#this is literally what my old dog otis looked like
Text
people’s princess | yt22
pairing: yuki tsunoda x fem!horner! reader summary: in which yuki is dating the christian horner’s daughter. note: i mentioned something awhile back about a horner!reader fic … so i kinda delivered. it’s kinda short since i learned that on mobile i only get a 10 image limit 🌝 trust i will be doing the rest of my smaus on web, so future smaus will be longer! promise, cross my heart!  note 2: i started this before alphatauri changed their name … and i’m most definitely not using the visacashapprb @ in my smau. i love you, yuki, but absolutely not.
ynhorner
liked by yukitsunoda0511, christianhorner, and others
ynhorner yukiroos !!
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user i didn’t know yuki and oscar were chill like that
yukitsunoda0511 i was attacked. it’s not funny to post my attack
⤷ ynhorner jerry didn’t attack you, he just wanted a hug
⤷ yukitsunoda0511 he literally attacked me
maxverstappen1 barf what is that second picture
⤷ ynhorner barf what is your face
⤷ maxverstappen1 i’m telling christian
⤷ ynhorner you’re dead to me
user i love yn and max’s friendship
gerihalliwellhorner missing you both!! ❤️
liked by ynhorner and yukitsunoda0511
redbullracing looking forward to seeing you in the OUR garage again
⤷ alphataurif1 um you mean OUR garage
⤷ ynhorner the girls a fighting 🫢
pierregasly barf gross nasty
⤷ ynhorner this is why i like kika more than you
⤷ francisa.cgomes i love you too 🫶🫶🫶
yukitsunoda0511
liked by ynhorner, pierregasly, and others
yukitsunoda0511 family dinner 🍽️
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gerihalliwellhorner it was lovely having you, yuki!! we have to do this again soon!
⤷ yukitsunoda0511 thank you for having me, geri! checking my schedule as we speak!
user yuki tsunoda and ginger spice, the duo i didn’t know i need
pierregasly my place next 😁
ynhorner idk whose dog is in the third pic … she was very sweet though
⤷ yukitsunoda0511 i heard something about petsitting for a friend
user OTIS
christianhorner not very family friendly pg clean on the third slide
⤷ ynhorner don’t you have ears to clean, old man?
⤷ christianhorner you’re no longer welcomed in the red bull
garage
⤷ alphataurif1 WE WON ‼️‼️
maxverstappen1 i don’t remember getting an invite to family dinner 🌝
user the fact that max didn’t get invited is crazy to me
redbullracing stealing our team principal i see …
user THE EAR WAX COMMENT FROM YN IJBOL
user yuki with his in laws, we love to see it
alphataurif1
liked by yukitsuonda0511, ynhorner, and others
alphataurif1 thx for banning yn from your garage redbullracing, she’s ours now 🥰
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ynusername i love you alphataurif1 admin <33
⤷ alphataurif1 I LOVE YOU TOO YN !!!! <3333
yukitsunoda0511 i could get used to this
user THE CAPTION
maxverstappen1 please keep her, i don’t want her in the garage anymore
⤷ ynhorner this is why you weren’t invited to family dinner
redbullracing WE didn’t ban her, boss man did (we will be getting her back)
user i love seeing alphatauri and red bull fight over yn, because i would too
user yn is the face of alphatauri (trust)
ynhorner
liked by yukitsuonda0511, maxverstappen1, and others
ynhorner BOYFI APPRECIATED POST !!
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yukitsunoda0511 i love you to the moon and saturn
⤷ ynhorner yuki :( i love YOU to the moon and saturn!
user MOTHER AND FATHER
liamlawson30 he’s got a little something on his face
⤷ yukitsunoda0511 blocked. reported.
user the boyfriend effect looks good on him
danielricciardo my fav couple 🫶
liked by ynhorner and yukitsunoda0511
user they make me sick (in the most loving way possible)
maxverstappen1 you guys are cute i guess
⤷ ynhorner i know! tell kelly i’m looking forward to seeing her in the paddock this weekend 😁
⤷ maxverstappen1 👍
user yuki is so lucky …
nyckdevries scooter race rematch when?
⤷ yukitsunoda0511 rematch?? there was a scooter race??
⤷ ynhorner you were busy with car stuff, so nyck and i
decided to race scooters on the trace 😁
user WHEN IS IT MY TURN
user idc what anyone says, i love nyck and yn’s little friendship
⤷ user no fr it feels like it came out of nowhere, but it works
#🕊️ ₊ sweet nothings#yuki tsunoda x reader#yuki tsunoda x you#yuki tsunoda imagine#f1 social media au#f1 smau#f1 x reader#f1 grid x reader#f1 instagram au#f1 imagine
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CHICAGO FIRE – LEADERS LEAD (S01E22)
Kelly Severide: A promotion, huh?
Tara Little: You need to stay away.
Kelly Severide: You get a promotion, and meanwhile, I could go to
jail?
Tara Little: Get away.
Kelly Severide: They’re talking about filing criminal charges. Why
the hell are you doing this? I didn’t do a damn
thing to you.
Tara Little: I said to stay away.
Man 1 (Shopper): Are you okay, ma’am?
Kelly Severide: She’s fine.
Man 1 (Shopper): Ma’am?
Kelly Severide: We both know nothing happened that night.
Man 1 (Shopper): Hey.
Kelly Severide: Tara!
[car door shuts]
cutscene
Matt Casey: I have a request.
Hallie Thomas: Yeah? What’s that?
Matt Casey: [groans]
Hallie Thomas: Jeez.
[chuckling]
Matt Casey: We don’t move from this spot for the entire day.
[kissing sound]
Hallie Thomas: And you skip your shift?
Matt Casey: Hmm? I’ll just have truck pick me up here if we get any
calls.
Hallie Thomas: Tsk. I don’t think these boxers are going to stand up
against a fire.
Matt Casey: I’ll just call out orders from this spot. “Cruz, grab a 2 ½.
Mouch put down the sandwich.”
[kissing sound]
Hallie Thomas: At 24 hours and 1 minute, I wanna be right back
here.
Matt Casey: Deal.
cutscene
[car door shuts]
[kissing sound]
Matt Casey: See you later.
Peter Mills: I’m happy for ‘em.
Gabby Dawson: Yeah, me too.
Peter Mills: Are you?
Gabby Dawson: Without a doubt, yes.
[Mills & Dawson chuckles]
Peter Mills: Good.
So, um, this might be a weird time but um… I was just
thinking this whole two rent thing, it’s… it’s crazy.
Gabby Dawson: The two rent thing?
Peter Mills: I mean, you know, you’re basically living with me
already, and we don’t call each other to say, “Hey, I
mean are you home yet?” So… how about I give you
a key, we make it official, you move in? I realise…
that was the complete opposite of being romantic.
Um…
Gabby Dawson: No, no.
Peter Mills: No, look, I know I’m really, really bad at this. I-I keep
beating around the bush all the time. Look, I love you.
Gabby Dawson: Uh…
Peter Mills: I think we should live together.
Gabby Dawson: I’m…
Peter Mills: Oh, God. God, that was awful. That was really awful.
Gabby Dawson: [chuckles] Yeah, it was.
Peter Mills: Look, take the time you need to think about it. Let me
know. No pressure.
Joe Cruz: [groans]
Christopher Herrmann: All right, hey! Peter Mills, hurry up! ‘Cause I
gotta take your money after I finish with
Cruz here.
Peter Mills: [sighs] Okay, duty calls.
Leslie Shay: What up, sunshine?
[station alert and buzzes]
[ambo door closes]
(Over PA): Truck 81, Squad 3, Ambulance 61. Building collapse, 800
South Carpenter Street.
[sirens wail]
[horn honking]
Leslie Shay: He loves you. That’s great news, right?
Gabby Dawson: I don’t know.
Leslie Shay: Out with it. What?
Gabby Dawson: I… [groans]
I still haven’t come clean with him about Boden
and his mom. And it just… it feels like this dark
cloud hanging over us.
Leslie Shay: Over you, you mean?
Gabby Dawson: Well, to be fair, yes.
Leslie Shay: Okay. So repeat after me. “It’s not my business.”
Gabby Dawson: Shay.
Leslie Shay: I’m serious. That is between Boden and what’s her
name.
Gabby Dawson: I just feel guilty is all I’m saying. A lie of omission is
still a lie. And if we’re gonna be getting this
serious…
[sirens continue to wail]
[indistinct radio chatter]
[background commotion]
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): Chief. All the schools are on spring
break, big party. We were here on
D&D when we saw the whole thing
collapse, one porch on top of
another.
Police Officer (Nicole Sermons): There’s at least a dozen trapped.
Just tell us where you need us,
Chief.
Chief Boden: Get the surface victims first. Set up cribbing columns.
K-12, sawzalls to cut away the timber.
(into radio) Battalion 25 to Dispatch, we have a three-
story deck collapse, multiple victims. Give me an
EMS Plan 2 and two extra truck companies for
manpower.
Dispatch: (over radio) Copy that.
Woman 1: No! No, God! Oh, God.
Chief Boden: Ma’am?
Woman 1: Oh!
Chief Boden: Ma’am, stay back. Come back, come on.
Woman 1: No, let me go. Let me go!
Chief Boden: Okay. Look at me.
Woman 1: No.
Chief Boden: Look at me, look at me. We are gonna do everything
in our power to help your friend.
Woman 1: Paul. His name is Paul. He’s my fiancé. Tell me he’s not
dead. We were just talking [cries]
Chief Boden: Okay, Katie.
Woman 1 (Katie): [sobbing] No.
Chief Boden: I need you to listen to me.
Woman 1 (Katie): [sobbing] No. Please don’t say it.
Chief Boden: Katie, he’s gone. He’s gone, he’s gone.
Woman 1 (Katie): [sobs] No!
Chief Boden: Katie, you gotta stop. You gotta stop.
Woman 1 (Katie): [sobs] No!
Chief Boden: Okay?
Woman 1 (Katie): [grunts]
[slapping sound]
Woman 1 (Katie): You did nothing! [cries]
You did nothing! [cries]
[sobs]
- title screen -
[victims yelling in background]
Victim 1: [sobs]
Joe Cruz: I got one!
Victim 1: [sobs] I’m gonna die.
Gabby Dawson: You are not gonna die, ma’am.
You are not gonna die.
Firefighters: Watch that.
Yeah, I’ll get it.
You got it?
Gabby Dawson: She’s got an impalement in her chest and lots of
blood. We gotta get her free enough to transport
her and this piece of wood.
Victim 1: I can’t breathe.
Peter Mills: Take slow breaths, okay? Slow breaths. Slow breaths,
all right?
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): Hey. We got one.
Leslie Shay: We need some more hands!
Victim 1: I’m not gonna… I’m not gonna… I’m not gonna…
Gabby Dawson: Hey, what’s your name?
Victim 1: Valerie.
Gabby Dawson: Valerie, you’re gonna make it. You have to believe
that, okay?
Victim 1 (Valerie): Don’t lie to me. You’re not telling me how bad it
is.
Peter Mills: Okay.
Kelly Severide: Okay, Valerie. Keep still.
Victim: [whimpers]
[saw whirring]
Victim 1 (Valerie): Aah!
Kelly Severide: All right, clear.
Gabby Dawson: All right, let’s get her on the backboard! Now!
[siren wails]
[monitor beeping slowly]
Gabby Dawson: Heart rate’s dropping.
[monitor flat-lines]
Gabby Dawson: She’s crashing, Shay!
Leslie Shay: (into radio) 61 to Lakeshore, we’re coming in hot with a
trauma victim. 20 years old, impalement injury,
respirations are dropping.
Dispatcher: (over radio) Copy that.
Gabby Dawson: [heavy breathing] Come on.
Hallie Thomas: I need a crash cart. Call for respiratory and blood.
Let’s hang units of o-negative. Let’s get x-ray and
CT standing by.
Push an epi now.
[pumping ambu bag]
Hallie Thomas: Stop compressions.
We got a pulse! Let’s get her into trauma! Let’s go!
Nice work, Dawson.
Leslie Shay: Wow.
cutscene
[truck beeps]
Mouch: Could’ve been a hell of a lot worse. Two DOAs and I bet we
saved a dozen or more.
Joe Cruz: That right there is what it’s all about.
[Japanese on TV]
Christopher Herrmann: All right.
Hey.
[clapping]
Otis Zvonecek: What are you doing?
Christopher Herrmann: I’m supposed to speak to Luke’s class
about fire safety. So I’m gonna rig one side
of the house with flammable materials and
then the other side with flame-resistant
type stuff. Then, I’m going to demonstrate
the difference. Kids are gonna love it.
Otis Zvonecek: Oh. What could possibly go wrong?
Joe Cruz: Guys, guys, I have an announcement to make. Please, I
need everybody’s attention. Today, I came across
something so upsetting that it literally shook me to the
core. I was in the laundry room. I was pulling my stuff
from the washer to the dryer, and I discovered these left
inside.
Everyone: Oh!
[chuckling]
Christopher Herrmann: Don’t look at me. I’ve been a fruit of the
loom man since 1975.
[laughter]
Mouch: 20 bucks to whoever finds the owner.
Joe Cruz: Lieutenant!
[roaring with laughter]
Joe Cruz: No!
Matt Casey: First, they ain’t mine. Second, these don’t come down
until the owner steps forward. I can’t unsee this.
Someone has to pay.
Otis Zvonecek: He who smelt it hath dealt it.
Joe Cruz: You’re nuts. Those look like something that a Russian
would wear on his wedding night.
Otis Zvonecek: They’re not mine, but I will put my money on Capp.
Mouch: Keep deflecting, Otis. That’s a good strategy.
Otis Zvonecek: Oh! Whoa! Whoa!
[dog whimpering and barking]
[extinguisher spraying]
Christopher Herrmann: Maybe I’ll just let the kids wear the oxygen
mask.
[extinguisher blows]
Woman 2: Excuse me?
Christopher Herrmann: Yeah.
Woman 2: Hi. Uh, I was wondering, um, do you guys allow kids in
here to take a picture on a truck or something?
Christopher Herrmann: Yeah, of course we do. Where are the kids?
Woman 2: Oh. Um, I’m just checking. Some other time.
Christopher Herrmann: Okay.
cutscene
Chief Boden: You confronted her in a parking lot.
[water running]
Kelly Severide: I’m facing criminal charges. Damn right I confronted
her.
Chief Boden: You are not helping yourself.
Kelly Severide: Chief, I did nothing wrong.
Chief Boden: You did today. You strengthened her case.
Kelly Severide: Whose side are you on?
Chief Boden: I am trying to help you here.
Kelly Severide: Well, it doesn’t feel like it. I’ll handle this myself,
thanks.
Chief Boden: No, no. You contact her again, you go within 100 feet
of her, you will force me to take away your Squad.
Kelly Severide: That’s your way of helping?
Chief Boden: Yes.
Otis Zvonecek: Hey, Chief. Taking bets on the red skivvies from the
laundry. You interested?
cutscene
Gabby Dawson: My dad used to tell me, “You have a choice. You
can either choose to be in a bad mood…”
Leslie Shay: Right.
Gabby Dawson: “Or you can decide to be happy.”
Leslie Shay: Where is this going?
Gabby Dawson: Uh, at first, I… I wasn’t sure about Mills, right? Was
he too young? Was I just rebounding? Did we
move too fast? But then I realised, damn it, he’s
good to me. Be happy.
Leslie Shay: So you love him ‘cause you choose to?
Gabby Dawson: [laughs] No. Because I do.
Leslie Shay: Aw. My little Dawson’s all grown up.
Gabby Dawson: Oh, shut up.
Leslie Shay: What about the mom thing?
Gabby Dawson: I don’t know.
[ambo door shuts]
[station alert & buzzes]
(Over PA): Ambulance 61. Man down from unknown causes.
Gabby Dawson: Looks like it’s one of those days.
[siren wails]
[thunder rumbling, siren blares]
Gabby Dawson: Hey there, bud. How you doing?
Hey.
His pulse is fast. Let’s sit him down and check his
heart rate. Come on.
All right.
Leslie Shay: Oh.
Gabby Dawson: Here we go, bud. All right.
Leslie Shay: Okay… Virgilio Ventura. Welcome back, pal.
Victim 2 (Virgilio): [groans]
Gabby Dawson: You had a couple cocktails today?
Leslie Shay: No, I think something a little heavier. What’s your
flavour, Virg? A little H?
Huh. He’s clean. What’s up with you, buddy?
Gabby Dawson: Okay.
[monitor beeping rapidly]
Gabby Dawson: His heart rate’s racing at 150. He’s in SVT. We’re
gonna lose him if we don’t stabilise his rhythm.
[shirt ripping]
Gabby Dawson: Cardioverting at 100. Stand back.
Leslie Shay: Dawson, wait! His ears. Look at his ears. Look.
Gabby Dawson: Shay, he’s got an electrical burn.
[clothes ripping]
Leslie Shay: His shoe’s missing. It’s a third degree burn. He’s got
an exit wound.
Gabby Dawson: He was hit by lightning. We can’t shock him. His
heart’s had too much trauma. 6 mils of adenosine.
Leslie Shay: Yeah, yeah!
[monitor continues beeping]
Gabby Dawson: Hang in there. Hang in there.
Leslie Shay: Okay.
Ready when you are. On three. One, two, push.
[monitor flatlines]
Victim 2 (Virgilio): [gasps]
Leslie Shay: Okay, it bought us some time. Let’s get him out of
here.
cutscene
[thunder in distance]
Christopher Herrmann: What is it?
Chief Boden: Ah, nothing. Rough shift.
Christopher Herrmann: Yeah.
[car door shuts]
Christopher Herrmann: Hey, what are you doing for dinner tonight?
I’m doing all the cooking now that Cindy’s
in the home stretch. So it’s either gonna
be pizza or steak. It’s your call.
Chief Boden: Well, I can never turn down a Herrmann steak.
Christopher Herrmann: All right. Great.
Bring the beer, all right?
Chief Boden: I will.
Christopher Herrmann: All right.
Chief Boden: Thanks.
Peter Mills: Hey! Excuse me, Chief! Um, I was wondering, can I pick
up a couple shifts next week? Maybe pull 48?
These-These Squad classes are breaking the
bank, so… I just need the extra money.
Chief Boden: What did your Lieutenant say?
Peter Mills: Check with you.
Chief Boden: Well, we can make that happen.
Peter Mills: Yeah?
Chief Boden: I’ll talk to second watch.
Peter Mills: Thank you.
Chief Boden: Okay.
Kelly Severide: I’m not exactly one to sit on my hands, you know.
Leslie Shay: Yeah, well, you shouldn’t.
Kelly Severide: Yeah, well, that’s not what the CFD is advising.
I’m running out of options here, Shay.
Leslie Shay: I’m telling you, the more I think about it, the more I
think that she targeted you specifically. She knew
your background, and she took what, all of two
seconds to start flirting up a storm? Anyone do a
background check on her?
Kelly Severide: I’ve-I’ve been on my heels this whole time, no.
Leslie Shay: Yeah, exactly. It’s time to turn it around, go on the
offensive.
[car door shuts]
[engine starts]
cutscene
Gabby Dawson: You thinking about jumping?
Peter Mills: Hey.
Gabby Dawson: Hey.
Peter Mills: You made it.
Gabby Dawson: Yeah, bearing carbs.
Peter Mills: I see.
Gabby Dawson: Hey.
[kissing sound]
Gabby Dawson: What is it?
Peter Mills: You never answered my question. I know that I’m… I’m
moving too fast. I…
Gabby Dawson: Peter. I love you too.
Peter Mills: Really?
Gabby Dawson: Yeah, really.
Peter Mills: [chuckles]
Gabby Dawson: I just got one question for you. Am I gonna have to
borrow Antonio’s pickup, or are you gonna help me
move?
Peter Mills: I will help you move.
Gabby Dawson: Yeah, that’s what I thought.
[kissing sounds]
cutscene
Antonio Dawson: Hey.
Kelly Severide: Hey, man. Thanks for meeting me.
Antonio Dawson: You sure you know what you’re doing?
Kelly Severide: Tsk. Like I told you on the phone, I’m-I’m feeling out
of options.
Antonio Dawson: Well, it might be worse than you think. I called the
Assistant State’s Attorney. That Rutkowski’s
testimony landed, and they won’t be accused of
playing favourites for a firefighter. They’re gonna
approve criminal charges. I ran a background
check on Tara Little. She worked at an ad
agency. There were criminal charges filed and
then withdrawn.
Kelly Severide: Against her?
Antonio Dawson: No. A fellow employee there named Clay White.
There’s an address in there.
Kelly Severide: I appreciate it.
Antonio Dawson: If I was smart, I’d tell you to let a lawyer handle it
from here.
cutscene
[bell chimes]
Man 2: May I help you?
Kelly Severide: Are you Clay White?
Man 2 (Clay White): I am.
Kelly Severide: I was told to talk to you about Tara Little.
Man 2 (Clay White): A-Anything you wanna say about her, you can
tell my lawyer. Now get the hell out.
Kelly Severide: It’s… it’s not like that. I-I need your help.
Man 2 (Clay White): I was a mid-level executive at Ramsey-Cole, a
high-end ad agency on Michigan Avenue. Tara
was one of 20 graphic designers we had on
staff. Tara and I had hit it off. Was it
inappropriate? She was game, and I wasn’t
married. It was all consensual. We had some
fun but went in different directions, ended
totally civil. Then we lost an account. The
rumour mill started flying about downsizing.
Next thing I know, Tara makes a claim, says I
took advantage of her, it was a hostile working
environment. I was fired and ostracised by the
whole industry.
I’ve got an MBA [chuckles]
And this is what I do to pay my mortgage. She
got a nice settlement from what I heard.
Kelly Severide: Sounds familiar. Would you consider coming
forward?
Man 2 (Clay White): I signed a non-disclosure agreement, so she’d
drop the criminal charges.
Kelly Severide: You didn’t answer my question.
cutscene
Hallie Thomas: Let me take a look at him
Patient (Miranda): [winces]
Hallie Thomas: Wow. What happened?
Patient (Miranda): [sighs] I was texting on my phone, and I walked
into a damn tree.
Hallie Thomas: Oh, that’s a new one. All right, I’m gonna walk you
back to a bed, where we can get that thumb set.
You can walk with me?
Patient (Miranda): Yeah.
Hallie Thomas: No texting while you do it.
[chuckling]
Hallie Thomas: One sec.
Thanks.
[door buzzes]
Hallie Thomas: Hey.
Matt Casey: You used to always drop by the firehouse with lunch,
so… I’m returning the favour, if you have time.
Doctor (Margaret): Got you covered.
Hallie Thomas: Come on.
[door buzzes]
Hallie Thomas: I’ll show you around.
Matt Casey: Okay.
Hallie Thomas: We have five beds. But we can stuff eight in here if
we need to.
Matt Casey: All right.
Hallie Thomas: Um, a couple of visitation rooms, a couple of
offices. There’s where we keep the meds. This is
our bathroom. One bathroom, mind you, for all of
us, including the patients.
Man 3: Hallie.
Hallie Thomas: Oh, Steven Goody. He started the clinic. This is
my… this is Matt.
Man 3 (Steven Goody): Hey. Nice to meet you.
Listen, Hallie, do you think you could help
us out on Sunday, maybe, uh, noon to
5:00-ish? Dr. Arend can’t make it.
Hallie Thomas: Yeah, I think so. I just have to check my schedule
over at Lakeshore.
Man 3 (Steven Goody): Great. Just let me know, okay?
Nice to meet you, Matt.
Matt Casey: You too.
Hallie Thomas: One sec.
[door buzzes]
Hallie Thomas: Huh. That’s weird.
Woman 3 (Bridgette): What?
Hallie Thomas: Uh, well…
Woman 3 (Bridgette): Oh, yeah, I know about this. I’ll take care of it.
Hallie Thomas: Okay.
Matt Casey: Everything good?
Hallie Thomas: Yeah. I’m starving. Let’s go.
Matt Casey: You really like it here?
Hallie Thomas: Yes. When I was away, I remembered why I got into
medicine in the first place. I remembered a lot of
things I wanted to reclaim for myself when I
returned.
[laughter]
cutscene
[overlapping chatter]
[video game in background]
Christopher Herrmann: All right.
Herrmann Kids: Look it, look, look, right there.
Christopher Herrmann: I won! Yes! Turn that thing up. Screw the
neighbours [chuckles]
Chief Boden: Uh, uh, no, no. Doing the dishes is my specialty.
Cindy Herrmann: You’re sweet, Wallace.
Chief Boden: Anyway, ain’t you supposed to be in bed?
Cindy Herrmann: You think I’m going to trust Chris alone with those
monsters?
Herrmann & Boden: [laughs]
Chief Boden: Get outta here.
Boden & Cindy: [chuckles]
[glass bottles clinking]
Christopher Herrmann: So?
Chief Boden: So?
Okay. I, uh… I think I’m losing the respect of an
important man in the house.
Christopher Herrmann: Severide?
Chief Boden: Between this Benny and this Tara thing… I think he
thinks I’m the bad guy here.
Christopher Herrmann: Eh. What’s that you always say? “Leaders
lead from the front.”
Chief Boden: Yeah. Sounds like me.
Christopher Herrmann: Up front can be lonely, that’s for sure.
But… it goes with the territory, don’t it?
Chief Boden: Yeah. Thanks.
[bottles clink]
Chief Boden: Again.
cutscene
Matt Casey: Otis. Ready to lay claim to your undies?
[chuckling]
Otis Zvonecek: Yeah, you wish.
Mouch: Just come clean, Otis. No one will judge you. This is a safe
room.
Otis Zvonecek: [sighs] You know what? No. I-I can’t stand to look
at these another shift.
All: Oh!
[laughter]
Mouch: That’s it. Now I know they’re yours.
[station alert blares & buzzes]
(Over PA): Truck 81, Squad 3, Ambulance 61. Vehicle accident.
[sirens wailing]
[horn honking]
Woman 4 (Bystander): The Taurus there was just pulling out of the
hotel parking lot, when, bam! The trailblazer
hit it straight on.
Matt Casey: Thank you.
Kelly Severide: We’re on the trailblazer.
He’s DOA.
[indistinct chatter]
Matt Casey: Ma’am, try not to move until we get you collared and
braced.
Victim 3 (Lady): I need the report to say we’re just co-workers, and
we were coming from a lunch when that jackass hit
us!
Matt Casey: We don’t report that kind of stuff, ma’am.
Victim 3 (Lady): I gotta get out of here.
Matt Casey: Ma’am, you need to remain still.
I need that collar!
Peter Mills: Here you go, Lieutenant.
Matt Casey: Thanks.
Chief Boden: (into radio) Struts, wedges, and cribbing. Stabilise that
car so you can get that woman out.
Kelly Severide: You heard him. Get that cribbing in place. Capp,
centre part!
[glass shattering]
Kelly Severide: Get it piped down. How are we on the other side?
[metal clanging]
Joe Cruz: Almost there.
Chief Boden: Good. Let’s cut that roof away.
[machine whirring]
Kelly Severide: Watch for sparks.
Roof’s clear.
Christopher Herrmann: C-collar.
Leslie Shay: Copy that. Flying in.
Kelly Severide: All right, you ready?
Leslie Shay: Take her out as straight as possible.
Victim 3 (Lady): Where are you taking me?
Gabby Dawson: Lakeshore.
Victim 3 (Lady): Will you call my husband and tell him you found me
by myself?
Gabby Dawson: Ma’am, you’re gonna have to take that up with the
doctors at the hospital.
Victim 4 (Man): [groans]
Kelly Severide: Hey, I’m gonna need you to cover for me for an hour
when we get back to the station.
Harold Capp: You got it.
cutscene
Tara Little: You’re supposed to stay away from me.
Kelly Severide: Am I?
Tara Little: [scoffs] You’re finished. You hear me? I am about to
scream so loud.
Man 2 (Clay White): Hi, Tara.
Tara Little: [scoffs] He can’t. He signed…
Kelly Severide: A non-disclosure and confidentiality agreement?
What else can you take away from him? I checked
with the union attorney, and it turns out in cases of
fraud, the courts don’t care much about those
agreements.
Tara Little: Fraud?
Kelly Severide: Maybe we take you to criminal court, get testimony
on the record or you retract your lie, quit this job.
We never see each other again.
cutscene
Woman 2: Excuse me.
Christopher Herrmann: Yeah.
Woman 2: Hi. Um, I was the one that asked about the pictures.
Christopher Herrmann: Aw, yeah, of course. How are you?
Woman 2: Hi.
Christopher Herrmann: Hey.
Woman 2: Uh, this is my husband, Roger…
Christopher Herrmann: Hey Roger.
Man 4 (Roger): Hey.
Woman 2: And our daughter, Charlotte.
Christopher Herrmann: Aw.
Woman 2: Would you mind?
Christopher Herrmann: Naw, no. No problem at all. Come on
Charlotte. I’ll show you around here.
Come on.
How old is she now?
Joe Cruz: One, two, three.
Woman 2: Uh, 12.
Christopher Herrmann: That’s incredible.
Joe Cruz: Tighter, tighter.
Woman 2: Yeah, plus today is her birthday. So here we are. She’s
really something.
Christopher Herrmann: Yeah.
Joe Cruz: Hey, one more. Let’s do one more. Everybody smile…
hold it.
Christopher Herrmann: Hey, do you have a few minutes. Because I
think we can do something a little better
than a couple of photos.
Joe Cruz: Great.
Woman 2: Sure.
Christopher Herrmann: Yeah? All right.
Woman 2: [laughs]
Joe Cruz: Get in there.
Woman 2: Okay.
Christopher Herrmann: Hey, Chief. We got a kid’s birthday party in
the common room, and they’d like to see
you.
Chief Boden: You tell little Danny or Billy or Leo happy birthday for
me, but I have a mountain of paperwork that I need
to get through.
Christopher Herrmann: This one’s important, Chief.
Chief Boden: Okay, where are the other kids?
Christopher Herrmann: Well, it’s not that kind of party, Chief.
Joe Cruz: Later I’ll grab all the guys from the truck, take a picture
together.
Chief Boden: Hey.
Girl (Charlotte): Are you Chief Boden?
Chief Boden: Yes I am. And are you the birthday girl?
Girl (Charlotte): Yeah.
Chief Boden: And um, what’s your name?
Girl (Charlotte): Charlotte.
Chief Boden: Charlotte. And how old are you, Charlotte?
Girl (Charlotte): 12.
Chief Boden: Well, Charlotte, happy birthday [chuckles]
Girl (Charlotte): Do you recognise me?
Chief Boden: Um, I’m… I’m sorry. No, I don’t.
Girl (Charlotte): 12 years ago today, I was left on the doorstep of
this firehouse. He said you were the fireman
who found me.
Chief Boden: I always wondered what happened to you.
Girl (Charlotte): I was adopted. I live in Indiana now.
Chief Boden: Look at you. Don’t you look great?
Woman 2: She’s always wanted the truth.
Girl (Charlotte): When my mom and dad told me where I came
from, I had to come here.
Chief Boden: And I am very glad that you did.
Girl (Charlotte): Thank you.
Chief Boden: No, thank you, Charlotte. ‘Cause you have made this
Chief… a very happy man today.
Christopher Herrmann: Okay. Here we go.
All: Happy birthday to you; Happy birthday to you; Happy birthday
dear Charlotte; Happy birthday to you.
[applause and cheering]
cutscene
Otis Zvonecek: You’ll still pay a $20 bounty on these briefs?
Mouch: If you’re ready to admit they’re yours.
Otis Zvonecek: You wanna know something curious? I looked at
the tag here. Interesting that they’re a Japanese
brand of underwear not sold in the United States.
Japanese. The same language you’ve been
studying.
Mouch: That… that doesn’t…
Otis Zvonecek: Japanese. The same proverbs you’ve been
spouting for weeks, one of which you used to
fleece me out of 20 bones.
Mouch: Fine.
Otis Zvonecek: [chuckles] Thank you… very much.
Mouch: [sighs] Go ahead. Go, tell everyone. Get a good laugh.
Otis Zvonecek: Oh, I will. I will.
Mouch: I’ve been dating a Japanese woman. I’m doing everything I
can to impress her, because quite frankly, I’m not getting
any younger. Now, she mailed me the underwear as a gift.
So that’s a good sign, right?
Otis Zvonecek: Wait, wait. Mailed? From where?
Mouch: Well, we’ve been uh… our relationship is, uh… we haven’t
actually met yet.
Otis Zvonecek: An Internet girlfriend.
Mouch: I’ve talked to her on the phone…
Otis Zvonecek: Hmm.
Mouch: A lot.
Otis Zvonecek: Right, right. How much have you spent on her?
Mouch: Eh, not much.
Yeah a little.
Otis Zvonecek: [chuckles]
Mouch: Please don’t bust my balls on this, Otis.
Otis!
cutscene
Chief Boden: Hey, just the man I was coming to find. I don’t know if
you’ve heard, but miraculously, Tara Little has quit the
fire service and recanted her testimony against you.
Kelly Severide: Did she?
Chief Boden: What’d you do?
Kelly Severide: Well, I-I…
Chief Boden: You know what? I’d rather not know.
Kelly Severide: It was on the up-and-up, Chief. I promise you that.
Chief Boden: Kelly. Throughout all this, never doubted you. I want
you to know that. Just had to be a Chief.
Kelly Severide: I know. I appreciate it.
cutscene
Gabby Dawson: Can we talk?
Peter Mills: Yeah.
Gabby Dawson: Uh, not here.
Peter Mills: Yeah.
Gabby Dawson: Apparently, it happened during a time when your
mom and dad were already separated. Boden
and Ingrid got together, but Boden backed away
as soon as he found out that your dad and mom
might reconcile. And I didn’t know what to do
with the information. And I didn’t think that it
was my place to tell you, so I just sat on it. But
the more I thought about how close you were
getting, the more I thought that maybe I should-I
should just tell you, so…
Peter Mills: Boden and my mom? [sighs]
And you knew about this how long?
Gabby Dawson: Since the big banquet.
Peter Mills: [sighs]
Gabby Dawson: Look, I know I should’ve told you sooner. I know it.
But you have to see it from my point of view.
Peter Mills: Oh, do I? Is that what I need to do, Dawson?
Gabby Dawson: Peter, I’m sorry. If I’d have known you’d have this
kind of reaction, I would’ve just come right home
and told you then.
Peter Mills: But you didn’t, okay?
Gabby Dawson: I didn’t know.
Peter Mills: Yeah. I need to be alone.
[station alarm buzzes & blares]
(Over PA): Truck 81, Squad 3, Engine 51, Ambulance 61. Building
fire, 3331 West Halsted Road.
Matt Casey: That’s Hallie’s clinic.
[horn honking]
[sirens wailing]
Matt Casey: Oh God.
[indistinct radio chatter]
Kelly Severide: Let’s go! Why aren’t those hydrants open yet?
Christopher Herrmann: We’re gonna need this vented. Get that
aerial to the roof.
Police Officer (Nicole Sermons): My partner, Barnes, he went in
further. He found a woman, but he
couldn’t get to her.
Matt Casey: Hey. Back door is there.
Kelly Severide: Fan out! Look for victims. I’ll stick with Casey.
[coughing]
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): [coughs] I couldn’t reach her!
Matt Casey: Where?
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): [coughs]
Matt Casey: Get him out of here!
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): [coughing]
[siren wailing]
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): [groans]
[ambulance beeping]
[car door shuts]
Kelly Severide: Fire department! Call out!
Matt Casey: Hallie!
[metal cage shaking]
Matt Casey: Hallie!
Chief Boden: (into radio) This is an oven. Everyone out!
[metal clanging]
Mouch: Hallie’s in there.
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): Who?
Leslie Shay: His girl.
Matt Casey: Hallie!
Chief Boden: (into radio) Casey, where are you?
Matt Casey: No! No! No!
[whimpers & groans]
[wood creaking & splitting]
[explosion]
Chief Boden: (into radio) Casey, where the hell are you?
(into radio) Casey. Casey!
[explosion continues]
Chief Boden: (into radio) Talk to me. Where the hell are you?
Kelly Severide: We got her! We’re coming out!
Chief Boden: [sighs]
Gabby Dawson: Get oxygen on her and into the ambulance now.
Police Officer (Jim Barnes): We’ll lead the way.
Matt Casey: I’m coming.
[ambo door shuts]
[sirens wail]
Matt Casey: [heavy breathing] Breathe, Hallie. Breathe.
Damn it, baby. Breathe.
Come on! Breathe.
Breathe. Damn it, girl.
Breathe.
[ambo door shuts]
[sombre music]
Matt Casey: [sniffles]
[sobbing]
No!
No! [sobs & wails]
- end -
Definitions:
D&D = Drunk and Disorderly
K-12 = Fire/Rescue saw. It can be used for forcible entry, ventilation, USAR (Urban Search and Rescue – technical rescue operation that involves the location, extrication, and initial medical stabilisation of victims trapped in an urban area, namely structural collapse due to natural disasters, mines and collapsed trenches), RIC (Rapid Intervention Crew - team of two or more firefighters dedicated solely to the search and rescue of other firefighters in distress), and vehicle extrication
Sawzall = Term often used to describe any brand of reciprocating saw. These saws cut in a back and forth motion, similar to a handsaw that’s just downed four espressos
EMS Plan 2 = 5 Ambulances, 1 Paramedic Field Chief, 1 Deputy District Chief, 1 Command Van, 1 Triage Van, Media Affairs Unit
SVT = Supraventricular tachycardia (SVT) is a condition where your heart suddenly beats much faster than normal
Cardioverting = An electrical cardioversion is a treatment which aims to get your abnormal heart rhythm (arrhythmia) back to a normal pattern. It’s done by sending controlled electric signals to your heart through electrodes placed on the chest
Adenosine = Used to bring your heart back into a normal rhythm
#Kelly Severide#Taylor Kinney#Matt Casey#Jesse Spencer#peter mills#Charlie Barnett#Gabby Dawson#Gabriela Dawson#Monica Raymund#Chicago Fire#Chicago fire department#One Chicago#CFD#chicago fire imagine#chicago fire script#leaders lead#Joe Cruz#Joe Minoso#Christopher Herrmann#David Eigenberg#Leslie Shay#Lauren German#Chief Boden#Wallace Boden#Eamonn Walker#Mouch#Randall McHolland#Christian Stolte#Otis Zvonecek#Brian Zvonecek
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Tagged by @spinalgirl !!!💖🫀
why did you chose your url? - it was a nickname my family had for my old dog, we would say it in a funny voice tripping out the syllables at him haha. he was such a good boy his name was Otis so I guess it went like Otis -> Tito -> Toto -> totopo -> totopopopo etc. Also totopos are a kind of tortilla chip
any side blogs? - no lmao I have no idea what the point of a side blog is. Like just use ur regular blog?
how long have you been on tumblr? - I joined when I was 12 so uhhh 9 years?
do you have a queue tag? - lmao no what the literal fuck is the point of a queue I find them just ridiculously dumb just. reblog the post when u see it ? this blog isn’t catered to other people idc about you fools this is for me to dump 600 posts at once and then dip
why did you start your blog in the first place? - I was uhhhhh into Sherlock. Also I was a nerdy 12 year old in 2012 so the culture appealed to me (rip)
why did you chose your icon? - Tod @alientoastt said I could pick a piece of his art for them to edit for pride so I searched their blog like a catalogue and found this one of Jonny which is INCREDIBLY good and is My Gender which is good for pride and Tod did the rest! Thank you Tod
why did you chose your header? - Mikhail Vrubel’s Six-Winged Seraph (Azrael) !!!! As y’all know for my religion major I have a concentration in religious art and I did a research project last year on angels in Christian artwork and I found this artist from the early 1900s who I really loved who did a LOT of gorgeous angels and he studied old Byzantine icons and repainted them in his youth he’s just a cool guy and I love the color palate of this one a lot!!!! I have a lot to say about it in general
what’s your post with the most notes? - I believe it’s my happy birthday trans people post from tdov?
how many mutuals do you have? - I don’t know???? Are people supposed to know these things?????? How on earth would I know this
how many followers do you have? - 545 but with your help we can get it to 666. Hail Satan
how many people are you following? - 273 but a lot are inactive I think
have you ever made a shitpost? - every post I’ve ever made was shit
how often do you use tumblr each day? - too much :/ I’m always here :// better than Twitter tho
did you have a fight/argument with another blog once? - MANY, yeah. Remember when that one dude said I was homophobic , just pretending to be a lesbian, and obviously a TERF because I said Elias Bouchard was a Tory shithead? Lmao. The most recent tumblr fight I got into was about Dante Alighieri
how do you feel about “you need to reblog this” posts? - posts like that give me INCREDIBLY intense anxiety and I resent them immensely. I feel like I have to reblog them or something bad will happen, but the knowledge that my doing that would cause another person to potentially feel that way is how I’m able to circumvent that impulse. I hate them they suck
do you like tag games? - yea I like talking about myself
do you like ask games? - yea I like talking about myself
which of your tumblr mutuals do you think is famous - I dunno tod probably is the most in terms of famous for reasons that he deserves. Although I know he doesn’t think of himself as famous and I don’t really either. Maybe Ruth @thedreadvampy bc she has notoriety as well but again, I know she doesn’t think it herself as famous and I don’t either?? She’s just Ruth my cool cool friend Ruth who I look up to so much like the into the spider verse meme and who is the reason I’m partway through s1 of riverdale (which is Compelling....... it’s a compelling show). Maybe rumi @milfkarlmarx is tumblr famous but idk if famous is the right word I think y’all are just parasocial
do you have a crush on a mutual? - I mean I’m dating Kisaiya @spinalgirl so does that count
Tagging anyone who wants to do this bc I’m abt to eat crepes and I would rather do that than tag people xxx but if u wanna do it please just say I tagged u I don’t care! :)
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Remoras Full Chapter XXXVI: Winds of Change
I
Early spring, the rustle of the reeds against a gentle breeze. An indentation made among several rows of them as I lay, pressed into the damp soil. Arms under my head, eyes closed, thoughts floated away, just as they ought to. There were many reasons to worry, many wrongs to correct, and many mysteries to solve. But none of those things could happen unless I allowed myself a moment’s rest.
What of the others? Did I abandon them? No. But I wasn’t meant to stay for very long, it just wasn’t who I was. By nature, I was a drifter. By trade, almost, if such a thing were possible in the current age.
Ray gave me a phone so that he could call whenever things got bad again. It was like an ebb and flow, little tremors. Sometimes the activity would quiet down, but not long enough for anyone to think that the nightmares were over. Then they would build back up and people would show up with gashes, scrapes, bruises, all over their bodies with no explanation. Some reported whispers and little shadows that resembled people, but not quite. Whenever it slowed down, I went away again and found some place to hide out.
Why? Well, let’s just say I had my suspicions that I was just as much a target as were Ray and the others. Just the simple fact that an anonymous letter requested my death was enough to warrant such a suspicion. Ha. If whoever was behind that note wanted me so bad, they should have just fought me themselves. No games, no beating around the bush. My time could come any day now, but if someone wanted to take this life from me, by all means. But they ought to expect a fight.
Speaking of notes, there was one which was left for me that night when I met Remora in that abandoned building (well, not so much “abandoned” now, as I managed to get the electricity working before I left. Tragic as it may be, that was all I could do before I left and things turned south for me. I guess too many tip offs and “authorities” grew suspicious. So I bailed, as I often did, and I could only hope that those homeless friends I met weren’t so homeless, even if there was so much more I could have done had I managed to stay). It had Ray and Sunny’s address, as well as the phone number of the one who killed Rhea.
When I awoke, the piece of paper had been next to me, and curious, I picked it up. As soon as I looked over the contents, I scoffed, let out a little laugh.
“She’s really insistent, isn’t she?” I shook my head as I mused to myself. On the back of the paper was a further explanation of the events which transpired between ‘Ves’ and Rhea:
“Ves told me the story at the bar. Not that I needed to know the details from her, I already had an idea. Her original name was Etna Modelo. If that name rings a bell, it’s because she was part of the original ‘ETNA’ project. She had begun to grow unstable as the part of her that housed the angel of happiness clashed with the part of her that was human. Such a clash had adverse effects on those around her. The other ‘R’ and Douglas Fir were tasked with removing her from the world. Both met their end, although Ves seemed rather mournful of ‘R’ when we met, and although cured, it’s evident that the ordeal still effects her.
As I wasn’t there, I don’t know the full story, so I would still recommend asking her yourself. Your call, though. I’d just like to move on from it.”
Remora probably wrote that figuring I wouldn’t want to contact Ves myself. Yes, ‘Etna’, I’ve heard of her before: the girl on the run, the experiment, the artificial doctor. All of her incarnations. Hotheaded, explosive, short-tempered were all words that were used to describe her in reports and between eavesdrops of idle gossip from those who were aware of The Flashbulb’s pet project.
I considered contacting her, but felt it best not to. We were strangers, and she probably wanted to move on from such a thing as well. Besides, that was all I needed to know. Maybe whatever angel was with us now came here because they sensed one of their kin? Who the hell knew?
Rather than solve some cosmic mystery, some existential threat, I was instead relaxed in the fields of a small town in Idaho. As of late, I’ve been staying with this middle-aged man named Cleaver in his little shack. Two hammocks hung inside, he slept below, I above. Next to him was a wolf who he named Mange. Not my first choice of names for a wolf, but it wasn’t my place to judge.
I got up and stretched.
Still early in the day; a crisp air, a cerulean hue in the sky. Everything was early, yet not. As I made my way back to the shack, I caught a glimpse of cleaver with his sagged, sunken face and his potbelly hanging low out from his white T-shirt. Scruff all over his face, gray hairs all over.
“Fancy day for a squirrel barbecue,” he scratched his chin and announced in a low voice.
“Ha. You and your meals,” I replied as I brushed aside some tall grass. “You do realize there’s a restaurant nearby, right?”
“Bah! You just don’t get it, Zephyr: that shit costs money. You know, our ancestors got by just fine without money.”
What makes you think your ancestors are my ancestors?
“Sure, but are you really gonna subsist on corn and rodents?” I retorted.
“Hey, if it tastes good and it doesn’t kill me, what does it matter?”
I put my hands in my pockets and shrugged my shoulders. Fair, I guess.
My swords were laid inside his shack. Mange knew better than to knock them down. When it came to food, I had two options: The Garage Cafe, or run 8 miles to the nearest city and get some Wendy’s.
“I might be gone for a few hours,” I mentioned, “so see you later in the afternoon?”
“You know I don’t care where you go,” he waved off. That was something I liked about staying with him, is that neither of us ever minded the other’s business. He reminded me of an old man I once knew who I also crashed with. Rather literally, but I’d rather not get into that. He was kind enough, and I might not have survived without the help, but it was clear he wouldn’t last. I was just glad that I got to see off that old man. That was a few hundred years ago, but memories were funny that way, how they didn’t care how long ago something was, just how important they could have been.
Before I could depart to Wendy’s (let’s be real, while I knew it was junk food, I couldn’t help but love that place because of its name), I heard the sound of shoes against soft soil, someone running, and their short breaths.
Sounds of Mange’s growls could be heard from inside the shack. I scanned the area until I spotted the source of the running: a young woman, about a foot shorter than I, with messy, shoulder-length blonde hair. Still, there was no denying that I recognized that face.
“Fi...finally,” she huffed and hunched over to catch her breath once she approached me. “I found you. You wouldn’t believe how difficult it was to find you.”
Tell me about it.
I blinked. I opened my mouth, then closed it. It took a while before I could figure out what I wanted to say.
“How did you find me?” I asked, dumbfounded.
“I asked some of your friends in Chicago. Otis, I think was his name, told me how you said you were headed to Caldwell, Idaho. So I went there, asked around, and apparently an employee at the Wendy’s there says she’s seen you head over toward Notus.”
“Dammit, Otis,” I cursed under my breath.
Really, it’s my own fault for telling anyone where I’d be heading. I just figured after I returned from Ray’s diner that I’d check in on how some of those folks were doing.
“You know this girl, Zephyr?” Cleaver called over.
“Yeah. She’s fine. Tell your dog to knock it off,” I called back over to him.
“MANGE! SHUT IT!” Cleaver yelled to the shack. There was a low whimper, then nothing after that.
“Zephyr?” She asked.
“Yeah. That’s my name now. Demetria, was it?” I asked right back.
“Mm-hmm. That much hasn’t changed.”
I studied her but nothing looked all that different from when I met her. If she had an air about her that was different, I didn’t sense it.
“So, Demetria, what can I do for you? It’s clear you wanted me for something, but for what, I don’t know.”
She straightened up her stance and looked up at me, a more resolute expression took hold on her face. One which said that she was ready to get right down to business.
“I want you train me,” she stated.
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me: I want to hone my skills with the blade.”
I puffed up my cheeks, desperate not to break into laughter.
“What?! You think I’m some wise, old master? Do you expect me to take you on as a pupil, and at the end bow and go ‘you have done well, my student?’ Is that it?”
“If that’s what you want to do, go ahead. But I’m serious.”
That much was obvious, but it still didn’t make sense to me.
“Why do you think I’d be a good fit to train you?” I questioned.
“Because our weapons of choice are similar. The way you fight, act, react, every movement has a purpose and it’s like you’re ready for anything. You don’t leave yourself with openings. If I had to pick someone whose style of attack was similar to my own, it would have to be you. Meanwhile, I’m reckless, less refined, and don’t know what I’m doing half of the time.”
“OK. But is there a particular reason why you want to be trained so bad?”
“Because I want to learn restraint.”
That still wasn’t good enough. I felt like I was missing the full picture, and despite how plain her answers were, it was like she was holding back, or avoiding giving anything away.
“Restraint, huh? And you think me, the cop killer, can teach you that?”
I glanced behind me. Cleaver didn’t seem to react to what I said. Strange, I thought that he would have. But I guess he figured it just wasn’t his business.
“You’re right,” she replied, “but I never said I wanted to be you, nor did I say what I meant by restraint.”
“Indeed. You didn’t.”
I paced about and thought it over.
“You use knives, I use large swords,” I pointed out, “each blade is different, with its own style and use. You don’t use a kitchen knife the same way you do a hunting knife. You don’t use an Oodachi the same way you use a Kodachi. Catch my drift?”
She nodded.
“What I can teach you, and let me be upfront, I’ve never taught anyone, may not help you.”
I continued to pace. While I explained such things, my mind was yet to be made up.
“That said, I do have some experience with small blades, but they’re not quite like the knives you’ve got,” I thought back to that night when we fought, “throwing knives and a hunting knife, right?”
“Yes. Although I’d like to broaden my horizons a bit.”
“Mm...I see. Short sword may do, then. But let’s not rush anything. Because if I’m going to train you, you’re going to need to learn more than just how to use a short sword.”
“Of course. So does that mean you’ll accept?” Her words were ones of excitement, anticipation, but her voice was flat. As for me, my smile widened and I let some teeth show through.
“Under one condition: every day, I want you to buy me Wendy’s.”
“Okay, sure, there’s one eight miles away, I can just take Cybele’s plane and head right back.”
“On foot,” I clarified. While I didn’t know who this ‘Cybele’ was, taking a plane would have defeated the whole purpose of such a training.
“What? Really? Do you know how long that would take me? Your food will get cold by the time I bring it back to you.”
“Then learn to get faster,” I shrugged. Wasn’t my problem, so long as I had my grub.
“Hey, don’t mean to butt in, but I got a solution,” Cleaver hobbled forward and chimed in.
“Oh yeah? What?”
“You and this girlie here should run together to the city, then you both can eat once there.”
“Ooh, like a race?” I liked the sound of that.
“Something like that. I’ll even take you back home in the back of the truck by the end of the day, since I can already tell she’s just starting out.”
“Hey! I bet I could run right back here!” Demetria protested.
“Go ahead and try, but I’m doin’ you a favor. Trust me,” he replied. He was right, of course, too, and that gross overconfidence of hers was all the more reason why she needed training.
“By the way, if you’re going to be running, you’re going to need a bottle of water,” I advised, then went into the shack to grab my water bottle: a nice and thick tin thermos. “Take this. We can stop at the Garage Cafe on our way to the city so you can fill it.”
“What about you?” She asked.
“I’ll get water once we get into the city. Plus, I can always get another thermos.”
“All right, all right, so when can we start?” She tapped her foot. Ever so impatient to be tortured, I see.
“Now,” I answered.
“What? Now? I just got he –”
Nope. Wouldn’t hear it. Especially after she begged. I took off toward town, then toward the highway right away. I’d glance back to see her in the distance, and it was clear that she was trying to run.
Okay, when we get to the city, I’ve got to teach her proper form.
Down on the highway, she was still quite behind, but she started to speed up.
“How...how much longer?” She huffed, short on breath, and still early in.
“Like, seven more miles?” I guessed. Really, we weren’t even a quarter of the way there. More like a quarter of a quarter.
She stopped and hunched over to catch her breath.
“You’re not going to get very far standing still,” I stopped too. Even though I was ahead of her, the training would have been moot if I just ran off without her. “It’s not about speed. If you try to sprint your way there, you’ll tire out fast. It’s about sustained motion.”
“How is anyone supposed to keep running for eight miles?!” She gasped out and threw her hands up.
“I just told you. You will get faster, eventually, but what’s important is to build up stamina and use up as little energy as possible. You can walk every now and then if you have to, but you need to keep moving.”
She gasped a few more breaths, then straightened up her posture.
“Okay. Let’s keep going.”
Throughout our run, she’d stop to walk for a few seconds, or take a sip from the thermos, then she kept going for a short burst before walking again. It wasn’t ideal, but I suppose she had to start somewhere. When we finally made it into the city, and Wendy’s, about two and a half hours have passed. Again, not ideal, but I suppose it wasn’t too bad.
She was collapsed at a booth in the Wendy’s, all huffing and puffing and complaining about feeling sick.
“You should get yourself something to eat,” I looked down at the suffering apprentice.
“I can’t. I feel like I’m gonna throw up,” she wheezed.
“Yeah, that’s how it is at first. But hey, I’m amazed you made it at all. It’s a good start. But seriously, some food will help you feel better. Plus you need the calories to replenish your energy.”
“...I’m...vegetarian…”
“Okay? So? Get a freakin’ salad. Go to another restaurant. But eat something.”
Her hands shook as she grabbed on to the edge of the table and struggled to sit up.
“I suppose I can do a salad,” she heaved out the words. I gave her a heavy pat on the back, which made her bellow out, “oof!”
“That’s the spirit!”
A few minutes later, she returned with a box salad, a large thing of fries, and refilled her water.
“Fries, huh?” I pointed out.
“It’s not meat,” she shrugged. Eh, fair point.
I myself had one of those big burgers, large fries, large soda, large chicken nuggets, large everything. Again, it was junk, but considering the name, I was biased.
“So, I should tell you this upfront: if you’re going to train under me, you need to have a reason. I don’t need to know what that reason is, but I won’t accept it if you don’t have one.”
“Trust me, I do,” she responded, not quite focused on me, and more looking listless as she dipped her fries in a pile of red sweetness.
“By the way, do you have a place to stay?”
“No, but I can check into a hotel. It’s not like I don’t have money.”
“If that’s what you wanna do, sure, but while you’re here, you can sleep over at the shack. It’s not the most comfortable, and you’d have to sleep on the floor, but it won’t cost ya anything. More convenient, too. Cleaver won’t mind.”
“Cleaver, huh? You sure seem to make friends easily,” she observed.
“Heh. It’s not quite like that, but I try to form connections where I can. I think you’ll find that it’s practical, pragmatic even, to get on someone’s good side wherever you go. Doesn’t matter if you think you’re stronger or weaker,” I shook my head and smiled, “it’s a lonely world. Universe, even. But there’s things you can do to make it less lonely. I’m a loner, both by trade and nature, but we’re all here on this Earth to help each other.”
“That’s a good philosophy. I’ve never given such things any thought.”
“You probably never needed to. It’s better if you don’t have to give it thought, but when you’ve lived as long as I have, with as many experiences as I have, you get plenty of moments to think. Reflect.”
“Huh?” She looked my way, as if I had caught her attention with my little musings.
“Huh what?”
“Oh, I thought you said my name.”
“What? ‘To think’? I guess that sounds like Demetria…”
‘My hearing’s probably off because of all that running,” she shook her head and groaned, “seriously, my ears won’t stop popping.”
“You’ll get used to it.”
“How long do we have to keep this running for, anyway?”
“Until you can manage to do it without stopping to walk. Stopping for water is one thing, but even then, it shouldn’t take long. As I said, it’s not about speed. It’s fine if you run slow, just don’t stop running.”
We stretched outside after our meal and wandered around.
“I’m taking online classes, actually, so I may have to pass on your offer,” Demetria mentioned as we walked through the city.
“There’s Wi-Fi at the shack. I’m an engineer, it wasn’t too hard to do.”
“Oh, okay. You really think of everything, huh?”
I denied such a claim.
“I just try to see what’s possible. So tell me about these online classes of yours.”
“There’s not really much to tell. I’m studying marine biology, but I don’t really care for it. I’m just doing it to finish what I started,” she gestured toward me and I caught a glimpse of her reflection through the glass of an electronics store. She looked so animated, even as she told me how little interest she had in her studies.
“That’s still impressive in its own right,” I replied. It got me thinking about how many projects I left unfinished, how many times I had to leave a place and its people behind, how many missions went abandoned when new information made me see a different perspective. Even the times when I just abandoned a project out of a loss of faith or desire to see it complete. What could have come of them had I completed them?
We wandered around town for a little while, then sat at a park, although little was said. Just before sunset, Cleaver’s rusty pickup truck sputtered and screeched as it arrived at the base of the park. Both Demetria and I hopped in the back and we let the gentle breeze of early spring overtake us. Soon we were back at the shack and once we landed on the soft soil, I broke down the plan.
“While she’s training with me, can she stay here?” I asked.
“I don’t see a problem with that, but she’ll have to sleep on the floor next to Mange.”
“Who’s Mange?” Demetria leaped out from the side of the truck and landed on her feet with a thud.
“Eh, just my dog. He’s friendly. Might growl at ya. Might even bite your arm. Might even rip it off. But he’s friendly.”
She squinted.
“It’s a lone wolf he found,” I explained instead. As it turns out, Cleaver wasn’t very good with this stuff. “I think as far as Mange is concerned, as long as you don’t actively pose a threat, he’ll probably consider you part of the pack.”
“Hold up. Why do you have a pet wolf?” She turned to Cleaver. He scratched the back of his head.
“Helps keep away the cougars,” he answered all matter-of-fact.
“Why do you need to keep away older women for?” She questioned and I almost spat out the soda that had already been digested three hours ago.
“I like this one,” he pointed his thumb to her, “she knows what’s up.”
“Actually, I think it’s the opposite,” I refuted.
“So while we’re training, what if we practice sparring right outside the shack?”
Then it would get interesting, I thought the devious thought. Of course I wasn’t going to disclose that.
“We’d just have to keep the door closed, I guess,” I said instead.
We all made our way inside, a very cramped space. There was a bathroom in the back, complete with a shower, but aside from that, it was a bedroom with little room to house one person, let alone three plus a gray wolf. Besides the bunk bed hammock and the wooden planked floor, there was a dresser on the left end once we entered, and on the right was where Mange slept (when he wasn’t sleeping outside).
“You don’t mind if I have my laptop open while you sleep, do you?” Demetria asked Cleaver as he was already headed up to the top hammock to get some shut eye.
“Do what you want, but if the bright screen wakes Mange, don’t come cryin’ to me when he bites ya.”
“Here, I’ll sleep on the floor across from you,” I offered to her, “so don’t even worry about it.”
“Thanks,” she turned quiet and looked down to her side.
“She’s working toward her degree!” I cupped my hands to tell Cleaver. “Her studies are very important to her!”
“Really, now?”
“How the hell should I know? They’re her studies, not mine,” I hissed out the words, trying not to be too loud as to wake Mange.
“Bah, you know it’s all a scam,” he grumbled.
“You’re a scam,” I mimicked back.
“Are you gonna be okay sleeping on the floor?” Demetria seemed puzzled at my offer.
What about you? I bet you’re more used to sleeping on a bed than I am.
“I’ll be fine. I don’t care where I sleep. I’ve slept just about everywhere,” I reassured her.
“Bah, there she goes again. ‘Look at me, I’ve slept in penthouses and castles and trash cans alike’. We’ve heard it all before,” Cleaver started up again. I ignored him, and leaned in to whisper to Demetria:
“That’s him on his good days. Now type away.”
Sleep never came easy for me, if much at all. That’s always been true, or at least as far back as I could remember. The dim glow of Demetria’s laptop didn’t make much of a difference. Mange for his part stretched during a couple of intervals, but other than that, didn’t seem to pay Demetria any mind. Not even as she was leaned up against the back of his fur.
There wasn’t much else to do but watch. After a while, she started to yawn and her eyelids started to droop down. There were a few more clacks against the keyboard, then she pulled the laptop screen down slow and closed it before setting it aside. She didn’t seem to notice me at all. All the better for it. I wasn’t fixated on her, but my surrounding as a whole. It was a quirk of mine which I attributed to countless years of pursuit. Always alert, always looking forward. If someone were to try to kill me in their sleep, they would be left disappointed.
If somebody managed to kill me while I was asleep, I’d like to live long enough to thank them.
Still, for what it was worth, I was still human. Tiredness was still a thing. Sleep came eventually. Even if just a single wink, I would have liked that. An hour must have passed, and I felt ready to nod off when I heard Demetria mutter something. It was faint, but I had peachy keen ears, and was able to make out what she said:
“Games? Like having a snowball fight? Building a snowman? Then again, it doesn’t have to be a snowman…”
“Snowman?” I mouthed. I had to think about it, because it sounded familiar. I soon began to hum a little tune.
“Isn’t that...from a movie?” I asked myself in a low mutter.
Not something I ever watched, but I’ve probably passed by TVs in display windows playing that thing. Those kind of animated films with songs are inescapable, regardless of the quality of said tunes. Well, I’m not going to speak on the quality of something I’ve no interest in. It’s just kind of amusing that she’d be reciting such a song in her sleep. Despite her moody exterior, maybe she’s just a kid at heart.
Demetria started to stir and then her eyes crept open.
“So, Frozen, huh?” I asked, my voice a little hoarse. Likely due to my lack of sleep.
“Mm...what?” She yawned a sleepy little mumble.
“You were talking in your sleep. I think you were singing a song from Frozen,” I pointed out.
“Huh. The only Disney movie I like is Finding Nemo. So what song was I singing?”
“Hmm...’do you wanna build a snowman?’ I think it’s called.”
“Oh wow. Asleep me has poor taste. Can’t say awake me has any better taste, but still.”
“Whatever. Just let it go and get back to sleep.”
She nodded, then closed her eyes again and leaned back. Soon it seemed that sleep had taken her once more, though I did hear her mutter one more thing before departing to a soundless rest:
“Not like I plan on being around much longer, anyway.”
Heh, I leaned my head back against the dresser. You and me both.
In the morning, I stepped out of the shack and took in the crisp morning air. It was bliss, it was serene, it was –
“Ugh...so sore…”
Behind me, a shambling zombie-like figure groaned. Almost as if someone had raised the dead.
“Right. I should have taken that into consideration,” I groaned as well, realization of who was behind me set in.
“What are we going to do?” She scratched the back of her head and a look of general displeasure possessed her face.
“We eat some food, we do some stretches, we do some heavy lifting,” I ran through the check list.
“Heavy lifting?! I thought we’d be taking it easy today since I’m so worn out!” She was flabbergasted and most devastated.
“This is taking it easy. We’re not going to be running to the city today. Instead we’ll work the upper body.”
“What happened to ‘buy me Wendy’s every day?’” Demetria mentioned, something I didn’t expect to get brought up.
“Eh,” I shrugged. “It doesn’t have to be every day. How about just every time we go into town? Now, I’m going to make it so you hurt in other places, so are you ready?”
She gulped, being given an answer she didn’t expect, herself.
“If at any time you want to quit, just say the word,” I offered. “Because it’s not going to get any easier from here. You’ll just need to get better.”
She gulped, being given an answer she didn’t expect.
“If at any time you want to quit, just say the word. Because it’s not going to get any easier from here. You’ll just need to get better.”
Another gulp, then she shook her head.
“I’m not going to quit. I can’t afford to.”
Her determination was commendable. I had to give her that. If I didn’t end up breaking her spirit, she could very well end up a force to be reckoned with in her own right.
So it went: we stretched. We walked around the fields near the shack. Our day came and went with little word save for what was spoken on her resolute face. Another night. Another dim glow from her screen as she typed away at whatever project she had.
Dusk turned to daylight; we ran once more the following morning. There were still some stumbles, still some hurdles. She steadied her movements more, and with only being the second run, it was a startling improvement. Maybe minuscule in the grand scheme of themes, but I would have thought it would take longer for her to show any signs of improvement.
Two or three miles in, she stopped, slowed to a walk, then a few minutes later, built back into a jog. This happened another mile out, as well as the next. During the second half, however, whether it be a high or just having found a rhythm, she managed to keep pace the whole way through.
After our meal, we found a nearby park and wandered into a deeper portion of the park, less populated, with the thicket of trees concealing us from the potential misunderstood eyes of passerby.
“All right. Now it’s time to fight.”
She was slumped over as she had followed me into the park already worn out. However, upon the word ‘fight’, she perked up. That, or it was a look of shock. Either way, I had her attention.
“A...Already?! It’s only the second time running here and I’m still a little worn out.”
“Your enemies aren’t going to care if you’re worn out. Hell, they’ll use that to their advantage,” I corrected her. Not that she had enemies. Maybe I was just drawing from experience with that example.
“You’re right,” she agreed, something which took me by surprise. However, as poised as she looked, it was little more than show, and her knees wobbled before the fight even began.
I swerved my left leg to the side and dragged my foot against the soft grass, which tripped her and she fell before she could even attempt to avoid it. She landed right on her butt and struggled to get up. Before she could bring herself up, I stomped down, and that time, she reacted well enough to roll over.
“While the idea does turn me on, some things are more important,” she remarked with a grimace.
...What?
She hurried up that time and I swung my right fist in a slow and deliberate manner, slow enough that it would have given her enough time to do any number of things in response. She chose to block it with her left arm and although she reacted in time, I soon overpowered her. In spite of that, she tried to hold her arm up. As she was distracted, I once again swept my leg to the side and knocked her down.
“Don’t try to block if you can’t withstand the hit. Dodge instead. Also, don’t leave yourself open. Your enemy could find an array of maneuvers to attack you if you leave yourself an opening.”
She winced and gave a short nod.
II
Further days passed; what was one week turned to two. Run, stretch, block, dodge, react. After two weeks, she managed to run the whole way through. From Notus to Caldwell with a reserve of stamina left over. At the park, she jumped when I did a side-sweep. Either a short jump, or jumped back. When I swung my fist, rather than block it, she would either duck down, or lean back.
Another week went by and on the third week, I introduced weapons into the mix.
“Dodging, avoiding hits, all that’s well and good, but you’ll also need to fight back,” I instructed.
“Of course,” she replied.
I knew she had her knives on her. I also gave her a short sword to use. For my part, I had my signature katana, though to make it more fair for her, I pressed a button on the blade’s scabbard and split them into two kodachi-type blades.
“Wha – how did you do that?” Her eyes widened and she blinked, astonished at the sight.
“It’s not an ordinary blade. It came with my old profession, you could say.”
“You mean as a janitor? Did everyone have weapons like that?”
“Some. I’m sure you’re aware that Remora’s rifle can split into two smaller, pistol-like guns which fires off a wave of energy. My blade, or blades, are coated in an oil which repels a certain kind of creature.”
“Angels,” she answered.
So you know? Whatever the reason, I’m sure it’s not a good thing.
“That is one way to call them. But not angels in the biblical sense. No, more like the ‘beings beyond comprehension’ sense.”
“Yet we comprehend enough to craft weapons to deal with such things,” she added.
“Sorta. It’s hard to know when these weapons will be useful, or even how useful they will be. Especially when dealing with beings that are unheard of.”
Like what Ray and Sunny were dealing with up in the arctic. Whatever was behind it, I had little to go off of. If they even wished to stand a fighting chance, I would need to know more, but I didn’t know how to learn further.
What was known wasn’t comprehensible, either, as it didn’t seem to fit a specific pattern or intention – creatures that were an amalgamation of other creatures, contorted to a strange shape. Shadowy mass filled with various materials and limbs, like rope, wire, legs, and tentacles that could cause others to lose their sense of self. People whose limbs grew out from their backs, who could control such strange hybird creatures. Then the latest addition – a fog which blanketed the area near Ray’s diner and gave injuries to passerby. Some reported shadows of strange shapes, others reported voices.
What exactly did it feel? What did it embody? How did all of those phenomena correspond with what the source embodied?
At any moment, one of the diner’s proprietors would call me up to tell me that things got bad again and I’d have to cut the training off there so I could hurry to their aid. Remora’s rifle more than likely protected the diner from the inside, but the surrounding area was fair game for the entity and the beasts it produced. For now, however, I could focus on training Demetria, who still had a great deal to learn, even if she picked up on things at an alarming rate.
We clashed with the blades, and that time, she was able to block well. At one point, I swung down only for her to block it with the scimitar I let her borrow. When I swung the other blade to the right, she side-stepped to avoid the swing. Then the left, and the same. However, she kept up the block the whole way and even if she managed to dodge in spite of the openings she left, she was still overpowered when I swung both blades down against the scimitar. She tried to bend her knees and apply more pressure, but it wasn’t enough, and both blades were but a hair’s breath away from her face.
Without any more strength to give, she fell. I put aside my weapons before they could cut her down, then I scolded her.
“Again, don’t block if you know you can be overpowered. You did good blocking one blade, but you left yourself open. If the enemy starts adding more pressure and you can’t keep up, release and get out of the way.”
“Right…” She sounded wiped out. I couldn’t blame her, and she was improving, but she needed to know where her weak spots were.
“We’ll call it a day for now. Tomorrow we’ll spar by the shack.”
“Right on! I’ve been wanting to do that since the beginning!”
Are you that excited to get beaten up?
“What’s so special to you about training near the shack and training in this park?”
“Well, for starters...I’m always worried someone’s gonna show up and get concerned. It might scare someone and they could even call the cops!”
“Let the cops come. I’ll skewer them all with glee,” I dispelled any unease she had.
“It’s not just that! The field by the shack is really secluded so we can go ahead and go all out!”
Ah, yeah. That is a good point.
Our training continued the next day at Cleaver’s shack. We had an open dirt clearing where we weren’t as hindered by tall grass. Both of us stood on far ends of the circle with our weapons in hand.
“Come at me, bro!” She shouted.
I had a moment of weakness. As in, I hesitated, hearing such a ridiculous statement. Or phrase, rather. It only took a moment, though, and after that moment washed away, I rushed in.
Our blades clashed once more and she dodged the attacks, struck when she saw an opportunity, and timed her blocks well as well. Although I could also block and dodge each of her attempts, it had more to do with my experience.
You really are a fast learner, aren’t you?
However, another weak point showed through once more as soon as I struck with a side-slash. No, she managed to dodge it. That wasn’t the problem: the problem was that she pushed her legs in and jumped up. If she didn’t manage to jump high enough, or didn’t move in time…
“Wrong!” I shouted as I stood in place.
“What’s wrong?” Her voice squeaked and she scowled. To her it must have been just a disagreement of ideas, and she looked ready to protest my scolding, but it had to be done regardless.
“You dodged it, but the way you did so was way risky and took up more of your energy that it should have. You’ve built up a lot of stamina, but in a fierce battle, every bit of energy counts. It would have been less risky and have used up less of your energy to have stepped back, even jumped a little backward, than to try to jump over it.”
“Yeah...I see what you mean now,” she looked down and shook her fists, obvious shame written all over her.
“I’m not saying this to be rigid. If you didn’t jump high enough, you would have gotten slashed for sure.”
“I’ve been slashed in the stomach already,” her voice turned low, and a sullen look took over. She then lifted up her shirt, which made me take a step back. Across her stomach was, indeed, a long thin scar. “So it’s not so bad, right?”
“It’s true that slashes are generally less harmful than stabs. It’s said that in old wars, soldiers would slash rather than stab their enemies so they wouldn’t have to bear the weight of killing another person. But a slash can still be very harmful depending on how much force is placed, and the proximity. If you get a deep slash, like say you strike a vein, expect blood to spray out. An endless flow that you wouldn’t be able to stop, and if unable to be treated soon enough, death. Given enough force, one could even slash a limb clear off or cut someone in half.”
“Okay, okay, I get it. Sheesh. Such gory imagery,” she made little “ack, ack” sounds to accompany her statement so that she could further express her disgust.
“It’s just muscle memory is hard. I know the right moves but sometimes I do the wrong one because so used to a particular pattern,” she added, something which I understood.
“Which is why we need to take it from the top until you get it right.”
We continued through the afternoon until sunset hit. After we called it good, Demetria headed back into the shack.
“Well, this thesis isn’t going to bullshit itself,” she told me as she waved before entering the shack. I waved back, but sat out for a while, letting myself bask in dusk’s chill.
“Is this what I’ve been reduced to? A mentor? An escort?” No, such thoughts weren’t good, especially not when spoken out into the air.
It was too late, of course. Once those words were spoken, the rest of the thoughts followed. Like, was I ever alive at all? What did it look like when I had a life? What was I now but a ghost, a shade, a wandering remnant? It wasn’t even that I didn’t want to help others or be a mentor, but that the only semblance of a life I had was one that would never leave. Violence was ingrained in me, ran through my bloodstream as I lived and breathed. There could be no help without it and the only justice I knew was an unshaken, violent justice.
For a while longer, I let myself sit beside the comfort of darkness. Close to silence, with the only sounds to fill the air being the crickets and the frogs which hid out in any given direction.
With a sigh, I allowed myself back inside. Demetria sat there, as she had many nights, with her face glued to that laptop screen. However, when she saw me enter, she closed her laptop and addressed me.
“How are you feeling?” She looked up.
I sat down and crossed my legs. I smiled, for I knew no other way to express anything.
“Just how I always am,” I shook my head, it sounded like such a carefree dismissal. Part of me expected her to be satisfied by such an answer.
“And how is that?” She asked instead.
That was a more difficult thing to answer than it should have been. It wasn’t a sense of monotony, but something else. Loss of life, or a loss of humanity.
“Forgive me if I’m unable to give a straight answer,” I replied after some thought.
“That’s okay, I’m gay.”
Fine, but just know that you brought this on yourself.
“Some say that ghosts are just memories, so in that sense, nothing ever leaves, does it, so long as the memory is there?” I posed the question. As I said, I couldn’t give a straight answer.
“Are you saying that you feel like a ghost?”
I shook my head.
“Not quite. I told you once that I considered my old self dead, right?”
As well as my current self. But only in a different sense.
“Yeah. How you were accused of –”
“I told you what my original name was back then. It was a lie. Not the story, but the name. Considering how long ago it was, my name was more than likely a simple one. Like Kuso Gozen, or something. There were bits and pieces of that life, that girl, that I remember. Being accused of an assassination, being put to death...but much of the details are lost. Forgotten. Hell, it’s enough for me to question if what I remember is real or made up,” I let out a deep breath. I was doing this again, wasn’t I? And who was I to say that was to confide would be any more real than last time?
“It could have been that I did murder someone. That I was given due punishment, and chose to evade such punishment. Based on what I know of myself, I wouldn’t put it past me to take out a corrupt official. But that’s beside the point.”
“What is the point?”
I shook my head.
“Ha. If I knew...well, I suppose the point is: maybe it’s better that I don’t remember. Maybe it’s better to be forgotten. To be more than dead, less than a memory.”
“I think I can relate with that. I suppose most people would prefer to be remembered, but I suppose to some, it may be better to forget. Like if you did something bad.”
“Mm...that’s not quite what I mean. As for that old self, yes, she’s forgotten. But my current self? I don’t mind people knowing my deeds. But this life I’ve had...I don’t want to preserve it.”
“What? You mean you’re going to let yourself get killed?”
No, that wasn’t quite right, either. But then, what ever was?
“Hell no,” I refuted, “I wouldn’t go down without a fight. But I’m just waiting for my time. Some say I’m like a cockroach, the way I’ve survived so much and had so many lucky breaks. But for the sake of my own sanity, I hope that’s not the case.”
“Why live your life that way? Why are you so eager to die?”
“It’s not like that. Maybe it’s a curiosity. How it will end and when. Will it be a quiet one, or a roaring crescendo? Will I be remembered afterward? Talked about? Or will I be forgotten, not even a passing name.”
“I’ll remember you. I already met you. Plus you’ve got all those homeless friends,” she pointed out.
“Ha! I guess you’re right about that one. It’s easy to call anyone a friend when you know you’re just passing through! We form a connection, make small talk, and then I disappear into the wind. It’s not really any different than how life was like with that company – I’d visit different places in different timelines, meet some people, do my job, and then go onto the next one. That’s just how it was. I suspect everyone who worked there, it didn’t matter what their personalities were or how big of a heart they had, got that way: just passing through, not really being alive. If any of us ever were in the first place.”
“How do you even know others were like that?” concerned dripped from her lips. Despite her stoic front, she really couldn’t keep all of that in, could she?
“Let’s call it an observation. I’ve seen how others were: some cope by indulging in their vices. Sex, drugs, booze, you name it. Some go numb, others break down, unable to find a sense of calm. Some can try to settle down, live a quiet life, maybe try to start a family, but it never leaves them. That feeling, like life, death, it may as well be the same thing. I think it’s the job, it does something to you. To all of us. Maybe that’s why I think that the ones who died were the lucky ones. Otherwise you just end up like me, waiting for your time to come.”
I gave a hearty laugh and smiled, not caring who I would wake up.
“I guess that’s why it’s so easy to talk to you about all this, because it doesn’t really matter. I may as well be talking to myself.”
She turned her head, puffed up her cheeks, and scowled. I thought she was ready to blow up at me, talk about how unkind that statement was, that I shouldn’t have had that mindset, but when she finally spoke again, it was about something else entirely.
“Do you know how Rhea died?” She asked, a fun topic for the whole family.
“Yeah. Was assigned to get rid of someone who was possessed by the embodiment of happiness. It was a pretty big task: potential world at stake scenario. Anyone could have lost to something like that.”
“Are you sure? Because I’m not so sure.”
“Why do you say that?” I stroked my chin, eager for her explanation.
“Ves is my cousin’s wife. She’s still mournful about the whole thing. She never wanted to kill her, and in fact, I think Ves was the one who could have easily been defeated. Apparently the two actually talked, tried to work out a compromise. Rhea actually showed her mercy, and in the end, I think Rhea was holding back because she wanted to be the one to go.”
How interesting. Mercy. Well, I suppose I would have at least tried to figure out what all of the options were before going in for the kill. So it’s not too surprising if it happened to be the same way.
“Did your cousin’s wife tell you all that?”
She nodded.
“It may have been the case that she was holding back, who’s to say?”
“But why would she do that if she knew the world was at stake? Did she just forsake the world?”
I remember the first time I met up with Demetria, she said that she had little interest when it came to Rhea. So now the sudden interest struck me as a little odd. But then again, maybe there was something to spurn such interest and I just didn’t know it.
“It’s doubtful the world ever mattered in the first place. After all, it was just one instance of the world, out of an endless amount of instances.”
“Yeah, but it’s my world! It’s the only instance I have!”
I leaned over and pressed my finger to her lip.
“Shh. Others are sleeping.”
After I released my finger and returned to my original position, I continued.
“She didn’t have a world she belonged to. While I’m sure she understood the risk, the stakes weren’t the same for her as it may have been for you. Maybe she was just done, and knew of no other way to go but through a fight.”
“But why did she show Ves mercy? That’s just not like her, is it?”
“Maybe she had a last minute change of heart. It’s possible.”
“Do you think she was infected by the entity? Is that why?”
I shook my head.
“It’s a possibility. There’s no way to know that for certain, though. As much as it’s natural for many of us to speculate, the bottom line is that the only person who knew what was going through her head was herself, and she’s not around to give us any answers.”
“You’re right...I was just wondering: what would you have done if you were in her position?”
I thought it over some.
“I don’t think I would have done anything different,” I concluded.
“Do you think she was lucky as well?”
Ah. So maybe that’s why she brought it up. I had to close my eyes for that one, lest the piercing glare give anything away.
“What do you think the answer to that one is?”
There was a pause, and there was something serene about such a pause. The heavy breaths of the wolf behind her, the snoring of the middle aged man at the top hammock. It carried with it a peaceful wind.
“I’m worried about you,” she said at last.
“Don’t be,” I shook my head and smiled, “the student has no need to worry about the mentor. You should get some rest.”
When we picked up on the following day, her growth was more than apparent. I’d strike down, but she’d sidestep, then do a sweeping slash, which I blocked, then did a slash of my own. She surprised me next, by sliding down, then struck up. I had to react fast just to block it.
“Ha. You’re getting better at reacting, but you’ve yet to land a hit,” I remarked.
“Just you wait,” she shot back with a smug smile.
Such confidence. I wonder if it will last.
In an effort to show that it wasn’t just a bluff, she rolled once, did another side step, which made me turn around as she made her next strike. Again, our blades clashed, and I still had another blade in my other hand. However, this time, she pulled something out from her pocket and I leaned my head back just in time not to get hit by what turned out to be a knife.
When I realized what she just tried, I couldn’t help but laugh. It wasn’t a condescending laugh, in fact, I was quite impressed. All the same, I was as amused as I could ever be.
“Ha, good one. You fancy yourself a ninja or something?” I gave a hearty chuckle.
“Not quite. I just need to learn all that I can,” she dispelled any such idea. She didn’t look any short on energy, either. That was good.
We’ll have to hone that aim of hers, but she seems to already have some sort of grasp. Force and precision, two things to work on.
“Let’s make things more interesting, shall we?” The proposal slithered out from my mouth as I slipped a cunning grin.
“MANGE!” I called out.
She looked over, a sharpened glance. It wasn’t even so much of a reaction, but more of an acknowledgment.
Has she adopted some of my traits? Is it from the training? Or did it just come with the confidence?
Busted out through the door of the shack came Mange, all fired up. That tired old wolf may not have been much but a heavy sleeper on his good days, but he could still be tricked into thinking there was trouble.
“Now you’ll have to dodge both of us.”
Before, I’d have expected her to react like, “really? Wolves are much faster than people! And they’re huge!” But instead, once again, a single nod of acknowledgment.
We clashed further, clangs of our blades as we maneuvered around each other. But soon, Mange gave chase, and as expected, darted toward Demetria. She stepped back, but he was quick to turn. She stepped to the side, but that didn’t stop him in the slightest. It was getting to the point that she was backing further away from me without even realizing it.
Panic seemed to set in and she turned her head from side to side and noticed how much further she had gotten. Mange was seconds away, and Demetria rolled forward, which seemed to do her little good. I charged toward her, like a little nudge to remind her who her target was, and I watched as she knew she was cornered on both ends: Mange behind her, and I about to strike her down in front.
So in a twist of events, she crouched down, then when Mange got close enough, she leaped into the air and launched herself off of that poor wolf’s nose, which propelled her further. I watched as she tossed a knife down in my direction, and I blocked it with the sword at my right. However, she then swung her blade down from over her shoulder, and I reacted just in time, with the blade at my left hand overhead. However, the force was strong enough that I needed both arms free, and before I could lift the other sword, she swung her legs together and flung herself forward against my abdomen, knocking me to the ground.
With her on top, the blade raised against my head and her head close, I could feel her warm, heavy breaths on my face. They weren’t breaths of exhaustion, but excitement instead.
I wonder if that’s what she meant when she said she wanted me to teach her ‘restraint’.
“Well, you’ve got me pinned down. What’s next?” I flashed a sharp-toothed grin.
No answer. Mange didn’t seem so interested in pulling her off, despite the image present. So it was up to me: I grabbed her by the wrist, even with that sword firm in her hand, and tossed her off of me.
“Waah!” She squealed, caught off guard.
I got up and brushed off any dirt that had gotten on me.
“Good job. That was a risky move, but it paid off. To think I had just tried that today and you had already figured out a counter,” I commended her. However, she walked off and seemed to have brushed aside every word.
“It’s still not enough,” she grumbled.
“What is enough?” I demanded. As much as I hated to admit, her attitude got to me.
“I don’t know yet, but I’ll know when I get there,” she huffed out a reply.
“Hey,” I called her out. That time, she turned around. “I know I said you didn’t need to tell me the reason, but what is it that you’re after, anyway?”
“I need to improve my aim when throwing knives, I need to improve my reaction time. My reflexes still aren’t enough.”
“Bullshit. What more do you need?”
“I need to be able to dodge a bullet,” she replied with such conviction that despite the absurdity of the statement, I had no choice but to take it seriously.
“If that’s your goal, you should give up right now. It’s never going to happen, no matter how good you get.”
“I need to.”
“Nobody’s fast enough,” I shot down once more, “you think I can dodge a bullet? You think I’m faster than what comes out of a gun? I just have to get lucky and hope there’s something I can shield myself behind. That, or hope that I’m faster than the one with their hand on the trigger.”
“Fine. Then I need to be able to block a bullet,” she was adamant, which only served to irritate me further.
“With what? A sword? Even if you could react fast enough, it’s more likely that the bullet will break the sword. What then?”
“I’ll…” She grit her teeth, “I’ll think of something.
How stubborn. Looks like I’ll need to compromise.
“Fine. How about this? For the next few days, or however long it takes, I’ll borrow your throwing knives, toss them your way, and you’ll have to dodge them. I’ll paint some targets on trees and I’ll have you keep throwing until you can manage to hit the middle. I’ll make sure you’re using proper form. Does that sound good?”
She gave it a few seconds pause, then signaled her approval with a single nod.
“Good. Now, let’s practice some sprinting. Run around the field for a while until you get worn out. Mange will chase you around, but don’t worry, he won’t actually hurt. He may knock you down, and he is heavy, but he’s friendly enough.”
With a sprint, she took off. As she went busy with that, I returned to the shack and decided to lay down for a little while on the bottom hammock. For whatever reason, as I lay, a smile formed, then plastered its way onto my face. Above me came the gruff voice of Cleaver:
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
“Maybe I am,” I replied, “who’s to say?”
“You’re not fooling anyone. You’re getting a kick out of this.”
“Of course,” I gave in, “I’m most alive in a fight. Not to mention, it feels refreshing. Both to fight without such high stakes, and to be a mentor. It feels like I’m passing on my knowledge to the next generation.”
“I don’t really get it, but I could tell there was something up with you ever since you first showed up.”
“Oh?” Consider my interest piqued.
“I mean, c’mon, some tall Japanese swordswoman just shows up looking for a place to crash? Like, what time period do you think this is? Obviously there’s something up with that, either that, or you’re just a weirdo.”
To be honest, I’m more of an oddball than I’d care to admit.
“But you know,” he went on, “I never pried, I never asked about what your story was, because I just didn’t care. As long as you’re going to help me out and mean no trouble, then it’s none of my business.”
“See? That’s why we get along so well. I’ve never asked you what your deal was, either,” I threw at him. If it wasn’t clear, I was a little cheeky.
“You wanna know something else? When you and that girl are talking late at night, I can hear you. You’re not as quiet as you think you’re being.”
“Aw, Cleaver, at your age, you need your beauty sleep.”
“Guh,” he grunted, “you’re one to talk. What with your talks. I’ll be honest, I don’t understand most of it, but your whole ‘I’m just waitin’ for my time’ bullshit like you’re some old woman about to croak.”
“Heh. I am. I’ve lived a long life, Cleaver.”
“You’re younger than I am. I bet you haven’t even hit forty.”
“I bet you’re right. But I’m past my expiration date, so to speak. With the kind of life I’ve lived, I’d say I’m past the average life expectancy. It’s a little strange...just to exist at all.”
Large breaths of air lingered just before the last few words were uttered. It was as if I had gone speechless, starved of oxygen.
“Well, if you’re havin’ fun, that’s gotta count for something,” he seemed like he was trying to make some sort of attempt at encouragement.
“Never said it didn’t, but thank you for the sentiment.”
“Another thing, uh, for what it’s worth, what does it matter if you’re just passing by? Doesn’t mean it don’t got meaning. Plenty of people are just passing by, having chance encounters. But it still has value.”
“I agree. Try not to put too much stock into the things I say,” I advised him. Selfish as it may have been, part of me wanted to know what kind of life he had lived, and why he lived in a shack out in an open field. Was it choice or circumstance? Was there another option? But just like him, I was fine with not knowing.
I think it’s always been that I’ve gotten along most well with older folks of a certain kind. Lost souls, or those who were destitute, vagrant, fallen on bad luck and hard times. Hermits whose own lives had become a distant memory. There was nothing to be fascinated by it, nothing romantic. It was just a certain kinship I felt. I in no way ever wanted to just scrape by with whatever I could reach for. It was just what I developed into, and now I felt as if I could live no other way. If I could even live at all.
III
Even as the days passed, and another couple of weeks flew by, it proved not to scratch that itch she so desired. Despite every throw closer and closer to the bullseye, every projectile avoided, every knife caught in the grip of her gloves (that one surprised me the most. Another risky move, but one I allowed, despite the trouble that could have caused. It seemed like less of a mistake and something she wanted to do. Still, I made sure to drill in her head not to try that with bullets, because all that would do, best case scenario, is give her a bloody hand), it wasn’t enough.
Throughout the training, I had wondered what her reason was. Although I told her she didn’t need to tell me, it was still important enough to her that she sought me out. She could have sought out anyone, a professional trainer, for example. But no, it was me. There had to be something specific there, and I had my suspicions as to what it was.
“Satisfied?” I inquired after she had managed to hit the target, square in the middle.
“Not quite,” she shook her head. That all but confirmed it; no more beating around the bush, I had to ask:
“Are you trying to be like your crush?” I drilled to the center of the matter, hoping to find gold.
“Excuse me?” She asked in turn.
“Remora. You haven’t mentioned her since you got here. You mentioned Rhea, which is surprising in of itself, but she never mattered much to you. As I’m sure you’ve thought, yourself, her and your cousin’s battle had nothing to do with you. But it was Remora who you were interested in, wasn’t it?”
Her brows creased, and I could tell she didn’t enjoy such a topic.
“I’ve just had nothing to tell. Feelings can change,” she replied, her voice lowered, guarded in its response.
“Indeed. So it was a falling out?”
“Something like that. It’s a period in my life that I’m done with, so I don’t need to think about it anymore,” she flat out stated. Still, she didn’t echo the same confidence that she did in our spars.
“So that’s just it? Yet you came here, to someone you knew worked the same job as her, and talk about wanting to dodge bullets. Even if you don’t feel like you don’t need to think about her, you either have her in mind, or something similar.”
That time, her defensive face relaxed, and she changed her expression: a smile took hold and stretched to a smug grin.
“Something similar, you could say that. You could say I want to be just like her.”
I figured as much, although a part of me hoped it wasn’t such a case.
“Or rather,” she added, then turned away, “I’d like to be strong enough to be able to kill someone like her.”
Such confidence. This could be interesting, if also disconcerting.
“Someone like me?” I suggested.
She shook her head.
“I’d rather not kill. That was the whole reason why I wanted to learn restraint. But if my suspicions are correct, then I may need to. Which means I have to make sure I’m strong enough to do so, even if it means becoming like one of you guys.”
“Suspicions? What are you talking about?”
It sounded like some delusion of hers, although I knew better than to think such a thing. If there was even a chance of someone else like Remora or I, even alive and out there, then what did she want with someone like that? Did she have some personal vendetta? Did someone kill someone close to her? What could have prompted such a desire?
“I think I’m ready to show you,” she paced about, then brought out her phone.
Yes. Please. Show me.
I watched her put her phone up to her ear, then speak into it.
“Hey Cybele. It’s me. I’m ready for you to pick me up. Oh, and I’ve got someone with me. There’s a place I want to show her. Both of you. I might be able to get you your money, there, too.”
There was a short pause.
“Cool, see you soon? Cool.”
She ended the call, then turned back to me.
“You can take your sword with you, if you want.”
Was planning on bringing it, anyway. I’ve got some bad vibes from all this.
“What is it you want to show me, anyway?” I asked her.
“You’ll understand when we get there,” her smile held as she assured me.
What was left in me was a sense of confusion. Before me wasn’t the same Demetria that showed up a couple of months ago, but then, she must have had such a thing planned out. So either she had been masking how she really was, or it was an alarming determination. Something which she was driven to see through.
“By the way, you should get that dog back inside. I don’t think my friend would like seeing them,” she advised.
“Mange is a wolf,” I corrected, then stuck two fingers in my mouth and whistled. “Hey Mange! Get inside!”
Mange let out a whimper as he slowly walked toward the shack. He looked over at me, let out a soft, “awoo,” then pouted and went inside.
“Yeah, yeah. Awoo to you too.”
About fifteen minutes later, a woman with a blonde ponytail and wearing a blue blouse and a pencil skirt walked approached us. At first, she stood up straight, but as soon as she saw us, she slumped over.
“Ugh, lemme tell you, it’s so hard to find parking when you fly a plane everywhere,” she bemoaned. Then she stood right back up and looked over to me. I raised an eyebrow and gave a short wave.
“Hey, who’s this?” She asked Demetria, who looked up at both of us.
“Cybele, this is Wen...err...Zephyr,” she introduced.
Cybele then smiled a big smile and held out her hand.
“Heya, nice to meet ya! Nice muscles,” she greeted. I took her hand and shook it, then tilted my head.
“Thanks, I made them myself?” I replied.
She let out an awkward laugh, then turned to Demetria.
“So, what’s this place we’re going to?”
“You’ll see,” was all she said in response, then made her way toward the plane.
“Oooookay. Looks like we’re off,” she strutted off. I followed behind.
Aboard her plane, I just realized that I had heard Cybele’s name before.
“I think Ray’s talked about you,” I mentioned to her.
“Oh?” She sounded curious.
“Yeah. He’s really serious about this thing that’s been going on.”
Demetria scowled and sat across from me, her arms folded.
“So you know what’s going on too? Was I the only one who didn’t?” She accused and stuck her nose up.
“Of course I know what’s going on, girl. I showed up at the diner a little after you left. You would have known too, had you stayed.”
“I was under no obligation to stay,” she rebutted.
“You’re right, but I take it you would have, had you known.”
“No shit.”
“Still, she knows now,” Cybele butted in.
“She found out?”
“Ray told me, then I told her. She seems pretty serious about saving them.”
My ears perked.
“Is that so?” I turned back to Demetria.
She shook her head, arms still crossed.
“Finishing up school is more important. They can handle themselves.”
“Wow, cold,” I reacted.
“Not as cold as the arctic,” she shrugged.
“Well, you’re right about one thing: there’s no reason for you to get involved. If it gets to be too much, Ray will call me back over there.”
She didn’t say anything after that. By the looks of her, she seemed disappointed, as she hung her head low, but she didn’t make any objections.
“Say Cybele, you got any drinks on this plane?” I called over to her. She walked over and got into stewardess mode.
“Yes, what would you like?”
“Got any alcoholic beverages?”
“We have spiced rum,” she offered.
“Cool. I’ll take it.”
“I’ll be right back with your drink, miss,” she did her best to sound polite, then raced off to the back of the plane. I leaned back and awaited our arrival to the mystery destination.
We landed a few hours later in a clearing through a forest. Demetria got out of the plane first, followed by myself. Demetria looked up to Cybele, who was still next to the door of the plane, then addressed her:
“Cybele, can I ask you to stay there? We’ll be out soon, promise.”
“Trust me, that place looks foreboding enough as it is. I’m totally cool with staying here,” she assured.
Demetria gave Cybele a thumbs up, then we walked toward the building in question: this long and high marble building with few windows. Around the perimeter was a barbed wire fence.
“Apparently this place used to be a prison,” Demetria explained. Not that I was interested in the building’s origins. My interest was more in what we were doing there in the first place.
She opened the door inside, then motioned me to follow her in. As if that was really necessary. I would have done so anyway.
Once we stepped foot inside, I noticed the thin tunnel-like corridor, many rooms on the floor above us, and an absence of sound. Another thing of note was that the lights were on, which made it appear less abandoned than it really was. Demetria looked around, then remarked in passing:
“Looks like she took care of the dead bodies like she said she would.”
That caught me off guard, and also made me take note of the floor. Indeed, there wasn’t any hint of bloodshed or anything of the sort.
“She?” I inquired.
“I encountered someone who wants to kill Remora. She said that Remora killed her father, so I take it it’s personal.”
Figures. That frosty bastard wasn’t as good at taking care of loose ends as she thought she was.
“Do you know whose father she might have killed?” Demetria asked.
“No idea. I never shared any missions with her, and I don’t know what kind of jobs she took on. Could’ve been anyone’s father.”
“That makes it difficult,” Demetria shook her head. I wonder, do you still have some concern for her?
“What is this place, anyway?”
Our journey took us to the end of the hall, where two flights of stairs to the upstairs were situated, and we stopped at a door along the back wall.
“There was this organization. They were trying to revive the janitor company. Don’t worry, though. I took them all out, so it’s not going to happen.”
“You mean, you killed them?” Was my first question, although there were many others which could have taken precedence. Like why anyone would want to do such a thing, let alone how they knew of such an organization in the first place.
“Their turret killed them,” she corrected. “They were too heavily armored for me to have done anything on my own.”
She opened the door, then stepped inside. I followed suit, and my jaw just about dropped at the sight of stacks of cash lined up along shelves on the walls. Aside from that, there were several guns strewn about the floor, and alongside those weapons, there was something else quite peculiar: minerals which appeared to change shape and color without end, going from smooth to jagged to crystalline. Brown, gold, blue, purple, green, black, white. No specific consistency, and yet at the same time as it made those constant changes, it was as if the ‘minerals’ or whatever they were, were still objects and objects which made no such movements to warrant such a change.
“Concentrated celestial aura…” I heaved out the words. Demetria turned to me as she shoveled stacks of cash.
“You know it?” She asked.
“They’re the materials created from the essence of angels, made solid. They were used to forge the weapons we use. What they’re doing here...no, how they got their hands on…” I was just about speechless.
“Yeah, I don’t have an explanation, either,” Demetria echoed my sentiment. “There’s many things I don’t know, but I figure with this, I’ll have a fighting chance.”
“Fighting chance? What are you talking about?” I snapped.
“I want a new weapon of my own created from this stuff. I’ve already got an idea as to what I want, it’s just a matter of finding someone who could forge with these.”
Astonishment turned to irritation, and I held my fist against the wall.
“That’s not what I mean! What do you expect to do with a weapon like that?”
Her face turned sullen, and her voice lowered.
“I have an idea of what’s causing these phenomena that Sunny and Ray have been dealing with at the diner. If my suspicion is correct, then I need to make sure I’m prepared.”
“Prepared? How the hell could you possibly know what’s going on up there?”
“Because I’ve dealt with it already!” She snapped right back. “There was a man who ate two people alive, two people who I tried and failed to save! Who claimed to serve an indescribable creature, and even though I burned that place down, I know it didn’t take care of anything! There were still monsters in the arctic, strange things that went on, and they’re still going on! I have to put a stop to him! It’s my responsibility!”
“No, it’s not. You need to stay out of it. I get that you’re worried about them, but you don’t have the experience that I do. So just go back home to your family, live a quiet life, and let me deal with it.”
She didn’t budge.
“I know I lack the experience, that’s why I had you train me, so I could be strong enough to take them on. Like it or not, they are my family just as much as my biological family, and you better believe that I will protect them.”
“So you were planning to go there after all? Was the education thing a lie?”
“Not at all. I’m graduating at the end of the month. After that, it will take another month or two to forge the weapon. Then, I’ll find a way to get there. Mark my words. I just hope that I’m not too late by the time I get there.”
I pulled out my sword.
“Maybe she no longer matters to you, but do you think Remora ever wanted you to be like her? What about me? We went through hell to become the kind of people we are, and you’re saying you want to be like that too?”
“You’re right: I wouldn’t want to go through the same things you guys did. I can’t even imagine how you dealt with it. But I’m willing to put myself through hell if I have to for those people, because damn it, they’re worth hell. So we can fight right now if you want to, but I’m not backing down from this. Not when their lives are at stake.”
I let out a single heavy breath, then eased my nerves as I sheathed my blade.
“Fine. I did tell you that I didn’t need to know your reason, but you better understand that there’s no guarantee of success and if you’re not careful, this will cost you your life. Are you still willing to proceed?”
“Without a doubt,” she answered without hesitation.
“Very well. We’ll take these materials with us,” and before we could get ready to do so, I spied something beside the boxes of celestial auras. “Hey. You said you wanted to be able to block a bullet?”
She nodded. I picked up the small devices and handed them to her.
“These are miniature bounded fields. I’ll train you how to use them.”
“Thank you,” she replied.
“I still don’t like the idea, but I can tell that your mind’s made up.”
So I grabbed a couple of boxes of the minerals while she carried stacks of cash and the miniature bounded field devices. My load was heavier, but I could take it.
“By the way,” she spoke up while we hauled the items back to the plane, “I don’t remember if I’ve asked, but did you know any janitors named Cronus?”
“No,” I replied, “do you think someone by that name is behind these attacks?”
“Yes. Or someone using that name as an alias. What about someone who ate people alive, or had a big mouth. Anyone like that?”
I had to think back a little, there were so many others, now lost to time.
“There is one person who comes to mind, but I don’t know much about him,” I suggested.
“Who?”
“He had the codename ‘Tarrare’. Apparently his specialty was more akin to a true janitor...as in, he cleaned up messes, all right. From what I heard, the higher ups would find jobs that had to do with disposing of dead bodies, and they’d send him out to devour the corpses. It’s kind of gross to think about, but I guess he had the stomach for that sorta thing.”
“Anything helps. It’s hard to believe there’s any other janitors alive, but I’m not going to rule it out.”
Just a few minutes later, we arrived back on the plane and took off. Demetria handed Cybele the cash, Cybele hugged Demetria tight, and few was spoken after that. In fact, I stewed in my thoughts.
I can’t believe I’m letting her do this. She must have been planning this a while, but how will she manage? For that matter, will she be okay with who she becomes? Or was it who she already was, and she just needed the resources? Then I considered that it must have been the latter.
We returned to the field later in the afternoon. Demetria waved goodbye to Cybele.
“How will you get around without me?” Cybele wondered.
“I’ll figure something out. Besides, I’m sure we’ll meet again soon enough,” Demetria assured Cybele.
“Okay. Stay safe, and remember: you’ve got friends!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Demetria waved off and dismissed. “You take care, yourself.”
As soon as Cybele took off, I turned to Demetria.
“What’s next?” I inquired.
“We keep training, I go to campus to get my degree, and then I take off to get my weapon forged.”
“I see. What kind of weapon do you have in mind?”
She flashed a smile.
“I dunno. I was thinking a sword,” she gave a little wink. So much for originality.
“All right, so we’ll train a bit more, you’ll graduate, but do you even know a blacksmith who can work with this stuff? For that matter, how will you get back to the diner? In case you aren’t aware, normal flights aren’t going near there, and if Ray knew you were coming, he’d try to pull out all stops to keep you away.”
“I don’t know yet, but I’ll figure it all out.”
I couldn’t help but smile in response to all that.
“Now I’m curious as to what you’ll come up with.”
She shrugged. Looks like I’d just have to wait and see.
The end of the month came, so too, did the end of spring. Demetria rushed out the door of the shack that morning, laptop and backpack in hand, and woke us all up.
“What’s the rush?” I turned to her, voice all hoarse and groggy.
“It’s my graduation. I’ve gotta get my degree in person. I think it’s dumb, but rules are rules. So going to take a Greyhound bus a few states over. See you in, like, a day at most.”
I clapped.
“Well good for you. It’s like you’re growing up and everything.”
“Oh, shut it,” she laughed. “Anyway, bye.”
“Have a good time,” I waved to her, then she was gone.
Cleaver sat up from his hammock and looked down.
“That kid gone?” He looked around.
“Yeah, but she’ll be back,” I informed him.
“I can’t believe it’s been three months already,” he shook his head. “Crazy, huh? She turned from a pipsqueak to a powerhouse.”
“She was already a powerhouse, she just needed for that power to come to the surface,” I corrected him, “now I wonder if she’s something more than a powerhouse.”
“Don’t know, don’t care,” he climbed down. “I’m going to find some possums to barbecue. Wanna join me in the hunt?”
“I’ll pass. But send my regards to Mange, will ya?”
He grumbled an incomprehensible grumble, then walked out the door.
“I suppose all that’s left for me to do now is wait,” I spoke into the air. Wait for Ray to send me that call, telling me that the place was in danger, or wait for Demetria to return. Wait for so many things, up to and including the prospect of an eternal rest.
So I went around town, I rested in the fields, I swung around the sword, but for the most part, I just sat and waited. On the following afternoon, Demetria returned running toward the shack, with plenty of stamina in tow.
“Hey, welcome back,” I greeted.
“Thanks!” She replied, and there was something different about her, as she was grinning and a glow seemed to surround her.
“You seem in a good mood. How was it?”
“Oh, you know, boring stuff. But you wouldn’t believe who I saw there. It was an old friend who I thought I’d never speak to again, let alone see! I guess we’re really still friends after all. It’s hard to believe,” she seemed to wipe a tear from her eye, and she continued to smile.
“Who was it?” I asked.
“Not who you’re thinking!” She backpedaled, and I was a little confused.
“I wasn’t thinking of anyone in particular,” I argued.
“Well, it’s not who you weren’t thinking of in particular, I can tell you that much! It was just an old friend from college. We used to be roommates.”
“Look at you! Being all social and stuff!” I congratulated.
“Stop it. I doubt I’ll see her again. My life’s just heading in a different direction and I probably won’t be able to have as many bright and cheery moments as that one. I have to accept that.”
How unfortunate.
“You should at least allow yourself the moments of happiness you can find,” I advised her.
Her smile lowered down until her face turned more serious.
“Yeah...you’re right.”
Before either of us could say anything else, Demetria’s phone rang, and she answered.
“Would you look at that, perfect timing,” Demetria remarked as whoever was on the other end must have greeted her, “been a while, hasn’t it, Hera?”
Hera? Was that the friend Demetria knew back at her university? I didn’t know, but I continued to listen in.
“Oh my. You want me to come over? Gee, I’d love to do that, but I don’t have any way to get there. I don’t have...how do I put it...the coin.”
You need a coin to get...well, she was probably talking of transportation money. But still, doesn’t she have plenty of money considering what she took at that building?
“Wait. You’ll come get me? Well this changes everything. Okay. Hold on. Slow down. I’ll meet you in Caldwell, Idaho. You can probably find me at a coffee shop. Thanks so much,. Bye.”
She then hung up and looked down where I sat.
“Well, time for me to run down to the city while carrying rocks in my backpack,” she announced, then tossed me her phone.
“Why did you give me this?” I looked down, confused.
“Can you hold onto it for me? Where I’m going, it’s best if I don’t have this.”
I was still confused.
“What am I supposed to do with it? I’m a homeless old bat!” I griped.
“Oh, come on. You’re not that old. Just pretend to be me if anyone texts.”
I shook my head and sighed.
“I can’t believe I’m agreeing to this, but what the hell?”
“Thanks! So I’ll see you around!” She rushed out the words and was in such a pose that suggested she was ready to run off then and there.
“I just hope you know what you’re doing,” I cautioned.
“Ha. Do I ever?”
We both allowed ourselves a little bit of a laugh, and then she ran off inside the shack, then ran back out with the backpack on her shoulders. Without so much as looking back, she ran off at once. Before long, her image faded from view. Then I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the shack.
“I think if fate will allow, I’d like to live at least long enough to see how this plays out. If not a little longer,” I sent my wish out into the air. It wasn’t so much of a wish as it was a certain sentimental idea. I wouldn’t have minded if my time came tomorrow, or that very instant.
#remoras full#writing#training montage#action#slice of life#fiction#sorry this took so long#turns out this chapter is even longer than chapter 27 was#sorry about that too
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heyy, I hope I'm not bothering but I've seen that you used to post about faberry and faberry fics like Shafd, and since I'm trying to find some faberry fanfics to read, could you please recommend me some of your favorites? Thank you :)
OKAY so this took me a whole lot longer than anticipated because I didn’t want to make it be like 500 fics long! But here, in no particular order, are my top 10 faberry fanfics! [excluding SHAfD of course bc whomever asked this definitely knows SHAfD!]I will be including trigger warnings/content warnings! Please be sure that you can handle the subjects before reading the content! Be safe and put your mental and physical wellbeing before a work of fiction!
10. Dirty Little Secret by patchesofink
Chapters: 77/77 [208k]
This fic would actually happen to be the first faberry fic that I ever read. I felt my little 15 year old self cry several times throughout this fic. It’s what first got me into writing fanfic, because I wanted to write as well as this author! There is a content warning so please be careful reading it if you are sensitive to topics mentioned!
Rachel has a secret and Quinn has figured it out - but will Quinn use this knowledge to exact revenge on Rachel for telling Finn that Puck was really the father or will she use her own experiences to help. WARNING - language and sexual content, r*pe.
9. I’ll Be by stix04
Chapters: 20/20 [330k]
God I was such a sucker for fake dating au’s as a young teenager and I’m most definitely a sucker for them now. This one I didn’t read right when it came out, I didn’t actually find it until it had finished but it still makes my top 20 because it’s just too good not to talk about!
Can Quinn pretend to be in love with Rachel just to get out of Lima? Can Rachel pretend to love Quinn so she's not so lonely in New York? And what happens when both girls realize they're no longer pretending?
8. Long Way to Happy by patchesofink
Chapters: 42/42 [104k]
This is the sequel to Dirty Little Secret and makes the list for being just as good as the original. This author is so talented and the story just resonates in my soul!
warnings for sexual content, language, violence and potential ptsd triggers!
Sequel to Dirty Little Secret. Rachel still has some healing to do as well with dealing with becoming a mom. Quinn has her own issues to deal with. Can their fledgling relationship deal with the ups and downs of life and cope with senior year? Quinn learns to open up and Rachel deals with motherhood and not letting her past define her. It's a Long Way to Happy.
7. Leather Jackets and Bad Coffee by antonius
Chapters: 11/?? [75k] [has not updated since 2018 :(]
Bikers, 50′s style diners, and good girl/bad girl pairing. Literally who could ask for anything more? I’m super sad this one hasn’t updated in a long time but it’s still such a fun read!!
warning for violence!
Ninety miles and nearly two hours from the heart of New York City, just off of PA-33 North, is the little town of Belfast, Pennsylvania: population 1,257. Right outside the city limits sits Moe's, a small 24-hour diner whose newest waitress, Rachel Berry, has taken her best friend Kurt's advice and started a calm summer temp job away from the hustle-and-bustle of busy city life in order to rest up before her final year at NYADA.During her very first midnight shift, she encounters a group of rowdy regulars led by a pink-haired woman with piercing hazel eyes. Quinn Fabray is the leader of the Skanks, a small but well-known local biker gang that doesn't take shit from anyone.So began the strangest summer of Rachel Berry's life.
6. Talk by saintdyke
Chapters: 17/? [43k] [last updated may 2019]
This is another one I’m sad hasn’t updated in a while! This honestly stole my heart to a point that in the time I found it in mid April 2019 and June of 2019 I have re-visited the fic 105 times, rereading it at least half as many as that. I’m really hoping the author comes back to the fic, because it was keeping me on the edge of my seat.
warning for violence, abuse mentions and depictions, homophobia and ptsd triggers!
(Previously titled Grease Stains, Starry Skies) Famous actress Rachel Berry’s car breaks down in the middle of nowhere. A pretty blonde with a blue truck rescues her from the side of the road, and just so happens to own an Auto Repair shop in town. Quinn is frustrating and mysterious, and Rachel is just as stubborn. Together, they start a revolution.
5. Just off the Key of Reason by iamapanda
Chapters: 30/30 [129k]
This one is another absolute classic in the Faberry fandom, and is another fic that has stuck with me throughout the years! It has a fantastic softer take on Quinn that I truly appreciated because everyone back in the early years of the fandom would make her so angry and bitter and she’s just so soft in some interpretations
Rachel Berry is a successful Broadway star with a new roommate, the very odd, naive Quinn Fabray. It starts with a note on the fridge and a childishly scrawled doodle of an elephant. Everybody has a little crazy in them.
4. Still off the Key of Reason by iamapanda
Chapters: 37/37 [185k]
The sequel to Just off the Key of Reason! Still as soft and as crazy! I can’t mention one without having the other in the list as well! I can’t explain how it feels to look at the ff.net pages after so long, my heart is transported back to 2011 and I’m sitting on my bed after I’m supposed to be in bed. I miss the days where I could just spend time reading these fics and not having adult responsibilities.
Quinn is thundering her way through vet school. Rachel is enlightening the west coast with her talent. The story continues with a wedding, dogs in tuxedos, and Pooh Bear vows. Crazy never fades.
3. A Million Miles of Fun by Jade8Devlin
Chapters: 12/12 [103k]
This one is a little different from the last ones! It isn’t my favorite because of its literary genius, but because of how fun and out there it is! It’s concept is fresh and dark and something I honestly didn’t expect to see but it quickly grew to be a favorite for me!
warning for violence, abuse, mentions of murder! the whole story revolves around The Unholy Trinity + Rachel murdering Quinn’s family so please take that into consideration!
And in Lima, Ohio, a man and woman were killed earlier today during what is believed to be a home invasion. Russell Fabray was last seen leaving Gas'N'Go at two o'clock; his wife, Judith, from a grocery story an hour earlier. Police are linking the double homicide to the area's recent surge in breaking and entering – though these appear to be the first fatalities. The victims are survived by their daughters; Quinn and Stacey."Jessalyn Briggs shuffles the papers on her desk, clearing her throat. The somber expression on her face seems to float off her as she turns towards camera 3."Otis-the-Otter finishes today's news headlines as the little critter that could. Abandoned by his mother and found foraging for scraps in the Nelson family's garbage cans, Otis has proven; if you can't teach an old dog new tricks, teach them to an otter! Otis placed second at this year's Ohio Dog Show after last year's well-documented struggle by the Nelson family to allow Otis to be included. Well done Otis, we here at Channel 43 salute you.
2. The Silence of Silence by your.kat
Chapters: 31/31 [135k]
This one... I can’t describe why I liked it, I just liked it.
warning for mental health, and trauma [possible others, please read with caution]
Quinn and Rachel meet at Haverbrook under unusual circumstances. Why is Rachel silent? And why does Quinn care? "You can hear," Quinn said simply, "but can you speak?"; "Yes," Rachel signed. "I can speak. But silence is a friend who will never betray."
1. Kissing Quinn Fabray by vondrunkaton
Chapters: 6/6 [45k]
This one just makes me super warm and fuzzy inside. I don’t think I can say it’s entirely changed my life but it’s just so soft and i love it
Quinn comforts Rachel after Finn says something oafish. Rachel is surprised by how sweet Quinn is. There's also some making out in delicious detail. Fluffy getting together fic.
I am super open to talking about more fics I love/like and other pairings! This was a ton of fun to talk about and sent me down memory lane! I went searching for two hours on a vague memory of a fic that I think has been deleted by now. But if anyone wants to help me track it down! Hit me up and I’ll give you the details!
#faberry#glee#rachel berry#quinn fabray#faberry fic#god please someone help me find this fic#Anonymous
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I really really miss photography.
Photography feels like an old friend I’ve lost touch with. It pains me greatly that I just don’t have the energy or stamina to do it anymore. It really filled a creative void after I was unable to create my original comedy posts any longer. My illness keeps taking and taking from me and it is a challenge to find ways to adapt and cope.
The saddest part is that I felt like I was just starting to master photography as an art form. I was at that point where I could instinctively do all of the technical things and concentrate purely on the art. Lighting was becoming intuitive to me instead of a complicated puzzle I had to solve each time.
Yes, I took a lot of photos that I am really proud of. (Which I am spreading throughout this post).
But sometimes I mourn the photos I could have taken if my chronic illness hadn’t worsened.
It’s also hard seeing the new cameras and lights that have been released since I had to stop. I *just* missed a technological revolution. New features that would have allowed me to do more with less energy. To push the boundaries of my creativity. To get shots I could only dream of back then.
Full frame mirrorless cameras have opened up so many creative possibilities. The low light performance, the detail, the dynamic range--it has all been improved greatly in just a few years. But there are also many automated usability features that allow the camera to offload work and concentration from the brain. These new digital wonders can even be used as cinematic quality video cameras--something I would have liked to have explored.
I had to take these match photos in a pitch-black room, with a reversed lens, with no control over my aperture, and a manual flash. It took forever to time it properly because I had a whopping 3 frames per second. It would have been a cinch with a mirrorless camera, with super fast burst modes and an electronic viewfinder. You can see exactly what your image will look like before snapping it. But you can also “see in the dark” using a high ISO preview. Before you had to use a live view mode on the back screen. But on older cameras that mode was clunky and slow and... it just sucked.
Enlarge!
MOAR BIGGER!
Weirdly, one of the biggest advances is due to a shortened “flange distance” where the lens connects to the camera body. It seems like a small thing. Literally only a centimeter or so. But because of the lack of mirror, camera designers are able to move the lens closer to the sensor and design more advanced lenses with incredible sharpness. Combined with increased megapixel counts, that would have been amazing for my macro photos.
Electronic viewfinders take the guesswork out of exposure--even in bright sunlight where screens get washed out from glare. And being able to compose portraits with highly accurate eye-tracking autofocus would have been a tremendous advantage.
No more “focus and recompose.”
No more “Did I get the eye? Let me zoom to 100% on this tiny screen.”
I could have spent more of my concentration getting natural expressions from my subjects and composing my photos without distraction.
And IBIS!
I missed out on motherhecking IBIS!
This photo of my wonderful friend Erin was taken handheld at sunset. The original RAW version was extremely dark--even though I was using a high ISO. I had to do a ton of work to get this to not look like noisy garbage. But there just wasn’t any other way to capture it... UNTIL NOW.
IBIS (eye-bus/👀-🚌) or “in-body image stabilization,” allows the camera sensor to kind of... float. You can eliminate camera shake caused by the subtle micro-movements when handholding.
How do I explain it? Ummmm...
It turns the sensor into a chicken head.
So instead of increasing the ISO (which is like a volume knob for light which gets grainier as you crank it), you can lower your shutter speed. In the past, depending on the lens, 1/60th of a second was about as slow as you could set it. With IBIS, as long as the scene you are capturing is relatively still, you can take photos in very low light without a tripod. This is great because tripods are a pain in the ass and you can’t always have one handy. Plus, you can combine an IBIS camera with a stabilized lens to get a de-blurrification multiplier. Then you can get sharp handheld photos that are technically considered long exposure. I’ve heard people say they got sharp photos exposing at several seconds. Literally going from a fraction of a second to 2 goddamn Missisisppi. I can’t even quantify how many fantastic photos are being taken right now that would have been unusable blurry messes a few years ago. We get to enjoy these photos all because they installed a chicken head inside cameras.
AND DARN IT ALL TO HECK I HECKING MISSED IT, GOSH HECKING DANG IT!.
Sorry... didn’t mean to curse like a sailor that stubbed his toe while stepping on a Lego.
I think I’ll have a cool refreshing root beer to calm my IBIS envy.
(Those water droplets are a total fraud, by the way. It’s fake blood without the red added.)
And with the progress in battery and wireless technology, artificial lighting has become lighter and more portable while still being powerful enough to compete with the sun. I could have used strobe lights in my little studio, packed them up into a small case, and gone to the middle of the field to use them there.
Yes, I was able to convert my old studio lights to be “portable-ish” but we had to lug so much equipment to accomplish this photo of Brittany in the red dress. The battery pack alone weighed as much as one modern light. I was stuck in bed for a week afterward from all of the carrying of heavy gear.
Before that, this was my hacked together “outdoor” light. The Flash-O-Tron 3000. It looks cool but it was delicate and hard to get through doorways.
After charging 12 AA batteries overnight, I had to drag this contraption outside at the buttcrack of dawn to get my favorite photo of Otis.
I had to use a handheld mirror to reflect my popup flash in the direction of the Flash-O-Tron 3000 to trigger it. It worked about 25% of the time. Oh, and I was laying on cold wet grass, manually tracking Otis--who refused to sit still. I had to line up a single autofocus point on his head for every snap. The concentration required felt like my brain was juggling chainsaws.
But guess what they invented last year?
PET. EYE. AUTOFOCUS.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
A little robot inside the camera is all, “Hey, that’s your dog’s eye!” and just follows it no matter where your pup moves.
I NEEDED THAT SO BAD!
This shot took 10 minutes of me trying to lock onto his eye with a macro lens. The depth of field at that distance was the width of his eye and, again, he does not sit still.
I want a time machine so I can go back and retake every blurry Otis photo.
Also, many of the modern strobes have NO WIRES. You just stick a thing on top of your camera and you can set off lights several football fields away. My photo studio has tons of wires routed in the ceiling and coming out of the walls.
[Hi-Res Version]
And then those wires all go into a weird analog remote with old school sliders that controlled the power of the flashes. But the sliders were difficult to finely adjust.
Now you can load an app on your phone and adjust the flash power digitally and adjust the brightness in 10% increments. You can save lighting ratios and recall them instantly. And you can preview your work with high powered LED modeling lights so you don’t have to take 50 test shots.
No more nudging a light and taking a picture.
Raising the power and taking a picture.
Swapping out a modifier and taking a picture.
Back and forth, back and forth.
Essentially, what you see is what you get, so setting up lighting takes a fraction of the time and effort with these new lights and cameras. That would have been so helpful with my disability.
Oh... the lights are less expensive too.
The future of camera tech looks exciting as well. I think the computational photography that is in the latest smartphones will soon be added to more professional cameras. That is going to make high-end photography so much more accessible to anyone who wants to try it as a hobby. The learning curve will flatten further, and as long as you are creative, you will be able to take beautiful, high-quality photos.
Some might say that not having all of the new tech helped me gain important experience, expertise, and problem-solving skills. Some believe the inconveniences are a photographer’s trial by fire. The struggle makes the art more authentic. And since I learned how to do it the hard way, my journey is more valid than some photography influencer on Instagram with an iPhone.
To that I say... BULLLLLSHEEIIIT.
Those inconveniences just made me SUPER DUPER TIRED.
And some of those influencers take really kickass photos. Not all of them are butts either.
I love photography but there is a reason I had to stop. Like anything, doing it well was a lot of work. I always ended up having to quit taking photos much sooner than I wanted. I had to scale back my ambition to fit my energy requirements. I could only do photography on days when my body was cooperating fully. I had to cancel many photoshoots because the preparation was just too much to handle. And after my bigger projects it took me forever to recover.
GIVE ME ALL THE CONVENIENCES PLEASE.
That “you have to struggle” attitude is no-good-gatekeepy-ableist crap.
Old photographer grumps are upset because they spent years learning how to focus manually on horseback and use the sunny 16 rule and develop film in a converted shed they built by hand and now “those darn kids” can use an iPhone on a skateboard while doing a kickflip with their eyes closed and still pull focus.
However, despite there being a lower barrier for entry, the technological improvements add new complications to the advanced side of things. So you can make photography as difficult as you desire if you are willing to learn new stuff. Which old school photo grumps are notoriously averse to.
This new tech has all kinds of novel things to discover and figure out. There is drone photography. There is advanced macro photography using robotic focusing rails and ever-improving focus stacking software. You can now network more lights together than ever before. Karl Taylor did a photoshoot with 12 lights! (Captain Picard would totally lose his shit.) Long lasting batteries and computerized sliders have created new timelapse possibilities. Stabilization software allows complex hyperlapse videos. Better low light performance and sharper lenses with big apertures combined with stacking or star trail software has improved astrophotography. Advances in material science have allowed darker and darker high quality neutral density filters for extreme long exposure photos. New focus tracking algorithms have allowed for wildlife photography that was never possible before. You can capture fast-moving birds in the sky from farther away and still get amazing detail. Faster burst modes allow people to capture split-second action. Never miss a good header at your kid's soccer games. (Is that a thing? I have no kids and don’t remember how to soccer.) IBIS allows photography without a tripod. So now people can trek to harder to reach areas, AT NIGHT, and take sharp photos with little noise. Increased dynamic range and new HDR displays will allow photographers to take images of lights and capture their actual intensity. What if the lights in photos could glow like they do in real life? Think about a neon sign at night in the rain reflecting in a puddle. That would look so neat.
Not to mention learning how to process photos in editing software is an entirely separate and challenging skillset you can master. There are thousands of techniques you can learn to elevate your images. Dodging & burning, frequency seperation, and compositing, oh my! Programs like Lightroom and Photoshop are constantly updated with new features that expand possibilities.
None of that is easy. It will all require diligent study and practice to master. Technical skills will always be an aspect of photography that anyone can pursue. But not everyone will need as much technical skill to start having fun and create art.
And much to the chagrin of those grumps... phones are perfectly viable to create that art and they will keep getting better.
You might find it odd that this love letter and goodbye to photography has so much talk of technical gadgetry. But, for me, it isn’t out of place in this sentimental essay. Technology was my first love. My parents bought me a 66mhz Packard Bell computer when I was 12 and technology was the first thing I was ever good at. I learned every function of that machine. I would sometimes break it just so I could learn how to fix it. I took it apart and put it back together. It was my first true obsessive hobby. I found my creativity soon after, and I immediately used that technology to help me create art. I wrote comedy. I learned how to digitally paint. I recorded music. And eventually I found photography. It was the perfect marriage of technology and art. I could nerd out as much as I want while still getting my creative fix.
So yeah... I miss it all.
I miss all of the technical nerdery.
I miss trying out new gadgets.
I miss editing the photos I’ve taken.
I miss taking pictures of my beautiful friends.
I miss taking pictures of weird products.
I miss asking Delling to call apiaries to find me freshly dead bees so I can take macro shots of their fuzzy little torsos.
I really hope some day I find a treatment that gives me enough energy to take photos again.
Thankfully my writing helps me feel creative and productive and fulfilled. And it’s something I can do even if I’m not able to get out of bed. And I am grateful I have so many awesome people that actually want to read what I have to say.
So thanks to everyone for that.
I always find a way to move forward. That’s just the nature of surviving chronic illness. But glancing back at what I lost is a pain I never quite get used to.
Though, writing this has helped.
Looking back at all that I accomplished has helped.
And I do feel lucky I was able to accomplish what I did--even if missing it makes me sad sometimes.
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Weekend Top Ten #448
Top Ten Moments in The Secret of Monkey Island
This week was one of those weeks where I had a list all ready to go, and then I discovered something that made me throw the whole lot in the bin and write something new in a hurry. And the thing that I discovered is that it is, approximately, the 30th birthday of my favourite videogame of all time, The Secret of Monkey Island.
When I was a kid, I’d go round my cousins’ house and play on their Spectrum or their C64. I played the usual 8-bit hits of the era; Dizzy, Ghostbusters, Skool Daze, that really weird and probably insanely offensive Spitting Image beat-em-up… then I got my Amiga around Christmas 1990, and I figured games would be more-or-less the same but with more colours. I was wrong.
I got two games in short succession that utterly changed my appreciation for the medium: Lemmings and Monkey Island. The first was funny, inventive, colourful and characterful; a fiendishly difficult puzzler that nevertheless made you want to come back for more, because you just fell in love with the Lemmings themselves. It was like nothing I’d seen before, and felt impossible. Monkey Island, on the other hand, was not only better, not only more my cup of tea gameplay wise, but just blew the doors of my perception of what games were and what they could do. It was like an interactive movie before that was even a term; a living cartoon where you were the main character. A funny, wordy, witty adventure story, full of gags and references that I didn’t quite get but that I knew were smart and humorous (and there was lots of daft humour in there that I did get, too). It wasn’t just a case of being able to talk to people – I’d done that in stuff like Skool Daze – but the ability to solve problems, to divine solutions; to work out that you can drug dogs by smearing meat with dubious petals. And even when do did something like that, the game was irreverent enough to put a disclaimer on screen assuring you that the dogs were only sleeping. It broke the fourth wall, and I was only just old enough to understand what that meant in narrative terms; this was a game about gaming, about stories and adventures. It was filled with movie references (George Lucas even makes a cameo!). It inspired me to write into Amiga Power for help with a particular puzzle, and they printed my letter, but by the time it came out about three months had passed and I’d solved the puzzle on my own.
Monkey Island was the first game that I loved as much as the cartoons I watched or the comics I read; Guybrush and Elaine and LeChuck and the rest were the first gaming characters that I took to my heart in the same way as Bumblebee, Garfield, or Peter Venkman. I’ve said it before, but I’m not sure I’d love games the same way if I’d never played Monkey Island. It certainly changed the types of games I wanted to play; even though I’ve enjoyed my fair share of platformers, racing games, and shooters, it’s always the slower-paced narrative games that I come back to, the Fables and Mass Effects and Deus Exes of this world (even faster-paced games like Halo, Gears and Half-Life still grab me with their stories, as daft as they may sometimes be). Basically, Monkey Island made me a sucker for a dialogue tree.
Monkey Island was my gateway to a whole host of other LucasArts adventure games; Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Sam & Max Hit the Road, Day of the Tentacle, Grim Fandango… Ron Gilbert and Tim Schafer were among the first names of games creators that I ever knew (probably the very first, in all honesty, was Peter Molyneux – I am British after all). It was a window into a much larger world, one filled with choice, consequence, non-sequiturs, and rubber chickens with pullies in the middle.
Anyway, to celebrate Monkey Island, here are my Top Ten moments from the game. See you next year for the Monkey Island 2 list.
How to Get Ahead in Navigating: I’ve gone about it before, but this simple, daft joke – swapping a guide book for an actual navigator’s head – blew my mind as a kid. It forced me to think differently about puzzles and comedy and how to approach the game. For little old me, it was a revelation, and just desperately funny.
How Appropriate, You Fight Like a Cow: a discussion of Monkey can’t be had without talking about the innovative swordfights; a wholly successful attempt to replicate the verbal parrying of a classic Hollywood swordfight, the insult-riposte dynamic also reinforced the puzzle mechanics of the game. Sublime.
Order Hint Book: Monkey Island was the first adventure game I played, so I didn’t realise at the time how innovative its gameplay was, because you could never get hopelessly, game-ruiningly stuck, and nor could you die. Except at one point, when you drown, but even that is a hilarious gag that is easily avoidable. The control verbs changing from things like “Pick Up” to “Decompose” is just tremendous.
Use Staple Remover on Tremendous, Dangerous-Looking Yak: Monkey plays fast and loose with game conventions, sending itself up in the process; the moment when Guybrush enters a room and is hidden from view, undergoing a series of preposterous and expensive-sounding adventures, which you only know about because you can read his actions in the sentence line as if you were still controlling him (“use… gopher repellent… on another gopher…”), is a phenomenal piece of comedy stagecraft, a game parodying games parodying itself, using its own architecture to tell a joke (as well as being a play on the whole “noises off” style of gag in the first place).
Ask Me About Loom: like I say, I’d never played an adventure game before; I’d never heard of any LucasArts (sorry, Lucasfilm Games) titles, apart from maybe Maniac Mansion. So the bloke in the SCUMM Bar with his “Ask me about LOOM” badge, who launches into an intense sales spiel when you speak to him, didn’t make sense at first. But when it clicked, the very idea of a pirate in this game directly referencing another game was fourth-wall-breaking hilarious genius; happening right near the start of the game lets you know what you’re in for.
The Rock: when you get to Monkey Island, there’s a puzzle where you need to use a makeshift seesaw to catapult a boulder onto a tree (or something). If you line it up wrong, you can sink your own ship (and presumably drown your mutinous crew). The first time I played the game, this is what I did; there’s another great gag where castaway Herman Toothrot turns out to have a ship of his own. But the second time I played through, I didn’t sink my ship, and sailed back with my original crew. This blew my mind; whilst obviously not at Warren Spector levels of emergent game design, the fact that you could actually change what happened, to have a different experience to another player, was phenomenal, and another one of those watershed gaming moments for me.
Men of Low Moral Fibre (Pirates): the trio of loitering pirates are funny in and of themselves, with their breath mints and Pieces o’ Eight and minutes from a PTA meeting. But what I always found really funny was that they are literally called “Men of Low Moral Fibre (Pirates)”; that’s what it says in the sentence line when you hover your cursor over them (an aside: Monkey Island and Lemmings probably taught me how to use a mouse). Again it was the game using the structure of a game to tell a joke.
Rescuing Otis: this is what promoted me to write into Amiga Power back in the day: how the heck do you rescue Otis from the jail?! There are delightful red herrings regarding files and whatnot, but the eventual solution – juggling acidic grog from mug to mug as you make your way through the town to eventually pour it on his lock – was a rare moment of fast-paced tension in a relatively slow game. Solving it on my own made me feel so clever at a tender age. And it’s funny! So great!
A Rubber Chicken with a Pulley in the Middle: ah, my beloved rubber chicken. Found early on in the game and used in a couple of puzzles, I don’t think I quite grasped the silly brilliance of it; as a kid you’re just more accepting of the surreal. Why does a rubber chicken have a pulley? It’s basically just so you can zip-line across a chasm; it’s a wholly functional, boring plot device. But it’s also a rubber chicken. It’s sublime comic genius. And then you cook it! Madness!
The Voodoo Root: I’ve not even mentioned The Ghost Pirate LeChuck yet (if I’m honest his best “moments” are in the sequel) but the finale of the game, when you’ve distilled your Voodoo Root and you’re dispatching ghosts left right and centre, brilliantly marries an epic adventure action sequence with the point-and-click structure of the game itself. But then you fight LeChuck and he boots you around the island, until finally you crash land on a soft drinks dispenser, and finally defeat him with… a can of root beer. Cue fireworks and a strangely romantic ending. Is it as good as the ending of Monkey 2? No, but nothing is. Literally nothing, in the history of the universe.
Wow, there we are. I never had room for the dance steps, the recipe, finding the treasure, defeating the Sword Master, or Stan. Stan! I didn’t have room for Stan! See, that’s how good the game is; I barely mentioned one of the greatest gaming villains of all time, and I didn’t even get round to one of the medium’s funniest supporting characters. Blimey.
Man, I love The Secret of Monkey Island. Ron and the rest of you guys: you done good. Thanks for the memories.
#top ten#monkey island#the secret of monkey island#monkey island 30#lucasarts#lucasfilm games#ron gilbert
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Really interested in knowing what your top 10 brittana fics are!! Thank you for doing what you’re doing! :)
Turns out it’s pretty much impossible for me to decide on just 10 Brittana fics….but I did manage to narrow it down! So heres my top 20, I hope thats alright too
In no particular order though, I barely managed to narrow it down to 20, no way I can also rank them. I’m really bad at this, I’m sorry lol.
Set the World on Fire by Cora709For six months Santana has been living in New York City with Kurt and Rachel, but now Brittany has received her diploma and is finally coming to join them. Can new relationships accommodate old ones? And can the past ever really be recaptured?
Only Time Will Tell by sadieredNationally-ranked American figure skaters Brittany Pierce and Santana Lopez train as Olympic hopefuls. “It is fresh and it is fruitful if I win, but if I lose. Oh, I don’t know."
Taking The Long Way by Lingering LiliesSantana’s journey toward self-acceptance through love, loss, friends, career and family. Contains Glee history through "Original Song.” Rated M for sex.
Tattoo by littleoases“She soaks it in for a few seconds—this night, this place, these friends, this family room floor, this girl—before she says it back.” Post-3x11. Brittana.
Any Sort of Blue Sky by themostrandomfandomBrittany and Santana find ways to love each other, no matter what their situation. Five Mouseverse vignettes.
You Instead by your-street-serenadeBrittana AU. Two feuding rockstars handcuffed together for 24 hours. A rock and roll love story set against an unforgettable lost weekend at a music festival, filled with lust, mud, betrayal, porta potties and a hundred thousand people partying to the greatest music in the world.
We’re Just Getting Started by lizbeanBrittany and Santana are married with twins. Join Quinn’s journey as she learns about herself, relationships and parenting from Brittana. Unholy Trinity friendship.
They Bring Me Back by wherehopeliesSantana Lopez lives an average life in New York as a bartender. When gorgeous Brittany and Santana’s teenage niece fall into her lap, things get interesting.
Somewhere in Brooklyn by MartianThoughtsSantana and Brittany have been trying to get pregnant for a year without any luck. What happens when a teenage foster child and positive pregnancy test land in their laps on the same day? A unique journey of motherhood ensues.
Piece By Piece by LeighKellyWhen pediatric surgeon Santana Lopez meets Dr. Brittany Pierce, head of plastic surgery, in the elevator during a blackout at the hospital, she’s immediately hit with a sense of disdain. Little does she know that she’ll be the first person to show her what love looks like, and change her life for good.
My Girlfriend’s Sister’s Keeper by bodybrokeBrittany isn’t the only Pierce that has Santana wrapped around her finger. Santana’s life with her two favorite people.
In My Life I Love You More by superrocketableFuturefic! 10 years on running into old school friends throws up a few suprises :D rated M due to language
be my fire in the cold (and I’ll be waiting by the mistletoe) by Echoes-of-RealitiesWhen the production stage manager for George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker, starring one Brittany S. Pierce, is fired seven shows into its run, Santana is hired and thrown into the production with barely any preparation.
And I’m Calling You to Be My Lifeline by daysofinspirationTina isn’t sure how Santana manages to mix her number with the crisis helpline, but now that it’s happened she is determined to do everything she can to help. Santina friendship, Brittana
You Gave Me the Word, I Finally Heard by LeighKellyWhen Brittany Pierce was seven, a near drowning experience left her profoundly deaf. For twenty-two years, she’s lived in a quiet solitude, her mother’s response to her accident leaving her wary of building relationships. She’s content with her life, her career, her home with her service dog Otis, until she quite literally runs into Santana Lopez…and then everything changes.
Rent My Pussy by soulpicnicLonely? Call 1-800-BSPUSSY.
Reasons that I Laugh and Breathe by klikeszombiesAU. Brittany goes to college and meets Santana and the rest of New Directions. Even though life has been hard so far, and even though bad things still happen, she regrets nothing that has brought her here.
I Know You Wanna Touch by bugstoriesBrittana AU - Brittany and Santana are both in their mid-twenties, meeting in a fancy bar in New York City. The chemistry is there, but how will Santana react when she finds out that the mysterious blonde is in fact an escort? Will she give her a chance?
Burn The Whore House (To The Ground) by IceRose92In a world where sex slavery is the norm, Santana is sold to a wealthy man who hopes that her company can help mend his daughter’s broken spirit. Can a master who doesn’t believe in the slave trade and a slave who only wants to be loved let go of their troubled pasts? AU Brittana (very small mentions of Faberry, Puckurt, Tike, and Samcedes)
To Wish Possible Things by bodybrokeAfter the events at Mr. Schue’s wedding, Brittany and Santana have a long overdue conversation about what exactly went wrong in their relationship, and start trying to fix it, with a little help from their friends.
#sorry it took me so long to answer#also this could have easily been a top 100 lol#brittana#fic help#fic rec#top 20
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Kitten Gray.
Crayola Crayon Color Asks
Kitten Gray: Do you have any pets? If so, describe them.
Penny & Delilah - They are littermates. They've been together their entire lives. We've had them for about ten years. They are Basset Hound and Cocker Spaniel mixes. Penny looks more like a Basset while Delilah has more of a Cocker Spaniel look. Penny is black with some white and tan on her. Delilah has more white on her but also has black and tan as well. The tan on either of them is not as prominent as the black and white though. They are outside dogs.
Emily - We've had since March of 2011. We got her and her brother the same day so that she wouldn't be lonely. Her brother, Mr. Parker, is no longer with us, sadly. But Em (or Mimzy Or Emmy Lou or Emily Ann) is long-haired and black and white. She's small in size, but she weighs a lot since she became an indoor only cat. She's spayed and has only ever had two liters of kittens.
Socks - He's a short-haired black cat with white on his tummy and feet. He belonged to the neighbors that we had before the ones we have now. He adopted us so they just left him. He's the sweetest old man you could ever meet. He lives outside. He's not neutered but we're not how old he is because he was already grown when he came to live with us. I worry about putting him under to have him fixed so I've just never done it. Besides, he never leaves the porch so I don't really think I have to worry about him going around getting any of the other cats pregnant.
Emilia - She's a short-haired black and white cat that came from Emily's second litter. She has this black spot on her face that I call her beauty mark. She's pretty vocal, but she doesn't care much for me. She loves for me to pet her, but she doesn't like when I pick her up. I'm the only one that she growls at for it though. So I leave her on the ground and pet her mostly. She lives outside as well. But she is spayed.
Milo - He's my big orange fluff ball. He is long-haired and sweet as can be to me, but he can be an asshole to my other kitties. I call him MIles most of the time. He got his name from that movie Milo & Otis because he's the same color as the cat from that movie. But other than the color he looks nothing like him. I wanted an orange kitty for so long and then he came along. I wouldn't trade him for anything. He's neutered and lives outside as well.
Penelope - She came from Emilia. I call her Nellie. She's sweet as can be but is skittish of unfamiliar people. She's black and white and short-haired as well. She lives outside and is spayed. She's never had a litter of kittens as I had her spayed when she was only six months old.
Picasso - This is my baby boy. He was the only kitten in his litter. He was born without a tail. The minute I saw him when my sister sent me his picture, I knew he was supposed to be my baby. We got him after my Scout passed away. He doesn't replace him, but I know Scout made sure I got him so I wouldn't be lonely. He's mostly white with some brindle colored spots on his head and back. When he sits down, from behind it looks like his markings make an exclamation point with the spot on his butt since he doesn't have a tail. Not even a noticeable nub. He's also neutered.
Roxanne aka Roxie - She's our Australian Shepherd. She's a red tri. Her coloring is gorgeous. We got her last May (2018). She was supposed to be my son's dog, but she's mine. She's such a turd, but I couldn't see my life without her now. I don't even like going away because I don't want to have to board her or leave her at home with someone else. She's one of the smartest dogs I've ever had. She still chases Picasso but is chill with the rest of our kitties. So she's crated when we're not home and at night (because Picasso sleeps with me). Also spayed.
Maizee - She's our newest addition. She's a gray tabby, and we're not sure if she will be long or short-haired. Right now, she's a fluff ball. I think she'll have medium length hair when she's older. The neighbors found her in their flower bed, and she had an injured tail. I brought her home and took her to see our vet. Her tail had to be docked as it was badly damaged from what he thinks was a vehicle motor. We weren't planning to keep her, but she's brought Picasso out of his shell so much that I'd hate to give her away now. So we're keeping her. She'll be spayed as soon as she is old enough. She lives in the house so there is no way she can get pregnant, but she'll still be spayed as it helps with their attitude as well.
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Get to know me!
Get to know your followers!
Rules: Answer the questions (which you can change if you don’t feel like answering certain questions) then tag 20 followers you want to get to know better!
Edited to add a ‘keep reading’ so you don’t have to scroll through all the pics! Also, rearranged for tags !
Tagged by: @riizen-ooc
Tagging: @kaidenblackwell @lahthesubtle @the-voyager-kota @strixena @atticus-angus-andrews @celestare And really anyone who would like to do this. I absolutely love seeing these things on my dash. We often forget there are individuals with their own lives and problems, ups and downs. There’s more to us than the characters we roleplay.
1. Nickname?
To my family, I’m referred to as Bomber (I had white-blonde hair as a kid and was called the Blonde Bomber. Over the years it’s been shortened,) Rosebud (middle name is rose), and simply Chels. Everyone else usually calls me Chels, also.
2. Gender?
Female
3. Star sign?
Taurus. This is usually so very accurate. I don’t usually follow things like this, but if you want to know anything about my personality, just look up the traits of a Taurus.
4. Height?
5′7″
5. Favorite feature?
I have great eyes, imo. Pretty green, and I have an awesome star in my left eye.
6. Favorite color?
It’s a toss up between pink and green, but never those two colors together.
7. Favorite animal?
This is actually a tough question. Favorite meaning what? I enjoy learning about sharks the most, though they terrify me. Shark week is the best week!
Aside from sharks, my kid is my favorite animal. And yes... he’s an animal. Shut up. (Taken at Comicfest this year).
8. Average hours spent sleeping?
Roughly 5-7 on most nights, but no matter how late I sleep on the weekends, I’m typically up pretty early the next day, -normally- before 8am.
9. Dogs or cats?
I have a dog, but I think I’m more of a cat person. Technically, it’s my son’s dog, but... yeah. Otis is my sweetheart, but he SCREAMS horribly. It literally will hurt your ears. He screams if I don’t give him attention right when I come home, if someone comes to the door, or... just because he feels like it with no reason at all.
10. Number of blankets you sleep with?
One, at most. Even then, I usually toss the blanket aside and sleep with just the sheet. It’s never cool enough. But I’ll never sleep with just nothing.
11. What’s your dream trip?
Going to Ireland, hands down. One day this will happen!
12. What’s your dream job?
I believe I’m too old and not good enough for my dream job. *shrugs* Let them there younger kids do it.
13. When did you make this account?
About a year ago. When I created Vin, I wanted to be completely separate from my old main, Verlai. Since then, though, I’ve realized that was silly and I wish I had the two accounts under the same one.
14. How many followers do you have?
253? I think? And the majority of them are porn blogs, and cam girls asking if I want to ‘hang out’. >.>
15. How many pets do you have?
I have one, personally, but there’s another one in the house also. This is Maxie!
16. Best places to visit in your town or country?
Phoenix is a nightmare. Don’t ever come here. If you make the mistake of doing so, I suggest staying indoors. As for the country.... anywhere along either coast is pretty great, I think.
17. Favorite ice cream flavor?
Mint chocolate chip.
18. How often do you read?
I used to read a lot more; I have a pretty awesome library. That was before I started RPing, though. Now, my reading mainly focuses on anything having to do with roleplay, and I haven’t touched a book in too long.
19. Favorite study locations?
Does not apply.
19. Favorite book series?
I have 2! The Dark Hunter series by Sherilyn Kenyon, and the Black Dagger Brotherhood series by J.R. Ward.
20. (In place of the original #19) Any tattoos?
I have 3! One on my forearm that is rather large that represents the support I got via WoW and RP during the toughest time of my life. One on my ankle of the Goddess Bethany from my favorite book, Styxx, in the Dark Hunter series, and one on the back of my neck/shoulders of a question mark that everyone thinks is a snake (when they see it).
Enjoy a gif of me attempting to take a selfie at work without getting caught and laughed at by my co-workers... it turned into.. this.
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...in which i do ornithology...
Asking for a friend: Is giving a worm to a fledgling a bad decision for someone who tries really hard (but fails on a regular basis) to eat plant-based?
Where do we stand on this? I mean, this “friend” ate homemade meat lasagne the other day because there was literally nothing else for tea and she would be no good to anyone unless she ate something, nay, anything.
But back to this baby bird. I mean a proper beaky tweety bird that somehow ended up on the lawn when I was trying to cut it, not matey who did You’re Gorgeous back in the 90s. If I was reviewing stuff for the student newspaper back in the day I would have suggested, yes, do feed him worms - stop him singing for a bit. But I’ve learnt to be nice. Anyway, this sort of nostalgia is getting us nowhere.
I’d gone out to cut the grass to clear my head, and was happily following the mower around when old chirpy frightened the life out of me. So I gave him a wide berth, and the grass around where he was sitting is still ridiculously long. His shrill little tweets could be heard over the mower and it occurred to me maybe I should give him a little snack while he was waiting for his mum.
I wrestled with the ethics of this for a few laps of the lawn, then stopped the mower and located the fork. I’d been out in the garden a lot over the past few sunny days, so knew where the best worms were to be found. Stuck in fork, turned over soil, revealed worm. Dropped it near bird. Bird looked at me. I looked at bird. Went back to find more worms. Not one worm to be found. It’s like they communicated with each other in some worm-type way; ‘Burrow Dave, burrow.’ Honestly, when I was weeding I couldn’t move for worms curling around roots and appearing in the soil. So I downed tools and made a cup of tea. I’d done what I thought was right, but, as usual in these situations, had probably angered the worm god and the bird god, and I expect they will take their revenge.
Did you know part of the reason I had my hair cut short was because I was worried about birds getting tangled in it? True story.
I just can’t be doing with it. Birds at close range. Doing wrong when trying to do right. That sort of thing. I blog partly to declutter my mind. But the thing is, I’d actually gone outside to think through a story idea I’d been working on. Then feathery matey frightens the living daylights out of me, I think, ‘I need to blog about this,’ and all I can then think of is amateur ornithology and not the story that made no sense whatsoever anyway.
And the trouble is, I had a fledgling-shaped problem last year. Cutting the lawn, (there is a theme developing here, no?) I discovered a baby pigeon. Again, gave it a wide berth. This was while cutting the front lawn. I go to cut the back lawn. The same fledgling is on the back lawn. How? How is this possible! He can’t fly! Does he not know we have a dog? Well, he did fairly sharpish because Otis just loves to say ‘hello’. We had to coax that pigeon onto a sledge in the end and tow him through the back gate.
Close enounters with live birds are bad enough, but dead birds????? I have to fetch my neighbour.
One time the kids came into the kitchen in a most excited manner. ‘There’s a bird in the garden,’ they cheered. ‘There will be,’ I replied. ‘It’s dead!’ they declared, thrilled. ‘I’ll fetch Clive*’ I replied, panic rising. ‘STOP POKING IT.’
‘You call your shovel Clive?’ asked my sister (also present).
‘No, my neighbour. He deals with dead bird situations.’
‘Just give me your shovel and I’ll sort it.’
She thought she could, so she did.
Despite the initial concern that this ‘ain’t no sparrow,’ my sister managed to get this dearly departed bird, which was only slightly smaller than an albatross, onto the spade. She then took a run up fit for an Olympic javelin thrower and launched it into the next postcode (read: field over our fence). You may have seen it. Perhaps mistaken it for a total eclipse. I still await revenge from the crow god.
So, what have we learnt? Baby birds turn up randomly? Worms can communicate? My shovel is not called Clive? There is no wonder my short story-writing career is stalling (at best) or non-existent (at worst) when I get so easily distracted? All of the above, I feel. But I did my best to be a good person and I can’t really do anymore than that...
J x
*not my neighbour’s name
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A Letter to Myself
BLOG POST 4
Growing up, I didn’t come from a family where everything we did had a life lesson. Thank god. (Although there were a lot of educational vacations. That’s a whole other post though.) And while I was raised Jewish, we were not a religious family by any stretch of the imagination.That being said, one of the books I remember most vividly from my childhood, was a classic Jewish parable called It Could Always Be Worse! At the time I don’t think I quite grasped how quintessentially Jewish the title is. I can literally hear my Grandma Clara saying it in her Yiddish accent while she mushed my tush. But I digress.
The story is about a man who lived in a small house with his wife and several children. He felt paralyzed and overcrowded by his circumstances and finally went to the Rabbi for advice. The Rabbi told him to go home and bring a farm animal into the house. A week goes by and the man returns to the Rabbi, saying he feels even more cramped now. The rabbi tells him to add yet another animal. This goes on and on for weeks with more and more animals loaded into the house. Eventually the Rabbi says to remove all of the animals from the house. Once they are out, the man is ecstatic. He feels like he has a whole new home and now sees his situation in a new light. He is appreciative for all he has. It could always be worse.
I’m sure the relevance of this story’s message to our current situation is not lost on you. So, in keeping with remembering that things could always be worse, I have tried to write an honest letter to my future self, post corona apocalypse. So I can remind myself of what I’ve learned and what I already have in my life.
April 13, 2020
Dear Post Corona Gwen,
Well, you did it! And you look AMAZING. I’m so glad you decided to start doing online dance classes, and running. Or at least running to online dance classes.
I wonder what it’s like on the other side. I wonder what you’re like on the other side. I would imagine, knowing you the way I do, that you haven’t changed all that much. I think you will appreciate your friends and family a bit more. You might shop a little less (Just a little though. Don’t forget about that super cute Juliet Dunn dress in your Matches shopping bag.)
But the one thing I’d like you to reflect on, is your perspective on having it all. I know it’s something you think about a lot. And everyone has a different definition of what ‘having it all’ means. To you it’s about balancing a successful full time job and the time you spend with your family and friends. But on top of that you look for praise and acknowledgement that you also somehow find time to cook (sometimes), entertain, manage schedules, work out regularly, have a side hustle and still keep up with ALL the Netflix and even some of the books and podcasts too.
I have no doubt that you will still want all of that now as life returns to normal. But, instead of always rushing to the office for an important meeting, remember it often works just as well to do it from home. And if that makes things easier for you, don’t sweat it. Because if you hadn’t been at home all those months, you might not know that Otis really needs to practice his cello. And that he’s an amazing football/soccer goalie! Not to mention, you’re actually pretty good at football yourself, even in jeans. Chic.
And Izzy is so confident and natural on his skateboard. So next time he asks to ride it to school, just cool your jets and let him, instead of stressing out about it making you late. Remember that having it all, isn’t just about you. To have it all, is for you to have a happy family. And when you’re stressed or putting too much pressure on yourself, they feel that.
Having it all is also not just a list of things to check off. Spending time with your family is more than being in the same place at the same time. You have so many friends that live all over the world. A lot of whom it’s taken a pandemic to reconnect with. Don’t just talk about your friends. Talk to them.
And Adam. I know his chewing is super loud and annoying. We’ll never truly understand what goes on inside of there. But yes, I think at some point in the last ten years he had a mini megaphone installed in his mouth just to irritate you. That said, remember that you never felt closer than when you were forced to spend every single second of the day together in unprecedented circumstances. It was no longer a competition over who had done more or who hadn’t done enough. You just shared the load and got on with things. Appreciating each other. Except that time when you cleaned all the toilets in your house of three pee and poop stain blind boys. You keep that one in your back pocket for a rainy day.
You loved having every meal together as a family. And Higgins loved it the most. That dog eats so much more when he’s not starving himself with separation anxiety.
Anyway, you get the idea. I really hope you continue some of the thing you were forced into, now as life adjusts back to normal. That you remember what you’ve learned about yourself and what you’ve learned to appreciate. But, Gwen, if you remember one thing, please let it be this. Pandemic or no pandemic, drinking alcohol and eating carbs every day makes your face fat. Knock it off.
Love Always,
Corona Gwen
P.S. I almost forgot. When you’re hormonal, maybe take a break from the old Insta. It doesn’t matter what anybody else is achieving (or saying they’re achieving). You’re doing great and I love you. And maybe that is having it all!
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Aside from the obvious Quetzal, what are some villagers last seen in the original (e+ exclusive villagers included) that you would like to see come back in the series?
Oh man I haven’t looked at the list in forever! EXCUSE TO LOOK AT ANIMAL CROSSING ANIMALS! TIME TO SEE WHO OF MY FAVORITES STILL AINT BACK YET.
Alligator: Liz. There’s only two other female alligators we need more! Sure she’s also pink but she’s different enough from Gayle that people shouldn’t get mixed up. (But come on, between the squirrel name shenanigans I doubt getting people mixed up is a real concern they have...)
Anteater: Lulu the islander. I’m a big fan of purple and yellow together. And she just looks so sweet it melts me.
NOSEGAY especially! Just change her name if that’s a problem, Nintendo. She’s so pretty!!!
Also Zoe. I think those are the only ones that haven’t came back. Just bring back all of the anteaters plz.
Bird: Ace! Flash! Blue birds! Yay!
Joe! Madame Rosa! Purple birds! YAY!
Otis. I had him in a town in Population Growing once. I miss him.
Twirp. I just liked his design when I saw it in the guide as a kid. (I shipped him with Midge.)
Bull/Cow: Chuck and Oxford. Seriously there’s so few Bulls why get rid of what little we have? Verdun too.
BELLE IS THE SUPERIOR BLACK AND WHITE COW. Fite me, Tipper fans. Q('.'Q)
Carrot! Give us the carrot cow to go with our tomato duck.
Petunia! Pretty purple cow~ basically all the cows plz.
Cat: Pierre, please. Everyone else gets nightmare clown sheep I demand my mime cat. And Meow just because.
Chickens: Leigh. If its fears of looking insensitive since she’s got a native american theme... remove the war paint and head band. :\ Its not hard guys.
Rhoda, too. she was pretty.
Cub: Cupcake! Cute lil pink teddy!
Dog: Bow. See Meow. Just because.
Megumi. PINK DOGGO.
Eagel: There’s only one. Y’ALL KNOW WHO I’M TALKING ABOUT. BRING MAH BABY BACK TO MEEEEE. Take off the war paint if it’s a problem. THIS AINT HARD.
Elephant: Elina. She was soooo pretty. Again if markings are a problem in her design, get rid of the bindi. :| She’s the only elephant I think.
Frog: Emerald and Sunny. Just because they’re kinda plain and just green frogs doesn’t mean they can’t be loved! SUNNY IS SO CUTE.
Goat: (I almost typed Groot instead of goat wtf) Old man Iggy and Old man Sven! Blue goats! BLUE GOATS.
Gorilla: Jane. Why take away one of our few lady gorillas?
Kangaroo: Koharu. I really like her face design.
Marcy. Her hood is cuuuuute on her baby!!
Valise is so elegant. Besides Carrie, she’s my favorite kangaroo!
Koala: Faith. She was my first villager islander ever and I always really liked her!
Huggy is cute. She deserves hugs. Its in her name.
Lion: Aziz. I need my blue maned lion back!
Jubei looks like he could be a pretty cool lion too.
(Also on the topic of lions, give us some lady lions! You gave us Boy Kangaroos finally, I WANT LION EQUALITY.)
Mouse: Candi, Carmen, and Flossie. THEY CUTE. (I would have had Penny on this list but... that Terrible Secret of Animal Crossing story kinda made me scared of her...)
Ostrich: Nindori. Coco needs a spooky eyed friend!
Rio is literally my favorite Ostrich WHY HAS SHE NOT COME BACK? SHE LOOKS SO NICE.
Pig: Hambo was cool looking. I liked his headband! Pigleg had and awesome name and an awesome pirate look.
SUE E. WAS PRETTY. GIMME BACK PURPLE PIG.
Rhino: Patricia is a yellow rhino with horns that look like watermelon slices. GIMME NAO.
Petunia the rhino is cute too!
Tiara had a unique look. One of the last times I played Population Growing I met her in my town and I dunno I just really like her look.
Sheep: *slams hands on table* WHERE. IS. WOOLIO. NINTENDO? WHERE HAVE YOU HID EPIC COOL SHEEP???
Squirrel: Kit. Looks like. Conker. That tickles me. I want him in my towns. I swear I will not make him say inappropriate things. I don’t do that in my games.
Wolf: Tarou is purple and cute and I love him.
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The Story of Us
PROLOGUE || 1 || 2 || 3 || 4 || 5 || 6 || 7 || 8 || 9 || 10 || 11 || 12 || 13 || 14 ||
✮ Epilogue ✮
Word Count: 2,348
✮ ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
10 years later…
It had been ten years since Rhiannon and Jedediah remarried. A union that would sadly only get until Christmas that year but their love would last long after both of them passed. It was only a few short weeks later that the Matthews returned to New York with a few hearts broken in the process.
Although her inevitable return to the city happened it wasn’t the last time Riley would twirl her way through Hillford Creek. A few events over the years would draw the brunette back into town, mostly happy reasons but some brought on by sad circumstances. Despite the reason, good or bad, Riley found it harder each and every time it came for her to leave.
Now, nearly four years since her last visit Riley sits on on a near empty bus. Her gaze fixated out the window, a small smile resting on her face as she admires the scenic drive into town. Her nostalgia building with every mile behind her.
Riley trips on the last step off the bus in her true klutzy fashion. Quickly she steadies herself and has a quiet laugh at the same sorry excuse of a bus stop she first arrived at all those years ago. The brunette inhales deeply, with a smile on her face she walks towards the sign that reads;
‘Welcome to Hillford Creek
, Austin Texas’
There’s no question in Riley’s mind about where she wanted to go first. The moment she reaches the outskirts of the main town Riley veers off in the direction of the old inn. The road now free of overgrown foliage and clearly signed, a contrast to the trees and bushes she’d weave through as a teenager.
Riley walks up to what was once an abandoned inn, now a beautifully repaired home. The last time Riley was here there was a sign out front with a newly placed ‘sold’ sticker. In it’s place now stands a sign that reads ‘Hillford Creek Veterinarian Clinic’. With a soft smile, Riley reflects on something that was once quiet chatter on the floor of a burnt out room, now a beautiful reality.
The city born girls thoughts are interrupted when she’s nearly tackled to the ground by an excited dog.
“Oh Otis,” Riley pats the dog that has two paws pressed up against her stomach. “You remember me don't you, boy?” Riley sratches the German Shepard as he pants excitedly.
A quiet giggle escapes her, Riley looks up and around to see where the dog came from, to see if he was there. Then, through the glass of the first story bay window Riley finds him. Lucas. The Texan is already staring out at her, his attention spiked when he heard his dog barking.
Lucas sits there frozen in place, a mixture of awestruck and sheer shock controls him. Riley too stays in place, her hand continuing to lightly scratch Otis’ neck, a smile creeping wider with every second passing under the gaze of Lucas. Finally the brunette raises a hand giving him a gentle wave. The Texans shocked expression cracks with a smile as he mimics her greeting.
Lucas stands and heads for the front door, Riley moves too, like a magnetic pull bringing them closer. They meet on the front porch, both at a lost for words.
“Hi.” Lucas exhales loudly, finally breaking the silence.
“Hey.” Riley giggles nervously. A sound Lucas had missed.
“Do you want to come inside?” Lucas sheepishly motions towards the door.
Riley gives him a small nod and follows close behind as he leads them in. Now over the threshold Riley lets the duffle bag on her shoulder slip off and hit the floor with a gentle thud.
“Wow.” Riley says letting her eyes dance around the entrance. Riley finds it difficult to believe that this beautifully renovated building was once the eerily abandoned inn she had visited many times in the past. “This place is... Spectacular.” Riley’s eyes fall back upon Lucas’.
The Texan just bashfully shrugs a shoulder.
“Is it finished?” Riley questions.
“Technically, I guess.” Another dismissive shrug of his shoulder.
“Technically?” Riley raises a brow.
“It’s just one of those things, ya know?” Lucas lets out an embarrassed laugh. “You build something up in your head then its hard for it to ever live up to the expectations.”
“You’re not happy?” Riley frowns.
“No I am.” Lucas shakes his head. “It’s just not... complete. Not yet.”
“Did you do everything you planned?” Riley asks. “Clearly you added the clinic,” Riley motions to the front desk, “But you live here too?”
“Yes Ma'am.” Lucas nods. “Would you like the grand tour?”
“Absolutely.” Riley beams. “But I wanted to give you something first. A very late house warming gift.”
Lucas watches as Riley crouches by her duffle bag. She stands again with a framed photo in her hand. “I found it when I packing up a few of my grandmas things.” Riley explains.
“I’m so sorry I couldn’t make it to the funeral.” Lucas frowns.
“Don’t worry you have your hands full with the clinic.” Riley gives him a small smile. “I got your flowers.” The death of Rhiannon was still fresh for Riley and ached to think about too much.
“May I see?” Lucas holds a hand out for the photo. Riley lets out a laugh realising she's still clutching it to her chest.
“Of course.” She passes the black frame to Lucas and watches as he inspects the photo.
“Is this...Is this from the day they all met?” Lucas looks up from the photo with knitted brows and a slight smile.
Riley nods, taking another look at the photograph that could possibly be pinpointed as to what spurred this unannounced visit, one of the reasons at least. A photo of Jed, Rhiannon, Joe and Mae all standing out front of the inn. Each pair had their individual couple photos that Riley saw during her stay in Hillford as a teenager, this photo was from the same moment, just of them all together. “My grandma had told me that she had more photos from this day but I forgot about that until I went through her things.”
“There’s more?” Lucas asks.
“Yes. I found a whole album from her whimsical trip around the country as a young adult.” Riley explains. “I brought a couple with me from her very short stay in Hillford... If you wanted to see them.”
“Of course I want to see them.” Lucas says genuinely and it makes Riley smile to think that all these years have passed and it can still feel like they're two excited teenagers uncovering their intertwined pasts. “How about I show you around the place and then we can sit down, look at the photos and catch up?”
Riley thinks that sounds wonderful. Lucas starts to give Riley the grand tour. One half of the first story to the left of the stairs is a living and dining area, there’s also a kitchen and main bathroom. To the right of the stairs is the bay window turned little library, they only pass through that to make their way into the clinic section of the home. Riley is amazed at how profession it all looked and she presses Lucas about his business whilst commending his efforts and expressing her wonder in him achieving all he has. Then Riley does something that she hadn't in all the times she visited the inn, she went upstairs.
Lucas explains how the second story used to consist of six smallish rooms considering it’s a small town and not exactly touristy. Riley finds that he’s renovated to four grand rooms. The main bedroom, Lucas’ room, has an ensuite attachment and there’s also a smaller communal bathroom upstairs too.
At the end of the hall is the second bay window Lucas had mentioned in the past. One Riley could only see from outside of the building. Riley slowly walks towards it, now leading herself in this tour. Her knees lightly brush the edge of the seat cushion as she gets a good look out the glass. This window overlooks the yard area. Riley didn’t spend much time out the back of the building because of how overgrown the surrounding grass and foliage was but now it’s cleared completely. The old barn that was affected from the fire too has been restored to its full potential.
All the nostalgia and astonishment building within Riley started to become overwhelming and began to resonate negatively for reasons she couldn’t really explain.
“Riley, are you alright?” Lucas asks noticing Riley’s deflated mood.
“Yeah.” Riley says and it feels like a lie. “It’s just- Living in LA these past few years, kinda makes me feel like I’m missing out...”
Lucas instantly remembers her saying the same thing about coming from New York. “You know, not a lot of people would be disappointed about living in LA.”
“I’m not a lot of people.” Riley almost snaps but lets out a sigh. “I’m not disappointed, I’m uninspired..”
“How about we go downstairs?” Lucas nudges his head towards the stairs.
Riley follows Lucas back down and instinctively Riley goes towards the bay window. Lucas leaves Riley be for a moment whilst he makes his way to the kitchen to fetch them two coffees.
Now alone Riley takes in her surroundings since they only brushed past this room on the tour. Maybe that was because of the conversations they shared as teens, maybe it was because of the sweet stolen kisses leading up to her departure. Whatever it was, Lucas seemed just as bashful as Riley when they first entered.
Riley smiles at the bay window seat itself. It had been upgraded again since Lucas first renovated it over ten years ago but still had the same feel it did back then. Riley looks at the shelves of books, this was literally a conversation they had as teenagers come to life. As Riley’s gaze is wandering around the small room she stops when something catches her eye nearly knocking the breath out of her. She steps towards the chest height book shelf but whats captivate her attention is hanging above it. Riley’s eyes remain fixated on the single item framed up on the wall.
“Oh that.” Lucas laughs nervously as he reentered the room and spotted Riley’s staring.
“Is that...?” Riley turns to face Lucas, her voice almost a whisper.
“You told me to keep it forever.” Lucas matches her soft tone.
Riley turns to take another look at the the item. A single fallen leaf that floated into her lap ten years beforehand, one she passed onto Lucas, now framed and hung in a room that held such dear memories for her.
Impulsively Riley spins back around and engulfs Lucas in a hug. He’s surprised at first thus making him a little stiff but quickly warms up as he wraps his arms around Riley’s back, still a little awkward as he holds two coffee cups in hand but it still felt nice for them both.
When the two finally part they sit in the bay window, each with a hot coffee in hand.
“So what brings you back into town?” Lucas finally asks the question thats been pressing in his mind since he first noticed her through the window.
“Mabel’s shower is in a few weeks.” Riley sips at her hot beverage.
“You came three weeks early for that?” Lucas questions.
“Well that’s not the only reason I came back.” Riley laughs nervously.
“No?” Lucas asks.
“My publisher has been pressing me about a new book.” Riley explains.
“I’m not surprised.” Lucas says. “You’ve released two best sellers for them already.”
Riley smiles that Lucas has kept up to date with her life even though their contact tapered off significantly after they parted ways last time. “I released a sequel to the first book because they asked but making it a trilogy just doesn’t feel right.”
“You have to stay true to yourself and produce something you’re happy with.” Lucas says.
“It took me a little while to come to that realisation myself but I did.” Riley says proudly. “Inspiration sparked in unsuspecting time. So I told my publishers that I would write them another book but only one that meant something to me.”
“They were okay with that?” Lucas questions.
“They were a bit shocked with my outburst but they were alright with it in the end.” Riley nods. “I tried to write in LA and even though I knew exactly what I wanted to write I was just uninspired where I was, so I told my agency that I wanted some time away to write this book.”
“So you came here?” Lucas asks.
“I couldn’t draw inspiration of a tiny town living in LA now could I?” Riley asks coyly.
“I’m intruiged.” Lucas matches her playfull demeanour. “Do I get to know more about this story?”
“There’s three stories actually,” Riley clarifies, “They’re all intwined into one. There’s a love story about about a foreign ballerina and a lowly stable boy.”
Lucas sucks back a breath but doesn’t interrupt.
“And another about a man who moves two thousand miles away from home to feel closer to the woman he let go.” Riley continues. “A story of how they met and how they found their way back to each other.”
“And the third story?” Lucas’ voice wavers.
“The story of two teenagers uncovering these two stories and finding out how they were connected before they were even born.” Riley says with a small smile.
“Are there happy endings all round?” Lucas swallows hard.
“I’m still trying to determine is that’s possible.” Riley chews on her bottom lip. “What do you think?”
“Sounds inevitable to me.” Lucas says, a crooked smile plastered on his face.
Riley lets out a breath she was holding in. “Yeah?”
“Sounds, epic.” Lucas says still smiling. “Does this story have a title yet?”
Riley nods, bites down on her bottom lip and delivers her words with a hopeful smile. “The Story of Us.”
End Notes: IMPORTANT.
There is ONE more part coming after this. A bonus chapter titled ‘The Missing Years’ which I will give you key information about important events of ALL characters in the past ten years.
This story is almost over and as always, it’s been a pleasure my loves !! :)
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I remember only two things clearly about Amber.
One was sitting at the kitchen table while the dog put her paw on the paper that wrapped my grandmother’s sandwich, and pulling the paper further and further toward her off the kitchen table until a full sub sandwich had fallen to the floor and disappeared into her mouth. My grandmother, who had been tending to my baby brother, was angrier than I ever saw. It was brilliant, it was devious.
The other was Amber, a centenarian in dog years, unable to get up the stairs, whimpering, incontinent. My dad carried her up the stairs. That day she went to the vet and never came back. I remember my mother inconsolable. I remember it being clear that there was no other option.
The rest of my memories are based on stories, the time she ate a razor blade, a Christmas ornament, and never batting an eye, and a photo of me, a really young kid, wearing a Santa hat, smiling huge and hugging Amber under the Christmas tree. Amber lived well, and died nobly.
Bailey, the next golden retriever in our household, was a terror. Somehow, she survived the family vote (3-2 in favor of her staying) to literally go live on a farm. And then her kidneys were failing. When she started jumping in the bathtub to lick condensation off the tile and tub after showers, it was clear that she was suffering. There was no other option.
Selma was pulling on the leash to go home, to get back in the car, while we waited for the sedative to kick in to put her down. She had just chased a squirrel, had gone on two walks, had pooped twice, had eaten a full breakfast. As I tearfully hugged her before taking her to the vet, after Emily and I decided it was time, she bit my face, like she was embarrassed by my blubbering and was ready to get on to barking about nothing.
When the tech came in to see if she was going to sleep, I reported that she had just jumped down from the chair and vet’s desk where she was sniffing the dogs who had come before. They had to give her another injection to put her to sleep. And as she passed out in my lap, finally, I tearfully talked to her about the two oceans she had seen. The cross-country road trip we had taken. The mountains we climbed (and carried her up because she quit on the hike).
It was nearly five years ago to the day that we adopted her. I thought about the persistent bladder infections, made clear only by the blood in her urine that led to overnight hospitalizations to get the crystals to flush out the blockages. The weird tumor on her chest that kept growing and shrinking. The time when my phone was playing the music at a wedding, and I had to literally stop the reception because the dog sitter called frantic that she had gotten out of her collar to fight a dog in the neighborhood she was staying in. I thought about the poopy diapers she had started eating. The friends and neighbors she had bitten. The times when she snapped at our 2-year-old. The never-ending barking, because she needed SOMETHING, but we could never figure out what. The increasing peeing on the floor. If she wasn’t licking my feet or my ears in this mortifying slurp, she was licking the inside of Emily’s shoes. It drove her insane.
When we adopted Selma, I had fallen in love with a photo of a dog named Otis. Otis had been claimed at the adoption event by the time we arrived. Selma got on her hind legs, and basically hugged Emily. She tried to bite me. I was looking for a friend while Emily was working on her PhD coursework from 5am - 9pm in a new city on a new coast. She wasn’t my first choice, but we seemed to be hers. Within the first hour, she had run away through our housing complex and had a seizure. We started making her food, beef liver, carrots, potatoes, chicken thighs, because the internet said it would prevent the seizures. She ate better than we did.
But through all that, she was a joy. She would sleep with her butt up against my leg, and feel unmitigated glee when she stared out the window in the car. There was the time we got tired of being embarrassed by her desire to hump her dog bed (she never slept in it), and we moved the bed upstairs. She carried the bed in her mouth, threw it down the stairs, and brought it to the center of the living room so she could show our guests her perverse trick. She was always her. She was never our dog. She was our really demanding roommate who always found a way to render us unwilling to say goodbye.
Selma didn’t want to die as I cried and stroked her ears as her last breath exited her body. “This really sucks,” I said before sobbing as they injected the overdose of anesthesia that would stop her heart. It was too late to say nevermind. And there’s a nagging part of me that feels really uncertain that we made the right call. But I’m also pretty sure that, despite our best efforts, we didn’t know how to help her live anymore.
When we filled out the adoption form, Emily and I talked a long time about how we would answer the question: “How much are you willing to spend on veterinary bills in a year?” We agreed $1200 would be tough, but we’d figure it out. I’m horrified by how much more we spent in the first year, and every one of the five years thereafter. But again, she was a broken down machine that somehow kept running. It was never obvious that it was time to go. And, 21 hours later, it still isn’t. It’s quiet around here. I’m still looking for her in the places she’d lie down. I’m still freaked out by how quiet it is, and how easy it is for all of us to talk, and how we’re not playing nature sounds to drown out the sounds from the outside that had that terrier barking like a maniac.
I don’t know what gives me the right to decide she’s not worth more daily pills, or a surgery, or more walks, or who knows what. On one hand, she’s just a dog. On the other hand she was a living animal I had chosen to take responsibility for. I don’t know if she would have had it better if she had chosen someone else at that PetSmart in Tustin, California. I do think she could have had it worse. And I hope she knows that I loved the shit out of her, no matter how hard she made it, even though we made the decision to let her go.
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#38: Season 1, Episode 17 - “Get A Job”
In order to afford a Sludgie (a.k.a slushie) machine for his room, Louis opens his own Doggy Daycare. But like most things Louis attempts, it quickly becomes difficult for him to handle. Meanwhile, Steve and Donnie bond over destroying a birdhouse.
This one opens with Louis trying to butter Steve up in preparation to drop the “Buy me a Sludgie machine” bomb. Which is definitely supposed to be a “Slushie” or “Slush Puppie” machine, but I’m assuming those words are copyrighted. Louis decorates the entire house for Father’s Day… even though it ain’t father’s day. “But, every day is father’s day, Dad… when you have the perfect dad, Dad!” Louis cannot genuinely think that this could work. After prefacing the Sludgie question with a dramatic story about how the machine is going to be thrown out of a store that’s closing unless Louis rescues the inanimate object from the potential clutches of an evil child — Steve drops a bomb of his own: “Get a job.” Oh, boy. Why are those words so… terrifying? Even today as a 24-year-old adult, those 3 words send a shiver down my spine. They scream “you’re getting older, get over it” to me. I don’t know. Louis and old-fashioned work isn’t exactly a match made in heaven, though. So you already know he’s gonna spin the job angle into something ridiculous.
Louis is wearing an “I ♥ DAD” shirt to really sell it!
Steve suggests that Louis should ask Ren for help, since she just so happens to be running a youth career planning center from her room. Of course she is. Something I really like about the scene where Louis asks her for a job, is the names of the other kids already there waiting. Ren refers to them by their last names, and they’re all names of writers/crew members!! “Dearborn” - The show’s creator, Matt Dearborn. “Cunningham” - One of the writers for this episode, Sarah Jane Cunningham. And “Kaiser” another writer for a different episode, Brooke Kaiser. This is so cute to me. It’s not the only time the writers have done something like this either. This only further supports my idea that one of the writers must’ve lived down the street from Del’s Pizzeria. These kids have zero lines though, and it’s kinda funny and obvious that Disney didn’t wanna pay people more than they had to. Ren talks to the kids and they just... smile... as a response, lol. It’s awkward. She gives the Cunningham girl a job at a movie theater concession stand and tells her “Here’s a tip... Extra salt on the popcorn = they’ll buy more drinks.” This has always stuck with me. How slimy.
So, Louis busts in asking for a “teen job thingy” (perfect!) and I freaking love when Ren questions Louis about his career goals. He’s so sarcastic in the most deadpan way. He says he wants to ride a motorcycle in the globe of doom in Vegas, is “hoping to move to Donnie’s room” in five years time, and refers to some guy at a donut shop with a claw hand as the public figure he most respects. I love Louis. Then we get a montage of Louis failing at every job Ren gives him. This is actually something that’s a little off about this episode, and I never noticed it until my series re-watch for this project. There’s, like.. 5 montages in this episode. I have to admit that’s a little overkill. To an extent, this almost doesn’t even feel like an episode. That many montages means there’s hardly any actual dialogue. It’s weird.
Anyway, one of the jobs Louis fails at is “Mass Mail Marketing” a.k.a licking envelops. They decided to use this annoying CGI tongue for the scene, which I hate and always have hated. It’s not the only time they use the CGI tongue either, tragically. Like I’ve said before, stuff like that just comes across as something thrown in for a cheap laugh. I’ve literally never thought it was funny. In fact, I usually cringe a bit when they pull stuff like this. Sigh.
Um, this actually looks a little... off-color. Ew.
Louis returns to Ren asking for another job as long as it doesn’t involve licking. She finds one for him, but quickly takes it back saying “...but that involves some light licking...” WHAT THE HELL kind of jobs does she have in this database of hers?! Louis goes on to fail at being a paper boy and a restaurant mascot. That’s three strikes, so he’s dead to Ren now. Louis goes to a local park, all depressed and emo over being a failure — when suddenly a stray dog sits with him. He has a heart-to-heart with the dog saying “I’m just not one of those job people you hear so much about.” I relate to this on an emotionally deep level. Within a minute, he gets the idea to start "Louis' Doggy Daycare" to hang out with dogs all day and make quick money. There’s a short montage of Louis hanging up fliers and I feel like Shia thought it was hilarious. I mean… Look at the photo on the flier, lol.
His shirt says “I ♥ DOGS” Amazing. Not to mention, that dog is actually… smiling. The fact that Shia even posed for that photo is iconic, lol. He seems to be genuinely laughing about it here, which is great.
Louis’ first client, Mrs. Walters, shows up with her little pooch named “Poopsy.” I love this so much. My mom and I quote this lady all the time when we talk to our own little dog. She speaks in such a strangely deep baby voice with all these dips and inflections. We always say “My little pOOOoPSEHHHH!” in her voice, lol. I can’t even explain it. She drops Poopsy off and says “Bye-bye, my preciousss!” but Louis cuts her off by saying “Please. Call me Louis.” I LOVE HIM!!!!!!!!
Ren is impressed that Louis seems to’ve thought this through and is babysitting a dog. Until she sees that he’s babysitting, like.. 25 dogs.
Ren: Louis, are you crazy?!
Louis: Crazy for canines.
There’s a slightly annoyingly obvious pop culture reference to the famous “Dogs Playing Poker” paintings here. It’s whatever. Fine, I guess. But, it just feels like an easy idea to go with.
Now the dogs get antsy and Louis has to take them for a walk. I swear to GOD!!!! This is one of the funniest moments in the whole series. It’s so simple and stupid but I somehow die laughing every time. The dogs are too much for Louis to handle, so he eventually falls and gets dragged by the dogs. Except Louis becomes an OBVIOUS dummy, which is the point, and it’s hilarious to me.
Look at this. Just LOOK!!! The longer it loops, the funnier it gets. The fact that tiny dogs are dragging him so strongly makes it even better.
When they get back from their walk, Louis puts on The Adventures of Milo and Otis for the dogs to watch.. which is another real life reference. But tell me why all I could think of is the Jonas Brothers episode of Hannah Montana where Miley and Lily disguise themselves as... Milo and Otis...
Around here is where we really dive into Steve and Donnie’s subplot. Which I actually think has some really strong moments. Both of these characters, especially Donnie, are so underrated. The two find the shambles of an old birdhouse dubbed “Feather-Feather Land” that they started building when Donnie was little, but never finished. They decide to start working on it again and end up completely butting heads about everything all day. Donnie thinks he’s reading the instructions for the birdhouse, but he’s actually reading the instructions for the garage door opener.. which is great. (“Didn’t you find it odd that a birdhouse would have a remote control?!”) They continue to pettily argue over every little thing. One of my favorite moments is when Donnie yells at Steve “You’re making me nervous hovering over me like that!!” To which Steve responds “I’m not hovering… I’m overseeing. At a close distance.” I use this all the time, omg. My other favorite bit is when the mood starts to become less tense and more lighthearted between them. Steve put a “vacancy” sign on the house and Donnie says “What’s with the vacancy sign, Dad? …BIRDS CAN’T READ!” It cracks me up every time. Basically, one thing leads to another and they decide to completely destroy the birdhouse for fun. It’s pretty great.
The sound of destruction coming from the basement causes the dogs to run absolutely wild. This is another montage. It ends with Poopsy completely covered in toilet paper in Ren’s room which I think is super adorable and too cute not to include here.
Louis eventually gets all of the dogs under control conveniently right before all of their owners arrive. This scene is too much. The owners show up one by one to pick up their dogs, and they’re all one-dimensional looking stereotypes??? It’s so ridiculous, lol.
One’s a punk, one’s a hippie, and that last guy is a construction worker you guys! Just in case you couldn’t tell by the fact he’s WEARING HIS HARD HAT LIKE A FASHION STATEMENT.
Louis is all proud of himself once every dog is gone and he’s raked in all the moolah. Except, all the dogs aren’t gone. Mrs. Walters shows up looking for Poopsy. Turns out lil Poopsy is missing in the house somewhere. Louis dramatically puts on a crying act and asks Ren for help with tracking the dog down. Sad violin plays and he starts talking about how Ren was always right… He is a failure. “I’m gonna be in circuses known as The Boy Who Can’t Do Anything. Step right up!! …just don't expect much.” - I love this line sooo much and the way Shia delivers it all fake-sad. Oh my god. This leads us to yet another montage of Louis distracting Mrs. Walters while Ren runs around looking for Poopsy. Obviously, they find him (yes, Poopsy is a boy) and everything’s fine. Yay!
Louis ends up spending his money on a churro machine instead, lol. I never knew what churros were before this show, and Ren’s description of “deep fried dough dipped in sugar” always makes me craaaaave churros. To this day, I still haven’t had one. I never understood how the machine works though. It doesn’t look like the kind of thing that MAKES the churros… rather, just holds them and keeps them hot. So, does Louis make them and then store them in the case??? Who knows.
Another “I ♥ ____” tshirt! That might be one too many, lol. Although, it’s probably meant to highlight Louis’ fickleness. One minute, he loves his dad. The next, he loves dogs. Now? Forget the dogs and the man who gave him life -- churros own his heart.
So yeah! That’s the episode. This one honestly goes by lightning fast, and I think that’s because of the montages. I’ve always really enjoyed this one, though. From the Poopsy lady, to the Louis dummy, to birds not being able to read vacancy signs... I like it a lot.
Thanks for reading! :) This review was actually really fun to write, haha. Chime in via Disqus belowww.
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