you know my favorite Marvel What If comic is #19 of the original run. it's a story that tells what if Peter Parker with his Spider-Man persona hadn't become a crime fighter but continued wrestling and he clicked to become prominent and famous. that's actually quite interesting to really see the contrast that Peter went through. I mean have you seen him in amazing fantasy 15? I mean really he's really there after the bite her in the direction I want to show it the schoolyard bullies, and quite immature on top of that, only that with his uncle gave him some self-reflection that he shouldn't use his powers for himself. and as I said it's fascinating to see what would have happened if he hadn't gotten that self-reflection, as it's also really interesting to see that he's acting quite childish there too. and I think that's one thing that I find kind of fascinating that you have a person who has kind of toxic streaks but yet you've fought them to become a better person.
and I think that's just one of the things that many unfortunately still have in their heads, that people with their bad qualities always act actively and consciously. but often it's just that many don't check it or don't want to check it, that they also say, think and act quite questionable things.
and I think the best comic that sort of dissects that thinking is Scott Pilgrim vs the world. and I have to talk about the differences between the film and I know what it's like to criticize this film even if I'm right that the comic clearly goes further. and best embodied with technically one of my favorite evil ex Lucas Lee. Anyone who only knows the movies knows he threw Scott into a clock tower (where the universe says he probably deserved it) and that he beat himself because he's not good at grinds. in the comic version it's a bit more complicated. basically it's a whole deconstruction on the nerd vs jock trope. because after Lukas Scott gave a crash course in architecture, they took a break. the two of them sitting on a bench and suddenly starting to get a conversation. and then slowly dissolves then on the masks and the roles that play. I mean you really get the feeling in another timeline maybe they could have even been friends. I mean heck, the way it happened with the self knockout with the skateboard wasn't a trick, scott just wanted to be nice because Lukas himself was an avid skater but hasn't done it in years. and in general it is treated more like a victory in history that he didn't even deserve. That's generally the problem I have with the film, that I don't think it really goes into it any more deeply, the construction of the cliché from loser to winner. precisely because a lot of elements also fall out about Scott, e.g. the whole thing with Kim, or is it actually his own fault that the relationship with Envy is a fiasco and that she even tells him to his face that he is emotional packages on others, oh yeah and the whole Lisa thing that was completely cut from the movie where he beat up someone who was flirting with her even though they weren't in a romantic relationship.
and while you're talking about people who lack self-reflection at a dangerous level, let's get to joe hill the cape. the story revolves around Eric who got into a pretty bad accident when he was eight years old while playing superheroes with his brother, the thing is he claimed the cape he was wearing really made him fly. but of course his mother and brother didn't really believe in it at first. Years went by somehow he's so common some are successful like Erik's brother and others are just like Erik. and at the very end he suddenly finds in his mother's basement the cape that she actually locked away for years after his accident. and lo and behold it was no imagination that he could fly with it. and with that power, one thing had decided to take revenge and killed his ex. then you know that's kind of like a horror story that's particularly mienna, why? because I was in a situation like Eric myself, I looked at myself like a loser out of nothing and was just jealous as well as almost everyone, I mean heck I can even draw a parallel to it because Erik's brother Nick is studying and Unfortunately, he doesn't have the opportunity to do so, which is also the case with me. The thing is I've managed to sort of outgrow it and even now have a pretty solid relationship with my brother, I mean he lives in my apartment and takes care of my cat when I have to go to the vocational training center. and that's exactly what I want to see more of, where you can really ask yourself hey isn't the badguy somehow me? you already know the fear of a thing you can be. because the thing is Erik never got away from his accident and the loss of his cancer, he only defined himself with it you can almost say it's a gimmick and if you just limit yourself with it as a person clearly he doesn't have much space to grow. it's just really fitting about the capture boxes spoken by Nick that he says that back when he was always playing with his brother Erik he was the villain because there always had to be one for Erik. and that's something I just can't outgrow, someone must be to blame for his misery. he has a victim mentality that he mostly uses to justify his shit and that's a thing you often see in nerds trying to cover up for their toxic behavior.
but what if i realize my toxic properties early on? Well, I have to say that starting early is important, but it doesn't mean that you haven't caused any damage that you have to live with. Sentinel was one of the titles that was part of the Mavel Next imprint, and my god it came out 20 years ago but it feels more modern than you think. Basically it's about Justin, a normal loose high schooler in the middle states who lives in his father's junkyard with his brother. and then he finds the remains of one of the eponymous giant robots from the Marvel Universe, which he begins to repair out of curiosity. and it's actually interesting because you really dig into the psyche of someone who has to realize they're not perfect, and believe me youngsters always have a hard time with that. I mean if you really really love this comic you really feel like you are actually reading something about a normal teenager struggling with his status and schoolyard bully. and then he cries himself out the giant robot that repairs after.The two most important points of the first Story Ark is, I don't think anyone knows something that makes this comic somehow so modern. in the story, justin develops a friendship with a girl who sees this relationship as just a friendship and he almost destroyed her for telling around he had sex with her, proving people a technic don't have a plan of people. oh yes, and that he uses the completed Sentinel to make himself look like a hero. he ordered the giant robot to pretend to attack the high school and he then hit his metal friend in the shin with a car and then he disappeared because of it. the thing is just like that justin doesn't really feel like a hero just because of that, i mean you traumatized a town and the guy that has been tormenting you most of the time is now technically in a mental hospital for the trauma, yeah no wonder you doesn't feel like a real hero if none of this is true or deserved. and I don't want to spoiler about it on how it goes because that's when it starts out like he's really really trying to do good and be a hero but like I said the damage is done and you have to live with him now. It works I think because you just really get the feeling a lot of teenagers, if not yourself, would do shit like that because they just don't know any better. and then crashing full force against the wall called reality. the thing is, toxic properties are mostly in people and only become apparent when they're released or have room to grow. and realizing that you have them is always a painful experience when you have to admit to yourself things you don't want.
and these are three comics that I think do a pretty good job of picking apart toxic nerd behavior, or some form of it. the self righteousness. and if you don't get it wrong, that's actually very important and it's even a breeding ground for many things, I mean the three examples I mentioned there also act about guys who somehow also have a problem with women. although I have to say maybe a story in general that deals directly with sexism in nerd circles is also important.
but other things are also important, e.g. racism and homophobia. I mean have you ever been in a lobby of the popular multiplayer game? I mean the hatred to people of color or LBGTQ representation in works of art eho bach them ware normally heteronorm is terrifying. I mean from people who say I was bullied in the schoolyard because I liked XY, it's ironic when they start attacking others themselves. I mean just because you've experienced shit yourself doesn't mean you should inflict it on others.
but we can also pull out the Marxist lens and deconstruct the pro-capitalist side of some creeps. I mean, from guys demanding that something go bankrupt just because it has diversity in it, to people spreading anti-union sentiment in the entertainment industry. I mean heck we can even take apart the Tech Bro Utopia which is actually more of a dystopia of white sausage libertarian partying.
I mean heck, from all the bullshit I get from the Gamer™️ site you could make a mark Russell comic series about of it, that's how f******* some of them are missing selfsreflection.
but do you say? what are works that come to your mind that deal with the? what else needs to be treated?

it's over man. this school thing is crushing me. i've been a good student with like only 2 Bs in high school until now but this year my family, friends, and teachers have broken me.i've been through almost 3 years of therapy against my will bc mom makes me, she calls me a sociopath all the time she degrades me about having no responsibility and being lazy then when i try and have a respectful conversation with her she lashed out and yells at me about how i'm always the problem.
it's no wonder i have a younger sibling it's so obvious that both parents think i'm a failure so why not try again and prioritize the second kid. my dad controls everything i do from what i wear to what i eat when i exercise who i do it with who i talk to and don't. when these two personalities between my parents clash their battles are insane, passive aggressive meets merciless rage and these lasts for days, sometimes weeks. this home is broken, two disfunctional parents that hate each other raising one kid and hating the other. for a little context they've always had a horrible marriage but in recent years it's taken a leap downward.
once when my mom lashed out at me abt failing a class i told her that school takes but all of my life and between all the classes sometimes one gets left in the dust and maybe it would be nice to come home from a hard day at school to at least a functional home so at the time i thought that wasn't asking too much. she ended up chewing me out for the rest of the evening and even came in my room to wake me up early to yell at me. after all this it's hard to feel anything anymore. i can't even remember the last time i had an authentic feeling. the stress of being a bad student, son, brother, friend, teammate, so on and so forth just gets to the point of hating myself to an unreal degree. the therapy started bc the family looked through my phone to find old texts of me venting to a trusted friend and saying i'm feeling like hurting myself and even to the point of ending it all. i'm not even sure if i'm truly past that. maybe i'll cave in to those thoughts, i'll let them win.
i used to cry but thag stopped a few years ago now i feel so numb and just wonder, mom? dad? why do you hate me? they frequently probe about my depression and i ask to try antidepressants but they say i'm already angry enough and the pills will change me, i say mom i'm asking for help to become better and to heal, but she sees me as the problem and gets mad. she says that bc i'm a man i need to toughen up and shit like that.
no friends no girls no anybody. i guess this battle is alone and at this point i've accepted i'll always be a failure, flunk out of school, i feel like i'll always be unlovable. maybe it's me and i'm always the issue i'm so confused so alone. i get called a red flag pretty often but how about this, i'm raising the white flag i give up i'll just live alone or something.

Transmission
by Brian Martinez
Let me start my story by telling you something about me, the most important thing, in fact: I find things, and I fix them. That’s who I am. If you don’t know that, you don’t know me.
I’m a second-generation auto mechanic, born-and-bred. I’ve been repairing cars since before Ford Pintos were blowing up, when cars were made of steel and Route 66 wasn’t just something for the cartoons. These days I’m fortunate enough to own a shop downtown between two of those chain coffee places. It’s small, sure, but it has a reputation for saving cars so far-gone no one else will even touch ‘em. So if you live in the area, and you’ve ever been stuck with the sourest of lemons, or maybe your kid drove your minivan into the pool, we just might have crossed paths, you and I.
That reputation is what led to me getting a phone call from a guy I’d never met, saying he had something that might interest me. His name was Burt and he’d apparently just purchased a piece of property that sat unowned for the better part of twenty years. I knew of the area he was talking about. It’s out in the hills, where there isn’t much to look at. Most of the land there went to weed years ago; acres and acres of old woods and burnt-down barns just waiting for nobody in particular to see the value in them. And, well, it seems Burt was that nobody in particular.
I honestly didn’t know what Burt’s purchase had to do with me, and told him just that, figuring he must have had the wrong number. But the next words out of his mouth told me he knew exactly who he was talking to.
Apparently when old Burt started walking around his new property, digging around in the dirt, so to speak, he made an interesting discovery. So interesting, in fact, that it got me to grab my keys, hop in my truck, and drive up into the hills without so much as a pause to wash my hands.
Some things, you see, don’t wait for a man to look presentable.
As I drove up into the hills to meet Burt, I started to think about my father and the drives he used to take me on. He liked to get a feel for whichever car he was working on, and those drives, they always ended with a detour into the hills. ‘Nothing tests a vehicle like elevation,’ he used to say, and I have to admit, I still agree with that statement. All those long inclines, sharp turns and fast descents- not to mention the occasional slam on the brakes- really put a car through its paces.
Dad knew a thing or two about cars, even if he knew nothing about how to raise a family.
Other than maybe a slight fear of commitment, the main thing I got from my father was a passion for restoring old cars in my spare time. It’s a hobby of mine, and I do it in the garage at my house. I’m especially a sucker for rare cars, and the rarer the better. That little hobby of mine, more so than my day business, was why I ended up driving out to the middle of nowhere with dirty hands and a head full of ideas.
The road up was just as long and winding as I remembered. I almost missed the entrance for the property, a hidden driveway marked with little more than a broken mailbox and a rotting signpost. The private road got smaller and smaller by the minute until I swore the trees were going to swallow me whole and spit the bones back out.
When I finally reached what could pass for a clearing, a guy with a face like a junkyard dog was waiting for me next to the newest, cleanest Ford pick-up I’d seen outside of a dealership. He introduced himself to me as Eddie, an associate of old Burt. I told him I’d been expecting to meet Burt himself, but Eddie explained that Burt didn’t like to meet new people, and rarely came out in the cold weather. It was a bit raw, I had to admit, so I dropped the whole thing and let Eddie get down to the business at hand.
We left our cars behind and Eddie led me into the woods, where the walking was slow-going on account of the overgrowth of vines and dead branches. I’m not one to spook easily, but the more we walked the creepier those woods got, until I was fairly sure Eddie was going to use that French Mastiff face of his to tear my throat out. But just when I was thinking about turning back and saying screw it to the whole thing, I caught sight of what we’d come for.
The very first car I saw was a white, 1974 Pontiac Trans-Am. It was missing its door and tires, and it was buried under a layer of dead vines, but the body shape was unmistakable. Under the rust I could even see what was left of the telltale Firebird emblazoned across its hood in blue.
I couldn’t believe a car like that was just sitting out in the middle of the woods, waiting for anyone to come along and find it. As I got closer, though, I saw just how bad the condition of the car was. The insides were rotted out from rain and mold, and the floor was so eaten up by rust it was ready to fall out.
Before my brain could process the loss of such a beautiful machine, I caught sight of another car. This one was a Datsun 210 with a tree growing right through the hole where its trunk used to be. Wet leaves and newspaper filled the back seat, and the dashboard was an abandoned nest that crawled with leggy insects.
Old Burt hadn’t been pulling my leg: those woods were a graveyard for abandoned cars. From what I could tell, about three acres of woods were absolutely littered with the corpses of old autos. Some were in pieces, most were covered in dead leaves and rust and all the other things that happen when anything is left outside for years and years, but they were there. The sight of so many classic cars in one place, virtually unknown to anyone, both excited and saddened me.
For close to an hour I walked around random piles of tires and glass to stare at rusted-out Range Rovers and Jeeps with their headlights hanging out like popped eyeballs. Finally, like I’d woken up from a spell, I asked Eddie what Burt expected from me. And that’s when he told me the strangest, most interesting offer he could have told me in that moment.
He said if I could make every, single one of those cars disappear in three day’s time, at no cost to old Burt, I could keep them.
The words nearly knocked me off my feet. I’d have to call in every favor to every salvage yard and tow truck operator I knew, but it was possible. Still, nearly all of the cars I’d seen were beyond repair, even for a guy like me. At most I saw some parts that could be salvaged. Maybe a few of the newer, less damaged ones could be saved. I knew a few guys in my circle who might be interested, and I figured if I played my cards right I could make a few bucks out of the deal to boot- or at least land a good trade or two. Still, there weren’t any cars that I was interested in for myself.
Until, at the edge of the property, tucked away in a spot I’d nearly overlooked, I saw it. It was as if I’d been drawn there. Like I was meant to find it.
The car was familiar-looking, yet like nothing I’d ever seen. Cross a Chevelle Malibu Classic SE with the modern retro feel of the ‘97 Plymouth Prowler, add the large rear spoiler and flared wheel arches of a ‘99 Nissan Skyline GT-R, and you still won’t come close. It looked like something one of the big three manufacturers had made and yet I’d never seen or heard of its like ever before. It had no logos, no hood ornament, no identification of any kind. I practically ran around to the back of it to look for a name, a logo, something to identify it, tripping over hidden rocks and broken glass to do it.
But there was nothing. Nothing to betray the make and mark of the strange car in front of me. I even asked Eddie if he knew what it was. He only shrugged, clearly wanting to wrap up our little outdoor meeting. I half-heartedly agreed. It was later than I’d realized. Between the dwindling sun and the discovery I’d made, I’d started to get a chill I couldn’t shake. I had a bad tooth I’d been neglecting, and even that was starting to hurt from the cold.
So I agreed to Burt’s deal. I shook Eddie’s hand on it and got out of there, giving one last glance at the strange car in the woods on the way out.
The next day, after making more phone calls than a politician on election night, a swarm of flatbeds, wheel-lifts and salvage trucks descended on those woods. For two days they scooped out every piece of metal and glass in the place, while I oversaw the operation like a choir conductor from hell. I directed trucks this way and cutting crews that way. They snipped and cut and tore out every dead tree standing in the way so the truck crews could do the rest. I even got in there myself with the old chainsaw when it was needed.
It was an exhausting two days, but I managed to keep my word to Burt and clear every abandoned car off his property with about an hour to spare. Some of the cars went to the junkyard, others to various garages I’d made arrangements with.
I was dead on my feet by the time I got home. I was ready for a shower and a bed, in what order I wasn’t sure. And yet a crackle of energy went through me when I saw what had been dropped off in my garage.
My mystery car. Without the shadows of the woods hiding it, I could see it had been painted silver before the rust took over. It had been a fast sucker once, like a bullet to a werewolf’s chest. That had been a long time ago, and yet I sensed there was still some life in the old girl. I wanted so badly to start digging around under the hood, to see what I could find out, but my legs were ready to collapse and my eyes could barely focus. Intending to wake up early and hit the garage, I stumbled off to bed.
You know that feeling you get when you realize someone’s been talking to you for the past minute, thinking you’ve been listening, and you only just figured it out?
That’s the feeling I woke up to.
I sat straight up like a vampire rising from his coffin. My bedroom was still dark, which meant it was the middle of the night. In my half-sleep I tried to make out the clock on my nightstand but couldn’t read the numbers, so I fumbled for my glasses and shoved them on. It was just past two in the morning: way too early, even for me. No way was I getting up, strange feeling or no.
I was about to take my glasses off and lay back down when I heard the reason I’d woken up.
Whispering.
A man was in my room, whispering in the dark. I lunged across my bed and turned on the lamp, nearly knocking it over. I didn’t have a weapon, but if I could see the intruder I could do something about it. I spun back, back to the whispering, to see who it was, to shout at them or jump on them, whatever I had to do to save my life from the psycho in my bedroom.
But the room was empty. Just me and a pounding heart.
I was so confused, I jumped out of bed and tore around the room, making sure no one was hiding, but I didn’t find anyone. I was alone.
Then I heard it again, and I knew: the whispers were coming from down the hall.
With bare feet I followed it, trying to make out what it was saying, but it was too low to understand. I grabbed a knife as I passed through the kitchen and held it in front of me with sweat beading on my face despite how cold I kept the house.
I followed the whispering to the garage. The overhead light flickered on, lighting up the strange car in my garage. In my half-sleep, half-terror I’d nearly forgotten about it. But there it was, like a bear hibernating in its cave, waiting for the end of winter. It felt alive somehow. Not dead, just asleep and dreaming.
And it was whispering.
I knew how crazy that sounded, how crazy that was, but I swallowed hard and approached the car, knife first. The blade shook in front of me. The whispering got louder the closer I got, and yet I still couldn’t understand the words it was saying. Was someone hiding inside the car? Had I inherited a homeless man when I’d had it towed to my house? If so I had to get him out of there. Get him help, sure, make sure he had a place to sleep, but he couldn’t stay in my garage, whispering through the night. No way.
With my free hand I yanked on the driver’s side door. It didn’t open. Rusted shut. I slowly walked around to the passenger side and yanked again. It opened.
The whispering was louder now, louder but not clearer, like an old television tuned between channels, like a frequency not being picked up, like a…
Like a radio.
The whispers were coming from the radio. I laughed under my breath, realizing how ridiculous I’d been. But then I remembered there was no way the radio could be working. The car wasn’t turned on. If it even had a battery under the hood, it was probably little more than a square pile of rust and battery acid.
I clutched the kitchen knife tight, and with the other hand I slowly reached out to turn the volume knob. I needed to know if the whispers were coming from the radio, and if they were, I needed to know what they were saying. My temple throbbed as the whispers grew louder and louder, louder and louder, louder and-
The moment my finger touched the knob, the whispers stopped.
I felt like I was going crazy. I looked around the inside of the car, noting the strong smell of mildew and animal with a tinge of rotten leather. Other than my own breath echoing back at me, it was silent.
No whispers. No nothing.
I went back to bed, but I barely slept.
The next day was the day I usually took off from the shop, which was a relief since I woke up almost as tired as when I’d gone to bed. As I ate my breakfast, the night before still sat fresh in my mind. But the more I went over it, the more I thought it had been a bad dream, brought on by exhaustion and an imagination run wild. I had to admit the mystery car sitting in my garage had gotten my mind racing faster than a Formula 1.
I’m the kind of guy who likes a simple explanation, something I can touch and feel and, yes, fix, so I started to think that I could have picked up some kind of rogue radio transmission from a trucker, or even a passing plane. The police scanner I owned in my younger days had certainly picked up its share of random broadcasts, and when it comes to working on junkers I’ve learned to expect the unexpected.
After I’d eaten my breakfast and downed my coffee I got right to work on the car. I wanted to clear the air of whatever had happened, and I was dying to see what that baby had going on under the hood. The mystery of who the hell had made the thing was still heavy on me.
But the enigma only deepened the more I looked. Under all that rust and dirt and oil I couldn’t find one damn mark that told me who’d made the car. I almost wanted to say it was a custom build, but the work was too precise, the system too well-planned out to be an after-market job.
I worked on it all day, so wrapped up in it I forgot to eat lunch. I ate dinner like a raccoon digging through a dumpster. Then I worked on it some more.
I was just crawling into bed when I heard it again.
The whispering.
This time I ignored it, hoping it would go away on its own. But it didn’t stop. Not until I got up, walked across my house, went into the garage, and touched the radio. Then, it stopped.
I decided right then and there not to go to the shop the next day. There was just too much work to be done.
I’d been working on the car for four days straight before I got it started up. Four days of stripping and cleaning and rebuilding. Four nights of whispering. I was even starting to hear it during the day, but low, barely audible, like a television playing somewhere in the house.
After I got the engine started, the first thing I did was pull my code reader down from my tool wall and hook it up to the dashboard input. I’d been pleasantly surprised to find an input on the car, even though I was fairly certain it had been built after '96. To my shock the screen filled up with a bunch of random trouble codes I’d never seen before, then went blank. I tried to get it powered up again but apparently the connection had completely overloaded the device.
I’d had the reader for years and it had never given me a problem. I put it down and got back to the car, deciding to stick to the old-fashioned way and get a feel for what was wrong with it. Just like dad used to do.
With my foot on the gas I revved the engine good. It sounded better than I’d expected, like a beast waking up from deep sleep. But there was also something rattling around under the hood, something loose knocking around inside the carburetor or possibly even the manifold.
I tried a few options, opening up this and that, until I narrowed it down to something completely unexpected: the transmission.
With considerable force I managed to open up the transmission, and sure enough I found something inside. Something dark and red. I pulled it out and studied it under the light. It looked like a small rock covered in old transmission fluid. How it got in there I didn’t have a clue. But I decided to clean it off and get a better look at it, in case it pointed to a bigger problem. As I walked it to the slop sink, I noticed the whispering, usually a dull static during the day, had started to grow louder. I could almost make out individual words now. But I ignored it and ran the small rock under the faucet, watching the dark red fluid swirl down the drain.
That was when I discovered something I wasn’t prepared for. The thing in my hand wasn’t a rock- it was a tooth.
A human tooth.
The whispers had grown so loud I could barely hear myself think, barely feel the disgust rising in the pit of my stomach. With the whispers practically shouting in my ear I dropped the tooth and it bounced and clattered inside the sink, coming to a rest near the edge of the drain.
The whispers grew quiet again. A dull roar tickling at the back of my skull. I stared at it, the tooth in the sink, the impossible tooth from the impossible car. I had the urge to throw it out. To get it out of my house and never see it again. But I didn’t do that. I couldn’t tell you why not.
Maybe because that meant touching it again.
Maybe something else.
Feeling like I should give the car a rest, I worked on getting my code reader working again, otherwise I’d have to run to the store and buy a new one. I changed out the batteries and gave it a good, solid whack. A few seconds later I was happy to see the screen turn on. I thought I’d have to do a factory reset to use it again but I was surprised to find it worked perfectly fine. Not only that, the trouble codes it had read off the car were still stored in its memory.
There were pages and pages of codes like I’d never seen in my life, more than I think are even in the tool’s programming. In fact I couldn’t find a single one of them anywhere in the manual. I figured they were probably just random numbers, and yet there was something strange about them, like they had a pattern to them. I dusted off my old computer and typed in the problem codes, figuring if I could get a better look at them I might be able to figure out their meaning. If not, I could at least print them out and show them to somebody who could.
After twenty minutes I’d barely made a dent in typing up all the codes. I gave up on the idea that I could copy them all. I pushed away from my computer and stood up, rubbing my eyes from the strain. Between the glare of the old screen and the noise in my ears, my head was killing me. It all felt so pointless. So inconsequential.
Just before I shut the computer down, I happened to glance one last time at the screen. And when I did, I noticed something that made my skin go cold.
The codes. The pattern. The numbers and letters and spaces between them. They were starting to form a face. A human face, with two eyes and a screaming-
I shut the computer down as fast as I could, then unplugged it to be safe. Then I marched to the garage and disconnected the radio, practically ripping it out of the car.
The whispers stopped.
The house was quiet.
But not for long.
For three days I told myself to get rid of that car, tow it out of my garage and dump it somewhere no one could find it. Maybe even drench it in gasoline and light a match. For three days I ignored the whispers and the doorbell and the phone calls from my shop asking when I was coming back. For three days I buried my head under the hood and worked and worked and worked.
On the fourth day, when the whispers from the radio had grown louder than my own thoughts, louder but still unclear, without words I could understand, I lost it. I threw my wrench at the tool wall, knocking down chisels and socket wrenches and a dozen other tools clattering to the ground. I pounded on my ears, cursing them, willing them to go deaf and stop hearing the whispers.
But they didn’t stop hearing. And the whispers didn’t stop. So I decided. I decided that if I couldn’t stop hearing them, I at least needed to know what they were saying.
I went back to the slop sink. The tooth was still there, perched near the edge of the drain. I’d prayed for it to slip down and wash away on its own but there it was, round and sharp and real as ever. So I picked it up, and the whispers grew louder. Clearer. But still not clear enough to hear. Not enough to make out what the radio was saying. To understand what it wanted from me. It was like a broken antenna, only tuning in half the frequency.
The garage was a mess. I was a mess. Rancid grease stains everywhere. A hole in my tool wall where the wrench had struck it, the ground littered with hammers and screwdrivers and …
Pliers.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I grabbed the pliers from the ground, shoved it onto my mouth, got a good hold of my bad tooth, and ripped it out. It was easier than I expected, but it still hurt, and it bled a lot. But I didn’t hesitate. I pushed the tooth I’d found in the transmission into its place.
The moment I did, it was as if everything came into focus. As if the radio was inside my skull. No, as if my skull was the radio, and I was the antenna. I could hear the transmission clear as day now, a man’s voice inside my head.
Whispering to me.
Telling me where to find the rest of him.
I told you all of this, not because I expect you to believe me, but because I’m about to walk out my door and do something I might not come back from. And if that’s the case, if I don’t return today or any other day from this thing I need to do, I want people to know why.
Because I find things. I find things and fix them. If you don’t know that, you don’t know me.

​
Basically, all else held equal, will a non underrepresented candidate have a shot at getting into a school if their GMAT is at the student profile median and their gpa is slightly under? If you HAD to put odds to the app, would you say its 50/50?
Multiracial male applicant, US citizen, half white, half south american (NON latino, guyanese)
Gmat 710, GPA 3.1. Large upward swing
You can check out my post history for my profile review if you are interested. I know there is more to an app than just stats, but truthfully I think the other parts of my profile are at bare minimum acceptable. Do you guys think id have a shot round one at Cornell? medians are 710 gmat 3.3 gpa. Thanks guys

First Previous Wiki
"I should not let you enter," the old man said, gazing unhappily at Phoebe standing beside Penny in her dream.
"Please. You're mind controlling her, so I think you would have stopped me if you wanted to,"
Phoebe replied.
"Not control. Humans don't 'control' the air, they breathe it. In the same way, I feed on Penny's psychic energy."
"I see. And when you said you had infinite power, what exactly did you mean?"
"I do. But my power is dead," Death said. "That is how I am."
"And you can exist in the psychic realm, but not the regular mindscape?"
"Sometimes."
"What defines those times?"
"It depends. People dying, obviously. About a quarter of all deaths in the galaxy aren't Sprilnav."
"A quarter?"
"Yes."
"So I assume they're killing themselves."
"Yes."
"And that energy isn't a constant influx?"
"Somewhat. It comes in both a trickle and waves. But I know you're going to ask more. The answer is that the Progenitors give conceptual protection to the Sprilnav. The further away a Sprilnav is from them in space, time, and more, the weaker they are. That is why Elders can survive impacts that could vaporize metal, not just their implants and psychic energy."
"Conceptual weight seems to feature heavily in your power," Phoebe said.
"It does."
"And you are a concept. If you fought Fate, for example, would you win?"
"Depending on what you mean by winning. Really, concepts cannot overcome each other."
Phoebe smiled. That meant that Death would want a way to do that. Probably the hivemind was the way. With that answer, she continued.
"Concepts cannot overcome each other? So you don't have a fate, and Fate can't die?"
"Not really."
"Can you die?"
"No."
"Does Fate have a fate?"
"I don't know. But really, there's no way I'll tell you that even if I find out."
"How many people have died?" Phoebe asked.
"Define people, and define death."
"People as in sentient and sapient beings, which are capable of thought and planning. Death as in the ceasing of characteristics of life such as the termination of blood or gaseous material within the living being, as well as the ceasing of psychic energy and brain activity within the being, for those that have some equivalent to brains."
"It is not specific. Quintillions, at least. A lot more, really. There's many that don't quite fit the condition. If you count the moments before the great war, you'd need exponents."
"We have numbers for that."
"Okay. Sprilnav deaths alone, even with the conceptual madness of the... what do they call it? The Source war. Yes. It's quite a lot," Death said.
"Give me a number, please."
"Fine. 39 undecillion."
Phoebe was silent. There were so many Sprilnav that it was stupid. Even thinking about the level of that fall was truly insane. And she assumed that during the fall, they had a very bad time. It would have been madness and anarchy with the added characteristic that everyone also had nukes and shields.
"There's more than the observable universe, you know."
"How many died in the aftermath of the Source war?"
Death frowned. "1 in 30,000 Elders lived. 1 in 850,000 regular Sprilnav lived. Of those, 875 Sprilnav didn't end their lives."
"875 thousand? Million?"
"No."
Phoebe thought that was sad. Basically, in the whole galaxy, every Sprilnav had died, at least statistically. The number alive right now, even still outnumbering the galaxy, was a rounding error. If what he said was true, the Source had killed more people than any other being, alive or dead. And that assumed there weren't any other civilizations of a similar scale to them.
She also didn't bother to ask how the Sprilnav population was now so large. Whether it was inbreeding or cloning didn't matter much. But it helped to explain why so many Elders were so crazy all the time. She needed to stay on task, however.
"Alright. Back to you. You're not a psychopomp?"
"No. I do not interfere with souls. I am the concept of death."
"So, do you get energy from stars blowing up?"
"That is not dying."
"But people believe that supernovae are the deaths of stars."
"That does not shift the concept itself."
That was interesting. So Death wasn't a belief harvester, then. Not the type that actually was shaped by the belief of sapient beings in their actions. Concepts existed and were finite and infinite in scope. Maybe some were truly finite. They could conflict with each other, and their influence would generate a weakening effect, like destructive interference with alternate types of waves. But that did not mean that was always so. Perhaps they could do the opposite.
It was likely that Death worked with Fate at least sometimes and that if Entropy existed, it was most concerned with the Sprilnav. Conceptual protection by the Progenitors was another interesting concept that she hoped to probe if Nova ever returned. She did have the feeling he was either doing everything for fun or entirely serious. He was certainly not quite there in the head after the experience that Death had shared with her.
But for conceptual beings like him, there were rules and regulations, perhaps bound by whatever absolute concept they fit within. Whether they were hard rules or not was unknown. Defined in their structure, but not their limits. And perhaps that meant there was more to figure out here. "Interesting. And if you need to feed off psychic energy, why not use psychic amplifiers?"
"It's not the same quality. Humans don't drink pure water only; they drink it for the minerals and other healthy products within it. It's the same for me."
"But you can't die. Why would it matter?"
"I can diminish. It would affect things, though not as you expect."
"That is interesting also," Phoebe replied. "Are you suggesting that you could diminish, which means other concepts can as well?"
"Not directly," Death nodded with a smile. He stumbled, clutching his head. Phoebe felt a vast energy press down upon them and could feel something brush against her mind like a bullet just grazing the skin. In that one motion, she'd felt more inherent danger than all previous enemies combined, so much danger that it bypassed her artificial instincts entirely to lay thickly on her tongue as an acrid taste.
She didn't fall to the ground, and neither did Penny. They stood there, searching for the source of the pressure.
"What is this?" she asked.
"Luck..."
"Luck is a concept that watches over others?"
A swirling vortex opened up around Phoebe, parallel to the ground. Light and other equivalents shone out of it, dancing around its interior, piercing the layers of dark black fog. The mindscape trembled slightly, and the ground underneath Penny and Phoebe cracked. A small voice whispered out of it, though it was easily audible.
"No more."
"Look, if you're really Luck, then-"
"No more," the voice repeated. "You are done here. Do not come back."
Phoebe snorted. "If you think this little mysterious act is going to intimidate me, you're wrong. And I will."
"Not today."
"You don't get to decide-"
"I decide all."
Phoebe's head seemed to split with pain, and she found herself lying dizzily next to Penny. The human's chest was heaving, and sweat laced her eyebrows and cheeks.
"That went well," Phoebe coughed. The headache receded far too slowly. But she'd still learned a lot. Conceptual beings had concerns, for one. They likely cared about getting stronger in some cases. Humanity had some sort of outside context power, but more than that, the hivemind itself could actually use it.
"It did. Thanks, and sorry you couldn't get more."
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"Hello, Rank 10 Ambassador Liinara. To what do we owe the pleasure?" Ambassador Varirlar asked, letting a small smile curve around her snout. Putting the other party at ease would make this conversation easier, especially since she suspected this call wasn't just a concerned friend.
"You might want to sit down for this," her counterpart said. "Remember Exii'darii?"
Varirlar froze.
"Don't tell me you let her free."
"We didn't. The Sprilnav broke her out."
"Elders?"
"Not that we saw. But it is likely they are working for one," Liinara said, her antennae twitching. Varirlar knew there was a pheromone effect that went on with the Vinarii, which still couldn't be fully translated into description by words.
"Alright. You know how serious this is, I assume?"
"Yes."
"Many factions in the Alliance, especially the more recently joined ones, will not be happy."
"We understand."
"I can speak on behalf of the Alliance in asking a request for an official apology. Furthermore," Varirlar said, holding up a single claw, "I want your government to share the full containment procedure down to the alloy composition of the materials. Assuming you actually kept her in a prison cell for over a decade, that meant you had a way to keep her from escaping. Tell us how."
"You wish to recapture her?"
"We are not as naive as we once were," Varirlar said. "The Hateful Galaxy has taught the rest of the Alliance the same hard lessons it taught me. The Breyyanik did not forget its nature when we settled Ceres."
"Ah, so you wish to either use her or kill her."
"There is no use for her," Varirlar said. "Unless our scientists can propose a solution, there will be no use for her. She will be put down like the dog she is." "Then we are in agreement."
"Yes. The Alliance and the Vinarii's relationship has been tense for a while. We haven't spoken with Calanii or Ashnav'viinir in several years now. Why have you decided to diverge from us? Do we no longer suit your interests?"
"Not exactly. Even besides the... tumultuous events of Humanity's first contact, there are other powers at play. And there is evidence, in some cases, of Sprilnav interference." Liinara tapped her skull three times, the Vinarii way of saying that someone was a few branches short of a tree.
"Interference. Are there ways to prevent it?"
"Not officially. If you wish to discuss terms, I can set you up with one of our intelligence agencies. They will not be willing to share national secrets for nothing, however."
"I think this... debacle should count enough as recompense, don't you?" Varirlar smiled.
"Perhaps. But I am not who must be convinced. With that said, I wish you luck, Ambassador. I am glad that your Alliance has moved to take a more realistic path. And Ashnad'darii is still imprisoned, I presume?"
"Under much heavier guard once this call ends. But yes, she is still in a cell. Yes, she has implants. But she is leverage."
"Her usefulness is little," Liinara warned. "Calanii won't care at all about her."
"Everyone keeps saying that. But let's just say there are reasons she isn't dead."
"You should kill her."
"We should. We maybe could. Assuming that the official way is still trying to get an implant under her chitin to kill her instead of just launching her into the sun. Granted, that would kill her eventually."
"She is dangerous. Unable to be trusted."
"She was broken years ago," Varirlar said. "From what I've heard, she wears human-made clothes now instead of going naked. Plus, she has given us insights on Vinarii society, particularly involving its hierarchy."
"You're using her as a spy."
"A spy that hasn't seen a Vinarii face in almost twenty years? Pretty crappy at that job, I'd say. We both know that she killed hundreds of thousands personally, and was willing to kill many more. If she did not have her uses, she would have already been killed. Plus, there's a safety procedure in place."
"If you mean a bomb collar, good luck with that."
Varirlar didn't mean a collar. Psychic energy monitors were closely tied to a pair of fusion bombs that were embedded in her prison's walls. Should she get too far from the natural cell, they would explode. After all, the room had a bed, bathroom, sanitized entertainment, and a food and water delivery system. She was definitely mostly rehabilitated, but her crimes would follow her for the rest of her life. Their severity made her a case that would likely never fully rejoin any society unless it was an afterlife.
"Well. This has been productive," Varirlar replied with a smile. "But unfortunately,"
"Wait. I'm here to tell you something else, as well. The Dual Systems Trading Company wants to send more ships to your Sol system."
"How many more?"
"Umm, around 400."
"Why don't you have an exact number?"
"The negotiations are still underway. But they seek to bring Vinarii products to the internal Alliance markets, particularly the small Vinarii and larger Wisselen exclaves living within."
"They wouldn't be able to get you much money, unless it's in various Alliance cash forms. There's an angle, isn't there?"
"Well, yes. We don't know it yet. But it is suspicious."
Varirlar sighed. "Have you given them special brain scans?"
"What do you... oh. You suspect that?"
"Suspicious and spontaneous changes in their policy toward the Alliance, as we are suffering from issues with Sprilnav messing with people, and wanting to send us ships? I'm not stupid, Ambassador Liinara."
"I did not mean to insinuate-"
"Sure you didn't. Now, I shall tell you something very interesting. Are you ready?"
"Yes."
"Very well," Varirlar said dramatically, adjusting her mane as she leaned forward. "The hivemind would be willing to meet with your... incapacitated members for study from afar."
"What do you mean?"
"Intelligence."
"We cannot trust it."
"I see. You are aware that you have just called all of Humanity untrustworthy, right? That's quite the insult, unprovoked."
"Apologies, Ambassador, that is not what I meant. The hivemind is likely to have its own motivations, and could be motivated to lie about what it saw."
"As could your own operatives, who could be pinned to the floor by any regular Sprilnav and chipped within a minute. Don't act like they don't have legendary hacking abilities as well. None of your systems are safe."
"And the Alliance's are?"
"With both Edu'frec and Phoebe watching over them, then yes."
"Ah, so you still think that the Sprilnav don't use AI."
"Why would they? It would threaten their own sense of superiority. If they already used AI, everyone would have a chip when they were born. There would be no resistance, because eventually a logical mind would not tolerate the constant pushback."
"You are free to believe what you do. However, my thoughts do diverge. As for Phoebe, she did a disappearing act for a while, didn't she?"
"And?"
"She isn't exactly reliable either," Liinara replied.
"If you're drowning in the ocean, would you rather have an island that storms a little or nothing at all?" "I fail to see how her situation compares to that analogy. It was a very serious problem, if I understand it."
"And what do you suggest, then? Constantly bring her down over it until she resents us and shoves her hands through our hearts? Phoebe's a person, Ambassador. An Alliance citizen, a Luna citizen, and even more importantly than that, a friend. It's quite hurtful that you are suggesting such, unless it is the official stance of the Vinarii government. I assure you, the mess with your company trying to invade us is not resolved, either. Words cannot heal what actions injured. If you want reconciliation, it would be best to take the first steps yourself. Do not tell the Alliance to alienate Phoebe just because she made a mistake."
"Your own intelligence agencies would do the same in many cases."
"I fail to see how her situation compares to that analogy," Varirlar sighed. "Phoebe is the single most useful asset that the Alliance has come across that is not a purely psychic entity such as the hivemind or Gaia, or some paragon of a species like Dilandekar or Penny."
"So she's an asset, and not a person?"
"Please, Liinara. In the world we live in, the galaxy we live in, everyone is both. Do not lie to yourself. However, the Alliance wishes to show its people a shred of respect so it does not drag them through the mud when they made a mistake. Even before that, rehabilitation was the goal of Humanity. Why else do you think that we have prisons instead of just a wall where the bad people stand in front of to be shot? If a starving mother stole something, that doesn't mean we chop off her hands. We get her the help she and her child needs, so they can rejoin Alliance society and raise us all higher."
"Your Alliance has not fixed poverty like it said, then."
"Kind of difficult when one of your species is at a near constant feudal civil war, and another had a third of its populace halfway through insurrection. I assume that the Vinarii Empire has no such problems, correct? And again, I remind you that you are supposed to represent its official position, not your own."
Varirlar suspected that the Ambassador here had something else going on, as well. Whether it was mind control, being paid to screw this up, or something else entirely, this wasn't how such a conversation was meant to go. She only was continuing it to see if Liinara slipped up on something interesting.
"My position is as a Rank 10 Ambassador. You would do well to respect that."
"Respecting positions instead of people does not make sense when the position is respectable and the people are not. You have insulted Phoebe, Humanity, and the Alliance with your words. Were I to relay them, you might see a more hostile stance to the Vinarii Empire. Remember that you have agreements with us."
"Yes. Times have changed."
"I am sure that the Hive Emperor would not exactly like to hear what you have said. But do not worry, Ambassador. We will learn the truth of your words soon enough, one way or another. That is all for now. Perhaps I will ask for a Rank 11 Ambassador next time, to save myself the insults."
She ended the call and sighed. Varirlar could spin the wheel of chance, but the two answers were likely either mind control or someone being paid off to harm relations between them. Given Liinara's expressions, she didn't assume it was translation errors to blame. And this call was on a secure line, even more so than most.
Really, the Vinarii could be doing it. But she smelled something was up. There was likely a very rich Vinarii who the Sprilnav had either made to work with them or forced to, using mind control. Perhaps it really was the answer to both. But she knew not to just assume that. When you had a hammer, everything looked like a nail. It was an apt human saying for the situation.
Varirlar contacted several officials after she wrote her report with the attached recording of the situation. She'd done her best to appear calm, though responding to Liinara was not the orthodox method. But this way, she'd drawn out a lot more on how she viewed the Alliance, giving them a window into whatever was happening, blurry and small though it may have been.
She didn't really think that Calanii would have condoned this. Indeed, she might have just had her last diplomatic call ever. Assuming, of course, that the Sprilnav hadn't managed to chip him, too. If they had, though, the Alliance's situation would get bad fast. Luckily they were already at war with Aphid. Everything was already mobilized, and extra listening satellites in deep space had been set up. The last time the Vinarii Royal Navy had come to visit Humanity, they had not been ready. Perhaps now they were.
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Phoebe stood on the surface of Mercury, just underneath the great mass of the Mercury-class gun that had been built there. The first one that is. Now there were two great behemoths above her head, rising hundreds of meters into the sky. Not that Mercury really had a sky. Maybe someday, that would change.
For now, though, what mattered was the task at hand. The guns were already checked and cleared for firing. A small misalignment had destroyed a Charon-class gun in the past, so they were taking no chances with this. Now, the massive laser would serve its purpose. And, of course, the results would be live streamed.
The planet itself was a world almost covered in machinery. The atmosphere was toxic, filled with aerosols and gaseous industrial waste. There were no detectable life signs on it, whether they were communications, psychic emissions, or even just patches of warmth away from machinery. No subterranean life either, of any kind. Not even microbes had been spared from Aphid's apparent purge, if they had ever existed on this rock at all.
And Aphid's signature station designs orbited it also, whipping around its poisoned atmosphere at several miles a second. That was a sign that everyone on the planet, if there had ever been any, was dead.
A stream of ships poured in and out, guarded by a vast military fleet. In the Sol system, the amplifiers were powering up, and Brey was starting to form the outside of the portals she'd use for the guns, one on each side of the planet, at the equator. Her analysis had determined the areas in which opposite strikes would do the most damage. Phoebe had ensured to check for subterranean activity using Gaia's matter senses.
That had revealed large underground development areas, where presumably more of Aphid's mechanical drones were going to be made. Brey finished forming the portal as Phoebe took a last look at the spires of Aphid's world, ready to see how they'd do when the lasers hit.
She moved the stealth ships around the planet, continuing to watch the shield. It wasn't at full power, likely because Aphid wasn't expecting an attack. She didn't have a presence here in the mindscape, either. She was using far dumber programs as proxies across the Q-comms connections so that he could not detect a hint of anything wrong.
Combined with the Alliance's stealth technology, it would allow for a total surprise attack. Brey finished building up the portals in front of the guns, and Phoebe couldn't help but notice how deep the portals looked. They didn't seem like a flat plane like usual but had a sort of three-dimensionality to them this time. Interesting.
"Fire!" Phoebe ordered. Brey's avatar, which was standing beside an android back on Earth, grinned.
The barrels of the guns glowed cherry red, and vibrations radiated out from their heavily reinforced bases. Even with the android's solar shades, the light was still incredibly bright. Just from underneath it, the temperature was reaching almost 300 degrees. Just as she'd calculated.
On the other side of the portal, things got interesting. Brey's portal was invisible, but the energy coming from it was anything but. It almost looked like Aphid's planet was being impaled through a pole of pure white light. That light slammed down onto the planet's surface in three seconds, passing through the atmosphere as if it wasn't even there. Gaia stood beside the portals in the Sol system, blueshifting the light as much as possible. Instead of visible light, most of the weapon's energy, at least on the other side, was gamma. It was enough radiation to kill anything on the planet, for sure. Or to fry any electronic systems, such as a resident AI's servers.
The pure power of the two guns released a constant molten shockwave of a mix of vaporized rock, metal, and most other materials rushing outward. Buildings were snapped like twigs, their ends going flying but never landing. The heat melted others, and earthquakes in some areas that hadn't yet been struck by the spreading destruction were rampant.
The planet didn't explode or anything. The military ships that were far enough away to remain working just moved away, activating shields that fizzled out due to the intense energy beyond them. That energy would have destroyed Phoebe's android had Brey not used the portal to shield them as well. And as for her observation ships, their stealth coatings were quickly fried.
But the reinforced hulls were made specifically to withstand the effects of this for as long as possible. Cities of metal, all empty except for countless billions of drones wandering their streets, were wiped away. And then the portals began moving, shining around the equator. The effects spread and repeated, with the seas of methane catching fire before they, too, were vaporized in the path of the Mercury-class guns.
The atmosphere was boiled and stripped off the planet within hours. Most of the factories and foundries in the city were turned to either molten slag, collapsed by giant earthquakes, or vanished entirely. The devastation in the equatorial region was total. There was nothing left in a solid band 1500 miles wide around the equator of the planet, save for the broken bases of destroyed skyscrapers.
Further out, the damage was from earthquakes, snapped power lines, and broken pipes, as well as rubble that had fallen onto transport roads and collapsed tunnels. Alone, perhaps the problems could have been dealt with. But not together.
"Just to be sure," Brey asked. "You don't need the remains, right?"
"No. I will make what I need, that way I know it is safe," Phoebe replied, looking at Brey's avatar. It had the signature black fur of her empowered form, with red eyes and sharpened claws. The armor looked cool, as well.
"Alright. I'm going to go dump a few billion tons of plasma on it, then."
Phoebe smiled. "Alright. Have fun."
"I did. Good job on the guns. Get enough of those, and it'll be like the full Dyson swarm's hitting you in a straight line."
"That's the plan. The test was more than successful, and Aphid got a taste of the justice we deserve."

My period tends to vary between 25-32 days so I couldn't know if I could've abstain from taking the pill. Took it on day 10 and was dry until a few days ago that I started seeing egg white discharge and today had a big blob so this means my period will be on day 50 or something. Should I be concerned? (Already took pregnancy tests).

1. How many purses do you own?
   
2. Any that you would recommend (link?)?
   
3. Do you buy purses in all different colors? Or stick to a certain set of colors?
   
4. Does purse material matter to you? Do you always buy leather? (Or?)
   
5. Would you buy a "luxury handbag" ($1000+)?
   

1. I probably have 15
   
2. No, though I always love the look of kate spade bags
   
3. Mostly black, but I want a white one but I'm wondering if that's a fashion faux pas
   
4. I like materials that don't stain or look dirty/weathered. I have two pvc purses that are kinda punky funky that are my favorite. I would like to get a woven grass one, but they all look so one-dimensionally "summery". If I could find one that looked a little more year-round, I'd get it.
   
5. Yes, at one point in my life I would have done it. I have some lovely vintage high end stuff. I'm too scared to use them though, lol.
   

[←Chapter 48] [Cover Art] [My Links] [Index] [Discord] [Subreddit] [Chapter 50→]
As soon as he placed the tip of the blade against the stone, a crawling dread swept over. He held it there for a moment, trying to tabulate the functions of the tool, but nothing but raw guesswork remained to him. He heard the footsteps of the children and their minders vanishing up the stairs.
“You ready?” he asked Innie.
“No. But don't let that stop you,” she said, wide amber eyes fixed on the door.
There was nothing for it - Efrain steadied his hand and pressed the black blade into the stone. It was a relatively simple application of magic, almost instinctual, to activate the tool. He projected down into the chisel end, where stiff filaments would pierce the wall and sink deep within. This defeated the function of the chisel, but he already suspected that some of the features were more ornamental.
The next part was slightly more complicated, angling the blade up and down until he’d pressed the furled tips to the smooth surface. They sank in as well, leaving him holding the blade spine nearly parallel to the wall. Slowly, taking painstaking care not to twist the metal, he drew it down.
The stone split apart and drew back, guided through the furls and out, revealing a thin line in the stone. There was a silent thrill that fought against the dread as the hairline crack grew larger and larger. Finally, he reached the floor, and drew the knife out of the stone with minimal resistance.
With one last look at his partner, he placed both hands on the door and began to push.
There was a grinding squeal as the heavy stones slid open and out. Past, there was a thick darkness that blotted out most of the detail, even with the magelight active. Efrain took two steps and raised it high, its luminosity increasing as it rose. Even so, it flickered as the smothering cold poured out of the chamber, casting wavering shadows on the surrounding stone walls.
A moment of grim satisfaction availed him - he had surmised correctly about the room being some sort of important tomb. Large alcoves with carved-relief tombs marched off into the dark, twinned pillars marking each and every one. A vaulted ceiling spanned the passage, faded mosaics depicting unknown scenes of times past.
In fact, it would’ve been a place that Efrain could easily see himself working in. Painstakingly brushing off the faded paint and chipped stone, recreating the designs in book after book. Days and nights of note taking, trying to piece together the story of what this place was and why it was here. Unfortunately, the beauty of that vision was marred by the hostile darkness that wrapped around the vault.
He and Innie cautiously crept forward, the light above his head pushing back the heavy shadows. Her fur stood on end, amber eyes inspecting every little pittance, every corner past where something might hide. Efrain was much the same way, expecting something to detach itself from the stone and give chase.
Yet, there was nothing, no movement, no sudden gleam of hostile eyes. Just the stone, and the ever deepening cold.
Finally, they reached the depths of the tomb, a handful of steps that lead down into a wider room. In the muddy light he cast, he saw something large and round, sitting slumped over what looked to be an altar of some kind. There was no aggression that he could feel, no stirring of the thing in response to their presence, just the cold that poured off it.
As he entered through the arched steps, he realised that the thing was making sounds. A wet, gurgling noise, that was rather uncomfortably reminiscent of the creatures from the fog. The sound of a throat that had been crushed and twisted by the weight of its deformities. Still, it lacked the rage that came with the things that had crashed on the church roof or swarmed its outer wall.
Efrain took another few steps and stood before the round mass, slightly taller than he was, peering closely as its features came into relief. When he realised what it was, he felt a stomach that no longer existed turn over on itself. There were pale bumps and ridges where there might’ve been anatomical landmarks at one point. Various malformed limbs jutted out and merged back into the structure, some recognizable, some alien. The flesh shuddered and writhed as he neared it, groans and gurgles exiting various gashes and holes in its surface.
What was far, far worse, however, was what he discovered when he looked within.
Innie must’ve discovered it at the same time, issuing a violent wail of disgust and grief. Efrain staggered away, trying to steady himself on one of the pillars as his vision swam. The self-hatred, the sorrow, the unbelievable nauseating pain that issued from the thing was enough to make him wish he never came here. Its magic was even worse - an indescribable warped abomination that should’ve never been borne into existence.
It took a herculean effort to remain standing, fighting the physically impossible urge to sink to his knees and vomit. Innie was slamming herself into a pillar in a mad horror, and his gaze slid to the knife in his hand. The terrible revelation was like an explosion in his mind.
He could almost see the priest raising the knife, almost seeing the gears of thought turning in his head. If it could join and separate stone, what else could it pull asunder? A terrible demon, removed from a child, think of the praise, think of the tithes, think of the reaffirmation of the faith!
Innie lay on the ground, curled and shivering, her wails fallen into a grim silence, punctuated only by quiet sobs. Efrain stood there, feeling the knife slip to clatter on the ground. The thing twitched and issued another moan as it undulated from its base to top.
Somewhere in the corners of his mind he wondered if somewhere in the mass the priest was still alive. It would be a ghastly fate, and a deserved one, to be trapped in this fleshy prison. But what had happened to the wisp matriarch’s power? Why was there a ghost appearing to Aya and granting her access to the flames?
Shrinking back into himself, he huddled by the wall - more than anything, he wanted to be away from here. He wanted to be in his isolated little castle in a far-away mountain. He wanted a cup of tea, and a good book, and to forget such horrible things could exist in this world.
But alas, he was here, he had made the choice to come here, and it made the choice to open the door.
It’s not fair, he thought, numbly, why must it be me?
Innie had stopped sobbing, merely lying there in a terrible stillness. Not dead, nor was she injured beyond superficiality, rather trapped in the depths of paralytic grief. But it would soon fade, Efrain knew for it was happening to him. All that stupefaction, swept away by rage.
There were footsteps, far behind him, a set of them, hurrying down the tomb corridor. Distant faces, barely distinguishable from the darkness, emerged past the arches, still some distance away. Their eyes were straining, faces scrunched up as they tried to pierce the gloom, not yet realising the dire horror that awaited them.
Maybe it was in a spirit of mercy that Efrain rose, and turned toward the cat. More likely, it was the rage that was boiling just under the surface, only held by the thinnest membrane of numbness. The stones under Innie were beginning to be cast in a red light as her fur began to glow, despite the damping of her magic.
“What is that?” called one of the paladins from down the hall.
Efrain said nothing as he faced the horrible fusion of the priest and girl, twitching and moaning. He didn’t need to.
Flames rose into the air, exhaustion no longer a barrier as Innie rose to her height. The cat was melting, dribbling down on the floor as the true form of the wisp mother bled through in a pillar of yellow-red light. The temperature of the room shot up from icy to lukewarm in an instant as flames began to crawl across the stone and reached for the abomination.
The paladins had reached the threshold, thrusting their charges behind them as they gazed upon the scene. They were reaching for their swords, even as the flames grew in heat and intensity. The mass did not attempt to lash rather bellowed as the fire licked, shuddering so violently Efrain thought it might come apart. It coiled and twitched as the flames rose up its side, the smell of burning flesh filling the room.
Efrain didn’t even look at it, merely fixing his stare on the church insignia, emblazoned on the plate of the paladins. The screams rose to a fever pitch, met by a furious roaring and crackling of the ever-growing blaze. There was one last desperate burst of coldness that rolled over him, dimming the firelight for a moment, and turning the paladin’s pale.
Then, as if a floodgate was opened, his magic was no longer suppressed, and the fires roared to new heights. The thing had been submerged in a pillar of red and yellow flames, leaping up almost to the tall ceiling of the room. In the back of Efrain’s mind, he realised it wasn’t wise that the fire would eat the air up so deep in the earth. He did nothing.
He simply stood there, staring at the paladins without a word.
“Efrain,” croaked Innie.
He turned to see the charred remains slumping to the floor. In its centre, no longer bound, floated a thin ring of yellow blue flame. The fragment shed little bright rivulets like downy feathers, soft sparks fading into Innie’s blaze.
The rage drove Efrain forward, knowing what was about to happen and what he was about to do. No rational impulse was going to stop him now. Innie was in lockstep with him as he knelt down before the remains, the flames parting as he reached in. The paladins were screaming something as he closed his hand around the ring, and felt his world come to life.
The fire was no longer just fire, it was light itself, so blindingly bright and hot that stones around them began to glow. Efrain felt something immense move into him, a wall of molten power moving enough momentum to sweep him away. The traces of the wisp matriarch entered the man and the cat, and in that moment they were its avatar.
He rose, and the blue-yellow blaze rose with him, fanning over the whole room. At some point, the paladins had grabbed their charges and ran for dear life. Efrain was almost beyond thought as he began to make for the stairs. Every step was a burden, his body rattling uncontrollably with each footfall.
Step-by-step, the pair made their way through the corridor, leaving a sea of flame in their wake. The stone glowed with the rage of their passing, murals utterly destroyed, features beginning to run like wax on the carven reliefs. The only thing untouched by the flames was the black doors, a constant wall in the flames.
As he made his way into the crypts, leaving glass footprints in the sand, he became dimly aware that his robes were beginning to smoke. The magic coursing through him was not meant for him to wield - memory, knowledge, consciousness, all seemed to fall away at its burning touch.
He was being consumed, he and Innie both as they channelled the might of the matriarch, fraction as it was. The burst of magic on the roof was nothing compared to what they now held within themselves. This was a primal power, far grander than anything they’d seen in their long lives.
The passage was beginning to groan and warp, the stone beginning to run as he found his way to the spiral stair. Step-by-step, gripping the walls for purchase, he managed to drag himself up. Every rise was harder than the one that came before it, and soon he was climbing mountains with each step. The stones trembled at his touch, his hands leaving glowing impressions. Soon they too fell into the wall of conflagration that rose behind him.
Still, onward and upward he climbed, higher and higher, past the entrance to the church and to the roof. Night had finally fallen, the sounds of battle beginning as the monsters moved for the final assault. The posted guards screamed warnings of ‘fire!’ ‘fire!’ and shouted prayers as Efrain crawled his way onto the roof. They must’ve thought this some terrible new monster, something immune to their burning brands.
“Leave. Now,” Efrain said, the words slurring as he forced them into the air.
The men were quick to take his advice, but stopped at the tower stairs, staring in horror at the dripping stone. Some looked to the edge, preparing to leap to avoid the frame.
In the midst of the tumult, some bare fraction of Efrain remained to recognize the arbitrary cruelty of their position. He reached out, not to the men but beyond them, and plucked the heat from the stones. With a gust of warm air, they cooled rapidly from molten red to survivable grey. Somewhere, the scholar in Efrain screamed at the indignity of this impossible action.
But this was a magic of fundamentals. It did not stoop to petty things like ‘rules’.
The men, seeing their chance, hurled themselves down the stairs. With their absence, there was nothing left to restrain the power. The flames poured out like water, spilling over the walls of the church, roaring into the sky. Efrain didn’t think about the memory, intent, or emotion, nor any mechanical aspect of the magic - where he wanted, the world burned.
What little left of his mind felt memories of times and places foreign to him roar through his mind. The chaos of his mind lent him very little clarity, sights were smells, sounds were feelings, a cacophony of sensations raced through him faster and faster. In that blurring conundrum, he could see a single, core memory, one that drove all others.
A sunlit place, far away near a golden sea, a funeral, a birth, both at the same time, a tall figure, singing of purpose.
With a final effort, he called the magic to him, hoping to gain some vestige of control. The flames coiled and twisted and condensed, collapsing into an ever-tighter sphere as nature did its work. Heat itself lifted off the melting slates of the roof, absorbed into the mass at his fingertips, leaving a bright ball no bigger than his fist.
The world hung in that moment, the sounds of battle far away, screams of human and monster distant memories. In that moment of brief lucidity, Efrain held a star in his hand.
Then with a tremendous expansion of sound and rage and fire, a blast of hot wind ripped the fog away from the hill and scattered it across the highlands. Men and monsters were sent sprawling, the creatures flying on the icy mist spiralling and falling to earth.
Now the true force of the enemy was revealed - hundreds, perhaps as many as a thousand on the hill beyond. It was only a matter of time before they would rise over the wall, dismantle the barricades, and slaughter the defenders. Men, women, even children who’d worked so hard to defend their homes and lives. All rended to pieces because a little girl had gone for a little hike.
Chains were wrapping around Efrain, white hot and heavy, pulling him to the roof, disintegrating the spells that held him together. He was smoking in truth now and might catch flame at any moment. At his back, felt rather than seen, was an immense twisting whirlwind. It reached up and out into the night, its sudden light blotting out the stars. At its very centre, a consciousness took form within the power, something that wished for nothing more than to reduce all to ash. Efrain turned to the creatures that squirmed and charged below, heedless of the peril above.
He barely even perceived what happened next.
There was one final roar, louder and more violent than anything he’d ever heard of, conceived of, and would likely ever hear again. Branches extended down from the fire, great scouring fingers that swept across the earth, tearing down fruit trees, barely missing the barricades, and spilling down the hill.
The creatures came to meet it, not even turning aside as the heat and light submerged them. Perhaps they couldn’t even understand death anymore, so far gone was their nature. In a heartbeat, they faltered in the tide of flame, falling to the ground as they burned to ash. Dozens of them went in an instant as the power of Wisp Matriarch did its terrible work.
The fingers swept down past the outer wall, two tendrils splitting and crashing back together in a fountain of fire. The great bulk of the monsters were burnt into mere shadows on the cobbles. Efrain’s vision began to darken as his last vestiges of consciousness began to fail. He felt a draining sensation, the last of the magic of the matriarch flowing out into the night.
The heat that ate away at his very being was gone now, leaving behind a scorched emptiness. He fell to the ground, his limbs barely weak enough to prop himself up against the church roof. Innie, once more a cat, dragged herself over to him, curling on his lap as her eyes closed.
Too late, he remembered the curse upon the mask. That must’ve been the draining sensation, now that he’d let so much magic flow through it, it was sucking him dry. He tried vainly for some way to stem the flow, but he was so tired, so weak. Looking down, he noted that the church, although singed, was still more-or-less intact. There was a strange mix of regret and relief at the observation.
His voice, now a drab, thin thing, echoed out, remembering the conversation he’d had with Innie about her future plans of arson.
“Sorry, old friend,” he said, “I think I missed.”
Then Efrain Belacore, Baron of the Frozen Vale, and self-titled ‘Lord of Death’, was no more.
[←Chapter 48] [Cover Art] [My Links] [Index] [Discord] [Subreddit] [Chapter 50→]

Level: 1 (0 Quests done.)
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Name: "Nava"
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Species: Omnicubus. (Satyr-Variant.)
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Gender: Yes. (Both Male and Female at once.)
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Appearance: Standing around 148cm tall (4'10' in feet) Fluffy brown hair reaching down towards neck-length, failing to conceal short pointed ears, almost elf-like. Two ribbed horns of differing size jut straight out from the sides of the Omnicubus' hair, a stark white shade along their length. The face remains mostly androgynous, presenting a deceptive Cuteness in its eternal youth. Large eyes showing a pink-ish hue regarding the iris', and razor-sharp teeth showing with every devilish grin exuded. Threatening to bite into both flesh, and the unnaturally lengthy tongue of the Omnicubus.
The torso is equally mixed as that of the face, mixing the structure of both a young man, and woman, cleaned up to perfection. Presenting slight bust, lightly broad shoulders, and slightly larger hips and thighs, attached to a clump of fur making up the rest of the legs. Of dark purple-hue fading into pitch black as it reaches the cloven Hooves in place of feet. An additional jaw-pattern of thin fur banding around the waist, two bat-like wings sprouting out of the edge of these markings, capable of sending the creature soaring with one strong flap, only further complimented by a thin rubbery tail flinging about with two upside-down hearts stuck together making up the tip of the appendage.
The arms are mostly human in form, more thin purple fur lining the arms like gloves, only made clear to be no fabric on both close inspection, the jagged shape in which it separates from the smooth flesh of the torso, the lack of fur on the fingers, and finally, a four-band pattern on the forearms presenting the smooth skin beneath.
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Stats: 12/12 Stat Points
Strength: + 0
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Dexterity: + 4
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Constitution: + 4
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Wisdom: + 1 (Racial)
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Intelligence: + 2 (Racial)
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Charisma: + 4
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Spirit: - 2 (Racial)
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Passive Abilities:
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"~Forbidden Ancestry~" (Racial)

• This Character's Feet, Horns, and Teeth, are all natural weapons, inflicting an additional 5 Blunt or Piercing Damage upon use. (Depending the Natural Weapon used.)
• This Character is considered both a Fiend, and Fey.
• This Character receives + 1 Additional Wisdom, and + 2 Additional Intelligence, at the cost of having Spirit reduced by 2.

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~"Unfiltered Presence~" (4 Slots)

• This Character's Charisma score is increased by 50% regarding any relevant purpose.
• This Character's Charisma is used for all Spellcasting.
• This Character does not benefit from increased Charisma while adorned in Heavy Armour.

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~"Take Flight~" (2 Slots)

• This Character has Advantage with Evade Dice against Melee Offensive Dice, alongside a Flying speed double that of ordinary movement speed.
• This Character cannot benefit from this ability while Adorned in Heavy Armour, or while restricted from moving.

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"~Dominating Demands~" (6 Slots)

• At the start of every round of combat, this Character forces a target to succumb to one 'Demand' upon failing a Wisdom Check against this Character's Charisma + 10.
• Each 'Demand' prevents the target from one of the following;
• The Target may no longer use Evade dice, or Move for the remainder of the round.
• The Target may not use Block Dice, or roll Constitution Dice for the remainder of the round.
• The Target may not use Melee Offensive Dice, or perform Strength rolls for the remainder of the round.
• The Target may not use Ranged Offensive Dice, or perform Dexterity rolls for the remainder of the round. (Excluding Evade Dice.)
• (The same Demand cannot be made twice in a row.)

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Active Abilities:
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"~Lurid Tap~" (2 Slots)

• Upon use, this Character performs a Melee attack against a target, using Charisma in place of Offensive dice.
• This attack inflicts Psychic Damage, and prevents the target from acting on the proceeding round upon landing this attack at the Maximum possible roll value.

14/14 Slots
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Complete Inventory:
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• 100k Gold

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"~Mind-Molding Scraps~" An outfit that hardly covers anything, consisting of tight chest-wrappings and what works about as effectively as a loin-cloth, both covered in small foreign patterns, acting as a form of enchantment for the defenseless garment.

• Whenever the wearer is attacked, inflict Psychic Damage to the attacker equal to double the wearer's Charisma.
• This Equipment provides zero additional defense.
• This cannot be broken.

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"~Suspiciously Intact Cloak~" A luxuriously woven Cloak and Hood made from fabrics soft as wool, easily capable of shrouding almost an entire body underneath the length.

• This Equipment provides the wearer with Advantage to Stealth Dice.
• This Character's Species cannot be determined while the Cloak is closed, unless said by the wearer directly.
• This Equipment cannot be broken.
• Provides the wearer's Evade Dice with + 1 Power per level of the wearer.

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"~Hyper-Sensitive Warmers~" Long black Fabric attire adorned over either the arms, legs, or both, molding to fit wherever they are placed. Inducing a tingling sensation regardless of where they are touched.

• Melee attacks inflict 'Sensitive' to the target for 3 rounds, alongside an additional 10 Psychic damage, increasing by 5 per level.
• This counts as both Armour, a Melee Weapon, and unarmed Weapon.
• This cannot be broken.

Status Ailment - "Sensitive" - Those inflicted with the Status Ailment take 50% additional Psychic Damage from all sources.

"Come inside, the kids are upstairs." Molly was in a rush, I knew this much from the phone call we had earlier. She had never used me before but heard about me through word of mouth. Which meant that my little side hustle was starting to gain traction.
I am a babysitter for a good neighborhood. There's cars parked outside, lawns are manicured, and the occasional termite company is out doing rounds. I don't know why but I always feel as if there's a termite guy nearby, it's a pretty decent area. Which is a far cry from where I live, on the other side of the tracks, literally. There are train tracks that run through our town and it acts as a divide. But they didn't need to know that. They only needed to see the straightened hair, well spoken, fake braces wearing girl in glasses sporting a skirt that wasn't too short where the neighbors would talk.
Usually I sat down with new clients, have them introduce me to their kids (trust me it helps) in order to make a clear cut line with them that I am in their parent's employ and I am not there to be their bestfriend and will definitely tell on them if they act up or break something. That's not to say I won't play silly games with them, feed them, laugh, tell bed time stories, and age appropriate jokes. But I am nobody's rug.
That's what I usually do, but there wasn't such luxury this time. Molly called me on the phone and she sounded desperate for me to come out. I had concert tickets and told her that they were non-refundable and she suggested that if I could make it in 30 minutes then she'd pay me twice the amount for the tickets and 1.5x my usual rate. I got there in 29 minutes. It would have been sooner but I needed to air myself out if you know what I mean.
Anyways, Molly barely had time to look at my face, let alone get any of my credentials as she was rushing out. Working mom it looked like. Business, by the looks of the pencil skirt and the bag that doubled as a folder. It always amazes me how much trust some people put in others to watch their kids. What if I was a serial killer? Or a deranged lunatic? What if I killed the babysitter on my way here and now I'm in a house, alone, with all her children.
I'm not. But I mean, what if, right?
She didn't seem to think about any of these things, leaving me to mumble goodbyes as she pulled out of the driveway, barely audible as the turbos wound up and she shouted something out the window to the likes of, "It's all on the iPad".
Yeah, no more yellow lined paper stuck with the realtor's magnet on the fridge anymore. It's all digital now.
I closed the door and figured that I better check up on the kids before I did a rundown. God this house was beautiful. I climbed the stairs two at a time and rounded the hall. To be fair, calling it a hall was so basic of me. It was more like a wing. West wing madam. The wing could have fit my living room. I click my heels when I heard a snort come from behind me. I came to face a shaggy dog that was well groomed. The collar was black with an underline of blue. Tiffany's undoubtedly. "Hey," I reached a hand and scratched the mop of top. "Let's go find the kids," I tell the dog as if it could understand me.
There were a series of rooms, most of them closed, but it didn't take me a second guess which one was occupied. The second door on the left, I could hear a kid shouting obscenities about someone being trash. I knocked on that door first.
"Come in," he shouted still loud but slightly less angry.
I opened the door and saw a stereotypical gamer's room. Posters, action figures, a rocking gaming chair on the floor in front of a huge flat screen, and a boy about 9 or 10. He had on his headphones and was sipping a Dr. Pepper.
"Don't they know trash day is on Thursdays?"
He cocked his head and laughed, "If you're looking for my mom I think she's downstairs."
"I'm actually looking for you." And let me tell you something. The audacity of this younger generation. The way he looked at me. Almost made me feel as bad as how I felt when he shrugged his shoulders after he had a good look. "Excuse me," I walk in front of him and blocked the screen. "I'm your new babysitter."
He shrugged. "Cool."
"What's your name?"
"You can read all about it somewhere else."
"What?"
"It's all on the iPad," he told me.
"What's your name," I repeated.
He rolls his eyes and looks at me as if I had asked him a stupid question.
I don't budge.
He whined, "Bobbie. Now come on, the next rounds about to start." he pulled his headphones over his ears. I grabbed the remote to get his attention. "What. Hey come on."
"It's nice to meet you Bobbie. Your mom's going to be away for a few hours and I'll be here until she gets back. Dinner is at 6:00 and I will make snacks at 4:30."
"No cap," he motioned at the tv, "Now can I get back to my game.
"Sure I tell him." Pocketing the remote.
"Hey!"
"Bye," I tell him as I close the door behind me.
So I'm back out in the hallway. And I open a few more doors. Some were locked. Before I get into one that's rather plain. There's a picture hanging up behind the bed, a tv, some lamps and shade. On the bed sits an identical, about 9 or 10, twins it seems. Probably why Bobbie was tired of being asked which one he was.
This one was staring at the blank screen. No video games. And quiet. Now I've babysat my share of kids before, and have seen all sorts. Quiet kids are my favorite. They don't mind board games, or listening. Most often times they only need to be left alone. I don't do too much talking in case they get tired of hearing my voice. And I give them a lot of space. "Hey, sorry about that. I didn't think anyone was in here."
He turned to me slowly, "Hi. Are you the new sitter?"
I nodded, "Yup. And I'm guessing that you're Max. I'll be watching you guys while your mom is away."
"She's probably going to work."
"Yeah, looked like it." I see the iPad in his hands. "Hey. I was looking for that."
"She's always at work." He hands it over. "It's dead. And mom took the charger."
I tried not to sigh. This was not how I wanted things to go. "Well, ok. If you need anything. Let me know. Or else I can come get you at 4:30 for snacks and dinner at 6."
He nodded, "Thanks," and goes back to staring at the screen.
I smile but he doesn't see, so I leave, closing the door softly behind me.
I make my way downstairs, wandering into the kitchen and start taking stock of what's there. Which was practically everything. This kitchen was so chic that I half expected Gordon Ramsay to pop out and tell me that the banana bread I made didn't have a clue if he staked the curved yellow fruit down the middle (it's a bad question mark joke. Listen. I never said I was funny).
Once I made sure that there was food, or ingredients to make food. There wasn't much else to do. The house was spotless. The kids were fine. And even the dog seemed well behaved. So I plopped on the couch, took out my fake braces, and watched tv until about 4:10 before I started slicing apples and celery to go with some peanut butter.
I fed the dog some peanut butter and licked my fingers (not with the hand I fed the dog with), before heading upstairs. Bobbie took the plate no problem but I couldn't find Max for the life of me. I wandered the rooms as the dog followed, still trying to lick my hand. "Max, I've got snacks." I knocked on what seemed like the umpteenth door before I get to a rather solid oak one that seemed custom.
Inside was the biggest home library I had ever seen. And I once dog sat for a pretentious professor from the college nearby. I mean, there was a portrait of said academic holding his dog in 18th century art style hanging over the mantle place of the deep wood cabinets filled with books. And yet this library made the other one look like a neighborhood book exchange birdbox.
"Holy..."
"Cow."
I whirled around to find Max standing in the doorway.
"You shouldn't wander into Father's study."
"I was just looking for you," holding up the plate. He made a face. "What? You don't like PB&C?" I took a stick and crunched on the celery.
"I'm not hungry."
I shrug. "Take it anyway. In case you get hungry."
He grabs the plate from me without much struggle so I decide to leave him be. I went back downstairs and crashed in front of the tv.
When I woke up. It was dark. My mouth was dry and all of the lights were off. The screen saver flashed the logo in blinks, lighting up the room only momentarily. For a second I forgot where I was and felt my heart thumping in my chest. My alarm didn't go off but I don't know why I woke up. Then I heard it again. The sound that must have jerked me awake. A crash. It came from upstairs. I grab my phone and glance down at the numbers. It was 8:10. I had slept through dinner. Shit. Shit. Shit. Here I was trying to make a good first impression and I missed out on dinner.
I wipe what drool was on my face and took to the stairs. Bobbie was probably so immersed in his game that he probably didn't even know he was hungry. Max on the other hand. "Max?" I call out down the hall. All of the doors are shut. I can hear something panting behind me. I turn to see the dog again. Its head is down and there's barely any light touching its face. "Hey come here," I called but it retreated in the opposite direction.
Then I shit me not. I heard a creaking come from behind me. It was the only noise in the house. I couldn't even hear Bobbie yelling in his room. I turn slowly and see one of the doors down the hall is now slightly ajar. It's dark in here. It was dark everywhere. I pressed my hands against the wall searching for a light switch. "Bobbie," I call out. There's no answer. "Hey, sorry about the delay in dinner. I'm going to get to it now."
Why was this place so big? And why could I see the door?
"Bobbie. Max?" I hear the dog tapping its paws behind me. Someone on the other side of the house by now. "Hey, where are you guys?" I peer at the single door that's open and realized why it was so prominent. The hall was dark, but what was inside was even darker. Instead of going toward it, I try the first knob my blind fingers came across. Process of elimination I told myself. It was locked. I tried the next one. Also locked. I finally get to Bobbie's door and I knock. "Bobbie." There's no answer. I press my head against the door and listen. But I don't hear a single sound.
"Where are all the light switches in this place!"
The door that was open before slightly opens again. Creaking, *tic tic tic tic*, with each ungreased turn of the hinge. "Shit. Hey, stop playing around."
There's laughing coming from behind me. It sounded like a little kids. Too young to be either of the boys. Followed by smaller footsteps. It sounded like they were barefoot. "Hey, this isn't funny. I'm going to tell your mother when she gets home." I take out my phone and turn on the flashlight. "When is she coming home?" It was almost 8:30, when I realized that we never set a time.
I hear footsteps again, they were odd. Almost like falling. Like a toddler learning how to run for the first time but the hollow ground sounded as if the person was much heavier. I shine my flashlight over the hall. "Shit." The dog was sitting on all fours in the corner. It was facing the wall. I couldn't even see his face. Every hair on its body completely still.
"Hey," I called out. "Come here." I clicked my tongue. "Come here." The dog didn't move. I couldn't even see it breathing.
Bang! It sounded like thunder behind me. As if someone dropped something on the floor. As if something fell off a shelf or was pushed. I jumped around and shone my light down the west wing. I didn't know if I should have been more or less afraid now that the door was closed. "Bobbie? Max?"
God. I did not want to try the door. And I stood there for a minute before realizing how stupid I must have looked. These were some rich kids playing a joke on you Camilia. I know it. The thought of their smug little faces made me stomp out of my frozen state. I took a couple of strides over and grabbed the handle.
"Fuck!" The thing was hot. "What the hell! You guys could have hurt me," I yelled. I banged on the door. "Open up. You two are in so much trouble." I banged on the door again. "Open the door. Right now!" I could hear something on the other side. It sounded like shuffling. Heavy furniture perhaps. "You guys better not be messing things up in there. I'm not going to clean it. I mean it."
I banged on the door. "I can hear you in there! Now come on!" I put my hands on my hips and tapped my foot. "I'm waiting. Your little jokes over now." I banged on the door again.
That's when the door knocked back.
It wouldn't have scared me. I don't think. Except for the fact that I was surprised. And alone in the hall. Without any of the lights on. In a strange house. And before I could say anything else. Another door behind me knocked from the inside. "Shit. Both of you are in on this?" I grabbed the handle to the other door. It was also locked. I banged on it. "Come out right now. Max?"
But then a third door started knocked from down the hall. I felt my throat clump as I tried to swallow. "You guys weren't supposed to have anyone over." The knocking didn't stop. It kept echoing down the hall. "I'm not getting paid for three kids you know?"
Tat-tat-tat-tat. Tat-tat-tat.
I took a single step. And then all of the doors in the hallway suddenly started banging.
I almost tripped as I ran toward the stairs. The doors were thundering on so hard I thought they would crack their hinges. I skipped the stairs, the sounds chasing me as I tried to not fall and break my neck. When I got to the front landing I hear someone say my name.
"Camilia. Are you okay?"
I'm trying not to choke on a lung here as I shot my eyes toward the kitchen. The kids are sitting on the barstools lining the counter. There are two plates in front of them. As if they didn't hear the drumline upstairs.
"Is it dinner time yet," one of them asks quietly.
"Max?"
He smiles.
"Kids. I think there's someone in the house." I rush over to grab each of their hands. Bobbie's wrists are limp but it was Max's hands that shocked me. They were ice cold. I tried to let go but my fingers wouldn't uncurl.
He turns my hand over and says, "There's no one else in this house except us. I promise."
"No," I wasn't about to listen to the kid even if it was his house. "Something is wrong. We have to go. Now." I pick up Bobbie and he doesn't seem to want to move. "Come on Bobbie. Let's go." He looks over at Max who shrugs and get out of his seat.
Bobbie follows as I drag them toward the front door.
"Camilia," Max says.
"What?" He looked scared. Which made me turn toward what he was staring out. At the front door was a tall figure. I couldn't see its face through the glass. It was a stark figure of a man.
"Do you think it's your dad?"
Max shakes his head. I feel him pulling against my arm.
I call out to the man, "Hey! Who is it?" The man doesn't budge. "I'm calling the police." I turn to Bobbie, "Get the phone." He doesn't move. "Hey!" I'm trying to sound as angry as possible. "Get the fuck out of here!" I grabbed a roll of painter's tape from the side table and hurl it across the hall, hitting the glass squarely in the face where the man's head stood blocking the exit. He doesn't even twitch as the glass shakes.
"Come on," I grab their hands and rush to the back. I don't get 10 steps before I feel a scream crawl up my throat making me cough. The man was standing at the sliding door. "Fuck!" I drag the two of them with me towards the kitchen. It's a big place so there had to be a way out to the garage. We push through one of the doors and end up in the laundry room. The next door gets us out into a 3 car garage. My hands find the glowing green opener against the wall and I hear the opener fold seamlessly towards the ceiling.
It started with his feet. Then his ankles. His shins. Then his legs. Light poured in behind him from the streetlamp. I watched as the door went to his waist before I hit the button for the garage to close, before rushing back inside. We make it into the kitchen to where I still see the tall man standing at the sliding door. A part of me wants to hide in the laundry room but I didn't want to be sandwiched in the middle of the house. So I pull the boys back up the stairs, back to where the doors banged themselves. Taking out my phone as we ascended, and called 911.
"This is the police operator speaking."
"HELLO", I hope they could hear me, "There are several men trying to get inside!"
"Men? Are you in any danger?"
"No! But they have us surrounded!"
"Why don't you go outside?"
My tongue suddenly felt numb in my mouth. Like I didn't know what to do with it. "W-what?"
"It's stranger in the house."
The line went dead as we hit the hallway.
I only took my eyes off of them for a second before Bobbie. Or Max. Runs down the hall. The one or the other already slipping through a door ahead. I look back down the stairs and see that the man is still standing in front of the doorway. I look back up and see the other boy also going through the same door. I take a single step and the doors start pounding on either side. I shut my eyes and turn around. Afraid to go. Almost deciding that these weren't my kids. That I should run away. I take a step backwards mouthing that I was sorry. But I was too scared to go! "Max! Bobbie!" My back foot sticks to the floor. I don't want to look down but the next step sticks too. I point my phone to the ground and see a trail of blood. And just behind me. It's the dog. Split right down the middle, its spine shiny and white, still facing the wall. I could see its organs still pulsing.
I couldn't go back downstairs. I couldn't go the other way. I couldn't leave them here. I couldn't be alone.
I ran after them. The thundering of the doors following me as frames fell to the floor. A vase rolled off a table in the hall. It came crashing at my feet. I run my shoulder through the door, except it wasn't locked. Which caused me to go crashing, sprawling to the floor. Running into the desk in the middle of the room.
The study.
Many of the books were off the shelves. The carpet was torn. There were curtains on fire. It was the first time a saw a window as they burned.
"Camilia!"
I hear one of their voices shouting at me.
"Camilia!" It came again. "Help!"
I get to my feet and start working my hands along the desk. I didn't have to search far. The bookcase directly behind the chair had been swung open. "Camilia!" I wipe the blood from my eyebrow where it had split and step into the tunnel behind the secret passage.
The tunnel started off tall and wide, but as I kept walking in. It got smaller and smaller. I started having to hunch. Several times I decided to turn back. But their voices would echo through, calling for me. Asking for help. "I'm coming!"
"I can't hold on! Camilia! Please!"
The twins cry for help bounced off the walls. I was finally on my hands and knees when I finally see two holes on either side. I'm afraid to look but then one of their voices came through clear as day. "Camilia." It was right in my ear now. I turned to see the boy naked and huddling, hugging his knees at the back of his hole.
"Camilia! Help! I don't want to play this game anymore!"
"Bobbie?"
"Help me!"
I look into the hole, the walls are pressing on my back and there's dust going into my lungs. I can barely turn my shoulder. "Crawl out!"
"I can't!"
"Crawl out! I'm right here." I take out my hand, "Come on!"
"Camilia!" Came a voice from the other side.
I turn my head and see Max in the other hole.
"No!" Bobbie shouts at me. "No!"
"Hold on," I tell him. "I'm going to get both of you out of here."
"No," Bobbie cries. "It's all his fault. He's the one that did it. He's the one that wants to get out!"
"Bobbie, what are you talking about."
"He's the one that put something in your drink so you'd fall asleep!"
"He's lying!" Max's voice rang through. "It's him! I saw him. Always in father's study! Reading those books! Trying out those things he reads. Those curses. Those spells. It's why the shadow men are after him! Camilia! You have to believe me."
I can hear Bobbie crying, "Why are you lying! I don't want to play anymore," he screeches. "I don't want to play!" He sobs. "You said you'd go away if I told you that I didn't want to play anymore."
I don't know what made me do it. It sure wasn't the nauseating squealing tantrum of the boy which made me reach for him first. Maybe it was because I wanted him to shut up. I don't know but I plunged my arm up to my shoulder in to grab Bobbie's collar.
Instantly I screamed and saw tiny spiders, short thin legs with round white backs crawl over my arms. I shook my arm in the hole, trying to smother them against the walls. That only caused these long brown flat slugs to fall. I saw one land on my hand. It had three distinct tendon-like lines running across its back and was about a half inch long. I pulled my arm out of the hole as I felt it pierce its flat head into the back of my hand. I dropped my phone and heard it crack as the light splintered in the small, suffocating tunnel. But I didn't care as I looked at my hand and saw it burrowing its tiny spearhead below my skin. I grabbed at the wiggling tail still exposed and tried pulling it out.
It was like trying to pull our barbed wire. The spines on its body were facing me. So with each pull they dug deeper inside. I could see blood pooling under my skin, it was starting to turn purple as I tugged on its tail even harder. Until it gave. Popped right off and lay twitching in my hand. The head missing.
I couldn't take it anymore. Really. I had tried my best. I shake my head. "Bobbie. Bobbie. I'm sorry." But it didn't matter. When I looked over at Bobbie. He was covered in it. All of it. Even the spiders.
My jeans started shifting as I tried to wiggle myself out of there. But I hear Max's cry again. "Camilia! Please!"
"No," I whimpered. Shaking. I couldn't reach my hand in there again. But his voice was so scared. More scared than the pain I felt.
I shot my arm inside. Bracing. Waiting for the pain. But there was none. Instead my hands grasped around his collar and I felt his cold clammy skin, and yanked him from the hole. He came without much struggle. His face covered in the soot of it all. "Camilia," he cried. "You picked me. You did it."
I didn't have the heart to tell him that I almost didn't.
"Come on," I cried. "We. Have. To go."
The two of us wiggled our way out of there, crawling on our hands and knees, and running when we could. We finally make it back into the study. And the fire is roaring now. One of the books fall from the shelves and when it hit the fire I swear it started screaming. There was so much smoke that I couldn't see. And the door was covered by the flames.
I pointed to the window, the curtains on the floor in ashes. I kick the window. It didn't budge. I coughed. I kicked it again. The glass shook. I kicked it again and my foot went through. Pieces of the glass still hung in the frame, I use the tips of my fingers and pull them back. They fall to the floor cracking until there was a hole big enough for me to get through.
I plunge my head out and take my first breath of fresh air. The moon was full and the sky was clear. I could hear sirens coming off in the distance. When both of my feet were on the roof. I reach my hand back and grab Max from the burning house. Together we run across the clay tiles and climb down the arched tree. The red fire truck comes screeching to a stop as several firemen help us down.
One of them pushes a breathing mask on me, and wraps me up. The neighbors are outside, and the police arrive. I see a familiar car come roaring down the street, screaming to a halt as Molly runs out. Her face is flustered and she's shouting. Pushing through the cops until she reaches me next to the ambulance.
"What happened," she literally screamed at me.
"I'm so sorry," I tell her. "There were these men." I take another breath. "I couldn't do anything! B-but I saved Max! I saved him!"
She looked at the house. It was blazing now in the cool night. "Oh my god. Is Bobbie still in there?" Molly starts to cry. "My baby!"
"Max. But Max." I cough. "Max is okay!"
And she turns to me. I wasn't expecting her to be grateful. But there's anger on her face. "You didn't save my son. But you saved our dog?"
I shake my head. "No. Max. Your other son." I looked around but he was nowhere to be found.
s

"Come inside, the kids are upstairs." Molly was in a rush, I knew this much from the phone call we had earlier. She had never used me before but heard about me through word of mouth. Which meant that my little side hustle was starting to gain traction.
I am a babysitter for a good neighborhood. There's cars parked outside, lawns are manicured, and the occasional termite company is out doing rounds. I don't know why but I always feel as if there's a termite guy nearby, it's a pretty decent area. Which is a far cry from where I live, on the other side of the tracks, literally. There are train tracks that run through our town and it acts as a divide. But they didn't need to know that. They only needed to see the straightened hair, well spoken, fake braces wearing girl in glasses sporting a skirt that wasn't too short where the neighbors would talk.
Usually I sat down with new clients, have them introduce me to their kids (trust me it helps) in order to make a clear cut line with them that I am in their parent's employ and I am not there to be their bestfriend and will definitely tell on them if they act up or break something. That's not to say I won't play silly games with them, feed them, laugh, tell bed time stories, and age appropriate jokes. But I am nobody's rug.
That's what I usually do, but there wasn't such luxury this time. Molly called me on the phone and she sounded desperate for me to come out. I had concert tickets and told her that they were non-refundable and she suggested that if I could make it in 30 minutes then she'd pay me twice the amount for the tickets and 1.5x my usual rate. I got there in 29 minutes. It would have been sooner but I needed to air myself out if you know what I mean.
Anyways, Molly barely had time to look at my face, let alone get any of my credentials as she was rushing out. Working mom it looked like. Business, by the looks of the pencil skirt and the bag that doubled as a folder. It always amazes me how much trust some people put in others to watch their kids. What if I was a serial killer? Or a deranged lunatic? What if I killed the babysitter on my way here and now I'm in a house, alone, with all her children.
I'm not. But I mean, what if, right?
She didn't seem to think about any of these things, leaving me to mumble goodbyes as she pulled out of the driveway, barely audible as the turbos wound up and she shouted something out the window to the likes of, "It's all on the iPad".
Yeah, no more yellow lined paper stuck with the realtor's magnet on the fridge anymore. It's all digital now.
I closed the door and figured that I better check up on the kids before I did a rundown. God this house was beautiful. I climbed the stairs two at a time and rounded the hall. To be fair, calling it a hall was so basic of me. It was more like a wing. West wing madam. The wing could have fit my living room. I click my heels when I heard a snort come from behind me. I came to face a shaggy dog that was well groomed. The collar was black with an underline of blue. Tiffany's undoubtedly. "Hey," I reached a hand and scratched the mop of top. "Let's go find the kids," I tell the dog as if it could understand me.
There were a series of rooms, most of them closed, but it didn't take me a second guess which one was occupied. The second door on the left, I could hear a kid shouting obscenities about someone being trash. I knocked on that door first.
"Come in," he shouted still loud but slightly less angry.
I opened the door and saw a stereotypical gamer's room. Posters, action figures, a rocking gaming chair on the floor in front of a huge flat screen, and a boy about 9 or 10. He had on his headphones and was sipping a Dr. Pepper.
"Don't they know trash day is on Thursdays?"
He cocked his head and laughed, "If you're looking for my mom I think she's downstairs."
"I'm actually looking for you." And let me tell you something. The audacity of this younger generation. The way he looked at me. Almost made me feel as bad as how I felt when he shrugged his shoulders after he had a good look. "Excuse me," I walk in front of him and blocked the screen. "I'm your new babysitter."
He shrugged. "Cool."
"What's your name?"
"You can read all about it somewhere else."
"What?"
"It's all on the iPad," he told me.
"What's your name," I repeated.
He rolls his eyes and looks at me as if I had asked him a stupid question.
I don't budge.
He whined, "Bobbie. Now come on, the next rounds about to start." he pulled his headphones over his ears. I grabbed the remote to get his attention. "What. Hey come on."
"It's nice to meet you Bobbie. Your mom's going to be away for a few hours and I'll be here until she gets back. Dinner is at 6:00 and I will make snacks at 4:30."
"No cap," he motioned at the tv, "Now can I get back to my game.
"Sure I tell him." Pocketing the remote.
"Hey!"
"Bye," I tell him as I close the door behind me.
So I'm back out in the hallway. And I open a few more doors. Some were locked. Before I get into one that's rather plain. There's a picture hanging up behind the bed, a tv, some lamps and shade. On the bed sits an identical, about 9 or 10, twins it seems. Probably why Bobbie was tired of being asked which one he was.
This one was staring at the blank screen. No video games. And quiet. Now I've babysat my share of kids before, and have seen all sorts. Quiet kids are my favorite. They don't mind board games, or listening. Most often times they only need to be left alone. I don't do too much talking in case they get tired of hearing my voice. And I give them a lot of space. "Hey, sorry about that. I didn't think anyone was in here."
He turned to me slowly, "Hi. Are you the new sitter?"
I nodded, "Yup. And I'm guessing that you're Max. I'll be watching you guys while your mom is away."
"She's probably going to work."
"Yeah, looked like it." I see the iPad in his hands. "Hey. I was looking for that."
"She's always at work." He hands it over. "It's dead. And mom took the charger."
I tried not to sigh. This was not how I wanted things to go. "Well, ok. If you need anything. Let me know. Or else I can come get you at 4:30 for snacks and dinner at 6."
He nodded, "Thanks," and goes back to staring at the screen.
I smile but he doesn't see, so I leave, closing the door softly behind me.
I make my way downstairs, wandering into the kitchen and start taking stock of what's there. Which was practically everything. This kitchen was so chic that I half expected Gordon Ramsay to pop out and tell me that the banana bread I made didn't have a clue if he staked the curved yellow fruit down the middle (it's a bad question mark joke. Listen. I never said I was funny).
Once I made sure that there was food, or ingredients to make food. There wasn't much else to do. The house was spotless. The kids were fine. And even the dog seemed well behaved. So I plopped on the couch, took out my fake braces, and watched tv until about 4:10 before I started slicing apples and celery to go with some peanut butter.
I fed the dog some peanut butter and licked my fingers (not with the hand I fed the dog with), before heading upstairs. Bobbie took the plate no problem but I couldn't find Max for the life of me. I wandered the rooms as the dog followed, still trying to lick my hand. "Max, I've got snacks." I knocked on what seemed like the umpteenth door before I get to a rather solid oak one that seemed custom.
Inside was the biggest home library I had ever seen. And I once dog sat for a pretentious professor from the college nearby. I mean, there was a portrait of said academic holding his dog in 18th century art style hanging over the mantle place of the deep wood cabinets filled with books. And yet this library made the other one look like a neighborhood book exchange birdbox.
"Holy..."
"Cow."
I whirled around to find Max standing in the doorway.
"You shouldn't wander into Father's study."
"I was just looking for you," holding up the plate. He made a face. "What? You don't like PB&C?" I took a stick and crunched on the celery.
"I'm not hungry."
I shrug. "Take it anyway. In case you get hungry."
He grabs the plate from me without much struggle so I decide to leave him be. I went back downstairs and crashed in front of the tv.
When I woke up. It was dark. My mouth was dry and all of the lights were off. The screen saver flashed the logo in blinks, lighting up the room only momentarily. For a second I forgot where I was and felt my heart thumping in my chest. My alarm didn't go off but I don't know why I woke up. Then I heard it again. The sound that must have jerked me awake. A crash. It came from upstairs. I grab my phone and glance down at the numbers. It was 8:10. I had slept through dinner. Shit. Shit. Shit. Here I was trying to make a good first impression and I missed out on dinner.
I wipe what drool was on my face and took to the stairs. Bobbie was probably so immersed in his game that he probably didn't even know he was hungry. Max on the other hand. "Max?" I call out down the hall. All of the doors are shut. I can hear something panting behind me. I turn to see the dog again. Its head is down and there's barely any light touching its face. "Hey come here," I called but it retreated in the opposite direction.
Then I shit me not. I heard a creaking come from behind me. It was the only noise in the house. I couldn't even hear Bobbie yelling in his room. I turn slowly and see one of the doors down the hall is now slightly ajar. It's dark in here. It was dark everywhere. I pressed my hands against the wall searching for a light switch. "Bobbie," I call out. There's no answer. "Hey, sorry about the delay in dinner. I'm going to get to it now."
Why was this place so big? And why could I see the door?
"Bobbie. Max?" I hear the dog tapping its paws behind me. Someone on the other side of the house by now. "Hey, where are you guys?" I peer at the single door that's open and realized why it was so prominent. The hall was dark, but what was inside was even darker. Instead of going toward it, I try the first knob my blind fingers came across. Process of elimination I told myself. It was locked. I tried the next one. Also locked. I finally get to Bobbie's door and I knock. "Bobbie." There's no answer. I press my head against the door and listen. But I don't hear a single sound.
"Where are all the light switches in this place!"
The door that was open before slightly opens again. Creaking, *tic tic tic tic*, with each ungreased turn of the hinge. "Shit. Hey, stop playing around."
There's laughing coming from behind me. It sounded like a little kids. Too young to be either of the boys. Followed by smaller footsteps. It sounded like they were barefoot. "Hey, this isn't funny. I'm going to tell your mother when she gets home." I take out my phone and turn on the flashlight. "When is she coming home?" It was almost 8:30, when I realized that we never set a time.
I hear footsteps again, they were odd. Almost like falling. Like a toddler learning how to run for the first time but the hollow ground sounded as if the person was much heavier. I shine my flashlight over the hall. "Shit." The dog was sitting on all fours in the corner. It was facing the wall. I couldn't even see his face. Every hair on its body completely still.
"Hey," I called out. "Come here." I clicked my tongue. "Come here." The dog didn't move. I couldn't even see it breathing.
Bang! It sounded like thunder behind me. As if someone dropped something on the floor. As if something fell off a shelf or was pushed. I jumped around and shone my light down the west wing. I didn't know if I should have been more or less afraid now that the door was closed. "Bobbie? Max?"
God. I did not want to try the door. And I stood there for a minute before realizing how stupid I must have looked. These were some rich kids playing a joke on you Camilia. I know it. The thought of their smug little faces made me stomp out of my frozen state. I took a couple of strides over and grabbed the handle.
"Fuck!" The thing was hot. "What the hell! You guys could have hurt me," I yelled. I banged on the door. "Open up. You two are in so much trouble." I banged on the door again. "Open the door. Right now!" I could hear something on the other side. It sounded like shuffling. Heavy furniture perhaps. "You guys better not be messing things up in there. I'm not going to clean it. I mean it."
I banged on the door. "I can hear you in there! Now come on!" I put my hands on my hips and tapped my foot. "I'm waiting. Your little jokes over now." I banged on the door again.
That's when the door knocked back.
It wouldn't have scared me. I don't think. Except for the fact that I was surprised. And alone in the hall. Without any of the lights on. In a strange house. And before I could say anything else. Another door behind me knocked from the inside. "Shit. Both of you are in on this?" I grabbed the handle to the other door. It was also locked. I banged on it. "Come out right now. Max?"
But then a third door started knocked from down the hall. I felt my throat clump as I tried to swallow. "You guys weren't supposed to have anyone over." The knocking didn't stop. It kept echoing down the hall. "I'm not getting paid for three kids you know?"
Tat-tat-tat-tat. Tat-tat-tat.
I took a single step. And then all of the doors in the hallway suddenly started banging.
I almost tripped as I ran toward the stairs. The doors were thundering on so hard I thought they would crack their hinges. I skipped the stairs, the sounds chasing me as I tried to not fall and break my neck. When I got to the front landing I hear someone say my name.
"Camilia. Are you okay?"
I'm trying not to choke on a lung here as I shot my eyes toward the kitchen. The kids are sitting on the barstools lining the counter. There are two plates in front of them. As if they didn't hear the drumline upstairs.
"Is it dinner time yet," one of them asks quietly.
"Max?"
He smiles.
"Kids. I think there's someone in the house." I rush over to grab each of their hands. Bobbie's wrists are limp but it was Max's hands that shocked me. They were ice cold. I tried to let go but my fingers wouldn't uncurl.
He turns my hand over and says, "There's no one else in this house except us. I promise."
"No," I wasn't about to listen to the kid even if it was his house. "Something is wrong. We have to go. Now." I pick up Bobbie and he doesn't seem to want to move. "Come on Bobbie. Let's go." He looks over at Max who shrugs and get out of his seat.
Bobbie follows as I drag them toward the front door.
"Camilia," Max says.
"What?" He looked scared. Which made me turn toward what he was staring out. At the front door was a tall figure. I couldn't see its face through the glass. It was a stark figure of a man.
"Do you think it's your dad?"
Max shakes his head. I feel him pulling against my arm.
I call out to the man, "Hey! Who is it?" The man doesn't budge. "I'm calling the police." I turn to Bobbie, "Get the phone." He doesn't move. "Hey!" I'm trying to sound as angry as possible. "Get the fuck out of here!" I grabbed a roll of painter's tape from the side table and hurl it across the hall, hitting the glass squarely in the face where the man's head stood blocking the exit. He doesn't even twitch as the glass shakes.
"Come on," I grab their hands and rush to the back. I don't get 10 steps before I feel a scream crawl up my throat making me cough. The man was standing at the sliding door. "Fuck!" I drag the two of them with me towards the kitchen. It's a big place so there had to be a way out to the garage. We push through one of the doors and end up in the laundry room. The next door gets us out into a 3 car garage. My hands find the glowing green opener against the wall and I hear the opener fold seamlessly towards the ceiling.
It started with his feet. Then his ankles. His shins. Then his legs. Light poured in from behind him from the streetlamp. I watched as the door went to his waist before I hit the button for the garage to close, before rushing back inside. We make it into the kitchen to where I still see the tall man standing at the sliding door. A part of me wants to hide in the laundry room but I didn't want to be sandwiched in the middle of the house. So I pull the boys back up the stairs, back to where the doors banged themselves. Taking out my phone as we ascended, and called 911.
"This is the police operator speaking."
"HELLO", I hope they could hear me, "There are several men trying to get inside!"
"Men? Are you in any danger?"
"No! But they have us surrounded!"
"Why don't you go outside?"
My tongue suddenly felt numb in my mouth. Like I didn't know what to do with it. "W-what?"
"It's stranger in the house."
The line went dead as we hit the hallway.
I only took my eyes off of them for a second before Bobbie. Or Max. Runs down the hall. The one or the other already slipping through a door ahead. I look back down the stairs and see that the man is still standing in front of the doorway. I look back up and see the other boy also going through the same door. I take a single step and the doors start pounding on either side. I shut my eyes and turn around. Afraid to go. Almost deciding that these weren't my kids. That I should run away. I take a step backwards mouthing that I was sorry. But I was too scared to go! "Max! Bobbie!" My back foot sticks to the floor. I don't want to look down but the next step sticks too. I point my phone to the ground and see a trail of blood. And just behind me. It's the dog. Split right down the middle, its spine shiny and white, still facing the wall. I could see its organs still pulsing.
I couldn't go back downstairs. I couldn't go the other way. I couldn't leave them here. I couldn't be alone.
I ran after them. The thundering of the doors following me as frames fell to the floor. A vase rolled off a table in the hall. It came crashing at my feet. I run my shoulder through the door, except it wasn't locked. Which caused me to go crashing, sprawling to the floor. Running into the desk in the middle of the room.
The study.
Many of the books were off the shelves. The carpet was torn. There were curtains on fire. It was the first time a saw a window as they burned.
"Camilia!"
I hear one of their voices shouting at me.
"Camilia!" It came again. "Help!"
I get to my feet and start working my hands along the desk. I didn't have to search far. The bookcase directly behind the chair had been swung open. "Camilia!" I wipe the blood from my eyebrow where it had split and step into the tunnel behind the secret passage.
The tunnel started off tall and wide, but as I kept walking in. It got smaller and smaller. I started having to hunch. Several times I decided to turn back. But their voices would echo through, calling for me. Asking for help. "I'm coming!"
"I can't hold on! Camilia! Please!"
The twins cry for help bounced off the walls. I was finally on my hands and knees when I finally see two holes on either side. I'm afraid to look but then one of their voices came through clear as day. "Camilia." It was right in my ear now. I turned to see the boy naked and huddling, hugging his knees at the back of his hole.
"Camilia! Help! I don't want to play this game anymore!"
"Bobbie?"
"Help me!"
I look into the hole, the walls are pressing on my back and there's dust going into my lungs. I can barely turn my shoulder. "Crawl out!"
"I can't!"
"Crawl out! I'm right here." I take out my hand, "Come on!"
"Camilia!" Came a voice from the other side.
I turn my head and see Max in the other hole.
"No!" Bobbie shouts at me. "No!"
"Hold on," I tell him. "I'm going to get both of you out of here."
"No," Bobbie cries. "It's all his fault. He's the one that did it. He's the one that wants to get out!"
"Bobbie, what are you talking about."
"He's the one that put something in your drink so you'd fall asleep!"
"He's lying!" Max's voice rang through. "It's him! I saw him. Always in father's study! Reading those books! Trying out those things he reads. Those curses. Those spells. It's why the shadow men are after him! Camilia! You have to believe me."
I can hear Bobbie crying, "Why are you lying! I don't want to play anymore," he screeches. "I don't want to play!" He sobs. "You said you'd go away if I told you that I didn't want to play anymore."
I don't know what made me do it. It sure wasn't the nauseating squealing tantrum of the boy which made me reach for him first. Maybe it was because I wanted him to shut up. I don't know but I plunged my arm up to my shoulder in to grab his collar.
Instantly I screamed and saw tiny spiders, short thing legs with round white backs crawl over my arms. I shook my arm in the hole, trying to smother them against the walls. That only caused these long brown flat slugs to fall. I saw one land on my hand. It had three distinct tendon-like lines running across its back and was about a half inch long. I pulled my arm out of the hole as I felt it pierce its flat head into the back of my hand. I dropped my phone and heard it crack as the light splintered in the small, suffocating tunnel. But I didn't care as I looked at my hand and saw it burrowing its tiny spearhead below my skin. I grabbed at the wiggling tail still exposed and tried pulling it out.
It was like trying to pull our barbed wire. The spines on its body were facing me. So with each pull they dug deeper inside. I could see blood pooling under my skin, it was starting to turn purple as I tugged on its tail even harder. Until it gave. Popped right off and lay twitching in my hand. The head missing.
I couldn't take it anymore. Really. I had tried my best. I shake my head. "Bobbie. Bobbie. I'm sorry." But it didn't matter. When I looked over at Bobbie. He was covered in it. All of it. Even the spiders.
My jeans started shifting as I tried to wiggle myself out of there. But I hear Max's cry again. "Camilia! Please!"
"No," I whimpered. Shaking. I couldn't reach my hand in there again. But his voice was so scared. More scared than the pain I felt.
I shot my arm inside. Bracing. Waiting for the pain. But there was none. Instead my hands grasped around his collar and I felt his cold clammy skin, and yanked him from the hole. He came without much struggle. His face covered in the soot of it all. "Camilia," he cried. "You picked me. You did it."
I didn't have the heart to tell him that I almost didn't.
"Come on," I cried. "We. Have. To go."
The two of us wiggled our way out of there, crawling on our hands and knees, and running when we could. We finally make it back into the study. And the fire is roaring now. One of the books fall from the shelves and when it hit the fire I swear it started screaming. There was so much smoke that I couldn't see. And the door was covered by the flames.
I pointed to the window, the curtains on the floor in ashes. I kick the window. It didn't budge. I coughed. I kicked it again. The glass shook. I kicked it again and my foot went through. Pieces of the glass still hung in the frame, I use the tips of my fingers and pull them back. They fall to the floor cracking until there was a hole big enough for me to get through.
I plunge my head out and take my first breath of fresh air. The moon was full and the sky was clear. I could hear sirens coming off in the distance. When both of my feet were on the roof. I reach my hand back and grab Max from the burning house. Together we run across the clay tiles and climb down the arched tree. The red fire truck comes screeching to a stop as several firemen help us down.
One of them pushes a breathing mask on me, and wraps me up. The neighbors are outside, and the police arrive. I see a familiar car come roaring down the street, screaming to a halt as Molly runs out. Her face is flustered and she's shouting. Pushing through the cops until she reaches me next to the ambulance.
"What happened," she literally screamed at me.
"I'm so sorry," I tell her. "There were these men." I take another breath. "I couldn't do anything! B-but I saved Max! I saved him!"
She looked at the house. It was blazing now in the cool night. "Oh my god. Is Bobbie still in there?" Molly starts to cry. "My baby!"
"Max. But Max." I cough. "Max is okay!"
And she turns to me. I wasn't expecting her to be grateful. But there's anger on her face. "You didn't save my son. But you saved our dog?"
I shake my head. "No. Max. Your other son." I looked around but he was nowhere to be found.
​
s

Hi I’m a 24F Brazilian who always thought about adopting and after seeing adoptees open up about their experiences I started questioning my beliefs of adoption in general and research a lot about the topic specially comparing the US and Brazilian system. So I wanted to know this sub opinion on how things work here in Brazil, specially from adoptees but I’d love to hear about everyone involved.
So how things work around here: Everything is done by the state, there are no agencies and no cost unless you want to pay for a lawyer but it’s not really necessary . There is a national adoption system that every potential AP must sign up and go through several documents, classes and appointments with psychologists and social assistance before you get approved to adopt. MANY people are not approved and all of this takes about 8 months if you don’t delay anything.
After you’re approved you have a profile(age/sex/race/accepts siblings/disabilities and diseases and drug status of the mother) of the child you would accept to adopt and wait for a match. Since vast majority only want white healthy girl babies there’s a huge “line” so some people wait almost a decade to adopt. This wait makes a reasonable amount of people broaden their profile but it still isn’t sustainable. Only 2% accept children over 10 and that’s 80% of the ones waiting adoption.
When there’s a match and the kid is a little older you start visiting the shelter and spending time with all the kids there. This is so they can ask the kid what they think of you without the pressure of knowing you’re their potential AP. If this goes well you then start spending time together outside the shelter and if you both like each other you get their guardianship that later converts to adoption. If it’s a baby you just welcome the baby and get the guardianship. Until the adoption is oficial social workers will still check on you also.
On how kids end up to adoption:
The law heavily prioritise the bio family and family restoration but is not well applied. Ideally they should search for every relative asking if they want the child and/or provide social programs to help the family in case of poverty/illness(law really reinforce poverty is not a reason to take a child away). Only after all this process is done without success that adoption is considered. - exception: A pregnant woman may give her baby up for the adoption system in the hospital she delivers. The rest of the family won’t be contacted and she has 10 days to regret this decision. The hard part is that most cases take too long sitting in court while the kids are in shelters. There’s a 18month limit that is not respected so a lot of cases the kid just stays there for years without actual effort to restore their family and if the judge later decides for adoption they are already “too old”. Shelters are also underfunded so kids don’t really have their needs met there. We don’t really have foster family as a nationwide policy and it’s very rare(5%).
The mainstream sentiment people have about the system is that it’s too bureaucratic and takes too long. There’s also a narrative that focus on the AP suffering of waiting without criticism of why they wait so long(they only want babies) so most people believe courts should rush to release the kids to adoption without considering the bio families. People still think of adoption as providing a child the parent even if the law is explicit that it is the other way round .
Personally. After researching everything I’m really considering fostering some time later in my life but since is not so common here I wanted to hear more from the perspective of people who had foster families.

I'll probably say more on this later. I mean, if a person doesn't have complicated health issues, there's aloooooong list of reasons why getting out of the U.S is a good idea. D.C/Russian politics aside, this is NOT a safe place to live. This is true if you are white, but 1,000 times more true of you are not. Like, honestly you could do a lot better. As we continue to devolve into a 3rd world country even our allies are giving us the Narco State treatment. That is to say, they're warning their citizens about traveling here. https://www.miamiherald.com/detouarticle274840151.html I mean, this is the kind of shit we're used to seeing with nations like Colombia, Mexico etc. Like I and others often point out, everyone knows America is collapsing except Americans. If I had to say any one thing to Tara Reade, it would be "Don't allow yourself to be used." There are many reasons why Russia is a more desirable place to live. Safety is a YUGE one. But if it were me, I wouldn't be making the rounds in Russian media talking shit about the U.S bcz Russia has her problems too. Granted, Putin isn't as evil as Biden and doesn't have anywhere near the blood & destroyed lives on his hands, but Putin is still DEEPLY problematic.
If Tara Reade doesn't feel safe in this country, I get it. I'm right there w/her on that. I think POC especially need to understand that while racism DOES exist in other countries, including Russia. You're far less likely to die as a direct result of it in other countries. America is lethal AF. When I was in Russia, if I got arrested, the thing I would fear is a cop there tryna shake me down ie "You pay me and I'll make this go away." I don't fear them trying to kill me in cold blood. I don't fear being beaten, tortured, fear of them killing my husband and my pets if they show up at the house. You don't have to fear them raping you either. They might do some shady shit like, ask you for sex in exchange for dropping whatever legal shit against you. But cops here will just straight up rape you and it's legal for them to do it. If I knock on the wrong person's door in Russia, I don't have to fear some racist using this as an opportunity to execute me in cold blood. I mean I hate to say it but white America is uniquely violent/lethal. I;ve been to other countries. I've been all over Europe. White America is uniquely violent. For POC the consequences of this is deadly AF. But back to Tara Reade's defection. She needs to tread carefully. None of these governments is anyone's friend. The ruling class not matter where they are, are parasites. Here's Tara's press conference inside Russia. Ppl understandably have some pretty strong feelings about this. https://twitter.com/ReadeAlexandra/status/1663572251810189318 There's a bit of a freakout on Twitter right now and I get it. But I'm also sympathetic to Tara's side of this too. I'll have more to say on this later I;m sure. Lol

Hi. This is a review of a few samples I purchase from SSE. I'm on a search for my personal matcha, pistachio, and marshmallow scents. I love gourmands, vanilla, oceanic, woody, and citrus scents. I dislike incense, sickly sweet, too much smoke, spice, musk, or white florals. Please keep in mind that these perfumes need to rest; the owner herself recommended it, and it mentions that on the website and the info card that came in my package. This will be my immediate first impression, but I will do a 1 week and 1 month update.
Rating system:

1. My body odor smells better than this perfume. Instant regret.
2. This perfume gave me a headache.
3. I would actively avoid breathing around people who wore this.
4. I dislike this, but I can see how others might.
5. I don't like it, but I don't hate it either. Indifferent.
6. I like it but its not anything groundbreaking. Smells like every other bitch.
7. I like it but I wouldn't buy it again. Others might love it.
8. This is unique/nice and I would buy samples/smaller bottles.
9. this is the best thing ever for its category of scent type. I would buy a full size and have it in my daily rotation.
10. Life changing. I will bathe in this perfume. So unique. I don't care what it costs to get a full size. I would wear this to seduce someone.

***These are my opinions, no one has to agree nor am I telling you to~***
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Siren Song - Salt Water Spray, Sea Salt, Dahlia, Lychee Fruit, Sand, Driftwood, Kelp, Dark Ocean Water, Regret

• floral and clean, with a slight saltiness. There is a slight sweetness/fruitness from lychee, which works well with the floral part.
• I wish there was more ocean and driftwood in there. It creeps up behind the floral, so It's more of a clean musk than oceanic scent.
• It's like smelling a bouquet of flowers followed by an ocean breeze.
• This would appeal to anyone who wants a mature and soft skin scent for everyday wear. I could see myself wearing this in a more professional setting.
• In my opinon, it leans very feminine, which makes sense considering the name. I would prefer more of a masculine push from the ocean and driftwood notes. But it a very pleasing balance.
• Rating: 6/10

Beguile - Stout beer, Chocolate, Vanilla Bean Ice Cream, Caramel, Toasted Coconut

• chocolate, warm sweet, slightly bitter
• You get so much toasty chocolate and a light alcoholic, sour note followed by a gooey caramel. The lightest note is coconut, I can barely smell it.
• If this was a drink, it would be an Irish car bomb (guiness with a shot of baileys)
• The dry down is a bitter, dark caramel and a softer chocolate and vanilla.
• Freaking delicious in the least sweet way. I like it a lot. If you want a gourmand that's not just outright sweet, please try this. It's a unique take and leans slightly into the fall gourmands due to the bitterness and depth.
• Rating: 7/10

Matcha Milk Tea- Matcha, Green Tea, Jasmine Tea, Oat milk, Honey, Vanilla

• Matcha, green tea, jasmine, honey.
• It's like a mix of a matcha latte and green tea honey latte from starbucks. Creamy, green with a slight floral, and honey forward.
• I don't personally like honey, but its a nice blend if someone wants a realistic green tea drink from a boba shop. The jasmine and honey notes give it intrigue compared to the other matcha scents I've tried. But as a trade off, you get less matcha.
• Dry down is more honey and sweet with musky florals.
• Rating: 5/10

Nocturne #6 - Sea Salt, Cypress, Driftwood, Pacific Rock Moss, White Sand, Red Flame Mimosa, Grapefruit, Thunderstorms, Tonka, Blue Musk Accord

• Citrus, woody, clean. The last note is musk that is just on the border of okay and too much for me.
• It's a neutral scent that gives clean, skin scent. It's well blended, balanced and I like it more than Siren Song. I would smell this and immediately guess something from Estée Lauder or my mom's collection.
• Leans feminine. Dry down is stronger on the citrus and musk, and the sweetness comes through more.
• I could see this replacing a mainstream perfume. It smells luxurious and would appeal to people who want the "clean girl" aesthetic. Not what I'm looking for, and seems a little basic to me.
• Rating: 5/10

Eat Me (Cheesecake, Blueberry, Lemon, Cream Cheese Frosting, Cake)

• fruity, vanilla, creamy, tangy. Like a carmelized basque cheescake with a blueberry sauce on it.
• There isn't a butteriness, more of a concentrated sugariness. It's not sickly sweet, but I can see how it might be on the border or too much for others.
• The dry down gives more of the sweet lemon and blueberry. I don't think the lemon helps in this case because it starts leaning more towards a blueberry jam than cheesecake.
• It's great if you like blueberry thats fruity and jam-like, and cake. There's a tartness that I find unique compared to other blueberry scents. No green notes. No cleaning supply type of lemon notes.
• Rating: 5/10

Maîtresse-en-titre - Pistachio, Macaroon, Double vanilla cream, Blush peony

• Nutty, coconut, toasted almond. The toastiness is so warm and creamy.
• It smells predominantly macaroon with the coconut and almond
• The dry down exposes some of the peony, which is slightly sharp and fresh compared to the rest of the notes. The peony makes me feel pretty and feminine and elegant. Like Blair Waldorf. It's sweet and floral.
• I wouldn't say its a pistachio scent, but the nuttiness helps bring out the coconut and almond and vanilla. Its a pistachio that doesn't scream gourmand. The peony rounds it out in an extremely feminine way that wraps around and leaves a trail. If I smelled this on someone I would stop them to ask what they're wearing.
• Rating: 7/10

Pistachio Cream - Pistachio pudding, Cardamom, Sweet Cream, French Vanilla

• Pistachio, vanilla, and the smallest hit of a spice. Like teeny tiny dusting. I'm not a fan of cardamom, but I can handle this amount. The intensity of spice is 2/10.
• It reminds me of pistachio kulfi (which is what ice cream is called in many eastern and south asian countries). Sweet from condensed milk. Nutty from the pistachios. A crisp, floral, mintiness from the cardamom sprinkled in.
• There is a slight plasticness to it, but I think resting will resolve that issue.
• Dry down makes the cardamom and cream blend and soften, somehow making it even nuttier.
• This is delicious. I enjoy it immensely and would recommend this as a pistachio with an unexpected note. The cardamom is present without overpowering, and it complements and elevates the pistachio. This is everything that DS & Durga Pistachio claimed to be (minus the patchouli). It might be my perfect pistachio. I will be buying this again.
• Rating: 8/10

I ordered a set of 5 samples 1.5mL x 5 for $25, and 1 separate sample for $6. The Pistachio cream was 5 mL and free with my $30 order. I appreciate that the vials come with a flint applicator (the little stick attached to the cap) and the larger bottle had a roller top. It took about 12 days for my order to arrive and everything was well packed and labeled. I would say that the blend of the fragrances was more unique and well done than some of the other brands I've tried; gourmands can get boring really quickly but I wasn't bored while smelling these.
10/10 experience and would order again from SSE.

There sum crazy ass white dude going round yelling white power and crap like that right by a uhual on may st, yall know or hear anything bout it?

1. Preparation: Picture again the lab, with 3333g of fresh cactus now reduced to 100g of ultrafine powdered cactus. 2. Basification: The stoichiometric amount of calcium hydroxide needed for mescaline is calculated based on the maximum theoretical yield (assuming 3-6% mescaline in the dried cactus, around 3-6g of mescaline). Given the molecular weight of mescaline (211.27 g/mol) and calcium hydroxide (74.09 g/mol), and the reaction mescaline + Ca(OH)2 –> mescaline-Ca + 2H2O, you would need about 1.05-2.1g of calcium hydroxide. You mix this precisely weighed amount of calcium hydroxide with your cactus powder and just enough distilled water to create a homogenous paste. 3. Nonpolar Extraction: You carefully immerse the cactus paste into exactly 1L of ethyl acetate in a volumetric flask, ensuring complete immersion. With gentle swirling, the mixture stands for 24 hours, allowing for maximum extraction. 4. Separation: Using a Buchner funnel and vacuum filtration, the green ethyl acetate solution is separated from the solid residues. Every drop of the liquid is carefully collected, while the solid remains on the filter paper, washed with additional ethyl acetate to ensure complete extraction. 5. Acidification: The green solution is carefully transferred into a round-bottom flask and gently warmed on a hot plate set to no more than 40°C, under a fume hood due to ethyl acetate’s low boiling point and flammability. A calculated 1.5-3g of citric acid (based on the molecular weight of citric acid, 192.12 g/mol, and mescaline, 211.27 g/mol, and the reaction 1 mescaline + 1 citric acid –> 1 mescaline citrate + water) is then added slowly to the warm solution until it fully dissolves. 6. Crystallization: The round-bottom flask, now containing the solution of mescaline citrate in ethyl acetate, is transferred to a refrigerator set at 4°C. Over the next 48 hours, fine white crystals of mescaline citrate slowly precipitate out. 7. Final Collection: The cold solution is quickly filtered again via vacuum filtration to separate out the mescaline citrate crystals. The crystals are rinsed with a small amount of cold ethyl acetate, then allowed to dry thoroughly under an airy hood, giving a final yield of white crystalline mescaline citrate. 

Last Tuesday I took my 3rd round of Misoprostol and it finally worked Tuesday evening/night. The day after the bleeding was more like a regular, normal period and decreased until Sunday.
On Sunday is seemed like the bleeding increased and by Monday evening I was having period-like cramps. No other serious symptoms so I’m not hugely concerned.
I’m wondering if it’s my period kicking in already? Has anyone else have a period start less than a week after you took the pills?

So a few months ago in December I was in a really bad mood and so my friend, let’s call him T, invited me over to his place for some drinks and video games. My partner at the time had recently split with me and I was getting used to being alone for the first time in a long time.
He had some other friends over and one of them is a drug user, who knows everything there is to know about that type of thing. Let’s call him P. I had never met him before then and didn’t know much about that world. I smoked a bit of weed in high school but that was it.
My friend T is a stoner but that’s it. None of the people in our friend group did anything big. It was just this one person who I had never met before.
None of us were sober that night, I was drinking pretty heavily and P was high. My friend T told me he paid for an Uber for me and I was very thankful, but later on after everyone was inebriated he revealed he hadn’t actually planned on doing it. I called another friend but no one was available, so I decided to walk myself home. I live in a part of our city near where P lives, so we agreed to walk back together for safety reasons (I’m a short gay guy, and I was pretty drunk).
On the way back P ends up stopping somewhere and buying some drugs. I didn’t know what kind at the time. I wait with him for the person to bring it to him, and it was the first time I ever saw that sort of interaction, so I was scared. The guy said I was too drunk to be an undercover cop. The night gets fuzzy so I’m trying to get it all down.
Once P had what he had purchased, we made it to my place, and he asked to crash on my couch. I reluctantly agreed, but I was embarrassed by the mess that was my place.
He didn’t mind, and so we had one last round of beers and watched the end of a Harry Potter movie on tv, and that’s the last I remember. I woke up on the couch with him on the floor in front of me.
I was a little hungover but other than that it was a normal morning. I took a shower and by the time I was out he was gone. It was a little after ten so I made breakfast and tried to calm down.
I found a bag of powder he left on the floor near where he slept. It was a light brown and there was only a little bit there. I picked it up and planned on calling him to tell him. I went to work at one and got home after ten.
When I got home I found the bag because I had forgotten. I was in a pretty shit mood and my curiosity got the better of me. I’ve seen movies so the things I did that night were honestly embarrassing. I took a plastic straw from my kitchen and cut off the end. I dumped the powder onto my counter and lined it up using a Dunkin’ Donuts gift card. I thought long and hard, but I guess not enough, because I snorted it using the fucking end of the straw, and sat down at the table, cradling my head.
At first I felt nothing. I sat there for what must’ve been fifteen minutes just surprised. And then I stood up.
I think the moment I stood up was potentially the greatest moment of my life, when it hit me all at once, and I just stood in awe, complete euphoria, the greatest peace, I can’t even describe it. I had no pain, no worry, no sorrow, only pleasure. I laid down on the couch and soaked it all up. It was the greatest feeling ever.
I fell asleep not long after and honestly I hate myself for it. I should’ve stayed awake to appreciate and savor every second. The best feeling in my life and I slept through it.
I felt fine waking up but I called P to tell him what I did. I was preparing to pay him however much he wanted, but when we talked he wasn’t concerned about money. He was concerned about my health. Said it was fucking heroin, and how stupid I was for just snorting a powder I found on my floor, and especially not for telling him I was doing it. He basically yelled at me because he said I could’ve overdosed since I’m not used to it. I asked him if he had any more and he lost his shit at me, telling me I was ruining my life and shit. I was just in shock, because my friend T never seemed like the type to associate with a heroin junkie, and it wasn’t what I was preparing for. I don’t know what I had been thinking it was. Something more tame.
P refused to help me out and after talking to another friend I decided I wasn’t going to try to get high again, because I was afraid I’d hurt myself.
About a week and a half later I was babysitting my niece while my sister and her wife were out overnight. After my niece was in bed I was making myself a place to sleep and found a safe in the linen closet. I didn’t think. I just started to try to open it. And it was their wedding anniversary so it was easy to get into it. Inside they had a bunch of stuff, but I ignored the cash (like an idiot) and found a pill bottle of OxyContin, with my sister in law’s name on it. I opened it to nineteen pills, and took them all. I locked the safe back up with the pill bottle, now empty, still inside.
I hate the fact that I did this. But since it’s anonymous here, I’m telling the truth. One place I don’t have to lie.
The next day I snorted two pills and saw stars. It wasn’t quite as amazing as the first time with heroin, but it was pretty fucking spectacular. But I knew I only had a small amount so I focused on getting heroin.
I went back to the spot where P got heroin that night. I stood out in the snow for a few hours, checking my phone and playing stupid, before giving up. But my feet still hurt from it.
I called P and asked to meet him for lunch. Maybe he suspected something because he brought T along as well. We went to a nice restaurant where it was impossible for me to casually ask where to find heroin around. But I had become completely obsessive. It was the only thing that mattered to me anymore.
So I just asked. In front of T and the entire restaurant. “How do I contact that man we met” or something as cryptic and pathetic as that.
P gave me a phone number and I finally felt relieved.
I’ve been texting this man, call him L, for months now. I never had guessed how expensive it would be. I’m on top of it, like I don’t think my boss or my sister suspects anything. I’m managing to pay for it but I don’t have money for much else. I had to stop drinking coffee in the mornings and shit like that.
Looking back it’s actually so insane how this happened. I know it’s crazy. I had a moral code that I believed in that I threw out the window just to chase that feeling I had in December. That one goddamn feeling where they only thing that mattered was the pleasure.
I know it’s a problem but I can’t tell anyone in my real life because I know how scared they’d be. It sounds worse than it is. You hear heroin and you think the worst but I think I have it under control. I’m just disgusted with myself for lying and stealing.
Am I crazy, though? For thinking I can do this? Because it really feels like I can. It honestly feels like fate that I found it that night. It’s the only thing that makes me feel okay. The only thing. And if it kills me in the long run I guess I don’t really care because it gave me new life.