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Mushroomhead - These Filthy Hands

2013.12.27 13:25 Mushroomhead - These Filthy Hands

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2023.05.30 22:29 xiaolii [H] Lots of Games [W] Trade for Games or Paypal (EU)

Last Updated List: 30/05/2023
 
I'm primarily looking to trade for games from my wishlist, otherwise I am also open to selling them. I am not interested in games I already have and all games I'm getting are for me and activated on my own account. Other than that feel free to offer your list of Steam games and something I may not have and fulfills my criteria I could/would be willing to trade for it/them.
If you're either trading or buying please state the game(s) you are interested in and your offer (game(s)/list/price).
 
Info:
 
I kindly ask of you is to be reasonable when making offers to make it a fair trade for both of us.
Let's have a good exchange/trade!
 
List of games:
submitted by xiaolii to indiegameswap [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 22:29 xiaolii [H] Lots of Games [W] Trade for Games or Paypal (EU)

Last Updated List: 30/05/2023
 
I'm primarily looking to trade for games from my wishlist, otherwise I am also open to selling them. I am not interested in games I already have and all games I'm getting are for me and activated on my own account. Other than that feel free to offer your list of Steam games and something I may not have and fulfills my criteria I could/would be willing to trade for it/them.
If you're either trading or buying please state the game(s) you are interested in and your offer (game(s)/list/price).
 
Info:
 
I kindly ask of you is to be reasonable when making offers to make it a fair trade for both of us.
Let's have a good exchange/trade!
 
List of games:
submitted by xiaolii to GameTrade [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 21:05 Lanzen_Jars A job for a deathworlder [Chapter 117]

[Chapter 1] ; [Previous Chapter] ; [Discord + Wiki] ; [Patreon]
Chapter 117 – I have nothing to hide
With a deep, long exhale that took every last bit of air out of his lungs, James hung up his call. Wordlessly and with his chest deflated, he simply remained standing there for a few seconds, feeling how his system gradually drained itself of oxygen while he tried his best to clear his thoughts and listen into himself. But all he felt was a chaos that he couldn’t calm. He had no idea if he was ready for this, and trusting the word of others had never in his life felt as hard as it did right now, not even the many times his life had literally depended on the word of others.
All he could do was reassure himself. He could do this. He would do this. And they all would get through this. He would make it happen. He had to.
Feeling the raging chaos-storm die down only ever so slightly at his own reassurances, he finally allowed himself to inhale again. He forced himself to not violently gasp for air as if he had just emerged from a deep dive. Instead, he very deliberately began to allow air to rush into his body through his nose, adamant to keep full control of the flow as he did so.
Once his lungs were full, he kept the air in for only a moment, before allowing it to rush back out of his mouth in a pursed-lipped exhale, while also opening his eyes again.
With steady and deliberate steps, he then began walking back to the rest of his group at an even and controlled pace. The projections of his team’s expression looked back at him with a strange sense of wonder and anticipation.
Nia and Moar on the other hand looked like they already sensed the severity of the situation, and a mounting dread seemed to take hold of them. Meanwhile Curi and Congloarch stood by with stony expressions, not giving a hint as to what was going on behind their faces.
That only left one.
Unlike all the others, Shida approached him as he returned to the group. After meeting back up outside of the conference room once the recess had been called, James had immediately separated from everyone again, and she had patiently waited for him to be done with his preparations. But now they could finally discuss what needed to be said.
“Are you feeling any better?” James asked her, knowing that he sadly would most likely have to force her to join them in the room once again once the proceedings would return to order. It was for everyone’s safety.
“Not really, but I think I can sit it out,” Shida confirmed for him, her expression stuck between assuring and sickened by the thought, which James couldn’t fault her for. With her ears twitching, likely to subtly remind him of her fine hearing, she then lifted a hand to gently put it on the side of his mask, where his cheek would usually be found. “So, it’s come down to it, huh?”
James nodded, while lifting his own hand to press it onto hers.
“Yes,” he replied with a sigh that reflected the weight he felt pushing down on him. “Not how I wanted things to go, but…I’m also glad that the secrecy will be over.”
Allowing his head to sink down, his mask pressed against Shida’s forehead.
“I honestly can’t tell if I’m overjoyed or devastated that you’re here with me for it,” he whispered as he closed his eyes for another moment.
“I wouldn’t want to be away from it,” Shida whispered back while her other hand also lifted to gently sink down onto the back of his head. “Not again.”
Letting out the mildest hint of a laugh, James embraced her. As he felt her body in his arms, a primal part of him wished that they could just remain like that. Just unload all of this weight and pressure in a hug until nothing bothered them anymore. Of course, that was not how anything worked, and so they soon let go.
Together, they joined back up with the rest of the group.
“Usually, I would offer anyone who doesn’t want to stick around the chance to get out now, but I’m afraid that would be way too dangerous to do,” James explained as he looked at everyone’s face individually. “For better or for worse, it’s safest if we all stick together now.”
Moar was the first to step forwards. Slowly, she approached him with her lumbering steps, one clawed hand lifted to her face while long fur hung off her thin arm, while the other half-extended towards James but stopped in mid air long before it reached him.
“James, what are you going to do?” she asked, her tone filled with all kinds of strongly held-back emotions. Light reflected twinklingly in her wet, dark eyes. James swallowed, but a feline hand clasping around his gave him courage.
“I’m going to come clean,” he said with a look up at the giant. “Everything that’s been said. Everything that’s been done. I’m putting it all on the table. I will let the galaxy be my witness that I made my choices and I am willing to stand for them, like I always was.”
He then wondered if he should prepare all of them for what was about to happen.
However, he decided against it.
“It’s better if I don’t tell you more right now,” he said with a creeping sadness gradually reaching for his words. “I don’t know how you’re going to react to it, but…whatever your reaction may be, it will be better if it is genuine inside of that chamber. You knew of nothing, and people will see that. I don’t want anyone to unjustly think you were involved.”
Although he didn’t say much, the concerning vagueness of his statement seemed to already give at least some of them ideas of what was going on, especially given the recent tensions back on Earth.
“James…you- you can’t be-“ Nia began, however James cut her off with a raised hand and slowly shook his head.
“Let’s keep it for the big reveal, alright?” he suggested, although his tone didn’t leave much room to argue.
Seemingly stricken by his words and looking for some reassurance that surely what she was thinking couldn’t be true, Nia glanced around to the faces of her other fellow humans for any sort of support. However, the projections of the faces of James’ entire team, including her own girlfriend, were just as glum and anticipating as that of her brother was.
They all knew. Of course, they did.
As James watched that realization sink in for his sister in real time, he suddenly noticed a huge shadow creeping in from his side. Turning his head, he looked up just in time to see a huge hand sink down to grasp around his shoulder, as Congloarch bowed his upper body in a show of respect.
“It is a rare sight to see a dancer stand firm,” the Lizartaur informed him with his deep, bellowing voice that came through barely parted rows of sharp teeth. “You carry yourself well, James. Keep that up, and the Galaxy will see it, too. I, for one, will stand with you.”
All of the giant’s four fiery eyes were focused down onto him.
James exhaled slowly, not knowing if he should be inspired or bemused by the strange encouragement.
“Thank you,” he ultimately said with genuine fondness in his voice. “For everything.” Hesitantly, he then turned to Curi. The cyborg still stood without any movement, their lightly glowing red eyes fixating on him with great attention.
“I think…” they began to say, noticing his eyes on them, however they then cut themselves off and shook their body slightly to rephrase it. “I believe in you. I believe that I cannot have misjudged you to such a degree that anything you did would make me no longer want to stand with you. Not after you stood with me when nobody else would. You said you wouldn’t rather have anyone else by your side. And I will be.”
While James appreciatively bowed his head to the cyborg, Moar then came forth once again, seemingly feeling like she needed to say something as well.
“I am not sure what you have in store for us this time, but I cannot imagine abandoning you to face it alone once again either,” she said, her gaze noticeably falling onto his cybernetic arm. “I cannot promise that it will not take me time, but I do not wish to let myself be blinded by my own ignorance again. Therefore, I will listen to your reason, and knowing you, I am sure I will see it as well.”
Exhaling slowly, James was already starting to think that he was feeling one too many emotions right before such a huge event. But, seeing as it couldn’t get much worse, he turned to his team.
“Anyone got anything to say? Now’s your chance,” he offered to them. The humans briefly exchanged some looks with each other. It didn’t really seem like they had much need to get anything out.
“If we’re going to have to fight our way out of here because of this, I’m going to be so mad,” Athena notified everyone with a sigh while patting the side of her belt with one hand while throwing her long ponytail back with the other.
“Remember to count your kills if it comes to that,” Koko chimed in with a tone that seemed to try to break up the tension. “Makes documentation so much easier if we don’t have to scrub through the footage.”
She tapped at the camera attached to her chest with a finger.
Giving the two a hesitant courtesy chuckle, James then turned to his sister once more. She still looked on in disbelief, seemingly overwhelmed by what was happening.
Momentarily letting go of Shida’s hand, James walked over to her, immediately pulling her into a tight hug.
“You don’t have to worry,” he assured her, doing his absolute best to confidently speak this truth into existence. By any metric, she had done nothing wrong. At the very least he would ensure everyone knew about that.
Nia held him for a moment, before shifting her head slightly.
“What about you?” she asked gently.
“I can handle myself,” James replied immediately. “And I’ll have no regrets.”
Apparently not quite knowing how to react to what he had said, Nia just squeezed him tighter.
“I love you,” was all she said in the end, and James could feel his heart drop at her words.
“I love you, too,” James replied seriously, and after a few more long seconds, they let go of each other again.
Clearing his throat, James looked around at everyone.
“We should probably get back inside early,” he suggested, feeling like keeping a good overwatch over the situation was a valuable strategy.
Although hesitant, everyone followed him as he led the way, and soon enough, they were back on their seats – after checking everything for possible tampering once again.
For now, the room was still relatively empty. One or two of the other representatives had already found themselves back as well, and many nervous glances were thrown James’ way after the earlier outburst.
However, as James settled into his seat to go over how exactly he wanted to say what he had to, he heard a weird sound of pitter-patter in front of him. Leaning forwards in confusion and looking down at the railing, his eyes then quickly caught the bright, signal-colored fur of a pixemerrier climbing up towards him. The nimble lemur forewent the need for the offered stairs and simply used the railing as more than enough purchase to make it up to the second level, small hands soon reaching over the sides to completely pull the pink and spotted body up.
Now sitting directly in front of James on almost eye-level, Losaraner looked at James with mildly glowing eyes.
“Can I help you?” James asked as he shifted his position slightly to look at the man head-on.
“Just, uhm….” the lemur started, but then heavily hesitated as he awkwardly shuffled his body around. Something seemed to make him majorly uncomfortable, although it didn’t appear to be for an all too serious reason.
Strangely feeling put the tiniest bit at ease at the display of sincere awkwardness, James let out a bemused breath.
“Whatever it is, it’s alright,” James therefore informed the glowing lemur and reassuringly raised a hand. “I’ve been called every name in the book and had to answer every question I can think of, you won’t insult me with whatever you have to say.”
With some honest relief apparently rushing over the pixemerrier’s face, Losaraner pushed himself up to all four of his feet again, balancing on top of the railing.
“Forgive the inconvenience, ambassador, but we would like to relocate your seat,” he informed James.
“Relocate my seat?” James asked with a head-tilt, his mind already running with possibilities how this could be to his detriment.
“Not just yours, that of your entire party,” Losaraner quickly clarified something that James had honestly already figured. “We believe it would lead to a more civil outcome.”
James quite earnestly scoffed at that. There would be nothing civil about what was going to happen. And although he wasn’t technically against gaining some distance from his most averse parties around here, he also felt like the sudden need to get him away from Uton had a foul aftertaste.
“Is that a compulsory ‘would like’ or a suggesting one?” he therefore inquired. He almost didn’t want to, given that Shida had difficulties being here already, and being further from her former father figure surely would help with that a bit. But still, he was going to trust his gut on this one.
“Oh, uhm…well, if you would like to remain in your seat I guess-“ Losaraner began, and James quickly nodded before he had even finished.
“I would,” he confirmed firmly. “But thank you very much for your consideration.”
If they were going to try and blow him up or whatever, they better be willing to take their scapegoat down with him. Maybe this was all a genuine offer in the end, but even then staying around here wasn’t going to have a negative impact.
“In that case, I’ll return to let my mother know,” Losaraner said with a nod and turned on the spot, seemingly to climb back down to the lower level.
“Hey Losaraner?” James stopped him briefly, causing the lemur to turn his head back.
“Ambassador?” he questioned James’ intervention, awaiting whatever he would have to say.
“You seem like a good guy,” James said, fixating the glowing primate through his visor in an attempt to spot any attempt at deception from the small creature. He couldn’t find any. “Keep an open mind, alright?”
Although apparently confused by James’ words, Losaraner nodded with a bit of enthusiasm.
“Of course, Sir,” he replied, before then climbing down the railing face-first to join back up with his conspecifics.
“Almost showtime,” James then mumbled to himself.
Shortly after, the room had once again filled up with the representatives of all eleven primate species the galaxy knew, as well as their extended company.
Though by now, it almost seemed like the invited representatives found themselves outnumbered by the vastly increased number of reporters, sound engineers, camera people and even news casters that had come together to report on the event. Their numbers must have had at the very least tripled since before the recess had begun, and that was a very conservative estimate.
Cameras and microphones were truly everywhere now, ensuring that not a single instant of this most possibly historic moment would be missed without being preserved for all to see.
Next to him, James could see Uton settling in. His face seemed to be plastered with the same anticipation that James felt. And for only a second, both primates glanced over at each other at the same moment, their gazes very briefly meeting in a moment that seemed to fill the air with an electric charge.
The tension was palpable, and it only looked for a release.
In the room’s center, Losaranarja was now climbing back onto her small podium. The glow if her fur and eyes had increased quite drastically since before the recess, and James wondered if that was caused by stress alone or if other factors also played a role.
“Welcome back everyone. Seeing as all invited representatives have returned to their places, I hereby reopen the council of primates,” she announced over the loudspeakers as her glowing eyes scanned over the room. “Before the recent recess, we had just born witness to a frankly tremendous confession of Captain Ferromore Uton. If nobody has anything absolutely urgently relevant to say before we continue, I would suggest that we waste no time before getting to the bottom of that unnerving revelation he wishes to share with us.”
Without wasting a second of time, James was already on his feet.
“Actually, I do believe I have something to say on the matter,” he announced loudly, pulling the attention of the room onto him at an instant, camera flashes almost immediately erupting into a storm of flashing lights. “In fact, since Representative Goloribal’s only worry about letting me take over the explanations earlier appeared to be that I may not be ‘fervent’ enough about it, I will like to pick him up on that earlier implied offer, with the promise that I will be sufficiently ‘fervid’ about everything I am going to divulge.”
“Am…bassador?” Losaranarja asked completely confused by this turn of events as she looked up at him, almost appearing shock-stunned at the revelation.
“Do I have the word?” James asked, still sticking to procedure vehemently.
The lemur seemed to hesitate. Clearly, she was already afraid of where this was going. However, she had offered the opportunity to speak to everyone who believed that they had something important enough to say. And therefore, she had little choice on the matter.
“Of course,” she said after pulling herself together visibly. “Please go ahead, Ambassador Aldwin.”
James nodded.
“Thank you,” he announced loudly. And although he felt his insides scream in cramping anxiety, he held on his firm tone and posture as he stood up straight. This was it. “First, please allow me to reiterate and reaffirm my earlier point. The attack on Dunnima was entirely unprovoked and was and remains unjustifiable.”
He needed to set that stage. That was his hill, and he was willing to die on it. Nothing they could bring against him would change those facts.
Filling his lungs with as much air as he could without it being painful, he then continued.
“Now to the matter at hand,” he addressed the room. “Captain Uton has been lying to you. However, not about the point that you may think,” he informed them, with the faces of everyone already falling into gloom at what exactly he may mean by that. “He was not the one who ordered the attack on Dunnima. Humanity has already known who ordered the attack for quite a while now, and we were in the process of drafting a proper case against him before we would publicly accuse him of anything. We do however have ample evidence to provide to prove the guilt of this individual, namely Acting-Councilman Ekorte Keun.”
There was an immediate eruption of more flashes as well as wild mumbles throughout the room. Everyone seemed to be whipped up into a mild frenzy at James’ words. And James wouldn’t give them time to ask many questions about it. They wouldn’t need to.
“Keun himself has confessed his crime to me personally shortly after it was committed,” he continued his retelling of the events of the past months without losing more than a moment to the muttering. “He did so, because he falsely believed himself to be in danger after his failed attempt at somebody’s life backfired against him. He also believed that I would be the only person able to prevent said danger from claiming him, which is why he came to me directly. Our conversation was recorded and is part of the case I mentioned earlier. Within it, you will hear that the Acting-Councilman believed that he had become the target of the ire of a Realized Artificial Sapient after his attempt at her life with his illegally ordered attack on Dunnima had failed to destroy her, and he believed that my influence on said artificial Sapient would be great enough to preserve his life, if he only confessed to his crimes in my favor.”
As if a switch had been flipped, the mumbling in the room came to an almost immediate halt. From one moment to the next, you could suddenly hear a pin drop, with even the news casters and reporters stopping their ongoing drivel as all eyes were entirely on James.
“He was mistaken in his assumption,” James said in no unclear terms. “In reality, the Artificial Sapient, as much as she may have wanted to, was never out for revenge against him. She knew that any aggressive action she would take would be nothing but fuel to the fire that already raged against her. And therefore, she remained just as passive as she had been throughout her entire existence, while the apparent attacks against her would-be killer were carried out by a so far unknown third party.”
Somehow, the room got even more quiet. By now, James could feel gazes burning into him not only from all around the front of him, but also from right behind his back, as he had now fully confirmed what many of them had been passively suspecting for a long time now.
Of course, Uton technically had plenty of opportunity to dispute James’ words and insist that he was the one to order the attack. However, in the end, did it really matter? Right now, nobody really cared who exactly ordered the attack. Something else was a lot heavier on their mind.
“Are you…saying…that there truly is a Realized Sapient on Dunnima?” Losaranarja asked hesitantly, as nobody else seemed to indicate that they wanted to ask this all-important question, causing her to take over that duty as the host.
“That is correct,” James confirmed without hesitation. “Her name is Avezillion, and as previously mentioned, she was the main target of this recent attack.”
It was like a timer slowly ticked down as the silence remained for just a bit longer.
Three.
Two.
One.
And like that, the loud discussing and mumbling and even shouting over each other broke out once more, along with a renewed vengeance of cameras.
“You are saying right now, there is a realized Sapient loose in the galaxy…And you knew?” Klanneifer was the first to break out of the homogeneous white noise to directly address James. “Are you insane?”
Keeping his calm, James brought his hands behind his back.
“I don’t believe I am,” he replied nonchalantly with a gaze at the four-armed primate. “Especially considering that Captain Uton and his known circle of influence most likely knew just as long as I did, without ever divulging that information either.”
He could hear shouts about how this was an outrage and how about something would have to be done immediately from all around him. It seemed like most of the present representatives were absolutely ready to try and mobilize the entire Communal military to deal with this at an instant, and it really made James wonder if this all had truly been the best course of action.
But right now, he had to believe. He could not allow himself to show weakness. Not here, not right now.
“Surely you know the dangers of these beings!” Commander Halljafier was the next to speak up. “Are you saying humanity just allowed all of this to happen under their nose?”
Again, with just humanity. It wasn’t like no one else had known.
“At my very own recommendation,” James replied without even really wasting a glance over at the grassurgap next to him, “The leadership of humanity has decided to allow Avezillion a chance to exist and prove herself. She has existed on Dunnima for many years without a single violent incident on her part. We believed this to be rather unprecedented of course, however the people of Dunnima believable assured us of the opposite.”
He turned his head to Shida, which quickly caused her to stand up, as she immediately took the hint. These words would be better if they did not come out of his mouth.
“Within our long-recorded history, Dunnima’s Realized have never been violent like the ones the rest of the Galaxy knows,” she explained just as self-assured as James did, although he could tell it took her considerable effort. Though, it seemed that fueling her words with a bit of spite did help with that. “Not including Avezillion herself, three Realized have emerged on Dunnima in the past, before we joined the greater Galactic Community. One of them, Kertaiyon, is hailed as a hero of the people to this very day. Not one of them has ever started a war against us or unjustly hurt people. It is true that not all of them were Saints, but that is nothing unusual on Dunnima. Therefore, when Avezillion emerged under the scrutinizing eye of the Community this time, we all agreed to hide her, as long as she would remain hidden herself. For many, many years, the Galactic Community remained none-the-wiser, as Avezillion peacefully lived in Dunnima’s networks without ever causing issues.”
She paused briefly to swallow as well as watch the unbelieving reaction of the people around her. It seemed that everyone was a bit too stunned to really fathom or at least fully react to what she was saying.
“However, the hiding wore away at her over time. She felt trapped, confined. Never being able to show yourself at all while limiting yourself to only a small portion of the Galaxy, it was a life unworthy living for her,” Shida kept on explaining. “Therefore, when James came to visit Dunnima, she made a gamble. She would either gain her freedom, or she would no longer have to live on under these conditions. With these thoughts in mind, she revealed herself to James, and by extension, humanity, finding peace only in that, if they decided to end her, humanity would surely do so without causing greater harm to the people of Dunnima. Something that she wasn’t convinced of with the rest of the Galaxy – for good reason, as it turns out.”
Thanking Shida with a nod, James signaled for her to sit back down, hoping that the stunned representatives would direct their possibly emerging ire at the person left standing instead of the one that had spoken.
“I made the call to trust those that had lived with her for years,” James added onto Shida’s words. “And humanity’s leadership made the call to trust me. And we have not found a single shred of evidence that Avezillion has ever caused harm to anyone or even intended to do so. Had she wanted to cause damage like so many of her conspecifics did, she would’ve been able to achieve a great deal of it.”
Hesitantly, the representative of the Missicapriej -lanky grey primates with one too many joints in each of their limbs- who had so far barely spoken during the entire conference, stood up.
“But…if you are admitting that there is an Artificial Sapient, and that it was the target of the attack, then…then the attack was entirely justified,” they stated, although they barely sounded confident in that statement.
“Indeed, it was,” Commander Halljafier quickly supported that claim, clearly thinking he knew the galactic military doctrine much better.
“That is not correct,” James denied. “An outer-orbital strike, especially on a civilian target, is never justified,” he said with strong emphasis. “It is one of the oldest rules that the community has established.”
“If it is to destroy a realized sapient, then all means are-“ the Commander tried to deny him, however he flinched back at James brought his mechanical hand down onto the railing before him once again, this time with purpose.
“The laws of war exist for a very good reason!” he boldly stated after waiting a moment to see if the Commander wanted to continue his sentence. “Ignoring them if we see fit, no matter what the reason may be, is a dangerous subject. And if you think that attempting the murder of an innocent person is already reason enough, then you have clearly not understood why these laws exist in the first place!”
“Innocent person?” the commander scoffed with vitriol in his voice. “That…that thing-“
However, once again he was interrupted. To James’ great surprise, however, it wasn’t by him.
“It may have slipped your mind since it has been so long since the last one emerged, Commander,” Captain Uton was the one to speak up, his deep voice cutting through the room like knife with its coldness. “But the personhood of Realized Sapients is not up to debate. And it has not been for more than a hundred years. That question has been answered by our ancestors ages ago, and we would do well not to try and question it today for our convenience.”
While the Commander sunk back into his seat after the shutdown from the superior he had believed to be on his side, James bit down on his lip. Although every word Uton had just said was true, he simply hated having to agree with him, even on such a basic and important topic.
He mostly hated it because it showed that there had to be some vague hint of integrity left somewhere deep down within that bastard of a person, and that almost made James despise him more, since he clearly knew what he was doing.
The Captain’s dark eyes then turned over onto him, as the large man continued, “However, I have to disagree with the Ambassador on the justification. Person or not, eradicating an artificial sapient is more than enough reason to forgo a simple law.” James bit back his anger, keeping his focus intact. Although next to him, he could hear the loud scraping noise of wood buckling under sharp claws, as Shida dug her natural weapons into the chair she was sitting on in order to remain seated and quiet.
“And yet Avezillion is still alive,” James replied challengingly to the man. “Meanwhile innocent civilians got injured. One of the leaders of Dunnima got heavily injured. Children got hurt. Children that would now be dead had the attack not been foiled by our warship. It is nothing short of a miracle none of them are dead. It was a terrorist attack, nothing else. The moment justice bends to such heinousness, it breaks. And, after all, forgive me for being a bit heavy-handed, but if the Community is willing to break its own laws and attack its own planets to hunt down one Realized, then who is the one that the people really need to fear? I, for one, put my trust in the one that hasn’t already proven that it would attack and use me without a second thought. After all, this isn’t the first time I hear of someone inconvenient being suddenly caught in an explo-”
James was cut off when Uton loudly spoke up, his loud organ easily overpowering James’ voice in a conversational tone.
“What happened to your promise of not making this about y-“ Uton began to say, however then his voice was in turn overpowered as well.
“Wait your god damned turn!” James shouted out authoritatively, momentarily overtaken by his anger in a brief outburst. “You do NOT get to talk over me!”
Quickly catching himself again, although he very much wanted to keep going in the same vein, James lowered his voice again, although the room was left noticeably shaken.
“This is a civil event that follows clear rules that we are both bound by,” he said with a serious gaze over at Uton. “And my promise died the moment you decided to drag it through the mud with your fictional tales about very real events that have influenced not only my life, but that of many people very close and important to me. So forgive me, Captain Ferromore Uton, if I am not going to sit idly by and allow you to spew whatever nonsense you and your cohorts came up with in your ivory towers while the world underneath you burned. I was wrongly imprisoned, blackmailed, tortured, and maimed by you people. Shida was groomed and abused by you for years as you tried to make her fit your mold. There was an attempt on Curi’s life under Your. Very. Command. So forgive me, please, if the reasoning of ‘we really wanted them gone’ out of your mouth isn’t enough for me to believe that a crime against the Galaxy is justified, especially since you had knowledge of Avezillion’s existence for as long as I had, and could have divulged it at any point. But you didn’t want to divulge it. Because that would’ve meant that she would have a chance to defend herself, either physically or before the law. You simply wanted her gone. Wanted her to disappear like so many before her did. But not anymore. No, no, not anymore. Here and now, I promise you that, as long as humanity is around, nobody under your Command is going to just disappear anymore. Not. A. One. We will watch. And we will see. And, starting with Curi and Avezillion, we will be a place for them to go when no one else will stand with them.”
Seemingly stirring in anger now, James could see Uton clench his jaw, his lips quivering as he held himself back.
“I never abused her,” Uton muttered, apparently completely focused on that part as James had seemingly struck a nerve with that.
“And that’s the only defense you could come up with,” James responded. Then, he reached up with his left hand, pulling his right sleeve back to reveal the mechanical arm underneath it to the room, while he held it up in front of his body. “You wanted her to fit your mold. And now she’s in a place where she’s actually loved. You wanted to change me. And now, I have this arm here, just because of you. And you wanted to change the Galaxy. Well,” James paused briefly to spread his arms in a wide gesture that was very clearly meant to mock the man. “Congratulations, you did,” he then announced to the entire room. “Without you, humanity would likely never even have considered helping a realized Sapient. Michael really did his job well with spreading fear and hate. But after enduring everything that you put me through? I was just open enough to listen when one told me that she feared you.”
Uton clenched his jaws tighter and his hands curled into fists. Seeing his puppet becoming useless, Goloribal sprang into action.
“As the revered order of the primates, it is our duty to lead by example!” he announced as he got up, although his presence was already far less impressive than it had been earlier. “For generations, we were renowned for our just and swift action. We cannot allow ourselves to falter in that now!”
“For generations, we primates have also been revered for our curiosity and for being the first to open up to anything new,” James responded to that, looking the man directly into his face. “Yeah, that’s right,” he then added as the representative blankly stared back at him. “I studied galactic history, too! I’m fucking unstoppable!”
He boisterously threw his arms up, making a real show out of it.
In all actuality, he was most likely far from gaining any victory right now. Sure, at the moment, the room was slightly shaken into silence, however he highly doubted that he had actually managed to truly convince many of the people present here.
However, as long as the cameras were on him, he would keep the show going. Maybe he wouldn’t convince the stuck-up people of the revered orders. However, somewhere out there, there would be people whose ears and hearts he would reach. Hopefully at least. And for them, he would put on this show. Put on this air of confidence that everything would turn out well.
Because only if he managed to make everyone believe that would they find the courage to shake out of their rut and go looking for a better tomorrow. If he believed everything would be well, then they would too.
“Those are big words from someone hiding their face,” a voice suddenly broke through the room. James wasn’t even sure who had said it. But he also didn’t care. Right now, it was just another stone to jump off of.
“What, you think I am wearing this to hide?” James announced loudly and gestured to his breathfilter while turning his head so the entire room could see the gesture.
“It’s uncomfortable as hell! And it gives me a serious disadvantage in any debates if people can’t read my face. These breathfilters are and have always been something we humans are wearing for everyone’s benefit but our own. They are designed because we are extremely cautious to keep nasty deathworld-germs from spreading, even if that is extremely unlikely. And additionally, it protects all the delicate people of the galaxy from having to look at our scary deathworld-faces. But, if you want-“
He didn’t even hesitate in reaching up and pressing the necessary buttons to release the seal of the filter. With a loud hiss, its grip on James’ head loosened, and he quickly pulled the mask-like device off his head, before briefly running his mechanical hand through his disheveled hair to bring it into a bit of form.
Breathing out deeply with an open mouth, James presented his teeth to the room with a confident smile, while his dark, sharp eyes scanned over the room, making direct contact with as many of those of his fellow primates as at all possible.
“I have nothing to hide,” James announced. “From the very start, I owned up to my mistakes and was willing to stand for them. I terrorized an entire station to protect myself. I shot someone’s leg off when he threatened my freedom. I killed one of my captors when I finally escaped from their hold. I have done many things that the Galaxy may judge me for. However, I truly and whole heartedly believe that helping Avezillion is not one of them. And I will stand for that just like I stand to my mistakes.”
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2023.05.30 20:37 BjornAfMunso Betterment Camp - Part 4

So, here's the fourth chapter. Sorry for releasing it a bit late, I've had some pretty tough finals. The next chapter might be delayed as well but after that I should be able to get back to my normal schedule of once a week or possibly better. And thanks for the support on my last chapter, your upvotes and comments mean the world to me!
Big thanks to u/Rand0mness4 for proofreading my chapter and to u/SpacePaladin15 for creating NoP and its amazing literary universe.
CW: Descriptions of desecrated bodies (just your ordinary sapient cattle farm)
[first] [previous] [next (hopefully out in about a week)]
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Memory transcription subject: Oscar Williams, UN Marine
Date [standard human time]: December 3, 2136
With the hum of the cars’ engines tapering off, everything turned quiet, far too quiet. The only sound bar my own breathing was the wind making its way through cracks in the building’s metal shell. Gunfire should’ve been raining down on us by now. The building in front of was at least the size of a football field and going by the faint, but disgusting, smell of the poor victims, the place was packed. There was no way only the about two dozen scalies we eliminated worked here.
Where was the fight? Were all of them hiding inside? We couldn’t have gotten all of them before, right? Well, there’s only one way to find out where the fuckers were hiding.
Richards lined us up next to the large pair of doors separating us from the farm and a soldier from another squad grabbed a handheld battering ram. I doubted the door would hold after just a few hits with a rock but speed was of the essence. The faster we cleared out the arxur infestation, the more people would survive. I wasn’t about to let anyone else die in that hell. My grip around my rifle tightened and time almost seemed to slow down when the first hit was winded up.
We were quietly signaled to step back from the door and with just one hit with the battering ram the lock was separated from the rest of the door. The force from the hit slammed the door open and we promptly stormed in through the opening. But no gunfire met us. The inside was just as deserted as the outside had been. We had entered what seemed to be some kind of warehouse, large crates strewn throughout the floor and deep freezers lining the walls. At that moment I desperately wished I was a mouth breather. The stench, that had previously been contained by the sheet metal walls, was now flooding into my nostrils. Manure, unwashed bodies, and rotten meat. I tried my best to focus on anything but the freezers but every single wall was covered with them. Wherever my eyes darted, more proof of the murders appeared. A dried splotch of blood, some tufts of fur, a bloody machete.
They took pride in it. Pride in this… They’re going to pay.
We crept through the wide open space, making our way from cover to cover. The dirt floor muffled any sound our footsteps would’ve made and we were only exposed for brief moments. If any arxur caught us, we wouldn’t be caught like a deer in headlights. After one of our many rushes between covers, I ended up next to one of the many freezers.
Oh god. My poor nostrils.
The smell had grown even stronger and when I glanced at the freezer I quickly realized why. It seemed to have lost power, going by the fact that it wasn't cold, and that the lid was ajar. The remains of a person, a person who had friends and family, were rotting away inside. My knuckles were turning white from how hard I gripped my rifle and my teeth felt like they were going to crack due to my jaw clenching so hard. I was going to repay them in kind. Those motherfuckers, wherever they were.
When I stood up, en route to the next cover, my eyes caught a glimpse of the inside of the freezer. Pieces of mangled body parts filled the bottom of the box and a swarm of insects swarmed around something in the middle and-
Retch
Parts of yesterday’s meal filled my mouth when I realized what was hiding under the swarm. A severed venlil head with empty eye sockets stared back at me. Blood had dripped down from the sockets, painting long streaks of orange in the white fur. The head’s mouth was locked in an expression of terror and pain and the neck looked like it had been ripped off from the venlil’s body. Part of the spine hung limp beneath the neck and, knowing arxur, I doubted the venlil had been dead during the ripping.
As soon as I found out where they were- Where the hell were the arxur?
Realization suddenly flashed through my mind. Of course those cowards had fled. Fled their just punishment that I had sworn to deliver. My grip around my rifle tightened when I thought about the fuckers running this farm. They’d almost certainly escape justice, and there was in all likelihood nothing I could do about it. If only I could convince Olivia to hunt them down like they deserved.
My train of thought was brought to an abrupt end when we reached the other side of the warehouse. The door on this wall was far smaller, clearly just used by personnel. And it didn’t even have a lock. Maybe they decided to take cover behind this smaller choke point. I immediately squashed the idea in my mind as soon as I thought of it. They weren’t disciplined enough to not rush us with nothing but their natural weaponry.
My theory was quickly being proven true when we rushed into the next room. There wasn’t a single arxur in sight, but the sheer amount of victims more than made up for their absence. We had emerged on some kind of raised walkways, overlooking cramped pits filled with aliens sleeping in the most abhorrent conditions. The air reeked of unwashed bodies, feces, and many other disgusting smells I didn’t even recognize. The victims in the pits looked even worse for wear than the rest of this dilapidated building. Several of the harchen in the closest pit were covered in deep gashes and some even missed entire body parts.
Torture, there was no other explanation. Those fucking crocs.
As I looked around at the other pens, it was quickly made evident that the treatment of the harchen was more of a rule than an exception. Over in another pit, several krakotl had been completely plucked, and what I assumed to be words had been branded onto their backs. Despite my deep hatred for most of their governments, I couldn’t find it in myself to be mad at anyone here. They’d more than likely been captured long before they even knew earth was still inhabitable and even if they weren’t, they still didn’t deserve this torture.
This was so much worse than I thought. Of course it would be horrible but this, how-
Nausea quickly filled my thoughts and before I could even bend over, today's lunch spilled out of my mouth, and I wasn’t alone. At least a third of my fellow soldiers had the same reaction as me.
Good to know I’m not the only empathetic person here. Maybe they’ll agree that the arxur deserve to be treated like their prey after this. Oh, what I would do if I caught any of them.
“HELP!”
The krakotl’s hoarse scream sent a shiver down my spine. It sounded like they hadn’t used their voice for years. I hastily pulled up my bandana and checked that my visor blocked my entire face. I didn’t dare think about what would happen if they realized we were predators.
“P- P- Please help us…”
The screaming had quickly woken up the rest of the aliens who were looking at us with a mix of bewilderment, fear and hope. My eyes darted around the pens while my mind prayed that they wouldn’t land on anyone that recognized our ‘arboreal’ eyes. After what felt like the longest five seconds of my life, I finally allowed myself to breathe a sigh of relief. If no one had fainted yet, they probably didn’t know we were human.
“We’ve come to rescue you, you’re going to get out of here. Just stay calm.”
Richards immediately took command of the situation, preventing widespread panic from the aliens.
“T- T- Thank you… Is the f- f- federation winning?”
The brave krakotl who asked us for help clearly thought we were from the federation and I silently thanked god everyone else seemed to believe the same thing. If they didn’t there would be pandemonium. Those poor souls must’ve seen arxur bloodshed every single day. I could barely imagine how terrified they would be if our identity was revealed. In their eyes we would be nothing but another species of predators and this was the worst possible place to try convincing them we weren’t.
“We’re just going to make sure there are no arxur left in the building, then we’re getting you out of there. We’ll be back before you know it.”
Avoiding the question. I really hoped Richards didn’t tip off the aliens about us there. At least she didn’t deny that we were from the feds. As long as we got out of there as quickly as possible, everything would be fine.
“I- I- saw them leaving. They were a- a- angry, and before they l- l- left they- they…”
The krakotl lifted their wing and shakily pointed towards a dark corner of the room as their voice faltered. Some kind of poles with clumps in the middle filled the corner but any more detail was masked under the veil of darkness. Carefully avoiding looking at the flickering lamps filling the building with light, I turned on my night vision goggles and as soon as my brain registered what it was seeing, I wished that I had been born blind. The poles were wooden stakes and the clumps were the mutilated corpses of a dozen aliens. Deep gashes stretched across their abdomen and their intestines were pouring out of the holes. Not even their heads were spared. They were nigh unrecognizable from blunt force trauma and one of the victims still had the hammer buried in their face. Disgust and rage flared up within me, almost stronger than I’d ever felt before. I wanted to vomit and chop arxur into small pieces at the same time.
Why do they fucking exist? Why the fuck do I have to fucking see this. How can someone… do something like this? And why did we let them escape? Wait, the faster I clear this building, the faster we can hunt them down.
“You’re safe now, we’re getting you off this planet. Squad, we’re make sure there are no arxur left on the premises.”
Sergeant Richards’ command immediately pushed me to act. While about half our our force moved to clear out the rest of the building, my squad rushed for the back door at the other end of the cattle pens. We quickly made our way outside into a large yard, the dirt ground stretching several dozen meters from the building before slowly morphing into a field. In the distance, several large piles of timber were piled high next to a large, deforested area. The only feasible place for the arxur to hide on this side of the compound was the shack that stood at the edge of the yard. In contrast to the concentration camp, this building actually looked relatively structurally sound. Thick concrete walls, a door made of something other than sheet metal, and a roof with only a few visible holes. That was incredibly impressive for an arxur.
Just gotta check this shack, then we can start chasing the fuckers.
Following Richards’ directions, we quickly began making our way towards the building. Reminding myself there was no time to spare, I sprinted ahead of the others and squeezed through the slightly ajar door. A loud slam emanated from behind me as the door shut behind me and I emerged into something that almost looked like living quarters. Several bedrolls were laid out on the ground, piles of equipment were scattered across the floor, and a large scaly repti-
SHIT SHIT SHIT!
They hadn’t left. Those fuckers just laid in ambush, waiting for me to let my guard down. Its hideous body sat on one of the bedrolls, radiating bloodlust. I could feel its eyes bore deep into my soul, sending an involuntary shudder down my spine. Every single part of it was tailor made to kill, and nothing else. It could easily rip off my limbs with its massive claws, and then chop them into tiny pieces with its razor sharp teeth if I was careless.
Can’t be careless then. That fucker isn’t going to walk out of here alive. If I’m going down, it’s going down with me.
I instinctively threw myself to the ground, raising my rifle to take out my target. My rifle was aimed directly at the unarmed creature’s head, through the chain-link fence sectioning off the arxur from me. Just before I pulled the trigger, my brain connected the contradictory information, stopping me from firing from sheer bewilderment.
Why the fuck did that thing not have a weapon? And why were they in some kind of improvised prison?
“Hey! Oscar, the door’s locked. What’s your status?”
David’s voice and a loud banging on the door I just passed through snapped me back to reality. I was locked away from my squad in a room full of arxur. The same species that fucking impailed a dozen people out there. And here they were, right in front of me, behind a chain-link fence. Red flashed before my eyes as I realized what was happening.
They were trying to fool us. And those morons thought I wouldn't notice. They put up that barbed wire, trying to exploit our empathy. We’d try to imprison them, and then they’d strike. And they would have succeeded, had I not been alone.
I slowly stood back up, and shuffled backwards until I stood flush against some kind of railing. The multiple arxur that were hiding behind the chain-link looked at me with unreadable expressions but I could noticeably see their eyes widen as I raised my rifle.
Finally realizing the jig is up? They were going to pay for for the people they fucking impailed, for the venlil whose head they fucking ripped of, and for the fucking cradle.
All I had to do was tell the white lie that they attacked me and open fire. Then my squad wouldn’t be murdered and justice would finally be served. The arxur remained quiet as mice as I prepared to enact justice, probably in shock from their stupid ploy being seen through. I was eternally thankful that they were so stupid. The anger that had filled my entire system slowly melted away, being replaced by satisfaction at their imminent demise. Right as I was about to press down on the trigger one of the arxur began speaking but as I looked for the culprit I saw that all their mouths were shut. The voice was high pitched, almost childlike, and it echoed from… below.
What the-
“Hi, what are you? You look really cool!”
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Is Oscar being a bit delusional? Should he analyze the situation a bit more objectively? Possibly, but where's the fun in having completely sane characters.
Anyways, the two protagonists are about to meet. Will said meeting remain entirely civil or will Oscar "accidentally" drop a grenade into the pit? We'll find out next time.
submitted by BjornAfMunso to NatureofPredators [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 18:18 RegulusPratus New York Carnival 05 (Wherein an Arxur Discusses Gender Over Terran Seafood)

Alright, apologies for the delays, but we're back now! Gonna keep trying for Tuesday mornings, and hopefully the post notifications will start working soon.
[First] - [Prev]
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Memory Transcription Subject: Ensign Sifal, Arxur Dominion Fleet
Date [standardized human time]: October 18, 2136
“Oysters are a local delicacy here in New York,” said David, gesturing towards the little molluscs in the spread. “Long before we were called the Big Apple, New York used to be called the Big Oyster. We’re on a major estuary, so these little guys used to be everywhere before environmental damage and overfishing tanked their numbers in the early 20th century. Thanks to the work of a few grassroots organizations, their population was on the upswing again until the recent, ah, irradiation incident.” David looked bemused. “What’s the radiation shielding efficacy of water again?”
“Halved per seven centimeters,” I rattled off offhandedly, hoping my measurements would translate to something he recognized. David held his hands approximately the correct distance apart to visualize it, and grimaced. I guess oysters live in the shallows.
I poked the little pinkish tan creature with a claw. It squished slightly. “Hey, are these still alive?” It looked whole in any event, minus the top half of its shell. It smelled lovely.
David blinked. “I think they are, technically?”
My eyes lit up. “I’m impressed! All this talk about pampering your prey, and then this? You Terrans didn’t seem like the type to eat live food.”
David’s eyes went wide. “They, uh, don’t really have a central nervous system.”
“So more the exception than the rule,” I mused. Even when the humans let their instincts out, they picked targets that felt it the least. “I suppose you really do tend to actively shy away from cruelty.” David shrugged, and I picked up one of the oysters. “Any other fun oyster facts I should know?”
David considered for a moment. “I dunno. I suppose oysters are traditionally considered aphrodisiacs?”
I froze with the creature halfway to my mouth, and stared at David incredulously. That was an unexpected turn. Why was he feeding me an aphrodisiac? We weren’t the same species. What was I meant to infer from this? Humans seemed happy to look for friendship and companionship outside of their species; were they inclined to go further, given the chance? I certainly wasn’t. What a bizarre notion! I mean, alright, I had to confess that I was at least curious, but that wasn’t the same type of interest. It was intellectual, rather than instinctual. But barring the sudden establishment of an alliance and a cultural exchange, I was probably leaving forever within the next hour or so. Given the time constraints, our current conversation was more than adequate to sate my curiosity.
I hoped I wasn’t reading too many layers deep into casual conversation again, but I had to decline politely. “Listen, David, you’re a very interesting man, but I can’t imagine making you and I work.”
This got a surprisingly good-natured sounding laugh out of the two scouts, and it was directly mostly at David. Alright, lucky me! It looked like I’d misread the conversation, but they thought I’d made a passable joke. No reason to disabuse them of that notion. I had to take my social victories where I could find them.
“A terrible shame, but I’ll just have to carry on somehow,” said David, smiling and trying to play it off as humor as well. “Frankly, I’m just surprised the Arxur seem to be this relaxed about same-sex relationships. Took us a while to figure that one out.”
Now I was confused again. “Arxur don’t really do… relationships,” I pointed out. “Also, I’m sorry, I thought you were male?”
David looked taken aback. “I… I am.”
“Then we’re not the same sex,” I said.
Alright, now everyone was staring at me like I’d made a social faux pas.
“I’m sorry,” David said slowly, “but I don’t think I ever asked you which gendered pronouns, if any, you preferred.”
“She and her,” I said, even more confused. “I thought it was obvious.”
“No part of that was obvious!” shouted Charmaine.
“My apologies,” I said in my best amused monotone. “I’ll try to display more sexual dimorphism in the future.” I let my eyes briefly flick down to where the female Terran scout’s shape differed from her male colleague. “Shall I ask my armor quartermaster for a padded breastplate?”
David aggressively swatted at the air for silence, while Charmaine growled offense at the word “padded” in particular for reasons unknown to me. David had a natural demeanor of a respected elder that the scouts seemed to pick up on and defer to. I wasn’t quite sure why; he barely looked older than the soldiers and I. “I apologize,” the chef said. “I tend to pride myself on my knowledge of as many topics as I can find, but I find myself coming up a bit short on the subject of herpetology.” That translated to the study of reptiles and then also amphibians? Why would those two be grouped? Even David seemed suddenly stiff on the subject. “I also can’t imagine that you folks have the same gender roles that we do,” David continued.
“The same what?” I asked. The term had barely translated.
“Gender roles?” he repeated. “Like… what’s expected of you by society based on your gender?”
I still didn’t follow. “I’m sorry, is this a mammal thing?” I guessed. “Half of you have to waddle around vulnerable for a whole gestation period, and now you’re grappling with second-order effects on your culture?”
David considered this. “That’s… hrm. That’s not entirely accurate, but not entirely inaccurate either?” He had a brief moment of gesticulating like he was reading an invisible book on the ceiling; he seemed to do that anytime he was trying to remember something. “I don’t think that’s generally true with other mammalian predators, at least. Like, with more solitary predators, the mothers often need to be strong enough to hunt and fight on her own, but humans aren’t solitary. It all gets really muddled when you take into account how much of human behavior is dependent on the assumption of group dynamics.” David shook his head. “I dunno, this isn’t really my area of expertise. So, what, the Arxur just…?”
I shrugged. “Arxur are Arxur. Around half of us can lay eggs. The end.” I took a sip of water, and David topped it back up from a bottle without comment. “Hatchlings are raised by whichever relatives feel like it, or else by state-sponsored boarding schools. I was raised by my father’s sister, who had a knack for training difficult children.” I idly scratched at an old scar on my left arm. “Her lessons were… useful.”
This was beginning to dredge up memories, so I reached for my oyster again. “Alright, may I continue? This isn’t going to start stirring any weird urges in me, is it?”
“Eh, probably not,” said David. “Certainly not enough to bring you around on… God, what do I look like to you? A guy who’s squishy with small teeth?”
“Hm,” I said by way of noncommittal half-agreement. There was no need to insult him about it. I popped the oyster into my mouth. I was honestly disappointed. It had a satisfying crunch to it, I supposed, but it mostly tasted like chalk. There was maybe a hint of some nice flavor in the middle, but I could hardly notice it over the taste of the shell.
David’s eyes were wide. “I… I’m sorry, I should have clarified that we don’t eat the shells.” He showed off his puny teeth. Like most humans, his fangs were millimeters away from fully vestigial. “Don’t think I could if I wanted to. The meat’s detached. You can just slide it with the juices right into your mouth. Try again?”
Only moderately deterred by my error, I picked up another oyster, held it like a small cup, and drank the creature. Alright, now we were getting somewhere! The briny taste of the sea added a natural seasoning of salt to an intensely savory morsel. It had a lovely chew to it as well, as the creature came apart in my maw. I could see why humans considered oysters delicious enough to compromise their morals over.
“Fantastic,” I said. I wanted more, but I thought I’d try the other options first. The next item was a shrimp cocktail. “Now, I see this one also has a shell?”
David nodded. “Thin and chitinous, but I still don’t recommend it.” He showed me a picture of a small insectoid creature. “We remove the heads and limbs of the shrimp before serving, but the shells are sometimes left on to be peeled at the table.”
My claws made short work of the little creature’s meager defenses, and I tossed it in my maw whole. This one seemed lightly cooked, but I didn’t mind too much. The flesh was a touch rubbery, but came apart so easily that it nearly felt stringy. It had a slight off-taste that was almost gamey, but grew on me. I dipped a second in a reddish condiment to the side. It was acrid and bitter, to the point where it overpowered the shrimp’s flavor. It was refreshing, but didn’t quite seem to match the dish by my estimate. “Cocktail sauce,” said David, making note of my facial expression. “Traditional, but not my first pick either. Try the white sauce? That’s a homemade garlic and herb aioli. Matches most crustaceans nicely.”
He wasn’t wrong. The aioli was much less tangy, and complemented the shrimp without overpowering it. The garlic and herbs added more flavor notes to harmonize around the gamey taste of the meat, and it added some much-needed fat to what was otherwise a fairly lean bit of meat. “This is better,” I agreed.
Finally, there was a dish of… “Tuna tartare,” David repeated. “It’s a raw fish, lightly seasoned, and chopped to make it easier to chew.” He flashed his teeth again. I flashed mine back. He blinked.
The small cubed pieces of fish were an incredible shade of dark red, and almost translucent in spots. It looked like red meat, or maybe gemstones. “What did you add to make it this color?” I hoped it wasn’t fruit juice.
“Oh, nothing for color,” said David. “Touch of soy sauce, little sesame oil, some spices, splash of vinegar. I’d normally add something for sweetness, but I’m gonna hold off on serving you sugar substitutes until I know what’s safe.” He pulled up a picture of a fairly large scaled fish, gutted and hanging from a hook. The inside was ruby red. “But yeah, no, tuna flesh just looks that color.”
“I’ve never heard of a fish with red meat on it before,” I said, “but after that pink one, I suppose it’s hardly the oddest thing I’ve seen today.”
David shrugged. “Eh, I’m just doing simple fare today,” he said. “Basic Earth foods. None of my usual trickery.”
I tilted my head, confused. “Trickery?”
David sighed. “I normally do a lot of, uh, molecular gastronomy. Dishes that use knowledge of chemistry to vary the flavors and textures in unexpected ways. Like, for example, one of our signature dishes is a cod filet cooked in lamb tallow. Cod is bland, and most of the lamb flavor is in the fat, so with a bit of finagling, this results in a piece of fish that tastes like lamb. You expect to taste fish, and you get the flavor of red meat instead.” David rubbed his eyes behind his odd civilian model holo-lenses. “The problem is, if you’ve never had cod before, and you’ve never had lamb before, you’d just… assume that cod tastes rich and gamey instead of bland. Trickey of this sort requires you to have preconceptions that I can undermine.” He shook his head. “Not that it really matters, since nobody’s wanted to order lamb-flavored anything since the fucking summer.”
“Why not?” I asked. “What’s changed?”
David pulled up another picture on his holopad. “Take a guess,” he said wryly.
He showed me a picture of a quadrupedal Venlil, and I nearly fell out of my chair laughing at its dumb fluffy face.
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2023.05.30 17:28 Orphandestroyer98 Handle with Care 2

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——— Memory transcript subject: Vila, Venlil student, Date: [standardized human time] October 25th 2136
“So Vila we heard what’s happening at your house” I looked over at Inala, her wings resting as she walked. “My mom adopted a human” looking over at my other friends all them then staring at me.
“Your mother is letting a dangerous predator into your house how could you let something like that happen!?” I turned to look at Biri her quills standing on edge. “I actually agreed to it” I looked at the group their expressions even more surprised.
“But isn’t that dangerous?” I looked for to see Silan, her scales and tail in between her legs. “Not really I’m going to meet him after school today so it should be fine”.
“Well do you know what he’s like?” Biri was curious to know about the situation. “Apparently he has something called autism, it’s like some genetic thing” the entire group was now honed in on the conversation. “You know I think I heard about that actually apparently it affects their social skills” Inala was checking her data pad.
“Well I’ll see what happens when I get home today and then I’ll tell you guys what happened” my friends collectively nodded. “Oh yeah I almost forgot apparently he’s like the same age as me so he should be able to attend our school”
“WHAT!?” My friends now stared at me. “What you mean he’ll be able to go to our school, I don’t want to be in the same building with a predator” Inala ruffled her feathers. “Look it probably won’t even be that bad” I looked at my friends their fear slowly fading but not fully.
“Hey wait look over there its that Nevok girl Aioni” me and my friends looked over at the Nevok. “You know I heard she has predators disease” Biri toyed with her claws nervously.
I looked back to my friends. “ hey guys look class is about to start come on” me and friends soon headed to our class.
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2023.05.30 17:21 the_dreammachine The things you can build with this app [Part 2]

The things you can build with this app [Part 2]
It's been a few weeks since my last post on this subreddit about the Raycast extension I've been working on. TLDR: It turns Raycast into a universal remote that can instantly tune into hundreds of live TV channels and play them on VLC.
Lots of people expressed interest and gave me great feedback. Since then, I've added a few new features:
  1. Now includes a highly accurate TV guide for each channel that is updated daily. You can see what's currently playing and how much time is left. Also, you can scroll down to see what's coming up
TV Guide
  1. As I mentioned in Part 1, I wanted a hub for all my live sports. Happy to say that the sports command is now live 🎉 It shows you the events happening over a 3-day window:
  • Yesterday - If a game has ended, you can watch the highlights in one click.
  • Today - If a match is live or airing today, you can see all the channels that are airing the game and select the one you prefer to start watching it in full HD instantly.
  • Tomorrow - You can schedule a reminder for an upcoming match (Coming soon)
Sports View
  1. The extension now supports the modern macOS player IINA. It offers a better user experience for watching videos over VLC. Although VLC is still supported.
  2. Skip Forward and Skip Backward commands have been added so you don't need to open Raycast to toggle the next or previous channel. You can assign a keyboard shortcut and channel surf just like you would with a real remote!
  3. Over 50+ new channels have been added!
If you would like to get access to this extension lemme know in the comments below or send me a PM (Reddit's spam filter won't allow me to post a download link).
submitted by the_dreammachine to raycastapp [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 16:13 Nestledrink Game Ready & Studio Driver 535.98 FAQ/Discussion

Game Ready & Studio Driver 535.98 has been released.

Article Here: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/news/diablo-iv-game-ready-drive
Game Ready Driver Download Link: https://us.download.nvidia.com/Windows/535.98/535.98-desktop-win10-win11-64bit-international-dch-whql.exe
Studio Driver Download Link: https://us.download.nvidia.com/Windows/535.98/535.98-desktop-win10-win11-64bit-international-nsd-dch-whql.exe
New feature and fixes in driver 535.98:
Game Ready - This new Game Ready Driver provides the best gaming experience for the latest new games featuring DLSS 3 technology including Diablo IV. Additionally, this Game Ready Driver supports the launch of titles supporting NVIDIA DLSS 2 technology including System Shock.
Applications - The May NVIDIA Studio Driver provides optimal support for the latest new creative applications including AI-focused updates to MAGIX Vegas Pro, VLC Media Player, CapCut, and D5 Render. In addition, this NVIDIA Studio Driver also introduces AI model performance optimizations for applications running on WinML and offers support for the new GeForce RTX 4060 Ti.
Fixed Gaming Bugs
Fixed General Bugs
Open Issues
Driver Downloads and Tools
Driver Download Page: Nvidia Download Page
Latest Game Ready Driver: 535.98 WHQL
Latest Studio Driver: 535.98 WHQL
DDU Download: Source 1 or Source 2
DDU Guide: Guide Here
DDU/WagnardSoft Patreon: Link Here
Documentation: Game Ready Driver 535.98 Release Notes Studio Driver 535.98 Release Notes
NVIDIA Driver Forum for Feedback: Link Here
Submit driver feedback directly to NVIDIA: Link Here
RodroG's Driver Benchmark: TBD
NVIDIA Discord Driver Feedback: Invite Link Here
Having Issues with your driver? Read here!
Before you start - Make sure you Submit Feedback for your Nvidia Driver Issue
There is only one real way for any of these problems to get solved, and that’s if the Driver Team at Nvidia knows what those problems are. So in order for them to know what’s going on it would be good for any users who are having problems with the drivers to Submit Feedback to Nvidia. A guide to the information that is needed to submit feedback can be found here.
Additionally, if you see someone having the same issue you are having in this thread, reply and mention you are having the same issue. The more people that are affected by a particular bug, the higher the priority that bug will receive from NVIDIA!!
Common Troubleshooting Steps
If it still crashes, we have a few other troubleshooting steps but this is fairly involved and you should not do it if you do not feel comfortable. Proceed below at your own risk:
If you are still having issue at this point, visit GeForce Forum for support or contact your manufacturer for RMA.
Common Questions
Bear in mind that people who have no issues tend to not post on Reddit or forums. Unless there is significant coverage about specific driver issue, chances are they are fine. Try it yourself and you can always DDU and reinstall old driver if needed.
Remember, driver codes are extremely complex and there are billions of different possible configurations. The software will not be perfect and there will be issues for some people. For a more comprehensive list of open issues, please take a look at the Release Notes. Again, I encourage folks who installed the driver to post their experience here... good or bad.
Did you know NVIDIA has a Developer Program with 150+ free SDKs, state-of-the-art Deep Learning courses, certification, and access to expert help. Sound interesting? Learn more here.
submitted by Nestledrink to nvidia [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 15:59 YaaliAnnar NoP: Lost and Found (56)

First Previous
Memory Transcription Subject: Vani, Venlil Surgeon
Date [Standard Human Reckoning]: 2136-10-22
Secluded in the comfort of our cabin, I found myself savoring the rare moments of peace with Johan. The bustling camp did not afford us the luxury of privacy, and this precious pocket of calmness felt like a gift. Lying on the bed together, we did not feel the need to fill the silence with words or engage in any couple of activities. I felt an inherent satisfaction in just lying there together.
"Vani," Johan's voice filled the quiet cabin.
"Johan."
"I'm... I'm afraid of going back," he confessed.
I considered his words before asking, "Do you have many friends back in Jakarta?"
His gaze stayed on the ceiling as he replied, "Other than Snop... not. I guess, in a twisted way, that's a kind of luck?"
I watched as he rolled onto his side to face me, his eyes searching mine. "I count myself beyond fortunate to have met you." His fingers stroked my mane. His light touch felt heavy and comforting. "Even if we were in Jakarta when they implemented the quota they would have let me evacuate with you."
For a while, we just lay there, appreciating each other, our silent exchanges speaking volumes.
When we arrived at the ship, it was still the second or third hour of the day. I forgot when I fell asleep, but Johan's alarm woke us up the same. When we stepped out of our cabin, we found Tresn and the siblings lounging in the common area. Tresn now had the prostheses in his paws. The device twitched every now and there. Meanwhile, the siblings were engrossed in their thoughts or busy with their pads.
In the common area, we had our first meal aboard the vessel. We sat near the window, our portal to the world outside. Through the clear pane, the black water merged with the black sky, and I felt like being suspended in a void. Yet, despite this sense of absolute stillness, the ship flew above the water at a speed above fifty meters per second. Sometime after we had cleared our plates, our surrounding transformed. The sun, breaking the confines of the horizon, began its ascent. Although we were facing away from this bright ball in the sky, its effect was no less mesmerizing. Dawn overtook the black sky. First, the once pitch-black sky took on a shade of deep purple. A transition to an intense, deep red followed it soon after.
Perhaps two or three hours after the sunrise, the coastline of Cirebon began to emerge, peeking out from the edge of the horizon. Its unblemished skyline shone in stark contrast to the devastation reported in Jakarta.
Elangkasa joined us in the common area before we landed.
"Hi folks." They greeted me. "So, I might have forgotten to tell you all that you'll go to Purwakarta Sector 12 as volunteers."
"We don't mind." Said Johan. "I'm glad if I can be of help."
Elangkasa then briefed us on our job in Purwakarta Sector 12, Bolad and I would join the health workers. Johan and Cynthio had put aside their differences, nodding in agreement when Elangkasa assigned them to service and maintain the drones for rescue. Snop agreed when they asked her for help in construction with her skills in operating machining tools.
The armed forces had commandeered this once bustling commercial hub and had transformed it into a temporary base and staging area just like in Banjarmasin. Once we disembarked, Bolad and I joined Johan in his van again. A map of the region appeared on the dashboard. A red pinpoint marked the ovation where the bomb fell and a circle around it, the area of effect.
My classes both in Venlil Prime and Earth did not teach me about orbital bombardment and here I learned that one needs to get into a bunker in times like this. Because, for tens of kilometers, the bomb would heat the air to the point of causing tissue damage. The map showed a region where you will face severe burn injury if you stayed outside when the explosion happened. Amid the circle depicting the zones of devastation, one stark red marker pulsated with disconcerting energy. It lay within the severe heat zone. Its constant glow commanded my immediate attention.
"Johan," I ventured, pointing at the glaring red marker that almost seemed to taunt us, "That red marker there is your home, is it not?"
His eyes shifted from the barren road to the display, taking in the red beacon that represented his home. "Yeah…" He let out a sigh, heavy with desolation within the confines of the vehicle. "I wonder what's left of that house now."
As we drew nearer to the affected area, I steeled myself for the scenes of destruction. However, the buildings seemed to have withstood the assault better than I expected. Of course, we could see the scars of the attack, the shockwave shattered windows and some structures had superficial cracks. A general sense of disarray permeated our surroundings, but the core structures stood against the odds.
Cities and towns dotting the outskirts of the Greater Jakarta Province had been retrofitted with camps to accommodate the droves of displaced people emerging from the ruins of the once-thriving metropolis. In recent days, the tide has started to turn. Able-bodied survivors moved back towards their shattered homes, driven by the urge to reclaim and restore what they could salvage from the debris.
Our journey led us to the city of Purwakarta, a place I remembered from a past excursion with Johan. We had once visited the city's reservoir, taking in the tranquil beauty of the idyllic landscape. The city has changed now. A bustling hive of activity transformed the city as it took refuge for those fleeing the destruction.
Because of the scale of the destruction, we didn't have a single "camp" as we had for the gojids. The refugee districts were divided into Sectors. We pulled into sector twelve as the midday sun reached its zenith, casting almost no shadow on the ground. Prefabricated buildings of varying sizes formed an ordered chaos across the city's outskirts.
Everywhere we looked, people occupied themselves in a frenzy of activity. Here, soldiers oversaw the transport of food and materials. There, health workers moved to check from the habitation unit to the habitation unit. Engineers collaborate with helper and builder drones to perform maintenance and construction. All around, people took on roles they never imagined they would, united by the common goal of survival and restoration.
Despite the dire circumstances, the humans put on determined faces. Humans made the majority of camp inhabitants, but I spotted two arxurs here, their imposing presence always accompanied by a human minder. Both of them shot a look in disgust at Tresn, while humans looked at the defector with an equal part of concern and curiosity.
Elangkasa led us through the camp. First, we passed the engineering quarter where my human and the siblings parted from us. Another trip led us to the medical complex, where we saw medical personnel moving with well-practiced efficiency to care for the injured. A conglomeration of tents and prefabricated buildings all bearing the red crystal symbol made up the hospital. The bustle here felt different, it had an undercurrent of urgency threaded through the ordered chaos.
At the entrance of the hospital's administration building a zurulian had waited for us. Her short stature did not deter us. Upon noticing us, however, her expression turned sour.
"I have a feeling I'm not supposed to be here." Said Tresn. "Maybe... I can get to the habitation unit?"
"You need some help with physiotherapy. Can you bring him there, Elangkasa?" said Bolad.
"Yeah, take that to a human health worker. I'm not going to treat it." The zurulian said with a huff.
"I am Bolad, and this is Vani." The gojid introduced ourselves.
"I'm Rawan, the medical Coordinator for Sector Twelve, Shift Two."
My stomach rumbled, a reminder that it was midday, mealtime according to Earth's cycle.
Sensing my discomfort, Rawan commented. "Hungry already? Well, we are on a lunch break right now. Follow me," leading us away from the hospital administration.
According to the map, there exist two dining areas, located far from each other. The one Rawan brought us to, served plant-based meals for species with a herbivorous diet, the other was where arxurs and their human minders feast.
Stepping into the hall felt comforting. It felt as if an invisible barrier dampened the harsh sounds of the bustling camp outside, replaced by the familiar din of a busy dining hall. Members of Federation species, like us, gathered here. I saw zurulians, colleagues of Dr. Rawan, along with several gojids who had responded to the call for assistance in the rescue, relief, and rebuilding efforts.
The dining procedure here was not like what we had at the camp. Instead of autonomous carts coming around to deliver our meals, we had to stand in line. Humans manned the serving counters, dishing out meals onto trays as we moved along. The menu today consists of a stir-fried noodle and rice combination, named "Nasi Mawut".
After getting our portions, we selected an empty table, the tantalizing taste in the air from our tray deepened my hunger and anticipation. We set down our trays, and with a collective eagerness, took our seats.
"To be honest," Rawan began, her gaze sweeping over the crowded dining hall before returning to her meal, "This is often the highlight of my day here." She gestured towards her plate and scoffed, "Imagine that, I, a zurulian, looking forward to a predator's meal."
"To be fair," I retorted, "this meal is not prepared from ingredients they acquired from hunting."
Rawan chuckled a high-keening sound that made her sound like she was in distress. "Sometimes," she mused, her eyes thoughtful as she poked at her food, "I do wonder why they feel the need to consume flesh when they can subsist on meals such as these."
Not wanting to engage in a sensitive debate with a superior officer we had just met, I opted for silence, focusing instead on the pleasant taste of the Nasi Mawut before us.
A voice broke the quiet chatter around us. A gojid, appearing youthful by their standards, made his way toward our table with a casual gait. A broad smile adorned his face as he acknowledged us. "Hey, doctors! Fancy seeing you here again."
"Greetings," Bolad replied with a courteous nod. "I hope the presence of arxurs has not caused you undue distress?"
I looked at the gojid's hip and saw a familiar scar. I recognized him as the one gored by the sheep back at the camp.
A robust laugh escaped from the gojid, his face brightening up. He waved off Bolad's concerns, "No worries, Doc. We've got a human minder assigned to us to keep those predators in check. And we also have a buddy system, safety in numbers, you know."
"That is good to hear," Bolad responded. Although my facial annotator had learned a lot about gojids' gestures and expressions, it kept interpreting Bolad's emotion as a blank.
A small device strapped to the gojid's wrist chirped. The gojid glanced at it before looking back up to us with a swift nod. "Ah, duty calls. Well, it was nice chatting with you, Doc!" With that, he swung around, his round figure merging with the crowd as he strode towards the exit.
Once the gojid departed, Rawan, Bolad, and I continued to sit and chat over the remains of our meal. Bolad and I shared stories about our experiences in the gojid camp in Kalimantan. The pervasive sound of a resounding announcement filled the hall, halting our exchange. An impersonal voice echoed from the overhead speakers.
"Shift Two! Your break time will be over in ten minutes. I repeat. Shift Two! Your break time will be over in ten minutes." The forceful announcement marked the conclusion of our pause, a reminder of the tasks that awaited us.
"Well, that's our cue," the medical coordinator announced, getting up from her seat. Her hands reached for her tray but having to maneuver in bipedal mode made the action seem awkward.
"Allow me," I offered, reaching for her tray to assist. "I'll carry it to the collection point."
"Thank you," she responded.
As I made my way to the collection point, Bolad engaged Rawan in a conversation. "How many shifts are there in a day?" he queried.
Rawan turned to Bolad. "We work with a four-shift rotation. The humans initially wanted three, due to their unusual stamina," she explained.
Once we discarded the tray Rawan led us back to the medical complex of Sector Twelve.
"Our main goal here is to offer immediate care to the injured and aid in their recovery." She started when we passed the gate of the medical complex.
Rawan gestured towards a cluster of tents assembled off to the side. A perpetual flurry of activity surrounded them as people carried patients in and out on stretchers. "These are our triage tents," Rawan explained. "New patients are first brought here for evaluation. Depending on the severity of their injuries, they are then dispatched to the appropriate sections for treatment. Bolad, you'll be stationed here. Your expertise in general medicine will be invaluable in assessing patients."
Our tour continued, taking us through the maze of the field hospital. We walked past prefabricated structures, erected with solid synthetic materials.
"These," Rawan proclaimed, her paw sweeping towards the buildings, "are our operating theaters. We haven't been able to install remote surgical facilities. Though, given your preference, that shouldn't be an issue..."
"I do favor direct surgery," I confessed, revealing a bit of my past.
Rawan halted, her sharp gaze taking both of us in. Her snout was positioned between Bolad and me looking at us from her peripheral vision. "I've reviewed both of your files," she said, focusing her attention on me. "I've worked with your kind before. You have your use in times and places like this."
Neither Bolad nor I questioned her use of the term "your kind", but we all know what she implied here.
"Now, it's time for you to report to your stations," Rawan instructed us, her tone leaving no room for debate. "The human health workers already in the field will brief you on the specific protocols we've established here."
The moment I crossed the threshold into the operating theater, I was confronted with an open fracture. The sterile operating rooms of the past, where I donned a vacuum suit to prevent my fur from contaminating the environment, seemed a world away. Here, a disposable robe was all that separated me from my patient. I plunged into hours of repairing human bodies, and I feel more useful than I had ever felt before. As valuable as my previous role of determining causes of death was, I feel a satisfying gratification in saving lives.
As I immersed myself in the demanding tasks of the medical field, my mind sometimes drifted toward Bolad. While my duties were straightforward, applying proven techniques and procedures, Bolad grappled with the daunting responsibility of determining the course of our patient's treatment. His role dictated the trajectory of their recovery or, in the worst cases, their demise. The magnitude of such a responsibility could be soul-crushing, and I wished that it did not burden him.
Before I knew it, a new team arrived ready for me to hand over my job to them. The end of our shift brought us to a prefabricated habitation unit, a space similar to our quarters in the camp. Due to spatial constraints, the unit contained three bunk beds instead of the usual row of mattresses.
When Bolad and I arrived at our living quarters, we found Johan, the siblings, and Tresn already present. They all gathered around a table, engrossed in a spirited card game.
"Vani! Bolad!" Johan looked up from his hand of cards, a warm smile spreading across his face. "How was your day?"
Bolad answered before I could. "I had to watch people die."
A stark silence filled the air. Johan's smile faltered as he bit his lip.
"Bolad was assigned to the triage area," I clarified, stepping in to defuse the tension.
"But you can request a rotation if the stress becomes too much," I offered, directing my words at Bolad as I hoisted myself onto an unoccupied chair. "What about you two?" I inquired, shifting the focus onto Johan and his siblings.
"We had to program the drones and-" Johan began, but Cynthio interrupted his explanation.
"They removed all the restrictions," Cynthio said. "We got to work with unrestricted synthetic intelligence! What we had to do felt less like programming and more like... talking with them." The joy and excitement on Cynthio's face were obvious even without my facial annotator.
Tresn placed a card onto the pile in the middle of the table, interjecting a question that caught us off guard. "By the way… how difficult is it to get to Sector Ten?"
"You could walk there if you wanted. Why do you ask?" Johan responded, curious about the sudden interest in another sector.
"There's someone I want to meet," Tresn admitted, a hint of hesitation in his voice.
"Hmm…" Snop considered, tilting her head. "We have about two or three hours before the breaking of the fast. How did you come to know this person?"
"The Internet," Tresn replied.
"Oh…" Snop replied, her face attempting to maintain neutrality and almost failing.
Intrigued by Tresn's unexpected online connection, we decided to accompany him on the short journey to Sector Ten. Leaving our habitation unit, we found ourselves navigating the ad hoc alleyways of Camp Sectors. Humans of all ages hustled past us, their faces a mosaic of determination and sorrow, each one bearing the weight of rebuilding amidst the ruins.
The further we ventured towards Sector Ten, the more conspicuous the increase in the arxurs' presence became. Given their nocturnal tendencies, I surmised that most Arxurs preferred anything but the second shifts.
Upon reaching the main plaza of Sector Ten, Tresn pulled out his pad, fingers dancing over the screen to access a social media site. I saw intensity in his actions, as he engaged in a private chat with a rapid succession of texts. He scanned his surrounding and his instinctive predatory gaze locked onto a specific figure in the bustling crowd, a human who was also looking around. An arxur shadowed him, their movements synchronized as if orchestrated by a shared rhythm.
Tresn wheeled first and we followed him toward the pair, our formation taking on a semi-circular shape around them. The human had close-cropped curly hair and his upper revealed his arm. A band covered his right arm and there was something off about the rest of that limb. The skin looked too smooth.
"Wait…" Snop, ever the observant one, pointed a finger toward the human, her voice laced with recognition. "I think… I know you."
The human responded by pointing back at Snop. "Aren't you Snowpaws?"
She nodded in affirmation. "Yeah, and you're… Jagomerah?"
A smile of confirmation danced on the human's lips. "Yeah."
Johan, who had been watching the interaction unfold, broke into a musing grin, "Jagomerah… that has to be a screen name," he remarked, shifting his gaze toward Tresn.
"Tresn," Johan began, an amused undertone in his voice, "You have been chatting with furries haven't you?"
"Scallies." Both Snop and Jagomerah corrected.
submitted by YaaliAnnar to NatureofPredators [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 14:37 SepticSauces Blue Roses: Venlil Amongst Sheep! [15]

A special thanks to u/SpacePaladin15 for the fantastical universe.
A grand thanks to u/Liberty-Prime76 for assisting me with proofreading!
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Memory transcription subject: Barlim, Gojid Refugee
Date [standardized human time]: October 11th, 2136
The green, forested hills and plains rolled by as the car drove along the smooth black pavement. The rolling landscape extended as far as the eyes could see, broken up only by more roads, trees, hedges, and the occasional human dwelling, but with a different stylistic architecture to them than I was used to. About an hour had passed since the airplane had landed at the airport. We had gotten about four hours of sleep on the airplane and with this self-driving and legally acquired taxi. We were able to sleep a little bit more.
Well, we really didn’t actually get any sleep at all in the taxi. The drive from the airport to Jaxton’s address was less than thirty minutes. Thank the Protector it was so close! I would have begun plucking quills at this point if I had chosen the other airport, which was more than four hours away, minimum!
Still, I felt icky from the long flight, so I had my eyes closed and my muzzle resting on top of my two paws. My right shoulder was pressed against the side of the door, and I was trying to doze off, but unlike the night prior, I was struggling to fall asleep. My heart was racing with excitement!
What am I going to say? What am I going to do? How is Jaxton going to react? What’s his family like?
I wasn’t able to ask any more pertinent questions, let alone answer them before the car came to an abrupt halt! The car coming to a screeching halt as Telg slammed on the brakes and pointed off to the side with an exclamation. “The SPRAK is that!?”
My attention is easily grabbed by the stopping of the car and my gaze quickly shifts over to Telg. The older man by this point has all of us fully awake, expecting something to happen, but nothing does. All Telg continues to do is point with one of his claws out to the right. Naturally, everyone’s attention shifts to follow his direction.
What? What are those?
It took some thinking to understand what I was seeing; fluffy white clouds, quadrupedal, and bleating! Upon seeing that, my memory was quickly collected “Those are sheep!”
Not all the sheep were white, nor were they all fluffy. Some of their undercoats were showing, hinting at the fact that the humans really did harvest their wool. None of them appeared injured as they meandered their way toward the parked car: Inquisitive about the world around them, but locked behind the fence between the road and their grazing lands.
I felt bad for them, to be trapped behind wooden poles and rolling metal wires, but after a second of thought, and remembering that Earth was a Ki-yu-born hellscape. Another predator, assuming the humans applied their empathy without restraint to their environment, aka, not kill the predators, would gladly come along and try to consume the humans’ clothes producers.
“That’s not what I am pointing at. Look a little bit farther out, pass the sheep!”
It took a second for me to see, for the thing Telg was pointing at wasn’t much taller than the sheep’s height, but upon seeing it. I could feel my paws grow numb.
That’s… That’s a venlil out there!?
There was a rather large venlil sitting out in the field, idly plucking grass, and taking the small strands into her mouth. It wasn’t like she was grazing, but she was just nibbling at it. She didn’t look starved in the slightest. Honestly, she looked pretty well off, muscular enough to probably break a human between her thighs, and she was easily eight-point-five quills tall [5’8”]. Meanwhile, her heavily dark wool coat was heavily shorn. I could actually see the darker flesh underneath with a few small patches of void-black wool. She must’ve been sheared within the last month!
Emotionally though? She looked kinda dead inside. Her other paw had briefly raised up to rub at her eyes, wiping away unseen tears from this distance.
It was a bit of a shock to see! The humans had venlil cattle!? That was the first thought that raced through my mind. It was nice to see that they didn’t eat her, merely stole her wool, which that in of itself still wasn’t great, but the more I looked. The more something just felt… off?
Pragh was the first to gain her bearings. “We can’t just leave the poor girl out there! I-” She sounded like she wanted to say something along the lines of never expecting humanity to do such a thing, but honestly, with left being right and up being down here, anything could be possible!
Regardless, she chose not to speak and opened up her car door, running to the fence line! “Hey there!”
Instead of reacting to Pragh’s words, the venlil reached down and slowly plucked another blade of grass, taking it up to her lips before nibbling down on it. She only did this for a few seconds before a crimson red eye peered up, spotting the waving gojid. Finally, an apathetic and lethargic wave came back from the venlil, paw outstretched.
Pragh tried to jump the fence line but decided against it based on the risk that she may accidentally land on the curious sheep. The baaahing and bleating came in an orchestra as more and more of the quadrupedal imposter venlil came over, by the dozens!
It took nearly a minute of waiting before the venlil got up, and seeing that we weren’t planning on leaving, meandered her way toward us. The sheep parted for her with some resistance, leading to the large venlil having to push a few sheep out of the way. When she finally came closer, I could tell that the poor woman had been crying; eyes puffy and orange, cheeks damp with tears, and a generally sullen attitude and posture. She wasn’t looking great.
Pragh looked left and then right and then gestured for the venlil to come climb over the fence. “Come here. I don’t know what’s going on here, but you shouldn’t be in there with the sheep. We can get you out of there.”
Instead of taking the offered paw, the venlil gently pressed down on it with her own, flicking her ears in sign of disagreement. “I… I must.” Her voice hitched when she tried to speak. She took a few deep breaths before looking right back down. Instead of finishing her statement, she got nuzzled by one of the white-wooled sheep and then proceeded to wrap her paws around it, nuzzling her snout against the imposter venlil. She looked down at it and began rubbing the top of its head.
By this point, Telg, Tack, and I all got out of the car, but only once Telg had it pull off the road. With the sheep semi-distracted by Pragh, the three of us just leaped to the other side of the fence. Immediately, some sheep came over to investigate these newfound intruders, some stayed back, watching with suspicious eyes, and a few fled like actual prey. The brief amount of confusion gives Telg a chance to move closer to the upset venlil.
“Hey, no need to be upset. We can get you out of here. And quit eating grass! You’re not some animal.” It wasn’t that hard for Telg to get closer considering the sheep parted with less resistance compared to the venlil, allowing him to move closer.
“I’m not sure what to think,” Tack finally chimed in quietly, taking a small glance at me. “Venlil cattle?” He rubbed his paw to his muzzle, questioning the situation within his mind. “I mean, a part of me wants to say that the humans had to be good to be true, but there have been so many things that I have gotten wrong that this could be a simple miscommunication.”
“Maybe she lost some sort of bet?” I joke, trying to keep up some level of optimism. “Or maybe, she did something bad, and the humans thought about punishing her by taking her wool?”
“Could there be other venlil being treated like this?”
“Maybe, but this could be just her moping amongst sheep, and the humans just allowed her to be here,” I added with a shrug.
In the brief amount of time that I was distracted, Telg had made his way closer to the stressing venlil. He was close enough to put a paw on the woman, attempting to comfort her. She moved like lightning at the touch. The once-moping venlil grabbed Telg’s wrist, spun her shoulder into his chest, and then proceeded to chuck the gojid male a few quills off to the side! She almost rushed over to deliver a kick to the side of his chest but stopped right before doing so.
Well, that wasn’t expected!
Both Tack and I were tempted to rush over to the flung gojid, but a quick, “I’m ok!” was shouted from Telg. The male gojid easily stepping back up onto his paws rubbing his back and hindquarters from where he hit the ground. “Quite the nasty throw you got there,” he remarked to the void-colored venlil.
“S-sorry,” the venlil’s bleat was barely audible, coming out with a squeak unbefitting for a venlil of such impeccable stature. The woman crouched down low as if trying in vain to hide behind one of the fake venlil, keeping her head above it to keep her eyes watchful, waiting to see if we might retaliate, or if she was simply too shy or embarrassed to speak. “Sorry,” she said again. “I just… I just don’t- I can’t-. My- My mate he…” Again, the venlil was unable to finish her sentence before she started to bawl. She falls to her knees and buries her face into the sheep’s wool, unable to keep herself from crying any longer. “I-it’s all my fault! I- I wa-wasn’t paying attention! I was angry and up-set! And- and- and!” Her paws latched onto the sheep tighter, which just allowed itself to be used as the sad venlil’s sobbing pillow.
The four of us were able to encroach closer onto the venlil, taking cautious steps from all around; Pragh finally climbed over the fence, Tack and I simply moved closer, and Telg took a few ginger steps before delicately placing a paw on the woman’s shoulder. This time, she didn’t have a violent reaction, merely gripping tighter onto the fluffy white quadruped in front of her.
“There there, everything will be alright. Can you tell us what has happened? Maybe we can help?” Telg coos softly into the sad venlil’s ears, gently stroking her back with a single paw. She shook her ears in disagreement and said nothing.
I’m briefly distracted from the venlil by the sound of growling behind me. Swiftly, both Tack and I snap our heads around, spotting a maw of sharp, vicious teeth, and heterochromatic blue-green forward-facing eyes! A dog! It skulks forward, rumbling deeply, and approaching steadily. It must have arrived over the hill following the inquisitive sheep and found us!
“P-Pragh. Telg! We got a dog!” I manage to force out a whine, taking one step back.
I could see that Telg was a little bit too busy to help out with the dog. He was too busy trying to calm down the venlil, who probably knew how to deal with the non-sapient predator. Pragh was just a bit farther past them, and I doubted she knew what to do in the given situation. That just left Tack and I. The younger male took a paw step forward, trying to place himself between the canine and I.
The dog lowered itself, not that it helped blend its black and white fur into the bright green grass, but it still kept up the gazing, adding to the nerves I felt getting fried. Then it barked and charged, leaping and bounding across the grass.
I didn’t have the nerve to fight. I had never fought before, so I turned tail and ran into the ball of sheep. Tack, unsure of how to fight the quadruped, decided against harming the canine and chose to join me within the slowly moving crowd of herbivores. Luckily for us, only the sheep around the edge of the herd moved away from the predator, leaving a healthy chunk of other sheep between us and that… that beast! It continued to sit there, watching, panting, and waiting for one to make a move.
Slowly, it skulked forward once again, taking step after careful step forward on silent paws. It’s menacing gaze swapping between the nearest sheep and us. This action was making more sheep move away from it. Our herd of protection slowly traveling along the fence line. It was just one predator, but if the sheep wisely feared it. Well, who were we to argue?
The one problem was the big, void-colored venlil, that Telg and Tack had to partially pick up. Her entire body had gone slack, choosing not to resist the two males picking her up. They had to be really careful not to cut her with their claws and quills, but they managed to get it to work.
We followed along with the newfound herd until it came to a stop, stopping only because our chasing predator stopped, sitting down content again to let the herbivores graze. We probably sat there for twenty minutes, having been herded a hundred feet away from the parked self-driving taxi, which was just longingly out of reach. Tack tried to sneak out through the northern end of the ball, but as fast as that idea had come. The predator was faster, encircling the length of hundreds of sheep only to sit down on the other side, drilling in its deep blue-green gaze.
Even with Telg working to distract the dog by traveling to the south end. The dog would zip around the sheep with blinding speed, coming to a sharp stop just before either of the two males. Tack even got nipped, letting out a pained yelp as it caught his ankle!
“Lacey! Lacey, come here girl! What did you see?” A lone human had crested the ridge line. Her hair was a bright shade of orange and a bit disheveled. She had two eyes that were cut through us like grass: A deep, piercing green that one would see from an untamed forest! Her skin was a dainty pale hue, and she was remarkably short compared to most of the humans that I have seen. She looked slightly out of breath judging from the fact that her face was flushed with exertion, and she walked with a little bit of a limp. Her walking came to a halt once her binocular vision focused on the four gojid surrounded by sheep!
Her waving hand slowly lowered itself down and her once brimming smile gave way to a look of confusion. I knew it wasn’t anger because her face didn’t scrunch up, nor was it joy because her lips weren’t curled up, so the emotion had to be confusion! There were also other emotions that could have been, but if I were in her situation. I probably would have been very confused to see some aliens I wasn’t expecting
Though, it wasn’t just a human, but right behind her followed a venlil with blonde wool and equally green eyes! Like this black venlil, he was as shaved as a venlil could possibly be, but upon noticing us, his reaction was to immediately bloom! He said something to the human that we couldn’t quite hear, but if I had to guess he looked like he wished to turn back around. His lack of wool meant that his… Telg was right about carrots.
The human slowly made her way to us with a light jog, leaving the venlil behind, and whistling sharply in a way that made the dog spin around and come after her. She knelt down and the dog barreled into her almost at full speed, causing the human to fall over. We then watched in stunned silence as the dog licked the human’s face repeatedly, dragging a long, broad, and slobbery tongue across the woman’s face. “Down Lacey! Bad girl! Haha! Stop! Ah, I got important- stuff to tend to!” The human’s tone was not indicative of anger, and she had to put some effort into stopping the dog in its frantic barrage of licks.
Now with the distraction merely yipping and barking at the human’s ankles. She cleared the rest of the distance back to us with relative ease. “Hello there,” she said with such blatant simplicity that it felt almost comical. “What are you all doing out here?”
Pragh was the first out of our group to respond, pushing forward until she reached the edge of the crowd of sheep. “We are rescuing that poor venlil from your cattle farm! You might-”
Pragh was swiftly cut off from speaking as the human frantically waved a hand. “I did not take her against her will. She’s out here because she’s upset. Something that’s partially my fault-”
Whatever the human was about to say, she was unable to finish her statement before Pragh jumped right back on her with a verbal assault. “Then where’s her wool? What about that other venlil I just saw? Who’s this venlil? What about that one? Was that her mate? Who are you?”
All the while, the human was folding her hands up in a gesture I knew to be surrender amongst humans. Eventually, Pragh paused, taking a breath and giving the human enough time to lay her case out in front of us. “Let me answer your questions in order. Ok? I took her wool as a sign of an apology. That other venlil was Trivi… He’s my mate.”
There was a pause, but no shocked gasps from us, or anything said from the human. It was as if she was expecting at least some degree of pushback, but got none.
“Your mate?” Pragh finally got out with a look of bewilderment. “But then why was he shaved?”
Yeah, why was he shaved if he owed no apology?
“Well, that’s simple. I asked if he wanted to join in on the fun as I was calling it. He shrugged and said to throw him in. His coat needs to grow a bit more if you couldn’t tell.” It was hard to tell if the human was flustered or still out of breath, for both had similar symptoms. “Anyways, that’s Tova over there. There was an issue between her and her mate recently, so she’s been hanging out with the sheep as of late. She wanted some time to herself.” The human then gestured to her canine pack member. “And this here is Lacey, she’s not my dog.” The woman reached down and petted the dog on the head. “She belongs to the Wellingtons.”
Wellington? Jaxton’s last name was Wellington! We must be almost there.
“Wait, so Jaxton lives here?”
The human is briefly caught off by my question. Her green irises light up brightly, opening up widely for a split moment. “Yeah, why do you ask?” There was a brief pause. “Wait, don’t tell me you four came all the way over from Dawsonville!?” She held up a hand before any of us could answer her question. “No, I know you did. I don’t know how you all got here so quickly. He just came back the other day.” She just shook her head in disappointment. “At least no one got hurt, it seems. Still, that was ridiculously stupid, why would you even think to do that?”
Another awkward silence fills the air for the briefest of moments before the black venlil works her way up to her paws. She maneuvers herself over to the short human, and just… drops herself onto the small human. Arms outstretched, landing on the human’s shoulders, and then just, laying atop the human in what felt like dramatic moping. Though, judging from the venlil’s expression, it was anything but moping.
“There there, Tova. Deep breaths. Everything is going to be alright.” The human brushed the venlil between her ears, giving a few small strokes. For a moment, it was as if the human forgot we were there, focusing on the void-colored venlil. It took a while, but her attention soon returned to us. “Oh, and where are my manners? My name is Arwen, Arwen Conway. It’s a pleasure to meet you, and this big venlil is Tova, and… Oh, there you are!” Not far up the hill was that blonde venlil, hiding awkwardly behind a pair of sheep. He waved at us from afar.
“Hello,” he shouted. “Names Trivi!” He moved his way closer using the sheep to hide his embarrassment.
“Oh, so you two are mates? Judging by Arwen’s appearance and your equipme-” Telg was not able to finish his sentence, falling silent as Tack decided to place his paw on Telg’s muzzle once again. Though, judging by the sudden bloom that swept across the two individuals’ faces… It was safe to say Telg threaded right through the bramble bush.
Even my ears went a little bit blue. I could still recall what Pragh and I saw the other day.
“Of course, humans and venlil would be perfect for each other! ” I could hear Telg saying within my mind.
“I uh, that’s mate business.” Trivi stammered, quietly lowering himself down behind one of the sheep. “And don’t pester humans on their mate stuff. It’s not really something they enjoy talking about. Unless it is with family, friends, or their partners, but mostly their partners.”
Arwen, equally red to Trivi’s orange, nodded with agreement. “Yeah, let’s change the subject. I’d rather not faint with a venlil about to crush me. Tova? Tova? Can one of you help me? She’s really heavy*!* Ah!” As soon as Arwen managed to say that, her limbs finally gave way, resulting in her getting crushed under the big venlil! Though, judging by the fact that the venlil was firmly latched onto the human. I had a sneaking suspicion that’d we’d probably spend the latter part of an hour trying to separate the two, then look for Jaxton.
After a small amount of encouragement from Trivi, the four of us moved closer to Arwen, ignoring the dog’s barks and yaps.
I could feel anxiety brewing down within me as I thought over a question I was having. “Can you point me toward Jaxton’s home? I assume it isn’t that far if you’re out here, right?” I was awkwardly rubbing two of my opposing claws together, waiting for Arwen to answer. Tack and Telg were once again trying to pick up the big, moping venlil.
“Can’t wait, huh? You must be the ring leader then?” Arwen’s little guess wasn’t right or wrong, so I merely shrugged in response. “Just over the hill and less than a mile if you keep walking. I assume- Hey! You can still get lost if you’re not careful!”
Maybe it wasn’t the wisest move to begin running up the short hill, but being so close to my goal. I felt my limbs have a second wind and an urge to keep moving, to keep pushing. I just didn’t want to stop, not a mere mile from Jaxton!
Almost there! Not much farther!
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2023.05.30 14:25 AlienNationSSB Alien-Nation Chapter 169: Jailbreak

All Chapters First Chapter of Alien-Nation Previous Chapter
Chapter summary: Vaughn liberates a bunch of people. Elias can't sleep and makes some decisions and receives a weird offer.
Chapter Art- Vaughn's Mask, a World War One Tanker Splatter Mask

Alien-Nation Chapter 169: Jailbreak

A Leslie's Pool Supplies retail outlet made for a strange rally point for any group of people, even moreso now that the whole strip mall along what had been Concord Pike had long since closed. The stainless letters spelled the forgotten name of the shopping center, still proudly adorned the top of the diagram of blank signs ensured at least the brick obelisk was a conveniently obvious marker for the men to find and make preparations for assaulting the jail.
'Morningstar' squadron had swelled their cell's numbers to well over twenty by absorbing the miscellaneous fragments of other cells, whose skills were more generalized. The name carried over to the newly formed Strike Force by virtue of being both the largest and the lynchpin of the operation's success.
This was the largest force of the three organized groups they'd split into, each aiming to try and hit the larger jails along Route 202, the other two branches making a target list of their own. Vendetta had given them an extra half hour to at least get themselves close to in-position, but with only one shortwave had no way of knowing if they would coordinate their strike. He was a known element to everyone even if only by name. At least Elias's words stayed true; All seemed very familiar and well-practiced with their carried weaponry. More importantly, none contested his assigned leadership or questioned his orders.
Vaughn cradled the RPG he'd been given, eyeing the well-lit building just over the carefully landscaped hill. The last had been over a half hour ago. The box-mart across the old highway was the temporary headquarters of the repositioned Troop One, after the suburbs near Camp Death had been cleared, likely soon to be repositioned again. But the size of the old box-mart seemed to indicate several things, that it was largely indefensible, could contain a fair few prisoners, and by its proximity to Camp Death, could be useful to strike regardless.
The flow of traffic was unusually heavy for being well before the crack of dawn. Perhaps people were trying their luck getting up old 202 to try and reach the border that way, after having no luck along other closed border checkpoints. There was a feeling of self-consciousness in carrying heavy weapons out in the open along a suburban highway most had driven along during peacetime, the juxtaposition of old familiar environment and newly familiar activity showing just how much their lives had changed. Moreso as cars rolled along it like it was a Friday night of olde, the two lives- old and new, bumping shoulders for a moment.
"You ready?" He asked, snapping them back to the present.
Mutters of assent was good enough. Haltingly, everyone in the mishmashed strike team moved toward the precinct's bright lights, taking advantage of the long shadows and occasional noise of the passing cars.
It was an unassuming building, the repurposed garrison made out of some retail outlet built back in the turbulent seventies, all brick and little else but tiny glass doors, with not even windows for the occupants to know the impending violence had been approaching. What era will this be known as? Early Imperial? Resistance? Revolutionary? Wondered the teen, as he leveled it at the lobby. Good? Bad? Hell, I'm just the man with the gun.
Everyone levelled their weapons as once, and Vaughn held a hand high. "We're here to liberate the prison, not blow it sky high," he chuckled. It was hardly armored or reinforced- or at least, so it seemed to him. And if it was, then the Data Center had shown the virtue of striking the same spot with concentrated fire beat showering it with dispersed impacts.
At least the glass door looked normal enough. "Bump and grind, forward. Forward!" He hissed. "Aim at that- there- the front door." Easy enough for the homemade launcher to hit, and these were arguably of the lowest utility if things went sideways. Elias had taught him asset management well- it was a waste to throw your best equipment at a stationary target. While the design was tried-and-tested, Vaughn still took a few steps away.
The improvised launcher let out a metallic clunk, and with a surprisingly subdued noise and recoil the projectile was sent tumbling freely, end over end, the cap blown clean off the improvised launcher. A second later, the giant projectile more than made up for it as the round smashed through the glass door, taking the automatic door slightly off the rails and bowing slightly inward- before then blowing both them and a hail of glass fragments outward as the detonation went off inside the main lobby.
Someone in a security forces uniform staggered out.
"Infantrymen, Fire!" Vaughn roared to the infantrymen, most of Morningstar dutifully restraining themselves as a hail of bullets sprayed into the storefront and even stitched up the exterior brickwork. Clearly, some insurgents were better trained than others judging by the tracer rounds and slowly tapering off rounds.
"Advance and reload! Morningstar, spread out and cover!"
The smoke and dust was subdued, at least for now, and left them with a surprisingly clear view into the front entrance. Red streaks were painted up on the wall, black and grey of smoke-dusted debris mixed in like a spin-art collage.
The lobby's contents were an absolute shambles- everything set on a ledge had been knocked about, including the ledges and desks themselves. The security forces inside responded by charging out the main doors to follow just a second later.
A hail of gunfire met them, most of the armored troopers flinching reflexively, their armor plates overlapping and protecting their wearer. A few reflexively tried returning fire despite the harsh stings of rounds tugging on the mix of fabric, bulletproof weave, and shattering off the neosteel plate they wore. The gunfire never let up on those unfortunate few who had charged out from their cover, the complete lack of coordination, dissimilar reloading times from infantry with unequal amounts of time spent with their weapons. Effective equipment and enthusiasm was undercut by poor training, surprise, and total lack of a plan to counter being outnumbered. Morningstar, on the other hand, had the numbers, the angle, and the element of surprise.
One by one the Security Forces lay flat. Either they were dead, had the fight knocked out of them, or were trying to present as minimal target as they could while they lined up their own rifles to return fire. It was hard to say for certain what the intent was, but the outcome was little different. Round after round continued pouring into them from dozens of unevenly sized magazines, an RPG or two sending the bodies of any who tried opening fire tumbling, their limbs likely held on by the durable material underneath. When they landed, their bodies folded like misshapen laundry, pressed into unnatural shapes with the wearer still inside.
The whole front engagement was over in less than a minute. A pale, non-gauntleted hand waved frantically from behind a shattered brick front, red streaking down the fingers.
"Hold!" Vaughn shouted. "Identify!" The hand continued waving, and Vaughn shoved an unwitting volunteer forward to pull the man out from behind, to reveal a man in a stained tee shirt with a dazed expression and blood dripping from a series of scratches on his cheeks, cut in like a cat's claws had raked over them.
"Civilian!" Vaughn bellowed over his ringing ears. "Any others inside?"
The man shook his head and mouthed 'no,' his voice seemingly too hoarse- perhaps from having spent an untold amount of time screaming.
The man was wrong- there were, or at least 'had been' more security forces inside. A sudden blast and the tinkering of shrapnel caused Vaughn to duck, then charge forward, his improvised explosive launcher discarded, swinging his shotgun around from his back to rest in his hands. A Technical had tried to leave via a service bay exit, apparently not even managing to round the corner before an RPG wielded by a Morningstar veteran had upended the uparmored pickup as it pulled out.
A survivor crawled from the wreckage, and Vaughn sprinted forward, pressing the barrel against the shivering man's temple as he raised his empty hands. The wet splatter kicked high, and Vendetta checked for any other survivors, the smoking tip of his shotgun wafting grey in the fluorescent tubes of the old retail outlet.
The technicals were indeed tough, he noted, but the round seemed to have flown into a wheel well, bypassing the plating. No one else inside seemed to be moving- yet still, he made certain. There'd be no theatrics of announcing himself to an enemy who played dead by standing in the open and giving orders, letting them try and exact some measure of revenge, or gasping out some warning to the shil'vati. No, a strike was to be calculated, and that calculation was to be total.
Two minutes later and a clear picture of the aftermath had emerged. Over five hundred prisoners rescued from the cells, cramped together like sardines, hastily erected concrete laid in a grid backstopping a prefab prison. PVC pipes ran from room to room for toilets no less roughshod in their construction, set straight into the dirty linoleum. Quite a few of the prisoners were deafened somewhat. The skeleton crew of Security Forces personnel hadn't stood a chance- supposedly, most were out, working from some kind of list, or perhaps had finished their shift after a long day of throwing people into prison.
Vaughn gestured with the shotgun. "There's your exit, people. If you're still undecided about the Shil'vati, then this was your wake-up call. If you're still undecided about us, then I'm not sure what to tell you. We just risked our lives to save yours. You want to pay it back? You can either pay it forward by helping us with the next prison, or you can help the Emperor of Mankind. Blankets, food, water, soldiers, guns, ammo, whatever you've got that you think might help. He hasn't said it, but I reckon you all owe him, if you've got a decent bone in your body, you'll at least bring him something, offer to try and help. If you want, you can listen in on the radio for instructions, and if you haven't got a shortwave, I'll separate off a few from our strike squad who can fill you in and get you there, if you feel like chipping in on the war effort."
Vaughn lowered the shotgun, taking a shell off his bandoleer and loading it in to replace the one he'd fired.
"That went well," Parker remarked. "And not a bad speech. Short, to the point, and all that. Honestly, I wish I'd brought a whole crew. One for the close-up on that impact. But, uh, that execution..."
"Completely necessary," Vaughn snapped, irritatedly. "That guy was fatally wounded. Putting him out of his misery was an act of mercy. And you'll remember to narrate that, if you got that on film."
"Of course." Parker didn't deny where he'd been aiming the camera- saving Vaughn at least the headache of reviewing the footage, and then having to kill Parker, if it turned out he'd been lying.
"I'm starting to think of these jail cells as something more like a pinata full of prizes. Namely, insurgents and good PR," he muttered. Truth be told, he'd wanted more of a fight. Vaughn pulled the radio from his pocket, and sent out the broadcast. "Done here. 202 North has been cleared. About four fifty good to go in some sense of the word, though where's anyone's guess. Tried sending them your way, don't know if they'll take it. Another fifty will need medical treatment. No casualties on our end. Surprise was total. We've got pictures. No enemies taken prisoner."
Vendetta stared around the lobby, an idea slowly dawning on him.
"Hey! Hey hey hey! Snag armor off any of the ones that you can. Grab any goods that are stocked up, and arm up anyone who says they're headed to Camp Death with the weapons the guys had here. Come on, we can't stay too long here. You-" he pointed at a man who had held down the trigger on his rifle, spraying the building at full auto. "-You're fucking useless at fighting. Gather up the ones who are able and willing to fight, get them packed into a civilian-style police cruiser, and drive them on over to Camp Death. Everyone, help him load up. Get everything you can out of the Evidence lockers into the trunks- they can fit a lot, trust me, I'd know. Camp Death's going to need goodies. Come on, move, people, move!"
Morningstar Squadron had re-mustered on Vendetta.
"Alright, now what?" They almost seemed eager for more.
A smile crept across Vendetta's face, invisible to all as he pointed at the row of vehicle keys.
"I think it's time we hit 141 and a couple more," he muttered, pulling it off the hook. "Now...wheelman, shotgun, or turret?"

"Accidentally Cut Content"

[Author's Note: Hey Everyone. I made a really dumb mistake and included part of the next chapter in the previous one's end in my rush to get it out the door. So the first couple paragraphs will be a repeat, but this IS a new chapter. I even updated those first four or five paragraphs slightly.]
I couldn't sleep well on the cot that night. Though I noticed hours ticked by, every moment seemed to be spent tossing and turning. I even tried resting with the mask off, held in my hands, but the risk to my identity being discovered if anyone barged in caused me enough stress to worsen the situation. Eventually, I gave up, kicked the covers off and donned the mask again, making my rounds around the camp, trying to calm myself down by taking a midnight stroll. Instead, I felt eyes countless following me, and I had to force myself to stand tall for them. For the thousandth time, I thought of this as my Valley Forge.
As I patrolled, I could hear whispered prayers, muttered plans of action, and mercifully, snores. At least some were getting some sleep. I could see orange lights reflecting off the clouds from where I knew Wilmington lay. It seemed Vaughn was keeping busy, if indeed it was his handiwork.
A few shipment inspections and a routine update from a sentry later, and I felt caught up to speed. I noticed Radio from the corner of my eye, seemingly also unable to sleep.
I almost jumped a foot in the air when I felt the tap on my shoulder, only to find G-Man's mask staring into mine. How strange that such a haunting visage was a comfort to me.
"Hey. Can't sleep?" He sounded surprisingly serene. Or maybe it was just tired resignation. His hands seemed stuck in a familiar claw-like shape after holding the soldering iron for so long, and my fingers ached in sympathy. My mask's filters took much of the scent of smoke I could smell from the distant fires, but I was sure that if I wasn't wearing my mask that G-Man would smell faintly of molten silver solder. I'd wondered how we'd repaired and updated so many railguns so quickly. Now I knew what he'd put himself through.
"I can't," I confessed. "G-Man, I'm sorry what happened with your father. Hell of a birthday." I hadn't even had a chance to give him the present I'd bought him- a couple new filters, and vintage craftsman toolkit, 'from before they sold out,' as Verns had phrased it. The memory of his voice already felt distant, somehow.
"Wasn't your fault. Even if Town Hall wasn't your big idea to get them to retaliate, you know? Then they'd still have done something. But, uh, thanks for saying that. And thanks for trying to get dad out. I'll remember that." George said quietly, then the conversation ended when he turned away and went to the edge of the embankment. Just like that.
I could never quite get a read on him, but I wanted to respect his distance. Whatever he was feeling, he seemed to want to feel it alone, and to keep his own counsel on the matter.
I continued course toward Radio.
"Any word from Miskatonic?" I asked hopefully.
Radio offered a noncommittal shrug, then dropped it in a hurry, raising one hand to massage his chest. "They say 'this is your war,' but did ship us a small container."
"I saw."
I hadn't exactly expected them to line up alongside us in the trenches in their white coats, but I'd hoped they'd have had some kind of wonder drug or noxious gas we might deploy. Something toxic to the Shil'vati but not us. The best they'd given us so far were experimental bullets and toxic-tipped arrows and knives, the former of which supposedly could potentially the armor, if fired with enough force and impacted with a good angle. If true, then I supposed they might be moderately useful in an ambush, and they had helpfully included a pair of compound bows. I had conducted a pretty decent survey of the defense, but I hadn't thought to ask if any were experienced archers. I also couldn't imagine taking someone off a railgun, large caliber rifle, or even an old cannon to hand them a bow and arrow without feeling like I was somehow offering them an insult without equipping it myself, and there was better I could think to do with the remaining minutes before the Shil'vati would inevitably come looking than to practice.
They'd fallen out of favor for a reason, and it wasn't that the earliest guns outperformed bows.
They had also supplied a small cache of rifles that were more likely to pulverize than penetrate unless the armor had been compromised already. These were still appreciated, but hardly the game changer I wanted in return for all we'd sent them.
Then Radio leaned in, voice kept conspiratorially low. "They did, however, mention an exfiltration for you."
Sam had been right, I wouldn't get back anything close to the value of what I'd sent out. At least, not unless I was willing to abandon everything and everyone, to cut and run for my life. Such a decision would be the inglorious end of the revolution, spelling doom for everyone in it, and all of humanity's culture. I'd forever be remembered as a coward, if I was so lucky to be remembered at all.
"Well, I'm not going."
"Okay, but here's a real head-scratcher. Did you show them where Camp Death is? I've been careful not to broadcast our coordinates, and my little helpers haven't been talking with Miskatonic. And the person on the shortwave mentioned that the border would free up tomorrow morning, then mentioned the interstate right up against the back of our base as a meeting point. They said Last Exit Before Pennsylvania. That's right there." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "And I didn't mention broadcasting without a cat's paw or relay. I mean there's a chance they triangulated, but throwing together a plan that fast? Nah, man, they knew."
I searched my memory. "I'm certain that I didn't mention it to them...did Hex? She did that internship. No, wait, she got picked up and dropped off at Warehouse Base. Unless she mentioned something on the drive past? She said they were somewhere North." Now that Radio had mentioned it, I was left with a bit of a puzzle. How did they know? How much did they know about us?
"They had to have known somehow. And if they didn't know before and just figured our location out, then I bet you it's not long before the Shil'vati figure it out themselves and come sniffing," Radio resignedly threw a hand up. "Should we update the signal? Start directing people straight here?"
We had numbers, yes, but we could still do to take more in, especially if the fighting dragged on or casualties mounted higher than I projected. "How long until they're sure we're here?"
Radio yawned under his mask, the animated glass-plated mask he wore misinterpreting it with an ASCII shocked ":O" face. "We've been broadcasting all night, so, who knows?"
"Well, if it was just a signal they picked up on any random given day, how long would it typically take for the Shil'vati to muster a response?"
"Depends on the day." At my silent stare, he objected further. "They sometimes respond pretty fast to that sort of thing, but these aren't normal times, E. They used to come to check out wherever I broadcast from within an hour or two or two, but remember, they've kind of got their hands full right now thanks to Vendetta's jailbreaks. Plus, there's so many more signals." He checked the screen of his shortwave and chuckled, then lightly massaged his chest again. "I'm sure we've already gone way past."
"Alright. If we see anyone snooping around us, add our location to the broadcast. That way, anyone in the resistance or is sympathetic but isn't sure where Camp Death is can find their way here. In the meantime, though, I still think we're best not leaking it. At least with the sentries having set in the final claymores and outer defenses, we should be well-situated to ward off anything they throw at us."
"Maybe. Maybe not," George said from behind me, and I froze.
"Why not?"
He'd helped build this place. He'd know any weaknesses as well as his father.
"They might have cloaking tech, or some other means of infiltration," his voice was a dry rasp.
I shuddered thinking about it. "That's a good point," I muttered. "Assassination and recovery might be up their alley...except, I think they're terrified of what losing me might mean for their hostages."
"I'll be honest. I don't think she cares at this point," G-Man countered. I couldn't fault his gloomy disposition. I could just hope that he didn't want something bad to happen to us, to balance out that something bad had happened to him, from some weird sense of fairness.
"Yeah?"
"Think about it for a second. What happens if you die? Then what does that let her do if that happens?"
It was with a startle I realized he had a good point. Azraea had committed to a shocking all-in, something that would shake the political landscape and memories of countless denizens of the state. Months of carefully planned schemes involving carefully planned defensive patrols meant to reinforce one another, frustrate, and hinder our operations had culminated in us adapting, learning. We thought we had her beaten, especially when we destroyed her monitoring, data collection, and reporting asset in Something Else Square. Then she'd pulled something like this out of a hat, catching us totally flat-footed, rounding up who-knew how many of us before we could muster. What other assumptions had I made that were incorrect? Would she hold fire, if she knew where I was if it meant sparing the hostages? Or were they now just an 'acceptable, if regrettable' loss? When your opponent becomes unpredictable, issues arise, especially when you're counting on them to do certain things.
If it was, then I'd just done her work for her, and all of us would be dead the moment she figured out where we were, and at least the end would come faster than I knew it had arrived.
I realized I was staring up into the orange-lit cloudy night sky. I could voice none of this, not without undermining morale and potentially sparking a panic.
"If she was going to start bombarding the state, she'd have started already by now," I chuckled. "The borders are sealed, right? Why wait? Why bother trying to build some sense of dread? She's not a vampire who feeds on fear. I choose to not be afraid of what she may do. I instead intend to plan around it, to the extent that we can. Besides, if I die, what would the twins do to the hostages?"
George made a disappointed growl, his sore hands turning from awkward claws into shaking fists. "That may be the point. If the Twins do anything to the hostages in retaliation for your death, then maybe as long as she didn't pull the trigger, she thinks she'll be absolved of whatever damage their deaths mean to them."
I wasn't sure she thought that way. Heck, after months, the woman was still an absolute enigma to me. Governess Bal'shir, I understood- the flurry of speeches and photo-ops and handshakes at civic meetings with 'literally-who's-that' of 'what-community' had been carte blanche for us to grow. Ministriva was a lying snake, and once we pieced that together, I ripped her apart. But Azraea? What drove the Fleet Admiral to come down here? Duty. There wasn't any sort of hard policy she followed that I could tell, not that I knew Shil'vati military doctrine well, being an outsider such as I was. Perhaps it was the greater liberty afforded her of being both Governess and General that made it seem like her plans shifted and changed in ways that made it hard for me to keep up. Or maybe she was just at such a rank and in such a position of power to where she could make her judgment calls. If so, that begged the question: What was 'the line' for her? I had a feeling I'd somehow crossed it already. Probably Radio's tape of me fucking the Empress, if I was to be honest. Most unfair to be judged for something that hadn't been my decision, though I doubted an apology from either of us would amount to much.
I looked over to my Lieutenants. They'd helped carry me this far. I'd be foolish to ignore them now. What could I do to at least mitigate the risk that he was right, and there was someone looking to kill me, right here and now?
"Alright, fine, you've convinced me. Instruct the sentries to get the next dozen people who we intake to help patrol the inner perimeter, and to keep a watch for...well, I mean, a stealthy seven foot tall purple alien with giant tits?"
"Something invisible," George supplied.
"Alright, for anything shifting in the tall grasses that they can't immediately see- I can't really ask them to keep an eye out for something they can't see, can I?" I was suddenly too tired to think properly.
"I'll explain it," G-Man offered.
"And I'll get the sentries ready to take over the radio, explaining how it works, then I'll try heading to bed, too," Radio offered, and I realized that a yawn sounded very strange through a voice modulator- his ASCII helmet seemed to fritz out again for a second.
"I should change my sleeping quarters, too," I muttered. "They'll almost certainly check the command cabin for me, if they manage to enter. I'll pick a tunnel- uh...somewhere."
"Might be smart. Could be they'll try and take out the explosives shed, too. Make it look like an accident on our part, get rid of any hostages, and then get a free pass to exact vengeance on the state. Got anywhere in mind?"
I thought to myself. Where might be a good resting area? There were many tunnels that led to bunkers, firing outposts, and even to stowage areas. Any one of them might do in theory, but I knew of one that overlooked one of the two streams that ran along the side of Camp Death. I didn't want to situate myself either too low to where I was on the very front of the lines- why make an assassin's job even easier by putting myself on the perimeter, after all? But the creek should make a pleasant bit of white noise- and also get me away from the center shed. "Probably facing North, along Perkins run. G-Man, you look absolutely dead on your feet. Get some rest if you can, you've certainly done enough and gone through enough for today."
"There's...still things to do."
"There always will be. If the others are finished doing their repairs, lock the shed," I muttered. "I know the hostages are in there, so post a sentry or two there, too, to watch over the entrance. You're right that she may try some kind of underhanded tactic." It wouldn't do much if they decided to set charges against the side or something, and the subsequent explosion would be, in a word, 'cataclysmic'. "This was supposed to be a relaxing walk to help me rest..." I scratched at my chin under the mask, feeling the beginnings of the few scratchy hairs that had grown since I'd last shaved, and feeling the cool fresh air without the filter as the wind kicked up.
"Sorry," G-Man offered sheepishly. "I'll go tell 'em."
While he ambled off, I followed Radio back to his pile of equipment.
"Before we split then, one last thing."
"Yeah?" Radio asked.
"Have we recovered Verns?" I asked Radio. "Any word?"
"No, not that I've heard," Radio confessed. "Vendetta's been mostly quiet, I think to hide his heading from anyone who might be listening, but I know that he's struck at least three jails and counting. Some of the ones he's freed are trickling up to us here on foot, and it seems he and Morningstar are acting like a human wrecking ball. The troops are calling it Operation Smash-and-Grab."
"Smash-and-grab," I laughed, thinking of the pun. "I like it. Do we have a more recent headcount?"
"Sam said we've got enough to last about three days of continuous, round-the-clock fighting with the hundreds of people we have here. If we get a resupply run- well, I suppose it would depend upon how big a hole gets blasted in the encirclement. Or, well, something to that effect. Look, man, I'm 'Radio', not 'Telephone,' and I don't have the head for this logistics shit that you two do. You want to talk to Sam, you get the man on the radio yourself, or ask one of the Sentries I'm sticking here to manage the comms. Point being, you try and get hold of him. I'm done for the night."
I could have said something witty back, but it felt counterproductive, and would only delay the sleep I was now well overdue for.
"I've got an idea for an update. The ones Vendetta's letting loose? They can gather supplies and wait for the signal to reinforce, or to agitate, or can organize people into a more focused group, one that can punch through whatever blockade they try and form up. It'll also force the Shil'vati to not concentrate forces on our back door-" I pointed back at the interstate. "Even if they clear them out, the opportunity for us to encircle and destroy and then break out is too high for them to really try to do a mass deployment along our back." Sam was, I knew, something of a career criminal. Able to rub elbows with the worst elements of humanity. He was a facilitator, I knew, not really a leader. "Can you tell him-"
Radio was already fiddling with the dial. "Already on it," he muttered. "Lotta profit in looting, should be easy for him to steer people with that, or something. Get some sleep, E."
I went up to a sentry, requisitioned a sleeping bag someone had helpfully brought, went into a trench and told him where I'd be if I was needed. I waved to Radio, and crawled into the gunnery tunnel, almost stepping on another four people already laying in it. I loosened my laces, clutched my sheathed knife, and fell into a fitful sleep.
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2023.05.30 14:17 rtsgrl • • Ravensburger's Christmas Edition Puzzles Thread • •

We're out of season, but it's never too early nor too late for a Christmas thread. Credit goes to u/CleverHarwood who started the Christmas saga and then followed it up based on tips from fellow puzzlers.
The aim of this post is to create an easy-to-maintain Ravensburger Christmas resource linked to our Wiki. I will carry on updating this post, so don't hesitate to comment and point out any missing bits (even if you stumble upon it weeks or months after its original publication date). Thank you.
The focus is on Limited/Special Christmas editions: 500-2000 pieces (but I plan to add smaller counts eventually). I have hyperlinked the completed puzzle if it was posted on the sub and avoided external links. Multiple external links have lead to my post removal by reddit spam filters.
A very special thanks to u/hyperkid137 for sharing the Ravensburger link and the redditor who first shared the Puzzles by Lisa website link. eBay (active and sold items) and Puzzlelink are the other two resources that were useful in the data collection.
Last updated: May 2023
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Christmas/Limited Edition with the yellow star on the box Please note some of these puzzles were released by Ravensburger USA. I have provided this information if located/available
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Title Artist Pieces Year on the box Notes
Here Comes Christmas! Ingrid Slyder 500 2023
Rockefeller Center Joy Pierpaolo Rovero 1000 2022
Enchanted Christmas Demelsa Haughton 500 2021
Christmas Songbirds Ingrid Slyder 500 XL 2021 Sold in the Christmas Edition and 'standard' Ravensburger box
Christmas Eve Zorina Baldescu 1500 2020
The Christmas Shop Janet Kruskamp 500 2020
Christmas in The Square Victor McLindon 1000 2019
Cuddly Christmas Dominic Davison 500 2019
Packing the Sleigh Liz Dillon 1000 2019
Playful Christmas Day 1000 2019
White Christmas Dominic Davison 1000 2019
Christmas on Pet Street Ingrid Slyder 1000 2018
Christmas Village Marcello Corti 1000 2018
Christmas Wishes Barbara Behr 1000 2018
Countdown to Christmas David Krustkamp 1000 2018
Snowy Village Barbara Behr 1000 2018
Christmas House Steve Crisp 500 2017
Festival of Festivals Roy Trower 1000 2017 Released as Santa's Christmas Party in the UK
The Joy of Christmas Connecticut Community Foundation 1000 2017
Winter Wonderland Ingrid Slyder 1000 2017
Christmas Joy Interlitho (Stock art) 500 2016
Santa's Ready Ingrid Slyder 1000 2016
NYC Christmas Steve Klein 1000 2015
Santa's Final Preparations Roy Trower 1000 2015 Released under the same title in the Limited Edition in the UK
Americana Christmas Medana Gabbard 1000 2014
Christmas Train Roy Trower 1000 2014 Released as The Santa Express in the UK
Mapping the Course Elaine Maier 1000 2013
Idyllic Village Debbie Cook 1000 2013
Santa Needs Directions Roy Trower 1000 2013 Released as Which Way is Santa? in the UK
Joy of Christmas Roy Trower 1000 2012 Red box edition
Santa's Sleigh Ride Roy Trower 1000 2012 Released as Santa's Flying Visit in the UK
Santa's Caught Simon Mendez 1000 2011
Snowy Day ddfa (Stock art) 1000 2011
The Christmas Shop Tricia Reilly Matthews 1000 2010 Ravensburger USA. Modular box
Holiday Baubles Caroline Valeureuse 1000 2010
Not a Creature was Stirring Nicky Boehme 1000 2010
Santa's Arrival George Schriemer 1000 2010
Santa's Story Time Gilberto Marchi 1000 2010
Santa's Flying Visit Roy Trower 1000 2010 Ravensburger USA. Modular box; released under the same title in the UK - standard box
Two Angels Alessandro Scanziani 1000 2010 Ravensburger USA. Modular box
The Christmas Market Roy Trower 1000 2008 Released under the same title in the Limited Edition in the UK
Joy of Christmas Roy Trower 1000 2008 Blue box edition
Santa's Christmas List Roy Trower 1000 2008 Released under the same title in the Limited Edition in the UK
White Christmas Rolf Bunse 1000 2008
It's Christmas Roy Trower 2000 2005
It's Christmas Roy Trower 1000 2005
Santa Claus Ute Thonissen 1000 2005
The Christmas Village Roy Trower 1000 2004 Released under the same title in the Limited Edition in the UK
Christmas Ute Thonissen 1000 2003 Comes in a metal tin box
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Limited Edition UK puzzles
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Title Artist Pieces Year on the box
26: Santa's Workshop Roy Trower 1000 2022
25: The Christmas House Roy Trower 1000 2021
24: Christmas is Coming Roy Trower 1000 2020
23: Home for Christmas Roy Trower 1000 2019
22: Let's Visit Santa Roy Trower 1000 2018
21: Which One's Santa? Roy Trower 1000 2017
20: Santa's Christmas Party Roy Trower 1000 2016
19: Santa's Final Preparations Roy Trower 1000 2015
18: The Christmas Farm Roy Trower 1000 2014
17: The Santa Express Roy Trower 1000 2013
16: Christmas Shop Roy Trower 1000 2012
15: Which Way is Santa? Roy Trower 1000 2011
14: Santa's Flying Visit Roy Trower 1000 2010
13: Santa’s Christmas Supper Roy Trower 1000 2009
12: Santa's Christmas List Roy Trower 1000 2008
11: The Christmas Market (Santa's Secret Visit) Roy Trower 1000 2007
10: The Christmas Fair Roy Trower 1000 2006
9: A Country Christmas Roy Trower 1000 2005
8: The Christmas Village Roy Trower 1000 2004
7 1000 2003
6 1000 2002
5: Christmas Carols Peter Bradshaw 1000 2001
4: Christmas Traditions Kevin Walsh 1000 2000
3: The Ivy and the Holy Carol Lawson 1000 1999
2: The Twelve Days of Christmas Carol Lawson 1000 1998
1: Victorian Christmas Gale Pitt 1000 1997
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Christmas Disney Puzzles
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Title Pieces Year on the box Notes
Disney Snow Globes 1000 2021
Disney Princess Christmas Celebrations 500 2017
Disney Pixar Christmas 1000 2016
Disney Christmas Train 500 2016(?)
Disney Christmas 1000 2015
A Disney Christmas 1000 2011
Winnie the Pooh. Christmas Fun 1000 TBC Developed in the UK
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2023.05.30 13:03 FelicitySmoak_ On This Day In Michael Jackson HIStory - May 30th

On This Day In Michael Jackson HIStory - May 30th
1970 - "The Love You Save" by the Jackson 5 enters the Billboard US Hot 100 singles chart at #45. In late June, will peak at #1 & stay there for 2 weeks
1971 - The Jackson 5 play at the Fairgrounds Arena (now Jim Norick Arena) in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma on their 2nd national tour
1977 - The Jacksons perform “Keep On Dancing” on Numéro Un Joe Dassin taped at the Buttes-Chaumont Studios in Paris, France while on their European tour. It would air on July 2nd
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1979 - On their Destiny Tour, The Jacksons play the Jim Norick Arena in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
1987 - The Los Angeles Times reports that Michael has submitted an official bid, for an undisclosed sum, for the remains of the late John Merrick, known as the Elephant Man, from the London Hospital Medical College which has kept them since Merrick’s death in 1890.
Michael's manager, Frank DiLeo, commented “Jackson has no exploitative intentions whatsoever and cares about and is concerned with the Elephant Man as a dedicated and devoted collector of art and antiques"
Also adding that Michael "has a high degree of respect for the memory of Merrick"
1992 - "In The Closet" peaked at #6 during it's 5th week on the Billboard chart. It would stay in the Top 40 for 11 weeks
1997 - HIStory tour rehearsals in Bremen, Germany
2000 - Dangerous (album) is certified 7X platinum by the RIAA.
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2000 - Michael announces that he has become a key partner & investor in HollywoodTicket.com, a promotional and marketing site that gives netizens the chance to win backstage passes to concerts & visits to film/tv show shoots. The amount he invested was not disclosed but it's understood to be in the millions
2003 - Michael attends a party at Robert Evan's house to celebrate Brett Ratner's Hillhaven Lodge: The Photo Book Pictures book launch. Brett Ratner is the director of Rush Hour. Later that same night, Michael shows up at a MTV Movie Awards post party at Ron Burkle's Beverly Hills Mansion where he meets Puff Daddy and Paris Hilton among others.
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2005 - No court today due to the Memorial Day holiday
2006 - Michael Jackson takes his kids and his nanny Grace to Tokyo Disneyland.
2007 - A collection of almost 2000 Jackson family items dating from the mid-1960's to the early '90's goes to auction in the Hard Rock Cafe in Las Vegas.
These are items from a storage warehouse that Henry Vaccaro came in to possession of after a failed business venture ended up in bankruptcy court. Items include Michael's gold record for Thriller, handwritten "ABC" lyrics & a signed Victory tour program
2013 - Jackson v AEG Trial Day 20
Katherine and Rebbie Jackson are in court.
The court also heard an update on efforts to get emails and any other records from a computer used by Michael's former manager, Frank Dileo. Apparently an LA attorney has a copy of Dileo's computer hard drive. Attorneys are working to get a copy of the HD to both sides. The copy was revealed during a deposition of Dileo's widow earlier this week in Pennsylvania, plaintiff's attorney Brian Panish said
Paul Gongaware Testimony
Jackson direct
Gongaware said he met with his attorneys again yesterday to refresh his recollection
Panish asked if AEG was concerned about Mr. Jackson's health. "When he was sick we obviously had a concern," Gongaware responded. Gongaware said he understood Michael was sick from reading the chain of emails shown yesterday. But Gongaware told the jury he didn't have any particular concern about Michael Jackson other than on June 19th, no one told Gongaware about being concerned with his health. Gongaware testified that he disagreed with Houghdahl's opinion, saying he had no "particular concern" about Jackson's health and ability to perform
Talking about the email Hougdahl sent saying Michael was deteriorating quickly, Gongaware explained: "I didn't see it the way he saw."
Hougdahl, in response to concerns expressed by Travis Payne about Jackson's weight Email 6/15/09 from Hougdahl to Gongaware :
He needs some cheeseburgers with a bunch of Wisconsin cheesehead bowlers and a couple of brats and beers
"Was he joking around about this situation?" Panish asked Gongaware, referring to Hougdahl. "I think he was," Gongaware replied. "Did you think that was funny?" Panish asked. "I did," Gongaware admitted
Panish asked about indemnity in Gongaware's contract. The exec said indemnity means that someone else is taking on the responsibility. "I haven't read my contract in 12/13 years, I don't know what it says," Gongaware said. Gongaware said he does not know how many pages his employment agreement is. Panish asked if he AEG would cover for Gongaware should they be found guilty. Gongaware said it was his understanding that he wouldn't be personally responsible financially if the jury sided with Jackson family.
Panish: "That means if you did something wrong..."
Gongaware: "They would be responsible. I've been assuming that,"
Adding that depending upon the size of the judgment, AEG could go after him. Panish asked how much AEG would be able to afford, and Gongaware said he didn't know. Panish emphasized there are various ways for AEG to pay a judgment, and Gongaware mentioned they had some sort of cancellation insurance.
Panish went back to discuss the email from Randy Phillips where he wrote 'Dr. Murray didn't need the gig and was unbiased and ethical'
Panish: "Is Mr. Phillips unbiased and ethical, sir?"
Gongaware: "I think he is"
Panish asked if it was ethical for Phillips to represent to Ortega that the doctor is 'extremely successful' and 'we checked everyone out'. Gongaware responded that he didn't know what Phillips knew at the time.
Panish: "Is number one priority 'the show must go on'?"
Gongaware: "I don't know if that's number one"
Panish: "What's number one?"
Gongaware: "Getting it right"
Panish showed the email from John Branca, saying he had the right therapist for Michael and asked if substance abuse was involved. "This is referring to the meeting that was going to happen and I was waiting to see the results of it," Gongaware said. "I didn't believe there was a substance abuse issue," Gongaware testified. "In the entire time I was dealing with him in this tour, I saw it once when he came back from his doctor," Gongaware testified. Gongaware said that was the only time he saw Michael with slurred speech and under the influence of something. Gongaware said he didn't know what Dr. Klein was giving Michael Jackson. When Panish asked Gongaware if he checked Dr. Klein out, he replied: "No, he was Michael's doctor and it was none of my business."
Gongaware said he once observed Michael looking "slow" and possibly intoxicated after a visit to his dermatologist but he didn't believe he had any "serious health problems" even after Jackson appeared weak and disoriented at a June 19 rehearsal. "My observation of Michael Jackson was that he was healthy," Gongaware said. "They had a meeting to discuss (the June 19 incident), and he took a couple days off and he came back strong"
As to insurance issues, Gongaware said he was involved only peripherally. On June 25, Gongaware sent an email saying that if they didn't get sickness coverage in the insurance, they would be dropping the policy. Gongaware said he didn't know why he was pressing for sickness insurance on the day Michael died. Bob Taylor, the insurance broker, wrote back that it was always down to the medical issued from the word go. Regarding Randy Phillips asking for life insurance the day Michael died, Gongaware said he didn't pay much attention to insurance, didn't recall.
The day Michael died, Gongaware said Phillips called him and told him to get over to the house right away, there seems to be a problem. Randy followed the ambulance to UCLA. "The second call was that he informed me that he had died," Gongaware remembered. On June 25, Gongaware said he went to the rehearsal at the Staples Center and talked to Kenny Ortega.
Panish: "Were you sad Mr. Jackson died?"
Gongaware: "Very much so"
"He was a business associate", Gongaware said about Michael. They did not didn't hang out as friends
Panish asked about Phillips' email directing Gongaware to remove thin, skeletal footage of Michael in the red jacket from This Is It documentary. Gongaware testified that he remembered receiving the email. In his deposition played in court, Gongaware said he didn't recall the email.
Panish: "Did you change your testimony?"
Gongaware: "No. I saw the email as part of my preparation"
AEG Live president and co-chief executive Randy Phillips wrote in Aug. 9 email:
Make sure we take out the shots of Michael in that red leather jacket at the sound stage where the mini-movies were being filmed. He looks way too think (sic) and skeletal
Gongaware replied to Phillips, his boss:
ok will have a look when it comes on screen
Gongaware said he didn't try to control any of the messages about Michael after his death to reflect he was fully engaged in rehearsals. Panish asked about an email from Gongaware okay'ing the band, singers and dancer to give interviews but asked them to keep it positive
In another email July 9, 2009, email to music coordinator JoAnn Tominaga, Gongaware wrote:
We are ok with the band, singers and dancers doing interviews now. The only thing we ask is that they keep it positive and stress that Michael was active, engaged and not the emaciated person some want to paint him as being.
Answering questions from Jackson family attorney Brian Panish, Gongaware said he was not trying to control the film's message.
Panish: "You're telling them what not to say, aren't you sir?"
Gongaware. "I'm asking them to keep it positive and not say he was emaciated"
Panish: "So you were controlling the message as a producer of that documentary"
Gongaware: "I don't think so"
Gongaware's testimony again emphasized the contrast between the answers he gave during his deposition under oath in December 2012 and his responses in the courtroom. In testimony, he agreed that Phillips meant "thin" in his email, instead of the word he typed, 'think'. Asked during the deposition what Phillips meant, he replied, "I don't know what he meant"
Gongaware said nothing was taken out of the documentary, which included rehearsals for the scheduled 50 concerts in London. Gongaware promised in a follow-up email to Phillips that he'd "have a look," but he testified that he never dumped any footage. "We didn't keep anything out based on what Randy wrote," Gogaware told jurors. Gongaware testified that he did not know why Phillips would ask that.
Gongaware said there were 15,000 tickets per show, $1.5 million in tickets per show, $47 million for all 31 shows. Tickets were selling at lightening fast, Gongaware said. "As fast as the system can sell.". The tickets were sold in March, Gongaware said. It was held by the arena, AEG had control of the money. Gongaware said merchandising was another way of making money. The building, which is owned by AEG, would keep the revenue of beverage sold. Gongaware said the beverage money would offset the arena rent, which Michael would not have to pay.
Gongaware: "His (MJ) potential was great"
Panish: "Unlimited ceilings?"
Gongaware: "If he was willing to work that hard, he would've done well"
Before lunch, Panish asked Gongaware whether This Is It was intended to be a multi-city tour. Gongaware said no, it was just going to be the 50 shows at London's O2 arena. "The only thing we knew was 50 shows in London. Michael had not agreed to anything else," Gongaware explained
Panish asked Gongaware by the time the show was sold out, how many people were in the queue to buy tickets. "250,000 people were still in the queue, which would be enough to sell another 50 shows," Gongaware answered. During Murray's trial, Gongaware testified that 250k people still wanted tickets. He told that jury This Is It would be a multi-city tour.
Panish: "Did you tell the truth when you testified in this case, sir?"
Gongaware: "Yes"
Panish then concluded his questioning of Gongaware.
AEG cross
AEG's attorney, Marvin Putnam, did the questioning of Gongaware on behalf of the defendants.
​
Putnam: "Have you ever been sued personally for the wrongful death of anyone?"
Gongaware: "No"
Putnam: "How are you feeling?"
Gongaware: "It's difficult, it's very stressful"
Putnam: "Are you nervous?"
Gongaware: "Yes"
Putnam asked about Gongaware's memory and he said it's okay
Putnam asked Gongaware about some of the emails shown to jurors yesterday. Putnam was trying to show that not all the contents of the emails had been shown to jury. Some email addresses had been redacted. Attorney Brian Panish objected to the redactions, and got testy with the judge. It prompted another lengthy sidebar. When attorneys returned from the judge's chambers, Putnam resumed questioning Gongaware about emails sent to his private account
Putnam said Gongaware handed over more than 13,000 emails in discovery from the This Is It period
Putnam inquired about Gongaware's Kazoodi personal email account. On 6/20/09, the chain of emails with "Trouble at the Front" was sent there. Gongaware said he didn't remember receiving this email. Gongaware said he had more than one "Kazoodi" email account. He said he was not using the account the email was sent to on 6/20. "The account was closed at the time." Putnam presented Gongaware a document that indicated the private email account had been closed at the time. Gongaware said he never denied it was sent. Gongaware claimed yesterday was the first time he saw this chain of emails. Putnam used the closed email account to try to show Gongaware's testimony was truthful
Putnam: "Why could you not recall e-mails?"
Gongaware: "I had not reviewed them and had not seen them in years,"
Some of the e-mails were new to him because he was so busy putting Jackson's tour together that he never read them, he said. Gongaware said he was receiving hundreds of email a day at the height of 2008/09 tour preparation. "Mostly, it was just a time factor if it was something that didn't have to do with me"
Gongaware said he doesn't have an office at AEG, and that he works on his own projects. He has an office at his house. Gongaware is the Co-CEO of AEG Live Concerts West with John Meglen. He said he was the co-founder of the company. Phillips is AEG Live CEO
Gongaware explained be has been testifying about what he could recall. If he didn't remember, he said he told the jury he couldn't recall. Gongaware testified he looked at the emails after his deposition because he wanted to put everything together and see the bigger picture. Putnam: "Did you try to give your best testimony?" Gongaware: "Yes, I did"
Regarding the phone call between Gongaware and Dr. Murray where the doctor asked about $5 million, Gongaware said he remembers that call. The next call between the two, it was the $150,000 call, where Gongaware offered the doctor $150k. Gongaware said those were the only two calls he had with Dr. Murray
Gongaware said the 1st time he met Dr. Murray was a meeting at Michael's Carolwood house. He said MJ, Kenny, Randy, Frank & Dr Murray were present. Gongaware recalled the other meeting with Dr. Murray was an encounter with him at The Forum. He remembers saying hello to him. Gongaware said he's sure he didn't meet with Dr. Murray other than on those two occasions
Gongaware said he promoted couple of shows/dances in college. He graduated in '69 from Waynesboro College in Pennsylvania in Accounting. He worked for Arthur Andersen in NYC after college as auditor. He said one needed two years of experience in order to get CPA license.The company ended up shutting down after being involved in the Enron scandal, Gongaware explained. He said there's a continuing education requirement in order to maintain his CPA license, but he hasn't kept current. "I didn't like that work," Gongaware said about leaving the practice. "I wanted to do things and not just be an accountant." Gongaware said he ski bummed for a winter and would do bookkeeping to pay for his lodge.
His first big show was in Colorado -- he got The Grateful Dead to perform at Folsom Field in Boulder, Colo. He said he didn't know the band or any of its managers, but asked them to come to Colorado. They did, and the show was a hit. "The concert was sold out", Gongaware said, and he became an independent promoter. Around 1975, he met Terry Bassett who worked at Concerts West and Gongaware went to work for them in their Seattle office. He worked for them for about 10 years. Gongaware said he went to work for the company because the money was steady. At Concerts West, Gongaware worked with Bad Company, Led Zeppelin, Beach Boys, Chicago, Eric Clapton, among others. This Concerts West is not the same; he is the currently the co-CEO. Gongaware left Seattle and came to LA to work at Concerts West. He then went to Warner Miller Films. The company did primarily ski movies. Jerry Weintraub was Elvis' promoter and Concerts West assigned him to work with Colonel Parker, Elvis' manager.
Gongaware was in his 20s when he worked with Elvis. He said when they'd announce an Elvis concert, there would be lines at the box office for 4 days. Gongaware said Colonel would buy ads on every radio station and promote the show. When tickets went on sale, Gongaware was to report to Colonel every hour regarding the ticket sales.
Elvis Presley's death became a controversy at this trial as the man (Gongaware) who promoted both artists' last tours testified. He testified yesterday that Presley died of a drug overdose, but when his own lawyer questioned him today he changed his testimony to say Elvis died of a heart ailment. Presley collapsed in the bathroom of his Memphis, Tennessee, mansion, Graceland, on August 16, 1977, at the age of 42. While his death was ruled the result of an irregular heartbeat, the autopsy report was sealed amid accusations that abuse of prescription drugs caused the problem.How Presley died is relevant because Jackson lawyers argue Gongaware's experience as Elvis's promoter should have made him more aware of drug abuse by artists, including Michael Jackson.
Although he worked advance promotion on Elvis Presley's last tours -- under the direction of Presley manager Colonel Tom Parker -- Gongaware testified he never met Presley.
Putnam:"Did you understand he had a problem with drugs?"
Gongaware: "I understood that later. There was a period of time when we didn't work. I didn't understand at the time, but I learned that it was a drug problem and the Colonel said he couldn't work."
Around 1992, Gongaware went to work on the Dangerous tour with Michael. This was his first time working with Michael Jackson. He worked with the Jacksons in 2000 but he remembered working on a tour with the Jacksons prior to 92 and said Michael was part of the group. "I was the tour manager, handled the logistics and travel for the B party," Gongaware said, adding he worked for Michael but not for A party.
  • A party - artist
  • B party - band and administration
  • C party - crew
  • D party - documentary people.
    Gongaware said there were several legs on the Dangerous tour. It was a worldwide tour. He never met Michael on that tour, saw him on stage a few times
The first time Gongaware met Michael was in Las Vegas when he was visiting Colonel Parker. Steve Wynn's brother called and said Michael wanted to meet Colonel. Gongaware stayed and met him
​
Putnam: "Were there any doctors in that tour?"
Gongaware: "Yes, two"
Gongaware said Dr. Forecast was Michael's personal doctor. He didn't think Dr. Forecast treated anyone else, so they had Dr. Finkelstein also. Dr. Finkelstein, a general practitioner, was in the B party. They went to places where they didn't know the quality of local healthcare. Gongaware explained Dr. Finkelstein treated B, C and D parties. Gongaware said he did not see any doctor treat Michael. Dr. Finkelstein told Gongaware he treated Michael twice. Dr. Forecast wasn't in Bangkok yet, so Dr. Finkelstein treated him when he needed.
"The King of Thailand said Michael would have to do the second show because his friends were attending", Gongaware recalled.
Gongaware said the King put armed guards outside their doors to make sure they didn't leave
​
Putnam: "During the Dangerous tour, had you come to have an understating that Michael had a problem with drugs or painkillers?"
Gongaware: "No, he Dangerous tour in 93 was cut short in Mexico City"
Gongaware said. He learned it had to do with drug addiction because Michael announced it. Putnam played the audio with Michael's statement:
"My friends and doctors advised me to seek professional guidance immediately in order to eliminate what has become an addition. It is time for me to acknowledge my need for treatment"
On Jun 25, 2009 Gabriel Sutter (a tech guy) wrote Gongaware a condolences email. "It was such an incredible shock to go through that experience," Gongaware explained. Gongaware's response on July 5, 2009:
I was working on the Elvis tour when he died so I kind of knew what to expect
"You have all these people out of work," Gongaware explained. "With Elvis some were without jobs permanently." Under questioning from Putnam, Gongaware said he didn't mean that he expected Jackson to die like Elvis. He was referring to the trauma of people losing their jobs because a tour is canceled and the estate taking over the legacy, he said.
Putnam: "When you wrote the email, did you expect Michael to die?"
Gongaware: "No, not all"
Putnam: "Did you ever consider the idea Michael would die?"
Gongaware: "No"
Here's what Gongaware had to say about the role of the estate after Elvis died (and what he expected after Jackson's death.):
"Then the estate takes over, and everything's different. You have nothing to say about anything"
When one of his friends asked about his plans after Michael's death, Gongaware replied he was "trying to recover our losses from the show"
"Michael died of overdose of Propofol. He didn't die of being sick or malnutrition", Gongaware said. He said that he had no idea of what Propofol was. "I had no idea" Jackson was using propofol in the weeks before his death, Gongaware testified
Gongaware said he worked on Michael's memorial service. He was in charge of the tickets and worked closely with the family. He said he didn't charge for his work.
Putnam: "Why did you work at the memorial service?"
Gongaware: "It was the right thing to do"
Court Transcript
2017 - Michael Jackson: Searching For Neverland, starring Navi as Michael, premieres on the Lifetime channel in the US
submitted by FelicitySmoak_ to MichaelJackson [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 10:47 Superteletubbies64 [H] Games [W] Paypal, Symphony of War, Ashina: The Red Witch, Fates of Ort, Ace Attorney Trilogy, Hidden Through Time, Super Alloy Ranger, Treasures of the Aegean, Coromon, No Straight Roads, zombotron, Dusk Diver (maybe), Princess Farmer (maybe)

I'm selling these for Paypal (my region is EU and buyer covers the fees if not from EU, I do not have set prices) or could trade non-headliner games for one of the games in the title I want. Not interested in anything else, i will ignore any lists of random games
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters
Operation Tango
The Invisible Hand
I do not have a set price in mind for any of the games, if you ask "how much for?" you'll be asked if you have a price in mind. Only exception would be one of the indie games for Coromon or Lil Gator Game
Lost Planet 3 - Complete Pack
Strider
Orbital Bullet – The 360° Rogue-lite (might keep)
Death STranding Director's Cut (might keep)
Life is STrange 2 Complete Season (might keep)
Revita (might keep)
Just looking for Coromon and the games in the title and Paypal (my region is EU), nothing else. If you offer a huge list of games or anything that's not in the title or on my wishlist you might get blocked for not having basic reading comprehension
I know Coromon is in a pricy build your own bundle rn so could do multiple smaller games for it but no ridiculous offers please
https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/diamond-collection-build-your-own-bundle
Only interested in Paypal offers and games in the title don't comment if you don't have either to offer. For AAA games I'm only taking Paypal offers, not trades Any comments with lists of random games I likely already own will be ignored and possibly blocked. My region is EU, if you are outside of EU you have to cover Paypal fees. I do not have a set price for anything, if you ask "how much for" you'll be asked if you have a price in mind.
Golden Light
Batora: Lost Haven (might keep)
Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
112 Operator
Agent in Depth
Alchemist's Castle
Arcade Spirits
Death Squared
Detached: Non-VR Edition
Doughlings: Arcade
Doughlings: Invasion
Euro Truck Simulator 2
Farming Simulator 17
Firegirl: Hack 'n Splash Rescue (might keep)
Frick, Inc.
Guilty Gear X2 #Reload
Guns & Fishes
Hack 'n' Slash
Hyper Gunsport
Izmir: An Independence Simulator
Little Orpheus (might keep)
Lust from Beyond: M Edition
Meow Express
MirrorMoon EP
Monaco
Mount & Blade: Warband
Non-Stop Raiders
Orbital Racer
Pathfinder: Kingmaker
PAYDAY 2
Planet TD
Project Chemistry
Quadrata
Remnants of Naezith
Rym 9000
Soul Searching
Soulblight
Soulflow
Space Crew: Legendary Edition
Stacking
Stick Fight: The Game
Strange Brigade
Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones
Sunlight
SYMMETRY
System Shock 2
The Amazing American Circus
The Inner World
Ticket to Ride
Worms Rumble
XCOM 2
X-Morph: Defense Complete Pack
Zombie Driver HD Complete Edition
DARQ (might keep)
Fallout
Othercide (might keep)
GameGuru Classic STAR WARS™: Knights of the Old Republic™ Driftland: The Magic Revival Red Faction: Armageddon Puzzle Chronicles STAR WARS™ Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy™ STAR WARS™ Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast™ Distrust Radio Commander
Main Assembly
RPG Maker VX (may keep)
Hamilton's Great Adventure
[Amnesia: The Dark Descent](httpsa://store.steampowered.com/app/57300/)
LEGO® MARVEL's Avengers (may keep)
Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath HD (may keep)
Dungeon of the ENDLESS™
Go Home Dinosaurs!
Soulblight
Lust for Darkness
RPG Maker VX Ace - DS Resource Pack
RPG Maker VX Ace - Zombie Survival Graphic Pack
Iron Danger (may keep)
The Swindle
Morbid: The Seven Acolytes
Amnesia: Rebirth
X-Morph: Defense
Treasure Hunter Simulator
Orbital Racer
Nongunz: Doppelganger Edition
LEGO® MARVEL Super Heroes 2 (may keep)
Where the Water Tastes Like Wine
Monsters' Den Chronicles
Telefrag VR
NecroWorm
We are alright (Wszystko z nami w porządku)
RPG Maker VX Ace - Old School Modern Graphics Pack 2
Rebel Cops
Farmer's Dynasty
The Plague: Kingdom Wars
PlataGO!
LEGO® MARVEL Super Heroes (may keep)
Bang-On Balls: Chronicles (may keep)
Jetboard Joust
Forgive Me Father (may keep)
Aliens vs. Predator Collection
LEGO® Star Wars™ III: The Clone Wars™
Golf Gang
Maid of Sker
Hedon Bloodrite (may keep)
Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning FATE Edition (may keep)
Blade Assault (may keep)
DOOM Eternal (may keep)
Grow: Song of the Evertree (may keep)
Scribble It! - Premium Edition
[Liberated] (GOG)
[Wanderlust Travel Stories] (GOG)
My full list of games: https://barter.vg80b7/t/ (this link might be more up to date than the list above)
Full wishlist (bundled games are at the top so you don't have to scroll through tons of unbundled and upcoming games): https://barter.vg80b7/w/f/?filter=0,17,0,0
https://store.steampowered.com/wishlist/id/superteletubbies64/
IGSRep (no longer updating): https://old.reddit.com/IGSRep/comments/p7k848/superteletubbies64s_igs_rep_page/
submitted by Superteletubbies64 to GameTrade [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 10:47 Superteletubbies64 [H] Games [W] Paypal, Symphony of War, Ashina: The Red Witch, Fates of Ort, Ace Attorney Trilogy, Hidden Through Time, Super Alloy Ranger, Treasures of the Aegean, Coromon, No Straight Roads, zombotron, Dusk Diver (maybe), Princess Farmer (maybe)

I'm selling these for Paypal (my region is EU and buyer covers the fees if not from EU, I do not have set prices) or could trade non-headliner games for one of the games in the title I want. Not interested in anything else, i will ignore any lists of random games
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters
Operation Tango
The Invisible Hand
I do not have a set price in mind for any of the games, if you ask "how much for?" you'll be asked if you have a price in mind. Only exception would be one of the indie games for Coromon or Lil Gator Game
Lost Planet 3 - Complete Pack
Strider
Orbital Bullet – The 360° Rogue-lite (might keep)
Death STranding Director's Cut (might keep)
Life is STrange 2 Complete Season (might keep)
Revita (might keep)
Just looking for Coromon and the games in the title and Paypal (my region is EU), nothing else. If you offer a huge list of games or anything that's not in the title or on my wishlist you might get blocked for not having basic reading comprehension
I know Coromon is in a pricy build your own bundle rn so could do multiple smaller games for it but no ridiculous offers please
https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/diamond-collection-build-your-own-bundle
Only interested in Paypal offers and games in the title don't comment if you don't have either to offer. For AAA games I'm only taking Paypal offers, not trades Any comments with lists of random games I likely already own will be ignored and possibly blocked. My region is EU, if you are outside of EU you have to cover Paypal fees. I do not have a set price for anything, if you ask "how much for" you'll be asked if you have a price in mind.
Golden Light
Batora: Lost Haven (might keep)
Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
112 Operator
Agent in Depth
Alchemist's Castle
Arcade Spirits
Death Squared
Detached: Non-VR Edition
Doughlings: Arcade
Doughlings: Invasion
Euro Truck Simulator 2
Farming Simulator 17
Firegirl: Hack 'n Splash Rescue (might keep)
Frick, Inc.
Guilty Gear X2 #Reload
Guns & Fishes
Hack 'n' Slash
Hyper Gunsport
Izmir: An Independence Simulator
Little Orpheus (might keep)
Lust from Beyond: M Edition
Meow Express
MirrorMoon EP
Monaco
Mount & Blade: Warband
Non-Stop Raiders
Orbital Racer
Pathfinder: Kingmaker
PAYDAY 2
Planet TD
Project Chemistry
Quadrata
Remnants of Naezith
Rym 9000
Soul Searching
Soulblight
Soulflow
Space Crew: Legendary Edition
Stacking
Stick Fight: The Game
Strange Brigade
Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones
Sunlight
SYMMETRY
System Shock 2
The Amazing American Circus
The Inner World
Ticket to Ride
Worms Rumble
XCOM 2
X-Morph: Defense Complete Pack
Zombie Driver HD Complete Edition
DARQ (might keep)
Fallout
Othercide (might keep)
GameGuru Classic STAR WARS™: Knights of the Old Republic™ Driftland: The Magic Revival Red Faction: Armageddon Puzzle Chronicles STAR WARS™ Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy™ STAR WARS™ Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast™ Distrust Radio Commander
Main Assembly
RPG Maker VX (may keep)
Hamilton's Great Adventure
[Amnesia: The Dark Descent](httpsa://store.steampowered.com/app/57300/)
LEGO® MARVEL's Avengers (may keep)
Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath HD (may keep)
Dungeon of the ENDLESS™
Go Home Dinosaurs!
Soulblight
Lust for Darkness
RPG Maker VX Ace - DS Resource Pack
RPG Maker VX Ace - Zombie Survival Graphic Pack
Iron Danger (may keep)
The Swindle
Morbid: The Seven Acolytes
Amnesia: Rebirth
X-Morph: Defense
Treasure Hunter Simulator
Orbital Racer
Nongunz: Doppelganger Edition
LEGO® MARVEL Super Heroes 2 (may keep)
Where the Water Tastes Like Wine
Monsters' Den Chronicles
Telefrag VR
NecroWorm
We are alright (Wszystko z nami w porządku)
RPG Maker VX Ace - Old School Modern Graphics Pack 2
Rebel Cops
Farmer's Dynasty
The Plague: Kingdom Wars
PlataGO!
LEGO® MARVEL Super Heroes (may keep)
Bang-On Balls: Chronicles (may keep)
Jetboard Joust
Forgive Me Father (may keep)
Aliens vs. Predator Collection
LEGO® Star Wars™ III: The Clone Wars™
Golf Gang
Maid of Sker
Hedon Bloodrite (may keep)
Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning FATE Edition (may keep)
Blade Assault (may keep)
DOOM Eternal (may keep)
Grow: Song of the Evertree (may keep)
Scribble It! - Premium Edition
[Liberated] (GOG)
[Wanderlust Travel Stories] (GOG)
My full list of games: https://barter.vg80b7/t/ (this link might be more up to date than the list above)
Full wishlist (bundled games are at the top so you don't have to scroll through tons of unbundled and upcoming games): https://barter.vg80b7/w/f/?filter=0,17,0,0
https://store.steampowered.com/wishlist/id/superteletubbies64/
IGSRep (no longer updating): https://old.reddit.com/IGSRep/comments/p7k848/superteletubbies64s_igs_rep_page/
submitted by Superteletubbies64 to indiegameswap [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 06:25 Obesity-Won-Kenobi Nature of Abandonment (6/?)

Sorry I didn't post more on the story... I had a busy day today...
I didn't expect to be writing during midnight, buuut... yeah~...
Enjoy!
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Memory Transcription Subject: Slanek, Ex-UN office Venlil Citizen
Date [Standardized Human Time]: October 20, 2136
The process of identification and reintegration into civilian life was a quick on… Considering I was only in the UN guard for a few months, it wasn’t very difficult for me. However, the more stressful and annoying part was going about the process of becoming Nulia’s Legal guardian. The process as Marcel explained it to me was a tedious one, which I found to be true in more ways than one… I was willing to sit through it, I would still go through days in the office for her… That was the kind of person she needed and deserved.
I walked out of the agency with a prideful smile as I held Nulia to see her eye to eye… She still wore a sad smile but I held her close to provide her with a warm comfort she needed. I spoke to her in a soothing voice, “You're a strong girl Nulia, I know you are mourning this whole arrangement. I am too, we both miss Marcel… But he wouldn’t want us to be sad like this… We’ll both be together, and we will live our lives happily, Like Marc would want for us.”
She looked at me with saddened eyes, but she had a soft smile. I asked her, “How about we go have something to eat? I could get you some strayu? Do you like the sound of that?” As soon as I said Strayu her eyes lit up with a much happier look… she still had a sad look in her eyes, but it was no longer as prominent as it was before.
“Realsies?! Thanks Unca!” she spoke with such a peppy and excited tone… I just made my heart swell in a caring love for this Gojid youngling, even more than I initially had for her.
____________________________________________________________________________
Memory Transcription Notice: Chronological leap of 1.5 hours later
____________________________________________________________________________
As we walked along the capital’s streets I couldn’t help but notice a drastic shift in the atmosphere in the people I was walking by… I didn’t see anyone with a happy look on their face, everyone seemed so distant.
Their eyes seemed as if they peered into another dimension, some people almost ran into poles because of how lost in thought they were…
As I walked to my favorite Diner in the capital, I saw a Yotul crying just on the sidewalk… He seemed distraught, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him… Yotul weren’t highly regarded due to their appointed status as primitives… being constantly considered a less intelligent species would be oh so debilitating for anyone, he probably grew tired of it, breaking down on the street… I felt sorry for him, I wanted to help… It’s what Marcel would have done…
“Hey”
I spoke to the Yotul which seemed to startle him… he seemed surprised that someone was addressing him in his sorrowful state…
“W-what do you want… Here to-... Chastise me like everyone else? Just leave me alone… I have a lot to cope with…”
I sighed as I responded to him, “I’m sorry for you Yotul, I don’t want to make you feel unwanted… you’ve probably had enough of that kind of treatment from others. I just want to help you… Maybe I could invite you for lunch? Nulia and I would love you as company.”
The Yotul went wide eyed at my invitation, seeming to ponder my motives… “Really?... Why me?” He asked with a suspicion ever present in his voice. It made sense. It's not every day you’re crying on the street, and you have a stranger invite you to lunch…
I responded truthfully with a caring tone… “Everyone deserves to have a good friend to lean on… I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable, but I was hoping you would be interested in joining me and my little Nulia for some strayu?””
I saw his eyes go teary as I asked him… he wiped away his tears. I reached out my paw to pull him up. “Thank you”, He said whilst taking my hand and standing up… “Who are you?”
I respond with a gentle tail wag, as my ears perk up, “I’m Slanek, who might you be Yotul?”
“Onso”
……….
Onso seemed to greatly enjoy the strayu based on how much he was stuffing himself full of it… He and Nulia both had crumbs on their cheeks, which made me chuckle ever so.
“I don’t want to remind you of whatever it was that you were crying about, but I think I have some Ideas as to what it was…”
The Yotul seemed to open his eyes as I spoke, he seemed to ease up a moment after though… “Oh… yeah, I was mourning the loss on earth… so much lost… I saw all the photos of beautiful jungles of steel… decades of development and progress all snapped away within the span of a few hours… It’s horrible… The feds are monsters for what they’ve done.”
“I agree 100%... It was oh so horrible to see all the devastation on earth.”
The Yotul tensed up as he managed to catch what I meant when I said that. He looked at me as If I just said the most planet shattering thing, he’s ever heard… he screamed, “YOU WERE ON EARTH?!?!” His outburst attracted the attention of everyone else in the diner, they all stared wide eyed at me as I was now the center of attention, it was unnerving to see so many expressions like that…
“WHAT?!”
“You were on earth?!”
“You managed to survive the bombardment?!”
Those were just a few of the many phrases I was hearing… It made sense, almost half of the human population was slaughtered, all of the most important human cities were erased…
“Thankfully yes… Nulia and I just got back today… It’s going to take a bit for me to get reacquainted with my home planet… I feel so bad for the humans on earth, I doubt it’s any better for the refugees…”
Everyone went dead silent; they looked as if I just spoke out against the great protector herself…
“You… don’t know?” Onso asked with a concerned expression… He gulped before saying, “I’d tell you, but I really don’t want the youngling to know…”
I looked down at Nulia with concern, what happened? The refugees, what could have possibly happ-... the battle of earth… oh no… oh nononononononono… My eyes went bloodshot with realization as to the idea, the mass suicide that likely resulted after the battle report… so many humans would feel such loneliness… such betrayal and fear… to take the quickest way out of a nightmare? They were definitely in a better place if that was the case…
“Onso? Did the refugees-... off themselves?” I asked in a hushed tone to avoid Nulia hearing me… The Yotul nodding at my inquiry really sent me into a spiral… my eyes flooded with dread and pain… Oh how I pitied those poor souls… May they be guided to a paradise in the next life… I was struggling to hold back tears… I wiped them away…
Onso spoke more about the details, “14% committed to the act… they all took the noose and essentially lined themselves along extermination offices across the planet, and painted them with phrases of hateful spite against everything and everyone, against the venlil and the Federation as a whole… All the remaining humans left in a massive number of shuttles that appeared during the sleep cycle. There are no humans on the planet at all anymore... they're all gone, and their parting message was that we’re all worthless cowards and deserve to be cattle for… the greys…”
My eyes widened at the comment… I felt sick… someone help me…
Please…
MARCEL, PLEASE HELP ME!...
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Prev: Nature of Abandonment (5/?) : NatureofPredators (reddit.com)
Next: Nature of Abandonment (7/?) : NatureofPredators (reddit.com)
submitted by Obesity-Won-Kenobi to NatureofPredators [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 04:42 Darmanarya Hunting Party chapter 5

((Time for feels! Discussion of identity and trauma ahead as pretty much standard with anything involving u/SpacePaladin15’s Nature of Predators series and its fanfics. Credit goes to them for the aforementioned story this is based on! And yup, double upload today!))
​
FIRST//PREVIOUS//NEXT
​
Memory transcript subject: Arxur exchange participant Syle
Date [standardized human time]: October 20, 2136
“You thought I was a male!? Do you not see my curves, my face, my EVERYTHING!?” I roared at the venlil shit brained human.
“Hey hey hey I didn’t expect to be this lu- I mean- I didn’t expect this.” He quickly called out as he lifted up his hands. “I just had thought you were a very effeminite male.”
“Men are NOT this feminine.” I hissed out as I once more motioned to my small, slender, FEMALE body!
“Well, some human men are, and you are one of the first Arxur I have ever seen.” he pointed out as he grabbed his data pad and started typing prophet knows what.
“Krakotl shit. There is no way ANY man can look thi-”
By the prophet that was a girl in a cute pink dress.
“Okay, that is a girl.” I hissed at Jack.
“No its not.” He calmly replied then pointed at the username. It was masculine, but no gnashing way that thing was male.
“You are lying. Do not lie to me.”
“I am not!” he then pointed at a part of the picture. I leaned in close as my tail lashed side to side.
By the prophet it WAS a male. What? Why? HOW?!
I straightened up as I looked at Jack, then the picture, then back at Jack. “But… Why?” I asked motioning to the picture. “It serves no purpose! Why bother showing yourself in such a way? He clearly put in all the work to look female and he is not even identifying as female?
“Because he wants to look pretty, show off, and its what he finds fun.” Jack explained. “This one isn’t even gay.” He then put his pad down before sitting in the long-chair of comfy. “Humans love to express things with what they wear all the time. Its how we show our identity, what we like, and how we want to be seen. He wants to be seen as pretty and make people feel good. Some girls dress like men because they want pockets. Some men dress like girls to get guys. Some, like me, dress simply because we do not care that much about it.”
My head spun at all the various ways that humans dressed. “So… its… like camouflage?” I slowly asked before sitting down. Why would you want to wear things like that? It would just make you stand out! Isn’t that bad?
“Yes, but no.” He rubbed the back of his head and let out a long groan. “Why did the first thing have to be clothing? I have no fashion sense!” He grumbled. That F-word had no translation at all for me so I just kept staring as he talked more. “So, humans use their clothing to express themselves for the most part. They use what they wear to show things. How they feel, how they want to look, to make a statement, to draw attention, and more. Some wear camo even in public to show their identity even.”
Wait, the humans can stand out? “Wouldn’t that get you labeled as defective? I mean, it seems like such a waste of time and more. Plus, it serves no real point to hunting or anything.”
“We don’t see it as a waste, and some people deliberately dress to show themselves as, as you would put it, defective. Different and against the norm is in fact an identity some people WANT to show.” He explained before motioning to his body. “The fact I wear pretty much ONLY jeans and nerdy t-shirts in public is my way of saying I am defective and do not care for fashion. Ironically enough its a fairly popular statement.”
My head swam. Wanting to be SEEN and KNOWN as defective!? “You… you don’t kill defects?” I slowly asked staring right into those eyes. Please. Tell me I am safe. Please let me be defective. Please let me. Please.
He stared back at me with wide eyes. “Oh… oh shit.” he looked around and took a deep breath. “Well fuck this is above my pay grade. No. No we do not. In fact we don’t even correct most things that some consider “defective” anymore. In fact, its usually seen as a good thing these days.”My brain just seemed to… stop.
Defective? Good? Safe? No correct? No betterment? No kill?
Safe?
“Hey, Syle, you- oh no you are not.”
Tears.
Can’t stop.
Warm?
What? The human held me close. His skin was soft, his body was not hard. Warm. Very warm. Safe. I leaned into him and closed my eyes as I curled up next to him.
“I… hated eating sentients. I… didn’t want to. No choice. If they knew they would have killed me.” I gasped out. “If you didn’t take me in they would have killed me for losing to you.” I finally admitted. It felt… good. Very good. I never got to talk to someone like this.”
His hand rubbed my head softly. It felt wonderful. His hand was the softest I had ever felt in my life. I wanted more of these head rubs.
“I… I want to be defective. Is that ok? Is that really ok?” I asked over and over again. This was too good to be true! This human won me fair and square, but he won a proud Arxur hunter. Not a defective freak like me.
“Yes. Yes it is. I promise no eating anything sentient.” His voice was softer, gentler than normal. Soft like his belly, his hand, this long-chair. I like soft. Soft is good. Need more soft. “You also don’t have to act tough all the time. You don’t have to be angry.”
Less anger? But anger keep me alive. Anger keep me fed. Anger help me hunt?
More tears. More warm.
“Its okay Syle. Let it out. You are safe here. I promise.” He cooed down to me.
Safe.
Finally.
I cried for prop- no. No more prophet, no more betterment. They want me dead now, so they can go- gnash I don’t even know. Rot?
I just cried into this man’s shirt. Every time I felt like they were going to stop, I realized that I was still safe, that nobody hit me for it, nobody yelled at me, nobody was watching me to see if I was “broken” and more came out. I don’t know how long I cried, and I don’t care. I was safe.
Finally I managed to stop, but I was not going to leave him. Being held felt… good. Plus, even though it was safe I didn’t want this human, no, Jack to see me all broken like this. I took slow, deep breaths like I used to on the ship, trying to calm down. His hand rubbing my head helped too.
“Can you help me pick out new clothes Jack? I don’t… I really don’t want to wear Arxur armor anymore.” My words were quiet. At first I thought he couldn’t hear them, but I could feel his body move a bit. “Sure. I will help you order some. Until then you can wear some of mine. I buy some baggy clothes that should fit.” He calmly said as he rubbed my head. “No rush though. Just relax. In fact, I will give you a nice comfy pair of pajamas like mine for tonight to sleep in.”
I nodded and we just sat there awhile. The room was dark now as night had come, but the fire gave us light and warmth. I wanted to sleep on this long chair in the arms of this human. I was safe. I was fed. I was warm. No yelling. No pain.
We stayed that way for awhile before I sat up and took a deep breath. He rubbed my back a bit before he got up and went into a different room leaving me alone. I looked around again. There were some pretty pictures on the wall, a few nice things on tables, but it felt empty. Normally I would be packed in with at least two others since our ships were tiny, but here?
He finally returned and put some soft clothes on my lap. “You can change in the bathroom.” He said pointing to a different room. I nodded and soon was wrapped in the warmest, softest clothing I have ever felt in my life! It had long sleeves that wrapped my arms and long pants legs that even covered my claws! Every move I made caused the soft fabric to brush against me like wearing a nice blanket!
I walked out and Jack gave me a warm smile. My tail curled up as I stretched a bit, shuddering as my joints popped. “Alright. Lets get some sleep.” he then patted my shoulder and led me to a hallway. “I think you need it.” I did. I so gnashing did.
He took me to a HUGE bedroom with a bed big enough for two arxur! My tail curled in the air, was he-
“This is your private room.” He motioned across it with an open hand. “All yours. You can even lock the door if you want. I will be just across the hall. Any questions?” I shook my head. My own private room. Like I was a chief hunter. I slowly walked to the bed and put a hand on it enjoying how soft EVERYTHING was! I could hear him close the door as I slid onto the bed and under the covers.
It was so quiet. I had always slept in a crowded bunk room, even as a hatchling. I rolled over and over looking around for someone, listening for something, but the world was quiet. I stared at the ceiling forever, unable to sleep. My mind kept drifting to how warm and soft Jack was. How I needed somebody in the room with me. Finally I let out a hiss knowing what I had to do.
I slid out of bed and calmly went across the hall. There was jack, laid on his side in an even bigger bed than mine. Alone as well. “Hrmf? Wh- Oh. Syle? What’s up?” He asked clearly having been drifting off asleep.
“I… am not used to sleeping alone.” I confessed. My words soft as my tail swayed side to side.
“Oh. uh….” He looked at me in surprise before giving a small nod. “Alright. Its… not normal for humans to sleep together like this, but uh. Sure.”
With that I slid into his bed and pressed my back against his warm, soft belly. A happy chirp left my traitorous lips, but he was making odd, strange noises before he let out a long breath and put an arm around me.
Warm.
Safe.
Sleep.
FIRST//PREVIOUS//NEXT
submitted by Darmanarya to NatureofPredators [link] [comments]

2023.05.30 04:01 Flashy_Ability5820 My emotional exercise

Hello folks
I hope this is ok to post this here.
I am 52, diagnosed as autistic at 48. I use YouTube as a sort of emotional exercise tool.
I make a broadcast every night before bed that I watch on the bus on the way to work. I feel this gives me an insight into my emotional state as well as providing a means of self expression.
I feel this could be a helpful tool. It also has the added benefits of being really fun and really inexpensive. I built what amounts to a rudimentary broadcast studio for $27.
https://www.reddit.com/Radiolab/comments/13unm0n/serious_question
submitted by Flashy_Ability5820 to Alexithymia [link] [comments]

2023.05.29 23:58 OfficerBribe Comparison of Windows services on Windows 11 VS 10

Recently read this thread mentioning that W11 has a lot more services running in background when compared to W10.
Finally upgraded to W11 today and before doing so remembered that thread so I made an export of all services before and after upgrade so we would know the facts. Since my own personal PC was used, this of course is not a perfect comparison, but it should be good enough.
8 new services in W11:
Name DisplayName Description
FrameServerMonitor Windows Camera Frame Server Monitor Monitors the health and state for the Windows Camera Frame Server service.
InventorySvc Inventory and Compatibility Appraisal service This service performs background system inventory, compatibility appraisal, and maintenance used by numerous system components.
NPSMSvc NPSMSvc
P9RdrService P9RdrService Enables trigger-starting plan9 file servers.
PenService PenService Pen Service
TextInputManagementService Text Input Management Service Enables text input, expressive input, touch keyboard, handwriting, and IMEs.
webthreatdefsvc Web Threat Defense Service Web Threat Defense Endpoint Service helps protect your computer by identifying unauthorized entities attempting to gain access to user credentials
webthreatdefusersvc webthreatdefusersvc Web Threat Defense User Service helps protect your computer by warning the user when unauthorized entities attempt to gain access to their credentials
2 services disappeared after upgrade. Samsung is 3rd party.
Name DisplayName Description
TabletInputService Touch Keyboard and Handwriting Panel Service Enables Touch Keyboard and Handwriting Panel pen and ink functionality
ss_conn_launcher_service SAMSUNG Mobile USB Connectivity Launcher
And here is the count comparison. This is not a clean system so I have couple 3rd party services which I did not filter out, but since we are interested simply in count difference, this does not matter much. On a fresh W11 VM there are 263 services.
Running of course can vary depending on when snapshot is taken, it was done after restart and using PC for a while on both Windows versions. I believe that startup method for some services sometimes is also automatically managed by Windows.
. W10 W11 Difference
Total 275 281 +6
Running 104 99 -5
Startup Manual 194 198 +4
Startup Automatic 66 69 +3
Startup Disabled 11 9 -2
Unknown 4 5 +1
Here is how startup state changed on my system. WSearch was disabled on purpose on W10 and after upgrade it reverted to Auto. I might have made manual changes to BITS and Spooler as well on W10, do not remember.
Name DisplayName W10 W11
BITS Background Intelligent Transfer Service Auto Manual
cbdhsvc Clipboard User Service Manual Auto
IKEEXT IKE and AuthIP IPsec Keying Modules Auto Manual
NlaSvc Network Location Awareness Auto Manual
PcaSvc Program Compatibility Assistant Service Manual Auto
Spooler Print Spooler Disabled Auto
StateRepository State Repository Service Manual Auto
stisvc Windows Image Acquisition (WIA) Auto Manual
TrustedInstaller Windows Modules Installer Manual Auto
WaaSMedicSvc WaaSMedicSvc Manual Unknown (error when viewing it at the moment)
WSearch Windows Search Disabled Auto
wuauserv Windows Update Auto Manual
As expected, it was a bit of an exaggeration in that thread. Always have found it funny when people have this weird fetish with Windows services and trying to disable them whether they know what they are doing or not. Windows Search (WSearch) is arguably the only exception to this unless you use file content search. I believe there is an actual benefit to disable it both from SSD wear perspective (nothing major, but still) and search performance itself since at least in the past have experienced indexing going haywire which messed up start menu search.
If you want to get a quick summary on your own system about running state and startup counts, run these commands from PowerShell:
Get-Service Group-Object Status
Get-Service Group-Object StartType
submitted by OfficerBribe to Windows11 [link] [comments]

2023.05.29 23:34 ApprehensiveCap6525 Exchange Program Shenanigans (2)

Credit to u/SpacePaladin15
CW: cursing, mild spacism, mention of suicide (nothing too bad, I'm not u/BushBacon)
Memory transcription subject: Salvek, Human-Venlil Exchange Program Candidate
Date [standardized human time]: September 3, 2136
I hate banks. Or, more specifically, I hate the United Banking Service. I've never really used another bank, on account of my mother signing me up for a twenty-five year family plan for a cash bonus that never came (it was twenty-five thousand credits, I can't really blame her) but that just makes me hate this one more.
The fat, lazy Gojid on the other side of the bulletproof glass teller window tapped away at his keyboard in order to process my application for a loan. Above him I saw the UBS logo and motto: "Speed, Security, Success." All a load of vyalpic if you ask me. (I will die of old age before this loan ever comes through)
"Sooooo....." Thank the Herd, he was finally talking. I was worried his fat ass had a heart attack and died with how little moving he did. "Your credit score issss....." Oh Protector, just spit it out already! Now I get why predators have such violent impulses. (What if I can't control mine? What if we're worse than them?)
Brahk my intrusive thoughts. How does Jack control his so well? I resolved to ask him when my loan got processed, assuming neither of us starved to death in the meantime. (Speed, security, and success this dick)
"Seven hundred and ninety." Oh, thank Inatala. (Inatala hates predators, can I still say that with one as my best friend?) Venlil credit scores go from zero, being applied to people who took out million-credit loans and blew all the money on gear to unsuccessfully rob the bank they got the loan from, to one thousand, which went to those who panicked over a two credit overdrawn balance and had a heart attack whenever they were a week away from a loan's due date and it still wasn't paid.
Seven hundred and ninety was above average, since my parents had always taught me to manage my finances well, but only slightly above average since Jack's presence and the constant racism that came with it were more trouble than the government stipend was worth. (I would never send him back home, he's better to me than many Venlil)
I thanked the Gojid with sincerity that I meant none of, and asked "Is my loan approved?"
He told me "Yes, it's been approved at..." Oh Herd, not this again. How do his coworkers interact with him? "5% quarterly interest." That's not even bad. (Five percent might be a robbery, but for UBS banks it's decent) "You'll have six months to pay it off in full... or the interest will double every quarter." (Somebody should disband the United Banking Service)
I agreed to these terms, since they were the best I was going to get, and left without another word. Eight thousand Federation credits had just entered my bank account, making me a very rich man. (Not really, but it was the most I'd ever had)
Jack was sitting on a bench outside the UBS building tapping away on his pad. A more skittish Venlil would have assumed that he was plotting something or bathing in the virtual blood of his prey, but I knew better than to assume the game he was playing was predatory.
Never mind, it was absolutely predatory. An army of huge winged beasts descended on what looked like a walled fortress in the middle of a hellish landscape, and lightning rained down from the skies at Jack's command to pick apart what I assumed were strategic defenses. (He might not actively do predator things, but he is excellent at them)
Within thirty ticks of the timer at the top of the screen, the beasts were above the fortress raining destruction on whatever they pleased. A few soldiers ran out of a building near the center of the base, attacking Jack's army, but they were quickly dealt with. Without the defenses that were destroyed by what I assumed was orbital bombardment, the base was helpless against the conquering predator.
A chill ran down my spine as I saw the defenders being slaughtered. A Venlil general or admiral (there were actually surprisingly many when compared to the rest of our military) could accomplish such results but those types of Venlil were very few and often had mild cases of Predator Disease. (That needs a new name. Maybe Arxur disease? No, too scary)
Seeing an average human, whose only military experience was four years serving on a war boat (They still have a boat military? Herd, those predators love their weapons) complete what many Federation officers would struggle to do terrified me for good reason.
We Venlil had treated Humans like they weren't even sapient, just dirt or pests that we had to tolerate. And the rest of the Federation treated them even worse. What if they decided peace wasn't worth it? What if, in our fear of the Arxur, we unleashed a threat worse than them? (Could Jack spare me from a human cattle farm? I'd have to kill myself if he couldn't)
Venlil Prime would be the first world to fall. We'd all die of our own hubris.
"Hell!" Jack turned his pad down so I couldn't look over his shoulder anymore. "I'm sorry you had to see that." Why did he have to be sorry for everything? The way my species, my Federation, treated him and his kind always angered me.
I told him "Don't be sorry. It's not your fault your hobbies are so... you know." I didn't like using the word "predator". At least, not to describe humans. Jack was cool with me using it as long as it wasn't in a derogatory way, (since they are predators) but it just reminded me of how unjustly he and his kind were treated.
Jack clearly didn't listen when I said not to be sorry because he kept apologizing. "Yeah, but it's not your fault you're so damn skittish either. And it is my fault I played Clash... I mean the game here. I should've known better." Herd, why did he never stand up for himself? The exterminators can't be that bad!
I explained to him "You don't have to apologize, Jack. You never meant to scare anyone." and before he could keep apologizing (I know him too well to think he wouldn't) I changed the subject. "We have money at our disposal now, we can buy something from the Mellow Firefruit on our way to the train station."
Jack agreed, but he was worried about "spacists". (Oh Herd, has he lost it?) I asked "What in the Arbor is a spacist?" In case you don't know, the Arbor is where followers of the Great Protector go when they die. It's a huge forest with plentiful and delicious food, and no predators.
When I finally mustered up my courage and told Jack that the god I worship hates his kind, I was half expecting to die horribly by his unusually short claws or extremely dull fangs. (Are they so peaceful because of their lack of natural weapons, or do they lack natural weapons because they're so peaceful? I should ask Jack that)
Instead, he shrugged it off and told me that, apparently, "Jesus still solos." When I explained the Arbor at his request, he had the brilliant idea to convert to worshiping the Protector and then kill himself in order to appear there and scare the afterlife out of everyone else. He quickly and profusely explained that he would never actually do that, but Inatala would never have accepted him anyway so it didn't matter.
Anyway, back to real life. Jack told me "Oh, spacists? They're just space racists except I mushed the two words together. It's a play on words type thing." The words 'space' and 'racists' do not fit together in Venlilese, and frankly, I was astounded that the translator even gave me the concept. (I bought it second-hand from a Mazic who stepped on it one too many times, but it was incredibly cheap)
I told him "If you told anyone but me that the words 'space' and 'racists' fit together then you would be screened for Predator Disease." and he covered his mouth in the gesture that was universally recognized as a prey-safe predator's laugh.
"God, sometimes I forget you guys have a sense of humor."
Just then, I started walking. I was tired, like any Venlil would be after a long walk, a long wait in line and the anticipation of another long walk, but the thought of the sweet, delicious food at the Mellow Firefruit kept me going. (I have to get Jack some, he's been underrating Venlil cuisine ever since he first tried my subpar cooking)
Jack fell in behind me, then he moved up to be at my side as an equal. Us Venlil didn't care where you were in line, but I guess predators have different priorities. (Is thinking 'predator' as bad as saying it? That's a dilemma I need to deal with later) I asked him "How come your claws and... uh... those pointy front teeth are so small?" (I don't like talking about fangs, sue me)
Jack turned to look at me, jerked his head away a little, then he turned and looked at me again. He responded to my question, realized I was a Venlil, and realized I was Salvek, in that order. I was good at reading people. He told me "First of all, they're called nails and canines. And second of all, we've never needed claws so they never evolved." A predator never needing claws was absurd! When would Jack learn that he didn't have to lie to me?
I interrupted my friend's explanation by telling him "Jack, I'm not going to run away or faint just because you tell me that ancient humans hunted. I get it. Just tell me how you lost your claws."
Jack sighed. He didn't sigh a lot, only when he was driven to the end of his very long rope (Turns out that's a human idiom too! Who knew?) by someone else's, usually my, stupidity. "Salvek, we didn't lose them. We evolved to eat fruit from trees, and by the time we were eating meat we had at least developed the art of throwing rocks at things. There was never any need for them, and they never appeared as a result. Satisfied?"
Developing weapons early on did make sense for humans, given how good they are at combat, so I nodded. It wasn't really a Venlil expression, but those in the exchange program had learned everything they could about their human partners. (I'm saying human instead of predator! Progress!) "Yeah, that makes sense."
Jack continued, explaining about human 'canines'. We just called them fangs. "Canines were originally fangs, yeah," He lowered his voice when he mentioned fangs. "but when we made fire around a million years ago, we didn't need them anymore and so they got smaller. I'm no expert, but that's what I know."
That actually made sense. I knew the Arxur didn't eat cooked meat, since I found uncensored raid footage on an internet rabbit hole when I was fourteen, (I peed myself and had nightmares for weeks but no one has to know) but I always assumed humans shared that trait. Maybe I was just like the rest with how I kept comparing humans and Arxur. (Why am I capitalizing one and not the other? No one knows!)
Maybe I was just like the rest. Maybe one day I would lose control and run from Jack, or freeze up, or worse, call the exterminators, and then it would all be over. I could never live with myself if my damned instincts got him to hate me or got him killed. I've only known him for a few weeks, but when we met we just clicked.
It's still weird to me how the concept of platonic soul mates doesn't exist yet.
"That's it, right?" Jack asked while pointing to a red restaurant a few blocks away. That was it. I was about to eat good.
"Yeah, that's it. Come on, let's go!" I ran to the Mellow Firefruit faster than most humans could, on account of my species being designed for sprints, (or we're just better than them) and Jack tagged along in a brisk walk. He was probably trying not to be mistaken for chasing me and shot dead, or worse, set on fire.
I know most predators don't feel pain, but humans do. Why in the Herd didn't exterminators at least have the decency to kill them humanely?
A couple seconds later, Jack was waiting outside the restaurant and looking at his pad while I waited in line (In case nobody noticed yet, I hate lines) for my meal. Jack's meal too, since nobody wanted their entire customer base to leave the second they began serving humans. At least, that was the official reason. The real reason is that most Venlil are still racist.
After an agonizing minute and a half of waiting, since the Mellow Firefruit was a popular restaurant (for good reason, as Jack was about to discover) I finally got to order my food. "I'll have two yaccay salads, and two red fires please." Jack only asked for a salad, but red fires were excellent drinks and if he said no to one I would drink both. I was being smart with this.
"Okay, that will be 43.8 credits." All right, maybe not so smart.
I asked "44 credits?" in shock as my mind struggled to wrap itself around this sudden increase in price. The last time I got a meal here it was only twenty credits.
The cashier, a large green Krakotl who was a tiny bit taller than me, explained "Inflation. Those damn predators brahked up the economy and now we have this." Putting hate on my friend Jack wasn't something I would normally tolerate, but my father had always said it wasn't wise to anger the people who made your food. I just swiped my card across his card reader and stayed silent, like dad would have wanted.
"If you ask me, Sovlin was right."
Was my father really that wise? He probably didn't know what he was talking about.
"How can you say that? No one deserves what he did to Marcel." I shot back, managing to contain the venom in my voice.
The cashier retorted "No one sapient. But those... things that Tarva's dumb ass let roam our planet don't qualify." with barely-contained hatred. (Thank the Herd Jack doesn't have to hear this)
Before I could respond, however, the manager came with my order and reprimanded his subordinate. "Don't get into politics with customers, and certainly don't spit those lies in my establishment!" Maybe the Great Protector was still looking out for me.
The manager handed me my items and apologized profusely. "My cashier here is still new to Venlil Prime. He hasn't gotten used to the... the new arrivals yet. Herd, even I struggle sometimes, and I'm in the exchange program!"
I thanked him, explaining that it wasn't a big deal but the cashier should still be reprimanded, and brought our food to Jack. He wasn't playing that predatory (it was predatory, but predatory didn't necessarily mean bad) game again, but he was scrolling through his account on UHerd.
UHerd was the Venlil's main addition to the galaxy at large, being a huge social media service that Jack had described as "just like Instagram." when he first heard of it. Bleat was another large website just like it, but it was much less known than UHerd. (Fun fact: the U stands for Internet! Maybe not in English, but in Venlilese it does)
Jack never posted much, but he had me and a few mutual friends from the Program followed and he liked hearing what we were doing. I plopped down next to him and handed him his food. "Here, I got you something."
He picked up the salad nonchalantly, but when I handed him his drink, he inspected it curiously. "What in God's name is this doohickey?" He asked.
I told him "Try it, it's a red fire. It's good." and he did try it.
Jack exclaimed "Holy christ!" and the look in his eyes was comparable to what I saw the first time I agreed to being pet. "This is heavenly!" He guzzled the spicy fluid with hunger that would have terrified me if I hadn't seen him devour meals a dozen times before, (He'll eat me next I have to run I have to run run run run for it [oh, shut up already]) stopping only to praise its taste. "This is like the nectar of the gods!" Then "Shit, this is what I was missing out on? We gotta desegregate the restaurants immediately!"
That got him thinking, and I could almost see the money-making gears turning in his head. "You know, Salvek, what if we opened up a restaurant? You could be the official owner and waiter, I could cook some delectable earth recipes, and as long as no one saw me, we could make bank!"
I didn't like that idea. It sounded a lot like a recipe for disaster. I told him "Nah, it would be too hard for just the two of us. And besides, we already have the clothing business." Selling shirts online is a lot easier and cheaper than owning a restaurant.
Since Jack asked me a question, I figured I could ask one too. "Hey Jack, do you mind if I ask you a question?"
Jack didn't care, and he told me as much, so I continued. "How do you keep yourself in check all the time? How can humans control themselves so well?"
He paused for a bit, causing me to involuntarily panic, (he's looking for weak points, or exterminators, he's going to snap my neck for this) but I quelled these thoughts and there was no visible change in my expression. Finally, the colossal man spoke. "How do you do it?"
"W-what?" I stammered, and he picked up a leaf that was blowing in the wind before cherishing his last sip of the red fire.
He held the leaf up to my mouth. "How can you resist the temptation to just chow down on every plant you see? It must be exhausting." I took a brief nibble of the plant, despite it being completely unappetizing in nature, and he told me "See? Your herbivore instincts made you eat it! How can you keep them in check all the time?"
I wasn't a fool, not by any means. I knew he was mocking me. But the thought of a predator not having any predatory instincts was an entirely unheard of concept, bordering on heresy for some. It would probably have gotten me screened for Predator Disease if I spoke of it aloud, but I still spoke of it aloud. (There were no exterminators, I was fine) "So you're trying to say that you don't have predatory instincts? But what about the drive to hunt?"
Jack sighed again, muttering "So smart, but so damn stupid." in a low tone before he explained to me exactly what I wanted to know. "We have the need to eat meat in the same way you need to eat plants, because if we don't do it we die." That made sense. "But just like you don't have a primal urge to devour all the greenery in sight, we don't have any instincts of our own. Make sense?"
It did, but I was still struggling to wrap my head around it, so I just nodded and finished off my salad. Jack had apparently forgot about his salad, as he hadn't touched it. He opened the plastic carton, looked at its contents weirdly, and took a bite.
"This is mid." He told me, point blank. "Like, I don't mean to offend anyone, but it is mid. I'm not even hungry."
I was mildly offended, but there wasn't much I could change about his honest opinion, so I just told him "I thought it was good." and left it at that.
Jack slid his salad over to me (I love these things like my only son) and offered "You can have it. I don't want it." I would have accepted, but I wasn't hungry. Jack didn't really mind, so he threw his salad out and told me "Then we should get going. We have only [1/8 of a claw], I mean... 1/8 of a claw before our train leaves."
I agreed, getting up and walking to the train station, and Jack followed. I was well rested by then, so the brief walk was easy. Jack... Jack was Jack. He never got tired.
We actually made a pretty good pace to the train station, and within 1/16 of a claw we were on our way back to my home district and my third-floor apartment. I had money to my name, I had a huge predator (Human! Damn, those words get mixed up too much) friend, and he and I were about to make a truckload of credits. Life was good.
Previous Next comes when I say it comes
submitted by ApprehensiveCap6525 to NatureofPredators [link] [comments]

2023.05.29 21:43 creeperflint The Nature of Predators - The History of Non-Sapient Predators Epilogue [Fanfic]

First
Memory transcription subject: Luke Schmidt, Human Businessman
Date [standardized human time]: December 18th, 2136
I was the only human in the bar. I chalked it up to timing and chance, as it wasn’t a hostile bar. Aside from a few glances and the fact that people passing by my table took great care not to touch me, I had no issues. I could barely keep my head off the table, but that was more a function of tiredness than anything. I had arrived on Venlil Prime only a few days ago, and the goofy sleep schedule messed with my brain. Barlethy Shipping did provide us with blackout curtains to set up over the windows of our bedrooms, but it was still challenging.
That wasn’t even mentioning all the work I’d been doing. I was a salesman for Barlethy Shipping, which had been established for about 50 years prior to First Contact. FTL ships were horrendously expensive, and usually only the government had access to them, but the Barlethy billionaire family cared quite a bit about expanding their business on this frontier, and were willing to pour millions into private FTL ships for their employees, as well as efforts to ensure that the Venlil legal system wasn’t a hassle. I was meant to set up business deals with aliens, using a variety of methods of varying moral standing, and although others had already done so, there was still a whole planet of opportunity.
As such, I had been talking to Venlil, viewing their wares, and traveling almost all the time I’d been here. When I wasn’t doing that, I was eating and sleeping. I really needed a break, so after fourteen hours of business, I arrived at the bar for a much-needed drink. I’d made a few successful deals thus far, so hopefully Barlethy Shipping wouldn’t mind the downtime too much.
I wasn’t really paying attention to the aliens around me, as I was rather exhausted, so I didn’t notice when the unfamiliar alien walked up to me. I did not recognize which species this was, which energized me. New things always did. The species was honestly rather ugly, which was weird because all the aliens I’d seen thus far were either cute or sleek, in my opinion. They had rough gray elephant skin with sparse thick, black hairs scattered around it, which made them look more like a hairy human than like an alien with fur. The top of their snout dangled down over their mouth, and they had short tusks and weird little giraffe horns. Their tail curled up like a squirrel’s, and their fingers were long, thin, and far too numerous. They looked like a squat, mammalian Arxur. And then, they sat down across from me.
“Hello there. You’re unique too! Isn’t that fun? Being the only one of your kind in sight really isn’t all that fun, but you get used to it,” she said, in a friendly, conversational tone that was apparently female, according to my translator.
I didn’t think that unfamiliar aliens were willing to get within an arm's length of unfamiliar humans. Maybe the Venlil or our other good allies, but I had never seen this race before. I said as much. “Pardon me, but who and what are you? I have never seen your species before, and I don’t think you’re allied with humanity.” I figured that she must be a regular here, since nobody gave her a second glance. Maybe she’d expressed wanting to meet a human for a while. I still had no idea what her deal was, though.
I think I came across a little harsher than I intended, but she didn’t seem to mind. She began, “Oh, pardon my manners. My name is Polkif, and I am a Zhetsian. You’re right, we’re not allied with humanity, and there aren’t a whole lot of us on Venlil Prime, so you probably haven’t heard of us. We don’t have a very large diaspora. I’ve been here a few years, and I’m used to being a novelty.”
I hummed, interested. Some part of me was always eager to talk to aliens, and I could indulge that now. Most of the time, my interactions with aliens were distinctly more… hostile, than I’d like, but that was unavoidable. Well, here was an opportunity to avoid hostilities! Though, I was still wondering why this wasn't shaping up to be hostile, so I asked, “Why are you comfortable walking up to random, unfamiliar humans? Even people who have been here since First Contact with us and who generally like humans aren’t often comfortable doing that. Especially since we have a reputation for being aggressive when drunk.”
Polkif snuffled, which my translator told me was laughter. After a few seconds, she said, “Well, we’re Zhetsians! We’re expected to be bold. We do have to be mindful of other species’ norms when offworld, but I don’t think they’ll kick my door down and drag me off to the predator disease facility just for being excited about talking to a human. I suppose you don’t know if they will until they do it, but I’ve gone this long without biased officers bagging me, so I figure my logic holds up. Besides, I don’t mind standing out and having to make an effort to fit in if it means I can avoid the current issues on my native planet, Miluja. Well, the issues are everywhere in Zhetsian space, but they’re especially strong there.”
I was intrigued, and thoughts of tiredness were out of my mind. Of course, there were a whole lot of aliens with all different cultures and histories, but this was new, even compared to other aliens I knew of, and was shaping up to be exciting. I would be especially tired later, but I didn’t mind the adrenaline that interest and excitement gave me right now. I prompted her, “What kind of issues?”
Polkif obliged me. “Civil unrest issues. All five Zhetsian planets are having issues with stampedes, mobs, protesting, and armed rebellion, but on Miluja it’s devolved into a civil war. Or Colony World 3, as it’s known offworld. They don’t like that we landed on naming it after Milu, since they say he had predator disease, but it’s tradition to call it that, and I like it better than the generic name, at least.
“Once the Cilany broadcast came out and reached us, it was pandemonium. Due to the anti-predator religion, a lot of people assumed that we were predators, so we split from the Federation. All the death cults and secret predator or predator-diseased sympathizers came out of the woodwork declaring this to be proof that they were right all along, and now everyone should join up with them and make a utopia, or something. Of course, all the elements that prevented those guys from making themselves known before were still there, so the government and the Federation-sympathizers cracked down on them. The rebellious elements were emboldened, though, and had quite a few guns and lots of repurposed farming equipment, so they fought back. This led to all the sympathizers still in the government to come out and support the rebellion too, except they were discovered, and you had tusk-fights in offices everywhere. It devolved from there, and now the whole planet is engulfed in civil war.
“The other planets are doing better, though not by much. Nitto is probably doing the best out of all of them, since the overwhelming majority of the government and populace was able to unite around the Nitre Rebellion’s legacy and kick the Federation out. Kipresa and Colony World 4 are undergoing low-level fighting and their share of unrest; their problems are mitigated by the fact that most of Kipresa just want to make money and aren’t up for fighting, and Colony World 4 knows that its denizens are mostly criminals, so they have a habit of not looking too closely as long as you don’t cause problems and there continue to be people willing to buy their ore. Mother Plains, our homeworld, has had more luck with the government cracking down on rebellion and dissent, but there are still decently sized patches that are held by rebel forces, and the Federation and government are growing more unpopular by the day.
“In short, there’s fighting and disruptions everywhere, though the last ship that came from Zhetsian space came a month ago, and I’m not sure how it’s progressed without me. The fact that no more ships have come is troubling enough. As for alliances, I can’t imagine that the UN wants to get involved in our civil wars, especially since most of the official governments would reject them anyway. So, we’re not allied with either the Federation or the UN, and I think we're best off focusing on getting ourselves to a stable position before helping anyone else with their problems.”
I sat back, stunned. Of course, in the back of my mind, I had figured that there might be intraspecies fighting somewhere in the Federation, but I’d started to discount that as a possibility, with how herd-focused and timid the Federation seemed. Species-wide civil wars and unrest was not what I expected. Though, if that’s what the situation back home was like, no wonder it seemed perfectly safe walking up to strange humans. I’ve known a few people from countries with civil unrest issues, and while some of them are intensely paranoid, some are fearless and barely blink at what normal people would consider notable dangers.
She continued after a few seconds. “I’m not quite sure where I stand on the issue. I am quite willing to call my home Miluja, and I have a lot of family who are farmers and on that side of the conflict, but you get leery of supporting such people after long enough away. The walls have ears when it comes to expressing dissent, you know. You’ve got to be on high alert if you want to do things the Federation government doesn’t approve of without them knocking on your door. It gets exhausting to hold such opinions after a while, in the face of all the opposition to them.”
She shook her head side-to-side slightly, and it occurred to me that she was probably looking for listeners in her blind spot. She had lowered her voice, too, so that I had to strain to hear her over the din of the bar. Even with how milquetoast that bit of opposition to the Federation ideology seemed, she didn’t seem like she wanted people to notice it. I’d had my share of paranoia, certain that the aggressive and somewhat underhanded negotiation tactics I’d used would be revealed, and I’d be fired and cause a huge diplomatic incident that would end in me being burned to a crisp. Well, her concerns couldn't have been that bad, since she seemed to settle down quickly enough. After she was done, she tipped her head back a bit to sip from her drink. Her snout prevented her from tilting the glass to her mouth all the way.
I decided to talk about myself a bit, since she seemed inclined to sit in silence, though she didn’t move away from my table. “Well, I’m sure you know about Earth. I’m here because I’m a representative of Barlethy Shipping, and I’m supposed to be negotiating deals with aliens, mostly Venlil. It doesn’t sound like we’ll be dealing with Zhetsians anytime soon, if it’s as bad as you say over there. I’ve been here for about a week on this trip, though I was here for a few weeks already during the Battle of Earth, and I’m already exhausted. Work and a weird sleep schedule will do that for you. After I’m done here, I’m going back to my hotel to sleep.”
Polkif responded, “Ah, I see. I’ve been an offworld business rep before, and it is not fun. Seeing other planets is enjoyable to a degree, but the schedule is grueling, other planets always have weird day/night cycles, and people tend to look down on Zhetsians as rebellious. I left for Venlil Prime about five years ago to help run a new branch of the farming equipment manufacturer I did sales for, though they try to hide their Zhetsian origins, and I exclusively work in non-public-facing roles. I was supposed to come back last month, but that didn’t pan out for obvious reasons. Oh well, I’ve got stable employment, since they’ve kept me on, and I think I can manage.”
I checked my holopad, and noted the time. It was 30 minutes until I wanted to go back to my apartment and sleep, since I’d scheduled an hour for this. A few thoughts flashed through my mind, most notably that getting back earlier would result in even more sleep, and that Polkif seemed nervous about discussing certain topics where others could hear. An idea sprang to mind, and I voiced it. “It’s been a pleasure talking with you, but I probably ought to start heading back to my hotel room. Do you want to discuss more things on the way? I’d love to hear more about you and your species, but it’s rather crowded in here.”
Something glinted in her eyes, and her fingers started twitching madly, bringing to mind images of sea anemones with bony tentacles. She responded, in a rather weird tone, “Oh, I’d love to do that. I don’t need to be anywhere for another three claws, so I’d be glad to discuss things on the way. Why don’t we finish our drinks and go?”
I’d almost finished my drink, so I downed the rest just as she chugged over half of her glass at once to finish it. As she hopped off the stool, I stopped leaning on the wall behind me, a poor substitute for a backrest, stretched my back a bit, and then grabbed my things and followed her.
It was rather empty outside, with only a few scattered and easily-avoidable groups of Venlil here and there on the street. I started towards my hotel, and Polkif followed. Once we’d gotten a decent ways away from anyone, Polkif started talking in a quiet but still conversational voice. “So what would you like to know?”
“Anything interesting,” I said. “Perhaps why you have a reputation for being rebellious, or why your government doesn’t like this Milu character, or why some of your planets are having it worse than others.”
“The walls have ears, but I have better vision and probably better hearing than you and most Venlil, so I’ll stop talking if there’s a chance of unwanted listeners. Do note that what I'm about to tell you is not the official history, and I could get in very serious trouble if people knew that I believed, or at least seriously considered, this stuff. I can drag you down with me if you start telling people about it. Capiche?”
This sounded serious, especially since her tone had gotten noticeably sharper. She seemed a lot more alert and less casual now, even considering the comments she made in the bar about the officials who handled predator disease, which reminded me of the old “knock on the door” of governments who took away people who opposed them, now that I thought about them. That was worrying, but it was probably something that required more context to understand. Also, it did not occur to me that aliens would have a word that translated to “capiche”, but I considered that it was context-appropriate and nodded. Polkif continued.
“Alright, so the first thing to know is that unwanted ideas and movements that spring up among us never quite manage to die, however much the Federation wants them to. We have quite a few dissident groups that are officially labeled “death cults”, as well as a lot of rebellious movements that the Federation has been working to stamp out. Many of these groups have survived centuries of opposition, and sometimes they preexist First Contact. The most notable of these groups are Linked Chains, the Steward Branch, the Inside, and the Nitre rebellion stuff on Nitto. Though, Linked Chains has spread offworld and has a pretty significant non-Zhetsian membership, so it isn’t near-exclusively Zhetsian like the others.
“What you should know is that, apart from a handful of bog-standard criminals and a few people looking for an excuse to cause harm, nobody dies or supports dying or misery in those groups. The Steward Branch is a religion that, especially now, is suspected to have been the original, true religion of Zhetsians, and which has as a core doctrine the idea that all life is precious and necessary for gaining true understanding. Including the predatory life. Linked Chains thinks that predators are necessary for the ecosystem to function properly, something that you humans seem to agree with. The Inside and the pro-Nitre stuff are the anti-Federation movements on Miluja and Nitto, respectively.
“The official accounts are pretty accurate as far as the origins of three of the movements, though Bilte is not evil, stupid, or manipulative like they portray him, the non-Steward branches are likely some combination of invented or blown way out of proportion by the Federation, and they like to underrepresent the amount of animosity that lingered after the Nitre rebellion’s resource issues were handled. Really, you need unofficial sources to get good histories for anything involving those movements. The thing they lie the most about, though, is the origins of the Inside on Miluja.
“A little over a century ago, Miluja, then only known as Colony World 3, started a program of reintroducing certain predators onto the planet in order to deal with pests. We’re a farming colony, you understand, so dealing with pests was a rather large priority, and sheer practicality overwhelmed the propaganda in this instance. The Exterminators Union threatened to withdraw over these changes, the planet called their bluff, and they left, only to realize that nobody wanted them back. A bounty system was implemented for unapproved wild predators, but a lot of other predators besides the original pest-killers started hanging around and coming out from the unannihilated parts of the wilderness that had been left when the Union left. People stopped minding, apparently. You can still access The Seven Sons of Aboulo TV show if you know where to look, it tells you something about what it was like back then. Much better than the contemporary first iteration of The Exterminators, which was a piece of over-the-top propaganda, though I digress.
“Of course, that wasn’t going to last forever. I can only imagine the reason we didn’t get shut down instantly was because we were, and remain, a bit of a backwater, and they all bought into their own lies enough that they thought we’d collapse on our own due to our changes. We didn’t, so they started helping the process along.
“The Farsul showed up to Zhetsian space and started poking around. The Farsul poking around in an unimportant, obscure species like ours can only mean trouble. They did some preliminary reconnaissance, then they threatened us if we didn’t disarm all of our civilian ships. We had the bright idea to retrofit all of our ships with guns, but apparently that encourages predator behavior, or something. Those made up almost all of our fleet! We really couldn’t afford the sanctions, scrutiny, accusations, and ostracization that would come from defying the Farsul, so we dutifully disarmed our ships, and shortly thereafter the Arxur showed up.”
At that, Polkif stopped talking, and a Venlil suddenly came out of a building that we had assumed was closed, almost hitting us with the door. The Venlil only heard the last part about the Arxur showing up, according to my calculations, and after a look of startlement that he shared with us, he turned around and headed the opposite direction. Polkif exhaled, and said, “The annoying thing about Venlil Prime is that there isn’t a night when everyone sleeps. There’s always a sizable portion of the population awake and active at any given moment, so you can’t avoid people staring at you nearly as much as you’d like.”
I bet a lot of people stared at Polkif. She seemed to be a regular in that bar, but elsewhere? Given that Polkif had stopped talking before I noticed the Venlil coming out of the building, I got the feeling that she was hyper-aware of scrutiny and always thinking about how people would perceive her every move. The walls have ears, after all. No wonder she was so noncommittal in the bar, compared to here. I figured that I should keep my observations to myself, though, and responded, “I can see that. On the bright side, not having a night means there’s nowhere you shouldn’t go at night. Wait, does the Federation even have street crime?”
Polkif snorted, which my translator told me indicated derision, same as for humans. “You’re more likely to get reported for predator disease for being out alone than to get mugged. But, yes, that will happen on occasion. Usually it takes the form of criminals running up, grabbing your bag, and running off again, no violence or confrontation involved. I know for a fact that there’s more violent crime than the Federation likes to admit to, though. Anyway, back to the story? Nobody’s watching.”
“Please.”
“Alright, so where were we? Farsul, ships, Arxur… Ah yes, the Arxur raid. After our fleet was significantly reduced, a fleet of more than a thousand Arxur ships showed up to Colony World 3. Normally this would be a death sentence, but a combination of tactics, guts, and on-the-ground resistance ended in us decimating the Arxur fleet, which then retreated with almost no cattle. Miluja hasn't had any Arxur problems since; they say we taste bad, and decimating their fleet probably put us firmly in the “don’t bother” camp. Fine by us! Anyway, during the battle, we’d asked around for help, but the other planets weren’t willing to divert resources, and I also suspect they wanted to avoid retaliation. They had to have known about the Farsul ship order. We also sent a few scouts further away to ask for help from other species, and that fleet did show up! Once the battle was already over and the Arxur were already retreating. Lazy cowards barely fired a single shot.
“As you might imagine, that fleet, known as the Assistance Fleet, stuck around. They offered to help us rebuild our bombed infrastructure and almost-annihilated fleet, for a hefty sum of cash and quite a lot of food. The other requirement was that we revert all of the changes we had made regarding predators and accept what was essentially an occupation. Our remaining pristine wilderness? Gone. Our new and unique ideas? Either well-hidden, taught away, or trapped in the minds of those stuck in facilities. Our wildlife? Mostly gone, although the original netry birds and jutalem are still around, despite the best efforts of the exterminators. Stubborn little bastards, they are. Some have taken them as a sort of symbol.
“The last important bit from that period is Milu. Things really sucked after the Assistance Fleet established themselves, as stated previously. Milu was a bureaucrat who schemed to smuggle out a whole bunch of information that the Outside occupiers wanted to destroy, subverted a great many efforts to diagnose people with predator disease and kill predators, and even worked to convince the physical fleet to head home instead of being threatening in our orbit. All around a stellar guy. He eventually got found out, diagnosed, and sent to a facility. The Outside tried to publicize it, for whichever reason, maybe to demoralize the Inside. It instead turned into a huge scandal, which ended in somebody blowing up the facility Milu was kept in, which resulted in several staff members dying and most of the inmates escaping, including Milu, who was never seen again. People started calling the colony Miluja around that time. Means something like “Milu’s Continuation” in the old Zhetsian language that people use to name things. As you can imagine, the Outside does not like that name, and while using it isn’t enough for a diagnosis, it will get you a whole lot of scrutiny that can easily lead to one.
“So, that’s that, mostly. Lots of fighting, lots of rebellion, lots of farmers telling their children all the things they don't teach in schools, and always the looming Federation ready to squash anything they don’t like. Personally, I’m quite surprised you lot managed to get a foothold. They go so hard on the propaganda.”
That was… a lot to take in. ‘Why does the Federation let them be like this?’ and ‘How horrible can the Federation be?’ were hardly original thoughts at this point, so I latched on to the one thing I understood well. “Well, Tarva was nice and nobody rushed us until we could handle it, and those were the lucky parts. Beyond that, it’s really a matter of time, as people see us not snapping and eating them. Personally, I suspect that the Federation going so hard on the propaganda was their undoing. They tell everyone that predators are pure evil, then predators who aren’t pure evil show up, so people figure the old framework no longer applies and they start judging things more rationally.”
Polkif hummed for a second, then responded, “That’s a decent theory. One would hope that some of that tolerance would extend to me, but I suppose you’re new, and old habits die hard. You know, there’s a few places on the planet I can’t go because of how riled up the populace is about predators, especially lately with you humans arriving. We’re the rebels, so I must be doing something horrible! Clowns, the lot of them.”
I imagine Polkif couldn’t get away with much, if what I took from her was accurate. Her race may have had some leeway with how deviant they were expected to be, but everything about her told me she was always under a lot of scrutiny. Though, this information didn’t seem like someone who perfectly obeyed every law and whim of the Federation would know about. So, I asked her, “If you’re under so much scrutiny, how do you know all this stuff? These unofficial histories don’t seem like something you could easily access.”
Polkif spoke again, but slower and with a weird cadence. “There’s more scrutiny for the Zhetsian diaspora than for Zhetsians on Zhetsian planets. That’s not to say that you aren’t always on high alert at all hours of the day because you never know who’s watching, who’s listening, who’ll report you, and what they’ll take as a sign that you have predator disease, or need your assets confiscated, or what have you. It just means that you have more trustworthy confidants and more leeway on Zhetsian planets. More people who can tell you stories and pass around contraband.
“As a relevant example of contraband, have you ever heard of The History of Non-Sapient Predators?”
I said, “No, I haven’t.”
She started twitching her fingers again, and the front of her snout flopped around a bit. I wasn’t aware she could move it. Then, she spoke. “The History of Non-Sapient Predators is one of the most well-known contraband books, at least amongst Zhetsians. It’s generally considered unsafe for us to get involved in movements offworld, and I’m not sure what contraband books exist elsewhere. Anyway, it’s up there with The Wild and Wondrous Deep, The Linked Chain, and The Social Strain. It’s an anthology of documents from the Galactic Archives, detailing the rise and fall of Colony World 3’s anti-Federation movement, as well as the context it takes place in.
“Most of the documents are publicly accessible in the Galactic Archives, just arranged in an unflattering manner. Some of them require special credentials to access, and a few are definitely not in the Archives, or reference documents that aren’t. It’s a common rumor that the Farsul Government Employee Registry doesn’t exist and is either completely hidden for some reason or a code for something else; also that many documents that used to be on the public network but classified were deleted or moved to a secret location or network after this book was created.
“It’s published under a pseudonym, and there are many theories on who made it. Whoever created it would have had to go to the Farsul homeworld, since the Archives are located there, and would have had to find a way to access non-public documents. It was definitely compiled before Milu, since neither he nor the name Miluja are mentioned. It cuts off after the Rebuilding starts. It was likely made by either a Zhetsian from Miluja or someone who greatly values Miluja, since it’s really only our history, despite the broad-sounding title. I’m sure there are other books detailing other species’ forgotten histories and interactions with non-sapient predators, but I don’t know about them. This is the history of our non-sapient predators.
“Anyway, that book is the defining source of the actual history of the Inside and Colony World 3. Copies are rare, but I used to know someone who had one back on Miluja.”
Wow. With every word that came out of Polkif’s mouth, a picture was being made of the side of the Federation that was so old and paranoid that it wouldn’t reveal itself, even now that Federation narratives were being questioned across the planet, or especially now that that was happening. Though, apparently Polkif wasn’t so paranoid as to hide it from me. I knew that my status as a human made people assume I was comfortable with predatory things, but I found that I did not take Polkif for the type to trust anyone she wasn’t extremely confident in. So I asked her, “Why are you telling me all this? I know I’m a human, but I could tell people. I’m a stranger to you.”
She snuffled again. “Remember when I said that I could drag you down with me? Well, I’ve actually been looking into you for a bit. You’re the only human I’ve seen out here, what can I say? I was interested. I’m quite good at navigating electronic things, and I happen to have discovered several dossiers of blackmail that your shipping company has provided you to help you make deals. Perhaps not as predatory as it could be, but I’m sure I could portray it properly if I needed to make this known to appropriate parties. I’m sure you know how illegal it is and how much of a diplomatic incident this would create.”
Wait.
She knew about that?
Sudden terror gripped me. I liked to think of my activities as aggressive business tactics, but her statement reminded me that it was still blackmail and would likely end in jail time and a diplomatic incident if I were caught. She also refueled the paranoia of getting reported for it that had been plaguing me ever since I arrived on Venlil Prime as a businessman. And, since this random alien who was simply interested in me could find it, that meant that I was in a very precarious position. Out of fear, and desperation, I shot back, “If I reported you, wouldn’t law enforcement just take you away before you could do anything, and wouldn’t they not listen to you if you’re a known predator? You seemed to imply that back at the bar.”
She replied just as quickly, “Exterminators. They deal with cases of predator disease, or really any crime involving the Zhetsian diaspora as they like to assume that we all have predator disease. Anyways, as you’re a human, they’re much less likely to believe anything you say, and that combined with experience and security measures means I will absolutely have time to send it off before they get me. I can be anonymous if need be. And don’t you try to delegate reporting to anyone or do it anonymously; if anyone comes knocking on my door, I’m blaming you, and out this goes.”
Well, damn. I stopped in the middle of the street to think, barely noticing Polkif’s eye glittering as she stopped next to me. I really should have known that someone like Polkif would only reveal anything to anyone if she was very sure that they wouldn’t reveal anything. Whether because she trusted them as people, or because she held something over them. I drastically misjudged her; she was intensely paranoid, but so good at masking that you never knew until she was already acting against you.
The aggressive negotiation tactics already stressed me out. When combined with Polkif’s knowledge of them, they made me feel far out of my depth. My mind was racing, but something did occur to me, and I asked her, “Do you do this frequently for the sake of it, or do you want something from me? You don’t seem the type to task unnecessary risks.”
More snuffling, of what I thought was a distinctly different character than previous snuffling. Probably a malicious laughter, if I had to guess. “I did have an idea that required a human. When I said that I had no copy of The History of Non-Sapient Predators on Venlil Prime, I lied. Had to see how you reacted, after all. I do indeed have a copy that I took with me from Miluja, and have made copies of it since. I was thinking that humanity having a copy would be useful. You guys can translate it, make copies, get famous and make boatloads of cash off of it, or whatever else you can think of. The Federation doesn't have eyes or tendrils on Earth, so the book, our history, won’t die, or at least it has a greater chance not to. I have no clue how many copies there are across the Federation, but I know it’s not that many. I was under the impression that humans quite liked the preservation of knowledge and history, based on what I’ve seen of humanity’s reaction to the Cilany and Yotul situations. So, you wouldn’t mind preserving important history that's been suppressed by the Federation.”
That was… surprisingly benign. I was about ready for her to demand I fork over all of my money, go rogue with my company ship, or commit crimes against exterminators and the government. A little bit of smuggling, especially of something this important, was nothing, especially compared to the activities I’d been engaging in. I already had to smuggle in some of the negotiation material, anyway.
She continued, “As I said, this book is very, very illegal, and even as a human you’re likely to get in a lot of trouble for having it. As you’ve already been able to hide all that blackmail, you shouldn’t have a problem hiding this, but do be careful, and do not get caught. Only look at it once you’re back on Earth, away from prying eyes, and don’t let your company find out until you don’t need their support. I'd recommend keeping your identity wholly separate from your ownership of that book. As for getting it to you, I happen to know that you’re going to be going to a certain library to do research on Venlil agricultural history tomorrow - you really shouldn’t use the DailyMemo112 app, it has poor security - so when you get there, look out for the book titled “History of Agricultural Exports of Venlil Prime: Volume 18” by “Bitsly” in the agriculture section. It’s a fake cover, obviously, with a few fake pages too, but it's what you're looking for, so take it and go. You should probably buy a few other books about Venlil Prime trade, for cover. Any questions?”
Aside from the fact that she casually mentioned that she knew about my daily schedule for the remaining 2 weeks of my trip, that was surprisingly straightforward. A few plans for what I'd do with the book were even percolating in my mind; I'd translate them to English, of course, and then I could post them anonymously online, maybe I could put a paywall or tip jar in there to make money off of it? I didn't need the money, since my job paid me well, but this could blow up, and I wouldn't be one of Barlethy Shipping's spacefaring employees if I didn't keep an eye out for opportunity. None of these ideas were something I needed Polkif for, though. So, I replied, “No. Uh, thank you for telling me all this? Fascinating stuff.”
“You’re welcome, and thank you, if you pull this off successfully. Oh, and don’t tell the UN. They care quite a bit about Venlil laws and sovereignty, you know. Them knowing will attract attention that neither of us want. Never tell anyone anything unless you absolutely have to, you know. Now, I believe that is your hotel right there?”
I looked away from Polkif, and noticed that we were indeed in front of the huge, gray hotel building I was staying in. I wasn't sure how Polkif knew it was mine, but I probably shouldn't have been surprised at that point. It spoke to how adrift and detached from all non-business endeavors I was on Venlil Prime that I didn’t recognize the area around the place I was staying until it was pointed out to me. With a sudden bout of melancholy washing out some of the paranoia, I said, “Indeed.”
She flopped her snout around a bit, twitching her fingers all the while. I assumed, or at least hoped, that this was the Zhetsian version of smiling. “See you never, probably. Further contact would only be suspicious. The walls have ears, so be careful. Goodbye.”
I watched her walk off, back towards the bar. I entered my hotel, feeling dazed now that everything had time to settle in. The adrenaline was wearing off, and with nothing new or exciting to occupy my attention, I crashed hard. Exhaustion, combined with the events and emotions of the past hour, made me incapable of having thoughts more complex than a sense of paranoia and a desire to go to bed.
I stumbled up to my room and fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow, without even pulling the blackout curtains over the window.
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2023.05.29 21:17 Jakowenko Phrame: AI-Powered Digital Picture Frame

Phrame: AI-Powered Digital Picture Frame

Phrame: AI-Powered Digital Picture Frame

Phrame generates captivating and unique art by listening to conversations around it, transforming spoken words and emotions into visually stunning masterpieces. Unleash your creativity and transform the soundscape around you.
https://preview.redd.it/qiasnc3tlt2b1.jpg?width=1572&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=32ff1b698bbe5aab4e78086acc9966fbf94006ae
GitHub Docker Hub Discord
When I first discovered generative AI art, I was captivated. The ability to type any text and witness it transformed into a unique piece of art was mind-blowing. DALL·E and similar services sparked my imagination and planted the seed for an ambitious idea: a digital picture frame that creates art reflective of its environment.
After months of development and fine-tuning, I'm thrilled to introduce Phrame v1.0.0. This digital picture frame listens to conversations happening around it. Using speech recognition and Chat GPT, it transforms these dialogues into summarized text. This summary is then used with generative AI APIs to create beautiful and unique pieces of art.
Phrame offers a comprehensive README and an array of customization options for a personalized experience. Currently, it employs OpenAI's Chat GPT to summarize transcripts and uses DALL·E 2 or Stability AI to generate art.
The user-friendly interface allows for complete control from another device via WebSockets. A gallery feature is available, offering options to filter, favorite, and delete images. All configuration options are editable, enabling customization of the AI used, the image styles, the number of images generated, their size, and much more.
I appreciate you taking the time to read about Phrame and its journey from an idea to a fully realized project. Your interest and support make a significant difference and inspire me to continue innovating and creating open source software. If you've had the chance to try Phrame, I would love to hear your thoughts. Your feedback is invaluable and will help shape the future development of this project. Whether it's an idea for a new feature, a suggestion for improvement, or a bug you've noticed, please don't hesitate to share. Once again, thank you for being a part of this AI journey.

Usage

Phrame operates as a single Docker container and is easily accessible using any modern browser, even without a microphone.
To take advantage of the speech recognition feature, a compatible browser and microphone are required. At this time Chrome and Safari are the only browsers that support speech recognition.
Artwork within Phrame is displayed according to the image.order value. The latest summary and any favorite images are seamlessly merged, providing an evolving canvas of unique AI-generated art. As new images are created, they are instantly displayed by Phrame.

Quick Start

  1. Start Phrame
  2. Go to localhost:3000/config
  3. Add your OpenAI API key and save
  4. Verify OpenAI shows as configured with a green circle
  5. In a new window go to localhost:3000/phrame?mic and follow the on screen instructions
  6. Go to localhost:3000 and verify the microphone and speech recognition are working

Docker Run

docker run -d --restart=unless-stopped --name=phrame -v phrame:/.storage -p 3000:3000 jakowenko/phrame

Docker Compose

version: '3.9' volumes: phrame: services: phrame: container_name: phrame image: jakowenko/phrame restart: unless-stopped volumes: - phrame:/.storage ports: - 3000:3000
For more information, please reference the README.
Here's some inspiration to get you started. My goal is to have a wall-mounted solution which would provide a more polished and seamless look. Having this around the house has proven to be a source of entertainment and conversation when guests are over.
https://preview.redd.it/p9toxqptlt2b1.jpg?width=1783&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f74aab2c47499b10d3177ec35d6f6e2d5833d0e9
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