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storydays · 5 months

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Brozone Random Headcannons

So I've seen the Trolls Band Together 3 times and counting and it was so good! So to get back in the groove, and after having some kind words come my way from multiple people, I really appreciate you guys! I'm gonna try a new writing style. Now remember, these are simply my opinions :)

SPOILERS AHEAD!

John Dory:

*Okay, so it is canon that Branch is 24 in the Trolls 3, which makes John Dory about 44.

*Nickname(s): JD, John

Fav color: Aquamarine and Green

Pronouns: He/Him (He supports, but is comfortable as himself)

He also gives me aromantic vibes, because like throughout the movie, he was really nonchalant when the romance bits came up, however subtle they are, he didn't give a damn lol.

JD is giving big Aries vibe with how confident he can be, pretty cheerful, and gets frustrated by tiny details, and unnecessary interruptions.

Bruce:

Bruce is the second oldest at 40

BIG Scorpio vibes!! He's strong (Y'all, have y'all seen how easily he lifted Branch when they first met) and hella independent. He was the first to question John Dory before their show, he was even hesitant to leave Vaycay Island before he sang with his brothers.

Nickname(s): Brucie, I feel like Brandy calls him that to mess with him or when she wants something. His brothers' (mostly John Dory and Clay), call him that to make fun of him as well.

Fav Color: White

DO NOT TOUCH THIS MAN'S HAIR!!!!! He will sic his kids on you and show no mercy.

Pronouns: He/Him (He's a huge ally, but he's also proud of himself.)

He loves experimenting and competing in the kitchen with Brandi, forces his brothers to try their food, and chooses whose food is going on the specials board.

Clay:

Clay is giving major middle-sibling vibes: at 35 years old.

Pronouns: He/They

Clay is non-binary and wears androgynous clothing but prefers their sweater romper and wristbands.

Nickname(s): Claybo (Viva calls him this to playfully annoy him), Clayton (Bruce and JD called him that as a kid, usually copying their mothers and grandma when they would scold him; but now call him that when he's overworked himself and they have to physically drag him to bed to rest.

Fav color: Green it was pretty obvious in the movie bc originally it was yellow when we first met him as a teen, but then we meet him later and it's green, and their whole outfit is green.

Def a Gemini! They're such a playful Troll, despite how serious he may act. But as he stated before, put some respect on his name bc they're a licensed CPA, fool!

Clay's favorite snack combo is:

Fries and a vanilla milkshake! He loves dipping the salty fries in the sweet vanilla.

They talk in their sleep, mostly about tax evasion and hot chocolate?

Hates doing their hair, Viva has to wait until he's sleeping for her to brush his tangles out.

Floyd:

Floyd is the second youngest at 32

He's such a Pisces! He's so empathetic, compassionate, and oh, so sensitive.

Pronouns: He/Him

He and Clay definitely go all out for Pride (Bc Trolls are literally all spectrums of the rainbow! We learned that in Trolls 2! It'd be impossible NOT to have a big party for Pride), and drag their brothers and are literally so hype at the whole event and crashes MEGA hard the next morning and sleeps for a good 12 hours.

Floyd remained friends with Veneer because, c'mon they were vibing. He could see Veneer wanted someone to see him, so he convinced the Mount Rageous police to let the twins out for Pride.

Had a long talk with Velvet and helped her to see the error of her ways, and she began to be nicer to Veneer and listen to him.

Fav color is Black. He knows he slays the Rock Troll look.

I'm gonna settle this once and for all: Floyd is gay. The one earring in his right ear is a shout-out to his voice actor who is an openly gay singer.

Nickname(s): Flo (I feel like Branch couldn't pronounce Floyd's name yet when he was just learning to talk, so he called him Flo and it stuck.) Floydie (when his brothers tease him about his crush that he refuses to name.)

The hair in his face is like a comfort thing for him. He knows his hair is soft, and when he's bored, he plays with it, and twirls it around his fingers.

Floyd definitely has a collection of journals, from his songwriting to venting his feelings, and even (poorly drawn) doodles of his family.

Branch:

He is the youngest at 24 as stated earlier.

Pronouns: He/Him

Fav color: Midnight blue like his hair

This dude is hella smart; like has a super high IQ, but is super chill about it.

He and Poppy are that meme: Tired X Energetic on a level 10!

Nickname: Branchifer (Poppy calls him that when she's calling him out on his attitude or when she's about to start teasing him.)

Def an Aquarius: highly intellectual, creative, and likes to join in on social interactions when it's on his time. Poppy learned the hard way why she shouldn't force him to join in.

Similar to Floyd, he was a bunch of notebooks filled with songs he'd written.

Branch is shy when it comes to family PDA, like if his brothers were to group hug him, or if they tried to mother him, and gets especially prickly when they baby-talk him in front of others.

This dude is the prince of sarcasm, clearly picking that trait up from all his brothers. Like bro, why are you so sarcastic?!

Is undeniably the most sarcastic of the brothers. (His nieces and nephews start to pick up on that, much to Bruce's horror. Brandi thinks it's hilarious.)

Doesn't really like kids, but absolutely adores his nephew Bruce Jr ( I mean he loves them all, but has a soft spot for that boy.) Bruce Jr is autistic and nonverbal and struggles to communicate. I believe he uses TSL (Troll Sign Language), and when Branch learns this, he starts signing fluently with his nephew, surprising everyone, especially Bruce Jr, because not many people can sign so fluently, but then Branch explains, that he learned when he was younger because you could go deaf at any moment and it's such a useful skill.

Bruce Jr shows Branch his blueprints that he's made and honestly, if they wanted to, they could take over the world.

That's all for now! Let me know what you guys think!

A big shout out to @vacayisland appreciate you! This one’s for you 🥰

#brozone x reader #dreamworks trolls #trolls band together #headcannons #branch #john dory trolls #clay trolls #bruce trolls #floyd trolls

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mostlysignssomeportents · 2 months

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Brinkwhump Linkdump

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me in TUCSON (Mar 9-10), then San Francisco (Mar 13), Anaheim, and more!

Once again, I find myself arriving at the weekend with a giant backlog of links, triggering a linkump, the 15th such dumpage, a variety-pack of miscellany for your weekend. Here's the previous editions:

https://pluralistic.net/tag/linkdump/

Let's start with the latest incredible news from KPMG, the accounting and auditing giant that is relied upon as a source of ground truth for a truly terrifying share of the world's economy. KPMG has a well-deserved reputation for incompetence and corruption. They first came on my radar in 2001 when they sent a legal threat to a blogger for linking to their website without permission:

https://memex.craphound.com/2001/12/05/reason-4332442-not-to-ask/

The actual link was to KPMG's corporate anthem, which remains, to this day, a banger:

https://web.archive.org/web/20040428063826/http://chkpt.zdnet.com/chkpt/uknewsita/http://anthems.zdnet.co.uk/anthems/kpmg.mp3

Don't miss the DJ remixes (and the Nokia ringtone!) that the internet thoughtfully provided when KPMG decided that it didn't want the world to know about "Our Vision of Global Strategy":

https://web.archive.org/web/20011128153057/http://corporateanthems.raettig.org/

Now all this is objectively very funny, a relic of the old, good internet from one of its moments of glory, but KPMG? They were already enshittifying, even in 2001, and the enshittification only intensified thereafter. Nearly every accounting scandal of the past quarter-century has KPMG in it somewhere, from con-artists selling exhausted oil fields to rubes:

https://www.desmog.com/2021/06/03/miller-energy-kpmg-auditors-oil-fraud/

To killer nursing homes that hire KPMG to audit its books – and to advise it on how to defeat safety audits and murder your grandma:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/09/dingo-babysitter/#maybe-the-dingos-ate-your-nan

They're the architects of Microsoft's tax-evasion plot:

https://www.propublica.org/article/the-irs-decided-to-get-tough-against-microsoft-microsoft-got-tougher

And they were behind Canada's dysfunctional covid contact-tracing app, which never worked, but generated tens of millions in billings to the government of Canada, who used KPMG to hire programmers at $1,500/day, plus KPMG's 30% commission:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/31/mckinsey-and-canada/#comment-dit-beltway-bandits-en-canadien

KPMG's most bizarre scandal is literally stranger than fiction. The company bribed SEC personnel help its own accountants cheat on ethics exams. The corrupt officials were then given high-paid jobs at KPMG:

https://www.nysscpa.org/news/publications/the-trusted-professional/article/sec-probe-finds-kpmg-auditors-cheating-on-training-exams-061819

I mean it when I say this is stranger than fiction. I included it as a plot-point in my new finance crime novel The Bezzle (now a national bestseller!), and multiple readers have written to me since the book came out a couple weeks ago to say that they thought I was straining their credulity by making up such an outrageous scandal:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

But all of that is just scene-setting (and a gratuitous plug for my book) for the latest KPMG scandal, which is, possibly, the most KPMG scandal of all KPMG scandals. The Australian government hired KPMG to audit Paladin, a security contractor that oversees the asylum seekers the country locks up on one of its island gulags (yes, gulags, plural).

Ever since, Paladin has been the subject of a string of ghastly human rights scandals – the worst stuff imaginable, rape and torture and murder of adults and children. Paladin made AU423 million on this contract.

And here's the scandal: KPMG audited the wrong company. The Paladin that the Australia government paid KPMG to audit was based in Singapore. The Paladin that KPMG audited was a totally different company, based in Papua New Guinea, who already had a commercial relationship with KPMG. It was this colossal fuckup that led to the manifestly unfit Singaporean company getting nearly half a billion dollars in public funds:

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/feb/24/incredible-failure-kpmg-rejects-claims-it-assessed-the-wrong-company-before-423m-payment-to-paladin

KPMG denies this. KPMG denies everything, always. Like, they denied creating "power maps" of decision-makers in the Australian government to target with influence campaigns in order to win contracts like this one. Who knows, maybe, this one time, they're telling the truth? After all, the company whose employees gather to sing lyrics like these can't be all bad, right?

The time is now to lead the way, We share the same the idea That may win by the end of the day. Our strength is here to stay. Identity, one energy, One strategy, with sympathy. These are the words that will lead us into a new world.

https://everything2.com/title/KPMG+corporate+anthem

You may find it strange that I'm still carrying around the factoid that KPMG once threatened to crush a blogger for linking to its terrible corporate anthem, but that's just my "Memex Method," which helps me keep track of literally everything that seemed important to me through most of my adult life:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/09/the-memex-method/

One of my favorite quips from the very quotable Riley Quinn is that "leftists are cursed with object-permanence" – that is, we actually remember what just happened and use it to think about what's happening now. The Memex Method is object permanence for 20+ years worth of stuff. A lot of those deep archives never see use, but there's a surprising number of leading indicators buried in the stuff that happened in years gone by.

Take James Boyle's 2014, XKCD-style comic about the experience of driving a notional Apple car:

https://www.thepublicdomain.org/2014/11/07/apple-updates-a-comic/

Apple, it turns out, spent the next decade working on just such a car, and while that car has now been canceled, Boyle's comic correctly anticipates so much about the trajectory Apple's products took. It's uncannily accurate – real "don't invent the torment nexus"/"cyberpunk was a warning, not a suggestion" stuff:

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/torment-nexus

But no matter how many times we insist that the torment nexus shouldn't be created, the boardrooms of end-stage capitalism continue to invent them. Take HP, the poster-child for enshittification, edging out even KPMG in the race to turn everything into a pile of shit. After years of tormenting people to punish them for wanting to print things, HP has announced a new service that so mustache-twirlingly evil that it lacks verisimilitude:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/02/hp-wants-you-to-pay-up-to-36-month-to-rent-a-printer-that-it-monitors/

Here's the pitch: HP will sell you a printer that you don't own. In addition to paying a monthly fee for your ink – which you pay no matter whether you print or not – you will also pay a monthly fee just for having HP's printer on your premises. You are absolutely, positively forbidden from using third-party ink in this printer, and must use HP's own ink, which sells for about $10,000/gallon.

But while you aren't allowed to use this printer in ways that are bad for HP's shareholders, HP is absolutely free to use the printer in ways that are bad for you. When you click through the signup agreement, you grand HP permission to surveil every document you print – and your home wifi network more generally – and to sell that data to anyone and everyone.

What's more, HP reserves the right to discipline you with punitive credit-card charges if you disconnect this printer from the internet, on the basis that doing so makes it harder for them to spy on your printer.

I'm sorry, this is just more torment nexus shit, the kind of thing you'd expect to drop on Apr 1, not Feb 29, but I guess this is where we are. I can only conjecture as to whether HP's businesses strategists are directly taking direction from my novella "Unauthorized Bread," or whether they're learning about it second-hand from a KPMG consultant who converted it to Powerpoint form and charged $1,500/day for the work:

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-near-future-tale-of-refugees-and-sinister-iot-appliances/

All of this cartoonish villainry is the totally foreseeable consequence of a culture of impunity, in which companies like HP and KPMG can rob, cheat, steal (and sometimes even kill) without consequence. This impunity is so pervasive that the exceptions – where a rich criminal faces real consequences – become touchstones: Enron, Arthur Anderson, Theranos, and, of course, FTX.

FTX was arguably the largest-scale corporate crime in world history, stealing more than $10 billion dollars, mostly from rubes sucked in by hype and Superbowl ads. When news that FTX founder and owner Sam Bankman-Fried was convicted of fraud and was in for a lengthy prison sentence made a huge stir, because criminals like SBF usually walk away from the wreckage with their hands in their pockets, whistling a jaunty tune.

One of the very best commentators on cryptocurrency scams generally and FTX/SBF in particular is Molly White, whose Web3 is Going Just Great feed is utterly indispensable. White's newsletter, "Citation Needed," dives deep into the wrangle of SBF's sentencing:

https://www.citationneeded.news/issue-52/

Bankman-Fried's parents – prominent law professors at top law schools – helped brief the court this week on their son's punishment. According to them, SBF faces 100 years in prison, but should be sentenced to 5.5-6.5 years at the most. Why? Because he is a vegan, who is not greedy, and feels remorse, and cares for individuals (recall that SBF presented himself as the avatar of the batshit "effective altruism" philosophy while privately admitting that he used this as a smokescreen).

The most bizarre note in the 100-page filing is SBF's mother declaring that her son is an "angel of mercy," apparently unaware of the grisly meaning of that term:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_of_mercy_(criminology)

America's prisons are a travesty and I wouldn't wish them on anyone, but that's not the argument SBF's parents are making; rather, they're arguing that their special boy doesn't deserve the treatment America metes out to poorer, less white people who merely steal hundreds or thousands of dollars. A crook who steals ten billion should be handled the way a casino handles a whale – with concierge service.

The problem is, there are so many of these remorseless, relentless crooks that there's no way we could scale up that white-glove treatment when we finally round 'em all up and make them pay. Writing for The American Prospect, Maureen Tkacik tells us about the ransomware attack that shut down America's pharmacy system last month:

https://prospect.org/health/2024-03-01-zoomer-hackers-shut-down-unitedhealthcare/

The attack brought down Change Healthcare, part of the monopolist Unitedhealth, which serves as the "pharmacy benefit manager" to a vast swathe of American pharmacies. PBM is one of those all-American finance scams, a middleman garlanded with performative complexity put there to make you feel stupid for asking why independent pharmacies all have to pay rent to this malicious, unaccountable – and now, manifestly incompetent – gang of crooks.

Tkacik's breakdown of this scam – and how it rendered Americans' ability to get the drugs they depend on to go on breathing – is characteristically brilliant. Tcacik is fast emerging as my favorite Explainer of Scams, a print version of John Oliver or Adam Conover. You may recall her work from my post last week on how private equity has taken a wrecking ball to America's hospitals:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/28/5000-bats/#charnel-house

I always try to finish these linkdumps with some upbeat news to carry you through the weekend, and this week brought two genuinely wonderful – and totally underreported – pieces of amazing news.

The first is that Starbucks has sued for peace in the war against its workers' unions. Hundreds of Starbucks stores have unionized in recent years, but not one of them had a contract. Instead, Starbucks had waged dirty war on their own workers, from denying gender-affirming care to unionized employees to simply shutting down whole stores after they voted to unionize:

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/14/starbucks-union-company-threatens-that-unionizing-could-jeopardize-gender-affirming-health-care.html

But the workers held fast and after years of this, Starbucks has caved, promising contracts for all unionized stores and an end to its campaign of terror against workers seeking to unionize more of its stores. In a postmortem for Jacobin, Eric Blanc rounds up "seven lessons from Starbucks workers' historic victory":

https://jacobin.com/2024/02/starbucks-sbwu-contract-bargaining/

This is the kind of listicle I can get behind. According to Blanc, the Starbucks unions won by deploying worker-to-worker organizing, a tactic that many of the new unions that are shaking up formerly impossible-to-organize jobsites are using (Blanc has a book about this coming from UC Press called "We Are the Union: How Worker-to-Worker Unionism Can Transform America," so he should know).

Other tactics that made the difference for Starbucks unions: new digital training and support tools and partnering with established unions for support and infrastructure. Blanc also calls out the success of "salting" – the venerable but largely disused tactic of union organizers applying for a job at a non-union shop in order to organize it.

Blanc also mentions government policy, including the outstanding work of NLRB general counsel Jennifer Abruzzo, a shrewd and committed tactician whose understanding of the technicalities of labor law have let her push for bold measures. For example, in Thrive Pet Care, Abruzzo is arguing that when a company refuses to bargain in good faith for a contract with its union, she can step in and order them to honor the terms of a contract at comparable unionized competitors until they produce a contract of their own:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/06/goons-ginks-and-company-finks/#if-blood-be-the-price-of-your-cursed-wealth

Abruzzo is one of several smart, competent tacticians in the Biden administration who are working to kneecap corporate power. Another is Rohit Chopra, chair of the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, who just announced another bold, important initiative that will help Americans fight corporate corruption and get a fair deal:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-03-01-public-option-credit-card-shopping/

Chopra is taking aim at credit-card comparison sites that purport to show you where you can get the best deal. If you're an affluent person who doesn't carry a balance, this might not matter to you, but if you're an average working stiff, high interest rates can gobble up a massive share of your paycheck. What's more, credit card margins are higher than they have ever been:

https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/blog/credit-card-interest-rate-margins-at-all-time-high/

The most expensive credit cards come from the big, monopolistic banks, but you wouldn't know it from the leaderboards produced by Credit Karma, NerdWallet, LendingTree, and Bankrate. All of these sites take bribes from the big banks to list their credit cards above those offered by credit unions – who are typically 10% cheaper than the big banks' cards.

The new CFPB rule prohibits this fraudulent ranking, but the Bureau is going even further. They're using their administrative powers to force banks to report their rates to the Bureau, which will publish them on a publicly funded, neutral website – what David Dayen calls "a public option" for shopping for credit cards.

This policy makes a perfect bookend to the last CFPB initiative I wrote about here: a rule that forces banks to allow you to transfer your account to a rival with a couple of simple clicks, importing all your history, payees, and everything else you need to switch to a better bank:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/21/let-my-dollars-go/#personal-financial-data-rights

Combine that ease of switching with reliable information on which banks will give you the best deal and you get something that will directly transfer millions and millions of dollars from giant, wildly profitable banks to low-income people who've been tricked into paying them punitive interest rates.

So that's it, this week's linkdump. I promised you I'd end on a high note, and I did it. The world may be full of all kinds of terrible things, but workers and regulators are scoring big, muscular victories in battles where the stakes are real and important. Have a great weekend – we've earned it.

And remember!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/02/macedoine/#the-public-option

Image: Stacy (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/notahipster/4402860361/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

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pixelpaladin · 1 year

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Deep dive to Spam bots on Tumblr (Spoiler: FSB mentioned)

(TL;DR: Russian business man is heavily investing into companies behind the bots, mentions of FSB, Shell companies in tax-evasion and weak business law countries, Huge industry and money laundering)

I got annoyed about the bots on tumblr, so I decided to do some investigation into who is behind them and funding the operation, here is my findings:

The graph shows how a network of “affiliate marketing” companies for “dating” services is connected and some of the key players behind said companies

The first “company” I ran into is called “Digital international Inc” and it is shown as the “legal entity” behind of many of the websites the bots tend to link to, it also has its address listed in the Marshall Islands.

By looking at trademarks owned/filed by that company, we find 2 more companies/trademarks that are/were owned by the same legal entity.

First of these is called “Mirelia Services Co.”, currently known as “Mirelia Networks”, which lists its main business as “advertising and marketing” and is registered at the same address as “Digital International”.

Where things get interesting is when we look at one of the trademarks that was passed between “Mirelia” and “Digital international”, a trademark for an LGBTQ+ dating app called “Hitwe”,

The trademark application for “Hitwe” is listed as “Rescinded/canceled” but from the original registration documents and later ownership transfer filings, we come across an interesting company

“Matar Trade & Invest Ltd.” This company has other similar “dating” and “marketing” companies linked to it, and is owned by “Vladimir Mnogoletniy”, a Citizen of Russia, who has lived in Ukraine for over 10 years and his runs his businesses there, but interestingly does not seem to have officially moved there, and maintains his Russian Citizenship as his only one.

He is also the CEO or a major of many other companies, the main one being “Genesis”, the company behind a controversial fitness app “BetterMe”, which has been shown to aggressively sell user data to less-than-reputable ad companies and affiliates, as well as being used to redirect money from scam dating sites and lessen the impact of credit card chargebacks from those sites [See footnote 1]

What makes him a particularly interesting individual is that his father, who is a Captain of the Second Rank in the Russian Navy, is doing security work for “Sevmash” - A Russian shipbuilding company, the only one that is making nuclear submarines in Russia. He also co-authored a research paper that talks about “Military Counterintelligence activities”, The other author of said paper is an FSB officer.[See footnote 2]

Sources and footnotes:

Footnote 1: “BetterMe steals traffic” - Article by SH[IT]HAPPENS on Medium Footnote 2: “Why don’t I no longer shake hands with Vladimir Mnogoletniy.“ - Article by SH[IT]HAPPENS on Medium

Tangent: one of the other companies that I came across that seems to be working with Mirelia is “Traffichunt”, which seems to be one of the companies selling bot spam advertisements as well.

Another interesting thing is that the lawyer who filed for most of the trademarks, has quite a repertoire of similar trademarks under his belt:

Most of these seem to have been rejected because the address he listed in the applications does not exist

If you read all the way to here, thank you and I hope that bot’s never bother you again.

#spam bots #deep dive #osint #spam #research #i hope i dont get merc'd #tumblr bots #please read #bots #spammers #opsec #phishing #cybersecurity #sex bots #fake accounts #long reads

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kittyball23 · 2 months

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True Crime (a Trolls fanfic)

Summary: Bruce hears something unexpected on the True Crime podcast he listens to

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Beach days were always the best.

It gave his wife Brandy the ample time she needed for a little R n R. It gave their 13 kids the fun they craved, hitting the waves and splashing about in the warm Vacay Island waters. And it gave Bruce the opportunity to kick back, tan, and listen in on the next episode of his True Crime podcast.

His kids were well-behaved for the most part (save for Bruce Jr. and his biting problem, and perhaps Freddy with his desire to stuff his body into whatever little cramped spaces there were). But, with a quick reminder to mind their manners and beware of any rough waves, he knew that they were well off.

As he settled down on the towel, he could hear the faint sounds of his children laughing and splashing, their mother floating on a surfboard nearby and watching over them. Bruce then removed his vest, rubbed tanning oil on his body, donned sunglasses, popped on his earbuds and began to play the podcast. The narrator's mysterious voice began to speak, introducing the story.

“In tonight's episode of True Crime, discover a true story about betrayal, deception, and greed, and the defeat of two nefarious villains who were finally dethroned from their treacherously influential reign…”

Bruce was already intrigued. Ooo, this is gonna be a GOOD one. He could tell. He tucked his arms behind his head and got comfortable.

“When one is a troll, there is no better way to live your life to the fullest than with hugging, dancing, and of course, singing. But for one troll, these harmless activities become the paramount of his nightmare for the next two months.”

Bruce scrunched his nose, skeptical. Singing and dancing that led to, as the narrator described, a ‘nightmare’ situation? He had to hear the rest of this.

“You never expect this sort of thing to happen to you, you know?” a new voice said, which Bruce could presume was the victim of the unfortunate scenario. “I sure didn't. They seemed like a nice pair of siblings. I never suspected anything malicious. They saw my performance, enjoyed it, and asked for some tips to boost their own careers. We had some drinks and… and the next thing I remember is waking up in a diamond bottle.”

Yikes, Bruce thought, pitying the victim. He sounded like a nice guy, too, with the calm, serene tone his voice had. Trapped in such a cramped space for so long sounded awful.

“And you won't believe who those said siblings were,” the narrator continued. He was very right in that, too. Because as soon as the podcast began to play a sample of the hit single ‘Watch Me Work,’ Bruce’s jaw practically dropped on the floor.

No way…

“Yes way. You heard correctly. Criminals in this case are none other than superstar sensations Velvet and Veneer, from the bedazzling city of Mount Rageous. But following them now, is a not-so-bedazzling record. (And we don't mean the musical kind.)”

A new female voice began to list off charges. “Troll-napping, Troll torture, not to mention tax evasion. You won't believe how many yachts, bling, and exotic PETS they illegally bought!”

Even if Bruce could believe it, he was still having a hard time wrapping his mind around the initial news. Velvet and Veneer? The well-known household names that his kids - and himself for that matter - were fans of? Well, not anymore! Hearing such things that they did made him sick. Man… it’s gonna be hard separating the art from the artist.

“And today, just two months after the duo was turned in by their assistant, Crimp, they find that their names live on forever not in fame, but in INfamy,” the narrator said.

“Oh, I feel awful,” the distinct voice of Veneer said next. “I wanted nothing more than to be famous, and… Vel made me believe that it didn’t matter HOW we did it, as long as we DID it. Even… even if it meant KILLING a troll. It was real rough - I mean, sucking up his talent was easy enough, but we were literally sucking the LIFE out of him. His skin was turning pale - and, like, not in a stunning Victorian way, either - and that magenta hair of his was turning whiter and whiter by the minute…”

Magenta? Bruce wondered. He’d known a troll once with magenta hair. His own younger brother. Could it be…? No, it couldn’t… I mean, there’s PLENTY of Trolls that have magenta hair, don’t they?

“I didn’t say anything to Velvet though because, truly, I was too afraid to stand up to her. She’s my sister! My biggest inspiration… I didn’t wanna discourage her. But now, I see that what we did was wrong. Very, VERY wrong.”

Good, Bruce thought.

“But despite the change of heart, this Mount Rageon still has to serve at least another six months in juvenile imprisonment, alongside his sister,” the narrator said. “It comes as much relief to the now-free victim.”

“Jail can’t be fun,” the same serene voice from before admitted, “but I’m glad they’re serving their time. Everyone makes mistakes, and just like it’s important to learn from them, it’s also important to pay the repercussions for your actions.”

Well said, Bruce had to admit. He also had to admit something else.

That sounds a LOT like something Floyd would say…

And if his suspicions were not enough…

“While recovery has been successful for the troll and he has plans to return to singing, he still feels as though something is missing from his life…” the narrator continued.

“I was solo-ing around for quite a bit of time before I ran into Velvet and Veneer,” the Troll said. “But, really… I would LOVE if I could perform in the band I was in years ago… but, we kind of had a fight, and ever since that fight, we haven’t seen each other. If we could reunite - oh - that’d be a dream come true. It’s been too long.”

Bruce swallowed. Twenty years is a long time…

The next part was the real kicker, though.

“Until that day, 36-year-old Floyd still holds onto the hope that he will see his bandmembers - also known as the brothers who made up the band BroZone - someday,” the narrator said.

“John Dory, Clay, Branch, Spruce… if ANY of you are listening, I want you to know that I miss you. And I want us to be a family again…” the Troll - FLOYD - said.

Bruce’s thumb went to hit the pause button. He had to stop. This was a lot to process, all at once. He was flabbergasted. Bamboozled. Shocked. He broke down everything he had heard piece by piece, trying to make sense of it.

Velvet and Veneer were baddies.

They had taken Floyd.

His brother Floyd.

They’d used his talent.

They’d almost killed him.

He would’ve never had the option of seeing his brother again.

But now, he did.

“Daddy! Daddy!” one of his kids - Windy - was suddenly calling to him. “Bruce Jr. threw sand in my eye!”

“I said I was sorry!” Bruce Jr. protested.

“Only after Mom told you to!” LaBreezy pointed out.

“Did not!” Bruce Jr. countered.

“Did too!” Cove jumped into his sister’s defense.

“Well, Daddy, aren’t you gonna punish him??” Windy demanded to know. The way he saw it, it wouldn’t be fair to let him slide!

But the way Bruce saw it… well, he wasn’t seeing anything. His brain was still overloaded with what he’d learned.

Brandy had followed the kids, curiously noting her husband’s surprised expression. “Honey?” she questioned. “Are you all right?”

Bruce looked at her resolutely.

“I… I have to find my brother…”

#trolls #trolls 3 #trolls band together #spruce trolls #brandy trolls #sprandy #dreamworks #fanfiction #kittyball writes

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