped completely. He checked himself out of the mental hospital and has reportedly been walking the streets as a free man ever since. Issei has even become a controversial celebrity, writing over 20 books. According to Japan Today, he most recently fantasized about an unnamed TV actress, saying:
"I'll catch a glimpse of her thigh and think, 'That sure looks tasty.' But I don't feel like I actually want to eat it. As I accomplished the act of cannibalism once, there's no meaning to maintaining the desire for it anymore. In my book, I wrote that it [human flesh] was tasty, but that was not really true; I'd much rather eat Matsuzaka (Kobe) beef. But because I'd desired to consume human flesh for so long, I'd managed to convince myself that it would necessarily be delicious."
Issei Sagawa was also referenced in the Rolling Stones song "Too Much Blood," with the lyrics reading: "And when he ate her he took her bones/To the Bois de Boulogne." He is currently 73 years old and continues to live in Kawaski City, Japan. To this day, no one knows why France did not allow Japan to give him a trial.
📷MATT MILLER
2023.05.28 04:49 moe_master The world longest joke (Pt 2)
I told you that you'd heal quickly now."
"Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?"
"More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second."
"Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack.
"Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?"
"Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food."
"We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate.
"Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours.
"I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to.
"Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk."
"Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food.
Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden."
Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically.
"Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose.
Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the trunk to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving.
Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky.
Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh!
Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to."
"It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack."
Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?"
"Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while."
"Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?"
"No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least."
"So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack.
"Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals."
"Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack.
"Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since.
"What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?"
"Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way.
"You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate.
"Why not?" asked Jack.
"I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate.
"Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot."
"Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate.
"What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?"
"Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned.
Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?"
"Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?"
Nate continued to grin.
"A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?"
"Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here."
"Rules? What rules?" asked Jack.
"The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate.
Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?"
"Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?"
"Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?"
"Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too."
"Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Jack. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?"
"Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more.
Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?"
"That seems to be it," agreed Nate.
"What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?"
"Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know."
"But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack.
Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack."
Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail.
Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?"
"Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago."
"Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?"
"Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing."
"What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack.
"He asked me about the third request," replied Nate.
"Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?"
"I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack."
"Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while.
Nate watched him, waiting.
"Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?"
Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him."
"Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me.
Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?"
"Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?"
"He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about."
"Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up.
Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both.
"You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position.
"Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice.
"And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?"
"Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it.
Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock.
Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten.
Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake.
Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around.
"Nate, do accidents count?"
Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?"
Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?"
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement.
A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack.
"That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate.
"No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?"
"Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared."
"Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky.
"Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack.
"Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack."
"Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?"
"He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad.
Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight.
Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway.
"His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time."
"And then he just died?" asked Jack.
Nate shook his head a little. "He made his fourth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite.
After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had.
After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise."
Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep.
Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat.
So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily.
Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it.
Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate.
Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions.
Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first.
Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite.
After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year.
After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school.
Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings.
But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally.
On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited.
After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to."
Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy?
"No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!"
Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever.
"Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake.
"Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?"
Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been.
"He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?"
Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more.
Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight.
Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement."
Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?"
Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die."
Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?"
Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request.
"I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me.
"I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword.
Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me.
"You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack.
"Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that."
Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack."
Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following.
Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and stories followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general.
When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances.
So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate.
When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert.
When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark.
As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight.
Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert.
Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving.
As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side.
Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster.
Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity.
Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away.
Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right.
The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side.
Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing.
Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel, "Better Nate than lever!", he ran over the snake.
THE END
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"Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?"
"More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second."
"Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack.
"Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?"
"Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food."
"We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate.
"Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours.
"I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to.
"Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk."
"Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food.
Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden."
Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically.
"Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose.
Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the trunk to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving.
Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky.
Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh!
Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to."
"It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack."
Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?"
"Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while."
"Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?"
"No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least."
"So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack.
"Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals."
"Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack.
"Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since.
"What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?"
"Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way.
"You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate.
"Why not?" asked Jack.
"I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate.
"Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot."
"Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate.
"What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?"
"Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned.
Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?"
"Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?"
Nate continued to grin.
"A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?"
"Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here."
"Rules? What rules?" asked Jack.
"The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate.
Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?"
"Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?"
"Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?"
"Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too."
"Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Jack. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?"
"Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more.
Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?"
"That seems to be it," agreed Nate.
"What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?"
"Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know."
"But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack.
Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack."
Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail.
Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?"
"Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago."
"Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?"
"Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing."
"What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack.
"He asked me about the third request," replied Nate.
"Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?"
"I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack."
"Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while.
Nate watched him, waiting.
"Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?"
Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him."
"Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me.
Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?"
"Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?"
"He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about."
"Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up.
Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both.
"You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position.
"Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice.
"And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?"
"Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it.
Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock.
Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten.
Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake.
Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around.
"Nate, do accidents count?"
Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?"
Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?"
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement.
A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack.
"That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate.
"No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?"
"Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared."
"Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky.
"Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack.
"Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack."
"Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?"
"He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad.
Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight.
Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway.
"His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time."
"And then he just died?" asked Jack.
Nate shook his head a little. "He made his fourth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite.
After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had.
After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise."
Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep.
Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat.
So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily.
Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it.
Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate.
Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions.
Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first.
Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite.
After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year.
After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school.
Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings.
But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally.
On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited.
After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to."
Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy?
"No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!"
Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever.
"Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake.
"Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?"
Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been.
"He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?"
Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more.
Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight.
Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement."
Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?"
Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die."
Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?"
Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request.
"I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me.
"I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword.
Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me.
"You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack.
"Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that."
Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack."
Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following.
Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and stories followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general.
When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances.
So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate.
When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert.
When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark.
As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight.
Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert.
Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving.
As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side.
Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster.
Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity.
Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away.
Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right.
The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side.
Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing.
Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel, "Better Nate than lever!", he ran over the snake.
THE END
2023.05.28 04:33 thaslaya [WTT][US-CA][H] Switch games [W] IEM offers
Might be a long shot but I have WAYYY too many Switch games and absolutely no time to play them. I don't have the funds for any new IEMs but I figured someone might want to trade for some games I have. I am open to offers but a few things I'm interested in: SeeAudio, Thieaudio, Yanyin, Zetian Wu Heyday.
Here is my list of games up for trade:
Astria Ascending Persona 5 Royal Persona 5 Strikers Undertale (loose) Hyrule Warriors AOC (loose) South Park TFBW The Outer Worlds Assassins Creed Collection Fate/extella link Fire Emblem 3 houses Sakuna of Rice and Ruin Pokemon Pearl FF9 (loose) Digimon story cyber sleuth Battle chasers nightwar Valkyria chronicles 4 Ni no kuni Ni no kuni 2 Tokyo mirage sessions 13 sentinels Cris tales FF x/X2 Dragon ball fighterz Dragon ball z kakarot
submitted by thaslaya to AVexchange [link] [comments]
Here is my list of games up for trade:
Astria Ascending Persona 5 Royal Persona 5 Strikers Undertale (loose) Hyrule Warriors AOC (loose) South Park TFBW The Outer Worlds Assassins Creed Collection Fate/extella link Fire Emblem 3 houses Sakuna of Rice and Ruin Pokemon Pearl FF9 (loose) Digimon story cyber sleuth Battle chasers nightwar Valkyria chronicles 4 Ni no kuni Ni no kuni 2 Tokyo mirage sessions 13 sentinels Cris tales FF x/X2 Dragon ball fighterz Dragon ball z kakarot
2023.05.28 03:46 longbeachlocale 🚨 City Council • June 6, 2023 • 5:00 PM 🚨
🗓 Date: June 6, 2023 @ 5PM
🗺 Location: Long Beach Civic Center 411 W. Ocean Boulevard
📺 LiveStream (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/c/LongBeachTelevision
📺 Live Stream (City Website): https://longbeach.granicus.com/ViewPublisher.php?view_id=84
ℹ️ Details: https://longbeach.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1105633&GUID=B4766DE1-9B6A-41D5-A545-7D151BE969EC&Options=info&Search=
📄 Agenda (PDF): https://longbeach.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=A&ID=1105633&GUID=B4766DE1-9B6A-41D5-A545-7D151BE969EC
🗣eComment: https://longbeach.granicusideas.com/meetings/4014-city-council-on-2023-06-06/agenda_items
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Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record and conclude the public hearing; Adopt resolution approving and certifying the Environmental Impact Report EIR 03-20, State Clearinghouse No. 2019050009 and associated findings;
Adopt resolution replacing the current Noise Element with the updated Noise Element of the Long Beach General Plan; and
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submitted by longbeachlocale to LongBeachCA [link] [comments]
🗺 Location: Long Beach Civic Center 411 W. Ocean Boulevard
📺 LiveStream (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/c/LongBeachTelevision
📺 Live Stream (City Website): https://longbeach.granicus.com/ViewPublisher.php?view_id=84
ℹ️ Details: https://longbeach.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1105633&GUID=B4766DE1-9B6A-41D5-A545-7D151BE969EC&Options=info&Search=
📄 Agenda (PDF): https://longbeach.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=A&ID=1105633&GUID=B4766DE1-9B6A-41D5-A545-7D151BE969EC
🗣eComment: https://longbeach.granicusideas.com/meetings/4014-city-council-on-2023-06-06/agenda_items
Agenda Item
CD4 - Funds Transfer for Partners of Parks
Item #1 • File #23-0553 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Councilman Daryl Supernaw, Fourth District
CD4 - Funds Transfer for LGBTQ Center Long Beach
Item #2 • File #23-0554 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Councilman Daryl Supernaw, Fourth District
CD4 - Funds Transfer for Wild West Women, Inc
Item #3 • File #23-0555 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Councilman Daryl Supernaw, Fourth District
CD5 - Funds Transfer to Support Community Events
Item #4 • File #23-0556 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Councilwoman Megan Kerr, Fifth District
CD4 - Funds Transfer for Rancho Los Alamitos Foundation
Item #5 • File #23-0562 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Councilman Daryl Supernaw, Fourth District
CD4 - Funds Transfer for Long Beach Century Club
Item #6 • File #23-0561 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Councilman Daryl Supernaw, Fourth District
Arcelia Delgado
Item #7 • File #23-0552 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Attorney
Michael Hannan
Item #8 • File #23-0551 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Attorney
CA - Kayla Jentes
Item #9 • File #23-0557 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Attorney
CA - Joel Reyes
Item #10 • File #23-0558 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Attorney
Martin Romo
Item #11 • File #23-0549 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Attorney
Mario Talavera
Item #12 • File #23-0550 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Attorney
CC - Damage Claims
Item #13 • File #23-0547 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Clerk
CM - Federal Lobbyist RFP
Item #15 • File #23-0563 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Manager
FM - Coastline Equip. for the purchase of a John Deere 332G skid steer
Item #17 • File #23-0566 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
FM - Coastline Equip-John Deere 310P backhoe
Item #18 • File #23-0567 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
Mayor - Cancellation of July 4th City Council Meeting
Item #23 • File #23-0560 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Mayor Rex Richardson
PRM/PW - Capital improvements at El Dorado East Regional, El Dorado Park West, Houghton, and Stearns Parks D4,9
Item #33 • File #23-0582 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Parks, Recreation and Marine
- Public Works
Resolution
CC - Destruction of Records
Item #14 • File #23-0548 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Clerk
FM - Ray Gaskin Service for for the purchase of one Ford F-550 refuse truck
Item #16 • File #23-0565 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
FM - The Quinn Co. for the purchase of 4 Caterpillar 430 backhoe loaders
Item #19 • File #23-0568 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
DS - Noise Element
Item #22 • File #23-0564 (Details, PDF)Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record and conclude the public hearing; Adopt resolution approving and certifying the Environmental Impact Report EIR 03-20, State Clearinghouse No. 2019050009 and associated findings;
DS - Noise Element
Item # • File #23-0585 (Details, PDF)Adopt resolution replacing the current Noise Element with the updated Noise Element of the Long Beach General Plan; and
ED - 702 Anaheim Shelter – LB Rescue Mission and First to Serve D3
Item #24 • File #23-0584 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Economic Development
- Health and Human Services
FM - Transfer of FY 23 gross operating revenue, from the Harbor Fund Group to the Tidelands Operating Fund
Item #25 • File #23-0569 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
FM - Velocity Truck Centers for the purchase of 7 CNG powered Crane Carrier LNT-26 trucks
Item #26 • File #23-0572 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
FM - Velocity Truck Center-10 CNG Crane Carrier Roto-Pac side loader refuse trucks
Item #27 • File #23-0573 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
FM/PW - Velocity Truck Center-20 CNG Crane Carrier side loader refuse trucks
Item #29 • File #23-0574 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
- Public Works
PRM - Reso w/LAFCO-LA for final District Boundary Map
Item #31 • File #23-0581 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Parks, Recreation and Marine
PRM/DHHS - Accept grant funds for Wrigley Greenbelt and Multi-Service Center D7
Item #32 • File #23-0577 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Parks, Recreation and Marine
- Health and Human Services
ABC License
PD - ABC License - Tacomasa D3
Item #20 • File #23-0576 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Police
PD - ABC License- Northern Café D3
Item #21 • File #23-0575 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Police
Ordinance
DS - Noise Element
Item # • File #23-0586 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Development Services
CM - Ordinance Amending LBMC 5.92
Item #35 • File #23-0532 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- City Manager
Contract
FM - South Coast Fire Equip. for 10 Pierce Enforcer Triple Combination fire engine pumper trucks
Item #28 • File #23-0571 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Financial Management
PRM - Great Scott for as-needed tree trimming
Item #30 • File #23-0579 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Parks, Recreation and Marine
PW - As-Needed Architectural Services
Item #34 • File #23-0583 (Details, PDF)Sponsors:
- Public Works
2023.05.28 03:43 Hayate-kun 60 most-viewed Mukbang videos on YouTube last week (2023-05-14 to 2023-05-20)
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